Kate's Progress (12 page)

‘All right,’ Kate agreed, ‘but if I fall for anyone it’s going to be a town man with London smarts. The County set doesn’t appeal to me. And Mr Right’ll have a hot job and a gorgeous flat. Jack Blackmore lives with his mum, for goodness’ sake! And now,’ she went on, reaching forward to add some more hot water to the bath, ‘given that we all agree I’m not in any danger, let’s talk about you two. What’s on your horizons? Any new men? How is it working out with Marta?’

Kate went to bed early and woke early, to a fine sunny day with a near-cloudless sky. Just perfect for getting up on the roof and repointing the chimney, she told herself, leaping out of bed. She felt fine, not a hint of hangover – thanks, she felt, to the fine quality of the champagne – but she was ravenously hungry. She dragged on her clothes and hurtled downstairs to the kitchen, only to realize, as she opened the fridge, that she hadn’t been shopping yesterday so there was nothing to eat. The bread was down to the last crust, she’d had the last of the milk the night before, and all there was otherwise was half a packet of water biscuits and a tin of tomato soup.

As she stared in dismay, feeling like Mother Hubbard, her stomach growled noisily, and as if summoned by the incantation, Kay appeared at the back door with an enquiring look on her face.

‘Hello! You all right?’

‘Yes, I’m fine. Why shouldn’t I be?’

‘Well, Dommie and me came over when he got back from school and you was spark out on your bed. He wanted to wake you but since you didn’t wake when I called up the stairs, I reckoned you were out for the count, so I shut him up and took him away.’ She grinned. ‘Had a bit of a heavy lunch, did you?
Two
bottles of champagne?’

Kate gave up on ever having any privacy in a village. ‘How on earth do you know?’

‘Ken over the Blue Ball told Dave at the Oak, he told Denny Foss and Denny told Darren. You can’t have secrets in a place like this. Jack Blackmore – you’re doing well for yourself !’

‘He’s nice,’ Kate said defensively.

‘I told you so, didn’t I? Told you he was a laugh. Told you he was a shocking flirt, too, as I remember.’

‘You did. Forewarned is forearmed,’ said Kate.

‘Ken said something about a dog?’ said Kay, her face wide open with curiosity.

‘Oh, it was nothing. I rescued his dog, or his son’s dog, that’s all.’

‘No! When was this? You never told me! Oh –’ she distracted herself – ‘I got to get their breakfasts, or I’d get you to tell me the whole story.’ She examined Kate’s expression, the one that been summoned by the word ‘breakfast’. ‘You all right. Got a hangover?’

‘No, I’m fine, just ravenously hungry.’

Kay smiled. ‘Come on over ours and have breakfast with us, then you can tell me all about it. Bacon and eggs?’ she added temptingly.

Kate groaned. ‘I’d love bacon and eggs. But you’re not to do it just for me.’

‘Kidding me? Got to give my Darren a good breakfast before he goes off to work, haven’t I? A man can’t do a full day’s work on a bit o’ toast or a bowl o’ cereal. And come to think of it, you’re doing a man’s work, aren’t you? So you need it too.’

Kate needed no more persuasion. Soon she was at the table in the Tonkins’ kitchen, telling the whole story over a plate of eggs, bacon, chipolatas and baked beans, accompanied by copious tea and toast. Darren asked questions about exactly where the gorse bush was, until he had pinpointed the site of the adventure to his satisfaction. Kay was far more interested in Kate and Jack and how well they had got on and whether Jack was enough over his divorce to be looking for another wife.

Dommie listened for as long as he could, but he had far more important things to talk to Kate about, and eventually the dam broke and his flood of conversation overwhelmed everything else until Darren rose from the table and said he’d better be gettin’ on, and Kay began to fret about getting the children off to school. Kate made herself useful by washing the children’s hands and faces and keeping them chatting while Kay got their things ready, and then the two households parted, and Kate went home to keep her appointment with the roof and the chimney.

It was a lovely day to be up on the roof, warm, and dry underfoot and with no wind. Her first task was to clean out the gutters with a trowel and inspect them. They were not in the first flush of youth, but they would do for another year or two, so they were not her problem. Then she walked about the roof and examined it thoroughly. It was slate, and she guessed it was about thirty or forty years old, but a slate roof would last fifty years or more, and this one was in pretty good shape, so again it would not be her problem when the time came. There was one slipped slate, but it was an easy job to push that back into position and put another nail in.

