by Jenny Colgan
The scream that Mary emitted now made the earlier noise seem like laughing.
Chapter Twenty-two
Mary leapt for Zoe like a crazed animal. Zoe was fairly convinced that if the article of clothing had actually gone into the flames, Mary would have gone in straight after it, so distraught was she. She snatched the cardigan from Zoe’s hands and pulled it to her, tucking it under her chin like a much younger child, tears streaming down her cheeks.
‘Her mother made her that,’ said Mrs MacGlone quietly from the side of the sink. Zoe swallowed. Oh God. That was awful. So awful. She felt dreadful.
She looked up at Mary, all the anger drained away, leaving only a vast well of pity.
‘Why would you leave something so precious strewn about?’ she said in a soft voice. ‘Wouldn’t you want to keep it safe?’
There wasn’t a sound in the kitchen. The traumatised child froze for a second, then finally nodded sharply and angrily.
Zoe moved forward very carefully and slowly, as if she were approaching a wild animal – which she was. Mary backed away.
‘Come with me,’ said Zoe gently. ‘We’ll put everything away together.’
Her voice was as soft and lulling as she could make it, almost as if she were singing. She could see the internal fight on Mary’s face; the desperate desire of the girl to continue to defy her, to force her away; the sheer weariness in her face. It must be so tiring to fight and to fight and to fight against the world; to be so angry and frustrated, every single minute of the day.
She didn’t touch Mary, simply picked up the laundry pile and handed half of it to her. Mary didn’t speak, didn’t capitulate in any way.
But she took it.
* * *
Still treating her as if she was liable to attack and bite at any moment, Zoe pushed open the door to what she’d worked out was Mary’s bedroom. It was dim; the curtains were closed tight and didn’t look as if they’d been opened in some time.
It was a large room and absolutely no concession had been made in the decoration that it was for a child. The walls were wood-panelled, with old oil paintings hanging on them. The curtains were a heavy burgundy tartan which was copied on the bed covers. Persian rugs covered the dark wood floor.
There were a few toys; things for very little girls. A doll’s house – a beautiful one – had had the front pulled off and the furniture scattered all over the ancient rugs. A few books, their spines uncracked, lay scattered higgledy-piggledy. The bed was made but nothing else had been touched, presumably on Mary’s instructions. Clothes were strewn all over the room.
‘I wish,’ said Zoe, keeping her tone light. ‘I wish I could do that Mary Poppins thing and snap my fingers and make everything tidy itself up. If I had a superpower, that would be what it would be, don’t you think?’
Mary looked about and frowned. But she spoke.
‘That’s the stupidest superpower I’ve ever heard.’
‘Well, what would yours be?’
‘Dematerialisation, obviously.’
Zoe blinked. Well, this was progress, of sorts.
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Now is there a place for things, or shall we make one?’
Mary shrugged.
‘How about . . . pants and tights up here?’
She opened a heavy old wooden chest. The other clothes in there – she was amazed – were all tiny, toddler girls’ things. Beautiful, hand-smocked dresses, little Liberty prints. It looked like the wardrobe of a girl from a hundred years ago. But everything was so very small.
Zoe looked at the girl again in her grubby nightgown.
‘Mary,’ she said softly. ‘Do you need new clothes?’
The girl shook her head.
‘I like my clothes,’ she said.
Zoe looked again at the cardigan. The little foxes worked into the wool were exquisite.
‘They are beautiful,’ she said. ‘It’s all beautiful. But wouldn’t you rather some things that fitted you better?’
Mary shook her head fiercely.
Zoe walked over and opened the curtains. Evening light flooded into the room suddenly, lush and golden. It showed up the dust everywhere. She opened a window too. The room didn’t smell bad, just a little old. A little sad. The fresh autumnal air, chillier than it looked from the sunshine, came in.
‘That’s better,’ said Zoe. ‘I always feel better when I can breathe.’
She looked around.
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Let’s arrange your clothes, see what we have, shall we? Make sure everything is organised and kept as well as it can be.’
