Where the West Wind Blows (6 page)

We are two of a kind.

If he were anyone else I would reach out and take his hand but he is Mr McAlister, and on many levels he
terrifies
me.

“The people in the village, do they know what really happened?”

He snorts. “They don’t give a shit. They hear the scandal, but they are blind to the bloody tragedy of it.”

“I don’t think they can help it. People just don’t understand grief. They
can’t
understand. Even though its something we all share and will all suffer at some point, we can’t ever know how it feels …not until it happens to us and we lose someone.”

“Aye.” He sniffs, rubs his hand over his face again and fumbles for his flask. This time, when he offers it, I almost snatch it from him. Overcome with embarrassment that I have just, in an oblique way, pointed out the similarities between us, I drink deeply, too deeply.

The whisky burns the back of my throat and I splutter, my eyes watering. He thumps me on the back while I turn red in the face, eyes streaming. Then, when I am recovered, I smile my thanks.

“Walk with me,” he says, taking me by surprise.

“Where?” I ask, although I am already following him across the beach, the prints of my footsteps in the sand tiny beside his.

“Along here a way. I want to show you something.”

As we head north along the sand he doesn’t talk much but he stops now and again to help me over the rockier places, his huge rough skinned hand engulfing mine. I have never ventured this far along the shore because I’ve always been afraid of being cut off by the returning tide. For the first time the thought strikes me as suddenly absurd in someone who has so longed for death.

At the foot of the spit of land the locals refer to as
Y Pen
he stops and urges me to look around the curve of the cliff to a stretch of coastline invisible from our cove and, as I look, the sun emerges from behind a cloud, flooding the landscape with light. I draw in my breath. “Oh, my!”

Here, the pastureland dips down to the sea, the hills dotted with sheep and the fields and meadows are golden, green and pink in the sunshine. The cliffs below are marbled grey and black above a stretch of tawny sand that, at this moment, is being buffeted and bullied by a steel blue sea. As my eyes fill with tears the colours merge into an abstract.

“I thought you’d like it. I’ve seen you standing admiring the scenery with your mouth open. This is the best bit of coastline for miles. You can see it better from my boat.”

“It’s certainly the most dramatic I’ve seen,” I agree, “It’s the contrasts. Have I got time to sketch it before the tide turns?”

“Go ahead.” He perches on a wave splashed rock, rolls a cigarette while I begin to make short sharp marks on the page. “Want one?” He offers the roll-up to me but I shake my head. “Filthy habit,” he agrees, “I should really give it up.”

“You should,” I murmur, not taking my eye from the landscape as I rapidly fill the blank page. “It kills you, you know … in the end.”

I risk a glance at him, wondering if he will spot my intended irony. His mouth twitches.

“Aye,” he says and, taking a lighter from his pocket, produces a brief spark and blue smoke engulfs him.

A few days later a rusty wagon comes lumbering along the track and pulls up outside my cottage. I open the front door and lean against the wall as I watch a man in a filthy wax jacket leap from the driver seat.

“’ow’re you?” he says in his deep, local accent as he pulls off his cap. I raise my eyebrows questioningly and he shuffles his feet and looks around the garden, not meeting my eye.

“I’m Huw, I brought the logs.”

“Oh, of course. How silly of me, I’d quite forgotten. Come with me, I’ll show where it is.”

I lead him to the back of the house and show him to the woodshed and he begins to travel to and fro with barrow loads of firewood.  When he has been working for about half an hour I take him out a mug of tea and find him stacking the split logs into a tidy stack. By the time the shed is full I should have enough wood to last me a year.

He pulls off his gloves and takes the cup I am offering, his nails black rimmed, his hands calloused and ingrained with dirt. I wonder why he bothers with gloves. They are the hands of a worker, I think, remembering James’ hands. They had been white with long, sensitive fingers and the only time I ever saw them dirty was if he’d been working with charcoal or pastel.

Huw avoids my eye and, if I was hoping for scintillating conversation, I am sorely disappointed. He sips his tea, winces as it burns his lip, and nods at the sprawl of weeds and brambles. “You could do with a gardener.”

“I know. The garden hasn’t really been a priority. I’ve been busy … working.” I wonder why I am so apologetic. It is my garden after all and it was rude of him to point out its faults. I want him to ask about my work so I can talk about my painting, what inspires me, how it feels to splash paint about with such abandon.

“Oh right,” he says and we stand in silence for a while, the scent of damp soil and wood resin all around us, and in the silence I notice something, probably a rabbit or a blackbird, is rustling in the hedge.

“How is your Grandmother - Mrs Davis?” I ask, for want of something to say.

“Oh, fine. Fine. Still running the shop.”  He drains his cup and hands it to me. “I’d better be getting on.”

Glad to escape, I begin to move along the overgrown path. “Just pop the bill through the letter box if you can’t find me,” I call over my shoulder.

