One Summer at Deer’s Leap

I could feel my cheeks burning, whether from the heat, or driving, or from the triumph that sang through me, I didn’t know. Perhaps it was a bit of all three, with a dash of anticipation thrown in.

I slowed as I neared the place, coughing nervously. I was almost there; about a hundred yards to go. I remembered that first time taking my eyes off the road for a second, then looking up to see the airman there.

I glanced to my right, then gazed ahead. He wasn’t there and soon I would have driven past the place. I looked at my watch. I had timed my journey so as to be in the same spot at what I thought was about the same time. I’d gone over and over the previous journey in my mind and decided that the encounter had happened a few minutes before eleven o’clock.

The time now was ten fifty-six and I had passed the place without seeing him or sensing that he was around. He wasn’t coming; not today, that was. People like him, I supposed, couldn’t materialize to order, but even so, I looked in the rear-view mirror, then in the overtaking mirror, to be sure he wasn’t behind me.

But he would come. Sooner or later he would appear, I knew it. If I really was psychic, then the vibes I’d been sending out for the past fifteen minutes would have got to him good and strong. I would have to be patient. Didn’t I have plenty more days? I smiled, pressed my foot down, and made for the crossroads and the dirt road off it. This time, the road ahead was clear of sheep.

I slowed instinctively when I came to the dirt road, glancing ahead for a first view of Deer’s Leap. When I got to the kissing gate I almost stopped, noting as I passed it that its black paint shone brightly.

‘She’s here!’

Beth’s children were waiting at the white-painted gate. Hamish and Elspeth were exactly as Jeannie had described them.

‘Hi!’ I called. ‘Been waiting long?’

‘Hours,’ Hamish said.

‘About fifteen minutes,’ his twin corrected primly.

‘Have you met Hector, Miss Johns ?’ The Labrador lolloped up, barking furiously.

‘Cassie! And yes, I have – the weekend you two were at camp.’

I’d seen little of the dog, actually; he’d been shut in an outhouse because of his dislike of strange men.

I got out of the car and squatted so Hector and I were at eye level, then held out my left hand. He sniffed it, licked, then allowed me to pat his head.

‘He likes you,’ Elspeth said. ‘We’ll help you with your things.’

I smiled at her. She was a half-pint edition of Jeannie, not her mother. Hamish was fair and blue-eyed, like Danny.

‘Beth’s in the bath.’ Danny arrived to give me a smacking kiss, then heaved my big case from the boot.

Carefully I manoeuvred my word processor from the back seat, handing the keyboard to Hamish. His sister took my grip and soapbag; I carried the monitor.

‘How on earth did you get all this in that?’ Danny looked disbelievingly at my little red car. ‘Looks as if you’ve come prepared for business.’

‘I shall write and write and write,’ I said without so much as a blush.

Beth arrived in a bathrobe with a towel round her hair. Her smile was broad, her arms wide. I love the way she makes people welcome.

It felt as if I had just come home.

When they left, waving and tooting at seven next morning, I watched them out of sight then carefully closed the white gate, turning to look at Deer’s Leap and the beautiful garden. It was a defiant glare of colour: vivid red poppies; delphiniums of all shades of blue; lavender with swelling flower buds and climbs of every kind of rose under the sun. They covered arches and walls, rioted up the trunks of trees and tangled with honeysuckle. In the exact centre, in a circular bed, was the herb garden; a pear tree leaned on the wall of the V-shaped gable end.

Uneven paths wound into dead ends; there were no straight lines anywhere. The garden, for all I knew, had changed little since witches cast spells hereabouts, and Old Chattox, Demdike and Mistress Nutter fell foul of the witch-hunter.

For a couple of foolish minutes I pretended that everything between the white gate and the stone wall at the top of the paddock belonged to me. I began rearranging Beth’s furniture, deciding which of the bedrooms would be my workroom when I had become famous and a servile bank manager offered me a huge mortgage on the place. Hector lay at my feet; Tommy, the ugliest of cat you ever did see, rubbed himself against my leg, purring loudly. Lotus, a snooty Persian, pinked up the path to indicate it was high time they were all fed. I felt a surge of utter love for the place, followed by one of abysmal despair. I wished I had never seen Deer’s Leap; was grateful beyond measure that for four weeks it was mine.

