Once Upon A Winter (27 page)

Daniel glanced at the girl’s retreating back, and sighed. ‘
That was a narrow escape . . .’

Nell smoothed down her dress again, resisting meeting his eye. ‘And then some.’

It was a cold, crisp, exceptionally bright morning. Nell wished she was wearing sunglasses to shield her retinas from the almost painful dazzle. Lack of sleep had filled her brain with a strange slurry. She could barely concentrate on working out her tasks for the day now that the kids were safely deposited in school, let alone what she was supposed to be buying from the grocers. She had an inkling that semi-skimmed milk was involved, but that was all she could remember.

Since settling again in Harreloe, Nell had developed a daily routine which didn’t involve spending too much time away from her grandmother, or driving any great distance for supplies. The bulk of the groceries were delivered once a fortnight, in addition to the weekly fruit and veg box from the local organic farmer. Nell also liked to go to the village shop for any top-up staples she needed, along with popping into the café for some teatime treats, if Emma hadn’t been baking enough to feed an army.

The bell over the door tinkled as she entered Calista’s, and Nell was instantly enveloped by the warmth and homely aroma of the long, narrow café with its shabby chic interior. A sudden compulsion overtook
her. She would buy a soup bowl-sized cappuccino and then slump at the quiet little table at the back, waiting for the caffeine to work its magic.

Thankfully, it wasn’t particularly busy. There were a couple of young mums with babies sleeping in prams, chatting over their lattes and flapjacks. By the window, three elderly ladies bent their heads over their tea and fruit scones and conspired like the witches in Macbeth. Everyone looked up as Nell entered. She managed a vague smile, befitting a close-knit community, even when you personally didn’t know who you were smiling at.

She trudged to the counter and placed her order, trying to widen her unconvincing smile into a grin, as Meryl beamed back at her.

‘All right, Nell? You look a bit worn out today.’

‘Oh . . . I just didn’t sleep well again. A lot going through my mind at the moment.’

‘I bet there is.’ Meryl sounded sympathetic. She glanced over her shoulder towards the kitchen, separated by a rainbow-beaded curtain. Her voice dropped. ‘You know
Calista’s here today?’

Nell’s jaw dropped. ‘Here?’

Just as Nell wanted to spin on her heel and scuttle out again, Calista popped her head through the curtain.

‘Nell!’ she exclaimed happily. ‘I thought I heard your voice. How are you? I haven’t seen you since New Year.’

Yes, thought Nell, there was a reason for that.

‘I thought I’d show my face around here, for once,’ said Calista, pushing through the curtain in a riot of leafy-green embroidered blouse and aubergine leggings. ‘I’m developing a new range of cakes, with Emma’s help. Did she tell you?’

‘Er . . . No.’ Nell knew she hadn’t been paying enough attention to her sister lately.

‘She’s a talented baker. I thought it was about time she received some monetary reward for her efforts.’

‘Wonderful.’ Nell wished she could sound more enthusiastic, but her mood was degenerating rapidly.

‘What were you going to order?’ Calista regarded her keenly over the counter.

‘A large cappuccino. But I think I might just buy some crumpets for Nana Gwen and forget about the -’

‘Nonsense.’ Calista flapped her hand. ‘You look as if you need a strong coffee. But look, I’ll pop it in one of the cups “to go”, and you can drink it as we walk. We’ll come back for the crumpets later.’

‘Walk?’ echoed Nell.

‘Yes, cariad. A bit of fresh air will do us both good. Meryl, could you see to the coffee while I fetch my coat, please?’

A couple of minutes later, Nell found herself propelled out of the café and into the harsh sunlight again. She narrowed her eyes as Calista took her arm and steered her along the edge of the Common.

‘Now, I know you’ve been avoiding me, Nell,’ Calista launched straight in, ‘but I also understand why.’

‘You’re supposed to be a recluse,’ said Nell sullenly, feeling press-ganged in much the same way she often did with her sister. ‘You make it fairly easy to avoid you.’

