Kilgarthen Read online

  Kilgarthen

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Next in Series

  Copyright

  Kilgarthen

  Gloria Cook

  With love and affection to my daughter Tracy and her husband Anthony, a super young couple of whom I am really proud.

  Chapter 1

  As her husband’s coffin was lowered into the cold, wet, black earth, Laura Jennings was thinking about how much she’d come to hate him. Let his flesh and bones rot here, in the place where he’d been born and bred, the little moorland Cornish village that he had loved so much, the place he had always refused to take her to.

  Laura would never grieve like the villagers of Kilgarthen over their ‘local boy made good’. The mental cruelty that Bill Jennings had inflicted on her throughout the five years of their marriage had left her totally numbed. She felt as bleak and lonely as the granite and slate headstones that stood guard over the graves at her feet. She felt as cold and raw as the persistent winter winds that swept over the brooding, exposed, sometimes dangerous moorland, part of the eastern flank of Bodmin Moor, that made up the stony horizon of the village. A tor dominated the skyline; Laura knew its name, Hawk’s Tor, and she felt it was frowning down upon her.

  Daisy Tamblyn, Bill’s aunt, whose homely face Laura recognised from his weekend holiday snaps, came to stand beside her at the graveside. She gave Laura a sympathetic smile but Laura kept her face rigid. All around her people were sobbing, but Laura took them for fools who didn’t know, or indulgent dimwits who chose to ignore, the truth of their hero’s character.

  Rather than listen to the burial committal, Laura eyed the mourners through the net of her smart black hat. Her shoulders had developed a slightly dejected stoop, her eyes tended quickly to look down, she was inclined to feel guilty even when something bad that had happened was not her fault, but she felt superior to the people here whom she thought of as simple villagers. Except for one woman in a matching fur coat and hat, compared to the other women in their square-shouldered utility suits and plain hats and boring headscarves, Laura was a striking sight in her large-buttoned full-skirted Dior coat. Her three-inch heels, which brought her model’s figure and bearing to nearly six feet, made her a few inches taller than the average Cornish man in attendance.

  Laura knew who some of these people were, Bill had talked about them often. The middle-aged couple with suitable funereal faces on the opposite side of the grave must be the stern schoolmaster and his wife, Cecil and Barbara Roach. Laura took an instant aversion to Cecil Roach. She recognised similar traits to herself in Barbara Roach; there was no spark of life about her, her eyes were dull, mouth taut, complexion unnaturally pale, like her own. Next to them, his legs squashed against Bill’s parents’ headstone, was a broad, whiskery man whose solemn expression could not disguise his cheery nature, making him the pub landlord, Mike Penhaligon. The little woman with her arm linked through his was his wife, Pat.

  Bringing her eyes round to Daisy Tamblyn, Laura was also able to pick out Bunty Buzza, Daisy’s best friend and next-door neighbour; two dumpy ladies in their late fifties, in black today but usually in drab dresses and overalls. On Bunty Buzza’s other side was Marianne Roach who had placed herself as far away as possible from her schoolmaster father and in a good position to ogle the tall, handsome, rather amused-looking Harry Lean, a rich estate agent. The woman in fur, standing straight-backed and aloof, was his elegant mother, Felicity; she was probably thinking it a shame she had to dirty her snakeskin shoes in the damp grass. Marianne Roach took her eyes off Harry Lean for a moment and glared at Laura.

  The vicar brought Laura back to the matter in hand by gently shaking her arm. The interment was over. ‘You have my deepest sympathy, Mrs Jennings. If there is anything I can do, please do not hesitate to call at the vicarage.’ He pointed to the left of the large granite church; fifteenth century in origin, it seemed to Laura too large to accommodate the little village. ‘It’s just round there. I’m so very sorry I can’t stay for the wake but I have an urgent meeting to attend.’

  ‘I understand, Vicar,’ Laura murmured, looking at the ground and moving away from him. She was in no mood for handshaking. ‘Thank you for taking the service.’

  Shrugging his thin shoulders, the Reverend Kinsley Farrow signalled to Daisy Tamblyn to take over from him. He left the graveside with his robes flapping in the wind.

  ‘Mrs Jennings, I’m so pleased to meet you at last,’ Daisy Tamblyn said, looking unsure of herself as she secured Laura’s reluctant attention. ‘Although not in these circumstances of course.’ Daisy sniffed into a large white handkerchief and looked sorrowfully down into the grave.

  ‘As I didn’t know what you wanted to do after the service, I took it upon myself to arrange for refreshments to be served in the village hall. Billy was very popular here, you see, there would be too many mourners to pack into my little house at the back of the shop, and I didn’t think you’d want them in Billy’s cottage.’ Daisy owned the village shop which doubled as a post office. She put her hanky in an old flattened black handbag and looked expectantly at Laura. There were many curious faces around them waiting for Mrs Bill Jennings to speak. ‘The train journey down from London must have been long and tiring. You’ll at least be glad to have a hot cup of tea, I’m sure.’ Daisy seemed eager to please.

