Chapter 2 Eden’s End #2
In the end we compromised, with Will spending Friday evening to early Monday at the cottage and the rest of the week in London, where he rented Simon’s spare room. As time passed, however, he more often went back there on Sunday afternoon, so he spent more time with Simon than he did with me.
But it seemed to work out. I liked my solitude to work and do country things during the week, then have his company at weekends, even if the furthest we ever got was only a pub lunch in a nearby village and Will spent most of the rest of his time on his phone or watching box sets.
The anachronistic Sky dish was only installed because he insisted: the things you do for love.
I thought we were happy until the Great Plague began to raise its ugly and menacing head and it became more imperative to work from home, when you could …
Then, finally, came the threat of lockdown and I knew Will would have to move to the cottage very soon and work from there for the duration, at least.
I was sure he’d have preferred to stay in London, except that Simon’s fiancée had moved in with him and didn’t seem that keen on having Will there twenty-four seven.
It was all getting a bit last minute until the road accident happened and then Will told me he was leaving me.
After that, although there might be no Adam in Eden, this Eve did just fine on her own.
But now, it seemed, things were about to change.
*
The phone rang and when I picked it up, Evie’s crisp, clear voice demanded, without preamble: ‘What’s all this about the land behind your house being sold and the new owners wanting to buy Wisteria Cottage?
Surely you must have known about the sale?
I mean, planning permission to build a large new house on the estate wouldn’t have been passed in five minutes! ’
‘I only had the solicitor’s letter with the offer yesterday,’ I said, which is when I had emailed Liv about it.
‘Yes, but you must have had some idea of what was happening, unless your head was completely buried in the sand – or the plums, or whatever else you were turning into jam or wine at the time,’ she insisted.
‘I’ve been too taken up the last few weeks with Mrs Snowboots; she seemed to fade away so fast …’
‘Well, I’m sorry about the cat,’ Evie said. ‘But she was old, so it can’t have been entirely unexpected. But all this about the Brocklebank estate must have been going on long before you got distracted by the cat.’
‘Yes, that’s true. Once I got the letter and began to look back, I can see I missed all the warning signs.
It must have been eighteen months ago when Eli mentioned the estate had been sold, but then nothing happened and I forgot about it.
I mean, people buy land just as an investment and then do nothing with it, don’t they? ’
‘No idea,’ she said shortly, ‘but if it was me, I’d have been concerned.’
‘The postwoman said the land had been bought by a pop star or film star, or some other big celebrity, who would build a new home on it, but she delivers gossip with the mail, so I didn’t take that seriously.’
‘Well, it looks like you should have, doesn’t it? After your email, Liv chased up the planning application and they’ve passed the plans for a big modern house complex, with staff quarters. No idea who the buyer is, though.’
‘It was a bolt from the blue,’ I admitted. ‘And I can see everything is going to change, but I suppose they will build on the far side of the estate, near Mossing, and lots of the old trees in the woodland must have preservation orders on them, so they can’t chop everything down,’ I said hopefully.
‘I don’t think I’d bank on it, Ginny. What did the solicitor’s letter actually say, other than offering you a good price for the cottage?’
‘Oh, that their client had bought the estate and was planning to build there, and would like to purchase my cottage, too, because they intended installing security staff at the entrance to both drives. They have already purchased the big lodge at the front of the house.’
‘Then I think you are about to be prised off your rock, darling,’ Evie said.
‘There was an email address on the letter and I sent a message straight back, saying I wasn’t selling,’ I said quickly. ‘And then they answered that one by saying that he – the solicitor – would like to come to see me and talk it over.’
‘Good strategy to turn them down first time round. I think they’ll pay you a staggeringly big price for it, if you play it right, Ginny. And you will have to sell because it sounds like they’re going to make it untenable for you to stay there.’
Just then there was a screaming metal sound outside that reminded me horribly of that road accident – and I was still having nightmares and flashbacks about that two years on.
Holding the phone, I went out into the front garden and peered over the rustic fence.
A large flatbed truck had pulled up outside and the first of the rusted wrought-iron gates had been wrenched from its hinges and was already being loaded on to it.
‘What’s that horrible noise?’ asked Evie.
‘I think the barbarians are already at the gates,’ I told her, with a sick feeling in my stomach.
*
I am nothing if not stubborn so I stuck it out as November moved into December and winter set in.
The price they offered went up and up, but so too did veiled threats that, finally, led to action, as the ground began to be cleared ready for building and the drives and woodland reclaimed from the wilderness I loved.
The straw that broke me was discovering that most of my rear garden – everything beyond the trellis fence – actually still belonged to the estate, and a bulldozer made short work of it.
The only survivor was the huge old plum tree.
Then came the information that if I would not sell, then the six-foot security fence that would run around the inner side of the estate wall would extend right around my cottage and garden, so I could envisage the tiny patch left at the back of the cottage would be more like a gorilla pit.
I didn’t want to leave, but the things I didn’t want to leave were mostly already wrenched away from me.
I accepted their last offer on the understanding that they didn’t hassle me until I’d moved out, and told them I’d leave at the start of February, which would give me one last Christmas in the cottage and time to decide where I was going to go next.