The Damage Done Page 2

  Kirsty fetched his feed of cubes and crushed barley from the feed-room and mucked out his stable while he ate. It was a beautiful old-fashioned stable, with herringbone flooring in red brick and a fixed hay-rack. Everything was in marked contrast to the stables at home, which had been converted from a cowshed and pig-sties, most with wonky doors, uneven floors and stubborn bolts. Judging that it was warm enough for Prince to do without his rug, she led him out to the field. She left the straw bedding piled up at the back of his stable, for the floor to dry, but filled the hay-rack ready for the evening.

  She had used up the last of a bale. The hay was stored in an open-sided barn at the far end of the outbuildings; she hauled out two more bales to take to the feed room, then fetched a wheelbarrow. While she was hoisting the second bale on top of the first, balancing the barrow, she heard a clumping sound behind her in the yard.

  She turned. Someone came out of the harness-room. She saw dark clothing, a skinny body; then the figure turned in her direction. She had a quick impression of a bony face, intense eyes, a tangle of brown hair. He looked at her for a moment, then walked away quickly, along the drive to the house.

  Kirsty stared after him. An intruder?

  She shouldn't be here. She fought the urge to get on her bike and hurtle back to Bramblings. Jay shouldn't have made her come. Her hands were trembling, her throat tight and dry. But who would look after Prince if she ran away and refused to come back?

  She gripped the handles of the barrow to steady herself, and trundled up to the feed-store. Leaving the hay, she stepped cautiously into the harness-room, which had been locked until she arrived half an hour ago. Nothing stolen - Prince's saddle and bridle, cleaned, oiled and unused, hung on their pegs; his rugs were folded on a trunk, the grooming kit in its box. Then she realised.

  The boy, or man, had clumped down the ladder from the loft above. He must have been there all the time, while she’d been mucking out the stable. He might have been watching.

  Her skin prickled. Her fear was at odds with the familiar warm smell of horse-sweat and leather.

  Carefully she climbed the steps of the ladder, and lifted the hatch into the loft. She heard the stirring of mice, smelled musty hay and dust; the loft had once been the hay-store, reached by high wooden doors through which bales could be pitched straight in from the cart. Now, it was just another storage place. Her eyes adjusting to the gloom, Kirsty made out another trunk, boxes, blankets, coils of twine.

  She’d have to tell Mrs Hendy.

  Clumping down again, she slid the bolt across to secure the hatchway. Then, for speed, and in case the intruder were still lurking somewhere, she took her bike, and rode to the back door of the house.

  Kirsty rang the bell, an ancient enamel bell-push; its jingling sound emphasised the silence of the house. Then she saw that the door was ajar. She slipped inside, into a vestibule with coat-hooks and umbrella stands and rows of boots and shoes; then through a scullery, with a huge sink, a washing-machine and a tumble-drier. The kitchen door opened, and Mrs Bishop stood there, in a pink overall pulled tight across her chest.

  “Hello,” Kirsty said. “I've just been doing Prince’s stable. Someone was down there in the yard. I thought I'd better tell Mrs Hendy.”

  Mrs Bishop had a vague, kindly face. “What sort of someone?” she asked, without much interest.

  “A bloke, tall, skinny. Youngish. In jeans, and a black jacket that looked too small.”

  “Oh, that's all right,” Mrs Bishop said. “That's only Dally. He’s the new gardener.”

  “So what was he doing over by the stables?”

  Mrs Bishop shrugged. “Fetching manure, I expect, or looking for tools. Have you finished down there? I'll get you a coffee if you like.”

  “No, thank you. I've got to get back.” Kirsty thought of the furtiveness of the young man's glance, the hurriedness of his walk. Why hadn't he said hello, even introduced himself? “Are you sure that's who it was?” she persisted. “He looked sort of guilty. As if he had no right to be here.”

  “No, that's him. He's a bit strange, Dally,” Mrs Bishop said, “till you get used to him.”

  Cycling back to the yard to finish tidying and locking up, Kirsty glanced across the lawn and saw the boy working; digging the wide border by the walled garden. He didn't look at her.

  *

  Chapter Two

  “The thing is,” said Mrs Luckett, “Gemma really needs some better schooling fences, with the show season coming up. Couldn't you arrange something?”

