Page 105 of A Year at Appleyard Farm
Laura held his gaze. She could tell from the way his lips pursed that there was a real force behind his words, and although his face was turned towards her, she understood that he was not talking to her alone. She glanced across the table, where the policeman’s previously relaxed pose had been replaced with a more businesslike stance. She licked her lips and swallowed.
‘I was shopping,’ she said calmly, ‘just before Christmas. Something I try very hard not to do, but it was a bit of a special occasion. Usually, I go home to Mum and Dad’s, but last year my neighbours all persuaded me to stay here and join them for Christmas dinner. I’d had to go to the big Tesco.’ She bit her lip as her face was suddenly flooded with heat. ‘That’s when Francis started having a go.’
‘What do you mean “having a go,” Laura? What did he say?’ encouraged Stephen.
Laura was quiet for a moment. It would sound stupid, she knew. Pathetic even. But to her, it had meant a very great deal. Staying in Much Marlowes for Christmas had been a big step for her at the time and had pretty much taken all her courage. Explaining it to complete strangers, however, would never do justice to how she had felt. She dropped her head, running a thumb over the smoothness of her fingernail. She was still staring at her hand when Stephen’s fingers slipped over her own. She looked up in surprise.
‘What did he say, Laura? Was he rude? Hurtful?’
She nodded gently. ‘He made fun of me, it’s what he always does. Goading me for being on my own; a sad and lonely creature he called me, saying it’s no wonder no one wants me, looking up at people the way I do with my big doe eyes. Like I wouldn’t say boo to a goose…Then he made some stupid joke about geese and Christmas and that what I needed was a good stuffing…’ The tears sprang to Laura’s eyes. ‘It was too much…especially coming from him, and it’s not like it was the first time he’d done it either. I just couldn’t bear it any more.’
Stephen’s fingers tightened over her own. ‘Bastard…’
The policeman nearest to her raised his hand. ‘I understand that you were upset, Mrs Ashcombe. That was very clear to see when you came into the station, but it still didn’t give you the right to assault the man.’
‘I did not assault Francis Drummond. I threw a turkey at him, which is hardly the same thing. And you and I both know that the only reason I got dragged in here in the first place was so that you could keep your boss sweet; everyone knows he’s been in Drummond’s pocket for years. I bet you had a good laugh about it with him, didn’t you? About how you ticked me off, and told me to behave myself. It’s Drummond that needs keeping on a lead, not me.’
The two men exchanged looks. ‘I rather think we’re getting off the point here…’
‘And yet it was you who brought up the subject of the assault, I believe?’ interrupted Stephen. ‘And as such, perhaps you could have the decency to listen to what Mrs Ashcombe has to say. At least, try looking at it from her point of view.’ He turned to look Laura straight in the eye. ‘I would imagine that for someone who’s deaf, shopping in a supermarket just before Christmas must be hell – aside from the usual irritations, imagine what it must be like with people pushing past you, coming from nowhere because you can’t hear them – glaring at you because they think you’re ignoring them. Shop staff with even less time than usual tutting and sighing at their ‘awkward’ customer, never realising that you can’t understand them. I bet their facial expressions hurt just as much as any words.’ He paused for a minute to check that Laura was following him. She nodded slightly.
‘Then, add to that the pain of having to spend another Christmas without the person you love, forcing yourself to be jolly and sociable which, by the way, only ever serves to reinforce the fact that you’re by yourself, and you probably don’t even come close to the way Laura was feeling that day. So, when a bully like Francis Drummond turns up, towering over her five-foot-three, shoving his face in hers and making rude and spiteful comments, it’s no wonder she lost her temper.’ He sat back in his chair, turning to look back at both policemen before returning his gaze to Laura. ‘Now, given all that, she still finds the courage to come and report a crime, knowing that she probably won’t be believed. And she does so not because she has a grudge against the Drummond family, but because an elderly lady has been knocked down and seriously hurt, and it’s the right thing to do. I’ve validated everything she’s described this morning about what happened on Monday, except the identity of the driver which I couldn’t see. What more do you need to know?’
