Wednesday
Crockington to Manderwood – The Second Matthew

My traditional Wednesday fatigue, that midweek slump just prior to the pre-weekend resurge of energy, was gladly absent this week.  At work I wish my life away, which I hate.  When I’m on holiday I long for the days to crawl as they do during a working week.

Polly and Martin had torn themselves out of bed early, and she had bagged the seat by Lyndon.  She shot me a smirk as I walked past to sit with the Salad Couple and their scrambled eggs.

There were no zebra sausages on the menu, but a choice of venison or pork and herb varieties.  This morning fare was of the variety my nan used to say would ‘land on your belly and make you bow-legged’ but, despite having seven miles to walk that day, I indulged without regret in the magnificent fry-up.  Ah, nothing beats a cooked breakfast.

Hazel sauntered in yawning and flopped down opposite me, but the colour and sizzle seemed to zing her awake.  ‘That looks divine.’

I gave her a thumbs-up, my mouthful of fried bread and sausage precluding speech.  She ordered the same, last night’s vegetarianism evidently temporary.

Afterwards, Lyndon gathered us for his team talk and started dishing out lists.

‘Now for this stage of the route I usually set everyone a little just-for-fun task.  I call it a photo scavenger hunt.  I see you all have cameras, or phone cameras, with you.  See how many of these you can snap during the course of the day.  Work in pairs if you like, or groups.’

There were seven typed random items:

- Easy one to start you off:  Earl Matthew’s decapitated marble head
- A yellow car
- A slice of coffee and walnut cake
- An azalea bush
- An old style red telephone box
- Where the Simpsons might reside?
- The way to Amarillo

‘Is there a prize, Lyndon?’ asked Shane.

‘I think we could stretch to that, Shane.  How about a bottle?’

‘How about a dance with you in the disco tonight?’ suggested Polly pertly.

‘They have started doing Wednesday discos at the Boscobel,’ Lyndon sidestepped.  ‘Bingo too.  The place is under new management, apparently.  Don’t blame me, I don’t choose the hotels, but you’ll get a survey to fill in at the end of the week so don’t be shy about letting head office know your thoughts.  They are constantly reviewing their list of hotels.’

‘Sounds promising,’ Hazel grimaced.

‘One thing I will say for the ‘Bozzie,’ as they call it locally, is the food was very good last time I was there.  Unpretentious, is how I would describe it.’

‘No zebra then?’

‘Definitely no zebra, Hazel.  Now we’ve got fewer miles to cover today, which will enable us to spend a good couple of hours at Manderwood Manor.  It’s just over three miles there, we’re booked on the half-eleven guided tour, there are stunning landscaped gardens to stroll around, lovely tea room where we can have a bite to eat, then it’s another four to Bhylcroft and the Second Matthew.  The Boscobel Hotel, home of the infamous discotheque, is at the bottom of it.

‘Same drill as yesterday, cases in the lobby, set off at nine.  Let’s have another good day.  And don’t forget your scavenger hunts, folks.’

******

There was more cloud coverage than of late as we set off.  The sky was of an enveloping white that had the potential to either darken to grey and yield rain or fragment and expose blue.

We veered almost immediately off the main A454 on to a footpath parallel to it, signposted Manderwood.  A hedge muffled the raucous traffic, plunging us into rural quietude again.

‘Bit chillier today, isn’t it,’ I remarked to Hazel.  Hey we’re British, of course we were going to make compulsive observations about the weather.

‘I spoke to our Bart this morning,’ Shane beamed, ‘before he went to school.  Told him I had crocodile for me tea last night.  Straight off he came out with: “Did you ask them to make it snappy, Dad?”  Such a bright kid.’

‘Bless him.’

‘My battery’s as flat as a dodo now.  Forgot to bring the charger.  Worth it to speak to me lad, though.’

‘I’ll lend you my charger tonight,’ I offered.  ‘You’ve got a Nokia, haven’t you, same as mine?’

‘Ah, you’re a diamond, you are, bab.’  He looked at me as though I’d just invited him to cash in my unwanted winning Lotto ticket.

‘No problem.’

‘Talking about Nokia, would you believe there’s actually a little girl called that at our Myleene’s nursery.  Nokia!’

‘Some parents, eh?  Must have been the network they were on when it happened!’

‘It’s not much worse than Bart or Myleene,’ Hazel hissed to me as Shane loped off ahead to share the ‘snappy’ anecdote with Ted and Enid who, evidently still mistrustful of the minibus, were continuing to lug their suitcase.  ‘You wouldn’t be a love, would you Naomi, and fish my water bottle out the back pocket?’  She pointed down to the side compartment of her rucksack.

As soon as everybody overtook us, Hazel smuggled her tiny camera out of her cagoule pocket and snatched a surreptitious photograph.  She took the water from me, winked and nodded towards one of the back gardens that bordered our path.

Half obscured by a shed, unnoticed by the rest of our gang, was a retro relic.  An iconic red telephone box, obviously privately acquired and lovingly preserved.

‘That’s one ticked off the list,’ Hazel whispered conspiratorially.

‘Good ruse, teammate.’ 

We hurried to catch up with the others before our absence raised suspicion.

******

‘How close are you to home now?’ Hazel asked me as we approached Manderwood Manor, which was on the side of a predominantly residential hill.

‘We can’t quite see my place from here.’  I curled my thumb and forefinger into a ‘telescope’ and did an exaggerated peer through it at the extensive view below.  ‘My bit of Walsall’s about eight miles from here.  Which Adrian thinks is hysterical.’

I swear Lyndon looked round momentarily at the reference to Adrian, giving support to my fuzzy suspicions from last night.  He appeared to be concentrating on his commentary to distract himself.

‘Right, I’ll collect our tickets from reception now.  We’re well ahead of ourselves, got an hour before we need to meet for the guided tour, so I’ll leave you to disperse, have a walk round the gardens, get a coffee if you wish.  I won’t tell you too much about the house, don’t want to spoil the tour for you.  We’ll congregate at the vestibule entrance just before half-eleven.’

******

‘So, Capability Boden,’ I linked arms with Hazel, ‘care to show me what an azalea bush looks like?  I wouldn’t know one from a tin of beans.  I live in a flat and grow cress.’

The gardens, for which Manderwood Manor is renowned, were exquisite beyond comprehension.  Regimented rows of yew topiary partitioned the lawns into mini plots, where bushes and flowerbeds were in gaudy bloom.

‘There,’ Hazel swiftly photographed an explosion of pinky-orange blooms and stowed the camera back in her deep pocket like a spy.   It was getting fun, being all competitive and wily like this.

‘Stunning here, isn’t it,’ I sighed.  I love my aforementioned flat but, not having a garden, I’m unaccustomed to profusions of flowers and topiary.  Therefore this was another place in which I came over all uncool and overwhelmed-by-the-beauties-of-nature.  ‘This one of your projects then?’

 ‘I wish.  In fact Sir Samuel Mott designed these grounds.  His books were my bibles when I was starting out.’

‘Those hedges are like something you’d see in a geometry textbook, aren’t they?  Not a stray twig to mess up those flat lines.’

We wandered back towards the house and bumped into Polly and Martin exiting the tearoom.

‘Just got the coffee and walnut cake,’ said Martin proudly, holding up his camera.  It was the first time I’d heard him attempt conversation with anyone other than Polly.

She now dragged him towards the so-called ‘secret’ garden – the object of which I felt was somewhat defeated by the prominent sign on the wall which proclaimed it thus.

‘Some of us prefer more adult fun,’ she purred.

‘That poor boy looks exhausted,’ Hazel murmured.

******

Polly and Martin showed up late, and brazenly dishevelled, for the tour, which displeased our guide, the schoolmarmish Pat.  Pat was about sixty, tall and upright, with the kind of long blonde hair some ladies that age can get away with (she wasn’t one of them) and bulgy eyes set wide apart, like a cod.  According to her badge, her name – you’ll never believe this – was Pat Codd!

‘Right, now that we’re all here,’ her boots clacked brusquely along the tiles, ‘we can begin.’  She had already barked to us of the dire fates that awaited us in hell if we touched anything in the house, sat on any of the chairs or failed to switch off our mobiles.

She ushered us into the drawing room.  It had that old-bookish scent and haunting, still-photograph feel typical of preserved rooms in stately homes and museums.  The decor was whatever the opposite of minimalist is.  A highly intricate pattern of interconnecting circles and hexagons was carved into the ceiling, there were magenta brocade curtains, and you could have barely placed a pin between all the paintings adorning the walls and grand piano lid.

