Will stands by the old stone cross, one hand on its rough, cold surface. He feels the lichen crumbling beneath his warm fingers and once again he experiences the sensation of release: the melting of the icy lump of misery that he’s pushed deep into his heart since his mother died, smothering it with other emotions, other sensations, denying it.
He stares around at the valleys and hills that flow away into infinity, the overarching sky streaked with cumulus, and his fingers tighten on the granite as if he is communicating his pain into the cross. Here he can allow that pain to dissipate as he has never been able to do; not with his father, or his friends, or even with Christian. He has no idea why this distorted lump of granite should have produced such a reaction in him but he welcomes it, offers his misery back to the cross, allows this strange sense of eternity to free him.
The sun gleams out, touching rocks, distant woodland and tors with its light. Will feels hopeful, anticipatory, but he has no intention of trying to analyse his feelings. It’s enough to be experiencing this new lightness of spirit. He turns to go, crossing the granite slab over the gully, getting back into the car. As he drives towards Tavistock he thinks about El. She’s phoned him to say that she’s found her father’s phone and some odd texts, which she can’t make out. They seem to be a kind of code, suggested meetings. The name and number mean nothing to her and when he asked if she couldn’t just phone the number El became confused, reluctant to explain why that was difficult for her. A moment’s thought showed Will several reasons why this might be the case and, cursing his tactlessness, he said that he’d like to see the texts. She took him up on this at once and suggested that he should pay another visit to the Pig Pen. They worked out when they both had time off and made a plan.
And now here he is, hoping that he’ll be able to help, guessing how much El must be missing her father and that she’s slightly fearful of this unknown texter. Will’s immediate reaction is that Martin had a woman friend, a lover, although clearly El knows nothing about her. It will be hard for El to discover that her father had a very close relationship, kept secret, but there might be several reasons for that.
Even as he broods on these things, he’s aware of the moor all around him: a pony grazing, sheep trotting across the road ahead of him. Unexpected shafts of sunshine light up a distant plantation of pine trees, a little stream, and cloud shadows pass across the bleached grasslands. He tries to imagine this landscape under snow or in high summer, and he hopes that he and El will be able to have another walk, leaving the car and striding out into unknown territory. It’s clear that she knows the moor very well, that it was almost like a back garden to El and her father. She seemed glad to show it to him, to share with him its mystery and its magic.
Already, as he drives, he’s remembering landmarks, but at the same time he’s beginning to feel apprehensive about this second visit. He knows what it’s like to miss someone very dear to you, to adjust to the terrible finality of death, and he wants to try to help El through it. He knows she hated their parents marrying just as much as he did. He saw how her mother tried to manipulate El into conforming to her own ideas and how El stood up against the coercement and remained loyal to her father.
Will wishes he’d known Martin. It might have helped to get a handle on this new development. Clearly there must have been a woman who’d been the reason for the divorce, but El believed that this was a very short affair and hadn’t lasted beyond the separation. Knowing El as he now does, Will feels it very unlikely that she would have resented her father finding companionship and even love in the last five years. What was odd was that he’d never talked to her about it. Maybe the woman was married … Or maybe he’s wrong and Martin feared that El would be jealous; that after all the loyalty she showed him she’d feel threatened and displaced. Human relationships are never straightforward.
Will glances at his sat nav to confirm his route and turns off into the lanes that run between Tavistock and the farm. He shakes off his apprehension and prepares to enjoy the visit. El has promised to show him Tavistock, to explore the moor, and he wants to hear all about her first week at the bookshop. Maybe the texts can be easily explained away; maybe they’re from some old friend who enjoys codes and puzzles. They might simply be a bit of fun between two old friends arranging to meet up for a lunchtime pint or an evening at the pub. Will drives carefully down the track and pulls in beside El’s car. He sits for a moment, then shuts off the engine and climbs out.
El watches from the window. She’s been waiting for him. Learning to live alone is not as straightforward as she imagined it might be. She’s always had school friends, family, or her friends at uni. It’s especially odd to be alone here, at the Pig Pen. Pa’s death is too sudden, too unexpected, to grasp. He should be here, sitting at the table calling out a clue to a crossword, making coffee, wandering out on to the little terrace outside the door where he has his favourite tubs and the bird-feeders. It’s all so silent, so empty, without him.
During these last few days, when the westerlies came rolling in, bringing soft grey curtains of rain that shrouded the moor in mist, she’d begun to wonder if she could actually make it alone, if she could endure long, dark winter evenings. The sight of Will’s big car, so totally unsuitable for a Devon farmyard, sliding gently to a halt below her fills her with relief and she has to prevent herself from running down the stairs and outside to greet him. He gets out, looking around him, and El steps back from the window lest he should see her watching. She tries to think of something casual she could be doing but nothing comes to mind. Quickly she opens her laptop so that when he bangs on the door, opens it and calls out, she can shout back and be sitting at the table when he appears at the top of the stairs.
‘Hi,’ she says, pleased to hear herself sounding cheerful. ‘You’ve made good time.’
