Freddie nodded silently. Her impassioned speech had moved him beyond words.
‘Dad.’ Tessa spoke quietly now, intensely, her hand on his sleeve. ‘I’m doing for them what you did for me, all my life.’
‘What was that?’
‘You inspired me, Dad. Like the times you took Lucy and me into the woods at the winter solstice – to touch the trees and feel them coming alive, listen for the song thrush, and find mistletoe. The times when you took us to the river to watch water voles and dragonflies, and the stories you told us about Granny Barcussy, and the times we played in her ruined cottage in the woods. It was precious, Dad, and it will stay with me, always.’
Freddie nodded, his eyes glistening softly.
‘But the BEST thing you did for me,’ Tessa concluded, ‘was that you loved me when I was horrible.’
They sat in silence for a few minutes, letting the words settle into manageable calm.
‘Well – I hope Paul appreciates you,’ Freddie said, looking at Violetta’s amethyst ring on his daughter’s slim finger.
‘He needs me.’
‘Well – I hope he doesn’t need you too much.’
‘What do you mean, Dad?’
Freddie hesitated. ‘I can see it in his eyes – an emptiness.’
‘You’re right. Paul had a terrible childhood, nothing like mine. No one believed in him, and he’s a brilliant musician. He comes alive when he plays music.’
‘So why do you want to marry him?’
‘He loves me, and I believe a good marriage will change him. I want to give him the love and support he never had.’
‘Ah, he’s not gonna change. People don’t. You be careful, dear, please. You can’t spend your life helping lame dogs over stiles.’
Tessa felt defensive now. She didn’t agree with Freddie’s warning, but she didn’t want to spoil the special time with him.
‘Shall we go and see the field?’ Freddie asked, rescuing her.
‘I’d rather go up to the ridgeway,’ Tessa said, meeting her Dad’s eyes. ‘I don’t want to go to the field – not yet – maybe not ever. It hurts too much.’
PART TWO
1970
CHAPTER 13
Honeymoon
The first cracks in Tessa’s relationship with Paul appeared just hours after the wedding.
An enthusiastic group of friends and family followed their car with its tin cans, balloons and streamers flying, to Castle Cary Station, armed with bags of confetti and rice. They gave chase as Paul and Tessa ran, giggling, over the footbridge. Tessa felt strange in her ‘going away’ outfit, a heavily textured Crimplene jacket and skirt in ‘duck egg’. The colour suited her, but the fabric felt scratchy and toxic. ‘But you MUST have a hat,’ Kate had insisted, and Tessa had reluctantly chosen the smallest possible hat, a crescent of blue feathers curled uncomfortably over the top of her head. It felt like a dragon’s claw. The hairdresser in Monterose had dragged her hair back and created an extravagant bun held together with sharp hairpins. It felt like a teazel.
Paul had nodded approvingly. ‘Very ladylike!’
Tessa didn’t want to look ladylike. She felt hot and itchy and longed to get on the train and hang her head out of the window, let the claw and the teazel unravel and blow away, let the wind stream through her hair. She was fed up with acting the radiant bride, smiling at aunties, sipping champagne when she wanted water, and striving to light a spark of approval in Penelope’s leonine eyes.
The hardest bit had been saying goodbye to her dad. Face to face on the platform as the train from Paddington came in, Freddie’s steady blue gaze was full of anxiety. She knew that he knew. ‘You remember your old dad,’ he said, ‘and remember you can always come home.’
I’d like to go home with you right now, Tessa thought, but her lips said, ‘Thanks, Dad. Don’t worry about me.’
They boarded the train under a hail of rice and confetti. Cameras with big flash guns flickered too close to their faces.
Kate blew a kiss, her eyes brimming with emotion. ‘Goodbye, darling,’ and she wagged a finger at Paul. ‘You look after my little girl.’ The train was moving now, and they hung out of the window waving, watching the loving faces getting smaller and smaller. It’s like dying, Tessa thought, watching your entire life vanish into a multi-coloured dot.
