by Emma Davies
Maddie frowned. There was something about Seth’s tone that carried a distinct warning. Now was clearly not the time to be asking questions.
‘In fact, I was thinking about today,’ continued Seth. ‘There are one or two things I need to attend to elsewhere and I wondered whether you might like to make a start on the office? You’re going to need a place to work from, somewhere we can find you. And we’ll need to keep records too… something else I’ve been a bit lax at. I thought you might like some time to make the place your own, you know, get things how you want them.’
He gave her a sheepish look. ‘It’s the perfect opportunity for you to take things a little easier today… and I’m afraid it is in a bit of a mess. It’s not a room I tend to spend any time in you see, other than to just dump stuff on the desk.’
Maddie picked up her mug, realising that her intention to make breakfast was rapidly losing ground, as indeed was everything else on her list for the day.
‘Oh right. So you want me to sort it all out?’
‘Would you? I really can’t face it.’
‘And you’d be eternally grateful…’
He grinned at her. ‘I would.’
‘Well, I’ll do it on one condition…’
‘Which is?’
‘That once I’ve finished this, you let me make you breakfast.’
* * *
The plan had been for the full works, but Seth would only settle for a sausage sandwich before practically running out of the door. After completing the washing-up, Maddie sat for a few moments longer, before she got to her feet and went and stood in the doorway to the office.
The only time she had been in here was when she was looking for a printer. She’d been so fixated on showing off her grand plan that she hadn’t really stopped to look around the room, but now that she did, her heart sank. There was stuff everywhere: the desk was piled high with papers and books, a tower of boxes occupied one corner and a bookcase overflowed onto the floor around her. She pulled open a drawer from a small filing cabinet that was pushed under one end of the desk and groaned when she saw that it was stuffed with receipts. She looked at the cup of coffee in her hand – she had a feeling it wasn’t going to be her last of the day.
Maddie was well used to paperwork. In fact, she prided herself on keeping the tightest of ships when it came to running the projects she had worked on previously. It meant that her time could be better spent achieving her project goals instead of drowning in admin. Today though, it looked like she had no choice.
But, she reasoned, if she was to succeed here at all she needed to get to grips with Joy’s Acre and all that it encompassed. She already knew there were several things Seth was reluctant to talk about, but he had a deep connection with the place, that much was evident, and a very clear set of ideas about how he saw things taking shape. The two were inextricably linked, and perhaps here, she might find a few answers to the story that lay behind the farm.
The real question of course was, what exactly was in this room? Was it personal, or did it relate solely to the business? If she was to make any order out of the chaos, she would need to separate the two. She pulled a piece of paper forward to use as a coaster and put down her mug, eyeing up the bookcase. You could tell a lot by the books people read.
Maddie thought back to her own bookcases at home. An avid reader, she had several, lining the walls of her London flat; a home now rented out to a friend of a friend. She hoped they were taking good care of her little library. Not particularly meticulous in how she classified her books, she did however tend to group fiction and non-fiction together, but the one thing she did do, always, was to place her favourite books right where they would be easily to hand. She looked now at the bookcase in front of her, and homed in on the second shelf from the top, the one that was exactly at eye level.
It was an interesting selection: a couple of poetry books, several thrillers from well-known authors, a weighty tome that had won the Booker Prize the previous year, and several historic texts; social histories mainly. There were books on traditional crafts, one on moon gardening, whatever that was, and a pagan book of days. She gave this a sideways glance and pulled it off the shelf, removing the auction catalogue that was stuffed between its pages, serving as a bookmark. She rifled through the book, frowning at the unfamiliar names and concepts, and when an illustration caught her eye, she began to read.
Maddie wouldn’t have described herself as religious in any sense, nor was she particularly attracted to the spiritual side of her nature. In fact, she wasn’t sure that she even had one, but clearly other people did. It was interesting, but it interested her more that it was on Seth’s bookcase. She looked up for a moment, thinking, before replacing the bookmark.
She was about to slide the volume back on the shelf when the catalogue itself caught her eye. It was from a specialist art auction, long since gone, but the fact that it was here at all was odd in itself. She glanced around the room, but the walls were bare here, much like the rest of the house.
She flicked through the catalogue, scanning the pages. It was pretty standard stuff, not much to her taste, but then she didn’t own a huge stately pile in which to display large sombre oil paintings in heavily gilded frames. She paused at a page that had its corner turned down and peered at the thumbnail illustration. It was a watercolour by an artist that Maddie had never heard of. There was something vaguely familiar about it, even though the picture was too small to make out any real detail, but at least the colours were more vibrant than those elsewhere in the catalogue. She closed the brochure, replacing it exactly between the pages of the book where she had found it, and moved on.
After a few more minutes she straightened. The books were interesting; they had perhaps shown her a little more of Seth’s character, but beyond that were not especially helpful. She turned around, surveying the room, and with a nod to herself, she set to work.
It soon became apparent that the room contained three different types of clutter. Some things, like the boxes in the corner, seemed to have been put there simply because there was no other place for them. They were filled with memorabilia, the kind of things you might put aside to sort through one day with the aim of throwing most of it away.
