Almost Eden Read online

  Almost Eden

  Copyright © Geoff Wolak

  Started January, 2012

  The book is set in Salcombe, Devon,

  UK, so why not have a look

  on Google Earth or a similar

  map, before starting to read.

  Place names are factual.

  www.geoffwolak-writing.com

  Almost Eden - synopsis

  Roger Bannister approaches his fifty-ninth birthday, not coping well with his divorce. His steady job at a law firm in the city of London keeps him anchored, but he returns each evening to a lonely apartment – the nightly news reporting a growing banking crisis in Europe.

  Having inherited his aunt’s house in Devon, Roger takes a much-needed weekend break, and visits a place where he spent many a happy childhood holiday, a place where he brought his own children. Preparing to sell the property, and struggling to do that in a full-blown recession, Roger soon discovers the dark secrets of his family tree - and of the house itself.

  Uncovering a vast hoard of stolen silver, Roger is soon in the media spotlight, surrounded by police officers, and knee deep in dead bodies. With the banking system collapsing around him, Europe falling apart, Roger will have to solve the mystery of the old house – and identify the real killer – before it’s too late.

  Some family secrets are best left buried…

  The writing on the wall

  “…and further to the measures we have already adopted, we shall be seeking an urgent meeting with our European partners to discuss the growing crisis…”

  The government minister now speaking, or at least attempting to speak, was drowned out by the raucous calls and shouts from the various assembled members of Parliament – on both sides of the house, papers being waved.

  ‘Growing crisis?’ I said towards the TV. ‘You’ve had six years of a growing crisis.’ I testily added the question, ‘How long does it take?’, but none of our elected public officials acknowledged me. I picked up the remote and muted the sound.

  Easing up from the sofa, I stepped across to the window and slid my hands into my pockets, a grey and overcast London evening greeting me. I blew out, frustrated, and accidentally created a misted area on the cold glass, childhood memories surfacing, those of deliberate finger drawings on such misted glass. I idly drew a “happy face” before resuming my inspection of grey London rooftops.

  I would be fifty-nine in a few weeks. Fifty-nine I repeated in my mind, my head delicately shaking itself. As a child, that would have been a big number. That would have been – I thought back – as old as Grandma Hobson. I remembered that she had been a chain smoker, had a dog with one leg that smelt terrible, but that she always baked the most wonderful cakes. An involuntary smile took hold of my face. Apart from her carrot cake - that was awful.

  But she had struggled through the Second World War with a young family, and so she knew what it was to go without, to make do – and what it was to ration your food. Like many of that era, she had grown her own vegetables in the family garden, and she appreciated what she had. ‘Count your blessings,’ she would always tell me. That and ‘wash your face and hands’.

  It was a different time, the war, but those unhappy souls who had lived through it would still have recognised Britain today, the word “austerity” seeming to crop up in every sentence and in every newspaper column. Contagion, the papers labelled it, and our elected officials busied themselves trying to blame both the Europe Union and the American Federal Reserve in equal measure.

  ‘Carrot cake,’ I thought out loud, a hint of smile evident in my reflection. ‘We’ll all being eating carrot cake soon enough the way things are going. That’ll be all we have left to eat!’

  I was almost sixty, and as I considered it - it seemed like a big number to my adult mind as well. Sixty; divorced, two grown children in university, a steady but dull job, a ten year old estate car, slippers, cardigan – and The Daily Telegraph newspaper on the coffee table. No pipe to smoke though, since I hated the smell of pipe tobacco, but as a child I quite liked the smell I encountered when I first entered my grandparents’ house, and I knew that my grandfather smoked a pipe each day. I had been – I thought back – five years old when he died, so I hadn’t known him.

  My grandmother had struggled on a further ten years after he had died, women tended to do that I considered, and my mother had always remarked that Grandma’s life had started over, had started afresh ‘without the old bugger around’. Grandma had been granted a new lease on life, and she had embraced it fully. She had not taken up parachuting or snowboarding in her twilight years, people didn’t back then, but she had taken up painting and drinking – though not at the same time for the most part.

