There is a madness in the air. The land has hurled itself into spring with a kind of reckless abandonment, like a young lover careless of all consequences. Everything is growing, faster than I can keep up with. There’s a feral whiff of sex in the air too, musky and earthy. When I walked along to Farm late one afternoon, I noticed a new addition in the field nearest the house: a bull, thickset, solid, burnished reddish-brown. Its bulk was so dense it made me think of black holes, or whatever it is in the universe that is so compact, so heavy, that it sucks everything else into it. I could see the muscles bunched under its taut skin and my eyes fell inevitably to the tuft of hair on its belly and to the enormous penis that hung like a bell-pull, dragged down by gravity. I felt a tingling in my breasts, a tightening in my groin, and with a flash remembered when, as a young girl, I would watch the bull mounting a cow, its hips bunching and thrusting. It had excited me. How ridiculous.
Thick breath on my neck. ‘Fine bit of flesh, eh?’
I spun round, feeling the flush rise from my chest to my face.
‘Badger. You startled me.’
‘Getting more cows see? Her idea. Came from old man Hardling. E’ll do the business. Look at the balls on ‘im.’
‘I thought it was all done by artificial insemination nowadays,’ I said, immediately wishing I could take the words back, looking swiftly away across the field, more nettles and docks than grass.
‘Don’t hold with that. Not natural is it? No, you need a bit of the old jiggery-pokery.’ And he raised his hands, square and thick, the fingers tinged yellow from tobacco, and thrust his solid thumb in and out of a ring made with the index finger and thumb of his other hand. My cheeks burned.
“Well, I must get on with my walk. Give my love to Hazel.’
‘Love eh?’ He laughed coarsely. ‘You don’ wanna love ‘er.’ I turned and walked off as briskly as I could, feeling his eyes following my hips down the road.

When I got back, I found Ben in the kitchen, finishing off grouting the tiles. He smiled easily and I felt my heart give a flutter as I caught sight of his arms, bulkier than Aidan’s but strong and with that easy tan of olive skin.
‘Looking good.’
‘Nearly done.’ He rubbed in a final line of grout and stepped back.
‘I’m happy. Are you?’
‘More than happy. It’s fabulous.’
‘I’ll get on my way then. See you in the morning.’
‘Yes, sure.’ I paused.
‘You OK?’
‘Yes. I was just wondering….do you fancy a glass of something?’
‘I should be going. I’ve left Monty at home.’
‘It’s organic.’ I don’t know why I said that. I laughed and he gave a broad grin.
‘Oh, OK. So it doesn’t get you drunk?’
‘Well, it’s supposed not to give you such a bad hangover. No conveners or whatever.’
‘So….’ He paused and then shrugged and picked up two glasses and moved over to the new French doors.
‘Are we intending to get drunk so we can test out the theory?’
I shrugged in return. ‘Why not? I’ve got a case of the stuff.’
We drank the first bottle very quickly. I’d never seen Ben do anything so hastily before – usually he moves through life in a strictly measured way.
‘Shall I get another bottle?’
‘No, better not,’ he said, his voice a tone lower than usual. He looked uncertain and a little uncertainty in a strong man is a very attractive trait.

I leaned towards him. He looked at me and I couldn’t break his gaze. I tried to think of Aidan. I tried to remember that I was married but, at that moment, all I wanted in the world was to feel his arms around me, to taste that smooth olive skin. A slight frown thickened around his forehead. I drew back, trying to read him. Then, as if on cue, a voice came chiming from the front door.
‘Helloooo. Anyone there?’
Judith. Well, who else would have such impeccable timing?


Thank God she came when she did. What was I thinking of? I go cold, imagining what would have happened if we’d kissed, if we’d gone to bed. Judith looked mightily disappointed that she hadn’t found us in a compromising situation. A juicy bit of gossip like that would have made her year. She was collecting for something or other and I shoved a fiver in her tin and bundled her off, ignoring her pointed glances at the wine bottle and strong hints about it being a warm evening.
‘I must be going,’ said Ben, smiling tautly.
‘Of course.’
He was almost out of the door when he stopped. For one moment I thought he was going to change his mind, ask to stay. I felt panic rising up in my throat.
‘Ben…’ I put out my hand, palm facing him, as if to warn him off.
‘No, no…it’s just that I meant to say….. I brought that cradle down. I thought I might give it a quick clean.’
I froze. Did he know?
‘I’m not sure I want it, Ben. I thought I might sell it.’
He looked stunned. ‘But it’s living history. It belongs to this house.’
‘I don’t like it.’
‘I know what you mean,’ he said thoughtfully, ‘when I cleaned the carving I found something really strange. Come and look.’

