EARLY MAY
Martha
‘I’ll just check your details.’ The clerk behind the desk in the tourist office on the seafront spoke without looking up. Martha, peering out from under the rim of her black straw hat, held her breath. Would the woman detect a lie? A false address? Not a fictitious name as such but not the one the world knew her by? ‘So, that’s Martha Langford? Eighteen Staplethorpe Avenue, Brighton? Right? From one seaside resort to another, eh?’
‘Yes to all that,’ Martha said.
‘Well, you’ll just love it here in Hollacombe, I’m sure. A proper little home from home is how our guests describe Number 23. Here’s the key. You’ll find your chalet is about five hundred yards to your left as you leave this office. One double bedroom, one sitting room with sofabed cum galley kitchen, one loo with basin and shower. All breakages to be paid for. No barbecues on the wooden deck, I’m afraid, because the chalets are wooden. Fire risk, and all that. To be vacated a fortnight from today by 10 a.m. to give the cleaner time to turn it all around before the next occupants. The key with the luggage-label tag on it to be posted through the letterbox here if we’re closed. Any problems—’
‘I’ll sort them,’ Martha interrupted. The last thing she needed was to have to come back here and, possibly, have someone else turn up at Number 23 The Strand to sort out whatever problem she might have. Just standing here, listening to the clerk reciting what she must have recited hundreds of times before, was giving her goose bumps. The sooner she got out of here the better.
‘Of course, this could be the last season this particular chalet is let because it’s up for sale,’ the clerk said as though Martha hadn’t spoken. ‘It’s owned by the local authority at present, as are a couple of others and they need to cut costs, so they’re up for sale too. The others are privately owned by locals who keep them for their own use at weekends and in the school holidays, although some do rent them out to holidaymakers. There’s not been a lot of interest in Number 23 so far but it’s early in the season. Any questions?’ The clerk cocked her head to one side questioningly.
‘Can’t think of any,’ Martha said, perhaps a bit too sharply, which is what happens when one’s nerves are on end. She didn’t want to be rude but she had to go.
Well, Martha thought, as she closed the door of the chalet behind her, what a lovely surprise. She’d glanced at the photos on the website when she’d booked, of course, but she hadn’t studied it in much detail. It was bigger than she’d been expecting – more ski chalet than beach hut, perhaps a bit boutique hotel – and just as the lady in the tourist office had said, a little home from home. And so very clean. A nest. Martha felt the welcome of it wrap around her, warm her. The boarded walls were painted a soft shade of yellow, like vanilla custard, with a frieze of stencilled scallop shells in deep turquoise where the walls met the ceiling. Pretty, cotton curtains with blue and yellow sailboats hung at the windows in the double bedroom and living room. The cream, linen-covered sofabed was piled with large and squashy cushions in various shades of yellow and blue, and two small but matching armchairs had biscuit-coloured fleece throws draped over the arms, for colder days perhaps. The duvet on the double bed, covered in a turquoise, jacquard-style pattern, was thick and sumptuous, and the pillows large, plump and inviting.
‘All very Eastern Seaboard,’ Martha said out loud. ‘I love it.’
Some of the tension she’d been carrying with her was beginning to seep away. Yes, she’d made the right decision coming here. It was as though this chalet had been waiting for her. She patted the duvet, her hand almost disappearing in its sumptuousness.
‘And I could lie down on you right now,’ she laughed, surprising herself with that laugh because she hadn’t laughed for weeks now. But she couldn’t flop down on it just yet. Martha drew her breath in and then let it all out again slowly, her shoulders dropping as she physically relaxed. Yes, it felt good here. It would give her space and time to rethink what she wanted to do with the rest of her life. But first, she just had to do something with her hair.
Martha had never done a home hair dye before. Ever since she’d been eleven years old and at stage school, her naturally blonde hair had always been professionally cut and coloured. And, of course, for filming she’d often worn wigs. It felt strange, but empowering, to be choosing a new hair colour without others calling the shots. So she’d chosen red; a sort of rosehip red with a bit of gloss to it to cover her natural blonde. The basin in the bijou bathroom – small but perfectly appointed the brochure had said, and so it was – looked as though a murder had been committed as Martha rinsed her hair one last time. Now to dry it. And then cut it. She pulled her hair high over her head and, with eyes closed, chopped straight across. When she opened her eyes again she had about eighteen inches of ponytail in her hand. Shaking her head to loosen her hair, she braved the mirror.
Not bad. Not bad at all. Next came the coloured contact lenses. Martha’s eyes were the palest blue, bordering on turquoise, but she reckoned a redhead might have green eyes. So in went the onyx contacts.
‘I hardly recognise myself,’ Martha said, in a Scottish accent, light years away from her true Home Counties way of speaking. But that was the advantage of being an actress. She could become anyone from anywhere. And she had. Many, many, times. From stage work to period TV dramas, through a six-month stint on a ‘soap’, to Hollywood. But there was a downside – over the years so many other people had pulled her strings, as it were. So many that she felt she had almost lost the essence of who she was inside. Almost.
Her agent, Ralph Newcombe, had been furious when she’d decided to turn her back on it all.
‘You cannot be serious!’ he’d raged at her in his office that smelled of whisky and cigarettes, making Martha gag. Or rather making Serena Ross, as she was known to the world, gag. ‘You are making me look an utter fool pulling out of this! I’ve worked my backside off getting you, not the lead role admittedly, but a not insignificant role in a Tom Marchant film. Bets were on that you’d get Best Supporting Actress at the Oscars. And you pull this stunt! I’ll be surprised if you ever work again!’
That night, Martha had gone back to the flat the film company had provided and cried and cried and cried. No need for glycerine on her bottom lashes to bring on the tears. And then she’d called Tom and told him she wouldn’t be coming back to the set. She’d been flattered by his attention, even though she’d known he was married with two small children – as did the rest of the world. Sitting close to him on breaks, sharing a burger or a salad, a frisson of excitement had fizzed through her. His invite to dinner after the day’s filming had been tempting. So she’d gone. Just dinner, he’d said. And it had been. Although if she were honest with herself it wouldn’t have taken much for their feelings to run over – perhaps not this time they had dinner, but definitely the next. Tom had felt it too.
‘Taxi time,’ he’d said, leaning across the table to give her hand a squeeze. ‘The danger hour approacheth. Two people from out of town with hours to fill till morning.’
