22. RUSTIC REALITY
TWENTY-TWO
RUSTIC REALITY
Number six was George Barratt, who lived a mere three miles away in the countryside. He was a farmer. Tess knew she had to go through with this, regardless of what he was like, to complete dates with the number of hearts she needed in order to apply for a refund from MMM.
‘Farmer George!’ Orla snorted.
George was looking to meet someone who liked animals, good food and country air. It all sounded very healthy. George wondered if she’d like to meet him at the local pub, aptly named the Plough, and then she might like to see his sheep and his goats and his newborn piglets.
This, Tess thought, is definitely a day for jeans and a T-shirt. Dresses were to be saved, hopefully, for a further date with Sanjeev. The Plough, which she’d driven past many times, was suitably rustic, boasting a large rusty plough positioned in front – perhaps in case some passing alien might not know what a plough was. Inside, the decor was predictably spit-and-sawdust, complete with beams adorned with various farming implements and a fair few cobwebs .
George was leaning against the bar, as he’d promised he would be, clutching a pint of bitter. He was a little taller than Tess, chubby, balding, with a careful comb-over and a pleasant open face. He was tanned but still not as attractive as his MMM photo which, of course, she’d now come to accept as being the norm. He wore an open-neck checked shirt and jeans jammed into a pair of no-nonsense wellington boots. He was Farmer Giles all right.
‘You must be Tess?’ he asked, which was a fair assumption as there was no one else in the bar, except four old men at a corner table playing dominoes.
‘Nice to meet you, George,’ she said as they shook hands. She was becoming an expert at meeting all these new men: shaking hands, smiling brightly, looking directly into their eyes. She’d read somewhere that this was the correct approach and she was certainly getting plenty of practice. There would be ample time – after they’d got through the niceties of ‘have you come far?’ and ‘how was the traffic?’ – to examine him in closer detail.
He told her he hadn’t come very far because he lived just a few miles down the road. As Tess lived a few miles in the opposite direction, this all seemed very satisfactory.
Tess ordered a glass of white wine, which he insisted on paying for. A definite plus point. He told her in some detail that his wife had taken off with a vet who’d come to sort out the mastitis of one of his prize cows. There was little Tess could say to that, other than make a few sympathetic noises. He had one son living in Australia who kept nagging his father to go out there, but George wasn’t keen on flying all that way and paying all that money. Anyway, who would look after the farm ?
To enter into the spirit of the thing, Tess decided to have a ploughman’s lunch, which consisted of the usual chunks of bread and cheese, along with a pickled egg and chutney. She’d only had some fruit for breakfast, so she reckoned she could probably get away with eating half the bread and half the cheese. She’d eat it very slowly – Judy told them every week that it takes about twenty minutes for the brain to inform the belly that it’s had quite enough, so the half should do it. She paid for her own meal and George didn’t argue. She always did offer to pay for her own whatever-it-was, but the majority of ‘hearts’ insisted that she put her purse away. George did not insist that she put her purse away. Were farmers supposed to be hard up these days? She supposed it depended on the farmer.
Like most men, he preferred talking to listening. He talked about his cattle, the price of animal feed, the astronomical cost of vets, the lack of subsidies, and the general disinterest of the government in his numerous problems. Tess felt her eyes glaze over a couple of times and had almost dropped off at one point when he said, ‘Do you fancy coming back to my place for a cup of tea?’
She jumped. ‘Tea?’
‘Yes, or coffee if you prefer.’
Well, why not? she thought.
‘You can follow me,’ he said, as they came out of the pub and he headed towards an ancient mud-splattered Land Rover. As Tess drove up behind, the Land Rover came to life, belching clouds of black exhaust fumes. Even with her windows closed, Tess was coughing as the fumes found their way into her car. Couldn’t he even afford a new exhaust? As she followed along, she tried to imagine him in a morning suit. She’d probably end up having to pay for the hire. And although he wasn’t bad-looking, he certainly wouldn’t be getting the admiring glances that Sanjeev would.