  Oh sure, Kirsty thought - I'll knock up a set of show jumps overnight, shall I, and build an indoor arena while I'm about it?

  “There are some old hurdles, somewhere, and some oil drums,” she said. “I'll look them out if you like.”

  Mrs Luckett looked sceptical. “It's not quite what I had in mind. Hardly what they're going to come across in the show ring. No, what we need is proper jumps, and a separate practice area where we can leave them out. There's that whole field doing nothing, on the other side of the lane.”

  “It's not doing nothing. It's resting,” Kirsty explained patiently, “so that the grass can grow. If people start riding in there it'll get all churned up. Then there won't be any grass when we need it in a month or six weeks.”

  “But it'd only be used by Gemma and Alison.” Mrs Luckett watched her daughter leading the grey pony out of the stable. “I know Alison agrees with me - she does a lot of competing, doesn't she? Riding club events and suchlike. And for us it's even more important. Petronella is an exceptional pony, and we’re expecting Gemma to do well with her this summer.”

  Guessing who would get the blame if Gemma's success turned out to be less spectacular than Mrs Luckett imagined, eyed the pony's brand-new saddle and bridle with misgivings. The Lucketts had forked out enormous sums, for the pony herself - Nellie, as Kirsty and Jay called her - and then for every piece of equipment imaginable. It made Kirsty nervous, all this expensive stuff lying about in the tack-room. For security, there was just a flimsy hasp and a padlock. She ought to think about improvements.

  “I know you're doing your best, dear,” Mrs Luckett said in a friendlier tone. “But we may have to think about moving somewhere with better facilities. I can't have Gemma held back.”

  “I'll talk to Jay about it,” Kirsty said quickly. The weekly cheque for Petronella, who was on full livery, added considerably to the yard's takings; she didn't want to have to tell Jay that the Nellies had gone elsewhere. Though if they went to one of the posher livery yards, like the one over at Wolverton, they'd end up paying double at least. Gemma, who was thirteen, wasn't too bad; Kirsty suspected that it was Mrs Luckett who fancied going to the shows in her Range Rover, bringing home trophies to polish. To her, the pony was a lifestyle accessory, a passport to the world of point-to-points and hunt balls.

  Kirsty missed Jay. When he was around, they had laughed privately about Mrs Luckett, whose accent was trying to move up the social scale, with occasional lapses into her native South London. Kirsty and Jay shared tea and biscuits in the tack-room; they mended gates and fences, and had marked out the schooling ring, trying to work out from a copy of a Novice dressage test which way the letter-markers went. They went out riding together, Jay on excitable Leopardstown, Kirsty on a fat piebald called Patches, whose owner was happy for her to borrow him whenever she wanted. Jay, a gifted rider, had planned to take difficult horses for re-schooling. He was full of impressive ideas: getting sponsorship for eventing, bringing on young horses, buying more land from the neighbouring farmer, to extend the stables and build an indoor school. His latest venture - training for a year with an Olympic three-day-event rider in the States, working for his place - seemed crazier than most. Kirsty couldn't quite reconcile Jay's big ambitions with what she saw in front of her - eight ramshackle stables in a yard where everything needed modernising, mending or repainting, and tiles slid off the roofs every time there was a strong wind.

  Now Kirsty had little time for
riding, let alone for all the maintenance jobs. When Mrs Luckett and Gemma had taken their pony into the schooling field, she went indoors to cook the shepherd's pie for supper. It was her turn to cook this week.

  It had been because of Jay and the horses that the family – when they were a family - had moved into Bramblings, left to them by Graham's grandparents. At first, he and Ursula thought they couldn't afford the upkeep; then Ursula had had the idea of dividing the big Victorian house into two, selling half and investing the money. She had planned to restore and decorate their own part of the house, too; but then, last year, she and Kirsty's father had separated. Now, with Jay gone, only Kirsty and Graham were left, hardly a proper family at all. Some days, Kirsty hardly saw her father. At least Ursula, disliking horses, mud and mess, had good business sense, taking care of the orders and the accounts. Since last summer, Graham had taken no interest at all in the horses, owners or practical work, leaving it all to Jay, and now to Kirsty.

  “Everything OK?” he asked her, while they ate the shepherd's pie at the kitchen table.

  “Yes, thanks. Dorcas doesn't look near foaling yet. Mrs Nellie was moaning because we haven't got a set of show jumps.”

