What Happens At Christmas...

The village of Brookford was only seven or eight miles up the road, but it took a while to get there, even in a Porsche. After leaving the pub, they had to cross a cattle grid that shook the car to its chassis, and then they were up on the open moor. Hills covered in dead ferns and yellow grass reached off in all directions, some capped with granite outcrops, sculpted into grotesque shapes by the power of the wind. Hardy black cattle and weather-beaten Dartmoor ponies dotted the hills and wandered across the road, and Holly had to slow to walking speed at every blind bend.

As they drove along, Julia was still mulling over what Holly had told her in the pub. ‘How can you not hear from your dad for so long?’

Holly slowed down as a very shaggy sheep crossed the road ahead of them. Three other sheep behind it hesitated until the Porsche was almost upon them before deciding to follow the leader. Holly jammed on the brakes and stopped. ‘After you, please…’ She glanced across at Julia. ‘I know it sounds insane, but that’s the way it was. He buggered off way back then, dumping his wife and his little daughter.’ Holly could hear the catch in her voice and she knew Julia would pick it up. She cleared her throat and did her best to sound more like her normal, pragmatic self. ‘And that’s the last we heard from him. The miserable sod just went off and left us.’ She had to clear her throat again. ‘Mum wouldn’t hear his name mentioned in the house. So, for all I knew, he could have been alive, dead, abducted by aliens, God knows what. But one thing’s for sure, he couldn’t be bothered to stay in touch.’

After a couple of miles, they turned off the main road, bumped over another cattle grid and found themselves on a tiny, narrow lane that snaked along between hedges so high that from time to time the branches met across the middle of the road, giving the illusion of driving through a tunnel. They only met four other vehicles, but each time Holly had to back up until she found a wide enough spot for the two cars to squeeze past each other. The last straw was a Land Rover pulling a trailer full of logs. This time, there was no suitable passing place so she ended up backing into the entrance to a field and heard sinister scraping sounds from underneath the Porsche as she did so.

At least the driver of the Land Rover was courteous enough to stop and lean out of his window to ask if everything was okay. He had a scruffy beard and his hair had clearly not been near a barber for a good few weeks. He was wearing a tattered body warmer over a lumberjack shirt, both of which showed signs of wear and tear, although the body underneath looked fit and hard. To the surprise of both girls, he was another very good-looking man. Holly heard what could have been a predatory growl from the seat alongside her and struggled to repress a giggle. She wound down the window, looked out and gave him a friendly smile.

‘I’m sure it’s all right, thanks. The car’s just a bit low and there must have been a rock in the way.’

He nodded, then made a suggestion. ‘Well, look, I’ll drive on so you can pull out, but I’ll wait until you give me a wave before I drive off, just in case you need help.’ His accent was indefinable, certainly English, but hard to pinpoint; certainly not broad Devonshire like the petrol pump man. With that, he put the battered vehicle into gear and drove forward until the trailer had passed their nose and Holly was able to inch her way back out onto the road. There were no further sinister noises, so she waved her arm out of the window and heard him toot his horn in reply before resuming his journey.

‘Bloody hell, Hol, there must be something in the water out here.’ Julia was rapidly revising her opinion of rural Devon. ‘That’s two in twenty minutes. You don’t get that kind of result even in central London.’

‘Don’t worry, by the law of averages, the next two men will be Neanderthals.’

In fact, they saw nobody else for the next three miles as they drove alongside a rather fine looking golf course, enclosed within high stone walls which were punctuated from time to time by gates with stags on top of the arches. Presumably this had been a former stately home. The next man they saw was the postmaster at Brookford and he was neither drop dead gorgeous nor the Missing Link. Instead, he was a pleasant man, probably in his late fifties, with an expanding waistline and a receding hairline. Clearly the post office also served as general store to the village and Holly had to pick her way between bags of crisps and toilet rolls to get to the counter. She introduced herself to him, as instructed by the solicitor.

‘Good morning, my name’s Holly Brice. I’ve come to pick up a key.’ The man’s face broke into a broad smile and he immediately reached through the glass partition to shake her hand.

