The Farm Beneath the Water

by Helen Peters

  When Hannah’s mum was alive, this had been her hen house. After her death, when Hannah was six, it was abandoned. Ivy and brambles had grown up all over it. The shed had been forgotten until Hannah and Lottie had rediscovered it last winter.

  They had cleared out all the junk, scrubbed the concrete floor and patched up the disintegrating walls with scraps of wood scavenged from around the farm. Using old fence posts and hessian sacking, they had built wings at the sides of the stage and a proscenium arch at the front. They had made scenery and costumes and entered the Linford Arts Festival with a play that Hannah had written.

  “I reckon,” said Hannah now, surveying her theatre thoughtfully, “that this whole space is about the size of the school stage. It’ll be a perfect rehearsal studio.”

  “What shall we move first?” said Lottie. “The dressing table?”

  “OK. In that corner.”

  There was a scuffling sound in the auditorium. Ugh. Mice. The only thing to do was to make as much noise as possible and give them time to get away, so you never had to see them.

  They pushed the dressing table into place.

  “I can’t believe we’re not allowed scenery in the house plays,” said Lottie, dusting off her hands.

  “Well, there won’t be time to change scenery, not with four plays one after the other.”

  “But how’s it going to look like Verona, without any scenery?”

  “Well, Jack had this great idea of projecting images of Verona on to the back wall of the stage.”

  Lottie snorted. “Oh, yeah, I’m sure that was Jack’s idea.”

  “It was.”

  “Well, I’ll be really interested to see if Jack actually comes up with anything apart from ‘ideas’.”

  Lottie was clearly never going to change her mind about Jack. Hannah changed the subject instead.

  “Right, let’s move the window. All the bits can go against the wall.”

  At the side of the stage, a sash window frame, found in another shed, was suspended from the beams. That was one of the great things about living on a farm. There was always loads of junk lying around. You could find anything you needed if you looked hard enough.

  “It’s a bit sad, dismantling everything,” said Lottie.

  Hannah untied the baler-twine knots that fixed the top of the window to the roof beam. “I’m sure we’ll use it again. It happens at the end of every play, doesn’t it? We’re turning the theatre into a rehearsal studio for our next production – ooh.” She stopped and looked at Lottie.

  “What?”

  “We should pin your costume designs on the walls. Then it will really look like a studio.”

  “Oh, yes. And a copy of the rehearsal schedule.”

  “And the props list, with columns for people to initial if they’ve got anything we need.”

  Excitement flooded over Hannah as she pictured her theatre walls covered with sketches and fabric samples, timetables and props lists.

  “OK,” said Lottie, as they leaned the heavy sash window against the side of the shed, “now the back wall.”

  The panelled back wall of the stage, built from salvaged wood, was wedged in place between the floor and the roof beams. As the girls grasped either end of it, Hannah heard more scrabbling from beyond the proscenium arch.

  The hairs on her arms stood on end. Not rats. Please let there not be rats here.

  A stifled giggle came from the auditorium. Hannah and Lottie stared at each other. Then, in three steps, they were through the proscenium arch.

  In the corner of the auditorium, with very guilty looks on their faces, huddled Jo and Sam. They clutched sheaves of paper and bundles of coloured pencils to their chests. A piece of paper was pinned to the wall behind them. It said:

  Bean Spy Club. Top Secrit.

  Hannah’s mouth fell open.

  “Have you two taken over our theatre?”

  “We didn’t think you’d be using it,” said Jo. “Since you’re directing the house play now.”

  “Well, we are. You’ve got your own place.”

  “Daddy needs it,” said Sam. “He’s getting more pigs.”

  “Well, you’ll have to find somewhere else, then.”

  “Why don’t you use the tractor-shed loft?” suggested Lottie. “That’s pretty much empty.”

  Sam’s eyes lit up. He looked at Jo enquiringly but she gave him a warning frown.

  “I don’t think that would be suitable,” she said grandly.