  I turned my head to the wall above my ‘real log fire’, which was actually a modern gas fire, and to a hung watercolour, a pleasant beach scene of kids playing happily at the water’s edge. I had kept the watercolour after she had died, her liver having finally given up trying to filter her toxic blood, and most days I would not even notice the picture; I certainly never thought of her when I did glance at it.

  Turning back to the grey of London, I wondered what her hopes and dreams had been in her youth. She had married and raised kids, survived the war, and her kids had done well enough for themselves. Was that it? Was the fulfilment of her hopes and dreams simply to marry and to raise a family?

  Things were different back then, but young girls in the 1930s must have still had dreams beyond making babies. Since she had turned to painting after my grandfather had died I guessed that she had been artistic all along, that particular latent talent stifled by having to cook and to clean – and to raise my mother and her sisters.

  My mother had often remarked that Grandma had been happier after her partner of forty years had passed, that it had been like a weight lifted, and that she could breathe again. Life had started anew, but at sixty-five.

  But what of me? Fifty-nine soon, little hair left, a pot belly coming, a dull job in a firm of city solicitors. My chest heaved a sigh all by itself. I had raised two fine children, a boy and a girl, both bright and now in university, one destined to be a doctor, one heading for electrical engineering.

  I suddenly felt as if I was stood in front of St. Peter at the Pearly Gates. ‘In my defence … I raised two fine children, and I remained married – she divorced me, not the other way around. I didn’t rob or steal, nor … kill or anything, but … on the other hand I only attended church half a dozen times; the wedding obviously, two christenings, a few funerals.’

  The glass had misted over, and if my neighbours were spying on me with binoculars I would appear to be the local lunatic talking to himself. Or, I could be like one of those people I’d see walking down the road talking to themselves, only to notice the gadget fixed behind an ear as they passed. Very annoying, people like that, especially on the bus; the spontaneous eruption of conversation by someone sat alone.

  ‘Alright, mate, how you doing?’ the lad would say without looking around.

  ‘Sorry?’ I would call, only to be stared at by other passengers, till I realised – and felt stupid. Hell, I was fifty-nine soon.

  And as for the neighbours here, I was in a block of flats in which no one spoke in passing, and no one knocked on my door for a cup of coffee and a chat. If I died during the night the people in work would probably find my body a week later. London, and good neighbourliness, were not words you used in the same sentence, and Grandma would have shaken her head.

  In her day, the people in her street all looked after each other, minded each others kids, and they cooked for each other when someone fell ill. If my grandmother had dropped dead, she would have been found within hours, certainly the next day. Thinking back, her neighbour had found her the following
morning, the back door never having been locked.

  ‘You wouldn’t leave your damn door unlocked today,’ I told my reflection with some conviction.

  Sitting, I put the TV sound back on, the news now reporting tourists having been attacked and killed in Greece. I shook my head. Greece needed the tourist income, not least because it was just about their only income. It was now the middle of May, so this particular news was bad news for Greece’s all-important summer tourist trade. Since no Germans dared set foot on Greek soil - and both the Norwegians and the the Danish avoided Greece for fear of being mistaken for being German, tourism revenue would be hard hit this summer. A British tourist had also been hurt after being mistaken for a German – and would never live it down. Being mistaken for a German? I shook my head.

  With the news now detailing the murder of numerous Arab refugees in Athens at the hands of Greece’s nationalists - the refugees probably from Syria or Libya, I turned the TV off. A familiar and unwelcome silence engulfed me, my cup of tea now too cold to drink.

  After a minute of quiet contemplation I could hear the tick of the old clock, the dated timepiece perched atop my fake real log fire. The clock had been handed to my mother by her mother before her, and as I sat there it took me back to my childhood, and to warm sunny days spent doing very little on sandy beaches, but we always seemed to be busy rushing around doing it.