‘Holly, Holly, how very good to meet you. Your dad often used to talk about you.’ His expression darkened. ‘How very sad he wasn’t able to see you before he died.’

Holly was taken aback. She had been reaching for her driving licence to prove her identity, but to find somebody familiar with her father – and who even recognised her name – was unexpected and a bit overwhelming. She took a deep breath and blinked rapidly, not trusting herself to speak. Luckily, Julia saw what was happening and stepped in.

‘Holly’s only just learned of her father’s death. They weren’t in contact, you see.’ Holly pulled out a tissue and blew her nose, surreptitiously running the back of her hand across her eyes. She gave Julia a grateful look, before returning her attention to the postmaster.

‘Yes, I’m afraid I’ve arrived too late.’

‘Well, better late than never. Here you are, I’ve got the key to your dad’s house for you.’ He reached under the counter and came up with a small envelope and passed it across to her. ‘Are you going to be staying there tonight?’

Holly shook her head. ‘No, we’re just taking a quick look at the house this afternoon and then we’ve got to go to the solicitor’s in Exeter to do all the paperwork.’ She glanced across the empty shop to the shop window. ‘Erm, could you tell me which one it is, please?’

‘Brook Cottage. You can just see the corner of it down there.’ They followed the line of his pointing arm. A bit of grey stone wall and a few bushes were just visible. ‘It’s down by the stream; you can’t miss it.’ At the mention of the stream, the two girls exchanged glances. A stream with ducks maybe?

Holly thanked him and they went back outside, pulling their jackets more tightly around them as they did so. The wind was positively Arctic. They crossed the road and walked down the side of what was presumably the village green. It was a patch of grass the size of a very small football pitch, surrounded by massive trees, with cottages looking onto it from all four sides. Most of the houses were built of granite, with thatched roofs. A few had slate roofs and a few were rendered and painted white. No two houses were the same and it was a very picturesque little spot, very much the chocolate box image of a traditional Devon village. In the far corner of the green, a sign hanging from a gibbet indicated the presence of a pub, but it was too far off to read the name.

‘So that’s it, then. A pub and a sort of general store post office. And that’s your lot. Somehow, I don’t see us doing a lot of shopping this afternoon.’ Holly kept looking round, feeling the stirrings of recognition.

‘Still, at least there’s somewhere to buy a pint of milk or a bar of chocolate without having to drive to the next town. God knows how far away that is. Mind you…’ Julia was still thinking about Justin Grosvenor from the pub. ‘Of course, if some kind man were to offer me a lift in his Range Rover, I wouldn’t mind spending a bit of time out here. I wouldn’t mind at all.’

Brook Cottage was remarkable for two reasons; first, for being built in a sort of L-shape and second, for making Holly cry when she saw it. As they rounded the corner and the house was revealed, she stopped dead, reached out to the stone wall beside her for support and burst into tears. Julia came over to comfort her. She stretched her arm round Holly’s shoulders and held her until the sobbing stopped. Then she located a clean tissue and passed it across without a word. After a few minutes, Holly began to get a grip once more. She turned towards Julia. ‘I’m so sorry, Jules. This isn’t like me. It’s just that this is it. This is the place I remember. Look – the ducks…’

Sure enough, three mallard ducks were sitting on the bank of the stream. Even when Julia took a few steps towards them, they didn’t appear too worried. The two male ducks did a bit of quacking and one got up, but they didn’t seem in any hurry to move. Holly stood looking at them for several minutes while she composed herself. Finally, she turned to Julia. ‘Sorry, Jules, I really don’t know why I’m being so emotional.’

Julia grabbed her by the arm and turned her so they were looking directly at each other. ‘Holly, he was your dad. It’s perfectly normal to be emotional.’ Holly nodded mutely. ‘In fact, it would be strange if you weren’t.’

Holly was beginning to realise by this time just why the tears had started. The sight of the house had awakened not only memories of summer holidays as a little girl, but also memories of her father. As she had leant against the stone wall, trying to stop crying, she had suddenly remembered something. Into her mind had come an image of a little blonde-haired girl balancing on top of the stone wall, while her father stood with outstretched arms, ready to catch her if she fell and her mother looked on anxiously from behind. Holly was laughing, he was smiling, enjoying a moment together that would remain with them for the rest of their lives. As the tears poured down Holly’s cheeks, she realised she had loved her father very dearly back then. Very dearly indeed.

