Echoes in the Cotswolds Read online

  ‘What have they done?’ Thea asked impatiently.

  ‘Nothing specific. It was me, really, if I’m honest. I said the wrong thing, and caused offence without meaning to.’

  ‘All too easy these days,’ Thea sympathised.

  ‘I suppose so. But it wasn’t anything like that – none of the usual sensitive areas. It’s a long story and will sound very silly, I expect. But the fact is, I’m actually quite scared. There’s a man called Hunter, who preaches free speech and personal liberty and then doesn’t like it if somebody says the wrong thing.’ She wrinkled her nose in disgust. ‘It’s fine as long as it stays in the abstract, but try telling him anything about himself, and all hell breaks loose.’

  ‘So you’re scared he’ll actually do something violent?’

  ‘Not exactly. It’s just the whole atmosphere. The women next door are always spying on me, and even the girl over the road is terribly intrusive. They all tell me what to do and what to think, and try to drag me into their pathetic societies.’ She looked miserably at Thea, with wide blue eyes. ‘I should never have moved. It was a huge mistake.’

  ‘Oh.’ Thea was briefly transported to the weeks she spent in Lucy’s barn, snowed in and frightened. The absence of colour or sound or human company had shown her new areas of vulnerability that she had mainly avoided up to then. It seemed to her that living in a quiet village street had to be preferable. ‘Are you trying to warn me about something in particular?’

  ‘In a way, yes. After last time, I’m surprised you even agreed to come, although everything’s completely different this time, because I’m not doing much of that any more. And I know it all seems back to front. Nobody could think of Northleach as threatening. But they probably won’t leave you alone, once they see you’re in the house. Although you won’t be bothered by people with broken computers, like last time, because I’m not doing that any more.’ She sighed. ‘That’s sort of the problem, really.’

  ‘Oh?’ said Thea again.

  ‘I make websites for people now. They do still phone or come knocking on the door, at odd times, but nothing like so much as before. The thing is, I’ve been doing some work for a group in Northleach. All to do with old songs and broadsheets and the wool industry.’

  Thea laughed in bewilderment.

  ‘Honestly – it does all link up. But there are some very strong characters, and they get very passionate about it all. My crime was in not taking them seriously enough. I stupidly hurt some feelings and put some backs up, and now they seem to want to kill me.’

  Thea held her breath for a moment. Not only was she the wife of an undertaker, but she had personal experience of far too many violent deaths. Lucy obviously didn’t mean it literally, but it was still a statement not to be taken lightly. ‘Why?’ she asked, thinking she must be missing something.

  ‘Oh, it’s too silly to explain in detail. You know how committees can be. There are factions and vendettas and all that sort of thing that matter terribly at the time, but sound ridiculous to an outsider. There are these two women next door, Faith and Livia, not to mention Bobby. They live together but make a great point of insisting they’re not a couple, as if anybody cares. And Hunter, who thinks about sex at least ninety per cent of the time. Everything he says is innuendo and can be incredibly offensive. That was my mistake – trying to get him to back off. I dare say he doesn’t really mean it, but it’s very annoying. I guess he’s done it all his life and can’t change now. He’s an utter fool, believe me.’ Lucy’s expression suggested that she might have some personal history in connection with Hunter, but Thea didn’t ask.

  ‘I’ve never been on a committee,’ she said irrelevantly. ‘They sound awful.’

  ‘They are,’ Lucy confirmed. ‘Anyway, the point is, Faith and Livia are right next door, with our gardens adjoining at the back. They’ll talk to you over the fence every time you go outside, all chummy and interested. But really they’ll be wanting to ferret out how long I’m away and whether there’ve been any phone calls, and did the book I ordered ever arrive. All sorts of stuff like that.’

  ‘Doesn’t sound too bad,’ said Thea cautiously.

  ‘They’ve taken over my life,’ Lucy wailed. ‘It’s a nightmare. Believe it or not, this is the first time I’ve ever lived with neighbours, and it’s absolute hell. I feel watched and judged the whole time. Honestly – in the Cotswolds, where everybody’s usually too busy or too rich or just too stand-offish to bother with the people next door. Why did I have to land up with neighbours who think my house is just an extension of theirs? If I don’t keep the back door locked, they think nothing of hopping over the fence and coming in without even knocking.’