The overall effect was, if I’m being frank, somewhat chaotic.  But then who am I to knock Jacobean VIPs for not embracing the ‘less is more’ approach?

‘Manderwood Manor is Jacobean in origin, exemplifying the Renaissance style of architecture.  It was constructed in 1608 as a home for Sir Edward Theodoric, the great-great-times-twenty-four-grandson of the famed Matthew.

‘The family home until then was Hednesborough Hall, fifteen miles up the road, but that had fallen into disrepair and Sir Edward decided to relocate.  Hednesborough Hall, as I am sure many of you know, exists today only as a ruin.  Like Manderwood, it is now in the care of History for Britain.  Manderwood itself was acquired by the organisation in 1938, by which time the Earl had for several years been without surviving direct descendants to take it on.’

Pat Codd gave us a synopsis of Theodoric family life, the dignitaries who’d have been entertained in this room, the history of some of its artefacts.  Polly yawned and studied her nails.  Shane, at the other extreme, was scribbling notes.

‘There had long been legends about Earl Matthew haunting Hednesborough Hall, and he allegedly followed Sir Edward and his family here.  Sightings of our phantom nobleman have been reported here for centuries.  He is by all accounts a fairly lonely ghost these days, since the house is uninhabited.  He pops into the tearoom for a spot of company from time to time, according to Donald the waiter.’  Pat’s tone made it plain she did not share Donald’s belief in ghost stories.

I seriously love history, I studied the subject at A-level – though confess to some gaps in my knowledge.  Until I was about nineteen, I thought – oh, this is a shameful admission – that the Battle of Trafalgar was actually fought in Trafalgar Square!  Wasn’t that moronic?  I’ve gone crimson just thinking about it.  Yes, I truly thought the battle took its name from the landmark, not vice versa.  It was an assumption you might say lacked logic.  Blame it on my education if you like – we didn’t cover the Napoleonic Wars at my school.

My eldest brother, Gaz, laughed so hard he virtually had a seizure when I told him.  ‘Nelson was an Admiral in the Royal Navy, sis,’ he spluttered.  ‘Didn’t you twig that sea might have played a role in his most famous victory?  What do you think they did with the ships – strapped them to the back of red London buses?  Whose side were the pigeons fighting on?’  He still occasionally reminds me of that gaffe.

Back to Manderwood.  We trooped through to the huge parlour, the focal point of which was the ancient marble statue head.  This was another highly decorative room; its walls were draped with tapestries depicting those surreal woodland scenes unfathomably beloved by embroiderers, and a pair of vases six feet tall flanked the fireplace.  I wondered whether mutant daffodils were grown in them, watered by a housemaid up a ladder with a can the size of a water cooler.

‘Successive Theodoric generations were avid collectors, and also lucky enough to number many eminent artists of the day among their acquaintance, giving them unrivalled access to original artwork.’

Perhaps, had the line not died out, contemporary Manderwood Manor occupants might be continuing the tradition and commissioning Damian Hirst creations.  The marble Matthew could have had the indignity of facing a pig’s rump in formaldehyde across the parlour from a matching display case.

We all photographed the head, it being the ‘easy one to start us off’ in the scavenger hunt.  I won’t pretend it looked magnificent, or that it much resembled a head, more of a misshapen shot put, but it is an important relic of English history, and one I am glad to say I have now seen.

Pat Codd may have been a bit stern, but really knew her stuff.  She would probably have had a nosebleed if I dared share my ‘Battle of Trafalgar Square’ howler with her.  The English Civil War phase of the Theodoric chronicles was clearly her favourite.  By the time the Roundhead mobs were annihilating Matthew’s statues, she had whipped herself up into a televangelist fervour.  She was right there with them, her cod eyes jammed shut in concentration.  I could picture her in battle actually; Boudicca in a Debenhams blouse.

Then history was sacrilegiously interrupted by Polly’s obnoxious mobile, and then by Polly shamelessly sniggering as she read her text (presumably from her Aunty Maureen).

Pat Codd (go Pat, go Pat!) zapped her with a ferocious look.  ‘If you could turn that off.  I did make that request at the beginning of the tour, but of course you were not here at that point.’

Poor Martin gazed at the floor.

******

As we emerged from Pat’s tour, a rabble of schoolkids were waiting to go in.  They were like every class in the history of school trips: all snot and Mini Cheddars, hyper with the euphoria of a day’s liberation from lessons, defying their three teachers’ ineffectual attempts at order.

Our gang descended upon the tearoom, where the coffee and walnut cake proved another easy item to tick off the scavenger list.  This delighted the camp, elderly waiter who wondered why his sponges were so photogenic.

The said waiter was the ghostly Earl’s friend Donald, and never had a man looked so at home in a ruffled pinny.  He rustled up egg sandwiches and beautiful tea, which was presented in floral teapots as opposed to those awful steel ones you usually get, with ill-fitting lids and handles you can’t hold with your bare hands because the manufacturers have not quite sussed that – hello! – metal conducts heat.  Donald also made salad sandwiches for a certain couple in our party, even though they were not on the menu, and was suitably captivated by Shane’s ‘They called me the Dieting Dustman from Dudley’ yarn.

‘This is what I looked like before.  Shane flashed the familiar photo.  ‘Since I lost seven stone I’ve never felt better.’
‘Peachy,’ Donald remarked, hand poised on hip.  He was such a cliché, there would be letters to Points of View were he on TV as a sitcom writer’s idea of a gay man.

This café was our nicest lunch stop of the week.  It’s a rarity, in these days of sachets, to see sugar lumps on the table, all beige and white and crystalline, heaped in a bowl.

‘Bliss,’ I said to Hazel, popping one on my tongue.

‘You don’t take sugar in your tea, though?’

I shook my head.  ‘Never have.  But I love sugar lumps.  Bizarre, eh?  There’s something old-fashioned about them.  They look so exquisite like that.  Like a bowl of diamonds.’

‘That’s very poetic.’

‘I wish the poetic inspiration could have walloped me last night.  Bloody “succulent” indeed!’

‘Lyndon seemed to admire your choice of word, though,’ Hazel reminded me.

‘So he did.’  I felt all hot and silly remembering last night’s meal and the looks across the table into which I may or may not have read too much.

I saw Polly curl up against Martin.  He looked mildly irritated as he was trying to pick up his tea with the arm to which she clung.

‘I need a cuddle after that old bag shouted at me,’ she said pathetically.

‘Well you should have turned your phone off really, petal.’  Martin was very mutinous today.

Clearly unaccustomed to her wheedling not working, Polly wrenched her arms away from him and crossed them petulantly.  ‘To think I’m missing Loose Women for this!’  She mercifully maintained a mute sulk for the rest of the day.

When we left, Donald said ‘Toodle-pip’ and gave us a little wave.  ‘Keep up with the diet, Shane,’ he added and winked.  He didn’t pat Shane’s bum, but I sensed he didn’t lack the inclination.

We were a good ten minutes down the road when Shane speculated, ‘D’you reckon that Donald might have been gay?’

******

The scene of this lightning-bolt realisation was Dipton, a large and relatively new South Staffordshire village that we were told had mushroomed out of an air force community.

‘There was an RAF base here during the Second World War,’ recalled Lyndon, ‘and the only housing initially was to accommodate the air force personnel and their families.  The base itself was then extensively built on after the war.  Schools and other community facilities evolved in time.  Dipton is therefore very modern and largely residential with, by all accounts, a strong community spirit.

‘Obviously the path predated the houses, hence this Dipton-to-Bhylcroft stretch is a bit more towny than scenic.  Oh hello mate.’  A cordial neighbourhood cat was weaving around Lyndon’s legs, leaving stripes of hairs across his walking trousers.  ‘You’re a bit like my Splodge.  Who I hope Aunty Rona is looking after well this week.’

The little feline, who was purring like a diesel engine (as would I, frankly, if Lyndon were stroking my back like that), was black and white and wore a glittery blue collar, as though en route to a kitty disco.

‘Splodge?’ I asked.

Is ‘Aunty Rona’ your girlfriend? a voice inside me was yelling.

‘He’s got a black splodge on his chin, like a little beard.  It was the first thing I noticed about him when I got him from the rescue place, and the name stuck.  Apart from that, he looks just like this one.  Bye-bye mate.’  Our blue-collared friend, having scampered along for a few feet, had stopped at the perimeter of what was presumably his or her house and was staring after us in that heart-melting, wistful way all cats have down to a tee.

‘Lovely way with animals you’ve got there, Lyndon.  How old is Splodge?’