There were other random items too: a few pieces of clothing, some jewellery, which had obviously belonged to a woman, and some bottles of perfume. It was as she reached the bottom of one of these boxes and drew out a jar of face cream that she had a sudden feeling she was trespassing on something she had no right to see. The items were too personal, and clearly didn’t belong to Seth. Perhaps to a part of his past, but if they were in boxes, a part that he had packed away. They intrigued her, but there was no way she would ever ask Seth about them, not right now at any rate. They had only just begun to rebuild their relationship, and prying into his personal life was a sure-fire way to have it come crashing down again.
Among the paperwork there were things which were obviously connected to the house itself – an instruction booklet for a washing machine, piles of old electricity bills – and, lastly, there were things which Maddie could see related directly to the business side of things at the farm – receipts for raw materials and the like.
She was torn between her natural desire to make order out of chaos and the need to accomplish her primary task, which was to make some space for her to work comfortably, where she might begin to keep paperwork of her own. Besides, without input from Seth it would be very hard to know for definite which papers belonged in which category. The best she could hope for was a rough approximation and a degree of tidiness. She picked up a pile of papers and began to sort.
Another hour passed in a flash, and she chided herself for getting side-tracked once too often. There was no need to read all the documents, she reminded herself, but somehow she found herself stopping every now and then, her attention caught by a detail. She tutted to herself, and replacing a sheaf of papers in her hand wandered through to the kitchen to re-boil the kettle. He
r neck and back were beginning to ache terribly, and she needed to find some more paracetamol before the pain took over her again.
The kitchen was warm and sunny and, pills taken, she wandered out into the garden for a break. She had all day after all; it wouldn’t hurt to pace herself, and she didn’t usually have the chance to sit and enjoy the beautiful spring sunshine. She made her way down the paths to the bench, and ran her hand along the smooth warmth of the wood before sitting down. She stretched out her legs and closed her eyes, rolling her head from side to side to try to relax the muscles. The heat of the sun was soothing on her face.
She wasn’t quite sure when and how it even happened, but as her eyes fluttered open she realised she must have fallen asleep. Her limbs felt heavy and languid in the sunshine, and she blinked and looked around her, suddenly seeing the beauty of the place. It was as if time was standing still, and there was just her, sitting alone on a bench with only the sun, the breeze and the birdsong for company. She felt infinitesimally small in the space around her, but utterly at peace, as if wrapped in warm arms that held her and comforted her. It was in stark contrast to the confusion of emotions that she had been bottling up for months now. Emotions which she could never seem to find release from, but which now seemed to have dissolved and lost their meaning. Tears sprang to her eyes and she let them fall, knowing that possibly, impossibly, everything in her life was finally right where it should be. She didn’t think she had ever felt this way in her whole life before.
Hardly daring to move in case it broke the spell, she turned her head a fraction, letting her eyes roam over every detail of the space around her. Whereas before she had seen neglect and a mishmash of broken-down buildings, she now saw that they were merely sleeping, waiting to be brought back to life. They were home; a place of sanctuary, a place of love. She swallowed, cleared her throat, and stood, closing her eyes once more and breathing in deeply.
Her legs felt weak, as if she hadn’t used them in a while, but she walked slowly down the paths of Clara’s garden, the evidence of her industry and care everywhere she looked. There was variety of texture, smell, colour, shape and size that she was sure hadn’t been there before. She trailed her fingers against the foliage, feeling the coolness of the leaves and the velvet softness of the blooms and knelt for a moment to remove a stray weed from between the rows of something planted in the vegetable garden before making her way back to the bench.
She hoped that Clara was all right. Her garden would need her soon, and Maddie saw how connected their relationship was, how each gave to the other. Removing one from the equation would cause the other to suffer. Maddie laid her back against the gentle curve of the wooden bench and let her body go limp. She still felt impossibly small but gradually, as she let the sun seep into her skin, the balance shifted again until, just like Alice in Wonderland, she felt herself grow to the right size again, at one with everything around her.
And with the feeling came a rush of understanding. Was this how the others felt, when they stood here, in Joy’s Acre? Because if it was, suddenly everything made sense. And furthermore Maddie now knew very clearly why she was here, and what she needed to do. She turned around and squinted at the thatched cottage behind her, just to check, but there was no sign of Seth. She checked her watch – she had a lot of work to do, and with any luck by the time he put in a reappearance later, she’d have made a good start.
* * *
Even with her renewed enthusiasm, it still took Maddie a couple more hours before she had sorted through enough of the discarded paperwork to feel she had made a difference. At least it was tidy and if she were asked she would know roughly where to lay her hands on things. If her assumptions were correct, the only paperwork that now filled the drawers by the desk related to the farm itself, and she could begin to keep track of things directly.
When she was finished, she went out into the hallway and peered at the only picture hanging there. She’d seen it almost every time she had passed through the space, on her way to the kitchen, or up the stairs, even backwards and forwards through the front door, but she had never actually looked at it. Now that she did, it was obvious, and she smiled to herself.