Reluctantly I followed him into the sitting room. The cradle sat, squat, like a toad, in the centre of the rug. Maybe it was my imagination but the atmosphere seemed heavy, thick.
‘Look here. I don’t know if it is some kind of mistake. It must be.’
I bent down and saw immediately what he meant.
Now the grime had been cleared from the inscription you could see a distinct line between the R and the Y making the wording stray somewhat from the biblical quotation.
The cot now read: ‘Suffer – ye little children.’
‘Ugh, that’s horrible.’
‘I know. But it can’t have been intentional, can it?’
‘I don’t know. But I don’t want it here.’

He looked puzzled and I fought the urge to tell him everything. But how do you admit that you’re infertile to a man you’ve so nearly kissed? I shook my head and moved away from the crib.
‘Well, it’s yours to do with as you wish. It’s a nice piece though. Would fetch a fair price, I’d think.’
And with a brisk smile, he turned and went.

The sitting room felt horrible. I couldn’t relax in there with the crib. Every time I sat down and tried to read I could feel it there, at the periphery of my vision. Once or twice I thought I heard a creak, imagined I saw it starting to rock. But of course there was nothing. I couldn’t face touching it either, to move it out of the way. I couldn’t shake off the idea that it was evil, contaminated.
So I sat in the kitchen instead.

The scrabbling was getting worse. Starting earlier. It was no longer confined to the attic either – it now seemed as though the walls were seething with life. Chewing, scratching, biting. It was horrible. Rommel was becoming more and more reluctant to be in the house. Left to himself, he’d sit outside the front door. When I called him in, he would creep, belly low to the ground, ears flat back, tail (what there was of it) squashed between his legs).
I turned the music up louder to drown out the sound. Roxy Music – uplifting, bright, breezy. The Cure and Joy Division were too gloomy, far too reminiscent of my mood. I ought to have eaten something but my appetite was vanishing. Instead I opened the other bottle of red.

I am drinking too much. I know that. Initially I found it helped with my sleeping. It stopped the dreams and would hurl me into oblivion with a blessed speed. But it’s not as effective as it was now. I’ll go to sleep alright but will wake a few hours later, heart pounding, thoughts whirring. By then the noises would be nearly deafening. It felt like at any moment they would break out from the walls and spill into the room, a moving tide of dark fur.
So I’ve started taking sleeping tablets. Aidan has a constant prescription and he’d left a packet behind. I suppose I should go to the doctor’s but the surgery is about seven miles away and I don’t want to ask anyone for a lift. Anyway, I don’t think there is anything really wrong with me. Just stress. Why am I such a fool? I should call a cab and get on the next train up to town. Make it up with Aidan. Sell this bloody house and everything in it.

Aidan has barely been here. I’m not sure I care really. Except that the dreams are worse when he’s not here. Ben has nearly finished the kitchen and it’s fabulous. He doesn’t say anything but he must know that my husband has, to all intents and purposes, abandoned me here. He’ll offer me a trip to the supermarket on the pretext that he has to get something or other from the builders’ merchants. Sometimes I catch myself staring at him. How ridiculous.
Since I heard about my ‘condition’ I haven’t seen so much of Jane. I’ve been avoiding her and I know she’s hurt. She doesn’t understand what she’s done wrong. How can I tell her that what she’s done wrong is to have a happily family; how can I tell her that to see her hug her children would feel like being stabbed through the heart right now?
Instead I’ve been splitting my spare time between Camilla and Hazel. Hazel and I garden mainly, or tramp the hills checking on sheep. We don’t talk much and it’s soothing being with someone who doesn’t ask questions, who doesn’t demand explanations. Occasionally she’ll break the silence and give me some gem of local folklore or nugget of gossip, but usually from way back in time.
‘That farm there,’ she said, pointing to a burned-out shell, ‘belonged to a man wanted to build a caravan park here.’ She laughed shortly.
‘What happened?’
‘He got drunk one night and burnt him to the ground. They reckons it was a cigarette started it.’
‘How horrible.’
‘Not really. Thought it was a blessing, meself. Nasty bit of work. He’d have concreted over all those fields. Big road threading through.’
‘Well, OK, I can see that wouldn’t have been good. But burning to death?’
She didn’t seem to see it remotely. I begin to think she sees people as totally expendable if they step out of line. Just as she won’t think twice about wringing the neck of a hen that stops laying, and popping it in the pot. I don’t think people count that much to her. She sees animals as having much more use, of being far more worthy of her care and attention.
Camilla is another story. Her home is beautiful, a manor house but not remotely offputting. It’s low-slung and long, even more ancient than our own house and with more detailing in the stonework and a grander porch to mark its precedence. Behind the house is a large cobbled yard, with beautiful old stables, carefully renovated (yes, Ben’s work), each stall with an alert head poking out, nuzzling one another or stamping impatiently. I have rediscovered riding, the sheer joy and freedom of it. Camilla lends me a chestnut mare, a neat trim horse with a definite touch of Arab in her. She’s called Trinity and I’m more than half in love with her. She is kind and sensible, no silly tricks, no rolling eyes. Yet take her up onto the moor and give her her head and she kicks up her heels and flies over the short grass, in love with speed, ears pricked, tail aloft like a banner.
Sometimes I ride alone and I find it soothing. I keep mainly to the bridleways, finding my way around this place, getting my interior map in place. You see things on a horse you’d never see on foot. One day we passed within maybe ten feet of a herd of deer, quietly cropping the grass. They looked up, gauged we were no risk and carried on.

