5. A Daunting Challenge

5

A Daunting Challenge

The sun was low over the hills to the west as they negotiated a spaghetti-like series of narrow country roads, few with any signposts, many going apparently nowhere.

‘Locals call it the Tangle,’ Hilda shouted over the rattle of the motorbike engine, as Josie, wearing a crash helmet for the first time in her life, and partially crushed by the suitcase squeezed into the footwell in front of her, tried not to fall out as they swung around blind corners, Hilda cackling with glee every time they went wide enough to brush the opposite hedge. ‘Some years ago, a bunch of local idiots pulled up most of the signs for an April Fool’s joke. They hid them in a skip belonging to a local builder who was renovating a house in the village. The skip got taken away, the signs lost, and the council decided to spite the local people by not replacing them.’

‘Is that a true story, or is it true like the polar bear one?’ Josie shouted.

‘Oh, my wonder, you know me so well,’ Hilda shouted back. ‘Don’t worry, we’re nearly there.’

A few minutes later, they came over a rise, and the V of the English Channel appeared up ahead. The road began to steepen into a valley, and they passed a sign that read:

Porth Melynos

Welcome to Sunset Harbour

The sunset, as far as Josie could tell, would happen way over to the west, with the village facing due south. Too afraid of death on the winding lanes to query it, Hilda appeared to read her mind.

‘Porth Melynos is Cornish,’ she shouted by way of explanation. ‘It literally translates as something like Port Yellow Night, but that’s not going to look good on tourist brochures, is it?’

Josie started to shake her head, but that just make her feel queasy, so instead she nodded. Thankfully, after a couple of sharp switchbacks through shadowy corners lined by towering trees, the road both straightened and flattened, and a quaint fishing village cramped into a narrow valley appeared in front of them. Hilda slowed down, and Josie’s queasiness eased just enough for her to enjoy the pretty stonewalled houses with their slate roofs, cobblestone alleyways leading to a promenade alongside a river, arched stone bridges, circular, ship-like attic windows, and pretty tourist shops and restaurants as they chugged past. She saw a handful of tea shops, confectionary shops, art galleries, and a small village museum with a pile of old sea buoys stacked outside. A pub a short distance back from a breakwater looked inviting, the triangle of grey-green sand that was the village’s best attempt at a beach a little less so.

On the corner, next to a launderette, was a small fish ‘n’ chips shop. Hilda pulled in to a tiny parking area, then jumped off the bike, leaving the engine running. She jogged into the shop before Josie could unstrap herself and move her case enough to get out. She had just managed to get one foot onto the ground when Hilda reappeared, a bag of food in her arms. She passed it to Josie, almost pushing her back into the sidecar.

‘Off we go again,’ she said.

The road bumped over a humpbacked bridge and then Hilda was powering them up a steep hill leading out of the valley on the other side. They passed lines of houses built into the hillside, gardens so steep Josie could imagine the owners descending to their vegetable gardens on ropes.

At the top of the hill, they reached a pretty farm gate painted in a variety of bright colours. Beyond it was a gravel driveway leading to a two-storey house with views over the valley. Around it stood several greenhouses.

‘My place,’ Hilda said. ‘I’d invite you in for tea, but we’re pressed for time, and it would be better to eat on location.’

Josie didn’t get a chance to ask what she meant. They sped through a few residential streets, then came to a stop at a closed gate just outside the village. A sign beside the entrance was hidden in the weeds, and the only word Josie could read was ‘ark’.

Hilda climbed off the bike, opened the gate, then drove them through without closing it again. They bumped down a rocky, potholed lane which curved between hedgerows into a valley. Hilda finally came to a stop in a wooded grove, swaying oaks and sycamores towering overhead. Through the trees on either side of the valley stood several wooden cabins, half buried in the undergrowth. A trickling stream ran down the middle, cutting around the outside of a flat but overgrown area the size of a tennis court. Further down the valley, the trees thinned out, suggesting that the valley opened out onto the cliffs.

Hilda killed the bike’s engine, then pulled off her helmet and hung it from the handlebars. She turned to Josie and spread her arms.

‘Ta da! Your adventure begins.’

Josie pulled off her helmet and set it down in the sidecar’s seat as she climbed out, stretching out her stiff legs and rubbing a shoulder sore from being bumped by her suitcase on each corner.

