by Gloria Cook
‘You look lovely. You always do.’ He turned and headed off up the track, taking a biscuit out of his pocket. ‘Hey, here boy! I’ve got something for you.’
Faye was still a little shocked, but full of joy that he’d paid her a compliment. So he had noticed her. Brilliant! She was bubbling over inside like a young girl out on a secret tryst. She loved Mark even more. She had to have him and she’d do anything to get him. She stopped wiping herself down and went after him.
The stray dog ambled shamefacedly back down the track towards Mark, who kept encouraging it while crouching low. Faye stood back a few inches and watched, believing, as the dog took the biscuit from Mark’s hand and allowed him to pat its filthy back, that it was the most charming scene she’d ever seen. Faye wasn’t fond of dogs, she allowed none in the house despite the Smiths’ pleas for a pet, pointing out there was a collie and two gun dogs on the farm they could romp with, but now she had found a way to impress Mark. ‘Oh, the poor thing. No wonder he’s wary, lots of pets have been killed because people aren’t prepared to stretch their rations. It looks like a Labrador-cross. You can hardly tell with his coat so terribly matted. He needs a bath and a good feed.’
‘You mean it’s all right to take him back and clean him up? I thought it too much of an imposition to ask before. I’ve tried washing him down in the stream, but he was too hungry to want to hang about.’
‘Well, we can’t just leave him here. He’s quite young and has survived so far, but it’s only a matter of time before someone shoots him, perhaps even someone from the farm. You’ve gained his trust, Mark, he deserves to be taken care of.’ Cautiously she reached a hand out to the dog. It edged away.
Mark held on to him. ‘Are you sure? He could sleep in the ancillary room. I’ll find something to make him a bed. I’m handy at knocking things together. I’ll pay for his food and veterinary treatment, of course. Thanks a million, Faye! You’re one of the best.’ He looked at Faye with sparkling eyes. He was so different to when weariness was weighing him down and when his mind shut itself off. ‘I think he’ll follow me. Come on, Addi.’
Faye went first so the dog wouldn’t feel threatened by her. She would abandon her task for the day. She couldn’t call on her tenants in her messed-up state anyway. Mark took a few steps away from the dog and called to him. It followed, halted, then padded along as Mark kept up the friendly encouragement. ‘You already have a name for him, Mark?’ she looked over her shoulder.
‘I’ve been calling Addi for a while. It’s after one of my closest friends, Lieutenant Clive Addison. He didn’t make it back from Changi. He’d be thrilled about this. We used to talk about getting home and keeping dogs.’ Instead of eating the scraggy mutts they’d felt lucky to lay their desperate hands on, or cats and any other remotely edible creature, living or dead.
‘Well, Addi’s on his way to his new home now.’
‘You’re so kind, Faye. Don’t worry, we won’t impose on you forever. We’ll get our own little place, and I’ve an idea about that.’
‘You’re not ready for that yet, Mark,’ Faye asserted, her heart plummeting. ‘Have you thought where you’d like to settle – one day?’
‘Not until a few minutes ago. Not too far away, perhaps.’
She was pleased at this. Her greatest fear was that he’d return to Surrey or decide on somewhere else far away. Next instant she was in for a sharp drop in her hopes when he said, ‘Come on, Addi. Let’s see if Susan’s got some tasty leftovers. Maureen’s going to love you.’
* * *
Tristan had spent the early part of the morning in the garden, sowing marrow, salad beets and rows of carrots. Tremore was self-sufficient in food and there was too much work for the elderly, part-time gardener to cope with alone. Knowing Faye had left the house shortly after Mark, and with the children at school, and Simon in with Agnes, he could hardly wait to go in for his morning coffee and spend time alone with Susan. He shrugged off the old cricket jumper he kept for outdoor work, changed his boots for shoes, and whistled merrily as he washed his hands in the scullery. He studied his reflection in the bottom of a gleaming copper saucepan. Did he look his fifty-four years? Older? Perhaps he could allow himself three or four years younger. Agnes often said he ‘did himself proud’ and was ‘in fine fettle’, but he didn’t know what she’d meant in terms of his age, and he hadn’t cared about it until now. True, he had a slim waistline and held himself straight. He didn’t have many frown lines or crow’s feet, and the silver in his black hair gave him a touch of dash, so he hoped. Perhaps he should lose the moustache. It might make him look a little more youthful.
