Chapter Eleven
ELEVEN
THE FIRST SNOWDROPS are pushing up on the west lawn over by the lake, legions of tiny green soldiers standing to attention.
Spring’s around the corner and this morning I’m preparing the kitchen garden seed beds, digging in a fresh helping of compost and pulling weeds as I go.
I plan on more variety in the vegetable crops this year.
While I appreciate that Mrs Allen cooks for us all, there’s only so many helpings of plain celeriac a woman can eat before she has to put her foot down.
My mouth waters just thinking of what’s to come: crisp lettuce, sugar-sweet peas, radishes, beets, pungent bulbs of garlic, tomatoes so plump they burst like sunlight on the tongue.
All the better for the care that goes into growing them.
Never one to be left out of things, Mutton has found his way to my side and is helping to dig – when he’s not chewing the handle of my fork.
He lives a charmed life, that dog, and he doesn’t even know it.
I give his rump a scratch with the fork tines.
Heading round the front of the house to access the potting shed, I notice that Tom’s preparing the Singer for Reacher to take out. ‘Back to London, is he?’ I ask.
Tom shakes his head. ‘Just Warminster.’ Doesn’t elaborate, which is unlike him. Wonder if he has something else on his mind.
I still have questions about Reacher’s odd management of the Harfold finances, and I’m conscious that if he’s off to Warminster, it’ll be for a business engagement.
So, while I’m moving things around in the potting shed, spotting the tin of rat poison I bought last time, an idea strikes me: if I ask Reacher for a lift into town, maybe I can get a glimpse of whoever he’s visiting.
I pop down my bits and bobs and scoot round the side of the manor until I come to Reacher’s study window.
Peering through the array of wild bird eggs on the sill, I can spot him at his desk, shoving things into a file.
I tap the glass until he looks up. Wave him over.
‘All right, Mr Reacher?’
He fights with a stiff latch to get the window open. ‘Hello, Miss Morgan. To what do I owe the pleasure?’
‘Tom says you’re off to Warminster this morning. I wondered if you could give me a lift? I have some seeds to collect at Wheeler’s.’ Give him a smile.
‘Don’t they deliver?’
‘I’d like them today, while the weather’s good for it.’
He adjusts the lapels of his bottle-green suit jacket. ‘Well, I shan’t turn down the offer of company. But don’t go getting any ideas: you’re not driving my car, understood?’
So a quarter-hour later, I join Reacher in the Singer.
It’s a very different driving experience to the Renault: she takes her time to get up to speed, and never passes much over thirty-five downhill, the engine grumbling the whole time.
Whenever Reacher hits the brakes, they let out a sharp, piglet-like squeal.
Still, it’s a fresh, sunny day and I let myself enjoy the unfolding countryside, more visible than it was on that previous drizzled drive.
As we pass places with quaint names like Codford St Peter, Ashton Gifford, Tytherington, Little Sutton and Bishopstrow, Reacher nudges me with one elbow.
‘You and my cousin are getting along jolly well.’ His expression is hard to read, his eyes roving over the road ahead and a slight scowl of concentration from driving.
‘Looks that way,’ I agree.
‘Who’d have thought …’ We pass an old tollhouse, coming into Warminster now. ‘Do you ever miss your last place? Where was it you were – in Cardiff the whole time?’
I glance at him. Why the sudden interest, I have to wonder. Is this just casual talk, or is he needling for information about my past? Could he have made the connection to that newspaper article? ‘That’s right,’ I say. Tell myself not to panic. ‘No, not really – I like it here just fine.’
Both a truth and a lie. That deep heart-ache for what I used to have: my parents, my home, the easy friendship with Lou and Gladys, running round the Reeses’ lawn with sweet little Kenneth.
But all of that was already long gone by the time I applied for the job at Harfold.
And there’s so much to love here. The beautiful, green countryside.
A garden that’s all mine to shape. Tom’s solid cheer and Mrs Allen’s growing warmth. Funny old Mutton.
Arabella. That swooping in my chest when I’m around her. The knowledge that someone wants me.
Of course, I’m trying to keep sight of reality when it comes to the two of us.
Our affair is a comet in the night sky, fierce and bright, passing in a flash.
