Duplicity (8 page)

‘Yes,’ Arthur shouted to the retreating figure.

‘She did speak funny, Grandad. “You’ll be fae the new hooses”.’ The boy giggled as he mimicked the girl’s broad accent.

They had been walking for half an hour when they came to a road branching off, with a sign ‘Private Road. Home Farm’.

‘Well, we can’t go that way if it’s private,’ Arthur said.

A little farther along, another sign pointed the way to the ‘Mither Tap’.

‘What’s a Mither Tap, Grandad?’ Sean asked when Arthur told him what it said.

‘I don’t know, son, but we could go along and find out, I suppose. It didn’t say it was private, and it’s probably some king of drinking well.’

As they went along the narrow road, not much more than a stony track, Sean hopped and skipped happily in front, looking for the myserious mither tap. Suddenly the road widened out into a large car park, at the far side of which the path continued, but now winding upwards. ‘This must be where people leave their cars when they want to climb up Benachie,’ Arthur announced.

‘And that’s the path to the top.’ Sean raced across the grassy surface towards it.

‘It doesn’t really look high enough to be Benachie,’ Arthur puffed, as he hastened to catch up.

They scrambled over the rough stones, and when they had almost reached the top, they found that it wasn’t the top after all. The path carried on over the brow of this part and went on and on up to the summit. Arthur had no doubts now about it being Benachie, and no doubts either that he wanted to climb to the very top now that they had come this far.

He noticed with relief that the mists were lifting and the sun was beginning to shine, but remembered that it might take some time to reach the highest point, and that he had taken nothing for them to eat.

‘What are those bushes, Grandad? I’ve never seen that kind before.’

‘That’s heather, son. Later on in the year it’ll come out in beautiful purple flowers. That’s why people speak about the purple hills of Scotland. About August or September it’ll look like one solid mass of colour from a distance.’

There were no trees now, and realising they had passed the tree line - the height above which trees will not grow - he explained this to the interested boy. The path had become more and more uneven, and they found the walking quite laborious.

‘It’s a long way, Grandad, but I still want to go to the very top. Mummy and Daddy’ll get a real surprise when we tell them we’ve been right up the mountain. And you said you were too old. You’re not really old, are you?’

‘I’m beginning to feel my age,’ Arthur laughed. ‘I’m getting short of puff.’

‘We can sit down and have a rest. We’ve plenty of time.’

The old man glanced at his wrist watch as he sat down thankfully on a grassy knoll. ‘It’s after eight o’clock, Sean. Your Mum and Dad’ll be up by now, and wondering where we are. We’d better turn back.’

He was surprisingly glad when the boy protested. ‘No, Grandad, we must nearly be at the top now. You said we’d passed the tree line ages ago, so it can’t be far. Please can’t we go on?’

‘In a minute, then.’ Arthur suddenly remembered that he had bought two bars of chocolate in King’s Cross, and they hadn’t needed to eat them; not with the load of sandwiches Nell had packed for them, and the fact that Sean had been asleep for a big part of the journey. He took them from his pocket and gave one to Sean, who sat down beside him. The foil was stuck to the chocolate, but they still tasted wonderful to the two hungry climbers.

‘Are you ready now, Grandad?’

Arthur hoisted himself to his feet and set off after the boy. After a while, the path deteriorated gradually until there was no path any longer. A wall of rock rose out of the earth in front of them, which Sean was madly trying to clamber up. ‘Come back, son, it’s maybe dangerous there.’

His grandson paid no attention and in a few seconds was out of Arthur’s sight, but his excited voice floated back. ‘Grandad! I’m at the top! Come on up!’

‘Eh, son, I don’t think I can make it.’

‘I’ll give you a hand up.’ The small hand dangled into view, but the man, shamed into action, forced himself upwards. He succeeded with no mishaps, although one step had been dodgy as he had dislodged the rock he’d been using as a toehold.

Shakily, he stood up and looked around him. On the flat plateau stood a plaque, showing the surrounding landmarks and naming the distant mountains on the skyline. He tried to place them all for the child, and a wonderful feeling of peace engulfed him; a peace he’d only thought to savour while he was at sea. This was very different from being aboard a ship, though it was still a marvellous, moving experience.

