MARY

Mary found the silence disturbing at first: no neighbours, no chatter, no buses, no bicycle bells. The moor stretched out behind the house, mist stealing over the fields, animals silhouetted in the early-morning light. The birds nesting in the trees at the bottom of the garden, swooping for twigs, a caw and a flap if she tapped on the glass, watching them fly up and away.

Bristol had never been quiet, Bristol had been full of children playing hopscotch in the street, bounding down the cobbled roads, sellers moving door-to-door, men bustling along the harbour, crowded into the pubs, spilling into the streets holding tankards and making noise. She hadn’t noticed the hubbub of traffic, the distant sound of a ship’s horn or the hundreds of footsteps marching places until they were gone.

Now she felt as if the whole world could have sunk into the sea and she was the last woman alive, walking over the moors, face flushed, her hands brushing the top of the grass. She built fires in the evening and tried to hum and talk aloud to fill the silence, had never been one for reading, unlike Abi, who had spent days with her nose in a book. She found an old croquet mallet in the shed, and a ball, and batted it across the lawn back and forth, rain coating her arms as she played on, desperate to be moving. She wanted to be angry at Abigail – the start of their grand adventure and she was stuck in a wet corner of north Devon waiting for what? Then she thought of Larry, knew she needed to stay, to help Abigail.

She had only been there a few days and yet it felt as if she was the witch in the cottage in the forest, ageing and gnarled. She jumped on Abigail when she arrived with bread and supplies, desperate to hear her news and fill the house with their voices. She couldn’t visit every day, so when she was there it felt like heaven, as they curled up on the sofa together, their voices chattering. Yet every time Mary outlined a new plan, a new chance for them to leave, she felt Abigail withdrawing, not wanting to meet her eye, something tying her to the village.

The rain was insistent today, driving her inside, stuck on a sagging settee making shapes out of a discarded load of newspapers, folding and tearing and propping them up on the floor around her so it looked as if she was making paper companions.

Getting up to boil more water, she heard a noise and ducked down by the sink, one eye on the garden. Abigail always came in from the side path, she knew Mary wouldn’t want to be startled and so she’d whistle or call her name.

This was different. A cough, foreign and loud, forced her to dart her eyes around the kitchen for something she could protect herself with. A muddied trowel sat on the table and she snatched at it, emerging from the kitchen holding it aloft, the figure in the garden leaning over a patch of earth to her left. ‘Who are you?’ she called in the most authoritative voice she could muster, as if she wasn’t the one encroaching. She wondered for a second if this man owned the house and she would be turfed out.

The figure yelped and tumbled straight into the nettle patch, scrambling back out, eyes all white, one hand to his chest. ‘What the…? Who…? Jesus… Sorry…’

Mary lowered the trowel. The man was around her age, good-looking, with ruddy cheeks and green eyes, flecks of yellow in the irises.

‘Richard?’ she asked, Abigail’s description in the flesh.

The man’s eyes widened and he scrambled to his feet, trying to seem relaxed, perhaps, as he walked towards her. ‘I am. And you are…?’

‘Mary.’

‘Mary!’ His face broke into the most enormous grin. ‘Mary, you seem a very long way away from Bristol.’

‘I suppose so,’ she said, her heart not quite settled in her chest. She reached up and tugged her fingers through her hair in a makeshift comb.

‘And do you always creep up on unsuspecting visitors ready to brain them with a trowel?’

She realized she was still holding it aloft, smiled shyly as she brought it to her side. ‘You would have been perfectly safe. I would have been hopeless, I really loathe the sight of blood.’

‘Well that’s a relief,’ he said, holding out a hand to her.

She took it, unable to stop smiling at him as he let out a low rumble of laughter. It seemed to fill the garden.

‘How long have you been here?’

‘I’m not sure, the days seem to merge now. I arrived on the fifth.’

‘And you’ve been staying here?’ he asked.

She nodded, worried then that he would be angry.

His eyes widened a fraction before his expression returned to normal. ‘Well you must be wanting to see the village a bit. Is Abigail here?’ He peered round her as if Abigail might emerge from the house.

‘No. She tries to come as much as she can, but it’s hard…’ Mary hesitated, wary of being indiscreet, feeling a loyalty well in her chest.

‘Let me fix a few things here and we can get down to the village. I imagine you could do with a break from the place.’

‘I…’ She had been cooped up in the cottage for days and the thought of a trip to the village below with its quaint shops and rolling sea was too much to resist.

She smiled at him. ‘I’d love that, let me get my coat.’

They talked all the way down into the village, Mary feeling guiltier with every step. Abigail had made her promise she would stay in the cottage until they’d decided what to do, was desperately worried Larry would find out and ruin things. Richard was pointing out shops and pubs, asking her questions about Abigail when they were younger, laughing at her stories, aglow when she told him more.

He took her to the line of cottages they’d walked past on that first day. The three of them tucked neatly next to each other, the sound of both rivers surrounding them. Clematis hung over the latticed porch on her left, a woman stopping to nod at Richard, a brief pause, forehead wrinkling slightly before smiling at her, a baby in her arms.

‘Hi, Beth,’ called Richard, tipping his hat at her.

She gave a sleepy, slow wave, bending over to peer at her baby swaddled in a blanket.

He turned around to face her, the front door behind him. ‘This is us. You’ll stay here for now,’ he said, nodding once, his mouth set in a thin line.

Mary looked up at him sharply. ‘No, I couldn’t. I…’ She felt thrown, flapping one hand to her chest.

‘You can’t stay up there, it’s not safe, you’ll get ill. The weather’s been terrible and there are holes in the roof.’

‘I can’t.’

‘Of course you can, just while you visit.’

‘I won’t be up there much longer, we’re leaving soon, it won’t be long.’

He stopped then, mouth loose, jaw dropping. When he spoke, his voice was quieter, the energy ebbed away. ‘She hasn’t said anything.’

‘She didn’t want anyone to know,’ Mary explained, panicking now. She shouldn’t have come, he’d tell people, Larry would hear and she’d have to leave. ‘Please, I….’

‘Where are you going to go?’

‘Exeter. We can share rooms there and—’

‘But why?’ It exploded out of him at first, then he hushed the second word, aware of his neighbour peering round at the voices. Richard couldn’t hide the hurt on his face, his mouth turned down, his eyes dulled. A line emerged in the middle of his forehead as he looked at her.

‘She’ll have to explain it to you herself,’ Mary said, refusing to be drawn on that secret. She wouldn’t betray Abigail.

He seemed to accept that, sighing as he turned back around to push open the front door. ‘Watch the step there,’ he commented as she followed him. ‘It’s me, Dad. We’ve got a visitor.’

Martin was sitting at a table in the window, the light cutting across the wooden surface, highlighting the dots of dust suspended in the air.

‘This is Mary,’ Richard said, pulling out a chair for her to sit in.

It was wonderful to feel the warmth of the room, to sit and smell chestnuts and furniture polish. She became conscious of her own appearance, tangled hair and hand-washed clothes.

‘Mary.’ Martin inclined his head, the smallest of lines creasing his brow as he looked back at Richard, his mouth half-open.

‘She’s a friend of Abigail’s,’ Richard explained. ‘And she needs somewhere to stay.’