Moving on and almost immediately saw a row of cottages straight ahead. Instinctively he turned and ran for the access road leading from the fence gates that he had seen on his left. Reaching the road, he slowed to a trot again and followed it south. Soon enough, he arrived at a very sparsely hedged lane. In the lane he stopped to look both ways. He was pretty certain he knew the lane from before. If so, to the right, the hedges would be thicker, and the lane led all the way down to the village of Wallop. He felt this confirmed his earlier reckoning of where he was.
To the left. Down there? He couldn’t actually see any ‘down there’. But he knew it did go down. And further on? He’d been down there...
Yes. How could I have possibly forgotten!
41 LOST & FOUND
He had indeed been down there and now he remembered it all. That way led into all kinds of rugged country. Technically it had to be part of Worrywart Woods. Somewhere down there he’d lost a family possession. He couldn’t believe he had forgotten such an episode. But there again, it hadn’t exactly been one of his proudest moments. Maybe that was why.
Maybe because it involved the only thing from the old house that he had inadvertently brought with him. It was part of a family set with initials on it that had belonged to someone ancient like his great-great-grandfather. How it had got into his satchel he had no idea, but his room had been a mess in those days and departure had been a bit, well, not thought out all that clearly, perhaps.
He had attached no importance to the wretched thing. It was a totally unnecessary possession. If he had thought about it at all, it was just a minor nuisance that he had been avoiding successfully. He just sort of ignored it, moving it around in his bag as if it wasn’t actually there, or wasn’t his, or - but when he had realised it was suddenly missing, he found he cared very much. He was attached. It meant it - he - the family - Dammit! He was trying to get away from all that!
He was confronted with something he preferred not to go too near. Oh, hell, what? Loneliness? There had always been a sort of unresolved conflict that threatened to drag him towards - No! He didn’t want to go into such deeply buried thoughts. And now this... this reminder!
He had settled for the fact that such an item belonged at home as part of a set. His father’s. And that he, Montague... well, his connection was to... Well, OK, maybe to look after it? Yes. Wouldn’t that be doing the right thing? And, still keeping the right distance from...it.
Yes. “It,” he had determined, sensing a way to look at it, to cope with it, and keep the kind of freedom he wanted. “It”, an object that had an identity separate from him. Written into it was “E S” And maybe, one day, it should go back. But he, well, one day, perhaps. Well, yes, maybe. One day. He’d drop it back. Maybe.
And then, in spite of his efforts to keep that emotional separation, he’d spent the next day getting more and more worked up about losing it. He swung from tearing himself up about his relationship with his family to dressing himself down at having lost a possession treasured by them. And on top of repeating all the old arguments and turmoil, getting more and more upset about his lack of responsibility, he had doggedly tracked his own footsteps and getting just as frustrated at doing that as well. The sheer waste of time, the futility, the hopeless idea of finding the wretched thing, the folly of his - until he finally saw it!
He saw it from a distance. A long way down at the bottom of the valley, a brilliant flash of gold - unmistakeable! He kept his eye on the spot, left the windy road and plunged straight down the hill. He was whooping with joy as he ran downwards. Well, surely that was not about finding his one and only connection to home. No. Much more likely a sigh of relief at not having to waste more time. Surely. Not that he could say he was in fact going anywhere in particular.
However. With that whoop of joy, he failed to look where he was going. Well, he was keeping his eye out for that tiny flash of light, wasn’t he! Gold! Only gold flashes like that in the sun! Got to be it! Half a mile away – whatever - through trees and scrub, down near the bottom of the valley, that flash was unmistakable! Near the river down there - Just keep focused on that one spot - Full speed ahead! Can’t go wrong! Wow-AAOOW! He’d run straight into a hornets’ nest.
As fast as he had hit them, the hornets went for him a lot faster. His whoop turned into a howl. The howl climbed into panic, back to anger, sheer rage, then cycled freely through the lot as he hurtled and crashed down towards whatever he had seen. Added to his howls and roars, was the thrashing, crashing and bashing of branches and leaves against him and his backpack and the furious buzzing, swarming anger of the hornets attacking him. In the stillness of the valley, the noise was awesome.
Bushes and anything less than a tree, he took head on in an attempt to scrape the swarm off him. However, their flying skills were far superior to his brute crashing. While he smashed his way deliberately through the scrub, some of it dense enough to slow him momentarily, the hornets seemed to fly through the lot to stay attacking him without hindrance. But while keeping up with him was easy, scoring a hit was tricky because the leaves and branches were definitely favoured the fox.
For their part, the leaves and branches had a different take on the situation. Instead of being battered and whipped by the odd seasonal storm, for once in their life they could give it out instead of taking the battering. If the fox wanted a slap in the face, they willingly gave him their best. Meanwhile, the hornets had the numbers, the speed, and plenty of fuel in the tank. Their time would surely come.
