Tuesday evening in September, the shadows had lengthened by eight o’clock. The blackberrying youngsters were departing with their pickings, the pensioners heading for home and television.
A young couple still strolled over the emerald slopes, their arms around each other. The girl, Jill Lingard, was nineteen years old, pretty enough in an everyday fashion, an air of robust common sense. Her boyfriend, Norman Griffin, seven years older, was a virile-looking young man with a stubborn set to his jaw.
They paused from time to time to survey one or other of the half-dozen houses, of varying sizes, dates and styles, dotted about the common, each in its own garden. They climbed a grass-covered eminence and stood looking down. ‘That’s the kind of house I’d like one day.’ Jill nodded in the direction of a substantial late-Victorian dwelling standing on gently rising ground a little distance ahead. The name on one of the tall gate pillars read: Fairbourne.
The house fronted the common, its large garden screened on three sides and a good part of the fourth by trees and shrubs.
‘That’s the sort of place to bring a family up,’ Jill added. ‘It’s got character. And space.’
‘We could never afford anything like that on what I earn,’ Norman said. He was a driver for Mansell’s, a local building firm. ‘There’s only one way it might be possible and that would take luck and years of hard work. Start off small and trade up. Find some run-down property dirt-cheap, work on it, sell it. Find another, work on it, sell it. The same again. And again. The real difficulty would be getting the money to buy the first property. We’d be lucky to get any mortgage at all on something like that. And we’d need cash for materials, all the way along.’
She looked earnestly up at him. ‘If we did find an old place cheap, do you think Tom Mansell might lend us the money to buy it?’ Tom Mansell was his boss. ‘You’ve always got on well with him. We’d pay him back every month, exactly the same as a building society, we’d have it all properly drawn up.’
He shook his head. ‘Mansell would never put up good money for us to buy some clapped-out property, he’d tell us to buy one of his starter homes. That would make a lot more sense. We could get the maximum mortgage on one of those, with both of us working.’
She pulled a face. ‘I’d hate one of those poky little boxes.’
He gave her a considering look. ‘I notice you don’t mention your grandfather. If we were trying to borrow from anyone, surely he’d be the obvious person. I wouldn’t mind betting he’s worth a lot more than he ever lets on.’
It was Jill’s turn to shake her head. ‘We’d be wasting our time. Granddad wouldn’t lend Gareth a penny when he was starting up.’ Gareth was her brother, several years older, married, with two small children; he lived some distance away. In spite of the age difference he and Jill had always been close. A few years ago Gareth had set up with another young man in the business of contract gardening. In the event he had managed without help from his grandfather; his wife’s parents had come up with the necessary backing.
‘Wouldn’t do any harm to ask the old man,’ Norman persisted. ‘He’s very fond of you. Catch him in a good mood, he might surprise you.’
She shook her head with finality. ‘He’d never do it. You know what he’d say: “If you want something you must work for it, save for it, the same as I had to do.”’ But she wasn’t defeated yet. ‘What about your mother? Has she got anything she might lend us?’
He laughed. ‘You can forget my mother. She’s got a few pounds in the post office and that’s about it.’
Jill’s face broke into a rapturous smile. It had just dawned on her that here they were, discussing properties, loans, mortgages, as if they were definitely intending to get married. They had been going out together for some months – on a strictly so far and no farther basis, by Jill’s express diktat. Norman had never mentioned marriage and with Jill it would have to be marriage, she could never settle for the casual arrangement of simply setting up house together, seeing how things went from there. Only the full commitment, the traditional set-up, would do for her: a settled home for children, security, stability. Norman was well aware of her views; if he was talking about buying a house together, then he was talking marriage.
As she savoured her moment of realization a girl of about ten years old came running up the grassy incline, a spaniel frisking at her heels. She was a rosy-cheeked child, chubby-faced and bright-eyed, her long fair hair taken back in a plait tied with red ribbon. She gave Jill a warm smile.
‘Not another dog!’ Jill exclaimed, laughing. ‘It’s a different animal pretty well every time I see you.’ She often came across the girl about the common, exercising a pet belonging to some relative or neighbour. Jill reached down to pat the spaniel; she began to chat idly to the girl.
A bus turned into the road running alongside the common and ground to a halt. Norman stood watching as a woman alighted and crossed over on to the common, towards Fairbourne. Not very tall, a slim, supple figure. A wealth of naturally curly hair, golden chestnut, beautifully arranged. Delicate features, a face lovely enough to arrest the eye. She was dressed with casual elegance in a light summer suit. She wore a shoulder-bag, carried a number of books. Norman’s gaze remained fixed as she let herself in through the wrought-iron gates of the dwelling.
As Jill straightened up from playing with the spaniel she caught sight of the woman turning to close the gates. Norman’s intent expression vanished abruptly.
‘There’s Mrs Holroyd,’ Jill exclaimed with lively admiration. She watched the graceful figure move away along the path. ‘She always looks so smart, she has such marvellous taste.’ There was a note of professional assessment in her tone, she worked as a sales assistant at York House, the high-class department store in Cannonbridge where Mrs Holroyd bought many of her clothes. ‘And she always wears such gorgeous perfume,’ she added without a trace of envy. ‘It must cost a fortune.’
Inside Fairbourne, ten minutes later, Claire Holroyd came downstairs and went along to the spacious sitting room, attractively furnished, immaculately kept. Some handsome old pieces, part of the original furnishings; an atmosphere of solid comfort. Petit-point cushion covers Claire had embroidered, fresh flowers she had skilfully arranged. The walls were hung with Victorian watercolours – one of her husband’s hobbies was restoring neglected paintings he picked up at sales.
She paused by a table to glance through the books she had earlier set down, then she crossed to the fireplace and rested her hands on the mantelshelf, staring down into the hearth with its summer screen of garden blooms.
Through the open window came the chirruping of birds, the murmur of traffic. She raised her head and contemplated herself in the mirror above the hearth. A look of glowing happiness shone from her eyes, a smile curved her lips. After a moment she leaned forward and gazed searchingly at her image. Her smile faded.
She raised a hand and passed the tips of her fingers lightly over her mouth, cheeks, brow. Surely the scars were almost gone now? In this evening light she could scarcely make them out. As she tilted her head this way and that a look of anxiety crept into her blue-grey eyes.
The sound of the side door opening and closing pierced her absorption – her husband coming in after his evening stint in the garden. He managed the garden himself, large as it was.
She left the mirror and dropped into her chair. She switched on a table lamp, picked up one of her books and opened it at random. By the time Edgar had changed his shoes and washed his hands, had come along the passage and opened the sitting room door, she was leaning comfortably back, reading with