‘Two.  Wasn’t able to have pets when I was,’ I held my breath for a reference to his perhaps not so mysterious ex-wife, ‘er, where I lived before.  City apartment.’

‘He must love living in the country then.’

‘Not half.  My dad’s partner, Rona, pops in and sees to him when I’m away.  He met her on a BFF walk too.’

Too?  As though Mr Hyde Senior was not the only member of that family to have met a would-be significant other through the group?  My heart started to do that stupid salmon-somersault again.  Was I reading fanciful hints into all his words and actions?  Was he referring to me or in fact an existing partner, who looked like a cross between Angelina Jolie and all of Girls Aloud and to whom he was introduced on a previous, sex-packed trek?

I looked up and he looked away swiftly, pretending to busy himself with his map, as though realising his Freudian slip.

‘What I mean is, he took up walking ten years ago, after my mother passed away, then met Rona on a tour of the South Downs.  It was through him I first found out about the organisation.  And now Rona helps look after Splodgey for me.’

‘Look – the way to Amarillo!’  Shane was pointing gleefully at a wooden signpost which directed patrons of the ‘Amarillo Social Club’ down a little potholed lane.  It’s anybody’s guess why a village night spot in South Staffordshire should be named after a Texan city, but there you go.

The apostrophe assassins had a faction here too.  A noticeboard at the top of the lane promoted ‘line dancing with Robyn on Thursday’s,’ and apparently this Friday we could look forward to a performance from a ‘top Lionel Richie impersonator – as seen on’ a TV programme that was apparently called ‘Stars in Your Eye’s.’

‘Well done Shane,’ commended Lyndon.

When it came to scavenger hunt clues, our slimming binman obviously wasn’t into subterfuge like Hazel and me.

‘There’s a yellow car,’ I announced, returning the favour, as there happened to be a custard Suzuki Jimny on a nearby drive.  Cars that hue are a conspicuous rarity outside Only Fools and Horses.  Or Noddy.

If any Dipton curtain-twitchers spotted us photographing their neighbour’s jeep, they probably just assumed we were Neighbourhood Watch, cagoule division.

******

Dipton bled into Bhylcroft, via a pedestrian crossing over the permanently gridlocked A41 (no stile here, just the more customary traffic lights).  This slice of the route had a towny, contemporary feel, as Lyndon had pointed out, with Bhylcroft high street being very retail-dominated.  Our backpacks and heavy duty boots drew some peculiar looks from the shopping-laden pensioners at the bus stop.  I felt like a Martian who had veered adrift.

‘Don’t know about you, Lyndon,’ I said, ‘but I’m starting to long for a bit of open countryside.’

‘I always do by this point.’  Ah, those smiles of his were enough to make me forget my own name.  ‘I mean, these built-up communities can be interesting in their own way, but they don’t exactly give you that ‘getting away from it all’ sensation, do they?  Bhylcroft is at least ten times bigger than the likes of Lower Bratchley.  The headquarters of the local council are here – how metropolitan can you get?’

‘Yeah, give me a hill or bit of moorland any day.  I know it’s daft, but when I don’t see a soul about I like to pretend I’m the first person, or part of the first group, to discover the land I’m on.’

‘I do that as well.’  Oh, we were soul mates, I just knew it!  ‘You can’t exactly play games like that in a village that has badminton courts and a Lidl.’

He and I had fallen quite naturally into a matey walking pace.  Cheesy as it sounds, it felt at that moment as though this was meant to be: Lyndon and me, shoulder to shoulder, at complete ease in each other’s company.  While I was very conscious of his solid presence next to me, there was none of that self-conscious panic to fill silences.  I sensed daggers from Polly, but I was so buoyant they positively bounced off my back.

Polly, talk of the devil, suddenly stormed ahead of us all – perhaps to watch Loose Women on the tellies that were in the window of Danks Electrical next to Lidl – with Martin in trotting pursuit.

‘You need to cross over by the Esso garage, you two,’ Lyndon called after them, ‘and head down that lane opposite.’

Without warning, a fantasy took shape which involved Lyndon and me tearing, Heathcliff and Cathy style, through lashing rain across a stark moor which our boots were the first to christen.  I tripped over my skirts (never much call for waterproof trousers in sexual role play) and as I tumbled my bodice conveniently gaped.  He pinned me to the sodden ground, and then…mmm!

I was blushing like a beacon, feeling absolutely transparent, whilst back in reality we were crossing by the petrol station, into a more residential, rustic lane. 

‘Now the ‘Bhyl’ part of Bhylcroft derives from the Welsh word for a hillock.’  Even as Lyndon was giving us a prosaic history lesson, those wanton pictures wouldn’t fade.  ‘The hillock being, of course, the Second Matthew.  This one is the smallest of the four, at 164 metres – 538 feet.  A glorified molehill in comparison with the other three.’  Every innocuous word seemed to carry sexual connotations.  I could hardly look at him. 

I spotted a sign at the junction of a cul-de-sac.  ‘Evergreen Terrace,’ I yelped, thankful to mentally pour cold water on my wayward thoughts, ‘residence of The Simpsons.’  Shane was already snapping it.  He didn’t feature in my heathland erotica, so I focused with relief on him.  ‘I thought you’d know that one, having a Bart of your own.’

‘Got another ’un here.’  He unzipped his anorak, displaying a sweatshirt that bore his son’s yellow namesake from the TV series aiming a catapult.

******

The Second Matthew was indeed rather miniature; a mere bulge in the ground.  It was a brief amble to the top, from which the Boscobel Hotel became visible.  I would like to say this hotel was an alluring haven at the conclusion of a day’s journey, but…well it didn’t quite possess the snug charm of the Badger at Crockington.  The illuminated sign and yellow canopy over the door were a tad garish for rural Staffs.

I definitely saw Lyndon wince.  ‘It’s under new management,’ he repeated apologetically.

The week’s entertainment was chalked on a sandwich board outside the entrance: the promised ‘Wednesday night Bozzie bingo and disco’ on one side; this Friday’s attraction, a drag queen who gloried in the name Trannii Minogue, on the other, underscored with pink hearts and stars.

In the lobby the burgundy flock wallpaper gave an oppressive vibe.  A fearsome receptionist, whose slate-grey hair was tethered into a knobbly bun with a rubber band, appeared to have been on duty since the wallpaper was last in fashion.  She thrust her Express & Star under the desk, slammed our room keys on to it and growled that our cases awaited us in storage, having been deposited by the minibus.

We retrieved the luggage.  ‘Oh, and the lift ain’t working,’ Grey Bun yawned, engrossed in the paper once more, so we slogged up to the second floor.

We were invited to meet, as usual, at six in the bar, with our cameras this time so Lyndon could inspect our scavenger shots and dole out prizes.

I unpacked my mobile charger, dropped it in to Shane and returned to my own uninspiring room for a shower.  The nozzle appeared to have just two settings: boiling gush and freezing sputter.  I could achieve a happy medium, of sorts, by twizzling it back and forth so that I was alternately scalded and dribbled on.  The shower screen was also loose and would recurrently flop outwards, deluging the bathroom floor.

I was already mentally composing my comments for the BFF survey.

******

‘In third place,’ Lyndon declared in the bar later, ‘with four out of seven, are Polly and Martin.’

We clapped sedately as he presented them with a bottle of rosé each.  Martin looked elated with the prize, Polly distinctly less so.

‘Second, with six of the items, it’s Shane, Ted and Enid.  Well done, you three.’  They won Californian whites.

‘So that means our scavenger hunt victors today, with all seven, are Naomi and Hazel.  Congratulations ladies.’

The equivalent of gold medals in this challenge was a bottle of Cava and a kiss each.  Yes, a kiss.  I was pathetically rapturous about both the peck itself and the fact Polly hadn’t got one.  It was the most fleeting of hugs we shared, but Lyndon seemed to envelop me and he smelled divine.  He was wearing a navy jacket, and a cream open-necked shirt which was utterly sexy in its simplicity and looked marvellous against the faint tan he had acquired from working outdoors.
‘I won’t glug it all at once,’ I said witlessly, my sticky lips forming shapes that seemed out of synch with my words.  In fact I’d called for Hazel early, stir crazy in my mildewy room, so had already had a couple of wines.
‘Where was the phone box then?’ queried Shane.
I think I replied, ‘In one of the gardens that backed on to that first footpath, Hazel spotted it,’ but I could have said it was up my bum for all I was conscious of after that kiss.

