Sands of Time Read online

  The grass was soft and damp under the trees. They didn’t hear her coming. She walked slowly, not hiding her approach, but drawing near to the group she began to feel inexplicably nervous. There was no one else around and they were clearly talking about something personal and secret. She wondered suddenly if they would welcome someone watching them. She paused, pretending to examine the leaves on a damson tree nearby, trying to look casual, wondering whether to bring out the sketch book which she always brought everywhere with her. She groped in the haversack on her shoulder and produced the small pad and pen and, perversely perhaps, given her suspicions about their preoccupation with themselves, began to move towards them.

  The group shifted. There were five men. They were talking, then shouting. Two of them walked apart, throwing insults at one another. She couldn’t hear them properly. In fact she couldn’t hear quite what language they were using, but if it was acting it was a very persuasive show of a quarrel.

  She stopped, leaning against the trunk of a tree, regretting that she had come so close, wanting suddenly to turn back towards the house to the noise of ordinary people talking and laughing, to the children screaming as they chased the peacocks. It was growing very hot. The sun beat down between the trunks of the trees, but her eyes kept being drawn back to the scene ahead. She was as trapped by it as were the participants, and in a way as involved. The voices grew louder. She could almost feel the heat pouring off the men. One of the two was waving his arms about. She watched his face growing red as he gesticulated, fascinated by the way the feather on his jaunty cap shuddered around his face, curling beneath his chin. Even as she thought about it, he tore off the cap and threw it to the ground, seemingly beside himself with rage.

  The man next to him suddenly had his hand on the hilt of the sword which had been hidden by his cloak. She caught her breath.

  Stepping away from the tree a little to show she was there, she moved closer still, hoping that one of them would catch her eye and acknowledge her presence, perhaps with another good-humoured bow to defuse the atmosphere around them. But they didn’t see her. Two of the men lunged towards the one who had the sword, as he drew it with a rasp of metal from its sheath. They pulled at his arms, his clothing, trying to restrain him, but his anger had overwhelmed him. He swung the sword for a moment over his head and the man who had broken away stepped back, his red face suddenly white. ‘No,’ he shouted. ‘No!’

  The blade entered his body through the velvet and through the white shirt. Red spilled down his front. Corinne caught her breath. She tried to remember that this was make-believe. He would have something secreted under his clothes to contain the blood – some kind of bladder they wore to hold the gore; Kensington gore, that’s what they called it, didn’t they? It was very convincing.

  The man clutched the sword, plucking at the blade as his assailant pulled it out, his fingers stickily trying to hold together the hole in his clothes, to stop the blood, the gore, seeping out. With an awful expression on his face, he fell to his knees on the grass. The others looked round. They seemed horrified. Stunned. And the one whose sword it had been looked at the bloody weapon in his hand for a moment as though he couldn’t believe that it were there. Then he dropped it on the grass and ran, passing within a few feet of her as he headed towards the house and out of sight among the trees.

  Embarrassed, Corinne waited. Did they expect her to applaud? What did people do under these circumstances? What was supposed to happen next? Her mouth had gone dry. She couldn’t move. She wanted to go back to the house, have tea and surround herself with people, but was trapped.

  The three remaining men stood huddled over their companion, awkwardly hunched on the ground. There was a moment’s silence, then one looked up at the others. ‘He’s dead.’ The words, stark, modern or ancient, without embroidery, echoed in the quiet of the orchard. She held her breath. What were they going to do now? The man who had spoken bent over his fallen friend, touched his shoulder and rolled his body over. It flopped, convincingly inert, and sprawled at their feet.

  As she watched, the three of them lifted him clumsily. He was heavy. His cloak dragged on the ground. One shoe fell from his foot. They heaved their awkward bundle up and began to run with it towards the trees in the distance. In a moment they had gone.

  Released at last to move, Corinne hesitated. She wasn’t sure what to do. Suddenly she didn’t feel like being with other people after all. She had been caught up for however short a time in the drama of the moment. Openly now, she walked forward, composing herself.

