Jon McGregor: Reservoir 13

In June the evenings were open and clear. The sun didn’t set so much as drift into the distance, leaving a trail of midsummer light that seemed to linger until morning. There was a reluctance to sleep. There was talk. In the meadows Thompson’s men worked the baler along the lines of cut grass, the thick sward gathered up and spun into dense bales. Every few hundred yards the tractor paused and there was a tumbling inside the machine and a neatly wrapped bale rolled softly from the hatch into the field. The woodpigeons laid eggs in their nests in the beech wood and in the horse chestnut by the cricket ground. They took turns sitting on the eggs, but there were still plenty stolen by magpies and crows. On the bank above the abandoned lead pits the badgers started coming out of their sett before dark. The sows with cubs were looking for food, and the boars were looking for mates. There were conflicts. There were some in the village still who could remember their grandparents talk of the lead-mining trade, of men who spent their lives clambering down hand-cut shafts to hack away at seams of toxic ore, the fields littered with workings and the smoke from the smelting works settling in everyone’s lungs. Mr Wilson went into hospital for a hip operation, and while he was gone Nelson stayed in Cathy’s house. In the village hall the well-dressing boards were almost finished. Winnie and Irene sprayed the boards to keep the clay damp, and when they finally stood back and smiled in approval there was a general dropping of shoulders and a cheer and the order was sent out to the Gladstone for sausage and mash. Jackson’s boys penned the sheep for worming. Will Jackson was ready with the drench gun and held each sheep by the neck in turn, easing the nozzle in through the corner of the mouth and down to the back of the throat. It put him in mind sometimes of getting Molly to swallow the pink medicine on nights when she’d sweated herself awake. The girl spent a lot of nights awake, it seemed. He wondered if he’d been the same as a child. His mother wouldn’t have had the time for it, he supposed. The ewes kept coming down the line and there was soon a lanolin sheen on his skin. Winnie’s grandchildren came to visit at the end of the month, and she took them out picking elderflowers in the old quarry by the main road, filling a bin-bag with the foamy white flower-heads and carrying it home on their shoulders. She sat them at the kitchen table and had them zesting the oranges and lemons she’d bought ready, while she picked the flower-heads clean and set them to soak overnight. By the next day they’d lost interest, and refused to leave the television when she added the sugar and fruit juice and heated it gently through. When her daughter came for the children she gave them a bottle of the cordial. It was still warm and the light shone through it, and Winnie knew it would never be drunk. Her daughter hugged her lightly and kissed her cheek and said they’d see each other soon. The children waved from the back of the car.

In his studio Geoff Simmons loaded the kiln for a first firing and took the whippet out for a slow walk. She’d been a runner once but her hips were gone. They walked down the lane towards the Jackson place and the road. He was a bit off the pace himself. He went into the pub and came out with a pint and a bowl of water. He sat on a bench and read the Valley Echo while the whippet drank. He knew all the names of the people in the Echo but there were plenty he couldn’t place if they walked by. They didn’t tend to socialise. He’d never expected to be here this long so he hadn’t made the effort. He’d been in Devon for a week with the woman he’d been seeing, and she’d talked about him staying longer. He’d told her there were things he needed to get back for. He finished his beer and went in for another. It would be hours before the kiln needed attending. There were other jobs but they would wait. The whippet settled down and slept. By the river Jane Hughes saw Jones, sitting on the bench by the gated cave entrance. Had to stop for a rest, Vicar, he said. It’s a nice place to sit, she agreed; sheltered. She sat beside him. There was a commotion in the hawthorn on the other side of the river. Magpies want shooting, he said. They’re in there going for the wrens. Jane had learnt not to enter these discussions, and nodded. How’s your sister doing? They say she’s coming on, he said. Settling in. I told them she could come back here but they thought it best not for now. There was a whine of machinery from the Hunter plantation, and jackdaws circling over the woods. The afternoon was darkening. Jones nodded at the locked gate to the caves. Reckon she might have ended up in there, he said. Who? Jane asked. The girl, he said. They searched it all before they put the gates up though, didn’t they? Could never search all of it, he said. Jane watched him for a moment. You know if you ever want to talk, about anything, she said, looking out across the river and keeping her voice light. There was a pause while the river moved over the stones and through the reeds. That’s me then, Vicar, he said, standing up. She watched the magpies pull the young wrens out of the hedge while their parents fussed overhead. Jones had started walking away, and turned back. I didn’t do it, he said. I didn’t do any of the things they said. It was a mistake. Something went wrong with the computer. I’m not like that. Someone put that stuff on there. They can bugger off, the lot of them. He was standing with his body stiff and arched towards her and for a moment she was afraid.