After a plain but hearty dinner – I had the delicious, if obviously microwaved, chicken and leek pie, not so much served as plonked on a bed of oven chips – we were invited to partake in the bingo.
One thing the Boscobel was not was overburdened with staff.  Thus far we had only seen Grey Bun, the barman, a waitress and now Rod, who possessed a Black Country twang and a Leo Sayer perm and was touring the tables with his pad of tickets, urging us all to ‘have a goo fer a quid.’
‘Come on Hazel,’ I said, ‘we’re on a winning streak.  Here, I’ll get ours.  I’ve got a two-pound coin.’
Rod, apparently, was the entertainment team, his talents stretched like a rubber band.  ‘Don’t forget there’s our disco comin’ up a bit later on,’ he intoned when he was back on the mic.  ‘I shall be yer DJ for the evening.  Got some super sounds for you, from the 60s right the way through to the present day.’
It was a hoot.  Hazel nudged me.  ‘With so few staff, it’s not surprising that Russian shot-putter behind reception looks so pooped – there’s probably no one who can relieve her shift!’
‘Then on Friday,’ Rod went on, rubbing at the lapel of his blue velvet suit, ‘we’ve got our hilarious drag show, which stars, er, me actually, as Trannii Minogue.  Right stunner, that one!’
Hazel was virtually doubled up, hooting into her whisky.
Rod gave a modest little cough.  ‘Now are we ready?  Two fat wenches – eighty-eight.’

Our gang failed to win a line between us.

‘Who’s up for the disco then?’ I grinned as DJ Rod welcomed us, over the opening beats of He’s the Greatest Dancer by Sister Sledge, to ‘Wednesday at the Bozzie, where great tunes are guaranteed, and don’t forget alcopops am just a quid before eleven.’  A pound, it seemed, could buy you an awful lot at this hotel.

To be honest, though I like a boogie at a wedding reception, I’m not a huge fan of discos these days and certainly haven’t been clubbing in a long time.  I hate to appear snooty, but I find them frightful places to meet people.  I favour restaurants and country pubs.  But I wanted to socialise with my new friends tonight, and was loath to appear square.

‘Could be an experience,’ Lyndon replied diplomatically.  We all, apart from the Salads, agreed to give it a go.

We were a reserved bunch initially, table-bound, entertained by what we were observing.  The disco was soon jam-packed, clearly a weekly fixture, nay highlight, for many a resident of this large village.  Tattoos, denim, beer bellies and enough gold-plated jewellery to restock Argos were proudly displayed – and yes, that was just the women.  The mating rituals witnessed during the Macarena could have formed the basis for an anthropological thesis: the discreet and not so discreet glances zapping across the dancefloor, all that coquettish twiddling with hair and earrings, not to mention the less subtle signals like bum-pinching.

If I’m perfectly honest, I’d rather have stayed at the Amarillo and hung on for line dancing with Robyn.

Polly slipped out for a fag at one point, and when she returned hauled Martin on to the dancefloor.  She thrust her blow-up doll body at him, to which he responded with a few Mr Bean steps.

‘Come on,’ I’d had enough of being a wallflower, ‘anyone fancy a bop?’

I hoped my eyes were suitably beseeching but Lyndon seemed mortifyingly reluctant, and I was a bit too shy to grab him.

‘Go on then, I will,’ Hazel conceded, and we did a self-conscious little shuffle to Build Me Up Buttercup.  ‘After this,’ she enunciated over the music, ‘I shall give you two some breathing space, darling.  I’ll swap cabbage soup recipes with Shane, enabling you to collar lovely Lyndon and escort him outside.’

‘Hazel!’

‘Nothing to be gained by being backward in coming forward.  I discovered that for myself a long time ago, and I’ve had my moments, believe me.’  I did.  ‘Look, he obviously isn’t comfortable about dancing.  So after this song invite him outside.  For a spot of fresh air, as they say.’

‘Reckon it’ll do the trick?’  To be so brazen is alien to me.  I watched my unwitting prey at the table having his ear bent by Shane, and excitement rippled through me as I imagined the consequences of my potential actions.

‘Nothing ventured, nothing gained.  He isn’t an upfront boy.  Sometimes we ladies have to take the lead.’

‘All right then I’ll go for it.’  I beamed as she stuck both thumbs up, then my nerve abandoned me and I craved Dutch courage.  ‘But I think I’ll get some drinks in first.  Yours another Scotch?’

‘You’re a treasure.  Though it’s so watered down, you could feed it to babies.  Now best of luck.’

I wove to the bar, ignoring ogles though not escaping a bum-tweak from a gerbil-faced lad sporting a pierced eyebrow, and queued behind Martin.

Polly was not noticeably pining his absence.  She was continuing to gyrate, putting on a show for the knot of blokes around her who goggled like sharks hovering for a morsel of fish.  Tonight she wore a denim mini skirt and this tie-dye top that was essentially a glorified bra.

My heart was banging.  What the hell was I doing, attempting to make a pass at the walk leader?  I was probably making myself a joke; the latest butt of his ‘Which sad woman can throw herself at me on this holiday?’ game.  Not that he seemed the promiscuous type, but perhaps that was a sham to charm the women.

‘You OK, Mart?’ I enquired.  He looked so morose.

Martin sighed deeply and then confided, apropos of nothing, ‘We’ve had couples counselling, you know.’  He was miles away, gazing at Polly, his poor boyish face bearing the glazed, lost look of someone who was drunk and unaccustomed to the state.  I had an urge to phone his mother to take him home.

‘Have you?  Blimey.’  We’d had an eventful day, and this night was turning wackier by the minute.

‘I so want the relationship to work.  She agreed to come to the therapy with me, so that must mean she wants it to work too.  D’you reckon?’

‘Well you’d hope so.’

‘My family and friends all think I’m mad, especially after the last time she cheated on me.  But I think everyone deserves a second chance.  Don’t you, Naomi?’

‘So long as they don’t abuse it.  So long as their remorse is genuine.’

‘That’s what my parents say.  Pretty much.’

‘I’m sure they’ve got your best interests at heart.’

‘They’ll change their minds about her when we have kids.’

‘Kids?’

I was on the verge of marching him to the condom machine, when he rambled, ‘Now I’m not so sure about having them.  I’ve been trying to persuade Polls to give up smoking before she gets pregnant.  It’s doing her no good – she’s found some of this walking a bit breathless.  I would still like to be married before I’m thirty, though.’

‘There’s no need to rush these things.’

Martin smiled bleakly.  ‘She’s said she’s reluctant to get married as she doesn’t fancy being called Polly Pickett.  I’ve offered to change my surname to hers, Dwyer.’

‘If she really loves you, then frankly she shouldn’t care if your surname is Put-The-Kettle-On.’

‘Ha, that’s a good one.’  His laugh sounded manic and sad.  ‘Sarah, that’s the counsellor, advised us to try each other’s hobbies.  Establish some common ground.  I’ve always liked walking, so Polls agreed to come on this with me.  She says I’ve got to do something she enjoys next.  It’s only fair.  I’m just so afraid her choice of activity is going to be, well,’ he picked at a stray bit of skin around his thumbnail, ‘er, swinging.’

‘Swinging?’  Good job I hadn’t got my drink yet, else Martin might have been spurted with it.

‘Hmm.  She’s hinted before that she’d like to try it.’

I am never judgemental or meddlesome, as a rule, where other people’s relationships are concerned, but I was aghast at the notion of poor wide-eyed Martin being dragged to a gangbang.  The phrase ‘lamb to the slaughter’ was never more apt.  I was suffused with abhorrence for Polly.  I hated feeling complicit in her deception when she’d silenced me after receiving that text at dinner last night.

‘Please don’t be forced into anything you don’t want to do, Martin.’  I was actually begging him.  ‘Going on a walking holiday is not exactly on a par with wife-swapping, you know.  Don’t let her persuade you that you owe her something like that just because she’s conceded to trek across Shropshire with you.  Be very careful.’

He nodded desolately.  ‘I want to make her happy, though, Naomi.  I still pinch myself that a stunner like that should have gone for me.  My parents say she’s after my money.  My dad refuses to give her a job in the family business.  That’s how we met actually.  She came for an interview as a receptionist.  Didn’t get it, just got me.  Anyway, maybe I’m the one in the relationship who’s in need of a second chance.  There must have been a reason she went off that time.’

And the time before that?  And before that?  And the inevitable next time?

I’d just twigged he said the counsellor was called Sarah.  Wasn’t that the name Hazel and I had overheard Polly screech at him on Monday night?  ‘Bloody Sarah,’ as I recalled.