  She went quickly to the spot where they had been. It would be there – the great red stain – and she would be able to tell now that it had all been an act, part of a play. She looked around in the grass. It must be the wrong place. She moved forward, looking for the shoe which she had seen fall from the man’s foot. There was no sign of it. She went to the next tree and the next, but the ground was untouched, the long grass uncrushed; there was no sign of the sword, no sign of the shoe, no sign of the blood which had so copiously flowed from the man’s chest. There was nothing.

  A strange shiver swept over her and she realised that she was feeling very cold. This was odd. Nothing felt right.

  Almost without meaning to she followed the way they had gone, away from the path through the nettles and the long grass. There was no sign of anyone having come this way, never mind three men, encumbered by cloaks, dragging a heavy burden. She stared into the shadows beyond the boundary hedges. Where had they gone? She saw now that there was rabbit fencing round the orchard, and on the far side of the hedge an electric fence and beyond that a field of grazing cattle. Of course the men could have vaulted the hedge and fences. Once out of her sight they could have put down their burden, and he, miraculously alive again, could have run with them lightly tiptoeing, probably laughing, out of sight of their audience.

  She walked back again, searching meticulously, more thoroughly now, determined to find at least a trace of them. There was a tiny core inside her, growing steadily more afraid. She walked up to the corner of the orchard, along the back hedge, looking at each tree, quartering the ground. She did the whole thing twice, gridding backwards and forwards beneath the tall, old-fashioned, ancient apple trees heading back towards the house. Of the sword, the shoe, anything at all in fact, she found no trace. There was nothing in the orchard.

  She began to retrace her steps back towards the open sunlight and the tourists and the people in their costumes, enacting scenes from a Tudor past, and looked at them suddenly with different eyes, knowing in some inner part of herself that she alone of all the people there had had a glimpse of the real thing …

  ‘Corinne?’ The voice behind her stopped her in her tracks. ‘I’ve been looking for you.’

  She turned.

  The lover. Repentant. Charming. Rueful. ‘Please?’ He held out his hand.

  She was still a little shocked. Still slightly shaky, she realised, suddenly. Had it not been for that, she might not so easily have decided that she needed someone to have tea with.

  Anyone, as long as he belonged to the present.

  The Cottage Kitchen

  When Roz first saw Fen Cottage it seemed like home. The kitchen was the only thing which stopped her from making an instant offer. The rest of the cottage was idyllic. It had low beams, thatch, three small charming bedrooms with tiny windows, a pretty sitting room which looked out onto a flower-smothered terrace and a dining room with a large inglenook fireplace. The kitchen was a lean-to. It was long, narrow, dark and basic. She thought, made a few sketches, did some calculations, crossed her fingers – the numbers didn’t quite add up – and made an offer. It was accepted at once.

  It was eight weeks after that first enchanted viewing that she closed the door for the last time on her London flat, took a deep breath and headed for the country. It was only six months before that, that she’d first realised she wanted to leave London at all. Thanks to modern technology – she worked from home as a PR con
sultant – she could live where she liked. Nothing was keeping her in town except habit. Certainly not men. Her last relationship had gone the way of the others before it – fun while it lasted, but somehow not completely satisfying. She had not, she supposed, met her true soul mate yet, and perhaps now she wasn’t going to. The thought, to her surprise, did not worry her. In fact, she felt a sudden sense of freedom.

  She turned one of the bedrooms – the nicest – into an office. It had a view across the wild, tangled garden (a future project, that) and over the hedge towards the fields. She established contact with the rest of the world via phone, fax and modem, and in the evenings began work on the dining room. It was going to be the new kitchen.

  It obviously had once been the kitchen of the house, or so she thought. She could see the vestiges there. In the inglenook, behind the electric fire, was the bread oven, a salt box, even the iron upright of the sway which had once held a pot over the fire, all invisible beneath an encrustation of centuries-old soot.