Tom had even called the taxi for her, walked with her to the door – just a little behind her with a hand in the small of her back. And that’s when she’d been startled by a barrage of camera flashes and saw in rapid fast-forward how it would be if she were to enter a full-blown affair with Tom. She – and he – would be hounded.
Martha, not liking herself very much at that moment for what she’d been on the cusp of, had turned to Tom then.
‘The danger hour is too dangerous for me,’ she’d said. ‘I’m not in the habit of breaking up marriages, despite the magic…’
‘…between us,’ Tom had finished for her.
Martha didn’t think Tom was a serial adulterer, although she was under no illusion that she’d been the first to tempt him. For the two weeks they’d been thrown together, working on Breaking Ice, he’d showered her with gifts, in time-honoured Hollywood style – bespoke perfume and a designer handbag, Italian silk scarves and an amethyst pendant on a fine gold chain. She’d worn that pendant on her first – and last – dinner date with Tom. But she’d known in an instant, the camera flashes almost blinding her, that she hadn’t been in love with him – merely in lust, feelings heightened and enhanced by the place and the setting and the fabulous clothes. There could be many Toms in the future if she stayed here among the beautiful people with money to spend and lavish lifestyles. Was that what she wanted?
And that was when she’d made her decision to end her contract on Breaking Ice and go home, back to the UK. And then… what?
Well, she had a fortnight to work out where her life was going, and a town she didn’t know to explore. In front of her, there was the curve of a bay the colour of faded denim, flat as the proverbial pancake at that moment, and the sun was shining. First she’d need to find a supermarket of sorts to buy food, and maybe a bottle of wine, although she knew it was dangerous – very dangerous – to drink alone. Martha placed her four-inch heels in the cupboard in the bedroom, slid her feet into flip-flops, took a deep breath, and went out.
‘Can I help you with that?’
A man’s voice. A Scottish accent. To answer or not? With one foot on the bottom step of the wooden steps that led up to the deck of 23 The Strand, and her arms full of carrier bags and a lamp she’d picked up in a charity shop, Martha considered her options. If she answered, she’d need to drop the Scottish accent she’d been using for a couple of days and which was becoming second nature now, because this man was likely to ask where in Scotland she came from, and she only knew Edinburgh, Glasgow and Aberdeen, each of which had its own particular accent.
‘I can manage, thanks. Only a few more steps,’ she said. And then the newspaper that had been on top of one of the bags fell to the floor.
The man picked it up, shifting awkwardly as he rebalanced himself.
‘Damned leg,’ he said, rubbing a hip. He looked at the photo and the headline on the front page and then at Martha.
ACTRESS SERENA ROSS QUITS BREAKING ICE
The photo was one taken on the steps of the hotel as Tom had guided her to her taxi. There were, Martha knew, more photos of them both inside, cosied up in the restaurant, because she was wiser now and knew that the man in the corner hadn’t been taking selfies but had been taking photographs of her and Tom.
‘I’ll take that,’ she said. ‘Thanks. The press scraping about in the gutter as per usual, I expect,’ she added, with a nod to the front page of the newspaper.
‘More than likely,’ the man said. ‘Don’t shoot but… Hugh Fraser. Photographer. Currently on sick leave while my leg heals.’
Oh my God! What sort of a photographer, she wanted to know – paparazzi? – but she was afraid to ask. Her hat had slipped back over her head as she struggled with her bags. If he was paparazzi, would he recognise her? She might have changed her hair colour and be wearing coloured lenses, but her mouth was the same shape. Her nose. Her high cheekbones, for which she was known in the world of acting.
‘I’m sorry about your leg,’ she said, acting a calmness she didn’t feel inside, although it was true she was sorry. ‘What happened?’
‘You know how, on TV, when you see photographers following a story in the street and they’re running backwards and taking photos? Have you ever wondered if they fall over?’
Martha gulped. So he was paparazzi? What on earth was she doing keeping him here, engaging him in conversation?
‘Yes, yes, I have.’
‘Well, I did. Right over a low wall. Only it was an urban fox I was trying to film without scaring it off. Compound fracture. Hence my stay here for a couple of weeks to strengthen my muscles now the break’s been sorted. Running on sand is good for that.’
‘Oh!’ Martha said, unable to stop the smile that crept to her lips as a cartoon strip of Hugh running backwards and going over the wall played in her head. ‘Sorry. It’s not funny, I know.’
‘That’s okay. Every one of my colleagues fell about laughing. And you are?’
‘Martha Langford.’
‘I’d shake your hand, Martha Langford, if you had one free for me to shake. How about I come over all macho and carry this newspaper up the steps for you?’
And then he did just that, but carefully and with a bit of a limp, Martha noticed.
Hugh took Martha’s bags and parcels from her as she scrabbled in her pocket for the chalet key.
‘I’m at Number 20.’ He waved the newspaper in the direction of his chalet. ‘Belongs to my parents, actually. Holiday home of sorts. I’d stop with them in their house back in Exeter but Mum would smother me to death with kindness. Much better I fend for myself a bit, get those muscles working again. Keep an eye open for the next big scoop, as it were.’
Martha shivered. She had no intention of being Hugh’s next big scoop.
‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘You know. For your help. Just put my bags on the deck. I can manage now. Things to do. Bye.’
With almost indecent haste she scooped her bags into her arms and grabbed the newspaper from him, pushed the door open with her knee, sidled in behind it and then closed it with a foot.
Hugh seemed like a nice bloke – the sort of bloke she’d be happy to spend time with in normal circumstances, because photographers could be useful to an actress. But her circumstances weren’t normal, were they, if the papers were still carrying stories about her quitting Breaking Ice? And she wasn’t entirely sure she still wanted to be an actress any more anyway. And what was more, she badly needed to get to know herself better before she even thought about making a new relationship with anyone. And could she trust Hugh not to be on his laptop right now letting the world know he knew where Serena Ross was holed up?
Martha kept a low profile for a few days, always on the lookout for Hugh in case he wanted to talk, or asked too many probing questions she didn’t want to answer. She’d seen him running a couple of times a day, not fast and rather ungainly, as though he was still carrying pain from his broken leg. She’d also seen him look up at her chalet as he made his way back to his own. But the red sand of the beach and the soft shush as the sea met the shore with a petticoat frill of white foam was calling her. The only thing Martha was missing from her old life at the moment was the gym. There were probably more than a few gyms in the area but she didn’t want to join one. Power walking and running could be just as good. She couldn’t hide from the world for ever. Or from Hugh. She had to get out there.
