The Lost Days of Summer (48 page)

‘As for Maria and myself, our marriage lasted until her premature death in 1937, just after her sixtieth birthday, and it was then that I decided to sell the gîte and come home.’

‘Then she was quite a bit older than you?’ Kath said, rather timidly. ‘Was she very beautiful? I know I shouldn’t ask but . . .’

John frowned, but his eyes were twinkling. ‘Oh, Kitty, she was a dear, worthy woman, but she would have been the first to tell you that she was no beauty. Well, I’m no beauty myself.’

‘And you had no children? Though you were married for so long?’ Kath said, unable to resist asking the question which had leapt into her mind. ‘Owain and I would have loved a family, but it was not to be.’

‘We had no children either,’ John said quietly. ‘She was a grand woman, my Maria, but I’ve not finished my story yet. You must be prepared to listen for a bit longer.’

Kath pulled a face, feeling her cheeks go hot at what had sounded like a reprimand. John saw it and cupped her face in his hands, then dropped a kiss on her nose and released her. ‘Little goose,’ he said tenderly. ‘As I was saying, with Maria gone, I had no reason for remaining in France. The Depression meant I got a ludicrously small sum for the gîte, but I didn’t care. All I wanted now was my own country; I found myself longing for lush Welsh pastures, woods carpeted with bluebells in the spring, and gentle hills dotted with sheep, and the mountains of Snowdonia rearing behind them.’

He tapped Kath playfully on the nose, making her blink. ‘You’ve never asked me where I came from; well, it was a tiny cottage in the Ogwen valley. My grandparents farmed mountain sheep and had had to struggle hard just to make a living. They both died soon after the end of the war – they never knew I hadn’t been killed in 1918.’

Wordlessly, Kath squeezed his hand, and neither of them said anything for a moment. Then she gave herself a little shake, and pressed his hand again. ‘So you came home in ‘37,’ she prompted. But how did you end up here?’

‘Well, as I said, I was growing homesick for Britain, but I might have stayed in France, believing you to be happily married and beyond my reach, but for the political situation. I could read it all so clearly! I’d met Germans in France, and thought them proud and arrogant. Furthermore, they were building an immense war machine: huge tanks, great battleships and a well-trained and efficient army. Others were saying “if war comes”, but I said ‘when war comes’ and of course I was right.

‘Once I was back in England I tried to enrol in the air force, because I thought, judging from what had happened in the Spanish Civil War, that what was coming would be largely an air battle. But they wouldn’t have me, so I tried the army and then the Navy, with the same result. I decided that if I couldn’t fight for my country – I was forty-seven after all – then I would buy myself a few acres of land and grow the food which I knew a country at war badly needs.’ But discovered that there was a good deal I didn’t know about modern British farming methods. Then, though the price of land was lower than it had ever been and farmers were going broke left, right and centre, most of the good places were either too big or to expensive for my purse. I knew a lot about sheep from the old days, but I wanted a mixed farm and for that I needed experience. So I signed on to work for as long as I was needed on a farm in Norfolk. And when I’d been there about a year Mr Maddocks, the farmer, said, regretfully, that he no longer needed me as his son was coming home. However, he paid me a month’s wages in lien of notice so that I might have something to live on whilst I searched for another billet and suggested I should go on a walking holiday, keeping my eyes open for properties to rent as I went. I thought it an excellent idea and decided to walk in Wales because, in my heart, that was where I wanted to be. I was born and bred here after all. I meant to go by train as far as Bangor and follow the coast from there, but believe it or not I fell asleep and didn’t wake until the train reached its terminus in Holyhead.’

Kath chuckled. ‘You must have been on the boat train; what a bit of luck that you didn’t decide to go on to Ireland! Why didn’t you make your way back to Bangor?’

John grinned. ‘Because the moment I realised I was on Anglesey I remembered that Owain had come from round here; he’d often said how beautiful the island was. So I humped my haversack into Holyhead, got myself a night’s lodging, and set off the next day. I stuck to the coastal path, so of course I found the Swtan and fell in love with it. It was almost derelict; a good half of the thatch had blown away, I imagine, in the previous autumn’s gales. The end wall of the cow byre needed repointing – the wind whistled through the gaps in the stones hard enough to blow a fellow over – and the garden was waist high in weeds, brambles and huge clumps of gorse, as were the nearest meadows. It was plain it had been abandoned for a good many years, but I thought it had immense possibilities. It was small enough for one man to manage, yet big enough if he farmed wisely to reward him with a good living. There was no question of buying it then, for every penny I owned would have to be spent on putting both the cottage and the land into working order once more, but I could rent. Having gone round it really carefully, making notes as I went, I walked up the hill to the nearest village and asked at the post office whether they could tell me who owned the longhouse above Church Bay. They said it belongs to a Mrs Jones, who hated the place. “There was a family feud, I reckon”, the postmaster went on, “because she won’t even hear it talked of. I tell you what, though, if you moved in there, worked hard to make it good so that she could charge you a rent worth having, she’d maybe put things on a proper footing. After all, the Swtan was a thriving little place fifteen or twenty years ago, so I’m told, and could be again.”’