  Hannah raised her eyebrows. “Well, if you’re going to be that fussy…”

  “What are you doing, anyway?” asked Lottie.

  “We’re making our magazine,” said Sam.

  Lottie picked up a stapled sheaf of papers from a chair. Bean Stew, it said in bubble writing across the top of the first page. The official magazine of The Great and Mighty Society of Bean.

  Lottie flicked through the pages of articles, recipes, quizzes, letters and comic strips. “Runner Bean Smashes World Record,” she read. “Broad Bean’s Diet Tips. Snow White and the Seven Dwarf Beans.”

  “You’ll have to do your magazine somewhere else,” said Hannah. “We’re going to be rehearsing in here.”

  Jo blew out her cheeks theatrically. “Fine.” She started picking up the pencils scattered across the floor.

  “What are we going to do with the carpet?” asked Lottie, looking at the rug on the stage.

  “Roll it up and shove it against the wall, I guess,” said Hannah. Then a thought occurred to her. “No, actually, let’s put it in the auditorium. It’ll give people somewhere to sit when they’re not in a scene.”

  Jo slid the front-of-house door open and stepped outside. “Come on, Mung Bean.”

  “We’re going to make a bean sculpture,” Sam told Hannah. “Out of dried kidney beans and—”

  “Sshh,” hissed Jo. She poked her head back around the door, her finger to her lips. “Get the notebooks, Mung Bean,” she whispered. “Daddy’s out there, talking.”

  “Who’s he talking to?” asked Hannah.

  “I don’t know. It sounds like more than one person.”

  Hannah looked at Lottie. “More visitors?” She moved over to the door and beckoned to Lottie. “Come on.”

  “Hey, don’t push in,” hissed Jo. “We’re going first.”

  Sam handed Jo a grubby yellow notebook. The Beans made their way in single file along the secret path. Hannah and Lottie followed them.

  At the end of the path, they stopped and peered through the curtain of brambles that screened the entrance to the thicket. Dad was striding up North Meadow with his springer spaniel, Tess, who was his constant companion. But today there was a man and a woman with him, taking two steps to his one to match his pace.

  “Who are they?” whispered Lottie. “Do you know them?”

  Hannah shook her head.

  The strangers wore walking boots and carried stout hazel sticks. The man had a bushy grey beard and the woman had a large camera slung round her neck.

  “Do you want to come in for a cup of tea?” asked Dad.

  Hannah stared at Lottie. What was happening to Dad? He had made more cups of tea this week than he had ever made in his life.

  “Oh, that’s very kind of you, but we have to get back,” said the woman. “Anyway, you’ve given up enough of your time, showing us around.”

  “No trouble at all.”

  “It’s such a beautiful place,” said the woman.

  “And so well preserved,” said the man. He stopped and gestured towards where the children were crouched. They drew back their heads. “It’s so rare nowadays to find a farm where thickets and copses haven’t been rooted out to make way for more crops. They’re invaluable wildlife habitats, places like this, impenetrable to humans.”

  A smile flickered across Dad’s face. “This one isn’t quite impenetrable. My children seem to have found a way in.”

  The man laughed. “Oh, children always do.”

  “It’s fantastic
that you’ve got things moving with Sophie,” said the woman. “She’s so lovely.”

  “Yes, she might be just what we need,” said Dad.

  Hannah’s stomach churned. She could tell Lottie was looking at her, but she couldn’t meet her eyes. She didn’t want to make the horrible possibility feel any more real than it already felt.

  The woman was looking at Dad in a questioning way. She opened her mouth as if about to say something. Then she closed it as though she’d changed her mind. Then she opened it again.

  “Look, I know it’s none of my business,” she said, “but have you told the children yet?”

  Hannah stiffened.

  Dad hesitated. “Not yet, no.”

  There was a slight pause before the woman said, “You might need to talk to them soon. You don’t want them finding out from somebody else, do you?”

  Sam turned to Hannah. Hannah put her finger to her lips and reached out to squeeze his hand.