‘Are you out of your head?’ he whispered to his suddenly nerve-stricken image. ‘You’ve finished with that sort of thing, love and romance. And Susan wouldn’t possibly want someone so much older. If you want female company, pick someone your own age. A matronly type who wants nothing more than companionship.’ But he wasn’t ready to be put into that category yet.
He chastised himself further, putting every obstacle in the way of forming something close and meaningful with Susan. He did this a hundred times a day, and into the small hours each night, for his brain was in a constant whirl about her and he couldn’t sleep. Did he have bags and dark circles under his eyes? He thrust his face forward to consult the saucepan. ‘You really are mad. You’ve never been vain before.’ But it wasn’t vanity, he was just anxious to know if he looked a suitable prospect for Susan. He didn’t want her horrified at the prospect that a haggard, middle-aged man was trying to impose himself on her. Or worse still, that he wanted to get her into bed. Susan seemed to like and trust him. He couldn’t bear to lose their polite and informal relationship.
He’d go back to the garden, then. Or to the farm and get a drink there. He went to the door, opened it, looked down at his earthy boots lined up beside the iron scraper. A token gesture. How could it be otherwise? He wasn’t going anywhere, except to the kitchen, where Susan was probably putting the kettle on for her own morning break. He’d allow her to pour his coffee and then he’d take it outside. Like hell, he would. He came up with all the possibilities and hopes. That Susan might, just might, somehow, some day, if he went about it the right way, and if the gods were kind to him, and if fate played some magnificent hand, that she might see him differently than as one of her employers. Was it such a strange thing to hope that she might even fall in love with him? He had a lot to offer her and Maureen, security, a better home, status. He’d happily settle for Susan seeing him as the provider of these things and hope she’d view him with affection. These were the other thoughts that kept him awake at night and filled him with daytime fancies? But he wasn’t going to win her by dithering on the doorstep.
He tried to ignore the horrible squirming feeling in the pit of his stomach. Susan was on the other side of the kitchen door. ‘Right then. Through the door and into battle, so to speak.’ He straightened his collar-less, open-neck shirt, grinning to himself. Then he collapsed inside. ‘Oh God,’ he looked up in agony, spreading imploring hands. ‘Do I have to go on behaving in these idiotic over-jolly terms?’
Susan wasn’t in the kitchen. His heart crashed down to the shiny tiles beneath his feet. Had she gone shopping? He touched the kettle on the range. It was cold. She hadn’t had her break. She could be somewhere in the house. Right, he’d look about for her, on the pretext he’d forgotten his cigarettes.
He listened for her singing. There was silence. What day was it? What was her routine? He was so flustered he couldn’t remember. The library door was open. There she was, her ash-blonde hair shining like a sheet gold where the sun beamed down on her, a picture of youth and loveliness. She could have been wearing a floating evening gown with jewels in her hair, for he did not see her plain dress, apron and boring shoes. She was gazing down at the long library table, her caddy of cleaning things on a chair.
He stole up beside her. ‘Hello.’ He used the softest voice.
She looked up. ‘Mr Tristan. I’m s
orry, I was looking at these.’ She indicated a mass of photographs spread across the table. ‘You’ll be wanting your coffee.’
‘In a minute,’ he said. He wasn’t going to waste the opportunity of holding her interest in something. ‘I’ve been sorting them out to put into separate albums for my children. They tell my family story.’ He pointed out his parents and brothers.
‘It must be sad for you, losing all your brothers,’ Susan said with sympathy.
‘Yes. I miss them a lot. Don’t know what I’d have done if Faye and Simon hadn’t turned up.’
‘You’ve had a lot of tragedy, but you’ve got the Smith children here now.’
You and Maureen too, if you’re willing, one day.
She picked up a studio portrait of Winifred Harvey, which showed her patrician grace. ‘I saw your wife about a week before she was knocked down, while you were both here on a visit. I was walking to the shop and she was taking a stroll in the lane. We chatted about how the war was going and she kindly asked me if I was coping all right.’