‘All right, you lot!’ I said to the animals, determined not to start talking to myself. First I would feed them, and then myself. Then I would make my bed and wash the dishes I had insisted Beth leave on the draining board. After that, I would start work.

The kitchen table was huge and I planned to set up my word processor at one end of it. I had decided to live and work in the kitchen and only when I had done a decent day’s work would I allow myself the reward of the sitting room, or of watching a wild sunset from the terrace outside it – with a glass of sherry at my side.

I smiled tremulously at Deer’s Leap and it smiled back with every one of its windows. Already the sky was high and near cloudless, and the early sun cast long shadows. I thought of Beth, and wondered if they had reached the M6 yet. Then I thought of Jeannie.

My route to Preston station had been painstakingly illustrated by Danny so I could find my way there without bother to meet her train at nine tonight. I felt a contentment that even my Yorkshire common sense couldn’t dispel. I had even decided not to drive down the lane to The Place, near the clump of oaks; that I wouldn’t hassle Jack Hunter nor feel disappointment if he didn’t turn up – or was it materialize? Today would be given to settling in, settling down and getting used to being mistress of Deer’s Leap.

Tomorrow, if I could, I would find an excuse to drive into Acton Carey alone. I am a writer, so surely between now and then I could come up with a believable excuse. After all, the pilot and I had met on a Saturday, so it was worth a try.

I sighed blissfully. I would potter until ten, when I would start work. Not until four o’clock would I prepare the salad to eat with the home-cooked ham Beth had left for us. Only then would I make myself presentable and meet Jeannie’s train. I felt so lucky, so utterly contented, that I wondered when the skies would open and jealous gods hurl down anger against me.

I crossed my fingers, whistled, then rummaged in a drawer for the tin opener. First the cats; then Hector’s biscuits and water as set out on the list on the kitchen windowsill. It was all so lovely and unreal that I wanted to laugh out loud.

‘That’s enough, Cassandra!’ I said in my mother’s it’ll-end-in-tears-before-bedtime-if-you-get-too-excited voice. ‘Just take every hour as it comes – then sit back and let things happen!

And happen they would, if I had anything to do with it!

Jeannie’s train arrived on time.

‘Hi!’ she said. ‘Good of you to pick me up.’

‘No bother. I like meeting trains.’ I do, actually. ‘Good to see you.’

‘How’s everything going? Got settled in?’

‘All set up and working. I’ve had a good day. Did you eat on the train?’

‘No, and I’m famished.’

‘Well, there’s ham salad and crusty bread and some rather special ice cream for pudding. There’s a bottle of white wine on the slate slab in the dairy, too.’

‘I’m ready for this weekend.’ Jeannie shoved her grip on the back seat of the car. ‘It’s been a swine this week at work. Nothing but meetings and interruptions and a pile of manuscripts a mile high to be seen to. I’ve brought a couple with me.’

‘You’re not spending your time reading!’

‘No. I can usually tell if a book is going to be any good by the end of the third chapter. Now, first of all I must tell you how pleased I am with the chapters you sent me. You’re on to a winner if the rest of the book is as good. You seem to be writing with more confidence.’

‘I am. It’s going well and I’ve covered quite a bit of wordage today. Beth’s kitchen is a lovely place to work in. They got away all right this morning. Beth says she needs a holiday to help set her up for the bother ahead.’

‘You mean leaving Deer’s Leap and finding another house.’

‘Mm. She tells me she’ll be thinking, once she’s left, about the woman who’ll be cooking in her kitchen and cutting flowers from her garden and –’

‘And shovelling six feet of snow from her back door to the wood shed! Have you been behaving yourself, Cassie?’

‘Of course I have! I’m well out of temptation’s way there.’

‘Not that kind of trouble! You know what I mean. No ghost hunting, or anything?’

‘Positively not!’ I met her eyes briefly and was glad to be able to tell the truth. ‘What really interests me, though, is the family who lived at Beth’s place in the war and got emptied out by the RAF. I’d have been spitting feathers if they’d done it to me.’

‘Me too. But I believe it was different then. There was a war on, so no one made too much fuss. It wouldn’t have been patriotic to complain. I remember talking to Bill Jarvis – lives in the village – once about the war. You wouldn’t believe what people put up with, according to him.’

