by David Mark
Seven weeks on, this little square room feels like home. The exposed floorboards are stained almost black but the rest of the cosy space is made up of warm colours. Rag rugs overlap either side of the soft, springy bed, the eiderdown a heavy affair in splendid reds and golds. An oil lamp sits on a pedestal table within arm’s reach, and little toppled columns of hardback books form stepping stones from the bed to the big, old, wooden door. Gold hooks on the back of the door are eclipsed by the old fur coats she found in a downstairs wardrobe and which she uses as ostentatious dressing gowns when taking a late-night trip to the toilet. Sometimes she vacates the bed to go and lounge on the blue chesterfield against the far wall, its scarred leather surface mostly covered up by the colossal crocheted blanket with its gypsy-rose motif. She always feels rather decadent when reclining, as though she should have a cigarette in a plastic holder and be wearing her hair in a sleek suffragette bob, rather than the short, choppy pixie cut she has given herself with a pair of dress scissors.
‘Morning. Are you decent?’
She smiles, ear to ear. He always asks her the same question before softly opening the door. His knock is a quiet, respectful thing, as if frightened that he may be about to wake a small child or disturb a sleeping bear cub.
She arranges herself neatly, sitting up, back to the headboard, quilt puddled around her middle, big sloppy T-shirt hanging decorously off one shoulder. She rubs her hand over her face as he enters; a cafetière and bottle of fresh orange juice on a tray, along with toast in a rack, a butter dish and a selection of jams. When Betsy is up early enough to return the favour, she intends to pick wildflowers and put them in a glass half full of water, just to give the tray that little extra touch of class, but she considers herself amply satisfied with his efforts.
‘Oh Jude, you don’t have to keep spoiling me like this, you’ve done so much …’
He places the tray at the foot of the bed and looks at her in that way of his: not quite smiling but his eyes radiating delight in her. There’s something timeless about him. She entertains fanciful notions that he is a spirit trapped in a haunted house; a manifestation from another time. She has so many questions for him but doesn’t know where to start asking. She cannot fathom the transformation between the musician she saw online, and the quiet, rough-handed man who always seems to be resisting the urge to reach out and stroke her hair.
‘No bother.’
‘But you must have so much to do – I’m such a nuisance.’
‘I like making you smile in a morning. I’m sure you’ll return the favour.’
‘Haven’t you got to be shaving the piglets or feeding the sycamores or something?’
‘That’s the joy of living on farmer time – you get to decide what pace you want to go.’
They go through this same conversation most mornings.
‘Do you mind if I …?’
She nods, motioning at the foot of the bed. He pours himself a coffee, adds a splash of milk. Eschews the option of sitting on the bed in favour of crossing to the window, opening the curtains, and looking out through the small square frame; a tapestry of blue skies hemmed with a thick tasselled foot of rippling greenery. Betsy ignores the view. Looks at him instead. He’s wearing his summer workwear: an old T-shirt, tatty moleskin trousers and work boots. His Akubra cattleman hat gives him a cowboy aspect. It’s dark with old sweat and will be darker still by the day’s end.
‘Sleep well?’ he asks, as she pours herself coffee and spreads a homemade gooseberry jam on buttered toast.
‘Until the birds started auditioning for X Factor, yeah,’ says Betsy, tucking in.
‘Aye, the nuthatch is an acquired taste,’ smiles Jude.
‘That’s a bird yes? The one that sounds like Space Invaders? It’s called a nuthatch? That is so what I would call the gusset in a pair of boxer shorts.’
‘I know you’re joking,’ he smiles. ‘I take comfort in the knowledge that you’re joking.’
‘I told you, I wouldn’t know the difference between a robin and a penguin!’ says Betsy, licking jam from her finger. ‘I only know a turkey because it’s bald and has an onion up its arse. That’s rather hard to get wrong.’
He takes a gulp of his coffee. Considers her. ‘You’ve got a shine about you today. You always do, but you’ve got that glow. They’d have burned you as a witch in the olden days.’