Carefully, she took it down from the wall and, walking back through to the study, propped it up on the desk. She didn’t need to recheck the auction catalogue, but she collected it just the same and studied the small photograph of the painting that Seth must have purchased over three years ago.
The photo didn’t do it justice; the colours were too muted and indistinct. In fact, she was surprised that Seth had even recognised it from the catalogue, unless of course he’d been looking for it…
She picked up the painting, wondering how on earth she had missed the resemblance. In reality the garden and cottages were soft in colour, warm tones of red and ochre, gentle greens and pale yellows, whereas whoever had painted Joy’s Acre all those years ago had slashed the canvas with bold statements of red and purple, vivid greens and oranges. But it was unmistakably the same place, brought to life by the as yet unknown painter.
She booted up the computer and studied the auction listing while she waited for it to load. It didn’t tell her much, a few lines of well-used patter urging potential purchasers to part with their cash for the opportunity to own one of the few artworks available from this little-known, but undeniably gifted Victorian artist. Maddie checked the spelling and carefully typed the name into an internet search engine: CJ Davenport.
Once she found what she was looking for, she supposed she oughtn’t to be surprised. The painting on the desk in front of Maddie was so vibrant and joyous that she smiled to herself at her use of the word. Because joyous was the perfect way to describe it, and back in the 1880s Cordelia Joy Davenport had painted a picture of Joy’s Acre, the farm she loved so much she had given her name to it.
Chapter 11
It was getting late by the time Maddie heard the front door go and she jumped at the sudden noise and intrusion into her thoughts. There was a shouted hello and she rose stiffly from the chair to make her own greeting. Seth was standing in the hallway, a plastic folder and car keys in hand, looking, frankly, exhausted.
‘Hi.’ She smiled warmly.
His eyes moved to the space on the wall where the picture had recently hung, a look of alarm overtaking the smile that had begun to form.
‘Don’t worry, I have it,’ she was quick to reassure him. ‘It’s safe on the desk in the office. Good day? You look tired, if you don’t mind me saying.’
‘So do you,’ he countered. ‘Long day, yes. Good day… possibly. I’ve been in London.’
‘London?’ Her heart began to beat a tiny bit faster. This couldn’t have anything to do with her, could it?
He grinned. ‘Yeah, big place. You know, capital city? Where the Queen lives?’
‘Oh, ha ha,’ she retorted. ‘I’m just a bit surprised, that’s all, I didn’t think it was somewhere you usually went.’
‘Well, I try very hard not to. This was just for a meeting I have to attend every now and again. Nothing to get excited about. How about you, what sort of a day have you had?’
‘I’ve had an… interesting day.’ She couldn’t help but let the sentence dangle.
He gave her an odd look, and then flicked his gaze to the wall again.
‘That have anything to do with it?’ he asked.
‘Probably.’ She grinned. ‘I can’t believe I didn’t notice it before, or its significance. I’ve spent the last few hours on the internet, finding out not very much at all, if I’m honest.’ She paused. ‘I tidied up and sorted stuff out first, but then I got sort of hooked, trying to find out about our elusive painter. Joy doesn’t seem to have been particularly noteworthy.’
Another look she couldn’t decipher the meaning of.
‘Perhaps you were barking up slightly the wrong tree?’ He glanced at his watch, causing Maddie to do the same.
‘Flipping heck, is that the time? I meant to cook something for dinner,
but then… I’ll go and do it now.’
Seth followed her into the kitchen, dropping his keys on the table. ‘Maddie, there’s no hurry. I tell you what, I’m just going to go and get changed and then we can sort something out. Maybe some fish and chips? I don’t feel like cooking, and I don’t suppose you do either. I’ll come and have a look at the office first though.’
He let her go ahead.
‘Well, I’ve made a start anyway,’ she said. ‘It’s nowhere near properly organised but I think it’s better than it was.’
‘I’ll say,’ he said, peering into the room. ‘That’s a huge improvement. You can see the floor… and the desk.’ He indicated the computer, whose screen saver was now rolling up a series of pretty landscapes. ‘Do you think you’ll be able to work from here?’ he asked. ‘If there’s anything you particularly need we can sort it out.’
‘A few bits of stationery, nothing major,’ Maddie replied. She picked up the painting from the desk. ‘I’ll just go and hang this back up again.’
She got as far as the door.
‘Seth?’ she said, turning round. ‘You said just now I was barking up slightly the wrong tree? What did you mean?’
He crossed to the bookcase and studied it for a moment. ‘So, I’m guessing you found the auction catalogue or you wouldn’t have made the connection with the painting, but I did wonder whether or not you’d found this?’
He pulled out a slender leather-bound volume from the shelf. ‘But I guess not. You see, Cordelia Joy Davenport’s story is fascinating in itself, but Davenport was her maiden name; locally she was known as Mrs Hall, and Edwin Hall’s story is perhaps even more interesting.’
He handed her the book. ‘Have a read while I go and get sorted.’
* * *
Maddie was still reading when Seth appeared a while later with two plates of fish and chips on a tray. She swung her legs out from under her and laid the book down beside her.