Down below, he glimpsed the river and actually saw the flash again. Whatever he had seen, he was closing on it at a colossal rate. Dead ahead. Plunging, crashing pell-mell, howling like a deranged dervish. Finally he burst into the flat open space of the road, made a desperate swipe for it as he passed, and plunge out of sight down the following slope. Making for the river was his only hope. Flinging away his satchel, he finally jumped clear and crashed into the water. Sinking to the bottom, he rolled and scraped himself on the stones. Surfacing only to catch breath, he dived and repeated the process until he was sure there was nothing left of his attackers.
Later, he had collected his things and, rather slowly in view of the impressive number of raw patches and bald areas, scrapes, scratches, countless lumps, bumps and bruises, he had made his way back all the way up to the top by the road, not by the way he had plummeted down, until he had come past where he now stood.
Stump couldn’t believe he had actually forgotten the incident. There again, he had to admit there were certain times that he did want to forget. Like when the conflict between the desire to go on or go home seemed too much.
So maybe I prefer to remember the good stuff. Or maybe I’m getting old. Isn’t forgetting things a sign of old age? But enough of that, surely!
Shaking those thoughts off, he realised he was standing in the road reminiscing like an idiot.
If I take to doing that sort of daydreaming, let alone in the middle of the road, I’m highly unlikely to have any old age.
42 NARROWING THE SEARCH
If the fencing, farm and cottages were all new to him, then he must have travelled the ancient track along the grassland further down, maybe even at night. It had been easy to follow through those parts, while a lot of it had long disappeared through the more wooded lands north of Nock. Further south, it was again easy enough to follow almost all the way to the coast. He remembered the track led to styles through the hedgerows on both sides of the lane. He had camped near there. It would have been closer to the village. Then the next day he had explored the lane down into its strange valley. The river down there might be useful to know, but he’d seen no signs of life in that valley, apart from hornets of course, and he had no desire to go down there again.
Where he stood now, the hedges of the lane were a sad sight and presented a poor barrier, but they prompted a choice of directions to him. He was not interested in going down to the village. The other way offered nothing but trouble in that awful valley, so he
was happy to leave both ways for some other time if needs be. He simply crossed the lane, pushed through the hedge and continued south.
More rolling grassland. The village had to be down on the right with the river. To his left the tree line was there again, so he moved up the slope close to it in order to take stock. Just there, he still couldn’t see the village or the river but was looking out across the top of both. On the far side he saw a more or less flat area of grassland then forested rolling hills. Further off still, the hills became rugged looking mountains that formed the horizon.
He moved on. Higher ground full of tree on his left, rolling grassland spread out ahead and led very gently down towards the river coming into view on his right. Rocks and boulders sat occasionally among the trees. One or two were even on the open grass. They looked weathered and well rounded. A magnificent oak tree stood in the middle distance. It was a king of a tree, halfway between the rugged hills on the left and the river to the right. There were also occasional gullies running downhill towards the river. They looked to have been formed by runoff from higher up. Some were overgrown, some deeper or wider than others. Coming from the high ground, most didn’t actually get very far. And there was that one majestic tree out in the middle on its own, close to one of the gullies.
He stopped again. The effect of the varying hills, rocks, boulders, the rills, the trees and rising ground on one side and the view on the other, he found interesting. There was variety and lots of possibilities. And... His mind was ticking over the facts. This would be reasonably close to the village. Perhaps therefore respectability nice and close? Maybe. Settling somewhere here could be ideal, maybe. Everything was a ‘maybe,’ but all these possibilities warranted a very detailed exploration.
The wooded hills continued south. Above the tree line they were much steeper, though still with the occasional rounded boulder, and the division between the grassland and trees was even marked by a noticeable cliff as if the grassland had sunk a little. Further south, fewer and fewer boulders were visible.
The view from where he was showed the river wending its way south for miles in the broadening valley. To his right, most of the village could now be seen, with the road continuing out from it. As well, there was still that view all the way across the river. Montague walked on but took his time. He worked his way south until he reckoned the area was becoming too flat to hold anything of significance. Turning around, he decided to stay within the trees as he worked his way all the way back to the laneway with the hedges.
During this search among the trees and occasional boulder, his inner conversation was primarily involved with ideas of accommodation. While trees and possibly boulders afforded convenient camouflage, the prospect of having to dig from scratch was not appealing. There would have to be a lot going for the position to justify the labour involved. Digging among trees in such terrain meant restrictions from roots and rock. In other words, an extraordinary labour of love and still likely to end up much smaller than what he had in mind. Modifying someone else’s hard work was always a good move. But extending it would be minimal for the same reason. A previous owner probably ‘would’ve if they could’ve’.
He arrived back at the lane having drawn a blank. Taking stock of the lowering sun, he decided he still had time before considering what to do for a meal. He then ran along the tree line going south again, but this time, examining the rills and gullies running from the trees towards the road and the river. None of them seemed to go as far as the road, let alone to the river. Some were merely bare depressions. Others were covered with bushes. Two were extensive in cover, depth and content, and alongside one was the majestic oak tree. It really was a king of a tree. Presumably all these gullies were originally formed by water runoff to the river, all of them were dry at least on the surface. And then there were a couple of boulders out in the grass on their own. They looked to be the remains of a far older landscape.
