I stayed a day more in that strange village. Like everyone else in Bridbydale, I eyed up Cowslip Cottage when I passed it, having left a severely drunken Mr Bonner on its doorstep after closing at The Falling Star. He wasn't there now, which I was grateful for; his sadness made me uncomfortable. So I spent most of the day walking the muddy paths around the mere, playing the game of trying to spot and identify the strange plants that existed only in this place, enjoying the seclusion of it. Plus, it was all billable hours, and what the man from London who was paying me to look for his missing wife didn't know wouldn't hurt him; he told me himself that it was a long-shot anyway.
My wife called as I was getting into the car for the drive back to York. "How'd it go?," she said, "Find what you need?"
"Nah, not this time. Poor tyke'll have to look elsewhere."
"Shame that."
"Aye, but it's all money."
"Mhmm," she agreed. "Forgot to say. I saw the gynae yesterday."
"Oh," I said with a little concern. I didn't know about the appointment.
"I had to know. And... It's a girl. You're having a baby girl, daddy."
"Oh, I...," a smile crossed my lips. "A baby girl." Almost without thought, I looked over to the passenger seat at the rose-coloured rock I'd picked up that morning by the mere. Tracing the veins of scarlet with my finger, eyeing the speckled gold at the top end: "Well, just think of that."
YOU ARE READING
The Dale Heron
TerrorGossip is rife in Bridbydale when the Bonners arrive in the village. Amongst other mysteries, the central one perplexing the villagers most is "Has anyone actually seen Mrs Bonner?". An unnamed visitor seems the unlikeliest to learn the truth, but h...