‘To be quite frank with you,’ he went on, ‘her, erm, appetite gets a bit much for me at times.  She’s forever dragging me off into bushes and things.  I’m still recovering from this morning at Manderwood Manor.’

Whoa, now we had well and truly strayed into ‘too much information’ territory.

‘Yes please?’ said the barman, mercifully.  With all that scandal, I’d quite forgotten we were waiting to be served.

Martin indicated me, as though I should go first despite him being ahead in the queue.

‘A Scotch, a small red wine, half a cider, a pint of Marston’s and a water for my friend here, please.  Sorry Mart, I’m afraid I’m going to be bossy, you shouldn’t have any more alcohol tonight.  Trying to walk a long distance with a hangover is horrible.’

‘You’re right, Naomi.  Thanks.’  He was clearly used to being submissive.  I pitied him so much, but also wanted to whack him.  He was wet and passive to the point of being stagnant.  ‘I’ll just get Polls her Tia Maria then.’

I certainly wasn’t buying her a drink.  And I didn’t care, frankly, if she tottered to the Third Matthew with a savage hangover and had to barf into every bush.

‘I reckon that Lyndon’s after her.’

‘What?’  I fumbled with the change the barman handed me, totally missing my purse with half the coins.

‘I noticed they were out at the same time earlier, when she went for her ciggie.  It’s like no blokes can resist her.’

Right.  I couldn’t have this.  The very thought of Lyndon even contemplating making a play for Polygamous Polly rendered me unable to see straight.  Realistically I knew their respective fag/loo breaks had overlapped coincidentally, they hadn’t been out of the room long enough to make any assignation worthwhile, and neither of them had returned looking flushed or dishevelled.  But I couldn’t stomach them being paired off even in Martin’s skewed imagination.  My jealousy was a potent but productive emotion.  It was the impetus I needed to grab hold of Lyndon and bang thoughts of Polly, or any other women, out of his brain.

‘I’m sure you’ve got the wrong end of the stick there, Mart.’  I gathered up my scattered coppers, my hands hot and trembling.  ‘Look, I’m going to take these drinks over.  You take care now, won’t you?’

Turning from the bar, I exhaled deeply.  After playing counsellor, dragging Lyndon outside for a snog seemed positively easy.

I conveyed my round in two trips: doling out to Hazel and Shane first, so mine and Lyndon’s drinks were left together.  Hazel, bless her, actually was swapping cabbage soup recipes with Shane.  They both thanked me, and Shane also expressed his profuse gratitude – again – for the loan of my charger.

Lyndon was conveniently out of the soup conversation, paving the way for me to steal him away without fear of interjecting.

I leaned towards him, feeling like a lapdancer.  ‘I’ll just go and get yours,’ I told him in what I hoped was a flirtatious tone.  A tendril of my hair flopped over my shoulder and brushed his.  It was entirely accidental but there was something really rather erotic about it.

He appeared a tad taken aback, I must say.  Everything suddenly seemed all slow and heady under the pink and yellow wink of the disco lights.  I pivoted and slithered back to the bar self-consciously, sensing his eyes on me.

I collected the two drinks and made what felt like a long walk back to him, forcing myself to maintain bold eye contact all the way and hoping I wouldn’t cock up the effect by spilling any liquor or tripping up.

It would have been easy to put the glasses on the table and sit down, but I couldn’t cop out now.  I handed him his, did the lapdancer lean towards him again and murmured (well it was actually a yell, but it would have been a murmur were I not competing with loud music), ‘Want to come outside for a bit, Lyndon?  For a spot of fresh air?’

He looked stunned.  So, I’m sure, did I when he smiled, said ‘Sure,’ and stood up.

Hazel shot me another thumbs-up as I led him out, doing the slow sexy walk again (easier said than done when you’re used to hiking boots).  I was ludicrously paranoid that everyone was gawping at us.

I’m afraid I’m going to be boring and not try to allege there were fireworks going off in my head, or waves crashing on some mythical beach, or orchestras playing, or a voice inside me yelling ‘Yessss!’  Actually I’m not sure I could articulate my thoughts and feelings at that precise moment.  I simply walked, which I obviously do a lot of, but this time I was oblivious to my surroundings, my feet somehow moving me in the right direction independent of brain control.

A pair of Ross Kemp clones (woo, more staff!) were on sentry duty at the main door.

‘Evening both,’ boomed one doorman, with a suggestive look that said he knew exactly what we were up to – or hoped to be.  ‘No glass outside, though.’  He relieved us of our glasses and poured the contents into plastic tumblers.  ‘There you go.  Looks very romantic tonight up on old Matthew.  Enjoy your evening.’

‘Thank you,’ I responded automatically. 

Ross One actually sounded rather gruffly poetic, and Matthew did look enticing by night, flecked by the squares of light from its neighbour, the hotel.  It was a fresh, clear night.  I was in a cap-sleeved top and the only coat I had, namely a turquoise cagoule, which I was hardly going to wear to share a romantic moment anyway, was back in my room.

Lyndon, all credit to him, only had to see me shiver and he shed his navy suit jacket and draped it over my shoulders.
‘That’s really kind of you.’  I smiled, warm as melted toffee, making no token protest but simply relished being caped in something of his.

‘Shall we…?’  He indicated a secluded patch of grass on the side of the hill.

‘Yeah, nice spot.’  I sounded hopeless.  It seemed being ballsy in getting him out here had expended my energy, and we had both gone all shy again.

We sat close together on the peaceful knoll, the only sounds being the stifled beats of Love Machine (ha!) by Girls Aloud from the disco and the soft chat of scattered other couples with the same idea as us.  Lyndon and I were a discreet distance from them, sipping our respective cider and wine from plastic glasses.

‘Discos aren’t really my thing,’ he admitted.  ‘I can’t be bothered with that kind of scene these days.’

I hunched myself cosily into his jacket.  ‘I’m not keen either actually.  I must be getting old.  Didn’t want to appear antisocial, though.’

‘Nor me.  I’m only capable of dad dancing.  Not that I am a dad,’ he added hastily.  I wasn’t expecting him to be.  Sian had never mentioned offspring.  She spoke of hiring round-the-clock nannies come the day (save us all!) she and Adrian began to spawn.

‘Only to Splodge.’

‘Quite.  To be perfectly honest, I only stayed for the disco because I thought you were keen.’  Oh wow!

‘Likewise.’  The world was suddenly still and there was a loaded hush between us.  It would have been the perfect move-in-for-the-first-snog moment.  So what did I do?  I lost my nerve and started wittering on about drag queens.  ‘The folks round here are spoilt for entertainment on Friday night, aren’t they?  How can they possibly choose between Trannii Minogue and the fabulous Lionel Richie tribute down at the Amarillo?  Perhaps Rod’s a protégée of Melba Most.’

Naomi!  Will.  You.  Shut.  Up!

Lyndon gamely chuckled, though.  ‘This place has gone downhill, I must admit.  No pun intended.  I told you, I don’t choose the hotels.  I’m sure head office will take note of your comments, especially if you’re going to be a future empl – ’

That was it.  The reason he never got the ‘oyee’ out was because I had finally pasted my face to his.  In the end passion prevailed and we bypassed the whole gazing-into-each-other’s-eyes build-up.

Although I’d just been spouting witless crap, the moment he started to talk in response I became hypocritically impatient.  He looked so irresistibly authoritative and sexy yet gentle in the moonlight.  I kind of sprang at him and stayed there, as though we were both coated with Velcro.

While he was literally gobsmacked at first (I suppose that kind of interruption is unanticipated when you’re talking about customer surveys), he instantly recovered and responded.  We seemed to kind of flow into each other.  I can’t claim the snog was elegant in its execution, but its impetuous rawness was highly exciting.

Now I don’t suppose justifying my actions is necessary in this day and age, but I feel the need to anyway.  Just let me explain I am no slag.  I’d had three boyfriends up to that point, and had certainly never Velcro-jumped like this at a man after such a brief acquaintance.

But, vomit-worthy as it sounds, I may have known Lyndon only three days – albeit three days in virtually constant company, amid luscious scenery that was apt to stir the old romantic soul – but I was already thinking of him in capital letters.  As in knowing he was Special; perhaps even The One.  We had a lot in common.  There was a quiet strength about him that truly drew me.  It was a characteristic shared by many outdoorsy types, and – though it’s something of a cliché – by the countryside in which he spent much of his life.

Mmm, I was enjoying this.  I started to lean seductively back, though I was not sure quite what I hoped to achieve with a plastic wineglass in my hand, or even whether the shedding of clothes and inhibitions and anything else would have actually ensued there and then on that moonlit hill, which I expect makes me sound a bit prick-teasy.