Other times Camilla joins me and we explore more widely – she shows me the shortcuts and where the local farmers are happy for us to cut across their fields and woodlands. She’s a lovely person, softly spoken and quite retiring. Unlike Hazel, she doesn’t gossip at all, won’t say bad things about anyone. Used as I have been to sharp London tongues, it’s refreshing to hear someone try always to find the best in others. There is something else though that really bonds me to her. She too wanted children – very much – but it never happened. Ashley, her husband, refused to have any investigations carried out – seemed he wasn’t too bothered. I found myself getting indignant – what about what Camilla wanted? But she smiled gently (though sadly) and said they had found themselves other distractions. Horses for her and for him the development of a small but select shoot and various business interests that took him to London and abroad at regular intervals.
‘I don’t mind,’ she said with a smile. ‘He’s gregarious. I’m not. He needs more company, more sophistication than he gets here.’
‘But what about you?’
‘I hate London. And I’m phobic about flying. I don’t want to go. I don’t need the….stimulation.’
There was a note in her voice that urged confidences. I looked at her and nodded my head… ‘And?’
‘And yes, he does.’ An unusual shard of bitterness soured her voice. ‘Yes, he has a mistress. He’s had dozens of them over the years.’
I couldn’t help the sharp intake of breath. I wasn’t surprised but her matter-of-face acceptance was surprising.
‘You don’t mind?’
‘Of course I mind. Well, I did. Now I’m not sure if I care or not. Anyhow, nothing to be done. Fancy a canter up this hill?’
She pulled in her reins, turned her big bay and set off at a crisp trot before breaking into an easy canter.

I went to church. I really didn’t think I would, not without Aidan there to chivvy me. But I found myself, nonetheless, walking in a stiff wind, skirt flapping round my legs like a flag.
Maura was there, looking pale and drained. Next to her was an unhealthy-looking man: bow-chested, long lank fair hair pulled back into a ponytail. Long black coat so I couldn’t see the infamous hips. He spent the entire service tapping on his mobile.
Camilla was there too, also with her (I assume) husband. A tall man in a smart tweed jacket and pressed cords. Good-looking, without a shadow of a doubt, but with thin lips that curled occasionally into a sardonic hint of a smile, as if he were thinking of something amusing, some wry joke. Occasionally he’d let his eyes rove over the congregation, as if looking for distraction, amusement. He caught my eye and held it a moment too long. Then raised his eyebrow ever so slightly and that curl of the lip again. One of those then. Poor Camilla.
I had realised, as I walked briskly along the lane, that I was coming to church to pray. Or to try to. I’m not a religious person but many people seem to find comfort in God, from joining others in a church, so I thought I would at least give it a try. But there was no solace there for me. I felt painfully aware of my body, not my soul. I felt the harsh itchy wool of the hassock as we knelt; I felt the chill of the old building not remotely touched by the calor gas heaters squatting in the aisles. My nose sniffed the habitual musty damp mingled with incense and the sweet sickly scent of lilies – tradition had obviously won out.
It was, if I’m not mistaken, Palm Sunday. But there were no processions of small children waving palms or other greenery.

When the service ended I dodged away, head firmly down, escaping from the mindless chit-chat; ignoring hands raised, my name being called. I trotted as fast as I could down the lane, slipping through a fence and cutting across the fields (wrecking my boots) rather than run the risk of being overtaken, offered a lift.

Back home, the house closed in on me like a shroud. I gave Rommel his food and wondered how to spend the afternoon. I tried calling some of my London friends, but it all seemed a bit pointless. I didn’t want to talk about the baby business and I didn’t really want to hear about their latest deals or wild parties or successes. I could hear, in their voices, the almost pity of those ‘in the know’, in the swim of things, when talking to one who has fallen out of the loop. If I didn’t return to London soon, I would have to start my life there almost from the start. It depressed me even more.

