The Garden House Read online

  Angus is taken aback by this retort – not Plum’s style at all – and he straightens up and turns to look at her.

  ‘Are you all right, darling?’ he asks. ‘You seem to have been a bit on edge today.’

  Plum gathers the dogs more closely to her, as if she is using them as a defence.

  ‘There is something,’ she says quickly. ‘It’s about where we live when we’re down here. I know you’d like us to be with you, Dad, but I’m not sure that it would work. Ian’s not the easiest person to live with when he’s just back from sea, and the girls are so random these days, turning up with friends. I feel really mean about this but I asked Kate this morning if we could rent her cottage.’

  Briefly, Angus is filled with terrible disappointment. It’s so good to have Plum here: to hear her about the place, talking to the dogs, turning on the radio, making breakfast.

  ‘After all,’ she’s saying, ‘Chapel Street is only a ten-minute walk away so we shall be in and out all the time…’

  How can he explain that, however conveniently close Kate’s cottage is, it’s not the same as having Plum and Ian living in the house with him, providing companionship? He gets a grip on his emotions, swallows down his disappointment, and nods.

  ‘I can quite see that,’ he says. ‘Ian will need his own space when he comes ashore. Perfectly reasonable.’ He hesitates. ‘So what did Kate say?’

  ‘Well, she says the cottage isn’t quite ready but she’s given us first refusal.’

  Angus feels a little spasm of gratitude towards Kate. She knows what he’s hoping and she’s probably just trying to buy some time for him.

  ‘Well, that’s all good then,’ he says. ‘Supper’s nearly ready. Shall we have a drink?’

  * * *

  Plum struggles out from between the dogs, stands up and goes to the fridge to find the wine. She feels utterly miserable. It was such a shock to see Issy standing there, in the bar at the Bedford, and she felt suddenly very vulnerable. It seems impossible that her old friend should drop her in it, yet ever since Plum met her in the Pannier Market, she’s felt that Issy is in a slightly volatile state and might easily say or do something a bit crazy. Just for a minute, when Dad mentioned her, Plum was taken off guard again and talked about Kate and the cottage so as to deflect him away from Issy.

  Plum takes out a bottle of Pinot Grigio, stands it on the kitchen table and finds glasses. She knows perfectly well that it’s her own guilt that is at the root of the trouble. All the while she’s been away she’s been able to cope with it, but now, back here amongst her friends and family, it’s getting more difficult. She was horrified when she heard that Martin and Felicity were divorcing. When her father told her, on the telephone, she’d held her breath with shock and dismay. It was a year since she and Martin had been caught up into that mad, brief moment of shared affection. Martin, whom she’d known since she was a teenager, her father’s junior partner, family friend. He often dropped in to see them if he was passing their naval hiring in Roborough, but on this occasion she was alone and very miserable, missing Ian, who was at sea, thinking about the baby, James, both girls staying with grandparents. Martin was so sweet, comforting her, encouraging her. They had a drink, and then another. Even now she can’t quite remember how they’d finished up making love …

  ‘Martin is getting divorced. He tells me that the marriage is finished,’ her father told her during that phone call a few months later, after she and Ian had moved to Portsmouth. ‘Felicity is accusing him of having an affair and he’s not denying it. Very sad, but it seems that he’s made up his mind.’

  ‘Having an affair?’ Plum asked faintly.

  ‘He tells me he’s not and I believe him. They’ve separated. To be honest he seems happier than I’ve ever known him but that’s between me and you…’

  Now, as she pours the wine, Plum wishes she could tell her father the truth. She will never know now if Felicity found out about her and Martin but she can’t believe that she did. Felicity would never have kept silent about it. Nevertheless, Plum feels responsible for the break-up and guilty every time she sees El.

  ‘Are you sure you’re OK, darling?’

  Her father slips his arm around her shoulders and Plum longs to turn and bury her face into the warmth of his jersey and hold him tightly. Instead, she smiles up at him and passes him a glass of wine.

  ‘I’m fine,’ she says. ‘Let’s eat.’

