The Newcomer

by Fern Britton

  ‘Do I look all right?’ asked Angela, fiddling with her dog collar. ‘Does this work with my shirt?’

  Mamie swept her eyes over Angela’s outfit. A short-sleeved checked skirt and denim shorts. ‘The picture of a modern vicar, my dear.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Robert was unsure about any of it. ‘Do you really need to do this? I mean, Polly will do her earth goddess bit, which is fine, but do you need to bring God into this?’ Having read through her short speech of blessing that morning, he had misgivings. ‘After that ridiculous report on the local news.’

  Irritated and nervous, Angela said, ‘It is a blessing. That’s all. Very simple. I’m not giving a sermon or conjuring up lucky djinns.’

  He reached for the phone in his pocket. ‘Text from Faith. She wants me to fix the brakes on her bike.’

  ‘Now?’ asked Angela.

  ‘Yeah. She’s going on a ride with Ben, apparently.’

  ‘I thought she was coming down here?’

  ‘She will later.’ He pecked her cheek. ‘I’d better go. Give me a call if you need me. Good luck.’

  Angela watched as he walked away. Mamie took her arm. ‘Buck up, darling. Men are a shower of utter shites. Don’t worry about Robert. I am here for you. Today is very much your day.’

  Piran strode to the centre of the surrounding crowd and clapped his hands for attention.

  ‘Can I have a bit of quiet, please? Right.’ He turned on the spot, eyeing them up, until the crowd hushed. ‘All villages have or had a pond at some point in their history. Back in the day they were a valuable water source for humans and animals. They were also the laundry place, the gossip place and, as I’m sure you will have heard on the telly last night, a place to put the local witches on trial by ducking.’

  He turned to find Polly, standing with Simple Tony, and pointed at her. ‘Polly there is a true twenty-first-century woman. A paramedic. A good one. Five hundred years ago a woman like her, with medical knowledge, would have been placed on a ducking stool and probably drowned, right here.’ He pointed to the ground beneath their feet. The crowd laughed nervously.

  Piran continued, ‘But Polly, modern woman that she is, has a foot in the history of the sixteenth century. Polly,’ he held his arm out to her, ‘come and tell us your story.’

  Polly stepped forward, receiving a spattering of uncertain applause. She was wearing a loosely floating, long dress; her dark hair, parted in the middle, hung in curly clouds either side of her pale Celtic face.

  She was barefoot and holding a branch of what looked like dead leaves woven with twine.

  ‘Hello.’ She smiled and lifted her arms, the sleeves of her dress falling back to her shoulders to reveal strong arms. ‘Are there any children here who believe in magic?’

  A few children put their hands up. Others crept into their mothers’ skirted knees and buried their faces with maybe half an eye uncovered.

  ‘I do,’ she continued. ‘I do a little bit of good magic to help people now and again because I am a white witch. Have you heard of white witches?’

  A couple of families began to look uncomfortable, passing looks to their partners that said, Let’s get the kids away from this mumbo jumbo.

  ‘Is that your wand?’ asked a small boy boldly. A small girl with bunched hair grabbed his hand and shushed him. ‘Get off,’ he told her. ‘You wanted to know.’

  ‘I’m scared,’ she whispered loudly.

  ‘There is nothing to be scared of,’ Polly said cheerfully. ‘This is a sort of wand.’ She held it out for all to see. ‘It is made from the leaves of sage and myrtle. Very good plants that will protect us and help with psychic awareness. I like myrtle so much, I named my cat after it. You might see her later. A little tabby with green eyes.’

  The little girl pulled the corners of her lips down and showed her teeth. ‘I’m scared,’ she said again.

  Polly smiled. ‘Don’t be sacred of my Myrtle. She likes a tickle round the ears so give her one of those and she’ll be your friend.’ The little girl managed a tiny smile. Polly went on, ‘I am here today to make sure that the spirits guarding this place are happy.’

  ‘What sort of spirits?’ asked the boy. ‘Are they like fairies? My sister believes in fairies. Don’t you?’ He looked down at the little girl gripping his arm.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Ah well,’ Polly said. ‘Fairies, elves and all sorts could be here and I don’t want them to be upset by the digger so, in case they are listening, I’m going to tell them it will all be all right. Would you all please hold hands to form an unbroken circle.’

