Trenouth

by Bea Green

  Leo’s cooking repertoire, apart from a few seafood dishes, was very limited and it hadn’t taken long for Elinor to preside over their meals. She superintended their weekly shopping trips for food at the Tesco in Padstow, and kept their kitchen cupboards amply stocked with supplies. Leo, meanwhile, had accepted her dominance over the kitchen with his usual laid-back sangfroid.

  Before long, Elinor was pouring the steaming hot soup into the bowls and putting them up on the serving hatch.

  As she looked through the hatch, she saw with hilarity that Leo was still seated at the head of the dining room table, seemingly entirely at ease, even though he couldn’t follow a word the men were saying to each other.

  The men seemed to be taking this fantastical situation in their stride, unwittingly revealing they’d had plenty of experience coping with the unexpected. They chatted earnestly amongst themselves, cradling their mugs of coffee in their hands.

  It was forty minutes before the knocker banged at the front door, announcing the arrival of the immigration enforcement officials.

  5

  Elinor waited in the dining room with the men, as for the second time that night Leo went to answer the front door. The men had fallen silent as though they had somehow intuitively guessed the presence of British officialdom was about to enter their lives.

  A deep, husky voice asked, ‘Leo Jago?’

  ‘Yes, that’s me, come in please.’

  Elinor heard the individuals at the door come into the hallway.

  ‘So you say the men don’t speak English?’ the husky voice asked in a lowered tone.

  ‘Don’t seem to, as far as I can tell.’

  ‘And, just to get our facts right, they arrived soaking wet at your front door?’

  ‘Yes, that’s right. I’ve got their clothes drying in the tumble dryer. Should be nearly done by now.’

  ‘At what time exactly did they arrive here?’

  ‘At ten past three in the morning.’

  A pause followed, as though this was all getting scribbled down.

  ‘OK. Would you mind taking us to them?’

  All of them walked down the corridor to the dining room.

  Leo came in first, as though to reassure the men around the dining table he was still there. Two individuals, in the distinctive black immigration enforcement uniform, followed him into the dining room. One was a burly man with a beard, who looked to be in his mid-fifties. Next to him stood a petite young lady, with her long blonde hair tied up in a ponytail. In her hand she carried a small notebook.

  ‘This is my niece, Elinor, and these are the gentlemen who arrived unexpectedly, early this morning,’ Leo said.

  ‘Hello, Elinor,’ said the burly man, nodding at her. ‘I’m Steve Maitlin and this is my colleague, Laura Bissell.’

  Elinor liked the look of Steve. His warm brown eyes twinkled at her and he had the jovial appearance of someone who was eternally an optimist.

  Steve turned to take a better look at the six men around the table and they, in turn, looked back at him apprehensively.

  ‘We’ll have to take them to the centre and find a translator for them. Any idea what nationality they are?’

  Leo and Elinor shook their heads.

  Steve, looking unsurprised, sighed despondently.

  ‘Recently we’ve been finding more and more young men arriving in small boats,’ Laura explained patiently. ‘Many of them turn out to be Iranian, strangely enough. We actually think we’re only managing to catch a small percentage of them. There are simply not enough of us to patrol the entire UK coastline.’

  Steve nodded in agreement.

  ‘There’s never been enough of us to fully patrol the main ports, let alone all the isolated bays and harbours around Britain. And at the moment it seems they’re going for the quieter entry points,’ he said.

  ‘But why on earth would anyone attempt to travel here on a night like this one?’ asked Leo, bemused.

  ‘No idea. It’s absolute madness...’ Steve rubbed his hair in frustration. ‘If it hadn’t been for the weather, they probably wouldn’t have ended up in your house. We suspect most of them have got local contacts to go to, once they arrive here. It’s easy enough for illegal immigrants to disappear, once they arrive undetected. The black market is huge in the UK and I’m sure in these parts a few Cornish farmers and fishermen won’t be immune from hiring cheap labour, no matter how illegal it is.’ Steve shrugged resignedly. ‘Everyone’s trying to survive, one way or another, including these poor fellows. That’s how the cycle goes.’