‘Probably he was romancing a bit,’ I said carefully. ‘He’ll be getting on a bit now?’

‘Told me he’s nearer eighty than seventy, but he’s as bright as a button for all that.’

‘And he’s always lived in Acton Carey?’ Again the casual approach.

‘In the Glebe Cottages, by the church. I once spent an interesting couple of hours with him. He opens up after a few pints.’

‘Ale-talk,’ I said, making a note that Bill Jarvis lived near the church and liked his beer. ‘Not far to go now. Think I’m hungry too. I’m going to enjoy this weekend, y’know. Will you be able to make it next week?’

‘I most certainly will! Get some decent air into my lungs and a bit of peace and quiet. Don’t wake me in the morning, there’s a good girl – not even with a cup of tea.’

I said I wouldn’t, then concentrated on the road ahead – both sides of it – because we had just passed the clump of oaks.

We reached Deer’s Leap, though, without incident or encounter, and I can’t say I was all that disappointed. Already I had pinned my hopes on tomorrow, if I could get out alone.

‘Why don’t you sleep in, tomorrow morning?’ I said, sort of offhand. ‘I’m going down to the village anyway. There’s a post office I hope?’

‘Yes. Next door but one to the pub. What do you want with a post office?’

‘Phone cards,’ I said promptly. ‘I’m not using Beth’s phone to ring home. Is there a phone box, too?’

‘Outside the post office.’

‘Fine.’ I didn’t press the point. ‘Be a love and open the gate, will you?’

I felt very pleased with myself. I’d hit on an alibi for tomorrow morning and discovered a World War Two veteran ready and able to talk. Or he would be, once I’d established I was from Deer’s Leap and had bought him a pint!

We sat on the terrace long after the sun had gone down, me with a glass of sherry beside me, Jeannie with a gin and tonic. We had piled the dishes in the sink and left them. Evenings such as this were not to be wasted on things banal. It was almost dark, but still warm. A softly shaded lamp in the room behind us lit us rosily as distant outlines had blurred and turned from purple to deepest grey.

Somewhere below us, the headlights of a car briefly lit trees as it passed them. Someone was making for the village, I supposed, which was a scatter of pinprick lights far over to our left.

The birds had stopped singing. Tommy’s loud purring was almost hypnotic; Hector snuffled and yawned. He was lying across my feet and to shift him would be to break the spell. Lotus, a night owl, had long ago disappeared over the paddock wall.

‘If there’s a heaven, Jeannie,’ I said softly, ‘I want it to be like this.’

‘Mm.’ She tilted her glass, draining it. ‘Look – I’m feeling cold, all of a sudden. Tired, I suppose. Would you mind if I shoved off to bed?’

‘Of course not.’ I got to my feet and the dog awoke with a surprised snuffle. ‘I’ll see to the animals and do the rounds of the house.’

‘Bless you. Night, love.’ She kissed my cheek, then patted the dog. ‘D’you know, I haven’t unpacked, yet …?’

‘Tomorrow is another day. And I won’t wake you in the morning – when I go to the village, I mean.’

‘Don’t dare!’

She climbed the stairs slowly, followed by Tommy, who had already, I supposed, decided to spend the night on her bed.

Beth had found him at the side of the lane with a bleeding paw and fed him. By the time it was healed, he had purred his way into the family’s affections. He followed people around, grateful for his new, cushy lifestyle. Jeannie’s bedroom door closed with a thud and I wondered if the animal had managed to slip in behind her.

Reluctantly I locked and bolted the French windows and removed the key. I’d already decided to wash the supper things because I didn’t want to go to bed yet. Even washing up here was a joy. I squirted liquid into the bowl and idly swished it into suds.

I was happy; indecently happy. It was as if I was establishing a rapport with the house so it would stay unoccupied until I could afford it.

‘Grow up, Cassie!’ Until fishes flew and forests walked again! In my dreams! I would never get Deer’s Leap. Some rich bitch would snap it up as a summer retreat. All at once I was glad I was a bit psychic and wondered if people like me could ill-wish. An awful sadness washed me from nose to toes and I wished that I’d never seen the place. I wanted to weep with frustration, then thought about tomorrow instead.

And about the airman.

