The Bells of Little Woodford

by Catherine Jones

  ‘Same again, please.’

  ‘I’m so glad you turned up,’ said Belinda as she turned on the Guinness tap. ‘When you were a couple of minutes late, Miles got really stressy. I think he thought you might have stood him up, changed your mind.’

  ‘No one wants to be stood up, do they? I mean, you always end up feeling such a fool.’

  ‘I suppose. Nine pounds eighty, please. Anyway, I’m glad you’re here.’

  ‘Hey, the kids are all staying over with friends and I’m footloose and fancy-free. I was not going to turn down the offer of a night out.’

  Belinda rang up the sale on the till and handed the change to Bex who stuffed the money in her purse, picked up the drinks and returned to the table.

  ‘Here you go,’ she said putting Miles’s drink down in front of him. ‘It’s weird,’ she continued, ‘I’m not used to being this side of the bar unless I’m collecting dirty glasses.’

  ‘Can’t say I do this very often either. If I’m working, I’m in the kitchen and on my day off I always seem to have other stuff to do.’

  ‘Like?’

  ‘All the domestic stuff – shopping, cooking, cleaning…’

  ‘Folding sweaters…?’

  Miles smiled at her. ‘I asked for that. So, what do you do in your free time?’

  Bex almost splurted her drink. ‘Free time – with three kids and a job?’

  ‘OK, what would you like to do?’

  ‘I keep meaning to make the cellar into a den for the kids. They’d love to have a hidey-hole – just for them. Every time I go into the cellar in the pub I get a guilty conscience about mine.’

  ‘What needs doing?’

  Bex had a slurp of wine before she said, ‘What doesn’t need doing? It’s got a beaten earth floor and it smells of damp although, as far as I can tell, it’s dry. But the lighting is pretty dreadful and the stairs are almost vertical and with no banister at all on one side and it’s quite cold.’

  Miles took a gulp of Guinness. ‘If it’s any comfort to you I can tell you the pub cellar has never had the least problem with damp as a result of the weather or the water table.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Dry as a bone. And since Belinda and I have been here we’ve had some shocking winters and torrential storms. I think the natural drainage around us is quite good.’

  ‘That’s nice to hear. I wasn’t planning on doing very much; maybe putting down a proper floor and make the stairs better and then getting some old sofas or bean bags down there, maybe get some uplighters installed… oh, and a heater.’

  ‘Sounds like heaven on earth. I’d have loved somewhere like that to hang out when I was a kid.’

  ‘I thought as they got older, if they want to play music or anything, it’s less likely to disturb the neighbours if they’re below ground.’

  ‘How big is it?’

  ‘About the size of the pub cellar, I suppose.’

  The pub door crashed open and about a dozen young men thundered in. It was the local rugby team who trained on a Friday evening and always went to the pub afterwards.

  The noise in the bar went through the roof. Bex could hardly hear herself think. She saw Miles’ mouth move but she couldn’t make out what he was saying. She leaned across the table.

  ‘What?’ she almost shouted.

  ‘I said,’ bellowed back Miles, ‘shall we go somewhere quieter?’

  Bex nodded and drained her drink. The pair put their glasses back on the bar and escaped out into cooler and quieter air.

  Chapter 14

  Bex looked at her watch. It was still early, she’d been enjoying herself and she really didn’t want the evening to end. She made a decision.

  ‘Look,’ she said a bit diffidently, ‘you could come back to mine if you like. I can’t offer you Guinness but I have wine or coffee. And,’ she added as an afterthought, ‘you could give me your opinion about my cellar.’

  ‘Why not.’

  They nipped next door and Bex let them both in, flipping on the light switches as she pushed the front door shut. She led the way into the kitchen.

  ‘What can I get you?’

  ‘What are you having?’

  ‘I’m going to stick with wine.’

  ‘That’ll be fine with me. Where’s this cellar?’

  Bex opened a door in the corner of the kitchen and switched on the light. ‘You go and have a look and I’ll open a bottle. And go carefully, the stairs are really rickety.’

