IT WAS THREE HOURS BEFORE THEY DROPPED OFF THE A27 near Kingston and slowed to a creeping pace as they entered the village of Rodmell. Rape fields lapped the handful of cottages, a few of them old enough to be half-timbered and thatched. Beech trees lined the fields; a gray, square-sided church tower pierced the distance. The soft, huddled shape of the South Downs rose behind. Children were at play in the schoolyard as the clock slid past noon, their high, piping voices calling as unintelligibly as cranes through the village stillness.
“There’s the pub,” Peter told Jo. “The Abergavenny Arms. Quite old, actually, and known for really smashing house ales. We turn left into The Street — that’s what they call this main road through Rodmell — and Monk’s House is perhaps half a mile on.”
It was a clear autumn day, crisp, with no hint of rain, not even a mass of clouds over the Downs. Stiff from the drive, Jo said, “Let’s walk.”
They left the car near the pub and set out together up The Street. Nothing seemed more natural than Peter taking Jo’s hand as they paced down the verge. “I love this sort of place,” he said. “I don’t know Sussex well, but one finds these smallish villages all over England, despite the ugliness of Town Councils and public works; and they call to me. Rather as I imagine gardens call to you.”
“Then why don’t you get out of London?”
He smiled faintly. “How would I live?”
“Cook. You know you want to. Just make a plan,” Jo answered sensibly. “Figure out how much money you need to set up a restaurant in a destination spot — one like this, only maybe not this exactly, but a village with some kind of draw. Tourists or weekenders. Antiques hunters. University people. That sort of thing. And just… go for it. Peter’s Place.”
“You make it sound so simple.”
“I started my own business.” She shrugged. “I know that it’s not simple. But I also know the more effort it takes, the more you love the result. You’ve got to follow your bliss, Peter. Not just do what you’re told.”
“I don’t know.…” He let go of her hand. “I was never good at… risk-taking. It’s not my strength. Margaux was always the one who walked out on a limb; my job was to make sure the tree never fell.”
“And so you’re still standing here, solid as a rock, while she’s skipped off into thin air?” Jo asked quietly.
He turned and, without warning, kissed her. It was unexpectedly fierce, that kiss: filled with a lifetime of Peter’s dreams and guilt and longing. Jo’s knees gave way and her breath suddenly stopped in her throat. Her hands came up to his shoulders.
“Jesus,” she breathed. “Where did that come from?”
“Sorry.”
He would have walked on, drooping with embarrassment, but she grasped his wrist. “Don’t. That was wonderful. I’d hate it if you never did it again.”
Wordlessly, he reached for her.
A passing car honked irritably as it swerved to avoid them.
MONK’S HOUSE, TO THEIR DISAPPOINTMENT, WAS CLOSED.
“Damn,” Peter said. “At least we know Margaux hasn’t been here.”
“Can we get into the garden?”
He glanced over his shoulder. “Not without an audience.”
It was true that the place was completely exposed to the wondering eyes of Rodmell folk. The house sat right up next to The Street, separated only by a narrow flint wall backed with shrubs. The wall was topped with rounded bricks, and reached only to hip height; Jo could easily imagine swinging over it in the darkness. There was a plain wooden gate with a sign that proclaimed the house’s name; the building itself was faced in white clapboard, with double-hung windows, shutterless, and a right-angled front entry jutting out like a carbuncle. It reminded her of the Federal farmhouses of the Delaware Valley; a place of simple elegance and sufficiency. It was decidedly unlike the flamboyance of Charleston. And that told her something about the sisters, Vanessa and Virginia.
“It’s really all about the garden, which you can’t see from here,” Peter murmured in her ear. “Leonard Woolf was an avid horticulturalist. Started the local society, and so on. Greenhouses, beehives, vegetable plots, an orchard. To say nothing of the flowers. There’s even a bowls lawn.”
“A what?”
He grinned at her. “Like boccie or pétanque, only with a straightforward British name. Perhaps we should walk round to the back, by the church and school — they run alongside Monk’s House. We might find a better view.”
Trying not to appear conspicuous, they walked. The way led them by the old Norman church and its wide-open, sunlit plot of ground, dotted with graves. The sound of children’s voices from the school next door had faded. Presumably the lads and lasses of Rodmell had gone back to their books.
“See the hedge?” Peter pointed. “It borders the bowls lawn. There used to be two elm trees growing in the middle of it — one called Virginia, and the other, Leonard. They leaned toward each other, as though seeking comfort.”
“What happened to them?” Jo asked, her voice hushed.
“Virginia’s blew down in a gale sometime after her death. Leonard’s died, I think, of Dutch elm disease.”
Jo looked at Peter. “And?”
“Leonard buried his wife’s ashes under the tree called Virginia.”
“April 1941. Rodmell.”
“Yes.”
She drew a deep breath. “How will we find the spot, now the tree’s gone?”
“The memorial plaque is still there. With a quotation from her novel The Waves.”
Jo sighed. “It all looks so beautiful — as though someone still lives here.”
“Somebody does,” said a voice behind them.
They turned.
A young girl with ill-cut, sandy-colored hair was easing herself out of a red Austin. She was holding a grocery bag and had a purse slung over her shoulder; keys dangled from one hand. “There are caretakers. Full-time. Only they’re not home at present. I’m house-sitting for the house-sitters. They’re friends of my parents.”
“Ah,” Peter said. “That’s helpful, thank you. It looks… very well tended.”
“Better than when the Wolves were here. That’s what I call them. Leonard and Virginia. They were perpetually short on funds. Used an earth closet, if you can believe it — no running water. All the effort went into the garden.” She set the grocery bag on the bonnet of the car and went round to the boot. Peter and Jo exchanged glances. Time to scarper.
The girl was engaged in lifting a suitcase to the ground. Another was firmly wedged near the spare tire.
“Can we be of help?”
“That’d be brilliant — thanks.”
Peter hefted the second case from the boot, took the other in his free hand, and said smoothly, “Lead on.”
She led.
There was a back gate to the property, and a path to a second gate in the walled garden; she opened this with some difficulty, the iron hasp being long since rusted into obduracy. “It’s just through here,” she said. “You can drop the cases at the back door — I’ll fetch them in.”
Peter set down the luggage carefully on the brick path and dusted his hands. Jo was trailing along behind, her eyes on the autumnal remains of the mixed borders. Leonard’s tastes had run to the exotic, it seemed — if indeed the plantings were representative of those that had grown in his day.
“Unfortunate that the house is closed,” Peter remarked. “We drove down from Cambridge on purpose to see it.”
“Cambridge? Which college?”
“King’s,” Jo said automatically.
“I’ve a mate at Magdalene,” the girl offered. “I’m Lucy, by the way.”
“Peter. And that’s Jo.” He held out his hand. “Well, we won’t keep you. Enjoy your time here.”
“Thanks. I’ll probably be stark, staring mad in another week — they’ll have to scrape me off the floor of the Arms.”
“Not keen on solitude?”
She stared at him, her lips slightly parted. “In this place? It’s the end of the earth. I only agreed to house-sit again because I had the loan of the car. As soon as I start talking to myself, I’m off to Lewes for the evening.”