He led her up a dusty lane, past a wooden sign proclaiming ‘Stonecroft Farm’ which, Tess reckoned, would be a sea of mud in the winter, and arrived at a farmhouse surrounded by a collection of ramshackle buildings, two tractors and two hysterically barking collies. She parked behind him and got out cautiously, none too sure of the canine welcome. The dogs jumped all over George, tails furiously wagging, before turning their attention to this visitor, almost knocking her over in their enthusiasm.
George grabbed both dogs by their collars and, indicating the one on his right, said, ‘This one’s Sadie, and this one here’s her son, Bobby.’ He held on to them while they quietened, and Tess stroked their heads. They were lovely dogs, if a little dirty. In fact, they were filthy. He then led the way to the farmhouse door, which badly needed a coat of paint, and into a hallway jam-packed with jackets, caps, odd socks, boots, piles of old newspapers and boxes of empty beer bottles, all covered in a generous coating of dust.
‘Keep meaning to have a tidy up in here,’ said George. ‘But there should be some wellies to fit you, if you fancy having a look around after we’ve had some tea.’
He then pushed open another large heavy door into an enormous kitchen, where an ancient Aga presided amongst a jumble of dressers and cupboards randomly placed round the walls, with a long wooden table down the centre. As far as Tess could see, there wasn’t a square inch of space on any of the surfaces. There were stray cups, plates, papers, hammers, nails, boxes, bags, some unidentifiable objects and two large cats. The slate floor was navigable, with care, through a selection of dog and cat bowls and stray boots. It was hot, stuffy and smelly.
‘Sorry it’s in a little bit of a mess,’ he said cheerfully. ‘You don’t bother much when you’re on your own, do you? Needs a woman’s touch.’
Tess avoided eye contact. Not my touch, she thought. Did anyone ever tidy up or clean in here? she wondered. And where would you start? One of the dogs brought a much-chewed rubber ball to Tess, and looked up at her hopefully, tail wagging.
‘He wants you to throw it,’ George explained.
‘I can’t very well throw it in here,’ Tess said, patting the dog’s head and trying to calculate how many objects you could hit by just rolling it along the floor.
George located the kettle, elbowed his way through the dirty dishes in and around the old butler sink, filled it with water and stuck it on the Aga. At that moment, there was a rapping at the door and a cacophony of barking from the dogs.
‘That’ll be the vet, come to see Mabel,’ he said.
Mabel? Surely not Mabel with the buttocks from Slim Chance? No, Mabel was his prize Jersey cow, who’d recently given birth and was now beset with problems.
‘I shouldn’t be long,’ he said, heading back towards the door, both dogs at his heels leaping and barking with excitement. ‘Could you make us a cup of tea? Kettle’s on, teapot’s around somewhere, and tea’s in that red box over there.’
With that, he and the dogs were gone. The door banged shut and Tess looked round at the wall-to-wall chaos. She made her way cautiously towards the window, pulled back the greasy half-drawn curtain, and wrestled with the window latch for a minute before finally forcing it open. Warm, clean summer air rushed in. Tess took a deep breath and went in search of a teapot and some mugs, none of which were immediately apparent. The sink was full of dirty crockery and there probably was a teapot buried underneath in the murky depths. There was nothing for it; she’d have to clear the sink.
At least there was hot water, and she eventually found a near-empty bottle of Fairy Liquid hidden behind a half-full bottle of West Country cider. Some of these dishes appeared to have been in there for days; plates encrusted with scraps of food and mugs stained black with tannin. Tess shuddered. No chance of finding any Marigolds round here, so she plunged her hands into the hot soapy water and commenced the mammoth task of washing up. There was what appeared to be a scrubbing brush on the water-stained wooden draining board, and Tess used it to ease off some of the detritus from the crockery.
As the kettle began to sing on the stove, Tess stopped short. She hadn’t heard that sound in years! She was immediately transported back to her childhood and to her mother’s immaculate kitchen. But you never heard electric kettles singing, and she couldn’t remember the last time she’d placed a kettle on a hob.
