It was a good thing he had a key. But getting in quietly so as not to disturb Marie and Zack was impossible as they were both in the kitchen having a bedtime drink.
‘Harry! Want a drink before you go to bed?’
Harry put his head round the door to say no thanks, he was going straight up. And he did, to spend the next two hours fretting about the situation he’d found himself in. He had to pull himself together. Falling in love? Absolutely not. It made life far too complicated and, in any case, he would be leaving in the middle of the week. He’d only promised to work until then.
After all, Jimbo would want someone permanent, and permanent was not his scene. He wouldn’t go for a swim tomorrow, he’d stay away, let things cool.
Harry might not have had a very satisfactory evening, but there were those who had, those for whom love’s path ran sweet. Tamsin Goodenough, exhausted by the intensity of her concentration during the recital, was glad to have someone to put the kettle on, get out the cups, those delicate china ones that had belonged to her mother, pull forward a side table to put the tray on, and pour her a life-giving cup of Earl Grey.
Paddy served the tea in such a gentle, considerate manner that Tamsin almost felt revived just watching him. His attention was heaven-sent and yet the man seated beside her on the sofa was not the kind of man she should have been attracted to. She’d grown up in a house where music was prized above rubies. All of them, which included her parents and two sisters, had been more than proficient in at least two instruments, and their greatest joy was to get together to play. They played till the moon shone through the windows, till the clock struck midnight. Passing music exams with distinction was the norm and she’d revelled in it.
Until tragedy struck one bright summer’s day. Tamsin was nineteen when her parents and one of her sisters were killed in a horrifying train crash. Happiness fled from her life, for ever, it seemed. Tamsin had won a place at the Manchester School of Music, to begin in the autumn. It gave her a sense of purpose, but her sister, Penny, eighteen months older than her, dug out a rucksack from the loft, filled it with everything she needed for a
long adventure, and disappeared to South America. Occasionally, over the next fifteen years, Tamsin got a postcard from her, each place appearing more remote than the last. She kept every one of them in a drawer in her bedroom. About three years ago, a postcard came that gave her an email address and since then it had been emails, not cards, that outlined the latest venture Penny had decided to take up. As for herself …
‘More tea, Tamsin?’
Paddy brought her back to now and, all things considered, she preferred now. ‘I don’t know why it is I can practise for hours when I’m by myself, but as soon as I have people listening to me, I’m exhausted after an hour.’
‘It’s because you want to do your best for them, which you do. Your playing is perfect.’ Paddy’s eyes glistened with approval.
‘Thank you. You’re a very restful person to be with, you know, and yet they tell me that in the pub you’re full of jokes and laughter.’
‘It must be you who makes me restful.’ Paddy smiled at her and those Irish eyes of his, almost midnight blue with their black lashes, stopped her in her tracks. In all her thirty-four years, Tamsin had never met a man who’d touched her emotions so quickly. One smile, one laugh, and she was captivated. But it wouldn’t do. She wasn’t the marrying type and neither, she felt sure, was Paddy. Maybe they could be friends and give marriage a kick into touch?
Paddy put down his empty cup. He hated Earl Grey; he only drank it for Tamsin’s sake. He said, ‘Can I tell you something?’
‘Of course.’ Tamsin hoped he wasn’t going to say anything at all about his feelings. Now wasn’t the time, and it never would be.
‘I had a very different upbringing from you, sure I did.’
‘How different?’
‘How long have you got?’
‘How old are you, Paddy?’
‘Forty last birthday.’
‘Which is when?’
‘November 20th.’
‘Is your name really Patrick?’
‘No. I was christened Paddy. How much more Irish can you get?’
‘You don’t sound very Irish.’
‘Once I’d left Ireland, I tried to make sure that I didn’t sound like an archetypal idiot Irishman.’
Paddy was silent then. It seemed to Tamsin that he had something more to say and suddenly she couldn’t bear it another minute. ‘I’m all ears if you’ve something to tell me.’
‘I was number three, and the first boy of eight children, not one of whom my parents could afford to have. We were dirt poor. My father never worked, as far as I know. Any money he got to before my mother got her hands on it went on drink. We were frequent visitors to the local convent, begging for food. I felt so ashamed. Everyone knew us for what we were; unclean, ill-mannered, shabby and at the bottom of every pile.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Tamsin spoke with compassion in every timbre of her voice.