‘Oh, good, you still have your sense of humour. You didn’t look much as if you
wanted to laugh at that party on New Year’s Eve.’

‘Can you blame me?’ Nell slid her arm out of Calista’s and slowed her pace. ‘You turn up with my husband, bringing him to the party when you must have known I’d be there, and then you start spouting on about having family connections to him. I mean, what the hell was all that about?’

Calista blinked at her in the brilliant sunshine. ‘So, you still think of him as your husband, do you?’

‘What?’ Nell frowned.

‘You didn’t say “Silas”, you said “husband”. You could have preceded it with “estranged”.’

‘Does anyone even say that
any more?’ Nell hesitated. ‘Anyway, Silas
is
my husband. Till the divorce is finalised.’

Calista tilted her head to the side and studied Nell. ‘You’re still very bitter and angry towards him, aren’t you, cariad?’

‘Oh, please
.
’

Understatement of the year.

Clutching her coffee, Nell strode away, unfortunately in the same direction Calista had been leading her in. An image flashed through her mind of Silas with Lauren. The black-haired, piratical head bent passionately over the golden Barbie doll. If Silas was even capable of that degree of passion.

Nell wanted to be sick, but that was far too theatrical, and she knew it was just the tense, unyielding knots of anger in her stomach making her nauseous.

How could he? After everything he’d ever heard about Lauren Guthrie, nee Harding - how could he just dismiss Nell’s feelings as if they meant nothing? As if all she’d ever been through at the hands of that girl could be reduced to a triviality?

‘Nell, please,
wait
!’ Calista was calling. ‘I’m sorry if I’ve offended you in some way . . .’

Nell swivelled back to
face the older woman. ‘Offended me? I just don’t understand what you think you’re playing at. My life - and my children’s lives - aren’t part of some game. I’m . . . I’m confused by how you’re involved. How you even know Silas that well. How -’

‘You want the “truth”, Nell,’ said Calista, ‘and Silas is gearing up to share it with
you. But first . . . first I need to show you something. It might help lay the groundwork for him.’

  And she took Nell’s arm again, and led her away from the Common.

*

‘
On a day like today, it’s hard to believe the forecast for the end of the week is snow - isn’t it?’ Calista gestured around her with all the exuberance of Julie Andrews in the opening to
The Sound of Music
.

Nell gazed at the sun-drenched fields and woodland rising up to greet the hills. Normally she would have been moved, stirred, exhilarated by the view. Today, nothing could lift her depression.

They were on the western edge of the village, by Harreloe’s parish church. Nell sat on a low stone wall beside the lych-gate, feeling sacrilegious sipping her cappuccino there, and half-feigning the fatigue that meant she couldn’t possibly go any further.

She
used to wonder why Harreloe hadn’t grown over the centuries around the hub of the ancient, grey-stone church, like most villages seemed to. Something to do with the course of the stream, her father had explained once.

The location of the church mea
nt, however, that a new churchyard had been merged with the old one, and fairly unlimited by space, as it wouldn’t have been in the village centre, it sprawled towards the nearby farmland.

It was the
relatively new part of the graveyard that Nell hadn’t ventured to in years. She wasn’t about to start now, just because an incredibly persistent - crazy - woman had dragged her here. Nell dug her heels in, tucking her chin deep into the collar of her coat.

Calista fiddled with a mobile phone.

‘What are we doing here?’ Nell asked flatly, once Calista had slipped the phone back into her coat. 

‘Not even a teeny-weeny jot of curiosity accompanying that question?’ Calista seemed surprised. ‘I drag you to a graveyard, and you don’t even bat an eyelid.’

‘I’m cynical in my old age. Not a lot shocks me.’

‘Really?’ Calista arched an eyebrow.

‘Well, no,’ Nell admitted, ‘but I’m just getting desensitised to the things you say and do, I guess.’

The woman laughed; a low, throaty chuckle. ‘What we’re doing, Nell Jones, is
hunting for yellow roses.’

Nell squinted mutely at Calista from under her fringe, which needed trimming again.

