Summer Season (6 page)

Joel loved the view from the top of the garden, which sloped gradually away from the house for nearly two hundred feet. The sunken garden was in the left-hand corner of the plot and the main part of the garden ended at the bottom of a lane, which led straight on to a farm. When Sam was a bit bigger, he was going to enjoy seeing the horses in the farmer’s field, which ate the apples from the apple tree next to the right side fence at the bottom of the garden.

The autumn sun cast a fiery light on the trees, as he stood with Sam watching the rooks cawing in the branches above them, and the sheep on the far side of the hill gently baaing. It was this view and the sunken garden, which had first captured his heart and convinced him that this was the home for them.

‘Let’s go and look at the secret garden, shall we, Sam?’ he said, and carried his son down the slope towards the garden. He unlocked the gate and surveyed the ruin of what must once have been a magnificent display of plants. Joel remembered showing Claire this garden before they moved in and how she had been as inspired as him to restore it to its former glory. She’d been in the early stages of pregnancy then, and both of them had been looking forward to a wonderful future together. The reality of parenthood was still a long way off, and they had joked about working on the garden together in the summer, while the baby slept in its crib.

Of course, when the summer came and Sam was born, Claire was too exhausted to do much more than sit at the top end of the garden on the cracked patio, which was large enough to accommodate a table and chairs, bemoaning the loss of their tidy little London patch, while Joel had been so determined to get the house just right for her, he hadn’t
taken the time to sit out with his family in those precious, precious moments. He regretted that so deeply now.

Joel swallowed hard, and blinked a tear back. He couldn’t go on like this, living in the past and never looking forward to the future. He no longer had a future with Claire, but he did have one with Sam. Maybe he should let Kezzie have her way and help him restore the garden. It would be something to look forward to, something to achieve. And maybe, just maybe, it could help him heal.

Summer 1892

Lily – how often Edward would later think of her as she was in those early days of their marriage at Lovelace Cottage, when they had shut the world out – his mother had gone on a trip to London – and they had sent the servants away, and lived for a blissful few days as if they were the only two people left on earth.

Lily, as she lay in their marriage bed, dark hair tumbling all about her, looking at him with those lazy, alluring come-hither eyes. He’d never even known what that meant until now.

Lily, waking up as he flung the shutters wide open to allow a bright summer morning to flood sunlight into their little kingdom.

Lily, protesting about him getting up and leaving the warmth and comfort of their marriage bed. Lily, wanting to always keep him to herself.

Always Lily, laughing, joyous, as they wallowed in the sensuous happiness of being together, alone, with no one but themselves to consider.

In his memory, the sun always shone on those early days of marriage. Every morning they would awaken, and walk down the lane at the end of the garden to fetch milk and eggs from the farmer. Then Lily would make breakfast on
the stove, determined to show him that not all domestic skills were beyond her.

Often he sketched her, sitting in the garden, or lying on the grass, staring up at the bright summer sky.

‘Come and join me,’ she’d say. ‘You see the world differently from here.’

And together they would lie and look up at the bright, white clouds scudding across the azure blue sky. Lily seeing all sorts of things in them he could never have imagined. Where he saw soft, rolling shapes, Lily saw castles, animals, witches and princesses. He loved the way she allowed her imagination to transport her somewhere completely different. She had an other-worldly quality that he found entrancing.

At other times they walked down the hill to the brook, and followed it to where it widened to a stream and then a river. There they would picnic underneath an old willow tree, delighting in the freedom of being unchaperoned, and leaning against each other, talking about their plans for the future.

‘We shall have six children,’ declared Lily, ‘three boys and three girls.’

‘When we come back from India,’ promised Edward, who had arranged for them to go on a three-month expedition to Lahore in order to search for exotic plants. ‘We can bring back plants for each of the children we are going to have. I shall build a greenhouse, so we can nurture them.’

‘And plant them in the knot garden,’ said Lily. ‘It will be wonderful, you’ll see.’

Those days seemed endless and gloriously heady, in Edward’s memory, filled with laughter and fun and love. He wished the time could stretch out endlessly, but alas, honeymoons cannot last forever, and all too soon, real life intruded. Work must be done, Lily must become the lady
of the house, though he hadn’t quite realized how very ill-suited she was to the task, prone as she was to wandering off into the gardens to smell the roses when she was meant to be telling Cook what to prepare for dinner. Or helplessly looking to him for advice when it came to the servants’ wages. Though she had been brought up to it, Lily simply didn’t possess the right character for the ladylike genteel world she had to inhabit; her spirit was far too free for that. And with his mother away for several months, there was no one for Lily to ask. He knew she chafed at the constrictions of afternoon teas with the neighbours and visits to the poor of the parish. His wild and wandering Lily, tamed and hemmed in by domesticity. He should have known it would lead to trouble.