Hugh always looked glowing and happy when he got back from a run. Martha badly needed some of that – glowing and happy. But running on the beach was tide-dependent so she bought a tide-table from the kiosk at the end of The Strand that also sold teas, coffees, ice creams and a few beach toys, so she could work out when Hugh might be running and when he might not. She simply couldn’t risk, at the moment at least, that he might recognise her, although she had a gut feeling he already had. Only that morning she’d seen him swing his long legs – rather stiffly – over the sandstone wall and drop onto the beach, landing awkwardly, struggling to get his balance the way a duck might on a frozen pond. She ought not to have laughed. Hugh had looked up directly towards her chalet as though he had sensed her watching him. She’d ducked quickly behind the curtain, but the speed of her movement made the fabric flutter. Had he seen?
To run, Martha would need trainers and some leggings and a T-shirt, so she went out to buy everything along with a few groceries. And a newspaper. Back at her chalet she decided to take a mug of coffee and the newspaper down to the beach. She laid a towel on the sand and sat down.
Martha shivered, a double-page feature on the demise of Tom’s marriage – TOM MARCHANT’S WIFE FILES FOR DIVORCE – falling open on her lap. Another actress, Amy Stevens, had been cited. Not her. So she’d been right – she hadn’t been the first to turn Tom’s head. And neither would Amy be the last. Martha felt relief wash over her that she hadn’t entered a full-blown affair with Tom and that there had been little between them except animal attraction, a few small gifts and one dinner after filming.
‘Was it something I said?’
Hugh. Standing above her on the steps that led to and from the beach. Could he read the headline from there?
Martha closed the newspaper with one deft movement. She did not look up.
‘No.’
‘But you’ve been avoiding me?’
‘If that’s what you think,’ Martha said with a shrug.
‘I like to think I’m thicker-skinned than that.’
Hugh jumped – rather awkwardly it had to be said – down onto the sand and sat beside her without being asked.
‘You’re not still letting that get to you, are you?’ Hugh asked, tapping a finger on the newspaper in Martha’s – now shaking – hands.
Oh my God. He knew, didn’t he? He knew that, despite the red hair dye, the coloured contacts, the wide-brimmed hat, and her almost exclusion from normal life, she was really Serena Ross.
‘You haven’t written this, have you?’ she asked, waving the newspaper at him. Sometimes it was better to graciously admit defeat than fight a corner she was never going to win. He would know by her answer that she’d guessed he knew.
‘No. Of course not. I’m a photographer – wildlife and landscape mostly – not a fully paid-up member of the paparazzi. But I did recognise you. And I’ve read that particular newspaper this morning and I see Mr Marchant has moved on.’
‘That’s not a very flattering remark,’ Martha said. He was making it sound as though she were totally dispensable, which, while it might be true in Tom Marchant’s case, was doing nothing for her self-esteem.
‘I’m not rushing to judge you. You’re here for your own reasons and it’s not for me to pry.’
‘I’m not suggesting you are for one moment but… well… I’m a bit sensitive right now.’
‘Yes, I can see how that might be. But if it helps, today’s newspaper is tomorrow’s fish and chip wrappings, as the saying has it.’
‘If only,’ Martha said with a mock-groan.
‘True. But if you ask me – which I know you’re not – you are far, far prettier than his, um, latest squeeze.’
‘Well, thank you, kind sir,’ Martha said, unable to stop a smile creeping to the corners of her mouth. ‘I’ll take that as a compliment.’
‘Please do.’
Martha felt her smile widen.
‘That’s better. Cliché alert – you’re even prettier when you smile.’
‘Thank you again, kind sir.’ Martha laughed. ‘I know I’ve not done enough of it lately. But I’ll need to go now. My coffee’s gone cold and…’
‘I could make you another,’ Hugh said. He gave Martha a big grin, the strength of it rippling the skin beside his eyes. ‘I’m in dire need of a coffee myself after my run. Stay right there,’ he went on, wagging a finger playfully at her. ‘I’ll be right back.’
Before Martha could find breath to reply, Hugh had loped and limped his way back up the steps.
Martha considered simply getting up and going back to her own chalet, because although she didn’t think Hugh was a controlling sort of man in any way, she didn’t know him well enough to really judge. And it had felt as though it was an order he’d issued just now.
But she stayed. She was safe enough here on a public beach and, as far as she could tell, Hugh didn’t have a camera of any sort with him. She folded up the newspaper and put it underneath her beach towel and waited.
Hugh was soon back. He’d put two mugs of black coffee, a small jug of milk, some tubes of sugar and a packet of Hobnobs on a tray.
‘Could you hang on to that while I sit back down?’ he asked. ‘Only I get a bit of a balance issue now and then from the leg and I wouldn’t want to shower you with it.’
‘Of course,’ Martha said, reaching up to take the tray.
Hugh sat back down and took the tray from her.
‘How do you take your poison?’
‘Black, no sugar, thanks,’ Martha said.
‘Ah,’ Hugh said, ‘we have the same impeccable taste in coffee.’
‘Indeed we do,’ Martha said, accepting her coffee and holding it to her in both hands. How civilised this was, just yards from their chalets, nothing between them and the horizon except shell-strewn sand and some strings of seaweed left by the tide.
‘I hope you don’t mind,’ Hugh said, ‘but I’ve brought my phone. I don’t take it with me when I’m out running in case it falls out of my pocket.’ He placed the tray on the sand beside him and took out a top-of-the-range phone from the pocket of his shorts. ‘So many interesting things in the sand to take photographs of.’
Martha heard her own sharp intake of breath, like a gunshot in her ears. Of course, people took pictures with phones as well as cameras, and phones could be so slim and so easy to hide. A shiver of unease wriggled between her shoulder blades.
‘But no photos of you. Promise,’ Hugh said. ‘I think I could work out where your thought processes were going there!’
‘More than likely.’ Martha laughed nervously. She sipped at her coffee – very good coffee she was pleased and surprised to note. But she wanted the focus off her for the moment, so she asked: ‘What sort of photographs do you take? And sell, presumably?’
‘How long have you got?’
‘Until I’ve finished this coffee?’ Martha quipped – gosh, how good that felt, to make a joke.
