Coming Home (102 page)

‘It's not just mornings, it's evenings too.’

‘It's no problem.’

‘Then there's the churns to be cleaned and taken up the lane for the milk-marketing lorry. Eight o'clock in the morning he comes, and doesn't like to be kept waiting.’

‘I won't keep him waiting.’ Mrs Mudge gazed dubiously at Loveday. She was clearly torn between the desire to be at her bereaved sister's side, and a certain discomfiture at the notion that she was not indispensable. ‘You'll have to clean up after you,’ she warned. ‘Walter won't do that for you. That's not men's work. And I'm not coming home to a mucky parlour and dirty churns.’

‘I promise. You won't. Oh, do let me, Mrs Mudge. Please. You've just said that the great thing to do is keep busy, and I'm just as miserable and worried as your sister is. I lie awake at night and think about Gus, so I might just as well get up a five o'clock and
do
something. So if you go to her, you'll be helping both of us.’

‘You mustn't think I think less of Gus than I do of my nephew. Lovely young man, Gus was. Remember that day when he came up to paint a picture of my barn? Chicken mess and manure all over the place, and he never turned a hair.’

‘Telephone your sister and tell her you're coming. Mr Mudge can drive you over to St Veryan this evening, and you can stay just as long as you think you're needed.’

Mrs Mudge shook her head in wonder. ‘I don't know, Loveday, you'll be the death of me. Full of surprises. I never thought of you as being so thoughtful…’

‘I'm not thoughtful, Mrs Mudge, I'm selfish. I probably wouldn't do anything if I didn't think I was going to get something out of it.’

‘You're belittling yourself.’

‘No, I'm not. I'm being honest.’

‘That's what you say,’ Mrs Mudge retorted. ‘Others are allowed to say different.’

Each morning, at half past eight in the morning, after she had taken the full churns up to the end of the lane, delivered them to the milk-marketing lorry and brought the empty churns back to the dairy, Loveday walked home to Nancherrow, ravenously hungry, for her breakfast.

It was now the eighteenth of June. Mrs Mudge had been away for five days, and was returning to Lidgey tomorrow. In a way, Loveday felt rather sorry, Coping with the milking, a marathon task that she had taken on so impetuously, had proved to be something of a challenge and tremendously hard work. At first, she had been both slow and clumsy (nerves), but Walter, alternately swearing at her, or handing out a bit of foul-mouthed encouragement, (‘If you wait, I'll show you how to shift that bloody churn’) had been uncharacteristically co-operative, and had seen her through.

Without a lot of chat. Walter was a taciturn fellow. Loveday was not sure if he had been told about Gus. Knowing Mrs Mudge, she was pretty certain that he had. Whatever, Walter said nothing, and offered no sort of sympathy. When Gus was staying at Nancherrow, the two young men had met one morning down at the stables, and Loveday had introduced them, but Walter had been at his most offhand, the very epitome of a mannerless groom, and Gus, after one or two friendly overtures, lost heart. It had occurred to Loveday at the time that perhaps Walter was jealous, but the idea was so preposterous that she almost immediately put it out of her mind. Walter was a law unto himself, but she had known him all her life and never felt anything but at ease in his company.

Each evening, when the last cow had been milked and the little herd turned out into the fields again, Loveday had set to work, hosing and scrubbing the parlour, taking pride in shining cobbles and pristine milk-pails, determined that Mrs Mudge, returning, would be able to find no fault. The Lidgey kitchen, on the other hand, was a pigsty of dirty dishes, blackened saucepans, and unwashed clothes. Perhaps, tomorrow, she would find time to muck that out as well. It seemed the least she could do for poor Mrs Mudge.

She crossed the farmyard and climbed the gate that led into the lane, and sat there for a bit, on the top of the rail, because this was one of her favourite views, and this morning looked particularly bright and sparkling. Earlier, as she had walked to work, all had lain dew-spangled and tranquil beneath the first low rays of the rising sun. Even the sea, shifting gently, unruffled by wind, had turned from grey to the translucence of mother-of-pearl. Now, however, three hours later, it was a silky blue beneath a cloudless sky. A breeze had got up, and she could hear the distant sound of breakers, rolling in at the foot of the cliffs. Gulls were flying high. In the sunlight, the moors were tawny, and pasture fields a brilliant emerald green. She saw the peaceful, grazing cows, and, from far off, heard the furious barking of Walter's dog.

Her mind, curiously, emptied. She hadn't thought about
nothing
for ages, and it felt rather pleasant, like being in limbo, floating in space between two worlds. And then, gradually, the vacuum of mindlessness was filled with the image of Gus, striding up the lane towards her with his painting gear slung in a knapsack over his shoulder. And she thought of him now, in France, and he was walking, or marching, or wounded, but he wasn't dead. His vital presence came across so strongly that, all at once, she was consumed with excitement, the irrefutable conviction that he was still alive. At that very moment, he was thinking about her; she could almost hear his voice, humming towards her as though transposed by unseen telephone wires. She closed her eyes in a sort of ecstasy, and sat, clinging with her hands to the top rail of the old farm gate. And when she opened her eyes again, everything was different, and she wasn't even tired any longer, and all the lovely world was brimful with the old possibilities of happiness.

She jumped off the gate and ran down the lane, her legs going faster as the slope steepened, her gumboots thumping like pistons over the loose stones and ruts of dried mud. At the bottom, she vaulted over the second gate, and then, breathless and suffering from an agonising stitch in her ribs, had to stop and kiss her knee, which was the classic remedy for stitches. Then, along the path, and across the drive, and into the yard, and through the back door.

