Reflections

by Reflections (epub)

  Suddenly Beth was falling, slipping on the slimy mud and she went down on her side, her upper arm and hip hitting stones and the breath was thudded out of her. ‘Owahh,’ she whined miserably. Struggling and slithering to her feet she walked onwards over waterlogged rough ground to retrieve her umbrella, sent flying out of her hand and blown some distance away.

  The umbrella was broken. Folding the cloth and fastening it up round the long handle she used it as a walking stick instead. Trudging back on to the track she carried on, choosing her ground a little more carefully. Making headway was painfully slow and it seemed Gabby must live in the middle of nowhere.

  Finally Claze Wyn was ahead, partially concealed behind willow bushes and other wild growth. As she closed in on the place Beth saw it was more dilapidated than she had imagined. Partly enclosed by tumbling walls of grey stone, the thatched, four-room cottage and miscellany of outhouses, sheds and abandoned chicken coops were all in advanced states of disrepair, except for a small, stone, padlocked building with a tiled roof which Beth rightly assumed was Gabby’s wine keep.

  The reek festering in the heaps of rubbish hit Beth full in the face. The smells must be revoltingly intense in hot weather. Narrow muddy paths of sorts skirted the refuse and led to the cottage and outhouses. Spent matches and dog ends lay scattered all about and Beth thought uneasily, in a reversed kind of way, of the folk tale of two lost children dropping bread in the unrealized hope of safely finding their way back home. There was no wicked stepmother in Beth’s current predicament but Gabby was easily a witch, even if her place wasn’t made of gingerbread.

  Glumly, Beth knew at once Gabby wasn’t at home or Tickle would have barked at her approach. However, she went all the way to the cottage and rapped on the battered door. No reply, as she expected. Puffing out her cheeks in disappointment Beth considered if it was worth waiting for a while. But she had no way of knowing when Gabby had gone out and when she was coming back. No smoke was coming out of Gabby’s chimney, but Gabby was known for not really feeling the cold so she probably didn’t light many fires. There were no kitchen smells, mixed with the foul ones, of a breakfast having been cooked, but the chances were she had spent the night at her cousin’s home. A sudden thought filled Beth with panic. What if Gabby had been to, or was soon intending to show up at, Owles House demanding to see her? She couldn’t risk her talking to Kitty or her mother. She must hurry all the way home but that wouldn’t be easy.

  ‘She’ll be coming round the mountain when she comes!’ sang out a raucous common voice. Beth jumped and her heart banged and raced. It was Gabby on her way home. Thank goodness she was apparently in a good mood.

  As soon as Tickle saw Beth he shot off from Gabby and yapping loudly headed straight for Beth. ‘Eh?’ Gabby stopped singing and peered short-sightedly after Tickle. ‘Tickle, what’s the bleddy matter?’

  Shivering in front of Gabby’s doorstep, Beth called out to her. ‘Miss Magor! It’s me, Beth Tresaile.’ Tickle had reached her, and rather than have the tiny dog jumping up and muddying her Beth crouched down and tried to pet the squirming white and patchy mongrel and got a dirtying anyway. Gabby was roaring with gleeful laughter. Beth groaned inwardly. I’m in for it now.

  ‘Tickle, leave the lady ’lone,’ Gabby bawled, and Tickle instantly scurried back to her mistress, and Gabby picked him up and held him under one arm. Tickle licked her affectionately on the hand. ‘Miss Tresaile, how very kind of you to call on me.’ Gabby mocked her with a gurning smile. ‘I was over my cousin Barbara’s. Good job I come back to get her some parsnip wine to go with the roast she’s cooking for us. Got a shilling’s worth of brisket today.’

  ‘We both know why I’m here,’ Beth said firmly. She had made a decision after seeing Philip’s presence and she was going to go through with it. ‘I have something I’d like to say to you. Will you hear me out please?’

  ‘Please?’ Gabby raised her beetling brows while smirking. ‘No one never said please to me before. So, Mrs Copeland got my meaning then, and you too? Yah, you lot think you’re better than the likes of me, but you and that woman are deceivers! Got no more morals than a pair of bleddy alley cats, so why shouldn’t I profit by it, eh? Eh? S’pose you’re going to argue about that. And that vicar’s bitch! Think I got no manners, well what manners did she have yes’day, throwing a tantrum and clearing off in a huff? All two-faced hypocrites.’

