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It was late October and the trees were aflame with autumn colours, an Indian summer blessed with misty mornings, and afternoons drowsy with the perfume of cider and wood smoke. At sunset, the white tendrils of mist crept low over the Levels, leaving the town of Monterose isolated like an island of rosy light, the church clock glinting, the bakery windows golden.
A beam of sun flared through the garden gate into the yard, lighting the delicate face of the stone angel. It glistened with moisture from the final wash-down Freddie had given it. Now he walked round it, looking at it from every angle, his mind ringing with a blend of excitement and satisfaction.
It was finished. Freddie thought it was the best thing he had ever made. He’d seen the angel waiting inside the block of stone, and his hands had brought her alive. She had Kate’s beautiful face, and Kate’s flowing hair. She had praying hands and outstretched curving wings. He didn’t need to show her to anyone. It was enough to have brought her into being with the combined skill of his artistic soul and his careful hands. Everything else he had done in his life was suddenly meaningless, as if this was his life, his reason for living.
Standing in the twilight with one bright star in the smooth sheen of the western sky, Freddie sensed he was not alone. A circle of radiance hung around the stone angel, like an aurora, gently shifting, settling into shapes that he recognised, faces looking in at him: Gra
Freddie nodded at them, dried his hands on a cloth, and stooped to pick up his scattered tools and put them in their wooden box.
A
In the lonely weeks since Kate’s departure he’d focused on the stone carving, and it had lifted him into a different dimension, and while he worked on the angel he was thinking about the other blocks of stone he had accumulated. He knew exactly what he was going to carve from each one, the images catalogued in his mind. Owls, squirrels, foxes, eagles, dolphins, he wanted to try them all, and right at the end of his list he pla
Finishing the angel was like coming to the end of an epic novel which had taken weeks to read. Without it, there was an awkward space in his mind, and the complications of his life came diving and swooping like returning swallows. He picked up Kate’s last letter and read it, frowning. It was shorter than usual, and she hadn’t said anything about his pla
But first something had to be done about his mother. Freddie sat thinking in the candlelight, and one person kept popping up in his mind. She’d always taken an interest in him, encouraged him with whatever he was doing, and, he thought suddenly, her husband was a doctor! Freddie put on his coat and cap, and stepped out into the moonlit street. With long, decisive strides he headed up the hill to the Old Coach House with the new electric lights shining from its windows. He opened the wrought iron gate, took a deep breath, and knocked on Joan Jarvis’s door.
Chapter Seventeen
THE ROAD TO LYNESEND
Freddie pushed the heavy motorbike onto the waiting ferry boat, his stomach tight with nerves as he eyed the foaming clay-brown river water slopping at the edges of the ramp. He parked the bike and went to stand at the front of the broad boat which rocked and creaked on the tide.
‘Last trip today,’ shouted the ferryman. ‘There’s rough weather coming in.’
Freddie peeled off the woollen balaclava A
When he saw the sunlight on the water Freddie remembered Kate’s vivid description of the sea. He took the black velvet box out of his i
‘You go now, lad – before those storms come in,’ he’d warned. ‘You don’t want to be stuck on top of the Mendips in the snow, do you?’
Freddie had been in a dinghy a few times across the winter floods on the Levels, but to him this Severn ferry boat was awesome. The throb of its engine under his boots, the ageing, sea-soaked timber, the fat ropes, the rusting cabin. He was unprepared for the savage power of the tide, the way it swept the heavy boat sideways as if it were a bobbing walnut shell. Used to listening to the sound of an engine, he could hear this one labouring against the current and sense the tension of the boat’s structure. Looking at the other passengers, he was reassured to see that nobody seemed worried. People were laughing and talking while he had been holding his breath.
Safe on the other side, he paused on the jetty to study his map and rearrange his clothing. He would have liked to sit and watch the flocks of geese dipping and swerving over the river, their barking cries like a cantata on the wind. But it was too cold to keep still. He pulled his mud-caked balaclava over his head, glad that it covered most of his face. His goggles were mud-spattered too, from the rough ride over the Mendips, through Bristol, and down to the estuary, and he thought his face would be covered in mud too. Kate would think that very fu
Ahead of him the wooded hills of the Forest of Dean were bulked against the sky, appearing and disappearing through the masses of low rain-bearing cloud. The north wind whooshed in his ears, barbs of sleet stung his cheeks. Soon his hands and feet were numb, his knees and elbows ached, and he could feel his cold lips cracking. Determined to reach Lynesend before the weather closed in, he pushed on, the motorbike bouncing and splashing over the puddled road. He thought longingly of Kate’s family, the warm kitchen and the cups of cocoa Sally used to give him with a dollop of scalded cream on the top, and sometimes Kate would wink at him and add a dash of rum. The memory of her smile illuminated his journey along the shores of the Severn, and the feel of the little velvet box in his pocket kept him going. The anticipation of seeing her again burned in his heart like a lantern.