Clear Light of Day (5 page)

Jabez meanwhile was picking his way through the clutter of machinery that occupied the periphery of the shop.

“I do have a ladies' bike, as it happens,” he said, “but it may not be what you had in mind. It's here.”

He moved aside a bike stand supporting a frame with no rear wheel, pushed a coiled length of hosepipe out of the way with his foot, and brought into the space in the middle of the workshop a very elderly bicycle, in admirable condition, but definitely a creation of yesterday.

“It's a nice bike.” Jabez looked at it thoughtfully. “Got some components added in the '40s and '50s, but a lot of it still original—celluloid-covered bars and mudguards. BSA three-speed hub gear with a panhandle changer. Monitor rear brake. Challis bell—I put that on. I've still got the original saddle, but I thought this one would be more comfortable. New tires, of course. I mean, I've overhauled it properly, stripped it down, and cleaned it, done all that was needed and waxed the frame and everything. Just depends, as I say, if that's what you had in mind.”

Again the bright, swift, amused glance that took in more than it gave away.

Esme decided the best course would be to abandon her defensiveness and let him help her.

“I don't know anything at all about bikes,” she said. “I mean, I can ride one, but I haven't done for years. I just felt I had to get some exercise and lose some weight. Why shouldn't I have a bike like this in mind?”

And the honesty seemed to pay off. He looked at her more openly; and this time she saw a kindness that she felt obscurely grateful for. Almost unnoticed, a thought passed the edge of her mind,
This man will never cheat me
.

“Modern bikes, like you might get in Barton's Bikes in Southarbour—which I think is also nearer your home for repairs and such—have more sophisticated gears, much lighter aluminum frames; they make for easier cycling, especially on the hills. Cost you more, of course.”

“What are the prices?” Esme asked him.

“Well—maybe you'll pick up a good modern second-hand bike for two hundred pounds, if you're lucky and you don't mind waiting. I'd ask you fifty for this. Because of the tires, and the work I've done on it. I didn't pay for it; Miss McPherson had no more use for it, and she sent it along to me in case I could make anything of it. Nice bike, as I say, but you'd use less puff and muscle on a modern job, there's no doubt about it.”

“If I buy this bike from you—” Esme hesitated; she had a feeling this was a man who could see through pretense to ulterior motive; “—would you maintain it for me? Help me look after it, I mean. Because they need oiling and stuff, don't they? You have to know things.”
And
,
which she didn't say,
I just love this place and you so intrigue me, I must find a reason to come back.

Esme had rightly detected Jabez Ferrall's capacity for insight, but he had a certain humility that prevented him ever imagining Esme to be interested in him. And he was very familiar with other people's inability to care for their own bicycles.

“It's how I earn my living,” he said. “I expect you'll find it easier to do all the routine stuff at home—tire pressures and lubrication, brake blocks, and whatnot—but you can always bring it to me for servicing or if you have any problems or the wheels go out of true.”

Esme looked at him aghast. “I don't think I can do
any
of that,” she said. “I'm only just about going to be able to ride it without killing myself.”

His eyes met hers then with a definite twinkle: “You wouldn't be the only one. I spent most of last Wednesday getting mud and nettle stalks and grass and heaven knows what else out of Mrs. Norman's axles. Mud's a bit out of her sphere of experience it would seem. Whatever. I can help.”

“Then I'd like it,” Esme replied, “but I'm not quite sure how I'll get it home. Is there a bus that comes out here from Southarbour?”

“Was. But not since 1973.”

“Oh.” Esme felt a bit out of her depth. “Well … I expect I could ask someone from chapel to give me a lift over here, only …”

He waited, and raised his eyebrows at her enquiringly. To her considerable embarrassment she could feel herself blushing. “I'd just rather they didn't know I was getting a bike. In case it turns out that I never really ride it. I'd feel so silly.”

Jabez chuckled.
Smoker's teeth
, Esme registered.

“Are you sure you want to buy a bike?” he said. “Why don't you go home and think about it. I'm not likely to sell this in a hurry.”

Then came a moment of inspiration.

“Could I come here a few times and watch what you do to maintain a bike? So I'd feel more confident?”

Jabez didn't reply at once.

“Yes … yes, I suppose so,” he said reluctantly, after a moment's hesitation. He seemed a little taken aback.

“Not if you'd rather I didn't.”

“No. No, it's all right. It's just people don't come here much; it's a bit of a refuge.”

Esme took a deep breath. She was unsure how much this man would understand.

“I promise not to be ‘people,'” she said softly, “and I would be very grateful to have temporary admission to a refuge.”

Jabez shifted his grip on the bicycle frame and looked down at it. “Let me just put this away,” he said, and turned from her to reposition the bike against the wall. Having done so, he stayed a moment longer with his back to her, buried his hands in his pockets as he turned again to face her.

“You would be welcome,” he said, “anytime.” But it was quietly spoken and, Esme sensed, somewhat costly. A man who deeply valued his privacy.

“I won't get in the way.” Her tone beseeched him, and he sighed, moved his head a little impatiently. He returned the hosepipe back to its original position with his foot. He wouldn't look at her. She saw she had imposed too much on his seclusion.

“Is any time better than another?” she persisted, ashamed at intruding, but determined not to lose this enchanted place.

He shook his head, his gaze averted still. “Anytime.”