  Miles disappeared into the basement and Bex got a bottle out of the fridge. By the time she’d got the top off the bottle and had poured two glasses Miles was back in the kitchen.

  ‘It wouldn’t need that much work in my opinion.’

  ‘You think?’

  ‘I reckon. Look, I’ll show you.’

  Bex handed him a glass and picked up her own before she followed him carefully down the cellar steps, hanging on to the grimy handrail because she felt distinctly unsafe on the uneven steps in her heels. The handrail didn’t feel any too safe either, she thought. Another job to be done before the cellar could be used regularly.

  ‘Looks pretty grim to me,’ she said as she reached the floor.

  ‘OK, there’s plenty of headroom,’ said Miles, ‘so you could put down a waterproof membrane, lay some underfloor heating pipes and then put a concrete floor on the top. I reckon that would sort out the damp and the heating in one fell swoop. There’s leccy down here so no problem with the lighting – anything would be better than that single bulb but some recessed LEDs would transform the ambience of this place. Add a dimmer switch, some comfy seats, a TV and a sound system and your kids will have the perfect den.’

  ‘You think?’ Bex was trying to visualise it as Miles had projected it. ‘I suppose. Maybe I should get a builder in to give me a quote.’

  ‘At least then you’d know if you were looking at five hundred or five grand.’

  Bex headed back towards the stairs and gripped the handrail again. She was about three steps up when she caught her heel, tripped and all her weight hung off the rail which pulled away from the wall. Her free hand flailed, sending her glass flying as she tried to keep her balance before she crashed off the unprotected side of the steps, a section of handrail in her right hand. She almost managed to land on her feet but because of her heels she instantly lost her balance and fell heavily on one side. She hit the beaten earth floor with a sickening thump and her glass splintered beside her a split second later.

  ‘Bex!’

  She lay there, winded and shocked.

  In a second Miles was by her side. ‘Don’t move,’ he commanded. ‘Are you hurt?’

  ‘I… I don’t know. Bruised. My leg really hurts.’ She breathed slowly and carefully, trying to assess which bits hurt the most and if the ‘hurt’ might be indicative of something serious.

  Miles bent to look closer. ‘Nothing looks like it’s broken. Nothing obvious anyway.’

  ‘I think it was my bum and my arm that took most of the fall.’ Bex flexed her wrist. ‘That seems to be working.’ She was still holding a piece of handrail in her right hand. She jammed it onto the floor and levered herself up till she was kneeling.

  ‘Jeez, I am going to have some bruises.’ Slowly she got one foot under her, and then, using the handrail as a crutch and Miles’s proffered hand she staggered upright. Something was far from right, then she realised that the heel of one of her shoes had broken off. She thought about slipping the shoes off but then she looked at the broken glass. She didn’t want cut feet on top of everything else. ‘What a waste of good wine.’

  ‘Are you sure you are all right?’

  Bex nodded. ‘I think so. I’m going to be sore for a day or two but I’m going to live. Anyway, one thing is certain; either I get this cellar sorted properly, so it isn’t a complete deathtrap, or I’ve got to put it out of bounds.’

  ‘Let’s get you back to the kitchen.’

  Bex turned to head for the step but pain shot up her
leg. She winced.

  ‘You’re not all right, are you?’ said Miles.

  ‘It’s nothing. I’ve twisted my ankle,’ she admitted. ‘But nothing a cold compress and tubular bandage won’t fix.’

  ‘Here, put your arm round my shoulder so I can take some of the weight.’

  Bex did as she was told and Miles held her close so that his left arm was also taking some of her weight but the steps then proved too narrow for the pair to go up side by side.

  Bex removed her arm again. ‘I’ll be fine. I’ll manage,’ she said, not knowing how, especially as there was no handrail now to offer support.

  ‘Desperate times demand desperate remedies,’ muttered Miles and suddenly he’d half crouched beside Bex, swept one arm behind her knees, curved the other under her right arm and around her shoulders and before she knew it she was in the air and pressed against his chest.

  ‘What the…?’ she shrieked.

