“It’s about Dowerby Fair.”
“Right.” Kim looked blank.
“Well, my husband, Nick, he’s on the fair committee and he wants to get some publicity for it. Umm, if you would, that is. I don’t know how these things work. Getting stuff in the papers, I mean. This fair happens every summer and it’s quite a big thing for Dowerby. People dress up in medieval costume and there are stalls in the market place. The big thing is a sort of re-enactment of history. It’s like a court where they put women on the ducking stool or in the stocks, that sort of thing, like they would’ve done, a few centuries ago.”
“You mean they don’t do that all the time here anyway?” said Kim, wrinkling her nose.
I grinned. “Don’t think they’d get away with it. But it’s a bit of a crowd-pleaser, so Nick says it’s a good thing to do. It always brings the TV cameras in. And he says the women queue up for it, they love it. Apparently.”
She looked at me quizzically and it suddenly seemed hilarious. We both burst out laughing.
Later, I told Nick all about her. “She had a really grim day. No-one helping her, everyone treating her like she’d just landed. Awful. I felt ashamed.”
He was bouncing Rosie on his knee. “She’ll soon settle in.”
“Well, Nick, I’ve asked her round for supper on Thursday. Is that okay?”
He stared at me. “Sure. Of course. Bloody hell, Maura, that’s not like you.”
“What isn’t?”
“Being social. Letting someone in the house without me forcing you to.”
I frowned, “God, Nick. I’m not that bad.”
People came from all parts of the country to live in Dowerby, even though the joke is that everyone there is interbred. There is actually an RAF base, the factory where Nick worked, and of course the district council, all attracting lots of professional men with wives in tow - although rarely, for some reason, professional women with husbands in tow. I was never sure if this was because the employers in Dowerby didn’t tend to take on women or whether career women just don’t move around and expect their families to follow them, the way that men do. Or maybe most women just had more sense than to come here.
The first thing these newcomers remark on is the weather. It’s so cold! It was March when Kim arrived to take up her new job, but in spite of the shocks of garish daffodils splashed along every patch of grass, there was little sign of spring in the temperature. The very sight of a daffodil still makes me shiver, because spring in the north of England is always so bitter. It’s as if there is a different sun, one that blinds you with its light and makes your eyes smart, but offers no heat whatsoever. A sunny spring day in London warms you up.
Kim, I remember, didn’t bow to the climate much. She wore jackets rather than jumpers and very short skirts. She said that people kept staring at her legs, women just as often as men. “I don’t know what you expect,” I said. “I think you like it, really.”
“I tell you,” she complained one day, “this woman looked at me this morning, like I was some sort of alien. She was wearing maroon tights – big thick ones – and green shoes. I mean, how can you go round looking like that? And if you do, how can you judge other people?”
But it wasn’t all hostility. Kim was actually a good reporter. It was very hard to dislike her, even if you wanted to. She was very pleasant to talk to. She smiled a lot, and had a sweet, trustworthy sort of face. Her editor was pleased with her. People in Dowerby grudgingly said the town was getting some good coverage in the Evening News...
Come and visit us at
www.legendpress.co.uk
Follow us
@legend_press
Table of Contents
Title
Copyright
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Acknowledgements
This Little Piggy Page 30