  After ten minutes of pleasant memories, my mind decided that these fond childhood images now hurt. My mind decided … that these memories had been very fondly recalled whilst still being married with kids, but were now of a different flavour altogether. Being divorced, and living alone, these memories prodded and attacked me, and reminded me of what I had lost – they no longer reminded me of a pleasant childhood.

  I picked up a paperback, keen to distract myself from my life; from what was left of my life. The kids were grown up and gone, my wife now gone – and seeing someone else, and I was here … in this small and Spartan apartment. Being married with kids, there had never been enough hours in the day. Now, being divorced, I existed in a universe where a normal hour stretched itself out, a universe where there was always plenty of time.

  Grandma Hobson had taken up painting and drinking, and had found a new zest for life. What had I done since gaining my imposed freedom? I came home each evening after a short commute, micro-waved a meal, sat watching the news in my work suit till the world at large angered me, then whiled away the long hours with a book.

  Freedom was over-rated; I wanted my wife back, and I wanted my kids to need me – not to be smarter than me. I wanted the life I had, not to take up painting and drinking.

  Two days later, on the Friday night, I stood in a busy central London hotel bar with Derrick from work, a three-time divorcee of fifty-five, and someone who annoyed me greatly most of the time. But when you have just the wall clock to stare at of an evening you learn to tolerate the Derricks of this world.

  ‘This place is nice,’ my drinking partner assured me, both of us still in our grey work suits. ‘And the ladies are all over forty and divorced, so … you know, easy.’

  ‘I’m not sure that easy … is a box I would tick on the dating form. Intelligent, interesting, respectful … are all boxes I would tick, as well as … you know, the not easy box.’

  ‘You know what I mean,’ Derrick insisted, glancing around the room as we whiled away the time before entering the lion’s den, otherwise known as an Over 40’s Singles Night.

  The idea of dating a forty-year-old lady did, in fact, appeal to me, since that would make the fine lady almost twenty years younger than me, yet still mature and … hopefully not easy. But, looking around the bar, I wondered how many of the ladies present today secretly possessed lengthy criminal records for armed robbery; most seemed to fit a wanted poster. The rest just scared the hell out of me.

  I asked Derrick, who now seemed to be smiling at a lady stood near, ‘Would you date a lady that was … three times wider than you at the shoulders?’

  ‘She’s OK,’ he insisted.

  ‘She, my dear chap, could lift us both – one on each arm – and carry us home when drunk.’

  ‘Nothing wrong with a wholesome lady.’

  Wholesome, I found myself repeating, suddenly picturing myself being crushed underneath an enormous amorous Walrus with lipstick.

  ‘Are we … far from London Zoo?’ I asked my keen wing man.

  ‘Not far,’ he said, still glancing around, and oblivious to my nervous attempt at humour.

  We finished our drinks, and I reluctantly followed him into the function room with the rest of the condemned, name tags soon filled in with felt pen. The complimentary champagne flutes were lifted, and for ten minutes nothing much happened, save a lot of people in their fifties standing around and looking as nervous as ten year olds at a school disco. But then a lady with a clipboard approached, two willing participants trailing behind.

  ‘Derrick, Roger,’ clipboard lady began. ‘This is Sheila and Penny, your first pair-ups. I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.’ And off she trotted after dispensing a forced smile.

  I offered polite smiles to the two ladies, handshakes given all around.

  ‘So you’re Roger, and a … barrister, is it?’ the first lady asked me, a lady with a pleasant round face - and a round body to compliment it.

  ‘No, Roger Bannister, like the runner,’ I corrected her.

  ‘Like who?’

  ‘Never mind. But I do work with barristers and solicitors, I’m a cost draughtsman.’

  ‘My ex-husband was a draughtsman.’

  ‘A cost draughtsman … is a legal term, it means to draw-up a schedule of legal costs, from a case at court. No … er … drawing of buildings.’