  ‘Put up a bigger fence,’ Thea advised.

  ‘I can’t. They’re responsible for the one on that side.’

  ‘And what about Hunter? Where does he live?’

  ‘The other end of town, on the high street. Five minutes’ walk away. But he does at least wait to be invited.’

  ‘And Bobby? Who’s he?’

  Lucy looked blank for a moment. ‘Oh – Bobby’s a she. The one across the road. Her name’s Bobine, apparently. American. That’s a whole different story.’ She reached for a biscuit that Thea had placed on the table. ‘And then there’s Kevin,’ she said, as if keen to complete the picture. ‘He’s my ex. He keeps turning up in Northleach, for some reason.’

  Despite herself Thea was intrigued. She liked meeting new people, learning as much as she could about the undercurrents in a village or small town. Northleach was inescapably lovely, as so many Cotswolds settlements were. No two were the same, and yet they almost all achieved the effortless appeal of old stone and colourful gardens. In an undulating landscape, many of them seemed to have perversely chosen to perch on a hillside or nestle discreetly in a valley, giving their streets odd angles and elevations that led to the need for flights of steps or sudden little alleyways. Footpaths ran in all directions, and stone walls required stiles of every description for people to gain access to the other side.

  Lucy’s little house was in a row that formed part of a street called West End. It was indeed the western end of Northleach, albeit barely two minutes’ walk from the centre, where there were a dozen or so shops and the big famous church. The houses opened directly onto a wide pavement, their front windows mostly blanked out by thick curtains or internal shutters. Why, Thea wondered now, had Lucy elected such a conspicuous site, when she clearly hated to be seen? The front rooms inside the houses must be sadly deprived of natural light, where the inhabitants were so keen to elude observation. Many of them probably contained valuables, which had to be concealed from aspiring burglars.

  Closer to the centre of town the houses were set well back from the pavement, with intervening gardens. They were bigger and far more expensive, Thea presumed. And a great deal more private. There were gates into the gardens and hedges or fences. All this she had observed on her preliminary visit some weeks earlier. She had described it all to Drew.

  ‘So – you’ve come here now to warn me not to fraternise with the neighbours? Is that right?’ She frowned at Lucy, trying to assess the exact level of difficulty in what she had heard.

  ‘In a way, yes. If I’ve understood you as I think I have, you won’t be any keener than I am on being interrogated by people with too much time on their hands. I don’t want you to get in a state about any of it, if it comes as a surprise. But believe me, you’d be wise not to encourage any of them.’ Lucy mirrored Thea’s frown. ‘That sounds garbled. I probably shouldn’t have come, but you can see why I couldn’t say all that over the phone. But I did want to ask you one more favour.’ She took a breath. ‘Do you think you could drive me to the hospital early on Wednesday?’

  ‘What – all the way to Oxford? No, sorry. I can’t possibly.’ The refusal came readily, with no need for thought. She made no attempt to find excuses. The idea was preposterous.

  Lucy was startled, but refrained from begging. ‘I suppose I’ll hav
e to get a taxi, then,’ she said.

  ‘There must be somebody that can do it. What about taking your own car? You’ll be all right to drive when they discharge you, surely?’

  Lucy shook her head in exasperation. ‘No, I won’t. They can’t say for sure how I’ll be, but I might have to have weeks of physiotherapy before I can even walk properly.’ She put a hand to her back, and seemed to press hard enough to make herself flinch. Thea was reminded of Andrew Emerson and his lumbago. And before that, her sister-in-law, Rosie, whose back had not been right through her entire adult life. And yet Lucy showed none of the same signs of chronic pain that the others did. A slight stiffness, a bit of hesitancy, were all she revealed as reason for needing surgery.

  ‘Is it a dangerous operation?’ Thea asked baldly, thinking she ought to have asked this sooner. ‘Is there any chance that it won’t work?’