Some of the dishes, as they emerged, were surprisingly delicate and pretty. Probably a throwback to when his wife was around. Had the poor woman looked round this mish-mash of a kitchen and headed off gratefully to the vet’s minimalist stainless steel one? And surely it couldn’t be the same vet who was now outside tending to Mabel?
Tess washed, rinsed and extracted from the sink seven mugs, four plates, five bowls, masses of cutlery and, finally, a large brown teapot. Drying was out of the question in the absence of any kind of towel, so she hoped that the fresh air now filtering in might do the job eventually. The teapot would have to stay wet. The red box that housed the teabags had once contained somebody-or-other’s ginger biscuits, but most of the writing had worn off over the years. She wondered how long George was likely to be and whether she should make the tea now or wait for a bit. She decided to wait and looked round for something to sit on. The Windsor chair beside the Aga was occupied by an enormous ginger cat, who watched her every move. It would not be a good idea to attempt to move that cat, she decided. Then Tess pulled out a chair from the table, removed several copies of Farmers Weekly from the seat, and sat down. The ginger cat continued to stare at her, while the tabby cat slept peacefully on what appeared to be a pile of old socks. She looked round at the animals’ food and water bowls, and decided that they too were entitled to a modicum of hygiene. She gathered the four up, emptied what little remained in them, returned to the sink and proceeded to scrub them all. She filled two with clean water and returned them to the floor, leaving the other two to drain.
‘You should be thanking me,’ she muttered to the ginger cat, who was still staring at her. He didn’t look particularly appreciative, just yawned, stretched and continued to study her. Then she heard voices outside the door, indicating that George and the vet had finished with Mabel, and that she should make the tea. She was aware of a flash of lightning and a rumble of thunder in the distance, and a few drops of rain finding their way in through the window.
A few minutes later, George strode in .
‘Sorry about that,’ he said, removing his jacket and slinging it on top of some others languishing over the back of a chair. There was another flash, and then a crash of thunder, which seemed to be directly overhead, and the heavens opened, storm clouds gathering and darkening the room. Tess hoped she hadn’t left her car windows open.
‘Thanks for making the tea.’ George removed the ginger cat from the Windsor chair and plonked himself down. ‘And for doing the washing-up,’ he added, eyeing the sink.
‘No problem,’ Tess said airily, pouring the tea into two still-damp mugs. ‘Milk? Sugar?’
He indicated the fridge. ‘Milk and three sugars, please.’
Tess was beginning to wonder who was supposed to be entertaining whom. She opened the fridge door to find every shelf heaving under the weight of cans of cider and beer. There was, however, a supermarket carton of milk, which plainly had not originated from Mabel.
‘Sugar’s on the table,’ he said, indicating an open bag of Tate & Lyle with a spoon rammed into it vertically. Tess added the milk and sugar to his tea, stirred it and handed it to him. He thanked her but made no other comment, so she reckoned this was what he expected of his female visitors.
The rain was now hammering down relentlessly.
‘When this eases off a bit,’ said George, gulping his tea, ‘I’ll show you round the farm.’
‘Well, that would be very nice, George,’ Tess said, ‘but I really should be going soon. I have a lot of work to do.’
‘Work?’ He took another gulp .
‘Yes, I told you I was a dressmaker.’
‘So you did. Not sure I’d call that work exactly.’
Tess bristled. ‘Call it what you like, George – it gives me a living, pays the bills, runs the car.’
‘OK, OK, keep your hair on! Didn’t mean to upset you,’ he said, standing up. ‘Any more tea in the pot?’
‘Help yourself,’ Tess said without moving. What a boorish, chauvinist pig! she thought. Rain or no rain, I’m not staying here.
‘Fancy staying for a bit of supper?’ He refilled his mug without offering her any more.