Mary looked for something she could disagree with in the statement but didn’t seem to find anything, so she shrugged.
‘I’ll make us sausages later,’ Zoe said, hearing the door slam below and realising Mrs MacGlone must have left. ‘I really must teach Shackleton to cook something.’
Mary half cracked a smile. ‘Shackleton couldn’t cook anything! He’s so incredibly stupid.’
‘You don’t need to be smart to cook,’ said Zoe, not wanting to contradict her. ‘A dog could make a shepherd’s pie.’
‘No, it couldn’t!’
‘It could! It would have to bite the carrot chunks off though. Ruff!’
And that is how Ramsay saw them, as he walked down the passageway in search of a cup of tea and hoping not to encounter too much chaos: the little girl and the new person, two dark heads leaning over a pile of clothes and folding and hanging them up. He stopped in the door frame for a while until Mary turned and saw him, and he was surprised as, for once, she wasn’t either screaming at someone or clinging to his legs.
‘Hello, liefe,’ he said softly. ‘Can I come in?’
Mary nodded. Zoe moved backwards as he came and folded his long unwieldy body down on the floor. It was like putting up a deckchair. His legs shot across the rug.
He caught sight of the cardigan Mary was still clutching furiously underneath one arm.
‘Oh,’ he said softly. ‘The fox cardigan.’
Mary went bright red.
‘It’s beautiful,’ he said. ‘Does it still fit?’
Mary wouldn’t answer.
‘Maybe we could let Patrick wear it.’
Zoe winced. This was exactly the wrong thing to say. And so it proved, as Mary screwed up her face.
‘Oh God, no way! He’d ruin it! He’s not allowed to touch it! He ruins everything!’
‘Ah, right, okay,’ said Ramsay hurriedly, shifting his position. He looked altogether too big for the room, even though the room itself was large. ‘Um.’
‘Here,’ said Zoe quickly, grabbing the first thing she found. ‘Look at this I found stuffed behind the cupboard. I bet it would still fit you.’
It was a bold stripe T-shirt with a big lion’s face in the middle.
‘For when you want to roar,’ said Zoe with a smile. Mary’s face lit up. ‘My lion T-shirt!’ she said. ‘I thought it was lost. I thought Patrick stole it.’
She frowned, obviously remembering some terrible punishment she’d dished out to Patrick.
‘I think,’ said Zoe carefully, ‘I could let the hem down a bit and that would totally still fit you.’
Mary dragged it on – it was covered in dust – over her nightie, and sure enough, it did just about fit. She almost smiled.
‘Well done,’ said Ramsay to Zoe, who looked at him.
‘Don’t say that yet,’ she said, looking at her watch. It was way past Hari’s bedtime and she still didn’t know how to use the stove and she could smell the once delicious but now ominous scent of toast rising up the stairwell. ‘There’s no dinner yet.’
‘I don’t want any,’ said Mary promptly.
‘That’s okay,’ said Zoe wearily, getting up. ‘That’s okay.’
* * *
Zoe didn’t know what time she woke up. Hari wasn’t stirring, but the entire house was still. Except . . . except . . .
She listened. It sounded like it was coming from right outsid
e her door. A loud sobbing. Confused, her heart racing, she checked Hari again. Then she jumped up.
‘Hello?’ she ventured. The sobbing continued. ‘Mary?’
There was no answer. Carefully, she tiptoed towards the door over the linoleum. The wind was moaning through the trees outside the window. She realised she was absolutely terrified and tried to tell herself not to be ridiculous.
‘Patrick?’ she said. ‘It’s okay. It’s okay, Patrick, I’m coming.’
Steeling herself, she threw open the door . . .
The crying ceased immediately. There was nothing and nobody there. She looked up and down the empty hallway but there was nothing.
‘Hello? Hello?’
But the house did not reply.
Chapter Twenty-three
‘Thank you,’ Zoe found herself saying again. It really was a terrible palaver getting vans out of the mud. The morning was fresh and dry. She had managed – had forced herself – to believe last night was all a dream.
