T Kinsey - A Quiet Life in the Country (A Lady Hardcastle Mystery Book 1)

I took the opportunity to take a look at what she had done with the orangery. Her ceaseless sketching was a symptom of a much broader obsession with the visual arts. While we had been living in London she had been introduced to the exciting new world of moving pictures. She had seen an exhibition of the work of several experimental moving-picture artists. She had been particularly taken with the photographic trickery of Georges Méliès, who had been using various techniques to produce magical effects.

She was so taken with it all that she had thrown herself into the study of the art and science of moving pictures with her customary zeal. Ideas tumbled from her imagination and she began to experiment with making films of her own. When she decided to move to Gloucestershire, one of her principal requirements for our new home had been a large, well-lit space where she could set up her photographic equipment. The orangery had proved ideal.

It took me several minutes of energetic searching amid the arcane tools of the film-maker’s art to locate the canvas sketch bag. Eventually I found it beneath a pile of miniature clothes and some designs for what looked like animal mannequins. Or should that be animallequins?

I was still pondering this vital question as I locked the orangery door and returned to the house.

We turned right out of the gate, away from the village and off into the wilds. I’d seen a fair bit of the country as a young child as we travelled from one end of the island to the other. We’d always stopped near towns and villages, though, and so to me, as much as to any native city dweller, the countryside was something one passed through on the way to the next bit of civilization. Seen from the driving seat of a wagon, the British countryside is beautiful, but it was never somewhere I’d hankered to be. There were no libraries or museums in the countryside, only cows, sheep, and thousands of unidentifiable trees.

I’d travelled the world with Lady Hardcastle, but parts of our homeland were like a foreign country to me. So this simple act of turning right, away from the houses and shops, was as much of an adventure as trekking across the Chinese heartland. The hedgerows were rustling with life as we passed and the air was full of the sounds of birdsong and the smells of . . . It’s always struck me as slightly odd that people complain about the smells of the city – the smoke, the waste, the factories, the breweries – as though the countryside is a perfumed garden in Paradise. If that’s the perfume they prefer in Paradise, I think I might look into what I might do to furnish my immortal soul with some sort of face mask.

As we rounded a bend, Lady Hardcastle decided that we should leave the lane and venture instead across the fields.

On the other side of the enormous field I could see a farmer driving his herd of cattle out of another gate and towards the farm buildings in the distance, perhaps for milking. He appeared to notice us and, after a moment’s indecision, abandoned his cows and started towards us.

The cows, indignant at this interruption to their routine, began lowing irritably. Some plodded towards their usual morning destination, drawn on, presumably, by the promise of the relief of milking. The others milled around, leaderless and lost. I never let on to Lady Hardcastle but I’d always been rather afraid of cows. I was glad they remained at a safe distance and appeared to be heading away from us.

‘Look out,’ I said. ‘We’re for it now.’

‘What?’ said Lady Hardcastle, who hadn’t noticed the farmer.

‘One hundred and fifty yards off the port bow,’ I said. ‘Closing fast.’

She turned to look. ‘Gracious,’ she said. ‘He can move pretty smartly for such a plump little chap.’

We slowed our pace and waited for the red-faced farmer to draw alongside.

‘Mornin’, ladies,’ he said, as he came within hailing distance. He tipped his cap.

‘And good morning to you,’ said Lady Hardcastle, genially. ‘Beautiful morning, isn’t it?’

‘That it is, ma’am,’ he said. ‘Out for a walk, I see.’

‘We are, yes. I do hope we’re not trespassing.’

‘You are, as it ’appens,’ he said.

‘My dear chap, I am most dreadfully sorry. But it’s such a beautiful day it seemed a shame to be stuck on the lane, walled in by hedgerows, when we could be enjoying this glorious countryside.’

‘Ah, well,’ he said, the wind taken out of his sails somewhat. ‘Just you mind you shut the gates and don’t frighten the beasts and we’ll get along fine.’

‘Thank you, Mr . . .?’

‘Thompson, ma’am, Toby Thompson.’

‘How do you do, Mr Thompson? I am Lady Hardcastle and this is my maid, Miss Armstrong.’

‘Ahhh,’ he said, knowingly. ‘You’ll be the lady from up London as has taken the new house on the lane, then.’

‘That’s right.’

More pleasantries were exchanged but I heard nothing of their conversation. My own attention was entirely held by the confused and disgruntled cows until I saw Mr Thompson pointing to the woods about half a mile distant and saying, in his unfamiliar West Country burr, ‘I reckon they woods’ll be a nice walk this time o’ the mornin’, m’lady. Like you says, it’s a beautiful day. I often goes into the woods for a bit o’ peace and quiet of a summer’s mornin’ once the milkin’s done.’

‘Thank you, Mr Thompson,’ said Lady Hardcastle, ‘I believe I shall do the same.’

‘Right you are, then. You ’ave a good day, m’lady.’

Lady Hardcastle expressed her thanks and we set off across the pasture towards the dense stand of trees.

‘That ended better than I expected,’ I said as we altered course. ‘I thought he was going to shoot us.’

‘He was just curious,’ she said. ‘And he didn’t have a gun. I don’t think they get many strangers round here, that’s all, so we’re bound to be something of a curiosity.’

‘Pity you and I didn’t meet when I was younger. If they’d known what a draw you’d be, my mam and dad could have put you in a sideshow tent and charged people a tanner to gawp at you.’

‘Nonsense,’ she said. ‘I’m worth two bob of anyone’s money. Sixpence, indeed. Tch.’

As we entered the woods, I looked back across the field we had just crossed, and at our tracks through the dew-damp grass. I had a sudden jolt of panic at leaving such an obvious trail, but just as quickly I remembered that we no longer had to worry about such things. No one had wanted us dead simply for being English for a number of years now. Indeed, here in Gloucestershire ‘English’ was rather a desirable thing to be, but ‘old habits’ and all that.

Ahead of me, Lady Hardcastle stepped nimbly over a patch of mud and turned back to me. ‘Keep up,’ she said with a smile, ‘and watch out for the mud.’

‘Yes, m’lady,’ I said in my best approximation of the local accent as I hopped across the miniature mire. I checked behind us again as we made our way further into the dimness of the wood.

‘For goodness’ sake,’ she said, ‘do stop acting like a blessed bodyguard, you’ll upset the natives. You’ve been looking for pursuit since we left the house.’

‘Sorry, my lady. It’s just—’

‘I know, dear.’ She reached out and touched my arm reassuringly.

The morning sun was struggling to have much of an influence on the world beneath the canopy of rich green leaves. The dark ground beneath our boots was soft and damp and the air was surprisingly chill. I began to wish I’d thought to put on a jacket, or at least to have brought my shawl.

Lady Hardcastle resumed her enthusiastic descriptions of the local plant and animal life. She had a passion for the natural sciences, which she never tired of trying to share with me, but I confess that despite her best efforts I was still unable to tell a beech tree from a beach hut. There were the obvious difficulties one might have in getting into a bathing costume in a beech tree, of course – at the very least there would be issues of balance and of being poked by errant limbs. Though thinking about it, an errant limb can be a problem in a shared beach hut, too. My laugh brought a questioning look and I was about to share my observations when we broke through into a beautifully sunlit clearing.