‘Right. Well. Best drink slowly! I do wildlife photography and sell it to book publishers and magazines. Newspapers. I take landscape photographs for the same outlets. Both here and abroad for all of that. Most of that is commissioned but I also sell to photo-banks and agencies, and I have no jurisdiction over where those photos go. When cash flow has been stagnant I’ve done engagement parties, weddings – both in the UK and exotic beach locations, local theatre productions, that sort of thing. Enough to be going on with?’
‘Yes. Thank you,’ Martha said. She had a feeling she knew what sort of photographs Hugh might take that went to photo-banks and agencies over which he didn’t have, as he’d said, jurisdiction: photos of celebrities being where they ought not to have been, and with people they ought not to have been with. But it was only a feeling – she had no proof.
‘And do you know something, Martha?’ Hugh went on. ‘I’ve had all-expenses-paid trips to Bali and Bondi Beach, various Greek Island beaches and countless places in Spain, and it’s always puzzled me as to why people bother to go all that way when we have perfectly lovely beaches in this country. I mean, look at this one.’
Martha looked. Indeed it did look magnificent with the sun shining, the sea, as she looked out towards Torquay at one side of the bay and Brixham at the other, appeared as though someone had scattered a million diamonds over it. Seagulls dipped and dived on the thermals and a cormorant dived for fish, then reappeared a few seconds later some way from where it had gone down.
‘On a day like today, yes,’ Martha said. ‘I suppose people go abroad for the guaranteed sunshine.’
‘Ah!’ Hugh said. ‘Not always guaranteed, I’m afraid. A friend’s wedding I covered in Bali was rained off completely – monsoon didn’t come into it! I could set up some wonderful shots here. The bride, barefoot, with her skirt hoisted to her knees, dipping a toe in to test the water for a paddle, with the groom holding her firmly by the waist, his trousers rolled up over his calves, so she doesn’t stumble.’
Goodness, what a romantic, Martha thought. Was there a significant woman in his life, she wondered, but wasn’t going to ask. They were only ships passing in the night here, weren’t they? Hugh was healing and she was, too, in a way.
‘I say,’ Hugh said, scooping up a handful of sand and shells and letting the sand sift through his fingers. ‘Could I borrow a corner of your towel to photograph these? The stripes are sharp and the navy against the white of the shells will be a perfect backdrop.’
‘Be my guest,’ Martha said, and edged a little further away as Hugh moved towards her, making space for his photoshoot.
‘What I’ll do,’ Hugh said, ‘is lay the shells in a line down the navy stripes. See, some of them have little swirls of long-discarded egg cases encrusted on them. And this one has got a frond of seaweed so firmly attached to it it’s going to take more than my strength to pull it off.’
‘It’s like a hat,’ Martha said. ‘Or a fascinator.’
‘Exactly that. And this one is so perfect it’s like one half of a pigeon’s egg. And just as delicate.’ Hugh handed the shell to Martha, placing it gently on her palm when she held out her hand to take it.
‘Exquisite,’ Martha said. And it was. She knew beaches were always covered in shells from which the living beings had long gone, but she’d never stopped to examine any of them in detail as Hugh was now.
She watched, in silence, as Hugh took photograph after photograph, so absorbed in what he was doing now that he didn’t speak either. For Martha it was a comfortable silence.
‘I’ll photoshop them later,’ Hugh said, holding his phone towards Martha. ‘But you get the gist.’
Martha was surprised to find Hugh had taken at least twenty photos of the shells against the backdrop of her beach towel. They were all of the same thing and yet they all looked different.
‘I’d buy a card – a postcard or birthday card – with any one of these on it,’ she said.
‘Now, there’s a thought! Never thought of doing cards or postcards. Thanks for the tip.’
Martha had finished her coffee, eaten one of Hugh’s Hobnobs, and knew she ought to go. Besides, Hugh seemed to have run out of things to say now they had exhausted the subject of the shells.
And then Hugh surprised her.
‘There’s a fête on the green tomorrow. Two o’clock. Would you like to come?’
‘A fête?’ Martha’s father had always termed the village fête ‘a fête worse than death’ but they’d always gone anyway, she and her parents, and bought things they didn’t really need or want because they felt sorry for the stall-holders. She hadn’t been to a fête in years.
‘I know. Very old-fashioned things, but it’s for a good cause. They hold two or three during the summer on the green the other side of the promenade and I usually go if I’m in the area. Please say you’ll come.’
‘I don’t think I can,’ Martha said. She knew she didn’t have a good excuse if Hugh pressed the issue. It was beginning to feel like a date, this invite, and she wasn’t ready to date yet.
‘It’s for a good cause.’
‘From my childhood memories of fêtes, they usually are. The church roof or the Scouts’ trip to summer camp or somesuch.’
‘Neither of those,’ Hugh said. ‘This one’s for the local hospice. It’s where my brother spent his last few days.’
Martha hadn’t expected that, but the actress in her made her hang on to her composure – a composure she didn’t feel inside. Inside she felt crass, and gauche, and uncomfortable, as though Hugh had fed her his final line on purpose to test her reaction.
‘I’m very sorry for your loss,’ she said. ‘But I still can’t come. Now, if you’ll excuse me…’
She got to her feet and pulled at a corner of her beach towel.
‘Of course,’ Hugh said, standing up, although it took a second or two for him to get his balance because of his bad leg. ‘Thanks for the loan of the beach towel.’
‘And for the coffee and biscuits,’ Martha responded, pulling the towel towards her.
It was only as she got halfway up the steps that she realised she’d left her newspaper on the sand where it had been underneath the beach towel. Well, she wasn’t going back for it now.
But when she got to the door of her chalet and glanced round, she saw Hugh had made it to the top of the steps and was dropping her newspaper in a litter bin. The kindness of his action in getting rid of something about which she had been upset earlier brought a lump to Martha’s throat. He really was such a good and kind man, wasn’t he? But at the back of her mind was the thought that she couldn’t be entirely sure if the invite to the fête had been because she was Martha Langford or… Serena Ross.
Martha tossed and turned all night. She’d been unforgivably rude walking off like that. Hugh had said his brother had died in the hospice and although she didn’t know how old Hugh was, his brother couldn’t have been very old either. Panic had made her behave the way she had and she was going to have to get over that.
Martha took a mug of tea and a round of toast and marmalade out onto the deck at half past eight the next morning. She took one of the throws and draped it over her knees while she sat at the metal bistro table and waited for Hugh to emerge from his chalet for his morning run.