He nods, pulls on his cap and trundles the barrow off toward the wagon. 
He’ll not win any personality contests
, I think as I rinse the cups, watching him through the salty window.

I escape to my studio and work for a while but I feel unsettled, restless, and my usual ability to lose myself in a project eludes me. In the end, I replace the lids on my tubes of paint and clean my brushes, popping them bristles up into a jam jar.

I find Huw bent over in the border, pulling weeds. “What on earth are you doing?”

He stands up. I am not sure if his red face is due to exertion or embarrassment. He dumps the weeds in the barrow and waves an arm at the disarray of the flowers.

“I got carried away,” he says, “I pulled out one and couldn’t stop. I’ve no love of weeds and it could look really pretty by ‘ere. I could do it for you, if you wanted me to.”

The colour in his cheeks doesn’t lessen and I am reminded of a schoolboy caught out in some misdeed.

“I can’t really afford a gardener, Huw. I keep meaning to do it myself, I just haven’t found the time…”

“Oh, I don’t want paying,
bach
. I’ll do it as a favour, we are neighbours, after all.”

“Are we?”

“Ooh, Yes.” His voice is as soft as the Welsh rain as he comes closer and points up the valley to a corrugated gable among the treetops. “That’s my place there, such as it is.”

“Really? I had no idea.” In fact, I’d not given a thought to who might live there and I’d hardly spared Huw a thought at all apart from remembering to phone to order my winter fuel. 

“Shall I finish off, then?”

“Finish off? What, the garden? Oh, I – I don’t know …it doesn’t seem right.”

“It’s no trouble. I like weeding. I’ve some hydrangea cuttings at home that would go lovely in the dry shade under the hedge there.”

For the first time he looks directly at me and I can’t help but smile. He looks so wistful, so eager to please, like a puppy. I don’t want the bloody garden doing but he is practically begging. How can I refuse?

“Ok, ok,” I say, raising my arms and letting them fall again, “just as long as you know I can’t pay you. But don’t go doing anything too fancy, I like it a bit untidy. Relaxed, you know?”

“Oh, yes, I know. It’s how I prefer it too. No regimented rows of French marigolds, then?” He smiles at me and I realise he is making a joke and I hear myself give a false laugh. At first I’d thought him approaching retirement age but he is not as old as he at first seemed. His face is long and two deep lines that run either side of his nose fan out to become ellipses about his wide, honest smile. If he would only maintain eye contact long enough, I imagine his eyes would be green or maybe blue. He cannot be much past forty although his clothes and manner are those of a much older man. He pushes back a lock of dark hair and pulls his hat low over his brow before reaching out for another handful of couch grass.

So, in the weeks that follow, I often find Huw doubled over in the garden, rain or sun and, slowly but surely, the garden takes on some semblance of order. Apart from taking him tea and biscuits twice a day, I don’t see much of him. I keep to my studio and in between my long, tiring walks, I paint with a fury.

The next time we pass on the cliff path Mr McAlister nods toward the cottage where Huw has started a small bonfire, burning the clippings from the hedge. “You’ve an admirer I see.”

I let out a huff of irritation, sure he says things to wind me up on purpose but I refuse to be baited.

“Huw?” I answer breezily, “He is such a nice, gentle man. He’s doing a splendid job of the garden and won’t take a penny in payment but I gave him a sketch last week, in way of thanks.”

“Oh aye, and did he know which way up it was supposed to go.”

“Actually it was an abstract and there was no right or wrong way. It’s all in the eye of the beholder.”

“Hmm.” He has no answer to that and I bid him good day and start to walk away but, before I have taken more than a few steps, he calls after me. “I’m out in my boat this evening, would you like to join me?”

I turn back, briefly contemplating the thrill of a spume soaked boat trip with a dangerous man like him. It is a tempting offer but, still piqued by his innuendo about Huw, I continue to walk backwards, the wind blowing my hair across my face, the back of my head exposed to the cold. I have no intention of letting him see how taken aback I am by the invitation.

“No, I don’t think so,” I call back, “I’ve made other plans.” I am some way from him when his laughter floats after me but I do not look back although I know he is watching.

Of course, I don’t really have ‘other plans.’ I never have plans. My time for nights out has passed, I will grow old here, a solitary witness of a thousand lonely sunsets. It’s a sobering thought. Shoving my hands in my pockets I carry along the path with my wellies squeaking on the wet, rabbit cropped grass.

***

I have just dried my hair after a shower when I hear a scratching at the door and, running down stairs, I open it to find Huw hurrying away down the garden path toward his van.

“Huw?” He stops and turns sheepishly toward me and I notice he has combed his hair into a tidy parting. “Did you want something?”

“Oh, no, no …I thought you were out.” He is backing away and I step into the garden, look up at the sky where the silver moon hangs like a Christmas bauble in the navy sky.