Seeing her looking more composed, Julia pointed at the garden gate. ‘Now, come on, let’s check out the house. It looks absolutely sweet and ever so ancient.’

Brook Cottage occupied one half of a long stone building. The roof was slate and the walls were granite, half covered by creepers and ivy. There was a small garden in front of the house and a driveway that led down the side, presumably to a parking area or garage and a back garden. They walked across to the front door. Above it, the date 1756 had been carved into the stone lintel. Like the window frames, the door badly needed a coat of paint, but it looked pretty solid all the same. A waist-high stone wall divided the rather overgrown garden from next door’s much tidier one. That house looked very similar, but in much better condition, with fresh paintwork. There were lace curtains on the neighbours’ windows and no sign of the occupants.

Holly pushed the key into the lock and twisted it. It turned remarkably easily and the hinges didn’t even squeak, so her father must have had an oil can, even if he didn’t have a paint brush. She pushed the door fully open and stood on the doorstep, looking inside. It was dark, damp and cold in the house and the air smelt musty. Together, they walked in and began to look around. The front door led straight into the kitchen. It was a large room with an old wood-burner set into a massive granite fireplace, with a neat stack of logs alongside it. It looked very clean and tidy and Holly found herself wondering if this was the work of her father, or if a helpful neighbour had tidied up after his death.

‘Lovely old table, Hol.’ Julia ran her hand across the smooth wooden top of a huge table that occupied the centre of the room. A dozen people would have no trouble sitting down to dinner around it. She went over to the front window and opened it, letting fresh air and more light flood in. Then she crossed to the window over the sink and opened that one as well, so as to give a through draught. They both looked out into the back garden that was bigger than they had imagined. There was parking for several cars and a long lawn, dotted with shrubs and trees, all enclosed by an ancient drystone wall. Even now, in midwinter, it looked charming.

They continued their tour of the house and Holly found it fascinating and not too emotional for her, right up to the moment they climbed the stairs and she found herself in her father’s bedroom. Beside his bed, in a silver frame, was a photo she recognised. Her mother had a copy underneath the sheet of glass covering her coffee table, along with other pictures of her daughter at different stages of her childhood right up to graduation day. The picture was of Holly and she knew it had been taken at her seventh birthday party. She was smiling at the camera, holding a dolly and looking very proud in her floral dress with ribbons in her hair. Then Holly noticed that this photo was not the same as the one in her mother’s house, because in this one there was a tall man beside her. He was slim, with light brown hair that was beginning to recede and he was holding her hand. His eyes were not on the camera, but on his daughter, and he was smiling every bit as proudly as she was.

This was the first image of her father Holly had seen for twenty-five years and, as she looked at it, so the floodgates very nearly broke once more and she found herself overwhelmed by memory after memory. Of course she remembered him. She remembered playing tennis with him in the back garden, splashing about at some beach or other with him while she tentatively learnt to swim, sitting on his knee while he read stories to her, and many more. Now, seeing his face, the memories all came flooding back. She sank down on the edge of the bed and tried to speak.

‘Jules, it’s him. That’s my dad.’ She found she couldn’t say anything else. She was determined not to break down and cry her eyes out again, but it was far from easy. She turned away and focused out of the window, across the garden to the old church. Beyond the church tower, the open moorland stretched upwards into the distance.

‘The post office sells milk.’ Julia turned on her heel and disappeared, leaving Holly to her thoughts. The significance of Julia’s words did not emerge for another ten minutes, when Holly heard the sound of Julia’s shoes on the stairs and found a cup of steaming hot tea being thrust into her hand. By this time she had regained some sort of normality. She returned her eyes to the room and gave Julia a weak smile.

‘Thanks, Jules. You’re a star.’