But there was no Hugh that morning. Martha waited until almost ten o’clock then went in search of him.
‘Well, good morning. This is a nice surprise,’ Hugh said, opening the door to her knock, as though the fact she’d rebuffed him the day before hadn’t happened. He was in checked pyjama bottoms but naked from the waist up. And his feet were bare. His hair was damp and curling every which way as though he was fresh from the shower and she’d knocked and interrupted him just as he was about to put a comb through it.
‘I’ve come to apologise for my appalling behaviour yesterday,’ Martha said. ‘I meant it when I said I was truly sorry to hear about your brother’s death, but I was rude to rush off the way I did without asking you about it. I’m sorry.’
‘Apology accepted,’ Hugh said. ‘After Harris – that was my brother’s name, by the way – died there were people who crossed the street to avoid saying anything to me at all.’
‘Oh God, that’s awful. Sometimes people simply don’t know what to say, I suppose, and say nothing rather than say the wrong thing. I’ve done it myself.’
‘It’s exactly that,’ Hugh said. ‘I’d ask you in but this is serious bachelor-pad land at the moment. I’m going to have to give it a thorough going over before I hand it back to my parents.’
Martha tried to peek around him to test the truth of his statement but his not inconsiderable body was blocking her view.
‘I can be messy on occasion,’ she said. ‘As more than a few flatmates have mentioned! But, well, I just came to say I’m truly sorry for how I reacted and if you want to talk to me about Harris, I’ll be happy to listen. But I’ll go now.’
‘Okay. As you see, I’m hours behind. But how do you feel about joining me for a spot of lunch later? The Shoreline does a mean burger, and lots of interesting fish, and salads for the diet-conscious. Do you know it?’
‘Give me a rough direction.’
‘Halfway between here and the harbour. Keep going in a straight line. You can’t miss it. It’s got fantastic views.’
‘I think I know where you mean.’
‘Good. Harris and I used to eat there in the holidays. I could tell you about him.’
‘I’d like that, Hugh,’ Martha said.
‘So would I. So, can I ask you to meet me there?’ Hugh asked. ‘About one o’clock?’
‘Of course,’ Martha said. She hadn’t planned her day beyond apologising to Hugh, but now she had a lunch date – was it really a date so early in the acquaintance? – she thought she might get into her newly purchased running kit and go for a run. It might help to clear her head. ‘I’ll look forward to it.’
‘Me too, Martha Langford,’ Hugh said with a grin.
He was letting her know it was as Martha he was wanting to get to know her, not just because she was also known as Serena Ross, wasn’t he? Martha’s heart lifted a little.
Martha was early, only about fifteen minutes, but she decided to go on in and find a table.
Oh! Another surprise because there were full-length windows on three sides, the ceiling was very high with Raffles-style fans, and the whole place was filled with light. Outside there was a small balcony along two sides. Tables and chairs were set up outside but Martha decided it wasn’t quite warm enough to sit out, although a few people were.
She chose a table for two, by the window facing the sea. The restaurant was built over the road, closed for the summer to traffic, and with the tide high it was as though she was sitting in the prow of a ship. She hadn’t expected that – it was almost like being on a cruise in the Mediterranean if she allowed her imagination to run away with her. She picked up the menu. Lots to choose from. Was Hugh going to offer to pay or should she suggest they go Dutch. If they went Dutch it would be easier to say, ‘Well, that was nice, but I don’t think we have a future together.’
Red snapper or crab? Quinoa salad or pesto pasta?
‘Penny for them,’ Hugh said.
‘They might cost a little bit more than that.’ Martha laughed, looking up into his smiling face.
Hugh laid a hand of greeting, briefly, on Martha’s shoulder and sat down opposite. ‘Thanks for coming.’
‘I’m glad to be here and, seeing as I had my first ever run this morning after I left you, I’m rather hungry.’
‘Really? The first? Ever?’
‘Yep. Although I’ve been guilty of being a bit of a gym bunny in my time, and daily dance lessons when I was at stage school.’
Talking about this now, it was starting to feel as though it was all in the past for her. Was it? Could it be?
‘Did you like it? The run, I mean.’
‘I’ll let you know tomorrow what opinion my calves have on that,’ she said, laughing.
‘It gets easier,’ Hugh said. ‘As most things do.’
And the smile on his face seemed to freeze, and although he was looking at Martha it was as though he was also looking inside himself.
‘Do you want to talk about Harris before we eat? You said earlier you used to come here with him so it can’t be easy being here with someone who isn’t your brother. We could just order a drink and talk? I’m not going to die of hunger if we postpone lunch for a while.’
‘I didn’t have you down as a mind-reader,’ Hugh said. ‘But yes, I was thinking about Harris. I imagined for a moment that he was going to come marching in, tell me it was my turn to buy the drinks – he always said that, even though I bought far more rounds than he ever did.’
‘And you wish you could be buying that round now?’
A waiter arrived at their table. ‘What can I get you?’ he asked.
‘Just a drink for the moment for me,’ Martha said. ‘We’ll eat later. Okay with that, Hugh?’
‘Fine, fine,’ Hugh said. ‘I’ll have a pint of local ale. And you, Martha?’
‘Prosecco if you have it,’ Martha said.
‘We sure do. Won’t be a moment.’
‘That was inordinately kind,’ Hugh said. ‘To realise I was struggling a bit there. I seemed to have lost all power of thought and speech for a second.’
‘We all need a bit of help and understanding sometimes,’ Martha said. ‘Tell me about Harris.’
‘It’ll be easier if I show you.’ He took out his phone from his jeans pocket. ‘I’ve got hundreds on here. I’ll spare you the baby brother photos.’ He looked up from scrolling through and smiled at Martha.
‘I can probably live without seeing those,’ she said, doing her utmost to lighten what was, to Hugh, a difficult moment. ‘What did he do?’
‘Sports teacher. With a bit of English on the side. Rugby was his game, although he was pretty good at just about everything he tried – tennis, cricket, water sports of every description. Here. That’s a good one.’
Hugh handed the phone to Martha, and a good-looking chap, with hair fairer than Hugh’s and a big, rugby player’s frame, smiled out at her. Despite the physical differences, she could see the likeness between the brothers.
‘How did he die?’ Martha asked, handing back the phone.
‘Leukaemia,’ Hugh said. ‘He responded to treatment at first and we all held our breath with hope, but then it just stopped working for him and he shrunk before our eyes. It was swift in the end.’
