Read Online The Windermere Witness by Rebecca Tope - Free Book Online
Authors: Rebecca Tope
Ads: Link
be asked. But there was a threadof resistance, alongside the instinct to accept. They were only interested in her because of Markie. They would pick her up and drop her again without a second thought. She might be seduced into regarding them as friends, only to find herself rejected within days.
Since moving to the area she had found it difficult to characterise the local attitude to incomers. There was no overt sense of closed ranks, perhaps because almost everyone she knew, other than Melanie, was also an incomer. Windermere was at the softer end of the Lake District, the fells covered with trees and the climate benign. A few miles north and the trees disappeared, the winds blew more harshly and human habitation dwindled to a smattering. Windermere saw the families and the retired, those more interested in a cruise on the lake than scrambling up High Pike or Scandale Fell. The handsome Victorian villas that filled the little town maintained an atmosphere of elegance and comfort, even now. The persistent presence of Shirley C Lingerie in the prime commercial position was an inevitable metaphor for the town. Without doubt, Eleanor Baxter bought her underwear there.
‘Okay, then,’ she said, with dubious grace.
The car was a roomy BMW, which had a child booster seat in the back. George automatically took the front passenger seat, so Simmy sat with Lucy. The interior smelt of money: a luxurious mixture of clean leather and a spicy perfume that emanated from a dangling freshener attached to the rear-view mirror. No hint of dog or mud or accidental spills, which filled her mother’s old Renault. Angie had befriended a local dairy farm and bought illegal milk there from time to time, transporting it in unreliablecontainers that often slopped. The resulting smell could be dreadful on a warm day.
The lake was in shadow, the sun having almost disappeared behind High Wray and his neighbouring hilltops. The autumn colours deepened into dark chestnut and liver red, reflected in the calm water. ‘Isn’t it lovely?’ Simmy breathed, her admiration all the more genuine for being involuntary.
‘Mmm,’ said Eleanor from the driver’s seat.
The woods of Rayrigg passed on the right, before Simmy’s own home turn towards Troutbeck. She had yet to experience the challenges of steep winter roads, snow and ice making the journey to and from the shop impossible without diligent attentions from the council gritting men. She had arrived in the last week of January, having missed by a few days the five weeks of serious winter that Cumbria had suffered that year. Nobody could quite convince her that all would be well in the coming months. Much more credible was a much-repeated tale of locals getting lost in a blizzard and freezing to death. Her cottage was on the steep winding road through Troutbeck, down which a car would inevitably slide, quite out of control, and stand no chance of getting up again until a thaw arrived. Melanie, Angie and others all laughed at her fears, pointing out that a system of salting the road was well established, and she was far from being the only person needing to travel back and forth every day.
Ambleside was only a few minutes further on, with the sudden looming fells embracing it on every side. Sandwiched between the river Rothay to the west, and Wansfell to the east, the town had a tighter, more chaotic feel to it thanWindermere. Charming, historic – Simmy felt there was a lot more to discover about Ambleside, when she had the time.
They turned to the right, climbing up towards the mountains, before stopping at a building that Simmy would have designated a mansion, if asked. Gables and wings, three floors and a generous parking area filled her view with a jumble of impressions. No wonder various relatives could stake a claim to their own permanent room here. At a rough estimate, there had to be at least eight bedrooms.
Constructed of the same dark stone as so many other nineteenth-century edifices,
Since moving to the area she had found it difficult to characterise the local attitude to incomers. There was no overt sense of closed ranks, perhaps because almost everyone she knew, other than Melanie, was also an incomer. Windermere was at the softer end of the Lake District, the fells covered with trees and the climate benign. A few miles north and the trees disappeared, the winds blew more harshly and human habitation dwindled to a smattering. Windermere saw the families and the retired, those more interested in a cruise on the lake than scrambling up High Pike or Scandale Fell. The handsome Victorian villas that filled the little town maintained an atmosphere of elegance and comfort, even now. The persistent presence of Shirley C Lingerie in the prime commercial position was an inevitable metaphor for the town. Without doubt, Eleanor Baxter bought her underwear there.
‘Okay, then,’ she said, with dubious grace.
The car was a roomy BMW, which had a child booster seat in the back. George automatically took the front passenger seat, so Simmy sat with Lucy. The interior smelt of money: a luxurious mixture of clean leather and a spicy perfume that emanated from a dangling freshener attached to the rear-view mirror. No hint of dog or mud or accidental spills, which filled her mother’s old Renault. Angie had befriended a local dairy farm and bought illegal milk there from time to time, transporting it in unreliablecontainers that often slopped. The resulting smell could be dreadful on a warm day.
The lake was in shadow, the sun having almost disappeared behind High Wray and his neighbouring hilltops. The autumn colours deepened into dark chestnut and liver red, reflected in the calm water. ‘Isn’t it lovely?’ Simmy breathed, her admiration all the more genuine for being involuntary.
‘Mmm,’ said Eleanor from the driver’s seat.
The woods of Rayrigg passed on the right, before Simmy’s own home turn towards Troutbeck. She had yet to experience the challenges of steep winter roads, snow and ice making the journey to and from the shop impossible without diligent attentions from the council gritting men. She had arrived in the last week of January, having missed by a few days the five weeks of serious winter that Cumbria had suffered that year. Nobody could quite convince her that all would be well in the coming months. Much more credible was a much-repeated tale of locals getting lost in a blizzard and freezing to death. Her cottage was on the steep winding road through Troutbeck, down which a car would inevitably slide, quite out of control, and stand no chance of getting up again until a thaw arrived. Melanie, Angie and others all laughed at her fears, pointing out that a system of salting the road was well established, and she was far from being the only person needing to travel back and forth every day.
Ambleside was only a few minutes further on, with the sudden looming fells embracing it on every side. Sandwiched between the river Rothay to the west, and Wansfell to the east, the town had a tighter, more chaotic feel to it thanWindermere. Charming, historic – Simmy felt there was a lot more to discover about Ambleside, when she had the time.
They turned to the right, climbing up towards the mountains, before stopping at a building that Simmy would have designated a mansion, if asked. Gables and wings, three floors and a generous parking area filled her view with a jumble of impressions. No wonder various relatives could stake a claim to their own permanent room here. At a rough estimate, there had to be at least eight bedrooms.
Constructed of the same dark stone as so many other nineteenth-century edifices,
Similar Books