  ‘It’s insane to be out at sea on a night like this. I would even go so far as to say they’re lucky to be alive, actually. The ocean beside these cliffs has very strong currents, and it’s blowing a gale out there,’ said Leo.

  Leo looked lost in thought for a minute, while the others glanced involuntarily at the men still sitting at the dining table.

  ‘I wonder where their boat ended up? It could well be smashed into a pulp by now. I’ll have a look around the coves once it’s daylight,’ Leo said. ‘I would’ve thought the south of Cornwall would’ve been easier for them to reach.’

  ‘Yes, but North Cornwall has had quite a reputation for smuggling in the past, hasn’t it?’ said Laura quietly. ‘You can see why. There are so many hidden coves around the coastline.’

  Leo nodded in agreement.

  ‘What’ll happen to the men now?’ asked Elinor worriedly.

  ‘They’ll be fed and given a bed to sleep on,’ Steve said calmly. ‘We’ll have to monitor them until we figure out what their status is. We’ll get a translator for them. It’ll probably take quite a few weeks to sort out. They don’t appear to have any official paperwork on them, which isn’t going to make things any easier.’

  ‘They didn’t come with any paperwork, as far as I could tell,’ said Leo. ‘Maybe they left it all on the boat.’

  ‘We’ll find out a lot more within a day or two,’ said Steve, looking surreptitiously at his watch. ‘Right, I think it’s time we take these gentlemen off your premises and leave you in peace... You might want to give them their clothes back,’ he added, looking at the trousers the men were wearing which, because of their length, were concertinaed up their legs.

  Leo went into the corridor and fetched the clothing from the dryer. When he came back through to the dining room, he let the men pick out their garments. One by one, they made their way to the bathroom to change back into their original clothing.

  Eventually, all six men stood in a forlorn group by the front door. They waited patiently as the immigration officials said goodbye to Leo and Elinor.

  Elinor felt terribly sorry for them. She didn’t approve of people trying to enter the country illegally but when confronted with the reality of these young men who’d undertaken a dangerous voyage to this country, all in the hope of securing a better life, she felt incredibly sad.

  6

  The most striking thing about the following morning was the silence.

  The tempest had blown itself out and all was peaceful once more. Even the seagulls were spiralling above the cove silently, almost as if they too were enjoying the calm after the storm.

  Elinor didn’t wake up until ten and once she ventured out of her bedroom she realised Leo had been up before her. His shoes were gone from the entranceway and his empty porridge bowl was soaking in the sink.

  Elinor made herself a strong coffee and wandered through to the dining room so she could look out at the view.

  The pale and sickly strands of sun that had made it through the clouds were colouring patches of the sea a bright turquoise green. The rest of the seawater remained a muted grey-blue, reflecting the sky overhead. The clouds weren’t moving very quickly because the savage winds from the night before had died down completely.

  Elinor sighed to herself as she looked out at the green
clifftop. She’d no idea what she would do today.

  A middle-aged couple walked past on the other side of the bungalow’s Cornish hedge, following the clifftop path, with their spaniel gambolling eagerly ahead of them.

  Their Cornish hedge was in actual fact an ancient wall, made of local stone and soil, and with no mortar. But like much of the estimated 30,000 miles of ancient wall in Cornwall it was smothered in vegetation. In the spring, cushions of pink sea thrift covered it, blooming beautifully with a mass of frilly pom-pom flowers.

  Elinor stood by the window and watched a large tanker on the horizon. These giant tankers always fascinated her, for no matter how long she stared at them they never seemed to move very far. And yet by the end of the day they’d inevitably vanished over the horizon.

  She turned as she heard the key at the front door announcing her uncle’s arrival.

  Shortly after taking off his boots he wandered to the kitchen. He helped himself to a mug of coffee and came through to the dining room.

