It's Raining Men

by Milly Johnson

  Whoever had cleaned the cottage hadn’t done a bad job really, but not to her exacting standards. She dusted everything that was wooden and sprayed it with polish, rubbing it in until the surfaces shone. Then she moved into the kitchen area and took all the plates and pans out of the cupboards to give them a good wash. Then she wiped down the insides of the cupboards themselves.

  Ludwig would have loved this cottage, she thought. They had been talking about buying themselves a fisherman’s house by the sea one day: somewhere to escape the rat race and live the simple life for a few weekends a year. Clare scrubbed extra hard at the draining board as if she were trying to rub away another unbidden memory of Lud. He was gone from her life and there was no point in pulling back the retreating memories of him and polishing them till they shone too. He had a wonderful job in a fabulous place – the sunshine and opulence would drive her from his thoughts. She had begun to slip from them anyway She would have only prolonged the agony by agreeing to a long-distance relationship. He was affording more and more priority to his work and less and less to her. And once she was in her fancy new office, with her name on the company letterhead, she would also forget him so much more easily because she wouldn’t have time to think about him. They’d finally be nothing more to each other than just someone the other used to know. Clare carried on scrubbing hard until her knuckles went white.

  After she had cleaned the bathroom she decided to tackle her tiny bedroom. As she was polishing the mirror, she noticed that her left earring was missing: one of a pair of pearl studs which Ludwig had bought for her last birthday. She had to find it. She shook her T-shirt and the back butterfly fell to the carpet. She picked it up and then got down on her stomach and searched around for the pearl. It must have only just become detached, she thought, if the butterfly was still on her person.

  It wasn’t under the bed or the chest of drawers. She shuffled commando-style over to the weighty oak wardrobe in the corner of the room and saw a flash of white in the pile of the carpet but she couldn’t reach it. She got back up and looked around for something long to nudge the earring towards her. She tried a wooden spoon and the poker but the earring was too happily lodged in the thick unworn pile of the carpet to respond to any cajoling by them. Her only option was to slide the wardrobe away from the wall, exposing the corner.

  There was no way Clare was going to let a stupid thing like a massive heavy wardrobe beat her. It would have been sensible to wait for May and Lara to wake up and help her but patience was not among Clare’s best qualities. The wardrobe had short stubby bow legs and she jerked on the front right one, but absolutely nothing happened except that her back gave a warning that if she did that again she might end up saying, ‘Ouch!’ at a very high volume.

  She took a scarf from her drawer and wrapped it around both legs on the right-hand side. If she could just nudge the wardrobe out of its groove in the carpet and manoeuvre it far enough along she could make some space between it and the wall, and then she would be able to wriggle inside the gap and push with her feet. She pulled as hard as she could, and again, until she felt the wardrobe shift from the position it had occupied for God knows how long. It took ten minutes of stop–start pulling for there to be enough pushing space at the left-hand side. At last Clare was able to place her back against the wall and lift her feet against the side of the wardrobe. She was crunched up so much that she barely had room to breathe. When the wardrobe had moved another six inches, Clare saw the earring beneath her feet. But she kept on pushing because she had seen something behind the wardrobe – a small arched door that had been papered over in a half-hearted attempt to hide it. After everything that had happened so far, Clare wouldn’t have been at all surprised to open it and find Mr Tumnus there.

  Chapter 23

  Joan took the sandwich that Gladys had grudgingly made for her lunch into the garden. She sat on the bench outside the grand dining room, which was one of the many rooms never used in Carlton Hall because the cleaning would have been far too much for one person. The furniture had been covered in sheets for years. If she ever became Lady Carlton, she would invite all the local dignitaries to dinner and make use of that beautiful room with the huge table and mirrored walls. Imagining Gladys running around making seven-course meals for a hundred people, she tittered to herself.