No expectations beyond that. Even if I weren’t her employee and from a completely different world; even if she could forget her paranoia and I could escape what happened in Penarth – even then, we’d still both be women, wouldn’t we?
Not that it can’t be done. Lou and Gladys.
Others: women I know, women I’ve heard of.
Best not to get carried away in dreaming, though.
The star will shoot by. But in the meantime, I tell myself, why not look up to the heavens and admire its passage?
Reacher interrupts my thoughts. ‘Was it a large house?’
‘Fairly.’ I cast around to change the subject. ‘And how about you then, Mr Reacher? D’you prefer Harfold or London? I’ll bet you get better company up there.’
Reacher gives an expressive sigh. ‘Alas, no. The men are all spoken for, ugly, old, or disappointingly normal.’
‘More’s the pity.’
‘You don’t need to tell me! No, Finchley is the only fellow to share my life. Ah, here we are.’ We’ve arrived in the marketplace, and Reacher finds a place to park the car nearby. Cuts the engine, leaving my ears ringing with silent absence.
We agree to meet back in an hour. As we part ways, I pretend I’m heading for Wheeler’s, then dart behind a stationary hackney, the horse rolling its eyes at me.
The driver gives me a look himself, so I bend over to tighten a bootlace, using the activity to conceal my peering out after Reacher.
Wait for enough distance that I can risk following.
I’ve been expecting him to head for a business engagement, so at first I’m not surprised when he makes a beeline for the Savings Bank just up the marketplace.
But then, to my interest, he overshoots, turning instead into the pub that’s one door down – the Three Horseshoes, it’s called.
I sidle up to the entrance, trying to peer in without it being obvious.
Catch a flash of green suit. Reacher’s inside, greeting another man at the bar.
Then they both move out of my sightline.
I wait a few minutes, now pretending to be winding my pocket watch, then stick my head in.
A handful of men – the sort of drinkers I’d expect to see before noon on a weekday.
One of them eyes me, wary. Expect they don’t get so many women in pubs out here as we did in Cardiff.
No sign of Reacher. Searching all round with my gaze, I spot a door to a backroom.
A private meeting, perhaps. The man watching me screws up his nose.
It’s clear that if I go in, there’ll be no hope of my enjoying a quiet drink undisturbed while listening at the door.
Stepping back into the street, I see that to the side of the pub – the other side from the Savings Bank – is a covered entrance, which must lead round the back.
I try this and find a yard with stables and, at the far end, what look like residential cottages.
And yes, there’s the rear of the pub itself, a handful of windows at ground level.
Crouching down, I peep into some of these until I find one that looks into a wood-panelled room, with two people inside it.
Reacher and another man. The cadence of their voices seeps through the glass.
Considering our earlier conversation in the car, it does cross my mind that this rendezvous could be of the amorous variety, but the other fellow is really getting on in years, with a receding head of grey hair and the bushiest moustache I’ve ever laid eyes on. He doesn’t strike me as Reacher’s type.
Thinking it won’t do to be caught eavesdropping, I light a cigarette and lean against the wall, keeping my ear pointed at the window.
Now if anyone comes through the covered entrance or glances out of the cottages, it will just look like I’ve popped out of the taproom to have a smoke in the fresh air.
Or so I hope … It’s not always possible to make out full sentences, but I can catch what Reacher and the other man are saying in bursts.
Enough to get the gist. To realize that this stranger is Mr Gerrish, the man who wants to buy the back paddock to add to his farming portfolio.
Now this is interesting because, as far as I know, Arabella is still holding her position against giving over that land for agricultural use.
I haven’t personally heard Reacher raise the topic since I slipped the letter into his in-tray, and I flatter myself in thinking that Arabella would’ve mentioned it to me if he’d discussed it with her in private.
I have to assume, then, that this meeting is happening behind her back.
Gerrish and Reacher are certainly discussing the paddock: I hear that word mentioned several times.
The tone of the conversation is friendly, excited.
It sounds like the pair are in agreement on most points – at least, there’s no argument that I can pick out.
Gerrish says something and Reacher responds with his characteristic squawking laugh.
Reacher makes a suggestion and I hear several enthusiastic yeses from Gerrish.
My forgotten cigarette spills ash on my boots.