The waiter came back with their drinks then.
‘Can you come back in about half an hour, mate?’ Hugh said.
‘Sure can. Enjoy your drinks.’
‘Nice bloke,’ Hugh said. ‘But I think it’s plainer than day that we’re not enjoying much at the moment.’
‘It can’t be easy for you,’ Martha said. ‘But I’m not sad I’m here. How long ago did Harris die?’
‘Just over two years. It’s still a bit raw. It’s why I try to go to as many of those fêtes as I can and help them raise a bit of money so others can get the care Harris did. Although what I’m going to do with yet another teddy bear won on the tombola I don’t know!’
‘Offload it to a charity shop?’ She was feeling guilty now that she hadn’t gone along with Hugh, but there was no point saying so. Hugh just needed to talk. About himself. About Harris.
‘I could. But a stupid part of me thinks Harris wants me to have the stupid things. They’re tactile. Look… sorry, Martha, I know I’m being less than a thrilling lunch companion. I can be a right miserable sod at times. It’s why I’ve been known to drink myself stupid more often than was good for my liver, although I’m over that bit now. It’s why I turned into a bit of a recluse, turned down commissions. And it’s why my long-term relationship broke down. Violins time, eh?’
Martha had a feeling that, with this remark, he was subtly letting her know he was unattached at the moment.
‘What was she called? Your long-term girlfriend? If you don’t mind telling me?’
‘No. I don’t mind. Abby. Abigail. Losing her was like losing Harris all over again but time has healed me more quickly there. And I realise now she could have been more understanding. Harris had only been gone three months when she walked out. And so, here I am, trying to put all the pieces of my life back together, along with my broken leg. Doing my best to live again. But I’m being a right bloke, aren’t I, talking about me all the time?’
‘I did ask you to,’ Martha said. ‘And besides, you must know a fair bit about me if you’ve ever watched TV or been to the cinema. Or read the newspapers.’
‘Yeah, that must suck at times, too, having every bit of your private life splashed across the media.’
‘It does. But I don’t have to take it any more.’ The restaurant was beginning to fill up now and people had come to sit at tables either side of Martha and Hugh. She couldn’t risk anyone overhearing what she was saying. ‘Shall we order now?’
‘Good idea,’ Hugh said.
‘And then we can think, perhaps, of something we can do that will put our respective lives back on track.’
Running, it seemed, was the activity that suited them both. Hugh ran on the beach at least three times a day, while Martha preferred to run along the promenade, but only twice a day. If they saw one another in the distance they waved, but Hugh hadn’t issued another invite to lunch, or dinner. And Martha wasn’t entirely sure she wanted another invite because she still wasn’t entirely convinced Hugh wouldn’t suddenly send photos of her to some agency. She’d told her parents she was staying with a friend until the hullabaloo had died down, and that she was fine, and would call them soon. Friends texted her and left voicemails but she didn’t reply to them either, having told anyone who needed to know the same story she’d told her parents. Sometimes she saw Hugh on the beach, bending to photograph something lying in the sand, or focusing on something out at sea. A couple of times she’d got that feeling a person gets when someone is looking at them and she’d turned to look up at the headland above the chalets, and Hugh had been there. There was a wonderfully panoramic view of the bay from up there and he’d probably been taking landscape, or seascape, shots. He’d obviously seen her, because he’d waved to her as she turned.
But here was Hugh now, walking towards Martha’s chalet where she was sitting on the deck, hat on to shield the low light from her eyes, reading in the late-afternoon sunshine.
He had a bottle of wine in one hand, and two glasses hanging from the fingers of the other.
‘I hope you don’t mind,’ Hugh said, walking up the steps of Number 23. ‘But my motto these days is never to drink alone, and I fancied a drink, so I hope I can persuade you to join me.’
‘Is the sun below the yardarm?’ Martha said, smiling.
‘It is somewhere in the world.’ Hugh laughed back. He set the bottle and glasses down on the patio table and took a corkscrew from his jeans pocket. ‘So, can I pour?’
‘You can,’ Martha said. ‘I might have some nibbles to go with that – some crisps and savoury crackers, and two or three varieties of cheese.’
‘Sounds divine,’ Hugh said.
Hugh had poured her a very full glass of wine when she got back with the nibbles.
‘To you,’ Hugh said, handing the wine to her.
‘Cheers,’ they said as one, chinking glasses.
‘I’ve come to thank you,’ Hugh said.
‘For what?’
‘For having lunch with me the other day. I’d never have been able to go in there had you not been waiting for me. I was hiding behind a pillar waiting for you and watched you go in. But now I’ve faced my demons and I’ve been in there alone. Just coffee and cake, but I did it. I sat where we sat having lunch and, really, it was fine.’
‘I don’t know what to say,’ Martha said, cradling her glass in her hands. ‘Unless it’s that I was happy to join you, and I’m glad you’ve faced that particular demon.’
‘We’ll drink to that then,’ Hugh said, holding his glass out towards Martha to clink again.
‘Onwards for us both!’ Martha said, holding her glass high as Hugh reached over to touch it with his. ‘I don’t know if you’ve noticed but when I’ve been running I haven’t worn my hat. And my hair’s been tied back at the nape of my neck.’
‘And no one came up and accused you of anything? Not that anything you may or may not have done is anyone else’s business.’
‘No. No one. I think there might have been two or three people who recognised me because, when people do, a sort of disbelief that it could be me running towards them, or in the queue for an ice cream, comes over their face like a veil. And then, when I’ve gone, they whisper to their companion, only often it’s louder than a whisper and I catch my name on the breeze… Serena Ross.’
‘Be careful who you pretend to be or you might forget who you are.’
‘Gosh, that’s a very profound statement,’ Martha said.
‘Not mine, I’m afraid. I’m quoting, only I’ve forgotten who for the moment. Is that how it’s been for you for a while? With the acting name, I mean.’
Martha nodded. ‘I see that now. These past few days have been good. Since you showed me the shells on the beach and pointed things out to me, I’m seeing more, if that makes sense.’
‘Perfect sense. And “seeing more” is my cue to come in with a suggestion. My mission here is twofold. There was the chance to share a bottle of wine, of course, but it was also to tell you there’s a small boat that does wildlife trips, coast-hugging. It leaves from the harbour early. Would you like to join me? Can you do early?’