  ‘Oh. This your first time here?’

  ‘Yes, I was … persuaded to come along.’

  ‘I find these places alright, night out, you know.’

  ‘Yes, sitting in can be … boring.’

  ‘You divorced?’

  ‘Yes, three years almost – at least three years since the start of the process. You?’

  ‘Twice.’ She shrugged.

  ‘And … what do you do?’

  ‘Do?’

  ‘Your work?’

  ‘I was a hairdresser before I had the kids, but four is a handful. I still do some part-time hairdressing.’

  ‘Four kids, eh; I struggled with two at times. Both in university now, thankfully. They turned out OK.’

  ‘I got one in the Army, one in the RAF, one working in … The Middle East someplace, and one inside.’

  I resisted asking for clarification on just what the final offspring was inside of, but I guessed prison.

  When the lady with the clipboard returned I was relieved, and my next lady guest was a respectable size eight, tall with sharp features, and pleasant on the eye.

  ‘Hello,’ she offered with a handshake. ‘You’re … Roger, and a barrister, yes?’

  ‘No, I’m Roger Bannister – like the runner, not a barrister, but I do work at a solicitors firm in town.’

  Susan was a dental nurse, at least a part-time dental nurse now looking after an infirmed mother, and she liked sailing – yet had never sailed, and wanted to retire abroad somewhere hot when she could, but admitted to coming out in rashes in the heat. She had one evening a week free, often a Friday, when a neighbour would sit with her mother.

  I had been pleased by her appearance, but that was all that my potential suitor had going for her, not least her availability. I offered to chat to her later, after the formal introductions, whilst having no real intention of making good on my promise.

  My third pair-up was younger than most, from what I could see, and quite attractive. Blonde, she was short and curvy, but in a nice way, and I found myself actually considering that I could date her; there was an attraction that I hoped was not just as a result of the dodgy cheap champagne.

  After ten minutes of idle chat, she got to the point. ‘I’m looking for an old
er man, someone well established – a few quid put away, but not rich – ‘cause they’re all arses, and … well, you wouldn’t find a rich guy here anyway.

  ‘I’m good in bed, I know how to please a man -’ My eyebrows lifted. ‘- but I expect to be taken care of; meals, trips, and a few quid to help with rent.’

  I found myself staring, and not having a damn idea what to say or what to do. ‘Oh.’

  ‘We’ll here’s my number anyway, think about it. You can always call in a week or two.’

  With the ladies departed, and a ‘break’ called, our cheap champagne flutes were duly topped up with cheap champagne.

  ‘Did alright there,’ Derrick commended.

  ‘She’s a step away from a prostitute,’ I pointed out in a whisper.

  ‘Nah, mate, just looking for a sugar daddy -’

  ‘Sugar daddy?’ I gave him a look that suggested he was about to annoy me, as he often did in work.

  ‘You know, you look after her and she looks after you.’

  ‘And I wonder how many other sugar daddies she has … helping to pay the rent.’

  ‘Plenty more fish,’ Derrick assured me as we turned and observed the fish in question. Whales and sharks came to mind.

  I left the function without having found the new love of my life, what was remaining of my life, and I headed home feeling dejected, but also feeling that I had somehow escaped a terrible fate; a lonely apartment seemed like the lesser of two evils. The dodgy champagne made me start to pee as soon as I got home, and once the seal had been broken I was up and down all night. Alcohol, and old age, did not mix well for me.

  But I found myself considering the lady for rent, and whether or not I actually could.

  ‘Here’s forty quid towards your rent, now get your clothes off.’

  There was something tempting about it, and I soon realised that it was the control factor, that the idea of a sexual relationship that could be turned on and off like a microwave meal held some small appeal. There would be no discussion of my performance standards, or lack or performance, no false promises and trying to comfort each other in awkward moments, and I wouldn’t have to tolerate her friends or – god forbid – her extended family.