Paddy smiled at her. ‘One day I saw the light, as they say, and I realised that life didn’t
have
to be like this, that things could be better if only my dad made the effort. So I tried to reason with him, for my mother’s sake. I got knocked down for my pains and went to school the next day with a broken arm, in agony. The head teacher insisted that I went to the hospital and, when I turned up at home with my arm in plaster, he knocked me down again. For being soft, he said. That day, iron entered my soul and I vowed that, as soon as I could, I would leave home and damn the lot of ’em. So, just before my seventeenth birthday, I did just that, would you believe?’ He laughed, but it was bitter laughter, and it hurt Tamsin dreadfully.
‘Paddy! What on earth did you do at your age? How did you live? At sixteen?’
‘I stole our neighbour’s wage packet. I shouldn’t have done it, he was a decent man through and through.’
‘Paddy!’
‘I struggled on for years, from one job to another, thieving if necessary. I’m sorry, it’s not recent behaviour. But when there’s no food on the table one has to lower one’s standards and get some … somehow or other. Then I met Anna, the curate from the abbey, and she brought me here when she stood in for the rector. I didn’t do right by her but …’ Paddy shrugged his shoulders. ‘Then I got lodgings with Greta and Vince, and a job at the big house courtesy of Mr Fitch. But still I couldn’t stop stealing.’
‘Paddy!’
‘Sorry, but I did. I was desperate. However, enough of my life history, it’s too sordid for your ears.’
He stood up and looked down at her. At her red hair and green eyes. At the sad, sweet, caring expression on her face. At the light sprinkling of freckles on her forehead and cheeks.
He liked her wholesomeness and the beauty of her spirit. And, at that moment, he lost his heart to her.
But he wasn’t worthy of her, not when he thought about his past and the rotten tricks he’d done to stay alive. He’d drag her down, no doubt about it, they weren’t in the same class. ‘Better go. Thank you for tonight, your playing was beautiful. It goes right to the heart, sure it does, just like you.’ He was out of the house and running down the road to his lodgings with Vince and Greta before she could stop him.
Tamsin watched him running away and, to her horror, knew for certain that he must be in love with her. But she must be mistaken, surely. Well, bad luck, Paddy, if you are. I’m not the marrying kind, we’re not right for each other. But the moment she thought that she regretted it, because there was a lightness of touch and a sincerity about him that impressed her.
*
Paddy ached with his love for Tamsin even as he drank the mug of Ovaltine so kindly prepared for him by Greta. ‘You’re quiet tonight, Paddy. Are you all right?’
Paddy nodded. ‘The music was beautiful, wasn’t it?’ There was a yearning in his voice which Greta couldn’t ignore. ‘Yes. Beautiful. It makes you wish you could play like that yourself, it must be wonderful. Neither Vince nor me ever got a chance that way.’ As a sly afterthought, she asked, ‘Tamsin OK?’ Still, she wasn’t prepared for the light that glowed in Paddy’s eyes.
‘Yes, thanks. I made her a cup of tea, she was tired out.’ ‘I’m not surprised. Playing like that must take it out of her. I’m going up. Turn out the lights, please. Goodnight!’ Greta just hoped, as she climbed the stairs, that Paddy hadn’t fallen for Tamsin. It would never be right, her a Cambridge music scholar and him dragged out of an Irish bog by his own boot laces, a man of the soil and an ex-thief too; they’d nothing in common.
Paddy acknowledged that too, but there was nothing to stop him dreaming. No one knew he dreamed of her but himself. He’d just have to pine away in his lonely bachelor bed for ever and a day. He sat up in bed with a start. He could buy one of those tapes she’d done in aid of the church funds. That was it! Then he could lie in bed listening and dreaming about her into the night, with his walkman clamped to his ears and no one the wiser. First thing Monday morning, he’d nip into the village store before work, buy the tape and take it with him to the big house! He could listen to it while he worked in the glasshouses, lost in his own world. Excellent.