  She had been nothing but pleasant to Gladys, but she knew that her shine had worn off as far as the old woman was concerned. Gladys suspected she was up to something, and she was right, of course. But Gladys’s days of being alpha-female at Carlton Hall were numbered. Joan had already overheard Edwin telling the interfering old bag to stop bitching about her. All it would take was for Joan to become terribly upset about ‘Gladys’s attitude’ and the housekeeper would be out on her ear. For the time being, though, Gladys was useful. Joan didn’t want to end up lumbered with cooking and general skivvying as part of her duties. And Gladys did make a very nice sandwich, she thought, as she bit into the Wensleydale and red-onion marmalade on home-made granary bread.

  There was no real rush. For now, Joan was happy to earn a generous wage for doing very little work. She had plenty of time off to catch the bus into Wellem and occasionally book herself for a treatment in the very nice spa there, or idle around the shops in Whitby, or sit in one of the wine bars practising her pout. There was no need to hurry; this job needed a slow hand. And every day she came a step nearer to having her name on Edwin Carlton’s will.

  Chapter 24

  Clare started gently teasing off the torn tissue-like wallpaper then her impatience stepped in and her actions turned to rips until the old door was fully exposed. From the shape of it, Clare expected that behind the door lay a priest hole or a small chapel. There was a keyhole above an iron hoop for a handle. She pushed and pushed but the door wouldn’t budge. It was as if it were cemented shut. So that seemed to be that, then. But Clare didn’t want to give up. She tried again, harder, and felt the door give. It was sticky but she was determined and after ramming it a couple of times with her shoulder it opened, with a Hammer-horror creak, onto stone steps that twirled and plunged into darkness.

  There was no light fitting or switch and it was black as midnight down there. Clare climbed over the bed for her phone and turned on the torch application, and with the aid of its light she trod down the steps, but carefully because they were narrow and there was no consistency of depth between them, plus there was no rail to hang onto. The air in the twisty staircase was getting cooler by the second and her journey seemed to go on for ever. She couldn’t imagine what she would find when she reached the bottom of the stairs. It was too deep for it to be an ordinary cellar. It had to be something far more exciting than that. Then she noticed that the steps were getting broader and shallower and much easier to negotiate, also there was a hint of light coming from somewhere below which was getting stronger as she stepped down what was to be the last turn. It had to be some sort of smugglers’ cave, surely. Maybe she’d find forgotten treasure down here – in one of those chests they always showed on pirate films, spilling gold coins and jewellery. Maybe it was a dungeon full of skeletons. She hoped it wasn’t going to be something boring and disappointing after all those steps – like a room full of old sewage pipes which once pumped their filth out into the sea. Without warning, the closed-in turret opened out into a water-filled cave and straight ahead was an archway in the rock leading out to the sea. The water in the cave was clear and a bright blue-green as if it were lit from beneath, though that wasn’t possible. When she bent to dip her hand into it, the water was warm to the touch. Clare sat on the step and studied the scene that lay in front of her. The underground pool was beautiful, like something out of a recurring dream she’d had. She’d read somewhere that dreams about swimming in blue water meant she was desperate to explore her emotions, which sounded right. She wanted to dive there and then into that lagoon with its amazing blue-green water.

  Tomorrow she would put on her costume and swim here. If Lara insisted they g
o and stay somewhere else now, after this find, she would refuse whole-heartedly to budge.

  Lara was awoken by a sizzling sound followed quickly by the smell of frying bacon. She yawned, stretched, picked up her Kindle which had dropped to the ground, and went inside, unable to resist the challenge to her senses.

  ‘Hi.’ Clare turned round and greeted her. She was standing by a pan with a spatula in her hand. ‘I’m making bacon butties.’

  The smell of baking bread was almost overwhelming that of the bacon.

  ‘You haven’t made a loaf as well, have you?’ Lara wouldn’t have put it past her.

  ‘No, that loaf in the “luxury hamper” was a fresh baker’s one and they go stale really quickly so I covered it in milk and popped it in the oven for fifteen minutes to soften up. The bacon is lovely and thick and smoked. I’ve done all the cleaning and thought I’d do a bit of cooking. And guess what I’ve found?’

  Lara went to put the kettle on, only to find it was already full and newly boiled. She got on with the business of brewing a pot of tea. The teapot was a huge brown one with a fat belly: a proper cottage teapot.

  ‘Go on, surprise me. A family of meerkats nesting in your skirting board?’