Late. Late
again
. Joel hated clockwatching, particularly when he had to discuss painful decisions about funding cuts that a few months of coalition government was forcing the small charity he worked for to make. Redundancies he had reluctantly had to tell Dan Walters, the director, were going to be necessary. At the very least they’d have to have a job freeze, and this at a time when services were going to be more squeezed than ever.

When he and Claire had first mooted a move to the country, Joel had been tempted to jack in his job and retrain in carpentry – something that had been a slightly obsessive hobby in his pre-married life, but which had gone by the board in the years since he’d met Claire. But with a big mortgage, and a baby coming, both he and Claire had decided this wasn’t the time. So the compromise had been that he joined the charity Look Up!, which catered for the needs of the blind, as a finance director. Up until now he’d enjoyed it, feeling at least he was working on something that made a difference to people’s lives. But hearing the staff regaling stories of the difficulties encountered by various service users, who were finding it harder and harder to get the help they needed, had made him feel pretty depressed about the future.

The meeting broke up, to Joel’s relief, but he felt gloomy
as he left the room. In the main, people were supportive of his domestic situation. Most of them had families too, but everyone else worked hard and late in the office; Joel didn’t like them to think he was being a slacker, but he knew he was already late for Lauren.

Finally – too late – he understood Claire’s point of view. She’d frequently complained about the stress of leaving work early to get home for Lauren on the couple of days a week she’d worked (thank God they’d employed Lauren while Claire was still alive. It had ensured at least some stability for Sam). Joel hadn’t understood. Like so much else. Too late. He’d always been too late.

He felt his phone vibrate in his pocket.

‘Can we review the situation in a month, Joel?’ Dan said, calling Joel back in. ‘Any chance you can get those figures I need by tomorrow?’

Joel surreptitiously looked at his text message.
Lauren
. Of course.
Where r u?
The message glowed at him, bristling with resentment. It was amazing how guilty Lauren could make him feel. But then he often felt racked with guilt these days.

‘Sure thing,’ said Joel, looking forward to another late night date with his laptop.

‘Brilliant,’ said Dan. ‘On my desk, first thing?’

Joel had never been late yet delivering figures, but Dan always made him feel as if somehow he were likely to be.

‘First thing,’ he promised, and tried not to leg it out of the meeting room and to his office.

He rang Lauren as soon as he was back at his desk, rooting around for the information he needed to take home with him that night.

‘Sorry, sorry, sorry,’ he said. ‘I’ll be with you as quick as I can.’

Thank God he’d got a job not too far outside Chiverton.
Switching jobs when they moved to Heartsease had felt risky at the time, but turned out to be a godsend. There was no way he could manage a job that involved a big commute now.

Ten minutes later he came flying up Lauren’s path, his heart pounding, sweating like a pig, and feeling like he might be about to have a coronary any minute. Lauren already had the door open, Sam in her arms, bag ready, disapproval rippling from her every pore. He couldn’t blame her. If life was tough for him, he knew it was equally hard for her. Lauren had told him snippets, and Claire had told him more, about Troy, the feckless father who’d left her in the labour ward, and on several occasions she’d confided in him how tough she found it being a single parent.

‘I’m so sorry, Lauren,’ said Joel. ‘I was stuck in the meeting from hell.’

‘It’s not me you’ll have to answer to, it’s my mum,’ said Lauren, her voice tight with evident frustration. ‘I’ve just had to put up with twenty minutes of nagging about why I let you get away with it. Mum did offer to stay with Sam, but I don’t like to leave him with anyone else.’

‘I’m really sorry,’ said Joel, again, feeling terrible. It was unusual for Lauren to actually say what she thought. ‘I promise I’ll do better next time.’

‘You always say that,’ said Lauren, but her tone was softening.

He took Sam from her. ‘Thanks, Lauren,’ he said. ‘Look. I don’t say it very often, and I should.’

‘Should say what?’ He could still feel some hostility.

‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘Since – since Claire died, I don’t know what we’d have done without you, Sam and I. You’re always there for us, and I take you for granted.’