‘And, before you ask, I washed the mugs thoroughly before using them. All right?’ Holly nodded. Her love – Julia had been known to refer to it as a fixation – of cleanliness was well known to all her friends. The story of her being caught in flagrante, vacuuming the floor of her office, had long since become a part of the folklore of the company where she worked. That, and her addiction to expensive shoes.

‘Thanks Jules.’ She sat down on the edge of the bed and took a sip of tea. ‘Mmh, that’s good.’ She looked up, still trying to come to terms with the emotions this place aroused in her. ‘It probably isn’t going to make any sense to you, but I realise I’ve spent twenty-five years of my life hating the man and now, suddenly, I remember how much I used to love him. He was my dad and I really, really loved him. I don’t know how to explain what I’m feeling. He went off and left us, after all, so he’s the bad guy in all this, but somehow I’m beginning to feel regret.’ She looked Julia in the eye. ‘Have I been unfair to him, Jules?’

‘You say he’s the bad guy, but he never did anything to harm you, did he?’ Holly could see that Julia was picking her words carefully. ‘I mean, did he at least pay maintenance, or whatever it’s called?’

Holly nodded. ‘As far as I know, money wasn’t the problem. He paid what he had to pay. And you’re right; he never did me any harm, unless you count just disappearing and never reappearing as doing harm. Thinking about him now brings it all back. I cried and cried and cried when he left.’ She rubbed her eyes with the back of a hand. ‘I don’t think I ever got over it really.’

‘It must have been awful for you, and don’t forget your mum. She must have been gutted when he went off, whatever the circumstances, so it’s inevitable that you should have grown up feeling the same way as her about him. Anyway, they’re both gone now, so there’s nothing more you can do. Maybe the solicitor will be able to shed some light on what happened.’

Holly arrived at the offices of Friar, Sutcliffe and Inglis a few minutes after four o’clock. Rather unwisely, she had taken a different road back from Brookford to Exeter and this had turned out to be even narrower and more tortuous than the route they had followed that morning. She left Julia in the car to sort out a parking ticket and ran the few hundred yards to the building where her father’s solicitor was housed. By the time she got there, she was rather regretting wearing her rather nice Alexander McQueen heels. A couple of times she almost turned her ankle over on the cobbles around Exeter’s old cathedral.

She was ushered into the presence of Mr Inglis, still desperately trying to cool down after the stress of the journey. He gave her a welcoming smile and waved her to a seat.

‘Miss Brice, how very good to meet you at last.’

‘I’m sorry I’m a bit late. I’m afraid I misjudged how long it would take me to get back here from Brookford.’

Mr Inglis waved away her apologies. ‘Devon roads can be a bit hard going, I’m afraid.’ He pointed to a folder on the desk before him. ‘I’m sorry it took so long to inform you of your father’s death. We had a bit of chasing around to do in order to find you. It would appear that all contact between you and him was severed many years ago.’

Holly nodded. ‘I’m afraid so.’

‘Anyway, you’re here now and, as I said to you when we spoke on the telephone the other day, you are the main beneficiary of your father’s will. Would you like me to read it to you?’

Holly sat back and listened as the lawyer read the words written by her father. It was short and clear. The sum of £25,000 was left to Force Cancer Support Centre, £25,000 to a Mrs Diana Edworthy and the rest to Holly. When he reached the part where her father left everything else to his beloved and sorely missed daughter, she found herself wiping moisture from the corners of her eyes.

‘So you are now the owner of his house in Brookford, the contents of the house, garden and cellar, and the sum of £15,439.67 currently remaining in his bank account. We have to apply for probate, so I’m afraid that amount will be reduced in due course after payment of duties, taxes and my firm’s fees. However, more significant, from your point of view, is the fact that you are the sole beneficiary of a trust fund set up by your father. You may be interested to see the current state of the fund.’

He removed a sheet from the folder and passed it across the desk to her. She took it absently, still doing her best to control the emotion aroused by the words of his will. She glanced down at the figures and her eyes came to rest on the bottom line. It took a few moments for it to sink in and then her head jerked back up towards the solicitor, her mouth open in amazement. He was smiling indulgently.

‘A very useful legacy, wouldn’t you say?’