‘Masters of all we survey,’ he laughed, ‘and I can see for miles.’

‘There’s my new house, Grandad.’ Sean was pointing to a row of tiny doll’s houses far below them. ‘I’m going to like it here after all … except … I wish you could stay, Grandad.’

Arthur recalled the day John had told him that he’d taken a job wih an oil firm in Aberdeen, such a distance away. ‘Why don’t you and Mum sell your house and come and live with us? There’s nothing to keep you here, is there?’

Nothing, except that Yarmouth’s always been my home, Arthur had thought. ‘Sea’s in my blood and I don’t like mountains’, was what he had said.

Nell had been quite keen on the idea of moving to be with John and Marge, he knew, but he had held his ground. But now, up here in the sky, his love for the sea was struggling to conquer his love for the boy - and losing. Aberdeen and the sea weren’t that far away, and he couldn’t honestly say now that he didn’t like mountains. This feeling of peace and intoxication, this bracing air, could grow on him. Yes, this place could be the El Dorado he’d been searching for ever since he’d had to give up the trawling.

‘Grandad, are you OK?’ Sean was rather alarmed by his silence.

‘Aye, lad. I’m OK. Definitely OK. Come on, then, we’d better be getting back. I bet your mum and dad won’t believe we’ve climbed Benachie.’

‘Ben-a-heeeee!’ shouted the boy, and with a leap, he turned and ran down the proper path, the path they had somehow managed to stray from on the way up and had been forced into a bit of actual mountaineering. With youthful footsteps, Arthur went after his grandson, and broke into song as they marched, ever downwards.

‘One man went to mow, went to mow a meadow,

‘One man and his dog, went to mow a meadow.’

When they reached the car park, they found John and Marge waiting for them, along with the girl they had seen on her bicycle when they had been on their way to find Benachie.

‘Mummy! Daddy! I’ve been right to the top with Grandad, and it’s beautiful, really beautiful. And we saw heather, and rabbits, and after a while there’s no trees because they don’t grow if it’s too high up, and …’

‘Steady on, son,’ laughed his father. ‘We were worried about you, wondering where the two of you had gone. By good luck, we met this lady and asked if she had seen you. She told us you were heading in the direction of the Mither Tap, and showed us the way.’

‘We didn’t see the tap, Daddy, and we could have been doing with a drink at the top, I can tell you. But we did climb the mountain.’

The girl laughed loudly. ‘The Mither Tap is our way of saying the Mother Top. It’s the main peak of the range.’ Marge was to find out much later that the name had originated because of its shape - the outline of a woman’s breast.

They returned to the car, and Arthur settled gladly back against the cushions. He wasn’t really tired though they had been on the go for hours, but he was glad of the seat. ‘What was your estate agent’s name and address?’ he asked, casually.

John cast a quick, questioning glance at his father, who nodded happily and patted the curly head now resting against Marge. ‘I’ve changed my mind, son. Even an old man can be wrong - not often, mind, just once now and again. I think we’ll buy a house here after all. The mountain has cast its spell on me and I know your mother wanted to come, anyway.’

Sean snuggled deeper into his mother’s arms. This was all too much for the exhausted little boy’s emotions to cope with. ‘It’s like a fairy story, Grandad, and we can all live happily ever after.’

***

Word count: 4796

Written February 1986 before I had a computer, so the words were counted individually, as I also had to do for my first three novels. The computer was a marvellous invention.

Sent to
Annabel
12.2.86 - rejected 19.4.86

Sent to
Woman’s Realm
22.4.86 - rejected 1.6.86

Search For A Prince
 

Roselle lazily shifted the slice of lemon with her tongue to get the last drops of sangria out of the glass.

If only the girls could see her now - sitting drinking by the blue Mediterranean, while the rest of the world passed by. But that was the whole trouble; they kept on passing by. She had hoped, dreamed, when she made up her mind to go to Spain on this Singles trip, that she would at last meet her Prince Charming, and find Romance (with a capital R) - no, True Love (also with capital letters) that would last for ever. But every likely lad seemed to have a girl glued to his side, and there were no unattached males to be seen.