  ‘Not even close.’ Clare’s eyes were full of excitement. ‘A secret door, a spiral staircase and a lagoon.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Honest. I lost my earring, nearly broke my back trying to shift the big wardrobe in my room to retrieve it and found a doorway behind it.’

  ‘No way. Show me.’

  Lara followed Clare into her room and saw the ripped wallpaper before she noticed the door.

  ‘You’d better put that wardrobe back before the nutter down the road sees the damage,’ she gulped. ‘He’ll have your guts for garters.’

  Undeterred, Clare opened the door and stood aside so that Lara could descend if she wanted to.

  ‘How far does it go down?’ asked Lara, looking down into the inky darkness.

  ‘Miles. Lara, the water is beautiful. You have to see it.’

  ‘Let me get some shoes on.’

  ‘Wotcher,’ greeted a yawning voice from the living room. They turned to see May now standing in the doorway, the last vestiges of sleep shocked out of her by the sight of the damage. ‘What the hell have you done, Clare? Don’t tell me you’re stripping off the wallpaper and are redecorating as well.’

  ‘I’ve found a staircase that goes straight down to the sea.’ She smiled proudly. ‘Have a bacon sandwich first then I’ll show you.’

  ‘Ooh that sounds very exciting,’ said May. ‘Both the stair thing and the bacon sarnie.’

  ‘Come on then,’ urged Clare. ‘You’ll need some carbs inside you to manage all the stairs.’

  Minutes later they were all munching away. ‘This tastes so good,’ said May, savouring the delicious smoked bacon. ‘All the better for someone having made it for me.’

  ‘That luxury hamper had some lovely stuff in it. The cheese is gorgeous and the butter isn’t from a supermarket. I wonder if it’s from Frank Hathersage’s farm.’

  ‘Still not worth one hundred and fifty pounds, though,’ grunted Lara. ‘I shall be having words with Gene the Mean about that. There’s no way he is charging us that amount of money for basic foodstuffs.’

  ‘Shall we brave the local pub tonight?’ asked May, licking her fingers as she popped the last of the bread into her mouth.

  ‘Yeah, why not?’ said Lara. ‘He might be in there and I can shame him into giving us a refund. Right – where are my shoes?’

  Clare was very giddy, hardly able to wait to show off the cave to the others. She led the way slowly, holding her torch down so they could see each step.

  ‘Blimey,’ said Lara. ‘This must have taken years to carve out.’

  ‘And why would you? Unless it was for something very important,’ added May.

  ‘Precisely,’ nodded Clare. ‘It has to be a smugglers’ cave, don’t you think? Careful.’ She steadied Lara who nearly missed her footing.

  ‘I’m going stair blind,’ chuckled Lara, patting her heart.

  ‘Nearly there,’ replied Clare, reaching the wider steps.

  ‘Oh wow. Oh wowdy wow wow,’ gasped Lara at the first sight of the lagoon. ‘Oh Clare, no wonder you wanted to show it off.’

  May was almost dumbstruck. ‘God, how gorgeous,’ she said, as breathless as if she had been winded.

  ‘Isn’t it? No way am I staying anywhere else now, Lara Rickman. Not even if Wellem Spa begged me.’

  ‘Where’s the light coming from?’ asked May, bending down. ‘And the water’s warm. That’s crazy.’

  ‘Wonderfully crazy,’ said Lara, checking for herself. They could add it to the list of crazy things that had happened already so far. Although this was probably the first one that merited the title ‘wonderful’.

  Chapter 25

  ‘What a lovely evening,’ said Lara as they strolled down the hill. She couldn’t remember the last time she had spent a full day in jeans and trainers and hardly any make-up. She had eased into holiday mode far more quickly than she had expected to. Or was she forcing herself to, so she wouldn’t have to think about the James and Tianne chaos back home? She wasn’t sure.

  ‘Those funny clouds have gone.’ May pointed to the sky. ‘Maybe they don’t come out at night.’

  As they passed Gene Hathersage’s cottage, Lara glanced sideways at it, wondering if she should ask him about the hamper now. She decided against it. She was too relaxed to get wound up this evening; she’d collar him sometime over the next couple of days and say her piece then.