  ‘I have to get back to London, Mrs Tamblyn,’ Laura replied in a cool, brisk voice, her educated London accent, which she’d deliberately heightened, a stark contrast to Daisy’s broad burr. ‘I haven’t got time to stop. I just want to spend a little time freshening up in Bill’s cottage then I’ll phone for a taxi to take me back to the railway station.’

  ‘Oh!’ Daisy flinched, clearly disappointed. She was about to open her mouth again but Laura wasn’t going to be persuaded.

  ‘Good afternoon, Mrs Tamblyn. I too am sorry that we had to meet like this.’ She walked away as fast as her heels, which were biting into the rough turf, allowed. She heard the remarks muttered at her back.

  ‘You’d think she’d at least spend a few minutes in Bill’s birthplace.’ This came from Bunty Buzza. ‘At least stop and have a word with you, Daisy.’

  ‘Yes,’ a male voice uttered disgustedly. ‘She refused to come here while he was living. Must think she’s too good for us just because she comes from money and looks like a film star. It’s too bad her behaving like this, and with Spencer Jeffries not bothering to show up at all.’

  Someone else added loudly, ‘Stuck up madam! It’s a disgrace.’ Daisy began to sob, but Laura was unmoved. These people had loved and respected Bill but they had never really known him. Well, she had done her last duty by him, brought him b
ack to this little backwater village to be buried as he’d wished.

  Harry Lean made to block Laura’s way out of the churchyard but her ice-blue eyes and steely demeanour quickly made him step aside. She walked up to the funeral directors, thanked them, and promised them there would be a cheque in the post. Bill’s cottage was directly across the road, the newly whitewashed one with hanging baskets under the eaves, quaintly named Little Cot. She searched about in her handbag for the key and cursed inwardly when her clumsy gloved hand let it drop to the ground. To her consternation Harry Lean picked it up.

  ‘Allow me, Mrs Jennings,’ he said, dropping the key into her outstretched hand with an exaggerated flourish. He was smiling. Laura instantly distrusted him; she had seen that sort of smarmy expression all too often on Bill’s face, there was no sincerity in it, it was designed to get the man his own way.

  Harry Lean doggedly kept eye contact with her yet his dark active eyes were sweeping the whole scene before him. He had careless good looks, was well built with a three-dimensional fleshy circle in the centre of his chin that some women would find endearing. Laura found his ready smile offensive.

  Thank you,’ she said stiffly, vexed that she’d been helped by someone from this village.

  ‘The name’s Harry Lean,’ he drawled. ‘It was a pleasure to meet you, Mrs Jennings, albeit for just a few moments.’

  Laura was aware of some of the villagers gawping at her over the churchyard wall. All she wanted to do was to get away from this place as quickly as possible, but first she needed a hot drink and the use of a bathroom and telephone. She wouldn’t allow Harry Lean to delay her.

  ‘Goodbye, Mr Lean.’ She moved away and looked to the left and right before attempting to cross the road.

  ‘No need for that,’ he said, coming up to her side. ‘Hardly any traffic passes through the village, even without petrol rationing – few of the villagers have cars. Things are very different down here to London. Mine and the hearse are the most to be seen together in a long time.’

  ‘Really?’ Laura retorted, angry that he had made her feel a fool.

  His face still seemingly full of hidden amusement, Harry Lean turned on his heel and ambled up the hill to his sporty car parked outside the Tremewan Arms, one of the places in Kilgarthen that Bill had enthusiastically spoken about. Laura warmed a little to Harry Lean; apparently he had no wish either to go to the village hall and pick regretfully over Bill’s bones.

  She crossed the road and unlocked the cottage door. Lifting the misshapen latch which had been there for decades, she stepped straight into the sitting room, which Bill had called the front room. He had told her in detail the changes he’d made to the cottage; she was never meant to see them, telling her about them had been part of Bill’s spitefulness.

  Like all the dwellings in the village, the cottage had extremely thick walls to combat the cold winds. When Bill had been brought up here, the cottage had been dark and bleak and no more than functional. He had decorated it himself in warm colours and furnished it comfortably with a tapestry-covered three-piece suite and wooden rocking chair, not at all like the modern lines he had insisted on for their home in London. A large ornament of a sleeping ginger cat lay inside the brass fender at the hearth. Pictures of wildlife adorned the walls and horse brasses hung from the black beams of the low ceiling. The stairs came down into the front room and Bill had changed the banister to one of thick dark oak with an ornately carved newel post at the bottom; it gave a charming effect. The room was spotlessly clean and smelled of lavender; Daisy Tamblyn checked over the cottage and cleaned it about twice a month.

  Bill had put in every modern convenience — to show the villagers he had made something of himself, no doubt, Laura thought bitterly. He had installed a generator for electricity in a shed in the garden, but there was no telephone; Bill had not wished to be disturbed in his holiday hideaway.

  Laura entered one of the two bedrooms at the front of the cottage and looked out of the window. She could see past the pub up to the top of the hill down which the hearse had driven to reach the churchyard. The village was sheltered in a valley and near the top of the hill in the opposite direction nestled the little Methodist chapel. Roughly halfway between the church and chapel, the public telephone stood out like a red beacon. In a little while she would go there to phone for a taxi to take her back to Liskeard railway station. A tawny pony and jingle stood close by and Laura watched, somewhat amazed, as an enormously fat woman in a huge tartan cloak and black bonnet awkwardly dismounted and approached the telephone box. She had difficulty opening the heavy door. Despite her size and strange mode of dress, Laura couldn’t place her from Bill’s reminiscences. But why be interested in anyone from Kilgarthen now?