I was just contemplating whether to eat baked beans or scrambled eggs on toast for Sunday lunch when there was a knock on the door. Rommel behaved weirdly – instead of either hurling himself at the door in a kind of ‘let me at ‘em’ way or wagging his tail furiously, he slunk back, ears flat against his head. Not scared exactly, but cautious. Who on earth was it?
I opened the door warily, already making up excuses for why I couldn’t do this or join that. But no need. It was Eden, the strange jackdaw of a woman from the hut in the forest.
‘Oh, hello.’
She just looked appraisingly.
‘Would you like to come in?’ Well, what else could I say?
‘No, thank you. I can’t trespass in Epiphany. It is not my place.’
There was a dog at her heel: slim, sandy-coloured with pricked up ears. It stared at me as if it were reading my soul. I had to drop my ears from its gaze, very disconcerting.
‘I thought you would come to see me. I’ve been waiting.’ Her voice was low.
I almost blurted out that I had, indeed, been to see her house. But kept quiet. She gave a twisted smile, as she knew exactly what I had and hadn’t done.
‘My house is safe.’
‘What do you mean, ‘safe’?’
She shrugged.
‘Walls listen. Walls watch.’
‘I beg your pardon? There’s nobody here.’ I paused. ‘Except the rats of course.’
‘Rats?’
‘Rats. They keep me awake half the night.’
‘There are no rats at Epiphany. Your dog would have sorted that.’
‘Well, whatever. Look, you said there was something you had to talk to me about, that day in the village hall. What was it?’
She looked around her, as if waiting for something to pounce on her from the shadows. The dog watched too, as if guarding her back. They gave me the creeps.
‘We can’t talk here. Come to my house. It’s….’
‘Safe. Yes, I know. But I can’t. I’ve….’ I paused… ‘got lunch cooking.’
She tilted her head, as if sniffing the air.
‘Well, we’ll walk a little then.’
I should have told her to get lost but I was intrigued, so I pulled on a jacket and boots and followed her. She wore misery like a cloak; an aura of doom and darkness that swished around her as she walked. For some time we walked in silence. I wasn’t going to make small talk; wasn’t going to make it easy for her.
Eventually we reached the river bank and she stopped. Bent down and picked up a piece of wild garlic. Chewed it. Then bent again and picked a bunch, tucking it carefully into a small canvas bag slung across her rake thin body.
It was on the tip of my tongue to say that this was my river, my wild garlic, but I knew just what she’d say – that it was its own, belonging to no-one, and I suppose she would have a point. Hazel had been getting to me with her green ideas – about how we borrow the earth, how we should learn to live in harmony with the wild. Quite the little eco-warrior, our Hazel.
She stood, staring at the river and spoke swiftly, in a low deep voice.
‘This is not a good place to have children. You should know that. I sense you want children. I sense things.’
I took a step back. Anger flushed my face red. I fought to control my words.
‘Er, it’s none of your business whether I want children or whether I have children or whether I don’t.’
‘This place is my business. Children are my business.’
How dare she? After what she’d done with Maura. I was so angry I could barely spit the words out.
‘Look, if it makes you happy, there won’t be any bloody children. OK?’
She looked at me sharply. Clearly she hadn’t expected that response. In some small faraway part of myself I felt pleased, as if I’d scored a point.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean what I say. There won’t be any children. I can’t have children. Happy?’
I willed the tears to stay away; focused on the anger to keep me strong, glaring at her. I saw all manner of emotions flit across her face, or so it seemed: surprise, shock, puzzlement, pity, relief?
‘I’m sorry. I truly am. But are you sure?’
‘Quite sure.’
‘I’m surprised. But, my dear, it is for the best, truly it is. I was going to warn you to leave. But,’ she shrugged again, her shoulders sticking up through the thin fabric of her coat, ‘Maybe it’s not necessary. Maybe it will pass over this time.’
‘What will pass over? What are you talking about?’
‘The curse. Maybe this time it doesn’t need to happen.’
And, without any farewells, any more conversation, she pulled her coat around her like a pantomime villain and stalked off into the woods.

For the last few days Aidan and I have been circling each other warily, like dogs, hackles half-raised, unsure whether to fight or accept. He kept to his room, to his computer and phone while I worked outside, trying to lose myself in the quiet earth.
There was a message from Dr F’s office on the phone, asking if we would like to make an appointment for counselling. I pressed Delete. I didn’t tell Aidan.
Jane called but I put her off, declining an invitation to Sunday lunch. I know I’ll have to deal with it some time but not now, not yet. I’m not ready to watch people play Happy Families, to witness the careless caress of a head, the perfect small fingers of children entwining through older hands. Instead I spent my spare time with Hazel.
There was something soothing about it, knowing she wouldn’t pry, wouldn’t offer false comfort. She didn’t. There was no sitting around moping over the kitchen table; she put me to work. I relearned old skills and learned some new ones too. I helped her fix gaps in the hedges, mend fences, chainsaw fallen trees. Lambing was over and we would check up on the straggle-legged lambs bobbing about the fields, watched keenly by Erin and Shee.

Badger barely lifted a finger. He seemed to spend most of his day in the barn or down the pub. Occasionally he’d head off to check the sheep, whistling the dogs to him. He had his own names for them – Meg and Jep – and they shrank, cowed, towards him – obedience warring with the deepest reluctance and fear.

Come dusk he’d set a light on his quad and head off, shotgun over the handlebars, to ‘lamp’ for foxes. Hazel shuddered and I would make my excuses and head home, for another supper of cold cuts or spaghetti with shop-bought sauce. The fire was left unlit – the cold and silent hearth.

