Precious Time (21 page)

Louise and the gang had always teased her that she saw life so clearly. ‘Nothing ever muddies the water of your vision and thinking, does it?’ Guy had said to her one day at work, after she had dealt with a dispute on the packing line between two women who claimed they couldn’t work together. And she supposed he was right. She wished, though, that he hadn’t made it sound like a criticism.

Much to her amusement, and Ned’s delight, Mr Liberty had joined them for supper in the van last night. ‘No steak and claret this evening?’ she had asked, when he had accepted her offer of grilled lamb chops and easy-cook noodles. His gruff reply had got lost somewhere in his rattling throat and confirmed what she had suspected: that it was a while since he had cooked himself such a meal. If ever.

Over supper he had brought up the subject of how much she

expected to be paid. ‘I’m nobody’s fool,’ he said, pointing his knife at her. ‘You’re not going to con me.’

‘And I’m no mug, either, so you’d better brace yourself. This won’t be cheap. If you want the best - me - you’re going to have to pay accordingly. I assume you have sufficient funds.’

‘That’s damned impertinent!’

‘Just making sure we both know where we stand. For all I know, you might be a penniless old codger who’s down to his last shirt button.’

‘I resent the implications of that last remark. I’ll have you know that I’m not an old codger and, what’s more, I’d bet my last shirt button that I’m better off than you.’

‘I’m glad to hear it. So why haven’t you got around to throwing a wad of cash at some other idiot to do the job for you? Or are you just mean with your money?’

‘I’ve never been mean with money, just prudent. If I was a Scrooge, do you think I’d be providing you with free electricity and water while you’re here? And I didn’t replace my last cleaner because I saw no reason to put up with another light-fingered woman helping herself to my belongings.’

‘So what changed your thinking?’

‘That blasted doctor started poking his nose in.’ He went on to tell her how he had burnt his arm and reluctantly paid a visit to the surgery. ‘I knew I was in trouble the moment that doctor started asking me how I was coping after my wife’s death. Fine, I told him.

But they don’t want to believe that, do they? And then he turned up here and I’d got something in my eye and he blackmailed me into going to the hospital to have it checked.’

‘Blackmailed you?’

‘It was what happened, true as I’m sitting here. He threatened me with Social Services if I didn’t get into the car with him there and then to go to the hospital.’

Clara had wanted to laugh at the doctor’s audacity, but refrained, and again she felt sorry for Mr Liberty. He was clearly terrified that he was going to have his independence taken from him. It convinced her that she was doing the right thing in helping him and that her main objective was to make him see the sense in getting regular help once she had gone. If he didn’t, he would be back to square one within weeks with the threat of Social Services still hanging over him.

If indeed they were a real threat.

She had smiled at the thought of the days ahead when she would be giving Mr Liberty a taste of his own medicine - a generous dose of bullying.

Carrying the bags of cleaning things, Clara let Ned run on ahead to knock at the door. It was opened almost immediately, as if her employer had been waiting for her to arrive and clock on. ‘Is your eye better now, Mr Liberty?’ asked Ned. The patch had gone and without it he looked a little less fierce.

‘It’s as good as new,’ he replied starchily, and stood back to let them in. ‘Where will you start? The kitchen?’

‘We’ll start first with improving labour relations,’ Clara said. ‘You will bid us a good morning, then you will offer to put the kettle on.

And while you are making us some coffee, I will survey the wreckage and assess the extent of the damage.’ She handed him one of the carrier-bags. ‘There’s a jar of instant in there, along with a packet of biscuits which will add to your onerous duties as tea and coffee maker.’

He grunted and led them through to the kitchen.

‘Ever thought of buying a dishwasher?’ she asked, when she saw once more the piles of dirty crockery still untouched on the draining board.

‘A waste of money just for one person.’

‘There are some reasonably priced ones on the market, small machines designed for people on their own.’

‘Reasonably priced,’ he repeated. ‘I don’t need things to be reasonably priced. I told you, I have money.’

‘Well, try spending it! Or are you hell bent on leaving it to the family of whom you’ve spoken so highly?’

He snorted, then reached for a pen and a used envelope. He handed them to Clara. ‘Make a list of all the things you think I need.’

‘I’ll put “new heart” at the top of it, shall I?’

