Read The New Neighbours Online
Authors: Costeloe Diney
The New Neighbours
    
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An Invitation from the Publisher
One
Mary Jarvis sighed as she looked out of her sitting room window. She could see her neighbour, Sheila Colby, bearing down on her door like a galleon in full sail. Her face was glowing with indignation and she was obviously bursting with news. Knowing that the quiet hour she'd promised herself before going to St Joseph's was now doomed, Mary set aside the Telegraph crossword and went to open the door.
“Mary, you'll never believe it, it's dreadful,” Sheila exploded even as she crossed the threshold. Her curled grey hair bounced round her ears and her powdered jowls quivered with consternation. “It's dreadful,” she repeated.
“Come in, Sheila,” Mary said mildly as Sheila hurried past her into the hall. “Come upstairs and have a coffee, I'm just having one.”
She led her friend upstairs to the sitting room and waved her into a chair. “I'll just get your coffee,” she said, going into the kitchen. She poured a coffee from the percolator and carried it through into the living room. Handing it to Sheila, she resumed her own seat by the window.
“Now then, tell me, what on earth has happened?”
“Ned Short's sold his house at last,” Sheila announced dramatically.
“Well, I'm pleased for him,” remarked Mary, sipping her own coffee. “Since Jane left him it's been a millstone round his neckâfar too big for him. And I'd have thought,” she continued, “that you'd be delighted. You've never liked either of them. I'd have thought you'd be thrilled he was going.”
“But Mary,” Sheila was extracting every ounce from the dread news she'd come to impart, “it's been sold⦔ She put her cup and saucer down with a clatter. “â¦to students. What are we going to do?”
“Do?” Mary looked surprised. “What can we do? There's nothing we can do. Ned's entitled to sell his house to whomever he chooses and whoever wants to can buy it. Not that he's had much choice, he must have leapt at this chance, I should think.”
“Gerald says there'll be rowdy parties and noise all the time,” wailed Sheila. “It's all right for youâyou don't live next door. The noise won't be coming through your walls!”
The houses in Dartmouth Circle were in three terraces of four; set at right angles to each other round a communal garden; âsixties' town houses on three floors with an integral garage beside the front door. Mary Jarvis occupied number five, the end house in the centre block. The Colbys were her immediate neighbours, sandwiched between her and the Shorts. On the other side of the Shorts lived Shirley and David Redwood, another retired couple.
Mary could see Sheila had a point, and she said, “No, I suppose not, but having students in number seven will probably affect the whole Circle.”
The residents of Dartmouth Circle always referred to their cul-de-sac as “The Circle”. Somehow, having a private name for their road made for a feeling of community, of belonging.
“Gerald says⦔ Sheila very often prefaced her remarks with “Gerald says” and it irritated Mary, particularly as she was fairly certain that Gerald, who was mild-mannered and inoffensive, seldom made any of the remarks attributed to him, and his name was used to cloak Sheila's own less charitable thoughts and ideas. “Gerald says that the value of our properties will go down when they move in. The whole Circle will suffer.”
“I don't see why it should,” replied Mary, even as she wondered if, in this case Gerald, or more probably Sheila, might be right. “There's a student house on the corner of Dartmouth Avenue, and Mrs Old's house, two doors away from that, sold very well last month, I'm told. It didn't seem to affect the price she got.” Mary didn't actually know what Mrs Old's house had sold for, but she felt the need to disagree with Sheila who was always so dogmatic about things.
However, as she was on rather shaky ground, she went on almost without a pause, “How did you hear?”
“Ned told me himself,” answered Sheila. She drank some more of her coffee and replaced her cup carefully on the table before going on. “I met him at Molly's when I went for the paper this morning. He was full of it. Contracts actually exchanged this time, Mrs C,' he said. âOh Mr Short, I am pleased for you,' I said. âI do hope it's a nice family moving in, or perhaps a young couple, the quiet professional sort, you know.' And he laughed at me, Mary, laughed that dreadful, common laugh of his and said, âDoubt if it'll be quiet, Mrs C, it's been bought as a student house. I heard them say they're hoping to put nine or ten into it.' Nine or ten, Mary! In a terraced house like ours! Can you imagine? Next door?”
Mary had to admit a certain sympathy at the thought. “Do the Redwoods know yet?” she asked.