  ‘Just stay still. I don’t want to drop you,’ said Miles through clenched teeth as he almost staggered under her weight.

  Oh, God, she thought. Now he knew exactly how heavy she was. Too heavy. Too heavy by far.

  He clutched her tight to him as he began to climb up the dozen or so steps. Bex found herself tempted to lean her head on his shoulder but felt that on one level it might be fundamentally wrong although, on another level, it might be so fundamentally right. She inhaled the scent of him, she held onto his shoulder – for support and balance… She could feel his heart hammering against his ribs and saw the sweat starting to bead on his brow.

  Her mind flashed back to the time when Miles had comforted her after Alfie had briefly run away from home and scared the daylights out of her. He’d held her then… and she’d pushed him away because she’d thought that when he and Belinda had told her they were ‘partners’ that’s what they were. Not business partners. And when she’d found the truth, although she liked him – A Lot – she still hadn’t encouraged him. And as Bex lay in his arms and he laboured up the steps, she wasn’t sure she had the courage to try and move things on. What if he rejected her?

  By the time they got into the kitchen his breath was rasping in her ear. With a groan he lowered her onto the kitchen table and then slumped onto a chair, his chest heaving, his mouth open to maximise his air intake.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘I’d have probably managed, though.’

  ‘It’s…’ he drew a breath, ‘it’s… no… problem.’

  Bex looked down at her floaty blouse. It was filthy down one side. She suspected the seat of her jeans might be too and she was already aware that she’d ruined her shoes. She must look a complete sight.

  She toed off her shoes and they fell to the floor beside Miles.

  Gently he took her left foot in his hand.

  ‘It’s the right one I’ve buggered,’ Bex advised.

  Miles looked up at her and grinned and then started to examine her other foot. He rested it on his lap. ‘It doesn’t look too bad.’ Slowly and gently he flexed and stretched the joint. ‘Does that hurt?’

  ‘Not really.’

  He rotated it.

  She jumped involuntarily at the pain. ‘Ouch.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘As I said, some decent strapping and it’ll be as right as ninepence.’

  ‘Where do you keep the bandages?’

  ‘I think the most I can run to is some Calpol or Elastoplast.’

  Miles rolled his eyes. ‘Wait here.’

  ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘The pub. There’s a proper first aid kit there. Back in a jiffy.’

  As soon as he’d gone, Bex slid off the table onto her good foot, hopped across the kitchen, got out two more glasses – their previous ones being still down in the cellar, hers in smithereens – and the bottle of white out of the fridge. She sat back on the chair and poured the drinks.

  ‘I’m back,’ called Miles a minute or so later. He tutted. ‘What have you been up to?’

  ‘Miles, I’ve got a slightly sore ankle. The other leg is working fine. I admit that getting up from the cellar would have been tricky, but I’m OK. Honestly.’

  Miles raised his eyebrows in response and flourished a crêpe bandage and a safety pin. ‘Let’s get this ankle bandaged.’

  With remarkable skill, dexterity and neatness, he had her ankle strapped in a couple of minutes and the loose end of the bandage pinned securely. ‘How’s that?’

  Bex stood and gingerly put her weight on it. ‘Pretty good. Where did you learn to do that?’

  ‘Scouts.’

  ‘Dib-dib-dib,’ teased Bex.

  ‘Don’t knock it.’

  ‘I’m not. I bet you were a cracking scout.’

  ‘I was. I got loads of badges – including first aid.’

  ‘Well, now I’m all fixed up, let’s go and sit somewhere more comfortable.’ Bex picked up her glass and led the way, limping only very slightly, into the sitting room. She switched on the lights and drew the curtains.

  ‘This is very cosy,’ said Miles, settling into an armchair. ‘I love this house.’

  ‘So do I.’ Bex sat on the sofa, next to Miles’s chair. She half-wished he’d sat on the sofa too. After all, just a matter of minutes previously she’d been in his arms and wondering how to move their relationship on. She made her mind up. With her heart hammering like Miles’s had done earlier, she patted the cushion beside her.

  ‘You could always sit here,’ she said. ‘If you’d like to.’