‘Go on. Think of it as a kind of scavenger hunt,’ Calista urged.

‘I don’t -’ But just then, Nell spotted something, and fell silent. A single yellow rose lay on a grave a few yards away. It looked freshly picked, but at this time of year obviously came from a hothouse somewhere. The gravestone itself was weathered, cracked and listing; the writing barely visible at this distance.

Almost without realising she was moving, Nell rose to her feet and drifted towards it until she could make out the words.

‘
Here lies Anna Caroline Lambert, beloved only daughter of Nigel Elliot Lambert and Caroline Louisa Lambert, 1846 to 1863.
’

‘Lambert . . .’ whispered Nell, then turned to Calista. ‘Do you know if this is the same Lambert family who owned Bryn
Heulog back then?’

‘It is.’ Calista nodded, looking searchingly at Nell. ‘So you’re already aware of some of the history of the house you live in?’

‘Just a little. I don’t know the particulars of each family member.’ Nell looked back at the gravestone. An almost claustrophobic sadness enveloped her. ‘She was very young when she passed away.’

‘Yes . . . Yes, she was. Only seventeen years old when she died in childbirth.’

Nell frowned. ‘Childbirth? But . . . was she even married? She’s still got her parents’ surname on here.’

Calista came to stand beside her, staring down at the old grave. ‘Anna was unmarried when she fell pregnant. She managed to hide the pregnancy from everyone, even her lover at first, until one day she couldn’t conceal it any more. Her parents hid the shame of it by hiding
her
. They claimed she was ill, and locked her in the attic at Bryn Heulog.’

‘Oh my God!’ Nell’s eyes widened. ‘That’s sick. I thought that kind of thing only happened in books.’

Calista blinked at her steadily. ‘There are an awful lot of things that happen in books that are as real as you and me, Nell.’ She shrugged. ‘Anyway, Anna’s parents wouldn’t even let the young man she was in love with see her. He was the gamekeeper on their estate.’

‘Really? So did he live in -’

‘The Gamekeeper’s Lodge.’ Calista nodded.

‘You mean, the Gingerbread House?’

‘Whatever you wish to call it. I rather like the sound of that better, too.’

‘So, the Lamberts turfed him out of there, did they?’

‘No. No, actually they didn’t. They carried on as if life was normal, apart from their daughter’s “illness”. The less to draw attention to what was really happening.’

‘But why didn’t the gamekeeper blab?’

‘Because then he would have been driven out of the village for certain. The Lamberts’ influence was far-reaching. And he couldn’t bear the thought of not being around to protect his beloved Anna.’ A shadow fell over Calista’s face. ‘But there were some things he was helpless to protect her from . . .’

Nell stared down at the grave. ‘The poor girl died giving birth to his baby.’

‘She did.’

‘And the child?’

‘A little boy. He survived.’

Nell felt heartened by this, even though it had no direct bearing on her. ‘So what happened to him? Did the Lamberts raise him?’

‘Heavens, no. They smuggled him out of the house before he’d barely taken his first breath. A trusted servant took him as far as Liverpool, with instructions to deposit him at the first orphanage he could find. The child’s father found out what had happened, though. Even in his grief over Anna, he knew he couldn’t let the child be discarded like that. He tracked down his son before the servant could abandon him. After that, the gamekeeper was never seen in Harreloe again. The Lamberts made up one more lie, I suppose, to explain his disappearance. Nigel and Caroline’s eldest child, a son, married and took over Bryn Heulog when they died. And the story of poor Anna Lambert comes to an end . . .’ Calista sighed and turned away. ‘May she rest in peace.’  After a moment’s silence, she ambled further into the graveyard, towards the newer section.

‘Wait!’ Nell followed her. ‘How do you know all this? If the Lamberts kept it such a secret, then -’ Nell fell silent again as she spotted another yellow rose.

This time, the grave was carefully tended. The gravestone was newer, the marble clean and well maintained. The yellow rose lay beside a posy of snowdrops.

‘
Lydia May Allen, sister to Calista June Grahame . . .
’