‘Mmm,’ said Lennox. Zoe was quickly realising nobody had been joking when they said he didn’t say much. She’d brought Hari along – she’d think about nursery later. After all, it wasn’t the worst thing for him to hang out with someone who was obviously doing all right but also didn’t feel the urge to talk very much.
Zoe couldn’t deny it though. There was a bit of her that thought that changing scene, starting nursery, something new in his life – she’d thought that would prompt something at least. Some noise from the little boy. It was all she thought about as she drove down the long roads. It felt, as she came to know the area more and more, that every day there was something new. She heard a woodpecker out in the woods, battering away. Fish leaping in the loch. She wanted more time to explore; but there was just so much to do.
‘How’s Nina?’ she asked. Lennox’s brow furrowed.
‘I want to say, having a bad time,’ he said. ‘But I’m not sure I can. There’s a new delivery in – could you pick her out something?’
‘I don’t think there’s anything she hasn’t read,’ said Zoe.
‘Yup,’ was Lennox’s only response.
‘I’ll definitely have a look. Might be time to revisit some old classics.’
Lennox had washed down the whole van; it was gleaming.
‘You’re sure you know how to drive it?’
‘I just need to practise . . . without anyone watching me,’ said Zoe decisively.
Lennox definitely smirked.
‘And don’t do that, sunshine! That man smirk thing. That makes it worse!’
Lennox put up his hands.
‘Aye, all right.’
He backed away. Then he stepped forward again. Hari wasn’t paying attention; he was crouched down attempting to pat the chicken, who waddled away every time he got too close.
She smiled, watching him chase the chicken. She had slept incredibly well the night before. It was, she thought, something to do with the coolness of the air at night – London retained its heat; the very buildings gave it off.
Here the breeze was cool and when she lay in bed with the window open a crack it was an absolute luxury not to have to worry about being woken by burglars, drug deals, sirens, helicopters, shouting Ubers or fights outside the window.
Even though everything in her life was in limbo – and she still wasn’t a hundred per cent sure there wasn’t a mad woman bricked up in the attic of the house she was staying in – it felt strangely safe. The cool air; the gently sleeping Hari; the occasional hoot of an owl or a squawk of something else on the run from the owl; the scent of berries on the night air.
She had gone to back to bed after the disturbance of the previous evening, emotionally exhausted, and had expected to toss and turn and worry about everything. Instead, she had lain down for a moment, just to feel lulled by the night sky she could see through the open curtains, the blazing stars unobscured by night pollution, and had made a half-turn to pick up her book, but then found herself, just as she grabbed it, lightly dropping off the shelf into the deepest slumber, tumbling down like Alice, and had awoken, completely refreshed, to a piercing draught and a cold ray of liquid sunshine penetrating the unclosed curtains and, as usual, a small boy sitting on her chest.
* * *
Perilously and painfully slowly, Zoe pulled the van away from the farmyard gates. She stuck in second gear, figuring that would be fine until she figured out what she was doing. Lennox watched her go, worried. This was Nina’s pride and joy; her life. She was under strict doctor’s orders not to have any stress at all. He really hoped Zoe wouldn’t mess this up – crash the van, or destroy the stock or the business. He sighed. They couldn’t really afford it but he’d get in an extra shepherd for the season; he had to be at the hospital. They didn’t chat much – he’d read the farming press; she’d beat him at Scrabble – but it didn’t matter. He was there, and that was the only thing that mattered.
* * *
Zoe decided not to make a right turn onto the village square so she could get to the corner plot, but instead go all the way round the left-hand route and end up there eventually. She could probably, she suspected, do this with everywhere she went from now on.
The little village looked beautiful this morning. The cobbles were polished by recent rain; the rows of small whitewashed cottages had smoke coming from the chimneys. Children were out playing, making the most of the holiday, and Mrs Murray’s shop had a bright display of buckets and spades and towels outside it for those heading to the shores of the loch.