So far, he had drawn a blank, and that was as he expected. It was actually the two more extensive gullies that were attracting him. Having ruled everything else out, he was now ready for them. He also realised that if he was to find anything, they were going to be his last chance.
He went up and down both gullies twice. As depressions, they certainly were much more extensive than the others, but again he sat. Now he was disheartened.
It seemed there was nothing to be found and he had no idea where to look next that would be even half as good.
43 TITLE DEED
By a process of elimination, after travelling through a massive length of varying countryside, with his field of choices narrowed to this one specific area, and then to have come up with nothing worth looking at twice, was a major worry to him. If the best had nothing to offer, where was he to go for second best?
Then he realised he had missed a trick and perked up a bit. He’d been looking for an established dwelling. But the soil here was rich and workable. Digging, if he had to, would not be a huge business. Why not pick his own spot? If there was no existing residence on the market, could he find a suitable site to create his own? Something along one bank or other of one of the deeper depressions would be best.
The advantages here were several. Cover was ideal and plentiful for the full year. The views were fantastic, and the proximity to food and the village was exactly to his liking. There was something else about the place that struck him. There were no disadvantages – or at least, none that he could see.
Reinvigorated, again he took stock of the situation. He was looking uphill from the bottom of one of the gullies, the one with the great tree. Behind him the road and river were still some distance away. The ancient track must have crossed behind him, close to the lower end and the road where it was flattest.
He walked slowly towards the hills. The gradient in the gully was gentler than the hill as it cut deeper into the grassland and was actually quite wide. The overgrowth was extensive as he continued up and was not helping. His mind went elsewhere, already casting about for another location to explore.
He passed an old ironing board that had landed edge on, stuck in brambles and bushes. It was up a little from the floor of the gully. He had passed it twice before, dismissing that area because of it. It was almost parallel with the direction of the gully. Finally distracted by the thing, he stopped and idly worked his way to it, wondering what its story could possibly be.
There was a smell. He stopped trying to see everything at once as he tried to isolate that one thing. Had he been mistaken? It had been the faintest, tiniest whiff. Like a distant fleeting memory evoked during a conversation and so easily passed over and lost again.
There. He had it again. Faint, but unmistakeable. It was a particular smell. He became very, very alert. He studied the bushes and brambles but gained nothing. Not satisfied, he dropped back, went further up the gully and tried to see past the other end of the board. He lost the smell but knew it would still be in the air where he had just been. Not satisfied, he dropped back again to go yet further up the gully.
This time, he climbed the bank and manage to get behind the brambles. Working his way along, he managed to move all the way down behind the ironing board. Sure enough, he found what he had smelt. An entrance to something.
The something turned out to be quite a large dwelling. It was fully furnished. Everything in it appeared to be exactly as it should be for the owner’s return, except for one extraordinary fact. Nothing had been touched for years and years. It must have been many years indeed. Everything was now useless and horrid. Whoever had lived there could not possibly be returning.
He explored, then went out and stood at the entrance. He did his best to consider the position of the place if the impenetrable brambles and bushes were either tamed or removed and the ironing board gone. He tried to imagine living there, and what he could do with the place. The great tree was a distance back from the opposite bank but still towering above. One great branch reached over him, suggesting protection from the worst of summer, if
not winter.
The more he stood there, the more he saw possibilities. This place could be very, very good. Then he checked himself. This was not his place. What was he thinking of? For all the possibilities there may be, the more he felt the need for great caution against wild assumptions. Definitely, one step should be taken at a time.
Curiously, reality came at him from various new perspectives. For the first time, he realised that if he were to go ahead with this place or any other for that matter, he would be once again incredibly busy. While he might have been moving towards a simplistic idea of settling down, behind it there lurked a rather grand idea of what he wanted that goal to look like.
He didn’t want to live like a hermit in a single room. He wanted... not so much the over-the-top swanky place that Fullon had but, well, yes, something akin to what he had walked away from. His father would expect nothing less. No, dammit. He expected it of himself.
Since he could afford to pay for it, he had been harbouring an idea he might find someplace grand that was already finished and furnished, where all he had to do was walk in and sit down. But now, if that were to be his standard, what he was setting himself to do was stunning enough. And there were other ideas lurking in his mind, some of which, if not flights of fancy, surely had to be quite impossible.
Before leaving, he made sure everything could only add up one way and would allow him to do as he was wanted. Then he sat, absorbing everything. Once satisfied he had come to the right conclusions, he went to a corner of the room, cleared a space in the floor and dug a neat deep little trench. From a pocket of his satchel he took out the family’s gold utensil, laid it in the trench, filled in the hole, compacted the floor, put the rubbish on top again and checked that he had left no clues. Out again, he worked his way along behind the ironing board into the gully.
A Tour de Fate Page 11