The Golden Rule by Amanda Craig

Author:Amanda Craig [Craig, Amanda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781408711507
Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group
Published: 2020-07-01T16:00:00+00:00

17

The Cellar

Driving back, Mor said, ‘They’re not all bad.’

‘I didn’t say they were.’

‘No, but I could see you thinking it. Without people like the Sponges, Fol would still be a half-dead fishing village.’

‘I know, Mor, I do know. Maybe if I had a home here that I could let out to tourists in the summer I’d feel a bit different, but I don’t. We should do what they’re doing in St Ives and stop incomers from buying properties.’

‘Would that solve anything? If you ask me, it’d simply push the problem further down the coast.’

They were passing one of the hidden eyesores of the coast between Fol and St Piran: a valley of static caravans whose plastic sides gleamed faintly in the moonlight. It had no view, and only locals even knew it existed, but like an increasing number of seaside towns it was a dumping ground. Addicts, alcoholics, the mentally and physically disabled, the unemployed and the unemployable had washed up there for years. Even as Mor drove, a thin figure lurched out of the verge, drunk or drugged or crazed into carelessness. She swerved to avoid it, and both women drew breath sharply, then swore as they jolted over a pothole. There was a whimper from the back seat.

‘It’s OK, Cadan.’

‘Oh my God. It’s like living near zombies,’ Hannah said.

‘They’re mostly harmless, poor souls. Or would be if they weren’t addicted to spice.’

Hannah shivered. ‘How long until all of us are living like that? I used to think that homelessness and begging were things in Victorian novels, things we’d left behind, and yet it’s all come back.’

‘In Fol, we have the luxury of the rich attracting the rich.’

‘Leaving St Piran with the dregs. Mind you, we’ve got legions in London, too.’

‘Yes. But at least if we get money coming into coastal towns, there’s some hope, unlike the inland areas. What we really need is to be allowed to hang on to more of what we pay in taxes, not send them to bloody London. But we’re just this olde-worlde place of cream teas and fucked-over fishermen.’

It was the same quarrel that had been going on over the dinner they had just left.

‘Only everything that actually brings money – agriculture, tourism, the fisheries – is going to be destroyed.’

‘We did without the EU before, and we’ll do so again. So what if we go without for a few years? We don’t need tomatoes in the middle of winter. Those people – the Germans, the French – they’ve always been our enemies down here. Always.’

‘Oh, Mor,’ said Hannah. She hated quarrelling with family, but the pain of the Referendum was felt on both sides. ‘History moves on. But if you feel so angry, why stay? Why not move to Exeter, at least?’

‘If I stay, I can make a difference to five people who wouldn’t otherwise have jobs here, including Cadan,’ Mor said. ‘I just wish we could get a council house.’

Hannah thought of mobile homes, their plastic sides almost bulging with hopelessness.

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