Nervously, Zoe took up the pitch, turned the little sign from closed to open, propped up the latest intake and pushed open the doors with a hopeful grin.
The morning was busy, but not particularly lucrative. Everyone but everyone wanted to ask about how Nina was getting on. They loaded Zoe down with cards and presents that she ended up having to pile in the passenger seat; homemade marmalade and chutneys; home-brewed gin (‘Tell her not to have too much,’ said old Mr Dennis, who didn’t think it had done his mother much harm when she’d drunk it during her pregnancy, and also didn’t think much was wrong with being five foot three inches tall). Zoe eyed it carefully and wondered if it would be wrong to purloin it and drink it by herself at night when everything got too much.
Yes, she concluded reluctantly. That would be very, very wrong.
It was lovely that everyone was giving her things. Unfortunately what they weren’t giving her was money in exchange for books.
‘Nina said she was getting that book in for me,’ was a common sentence, followed by complete blankness when Zoe asked them what it was.
‘I’m after that book with the red cover.’
Or ‘You know the one? It’s got a doctor in it. A bad doctor.’
The worst of it was, as she desperately tried to recommend things, she knew Nina would know. She was trying to listen to Lennox’s instructions and not call her every second – the one time she had tried (someone was almost exactly positive that Nina would know if their book about walruses had come in and Zoe turned the place upside down and actually it might be seals), Nina’s phone was engaged and Zoe concluded correctly that she was talking to her mum.
She was exhausted as she parked up the van carefully, trying to keep out of the muddy area and the stupid chicken’s way. Lifting Hari out bodily in his car seat even though it weighed a ton – why, she wondered frequently, didn’t she have the most amazingly toned Thandie Newton arms given the amount of four-year-old lifting she did? It didn’t seem fair – she hauled him into the little green car and nearly squashed another neat basket of eggs that was sitting there.
She put Hari on the ground.
‘Ooh!’ she said. ‘Look! That could have gone very wrong, huh?’
Hari blinked.
‘Well, that’s supper sorted,’ she said, and she glanced around to see if Lennox or anyone else was there to thank, but the farmyard was totally deserted. So she thanked the evil chicken, before carefully driving around it.
Mrs MacGlone was pulling on her coat.
‘I’ve got bingo,’ she said, sounding almost cheerful for once. ‘With Thea Newton. Who cheats. Always. I spent the day giving the grand piano a proper going-over.’
‘How can you cheat at bingo?’ said Zoe, confused, but Mrs MacGlone had already gone.
The kitchen, as usual, was covered in crumbs and Shackleton sat placidly eating his way through a jar of marmalade, eyes fixed on the screen.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake,’ said Zoe, irritated. ‘Enough. Come on! Get up! You’re going to help me make supper.’
She was going to do a big shop. Just as soon as she found out where there was a big shop.
Shackleton looked at her sideways.
‘You’re all right, ta.’
Zoe blinked. Then she went behind the cooker – it was absolutely disgusting back there – and, taking a deep breath and closing her eyes, she pulled out the tiny ancient internet plug.
Shackleton leapt from his seat and she suddenly remembered just what a large chap he was.
‘Oi!’ he said. ‘Put that back.’
Zoe folded her arms.
‘Neh,’ she said. Mary looked up, blinking; she looked pleased it appeared to be somebody else’s turn for getting it in the neck from Zoe today.
‘Nanny Seven, you are ABSOLUTELY QUITE TERRIFYING,’ came a small voice from the ground.
‘You can shut it. Now, give me that back.’ In dirty old tracksuit bottoms and unwashed hair, overweight, pasty-faced and truculent, Shackleton was an unappealing prospect.
‘You’re going to learn to cook something,’ said Zoe. ‘Help out a bit. Get you doing something.’
‘No!’
‘Okay,’ said Zoe, weighing up the plug in her hand and wandering over to the sink with it. ‘Fine.’
Shackleton stuck out his large lower lip.
‘I’m telling Dad.’
‘He’s not here,’ said Zoe. ‘Where is he, anyone know?’