‘So you came upon the Swtan by chance,’ Kath breathed. She looked around her at the comfortable kitchen, the fire roaring in the range, the gleaming windows through which she could see the tidy rows of vegetables, the new young apple tree and the stone wall that guarded the garden from the depredations of the beasts which grazed on the turf beyond. ‘You’ve done all this in such a short space of time – it’s unbelievable!’ She got to her feet. ‘Will you show me round, dearest?’

She took due note of the work that still needed to be done to the outside of the Swtan, appreciating the fact that John had put his energies into making good the outbuildings that housed his stock, and his neat vegetable patch. But when they were about to go back inside something seemed to strike him and he put a detaining hand on her arm. He pointed to the bench.

‘Sit down for a minute, my love. Just there, by the door, and tell me . . . tell me what you can see.’

Puzzled, Kath took the seat he indicated, then stared before her at the gentle hills, the gorse and the rocks and the little winding path which, she knew, would lead eventually to Ty Hen. Then she turned to John, seated beside her. ‘I can’t see anything unusual.’

‘But can you
feel
something?’ he asked. ‘A cold wind round your back, a sort of uneasiness? I’ve felt it myself, and wondered whether I should move the bench to get it out of the draught, but it’s been here a long time, a lot longer than I have. I admit I don’t understand why one should feel chilled when sitting in full sun, but I tell myself it may have a meaning for somebody else. Let’s change places for a moment.’

They did so and John beamed at his companion. ‘It’s gone!’ he said triumphantly. ‘I can feel a breeze on my cheek and the sun on my head, but neither the cold draught nor the feeling of unease. You’ve known the Swtan for years; is there any explanation, do you think?’

Kath looked at him seriously. ‘I think there may be. Once, long ago, a woman who hated me and wished me harm spent a great deal of time sitting on this bench. I thought she sat here to repel me if I ever tried to visit her, because after Owain died she forbade me to cross her threshold. But I didn’t feel a cold draught, or a sensation of uneasiness. Could it be possible, do you think, that she’s been waiting to see me all these years, and now that I’m here she’s been able to leave at last?’

‘Perhaps she wanted to ask your forgiveness for the way she behaved,’ John said quietly. ‘People can change. I think it’s quite possible that she needed to make her peace with you before she went . . . home. But now I’m sure of one thing: this bench will never be moved while I’m alive.’

He stood up, took hold of Kath’s hands, and pulled her to her feet. ‘Well, you won’t be able to live here once we’re married,’ Kath said as they re-entered the longhouse. ‘Oh, John, finding you again is the answer to every wish I’ve ever wished, and every prayer I’ve ever prayed. We must be two of the luckiest—’

She stopped speaking as the door burst open and Nell appeared. She was pink-cheeked and breathless, already talking as she entered. ‘Oh, Auntie, please don’t make Toddy leave! You’ve seen how he’s looked after the Swtan, which just proves that he’d be a very good tenant. I know how you feel about selling . . .’ She stopped speaking, staring from one face to the other, and slowly, very slowly, a broad smile spread across her face and lit her eyes. ‘You’re not angry with each other,’ she announced. ‘In fact, you’re . . . you’re . . .’

‘In fact we’re old friends,’ John said, smiling at Nell. ‘I’m John Williams. We met long ago, during the Great War, but we lost touch, and it’s taken us more than twenty years to find each other. But we won’t lose touch again because we’re going to get married.’ He turned to Kath. ‘Isn’t that so, my darling?’

Nell was staring so hard at John that she scarcely heeded his words. ‘You’re the man in the kaleidoscope,’ she said slowly. ‘Or rather you’re the photograph in the kaleidoscope. Oh, you’re older, and your hair is grey instead of black . . . now why didn’t I realise that you were him when we first met?’

John looked puzzled, as well he might, but Kath gently disengaged herself from the arm which John had slung round her waist and went over to give her niece a kiss. ‘Wish us happy, Nell,’ she murmured. ‘We’ve waited a long time for this. I only thank God that it’s not come too late.’

Nell returned her aunt’s kiss with warmth, then abruptly turned back towards the door and pulled it open. She was just slipping through when her aunt spoke again. ‘Where are you going, queen? You’ve not said you’re pleased with our news.’

Nell turned round and Kath saw that she was pink-cheeked and starry-eyed. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, Auntie. I’m really, really glad for both of you,’ she said quickly. ‘I can see how happy you are and you’ve made up my mind for me. I won’t make the mistake of waiting. I’m going to go into the village and ring Hywel, and I shall tell him yes.’

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Epub ISBN 9781409038511
Version 1.0

Published by Arrow Books 2011

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Copyright © Katie Flynn 2011

Katie Flynn has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

First published in Great Britain in 2011 by Arrow Books

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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 9780099550525