Untimely Graves (7 page)
Authors: Marjorie Eccles
Hannah was dimly aware of all this but dared not say anything lest she precipitated one of his rages with himself. The effect on their marriage was disastrous. The more his complacency became dented, his personal inadequacies revealed, the angrier he became. Hannah had not been able to bear it, but she bore it better than what came after … She could scarcely believe that they had once been happy, or how wretched their lives had since then become.
When Sam had come into her life, it had been like letting in the sun. He was too young for her, ten years in age and twenty in experience. What did age matter, said Sam, and she’d believed him. Until he’d gone berserk and nearly killed Charles when Charles found out what was happening. What would he do now, when he discovered nothing had changed? That she was still too spineless to have made the move to leave Charles, even though Paul was now old enough to lead his own life? That, trapped in an unhappy marriage, she had allowed herself to get lost in a labyrinth of introspection, which had led to much worse?
So much worse that she wouldn’t even allow herself to think about it.
Cleo had often before passed, but never had reason to enter, the premises of Maid to Order, which were situated on a busy road, lined with shops and houses of Edwardian vintage: the business was run from Val Storey’s own house, the yard being the back garden which had been concreted over. That first morning, there were four snazzy white vans drawn up in the yard, with Maid to Order written across the sides in black and scarlet.
It was a large, double-fronted, villa-type house and Cleo found Val distractedly supervising operations in what had once been a sitting-room and was now her office. It was thronged with women talking fifty to the dozen, receiving their instructions through a haze of cigarette smoke, being issued with invoice pads and replenishing cleaning kits from the bulk supply cartons lying around the room and spilling out to line the passage to the back door. Not knowing what to do, Cleo stood hesitantly to one side until Val, looking up and running a hand through her hair, saw her, smiled and told her to make herself comfortable and she’d be with her in a minute.
She found a chair and tried to squeeze herself out of the way, ordering herself to remember that this was going to be
fun
, resolutely squashing her doubts that she’d be in any way suitable for the job. Too late for that, she was committed, but if she couldn’t actually enjoy the work, at least she would be earning some money, not only to pay her parents the modest rent they were asking for Phoebe’s house, but also to live on.
fun
, resolutely squashing her doubts that she’d be in any way suitable for the job. Too late for that, she was committed, but if she couldn’t actually enjoy the work, at least she would be earning some money, not only to pay her parents the modest rent they were asking for Phoebe’s house, but also to live on.
Gradually the room emptied and she was able to inspect her surroundings properly. There wasn’t much to look at, other than Val’s desk, occupied by a small PC surrounded by a sea of papers, and a stack of filing cabinets to one side. After a while, her eyes were drawn to the wall above the fireplace, still papered in a psychedelic 1970s wallpaper, where an A4 sheet of the firm’s headed notepaper was pinned. Underneath the heading, ‘MAID TO ORDER’, was an accomplished sketch in black felt tip of a saucy French maid wearing a very short skirt and a suggestive wink.
Ring Fifi, maid to order, it said, and gave a telephone number. Underneath, somebody had scrawled, ‘We should be so lucky!’
Ring Fifi, maid to order, it said, and gave a telephone number. Underneath, somebody had scrawled, ‘We should be so lucky!’
‘Don’t take any notice of that,’ Val said, seeing her smiling at it when the rest of the women had gone. ‘It’s only
someone
thinking they’re being funny,’ she added, nodding towards the corner, not seeming in the least put out by it.
someone
thinking they’re being funny,’ she added, nodding towards the corner, not seeming in the least put out by it.
‘I’ve been trying to get her to accept it as the firm’s logo but she won’t listen,’ said the languid person to whom she’d obviously been referring, a youth of about seventeen or eighteen, who was smoking and lounging in a chair tipped on its back legs, his feet propped up against the wall.