With her soul disappearing into infinity, she had a burning need to know where Paul was taking her. He’d relished keeping it a secret, his eyes twinkling stubbornly whenever she asked. She hoped the train was going to Southampton to catch the boat to France. But as the sleek diesel engine hummed past her on the platform she’d noticed the proud lettering on the side. It was the Cornishman. Surely, surely Paul wouldn’t be taking her there?
‘Now will you tell me where we’re going?’ she asked as they settled into two window seats.
Paul twinkled. ‘This train stops at about twenty stations so you’ll have to keep guessing! Or we might change trains. Now – come here, Mrs Selby, it’s time I kissed the bride properly.’ He pulled her towards him and kissed her long and hard, his hands grinding the rice and confetti into her back. Tessa felt like screaming. ‘What’s the matter with you?’ he asked. ‘You’re my wife now. I can kiss you whenever I like!’
‘No, you can’t.’ Tessa pulled away, glaring at him.
‘Hey – hey, don’t go all huffy,’ he said. ‘We’re on honeymoon.’
‘Honey and moon means sweetness and light,’ Tessa said, ‘not grope and grab.’
‘I wasn’t groping.’
‘Yes, you WERE.’
Paul looked affronted, and patronisingly amused. ‘You’d better calm down, Mrs Selby,’ he said. ‘You’re a married woman now.’
Tessa fumed silently. Her new name sounded mildly insulting and alien. She clawed at the neck of her blouse and fished out a handful of confetti and rice. ‘This is what’s bugging me.’ She tried to smile brightly like her mother would have done. ‘It’s down inside my clothes. I need to go into the loo, strip off and shake it out.’
Paul’s eyes lit up. ‘Oh boy! Can I come?’
‘No.’
Tessa escaped down the corridor and into the loo, slamming the bolt shut with a sense of relief. She confronted herself in the mirror. A young woman she didn’t recognise stared back with angry eyes. I look frumpy, she thought. While the train careered across the Levels towards Taunton, she stripped off and shook the confetti and rice grains all over the floor and into the toilet. She put on just the skirt and blouse. She liked the blouse for its motif of tiny white horses with their manes and tails flowing, and the satin felt good against her skin.
Her mind was racing like the train as she unpinned the complicated bun and let her hair roll down her back. Paul knew how passionately Tessa loved Cornwall. They’d met in St Ives, as hippies, that long-ago summer. But Tessa felt she could never go there again. To her it was sacred space, not to be revisited because it belonged to her intense love affair with Art. Her memory had sealed it in a golden bubble, forever floating over the wild and rocky cliffs out at Clodgy where she and Art had first made love in the hot grass. Kindred spirits. Lovers across time as if they’d lived many lifetimes together. She could never imagine St Ives without seeing Art’s serious grey eyes and feeling the sensual beauty of his warm, tanned body close to hers, feeling his love transforming her into an ethereal creature like Botticelli’s painting, Birth of Venus.
When they’d discussed the honeymoon, Tessa had tried to explain to Paul, without hurting him, that she never, ever wanted to go back to St Ives. He had listened, with a kind of darkness flowing through his eyes. It wasn’t there all the time. Only when he talked about his childhood. How his parents had favoured his sister, Amelia. How they’d pushed him mercilessly, and criticised the choices he made. How Amelia had ballet and piano lessons while Paul, who was musically gifted, was never even allowed to touch the piano. Instead he had to do macho stuff like rugby and rowing.
Tessa felt sorry for him. Sh
e could relate to those kinds of problems. She wanted to do for him what Art had done for her. Bring out the best in him. Show him he was worth loving. Nurture his music.
She went back to their compartment and sat down, running her fingers through her hair. ‘There, I feel like me again.’
Paul didn’t look too pleased. ‘Aw, I liked your new look,’ he said. ‘I like you looking ladylike and mature.’
‘Too bad,’ said Tessa. ‘I’m happy like this.’
The train rattled on through the March countryside, past flocks of sheep with baby lambs, and stretches of newly sown wheat and barley just showing their green blades. After Taunton they entered the rich red clay beds of Devon, then Exeter, and along the coast of the red rocks. Dawlish and Teignmouth flew by and they moved inland again. Tessa got increasingly anxious. She didn’t tell Paul, but sat beside him, her hand in his, her head on his shoulder as they talked and laughed about the wedding and the aunties.