As though to prove the point she was making to herself, a young couple sauntered past, arms linked. Roselle heard them talking softly to each other, in German she thought, but as she watched them stop and kiss tenderly, she reflected that it didn’t matter what nationality you were. Love was the same in any language. If you could find it, that is.

She hadn’t been able to find it back home in South Norwood. Not that she hadn’t had boyfriends. There had been quite a few, but she hadn’t once felt THIS IS LOVE!

She’d been quite fond of them at the time, but when they moved on, dropped her for another girl, her heart hadn’t been broken or anything like that. Rather, she’d found herself looking expectantly for somebody else, in the hope that this time it would be the real thing. But it had never been.

The last time had been the nearest. She probably could have fallen in love with Derek, given time. It hadn’t been the love-at-first-sight, legs-turning-to-jelly, fluttering-heart sort of business, but she
had
dreamt about him at nights, and thought tenderly of him when she should have been concentrating on her word processor, so there must have been a spark of something there. All it would have needed to fan it into a flame was … what? That was what she didn’t know.

She remembered how surprised and disappointed she’d been when Derek had stood outside her door that Saturday night. ‘No, Roselle, I’m not coming in. I’m not even going to kiss you. I thought I’d be able to make you love me, but I’ve tried everything.’ He had ignored her spluttering protests. ‘No, it seems to me you’re waiting for somebody to sweep you off your feet and carry you off to an enchanted castle, or something along that line. Well, it doesn’t happen like that in real life, Roselle, and I’m no fairy prince. I’ve got very human emotions, so it had better be goodbye. I really hope you meet your Prince Charming some time, somewhere.’

She had cried after he left. Had she been expecting too much? Was he right? Was it only in fairy tales that love was instantaneous and all-consuming? Later on, she had remembered that he had said ‘some time, somewhere’, and her heart, not broken, just slightly bruised, had made a miraculous recovery.

Why should she expect love to come to her? Why shouldn’t she go and search for it herself? That was why, three weeks later, she was here on the Costa del Sol. Her parents had been horrified when she told them what she intended doing. She recalled the conversation as if it had been the dialogue in a play.

ROSELLE: I was lucky there was a last-minute cancellation.

MOTHER: You can’t go off to the south of Spain on your own.

FATHER: You know the kind of things that could happen - a young vulnerable girl on her own in a foreign country.

MOTHER: What’ll the neighbours think?

FATHER: Never mind what the neighbours think, woman. Think of your daughter, alone over there, a prey to any disreputable Casanova.

MOTHER: I am thinking of her. What if … Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Surprisingly, she had felt quite stimulated as their argument reached a crescendo, and waited for a lull to make her solo contribution. ‘I’m unattached, I’m over eighteen and I can look after myself. No wolf in sheep’s clothing can pull the wool over my eyes. Besides, it’s all paid for.’

That had clinched it, as she had known it would.

Neither of them liked to waste money under any circumstances. She’d been here nearly a week now, though, and was no nearer to realising her dreams. She toyed with the empty glass and looked around her. The French family at the next table were chattering and gesticulating violently to each other, while two small Italian girls in their dainty frilly sun-suits were pestering their mother for money to go to the amusement arcade. At least, that’s what it looked like. This was the first time she had come to the open air lounge bar, and it was like sitting in the stalls watching a drama unfold before her eyes.
‘Pardone me, senorita.’

A waiter hovered anxiously. Roselle shook her head, then decided in favour of another drink after all. ‘Sangria, por favor.’

Her knowledge of Spanish was very limited, but she had managed to get by so far. She watched him as he walked towards the bar. His rear view was rather nice, in a Spanish sort of way, with the dark curly hair and the short white jacket trimmed with blue. Could this be
him?
She hadn’t noticed him before and found herself waiting impatiently for him to return.

He was back in a few minutes and she looked up into his face as he set the glass in front of her. ‘Gracias,’ she murmured, meeting the full force of his dark brown eyes. Her heart fluttered manically, her legs turned to jelly -
it was love!
Love at first sight, as she had always hoped for. Her shy smile was rewarded by a toothpaste commercial.

‘Ramon!’ The summons came from the bartender, competently shaking cocktails.

‘Si.’ He gave her a sketchy salute and hurried off.