The chimney obviously had to face a lot of weather, and the pointing on two sides needed redoing. Also the flaunching was breaking down and needed replacing, and one or two ridge tiles needed re-bedding. Altogether a nice, manageable job for a fine day. And pointing was a satisfying task, a bit like icing a cake, with something to show for it at the end. She went back down to mix herself up some three-to-one mortar, threw off her jumper, which she was not going to need, retied her hair more firmly out of the way, and went back up to work.

She worked steadily, looking up now and then to admire the view. From up here she could see a lot further over the moors. She could also see down over the village. She saw the stone cross sticking up from the gable of the old school; the Royal Oak’s jumble of roofs and chimneys, and the top floor and roof of the Blue Ball opposite, giving rise to a few pleasant thoughts about Jack Blackmore, and some speculations, too, to keep her going. She could see the top of the old mill down the Stindsford road, and beyond it some high trees and the hint of chimneys just showing through them which she thought were probably those of The Hall.

When she had visited Bursford as a child she had had The Hall pointed out to her in passing as the ‘big house’ of the village – the place where ‘the squire’ lived. Of course, they didn’t use those terms any more in this modern world, but she was glad at least that she had heard of it and knew where it was when Jack had mentioned it. Her memory from childhood was only of an old house of a largeness out of her experience, tall trees and many windows, and gateposts, which had seemed to her the apogee of grandness. No-one in her parents’ or grandparents’ circle had gateposts. The people who lived in The Hall were from another planet, as far as the child Kate had been concerned.

Well, now the adult Kate had had lunch with an inhabitant of Gatepostworld, and had a date with him into the bargain. She wouldn’t, of course, be overwhelmed by the consideration, now she was grown up and sophisticated and had lived and worked in fast-paced London; but she couldn’t help a little smirk of satisfaction and a wink towards the wide-eyed child she had been. She thought of Gaga, and how pleased she would be that her money was giving rise to new experiences for her granddaughter.
I must write to her tonight, and tell her about the lunch
, she thought. It would probably give her more pleasure than talk of flaunching and mortar and re-bedding tiles.

It really was a fine day, and it was beginning to get very hot up there on the slates. Kate wondered about sunburn – a fine thing to think of in England in May! She hoped she was going to be able to get the job done today. It was a nuisance that she had to remember she had no food in the house and mustn’t leave it too late to go and do a shopping run. She had borrowed a bit of milk from Kay who, enquiring about the state of her commissariat, had also put her up a cheese sandwich for her lunch when she did the children’s, so she was covered for lunchtime, at any rate. She began to feel very hungry, and looking at her watch, found it was half past twelve. Past time for a break.

She eased herself down the slope to the ladder, descended briskly, and went to wash her mortar-y hands in the bathroom. Glancing at her reflection in the mirror over the basin, she saw that she had caught the sun. She needed to be careful – it wouldn’t do to go to the Country Club looking like a tomato. She rummaged about in one of the boxes until she found the remains of the suntan cream from her last holiday, and took it downstairs with her to put on after lunch.

She put the kettle on and made herself a big mug of tea, and then went outside and sat in the shade of the house on an upturned milk crate she had discovered in the tangle of the garden. The cheese sandwich was large and delicious – man-sized, just what she wanted – and blessed Kay had put in a couple of chocolate biscuits and a lump of cake as well. She’d save the cake for teatime, when she was bound to be peckish again. What it must be like to have a wife! she thought. Men didn’t know how lucky they were. If
she
ever got married, all she’d get was a husband.

Lunch finished, she continued to sit, enjoying the wonderful smells of open air and green things, and listening to the birds. The tortoiseshell cat appeared, dissolved itself under the front gate and came mincing down the path towards her. It wiped its nose elegantly on her outstretched fingers, then settled down companionably a few feet away, just beyond the house-shadow, tail firmly tucked around its feet, squeezing its eyes blissfully in the sunshine.