  ‘Some. I haven’t told you the full story about that, either. It’s an old injury that’s flared up. Two of my vertebrae are crooked and getting worse, and they’re pressing on nerves. We thought it would come right with a lot of physio and a horrible corset thing, but it hasn’t. So they’ve got to try and fuse them together. Right in the middle of my back.’ Again she put a hand to the place. ‘It’s started to get quite painful, and it’s an awful place to try to get at. I end up rubbing myself against doors and corners of walls to try and ease it.’

  ‘It sounds as if they know what to do to fix it,’ said Thea bracingly. She was getting the impression that there was nothing unduly alarming or even urgent about the woman’s condition.

  ‘Let’s hope so. I still wouldn’t trust them to get an epidural right.’

  Thea heard the front door opening, and Hepzie gave a yap. ‘Gosh – what time is it?’ Thea said in alarm. ‘Is that Timmy home already? I’m going to be late for Stephanie, if so.’

  ‘It’s three-fifteen,’ said Lucy.

  ‘Heavens! Sorry – I’ll have to go. She’ll be waiting. I’d better send her a text.’

  Timmy came slowly into the kitchen, looking tired and somewhat grubby. ‘Was it games today?’ Thea asked him in puzzlement.

  He shook his head. ‘No. I fell over.’ He looked down at his knees, and the muddy stains on his trousers. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Oh, Tim. Do you want to come with me to get Stephanie, and tell me about it in the car?’

  He shook his head again. ‘Is Dad here?’

  ‘Yes. He’s busy. There’s somebody coming at four. This is Mrs Sinclair, whose house I’m looking after this week.’

  ‘Hello,’ said Tim listlessly.

  ‘Hi,’ said Lucy. ‘If you ask me, there’s been a bit of fighting going on – am I right? I can see the signs.’

  Thea was texting Stephanie and gathering up car keys and coat. ‘Fighting?’ she echoed, absently.

  Lucy stood up. ‘I’ve got three boy cousins, all younger than me. I remember that look.’

  ‘I’ve got to go,’ said Thea urgently. ‘Tim – tell Dad about it, if you like. And show Mrs Sinclair out. I won’t be long.’

  And she was gone, leaving a trail of unfinished stories and unconfirmed plans behind her. In the car she thought about Northleach and new people, and tourists passing by outside. She wondered about the references to old songs and local history, and what any of it had to do with anything.

  Chapter Four

  Stephanie was sitting on a wall outside the school gate, staring into space, apparently unconcerned at being left uncollected for twenty minutes. But when she saw Thea her expression changed. ‘Why are you late? Is Dad all right?’ she demanded, before she was fully inside the car.

  ‘Yes, he’s fine. We had a good long talk at lunchtime and now he’s feeling much better about getting everything done. The families are going to have to do more for themselves, but that won’t matter. They’ll probably be glad. I expect he’s phoned them all by now, to see what they can work out.’

  ‘Good,’ said Stephanie thoughtfully. ‘Was that your idea?’

  ‘Not really. I might have had to remind him of a few things. I think he’d got into a bit of a rut, and needed a nudge. He hasn’t done one of his talks to the Women’s Institute or wherever for ages now – they were always useful for getting him back on track.’

  ‘Andrew should do that. Like Maggs did. She was always telling him what the families really wanted, and how he should try not to be such an undertaker.’

  Thea laughed. The young girl had pinpointed precisely the crucial issue.

  ‘So why were you late, then?’ Stephanie persisted.

  Thea told her some of Lucy Sinclair’s worries, trying to make it sound amusing. ‘Sounds as if we’re lucky with our neighbours,’ she concluded.

  ‘Right. And now I’ll be late for Mr Shipley. That’s not being a very good neighbour, is it?’

  ‘I forgot all about him,’ Thea admitted.

  ‘You forgot about me,’ Stephanie pointed out.

  ‘And there I was thinking I was doing rather well these days,’ sighed Thea. ‘But at least I’ve kept your father happy. I should get a star for that.’

  ‘Mm,’ said Stephanie, clearly thinking that a wife ought to do that sort of thing automatically, without expecting praise for it. Then she changed the subject. ‘We did something about Northleach at school,’ she said. ‘All that wool making so much money – it was corrupt, you know.’