Ben worked quietly, unobtrusively, picking up on the atmosphere as if by osmosis. I hadn’t the heart to tell him we might not stay, that all his hard work and loving care could be enjoyed (or ripped apart) by some other people.
He had found the crib in the attic and started talking about it. Something about the inscription. But then, noticing my face, had stopped. He’s a sensitive man, an observant man. He quietly and deftly changed the subject and started talking animatedly about the warbler on the bird feeder, pointing out the window, allowing me to regain my composure, to hastily wipe away the traitorous tears.

Spring comes late here but, once started, there is no stopping it. Everything is new, fresh, thrusting, bursting out, pushing up, eager for birth, for life. The irony is not lost on me.
I try to lose myself in the evenings in a good book. I am glad I’ve finished The Stolen Child with its changeling children banished to the woods, with its vulnerable babies. I’ve started Louise Erdrich’s The Painted Drum and it seems to fit my mood – introspective, melancholic. So far it has no babies in it, only ravens and mad dogs and strange, uncommunicative relationships.
This morning I woke up alone. It’s not unusual: Aidan has been sleeping in the so-called guest room – not that it’s had any guests. But this morning, the moment I awoke, I knew immediately that he had gone. Rommel and I were alone in the house (apart from the rats/mice/whatever).
There was some quality of the air that told me so. Sure enough, there was a terse note on the kitchen table.
‘Gone back to London. Will call. A.’

I wasn’t sure if I should go to the Knitting Circle or not. It was such a stunning day that I really wanted to crack on in the garden. Also, while Aidan was here, I thought I might persuade him to take a run out to a garden centre. I needed tools and seeds and, well….gardening things. I suppose I felt a bit of a need to shop.
But Aidan frowned when I suggested it over breakfast and said he’d be tied up pretty much all day. I tried to lose myself in the garden but I couldn’t stop thinking about what he’d said. Move back to London?
I should be over the moon. So why was I feeling, well, depressed? I was sitting on the bench, watching a fat thrush tugging at a worm, when I heard a car drawing up outside. Jane marched round with a menacing look on her face.
‘You’re not thinking of bunking off?’
‘Hmm, well….it’s a lovely day and I’ve got tons to do.’
‘Looks like it,’ she said, casting a beady eye on me, the bench, the clearly unturned earth. ‘Come on. Grab your stuff. You need some company.’
‘But Aidan’s here.’
‘Exactly. Go on. Hurry up.’
Lord she was bossy.

It was a much diminished group. No Maura, for which I was profoundly grateful. No Judith, which was surprising but, as it turned out, really a blessing. Without her bossiness, everyone loosened up and Camilla really came into her own. She possesses a wry, sardonic sense of humour and a very fine intellect, marred only by a crushing lack of self-esteem. Her passion, it turns out, is her horses.
‘Do you ride?’ she asked.
There was a tone on the word ‘ride’ that reminded me of my youth, when the question actually meant ‘do you hunt?’
‘My mother was joint-master of foxhounds,’ I said, which didn’t really answer any question. But Camilla obviously understood for she smiled right up to her eyes.
‘I’ll lend you a horse. It’s good riding country. No hedges, not much jumping, but challenging, very challenging.’
I thanked her and said I might just take her up on that offer. What a funny thought. How would it feel to get up on a horse after all these years?

On the whole, the conversation was light and pleasant. I realised, as I walked home (having turned down the offer of a lift from Jane) that I hadn’t once thought about Aidan and London. But, as I looked at the banks - bursting with green, young nettles and cleavers and aconite like starbursts – it all came crowding back to me. I was confused. Move back to London?
Isn’t it funny what a difference a month makes? If he’d said it even a fortnight ago, I’d have bitten his hand off with impatience. But now? I wasn’t sure. The house was coming together. It still didn’t feel entirely ‘mine’; still had uneasy corners, snags of discord, as if it still clutched onto old dark secrets. But what old house doesn’t have its secrets, its dark moments? Ben was teaching me patience. Showing me that you can’t just race in, that slash and burn isn’t the way with old houses. You have to nibble at the edges, to tease out the problems, like softly untangling yarn. I was no longer in such a rush. I wanted to discover its past, but slowly, cautiously, one stitch at a time.
The garden was all mine though and I loved it. Could I bear not to see my flowers bloom? Not eat the vegetables I was lovingly planting? I was making friends too. Jane of course, but also Camilla, and Ben and even Hazel too, in her funny way. And - how could I have forgotten -
Rommel? He wasn’t a city dog. He couldn’t live cooped up in an apartment, go for walkies in some neat urban park. Could I abandon him?