Her first job was to clear the decks by shifting most of the junk on to either the table or the floor so that she could get at the work surfaces to scrub them clean. Once she had done the sink, she tackled the washing-up, then moved on to the cupboards, which were chock full of things she doubted were ever used. At the back of one she found a two-year-old bag of self-raising flour crawling with weevils. Cringing, she threw it into a bin-bag, along with a dozen pots of out-of date Shippam’s paste, two opened jars of pickled cabbage, another of horseradish sauce that was a dubious shade of yellow, and a tin of rock-hard Oxo cubes. It wasn’t difficult to work out what the poor man was eating on a daily basis: the stockpiled cans of pilchards and tomato soup were a dead give-away.

With Ned helping to empty the lower cupboards of old pans, buckled lids, steamers and fish kettles, the like and size of which Clara had never seen before, she called Mr Liberty. He appeared in the doorway and looked aghast at the mess. ‘You’ve made it worse,’

he said, as he surveyed the scene.

‘Oh, bring on the gratitude, why don’t you?’ said Clara sharply.

‘Now, listen, I need you to decide what you want to keep.’

He shrugged. ‘You decide for me.’

She took him at his word, and deciding that it was highly unlikely that he would be cooking a whole salmon in the near future, or steaming enough vegetables to feed an army marching on its stomach, or making vats of jam and marmalade, she put together a modest collection of pans for his basic cooking needs and instructed Ned to take them over to the sink. He could mess around with soapy water under the guise of washing them.

‘What will you do with the others?’ asked Mr Liberty.

‘Some are fit for the dustbin - which reminds me, that skip I ordered should be here around lunchtime - but the better ones could go to a charity shop. Do you have such a thing in Deaconsbridge?’

‘There was one, but when the rents on all the shops in the market square went up, it closed.’

‘It seems a shame to ditch them when they’re in pretty good nick.

Put the kettle on again and I’ll have a think.’

With a bucket of hot water dosed liberally with disinfectant, she started to clean inside the cupboards. There was something satisfying about bringing order to chaos, and though she would never admit it to Mr Liberty, she was enjoying herself. By the end of the day she would have the pleasure of knowing that she had personally conquered this grubby wreck of a kitchen. She would have it shipshape and Bristol fashion, or her name wasn’t Miss Clara Costello.

Calling herself by her full name made her think about the formal way in which she and Mr Liberty referred to each other. It amused her, and if she wasn’t mistaken, it amused him.

Behind her, she could hear Ned talking to Mr Liberty as he spooned coffee into mugs. He was chattering nineteen to the dozen, just like he did at home with Granda, and she realised that as long as Ned had someone to talk to, he would not get bored.

When Mr Liberty handed her a mug of coffee, and she indicated for him to place it on the floor next to her, he said, ‘You’ve been working like a Trojan ever since you got here, why don’t you take a break?’

She wrung out the cloth into the bucket and doffed an imaginary cap. ‘Gawd bless you, guv’nor, for taking pity on a humble scullery maid. I’m touched.’

She was even more touched when he held out a hand and helped her to her feet. ‘Bring your coffee with you, and I’ll give you a guided tour,’ he said gruffly.

She tugged off her rubber gloves and, Ned following with the biscuits, Mr Liberty led the way. He stood for a moment in the vast hall, as though getting his bearings - it was a large house, after all.

‘Do we need a map?’ she asked, good-humouredly.

He threw her a disparaging look. ‘Suggesting I’m so far gone I don’t know how to get round my own home?’

‘Not at all. I was merely implying you live in an above average sized house. How many bedrooms are there?’

‘Just the ten.’

‘Just the ten,’ she repeated. ‘A bit cramped, then?’

‘I know the way,’ said Ned, and sped off down the gloomy length of the hall, whose panelled walls were decorated with an incongruous mixture of African masks, a barometer, a large, heavily worked brass plate that looked Indian, and a moth-eaten bear’s head.

Everything was covered with a peppering of dust, including the ornate gilt frame of a massive oil painting depicting a Highland stag.

‘Where’s he taking us?’ she asked. ‘And do you mind?’

‘To the library, and it doesn’t look as if I have much choice.’

When they caught up with Ned, he was swinging open a heavy door. ‘Slow down, partner,’ Clara told him. ‘And you’ve had enough biscuits.’

She took the packet and handed it to Mr Liberty. For the first time she noticed his arthritic hands, how swollen and clenched they were.