‘Thank you, but no.’ Had it not registered in his dull brain that she’d said she had to work? She imagined herself doing all the cooking, struggling with the Aga, and rounding off the evening with a heavy load of washing-up, which was almost certainly what he had in mind. Was it likely that he’d ever find a woman who’d happily don an apron and sort out both him and his shambolic house? Tess shuddered to think what the rest of it might be like, but she had no intention of ever finding out.
She stood up and grabbed her shoulder bag. ‘I’ll be off now, George. It’s been really interesting meeting you.’ How many times had she said that to these hapless ‘hearts’? But this, for sure, was the grand finale.
‘Still coming down in stair rods,’ he remarked, crossing to the window. ‘Don’t know why you opened this.’ He pulled the window shut.
Tess got to the door, wondering if he might at least escort her to the car. He got as far as the hallway, muttering, ‘There must be an umbrella somewhere.’ He rummaged around for a few minutes, lifting up coats and jackets and boxes. ‘Could have sworn there was one in here.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Tess said, pushing open the outer door. She could see her car parked behind his, about fifty yards away. ‘I’ll make a run for it.’
‘Mind how you go then!’ he said cheerily. ‘I’ll email you. You might fancy coming over for supper next week.’
In the short time it took Tess to reach her car, she was absolutely soaked. She glanced back at the door but he’d already disappeared inside. No question of accompanying her to the car or guiding her out of her parking spot. Fortunately she hadn’t left any windows open, but she felt cold and extremely wet as she slithered damply into the driving seat. She switched on the engine, engaged the windscreen wipers at top speed, and proceeded to do some tricky manoeuvres in an effort to turn the car around.
Finally she exited Stonecroft Farm down the lane, which had already reverted to a sea of mud.
After a long soak in the bath, Tess got into her dressing gown, poured herself a large glass of Merlot, and sank into a chair with her laptop. The rain was still hammering against the windows and was most likely on for the night.
She ploughed her way through her emails, deleting most of them, before finding one from Sanjeev, who’d been visiting one of his sons in Norwich, but was now back in London and wondered if she might be free next Friday, when they could perhaps spend a day at the coast together, weather permitting? At least, she thought, I seem to be able to attract one decent man. But what would Orla say tomorrow when she had to admit that ‘heart’ number six had also been a non-starter?
‘Do you sometimes wonder if you’re being just a teeny-weeny bit too fussy?’ Orla was sitting down after a long hard morning of measuring and fitting.
‘I don’t think so,’ Tess replied. ‘And don’t forget you’ve been exceptionally lucky.’
And she had too. Orla and Paul had got on well for quite some time, and at least she’d got her plumbing sorted out so she’d got something to show for it. And now there was Ricky, he of long-distance haulage fame, and he too had been on the go for some time. Of course, Orla had had to adapt accordingly, which meant she pretended to love watching Match of the Day and being passionate about Chelsea. She’d even accompanied him to a Chelsea match! Until now, Orla’s interest in Chelsea had been restricted to posh shops and buns. But suddenly Orla was an expert on the Premier League, moaning about the idiocy of the goalkeeper during the match with West Ham, or the player sent off during the Manchester United game.
The thing about Ricky was that he was constantly away. Perhaps absence made the heart grow fonder. And his return was frequently delayed, due to various problems such as dock strikes, mechanical faults, loads not ready to be loaded, and so on. Tess occasionally wondered about this. Back in the days of yore, when only sailors travelled for a living, they were known to have a girl in every port. Hull, Huddersfield and Harwich might not have quite the same kudos as Haifa, Hong Kong and Honolulu, but the principle was very much the same.
Maybe, Tess thought, I am too picky. Maybe Orla has the right idea, accepting whatever comes her way without complaint. But try as she might, Tess could not imagine any of the guys she’d met becoming a long-term prospect, or even a short-term one for that matter. Certainly none of them was likely to impress Gerry and Ursula at the wedding. None, that is, except Sanjeev. She’d gladly have Sanjeev escort her up and down the aisle, or anywhere else for that matter. And now he was suggesting a day at the seaside! Bognor? Brighton? Bournemouth? What did it matter? Sea, sun, sand and Sanjeev! Friday – hey ho!