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Will stands by the old stone cross, one hand on its rough, cold surface. He feels the lichen crumbling beneath his warm fingers and once again he experiences the sensation of release: the melting of the icy lump of misery that he’s pushed deep into his heart since his mother died, smothering it with other emotions, other sensations, denying it.

  He stares around at the valleys and hills that flow away into infinity, the overarching sky streaked with cumulus, and his fingers tighten on the granite as if he is communicating his pain into the cross. Here he can allow that pain to dissipate as he has never been able to do; not with his father, or his friends, or even with Christian. He has no idea why this distorted lump of granite should have produced such a reaction in him but he welcomes it, offers his misery back to the cross, allows this strange sense of eternity to free him.

  The sun gleams out, touching rocks, distant woodland and tors with its light. Will feels hopeful, anticipatory, but he has no intention of trying to analyse his feelings. It’s enough to be experiencing this new lightness of spirit. He turns to go, crossing the granite slab over the gully, getting back into the car. As he drives towards Tavistock he thinks about El. She’s phoned him to say that she’s found her father’s phone and some odd texts, which she can’t make out. They seem to be a kind of code, suggested meetings. The name and number mean nothing to her and when he asked if she couldn’t just phone the number El became confused, reluctant to explain why that was difficult for her. A moment’s thought showed Will several reasons why this might be the case and, cursing his tactlessness, he said that he’d like to see the texts. She took him up on this at once and suggested that he should pay another visit to the Pig Pen. They worked out when they both had time off and made a plan.

  And now here he is, hoping that he’ll be able to help, guessing how much El must be missing her father and that she’s slightly fearful of this unknown texter. Will’s immediate reaction is that Martin had a woman friend, a lover, although clearly El knows nothing about her. It will be hard for El to discover that her father had a very close relationship, kept secret, but there might be several reasons for that.

  Even as he broods on these things, he’s aware of the moor all around him: a pony grazing, sheep trotting across the road ahead of him. Unexpected shafts of sunshine light up a distant plantation of pine trees, a little stream, and cloud shadows pass across the bleached grasslands. He tries to imagine this landscape under snow or in high summer, and he hopes that he and El will be able to have another walk, leaving the car and striding out into unknown territory. It’s clear that she knows the moor very well, that it was almost like a back garden to El and her father. She seemed glad to show it to him, to share with him its mystery and its magic.

  Already, as he drives, he’s remembering landmarks, but at the same time he’s beginning to feel apprehensive about this second visit. He knows what it’s like to miss someone very dear to you, to adjust to the terrible finality of death, and he wants to try to help El through it. He knows she hated their parents marrying just as much as he did. He saw how her mother tried to manipulate El into conforming to her own ideas and how El stood up against the coercement and remained loyal to her father.

  Will wishes he’d known Martin. It might have helped to get a handle on this new development. Clearly there must have been a woman who’d been the reason for the divorce, but El believed that this was a very short affair and hadn’t lasted beyond the separation. Knowing El as he now does, Will feels it very unlikely that she would have resented her father fin
ding companionship and even love in the last five years. What was odd was that he’d never talked to her about it. Maybe the woman was married … Or maybe he’s wrong and Martin feared that El would be jealous; that after all the loyalty she showed him she’d feel threatened and displaced. Human relationships are never straightforward.

  Will glances at his sat nav to confirm his route and turns off into the lanes that run between Tavistock and the farm. He shakes off his apprehension and prepares to enjoy the visit. El has promised to show him Tavistock, to explore the moor, and he wants to hear all about her first week at the bookshop. Maybe the texts can be easily explained away; maybe they’re from some old friend who enjoys codes and puzzles. They might simply be a bit of fun between two old friends arranging to meet up for a lunchtime pint or an evening at the pub. Will drives carefully down the track and pulls in beside El’s car. He sits for a moment, then shuts off the engine and climbs out.