What in fact ensued was that Lyndon pulled abruptly away from my viper embrace.  ‘Perhaps this isn’t such a good idea,’ he murmured apologetically in response to my quizzical look.

As I lugged myself upwards, flummoxed, I saw Promiscuous Polly outside the hotel, sending forth a plume of cigarette smoke to the heavens.  I then saw Martin emerge behind her.

‘You’d better have your jacket back then.’  I shed the makeshift cape, shivering as my arms were exposed, and handed it to Lyndon without looking at him.  Despite the chill, my face was ablaze with mortification and the exertion of what we’d been doing.

Polly aimed a distinct and prolonged look in our direction.  Then there were gagging and splatting sounds as Martin – for whom the bottle of water I’d bought had clearly come too late – puked all over the driveway.

Tuesday
Sneydley to Crockington

The sun hugged me awake before my half-seven alarm. I lay cosily for a few minutes, enjoying that ‘not having to get up yet’ sensation, until the lure of the day proved overwhelming.

It was one of those April mornings that make you think, if this is only spring, then summer holds exciting promise. I like getting up early anyway, and days like that are a crime to waste.

Downstairs, though, I felt like a layabout in comparison with Shane, the reformed couch potato.

‘Y’allright bab,’ he beamed, already exiting the dining room, ‘just going for a little stroll in the village before we set off.’

‘Apparently he did fifty sit-ups before breakfast as well,’ said Lyndon, who was buttering a perfect isosceles triangle of that brittle toast which exists nowhere but in hotels. ‘I wish even I had as much energy as he does.’

I helped myself to cornflakes and orange juice from the buffet and joined Lyndon at his table opposite Ted and Enid, the Salad Couple, who were gobbling scrambled eggs – presumably because salad wasn’t on the breakfast menu. I greeted them, to which they muttered something that sounded like ‘Good morning’ with the vowels removed.

‘How did you sleep, Naomi?’ asked Lyndon.

‘Beautifully, thank you.’ I reddened pathetically at the mention of sleep and the filthy word association game my brain started to play: sleep – bed – sex – bluush! It was a relief to be diverted by Bryony, on waitress duty, taking my order for coffee and more toast.

 Lyndon, meanwhile, slid a folded piece of paper towards me. Your phone number? Why Lyndon, this is so sudden! Oh, it’s the application form!

‘Thank you so much. I shall have a good study of this later.’

‘You might want to wait ’til this week’s finished, make sure I haven’t put you off completely.’

No chance of that. ‘Are there any particular qualifications I’d need?’

‘Not as such. Plenty of walking experience, obviously. They prefer if you know your way round a map and compass too, but BFF run navigation courses if you need to brush up your skills. If so, you’d need to do that before taking your assessment. They also do first aid training.’

I hoped Lyndon would teach me the mouth-to-mouth technique. Mind you, even spending my days in the wilds giving the kiss of life to halitosis-ridden geography teachers with beards full of breakfast crumbs was going to be preferable to working at Raybould Communications.

‘It sounds brilliant. I’m definitely going to go for this, Lyndon.’

‘Good.’ He beamed with what looked like genuine pleasure at this news. ‘The other prerequisite I forgot to mention is strong interpersonal skills. Obviously you’re on pretty much permanent duty for a week at a time, interacting with folks. I don’t think you’ll have any problems in that department, though. You seem very confident and personable.’

Confident and personable! He might as well have said I had a great arse, judging by my reaction. My heart was flipping like a salmon at the compliment. Although, continuing the fish theme, I was certain my gaping expression must be reminding Lyndon of a guppy.

******

Later, when we were all there – Shane refreshed from his pre-walk walk; Hazel looking bleary and bed-haired; Polly bursting out of something purple, glowering because I was sitting next to Lyndon again – we were invited to each compile a packed lunch for the excursion.

‘We won’t have this every day,’ Lyndon explained as Bryony started to load the sideboard with homemade rolls (‘cobs,’ they call them in the Black Country), crisps, cereal bars, fruit and Buxton spring water. ‘There’ll be pub stops on some of our routes. Help yourselves now, there’s enough for a couple of cobs apiece, a bottle of water and whatever snacky things you fancy. Mix and match as you please.’

It was a generous array. I opted for a pair of cheese rolls, water, an apple and a bag of Quavers. Polly made a beeline for the bananas, and – unless my imagination was in overdrive – I swear she stroked the one she picked. I could see a pattern forming: she favoured phallic foods. And Ted and Enid favoured salad rolls.

We then carted our overnight cases down and lined them in the lobby for their somewhat smoother journey, by minibus, to the Badger Inn at Crockington. And off we set.

******

‘Lyndon says I’m confident and personable,’ I divulged to Hazel, exultant schoolgirl-like, as though teacher had just awarded me an A. ‘Get me, eh!’ I licked my finger and made a mock ‘one point to me’ gesture on an imaginary blackboard.

‘Get you indeed,’ she responded with equally tongue in cheek glee. She was a fun, aunty type. ‘You’ve obviously made a speedy impression there.’

‘It’s a start, I suppose. He thinks I’m cut out to join the ranks of BFF anyway. I could be seeing a lot more of him in the future. Unless I get posted to take charge of the Outer Hebrides treks.’

‘You could always become pen pals. Or internet buddies, I suppose it would be nowadays.’

‘And write passionate e-mails? Why have those two brought their suitcase, by the way?’ I whispered, nodding towards the Salad Couple, who wore no backpacks and were cutely but bafflingly carrying between them a brown trunk of the variety prevalent among wartime evacuees.

We were approaching a stile, which they negotiated by passing the impractical case to one another while conferring in their secret dialect. Lyndon offered to hold it for them while they climbed, but Ted Salad clasped it to his weedy frame with a defensive ‘No.’

‘Perhaps they’ve got surveillance equipment in there,’ Hazel suggested. ‘They could be gathering intelligence and reporting our whereabouts to Al Qaeda.’

‘They didn’t want to put any of their stuff on the minibus, apparently, bab,’ Shane clarified. ‘Ted was telling me as they’d had luggage go missing before, so they don’t wanna take chances now, like.’

‘Oh right.’ I was more amazed by Shane’s ability to extract so many words out of the man than by his explanation.

Once we were all over the stile, we crossed a little lane and scaled another stile on to a hedged footpath. We shortly veered right into a veritable fairy woodland, and it was as though I had suddenly entered the most peaceful spot on earth. Like the view from my window, which I mentioned earlier as being childlike in its bright colour, it exemplified what truth exists in kids’ paintings and storybooks.

Canopied by the stately beech and chestnut trees, I experienced one of those terribly uncool moments when simple beauties in nature spellbind and humble me. I could have literally cried. I seldom admit these emotions, or at least only to fellow walkers who relate to my love of the outside and the country’s diverse geography.

‘This area is known as Quanswood,’ Lyndon advised. Oh, and he had the perfect voice for such a setting. Were he narrating a radio serial, I swear I’d have conjured up images just like those I was seeing now. ‘We’re just coming up to St Botolph’s Church – rather out-the-way location for a church, I know – which is quite famous locally for housing the proverbial bats in its belfry. There’s a colony been making themselves at home in there for a number of years.’

‘What species?’ Hazel asked.

‘The brown long-eared variety, Hazel.’

‘Bit like this one then.’ She fished a gold chain out of her T-shirt and flashed the bat pendant like a talisman. ‘I’m secretary of the Bat Protection League back home in Ledbury. Mad about the creatures.’

‘As you’d well know then, of course, they’re protected so their roosts can’t be disturbed. Though the local churchgoers – not that there are all that many – are pretty accustomed to their nocturnal visitors by now. I doubt we’ll be lucky enough to spot any today. They’ll just be coming out of hibernation about now. If you like visiting churches, though, I’m afraid this one has to be kept locked because it’s so secluded. Another sad sign of our times, I suppose.’

I am not religious, never have been, but it was a cute little setting. St Botolph’s is a miniature stone structure, like a dolls church, only its bell tower – home to the cosseted bats – distinguishing it from the rustic cottages nearby. Most of us reached for our cameras.

‘Now even though I’m not religious,’ Lyndon said, echoing my thoughts, ‘I never fail to be moved by this place. There’s something so utterly enchanted about it.’

I wanted, not for the first or last time that week, to leap for joy. I was out in the English countryside with a gorgeous man and a group of true eccentrics which included a couple who lugged their suitcase with them on a cross-country hike and a lady who helped run a bat preservation group. And I had the prospect of doing this for a living, as my days churning out press releases for Adrian Raybould’s smarmy clients were numbered.