Betsy focuses on her toast, playing things cool. Manages to breathe in a crumb. She holds in the resulting cough, which chooses her nostrils for an emergency exit and a moment later she is coughing, spluttering, sneezing and utterly malfunctioning in front of a man who thinks she glows.
He pours orange juice. Helps her sip it. Wipes the tears from her face with a rough thumb.
‘So smooth,’ wheezes Betsy, her chest sore and features burning. ‘I’m the coolest person I know.’
He sits back down, shaking his head. ‘You fancy helping out today? It’s one of the nicer jobs.’
Betsy narrows her eyes, unsure how to wear her face. Helping out? Was he serious? So far she thinks of herself entirely more hindrance than help. When she’d first arrived he’d made some vague suggestion that she help out a little, just to see whether country living was for her. Thus far, that has consisted of doing a little invoicing on Jude’s behalf, ordering feed from a supplier – a task she got spectacularly wrong – and trying to tidy the living room in a way that did not actually give off the impression of her trespassing on his inner sanctum. This has involved lifting up books and dusting beneath them, then replacing the books so he doesn’t notice. She has taken a lot of Brasso to his musical instruments, only to learn that this could cause vintage instruments to turn from a gorgeous brassy gold to a kind of mottled pewter hue in the space of twenty minutes. She was midway through cleaning one of the visually impenetrable downstairs windows with an abrasive cloth when Jude had informed her that it was frosted glass.
‘I’m game for anything, but I’m a liability, you know that,’ says Betsy. A sudden thought spurts up, geyser-like, from a part of her mind that has been dormant for weeks. She scratches at her head, prickly heat at her pulse points, her scalp tightening. ‘Sorry, sorry, I just got this look at myself, this moment of clarity – what am I doing, Jude? Look at me, sitting here like Lady Muck, letting a stranger look after me, hiding away in the middle of nowhere like a teenage runaway!’
‘Are you OK, you’ve gone kind of grey?’
She ignores him, words tumbling out in a rush. ‘God, I wonder what all your neighbours think of me! I mean, I’m not bothered what people think, or maybe I am – Jay always said I was obsessed with approval but that can’t be true, can it? I mean, I went out of my way to be the opposite to what people are supposed to be. I dunno, I mean, well, how do you make yourself criticism proof? That’s the hard bit with all this social media stuff. Kids are having to find ways to be so unremarkable that there isn’t a single thing for people to pick them up on, but then they run the risk of being accused of being Average Joes, or whatever. This jam is amazing, by the way. It’s sort of tart, but not. It wakes your mouth up. Actually, that reminds me, I think I used your toothpaste. It’s the pink one, isn’t it? Tastes absolutely vile, what on earth do you use that for? Maybe I should get my own. We should probably talk about money, and stuff. I eat like a horse so I need to contribute, don’t I? The shop’s in Allenheads, you said? Or there’s the Tesco in Hexham. I can’t put it off, I need to show my face, but I sort of feel embarrassed, like I’ve duped you into giving me a place, and I haven’t, have I? I mean, I know it’s weird, how quickly it’s all happened, or hasn’t happened, but that’s just circumstances rather than choices, and …’
She realizes Jude is smiling at her. Realizes she may need to stop talking in order to take an actual breath. She sags, suddenly very tired. She wants to slink back down into the cushions. Wants him to climb in beside her and stroke her hair until she falls back to sleep.
‘I don’t think I’m interesting enough for the n
eighbours to give me or my companions a second thought,’ says Jude, thoughtfully.
‘Oh, I’m one of many, am I?’ asks Betsy, in a way that she hopes is playful.
He shakes his head. ‘Sylvia’s the gossip, and she’s on your side. Thinks you’re brilliant. Hasn’t stopped popping up under false pretences, desperate to see how you’re settling in.’
Betsy finishes her coffee. ‘I feel bad for Carly. She really would have looked after me.’
‘She would,’ nods Jude. ‘She still can, if you tire of this. If you’re wanting to go to the shops you’ll pass into a signal area and you can call her then. Tell her you’re doing OK. Send her some flowers or something. I’ve got your money downstairs.’
She crinkles her brow. ‘My money?’
‘The package from Campion.’
