A Week in Winter(77)

‘And does your husband help you in all this enterprise?’ she asked brightly.

‘Sadly he died some years ago. But he would have been very pleased to see Stone House up and running,’ Chicky spoke simply.

The Walls felt chastened. They had been intrusive.

‘It’s a lovely part of the world you live in,’ Charlie said insincerely.

‘It’s very special,’ Chicky Starr agreed. ‘I spent a long time in New York City, and I used to come home for a visit every year. It sort of charged my batteries for the rest of the year. I felt it might do the same for other people.’

The Walls doubted it, but made enthusiastic murmurs of agreement.

They were pleasantly surprised by Stone House when they arrived there. It was warm, for one thing, and very comfortable. Their bedroom had great style and a big bow window looking out to sea. On the little table by the window were two crystal glasses, an ice bucket and a half-bottle of champagne.

‘Just our way of congratulating you on twenty-five years of happy marriage. You were very lucky to have it and even luckier to realise it,’ Chicky said.

The Walls were, for once, wordless.

‘Well we have had a very happy marriage,’ Ann Wall said, ‘but how did you know?’

‘I read your entry in the competition. It was very touching, about how you got pleasure out of ordinary things but you wanted a little magic sprinkled on it. I do hope that we can provide some of that magic for you here.’

Of course, she had read their essay.

They had forgotten that she was one of the judges. But even though she had been touched and moved, she hadn’t voted for them to have the holiday of their dreams.

‘So you read all the entries?’ Charlie asked.

‘They gave us a shortlist. We read the final thirty,’ Chicky admitted.

‘And the people who won . . .?

‘Well, there were five winners altogether,’ Chicky said.

‘Yes, but the people who won the first prize. What kind of an essay did they write?’ Ann Wall had to know. What kind of words had beaten them to the winning post?

Chicky paused as if wondering whether or not to explain.

‘It’s odd, really. They wrote a totally different kind of thing. It wasn’t at all like your story. It was more a song, like a version of “I Love Paris In The Springtime” but with different words.’

‘A song? It didn’t say a song. It said an essay.’ The Walls were outraged.

‘Well, you know, people interpret these things in different ways.’

‘But words to someone else’s song – isn’t that a breach of copyright?’ Their horror was total.

Chicky shrugged.

‘It was clever, catchy. Everyone liked it.’

‘The original song may have been catchy and clever but they just wrote a parody of it and they got to go to Paris.’ The hurt and bitterness were written all over them.

Chicky looked from one to the other.

‘Well, you’re here now, so let’s hope you enjoy it,’ she said hopelessly.

They struggled to get back to their normal selves, but it was too huge an effort.

Chicky thought it wiser to leave them on their own. It was so obvious that for The Walls, this holiday was a very poor second best.

‘If it’s any consolation to you, everyone, all the judges, thought that even if the Flemmings got the first prize, your story was totally heart-warming. We were all envious of your relationship,’ she tried.

It was useless. Not only had they been disappointed but The Walls knew now that they had been cheated too. It would rankle for ever.

They made an effort to recover. A big effort, but it wasn’t easy. They tried to talk to their fellow guests and appear interested in what they had to say. They were an unlikely group: an earnest boy from Sweden, a librarian called Freda, an English couple who were both doctors, a disapproving woman with a pursed mouth called Nell, an American who had missed a plane and had come here on the spur of the moment and a pair of unlikely friends called Winnie and Lillian. What were they all doing here?

The food was excellent, served by Orla, the attractive niece of the proprietor. Really, there was nothing to object to. Nothing, that is, apart from the fact that the Flemmings, whoever they were, had stolen their holiday in Paris.

The Walls didn’t sleep well that night. They were wakeful at three in the morning and made tea in their room. They sat and listened to the wind and rain outside and the sound of the waves receding and crashing again on the shore. It sounded sad and plaintive, as if in sympathy with them.

Next morning, the other guests all seemed ready and enthusiastic about their planned trips. The Walls chose a direction at random and found themselves on a long, deserted beach.

It was bracing, certainly, and healthy. They would have to admit that. The scenery was spectacular.

But it wasn’t Paris.

They went to one of the pubs that Chicky had suggested and had a bowl of soup.

‘I don’t think I could take six more days of this.’ Ann Wall put down her spoon.

‘Mine’s fine,’ Charlie said.

‘I don’t mean the soup, I mean being here where we don’t want to be.’

‘I know, I feel that too, in a way,’ Charlie agreed.

‘And it’s not as if they won it fair and square. Even Chicky admits that.’ Ann Wall was very aggrieved.