CHAPTER 12
Harriet
Dorset
Harriet decided to go for a walk. If she didn’t get out of the house, she’d spontaneously combust.
Lucky Joanna, to be in Venice . . . One minute she’d been here, then whoosh, a lift to the railway station and she was off to the airport.
Jet-setting around, and being paid for it too.
Her sister might be having marital problems but there were compensations.
What would it be like, Harriet wondered, to be so free?
This morning, when Harriet went out to collect the eggs, she noticed that another two tiles had come off the roof; they were lying, in pieces, by the front door, like symbols of doom. ‘Bugger,’ she said.
Mother hadn’t wasted any time. While Harriet was doing some digging in the kitchen garden, she must have gone through the Yellow Pages because after lunch three different roofers turned up to give them estimates for a new roof.
‘And how much just to replace the broken tiles?’ Harriet had asked.
‘Well, now . . .’ Eventually, one of them reluctantly agreed to do the work; the others all shook their heads and told her that there was a ‘limit to the number of times you can do repairs, love.’ She knew they were right and they’d have to get a new roof eventually, but how could they possibly afford it?
Harriet plucked her jacket from the hook by the door.
And not that she had ever been expecting anyone from Someone Somewhere to rescue her exactly .
. . But it would be nice to have the choice.
Predictably, Hector hadn’t got back in touch, despite the fact that he’d thought he was going to fall in love with her.
Though Harriet had to admit, she felt more relieved than offended.
She allowed herself to briefly consider the two remaining contenders for her affections.
Charles was a research scientist – very commendable.
Harriet liked intelligence in a man and it was really no trouble to use a dictionary every time Charles sent her an email; at least she was enlarging her vocabulary, which wouldn’t do her any harm since most of the time she was stuck here with no one to talk to all day but Mother.
And then there was Malcolm, a pig farmer in East Devon.
Malcolm had obvious pluses – he too had been brought up on a farm, so they were compatible in that respect, and he knew everything there was to know about pigs, which could come in useful.
But Harriet was beginning to think of this as a negative point.
Malcolm never wrote an email that didn’t mention pigs.
She really couldn’t imagine what sort of a life partner he would be.
Or at least she could, which was the problem.
Harriet strode out through the cluttered porch, kicking a moth-eaten blanket to one side.
Pausing, she took a deep breath to let the smell of the freshly turned soil in the kitchen garden filter into her senses – all its layers, from the fresh turfy top to the almost foetid underground.
That delicious autumn mix of decay and fecundity.
She had always loved this time of year. In the lane behind the farmhouse yesterday as the sun was setting, she’d picked a bowlful of luscious blackberries seeping with juice, staining her fingers.
Mmm. Sticky soil, wet plants, milky sap, musty leaves; the pigs and the chickens mixing in. Glorious.
Harriet had been flirting with online dating for over a year now, without ever meeting anyone until Hector.
Early days, she thought. She didn’t want to rush into anything.
Because although a lot of people were doing it these days, online dating was still a risky way to meet a partner, wasn’t it?
Compatibility and chemistry could hardly be detected via a text or an email – though the way things were going round here it would be useful to have a man about the place.
She walked down the track, past the tottering woodpile – which reminded her that the logs Owen had delivered yesterday needed sorting and chopping – across the grey cobbled farmyard and beyond the pen where the pigs were snuffling.
She glanced back towards the mulberry tree, thought of Joanna sitting under it only a week or so ago, reading something that made her smile that secret smile.
Then she climbed over the wooden stile onto the Down.
The truth was that Harriet wasn’t even sure she wanted a man.
It had been so long and sometimes she was just plain terrified.
She shivered, although the air was warm and the sun was creeping out between the clouds.
And even if she were to find the right man, what would she do about Mother?
It was all very well keeping promises . .
. Look after your mother. She needs you.
Promise me you’ll do that . . . But it was so hard to shoulder all the responsibility. Sometimes . . .
Harriet began to walk across the field. This was Owen’s field which used to be their field; full of Owen’s sheep which used to be their cows – in a manner of speaking anyway.
Last night, she had stayed up until she heard the ancient grandfather clock strike midnight.
The cottage was still full of furniture from her childhood and Harriet was glad.
Memories had a way of creeping into those old chairs and tables, clocks and bookcases like woodworm; you could touch their dusty wooden surfaces and almost be transported back – well, Harriet could anyhow.
The clock reminded her of Joanna and their childhood game, one, two, three, alive.
It was hide-and-seek, but with a time limit.