It was all so peaceful; Kate felt extremely relaxed, and was in no hurry to call an end to lunchtime. Indeed must have nodded off for a minute, because she started awake as her head lolled forward, to find the cat had disappeared, and became aware of the sound of horse’s hooves. It was the unmistakable thub-dub of unshod hooves on the packed dirt of the track behind the house, and she stood up cautiously, expecting to see some of the wild ponies that used the track to take them from one grazing to another. She could only hear one set of hooves, but the others might be walking on the grass.

When the animal came into sight, it was indeed an Exmoor pony, with a dark bay coat, thick black mane and tail, and the typical mealy muzzle and eye patches; but it was no wild mare. It was beautifully groomed and glossy, was wearing a saddle and bridle, and was being ridden by a girl in a blue shirt, jodhpurs, and well-polished jodhpur boots. She looked about twelve or thirteen and had fair hair in a thick plait down her back, and a pretty, cheerful, freckled face.

Kate stood watching with pleasure, remembering the joy she had had riding at that age. Dad had been very horse minded, and had paid for riding lessons at O’Rourke’s at Castleknock for Aileen and Kate – the others hadn’t been interested. Aileen had given it up after a while, when she started to be interested in boys instead, but Kate had always loved it. When she visited Granny and Grandpa they arranged for her to go out riding from Langtrey’s on Almsworthy Common. Sometimes Dad had gone with her – they were the most special times of all, when he shared with her his knowledge of Exmoor’s history, flora and fauna. On ponyback you could get closer to all sorts of creatures than you could on foot, and could go so much further, and to places otherwise inaccessible.

She expected the girl to carry on past down the track towards the open moors, but instead she turned her mount firmly into School Lane and halted in front of Kate’s garden gate as if that had been her destination all along.

‘Hullo,’ she said, fixing Kate with a solemn and perhaps slightly cautious eye. ‘Can Daphne have a drink? Mrs Brown always used to give him a bucket of water if he needed it.’

Kate roused herself. ‘Yes, of course. I’ll have to wash the bucket out first – it’s had mortar in it.’ She got up, and tilted the bucket towards the girl to show her the remains.

The girl smiled, evidently relieved that Kate was disposed to be friendly, and said, ‘Can I come and in and see what you’re doing? They say you’re doing up the cottage yourself. That must be fun.’

‘It is. Hard work though.’

‘I’d like to see how you’ve changed it. I used to come here a lot when Mrs Brown lived here. She was nice. She always used to invite me in.’

‘You can come in and welcome, but there’s not much to see yet. It’s pretty bare.’

‘What was the mortar for?’

‘I was working on the roof this morning. Have to take advantage of a dry day.’

‘You’ve caught the sun,’ the girl observed, jumping down.

‘Can you tie him up?’ Kate wondered. The pony wasn’t wearing a headcollar and she didn’t think she had a piece of rope anywhere.

‘I’ll bring him in the garden and shut the gate,’ said the girl. She looked round. ‘There’s nothing here he can hurt, really, is there?’ she added with breezy self-confidence.

True, if slightly tactless
, Kate thought. The girl led the pony through into the garden and shut the gate, and Kate went over to help by running up the stirrups. ‘If you slip the end of the reins under one of them, they won’t slip down where he can tread on them.’

‘I know,’ the girl said, but she looked at Kate with interest. ‘You know about horses.’

‘I used to ride,’ Kate admitted. ‘I thought you said his name was Daphne,’ she admitted, patting the thick neck. The pony was already investigating what there was to eat in the tangle of the ground-cover. He shook himself as if shaking off her caress, and stamped a forefoot, but it was probably only a fly.

‘I did – it is,’ the girl said. ‘You see, Ed bought him for me – my brother – because Chloe’s a bit small for me now, and she doesn’t like to jump, and
he
called him Daphnis, but Mummy said there was no such name and he must have meant Daphne, so that’s what he got called after that.’

‘Oh, Daphnis and Chloe – I get it!’ Kate said.

‘Do you?’

‘The Greek story – the lovers, Daphnis and Chloe. Weren’t they a shepherd and shepherdess?’

‘That’s what Ed told me. Mummy didn’t get it. She said what was the point in knowing silly old stories like that if you couldn’t even give a pony a proper name? Anyway, it was too late by then – the name stuck, and he’s called Daphne. Except at shows, then we put him down as Daphnis because otherwise there’s confusion over whether he’s a mare or a gelding and it’s a nuisance.’

‘You show him, do you?’