‘You don’t have to sell it to me. I can see how lovely it is. The church is wonderful. Look at that beautiful spire!’ Lizzie paused. ‘I don’t suppose we could get married there?’ Suddenly she found that she did care about her wedding, a bit, and didn’t want to get married in a register office and wear a suit. She wanted a dress and a veil and her friends as bridesmaids.
‘I’m not entirely sure of the rules,’ said Hugo. ‘But Patsy will know. We’ll ask her.’
He meant to be reassuring but Lizzie was already a little afraid of Patsy. She would either be like Electra, or be Electra’s best friend. Or both.
‘How much does Patsy know about – our situation?’
‘I did have to tell her everything, but she was very matter-of-fact about it. She even invited you to stay with her and Tim until the wedding. Tim thought it was a huge joke. I don’t think he liked Electra much.’
‘Right,’ said Lizzie, not sure if she liked being a joke.
‘I think Tim was just very surprised that I, who he’s always teased for being respectable and law-abiding, could make a girl pregnant by mistake and end up having to marry her.’
Lizzie didn’t quite know how to answer this.
After a little while Hugo turned off the road and on to a track. ‘Now we’re getting on to the estate. You can see it’s quite wooded but not too densely.’
‘You mean it’s not spooky?’ asked Lizzie, who was wary.
‘I don’t think so, no. Look how beautiful the trees are! And there’s the house.’ A few minutes later he pulled the car off the track.
Lizzie stifled a little gasp of delight. It was a dream cottage. It had a pitched roof, a couple of tall chimneys and plenty of windows. There was a garden that was filled with tall flowers she couldn’t identify and seemed to include a couple of fruit trees.
Hugo may have misinterpreted the noise Lizzie made. ‘I know,’ he said apologetically, ‘it’s not very big and miles from the nearest town. Although it’s walking distance to the village.’
Lizzie had a sudden flash of herself walking along the path, through the trees with a pram and a happy baby. ‘No! I think it’s wonderful! And to be honest, thinking where your parents live, anywhere normal is going to seem tiny to you. Can we go inside?’
‘I have got a key so I can get us in, but I’m not sure if the electricity is on. We might have to manage with a torch.’
‘Have you got a torch?’
‘Of course. In the car. Wait here.’
Soon they’d gone in through the back door and down the passage where several old waterproof coats hung, and into the main room.
With the aid of his torch, Hugo found a couple of oil lamps that he lit and they filled the room with warm light and shadows. ‘I promise there is electricity, just not at the moment.’
They were in a good-sized sitting room with a huge fireplace including a bread oven. ‘This is quite big!’ said Lizzie, surprised.
‘Yes, but this would have been the only room,’ said Hugo. ‘A whole family, with several children, would have done everything in this room, including the cooking. There would have been a range in that fireplace.’
‘I almost wish there still was. Think how cosy it would have been! Oh, look, there are a couple of candles on the mantelpiece. Let’s light them.’
‘There are a couple of bedrooms upstairs,’ said Hugo.
‘But where are the stairs?’ asked Lizzie.
‘Behind that cupboard door. Apparently it keeps the draughts down in here, but of course, no heat goes up the stairs unless the door is open.’
She nodded. ‘And the kitchen?’
‘Now you no longer have to cook on the range there is a lean-to. Through there.’ He picked up a lamp and led the way.
The kitchen wasn’t very big or very promising, but it was a proper brick extension with plenty of shelves, a large sink with a wooden draining board under the window and a wooden plate rack on the wall next to it. The window looked out over the garden. There was a table with two chairs against the wall and a small separate larder with a zinc mesh-covered window.
‘This just needs some jolly curtains and a lick of paint,’ said Lizzie.
‘I’ll talk to my landlady about it,’ said Hugo.
