Breaking Away

Well, supermarkets were obviously something that remained the same countrywide, Harriet reflected tiredly, as she collected her receipt from the girl on the checkout and wheeled her trolley out into the murky greyness of the wet autumn day and the unprepossessing expanse of the supermarket’s car park.

Had the day been pleasanter, she might have been tempted to explore a little more of the town, but the rain was falling heavily, and she felt chilled by the icy wind that whipped across the exposed tarmac.

So much for the mellow fruitfulness of autumn, she thought wryly as she packed her shopping away in the car and then drove away.

The Border hills looked bleak and alien as she drove homewards, and inside the warm capsule of her car Harriet shivered. She didn’t envy anyone working on those hills today, where the sheep would be protected from the rain by their oily coats, but the shepherds and their dogs…

The village was deserted, and she remembered that the agent had told her that Tuesday was their early closing day. Early closing…she smiled to herself. Living in London, she had almost forgotten that such things existed. She stopped the car to allow an old man to cross the road, watching him disappear into the old-fashioned telephone kiosk.

The wind buffeted her when she stopped the car on her drive and hurried to unlock the back door. Once it was unlocked she removed the keys and threw them and her handbag on to the kitchen table so that she could hurry back to get her shopping in.

The slam of the back door as she ran back to the car meant nothing to her until she returned to it, her arms fully occupied with the heavy cardboard box of groceries, and discovered that it wouldn’t yield one single inch to the pressure of her arm on the handle.

Telling herself not to panic, she put down the box and tried the handle again, realising too late, when the door wouldn’t open, that she had forgotten to snick back the Yale lock after opening the door, and that her keys were now locked inside the house and she and her groceries were locked outside it.

As she stood staring in self-condemnatory disbelief at the locked door, she suddenly realised that she was getting soaking wet. Staring at the door and expecting it to open by sheer will-power wasn’t going to work and, London-trained, she had of course made sure that all her windows were closed and locked before she went out.

So now what was she to do?

The agent? He might have a spare key. Failing that, he would be able to recommend a locksmith, perhaps…

Groaning to herself, she picked up the now damp cardboard box and shoved it back in the car, thankful that she had not yet had time to add her car keys to the same ring as her house keys.

The nearest telephone was in the village, and the thought that without them she would have had to walk the two miles there in this weather, dressed in her flimsy jacket and her court shoes, made her shiver even more than she was already doing.

The village and the telephone box were both empty. She had to ask for directory enquiries in order to get the agent’s number. Fortunately she could remember his address as well as his name.

His secretary listened to her problem and then told her sympathetically that he was out and not due back for over an hour. ‘Wait a minute, though,’ she added as Harriet was about to hang up. ‘I seem to remember that they held a spare key up at the Hall, because they were keeping an eye on the place while it was empty. Do you want me to ring through to them and check?’

Harriet thanked her and said no, explaining that she had her car and it would probably be quicker for her to drive straight round to the Hall and find out for herself.

She knew where it was, for the agent had pointed out to her the impressive wrought-iron gateway, fronting on to the main road a couple of miles past her own unkempt lane. As she thanked the girl for her help and hurried back to her car, Harriet could only pray that the Hall’s spare key had not yet been returned to the agent, and was glad that she herself had not had time to change the locks as she had fully intended to do.

Cursing herself for her own stupidity, she drove back through the village, past the entrance to her own lane, and on towards the immaculate, black-painted wrought-iron gates with their gold tips, and impressive crest.

The man who had bought the Hall, in what the agent had described to her as a very rundown state indeed, had apparently been almost as much a stranger to the area as she was herself, a very successful businessman whose ancestors had originally come from this part of the world, the agent had told her. He had gone on to explain that not only had this man bought the Hall and moved into it, but also he had transferred his business to the area as well, opening up a new factory on the small industrial estate just outside the market town.

‘Something or other in computers he is,’ Harriet had been told, and was glad that she had kept to herself her own method of earning her living. The agent did not mean any harm, but he obviously couldn’t resist discussing his clients, and she was still too unsure of her own ability to follow up her first novel with an acceptable second one to feel she justified being described as ‘a writer’.

She had to get out of her car to open the gates, but was too relieved to discover that they were not electronically controlled and thus impenetrable to her to care about the discomfort of getting even wetter.

Her thin jacket, adequate enough while she only had to dash from the car to the supermarket, was now soaked through, the dampness penetrating the thin T-shirt she was wearing underneath it, making her skin feel cold and clammy.

Her jeans were wet as well, the heavy denim fabric rubbing uncomfortably against her skin every time she had to change gear.