  “It will come as an awful shock if they hear it from someone at school,” the woman continued. “And you’re not going to be able to keep it secret for much longer.”

  Jo turned to Hannah with a questioning look and opened her mouth to speak. Hannah shook her head.

  Dad started walking again. “Yes, well,” he said, in a tone that Hannah knew meant the conversation was over. “We’ll deal with that directly. Thank you very much for coming up here. I appreciate it.”

  “It was our privilege,” she said. “This is a very special place. It’s been—”

  But the rest of her sentence was drowned out by a flurry of barking, and once Tess had calmed down, Dad and his visitors were too far away to be heard.

  Hannah felt sick. Was this Sophie person really Dad’s new girlfriend? And how come these strangers knew about it and his own children didn’t?

  Fury rose up inside her. Why did he still not tell her anything?

  “You’ve got to talk to him,” said Lottie, as though she had read Hannah’s thoughts.

  “What was that lady talking about?” asked Sam. “What secret?”

  Hannah looked at the Beans. Maybe, if all his children confronted Dad together, it would be harder for him to fob them off with vague replies that told them nothing.

  “Come on,” she said, parting the brambles and edging out of the thicket. “We’re going to talk to Dad.”

  Martha was in the kitchen, crouched in front of an open cupboard. She glared at Hannah.

  “How come there’s never anything to eat in this poxy place?”

  “There’s a casserole in the larder.”

  “Not that one we had the other day?”

  “There’s plenty left.”

  “Yes, because it was so gross that nobody ate it the first time round.”

  “Don’t be rude. Granny made that.”

  Their granny, Mum’s mother, lived in Middleham. She was old and frail, but she still liked to cook for them, and they always came back from visits to her house with meals for the freezer or tins full of cake.

  “I’m making my own tea,” said Martha. She reached to the back of the cupboard and pulled out a tin of spaghetti hoops.

  “That’s not fair!” cried Jo. “How come she gets spaghetti and we have to eat casserole?”

  The door to the washhouse, where Dad kept his coats and boots, rattled open.

  “Martha, will you leave that for a minute?” said Hannah. “We have to talk to Dad.”

  “We? What do you mean, we? What about?”

  Hannah spoke quickly. Any minute now, Dad would come into the kitchen. “You know that woman who came up the other day? Sophie?”

  “What about her?”

  Hannah told Martha what she had overheard in North Meadow. Martha stared. All the colour drained from her face.

  “No way,” she said at last.

  “I swear.” Hannah nodded at the Beans. “They heard it, too.”

  “But what did it mean?” asked Sam. “What’s he not telling us?”

  The kitchen door opened.

  “Tea ready?” asked Dad.

  They stared at him.

  “What’s up with you lot?”

  Hannah pulled out a stool and patted it. “Sit down. We need to talk to you.”

  He sat, frowning at his children. “What’s going on?”

  They pulled out stools and sat at the table. And everyone, including Martha, looked expectantly at Hannah.

  Hannah took a deep breath. “Dad, we know you’re keeping secrets from us.”

  He looked startled for a second. Then he seemed to pull himself together. “What are you talking about?” He turned to the Beans. “Is this that blessed spy club of yours, or whatever it is? Have you been snooping about again?”

  “Don’t get angry with them,” said Hannah indignantly. “We’ve all seen stuff. It’s not exactly difficult. First we come home and there’s a strange woman in the house wanting to check out the loft, and you’re wearing your best jacket and making her tea, when you’ve never made a cup of tea in your entire life…”

  “Good grief, if I can’t make a cup of tea in my own house without facing a court martial from my children…”

  “And then we come home and you’ve got a tea party going on in the sitting room, with a load of women we’ve never seen before. And just now, you’re showing those people round the farm and they’re asking you whether you’ve told us yet. And you said you would do it directly, which we all know means never. So we had to ask you. And we’re not letting you leave this room until you tell us what’s going on.”

  Dad’s frown had deepened. “What were you doing listening to private conversations? It’s none of your business.”