He was seriously weird. Ear-rings and an eyebrow stud and cropped-off dyed carroty hair were par for the course, but that was only the start. It wasn’t only that he was as thin as a broomstick, either, with the pale eyes and complexion that go with ginger hair, not to mention ears that stuck out like batwings. A deep scar ran across his forehead and lifted one side of his face, so that his features looked somehow uncoordinated, as though one half was saying one thing and one another.
‘This is Tone, Tony Gilchrist,’ Val said, ‘Cleo Atkins.’
‘Hi, Cleo.’ It sounded as though the simple effort of getting the words out had exhausted him.
‘You’ll be working together, with Sue – that’s Sue Thomas – when she gets here. She’s your team leader,’ Val added, glancing at her watch, looking worried, while Cleo was trying to believe that, appearances to the contrary, Tone might well be a whizz with a squeezy mop, for all she knew. ‘I hope she isn’t going to let me down. She’s usually so reliable. Well, let’s get you sorted, Cleo, before she comes.’
She tossed Cleo a black sweatshirt with MO monogrammed on it in red, and a pair of black jogging pants, the uniform she must wear every time she went to a job. ‘That way, people know who you are,’ Val said, seeming confident that it was enough for the people who employed them to accept without question this evidence of any lack of evil intent. She was shown to a little washroom where she could change.
As she emerged, Val was throwing open a window, though it was another clear, piercingly sharp, blowy March morning and the wind immediately began to blow the papers on her desk
about. ‘Oh, close the bloomin’ thing again, Tone, will you?’ she said resignedly, chasing papers, wrinkling her nose. ‘I don’t allow smoking on the job, so they all get as much in as they can before they start, never mind that I might die of passive smoking.’
about. ‘Oh, close the bloomin’ thing again, Tone, will you?’ she said resignedly, chasing papers, wrinkling her nose. ‘I don’t allow smoking on the job, so they all get as much in as they can before they start, never mind that I might die of passive smoking.’
She shot an accusing look at Tone, who was about to light up again. He mumbled sorry, put the packet away and shut the window. At that moment, the door burst open and Sue surged in, full of apologies for being late.
Like many fat people, she moved lightly on her feet, bouncing as energetically as a sorbo rubber ball. She was very pretty, with a round, pink-cheeked face, dark eyes and curly brown hair, and within a few minutes she had Cleo and Tone outside in the yard, the cleaning gear stacked in the back of her van and herself in the driving seat.
‘I’ll go in the back,’ Tone offered, insinuating himself in amongst the bottles of Flash and the plastic mop-buckets and the industrial vac, sitting on the floor, thus relieving Cleo of one anxiety at least. She hadn’t fancied being wedged in the front seat of the van between him and Sue. Even though there wasn’t all that much of Tone, there was more than enough of Sue.
He was very quiet on the way there, but Sue became chatty, once out on the road, explaining how the system worked for MO. ‘We mostly have regular calls, but we do have one-offs as well, like cleaning before somebody moves in and that. Domestic jobs are best,’ she added, ‘doctors’ and dentists’ surgeries mean getting up early, and office cleaning generally means working late.’ She threw Cleo a speculative glance. ‘We often get students helping out, between terms, they’re always hard up. That’s why you’re doing it?’
‘That’s right, money,’ Cleo said, and Sue nodded with understanding, seeing this as an entirely satisfactory explanation which needed no elaboration. She had three children, she added, you wouldn’t believe what they cost.
‘Hope you don’t mind mucky jobs,’ she remarked, after a few minutes. ‘This one we’re going to, it’ll be pretty rotten. It’s not a regular, though Val thinks we’ll likely have to come at least twice.’ It was only then that Cleo learned they’d been earmarked for work at one of the houses which had been flooded.