  Across the road no one was left in the churchyard. Apart from herself and Harry Lean, the rest of the mourners must have trudged along the gravel path and passed through the gate at the end of the churchyard to the village hall, a modern, grey, rectangular building. Judging by the remarks just thrown at her back, the villagers thought she’d refused to come down here. Bill must have told them that. According to him, some of them were narrow-minded, they’d never forgive her – not that she cared about that. She was glad she couldn’t actually see Bill’s grave from here.

  She didn’t go into the main bedroom. There would be many of Bill’s personal things in there and she wasn’t up to looking them over. Some day she would have to decide what to do with the cottage. She could sell it but had thought about giving it to Daisy Tamblyn who had served Bill faithfully over the years since his mother, Daisy’s sister, had died.

  Laura used the bathroom, the only fully furnished one in the village; Bill had had it built on from the kitchen. She looked in the mirror over the sink. She ripped off her hat and took out the combs that restrained her shoulder-length blonde hair and shook it free. She wore no make-up and the clear skin of her face was white, transparent looking, and stretched over her high cheekbones. Her eyes were dull, making her look slightly older than her twenty-three years.

  In the kitchen she opened a window and listened to the gurglings and rush of the Withey Brook that ran the length of the back of the village. She kicked off her soiled shoes and took off the black coat which she’d bought for her father’s funeral two months ago; she hadn’t wasted valuable clothing coupons on anything new for today’s event. The generator had not been switched on but the cooking range was lit, and she put half a kettleful of water on the hottest spot to heat for coffee. She hunted through the cupboards and found Bill’s favourite biscuits. She felt guilty at first then realised he wasn’t here to tell her she mustn’t eat them. She’d only meant to spend a few minutes in the cottage, but he wasn’t here to say how long she could stay. She was free at last to do as she pleased.

  Her life with Bill had been hell from the moment their honeymoon began after their whirlwind courtship. She had quickly found out that she had only been the route to a seat on the board of her father’s successful construction company. Bill had left the village for London in 1940 as a twenty-year-old youth, not to do something for the war effort as he’d been unable to fight due to an eye defect, but to better himself. He’d got himself a carpenter’s apprenticeship in Laura’s father’s construction company, but with little need for building due to the bombing, Colin Farraday had diverted his wealth and energies into munitions. Like most of the workforce, Bill had lost his job but he hadn’t been dismissed altogether. Colin Farraday had liked the youth’s drive and energy, his determination to get on and his apparent loyalty, and had kept him on as a ‘runner’ between his businesses. Bill had made himself indispensable and at the end of two years had been promoted to office manager.

  Laura had met him in the office when, as an impressionable girl of eighteen years, fresh out of boarding school, she’d worked as her father’s personal assistant. Bill had quickly wormed himself into her affections and she had fallen for his apparent good nature and ready charm. Her father’s health had been deterio
rating for some time and he was beginning to allow Bill to make serious decisions for him. He had no real objections when Bill asked for Laura’s hand in marriage, and believing the three of them would have an excellent working relationship, Laura had allowed herself to be rushed into wedlock.

  Bill had made it clear from the start, however, that he expected her to stay at home and keep house, only allowing her out to work in the soup kitchens and canteens. That had set the pattern for the next five miserable years. When the war ended, Farraday Construction was resurrected to rebuild parts of the bombed-out capital city and by then Bill was chairman of the company, one of the biggest in South London. No wonder the good people of Kilgarthen thought he’d done well for himself.

  Now, seven years after he had left the village, the wretched existence Bill Jennings had imposed on her was finally over, finishing not tragically as reported in the newspapers from suffocating in a fire while lying innocently in a hotel bedroom; Andrew Macarthur, the family solicitor, had managed to keep quiet the two high-class call girls who had died with Bill. And Laura was free of Bill in a way neither of them had been planning. A divorce would have upset her father but when he’d died she’d made up her mind to leave Bill, then she’d found out he’d been about to leave her for the wealthier daughter of a minor title.

  She finished her snack, washed the cup and saucer, tidied up the kitchen and was locking up the cottage to make her way to the public telephone when Daisy Tamblyn waddled up to her, looking agitated.

  ‘M-mrs Jennings. I’ve just been called away from the village hall. I was told my telephone has been ringing and ringing. Anyway, I went home and there’s a London gentleman on the phone for you. He says it’s urgent and can you come to speak to him right away.’

  Daisy was red-faced and out of breath and Laura felt guilty about her earlier unfriendly behaviour. ‘I’ll come at once, Mrs Tamblyn. Thank you for coming to fetch me.’

  As she walked beside Daisy up the short steep hill to the shop, Laura made amends with a lie. ‘I should have explained more fully about wanting to go back to London immediately. There’s a very important meeting tomorrow. Bill would have wanted me to be there in his place.’