  Beth swallowed hard. ‘Actually, I roughly agree with all that, although I don’t want to remark on Miss Howard-Leigh.’

  ‘What?’ In incredulity, Gabby stuck out her upper jaw over her heavy lower jaw making her seem all wobbly chins.

  ‘Please let me explain. I haven’t come to argue with you, Miss Magor.’ Beth said, finding herself breathless and a little light-headed.

  Gabby stared at her suspiciously but not without interest. She noticed Beth was bedraggled. ‘Oh, fallen down, have ’ee? Hurt yourself?’

  Beth’s hand went unbidden to her arm. ‘I expect I’ll have a bruise or two here. I just feel so cold.’ Her voice emerged small and teary and Beth was cross with herself. Gabby would jeer at her and believe she would be very easy to exploit.

  ‘Well, you better come in then, don’t expect you to do business out here in the rain.’ Gabby put on a posh tone and wiped at her straggly hair as if she was aware for the first time it was raining. ‘Come in for a cup of tea. I’ve got a primus stove, have some ready in a mo. You go first, just push on the door, it’s never locked and latch’s been broke for years. Do mind the mess. I wasn’t expecting visitors, you see.’

  Beth surmised Gabby’s new pleasantness was a tactic she planned to use to her financial gain. At that moment Beth badly wanted to get inside out of the rain and sit down for a minute. She pushed on the door and pushed on it again until it finally moved inwards on much squeaking and shuddering. She reeled at the rank smells that hit her like a living force of rotting things. She could even smell urine. Just feet ahead were the stairs and it was obvious from all the junk piled up on every step Gabby had not used the top part of the house in years. Beth eyed the filthy floor in case Tickle had messed on it. It seemed clear of dog’s faeces but it was impossible to determine what the floor covering was, or if indeed there was any apart from rubbish, old newspapers, rags and broken items, including a bicycle wheel.

  ‘Mind your legs, Miss Beth,’ Gabby said, from right up behind her, making Beth shudder in horror. She felt she was entering an unpredictable creature’s den. ‘’Fraid I’m not much of a housekeeper. Sorry about the whiffs, forgot to empty the commode. Go to your left, into the kitchen. Damn me, you’re shivering, aren’t you? Got a fire laid in the grate. I’ll put a match to the kindling and I’ll soon have you warm. Oh, just a minute, step aside for me. I need to go first and clear a space for you.’

  ‘Th–thank you,’ Beth stuttered. She had never felt so cold in her life, not even when she had ran down Portcowl Hill when abandoned as a child on that stormy winter’s night. She knew it was her soul and her spirit, rather than her flesh that was numb and chilled, for by the end of the day her life would be changed forever.

  Leaning against the greasy doorway, she watched with a strange fascination as Gabby gathered up the stuff heaped on the table and dumped it into the already overflowing stone sink and on the mouldy wooden draining board. Black dots lay everywhere – dead flies. Gabby rooted about in stuff falling out of a cupboard and grunted in triumph as her huge tanned dirty paw picked up a ‘clean’ rag. Wetting it at the tap she wiped hard at the creaking table. Then finding a ‘clean’ folded towel, that had probably been left so for years, she laid it on one of the two high back chairs, the only seats in the room. ‘Sit down here, Miss Beth.’ Gabby patted the towel. ‘I’ll just put a match to the fire then put the kettle on, soon have you as warm as a buttered crumpet. Tickle, you go lie on your bed, my handsome.’ Wagging his long, thin tail Tickle did so, his bed a heap of crumpled clothing under the table.

  Feeling as if her legs didn’t
belong to her, Beth shuffled to the chair and lowered her frozen limbs until she was sitting down. She looked on longingly as Gabby struck a match and the scrunched up newspaper and kindling wood caught slowly alight. It was a large open fireplace – there was no cooking range – and logs and scavenged wood were piled up at its side. It would not take very long to give forth some much welcome heat.

  ‘Tea next,’ Gabby said, glancing often at Beth. Beth could see the grotesque woman was puzzled by her sudden frailty. Good, Beth thought, it might work to my advantage.

