The Cottage on Winter Moss by Allie Cresswell

Author:Allie Cresswell
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Allie Cresswell
Published: 2022-10-13T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Jamie had been quite right about the weather. I woke late on the Saturday morning to find the radiant, crystalline aura of the Moss had disappeared, leaving it drab and sagging. A low cloud coated the sky. Skeins of geese arrowed listlessly across the Moss, squawking tetchily to one another as they looked for feeding grounds. I thought about Hugh’s vision of the Moss, a lagoon of shallow waters alive with fowl, but the secret by-ways of the bracken all submerged, the trysting tree in all probability felled or drowned, the jacquard of colours which, even now in its subdued state, had a kind of beauty, all reduced to one reflective plate of sky. These very cottages would be mouldering remains, if they were not demolished. All their history—as Moss Farm in the Winters’ time, and Winter Farm as cynically renamed by Todd Forrester—would be gone. But then, if it were not, and if the destructive force of the run-off was not stopped, the pele tower would fall. I wondered why life often offered such impossible alternatives, and found the truism incredibly depressing.

It was 5th December, my dad’s birthday. Another cause for dejected spirits.

I showered and dressed and took Bob out for his walk. Jamie had already cleaned out the hen coop. There was no sign of him or his quadbike. I stood for a moment in front of his house and felt unaccountably lost; I could have used a friendly face and someone to talk to.

The curtains of Jamie’s house were drawn back but the middle cottage, of course, was shuttered and silent. I was reminded of Boo Radley, the recluse in To Kill a Mockingbird who lived vicariously through the children in the neighbouring house. Would Jamie’s father respond if I were to rap at one of the boarded-up windows? What if I slid a note through the gap I could see between one of the peeling boards and the rough masonry of the house? Hadn’t he already proved to me, on the night of the fog, that he would come out and save me, as Boo saved the Finch children? But then I was struck with the idea that the Boo of my neighbours’ household might in fact be Jamie. He, after all, was the one who had been virtually imprisoned, if not quite by his father then at least by his father’s neurosis. I knew that, from time to time, Jamie took a beating, as Boo had from Arthur Radley. Their relationship—like many families’, I supposed—was complex and, without being able to discuss it with anyone, I couldn’t comprehend it.

My walk took me along the boardwalk and into the village, where I saw to my surprise that some houses were already decorated for Christmas. Seeing the brightly twinkling lights and the Christmas trees added to my stab of longing for my dad and my brother. All the bonhomie from the previous evening, the sense of having made friends and a little social circle for myself, went up in smoke.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.