  They all expected that as they walked into the Crab and Bucket the locals would freeze their activity in order to start staring – and they weren’t disappointed. For a good five seconds after the three women entered, there was a pin-drop silence and a halting of action as if someone had hit a pause button, then that same someone pressed play and normality resumed.

  The pub lounge was low-roofed and heavily beamed. The walls were decorated with cases of stuffed fish and nets, models of lobsters, crabs and basket catching pots, giving it a typical seaside feel. There were ten people sitting at three tables, all men. The funny Sherlock Holmes man with the pink pumps was sitting in a high-backed Chesterfield seat in the corner and sucking on a calabash pipe that wasn’t lit.

  Surprisingly there was a woman behind the short, but well-stocked, bar. She looked no older than twenty and had a pierced lip and dyed black hair fastened into two high pigtails interwoven with blue hair extensions.

  ‘What can I get for you ladies?’ she asked cheerfully, her eyes mainly on Clare. It seemed that their reputation had preceded them.

  ‘Gin and tonic for me, please,’ replied Lara.

  ‘Same for me.’ This from May.

  ‘And me,’ added Clare, looking around the pub.

  ‘How are you finding Well Cottage, then? Sweet little place, now, isn’t it?’ said the barmaid as she lifted the first glass to the optic of gin. ‘Gene’s had it all done up. You’re the first visitors.’

  ‘And the last,’ called one of the locals, although it was unclear whether this was a response to the barmaid, or part of his own conversation.

  ‘Yes, it’s lovely,’ replied May.

  ‘Two pints when you’re ready, Shirley.’ An elderly man appeared at the bar with two empty tankards. Having given in his order, he turned to Lara. ‘It would be better if we got the sun. It’s always cloudy here. Bet you won’t be back in a hurry.’

  I bet we won’t as well, thought Lara.

  ‘It’s a pretty place,’ put in May. ‘We had a walk around earlier.’

  ‘Hathersage had no right to—’ the man at the bar snapped before the barmaid interrupted.

  ‘Shhh, Uncle Morris,’ she said, levering the tops off three small bottles of tonic whilst she gently admonished her elderly relative. ‘No village politics, if you please. Same again for Milton as well?’

  ‘Oh, I dunno.’

&nbs
p; Shirley shouted over to the strange old man with the pink pumps. ‘Old Peculier or Sea Brew?’

  The old man held up an affirmative thumb.

  ‘Milton, is that thumb for Old Peculier?’

  Again the thumb went up.

  Old Peculier, there’s a shocker, thought Lara.

  May handed over a twenty-pound note and Shirley slid it into an ancient till before handing over the change, which wasn’t much.

  ‘Blimey, it’s not cheap to drink here,’ whispered May, returning to the table.

  ‘I bet they’ve got one price for us and one price for locals,’ said Lara, in an equally low voice. ‘No one seems very happy to have holidaymakers around. Don’t you get the feeling people are trying to put us off staying here?’

  ‘Well, I’m not going anywhere,’ put in Clare adamantly, thinking of that lovely lagoon underneath the cottage. If anything could empty her mind of all the rubbish that was heaped up in it, it would be swimming in that clear, warm sea-water.

  ‘You mean you’re going to stop cleaning and take some time to swim?’ joked Lara.

  ‘The house is lovely and tidy now,’ sniffed Clare. ‘I can relax.’

  ‘You haven’t done my bedroom,’ teased May.

  ‘Don’t set her off.’ Lara slapped May playfully on the arm. ‘Actually you haven’t done mine either.’

  Clare laughed. ‘You can stuff off, the pair of you. Anyone fancy some crisps? There are no calories in crisps when you eat them on holiday.’

  Shirley arrived at their side with a cloth to wipe the table after they’d ordered another round and eaten two bags of cheese and onion crisps between them.

  ‘Sorry about my Uncle Morris earlier,’ she said. ‘Miserable old bugger.’

  The place is full of them, thought Lara, as Gene Hathersage and his scowling face took centre stage in her mind.

  ‘They’re not used to holidaymakers here,’ Shirley went on. ‘And they don’t want to get used to them.’