William Walkers First Year of Marriage (25 page)

‘I said, “Fuck off” .’

He looks as if he’s about to cry again, which is annoying, given that I am the victim here.

‘Why do you, the total nutter, want to help me get my wife back?’

‘I’ve been doing a lot of thinking. And therapy. And Iyengar yoga…Also, your mate Andy phoned up and was entirely reasonable about the whole thing. And your mate Johnson phoned up and wasn’t. Either way, I’ve realised I was being irrational.’

I slam the door again. So he starts talking through the letter box.

‘I want her to be happy. I want to make amends.’

‘It’s too late for that.’

‘Why? She’s only in Wales. It’s not exactly Borneo.’

‘She doesn’t want to be with me any more.’

‘She does.’

‘How do you know?’

‘I know. Much as I hate to admit it, I know. And so do you. You need to go and talk to her at the very least. You can take my car.’

Three people who all played their part in my marital horror story now trying to make it all better. Annoying.

They had a point, however, given that the alternative was to sit around my house in my underpants for the rest of my life. I told the managing editor I was going to Malaysia to research an article on cannibalism.

He said I wasn’t, was I?

I said no, I was going to save my marriage.

He mumbled something about how he wouldn’t go further than Shoreditch to save his, but that, contrary to his job title, his reputation and his manner, he was a romantic at heart. He wished me good luck in my mission and said that if I wasn’t back next week, I was definitely fired.

Advice was plentiful.

Andy: ‘Tell her you can’t live without her. Tell her you won’t live without her. And if she still says no, threaten to throw yourself off a Welsh cliff.’

Johnson: ‘Tell her she can’t live without you. Tell her she won’t live without you. And if she still says no, throw her off a Welsh cliff.’

Mum: ‘Have you packed a jumper? It can get very cold at night in Wales.’

As night falls, Alex’s car—a vintage Porsche, aka a completely impractical vehicle for a marriage-rescuing mission—breaks down just outside Telford. The relaxed mechanic who arrives an hour later casually explains that he doubts he can fix it. I explain that he
must
help: my marriage depends on it. He seems unmoved by the idea of a romantic nail-biter. I do some begging. He says he’s not sure the local garage will have the right part. And, besides, they’re shut until tomorrow. But he tows Alex’s stupid, pretentious car to the deserted forecourt, points at a sub-Travelodge across the dual carriageway and leaves.

Why didn’t I just hire a bloody car?

‘It’s going to cost you,’ explains the mechanic.

‘Fine, please just hurry,’ I reply. If the ground hadn’t been wet, I would have actually dropped to my knees and begged.

Four p.m., he finishes. Three hundred quid, he charges. Thank God for that pay rise. Oh no, it got cancelled. Bastards.

‘Oh, and by the way, I would keep it below forty for the next couple of weeks. Just in case.’

‘Just in case what?’

‘I don’t know. It’s all a bit…ah, no, you’ll be fine.’

It really shouldn’t take two days to reach northern Welshland, but it has. By the time I arrive in the village of Lllllanllanlan, it’s just after ten. There is no street lighting and in the murky moonlight I see no sign of Isabel or any recently repaired dry-stone walls. No sign of anyone, actually. I park the car and walk into the only pub.

Six people stop talking and turn to look at the tired and unhappy stranger who has just cracked his head on the very low beam across the door. Refusing to believe the stereotypes about the
Welsh hating the English, I decide to befriend them before asking any wife-locating questions.

‘Evening,’ I begin, in as chipper a voice as I can manage given my long and horrendous journey. ‘Any chance of a sharp half?’

Which, in retrospect, was probably a little too chipper and English.

No one replies. Not the punters; not the short, red-faced, moustached person nursing a pint behind the bar whom I take to be the landlord.

‘Sorry. I mean, err, any chance of a drink?’

Still no reply. Maybe none of them speak English. Maybe their tongues have been bred away over centuries of incestuous impropriety. Maybe they’ve just killed the landlord, robbed his takings for the evening and are having a quick celebratory round before escaping into the Welsh night.

‘I’m looking for my wife. Her name’s Isabel.’

Silence. Absolute silence.

‘Well, do you have a room for the night?’ I ask, very slowly and clearly.