She realizes that she doesn’t know how to greet him, whether she should get up and hug him, but he solves the problem by walking across to the window and looking out.
‘You’ve got good views here,’ he observes. ‘I couldn’t remember them clearly from last time.’
‘It’s the advantage of being upside down,’ she says, and suddenly she’s calmer. ‘It’s really great in the summer with all the sunshine pouring in. Would you like some tea?’
‘That sounds good. I didn’t stop on the way down.’ He turns back into the room. ‘I dropped my bag in the bedroom. Hope that was OK?’
‘Yes, of course.’ She’s glad to have something to do, to fill the kettle, find two mugs. Even though he was here to help clear out Pa’s things, for her to be here in the Pig Pen with him still feels slightly bizarre. ‘I’m glad you could get down again. To be honest I was totally thrown by finding Pa’s phone. And those messages.’
She has her back to him as she makes the tea but she hears him drag out a chair and sit down at the table.
‘Well, I totally get that,’ he replies. He hesitates and then goes on. ‘It was a bit like that after my mum died. I’d open a book and find in it a card she’d sent me or a letter from when I was at school. It really shredded me. Like I could hear her voice.’
El is touched by this disclosure. She can imagine that it must really cost Will to share this with her, and suddenly all her anxiety, this discomfiture at his presence, is done away with. She carries the two mugs to the table and then fetches a plate of chocolate cookies.
‘It was a bit like that,’ she admits. ‘It’s the whole thing. Not just seeing these weird texts but feeling like I’m spying on something private. You know what I mean?’
Will raises the mug to his lips. He looks thoughtful.
‘It’s a tricky one, isn’t it? In the old days people had address books and at times like these they could be checked through so as to let everyone know what has happened. But these days everything’s in your computer or your phone, isn’t it? So when you check it out you’re always going to come across texts and emails.’
‘Pa had a very comprehensive database of friends and business acquaintances on his laptop,’ El said, ‘and I checked right through it to make sure everyone was informed. The thing was, I couldn’t find his phone and then I kind of forgot about it.’
‘Well, that’s fair enough. You’ve had a lot on your mind.’ He reaches for a cookie. ‘So you found it in his jacket pocket?’
She nods. ‘His fleece gilet. I forgot his coats when we were doing the packing up because they were hanging in the hall, and there it was in the pocket. It was out of charge, of course, but when I’d got it charged up I thought I should just check it.’ She hesitates. ‘There were these unanswered texts, you see. It was awful, really. I felt I was spying but I didn’t know if there were people who still hadn’t heard about what had happened.’
‘And were there many?’
She shakes her head. ‘Only this one that I didn’t recognize. The others were on his database. Just close family and friends.’
He’s watching her across the table, compassionate but slightly challenging too, which oddly gives her courage to admit her fears.
‘I know I could just phone the number and ask the question,’ she says. ‘It’s the obvious thing to do. But the texts have made me…’ she shrugs. ‘I don’t know. They’ve made me wary.’
He nods. ‘OK. So shall I have a look at them?’
As an answer she picks up the phone lying beside her, unlocks it and pushes it across the table to him. He takes it and looks at the screen, reading the last text and then scrolling slowly upwards. El watches him, seeing his expression change from interested, to puzzled, and then slightly amused.
‘Yes,’ he says at last. ‘I see what you meant now when you talked about codes. Was your father into that?’
El thinks about it. ‘I can see that it would have amused him,’ she says at last. ‘He was a solicitor so you might say that it was part of his work to assemble facts, sort out truth from lies, see his way through things. You notice that I’m not using the word “devious”?’
Will smiles at her. ‘Don’t think I can’t see how hard this is for you.’
She stares at him, slightly taken aback. ‘Yes,’ she says. ‘OK. Yes, if you want the truth I’m finding it really hard to think that he’s had this kind of fun relationship with someone that he never told me about. I know most of his friends, but this is different.’
Will looks at the screen. He begins to scroll up again, making comments as he goes.
‘So you don’t know Nancy Fortescue? … Some of these are just initials and a time … Almost businesslike, isn’t it? … The magic circle sounds interesting … the wisteria bridge … Sophie’s place. Do you know anyone called Sophie?’
‘Only a school friend who lives miles away.’
He shakes his head, puzzled. ‘So all we know is her mobile number, a voicemail, and an initial J. And you really feel you can’t just phone the number?’
‘I don’t want to admit to whoever might answer that I didn’t know this obviously important part of his life because he’s kept it secret from me.’
‘Would you like me to do it?’
‘No!’ She reaches across the table and pulls the phone back towards her. ‘No. Not yet, anyway.’
‘OK,’ says Will pacifically. ‘So what do you want us to do?’
‘Sorry,’ she says, feeling foolish. ‘I know I’m probably overreacting here, but what I wondered was whether we could perhaps follow up some of the clues.’
Will sits back in his chair and drinks some more tea. ‘OK,’ he says. ‘I’m cool with that. Where do you want to start?’
El sighs with relief. She has her answer ready.
‘I thought we’d start with Nancy Fortescue,’ she says.