‘Take your boots off, Loveday, they're caked with dirt.’

‘Sorry, Mrs Nettlebed.’

‘You're late today. Busy were you?’

‘Not particularly. Just hanging around.’ In socked feet, she came into the kitchen. She wanted to ask if there had been any news, if there was a letter, if anybody had heard anything, but if she did this, then Mrs Nettlebed and everybody would start asking questions. And until there came some sort of confirmation of Gus's safety, Loveday was not going to whisper a word of her new hope, not to anybody, not even Judith.

She said, ‘What's for breakfast? I'm ravenous.’

‘Fried eggs and tomatoes. On the hotplate in the dining-room. Everyone else has finished already. You'd better hurry along and let Nettlebed get cleared up.’

So Loveday washed her hands in the scullery and dried them on the roller towel that hung behind the door, and then went out of the kitchen and down the passage. From upstairs came the sound of the vacuum cleaner, and her mother's voice calling Mary. The dining-room door stood open, and she was just about to go through when the telephone began to ring. She stopped dead, and waited, and then, when nobody answered, went on and into her father's study. The room was empty. The telephone, shrilling, stood on his desk. She picked it up and the ringing was stopped.

‘Nancherrow.’ For some reason, her mouth had gone dry. She cleared her throat and said it again. ‘Nancherrow.’

Click, click,
went the telephone, and then started buzzing.

‘Hello?’ She was beginning to sound a bit desperate.

‘Who's that?’ A man's voice, blurred and distant.

‘Loveday.’

‘Loveday. It's me. It's Gus.’

Her legs, literally, turned to water. She couldn't stand, so she collapsed onto the floor, taking the telephone with her.

‘Gus.’

‘Can you hear me? This is a ghastly line. I can only talk for a moment or two.’

‘Where are you?’

‘In hospital.’

‘Where?’

‘Southampton. I'm okay. Being shipped home tomorrow. I tried to ring before but everybody's in the same boat and there aren't enough telephones.’

‘But…what…what happened? Are you badly hurt?’

‘Just my leg. I'm okay. On crutches, but all right.’

‘I knew you were safe. I suddenly knew…’

‘There's no time for more. I just wanted to speak to you. I'll write.’

‘Do that, and I'll write too. What's your address…?’

‘It's…’

But before he could tell her, the line went dead. ‘Gus? Gus?’ She jiggled the hook on the receiver and tried again. ‘Gus?’ But it was no good. He was gone.

Reaching up, she put the telephone back on the table. Still sitting on the thick Turkey carpet, she laid her head against the cool, dark, polished wood of her father's desk and closed her eyes against the tears, but they streamed out, quite quietly, pouring down her cheeks. She said aloud, ‘Thank you,’ and was not quite sure whom she was thanking. She said, ‘I knew you were alive. I knew you were going to be in touch.’ And this time she was talking to Gus.

And after a bit, she sat up, pulled her shirt out of her trousers, and wiped her face and blew her nose on its hem. And then she got to her feet and went out of the room, calling for her mother, and calling again, and she fled up the stairs on feet that could have been winged, to be met by Mary, to fling herself into Mary's arms, and to share in hysterical joy the incredible news.

At The Dower House, Biddy, making full use of her newfound energy, had cleared the second attic of its rubbish. All that had been salvaged were the two cabin trunks, and space was found for these on the upstairs landing, their contents being too personal and precious for Judith to feel that she could take responsibility for their disposal.

One was filled with old letters, tied together in bundles with faded silk ribbons; dance programmes, dangling tiny pencils; sheets of music; photographs; albums; birthday books; and a battered leather Visitor's Book, dated 1898. The other held a selection of Victorian finery. Long white gloves with tiny pearl buttons, ostrich plumes, wilted bunches of artificial gardenias, beaded bags, and paste hair-ornaments. All too sentimental and too pretty to throw away. Sometime, Diana Carey-Lewis had promised, she would come to The Dower House and sift through all these old memories. Meantime, Judith had draped the cabin trunks with old curtains of William Morris damask, and thus disguised they would probably stay where they were, undisturbed, for years.

Everything else had been deemed either useless or broken (even the picture frames proved to be riddled with worm); and humped painstakingly downstairs, to be piled alongside the dustbins. The next time the dustbin lorry made its call, the driver was going to be given half a crown in the hopes that he would cart it all away.

And so the attic was now empty. And Judith and Phyllis stood side by side, surveying it and discussing how it should be used. They were on their own, because Anna was out in the garden digging holes in the border with an old tin spoon, and Morag was with her, doing her best to assist in this exercise. From time to time, Phyllis went to the window to glance down, and make certain that neither dog nor child were either tormenting each other, or doing untold harm. But all seemed to be peaceful.

Biddy was in the kitchen. The most unenthusiastic of cooks, she had found, in Isobel's battered and butter-smeared old cookery book, a recipe for making elderflower cordial. The elderflowers happened, at this moment to be out, the hedgerows were heavy with their subtly scented creamy blossom, and Biddy was fired with enthusiasm. She didn't count making elderberry cordial as cooking. Cooking was stews and roast mutton and jam tarts and mixing cakes, none of which she had any intention of attempting. But concocting lovely drinks was right up her street, specially if one could gather the ingredients for free, from roadside bushes.