Appleby Farm (36 page)

‘Mr Turner,’ I yelled, ‘I want to talk to you.’

The next moments flashed by in a blur and everything seemed to happen at once. A chicken flew out of the kennel and pecked the surveyor in the back of the leg. Mr Turner leaped into the air with shock. He clung on to his camera but dropped his clipboard. Madge, presumably thinking that this stranger had designs on her freshly laid egg, which was no doubt waiting for her in the kennel, began to bark viciously. Then she flew at him and tore a chunk out of his trousers – at least, I think it was only his trousers. The startled man stumbled backwards, landing in a sprawling heap on the kennel.

‘Ow, my back,’ he yowled, rubbing his spine. ‘Call this bloody dog off.’

Luckily Madge didn’t need calling off: she’d obviously remembered the egg and slunk off into the kennel to retrieve it. Which was just as well because the papers on Mr Turner’s clipboard had come loose, an architect’s drawing unfolding on the yard. I was so shocked by what it revealed that words completely failed me.

I knelt down on the cobbles, pinned the drawing flat to the damp ground with both hands and stared. The large piece of paper depicted a very different-looking Appleby Farm to the one I saw before me now. Gone were the barns, the tea rooms, the lovely old stone buildings, the fields nearest the house with their ancient drystone walls … In fact, with the exception of the farmhouse itself, this new layout was almost unrecognizable.

Mr Turner clambered to his feet and tried to prise the drawing from my fingers. ‘You have no business looking at that,’ he bellowed.

‘Actually, I have every business,’ I said indignantly.

At that moment Auntie Sue and Uncle Arthur appeared and the tractor chugged into the yard with Eddy at the wheel.

‘What’s all the commotion?’ cried Auntie Sue from the farmhouse gate.

‘Don’t speak to my niece like that,’ barked Uncle Arthur at the same time over her shoulder.

Eddy climbed off the tractor seat and marched towards us. His boots made such a clatter on the cobbles that I looked up. New boots and clean jeans. I blinked. Unheard of!

Anyway, I ignored Mr Turner and held my ground. As I tried to make sense of the drawings I could literally feel the blood drain from my face. Four long cattle sheds, a maternity unit, a hospital unit, two huge milking parlours, offices …

‘This isn’t farming, it’s …’ I floundered, searching for the right word.

Mr Turner jutted his chin out as far as it would go. ‘It’s intensive dairy farming,’ he finished for me.

There was a collective gasp.

‘Is that right, Arthur?’ Eddy glared at his boss, his face puce. ‘You’re selling out to an intensive dairy – where cows never feel the sun on their backs, never get to graze in paddocks?’

Now I was no farming expert, but I did know from the odd snippet I’d seen in Uncle Arthur’s magazines that intensive dairy farming was highly controversial and a million miles away from the way Appleby Farm had been run since it had been in our family.

‘Now, now, Eddy,’ my uncle countered. ‘I’ve agreed to nothing yet.’

Eddy nodded grimly. ‘But you’re not denying it.’

‘I’m seventy-five, Eddy, and this is a cash offer.’ Uncle Arthur shrugged weakly. ‘What choice do I have? I could have another heart attack and—’

‘Don’t say that!’ wailed Auntie Sue and she clapped her hands over her ears.

What? I blinked at Uncle Arthur. Surely he wasn’t
still
considering Julian’s offer? Not after finding out what the intensive farming company had planned. Why did everything come down to money? I felt sick.

‘Excuse me,’ interjected Mr Turner, ‘but I’ve still got a job to do and who’s going to pay for these trousers?’

I examined his trousers. One bare white knee was poking through a large hole and a flap of trouser material hung almost to the floor. It was all I could do not to grab it and rip for all I was worth.

‘Your job’s finished,’ I snapped. ‘And you can send the trouser bill to your client. I’m sure he’ll pay up. Now go.’

Auntie Sue looked on the verge of tears. Uncle Arthur put his arm round her shoulders.

Mr Turner jutted his chin. ‘This has got quite out of hand. It was all that hen’s fault.’

‘No, it wasn’t the hen’s fault,’ I replied coldly. ‘It was my brother’s fault. And I’m going to phone him right now and tell him what I think of him.’

I pushed past everyone, leaving them arguing amongst themselves, and ran back into the farmhouse to the office.

Maybe I should have taken a few moments to collect myself, build a rational argument and approach my brother calmly. But I didn’t.

‘How could you?’ I spat, when he answered my call.

‘The surveyor has been, I take it?’ asked Julian smoothly.