‘Ah, so you’ve noticed I don’t emerge for my run until after coffee time?’
‘I have. Would eight o’clock at the harbour be too early? The carrot here is that there’ll more than likely be dolphins off Berry Head.’
‘Really?’
‘The boat leaving at eight bit, or the dolphins bit?’
‘I can do early if I’m going to see dolphins.’
‘You’re on,’ Hugh said. ‘My treat.’
Martha was up at six o’clock the next morning. Hugh had said it might be an idea to wear a jacket with a hood if she had one with her, and a scarf, because it was still only May and, while the forecast was good, it could be a lot colder on the water than it was sitting on the decks of their chalets in the shelter of the cliff behind them.
He’d said it in a very non-bossy way as though he really was concerned she might get chilled.
Hugh had said he’d call for her at seven and they could walk over to the harbour. But when she looked out to see if he was on his way she saw he was on the beach, his phone/camera to his eye, back to the sea, photographing the chalets on The Strand.
Why was he doing that? Was he waiting for her to open the door so he could get a shot of her coming out? Was she being paranoid? Whichever, a ripple of unease snaked its way up her spine and out over her shoulders, and she shivered.
But just as Hugh had faced his demons by going into The Shoreline on his own without his brother, so she would have to face the fact that not every lens aimed her way was going to be for evil ends.
Martha reached for her coat, scarf and shoulder bag and went out. Hugh slid his phone back into his pocket and walked to greet her.
‘Gorgeous morning for it, Martha,’ he said. ‘I don’t think you’ll regret this.’
‘I hope not,’ Martha said. ‘I’ve usually got pretty good sea legs.’ And then she decided to let Hugh know she’d seen him photographing her chalet. ‘What were you taking photographs of just now?’
‘The chalets. And yours in particular.’
‘Why?’ Martha said. She didn’t know whether she wanted to go and see dolphins any more.
‘Because there was a peregrine falcon hovering above it. I think it must have seen a piece of cockle or something a seagull had dropped. I’ll show you if you like.’
‘Please.’
‘We’ll need to get going if we’re going to catch that boat, though.’ Hugh placed an arm under Martha’s elbow and steered her round in the direction of the harbour. ‘I’ll find the best shots and show you as we go along.’
And he did, but still Martha was uneasy.
‘Have you ever seen the film Roman Holiday?’ Martha asked.
‘Yep. Dozens of times. It’s my mother’s favourite. After Harris died she curled up on the couch watching it on a loop for months. I watched with her more times than I can count. So, I think, reading between the lines here, that you’re saying I’m not the Gregory Peck character who gets to kiss the iconic Audrey Hepburn character, but that I’m… the photographer?’
‘But you haven’t taken any photos of me that you’re going to present to me, as happened in the film, when my fortnight of escapism here is over?’
‘Nope. But then, photographers don’t, for the most part, have to sit in a darkroom developing stuff these days. There are no negatives to blackmail people with. Anything unwanted is deleted with a swipe of a finger. ‘But back to Roman Holiday… Audrey Hepburn’s character, Princess Ann, and the journalist, Joe Bradley, as played by Gregory Peck, were never going to get together, were they? Even though they did share just the one kiss,’ Hugh went on. ‘See how well I know this film!’
‘And the Princess Ann character was never going to get it together with the photographer?’ Martha smiled.
‘Irving Radovich, as played by Eddie Albert. Who never got to kiss Audrey Hepburn, although, as I said, Gregory Peck did. And what a kiss! What fantastic on-screen chemistry those two had, eh? And off-screen for all we know.’
They’d reached the end of the beach now, and would have to get back on to the promenade to make their way to the harbour. Hugh, with his long legs, stepped on to the prom and held a hand out to help Martha up.
Hugh was looking at Martha, a gentle smile playing about his lips. He ran his tongue around them as though they had suddenly gone dry with nerves. She had the feeling he would very much like to kiss her. And much to her surprise, Martha found she wanted very much to kiss him too. In all her twenty-seven years she’d never kissed anyone who hadn’t been involved in the world of acting. But would that be wise? Could their worlds knit together happily? Would they?
‘Well,’ Hugh said, breaking the spell that seemed to have been cast over them both. ‘The boat and the dolphins wait for no man. Come on.’
‘You weren’t joking when you said it was a small boat.’ Martha laughed. ‘I’ve been in bigger baths in the States!’
‘I’ll have to take your word for that!’ Hugh grinned.
They were sitting in the stern, just seven other passengers seated onboard. And two crew. Tea and coffee available on request was written on a scrap of paper pinned to the cockpit and Martha wondered where it could possibly be made in such a small space – and how, given the boat rocked as the captain spun it round to point out to sea. But then the sea seemed to flatten out as though it had been ironed and they were sailing over a sheet of satin.
‘Cormorants,’ Hugh said. ‘Fairy Cove.’
Just yards out of the harbour and Martha had seen her first cormorant up close, standing on a rock a few yards from the shoreline of a fairy-sized cove. How large they seemed so close up, how glossy and rather elegant-looking with their small heads and slender bodies.
‘And the gulls are just waking up in their cliff roosting places,’ Hugh said, pointing up at the red sandstone cliff. ‘And terns.’
‘It’s a bit of a day of firsts for me already,’ Martha said. ‘I mean, do we ever really look at cormorants and seagulls and terns in the normal course of events?’ She never had – they were just there, seagulls being a nuisance much of the time, but from the boat they looked as though they’d just come through a washing machine on a white wash, they were so bright in the early-morning light.
‘Well, I do,’ Hugh laughed. ‘They can be my bread and butter, seagulls. Thank God for photo memory cards these days because I can take literally thousands of images and then discard what I don’t want. Forgive me if I ignore you for a moment, but there’s loads I want to take pictures of.’
‘Snap away,’ Martha told him.
The captain was giving a running commentary about the area and the wildlife and Martha was happy to let his words wash over her as her eyes drank in the view. Hugh kept standing up to take pictures, then sitting down again, touching her on the arm now and then, gently but briefly, to ask if she was okay, and was she warm enough.
And then, there they were. As the boat rounded Berry Head, there were the dolphins. The captain shut down the throttle so that there was only the shush of the sea and the rumble of the motor as they all stood, as though choreographed, watching the dolphins jump and dive. No one spoke. A woman on the port side put her hands to her mouth and her eyes went wide with wonder as though she couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing. Martha tried to count them… seven, eight, nine… but couldn’t be sure she wasn’t counting the same ones twice. As the boat rocked gently on the current, and everyone seemed to instantly find their sea legs, the dolphins came nearer. Martha had the urge to reach out and touch one, they were so close.
