Page 36 of A Year at Appleyard Farm
Tom licked his lips. ‘No, we had lunch. These are emergency fuel rations.’ He waved his empty wrapper. ‘Anyway, onwards…shall I give you a hand?’
Merry followed them straight out to the car, just as Freya knew she would.
‘She’s been absolutely fine, Merry, honestly. Although you might have warned me about the amount of bodily fluids she was capable of producing.’
‘What and spoil all the fun?’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘It wasn’t too bad, was it?’
Freya handed Tom another bag out of the car. ‘Well, no, not all the time; I had rather a baptism of fire this morning that was all. I’ve done a bit of washing for you as a result, although I’m afraid it’s not quite dry yet.’ She turned and looked back at Merry. ‘More importantly though, how have things gone today? Are you all in?’
‘We are,’ replied Merry. ‘The removal men were gone by twelve, and we’ve worked like stink this afternoon to get things sorted. I’ve even managed to get the beds made up already.’ She looked around her to the fields beyond the house. ‘You know, I already love it here. I know the house is hideous in places, but it’s only on the surface. I think we’re going to be really happy here.’
Freya squeezed her friend’s arm. ‘I know you will. Even the sun came out for you today,’ she said, eyeing the sky, which was already darkening a little. ‘Come on, let’s get back inside before it decides to rain again.’
15
Merry could hear the rain battering against the window, but that didn’t stop her from rushing to look out. With no curtains up yet, she had woken early, even earlier than Robyn, and was filled with a sudden rush of excited energy.
She’d been completely exhausted of course, when she’d finally gone to bed, but had slept like the proverbial log. Even the lime green walls hadn’t intruded into her dreams. Now, as she stood looking out onto the spread of the village below, she felt a deep calm and contented peace. Tom still lay snoring gently in bed, and knowing that it couldn’t be long before Robyn did wake up, she slipped from the room and went downstairs.
As moving days went, it had all gone like clockwork. There had been no dramas, no mishaps, and even no sticking points over furniture. Most of the rooms still held piles of boxes, but here in the kitchen, the last few to be unpacked held all her china and glassware. As she flicked the kettle on, she opened the lid on the uppermost box and started to pull out its contents.
Within twenty minutes, the kettle had been forgotten, and instead the kitchen floor was littered with newspaper, as she emptied the first box and then the second. The table was covered with a selection of wine and spirit glasses, and having room for no more, Merry started to ferry them to the dining room. It didn’t escape her notice that it would have been easier to unpack them in situ, but she enjoyed walking back and forth, and the way it made her feel a part of the house.
The dining room, which faced the road was still in darkness, heavy curtains drawn to shut out the night. They were thick and cumbersome, dark, with a faded flowery pattern, and although she’d leave them in place for the time being, Merry eyed them dispassionately; they would have to go. She struggled to throw them back, wrestling with their weight and amazed that after her tugging, the rail still remained fixed to the wall.
Her eye was immediately drawn to the view outside, or more specifically to the figure which stood by their gate, staring up at the house. The day was foul, and yet it seemed to make no difference to the woman, her raincoat, already soaked and buffeted by the wind. She stood motionless, her gaze trained on an upstairs window, and if she saw the curtains opening, she certainly gave no indication that she had. Merry turned away, smiling to herself. She wasn’t sure yet what form the local jungle drums took, but she had a fair idea that whoever was standing by her gate would be one of the main drummers. Their arrival had obviously not gone unnoticed.
Whilst it was better with the curtains open, the light this morning was minimal and did little to expel the gloom. The dark, almost navy-blue walls weren’t helping either, but Merry opened the doors on her dresser and started to replace the contents: glasses which had only been removed for packing a few days earlier. She enjoyed this, the routine and rhythm of making the house theirs, and breathing new life into it with their things. They had a long day ahead of them, but it was exciting, and as she bent to load the last few glasses into the cupboard, she realised that she hadn’t felt this good for a long time.
She straightened up once more, surveying the room, her artistic eye looking forward in time to her vision of how she wanted it to be, but first things first; now it really was time for that cup of tea. She crossed the room, instinctively looking back towards the window; but whoever it was who had been outside, was gone.
By some miracle Robyn hadn’t woken until half past seven. Merry had even crept upstairs to check on her once or twice, but the baby had been fast asleep. Now though, she seemed to be making up for lost time with an extra-long feed, and Merry winced as she latched on once more. Tom had made copious quantities of toast this morning, and she munched on slice after slice to keep her mind off the pain, while they chatted over their plans for the day.
Tom was itching to get started on the shop; clearing it out ready for the refurbishment that needed to take place. Although there was still much to be done in the house, he reasoned that the quicker they made a start outside, the quicker they could ascertain what work needed doing and start to make plans. It was going to be their livelihood after all, and the sooner it was open, the sooner they would start to see some return on it.
‘Besides which, once we get everything else unpacked, we’re going to have a huge amount of rubbish to get rid of. This way maybe we can do it all in one fell swoop, maybe even get a skip.’
Merry considered her husband for a moment, knowing that there would be no deterring him from something he had already decided to do. So, rolling up her sleeves and helping him was the only real option. She glanced down at the now, sleeping baby, and levered herself out of the chair. No time like the present.
In truth, the shop was more than one room. The front part that was visible from the road was the largest of the rooms, split almost in two by another wall with a wide archway through to the rear portion. From here, another door led into not one but two separate storerooms, and it was these rooms which had really fired their imagination. The second of these was L-shaped and formed the top of the courtyard. It sat beyond the house, providing a backdrop to the rear garden, and in time was an area they hoped to develop into a showcase for local speciality products.
The other thing which had appealed to both of them was currently still in place, although covered in assorted rubbish, and, Merry suspected, had long been out of operation. The little black pot-bellied stove would have once been here purely for practical reasons, but it was such a homely addition to the space and fulfilled every vision that Tom and Merry had for the place. Now, eyeing the flue warily, it seemed that an extraordinary leap of faith would be called for to ever get it working again.
They decided to start on the storerooms and, checking that the baby monitor was switched on, Merry pulled on a pair of gloves. Robyn usually had her longest sleep in the morning, and if Merry was to be of any help to Tom today, now would be the time. She flicked on the old light switch and surveyed the space in front of her. Spiders she could cope with (up to a point), but dear God, let there not be any rats.
The space was dim at best; on a day like today, little natural light fell through the tiny window at the rear, and despite her surprise that the single overhead bulb actually lit, the glow from it was disappointing. The only thing that Merry could establish was that to get to her goal – a row of wooden cupboards at the rear of the room – she would have to wade through a huge number of damp and rotting boxes. She picked up the first, but it fell apart as she lifted it, the smell of decay, sour and strangely verdant.
She wandered back out into the main room.
‘Tom,’ she called, searching the room for her husband.
A head appeared from behind the archway, already white with dust.
‘Found any buried treasure yet?’ He grinned, wiping away a cobweb.
‘Not exactly…I was just wondering whether that agent had ever got back to you. Did you find out what the shop used to sell?’
‘General produce was his best guess. I googled it too and found some old references from the 1950s when it seemed to be a family grocer’s. There was a picture with an old delivery bike propped outside. Other than that, only what a chap from the village told me: that it was a gallery of some sort. Why, what have you found?’
