I passed a farmhouse, and then a pair of cottages. As the road levelled out, a T-junction loomed before me. ‘Cotterly ¼ mile’, declared the sign pointing left. So this was it. I took a deep breath and turned the wheel.
A lemon-coloured Citroën, old and battered, was parked on the grass beyond a broken-down gate, along the top bar of which the inscription ‘Wood Edge’ was faded but legible.
I had experienced no difficulty finding Flora’s house. Despite my pessimism, the doors of the pub, easily spotted at the side of a small green, had been open; but the clamour of male voices, raised in exhortation at the flickering figures of rugby players on the television screen within, decided me to try the shop next door instead.
I waited impatiently while two small girls and a boy rummaged among the sweets on the counter, finally handing over precious ten-pence pieces. I purchased a bar of chocolate and made my enquiry.
‘Wood Edge?’ The short, middle-aged woman pushed to the drawer of the till, then, wiping her hands on her apron, ushered me to the door. She pointed along the road. ‘The lane up to the right, ‘bout a half mile along. Just past Manning’s barn.’
I had devoured the last square of chocolate as I passed the huge corrugated-iron hay store and drew the car to a halt some fifty yards further on.
Now I climbed out, flung my bag across my shoulder and hoisted the books into my arms. I crossed the lane and stood in the entrance.
The house, like most of the others in the village, was of yellowish grey stone, mellowed with age. The garden sloped up towards it, unkempt grass lush with the first thrust of spring. Purple crocuses dotted banks supporting a path beneath the windows. Here and there, clumps of tight daffodil buds promised a golden flowering.
A robin hopped across the driveway in front of me as I crunched towards the front door, then darted to the branch of a straggling buddleia where it bounced round to face me, twittering. Sparrows rustled in the bushes and overhead a pair of wood pigeons flapped lazily towards some unknown destination. There was no other sound or sight of movement. For the first time, the possibility occurred to me that Flora might not be at home.
The front door, approached by three stone steps built into the abrupt rise, was firmly shut. There was no bell; just an old and tarnished brass knocker. I lifted it and banged twice. The sound echoed. I waited, then knocked again, this time with greater force. As the reverberations faded, there was silence.
I retreated down the steps and surveyed the frontage. One of the upstairs casements was ajar. In the country that probably didn’t mean anything. What now? Presumably I could find somewhere to leave the books. A note through the door … I struggled with a sense of anticlimax.
Then: ‘Come on, Columbus. We have a visitor.’ The voice floated from somewhere along the side of the house. Footsteps sounded.
From under the ivy-clad overhang at the corner, a tallish and solidly built figure, in what I’d guess were her late fifties, appeared. She strolled towards me along the upper path, a somnolent cat, knitted into the design of her heavy jumper, undulating across her bosom as though rocked on a gently rolling sea. At her feet padded a ginger tom, tail erect, rubbing confidently against the green of her scuffed cords. This presumably was the companion I had heard her addressing; but addressing in a tone startlingly softer than the one she now directed at me.
‘Yes?’ Short; to the point; unsmiling.
The cat turned slit eyes towards me and stared. Flora’s own were wide and brown and framed by waves of greyed hair among which glints of auburn provided curious contrast. In one hand she held an ancient trug, half-filled with mud-smeared potatoes and knobbly shapes that might have been swedes; in the other a garden fork. Wooden sabots hugged her feet which she planted firmly on the top of the bank.
I looked up at her; never in all my childhood imaginings had I visualised her thus.
I resisted an instinctive step backwards. ‘You’re …’ I hesitated over the informality ‘… Flora?’
‘Yes.’ The same clipped neutrality.
I took a deep breath. ‘I’m Charissa,’ I said, glad of the extra stature I felt my full, and somewhat distinctive, name gave me. Then, as her eyes roved over me, ‘I came to return these.’ I held the bundle of books out towards her.
There was a pause, while she continued to size me up. ‘So you are. Spitting image of your father of course.’ The merest hesitation before, just a shade less abruptly: ‘You’d better come in.’
Ignoring the proffered parcel, she turned on her heel and started round the house, Columbus falling into step behind her. ‘Never use the front door,’ she announced, leaving me to catch the words as they floated back on the air. It seemed I had no alternative but to follow.
In Indian file, the three of us made our way to a paint-chipped door. It gave access to a lobby cluttered with gardening paraphernalia. Flora deposited trug and fork, kicked off her shoes and pushed the kitchen door wide. A wave of warmth billowed to greet me.
Moving straight to the Aga at the far side, she lifted one of the heavy circular lids and slid the kettle across on to the hotplate beneath. Columbus bounded on to an elderly chesterfield and took possession.
Flora turned, leaning against the rail over which teatowels were drying, and looked at me, arms folded.
‘Well, come in then.’
I took a step across the threshold. The room, unlike the exterior of the house, had a cared-for look; that is to say, not clinically scrubbed as my mother always kept her kitchen, but comfortably clean and ordered. And, yes, cheerful. A first glance took in an antique Welsh dresser hung with good quality china, a large oak kitchen table, the near end of which was home to a pile of shuffled papers, and a set of cupboards and work surfaces along the length of the window wall. Dotted here and there, but always looking as though they belonged, were the bits and pieces that gave the room its lived-in feel – table lamps, a busy Lizzie draped from the window sill, a magazine lying open.
‘Push Columbus over,’ Flora instructed, noting my hesitation. ‘Oh, and …’ she nodded towards the bundle I was still carrying ‘… put those down somewhere. By the bookcase will do.’
It stood against the wall immediately to the right of the doorway, out of vision until I entered and moved towards the sofa.
On its top shelf, and flanked by a rosebowl on one side and a pair of silver candlesticks on the other, stood a large framed photograph of my father. It brought me up short.
‘Tea or coffee?’
I looked across at Flora. Her face was expressionless. ‘Coffee, please. Black.’
Turning back, I stared at the picture again. It had been taken in the garden, presumably at the rear of the house; and, as was clear from the fit of my father’s familiar brown tweed jacket, long before his illness began to take hold. He was standing beneath the branches of an apple tree in full fruit, laughing. That sparkle in his eyes … I hadn’t seen it since …
I bit my lip. Flora – I glanced in her direction – was spooning coffee. I placed the books on the floor as directed and squeezed a place for myself beside the already slumbering ball of ginger fur.
The photograph drew my gaze inexorably. I forced myself to lower it and study instead the contents of the shelves. They held an eclectic collection, bundled in together with the familiarity of use.
Books of poetry rubbed shoulders with a Dickens or two, some Nevil