  When Gabby had the tin kettle on top of the primus stove, set up on the hearth, and tea leaves in a dusty white teapot she had dug out from somewhere, she said, ‘’Scuse me a minute.’ She left the room. Beth heard furniture being shifted and Gabby grunting. Gabby returned, holding something pretty and delicate, with pride. ‘From my mother’s treasured tea set, never used it myself. Mother used to bring it out just for Christmas Day. We had good Christmases, me, her and Father. Don’t expect you to use my horrid old mugs, Miss Beth.’

  ‘That’s very kind of you,’ Beth said, almost wearing a smile.

  ‘Turn your chair round, get nearer the fire. Flames will be licking up nicely soon. Got a good clean chimney, swept it myself. Father had his own brushes, got a bit of work from ’em at times.’

  Beth nodded. She moved her chair to the hearth. Taking off her gloves she held her hands to the burgeoning warmth. Her eye caught a sepia wooden framed photograph on the cluttered sideboard. It was a studio depiction of a thin woman sitting on a chair with a girl on her lap and a stocky man standing at their side. ‘Is that you with your parents in the photo?’

  Gabby paused from throwing scraps of bread to Tickle. She stared at Beth as if she was seeing something utterly amazing in her kitchen. ‘No one asked anything about me before, ’cept occasionally Mark Reseigh. “How are you, Miss Magor?” he’d say. Nice of him, I always thought, though he don’t never hang about long for much of an answer. He weren’t nice to me yes’day though. Do you really want to know about my parents?’

  ‘Yes, actually I do. Really,’ Beth answered truthfully. She was so grateful to be receiving warmth from the fire, for her mind to be clearing as the horrible shivers died away that she felt an unexpected appreciation towards the fire’s owner.

  As Tickle chewed up the last of the bread, then curled up to sleep, Gabby picked up the photograph and held it in front of Beth. ‘That’s my mother. Florence Ellen May, was her name. She married my father, Albert George, when she was sixteen years old. She was quite pretty when she was young. I’m about seven, an ugly child, always been ugly, no use denying it. Got teased for years, called names, had stones thrown at me, got deliberately tripped up. If I was down in the cove on the beach I’d get thrown into the sea. So I learned the only way to deal with it was to toughen up. So I did, and I made some of them rotten buggers pay for what they did to me, I can tell you.’

  ‘Have long have you lived alone?’ Beth asked, understanding now why Gabby had turned out to be so aggressive and defensive. It could not be mistaken that the girl in the photograph, with a big bow and long ribbons in her curly hair, had been passed by on good looks. Albert Magor was holding his cap and had a thick brush moustache. Florence Magor, in a Victorian blouse and long straight black skirt, had a gaunt look.

  ‘Father passed over years ago, just after Mother, can’t remember how long it is now.’ Gabby made a cheerless face.

  ‘You must have been very lonely at first.’

  ‘For a while, but I don’t begrudge them their eternal rest.’ Gabby then gave a smile that could almost be described as cheeky. ‘Mother was untidy in the house but I s’pose I’ve let things go a bit. Least, I’ve always had Barbara, my cousin. She lives a couple miles from here, got a little house on the roadside. She’s a good bit older than me. You wouldn’t have seen her. She’s never been to Portcowl in her life, shops in Leaford. And I’ve got my Tickle, he fills my life.’ She bellowed with mirth. ‘Don’t know why; ugly little mutt.’

  ‘He’s quite sweet. I’m glad for you.’

  ‘Are you now?’ Gabby’s suspicions returned and she eyed Beth sharply. She glanced down at the kettle. Steam was beginning to show from the spout.

  ‘Time to get on with things,’ Beth said, taking a deep breath to steady herself. ‘This will surprise you Miss Magor, but although I’m very anxious, I’m also feeling quite relieved that you’ve brought my rather lurid past to a head.’

  ‘Oh? What does that mean?’ Gabby dragged her chair to the hearth where she could make the tea by just leaning to her side. She put hawklike eyes on Beth. ‘Spell it out with no fancy language.’