‘You’re going to abandon me in the forest? Do I have to find my way out to survive? That’s easy, I can just walk back up that road there.’

She nodded at the way they had come, but Hilda was shaking her head. ‘No, this is your new challenge. It’s rustic, I’ll admit … but surely it’s better than wallowing in the memories of your old life? I thought you needed a challenge to get you out of the doldrums, something to take your mind off things.’ She clapped her gloved hands together. ‘Nothing like a bit of hardship and some physical labour—’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Look at you, with your paper soft hands. You need to get down in the dirt, get some soil under those fingernails.’

‘I like being clean.’

Hilda just chuckled. ‘Right, let’s eat these chips, before Nat turns up.’

‘Nat?’

‘My friend. He said he’ll be here. Don’t worry. He’s Cornish. They do things “dreckly.”’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means when they feel like it. Don’t worry, he’ll smell the chips. He won’t be long.’

They leant against the sidecar as they ate. As Hilda talked incessantly about all manner of things, the classic BMW R60 motorbike she had recently bought, a new species of rose she was working on, her plans to build a new sun-lounge room extension onto her house, Josie tried to pick up on her friend’s positivity. She forced a smile, happy for Hilda, but unable to shake the black clouds that had followed her down from Bristol.

Suddenly, the snapping of a twig made her turn. Something was shuffling through the trees, bent low, leaning on a gnarled wooden staff which tapped against overhanging tree branches as the figure passed. It’s course apparently random, as it made a switchback turn down the hill Josie realised it was following a meandering, overgrown path.

‘Ah, here he is,’ Hilda cried, clapping her hands together. ‘Nat! Over here! Can’t keep a Cornishman from his chips.’

The figure reached the bottom of the path and shuffled out into the clearing, the weeds parting around him. Josie could only stare in both wonder and horror. The figure was surely a man, but with more grey hair and stomach-length beard than face. Apart from a hooked nose that resembled the knot of a tree branch, the only part of him that might have been visible was his eyes, had they not been covered by a pair of incongruous black plastic sunglasses.

Nat’s clothing was no more unusual than what was visible of his face. He wore a mixture of linen and sacking, with the shredded remains of a dark green woollen jumper in there too. Ragged cargo trousers covered his legs, and lumpy toes poked out from a pair of plastic sandals that looked even older than him. A signet ring glittered on the hand that gripped the staff.

‘Nat, good to see you again!’ Hilda exclaimed, jogging over to give the post-apocalyptic version of Father Christmas a warm hug. She took his arm and led him over to the motorcycle, steering him in a way which explained his reason for the sunglasses despite the gloominess of the forest: Nat was quite blind.

‘This is Josie Roberts, the friend I was telling you about,’ Hilda said.

‘Maid,’ Nat said, sticking out a hand which Josie felt obliged to reach for and give a quick shake. It felt like a piece of driftwood, hard and lumpy, yet simultaneously smooth and sun-warmed. Up close, the old man smelled of the sea, salty and slightly musty, like seaweed sun-dried over pebbles.

‘Nice to meet you,’ Josie said.

‘And you, maid,’ Nat said. ‘Nathaniel Blackthorne. But Nat works.’ He grinned, gold and silver capped teeth glinting. ‘The maid here says you’re looking for a project.’

‘Ah, I….’ Standing beside Nat, Hilda gave Josie a thumbs up, then a surreptitious nod towards Nat which suggested he was some kind of deity to be respected. ‘I … found myself between jobs. Anything you have would be a great help.’

‘Twas nervous about giving the old girl a go,’ Nat said, still shaking Josie’s hand. He glanced around, leaving Josie unsure whether the ‘old girl’ was herself, Hilda, or some other, perhaps abstract concept. ‘Been a while, after all. Folks’ve moved on. The maid here convinced me, so if you want the challenge, it’s yours. Me, though, I ain’t one to do nothing by halves. You’re all in, or all out, so to speak. Since you’ll be doing all the work, you can have two-thirds.’ He grinned again. ‘I’ll take me third as silent overlord.’

‘Uh, sure.’

‘Then welcome.’

‘Thanks. Just to clarify … where exactly are we?’

Nat let go of her hands and stumbled around in a circle, hands out like a shaman calling for rain. ‘Maid, you be the new manager of Porth Melynos Caravan and Camping Park.’