Read Online The Living and the Dead in Winsford by Håkan Nesser - Free Book Online Page A

to one side.
    ‘You’re passing through, I take it,’ said the woman.
    ‘Not really,’ I said. ‘I’m renting a house just outside the village for the winter. Darne Lodge, maybe you know it?’
    The man shook his head but the woman nodded. ‘Up there?’ she said. ‘Above Halse Farm, isn’t it?’
    ‘Yes, that’s the place.’
    ‘For the winter?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Isn’t it old Mr Tawking who looks after it?’
    ‘Mr Tawking, yes, that’s right.’
    ‘And you’re going to live there all this winter?’
    ‘Yes, that’s the plan. I have a piece of writing I need to work on.’
    She laughed. ‘Well, if it’s being left alone you need, you’ve come to the right place. But forgive me. What would you like to drink? I sometimes forget that I’m working in a pub.’
    ‘You’ll get used to it eventually,’ said the man. ‘You’ve only been working here for thirty years.’
    ‘Thirty-two,’ said the woman. ‘We do a very good shepherd’s pie, if you fancy something to eat. That’s right, isn’t it, Robert?’
    ‘Not bad at all, it has to be said,’ replied Robert, eyeing his portion intently. He had only just begun eating it. ‘I’ve tasted worse. I can’t quite remember when and where, but I think it might have been in—’
    He was interrupted by somebody else coming in through the door.
    ‘Good evening, Henry,’ said the woman. ‘Pretty rough weather out there.’
    Robert shrugged and started eating. The newly arrived customer – a short, slim man aged about thirty-five – nodded a greeting to all three of us, and smiled when he noticed Castor, who had already stretched himself out on the floor in front of the radiator. ‘A nice dog. Yes, winter’s on the way.’
    ‘Can you wait a minute, Henry,’ said the woman. ‘I must just see to our new guest first. Would you like to try the pie? There’s steak and kidney as well, of course. And a few other things.’
    ‘Shepherd’s pie sounds good,’ I said. ‘And a glass of red wine, I think.’
    ‘Excellent,’ said the woman. ‘My name’s Rosie, by the way. It’s always nice to have a new face around.’
    ‘What’s wrong with our faces?’ asked Robert, his mouth half-full. Henry, who actually looked as if he might be Robert’s younger brother, or even his son, took off his jacket and hung it on a hook on the wall. I received my glass of wine and sat down at one of the four empty tables in the bar. Castor raised his head and wondered if he ought to move a little closer to me, but decided it was more comfortable by the radiator.
    ‘Anyway,’ said the man called Henry. He seemed a little more shy, somewhat more introvert than the other two, Robert and Rosie. ‘Mrs Simmons managed to get away to the hospital after all.’
    ‘Thank God for that,’ said Rosie.
    ‘And not a day too soon, if you ask me,’ said Robert.
    ‘Nobody’s asking you,’ said Rosie. ‘How’s George?’ she added.
    ‘I don’t really know,’ said Henry. ‘But at least he said he was going to take the opportunity of throwing out that sofa.’
    ‘About time,’ said Robert. ‘The cat’s been pissing on it for the last ten years.’
    ‘George is the nicest man I’ve ever met,’ said Rosie as she poured out a glass of beer for Henry.
    ‘Except when he’s watching football,’ said Robert. ‘Then he’s like a male gorilla with toothache.’
    Henry sat down on one of the barstools. They continued talking about Mrs Simmons and George, the sofa and the cat, for a while. All the time they avoided using Mrs Simmons’s first name, whatever it was, and I wondered why. But I didn’t ask. I sipped my wine and started leafing through my Exmoor guidebook. I thought that if I really was going to stay here for the winter I would eventually discover all kinds of connections and contexts that I didn’t have a clue about just now. Perhaps Robert and Rosie and Henry had spent the whole of their lives in this village. Mrs Simmons and George as well. And the