Aidan was closeted in his office when I got back. I could hear his voice, raised, on the phone. Angry. Barely containing his temper in fact. I retreated quietly to the kitchen and started preparing lunch. Ten minutes or so later he stormed in.
‘Bloody idiots. All bloody incompetent.’ He was white with rage.
‘What’s up hon?’
‘You wouldn’t bloody understand,’ he snapped, slamming his hand on the table.
‘I’m not a fool, Aidan.’ I was surprised at how sharp my voice sounded. So, I think, was Aidan.
‘I’m not saying you are, darling. It’s just….it’s complicated.’
‘Try me.’
‘Boring, darling, boring. It’s nothing I can’t sort out once we’re back in London.’
A deep shaft of sunlight was ploughing a furrow of light across the flagstones, dust motes dancing in its path. Rommel was curled up by the Aga, giving every appearance of sleep but with ears pricked, slightly twitching at the shifts in our voices.
‘I’m not sure I want to go.’
‘What?’
‘I thought you’d be pleased. You’ve wanted this so much. I think we need to give it a bit longer. A year at least. I don’t want to give up so easily.’
‘A year?’ He virtually spat it out. ‘But you hate it.’
I shrugged, feeling a little foolish.
‘Maybe I don’t hate it quite so much any more.’
‘This is ridiculous. You’ve been moaning about it ever since we got here.’ He was still angry – I could see it around the corners of his mouth, set hard.
‘I’ve changed my mind. It’s allowed, isn’t it? Anyhow, what about my novel? I’m making really good progress. And what about the babies? I thought we’d agreed this move was about us, about us as a family, about us having babies.’
Aidan glared at me and I couldn’t read his face at all. Then he spat out the most horrible sentence I have ever heard.
‘There won’t be any bloody babies.’


I stared at him in sheer amazement. My hands started shaking.
‘What on earth do you mean?’
He gazed at the floor, plucking at a hang-nail. How funny. Aidan is always so well-groomed, so fastidious – how had he got a hang-nail? How ridiculous that I should notice something so tiny, so inconsequential, so totally trivial at such a horrible, life-changing moment.
Thoughts hurled themselves round my head. I felt sick and dizzy.
‘What do you mean?’ I repeated, my voice sounding cracked and discordant.
He couldn’t meet my eyes. He’d obviously not meant to blurt out what he’d said – but there was no taking back those words.
‘I..er….well.’
‘For God’s sake, Aidan, you have to tell me what you mean. Are you ending it? Are we over? Is that it? You’ve got someone else?’
All those trips to London suddenly seemed clear, crystal clear. I could feel the bile rising, swallowed desperately.
‘No. No. Nothing like that. God no. Row, I love you, you know I do. There’s nobody else. How could you think that?’
‘Well, what did you mean?’
‘I…it’s just…. I don’t know how to tell you this. Well, I had a call from Dr F…’
The fertility specialist.
‘Why?’
‘I went to see him when I was in London. Got him to do some more tests on me.’
‘Lord, Aidan. What did he find?’
‘Nothing, I’m afraid.’
‘But that’s good.’
‘Well…..’
Then he told me. Pulling each word out of a dark dark place, explaining that the doctor had been reviewing our files, rechecking our results and a mistake had been made. I didn’t take it all in; I don’t really want to talk about it. I just watched the shapes his mouth made, found myself thinking about how strange speech is, how curious that we developed it. When I hauled myself back to his words, I understood the bottom line all too well. No wonder he hadn’t meant to blurt it out. No wonder he didn’t want to tell me. Aidan isn’t the problem. I am. The doctor thinks it’s highly unlikely I will ever have children naturally.
‘I don’t believe it. I want to see him. I want more tests.’ My voice was shaking.
‘Of course you do, darling. So do I. We’ll look at it when we go to London. Though we can’t see Dr F for a while yet – he was going off on some conference in Florida.’
I burst into tears. I couldn’t help it, couldn’t stop them. I sobbed and sobbed and sobbed. Aidan tried to comfort me, but he isn’t good at comforting. He dislikes overt displays of extreme emotion.
‘Darling. It’s not the end of the world, truly it isn’t. I know it’s a shock but it’ll be fine. We’ll go back to London, get our old life back. We could think about other options. If it comes to it, we could always adopt.’
‘I don’t want to adopt. I want my own children.’
‘Darling, please.’ But I was sobbing too hard to hear. I thought I’d never stop.

I walked to the very edges of the garden, where the compost heap lies smouldering. Where the nettles muscle in, where the brambles tangle. It’s where the beginnings of cultivation end and the wilderness begins. A threshold, an inbetween place, liminal, neither here nor there. Just how I felt. I burrowed myself into a place in the bank, between the stiff rods of elder; pushing aside the willow. This had once been a dry stone wall, but the moss had long ago claimed it. I poked at it with my toe, peeling off a mat of thick springy green moss. The green was everywhere, trying to take over the entire valley. Grass, moss and lichen raced, almost barging each other aside, to cover stones, branches, bones. Who knew what lay hidden under their green cover?
For some stupid reason I thought about Judith. She moans endlessly about the way everything here goes green. I could hear her voice in my head, high-pitched and strident, droning on about how you could paint your house white the previous summer and it would take on an unmistakable greenish hue by the following spring. Slates on the roof, she grimaced, would be grouted with moss. She had to get the whole place power-hosed at the first hint of sun.
The woman is ludicrous of course, but I had the uneasy feeling that, were I to sit still too long, the moss and lichen would climb up over me, transforming me into a statue of green until I would elide with the hills and became no more.
I heard Aidan’s voice, calling round the house, out into the garden. But I couldn’t see him, couldn’t talk to him. I slunk away, through the fields, like an injured animal going to ground.