‘No,’ says another short, red-faced man with a moustache, this one leaning against a fruit machine.

‘Oh right, not to worry then,’ I hear myself reply, before turning tail and walking out. Far too polite. Don’t know why they have to be so rude. I wouldn’t be if they came to my village and asked for a pint. As the door closes behind me, I hear them all whispering, but I decide it isn’t worth another confrontation.

Vintage Porsches are not good places to spend a night. They aren’t well insulated. They aren’t generous in the legroom department. I very nearly died in the small hours when I woke
with a dead leg, attempted to resuscitate it and skewered my testicles on the unnecessarily pointy handbrake. I didn’t really sleep again after that, and by half eight I was standing cold and wretched outside the only teashop in the village. It was supposed to open at nine but the curtains only began to twitch at twenty past.

‘Morning, love,’ said the tea lady. ‘Sorry to have kept you.’

‘Morning.’ At least she was friendly.

‘Now what’s an Englishman like you doing in a Welsh place like this?’

I explained.

‘Oh, how sweet. You’ll need to talk to the park ranger about that. He’s in charge of all them volunteer projects.’

‘Oh right, where can I find him?’

‘In his house up on that mountain. Or in his hut up on
that
mountain. Or somewhere in between. He’s always wandering around, is our park ranger. More cake, dear?’

It appeared that there wasn’t a dry-stone wall headquarters in the village.

‘No thanks…you don’t have his mobile number, do you?’

‘Of course, dear, but I’m not going to give it to you.’

‘Oh right.’

‘There’d be no point, my dearest. No reception, you see. We had it for a while, you see. But then it went.’

‘Oh right.’

‘Shall I tell you why?’

‘Umm, well, I’d really better be—’

‘UFOs.’

‘I’m sorry?’

‘We had one here, you see. Gwill, who runs the pub, he saw it clear as day. Even though it was night. Hovering, it was. Then after that, it went. Whooosh. Gone. Just like that.’

‘Right.’

‘You don’t believe in UFOs?’

‘Well—’

‘You see, that’s what the authorities want you to think. They came here, men in radiation suits and everything. Examined Gwill. Like
ET
, it was. Then they left. And from that day on, no mobile reception.’

As she finished, the door swung open and a short man with a red face and a moustache walked in on a gust of icy wind. I couldn’t be certain if he was one of the men from the pub.

‘Not talking nonsense about UFOs again, are you, Ceri?’

‘Yes, as a matter of fact I was. You should have seen his face.’

And they both burst out laughing.

‘I’m sorry, son. She likes a good wind-up, does Ceri.’

‘Can I have the ranger’s number, then?’

‘He doesn’t have one. No reception round here, as I said. More cake?’

‘No thanks, I’d better head off to his house.’

‘Or his hut.’

‘Or somewhere in between.’

And they both burst out laughing again.

I drive the stupid Porsche as far up the stupid single track as I can, then abandon it and start walking in the direction the hilarious tea lady pointed. After two hours, the only good thing that has happened is that I’ve reached the top of the mountain. On the other hand, the bad things that have happened are many and varied: it has started raining again, then hailing, then raining and hailing at the same time. I am wearing jeans and a wool-mix three-quarter-length coat, both of which are waterlogged and have tripled in weight; I smell of sheep; and then I realise the top of the mountain isn’t the real top. It’s only a pretend one.

By early afternoon, after three more false summits, and one quite extensive man-cry when I fall headfirst into a stream, I find the ranger’s house. It’s a hundred yards off a B-road that I could have driven up if the tea lady hadn’t implied I had to walk.

And he’s not there.

And I haven’t brought a pen to leave a note.

And no one stops when I thumb for a lift.

So I have to walk back down again.

And the stupid Porsche won’t start.

And it’s already getting dark.

So I stagger back to the teashop to ask about accommodation.

But the teashop’s shut.

And so is the pub.

And obviously I have no reception on my phone.

So I walk back to the Porsche and huddle down for another desperate night.

‘Morning, love,’ says the tea lady. ‘Sorry to have kept you.’

‘Morning. You didn’t tell me I could drive to the ranger’s house.’

‘Oh, it’s you again. Sorry, didn’t recognise you. All you English look alike. Hahahahahaha. Cake again, is it?’