  * * *

  El watches from the window. She’s been waiting for him. Learning to live alone is not as straightforward as she imagined it might be. She’s always had school friends, family, or her friends at uni. It’s especially odd to be alone here, at the Pig Pen. Pa’s death is too sudden, too unexpected, to grasp. He should be here, sitting at the table calling out a clue to a crossword, making coffee, wandering out on to the little terrace outside the door where he has his favourite tubs and the bird-feeders. It’s all so silent, so empty, without him.

  During these last few days, when the westerlies came rolling in, bringing soft grey curtains of rain that shrouded the moor in mist, she’d begun to wonder if she could actually make it alone, if she could endure long, dark winter evenings. The sight of Will’s big car, so totally unsuitable for a Devon farmyard, sliding gently to a halt below her fills her with relief and she has to prevent herself from running down the stairs and outside to greet him. He gets out, looking around him, and El steps back from the window lest he should see her watching. She tries to think of something casual she could be doing but nothing comes to mind. Quickly she opens her laptop so that when he bangs on the door, opens it and calls out, she can shout back and be sitting at the table when he appears at the top of the stairs.

  ‘Hi,’ she says, pleased to hear herself sounding cheerful. ‘You’ve made good time.’

  She realizes that she doesn’t know how to greet him, whether she should get up and hug him, but he solves the problem by walking across to the window and looking out.

  ‘You’ve got good views here,’ he observes. ‘I couldn’t remember them clearly from last time.’

  ‘It’s the advantage of being upside down,’ she says, and suddenly she’s calmer. ‘It’s really great in the summer with all the sunshine pouring in. Would you like some tea?’

  ‘That sounds good. I didn’t stop on the way down.’ He turns back into the room. ‘I dropped my bag in the bedroom. Hope that was OK?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ She’s glad to have something to do, to fill the kettle, find two mugs. Even though he was here to help clear out Pa’s things, for her to be here in the Pig Pen with him still feels slightly bizarre. ‘I’m glad you could get down again. To be honest I was totally thrown by finding Pa’s phone. And those messages.’

  She has her back to him as she makes the tea but she hears him drag out a chair and sit down at the table.

  ‘Well, I totally get that,’ he replies. He hesitates and then goes on. ‘It was a bit like that after my mum died. I’d open a book and find in it a card she’d sent me or a letter from when I was at school. It really shredded me. Like I could hear her voice.’

  El is touched by this disclosure. She can imagine that it must really cost Will to share this with her, and suddenly all her anxiety, this discomfiture at his presence, is done away with. She carries the two mugs to the table and then fetches a plate of chocolate cookies.

  ‘It was a bit like that,’ she admits. ‘It’s the whole thing. Not just seeing these weird texts but feeling like I’m spying on something private. You know what I mean?’

  Will raises the mug to his lips. He looks thoughtful.

  ‘It’s a tricky one, isn’t it? In the old days people had address books and at times like these they could be checked through so as to let everyone know what has happened. But these days everything’s in your computer or your phone, isn’t it? So when you check it out you’re always going to come across texts and emails.’

  ‘Pa had a very comprehensive database of friends and business acquaintances on his laptop,’ El said, ‘and I checked right through it to make sure everyone was informed. The thing was, I couldn’t find his phone and then I kind of forgot about it.’

  ‘Well, that’s fair enough. You’ve had a lot on your mind.’ He reaches for a cookie. ‘So you found it in his jacket pocket?’

  She nods. ‘His fleece gilet. I forgot his coats when we were doing the packing up because they were hanging in the hall, and there it was in the pocket. It was out of charge, of course, but when I’d got it charged up I thought I should just check it.’ She hesitates. ‘There were these unanswered texts, you see. It was awful, really. I felt I was spying but I didn’t know if there were people who still hadn’t heard about what had happened.’

  ‘And were there many?’

  She shakes her head. ‘Only this one that I didn’t recognize. The others were on his database. Just close family and friends.’

  He’s watching her across the table, compassionate but slightly challenging too, which oddly gives her courage to admit her fears.

  ‘I know I could just phone the number and ask the question,’ she says. ‘It’s the obvious thing to do. But the texts have made me…’ she shrugs. ‘I don’t know. They’ve made me wary.’