  ‘Morning, Elinor! I hope you caught up with your sleep?’

  ‘Yes, I did thanks. I’m just wondering what to do with myself today. What have you been up to?’

  ‘I’ve been having a little scout around the coves now that the tide’s low. I found a small sailing boat wedged against the rocks in Fox Cove. I suspect it’s the boat our visitors came in last night. I won’t hazard a guess as to whether they owned it or not. The name on the side of it says “La Vague Azur”. That suggests it’s originally French.’

  Leo turned to look out of the window, gazing at the sea in the distance.

  ‘I wonder if the boat travelled all the way from France. It’s really very small for such a voyage; it’s a pleasure boat if anything. They must’ve had a competent sailor with them. I can’t see how they would’ve managed it otherwise.’

  Elinor assumed that having seen the boat’s name, Leo must have descended right to the bottom of Fox Cove. Leo had a head for heights, unlike Elinor.

  She’d seen Leo wander up and down the sheer cliffs near his home with the supreme confidence of a mountain goat. Even at the height of the tourist season, very few ventured down into the sheltered coves, because the cliffs were so steep and unstable.

  When Leo had been a young boy, his father had taught him all the zigzag cliff paths to follow when descending into the Cornish coves near their house, and to this day Leo still retained this valuable knowledge.

  After one futile attempt to climb down the relatively easy descent into Warren Cove, Elinor had given up trying to reach the bottom of any of the cliffs in Cornwall apart from Bedruthan Steps, which, as its name suggested, had a narrow stairwell leading down onto the beach.

  In her one failed effort to descend to Warren Cove, she’d looked down at the pebbly beach far below her and she’d predictably panicked. Suddenly, feeling everything spin around her like a merry-go-round, she’d shut her eyes and clung on desperately to the vegetation on the cliff wall. Standing spreadeagled against the cliff face, she’d refused to move.

  It had taken her uncle a good twenty minutes, talking to her reassuringly, to calm her down sufficiently to open her eyes again. Eventually, she was able to make her way, carefully, back up to the top of the cliff. It wasn’t an experience either of them wanted to repeat.

  ‘Do you think you should let the authorities know about the boat?’ asked Elinor, thinking about the stranded vessel.

  Leo looked pensive, taking his time to answer, as was his wont. His ponderous and laid-back nature, as always, dictated a reasoned response.

  ‘Yes, I think so. It could help the immigration officials complete the picture. I’ll give them a call later on and ask to speak to Steve or Laura. What are you thinking of doing today?’

  Elinor shifted uncomfortably under the directness of his gaze.

  ‘I’m not sure. I thought I might go out with the camera and take some photos.’

  Leo nodded with approval.

  ‘That’s a great idea. I don’t think we’ll be getting any rain today and the wind has died down. It’s a lovely day for some fresh air.’

  Elinor smiled at him.

  Whether she liked it or not, she was going to have to go out and explore today. Her uncle was a determined man and, like a heavy-duty grass roller, he would patiently squash any resistance out of her.

  Given her inherent anxiety, she’d always be reluctant to go out on her own, but as her mother would no doubt have told her, Leo’s steady and determined persistence was the best medicine she could get.

  With a heavy sigh, she picked up their coffee mugs and went through to the kitchen. Putting them into dishwasher, she then made her way to her room to get changed. The outdoors was summoning her and she had no valid excuses left to make in ignoring its clarion call.

  7

  Elinor looked across to Treyarnon Bay and fondled the camera in her hands. Her camera was like a security blanket to her because she felt she could hide behind it.

  This particular camera was a by-product of her previous vocation when she’d worked as an artist. Two years ago, Elinor had been a successful artist and had used this camera extensively in her work.

  It seemed to her a very long time ago.

  Unfortunately, since Mark, her fiancé, had died, she hadn’t been able to express herself creatively on canvas at all. She hadn’t lifted a single paintbrush, despite desperately needing the income, so it was no wonder her mother utterly despaired of her.