  ‘I think,’ said Miles, uncrossing his legs and standing up, ‘I’d like that very much.’

  Chapter 15

  Olivia hauled herself out of bed the next morning at six thirty and pottered downstairs to make tea. Nigel snored on. She could have really relished a lie-in, like Nigel was indulging in, rather than getting up at this ridiculously early hour because she had a mountain of tasks before her shift started that afternoon. That was the trouble with working in the hospitality business – someone had to be around to cater for guests’ needs twenty-four seven. She was only expected to work ten days a fortnight but her days off, like her shift pattern, varied from week to week. She imagined she’d get used to it but at the moment she was having a problem getting her head round the fact that her ‘weekend’ wasn’t necessarily going to coincide with her family’s. As the kettle boiled she zipped around the downstairs, opening curtains, picking up dirty crockery and the previous day’s papers, plumping up a couple of cushions and restoring order to the living area. The kettle clicked off and she made herself a cuppa which she left on the counter to cool while she returned to the bedroom and got her and Nigel’s laundry from their en suite. The weather forecast for the day was fine and sunny so if she got the washing on first thing she might be able to get it to dry on the line before she had to go to work. She’d been told that this week her day off was on Sunday, so tomorrow, while she cooked the joint, she could iron it ready for the following week. Huh – some day off.

  She stuffed the dirty clothes in the machine, dosed it, pressed the start button and then returned to the kitchen to make some lists – urgent things to do, less urgent things, shopping… She had limited time before she had to go to work and she needed to maximise it.

  Half an hour later, while her family slumbered on, she was washed, dressed and had her shopping list in hand as she headed for the car and a trip to the twenty-four-hour supermarket in Cattebury. She was banking on the fact that at seven thirty on a Saturday morning she’d have the place to herself and would be able to whisk round in minimum time. She turned into the car park and saw it was practically empty. Sometimes, she thought, being organised was a definite asset.

  She was back home and unpacking the shopping by half past eight. As she did so, Jade staggered into the kitchen.

  ‘Bloody hell, Mum, do you have to make such a racket?’

  Olivia, who had been bending down to pull boxes of cereal out of her shopping bag, straightened up. She stared at her daughter.

>   ‘And could you put the kettle on?’ added Jade who was sitting at the table checking her new phone, one purchased to replace the lost one, and oblivious of the danger she was in.

  Olivia reached forward and plucked the phone from her daughter’s hand.

  ‘Hey!’ protested Jade.

  ‘I’ll give you hey,’ snapped her mother. She slammed the phone down on the table. Jade jumped. ‘I have had it up to here with you and the rest of the family. I am working round the clock and yet I have still to see anyone else do a hand’s turn around the house. This morning I came down to find that, yet again, no one had managed to put their mugs and plates in the dishwasher. Is it too much to ask? It’s not difficult.’ She stopped. She was so angry she was afraid she might lose it. She turned away and looked out the window. She took a deep, calming breath. ‘I have been up for two hours. I have tidied up, I have shopped for the week, I have got the washing on… and what have you done?’

  ‘But it’s the weekend,’ protested Jade.

  Olivia turned around and slammed her hands down on the table, causing her daughter to jump out of her skin yet again. ‘The whole of last week was a weekend as far as you were concerned.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘There’s no “but”! Either you help out or you can move out.’

  ‘But I’ve got nowhere to go.’

  Olivia drew an imaginary circle with her forefinger round her face and leaned in towards her daughter. ‘Bovvered?’ she said.

  ‘But, Mum.’

  What’s going on?’ said Nigel strolling into her kitchen in his dressing gown. ‘You two sound like a pair of fishwives. We’ll have the neighbours complaining next.’

  Olivia rounded on him. ‘And you’re no better.’

  Nigel took a step back and put his hands up. ‘Hang on a sec—’

  ‘No, I bloody won’t. You’re almost as bad. You promised you’d help out around the house a bit but you don’t seem to be able to put anything in the dishwasher, pick up your clothes off the bathroom floor, cook for yourself, tidy up—’