The Fleethaven Trilogy (105 page)

Ella’s glance went at once to her mother. She was sitting
beside Danny, her head inclined towards him listening to
him, her gaze upon his face, a small smile playing on her
gentle mouth. He must have said something which amused
them both, for they laughed softly, swaying towards each
other, their heads, for a second even closer, almost touching.
By her side, Ella was aware that Rob was staring at
his father too, a puzzled frown creasing his young forehead.
They hadn’t even noticed them enter the room until
Esther said, ‘She’s ruined her good shoes, Kate. She’d be to
her bed with no supper if I had owt to do wi’ it.’

Kate looked up and held her hand out to Ella, drawing
her closer. Glancing down at her daughter’s feet, she sighed
and said, ‘Oh, Ella . . .’

Behind her, Ella heard Rob stifle a giggle as her mother,
predictable as ever, had said exactly what Ella had said she
would.

The girl grinned at her mother, love for her gentleness
flowing through her. ‘I’m sorry, Mum. Honest. I didn’t
know it would make such a mark. I thought it’d just dry
off like when I get them wet in a puddle.’

‘The sea’s different to rainwater puddles, love,’ Danny
explained. ‘It’s the salt.’

‘Tek ’em off.’ Esther spoke again. ‘Put them near the range. When they’re dry, we’ll see what we can do. And if
you go on the beach again, wear some rubber boots.’

‘Yes, Gran,’ the child said, feigning meekness and
dropped her chin so that none of the adults should see the
mischief in her eyes.

‘Grannie!’ came the sharp reminder above her bowed
head.

Ella said nothing.

‘We’d better be going.’ Grandma Eland levered herself
up from the low chair beside the fire. Her right cheek was
red with the warmth from the fire. She moved awkwardly
across the room towards Esther. ‘I’m real sorry about ya
dad, Esther.’

Ella watched as her grandmother, standing by the door,
said stiffly, ‘Thank you, Beth.’ The two women stared at
each other and then, suddenly, Esther put out her hand and
touched the other’s arm. She said again, ‘Thank you, Beth,
for coming,’ and this time there was a wealth of difference
in her tone that was obvious even to the ten-year-old girl,
who watched the exchange. Beth Eland nodded and patted
Esther’s hand and then moved on out of the room to leave,
Esther following her. Those left in the room heard the
murmur of their voices.

‘I’ll never understand those two,’ Ella heard Danny say.
‘Long as I live, I won’t.’

‘I don’t think they understand themselves,’ Kate said
pensively. ‘But there’s so much between them, Danny. So
much they can’t forget, yet they always come together
when there’s trouble.’

‘Aye, they do,’ he said, his voice dropping so that it was
almost inaudible even to Ella’s sharp ears.

‘What, Mum? What are you talking about?’ Ella
touched her mother’s arm, to attract her attention. ‘What
about Gran and Grandma Eland?’

‘Never you mind, Missy,’ her grandmother said sharply
as she came back into the room. ‘Really, Kate, I have never
met a child who asks so many impertinent questions.’

Unseen by her grandmother, Ella grinned cheekily at
her mother and heard her uncle Danny try valiantly to
smother his laughter.

‘I don’t want to stay here any longer. I hate it here. Please,
Mum, can’t we go home today?’

‘Ella, darling,’ Kate tried to placate her daughter, ‘it’s
only another two nights. Just until Sunday evening.’

The girl glowered at her mother. ‘You promise?’

Kate sighed. ‘I promise.’

‘But why have we got to stay longer?’

Suddenly, there was a light in her mother’s eyes and
with a nervous gesture, she touched her lips with the tips
of her fingers. ‘There’s – there’s someone I have to meet
tomorrow . . .’

‘Who?’ Ella asked, and, with sudden intuition, she put
her head on one side and added, ‘It’s to do with that letter
you had, isn’t it?’

Kate’s cheeks were pink as she nodded. ‘It was from
someone I knew in the war.’

‘Like Aunty Mave and Aunty Isobel, you mean?’

‘Yes – yes, like them – well – sort of, except with this –
person, we – we haven’t seen each other since then.’

‘Can I come with you?’

‘No, darling, not this time. Maybe another time.’

‘I’m not stopping here on my own with
her
.’

Kate sighed again. ‘Well, I’m borrowing Uncle Danny’s
car.’

‘Is he going with you?’

Kate shook her head. ‘No, but I have to drive a few
miles up the coast. Maybe you could stay the afternoon at
Rookery Farm – with Rob.’