******

‘Well this sure beats work,’ I declared happily to Hazel on that theme, as we resumed walking, having photographed the woodland dolly church from every angle.

‘You say you’re in public relations at the moment? And your boss is a reptile?’

‘The worst. Backstabbing little bastard – excuse the French. As good as promised me a promotion, then brought his vile fiancée in and installed her in the job, despite her having no PR experience. Her bloody aunty’s already been working there as secretary for the last year, so it has started to feel like an invasion.’

‘Hateful thing, nepotism,’ Hazel tutted.

‘Oh, but while I’m apparently not good enough for the job, my experience is conveniently valuable enough that I have been bullied into doing stacks of overtime to help the malevolent bimbo learn the ropes. Learn how to turn a computer on, wipe her own bum, that sort of thing.’

‘Comfort yourself with the idea that they’ll probably divorce, he’ll end up replacing her with his next bit of fluff and this current gal will sue him for unfair dismissal. Or else her lack of nous will cause her to make a major booboob, which will result in a client suing the company.’

Hazel made me smile. I hadn’t heard the word ‘booboob’ for years. I knew I would remain friends with this quirky woman who had flyaway hair and a bat necklace who I had known less than twenty-four hours.

‘There might be less call for the overtime,’ I said, ‘if she made more than a cameo appearance in the office occasionally. But if she’s not off having manicures, she’s seeing caterers and wedding stationers and what have you. I’ve been promised an invitation to their nuptials, by the way – me and half the West Midlands, I think.’

‘Let me guess – you’ll be washing your hair that day?’

‘How uncanny! She was still married to some other poor guy when she met Adrian, so for months he’d be on the phone arranging assignations and returning from “extended lunch breaks” looking flushed. Now we have to put up with them being gooey with each other in the office. Not sure which is worse.’

‘I can see why you’re leaving.’

‘It’s surprising how detached I feel now, talking like this about it all, Hazel. It’s as though the whole nightmare happened to somebody else.’

‘You’re moving on. That’s positive.’

‘Onwards and ever upwards. Marketing was all I wanted to do at one time. I enjoy the social aspect of PR, the interaction with people, but can see now I was only sticking at the job because I pinned all my hopes on getting Senior Marketing Executive on my CV. Adrian, that’s the slimeball boss, likes to rub salt in the wound by earnestly denying ever raising my hopes in that direction – obviously it was all my imagination and ego – and I’ve now opened my eyes to the fact that without the promotion prospects there is absolutely no incentive for me remain with that company.’

‘How long have you worked there?’

‘Nearly three years. I moved there from a much smaller firm, thinking it would be a wise career move. PR is quite a small world and Adrian has a good reputation in it, believe it or not, bearing in mind he behaves like he’s twelve. He’s the type who thinks it’s hilarious to play practical jokes on his staff.’

‘And don’t tell me – if you fail to be amused by his infantile pranks he accuses you of being humourless.’

‘Absolutely.’ I related the April Fools Day incident, the fictitious ‘urgent press conference,’ the needless hour-long journey there and back that set me behind schedule with my mountainous workload, on a day when I still so not-with-it after Uncle Terry’s passing that I didn’t even cotton on when Adrian gave me the name of the guy allegedly hosting the event – Drew Peacock (think about it).

‘You should see the e-mail he sent me on Friday when I handed my notice in. I’ll show it you later. I tell you, Ricky Gervais had it spot-on with that sitcom. Adrian is a proper little David Brent. He can barely speak unless it’s in a string of corporate buzz phrases.’

‘He tells you to think outside the box, go forward, sing from the same hymn sheet, that type of thing?’

‘At the end of the day – that’s another one he uses – yes!’

‘I am sorry about your uncle, though,’ Hazel sympathised. ‘Uncle Terry, my mom’s younger brother, never married or had a family of his own so was always close to my brothers and me. He used to come on a lot of walks with us.’

‘He’d be proud of you for doing this one then.’

I was incapable of speaking for a few moments. Hazel gave my shoulder a fleeting squeeze, supportive without being mawkish. ‘Yes, he would,’ I responded in a bold voice. I hadn’t come on this break to dwell on morbid concerns. ‘I’m looking forward to working outdoors. I identify with what Lyndon said yesterday, about the outdoors having a pull on you. Even when it’s bucketing down with rain and I’m saturated on a rock in the Peak District, I won’t miss the office life. It’s not for me after all. Honestly Hazel, I could tell you tales about Adrian all the way from here up to Tunclough.’

My work woes had already taken us to Camp Hill Common, a heathery beauty spot four miles from the Earlcott. There was plenty more I wouldn’t bore Hazel with.

As I beheld the unbound and beautiful landscape around me, it was hard not to feel smug imagining Adrian, shallow Sian and noxious Nova sweating it in that 80s throwback office. This sweat always made its mark on Adrian’s Matalan shirts. He would lounge back in his tycoon padded swivel chair, his small legs dangling off the floor, hands behind head to afford us an enchanting view of his sodden underarms.

Sian, apparently oblivious to that, was no doubt now cooing at him, texting, shopping on Amazon, or buffing her dagger-like nails. The lax approach to work clearly ran in the family. Gossiping was the favoured office pastime of Nova Bagnall, Sian’s two-faced aunty, she of the inability to relay messages. A bosomy fifty-year-old with a fake, horsey laugh, she would react, if asked to do something so onerous as type a letter, as though she’d been ordered to perform open heart surgery.

Nova naturally watched her step in the presence of her future nephew-in-law. In conversation with Adrian she was all ‘love’ this, ‘sweetheart’ that. She just about stopped short of ruffling his hair and cutting his Marmite sandwiches into triangles. Only out of his sight came the passive aggressive huffs, slamming down of files or banging of doors. She was more openly contemptuous of my requests for letters, which hovered at the permanent bottom of her priority pile.

‘Right, we’ll have a pit stop here.’ Lyndon was gathering us around. ‘This is Camp Hill Common, which I’m sure some of you are familiar with. Bit early for lunch, but we can have a snack and a rest before continuing with the next couple of miles to Lower Bratchley. There are loos here too, if you need.’

I needed. Hazel and I then sat together on the scratchy grass to have our apples and water.

I stretched indulgently in the sun and gnawed at my Golden Delicious. ‘I haven’t been here for years.’

‘Another of your childhood haunts?’

I nodded. ‘My brother Gaz used to fly his model aeroplanes.’ A miniature Spitfire was whirring overhead as we spoke. ‘They still have the Red and Blue Routes, I see.’ The colour coded signposts denoted short and longer walks around the common.

I saw Posturing Polly strip open her banana and whisper something to Martin with a salacious look in her eyes. Martin looked perplexed and replied, ‘We haven’t got a dog,’ to which she rolled said eyes. She was a walking innuendo; like a bored housewife from some cheesy 70s sex comedy.

Poor Martin. Polly’s suggestion referred, I would wager, to Camp Hill Common’s current regrettable reputation for dogging: group sex and voyeurism in secluded car parks.

Perhaps Red Route had a different meaning these days too?

******

‘Tell me about the bats of Herefordshire then,’ I urged Hazel when we resumed walking. I had bent her ear enough this morning and was interested in her life.

‘Horribly misunderstood creatures, bats.’ Her voice was robust and passionate, and with every step she jabbed her stick into the ground, as though for emphasis. She was not a woman I could ever imagine being half-hearted about anything. ‘Play such a vital role in nature, yet to too many folks they are still saddled with this ludicrous Dracula image.’

‘Protected species, though, aren’t they?’

‘You bet, and rightly so. Their natural habitats have dwindled so much, what with the old buildings and hedgerows that have been lopped down. You disturb a bat, you’re walloped with a fine. I’ve been with the Protection League best part of twenty years…’

She had me virtually signed up to the campaign by the time we descended into Lower Bratchley via Rumbold Lane.

The tiny lanes from the common, along which we were single file, yelling ‘Car alert’ to one another when an intermittent Land Rover or tractor obliged us to hug the hedge, opened out into this long wide slope. Rumbold Lane’s summit afforded a splendid panorama of infinite fields and villages. The Clent Hills in Worcestershire, enticingly viewed from Lyndon’s former workplace, were a smudge on the horizon. There was purportedly no higher land between them and the Ural Mountains in Russia – although I was aware other English hill ranges laid claim to this statistic.