‘Is there a mechanic in the village?’

‘Yes.’

‘Do you have his number?’

‘I told you yesterday, he doesn’t have a phone.’

‘Not the ranger, the mechanic.’

‘Same man, dear. Same man. Did you find him, then?’

‘No.’

‘Went to his hut?’

‘No, his house.’

‘Oh, he’s always in his hut.’

I won’t let these people break me. I have come for my wife.

It takes two hours for my clothes to dry on Ceri’s one tiny gas fire. It takes four minutes for them to get soaked again as I set off for the hut.

Three hours later, I’m standing outside the ranger’s hut. I have a cold. I have blisters. There is no sign of the only man who knows (a) where my wife is and (b) how to fix the stupid Porsche.

I decide to wait on the deck. And wait. And wait. And now that I’ve waited this long, I wait some more. Then it starts getting dark again. And I start to panic. I can’t walk back to the village in wet clothes in the pitch dark. I’ve seen the headlines.

The body of a stupid man has been found at the bottom of a ravine by potholers after rescue teams called off the search for William Walker of London Town four days ago. It is thought Walker went missing last Thursday after attempting, stupidly, to wander down off a mountain in the dark.

‘He was ill-equipped for the conditions,’ said Gwill Gwyn, landlord of the Leekcutter’s Arms, who led the rescue attempt. ‘That’s the trouble with these townies. They’re stupid. Very stupid.’

‘Very stupid indeed,’ agreed Ceri Hughes, tea lady and head of the local police force who coordinated the search.

Walker’s wife, Isabel, was too embarrassed to comment.

I have no option but to stay at the hut because I’m damned if I’m spending a third night in a leaking Porsche. So I smash the smallest window I can find in order to break in. Unfortunately, the window is too small to get through so I have to smash another one. There is a stove, a small camp bed and some Kendal Mint Cake. It is better than a five-star hotel.

I wake with a start. Well, actually, I wake with a furious short, red-faced man with a moustache poking me with a stick.

‘What do you think you’re doing, boy?’

At first, I have absolutely no recollection of what I’m doing. Then, I remember.

‘Are you the ranger?’

‘Yes, and you are coming with me to the police station, you vandal.’

I explain my logistical predicament, and he’s still furious.

I explain my matrimonial predicament, and he starts to calm down.

I explain my Porsche-related predicament, and his face lights up like a short, red-faced boy with a moustache in a sweet shop.

‘What year is it?’

‘I don’t know, it’s not my Porsche.’

‘I wonder if it’s a seventy-three. Best car ever made.’

‘Right, anyway—’

‘Can I have a go?’

‘You can if you can fix it.’

‘It’s a deal.’

‘Now, about the dry-stone wallers.’

‘Oh yes, great job they’re doing. No one round here cares about those walls but, for some reason, you English love them.’

‘Great. Can you just tell me where they are?’

‘Oh right, they’re camping up by the old fort. It’s a good three hours from here. Or ten minutes in your Porsche. If it worked. If there were any roads. Hahahahahahaha. I would come with you but I’ve got to fix these windows you smashed. And then I’ve got to fix my Porsche.’

‘My Porsche.’

‘Right.’

By ‘good three hours’, he meant five. Plus one for getting lost. And another for getting lost again. I’ve never done so much walking in all my life.

In the gathering gloom, I see the fort. Then I see a half-finished dry-stone wall with some tents tucked in beside it. My first thought is that the wall is very straight. My second is that I’m only a minute from finding Isabel. And the third is that I’m terrified; so terrified that I register a complete blank in the part of my brain that had until now contained The Speech to Win Back My Wife.

‘Hi, I’m William. Isabel’s husband.’

‘Oh dear,’ said the nearest girl, standing up.

‘What?’

‘I’m afraid she left yesterday.’

The girl is called Cassie, which is just the sort of name you’d expect to belong to someone volunteering for dry-stone-walling duty in this soaking, sodden, hilly, horrible part of the world. She and Isabel had become bestest dry-stone-walling buddies. Last night, Cassie told me that Isabel had been pretty upset when she’d arrived
(which I already knew). And that she’d just got more and more miserable as time passed.