Chapter Four

The post office at Acton Carey was well stocked and I bought two phone cards, postcards of local views, stamps, a bag of toffees and a bottle of sherry. I shoved it all in the boot, then rang Mum from the phone box. Almost the first thing she asked was if anyone had called – as in visited.

‘Jeannie arrived last night. I left her still sleeping. She plans to come next Friday too.’

I could almost hear Mum’s sigh of relief.

‘Has Piers phoned, Cassie? He rang here to see if you’d got off all right. He said you’d forgotten to give him your phone number, so I let him have it.’

‘I’ll ring him tomorrow maybe. How’s Dad?’

‘Same as always. He says that if we come up to see you it’ll probably be midweek. The traffic, you see …’

‘Fine by me.’ Dad has a thing about weekend drivers. ‘Just as long as you come. I’d love you to see the place. Tell Dad the natives are friendly!’

We chatted comfortably on about things in general and nothing in particular – you know the way it is when you phone your mum – until the card began to run out. I said I’d ring in the week and sent my love to Dad. She told me to look after myself and be sure to check the doors at night.

I called, ‘Bye, Mum. Love you!’ just as the line went dead.

Then I looked up at the church clock and realized I had half an hour to kill. If I left at about ten forty-five, I’d figured, I should be at The Place a little before eleven. I decided to walk the length of the village and back, gawping at the pub and the village green as if I were a tourist.

The pub was called the Red Rose, which figured. It looked old and, from the outside, friendly. The village green was ordinary, but the grass was cut short and the flowerbeds either side of an oak seat were well kept. There wasn’t a scrap of litter about.

I sat down to waste a few minutes, looking about me, liking what I saw. Sheets blew on a line, very white against a very blue sky; a lady in a pinafore came out to wash her front windows. The Post Office van was making the morning delivery. I supposed that Deer’s Leap would be its next stop and wondered if there would be any letters in the lidded box at the crossroads end of the dirt road when I returned. There would certainly be milk and a brown loaf, because I’d left a note there this morning.

There was nothing else to think about now except being at The Place at about four minutes to eleven, even though the airman wouldn’t be there; how could he be, just because I wanted it? On the other hand, I had thought about him so much that surely some of my vibes had reached him.

Jack Hunter. A young man with old eyes, piloting a bomb-loaded Lancaster. Young men of my own generation were still kids at his age, fussing over their first car, pulling girls. Once, the Red Rose would have been filled with men from the airfield nearby; women too, because they had had to go to war. I wondered how people could have been so obedient, doing as they were ordered in the name of patriotism. I supposed they’d had little choice.

Would Piers have flown bombers or fighters? Somehow, with his dark, brooding looks, I think he would have been more likely to have been a paratrooper; a swash-buckling type with a gun at the ready.

I pushed him from my mind. There was no place for him in my life for the next four weeks. Correction. There was no place for him, if I faced facts, in my life at all! Piers had served his purpose, satisfied my curiosity. He was nice enough to have around, but in small doses.

I wondered what it would be like to be in love – desperately in love – with a man who might any night be killed. I jumped to my feet as I remembered the war memorial, realizing I hadn’t seen it yet.

I found it on a triangle of grass outside the church gates. It was in simple stone and on the front were the names of men who had died in the First World War. I counted them, horrified that from so small a village, twelve young men had been killed.

Underneath it, three more names were chiselled; dead from a later war. It made me feel grateful those men had given their lives and then I knew I’d got it wrong. They hadn’t given anything! Their young lives had been taken, stolen, squandered!

I looked to the side to see the names of seven airmen in alphabetical order and the simple inscription, In Grateful Memory. 8.6.1944.

I saw the name J. J. Hunter and reached to touch it with my fingertips.

‘Please be there,’ I whispered.

The tingling began at the clump of oaks. Until I reached them I had managed to keep my feelings in check. But beyond those trees anything could happen and I was hoping desperately that it would.

Strangely, I was more excited than afraid, because deep down I was telling myself he wouldn’t be there. In fact, if Beth and Danny hadn’t told me to leave it, if Beth hadn’t half-heartedly admitted she might have seen the airman and told me the people in the village didn’t want the press all over the place, I might have convinced myself he was all in my mind. But Jack Hunter was as real as you or me.

I wound down my window. Then I stopped to lean over and slip the nearside door catch.