  She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Slowly she began to turn on the spot, waving the sage and myrtle branch. ‘Mother Goddess, purify this long-lost water and bless this sacred land with your ancient powers and bless all here with your loving light.’

  She stopped turning, held the branch high, opened her eyes and smiled. ‘Perfect. What marvellous energy you have given me. You may feel a little woozy after that but it will pass quickly. Now, may I ask the vicar of Pendruggan, Angela Whitehorn, to give us her blessing.’

  Angela stepped forward and Polly returned to Simple Tony’s side. ‘Well done,’ he whispered.

  ‘Thank you, Polly,’ said Angela. She looked over to Mamie for reassurance, who gave her a thumbs up.

  Angela took a breath and began, ‘Let us pray. Dear Lord, bless the work we do here today. May we find water that is pure and may the workers stay safe. Help us make this a day that will be remembered well. We thank you. Amen.’

  Before Angela could open her eyes, she heard the unmistakable tones of Audrey Tipton. ‘Mrs Whitehorn! Mrs Whitehorn!’

  Angela opened her eyes. Audrey was pushing her way through the throng. ‘That ice cream van cannot, cannot, stay where it is. Geoffrey is bringing the off-roader down in a minute. You must tell the driver of the van to move.’

  Audrey was a sight. The normal tweeds and brogues had been replaced with ageing tennis shorts, at least three sizes too small, which showed her Queen Anne legs to the worst possible advantage. Her top half was sporting a T-shirt with the message ‘Beethoven at Bognor, 1983’.

  ‘Can you not ask the driver, Audrey?’ Angela asked, trying not to laugh.

  ‘He will not listen to me.’ Audrey was scarlet. ‘Is Robert here?’

  Angela thought she saw a flush of extra red in Audrey’s face. ‘He’s at home.’

  ‘Well, get him down here,’ ordered Audrey.

  Angela felt in her pockets and then in her shoulder bag, then in her pockets again. ‘Gosh. I must have left my phone at home.’

  Mamie, watching, sighed and stepped in. ‘Audrey dear. Whatever is the matter? Let me help.’ Audrey allowed herself to be swept off.

  Mamie glanced over her retreating shoulder and gave Angela a big wink.

  Angela blew her a kiss.

  Piran took centre stage once more. ‘May I have your attention, please? Would you all step back to behind the blue paint-line on the grass?’ He pointed to the digger next to him. ‘This is a dangerous bit of kit. Kids, listen to me, that big bit on the front,’ he pointed to the heavily toothed digger arm. ‘That bit there will swing from side to side, digging and emptying whatever is under here. So, keep your parents from being stupid, would you?’

  The adults smiled. The children giggled. Piran carried on. ‘As long as you keep yourselves and your dogs behind that line, you’ll be safe. OK? And to make sure you don’t step over the line. Bob there, and Mike Bates, are going to put up a temporary barrier.’

  Gasping Bob helpfully indicated the blue line and encouraged people to move out of the way. ‘Right back, please. Right back. We’m putting up some poles and orange tape for your safety so step right back please.’

  The site was at last made safe and ready. Mike Bates checked that all was secure and, after a final reminder to keep back behind the orange tape and blue line, Digger Pete started up the old machine.

  ‘Ooh,’ went the crowd, one or
two of the younger children screaming with shock at the sudden noise.

  ‘’Tis all right,’ shouted Piran. ‘’Tis a noisy beggar but by lunchtime we could be down to the water level. OK, let’s have a countdown. Three. Two. One.’

  He lifted his right arm and dropped it, signalling to Pete to roll the digger forward and begin.

  The caterpillar tracks moved him to the centre of the irregular circle. The heavy arm dropped towards the deep grass. Pete manoeuvred the stick handles in the cab, and the great metal teeth bit into the vegetation. The Big Dig had begun.

  The sun was rising fast in the bright July sky and the crowd was growing by the minute.

  After every scoop was dragged out and tipped into the nearby skip, Piran, Bob and Mike Bates went to see what lay beneath. Each time they turned to Pete with thumbs down and Pete would start again.

  The morning wore on … with nothing to see.

  Those who had been there since the beginning began to drift down the lane and onto the beach of Shellsand Bay.

  The ice cream van had found a good vantage point at the top of a slight slope, a spot that was shared by a burger van that had turned up out of the blue. Geoffrey arrived in his four-by-four off-roader, parking it sideways across the lane to stop any other hawkers arriving without permission.