Laura leaned up against the wall outside the police station, gasping for breath. ‘I’m sorry, I know I shouldn’t be laughing, but you should have seen your face when I said I’d thrown a turkey at Drummond. It was priceless.’
Stephen caught both of her hands, pulling her upright. He faked hurt for a moment. ‘I thought I’d hidden it pretty well,’ he said, pretending to pout, although the corners of his mouth began to turn upwards despite his attempts at restraint. ‘You have to admit, it sounded really funny the way you said it. Did you honestly throw it at him?’
‘I did. It caught him square in the back of the neck,’ said Laura, grinning again. ‘It just came over me in a wave; I was so angry. I watched him walk away for a moment and then, boom! I picked up the nearest thing and hurled it at him – sent him sprawling. That’s why he made such a fuss of course, because the place was heaving, and he went down like a sack of spuds. He did thispoor me, I’m just an innocent defenceless man struck down by a lunatic womanroutine. I couldn’t tell half of what was being said of course, so I just kept shouting at him until the security guard came and hustled me away. I think they thought I was a spurned lover or something.’
Stephen was properly laughing now, his eyes shining in amusement. ‘I wish I’d been there to see it—’ he said, and then he stopped. ‘Although if I had, things might have been a little different of course…’ And there was that look again, the one that Laura couldn’t define, but that was beginning to make her feel hot all over again.
‘Anyway,’ he continued, pulling away a little. ‘I’m glad the bastard got what he deserved, even though it’s meant you’ve had more of a tough time of things.’
Laura nodded back towards the police station. ‘Will they do anything, do you think?’
‘Oh yes, I think they got the message,’ he replied, smiling. ‘The local police probably don’t see much more than a few kerfuffles outside the Red Lion on a Friday night. It’s pretty quiet around here, and they’re local lads after all, soaking up all the town gossip just like anyone else. Their attitude was somewhat different by the end of our conversation, don’t you think?’
‘Thanks to you,’ Laura remarked. ‘That was some speech.’
Stephen thrust his hands into his pockets and swallowed hard. ‘I wanted them to treat you properly, that’s all.’ He dropped his head and mumbled something Laura couldn’t catch.
‘What was that?’ she asked, deliberately forcing Stephen to look up again.
‘I said, it’s only what anyone would do,’ he repeated.
Laura held his look for a second before replying. ‘Really?’ she queried. ‘Only no one has done anything like that in the last five years.’ She looked up and down the street again, conscious of Stephen’s eyes on her face. ‘I tell you what,’ she said, breaking the awkward silence. ‘Why don’t I buy you a coffee as a thank you? And the biggest piece of cake we can find. It’s the least I can do after you stuck up for me like that.’ She was pleased to see Stephen looked relieved.
‘Deal,’ he said, with a quick glance to his watch, ‘and then I’ve got to go and see a man about a disco of all things, I’m afraid. I’m Sam and Freya’s official wedding entertainment co-ordinator, God help them.’
Laura smiled. ‘Yes, I must get back too. Wedding bouquets to design and all that.’ She cleared her throat. ‘Is Mrs Muffin’s Tearoom okay? It’s the only place I’ve ever been in.’
Stephen offered her his arm. ‘That will do fine,’ he said. ‘I’ll avoid the rock cakes, though. That way if the conversation takes a turn for the worse, I won’t end up with concussion.’
56
Stephen drummed his fingers against the steering wheel. He’d been stuck behind the tractor for what seemed like an age now, and whilst he hadn’t made any firm arrangement over what time he’d call in to confirm the disco booking, he was later than he’d planned, and getting later by the minute.
It was partly his fault of course. His joke to Laura about the rock cakes had set her laughing again, and it had been so good to see her serious face lift and relax. If he was honest, he was also rather relieved at having managed to turn the conversation back to something more light-hearted, rather than focusing on his behaviour at the police station. That conversation had danger written all over it, and he had been anxious to move away from all that it might have implied. Laura didn’t need those kind of complications in her life right now, and Stephen had been so surprised by how he had felt sitting next to her in the station that he had shoved these thoughts firmly to the back of his mind.