‘Hop in,’ I’d say. ‘It’s open …’

Almost eleven. I started the car and crawled past the spot I’d first met him, trying to look both sides and straight ahead at the same time. I looked in the rear-view mirror, but he wasn’t behind me, either.

‘Aren’t you coming, Jack Hunter?’

My voice sounded strange, then I let go a snort of annoyance because talking to a ghost that wasn’t there was worse than talking to myself!

‘That’s yer lot!’ This was a load of nonsense and he’d had his last chance! If he wasn’t interested, then neither was I! He could find his own damn way to Deer’s Leap! I’d come here to look after a house and two cats and a dog; to write in peace and quiet and when Jeannie went back on Monday, that was what I would do!

‘Men are a flaming nuisance,’ I said out loud, and that included ghosts!

I began to laugh. A very real Hector would come bouncing up, followed by a loudly purring cat, when I got out of the car. All very neat and normal. Only Cassie Johns was out of step!

I realized I had slowed, because I was looking for a flock of sheep, wondering if I’d imagined them too. The crossroads was ahead, and the signpost. I turned right, then slowed so I could take the pot-holed dirt road easily.

I could see the roof of the house above the trees. Jeannie was up, because the white gate ahead was open, and I’d left it closed. In front, to my left, was the kissing gate and, oh, my God! He was there! Walking through it! I saw him clearly, and the gas mask slung on his left shoulder.

I slammed on the brake, the engine coughed and stalled. I yelled, ‘Jack Hunter!’ then flung open the door as he pulled the gate shut behind him. When I got there, he had gone. The path, which led to the farm buildings, was empty. I ran down it as far as the conservatory, but there was no sign he had ever been there.

Then I turned, and stood stock-still, gawping in disbelief at the iron gate. Now it was black again with shiny paint, yet when I’d opened it I’d swear it had been rusty! And what was more I had heard its grinding squeak as he closed it behind him! I walked up to it, touching it with my finger, and it swung smoothly and silently on well-oiled pivots.

Yet he’d been there. He had! He was still around. It was just that this morning we’d missed each other by seconds – and fifty-odd years!

Jeannie and I ate a lunch of soup and sandwiches, then lazed on the terrace, gazing for miles, soaking up the August sun, breathing deeply on the air.

‘Y’know, this shouldn’t be allowed. It’s positively antisocial to have a view like this all to yourself. I wonder what they’ll ask for this place, once it goes on the market?’

‘Haven’t a clue. I’m used to London prices,’ Jeannie shrugged. ‘But I suppose that even though it mightn’t be everybody’s cup of tea, it won’t go cheap. Like you say, the view is really something and position counts for a lot.’

‘If you like out-of-the-way places,’ I said.

‘The old ones knew where to build, didn’t they?’

‘Before planning permission came in, you mean, when they could choose their plot and just start building?’

‘Sort of, but they’d have to do their homework first. The most important thing when Deer’s Leap was built would be the availability of water, I shouldn’t wonder.’

‘Danny said there was once a stream, just beyond the paddock wall.’

‘Well, that would’ve been all right for livestock and clothes washing, but they’d have needed drinking water too. Mind, that ornamental well at the back near the conservatory was once the real thing. I believe they only got mains water here after the war. And they still don’t have sewers. That’s why we shouldn’t use too many disinfectants and upset the natural workings of the septic tank.’

‘They were very self-sufficient, though.’ My mind jumped the centuries to the man and woman who built this house. Their initials were above the front door: W. D. & M. D. 1592. ‘Do you realize Elizabeth Tudor was still alive when W. D. brought his bride here? Wonder what they were called – and how many children they had.’

‘William and Mary Doe,’ Jeannie said, off the top of her head, ‘and they probably had ten children and would count themselves lucky to rear half of them!’

‘A bit nearer home,’ I said cautiously, ‘I wonder who lived here in the war, and how they managed. Petrol was rationed, I believe. How did they get about?’

‘On bikes, most likely. Or maybe they’d go shopping once a week on the farm tractor. Who knows? And anyway, who’s interested?’

‘Me, for one.’ I looked straight ahead, pretending it didn’t really matter. ‘Well – I’m an author. I can’t help being curious and it would all be grist to the mill – if we found out, that is …’