Seagulls in the Attic (32 page)

We wander over to the egg section where I’ve never seen so many varieties, all displayed on earthenware saucers with straw to give it some atmosphere. I recognise the amazing brown eggs that could almost be mistaken for chocolate; my Maran hen lays ones like that. The Arauncanas eggs are a pale blue-green. As with the other produce, the idea is to have the three eggs on display identical in size and shape.

We stroll around the jams and marmalades, which the judges will select for taste and consistency, and then look at the cakes, the bouncy sponge cakes and fruity farmhouse slab cake. All are beautifully presented and look professionally baked. People have worked long and hard for this show.

After the judging everyone in the village troops in again to see who has won. You don’t even have to look at the cards by the side of the entrants, with the handwritten First, Second, or Third prize and ‘Highly Commended’, like personal invitations to some exclusive party. All you have to do is look at the faces of the competitors, especially the men. Those that haven’t won look either crestfallen or miffed, but you can tell they’re already thinking of next year’s blue ribbon. Those that did get a coveted prize try to look modest but fail utterly. People crowd around them telling them how exquisite their onions are, their brown papery tops bound up sweetly with brown string, or how big their turnips are, how huge their parsnips. Once again the testosterone in the air is nearly tangible.

I giggle to Daphne in a whisper, ‘I don’t see the female gardeners strutting around like that.’

She laughs, ‘They don’t take it as seriously.’

At the cabbages we see Doug, gloating over his blue ribbon. He’s grown the most humongous cabbage I’ve ever seen. I go to congratulate him and he surprises me by saying, ‘Well my lover, I needs be congratulating you too.’

‘What for?’

‘Why your cucumber, ’tis the ugliest the judges have seen for years, apparently. You got the blue ribbon for it.’

I rush over to have a look and sure enough, there it is, first prize for the oddest-looking vegetable. I couldn’t be more chuffed if I’d grown a hundred perfect leeks and a bigger cabbage than Doug’s.

‘So, my lover, what’s your secret then?’ Doug has followed Daphne and me to see my blue ribbon. ‘How you be growing such an ugly thing?’ He snorts with laughter.

I just grin but Daphne says, ‘What about you, Doug? What nasty things did you use to grow that monster of a cabbage?’

He scowls at her. ‘That’s a slander I thought I’d never hear. Others may do wicked things with their cabbages, ply them with chemicals and such like, and I know for a fact they do, but not Dougie here, no way.’ He straightens his back and glares at her. ‘I got me own secret ingredient.’

When we’re out of earshot Daphne says, ‘I can’t resist winding him up sometimes; he does get far too cocky. But it’s true, he’s about the only one who wins prizes without using artificial stuff. He thinks I don’t know it but his secret ingredient is nothing more than good old dung. It works a treat for him every year.’

A tiny seed of elation begins to plant itself inside me. Dung, eh? Dung is good, dung is organic. Daphne and Joe can supply me, I’m sure. My mind is racing ahead to next year, to huge cabbages, monster onions. Maybe I’ll even grow one bigger than Doug’s, enter it in the show, win the blue ribbon.

Luckily I stop myself before I get too carried away, and I remember that growing food is not a competition but a way to feed my family the way I want to. And besides, the competitive side of my nature has been mollified, what with my cucumber and now, with another victory. As Daphne and I approach the children’s section I see Amy, waving at me and
holding up the card in her hand which says her sunflower has won second prize for the tallest sunflower.

When all the gaping and gawping over the produce and the prize winners has finished we sit down for a massive Cornish cream tea. Life in London was never like this, I think, as I bite into my second homemade scone and ladle the clotted cream on it as thick as I dare.

‘Tuck in, my lover.’ Doug, passing my chair, gives me a nudge on my shoulder. ‘You be a proper gardener now. Mebbe next year you can grow the most peculiar radish. Especially if you talk to it.’ He roars with laughter at his joke, as he always does. Then he adds, ‘I even might be persuaded to give you a gardening tip or two for the future.’ He gives me a smug wink, taps the side of his nose and puffs up his chest on which he’s pinned his blue ribbon.