Ella thought for a moment, then grinned mischievously.
Rob wouldn’t like that. ‘All right, then. I’ll go
there.’

That evening as night closed in around Brumbys’ Farm,
the wind seemed to batter against the farmhouse, rattling
the windows and blowing in under the back door, lifting
the mat.

‘I hate gales,’ Esther complained, and for once Ella
found herself in agreement with her grandmother. ‘It
always reminds me—’ The older woman stopped and Ella
saw her glance across at Kate, before she turned away and
poked vigorously at the glowing coals in the range grate,
making the sparks fly and the flames spurt. ‘Well,’ she
muttered lamely, ‘I just hate wind, ya know I do.’

‘You’re not the only one,’ Kate said, and nodded
towards Ella sitting huddled in a chair, her arms around
herself, her knees drawn up. Esther’s eyes softened and she
held out her hand. ‘Come and sit by the fire, Missy, and
let’s forget about the storm out there.’

‘Where’s Grandpa?’ Ella asked.

Esther shuddered. ‘Outside mekin’ sure the cows are
safely in the byre. We dun’t want ’em wandering about in
this lot. And I think he’s tying the tarpaulin over his
beloved tractor an’ all, in case we get a downpour.’ She
cast an anxious glance towards the back door. ‘He should
be back in a minute and then we can shut the storm out. I
know.’ She smiled suddenly. ‘We’ll roast some chestnuts.
You’d like that, wouldn’t you?’

‘I – dunno,’ Ella glanced at her mother for reassurance.

‘I don’t think she’s ever had any, Mam.’

‘Not had roast chestnuts? Well, I never did. Have you
taught the poor child nothing, Kate Hilton?’

Kate laughed. ‘They’re not so easy to come by in the
city, Mam.’

Esther snorted with laughter as she disappeared into the
pantry and returned a few moments later with a bowl of
shiny brown nuts. Kneeling before the range, the dancing
firelight illuminated her face in its soft glow, making her
seem, for a moment, much younger than her years. Ella
caught a fleeting sight of the lovely girl her grandmother
must once have been, glimpsed the young woman her
grandfather must have fallen in love with; the smooth dark
skin, rosy in the firelight’s glow, green sparkling eyes and
beautiful auburn hair.

‘Now, we take the fire tongs, see. Grasp a chestnut . . .’
As she spoke Esther carried out the action, operating the
claws of the tongs to clasp a nut then lifting it carefully
towards the bars of the grate where she balanced it close
to the coals. ‘When the skin begins to blister and split, we
turn it round.’

Fascinated, Ella watched.

‘Now,’ said her grandmother, holding out the tongs
towards her, ‘you try.’

The girl took the tongs and squeezed the handles to
open the claws. After several attempts she managed to
grasp a chestnut and slowly she moved it towards the fire,
gritting her teeth in concentration. Steadily, she placed it
on the bar of the fire.

‘Well done, darling,’ Kate said, clapping her hands and
Ella glanced up to see her grandmother nod approval. A
warm glow, that was nothing to do with the heat of the
fire, spread through the young girl.

At that moment the back door opened as Jonathan
came in. The storm seemed to rage into the house, lifting
the peg rug in the scullery and blowing a cold draught
round Ella’s legs even as she sat by the fire in the kitchen.

‘Shut the door quickly,’ Esther called to him, ‘and come
into the warm. We’re roasting chestnuts.’

Jonathan came into the room rubbing his cold hands,
seeming to fill the shadowy kitchen with his presence. ‘It’s
a rough old lot out there. I’ve never heard the sea so plainly
as you can tonight. Let’s hope they don’t have to launch
the lifeboat . . .’

Ella saw her mother’s eyes widen and she stared up at
Jonathan. ‘Dad, is Danny still in the lifeboat crew?’

He shook his head. ‘No, love. When he came back after
the war with his leg wound, it was decided he couldn’t
really be a part of the crew any more. But he’s still a
launcher.’

Ella saw her mother shudder. ‘That’s bad enough on a
night like this,’ Kate murmured.

‘Yar dad sometimes takes his tractor up to help launch,
an’ all,’ Esther said, and Ella could detect a note of
disapproval in her grandmother’s voice, but her grandpa
only smiled his slow, gentle smile.

‘Well, in a small community we all have to do our bit.’

The conversation ranged on over the girl’s head; she
was feeling drowsy now and, tucking her legs under her,
she leant her head against the wooden Windsor chair.