‘This intensive dairy farm of yours would ruin the landscape and destroy our beautiful Lakeland farm. And what about animal welfare? What about the lives of those poor cows?’

‘Oh yawn, yawn,’ Julian groaned, sounding bored. ‘Wake up, dearie. Farming isn’t all about baby calves frisking about in the meadow. Arthur doesn’t breed pets, he breeds meat. Farming is a form of industry and this development is no different, except it’s investing millions in developing food production for twenty-first-century Britain.’

‘Well, they can stick their millions. We don’t want them.’

I slammed the phone down so hard that the desk shook and I sat with my hand still on the receiver, getting my breath back. The phone rang again almost immediately. I picked it up and braced myself for a further onslaught.

‘Appleby Farm Vintage Tea Rooms, Freya speaking,’ I muttered through gritted teeth.

‘Freya, darling! It’s Mum. Dad and I are at Manchester airport. We’re stopping off for lunch and then we’re making our way to the farm. Will everyone be at home this evening? Your father and I have got some news.’

‘Mum! Right.’ I swallowed. ‘How exciting! Yes, we’ll be here.’

My heart was still thumping as I put down the phone. My father hadn’t visited Appleby Farm for decades. What was he up to now?

By six thirty, when Mum and Dad’s taxi rumbled into the farmyard, the rest of us had reached some sort of uneasy truce. By which I mean that we had all agreed to disagree.

Auntie Sue had taken my uncle off to the next village in the afternoon to visit the bungalow she’d fallen in love with and he had declared it ‘not bad’, which she took to mean ‘perfect’. It was part of a small development and wasn’t quite finished, which according to Auntie Sue made it even more appealing; they would be able to make some of the final decisions and put their own stamp on it.

Eddy had spent most of the day moping about in the tea rooms, where, between serving customers, I had had a long chat with him, confiding in him how much I really wanted to buy the farm.

‘Aye, well, you’ll need three-quarters of a million pounds for that, lass,’ he’d replied, which more or less put paid to that idea.

And he’d confided that he had a new lady friend who lived on the coast in Morecambe. She had a fresh fish business, selling out of the back of a van, and had started calling in at the White Lion once a week. They’d struck up a romance after he’d complimented her on her potted shrimps and now she was dropping hints that she wanted him to get a Monday-to-Friday job so they could spend more time together at weekends.

‘I’m thrilled for you, you dark horse!’ I’d hugged him and he’d blushed and not even shoved me off – it must be love. ‘That explains the new boots and the ironed jeans.’

‘Yes, well, she’s made me smarten up a bit.’ He shrugged. ‘But I wasn’t going to leave Arthur in the lurch, what with his heart attack and everything. But now …’ He puffed out his cheeks and shook his head sadly.

I nudged him sharply. ‘Hey! Not that I want to stand in the way of you and your love life, obviously. But this Moorcroft,’ I tapped my own chest, ‘isn’t ready to give up on the farm just yet.’

And then he’d gripped my hand, kissed my cheek and said anything he could do to help, I only had to ask.

So when Mum and Dad began to haul enormous suitcases (rather unnervingly) out of the boot of the taxi, everyone was in a slightly better, if apprehensive, mood. The taxi drove off and Uncle Arthur and my dad walked towards each other hesitantly. I racked my brains but I couldn’t remember ever seeing them together before. I held my breath as Uncle Arthur extended a hand towards his younger brother. Dad took it and then pulled him closer and slapped him on the back.

Auntie Sue and my mum smiled at each other indulgently as they kissed each other’s cheek.

My dad looked up at the farmhouse. ‘It’s good to be back. The place looks exactly as I remember it; it hasn’t changed a bit. Our old dad would be proud of you, Arthur.’

Uncle Arthur mumbled something about that being debatable and extracted himself from Dad’s grip.

Oh, God. I felt a lump swell up in my throat and didn’t dare meet anyone’s eye. I wrapped my arms tightly round my mum’s neck instead, breathing in her familiar perfume.

‘That’s a lovely welcome,’ laughed Mum.

I shook my head gently. ‘I am so glad you’re here.’

‘Does that include me?’ said Dad.

‘Of course,’ I said, kissing his cheek and rubbing my face where his bristly moustache had tickled it.

‘Planning on moving in, are you?’ I pointed to their luggage.

He opened his mouth to answer but Auntie Sue clapped her hands. ‘Come in, come in,’ she cried. ‘Let’s not stand on ceremony.’