‘Oh you have already,’ I say. ‘Given me a huge tip.’

He looks at me suspiciously, ‘Have I?’

‘Maybe,’ I say, all innocent and mysterious. He stares at me then shrugs and goes to get his cream tea, plonking down with it in the seat opposite me and Daphne, the one I’ve been saving for Ben who is somewhere around talking to the locals.

‘I have to say, my lover, despite all your peculiar ways, your garden ain’t looking half bad.’ He consumes an entire half scone covered with jam and cream, in one huge mouthful.

I’m ridiculously gratified. I feel as if I’ve passed some enormous test and have come out with flying colours.

In October, the country is plagued with storms and ferocious gales. With the autumn tides the sea is fierce, pounding over the sea wall as it is doing today, washing over the road in Morranport where I’m on my walking round. I fear I’m going to be blown away into those monstrous waves, never to be heard of again. Despite being dressed in waterproofs from top to bottom, I’m pretty wet when I reach Archie and Jennifer’s house at the end of the sea wall.

‘Come in, quickly,’ Jennifer says, hauling me into the house. ‘Get something warm in you and dry off a bit in the kitchen.’

I take up her offer gratefully. Archie is in the kitchen, already putting on the kettle. I admire some new paintings of Jennifer’s – she does exquisite portraits of local people, and in fact sold a couple of them at Charlie’s gallery – then comment on the storm.

‘It’s a bad one, a south-easterly, and lasting longer than it should. They’ll be more call outs for the lifeboats yet, you wait,’ says Archie.

Jennifer puts a hand on his shoulder. ‘Wayne will be fine. You worry too much about him.’

‘Has the lifeboat already been called out from Falmouth?’

Archie nods. ‘Early this morning, ages ago when it was still dark. The all-weather boat, there’s a freighter in trouble. An old mate who lives in Falmouth rang to tell me. He knows I like to know when Wayne’s out there.’ He looks at Jennifer, tries to smile as he says to her, ‘You think it is best I don’t know until he’s back safe, but I like to hold him when he’s out there.’ He turns to me, ‘Hold him in my mind, is what I mean. In my heart, you know? Like praying, I guess. I like to feel something, some strength or good wishes or whatever, are going from me to him and all the others, out there in this.’

He looks out of the kitchen window and my eyes follow, seeing the spray lash against it. I’ve never seen the sea this high. ‘The freighter’s got some sort of engine problem I think, and it’s perilously close to some rocks, not sure exactly where, my mate didn’t know.’

The three of us are silent, listening to the wind and the lashing rain. I go back out, uncomplaining about the weather. Walking in it is a doddle compared to what Wayne and the rest of the lifeboat crew are doing.

When much later I deliver some post to Belle, she asks me in and I accept, hoping to spend a few minutes in front of her wood-burning stove warming up again. Batman stops barking when I shout, ‘Ham,’ and lies down like a lamb in front of me. As usual he accepts my ham gracefully and wags his long, thick, furry tail at me; we’re slowly learning to be friends now.

Belle says, ‘You’ve heard the lifeboat be out?’

‘Archie told me. His godson Wayne is on it. I guess Blake, your grandson, is there too?’

She nods. ‘His mum just rang. ’Tis monstrous rough out
there.’ We sit quietly for a few minutes, listening to the storm.

‘It don’t get easier, y’know. Not for his mum, nor me, nor any of us who love him. No matter how many times that lifeboat gets called out.’

Much later I see Nell in the post office, ask if she’s heard anything about the Falmouth lifeboat. ‘Back safe, only just heard. Freighter still out there though, anchored down but they took the ten man crew off, too dangerous for them. Storm’s the worst I’ve seen in a dozen or more years, I’m telling you.’

I stay a while, drinking more tea with Nell, before going out in it again and heading home. I think of Belle and Archie and Jennifer, the relief on their faces as they learn that their loved ones are safe home from the sea yet another time. I hope and pray it will always be so for the lifeboat crew.