Sheila shook her head. “No, I don't think so. I think they're still away. I came straight home to tell Gerald of course,” she went on, “and then I did give their doorbell a ring, but there was no reply, so I assume they aren't back yet. I know Melanie had the baby last week, I told you it was a girl, didn't I? Anyway I think they were going to stay for a while to help with little Todd.”
Well, thought Mary wryly, if anyone knows their plans it'll be you.
“Anyway, Shirley didn't know how long they'd stay.”
“Not all that long if I know David,” laughed Mary. “He hates to leave his garden at this time of year.”
“Well, they'll be devastated when they do hear,” asserted Sheila. “They like their peace and quiet and they'll have the same problems as we willâall the noise and the comings and goings with ten of them!”
“I really doubt if there'll be ten living in a house that size,” soothed Mary. “They wouldn't fit in.”
“Of course they would, they don't care how they live, people like that. Gerald says they'll probably smoke pot or worse. What are we going to do?”
“I agree it's not what any of us would have chosen to happen,” Mary said briskly, “but as there isn't anything we can do about it, we'll just have to wait and see and make the best of it. Now, I'm sorry to have to turn you out, Sheila, but I'm due to help with the lunches at St Joe's today and I've got to go.”
Sheila drained her coffee cup. She considered her neighbour was taking the whole thing far too calmly, and wanted to jerk her into awareness of the dreadful reality that was about to overtake them. “Gerald says we should call a meeting of the Residents' Association,” she began, “and form a committee.”
“A committee?” repeated Mary incredulously. “Gerald said that?”
“Yes,” replied Sheila firmly, “well, a sub-committeeâ¦within the Residents' Association, so that things aren't allowed to get out of hand.”
It seems to me that it's you who's getting out of hand, thought Mary.
“And just what will this sub-committee do?” she enquired dryly.
“Keep a strict eye on number seven,” Sheila said. “Warn them about being a nuisance and call the police when they are.”
“Call the police?” Mary was exasperated with such an attitude. “Sheila, you don't know anything about these young people yet. You've no idea if they're going to cause a nuisance, make a noise, give rowdy parties, take drugsâthey may be perfectly normal youngsters.”
“Yes,” agreed Sheila ominously. “That's what I'm afraid of! Anyway, I shall go and see Anthony Hammond this evening. As chairman of the Residents' Association he must be told.”
When Sheila had departed to her long-suffering Gerald once more, Mary stood at her third-floor bedroom window and looked down into the gardens spread out below herâher own, paved, with tubs of shrubs about to bloom; the Colbys' next door with neat lawn and daffodils and hyacinth glowing in the weeded beds. Beyond the Colbys' was Ned Short's garden, an overgrown wasteland complete with rusted bicycle, discarded fridge and a roll of rotting carpet. Beyond this again was the Redwoods' garden, loved and tended, already a profusion of colour.
How would David and Shirley Redwood like living next door to a student house she wondered? It really couldn't be much worse than living next door to Ned Short, could it? The rows from his house had been heard all over the Circle. Mary smiled to herself. Ned must have known Sheila was thinking that any neighbours would be an improvement on him, that's why he'd taken such delight in telling her it was going to be a crowd of students. Surely he must have been exaggerating when he said nine or ten? Just winding Sheila up to watch her spin. A piece of quiet revenge for all the implied insults and unpleasant barbs that he'd had to endure over the past months, little things which Sheila was so good at slipping into an apparently innocuous conversation. Mary couldn't help smiling as she recalled the horror on Sheila's face, but even so, the idea of a house full of students next door but one to her own did bring on a mood of foreboding.
Still there was really nothing to be done about it, she told herself, so I'm not going to let it worry me yet. And giving herself a mental shake she set off to do her stint at St Joseph's, the local church's day centre for the elderly.
As she was getting into her car, she saw Ned Short coming into the Circle. She smiled and waved. “I hear you've sold at last, Mr Short,” she called. “You must be very pleased.”
“Told you already, has she?” said Ned with a jerk of his head towards number six. “Knew telling her would be the best way of spreading the news.”
“Yes, I did hear it from Sheila,” said Mary with a smile.
“Tell you it was students, did she?” enquired Ned innocently.
“Yes,” said Mary, matching his innocent expression, “It'll be lovely to have some young people around. The Circle has become positively geriatric, don't you think?” She got into her car and spoke through the open window. “When will you be on the move then? Sometime soon? We shall miss you.”