  “Stupid bloody woman,” said Graham, even though as far as Kirsty was aware he hadn’t met Mrs Luckett.

  They ate in silence for a few moments. Nutmeg, the tabby cat, sat close to Graham's plate, watching every mouthful. Kirsty's mother would have been appalled at the idea of having cats in the house, let alone on the table, but Graham took no notice other than to give a vague swipe when Nutmeg looked too keenly interested. “You could have a look at my script after this,” he said, “if you're not doing anything else.”

  “I've got to go round to Mrs Hendy's first. And finish off in the yard. Then I will.”

  It was almost dusk by the time Kirsty reached Ravenswood, a soft, spring dusk that breathed out scents of soil and new growth. A standard lamp was on in the front sitting-room, the room where Kirsty and Jay had been taken for sherry. Kirsty couldn't help glancing in. Mrs Hendy was sitting very upright on one of her velvet sofas, reading a book, the lamplight glossing her grey hair. Wasn't she afraid, alone in the huge house? Eventually, Jay had said, when Mrs Hendy died, her son would find the house too much of a burden and would sell it, for conversion into a country club or golfing hotel. Kirsty didn't like that, preferring to think of the garden as it was, deserted but for rabbits and blackbirds; the curve of lawn sweeping down to the unruffled surface of the lake.

  She had forgotten her earlier fear until she rounded the bend to the stables and saw someone standing by the paddock gate. That boy. Dally.

  He turned on hearing the crunch of tyres on gravel; again, she had an impression of boniness, of harshness in his face, of deep-set, intense eyes. Then he looked away, and stood as before, leaning on the top rail of the fence. He was looking at the horse, who raised his head from grazing and gave a fluttering whicker of greeting.

  Slowly, Kirsty leaned her bike against the wall. The boy stayed where he was, ignoring her. She forked down straw in the stable, then unlocked the harness-room door and took out Prince's headcollar, reluctant to go up to the gate while the boy was standing there. If he was around all day, wouldn't it make sense for Mrs Hendy to ask him to bring the horse in for the night?

  Why am I so awkward, Kirsty wondered? We're only two people. Why don't I just say “Hello!” in a perfectly normal, friendly way? Why doesn't he?

  She walked up to the gate, trying to appear confident. He didn't turn again until she was right beside him.

  “Hello!” she breezed. “I'm Kirsty. I look after Prince for Mrs Hendy. You're Dally, aren't you?” It sounded as fake as it was. Jolly-hockeysticks.

  The boy looked at her quickly. He was tall and skinny, with that craggy face that made it hard to tell how old he was. Not really a boy - maybe twenty or so, she thought. His hair was straggly and needed washing, and the black jacket he wore was torn at the elbow - she could see his bent arm as he leaned against the fence, still gazing at Prince.

  “I could do that,” he said. His voice was hardly more than a mumble.

  “What?”

  “Bring him in. Do all of it, the stable and all. Save you coming.”

  “I don't mind. I need the money,” Kirsty said. Prince came up to her, pushing his nose into the headcollar. She smoothed her hand through the rough tangle of his mane. She ought to find time to groom him.

  “Yeah, well, she's got plenty of that, the old lady,” Dally said.

  Holding the headcollar rope, and with Prince snorting beside her, Kirsty felt more assured. “Do you work here all the time? Where do you live? I've never seen you around before.”

  “Wolverton. Near the bus station.”

  “Is Dally short for something?”

  He shrugged. “Dallimore. My surname.”

  “And your first name?”

  “Dally. Just Dally.”

  “Dally Dallimore?” Kirsty looked at him as she led Prince through the churned gateway.

  The boy didn't respond. He closed and bolted the gate, but didn't follow her to the stable. He stood watching from the fence while she led Prince into the stable, put on his night-rug, checked his water-bucket and fetched feed from the store. He was making her feel edgy. He had been watching the horse - supposing he was planning to steal him, later? How much did Mrs Hendy know about him? She thought of the frail old lady reading in her sitting-room, with the curtains undrawn. Anyone could prowl round outside, and see her inside, alone and vulnerable. There must be all sorts of valuable things in the house - paintings, ornaments, furniture ... money, credit cards...

  “Bye, then,” she called, when she had tidied everything away. “Are you going home now?”