I haven’t blogged for a while. I haven’t really been in the mood. Aidan returned unexpectedly from London (is he checking up on me? Have to say the idea flashed through my head). Sorry to disappoint you all but he found me on my knees, up to my elbows in earth, planting all manner of vegetables, pure as a nun at prayer.
I’ve been keeping myself very busy – and find that walking can take you into people’s lives as easily and naturally as child or dog. I have been studiously avoiding the hollow way to Maura’s caravan and the woodland path to Eden’s Hansel and Gretel cottage. I don’t know what the two of them have cooked up, and I really don’t want to know – so I’ve been keeping out of their way until it’s all done and dusted. I just hope Maura doesn’t want to confide in me, to expunge her guilt or whatever. Anyhow, with those two routes barred, I’ve been heading off down the lane and onto the footpaths that lead to and around Farm.
Hazel fascinates me. How can anyone so young be so unworldly? How can she be content with such a limited life, such closed horizons? How can she throw away her youth on someone as uncouth as Badger?
I’ve contrived to ‘bump into’ her several times in the last week and, as politeness demands a brew, have had a few chances to draw her out. It’s hard work. She still won’t talk much and clams up if I try to ask about her relationship or children.
‘Do you want children, Hazel?’ I asked pretending innocence of her story.
‘Me? What will be, will be,’ she said vaguely, gazing at the floor.
‘Well, I suppose you’re very young. There’s plenty of time.’
‘Some creatures are not meant to have young. Some are barren, see.’
‘Crikey, Hazel. You’re not a ewe or a cow.’
She flashed a quick smile.
‘I wouldn’t keep a ewe or cow that couldn’t bear young.’
‘But people aren’t animals. Women aren’t animals.’
She gave me a look as if to say, are you so sure?
‘Does Badger want children?’
‘What Badger wants and what Badger gets are two different things.’
She furrowed her brow and I felt inordinately sorry for her. Imagine having that great oaf pressing himself onto you, into you. I couldn’t help a moue of distaste flicker over my mouth.
Maybe she has more social graces than I give her credit for, because she deftly changed the subject and talked about the fox earth up behind the hedge line.
‘Don’t you worry about the chickens?’
She shook her head. ‘Not me. Badger does, mind. Shoots foxes if he gets the chance. Puts ‘em on his gibbet. I like the wild creatures, as much as the tame. ‘Twas their place afore ours.’

The idea of Badger with a gun wasn’t a pleasant one and I muttered about getting on. But she waved a small hand airily, as if reading my mind.
‘Badger won’t be home a-while yet. Come on out the back. I’ll fetch you something to set off your garden. Alright?’

She is a wonderful gardener, incredibly knowledgeable about nature altogether really. She knows every bird at her feeders and can tell you the name of every single wildflower, every form of moss, every different tree. She knows how to tap birch for wine; how to pick the best mushrooms for an omelette; how to store vegetables and fruit through the long hard winter without a blemish.

She woke in me a desire I didn’t know I had – to rekindle my childhood knowledge of the land: of where to grow and what to grow; of how to find your food for free; of how to live without every last modern day comfort. Don’t worry, I’m not going native. But it is a challenge.

Jane kept me civilised, coming round with a bottle of Sancerre and a tub of olives and hauling me out to sit on the old bench, sipping and chatting as the sun went down – later now of course.
Ben has been going great guns too – the staircase now feels safe at last and he’s already replaced a couple of window frames that were beyond redemption. He says he prefers to repair old wood if he can, and usually can, but these really were wrecked, rotten to the core.
I asked him if he could knock me up some bird feeders and he has – lovely elegant ones of smooth wood and wire. He’d wrapped them up too – said they were house-warming presents – and bought seed and nuts too (from the pet shop in the nearest town; Grace wouldn’t think about feeding birds – she can barely feed humans). So I have them up now and have already managed to identify bluetits, chaffinchs, great tits, some kind of warbler and a great big woodpecker that makes the feeder wobble furiously. It’s quite mesmeric and I find I can waste hours this way.