‘Oh!’ she says, unsure how to respond. ‘I wasn’t sure if I’d lost that. Or imagined it.’
‘It fell out of your trousers on the way to hospital.’ He cocks his head. ‘You didn’t think I’d taken it, did you? I wouldn’t touch money from that bastard and I sure as hell wouldn’t steal from an unconscious woman.’ He turns away, hard to read. ‘Jesus, people really have messed you up, haven’t they? I hate the idea of people damaging you.’
Betsy studies the pattern in the bedspread. ‘I wind people up,’ she mumbles.
‘Everybody who’s hurt you, mistreated you, looked at you like you’re anything less than spectacular – I want to show them just how wrong they were.’
There’s something about the way he says it which causes the hairs on Betsy’s arms to rise. Shivers, involuntarily, and Jude immediately changes his demeanour, waving away the darkness in the air that has briefly gathered about him. ‘We can talk about that now, or the past can be left where it belongs.’
‘Does he know I’ve gone? Did he call in the police? Does he think I’m missing? I’m getting a bit twitchy, if I’m honest. My head’s a bit jangly. I mean, he did go for me, didn’t he? Tried to squeeze my throat shut? And you came. I know you came for me, and there was a hospital, and now I’m here and I think I’m happy, but I don’t even really know what you do, or anything about you, and …’
Jude returns to the bed. Sits down. She gets a whiff of him. It’s a warm smell that makes her think of a badger’s burrow: cosy and dry and the sort of place where a lost soul could make a safe, secure little home.
‘You didn’t answer my question,’ says Jude, softly. ‘Do you want to help out? I’ve got to do some felling at the dingle.’
‘The dingle?’ grins Liz. ‘Is that a real thing?’
‘Yeah. A little woodland, just up the valley. The beck we get our water from runs through it. Beautiful at this time of year, and occasionally profitable.’
‘What do you do?’ she asks, unsure where this is heading. ‘Shave bears and sell their fleece or something?’
‘Bears?’ he asks, frowning. ‘You realize they don’t live in Britain, don’t you?’
She tuts at him, as if he’s been a little insulting. ‘Of course!’ she says, then adds, under her breath, ‘I do now.’
‘That’s a relief. Anyways, the golf club likes to serve hedgerow specialties when they’re available,’ he continues. ‘Delicacies; gorse lemonade, hawthorn bread, stuff that sounds good in a fancy cookbook. They’ve asked me to rustle up some elderflower champagne. There’s a great clump of the stuff at the dingle. You can pick while I fell, and then we can make it together. It smells wonderful.’
Betsy pours the last of her coffee into the mug. ‘A lot of that was just noise, Jude. I heard “rustle” and “clump” and “smells wonderful” and that must mean there’s a sentence to be had, but I’m not going to bother looking for it. Anyway, if you’re willing to take the risk, I’m game.’ She smiles, feeling better. ‘Dingle all the way.’
She sees her left hand rise and move swiftly forward, fastening over the hard, grimy knuckles of his clenched right fist. She can’t stop herself from pushing for more. ‘Is it healthy, do you think? Just shutting out the world and acting like none of it is happening?’
Jude lays his head on one side, giving the matter some thought. ‘Who knows what’s right? Like you say, everybody wants to be criticism proof. You tried one way and it nearly killed you. Maybe try this for a while, eh?’
She drops her gaze to the bedspread. ‘She had nice taste, your Maeve. Her things are lovely.’
He looks puzzled. ‘You’ve never said her name before. And I know I haven’t.’
‘I Googled her. I told you. The day it all …’
‘So you’ll know what people said.’
She looks away, wishing she hadn’t spoken. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to …’
She feels his rough thumb stroking the soft skin of her palm. ‘It’s all OK, Betsy. Ask me what you like.’
‘I will,’ decides Betsy. Her grin becomes impish, her whole manner teenage and full of mischief. ‘And you’re going to take me up the dingle, yes?’
He grins, a flash of white teeth and a crinkling of the eyes. ‘You are the strangest person I’ve ever met. Don’t ever change.’
‘You won’t always say that,’ mutters Betsy, trying to keep things light, and failing.