  ‘That’s what I intend to do. I’ve made some decisions, you see. I’m going to confess to my friend Miss Copeland about my affair with her brother. Stuart and Constance Copeland’s marriage is their own affair, and they have kept no secrets from each other. But I have kept another secret from Miss Copeland, which I also intend to admit to her. When Constance Copeland came to stay at the Grand Sea View Hotel she got in touch with me. She knew about my affair with Stuart, but she had forgiven me, knowing herself what it’s like to believe you’re in love with someone else, someone who turned out to be thoroughly unsuitable. Constance Copeland was afraid that Kitty, who didn’t trust her following her desertion, would try to prevent her from making a successful attempt to repair her marriage, and Constance asked me to keep Kitty out of the way. It’s been a heavy burden keeping my secrets from Kitty but now I can see she deserves to hear the truth. If I lose her friendship that will be my punishment and I will have to bear it, also the disappointment of my mother and the displeasure of my younger brother.

  ‘I know you are looking to gain a sum of money from me, Miss Magor, in exchange for your keeping what you overheard on the beach to yourself.’

  ‘And now I won’t be getting a penny! That what you’re saying?’ Gabby snarled, her dark expression like that of a sulky child, glaring at Beth, and then the whistling kettle.

  ‘No, I am not.’ Beth leaned towards Gabby. ‘What I plan to do, I fear, and I am genuinely afraid, Gabby, if I may call you that, will cost me much more than money. The money isn’t at all important. But I would like to offer you something in the hope that you will agree to never ever mention a word of my shame, and the Copelands’ situation. It goes without saying that I’d hate for my past to be turned into a scandal. It would greatly hurt my mother. I’d hate for people to lose their respect for her over something I had done. I’m not proud of what I did, and believe me I have suffered because of it in many ways. Do you understand all I’ve said?’ Beth ended on a plea.

  ‘I do that.’ Gabby nodded, her ugly face passive for once. ‘Just a sec.’ She turned off the primus and poured the boiling water into the teapot. ‘Right, how much?’

  ‘I would like to give you one hundred pounds as a gift rather than as a bribe. Would you like to think about it?’ Beth searched Gabby’s wrinkled eyes for signs of discontent or greed. If anything she seemed stunned. ‘It’s a willing act on my behalf, I swear to you. I can drive to the bank in St Austell tomorrow and get the money for you, and meet you out in the lane on my way back.’

  A huge grin spread across Gabby’s flabby face. ‘I was thinking of two hundred pounds but one hundred is still a bleddy fortune. Be enough to do all the things Barbara would like and enough for us and Tickle to go on a holiday.’

  Beth was actually moved to admire her would-be blackmailer, the persistent local troublemaker, for putting her cousin first. Gabby looked so happy, she was like an excited child. ‘What will you buy for yourself?’

  ‘I might get a silk neck scarf. I’ve always liked the ones you ladies wear. P’raps some new clothes, but I don’t know what’d suit me. Don’t s’pose I’d look right in a frock. Oh, let me pour the tea. Got no milk though. You take sugar?’

  ‘One spoonful please,’ Beth said, looking forward to the hot drink and not caring how horrible it might taste. ‘So we have a de
al, Gabby? May we shake hands on it? For a one-off gift of one hundred pounds and for the facts behind it never to be mentioned again.’

  Putting down the packet of sugar, Gabby stuck out her doorstopsized hand. Her tanned cheeks blushed and again she was like a girl. ‘Never shook no one’s hand in the proper manner before. I won’t spit on it, not right for a lady. It’s a deal, Beth, forever, on my life and the memories of my parents. I’ll never do the dirty on you. You can sleep at nights on it. We’re sort of friends now, eh? Anyone ever hurt or annoy you and you want them sorted out just you come to me. Aw, got a new packet of biscuits in the larder. Bought ’em the other day, so you can rest ’sured they won’t be stale or dirty. Me, you and Tickle can have a feast.’

  Huddled in the longed-for warmth, less anxious now she had succeeded better than she had hoped for with Gabby, Beth sipped the tea, actually wonderfully refreshing, and munched on chocolate-coated biscuits. Gabby dunked her biscuits in her mug and she and Tickle, begging appealingly at her feet, were soon smeared with chocolate.

  ‘Nice having company here,’ Gabby said happily. ‘No one been here since the last vicar called here after Father died. The new vicar called and left his card but I was out. Oh, one or two have come to buy my wine, I’m famous for it, you know. Make it over Barbara’s, if you’re wondering, then I bring the bottles over here. Got a little handcart in the shed. I’ll give you a bottle sometime.’