Her grandmother’s voice broke into her dreams, ‘You
goin’ to eat these chestnuts, Missy?’ and Ella raised her
head.

She reached out to take the nut, peeled to reveal a
creamy kernel. ‘Careful, it’s hot,’ Esther warned her.

Ella blew on the nut and then carefully bit into it, it was
crunchy and sweet. ‘Ooh it’s nice.’

‘A few more, and then it’s your bedtime.’

Ella glanced fearfully across at her mother. ‘Are you
coming up?’

Before Kate could answer, Esther broke in, ‘Dun’t be
such a baby! You’re a big girl now to be wanting your
mam to take you up to bed. When I was your age I was
having to look after me younger cousins.’

Ella’s sharp mind latched on to the last word. ‘Cousins?’
she asked. ‘Not brothers and sisters?’

‘No,’ Esther said shortly, and poked the fire again,
stabbing a burning log resting on top of the bed of red-hot
coals so viciously that sparks shot up the flue, casting eerie,
dancing shadows about the darkened room, lit only by an
oil lamp standing on the table. But Ella’s concentration
was on her grandmother. ‘That old man who died – he
was your dad, wasn’t he?’

Esther nodded.

‘Didn’t you live with him and your mam, then?’

Slowly Esther turned to face her granddaughter and in
the glow from the firelight they stared at each other, each
one weighing up the other, perhaps really seeing one
another for the first time. In the shadows, Jonathan and
Kate were silent, watching the scene almost, it seemed,
holding their breath. Outside the wind battered against
the farmhouse, whistled around the buildings and rattled
the roof tiles, but in the warm kitchen it was cosy and
safe.

Esther reached out and gently touched the faint birthmark
on Ella’s jawline shaped like two tiny finger marks.
‘Oh, Missy.’ In the firelight, Esther’s face was suddenly
filled with a gentle sadness, a compassion, as she whispered,
‘You’re more like me than you could ever know.’

Ella waited, holding her breath, but suddenly, the spell
was broken as Esther seemed to shake herself and snatch
her hand away as if she was suddenly angry at herself for
almost being led into giving too much away, into becoming,
for a few minutes, soft and gentle and human. She got
to her feet. ‘Time you were in bed, child,’ she said sharply,
‘Kate . . .’

‘Yes, Mam,’ Kate said meekly and cast a wry grin at her
daughter. ‘Come on, darling, I’ll come up with you.’ And
though Esther tut-tutted in disgust, Kate went upstairs
with Ella and did not leave her until she had been reassured
that the noise really was only the wind whipping across
the open, flat land.

The following day, the last day of January, was a Saturday.

Hugging her coat around her against the blustery wind,
Ella stood in the yard at Rookery Farm watching her
mother climb into Uncle Danny’s car. It was small and
green, with a sloping back and huge bulbous headlights.

Danny was holding the door and bending forward,
pointing out all the instruments to Kate. ‘Do be careful,
Kate. It’ll be very rough along the coast road with these
gales,’ he was saying, almost shouting above the racket the
wind was making. ‘Try to get back before it gets dark, if
you can. The shipping forecast reckons it’s going to get
even worse by tonight.’

Ella saw her mother pull a face expressing doubt. ‘I will
be back tonight, but I don’t know whether I can make it
before dark. I’ve a fair way to go up the coast.’

Danny looked at her. ‘Any good me asking just where
and why?’

Kate’s laughter bounced over the wind, her eyes sparkling.
‘Not a scrap. But I might tell you when I get back.’

Listening, Ella thought, it’s a real secret if she’s not even
telling Uncle Danny.

‘Well, be careful, then,’ Danny said again as he shut the
door.

Kate wound down the window. ‘Be a good girl, Ella,
won’t you? Go back to Grannie’s at tea-time.’

‘She can stay here for her tea, if she wants,’ Danny put
in, but Kate shook her head. ‘She’d better go back there,
thanks all the same.’

Ella opened her mouth to argue – she would much
prefer to stay at Rookery Farm until her mother came back
– but as Kate pressed the starter and the engine burst into
life, her protests were drowned in the noise.

‘Mum!’ Ella ran forward, her fingers grasped the door
of the car. Suddenly, she was filled with a terrible foreboding.
‘Mum, please let me come with you. Don’t leave me
here.’

‘You’ll be all right, darling. Stay with Uncle Danny and
Aunty Rosie – and Rob—’

‘No, Mum, let me come. Please.’

‘Darling, I can’t,’ Kate said. ‘I’m sorry.’ She revved the
engine and let in the clutch.