There was a silence and Joel felt more awkward than ever.

‘And I am sorry,’ he added.

‘Oh stop,’ he detected a wobble in Lauren’s voice. ‘You know I’d do anything for the pair of you. It’s the least I can do for – for Claire.’

She turned away from him for a moment, and he thought maybe she’d wiped a tear away from her eye, but she looked back and added casually, ‘Oh, by the way I had coffee with your guerrilla gardener. Her name’s Kezzie and she thinks you should get back on with restoring your garden.’

‘I gathered,’ said Joel.

‘I think it’s a great idea,’ said Lauren. ‘I hope you don’t mind, but I told her I thought you should.’

Kezzie stood outside Joel’s house wondering whether she’d made a mistake. She felt absurdly nervous. Having rashly declared to Lauren that she was going to take on Joel’s garden for him, she’d decided she should go round and just tell him that’s what she was going to do. Logically she knew all that could happen was that Joel would say no. But somehow it mattered to her more than she thought possible that she restore the garden. Not only had the magic of the place infected her, but if she could do this, and do it well, she might be halfway to her dream of getting a show garden ready for Chelsea, just as she and Richard had always planned. And she did want to fulfil that dream. If only to show Richard what he was missing.

‘Come on, Kezzie, are you a woman or mouse?’ she said out loud, then pushed open the creaking gate, and walked up the cracked path. Now she was up close to the house, she could see there were evident signs of occupation – a pair of boots by the front door, a child’s plastic scooter hidden in the privet bush that jammed its way up against the bay windows, a light faintly shining through the stained-glass window. But it had a sad, lonely air, as if it were a
house that had been left to its own devices for a very long time. Even the wisteria bush which clung to the front of the house looked lost and untended.

Taking a deep breath, she knocked hard on the door. There was no reply, so she knocked again. Still no reply. Oh well, perhaps she should come back another day. She was about to leave when suddenly the door was opened and Joel was standing there. Taller than she remembered, with dark, floppy hair, and kind blue eyes. Her heart gave a little flip. He was more attractive than she’d realized on their previous encounter.

‘Right, here’s the thing,’ she said, ‘I want to restore your garden for you.’

‘Sorry?’ His voice wrapped itself round her like dark velvet. She hadn’t noticed how warm and deep it was.

‘It’s me, Kezzie. I did tell you my name was Kezzie, didn’t I? I’ve decided I want to restore your garden. May I come in?’

‘Er. OK,’ said Joel, looking and sounding bemused. ‘If you just give me a minute. I’ve just put my son to bed, and I’d better just check he’s settled down. Go on straight through to the kitchen.’

‘No problem.’

Not that she was interested in Joel, but he was the only halfway decent male she’d met in the bruising months since Richard had ditched her. It had occurred to her she needed a nice uncomplicated fling to get Richard out of her system, but attractive as Joel seemed, she had a feeling he’d be very, very complicated.

She walked through the hall noticing the unfinished floors, and unpainted walls. It all felt so terribly sad. She was surprised when she turned left into the kitchen, that it was shiny and new, with the latest modern gadgets, and a dazzling array of equipment. It was a kitchen to die for,
and yet somehow it seemed to lack soul. She sat down on a bar stool, which she found tucked under the breakfast bar, and sat at the kitchen window looking into the dark. What was she doing here? She didn’t know this man from Adam. If Joel had wanted to do something about his garden he’d have done something about it by now. She was just interfering in something that she had no business interfering with. Kezzie sat there, irresolute, her heart churning, her palms sweating.

‘Sorry about that,’ said Joel, interrupting her thoughts as he came silently into the room. ‘So what is it you want exactly?’

Kezzie took a deep breath. He hadn’t told her to get lost, maybe this could work. It was worth a try at least. ‘I know we didn’t exactly get off to a good start, and you probably think I’m interfering, but I really would be interested in doing up your garden. I want to exhibit at Chelsea at some point and I think restoring your knot garden would be a fabulous project to work on. And Lauren said you always wanted to restore it …’ her voice trailed away. ‘Look, I’ll understand if you say no, it’s just an idea.’

‘No, you’re OK,’ said Joel. ‘I did – do – want to restore it. Life’s got in the way a bit, that’s all. I’d like you to do it, if you still want to.’

‘Are you sure?’ said Kezzie. ‘I’d love to.’

‘I can’t pay you,’ warned Joel, ‘or not much. And I can’t help except at weekends. I have to go to work.’