  Audrey strode to the dig team, her thighs rubbing painfully together. ‘Geoffrey has stationed our vehicle up there. Traffic prevention.’

  Piran ignored her but Mike, being well-mannered, said, ‘Do thank him, Audrey. Very kind.’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ she said without humour. ‘We have a comprehensive selection of first-aid equipment on board. I don’t suppose anyone else has thought of that. So if there are any problems, wasp stings, bites, grazes, I have everything.’ She was very pleased with herself.

  ‘That’s excellent,’ Mike replied. ‘Thank you.’

  Audrey, catching sight of a dog fouling near the ice cream van, cried, ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake. Look at that. Some people,’ and marched off to have words.

  Piran sauntered over to Mike. ‘What did Captain Mainwaring want?’

  Mike couldn’t help but laugh. ‘Oh, you are bad, Piran. She’s got a heart of gold really. She’s brought some first-aid supplies down in case of accident, apparently.’

  ‘I ’ope she hasn’t forgotten the sun cream. Her thighs are getting burnt.’

  Mike looked at Audrey, who was now berating the elderly dog owners. ‘Oh dear me, yes. Those shorts of hers are rather skimpy.’

  Piran threw away the last dregs of tea from his mug. ‘Never mind her. Right, let’s push on. Two hours until lunch break …’

  By lunchtime, the whole area, roughly forty metres square, had been scraped back to underlying seams of shale and sand. The sand was damp, giving the team a boost.

  ‘Looks like we might find something after all,’ Piran told Simple Tony, who had been watching from the slope by the ice cream van. ‘I’m going to get some lunch. Want anything?’

  Tony shook his head and patted the pocket of his blue overalls. ‘Polly did me some Marmite sandwiches.’

  ‘Right you are. I’m going for the burger and chips, with fried onions and a mug of tea.’

  Angela returned to the vicarage for lunch and found Robert in the kitchen with Mamie.

  ‘Hello, you.’ He kissed her as she came into the kitchen. ‘Just making a chicken Caesar. Fancy some?’

  ‘Yes, please.’

  ‘How’s it going?’

  ‘OK. Some damp sand that looks promising. It’s very hot out there.’ She slumped into a chair.

  Mamie got a glass from the cupboard and filled it from the cold tap. ‘There you are. You’ll be dehydrated.’

  ‘Where’s Faith?’ Angela asked after she’d drunk the glass empty.

  ‘Still out on her bike,’ replied Robert, mixing the salad dressing. ‘She said she and Ben might come down to the dig to have a look later.’

  ‘Her bike was OK, was it?’

  ‘I pumped up the tyres and greased the chain. Everything else was fine. The brakes will need replacing soon but they will be all right for today.’

  Angela remembered something. ‘You haven’t seen my phone, have you?’

  ‘No,’ Robert replied.

  ‘I wonder where it is. I was sure I put it in my pocket earlier. I’ll have a look.’ She wandered upstairs and checked her bedroom, Faith’s bedroom, the bathroom, and the handbag she hadn’t bothered to take with her to the dig. Nothing.

  As she came back into the kitchen, Mamie looked up. ‘Any luck?’

  ‘No.’ Angela frowned, thinking.

  ‘Checked all your pockets?’

  ‘Yes. Odd. I was sure I had it with me when I went to the dig.’

  Robert finished shaving parmesan on top of the salad and placed the bowl on the table. ‘Get that down you before you do anything.’ He made Angela and Mamie sit down as he spooned the salad onto their plates. ‘Have you checked your office? The sitting room?’

  ‘No.’ Angela moved to get up.

  ‘Uh-uh, stay there and eat first. Then you can look. I don’t know. You’ll lose your head if it wasn’t screwed on.’

  ‘It’s stress and exhaustion,’ said Mamie. ‘Your mind is whirring with too many things.’

  Robert added, ‘Take a hat with you this afternoon. We don’t want you getting sunstroke.’

  ‘Sunstroke is not funny.’ Mamie broke the end off a baguette and started to butter it. ‘I remember skiing in Aspen with Goldie Hawn back in the eighties. It got very hot at the top of the mountain and the sun was scorching. One woman was taken very ill and Goldie and I had to get her down on the ski lift. Horrible. She needed hospital treatment.’