‘Yes,’ he says, eyes fixed on hers. He says it like a prophesy. ‘Yes, I will.’
FIFTEEN
The dingle is every bit as charming as its name suggests. Jude did give Betsy the option of taking the quad bike, but he had also offered the chance to enjoy what he had referred to as ‘a little walk up the hill’ – a sentence that had sent Marshall into great paroxysms of excited barking. Betsy had felt unable to disappoint him, and besides, a walk had sounded nice. They left the bastle just after seven a.m., Betsy in a colourful patchwork dress that Jude had laid out across the lid of the colossal wooden hamper at the top of the stairs. She hasn’t rummaged around in its depths yet, but she plans to. It’s an antique piece, easily big enough to hide a family in, and the first place she’ll head in the event of a rising flood. She has a sneaking suspicion that it is full of Maeve’s old things, but she has enough of a grip on herself not to go looking for landmines to sow in their Eden. Not yet, anyway.
They’ve made their way down the hard dirt track and the wooden footbridge across the river – Marshall bounding ahead – then begun their ascent up the green slope, patterned with white and yellow flowers and cut into occasional squares by patches of dry bracken. Jude has pointed out old lead mine workings as they walked – showed her the remains of a house unoccupied since the First World War. Our place was like that, he’d said, casually. Just a ruin.
Twenty minutes later – exhausted, limp and oozing moisture like a malaria sufferer – Betsy is beginning to regret her decision to walk. Jude has dictated the pace, which hasn’t been much above a leisurely amble, but Betsy has never been good in the heat and today the sky has been travel-brochure blue; the sun a big blurry golden medal on a sailor’s suit. By the time they spot the line of trees that point the way to Swinburnhope Wood, Betsy is starting to hate nature with a passion she had previously reserved for Nazis and traffic wardens. It comes as a true relief to finally duck under the leafy parasol of the trees and to hear the low applause of the river chuckling its way over rocks. The temperature drops almost at once. Betsy takes her first deep breath since leaving the bastle. Reminds herself that it is unladylike to spit.
She looks up, foggy-eyed. The dingle is almost unreal in its loveliness, as if it has been designed as a Hollywood filmset. Butterflies and dragonflies flit like faeries between flowers of yellow, blue and white, while the trees tower so high above that their tops are out of sight. The grass and moss beneath her feet looks inviting as a feather-bed and she can hear the pleasant gurgle of water splashing over rocks somewhere nearby. There’s a path, of sorts; a slim track that heads in the direction of the running water, the branches of the sweet-scented evergreens forming an arbour overhead. Betsy feels an urge to string it with fairy lights.
‘T
his is amazing,’ she says, catching her breath. ‘It’s beautiful, really. Is it … yours?’
He flashes her a grin, Marshall springing around his legs. ‘Ownership is a hard thing to explain when it comes to a woodland. Nobody should own something like this – it belongs to everybody. But if you’re asking me whether, on paper, it’s part of the area I look after, then yes, it is.’
‘That was a complicated answer,’ smiles Betsy. ‘I’ve noticed you’re good at that. You tell me things in a way that makes me feel like you’ve answered, when really you’ve just given me more questions.’
‘Do I?’ He looks troubled by the accusation. ‘Maeve used to say I didn’t know how to communicate.’
‘You fought a lot?’ asks Betsy, eagerly.
‘I didn’t fight,’ he says, quietly. ‘She did.’
They traipse on in silence, enjoying the relative cool of the forest. She hears birds she cannot remember noticing before. Somewhere, bees drone fatly in the undergrowth. She looks up at Jude, shading her eyes with her hand, and realizes he is smiling. He seems happy here. Peaceful. It is as if this is where he belongs.
‘Down yonder,’ he says, gesturing through the trees. He seems unconcerned by the multitude of different insects that are landing upon the faint sheen of sweat at his neck and bare forearms. ‘I’ve a bit to do but I’ll talk you through it.’
She follows him, her feet sinking into the soft grass. She wants to take her shoes off, feel the caress of the dew-dampened moss upon her bare soles. She realizes he is speaking to her – that she has been lost in her own thoughts.