Slipping a thumbnail under the top biscuit, she raised it so that he could easily get at it. He caught her eye. ‘Don’t go putting yourself out on my account,’ he muttered.

‘Don’t flatter yourself.’

The library felt cold and damp, but was comparatively tidy, in as much as it contained a few basic items of furniture: two leather armchairs either side of a stone fireplace, another two in the bay window either side of a large rent table, a footstool, and a lampstand with a dented shade and an unravelling gold fringe. Two of the walls were lined from floor to ceiling with books. But it was difficult to make out anything in any detail: the curtains were drawn, keeping out the light - and holding in the musty smell of age and soot. Clara guessed that the chimney needed sweeping. ‘Do you always have the curtains like this?’

‘Not always.’ He went over to the window and gave the burgundy velvet drapes a hefty tug. ‘But it stops the light destroying the books.’

So the man had a weak spot. Books above humans, by the looks of things.

She changed her mind when light flooded the room and she saw the painting above the fireplace. ‘Who’s that?’ she asked.

Mr Liberty stood beside her. ‘My first wife, Anastasia.’

Clara stared at the young woman, her confident gaze and the beguiling gentleness in her expression. The eyes were full of warmth and humour and were as dark as her thickly tousled hair, which was painted so luxuriantly and with such depth that Clara could almost feel the silky curls in her fingers. ‘Is it a good likeness?’ she asked softly.

He took a noisy swallow of his coffee. ‘Yes.’

‘She was very beautiful.’

‘And I suppose you’re wondering what she saw in someone like me?’

Before she could deny or refute this, Ned called, ‘Mummy, come over here. This is where the secret passage is.’

She went to where he was standing. She stared at the rows of leatherbound books that he was pointing to. ‘Are you sure?’ she asked, playing along with him. ‘All I can see is a load of old books.’

His eyes danced with excitement as he glanced at Mr Liberty.

‘Shall I show her?’ he asked, his hand already reaching to the shelf where, presumably, the handle was hidden.

Mr Liberty sucked in his breath, then let it out slowly with a doubtful shake of his head. ‘I don’t know, lad. Can she keep a secret?

We don’t want her blabbing all over the county, do we?’

Ned’s face grew solemn. ‘Mummy, you won’t tell anyone, will you? Do you promise?’

‘Hand on heart,’ she said, as seriously as she could. ‘I promise not to tell a living soul about Mr Liberty’s back passage.’

Mr Liberty snorted. But the hint of a smile on his face didn’t escape Clara.

Despite the misty rain, the views from the tower were spectacular.

They would be even better if the windows were clean, thought Clara, wondering if there would be sufficient time in the coming week to add the tower to her agenda. But was there any point? Dr Singh was hardly going to rate his patient’s ability to stand on his own two feet if this extraordinary piece of whimsical architecture was spick and span. Stick to the essentials, she told herself.

‘When was the house built?’ she asked.

‘In 1851. John Temple, a local quarry owner, had it built for him and his family. He called it Temple House, but when his son inherited it, and later discovered an underground cavern in the area with its dubious rock formation, the whole ridiculous mermaid saga was set in motion. As a consequence, and to plump up the son’s ego, the house was renamed.’

‘You sound like you don’t approve.’

‘I don’t approve of scams.’

‘What’s a scam?’ asked Ned.

Not wanting Ned’s anticipation spoiled, Clara gave Mr Liberty a warning look. To her grateful surprise, he said, ‘Nothing you need worry about, young man.’

‘Any particular reason why the secret passageway was built?’

asked Clara. ‘The age of the house precludes priest-holes, and the geography’s certainly wrong for smuggling.’

‘No real reason as far as I’m aware, other than that John Temple wanted something none of his neighbours had. Now, if you’ve seen enough, shall we get on?’

He took them down the creaking narrow staircase, along the dark corridor and back into the library. From there he showed them the rest of the ground floor: the dining and drawing rooms that, like the library, both smelt of soot, the gun room, where Clara had no wish to linger, and the laundry room, which was a glory-hole with bells on. Piles of yellowing newspapers and boxes of empty whisky bottles littered the stone-flagged floor, with dirty clothes, towels and bed linen. Mr Liberty kicked at the heap of washing. ‘Machine’s not working,’ he muttered, embarrassed. He picked up a wooden clothes horse and set it against one of the damp-spotted walls.