Martha lost track of time. She’d heard how seeing dolphins could be an almost religious experience and now she knew it to be true. Never would she have thought she could see them here, off the Devon coast, and in May, and in the company of a man she’d only just met. They were so free, so joyous, the way they leapt and then disappeared beneath the water again only to surface a few yards further away to make the same manoeuvre all over again. And it was then that Martha knew she had never had that freedom. Her life in acting had been scripted by her mother for the most part. Yes, she’d had a gift for acting – and dancing and singing – but had she only been living the life her mother had wanted for herself? She had spent two-thirds of her life living in what she now realised was a rather cloistered world.
Although it had been Martha who had run out on her acting life, it had taken meeting Hugh to show her the beauty in the real world.
‘Thank you for bringing me, Hugh,’ she said, sitting back down, quite giddy with emotion now.
‘It’s been my pleasure.’
The dolphins were moving further away now. Still rising from the water but not as high as they had been.
‘I’ll hold this experience to me for ever, I think,’ Martha said.
‘Me too. And we could,’ Hugh said, ‘make a few more before your fortnight’s up. If that’s okay with you, Miss Martha Langford.’
There it was again – Hugh’s use of her real name, not her stage name. He liked her because of who she was, not what she was.
‘We could,’ Martha said. ‘And I think we should.’
So they did. They still ran each day, but separately, because Martha was never going to be able to keep up, running on sand, with Hugh. But they always met for coffee, at one of the many cafés along the seafront, or back at Martha’s chalet, taking their drinks down onto the beach to drink if the tide was out, burying their bare feet in the sand, and letting the sand trickle through their fingers as they talked and shared aspects of their past lives. In the evenings they wandered up into the town to find a restaurant or pub for supper. They even had a hilarious hour in the Penny Arcade playing the gaming machines – winning sometimes, losing sometimes. A bit like life, Martha thought, although she thought she might be on a winning streak now she’d met Hugh.
Hugh had taken Martha’s arm in a gallant way and linked it through his to cross roads, but they didn’t hold hands. Or kiss.
On Martha’s last night, sitting on the deck of 23 The Strand, Hugh uncorked a bottle of champagne he said he’d had cooling in his fridge, along with a plate of deli nibbles Martha had a feeling he’d bought for just such an occasion.
‘Glasses out,’ Hugh said, indicating the frothing champagne and the need to get it into glasses before it frothed all over the deck.
‘Yes, sir!’ Martha laughed, holding out the champagne glasses towards him.
When they were filled to the brim, she handed one to Hugh.
‘A toast,’ he said. ‘To you. For helping me with my grief over Harris. So, to you.’
Martha gulped back tears, then took a sip of champagne.
‘And to you,’ she said, clinking glasses. ‘And to legs and hearts that will mend, given time.’
‘That too,’ Hugh said, tapping Martha’s glass again.
‘What will you do now?’
‘Photography, of course. I’ve a fancy for photographing the oceans of the world, running on the world’s beaches. I’ve got an idea for a TV series running around in my head – 90 Mile Beach, Bondi Beach. Woolacombe in North Devon, even. It doesn’t have to be a big beach or a famous one. The concept is I’d run with a well-known personality and we’d look at the geography and wildlife around us, and put the world to rights as we ran. What do you think?’
I think it’s a rotten idea. I want you to stay in my life, not go running off with some random person you might fall in love with on a tropical beach. Was he telling her this was the end of their friendship? Or was he putting the ball in her court, giving her an ‘out’ if she wanted it?
‘Sounds good,’ Martha said.
‘Once more with feeling,’ Hugh laughed.
‘Sounds really, really good.’
‘That’s better. A seven out of ten that time. And you?’ Hugh asked.
‘I’ve not made any firm plans yet. I quite fancy stage work again. It’s all too easy to iron out mistakes while filming for TV or the cinema. The money would be less but I’ve got enough to live on for a while. Then again, there’s an idea buzzing about in my head like a mosquito that I could train to teach drama. Not at a stage school but in an ordinary comprehensive perhaps.’
‘Go for it,’ Hugh said. ‘You’ve got a beautiful speaking voice. Well, a beautiful everything actually.’
‘That’s a lovely thing to hear,’ Martha said. ‘And?’
‘And what?’ Hugh swirled the stem of his glass in his fingers. He looked down at the table, up at the sky, out to sea. His eyes settled on Martha for a second and she saw his Adam’s apple going up and down.
He was struggling for the right thing to say, wasn’t he?
‘To our respective futures?’ Hugh said eventually.
‘I think we both know that isn’t what I meant. And I do believe, Hugh, you’re blushing.’
Martha prised Hugh’s glass gently from him and placed it on the tiny table between them.
‘I was taught in drama school that, in the right situation, more emotion, more feeling, more truth can be conveyed by what people don’t say than by what they do. Action – and conversely inaction – really can speak louder than words sometimes.’ Then she cupped Hugh’s face in her hands and kissed him. Just a gentle kiss but she let it linger.
‘Wow! Is that how they teach you to kiss in stage school?’
‘Nope. That one came from the heart.’
And then Hugh kissed her back.
It was that old cliché of fireworks and music playing for Martha.
‘And so did that. But back to our futures… I like live theatre,’ Hugh said. ‘Can I come and watch?’
‘Of course. And I’ve decided a bit of running on the world’s beaches is something I’d quite like too.’
‘So, we’ve rewritten the end of Roman Holiday.’ Hugh kissed her again.
‘Get a room already!’ someone shouted from the prom.
‘Your cabin or mine?’ Martha asked as Hugh released her from the kiss.
Martha wrapped the amethyst necklace Tom Marchant had given her in tissue paper and slid it into an envelope. She had no need of it any more but it might be just the thing someone else might love and cherish. On the outside of the envelope she wrote her message:
Dear next occupant,
I’ve had the most interesting and wonderful fortnight at 23 The Strand. Life-changing even. I hope you have a wonderful time too. I leave you this gift, which I hope you’ll enjoy wearing or will give to someone you think would like it. It might be fun if you could leave some little thing as a welcome gift for the next occupant but that’s by no means obligatory.
Best wishes
Martha
P.S. Formerly known as Serena Ross