‘I’ve some money put aside from my redundancy, and I’ve got some freelance work, so I can survive for a bit. Besides, it could be my showcase garden, and help me get other business. You would be doing me a favour. And I can look into the possibility of getting a grant to help restore if you like,’ said Kezzie, unable to hide the excitement in her voice. ‘Edward Handford is of historical significance,
I’m sure someone would be prepared to help with the restoration. I really am keen. I’ve been looking into Edward’s work. He adapted a lover’s knot garden from an original Elizabethan design and made his own version, which was more in keeping with Victorian times. But that might seem a little over the top for modern tastes, so I thought I could stay true to the basic vision, but simplify it a bit, and have heartsease at the heart of the garden. It seems appropriate.’

‘If you say so,’ said Joel looking amused.

‘Sorry, running away with myself again,’ said Kezzie. ‘Bad habit I have. But look, I’ve printed off some stuff that I thought might be interesting.’

She showed Joel everything she’d found so far along with a plan of an Elizabethan knot garden, which Edward had apparently used as a guide.

‘This is amazing,’ said Joel. ‘I had no idea of any of this. You’ve really inspired me to start again with it.’

‘I’m really frustrated that I haven’t managed to track down Edward’s actual design,’ said Kezzie. ‘Having that would be an enormous help.’

‘You can just about see the shapes of the original,’ Joel said. ‘It has been semi maintained over the years I think. But in the latter years, poor old Uncle Jack couldn’t cope any more and it fell into a complete state of disrepair. So now it’s full of weeds as you’ve seen, and needs cutting back and starting again. I only got as far as trimming back the box hedge.’

‘I think it was beautiful, what Edward Handford did for his wife,’ said Kezzie. ‘All that effort to create a garden that spelt a message of how much he loved her.’

‘I don’t really know an awful lot about Mum’s side of the family,’ said Joel, with a frown. ‘My Uncle Jack – well not so much an uncle, more of a second cousin, we just
called him Uncle Jack – lived here alone. I think his mother was one of Edward’s children, but I’m not sure. I should ask Mum about it. She must know something.’

‘So how did you end up with this place?’ said Kezzie.

‘By dint of being the only one left,’ said Joel. ‘My mum’s got Parkinson’s so though Uncle Jack left it to her, Claire and I did a deal where we took out a mortgage on this house, and bought Mum a warden-assisted flat in Chiverton. She always used to go on about the garden here, and I was intrigued. I came here a few times when I was a small child, and I remember breaking into the knot garden. It was like a secret place, all locked up. When Jack died there was no one else but Mum and me to leave it to. I fell in love with it immediately. Claire and I had so many plans …’

His voice trailed off wistfully, and Kezzie felt as if she’d walked in on some private grief. She wished she knew him well enough to give him a hug.

‘Claire never liked it though,’ he continued. ‘She thought it was gloomy. I took out the heavy oak panelling in the hallway and made it lighter, but what with work and looking after Sam, I haven’t really had time to finish what I started.’

He looked sad, as if something pained him.

‘You’re right about the garden of course, that was the one bit of the place Claire really liked. I should have got it sorted.’

‘Well, now you’ve got me here, you can,’ said Kezzie.

‘Really?’ Joel looked as if he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing.

‘Really,’ said Kezzie.

‘It’s masses of work,’ said Joel, ‘and I won’t be able to help you much.’

‘I know,’ said Kezzie. ‘But I think it would be amazing to restore it, a huge privilege. Please let me.’

Joel stood for a moment looking as if he were battling with some inner demon, then he gave Kezzie a huge, and charismatic grin.

‘You’re on,’ said Joel, and it was all Kezzie could do to stop herself from punching the air in delight.

It was a quiet evening in the Labourer’s Legs, only a few punters had wandered in. It was the middle of the month, so people were probably saving their money till pay day, there wasn’t any football on and the darts match scheduled for the night had been cancelled, leaving the sandwiches that Sally the landlady had laid on wilting on the bar.

‘Go on, take them home with you at the end of your shift,’ Sally said to Lauren, with a slightly patronizing, sympathetic tone, as if she’d never be so foolish as to have been left holding one baby, let alone two. She also seemed to assume because Lauren was young she couldn’t do anything for herself. Lauren had to bite her tongue from saying that it was most unlikely that two four-year-olds would be interested in stale prawn sandwiches, let alone risk a tummy bug. It was a battle at the best of times to get them to eat anything other than chicken nuggets and chips.