The weather stays unpredictable for the next couple of weeks and now I’m getting worried about the wedding. It’s the last Saturday in October, not far away now, and it’s more like winter than autumn. We’ve hardly had a chance to admire the splendour of the turning leaves and many have blown away prematurely in the gales. The autumn chrysanthemums in the village gardens look bedraggled and sodden, and everywhere you stand your feet squelch in the soggy grass and mud.

By coincidence some of our rounds have been slightly altered and for the last few weeks I’ve been delivering to Pete’s parents who live in a bungalow in one of my new villages. I’ve got to know them quite well as either Bernie or Miranda, and often both, are outside in their garden when I arrive. They are a good solid Cornish couple who like Annie but can’t help viewing her with a hint of suspicion, as I’ve come to realise. Today, as we chew the fat and watch their tabby cat stalking what looks like a beetle in the front lawn, we are, as usual, talking about the wedding, about Annie and Pete.

Suddenly, as if making up his mind at last to speak, Bernie
says, ‘I tell’ee, maid, I’m fond of that girl of his. I truly am.’ There’s a
but
in that sentence, you can tell. I wait for him to go on. ‘But she do be sneezing all the time. ’Tis a worry, that is. ’Tis not normal.’ He shakes his head which is square, stocky and bald, sitting on his short squat body. The only resemblance to Pete is the warm twinkle in his clear blue eyes.

‘It’s only an allergy, Bernie,’ I tell him. ‘She can’t help it, she has lots of them. They’re starting to ease, though, now that she’s coming here more often, getting acclimatised to the different types of plants and things that can cause her allergies.’

He doesn’t look convinced but shakes his head worriedly. A chilly wind is whipping around the garden though the rain has stopped at last. Pete’s mum, Miranda, who has been listening to us, now shakes her head as well. It too is square, full jawed. Her hair is grey and permed tightly and does nothing for her, but her face is open and kind. They are good people and I know they’ve tried to welcome Annie into their family. I’ve grown fond of them both, and more importantly, so has Annie.

Miranda says, ‘’Tisn’t good for childbearing. All them sneezes.’

Ah, so that’s what this is all about, I think. I assure her that Annie’s health is spot on, that truly her allergies are only allergies and won’t affect any pregnancy she might have.

Miranda looks doubtful. ‘She’s a good maid, I be fond of her too, like Bernie is. But a city maid like she be won’t want to be bothered by infants now will she?’ Her face is so woeful my heart goes out to her. Pete is their only child. Have this kind couple been worried all these months that they are to be for ever deprived of grandchildren?

I reassure them with words I know to be true. ‘Annie loves babies and would love children.’

The look of relief doesn’t come as I expected. ‘But, maid,’ Miranda begins then hesitates.

‘What is it?’

Bernie takes up the challenge as his wife falters, lowering her eyes in embarrassment. ‘The thing is, she ain’t a young’un, is she? Now don’t get me wrong, we like her well enough, but she be not a young maid for sure.’

I’m flabbergasted. Annie’s not even forty yet, not for another year or so. Plenty of women these days get pregnant in their late thirties or early forties for the first time; I could name a few I know straight off. I’m starting to feel indignant for Annie’s sake when I realise how they must be feeling. Pete’s first childless marriage and divorce, long before he met Annie. All their hopes dashed. Then Pete finding another woman at last but one who perhaps doesn’t want, or is too old to have, a child. I look at their kind, concerned faces and my heart goes out to them.

Miranda is saying, ‘The thing is, Pete do be wanting kiddies; he’d hope for one with his first wife but they broke up before any little’uns came along. All for the best in hindsight, but . . .’ her voice trails off.

I do my best to let them know that there is a good chance that one day they’ll have the grandchild they so long for.

Reassured on that front, Bernie now says, ‘But ’twill be hard on the maid, adjusting to our ways.’

Miranda nods sagely, ‘’Twill be terrible hard.’

‘How do you mean?’ I mumble the words but I know what they are saying.

They look at each other. Miranda says, ‘Pete be a country lad. Annie be city.’

I open my mind to say something glib and meaningless, like I’m sure they’ll work it out, they’ll be fine. Looking at their serious, concerned faces I realise I owe them more than shallow words meant to reassure. They are too intelligent for that, and too caring.