  Angela was getting irritated with the assumption that she was unwell and/or forgetful. ‘I’m fine. Really. My phone will turn up. It’s no drama.’

  Piran finished his tea and brushed the burger-bun crumbs from his fisherman’s smock. He had spent the lunch hour with Gasping Bob and Digger Pete, sitting in the dunes of Shellsand Bay. The tide was out and the long stretch of wet sand between them and the water’s edge had people scattered over it. Some were dragging body boards to the virtually flat sea, others were playing boules or throwing Frisbees.

  A sandy tennis ball landed at Piran’s feet followed by a wet dog and a small child.

  ‘Watch where you’re going,’ he said, patting the dog and smiling at the laughing child.

  ‘That’s our ball,’ the child told him with youthful menace.

  ‘’Tis that. Want me to throw it for you?’ Before the child could answer, Piran threw the ball high. ‘There you go.’

  The dog and child left Piran in a shower of sand as they dashed off after it.

  He began to pack up his rubbish. ‘Right fellas, fit to go again?’

  ‘Aye.’ Pete checked the time on his phone. ‘Reckon we’m got a few hours left in the day.’

  Gasping Bob stubbed out his latest roll-up and burped. ‘Do you think we’re going to find anything? How much further do you think?’

  Piran shook his head. ‘Just scratched the surface. I’ll bet my dog’s life on us finding something this weekend. Why else would there be such an enormous clump of gunnera growing there? They’m only grow that strong where there’s water.’

  ‘Maybe it’s a stream and not a pond,’ Bob said.

  Whatever it was, the villagers hadn’t had so much fun together in years.

  At the vicarage, Angela was wiping the last of the Caesar dressing from her plate with some French bread. ‘Delicious, Robert. Thank you.’

  ‘I’ll clear this up.’ Mamie began to collect their plates. ‘You two go and check on the dig.’

  Angela sighed. ‘I’m beginning to wonder if this is going to turn out to be a wild-goose chase. The boys found some damp sand under the top soil and, if there ever was a pond, it may have disappeared.’

  ‘Hey.’ Robert, sitting next to her, nudged her arm with his. ‘No negativity. If there is a pond, g
reat. If there isn’t, well, it’s been a good community project. History. Myth. A day out. What could be better?’

  ‘Yeah, I know all that, but an awful lot of people have given a lot of their time to this. If it all fails I’ll be remembered as the newcomer vicar who got carried away … If I’m remembered at all.’

  ‘Oh for heaven’s sake,’ said Mamie. ‘Self-pity is not worthy of you. Robert, take her away and have a lovely afternoon in the sun together. You might be surprised yet.’

  Robert and Angela arrived at the site in time to see Digger Pete start the first excavation of the afternoon. The crowd had thinned considerably since the morning, most of them heading for the beach where the ice cream van had also relocated. Just about a dozen die-hard gawpers remained.

  Angela and Robert made their way to the orange-taped barrier.

  ‘Ah, Mrs Whitehorn. You haven’t missed much,’ Audrey said. She was very sunburnt now, her legs, out of her unsuitable shorts, like sausages in tight skins. She walked unsteadily towards them. ‘Robert, I have been waiting for you.’ She smiled at him.

  ‘Hello, Audrey. How is it all going?’ Robert could see she wasn’t quite herself.

  Audrey placed her hand on his shoulder. ‘You do look very handsome. So strong.’

  Robert raised his concerned eyebrows towards Angela.

  ‘Are you quite well, Audrey?’ Angela stepped closer. ‘You look a little flushed.’

  ‘Flushed?’ Audrey slurred. ‘Flushed? Mrs Whitehorn, I have never … oh, the ground is being silly … I may need to sit down a moment … Robert, can you help?’

  Robert put an arm out for her to lean on. She looked giddily into his eyes.

  ‘Such a lovely man, you are, and so strong and handsome. Oh dear, I’m …’ She collapsed against Robert and he tried to catch her but she tumbled to the ground, pulling him with her. He felt his balance going and, whirling his arms helplessly, he fell on top of her. His knees hit hard ground but his face was saved by her bosoms.

  ‘Oh my God!’ He could feel whale bone against his nose. ‘Angela! Help.’

  Angela bent down to lift Robert off her but Audrey had got Robert in a sort of Boston crab.