Tom was having a long weekend so Jimbo was in there first thing. Paddy wished he wasn’t, because he knew of Jimbo’s predilection for gossip. ‘Do you have one of those tapes that
Tamsin did of her playing, you know the ones for the church funds, please? I want one for Greta. Thanks.’ ‘Just past the stationery, on the top shelf, the special display.’ Jimbo had a grin on his face, but the look on Paddy’s face when he carried the tape to the till made him hesitate to make a comment, however well meant. ‘Lovely Saturday night, wasn’t it? Did you enjoy it?’
‘I did indeed, and so did Greta. It must be lovely to have a talent like hers. Greta says she never got a chance to learn anything musical and I must say, I certainly didn’t. Survival was my priority! Believe me. Here’s the money.’ Paddy handed his ten-pound note over, whipped the tape into the holdall that held his gardening overalls and his packed lunch, and was out of the shop before Jimbo could come up with a merry quip.
Paddy was in one of the glasshouses, checking the vine, when he surreptitiously got his walkman out of his overall pocket and switched it on. So absorbed was he that he didn’t hear Michelle sliding the glasshouse door open.
She had to tap him on his shoulder to catch his attention. ‘Morning, Paddy. How’re things?’
He swung round, switched off the tape and took the earphones out saying, ‘Morning, boss.’
‘The name’s Michelle. Think it’ll need watering?’
‘Just finding out. It’s not been all that hot this weekend, has it? We don’t want to drown it.’
‘No, that’s right. You’re doing a good job with these vines, the best chap I’ve had looking after ’em. Remember last year’s crop? I thought they’d never end. Let’s hope it’s the same this year.’
‘You won’t be here to see.’
‘No, I won’t.’
Before he knew it, he was saying, ‘If you need someone when you get to Kew, you know I’m reliable.’
‘Come on, Paddy. You can’t leave Turnham Malpas, you’ve put roots down.’
‘A chance to work at Kew can’t be turned down for the love of Turnham Malpas.’
‘I turned down several jobs till Kew came on the scene but somehow, this time, I can’t say no.’
‘You’d be a fool if you did.’
‘Do you mean it about going to Kew if the opportunity arises?’
There came a brief pause while Paddy stared out of the window and then he replied, ‘I do, indeed I do.’ But his tone wasn’t entirely convincing.
‘Well, in that case, I’ll let you know. At least I’d know I could rely on you, one hundred per cent.’
‘Thanks. Thanks too for getting me this promotion, by the way.’
‘You deserved it. When you’ve checked the glasshouses, that piece there is looking a bit sick. It needs snipping off. Come and see me in the office later, to talk about things a bit over a coffee. OK?’
‘Righto.’ Paddy was surprised by his spontaneous request for a chance to work at Kew Gardens. Whatever had made him say it? He was the biggest fool, how could he separate himself from Tamsin? He couldn’t. He closed his eyes for a moment to think, without distraction, about how beautiful she was. Those clear, green eyes of hers, so unusual. The red hair she wore without any restraint, like a hairclip or a ribbon. It must be the very devil to dry he thought, then he imagined himself helping her to dry it in front of a big roaring fire and taking her up to bed … Ouch! Snipping off the piece Michelle had said needed snipping off, he’d cut his finger. Blast. It had gone deep. Blood poured. He’d nearly cut the end of his finger off! Oh, God, not hospital. He was terrified of hospitals. Perhaps a bandage would do the trick. Anything rather than white coats and needles. The piece
of flesh was hanging by a thread. Hospital? Hell! He was scared. He sped with the speed of light to the staffroom, a handkerchief wrapped tightly round his finger doing nothing to stem the blood. It dripped with every step he took. Once bandaged up by the official First Aider, Paddy fainted. Out cold.
When he came round, Paddy couldn’t believe what a fool he’d made of himself. Three of the groundsmen were in there having their morning tea so they were crowded round, along with the First Aider and, to add to his feeling of foolishness, there was Michelle. ‘Honestly, Paddy, there was me thinking you were a man. I got the message to come ASAP imagining that at least your arm was hanging by a thread, and all it was was your finger! Get him some hot tea, somebody, with sugar in it, right now.’