Ten minutes later we were all ensconced around the kitchen table with teas and coffees. Once all the ‘milk?’ and ‘pass the sugar’ pleasantries had run their course, a palpable tension, as heavy as a storm cloud, descended over us.

‘We’re leaving Paris and thinking of coming back to England,’ Mum blurted out, the first to cave in under the pressure. ‘Rusty is retiring at last. With immediate effect.’

‘Really? That’s fantastic! Where in England?’ I asked.
Please say nearby.
I nearly said that out loud but remembered I might not be living round here myself for much longer so I kept my mouth closed.

‘Well …’ Mum began, flashing me a nervous smile.

‘Retiring? Just like that?’ Auntie Sue’s shoulders visibly sagged. ‘Oh. We’re so jealous, aren’t we, Artie?’

Uncle Arthur grumbled something about chance would be a fine thing and slurped his tea noisily.

‘It’s not quite … I wouldn’t …’ My dad shifted in his seat as if his beige slacks were bothering him before admitting, ‘I’ve been pensioned off. The apartment comes – or should I say goes? – with the job.’

‘He’s got a golden handshake.’ Mum patted his hand gently. ‘To thank him for all his hard work.’

Dad grunted and folded his arms.

‘I’m chasing after a golden handshake myself.’ Uncle Arthur sighed, mirroring Dad’s arm-folding. ‘But it’s feeling more like a Judas kiss.’

‘Now, now, Artie.’ Auntie Sue patted
his
hand. ‘Your health comes first, not the farm. This place will be the death of you.’

Mum frowned at me enquiringly across the table and I grimaced and mouthed,
Later.

‘Do you know, Arthur,’ Dad said, running a hand over his bald head, ‘now that I’ve left the bank, I feel like my entire life’s work has vanished into thin air. I envy you having this place. No matter what happens, Appleby Farm will always be here. I hadn’t realized until I came back how much I’ve missed it.’

I stared at him open-mouthed until Mum cleared her throat and looked pointedly at me. Well,
this
was new. It seemed like Dad felt the same way about the farm as I did and yet he had never ever had a good word to say about farming before now. What happened to ‘British farming is a money pit’ and ‘you start the year with nothing and you finish the year with nothing’?

Uncle Arthur scratched his chin. ‘But you couldn’t wait to get away from Appleby Farm, Rusty. And you’ve never been back since.’

I gave my dad a stern look. ‘That’s true, Dad.’

‘There was never a role for me here,’ Dad answered morosely.

He dug a clean spoon into the sugar bowl and began grinding the crystals against the side of the bowl. I recognized the habit: I did that myself. Shirley at the café had always been telling me off for it.

‘I was always the studious one,’ he added. ‘You were bigger, stronger and older than me, the one Dad always shouted for when he needed help with anything. So I left.’

Uncle Arthur shook his head slowly. ‘Mam was heartbroken after you left. You were always her favourite.’

‘Was I?’ Dad looked so dejected and my heart melted for him. And bizarrely I knew just what he meant. I’d always felt like the unwanted child; Dad had always seemed to favour Julian. Weird how history seemed to repeat itself.

‘I devoted my working life to the bank.’ Dad hesitated. ‘In fact, I devoted
all
my life to the bank, and now what have I got to show for it, for my
life
? Nothing.’

‘You’ve got me,’ I said quietly, sliding the sugar bowl out of his reach, ‘and Mum.’ Technically he had Julian, too, but I didn’t want to think about him at the moment.

Dad stared at me blankly for a moment and then tutted at himself. ‘I’m sorry. Of course I have. And I’m fully aware that I haven’t been the world’s greatest dad.’

Now
I
was patting his hand.

‘What I mean is … I went in on Friday to collect some paperwork and there was a new chap at my desk. No one even looked up. I’d been instantly replaced. And after making Paris our home, we get a letter informing us that we need to leave the apartment. Just like that.’ He snapped his fingers.

Mum smiled reassuringly. ‘Darling, that Paris office was tiny when you arrived. Now it’s thriving. And anyway, look on this as an opportunity. A fresh start, time together. Just think – we can have a home! Our
dream
home, somewhere cosy, not some fancy rented place.’

‘That’s just what I said to Artie, Margo, when the herd came down with TB. This is an opportunity!’ cried Auntie Sue.

At that moment Benny the cat jumped on to Mum’s lap and rubbed his head against her chin, as if demonstrating the benefits of a cosy home.

Dad got up from the table and stood, hands on hips, looking out at the view of the fields through the window.