  He nods. ‘OK. So shall I have a look at them?’

  As an answer she picks up the phone lying beside her, unlocks it and pushes it across the table to him. He takes it and looks at the screen, reading the last text and then scrolling slowly upwards. El watches him, seeing his expression change from interested, to puzzled, and then slightly amused.

  ‘Yes,’ he says at last. ‘I see what you meant now when you talked about codes. Was your father into that?’

  El thinks about it. ‘I can see that it would have amused him,’ she says at last. ‘He was a solicitor so you might say that it was part of his work to assemble facts, sort out truth from lies, see his way through things. You notice that I’m not using the word “devious”?’

  Will smiles at her. ‘Don’t think I can’t see how hard this is for you.’

  She stares at him, slightly taken aback. ‘Yes,’ she says. ‘OK. Yes, if you want the truth I’m finding it really hard to think that he’s had this kind of fun relationship with someone that he never told me about. I know most of his friends, but this is different.’

  Will looks at the screen. He begins to scroll up again, making comments as he goes.

  ‘So you don’t know Nancy Fortescue? … Some of these are just initials and a time … Almost businesslike, isn’t it? … The magic circle sounds interesting … the wisteria bridge … Sophie’s place. Do you know anyone called Sophie?’

  ‘Only a school friend who lives miles away.’

  He shakes his head, puzzled. ‘So all we know is her mobile number, a voicemail, and an initial J. And you really feel you can’t just phone the number?’

  ‘I don’t want to admit to whoever might answer that I didn’t know this obviously important part of his life because he’s kept it secret from me.’

  ‘Would you like me to do it?’

  ‘No!’ She reaches across the table and pulls the phone back towards her. ‘No. Not yet, anyway.’

  ‘OK,’ says Will pacifically. ‘So what do you want us to do?’

  ‘Sorry,’ she says, feeling foolish. ‘I know I’m probably overreacting here, but what I wondered was whether we could perhaps follow up some of the clues.’

  Will sits back in his chair and drinks some more tea. ‘OK,’ he says. ‘I�
��m cool with that. Where do you want to start?’

  El sighs with relief. She has her answer ready.

  ‘I thought we’d start with Nancy Fortescue,’ she says.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  ‘So what’s the plan?’ asks Davy at breakfast on Saturday morning, buttering toast, reaching for the marmalade. ‘What excitements do you have in store for me?’

  Julia smiles. Davy always likes to have some jaunt planned, though nothing too strenuous. Not for Davy a yomp across the moor or the cliffs. He likes something more civilized, which might include a gallery or a National Trust property, but which definitely includes some kind of sustenance. Julia has an idea, though. She wants to go back to The Garden House, to revisit those places she went with Martin. The prospect of going alone fills her with a kind of dread, yet she’s got to get herself back to the garden.

  ‘I was thinking.’ she says casually, ‘that we might go over the moor to The Garden House. It’s the most amazing garden and the acers will be really spectacular just now. There’s a café and they make delicious cake. I think you might enjoy it. What d’you think? It’s a lovely morning now all the mist has blown away.’

  ‘Perfect,’ Davy answers, contentedly. ‘I haven’t the least idea what an acer is, but I trust you utterly, darling.’

  Julia laughs at him. ‘You’ll love it. That’s an order, as dear old Bob used to say. I’ll give Bertie a quick run up the lane now and then we can give him a walk on the moor on the way back home.’

  Davy waves his piece of toast in acknowledgement of the plan. ‘Sounds good to me. I am so enjoying this, Jules. Thanks for rescuing me this weekend. I’ve been feeling pretty low and sorry for myself, and now I know what you’ve been going through for these last few weeks I’m quite ashamed of myself.’

  ‘Well, don’t be,’ she says swiftly. ‘Nobody has a monopoly on feelings and it’s not a contest. I’m really glad I told you, Davy. And, OK, The Garden House is somewhere I first met Martin and it’s a pretty special place for me. It would be really good to go back there but somehow I don’t want to go on my own.’