  She began on the floral wallpaper, the top layer of about six, pulling it off in great flapping wedges. Then, to tackle the Edwardian brown-painted cupboards, the Fifties light fittings and the damp floor, she decided to call in the help of a local builder. She had already had two quotes when Edwin Fosset appeared.

  ‘I hear you want some work done.’ He looked down at her gravely from gentle grey eyes. He was tall and thin with a kind, lived-in face, attractive in its way, the kind of face she trusted instinctively. In fact, within seconds she felt she had known him all her life. She found herself showing him inside and went to fetch her sketches.

  He looked at them critically. ‘It could be a nice room. No problems as far as I can see. I can get started straight away.’ He shivered. ‘It’s chilly in here. Perhaps I should start by opening up these windows and letting in some sunshine!’

  That was one of the problems. The room was extraordinarily cold. And depressing. When she stood in it she could feel all her buoyancy and energy draining out of her, as though someone had pulled a plug in the soles of her feet.

  She mentioned it to her first guests, her new neighbours, Bob and Julie, who lived up the lane. They admired the living room and the bedroom, came with her into the kitchen while she made coffee and agreed with her that it was too small, then carried their cups with her into the old dining room. ‘This is such a nice room. Potentially,’ she added.

  ‘Ah,’ Bob said. ‘Potentially.’

  ‘And what does that mean?’ Julie said, as she stood looking round. ‘Potentially!’ She echoed his voice. ‘It’s a lovely room! Look at the view across the orchards.’

  Roz had her eyes fixed on Bob’s face. ‘Don’t tell me. Someone died in here.’ She tried to make it a joke, but it was a thought that kept on occurring to her with depressing regularity, one that had been suggested by several London friends who, on agreeing to visit at some time in the future and promising to bring food parcels as though there were no Sainsbury’s outside the M25 ring, invariably asked with mock caution if there was a ghost and, if so, was it friendly?

  Bob shrugged. ‘I’ve never heard of anyone dying in here. But the Grahams, who you bought it from, never used this room. Betty said it was always cold, even in the summer. One of Jim Fosset’s boys is going to work for you, isn’t he? He would know.’

  ‘Boy?’ Roz giggled. ‘He must be heading towards forty!’

  Bob smiled. ‘But this is a village, Roz. People are defined by generations. And the Fossets have been here hundreds of years. The boys’ grandmother ran the village school, and their great-grandmother was cook up at the hall in the old days. And their great-great grandmother was –?’ He hesitated, glancing at his wife.

  ‘Don’t tell me. She was a witch?’ Roz looked from one to the other expectantly.

  Julie shrugged. ‘Not that I’ve heard. I haven’t any idea what she was. I wonder where your builder fits in. He sounds older than the sons, so he might be the cousin who went off and made good. The one who went to university and is reported, by village gossip, to have made a lot of dosh. If that’s true, why is he back here doing work as a jobbing builder?’

  ‘I got the impression he is a craftsman,’ Roz put in defensively. ‘Perhaps he likes being a builder.’ She had a sudden depressing vision of her newly-acquired friend leaving her amid piles of hammers and dust-sheets to go and attend to his investments. She was intrigued nevertheless.

  She found herself thinking often about Edwin’s strong brown hands as he handled his hammer and shovel. His quiet, reserved charm appealed to her more than that of the more extrovert men who had come and gone in her life up to now. She had to admit she found him very attractive. But she was not in the market for a man. What she wanted was a kitchen.

  Only two days later Edwin climbed up the stairs to Roz’s study and tapped on the door as she finished a phone call to New York. ‘Can you come down?’

  ‘What is it?’ She felt a twinge of anxiety.

  ‘There’s something I want you to see.’ More than that he would not say, and she had to follow the enigmatically silent figure down the twisting staircase into the dining room where he had been digging up the floor to lay a damp-proof course.

  ‘You haven’t found a body, have you, Edwin?’ She tried to make it a joke. ‘I’ve been waiting for you to unearth something in here.’