The tabby cat rose to its feet among the ashes, elongated its body in a long, shaky stretch and ambled across the shed to wind itself around his ankles, scattering a light fall of the ash that clung to its fur. It had a purr like a diesel engine. Jabez bent to scratch its head, and the cat raised its chin appreciatively, closing its eyes in slow ecstasy.

“Thank you, Mr. Ferrall, for your understanding and your help,” said Esme.

Straightening, he looked from under his eyebrows at her; appraised her carefully for a matter of seconds.

“I expect it had better be ‘Jabez,'” he said.

Esme stowed this treasure in her heart with joy.

When she said good-bye and left him in his workshop, Esme became aware of a happiness that had been absent so long its quality had become unfamiliar. She had become used to the satisfaction of a job well done, and the pleasant company of decent people who were disposed to be nice to her; used to the appreciation and delight called forth in her by a sunny day or dewdrops on a cobweb or the first sight of new lambs in the spring, and used to the comfortable feeling of five minutes longer in a warm bed on a chilly morning, or the relaxation of a cup of coffee enjoyed curled in an armchair at the parsonage after the end of a long business meeting. Life held many comforts and consolations. But not for a long time had she felt this song of delight that came from meeting someone whose soul she recognized as—what? A kindred spirit, maybe? Someone whose being spoke to her destiny? At any rate, someone to whom her own soul gave its unhesitating “yes.”

I think
, she reflected as she paused by the front door of his cottage to buy a pot of honey and half a dozen eggs,
Jabez Ferrall is going to become a friend
.

As she motored peacefully back along the narrow lanes in their dappling of sun and shade, through the wooded hillsides and pastureland around Wiles Green toward Southarbour with its banked terraces of Victorian red-brick dwellings clinging to the steep coastal hills, Esme decided to disregard her standard plan of preaching from the lectionary so as to offer an ordered but varied theological diet of careful scriptural exegesis. Once Easter had gone, and they were back to ordinary time, as a change, she thought she might preach on contentment. Something about the wisdom of staying where you are, being at peace with what life has offered you, living quietly and simply, recognizing when you have enough, and finding satisfaction in daily work, in what is ordinary—even, maybe, a little old-fashioned. Philippians 4 would do nicely as a scriptural basis. The whole of it—possibly trimming Evodia and Syzygus off the beginning and the same with Epaphroditus at the end. And for a text, majoring on the assertion, “I have learned how to be content with whatever I have.” She might even have a point to make about the countryside with its little cottages, and the virtues of the bicycle as compared with the motorcar—always recognizing of course that some people needed cars and even small trucks to fulfill the requirements of their occupations. Worth pointing out though that bicycles have an important part to play in a green future. Especially the older, recycled, less garishly painted kinds of bikes.

Changing down to negotiate a sharp bend, Esme slightly adjusted her thinking to lower the profile of the bikes in her sermon plan. The spiritual potential of cycling she felt sure might be considerable, but its theological application was perhaps limited. Though there again … Her thoughts were interrupted as she pulled out of the bend and spotted ahead of her a line of cars behind an elderly tractor making valiant progress but nonetheless creating an obstruction. On an ordinary day this might have irritated her. Today she chose to regard the tractor as a form of angel, a protective escort gentling the excesses of accelerated modern living, promoting longevity in the rabbit population and inner peace and patience in the lengthening queue of motorists in her rearview mirror. Esme hummed a little tune and felt disinclined to overtake even when the opportunity came.

As the traffic became more congested in the approach to the town, so also the road signs proliferated and the view changed to one of faded advertisement hoardings, bus stops, edge-of-town supermarkets with huge parking lots and adjacent garages, all huddled in against the railway station with its taxi rank and little fruit stall and the inexplicable piles of rusted metal girders and broken-up concrete. Esme felt its familiarity challenged by a new sense that the small country chapels and the village communities in which they were set had a special value, deserving at least as much pastoral attention as a larger town church. Possibly more. The town church could probably look after itself. Up to a point.

When Esme got in, she found thirteen new messages on her answer-phone (all countering her notion that a larger town church could in any sense manage its pastoral or administrative tasks without the assiduous attentions of its minister) and a late mail delivery comprising of a complicated letter about changes to the ministerial pension scheme, the local preachers' quarterly magazine, and the draft minutes and agenda for next month's meeting from the church council secretary.

Esme applied her usual solution of a large mug of coffee and a chocolate flapjack. And then another chocolate flapjack. She felt even guiltier and disliked the round contours of her face and the disappearance of her ribs, but it staved off the moment she had to go into her study, begin returning telephone calls, prepare her Sunday sermon, and give a little advance attention to the agendas of her three forthcoming church general meetings.

Easter. Light. Morning light dawning into the darkness of the tomb. New life coming with the light. Living. Living lightly
, she thought.
The way of the poor carpenter of Nazareth: simplicity, anonymity. Detachment from all the baggage that weighs down human beings: complications of material possessions and relational possessions too—just of being possessive. Jesus let things go maybe; perhaps that's why they let him go too—the way parting to let him walk through death into life alight and unlimited. His presence reversed cling and effected freedom. Death could not hold him. He lived lightly. He arose. Jabez Ferrall,
she thought,
you are a most extraordinary man. Easter. Light. The power to be free. Simplicity. Soaring. Flight. Even the sparrows are numbered. Do not be afraid to live simply. Do not be afraid to soar and to fly. Easter. Living lightly. Simplicity. Do not be afraid. Jabez—in the Bible, isn't it? Where is that?