  She knew countless artists who recreated their emotional traumas on canvas but she wasn’t one of them. She didn’t want to open the door to what was inside of her head because she was fully aware it was too repugnant and dark to look at. Who would want to buy something born out of the ugliness of despair? Just as they did with conversation, people appreciated the inconsequential and the light-hearted, not the depressed and dreary.

  In the days when she’d been actively working as an artist, her Canon camera was her much-valued personal assistant.

  Despite how much she liked to draw and paint from life, it was often impossible to capture an entire scene on canvas before the light changed. She often found that within a short time frame, clouds would cover the sun, or the sun would change position, redirecting all the shadows to a different place.

  Inevitably, the light changed as the day progressed. A multitude of weather idiosyncrasies could utterly change the landscape in front of her. At times, this could happen, literally, within minutes. By capturing a scene on camera, Elinor found she could finish off a canvas in her studio at her leisure and without losing the essentials of the light on that particular day.

  Elinor felt light had affected every part of her paintings. She didn’t really see colour, just light and shadow. Brought up in Glasgow, she was used to the lack of sunlight in the winter and the heavy, grey skies, and maybe that was why light was immensely important to her.

  She thought it was unsurprising Scotland had produced so many renowned colourist painters: Peploe, Cadell, Fergusson and Hunter. Its harsh climate inevitably created a yearning for colour and light. She remembered how she’d felt during the Scottish winters, when the sun, if it appeared, started to sink rapidly down to the horizon at half past three in the afternoon. The darkness stifled her creativity.

  It was then that she relied on her treasured photographs for her artwork. All those images she’d taken in the brighter seasons of spring and summer.

  And here in Cornwall she was falling in love with light once more. More than anything she loved the effect of the sky on the seawater. The palette that nature used in the water entranced her. The colours could change radically, depending on the weather and on what lay beneath the surface of the ocean.

  On a sunny day, with white sand beneath the ocean, the water turned a bright turquoise blue. If there was seaweed under the water, the sunlight turned the water into a deep blue-green oas
is, with tinges of indigo. Cloudy skies could turn it into a range of colours: from a dull slate blue to purple black, from a metallic Prussian blue to a threatening, dark, olive brown.

  Sunsets viewed from Leo’s little house were also stunning. Then, nature’s palette turned to a range of warmer colours to depict the falling sun’s demise: from pumpkin orange to coral pink, rose red to buttercup yellow. The clouds would become infused with colour as they captured the sun’s dying rays. Elinor would never tire of viewing sunsets from the mound of their Cornish hedge.

  Today, as she looked across to Treyarnon Bay, she saw there were a few surfers attempting to make use of the waves curling towards the shoreline. Surfers here fascinated her too and she wasn’t quite sure why. Maybe it was the reckless abandon with which they seemed to harness themselves to the thundering waves. The surfers she’d watched so far seemed to have no fear and she envied that.

  She decided to walk across Treyarnon Bay, making her way to the rocks straddling Treyarnon Bay and Constantine Bay. From there she’d be able to watch the surfers more closely.

  8

  There were five surfers in the water vying for the very few surfable waves. The wind wasn’t blowing hard, let alone offshore, so the waves weren’t so impressive today.

  Elinor lifted up her camera, looking at the surfers through her viewfinder, trying to trace their rapid movements as they balanced on a wave. It didn’t take long for the waves to peter out, and she felt the frustration of the surfers out there as they desperately tried to get a good run on the feeble rollers coming in.

  Ten minutes later, one of the surfers made his way out of the seawater and walked briskly onto the beach, passing close by her without even flicking her a glance of recognition or acknowledgement. She didn’t like the look of him. He was heavy set and was scowling fiercely as he stomped past her.

  Elinor moved her legs towards her chest protectively as she sat with bent knees on her rock, invariably observing closely everything around her.