‘Ah – the Tamar Bridge,’ Paul said as the train slowed down after Plymouth. ‘Isambard Kingdom Brunel. What a name – and what an engineer. Your dad would love this.’
‘He would,’ agreed Tessa. She leaned out of the window to taste the cool air rising from the silvery water.
‘Look at those battleships!’ Paul said.
‘I thought we might get off at Plymouth?’ Tessa said, ‘and get the ferry to Roscoff?’
‘No luck.’
‘But we must be in Cornwall now.’ Tessa felt her face begin to burn with frustration. ‘Paul – come on – I really need to know where we’re going.’
He sighed. ‘Don’t keep on about it. Enjoy the mystery.’
‘I’m not enjoying it. I’m worrying.’
‘Worrying? What – about a honeymoon with your handsome new husband? Don’t you trust me, Tessa?’
Tessa was silent.
‘For God’s sake, smile,’ Paul snapped suddenly. ‘You’re not going to a funeral.’
‘I’ll smile if I want to smile.’
‘Be like that then.’ Paul took a bottle of brandy from his pocket and swigged it. He put his feet up on the opposite seat and went to sleep.
It was getting dark. The train belted onwards. Liskeard. Bodmin. Parr. St Austell. Names Tessa remembered. She stared at Paul’s shiny black shoes propped on the seat. She eyed their precious luggage stored overhead in the string luggage racks. It crossed her mind that she could grab her nice new blue suitcase and get off at the next stop while Paul was asleep. She could make a run for freedom, and be a homeless hippie all over again. Except that Art would not be there.
When they got to Truro she was still on the train. She gave Paul a prod. ‘Wake up. There’s not many stations left and I don’t know where we’re getting off, do I?’
Paul yawned and stretched. He pressed his nose against the window. ‘Truro Cathedral. All lit up. You’ll soon find out, and you’re going to love it, Tessa.’
‘I need to know now, not soon.’
‘Don’t you think you’re making an unreasonable amount of fuss?’
‘No, Paul. That’s not fair. I carefully explained to you why I didn’t want to go to Cornwall, and in particular St Ives.’
‘St Ives is a beautiful place,’ Paul drew a piece of cream paper from his wallet and unfolded it, ‘and we’re staying in the lap of luxury.’ He thrust the paper in front of her with a flourish. ‘Ta-da!’
Tessa stopped breathing. A hotel in St Ives! For a week. And Paul’s eyes eagerly awaiting her reaction.
‘I can’t believe you’ve done this,’ she whispered. ‘You know how I feel about St Ives. Being there will be emotional torture for me.’
‘Don’t be silly, Tessa. You’ll get over it. You’ve got me now.’
Silly? The word danced in front of Tessa’s eyes like a wasp. One wasp for every time she had ever been called silly. Another half of her mind floated alongside, and it was the people-pleasing half. The wedding. The gifts of towels and saucepans. The aunties. But mostly it was about her mother’s dream of a white wedding for her daughter. The way Kate had opened her heart and her home to Paul. The way she kept saying, ‘You’ll be so happy, dear, when you get your own little home together.’ Kate had even helped her write the thank-you cards. ‘Thank you for the lovely Crown Derby tea set. It will look so nice in our new kitchen.’ ‘Thank you for the lovely embroidered napkins. They will come in very useful for entertaining.’ ‘Thank you for the Mrs Beeton’s cookery book. It’s just what every girl needs.’ The list went on and on.
And somewhere among the sets of saucepans, Tessa’s soul had gone missing. She felt like a troubled child again. She’d forgotten how Starlinda had taught her to rise above the emotional body. She was no longer in charge of her life.
‘Don’t look so stricken,’ Paul said. ‘I chose this place because I knew you’d love it. We’ve got a balcony with a view out towards Clodgy.’
It got worse.
‘You should have asked me,’ Tessa said.
‘I knew you’d say no,’ Paul explained. ‘I’ve done it for your own good, Tessa. It will help you get over that bastard Art. Once and for all.’
‘It’s not like that.’