The tradition was to start the game at fifteen minutes to the hour, one of you standing by the clock, the other running off to hide.
After five minutes the seeker could start looking.
The challenge for the person hiding was to remain undiscovered and then reappear by the grandfather clock as if by magic, as it struck the hour (but not before) shouting ‘One, two, three, alive’ at the top of their voice.
Harriet grinned at the memory. Try as she might, Joanna had never worked out Harriet’s favourite hiding place and Harriet had always refused to tell her.
A small triumph perhaps, but . . . ‘One, two, three, alive,’ she murmured.
Joanna had always been easy to find – she’d either be in the old cow shed or Big Barn.
The ground underfoot was humped with rabbit burrows and molehills that she knew drove Owen crazy.
Well, not crazy. Owen wasn’t the sort of man who did crazy.
She couldn’t imagine him even being angry.
Unlike Harriet who felt angry a lot of the time.
She unlocked the gate and swung it open.
She didn’t want to, but . . . Didn’t she have good reason?
In the distance now, she could see Owen in his tractor and beyond him the church on the hill.
She waved, in case he was looking her way.
Did he ever get lonely? she wondered. He seemed pretty self-sufficient, but he was always keen to come to the cottage to drink whisky with Mother and he had certainly been getting on well with Joanna when they had him round to supper the other night, laughing and joking – Joanna must bring it out in him because Harriet had never seen him that way before.
The grass on the Down was clipped short by the sheep and shone green-gold in the autumn sunshine.
Harriet paused at the next stile and looked ahead, shielding her eyes.
Between the hills, the glistening sea yawned out in front of her into that glorious feeling of infinity that always soothed her ruffled senses.
Dorset – land of gentle green hills, fields of grass and acid-yellow rape, flocks of placid grazing sheep, where the seasons dictated the organic produce at farm markets and the air was fresh and clean.
She complained about this place, but deep down she loved every muddy inch of it.
She had lived in this same landscape for as long as she could remember.
There were more camper vans in the car park in summer, Linda had rashly paid someone to repaint the pub bright tangerine, occasionally there was an unfamiliar fishing boat on the beach.
Otherwise, it never changed. And despite everything, that was what Harriet craved.
Change. Excitement. And not the kind of excitement that involved shepherds’ huts or prowlers either.
It was hard to imagine how she could escape from what her life had become.
She had spent all summer baking for the café, and when September came, she had breathed a sigh of relief as she turned her attention to the trees in the orchard – to pickling and bottling and making the jam.
As for winter . . . Harriet didn’t want to think about that.
In winter, she felt more enclosed than ever.
She climbed the next stile and walked on.
The afternoon sun was mellow, warming her face and her hair, and the breeze had dropped, although there was a faint chill in the air that reminded her again about the blasted logs.
Mother had been cold last night. Time to batten down the hatches, chop the wood, light the stove.
Harriet let herself through the final gate, reached the lane and the stream and made her way down past the old fishing boats to the beach of Warren Cove, tucked between the grass-capped sandstone cliffs.
She glanced at her watch. Crikey, she’d been gone forty minutes already; she’d best get back before Mother called out another herd of tradesmen.
She hot-footed it back up the lane and over the Down. And was just crossing the last field when she saw it. Or him. Again! She could barely believe it. A thin figure dodging behind Little Barn by the chicken run where a path led past the pond and up to Blackberry Lane. Unmistakably their prowler.
Harriet increased her pace. ‘Hey!’ she shouted. ‘Hey, you!’
She began a loping run, launched herself over the stile and scooted round the back of Little Barn. Her heart was thumping in her chest. She looked around. Nothing. No one. She bent double for a few seconds to recover, then straightened and headed for the path.
She stopped. All was quiet, except for the rustling and squawking of the chickens, the snuffling of the pigs and the distant rumble of the tractor.
Her breath was still coming in short gasps. Her side was aching. But she ran on past the pond and the mulberry tree up to the lane. And she saw him, in the distance, racing down the road towards the village.
‘Stay away from here!’ she yelled. ‘Stay away from us, or I’ll . . . I’ll . . .’ Damn. She couldn’t think of anything. But anyhow, he was gone, out of sight, probably he hadn’t even heard her.
Harriet was so angry now she could scream.
What right did he have to keep coming here scaring everyone half to death?
Who was he? What should she do? What could she do?
Stop shaking for a start, she told herself.
But what in heaven’s name was he after? There was no doubt in her mind, she would have to find out.