The Hall was not the imposing edifice she had anticipated, but a long, low, rambling affair of a similar period to her own cottage. Even with its stone walls soaked dark grey by the heavy rain to match the surrounding countryside, it still managed to exude an air of welcome and tranquillity.

Its warmth and beauty, indefinable and yet so very much there, took her breath away for a moment, so that she forgot the discomfort of her damp clothes and even momentarily forgot the irritation of locking herself out of the cottage, and the embarrassment of announcing as much to the strangers who lived here.

As she stepped out of the car and walked towards the ancient oak door, she found herself envying whoever it was who lived here—not because of the house’s size and privacy, but for its marvellous and totally unexpected aura of peace and happiness.

Someone was opening the door as she approached it. Trixie’s familiar, smiling face greeted her, the younger girl apparently completely unsurprised to see her.

Ben, the Labrador, welcomed her boisterously as Trixie almost pulled her inside.

‘I’m so glad you’ve come round,’ Trixie told her. ‘I’ve been bored out of my mind.’ She rolled her eyes and giggled. ‘Rigg has virtually banned me from going out.’

They were standing in a lovely square panelled hallway, with an enormous stone fireplace that actually had a fire burning in its grate.

Ben, having welcomed her, went and lay down in front of it with a luxurious sigh of pleasure.

A worn oak staircase went up one wall to a galleried landing, the staircase wall lined with paintings which looked frighteningly as though they might be originals and priceless.

Heavy damask curtains hung at the windows, their rich fabric adding an extra glow of warmth to the room. She was standing, Harriet belatedly recognised, on an antique rug that was surely never intended to be the recipient of wet and probably still muddy shoes.

She started to apologise automatically, but Trixie just laughed.

‘Come on. I’m dying to introduce you to Rigg. He’s always complaining that I never make any respectable friends…’

Harriet froze as the potential embarrassment of the situation struck her. Somehow or other she had assumed that Trixie’s uncle would not be here, that he would be at work. If he was the same man she had had that difficult confrontation with the other evening, she had no wish at all to meet him again, especially not under these circumstances—not an invited and welcome guest to his home, but rather a petitioner.

‘Oh, no…please…there’s no need to disturb your uncle. I’m sure he must be very busy,’ she protested, catching hold of Trixie’s arm and adding uncomfortably, ‘Actually I didn’t come here to see you, Trixie. I didn’t even realise you lived here.’ Although she ought to have done, she recognised; it had been obvious from Trixie’s engaging and informative conversation that she came from a wealthy background, and from what the agent had told her about the owner of the Hall she ought perhaps to have had the sense to put two and two together and recognise that it must be Trixie’s home. No wonder her uncle hadn’t wanted Harriet reporting his plight to the police.

Trixie looked at her, her expression clouding a little.

‘You haven’t come to see me, then?’

Quickly Harriet explained about locking herself out of her cottage.

‘I rang the agent I bought the house from, and his secretary told me that you used to have a key here.’

Neither of them heard someone also enter the room, but as Trixie furrowed her forehead and then said doubtfully, ‘I don’t know anything about it. I’ll have to ask Rigg.’

Then an all-too-familiar male voice sent shivers of despair racing down Harriet’s spine as it enquired dulcetly, ‘You’ll have to ask me what, Trixie?’

Without intending to, Harriet swung round towards the door, and suffered a heart-shaking jolt of sensation as she stared at the man standing there. He seemed familiar and yet almost totally unfamiliar in his formal business suit and immaculate white shirt.

The dark hair, no longer damp and clinging to his scalp but well cut and brushed, seemed to accentuate the maleness of a face which in the daylight she could see appeared to be almost carved in deep lines of cynicism.

‘It’s Harriet,’ Trixie told him. ‘She’s locked herself out of the cottage and she thought we might have a spare key.’

For a moment, from the dismissive way his glance flicked over her and then returned with hard intent to his niece, Harriet thought that he had not after all recognised her.

She was surprised by the strength of her chagrin that he, who had made such a dangerously lasting impression on her, had apparently no remembrance of her whatsoever.

‘Try for a slightly more logical explanation, Trixie,’ he suggested calmly. Although Trixie grimaced a little, it was obvious to Harriet that she had a healthy respect for her uncle, because after gritting her teeth and casting Harriet an appealing glance, she said quickly, ‘This is Harriet, Rigg. I met her the other…yesterday. She lives in the old gamekeeper’s cottage. Harriet, this is my uncle.’

‘Thank you, Trixie, Miss Smith and I have already met.’