It had a desolate feeling, she thought when they arrived, this
place where the Kyne began. So near Lavenstock, yet it might have been fifty miles away. Even the quality of the light was different, suggesting that the sharp, brilliant sunshine of the morning was only transient. Although the water levels were everywhere going down rapidly, here it was less apparent. Light reflected on flat sheets of still, dirty yellow water that stretched across the reedy terrain, riffled by the wind. Sparse groups of alders still stood with their feet submerged. But the sky was eggshell-blue and clumps of wild daffodils blew on the few patches of higher ground, and in the distance could be heard the calls of spring lambs and ewes.
place where the Kyne began. So near Lavenstock, yet it might have been fifty miles away. Even the quality of the light was different, suggesting that the sharp, brilliant sunshine of the morning was only transient. Although the water levels were everywhere going down rapidly, here it was less apparent. Light reflected on flat sheets of still, dirty yellow water that stretched across the reedy terrain, riffled by the wind. Sparse groups of alders still stood with their feet submerged. But the sky was eggshell-blue and clumps of wild daffodils blew on the few patches of higher ground, and in the distance could be heard the calls of spring lambs and ewes.
A tall, narrow farmhouse, gaunt and unadorned, stood like a grim fortress a few hundred yards away at the end of the lane into which they turned. There was no doubt what sort of farm it was. Tone sniffed the rich aroma as he uncurled himself from the back of the van, announcing ‘Pigs!’ Unnecessarily, since a nearby signboard advertised itself as ‘Covert Farm, Organic Pig Rearing’.
Val had drawn the van up, not at the farm but in front of a cottage, crouching low to the ground and suddenly appearing in an unexpected dip in the lane. It had probably been two, or even three tiny cottages at one time, where farm-workers had brought up broods of children in rural squalor. The pump still stood picturesquely outside what had once been a barn attached to the end of the row. Now knocked into one house, modernised, centrally heated and with indoor plumbing installed, even in its present surrounding sea of mud, the cottage, with rosy bricks between black beams and wavy, pantiled roofs that sloped nearly to the ground at the back, unexpected windows and crooked chimneys, was the sort that fetched mega prices. It had a twee ceramic plaque on its gatepost, decorated with flowers of unknown origin, proclaiming it to be Wych Cottage.
No one who has ever experienced their home being flooded can have any idea what it’s like, Cleo thought as they surveyed the task they were to undertake. Daphne’s washing machine had once flooded the kitchen at home, and what seemed like tons of water had reached right across into the dining-area, where it had lifted the parquet flooring. The carpet tiles in the kitchen, despite their claim to be washable, had taken weeks to dry. But at least
it was clean, soapy water and there was only a measurable amount of it.
it was clean, soapy water and there was only a measurable amount of it.
The ground floor of old Mrs Osborne’s home had been under eighteen inches of dirty river water for over a week, and now that it had receded it had left a thick, stinking layer of alluvial mud over everything. Somebody had already got rid of at least the top layers of it, but a lot – and the stink – remained. She told them tearfully that the upholstery on her sofa and three chairs had been utterly ruined, though her precious Persian rugs, now at the cleaners, might be salvaged. What still had to be assessed was the damage done to her other furniture. Luckily, the boys from the farm had come over and carried the more portable pieces upstairs before the worst of the water came seeping in. Lucky was the word, Cleo thought when she saw those tables and chairs. Most of them had to be antique, and expensive antique at that.
Mrs Osborne, a deceptively frail-looking old woman in her seventies, insisted on making them mugs of coffee, which they drank while they worked, since it would otherwise cut into their cleaning time.
‘She’s getting under the feet, I know, but never mind. Drink it or the old duck’ll be offended,’ Sue whispered to Cleo as they attempted to make inroads into the devastation, while Mrs Osborne sat on the window seat and chatted, drawing her legs to one side every time anyone came near her. Perhaps she wanted to keep her undoubtedly sharp eyes on them: if they looked like missing a corner, she wasn’t slow to point it out.