There was swimming in the flooded quarry, and another rope-swing went up. At the parish council a motion was tabled to have razor wire added to the fencing. Brian Fletcher objected. They’ll find a way past anyhow, he said. Young people think they’re invincible. There’s only so much you can tell them. Some of them are only going in there because you keep telling them it’s dangerous. Sometimes they just have to learn. The only way they’ll learn is by drowning, someone pointed out. Brian shrugged. His was a minority voice, and the razor wire was approved. In Cardwell the cricket was ill-tempered and the match was abandoned. Will Jackson’s boy was arrested with some friends from school in a stolen car up by Reservoir no. 8. Tom hadn’t done any driving, and insisted he hadn’t known the car was stolen, but Will still asked Claire to keep him indoors for a week. In the dead grass around the cricket field the eggs of the skippers turned from white to yellow, and the larvae span themselves into cocoons. At Reservoir no. 12 the maintenance team mowed the grass on the embankment dam, letting a hover-mower glide down the steep face on a rope before hauling it up again. There was a childish pleasure in the work to which none of them would admit. Cathy knocked on Mr Wilson’s door before letting herself in with the key. Just in case, she explained, when he asked. He looked up at her from the bed. What do you imagine I might be capable of doing that I wouldn’t want you catching me at? he asked. She said she thought it was just polite. She asked whether he needed anything before she took Nelson out. He said he’d love a cup of tea but he wouldn’t want to deal with the consequences. She asked how he was doing and he said he’d be fine if the nurse didn’t keep dragging him out of bed to do exercises. She probably knows best, Cathy told him. They’ll have you walking this dog yourself in no time, she said, putting Nelson on the lead and heading out up the lane, past the cricket ground and the school and left at the church towards the packhorse bridge. When she came to Hunter’s wood she rested her hand on the smooth topstone as she squeezed through the gapstone stile.

In September the swallows left, lifting from the wires one morning and heading south, quickly picking up speed as they cleared the valley and strung out into a long steady line. A soft rain came up from the river and blew over the village, sifting through the fields and up to the first of the reservoirs. The river was slow and shallow and when the rain passed the sun bent through the water to the shore. Ian Dowsett stood in the damp shade of a beech tree and whirled a hairwing dun to an overhang on the far side. There was a brown trout in there he’d been watching rise. The dun settled lightly on the surface and sailed away untouched. He reeled it back and waited for a shift in the light to try again. Jane Hughes had moved away at the end of August, and the Harvest Festival service was held without her. It was Susanna Wright’s turn to put the display together. She collected produce from the allotments, and made wheat sheaves, and used flowers from the market in town to make two very attractive arrangements. Even with the overabundance of tins and packets, which were sent to the new food-bank, people said it was one of the finest displays seen in some years. After the service Clive found her and asked if it wasn’t time she had another go with an allotment. She looked surprised, or embarrassed. After my last attempt? I don’t think so, Clive, she said. You’d have more time on your hands now, I believe, he told her. I’m not a retired yet, Clive. So I hope you’re not suggesting I’m the other thing. The offer’s there, he said. There’s other folk’ll take it. He turned to go. Susanna told him she’d think about it, and as she thanked him for the offer she touched a hand to his arm. He looked at her hand as though she were wiping oil on to his sleeve. William Pearson was once again asked to step down from the parish council. At night there were fires sometimes in the hills, and it wasn’t known who was lighting them or what they were burning.