  He grinned and his face lightened visibly. ‘No, it’s not a body. Look.’

  She peered into the earth and dust. ‘What exactly am I supposed to be looking at?’

  He sighed. ‘Look. Here.’ He squatted on his haunches and scraped at the loose soil.

  She crouched beside him and stared. ‘It looks like old brick.’

  ‘It is.’ He smiled up at her. ‘Well, tiles, actually. This house is supposed to have medieval foundations, and this is the old floor.’

  She knelt to touch the red tiles. ‘I had no idea the house was that old. They are beautiful. Can we expose them and use them, do you think?’ She glanced up. ‘Do you mind my asking? Is it true that you have a degree?’

  ‘I have.’

  ‘Am I allowed to ask what in?’

  ‘History of Architecture.’ He frowned. She had touched on forbidden territory.

  She retreated to more neutral ground. ‘So, you would know if we have to report it or anything?’

  He relaxed. ‘Yes, I would know.’

  Encouraged, she dared to ask the question she had been brooding on. ‘I am going to be nosy. Can I ask why, if you have an architecture degree, you are working on my kitchen?’

  He shrugged. ‘It’s a job.’

  ‘Not a very academic one.’

  ‘I’m not an academic.’ He picked up the trowel with which he had been digging. ‘Did you mention a cup of tea?’

  ‘You know I did not.’ She smiled again. ‘But I can take a hint.’

  It was half past two in the morning when she was awakened by the sound of shouting. Struggling up from an exhausted sleep, she stared round the room, disorientated. It was silent now, but she was sure the noise hadn’t been part of her dream. Climbing out of bed, she tiptoed to the door and listened. The cottage was completely silent. Outside the open window she heard the call of an owl hunting along the hedge behind the hollyhocks, then all was silent again as the smell of roses drifted up to her.

  Pulling open the door as silently as she could, she stepped out onto the landing and crept on bare feet to the top of the stairs. The tiny hairs on her arms, she realised suddenly, were standing on end and she shivered in spite of the warmth of the night.

  She could see the moonlight shining from the window of the dining room across the black chasm of the floor and out across the hall towards the staircase. The silence was suddenly oppressive. She took a deep breath and, plucking up courage, forced herself to go down. At the bottom she stopped again, staring into the room as she realised that there was an indistinct figure standing by the fireplace. She stared at it in astonishment.

  ‘Edwin?’ Her v
oice came out as a breathless croak.

  The figure turned to face her and she was conscious of the pale, drawn face, gentle grey eyes and the worn brown jerkin. Then, as she watched, the figure seemed to fade and disappear. Not Edwin, but someone so like him.

  For a moment, total silence still surrounded her, then she became aware of the usual cottage noises. The clock in the hall was ticking, she could hear a tap dripping from the kitchen and suddenly, from the window, came the pure delicate notes of a nightingale.

  Abruptly, she sat down on the stairs and buried her face in her arms. She was shaking but it was, she realised, with shock rather than fear. There had been nothing at all frightening about him.

  ‘I’m dreaming.’ She spoke the words out loud. Taking a deep breath, she stood up and went to the door of the dining room. It was completely empty, the moonlight lying like a silver carpet over the dust and bricks and soil and scatter of tools. She took a few steps into the room, looking round. The figure had been standing in front of the fireplace, staring down into the earth in front of him. She looked down as well. There was nothing there.

  When Edwin arrived next morning she was in her office on the telephone. She stood looking down at him as he walked up the path from his van, her concentration only half on what she was saying. Without realising it, she shivered.

  When she finally went downstairs, half the floor had been uncovered.

  ‘Good morning.’ He smiled at her without stopping work.

  ‘Edwin.’ She hesitated. The face in her dream – if it was a dream – was still haunting her, but how could she admit to dreaming about someone who looked so like him?

  ‘How long do you think it will take?’ she finished lamely.

  ‘Not long.’