  ‘Enclosures,’ said Thea vaguely.

  ‘Partly. I can’t remember exactly, but we had to look at history websites, and there was more about Northleach than almost anywhere else. Can I go there with you one day?’

  ‘Absolutely. Maybe at the weekend. If the house is as quiet and safe as I expect, I can come home for Saturday night – and then maybe pop back on Sunday with you. I still don’t properly understand what she wants me for, anyway. She just seems to think that everybody hates her, and they might burn her house down or something. Then you could come at the weekend.’

  ‘Great,’ said Stephanie. Then they were home, and Drew was looking drained, and Timmy said he had a headache. The girl ran upstairs to change and then over the lane for her promised chess game.

  Lucy had left a note, with the house key and her mobile number, saying she was sorry Thea had rushed off, as there was more she’d wanted to say.

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Thea. ‘I suppose it was a bit rude of me.’

  ‘She wasn’t cross,’ said Timmy. ‘Not until Dad made her go, anyway.’

  ‘I didn’t!’ Drew protested. ‘I just told her we had quite a lot to do and there wouldn’t be any time for further discussion.’

  ‘The phone kept ringing,’ Tim added.

  ‘Has anybody been to Stow yet?’ Thea asked. ‘And where’s your four o’clock person?’

  ‘Andrew said he could manage so he’s going off now. He’ll be back by five. Actually, I doubt if he’ll be able to do any lifting, so … ?’

  ‘You want me to carry a dead body into the back room with you,’ Thea supplied, with only the slightest shiver. ‘I hope he’s not very big.’

  ‘Not carry – just lift him onto the trolley. Andrew might say he can do it, after all. He seemed a little bit easier today when I saw him. He thinks it’s mostly sciatica now, and not so much lumbago. And the four o’clock is only a couple of minutes late.’

  ‘Somebody’s here now,’ reported Timmy, a fact confirmed by a yap from the spaniel. Drew and his client disappeared into the office, and Thea began preparations for the evening meal. An hour passed with people coming and going in a predictable pattern. Stephanie and Andrew were both in the house before five, talking together in the kitchen with Drew, who had made a pot of tea. Thea and Timmy were idly listening.

  Stephanie was tapping her phone – a habit she had recently acquired and which Thea found irritating. ‘Sciatica … Lower back, with sharp shooting pains down one leg, which is often worse when sitting down,’ she reported. ‘Although painful, most cases resolve with non-operative treatments in a few weeks. That’s good
, isn’t it!’ She beamed at the adults. ‘Although it sounds as if driving must be nasty.’

  ‘No mention of lifting or bending, then?’ asked Drew.

  Stephanie flicked and tapped for a moment, and found that lifting heavy loads could be a contributory cause, and that sudden movements were a bad idea. ‘Nothing about bending,’ she concluded.

  ‘Sounds as if you don’t believe me,’ Andrew challenged jokingly. ‘Are you trying to say I ought to be out there getting Mr Waters into the cold room on my own?’

  ‘Absolutely not,’ Drew assured him. ‘I’m just curious, and Stephanie likes to look things up.’

  Thea was still thinking mainly of Lucy and her little house. The story had been ruthlessly interrupted, she realised, with a lack of a proper explanation for the woman’s neurotic anxieties. Perhaps that was just as well; perhaps it would be best to find out for herself just how troublesome the neighbours really were. The list of names was already growing fainter in her memory, and she went in search of a notepad to jot them down before they vanished completely. ‘Faith, Livia, Bobby and Kevin,’ she murmured, as she wrote. ‘And somebody else on the committee, who lives in the high street … a surname … Hunter! Got it.’ And she wrote that down as well.

  Andrew had arrived at four-fifty with the body of Adrian Waters, looking pale but determined. When Thea asked how his back was, he muttered that it was about the same, through gritted teeth. ‘Turns out driving doesn’t do it any favours,’ he added. Watching him, Thea thought he had a very different look from that of Lucy Sinclair. Both middle-aged and suffering from spinal issues, there was little of Andrew’s dogged stoicism laced with apprehension in the woman. She seemed to pay very little attention to her physical self.