Elizabeth Elgin - One Summer at Deer’s Leap

Even the birds were silent. A few fields away, black and white cows were lying down. They always did that when rain threatened, so they could at least have a dry space beneath them when the heavens opened. Clever cows!

I turned to see Jeannie standing there, yawning.

‘Hi!’ I smiled. ‘Sleep well?’

‘Hi, yourself.’ She pulled out a chair, then sat, chin on hands, at the table. ‘I woke twice in the night; it was so hot. I opened windows and threw off the quilt then managed to sleep, eventually.’

‘Coffee?’

‘Please. Why is everything so still?’

‘The calm,’ I said, ‘before the storm. We’ll have one before so very much longer. Are you afraid of thunder, Jeannie?’

‘No. Are you?’

I shook my head. ‘Want instant, or a ten-minute wait?’ I grinned.

‘Instant, please.’ She yawned again. ‘You’re a busy little bee, aren’t you? How long have you been up?’

‘Since seven. I’ll just see to your coffee, then I’ll nip down to the lane end and collect the milk before it rains.’

All at once, I wondered how it would be when it snowed. It took me one second to decide that if I lived here I wouldn’t care.

‘We won’t go down to the Rose if the weather breaks, will we?’

‘No point,’ I shrugged. ‘There’s lager and white wine in the fridge. We can loll about all day and be thoroughly lazy.’

‘I’m glad I came, Cassie,’ she smiled.

‘I’m glad you did,’ I said from the open doorway. ‘Won’t be long.’

I didn’t expect anyone to be at the iron gate, or even walking up the dirt road, and I wasn’t disappointed. Ghosts, I reasoned, were probably the same as cats and dogs and didn’t like thunderstorms.

I put a loaf and two bottles of milk into the plastic bag I had learned to take with me, and set off back. It could rain all it liked now.

I wondered if there were candles in the house in case the electricity went off like it sometimes did at home when there was a storm.

I made another mental note to ring Mum tomorrow from the village, then sighed and quickened my step, glad that for two days I had little to do but be lazy.

Jeannie crossed the yard from the outhouse where Beth kept two freezers.

‘I think we might have chicken and ham pie, chips and peas tonight. And for pudding –’

‘ No pudding,’ I said severely. ‘Not after chips! And is it right to eat Beth’s food?’

‘Beth told us to help ourselves – you know she did.’

‘OK, then.’ I decided to replace the pie next time I went to the village. ‘And are there any candles – just in case?’

‘No, but Beth has paraffin lamps. Everybody keeps them around here. Are you expecting a power cut?’

‘You never know. It could happen if we get a storm.’

‘Then thank goodness the stove runs on bottled gas! At least we’ll be able to eat!’

‘Do you think of anything but food? No man in your life, Jeannie?’

I had stepped over the unmarked line in our editor/author relationship, and it wasn’t on. Immediately I wished this personal question unasked. I put the blame on the oppressive weather.

‘Not any longer. I found out he was married – living apart from his wife.’

‘No chance of a divorce?’

‘His wife is devoutly Catholic, he said.’

‘He should have told you!’

‘Mm. Pity I had to find out for myself,’ she shrugged. ‘Still, it’s water under the bridge now.’

She said it with a brisk finality and I knew I had been warned never to speak of it again. So instead of saying I was sorry and she was well rid of him, I had the sense, for once, to say no more.

The storm broke in the afternoon. We sat in the conservatory, watching it gather. The air was still hot, but Parlick Pike and Beacon Fell were visible again, standing out darkly against a yellow sky.

‘This conservatory should never have been allowed on a house this old,’ Jeannie said, ‘but you get a marvellous view from it for all that.’ It was as if we had front seats at a fireworks display about to start.

‘Are the cats all right?’

‘They’ll go into the airing cupboard – I left the door open. Hector will be OK, as long as he stays here with us.’ She pointed in the direction of Fair Snape. ‘That was lightning! Did you see it?’

I had, and felt childishly pleased it was starting. I quite liked a thunder storm, provided I wasn’t out in it.

It came towards us. Over the vastness of the view we were able to watch its progress as it grew in ferocity.

‘You count the seconds between the flash and the crash,’ I said. ‘That’s how you can calculate how far away the eye of the storm is.’

We counted. Three miles, two miles, then there was a vivid, vicious fork of lightning with no time to count. The crash seemed to fill the house.

‘It’s right overhead,’ Jeannie whispered.

That was when the rain started, stair-rodding down like an avalanche. It hit the glass roof with such a noise that we looked up, startled.

‘Times like this,’ Jeannie grinned, ‘is when you know if the roof is secure.’

I knew that old roof would be; that Deer’s Leap tiles would sit snug and tight above.

The storm passed over us and I calculated they would be getting the worst of it in Acton Carey. Lightning still forked and flickered, but we were becoming blasé after the shock of that one awful blast.

‘I wonder if it was like this in the blitz – the bombing, you know.’

‘Far worse, I should imagine. Bombs killed people. Are we back to your war again, Cassie?’

‘It isn’t my war, but there’s something I’ve got to tell you.’

Even as I spoke, I knew I was being all kinds of a fool, so I blamed the storm again.

‘About …?’

‘About what we agreed not to talk about. Shall I make us a cup of tea?’

I was glad to retreat into the kitchen, to get my thoughts into some kind of order, relieved to find the storm had not affected the electric kettle. When I carried the tray into the conservatory, Jeannie was standing at the door, gazing out.

‘You think you’ve seen the ghost again – is that it?’ she said, her back still to me.

‘I’ve seen him. Twice more. Come and sit down.’ I made a great fuss of stirring the tea in the pot, pouring it.

‘Right then!’ She placed her cup on the wicker table at her side, then selected three biscuits, still without looking at me. ‘And I don’t for the life of me know why I’m so silly as to listen to you,’ she flung, tight-lipped. ‘You’re normally such a down-to-earth person!’

‘I know what I saw and heard,’ I said stubbornly. ‘Do you want to hear, or don’t you?’ I took a gulp of my tea. ‘Well – do you?’

‘There’ll be no peace, I suppose, till you’ve told me.’

There came another startling flash of lightning, followed almost at once by a loud peal of thunder. The storm we thought was passing had turned round on itself as if it were searching for a way out of the encircling hills.

‘I’m getting bored with this!’ Jeannie lifted her eyes to the glass roof. The rain was still falling heavily and making a dreadful noise above us. ‘Let’s go into the kitchen.’ She picked up the tray and I followed her, carrying the plate of biscuits. Hector slunk behind me, whining, so I gave him a pat and a custard cream.

‘Now.’ Jeannie settled herself at the table, back to the window. ‘You are serious? After all we agreed, you’ve been poking about again!’

‘I have not ! I went to the Rose on Wednesday night, and I’ll admit asking Bill about the people who once lived here. It was natural that since the RAF was the cause of them getting thrown out, we should talk about the Smiths.’