So, all in all, I’d found an almost pleasant rhythm by the time Aidan returned. He took off his black coat and went to lay it on the bench, then checked himself and said, ‘I’ll just pop this indoors. We’ll have to get some decent garden furniture.’
I don’t know why but it made my blood boil. He’s away for ages and then waltzes in and goes all sniffy, all precious. He came back out with a bottle of wine and two glasses. ‘Come here, have a drink. I’ll get something to put on this rotten old bench.’
‘It doesn’t bother me,’ I said, sitting firmly on the bench. I didn’t really feel like wine, and I really rather wanted to get on with my vegetables, but it seemed churlish not to fall in.
We sat and chatted a bit. He kept asking questions about life down here, like he was looking for something. I told him it was getting better, that maybe I would like it. I didn’t get a chance to say a word about London.
Then he surprised me.
‘We don’t have to stay here.’
‘What?’
‘If you’re unhappy, we don’t have to stay here. We could get the agent in, have the place valued. It’s probably gone up a bit even in the time we’ve been here.’
‘You want to leave?’
‘I’m not saying that, darling. Just that, if you want to go, we can.’

I’m lonely. I never thought I’d say that. I’m not the lonely type. But, in London there were always people around, always someone calling up asking if you fancied the latest film or a quick drink in a bar, or popping over for coffee and a quick natter. This just doesn’t happen here. Yes, Jane is becoming a friend but she has her life, her children, her husband, her work, her ‘causes’. I wouldn’t feel comfortable calling up, it wouldn’t be fair. Also it goes against everything I am. I am not a helpless little girl. I am – or I like to think I am – a strong woman. At work I used to have a reputation as a bit of a tough cookie – if there was a tricky situation they’d send me in to deal with it.

I love bargaining. When Aidan and I went to Egypt he hated the game of haggling, got irritated, bombastic. Whereas I was right in there, sitting on a stool, thick dark coffee in one hand while the other one waved around, fingers flying, eloquent as words. OK, so the salesman had a family of ten to feed – I had a whole orphanage. I adored it.
We ended up with statues of Bast, supposed ancient amulets, papyri and heavy bead necklaces that we didn’t really need or particularly want, but it was the fun of it. It was a game.

But it’s funny that, when it comes to men, I am not a good game-player. Whereas, in my professional life or in the bazaars of Cairo, I can keep a poker-face, my cards clutched close, in my personal life I’m an open book, fair game. I fell for Aidan hook, line and sinker. I slept with him on the first date (easy as apple crumble). I told him I loved him on the third (but only after I’d snuck a look at his Blackberry and read the email where he told his sister that he had found ‘The One’). Love is precious to me. Maybe because my family were not warm, not in any way lovely or loveable.

I had a tough upbringing. As you know, we were farmer’s children, my brother and I – and, to be honest, I never felt more or less than another animal. I don’t know how I was conceived but it wouldn’t remotely surprise me if you told me it was by AI with a large syringe. We were fed enough to thrive but not to grow fat and, as soon as we could walk and understand a simple command, we were set to work. My brother Tim would inherit the farm, of course. I would do….whatever. Marry, work, who cared? Incredible really. Tim worked with the cattle and sheep. My area of duty was the chickens (I can’t look a chicken in the eye to this day), the ducks and pest control. The first time I was handed a shotgun I couldn’t even lift it to my shoulder. But I soon learned. I was paid by the tail – be it rats, moles, rabbits or squirrels, or by the beak – crows, magpies, rooks. I’m a good shot.
Anything that could be eaten was eaten (the blog about ‘tree squirrels’ reminded me all too unpleasantly of this). If we didn’t eat it, we went hungry. We ate everything.

I also learned to ride, almost before I could walk. My mother was not a natural mother but was a very natural horsewoman, born of centaurs, welded to a saddle. There was not a horse she could not ride, not a colt she could not tame. She hunted three days a week during the season and Tim and I were expected to join her, just as soon as we grew large enough to ride ponies long-legged enough to keep up with the field. I was blooded at seven, a year before my brother (which gave me inordinate satisfaction).

Fi and her family were my real refuge. They taught me kindness, they tutored me in love. Otherwise I think I would have become one of those feral children who can never bond. I craved kindness, sucked up intimacy like a sponge. So was it surprising that I saw in Aidan my chance for a new life? A man of my own, a family of my own. I think anyone who has had a childhood bereft of love craves children in a way no pampered, cosseted, adored child can imagine. It surprised my London friends. They were all too busy with their careers. But all I wanted – and still want – was to remake the world as it was meant to be. To give a child all the love in the world. To rewrite history and make it kind.

Sorry, this is a rant. I thought I could write this blog without emotion. But it’s impossible. The deal, I thought, was that we could move down here to start a family. But Aidan is never here. When I spoke to him last night he said that he had to stay in London over the weekend. It’s ridiculous. What is so urgent that it can’t be done over the phone or by conference call? He’s being secretive about it too, which really hacks me off. He was the one who wanted to move here. He was the one who talked about fresh starts, fresh air, fresh opportunities. So how come I’m the one stuck down here in a place that reminds me, all too clearly, of the most unhappy days of my life?