She told them she’d once lived up at the farm proper, up the lane, but it had been sold when her husband died and she’d moved down here into this cottage. She seemed an unlikely farmer’s wife, and not averse to the change; the cottage was obviously the pride of her life. She sighed as she said, ‘I was never much of a farmer’s wife. To tell the truth, I never was one, very much. I’ve occupied my life with much more interesting things.’ What they were, she didn’t say, as she smoothed her coral pink skirt and matching jacket and adjusted the string of pearls around her neck.
Cleo could imagine the interior of the cottage as it had been before the flood: the chintz and china, the pretty ornaments on the walnut tables and chests, the Persian rugs on the polished
stone floors. These thick stone slabs made getting the mud off much easier than if they’d been wooden floorboards, and with all the windows and doors open to let the brisk, blowy wind through they were drying quickly, after several sluicings followed by a thorough scrub. It surprised Cleo what six hours brisk work could accomplish. Once they’d managed to make the floors presentable, they had washed down the walls right up to the low, beamed ceilings so as not to leave further tidemarks. ‘No way can you wash half a wall,’ said Sue, speaking from experience.
stone floors. These thick stone slabs made getting the mud off much easier than if they’d been wooden floorboards, and with all the windows and doors open to let the brisk, blowy wind through they were drying quickly, after several sluicings followed by a thorough scrub. It surprised Cleo what six hours brisk work could accomplish. Once they’d managed to make the floors presentable, they had washed down the walls right up to the low, beamed ceilings so as not to leave further tidemarks. ‘No way can you wash half a wall,’ said Sue, speaking from experience.
‘We can get some of your furniture down for you now, seeing the floor’s nicely dry,’ she told Mrs Osborne at last. ‘Then we can give a quick once-over upstairs, and next time we come, do a proper spit and polish on everything. A good rub-up and these flags’ll come up a treat.’
‘Oh, could you? But no, it isn’t really necessary for you to move the furniture back. The boys will do it!’
‘We‘ve time to shift some of the smaller bits, anyway, so it’ll start looking more like home,’ Sue said, conscientious about not wasting time they were being paid for.
‘You’ve done marvels already. Wait until my daughter sees it! She’ll be coming down to pick me up presently. I’ve been staying with her since that dreadful night. She’s a teacher and she has a lovely new house over at Lattimer. Even so, I shall be glad to get back into my own home. Just do as I want, you know, without bothering anyone else,’ Mrs Osborne added wistfully.
‘You shouldn’t live out here all on your own,’ said Tone suddenly. ‘Aren’t you scared?’
‘No, why should I be? I’ve got some good door locks and a telephone, and I’d never answer the door after dark.’
‘All the same, nasty things can happen to old ladies living on their own.’ He mooched off upstairs and in a moment, the sounds of furniture being moved penetrated through the ceiling.
‘Don’t mind him,’ Sue said, ‘His mother never taught him to mind his manners. He’s not as bad as he looks.’
‘Oh, I’ve already cottoned on to that! His heart seems to be in the right place. And he’s a good worker.’
Cleo didn’t know about his heart being in the right place – it might have been anywhere, looking at Tone – but to her surprise, her cynical private observations about his capacity for hard work
had proved quite unjustified. When he took his jacket off, she could see he had strong muscles and he used them to good effect. And being so tall, he could reach as far as the low ceilings, which had been a help. He didn’t say much, but got on with the job, chugging away like a steam engine. Sue worked just as briskly. They seemed tireless. Cleo’s back was breaking, her arms ached with the unaccustomed exercise. But she thought she might get used to it, given time. Providing she didn’t drop dead first.
had proved quite unjustified. When he took his jacket off, she could see he had strong muscles and he used them to good effect. And being so tall, he could reach as far as the low ceilings, which had been a help. He didn’t say much, but got on with the job, chugging away like a steam engine. Sue worked just as briskly. They seemed tireless. Cleo’s back was breaking, her arms ached with the unaccustomed exercise. But she thought she might get used to it, given time. Providing she didn’t drop dead first.
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