  Dally raised a hand and looked at her unsmiling. He stayed where he was.

  *

  Arriving back at Bramblings, Kirsty saw a red car parked in the yard. Tatjana, triumphant and glowing, was in the kitchen, sharing a bottle of wine with Kirsty's father. She let out a yelp as Kirsty came in and stood up, holding out both arms.

  “I passed! Did you see my green L-plates?”

  “Oh, well done!” Kirsty had forgotten all about Tat's test. She went round the table and was crushed in an exuberant hug.

  “First time! Brilliant, or what?” Tat smiled at Kirsty, releasing her. She smelled of freshly-washed hair and Calvin Klein perfume.

  “Here, sit down. Let me get you a glass.” Graham fetched one from the cupboard and sat down again, passing the filled glass to Kirsty. He raised his own. “To Tatjana! May the roads feel privileged to carry her in green L-plated splendour.”

  Tat laughed and flicked her hair back, then drank deeply. Kirsty glanced at her father. He had got out of the habit of drinking this early in the evening; he said that it fuzzed his brain and stopped him from working, though she knew he sometimes drank whisky in his study, late, when she'd gone to bed. She asked Tat, “How long have you been here?”

  “Only about ten minutes. I've got Mum's car for the evening and I was going to take you to the pub, but this is nice. Shall we go down later? Ross and Ollie might be there.”

  “I said I'd help Dad,” Kirsty said. She could tell by his surprised expression that he'd forgotten. “I was going to read his script. Anyway, you can't drink and drive. Specially not on the day you pass your test. And you’re on the wine already.”

  “It doesn't matter, Mouse. About the script, I mean.” Graham poured more wine for himself, then for Tat. “Not when Tatjana wants to celebrate. You might as well stay here and finish this off, then have black coffee before you go. You'll be OK.”

  Mouse was Jay's nickname for Kirsty, from when she was little. It sounded odd, coming from her father, but she missed Jay so much that she liked hearing it. Graham always called Tat by her full name, Tatjana; a beautiful name, he had once said to Kirsty, mysterious, evocative of faded Russian aristocracy. No one would ever give Tatjana a nickname like Mouse. Tatjana was like her name -
beautiful, a touch exotic, with long dark hair and a head-turning smile. Kirsty loved Tat, her best friend for years, but wished that fate had been more even-handed in the distribution of looks - she would have liked a share of Tatjana's beauty in exchange for her own pale, ordinary mouseness. It would be difficult not to be confident if you knew that people admired you wherever you went.

  “How's it going, then? The writing?” Tat asked Graham, raising her glass.

  “OK. I'm working fairly solidly now. My biggest problem is that it’s London-based, street-life, teenage characters – difficult to get into when you're forty-four and living in a country backwater. That's why I want Kirsty to read what I've done so far.”

  “I'm full of street cred, obviously,” Kirsty said. “Experienced in drug-dealing.”

  “Is that what it's about?” Tat asked. “What's it called?”

  “The Damage Done,” Graham told her. He raised his eyebrows, waiting to see what impact it made on her.

  Tat thought for a moment, then said, “Oh, yeah, I get it. The old Neil Young song. The needle and the damage done.” She hummed a phrase.

  Graham smiled at her. “You know that?”

  “My parents are a couple of old hippies. Neil Young's still a favourite of theirs. So tell me about your characters, then.”

  Kirsty sipped her wine and listened while her father outlined his ideas. He didn't usually talk much about his work; not to her. Their daily exchanges usually consisted of no more than “How's it going?” “Oh, not too bad, thanks.” Tat, whose parents were a Russian historian and a lecturer in a sixth-form college, knew a bit about writing and publishing; her father wrote articles for journals, and gave lectures. Unlike Lottie, she wasn't thrown into stunned admiration by the fact that Kirsty's father had published novels. “Wow! You're a real writer! That's amazing!” Lottie had gushed, when she first found out. Kirsty knew that her father wasn't flattered by this kind of reaction, only irritated. Lottie, wrapped up in horses and the family farm and completely un-bookish, had the naïve assumption that writers were automatically famous. Kirsty and her father knew better. Graham's three novels had had good reviews but hadn't sold well, and the first two were now out of print. TV drama was where big money could be made, he’d decided now, and had set himself two months to write one.