‘That was Winnie,’ Tristan said, sad again at his loss. ‘Kind to a fault. I was very lucky to have had her.’ He showed Susan other photos. ‘This is our daughter Adele in her Wrens uniform. She married a naval captain last year and they’re currently in Hong Kong, where’s he serving. And this is Winnie’s daughter, my stepdaughter, Vera Rose. She lives in London. And this handsome chap,’ he went on proudly, ‘is my son Jonny, by my first wife.’
Susan took the photo of a strikingly good-looking RAF officer. ‘Oh, I’ve met him too.’
‘He didn’t bother you, I hope. He’s a bit of a one for the ladies.’ Tristan smiled down fondly at the picture that displayed his son’s thick coal-black hair and gleaming white teeth.
‘I gathered that. He was charm itself. The sort to make you feel you’re the only woman in the world. Maureen was with me, she said she’s going to marry him when she grows up.’ Susan laughed. ‘How’s his hand now? I know he got shot down just after D-Day and suffered some burns.’
‘It allows him to instruct the younger pilots, but he gets frustrated he can no longer zoom along looping the loop.’ Susan pointed to a lady in an ankle-length suit, a high-neck lace blouse, and a wide-brimmed hat over a cottage-loaf hairstyle. ‘Who’s this, may I ask? She’s so beautiful.’ Tristan took a moment to answer. Herein lay some of his saddest memories. ‘That was Jonny’s mother, Ursula. She died when he was five years old, from childbirth… it wasn’t my baby.’
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.’
Tristan loved her for the compassion in her eyes. ‘It’s a long story. I was on injury leave from the Front, and Ursula was about to leave me for her lover and take Jonny away. I took it very badly, and when the fellow abandoned her I left Ursula to die alone. I’m ashamed of what I did.’
‘I can’t imagine you doing anything to hurt anyone. You mustn’t blame yourself.’ Susan took a searching look at him.
‘Thank you.’ Her declarations heartened him, and the fact she was allowing him to entrust her with these most personal of memories. ‘But it’s all rather complicated. Jonny’s half-sister was adopted and brought up in Truro without either of them knowing about it. It was my decision to keep it a secret – I was too hard. Thankfully, it was all resolved in the end and Jonny was united with Louisa.’
‘You had your reasons for what you did. You suffered. People don’t always know what goes on… well, it’s good that you’ve got a lot of family members.’
He plunged in with a personal question. ‘Have you anyone else apart from Maureen and your brother Kenny?’
She shook her head. ‘No one, but please don’t think that makes me unhappy.’ She looked over the photographs again.
‘I’m glad to hear that. Was there anything else you’d like to know about?’
She pointed. ‘I was wondering about the fine house there. It looks as if it’s by the sea.’
‘Ah, that’s Roskerne. It is by the sea, at Watergate Bay, near Newquay. It’s where I lived with Winnie. It was her house, and after she died I felt it only right it should pass on to Vera Rose. She kindly allows the family to use it for holidays. Faye and I took the children there for three weeks last summer and we’re planning to do so again this year. Agnes came with us. She doesn’t want to come this year. You and Maureen must come instead.’
Susan’s lovely blue eyes lit up as if the sun was shining straight out of them. ‘Really? You mean it? We’ve never been to the seaside before. Maureen would love it.’
‘It would be a holiday for you too, just as it was for Agnes last year. She deserved it and so do you. I insist.’ Tristan smiled down on her, while longing to tell her how important she was to him. He felt certain she’d never been told that before by anyone except Maureen. ‘Vera Rose employs a local man and his wife to look after the house and see to the garden, and Mrs Loze is happy to cook and make up picnics for us. I’ve got an antique and curio shop in Newquay. You must pay a visit there.’ He would take her there personally.
‘What about Mr Fuller?’
‘If he’s still with us he’ll be welcome too, of course. Some sea air will do him a power of good.’
The long case clock in the room suddenly chimed eleven o’clock. ‘I’d better get on,’ Susan flushed guiltily. ‘I’ll make your coffee first.’