  “None of our business?” exploded Martha. “Of course it’s our business.”

  Dad hesitated for a second and when he spoke, his voice was gentler. “It’s none of your business at the moment, and hopefully it never will be. There’s nothing you can do about it so what’s the point in getting you worried for nothing?”

  “For nothing?” said Martha. “It’s not exactly nothing, is it?”

  “It’s completely our business,” said Hannah, “if we get a strange woman living in our house, putting her stuff in our loft. And what about Mum’s stuff? We won’t let her throw out anything of Mum’s.”

  “Throw out…? What on earth are you talking about?”

  “We know you’ve joined a dating agency,” said Martha. “So I don’t know why you’re bothering to lie to us.”

  “A dating agency?” Dad’s voice was about two octaves higher than usual.

  “Wearing your best clothes. Strange women all over the place.”

  “Are you getting married again?” asked Jo. “Is Sophie going to be our stepmother?”

  Dad looked completely bewildered. Then, suddenly, his face cleared and he threw back his head and laughed until the tears rolled down his face.

  Hannah stared at him.

  “What are you laughing about? There’s nothing to laugh about.”

  “He’s gone mad,” said Martha. “He needs locking up.”

  Eventually, Dad stopped laughing, pulled a grubby handkerchief from his jacket pocket and wiped his eyes.

  “I’m not getting married again, all right? I’ve got enough on my plate without that, for goodness’ sake. I have absolutely no intention of getting married. Or,” he said to Martha, seeing that she had opened her mouth to interrupt, “joining a dating agency. All right?”

  They stayed silent for a while, taking this in.

  “Really? Definitely?” said Hannah.

  “Absolutely definitely.”

  Oh, thank goodness, thought Hannah. They weren’t going to get a stepmother. There was nothing to worry about. Her hunched shoulders dropped and she let out her pent-up breath in a huge sigh of relief.

  Sam looked disappointed. “Oh. She was nice.”

  “Stepmothers always seem nice,” said Jo darkly. “Until they try to kill you.”

  Martha was still frowni
ng. “So who were all those people, then? Why were you wearing your best jacket and making tea?”

  “They’re from the local Ecology Group. They’re interested in the farm, that’s all. How soon’s tea, Hannah? If it’s not ready, I’ve got things to do.” He pushed back his stool and stood up.

  But Martha’s question had stirred up Hannah’s thoughts.

  “Wait a minute. If Sophie was just interested in the farm, why was she wanting to put stuff in the loft?”

  Dad hesitated. Then he said, “Sophie’s a chiropterologist.”

  “A what?”

  “She studies bats. We know bats roost in the loft, and she wants to put recording equipment up there so she can identify how many species we have.”

  “Cool,” said Jo, her face lit up with interest. “What was that word you said?”

  But it still didn’t make sense to Hannah. “But then why did you say she was just what we need? Why do you need her?”

  “Need? What do you mean?”

  “You said she might be just what we need.”

  “Did I?”

  Hannah prickled with irritation. “You’re still not telling us the truth. I know you’re not. When those other people came round, one woman said something about it being a totally unsuitable site, and you sent me and Lottie out of the room. What’s it unsuitable for?”

  “And,” said Jo, “why did that lady ask if you’d told us yet? What haven’t you told us?”

  “Yes,” said Hannah. “And she said she hoped we wouldn’t hear it from someone at school – oh!”

  Like a punch to the stomach, she remembered the last time someone hadn’t wanted her to find something out from gossip. That time, it had been Granny. And Granny had been warning her that her father had no money to pay the rent and they might have to leave the farm.

  Had Dad run out of money again?

  “What?” Dad asked Hannah. “What’s up with you?”

  Hannah glanced at the Beans. She didn’t want to scare them, but she had to get the truth out of Dad. This was their chance to get a proper answer, while they had him cornered.

  Trying not to sound too panicked, she made herself look her father in the eye. “Is it the rent? Is it the landlord?”