Paul stared at her. Too late she saw a flow of darkness eclipsing the light in his eyes. ‘You still love him, don’t you?’ he hissed, and his cheeks turned white with anger. In one quick, robotic movement, he clamped her arm with an iron fist as the train belted on through the starless night. He pushed his face close to hers. ‘Don’t you? Go on – admit it.’
‘You’re hurting me. Let go.’ Tessa was terrified. Everything rose up from the depths of her life. Everything that was black and merciless. Demons that had followed her. The colours of the day faded, and she became once more a dark shell of a creature who wanted to die.
‘Redruth. This is Redruth.’
The train’s brakes squealed on the metal as it pulled into the small Cornish station where the doors and the railings were painted red, and tubs of daffodils shone yellow in the light from the train windows.
‘I’m getting off. Let go of me.’ Tessa twisted her arm out of the iron grasp and with all the strength of her anger she pushed Paul away, grabbed her suitcase from the rack and turned the door handle.
He charged back at her, breathing hard, his high cheekbones white and skull-like, his eyes glinting like broken china.
The train door flew open, and Tessa fell out. Her head hit the concrete with a sickening crack, and she lay still, her chestnut hair spread across the platform, her eyes closed, her face suddenly shell-like and peaceful.
Her new blue suitcase had burst open and lay beside her on the platform, her carefully packed honeymoon negligee tumbling out like the foam from a wave.
Paul leapt out and knelt beside her, aghast. ‘Tessa! Oh God – what have I done? Open your lovely eyes, darling, please.’ He howled and shook as people came running. ‘Oh God – help us please.’
‘Well, what a wonderful day we’ve had.’ Kate kicked her shoes off and sank into a chair. ‘My feet are killing me. But it was worth it. Worth every penny.’
‘Ah. It went well.’ Freddie had taken his tie off and loosened the stiff collar which had been chafing his neck all day. He was kneeling on the hearth rug, lighting the fire.
‘Tessa looked so pretty,’ said Sally.
‘She can look pretty – when she’s happy,’ Kate said. ‘What did you think of Paul?’
‘He seems a nice lad. I can’t wait to see the photographs. How long will they take?’
‘About a week,’ Kate said. ‘And they’re going to be in colour!’
‘You can get colour TV now,’ Sally said.
‘Susan’s got one,’ said Kate.
‘Ah – the Tillermans would, wouldn’t they.’ Freddie held a sheet of newspaper against the fire to make it draw. Flames roared up behind it, a spark jumped, and he quickly screwed up the burning paper with his bare hands and crammed it into the fire.
‘I wish you wouldn’t do that,�
� Kate said.
‘’Tis all right. I’ve done it all me life.’
‘I wonder where Tessa and Paul are now?’ Sally said. ‘He was so mysterious about the honeymoon.’
‘The Channel Islands – or even France, Tessa was hoping,’ Kate said. ‘We won’t know ’til we get a postcard.’
‘I’d worry,’ Sally said, ‘if I didn’t know where my loved ones were.’
‘We do, Mum,’ Kate said. ‘But, with Tessa, we’ve got used to it. We’re seasoned worriers now.’
‘She always was a bit of a problem, wasn’t she?’
‘But she’s much more tenacious now – isn’t she, Freddie?’ Kate said. ‘We were so worried when she went through that hippie phase, and that dreadful man let her down – she was broken-hearted – but it was a blessing in disguise. Now she’s got Paul and he comes from a decent family. His father is a lawyer. You like Paul, don’t you, Freddie?’
‘I’m not sure about him,’ Freddie said.
‘Why? What’s wrong with him?’
‘There’s just – something in his eyes,’ Freddie said. ‘He seems all right. But time will tell. I hope he treats her right.’
‘Pity he lives in London, though,’ Sally said. ‘Tessa won’t be happy there, will she? Not for long.’
Kate was looking at Freddie. He had a way of going tense and moving his eyes when he was listening to something outside. ‘What are you listening to, dear?’ she asked.
The three of them went quiet, and the sound of the rain sighed in the darkness. The wind howled through the telegraph wires and rattled the shutters.
Freddie looked from one to the other. ‘Can’t you hear it? A dog howling.’
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