“Why did you knock then?”

“It’s a lovely night for a change.”

“Yes, I was beginning to think it would rain forever.”

He pauses at the gate. “We do have good weather in Wales sometimes.” He joins me in staring at the sky. “And when we do have it, there’s not a place on earth I’d rather be.”

We exchange smiles. “Yes, I can understand that.”

Silence hovers, our eyes sliding about the garden, avoiding each other. I wait for him to say something, something I’m not at all sure I want to hear.

“I was wondering …” His teeth appear momentarily on his bottom lip, strong yellowish teeth that are slightly overlapping. I capture his eyes, compelling him to speak out or shut up.

“Yes?” 

He takes a deep breath, the lapels on his best jacket opening and closing.

“I was wondering if you fancied coming to the pub …for a drink?”

Where on earth did he find the courage for this?
I wonder. “What now? This evening? With you?”

He shakes his head, backs away again. “You’re probably busy, it’s no problem, I just wondered …” His voice trails off and his hands creep up and into his trouser pockets. I look down at his polished brogues gleaming, his socks so white they must have just come from the packet. Poor Huw, he’s made a real effort.

“Ok, just wait while I get changed.”

What are you doing?
I berate myself as I pull on clean jeans and a fresh t-shirt. I know I’ve let myself in for a night of gnawing boredom in some spit and sawdust dive.  I drag a comb through my hair, the teeth dragging on tangles as I try to tame it.  In the bottom of the wardrobe I find a pair of pink sandals, unworn since London and I push my feet into them. My toes, used to the spaciousness of wellingtons and trainers, feel cramped and trapped but, ignoring the discomfort, I grab my bag and go downstairs.

Huw is still in the garden, perched on the stone gatepost, his arms folded as he looks across the bay. When he hears me close the door he stands up and offers me his arm. I can’t believe I am tiptoeing along the familiar path with soft mud oozing over the sides of my pink sandals, arm in arm with Huw the Log.

Is this a date?
I wonder.

I do hope not.

“Pint of bitter, please Dai, and a tonic water for the lady.”  He is proud to be seen with me. I smile at the barman, grab the glass and bottle and retreat to a table in the window.  The Ship Inn is as quiet as the grave. Two boys, too young to drink, play pool, the gentle click of the balls providing the only sound in the sleepy bar. By the fire an old man dozes, his beer going flat and warm while, at the other end of the bar, Dai retreats to his newspaper and begins to turn the pages.

Huw smiles at me, raises his tankard. “Cheers,” he says and I mirror his movement, lifting my tumbler, the ice chinking against the sides of the glass.

“Cheers.” We drink in silence, the flashing lights of the lonely fruit machine reflecting in the dark windows. Huw sucks foam from his top lip while I look desperately around the pub for inspiration. I wish a crowd would stumble in the door and start making a racket. If the bar was noisy we’d be spared the need to wrack our brains for something to say.

“Where do you get all your wood from?” What? Am I really asking a question like that?
God help me get out of here
.

“Oh, hereabouts.” He puts down his glass and places a hand on his knee, straightening his back importantly. “I’ve a chainsaw licence and if a local person has a tree they want taking down, I charge a little less in exchange for the felled timber. Of course, sometimes they have their own solid fuel fire and want to keep it, so then I has to charge them extra for splitting and stacking the logs in the shed.”

“Oh.” I don’t know what else to say. It is beyond my capabilities to pretend that his job is interesting. I long for James, suddenly missing his vibrant creativity so much. How he would laugh to see me here with a strange man like Huw.

“You’ve lived here all your life then?”

“Oh yes. Though once, I went to Spain. Didn’t like it at all, it was far too hot for me.”

I have the sudden image of Huw and Mrs Davis sitting on striped deckchairs on a Spanish beach, Huw has a knotted hanky on his head, his trousers rolled up to his knees. Mrs Davis is still in her raincoat, with her handbag clutched on her lap. I hide my smile
.

“Have you been?”

“Where?”

“Spain.”

“Oh, yes. James, my husband, liked
Andalucia; we went a few times on painting holidays. We had a Spanish exhibition once. It was very successful.”

Go on, I think, ask me about my life, about my work.
But it doesn’t occur to him.

“Oh, that must have been lovely.”

“Yes, it was.”

Silence falls again and I look about the bar, still seeking something to stimulate conversation but there is nothing. Even the walls are bare, apart from a yellowing schedule for the darts tournament and a poster with details of a coach trip to Bangor that had taken place in June.

As the evening progresses Huw slowly consumes three pints of beer. I shake my head when he asks if I would like a third glass of tonic. Already I feel full of gas, another glass would be fatal.  It is just nine-thirty when Huw finally puts his glass on the bar and suggests it is time we left. I let out a silent sigh of relief.