‘You mustn’t miss your break, Susan. It’s I who’s kept you talking.’
They went to the kitchen together, both looking forward to the summer at Watergate Bay, but for different reasons. ‘Someone’s coming in,’ Susan said, going to the scullery door.
‘Drat,’ Tristan muttered under his breath. More time alone with her was being denied.
‘Oh, you’ve got the stray!’ she exclaimed, as Mark and Faye entered in unkempt states, they and the dog dirtying her spotlessly scrubbed floor. ‘Maureen begged me to let her have him but I couldn’t really afford to feed him. I’ve given him what I could spare.’
‘Susan, would you mind if I gave him a bath in here?’ Mark said. ‘And have you got any scraps? He’s ravenous.’
‘Do what you want for him, Mark. Poor thing, I’ll see what I can find him to eat. Have you brought him back for the children, Faye?’
‘No, he’s going to be Mark’s, but they’ll love having him here,’ Faye replied. ‘There’s an old tin bath in a shed at the farm. One of the farm hands is bringing it over for us.’ Faye stressed the ‘us’.
‘Meet Addi,’ Mark said, crouching beside the nervous dog. ‘You’re not going to be too much trouble for Susan, are you, old boy?’
‘I’ll fetch some soapy water and rags to clean him up,’ Susan said. ‘After your tummy’s full, eh, Addi?’ She put a hand out to Addi and he licked it, trusting her from seeing her before.
‘He’s going to need to have his fleas combed out,’ Mark said to Susan.
‘He’s going to need a lot of attention,’ she replied. She had forgotten all about the coffee.
Tristan and Faye stood back and watched. Forgotten too.
Chapter Nine
The school grounds were laid out with desks and trestle tables borrowed from the Methodist social rooms. Emilia and Elena Killigrew, who together headed all the village committees, had arranged an end of summer term Bring and Buy sale to raise funds for a new heating system for the school. They expected a good turnout. The locals didn’t want the children to shiver through another winter.
Faye arrived with Simon. For a long time after her return to Hennaford, she had been wary about getting involved in village events, but with her aunt in charge, no one yet had dared make direct remarks about her lack of marital status, although she often got the sense some were itching to. She was proud to show Simon off. He was well behaved and appealing, a handsome child. It was time the villagers saw more of him. Time he took his place in Hennaford. After all, no matter what people thought of her, her precious son had done nothing wrong.
She found herself manning the toy stall, its wares
mainly knitted or sewn from old garments, or made from scraps of wood and metal. There were tired and well-loved old toys sacrificed for the good cause. The stall was down the far wall of the girls’ concrete playground. On the other side was a long field of Ford Farm’s, alive with breeze swaying maturing corn. Away across the fields she could see her cousin Tom driving a tractor, haymaking, and cattle grazing in another.
She was joined by Lottie, who settled Carl next to Simon, the boys in their pushchairs, content for the moment to gaze at the busy scene of nearly all women getting ready for the opening. ‘Hello. It’s a lovely day for this. Just think, in a couple of years Simon will be going here. I feel quite sad to think Carl won’t be attending my old school.’
‘Any prospects of a farm of your own yet?’ Faye unpacked the box she had brought with her.
‘Nothing yet.’ Lottie picked up a tiny rag doll Faye put on the table and spread out its crinoline dress, made from oddments of silk and lace. ‘Nate and I can’t seem to agree on exactly what we want. Yesterday we looked over a smallholding at Allet. Too small, of course, but I thought we could see about buying the land around it. Nate wasn’t interested. There was a place down at Land’s End, but I said it was too far away. Nate says he’s used to distance, that Land’s End at just over forty miles away is just a stroll to him, and he’s now decided to look out of the county. I’ve told him I’ve no intention of settling far away from Hennaford. Why should I? Family ties are important to me. He’s not taking me seriously.’
Nate had unsettled her last night when he’d said firmly, ‘It’s a man’s place to provide a home for his wife and family, honey, and that’s what I intend to do. I’ll get you your own car. When the gas rationing is over you’ll be able to see your mom as often as you like. Don’t frown, Lottie, you were an adventurous girl when I met you. Can’t see what your problem is.’