We had to huddle closer to Lyndon (never a hardship) to hear his introduction to the village we now approached. ‘Now we’re coming into “Lower Bratchley,” or Lower B, as it’s colloquially known. Actually there are two villages that make up this parish. We’ll skirt through Upper B – that’s known round here as “the posh end” – after lunch, along the canal towpath. More about that in due course. There’s a little school here, four shops, a church and three pubs. Population about 1,300.

‘The history buffs amongst you might be aware of the English Civil War connection to this place. Charles I famously had his sword sharpened here, at the ironworks which existed from the 1550s right up to 1976. Earl Matthew’s descendents – who had long since lost the title and were now the plain Theodoric family – were firmly on the side of the Cavaliers during the war. A mob of Oliver Cromwell’s allies ran riot and tore down the busts of the old Earl from the four hilltops. You’ll hear more about that tomorrow, when we visit Manderwood Manor.

‘In the 80s the Lower B ironworks was knocked down and a housing estate built on the site. All that remains is the former works canteen, which has been the village community centre for a number of years now. Getting a new roof by the look of it.’ He indicated the scaffolding which was obscuring the hall.

A pleasant day in a leafy country village really does elevate the spirits. I liked the look of Lower B. We trooped down High Street, the long straight thoroughfare, off which side lanes and cul-de-sacs of relatively modern housing branched. On the corner of one stood a pub called The Bargeman, outside which a chalkboard declared, with flagrant disregard for the apostrophe rule, that “sandwich’s” were “available 12 til 2.” Not that we’d be partaking.

‘I can smell chips,’ Shane observed. I thought at first his marriage had left him sensitive to the odour, but actually he was right.

‘That’ll be the McCain factory,’ Lyndon clarified. ‘There’s an industrial estate over there,’ he waved to the left, ‘and when it’s blowing in the right direction there is a greasy reek in the air. We’ll be following the smell in fact, as we pass the oven chip factory on the canalside. Now we swing a left here. This is the Staffordshire-Worcestershire Canal – the cut, as it’s known in these parts.’

We joined the towpath from High Street, which formed a bridge over the waterway. I had traversed sections of this canal before, north of here, closer to Wolverhampton, but never as far down as this (though I decided now I would revisit).

There is a lovely serenity about being on a canal bank; a sense that you could be anywhere. It’s a slow, history-steeped world of ducks and fishermen and gaudily painted narrowboats. Canals cleave through towns and sites of active industry – that was the purpose of them in the first place – but cars and roads could be on a distant planet. Urban life is reduced to a distant thrum that, while reassuring by reminding you it’s there, does not infringe on this waterside respite.

‘Now this canal was completed in 1771 by James Brindley and it stretches from Stourport-on-Severn in Worcestershire up to Great Haywood, near Stafford, where it meets the Trent and Mersey Canal.’

‘Yow ever walked the whole of it, Lyndon?’ asked Shane.

‘I have, in fact. In stages, of course, over a week. It’s forty-six miles altogether. We’ll be on it for just over three today, as far as Crockington.’

A vicar – either that or a man en route to a lunchtime fancy dress do – was gliding towards us as though there were castors beneath his cassock rather than feet. He wore huge glasses, and possessed no evident neck, so his perfectly ball-shaped face appeared to be dolloped on top of his dog collar.

‘Afternoon.’ Had he a hat, I got the impression he’d have doffed it. He smiled cordially, apparently used to the sight of hiking herds.

Shane, to my surprise, approached him. ‘Hey, ain’t I seen you on telly, reverend? You’re Ellery Crisp.’

‘The very same.’ The vicar grinned modestly, as though trying not to look too chuffed at being recognised. ‘This is my parish.’

Hazel and I exchanged mystified looks.

‘How many game shows is it you been on now?’ Shane asked his new ministerial mate.

‘Eighteen.’

‘Got any more coming up?’

‘Still trying for Millionaire,’ Rev Crisp tapped the cover of the puzzle book under his arm, ‘that’s the big goal. Just have to keep phoning, and swotting.’

‘I seen your episode of Bullseye again the other week actually. They been showing the repeats on Freeview. Yow still got the speedboat?’

Rev Crisp nodded.

‘Never!’

‘Had it twenty years now. It’s sort of emblematic,’ he explained to the group at large. ‘I’m living proof of the cliché about the Bullseye speedboat always being won by West Midlands contestants. I can’t exactly race it up the cut, I just love the idea of having an exhibit from TV history in the village. It’s such a talking point.’

The rest of us laughed uncertainly. This was fairly surreal.

Lyndon, obviously mindful of Shane’s capacity for nattering, edged away, indicating that, much as he’d love to spend all day hearing clerical anecdotes about points meaning prizes and keeping out of the black and in the red, we had to press on.

Shane thankfully took the hint. ‘Best be getting going. Super to meet you, reverend.’ He shook the celebrity cleric’s hands like he was touching Ghandi.

‘Likewise. Good day to you all.’ He did a little wave, as though doffing the imaginary hat again. ‘Safe journey.’

******

A couple of locks along, we veered off into a tiny picnic site for our lunch. There was one picnic bench, though Hazel and I were more than content with the grass.

As I withdrew my cheese rolls, my rucksack buzzed to announce I was in receipt of a text. Two, in fact.

‘Ade,’ I grimaced at Hazel. ‘Believe me, I’m changing my number as soon as he no longer needs it for work purposes.’

‘Yo Nay! Rubbing 2 sticks 2gether for your lunch? LOL!! Sian & I have decided to take a leaf out of yr bk & spend our honeymoon at a Travelodge nr Dudley. Any you can recommend? C ya – wouldn’t wanna b ya!!’

Ha bloody ha, Ade. And has anyone else in the world said ‘Yo’ since about 1990?

I showed it to Hazel, explaining the Travelodge near Dudley reference. ‘He thinks it’s hilarious that I’m on a walking break so close to home.’

Hazel didn’t have her reading glasses, and leaned about three feet back to see it. ‘Who’s Lol?’

‘It’s an abbreviation. Means Laughing Out Loud. Textspeak.’

Her look spoke volumes. ‘And how much longer do you have left to work with this incisive humorist?’

‘Four weeks,’ I answered happily.

‘And how many minutes? Blimey, I’d be counting them down with a stopwatch if I was in your shoes.’

My thumb prodded the delete button.

My second text was another from Mom, bless her, checking I had slept well and was still enjoying myself.

‘You live at home?’ Hazel asked as I keyed a reply.

‘No,’ I swallowed a mouthful of roll, ‘bought my flat a couple of years ago. I’m only five minutes from my folks, though.’

‘No boyfriend, I take it?’ She slid a look towards Lyndon.

‘No. I am currently without a significant other, as they say these days. Yourself?’

‘Good grief, no. Not had a whiff for years. It’s just me and the picture of Anton Du Beke I’ve stuck on my fridge. Ah, that man can foxtrot like nobody else.’ She had a salt and vinegar Hula Hoop on each fingertip and bit them off one by one, the way we used to do at school. ‘I did live with a Druid for a number of years, but that crashed and burned.’

‘A Druid?’

‘Mmm, met him at my tai chi class. Ken, his name was.’

‘Ken?’ I thought Druids had names like Merlin and Culpeper. ‘Did he attend Summer Solstice?’

‘Darling, I never wish to see Stonehenge again as long as I live! He left me for a witch in the end.’

‘At the risk of sounding like a parrot – a witch?’

‘Oh yes, proper Wiccan. She initiated Ken into her coven.’

‘Maybe she’s turned him into a frog by now.’

Hazel’s laugh was wicked and dry. ‘What do you mean, turned him into one?’

******

As we cleared the remnants of lunch, Lyndon resumed his commentary. ‘We’ll be heading up to – you’ve guessed it – Upper B shortly. This is one of the most highly sought-after estates in the region, even home to one or two celebs.’

‘How will we cope?’ Hazel affected a starstruck swoon. ‘I’m in need of a lie down after meeting the Reverend Ellery Crisp!’

‘Quite,’ Lyndon laughed. ‘Not sure if we’ll spot any famous faces today – more famous faces, should I say – but I suppose you never know who might be creosoting the fence or having a cup of tea on their lawn when we happen to pass.’

‘Doesn’t Melba Most live there?’ I asked.

‘I believe so. A few Premiership footballers too, apparently – not that I think I’d know any of them if they hit me.’

‘Not a footie fan, Lyndon?’ asked Shane.

‘I’m afraid when it comes to soccer I’m afflicted by DFS syndrome – no interest whatsoever!’

We groaned amiably at the pun. I have never liked football either.

Melba Most, meanwhile, AKA Melvyn Corns, is the Black Country’s answer to Lily Savage. As Paul O’Grady famously based Lily on harridans from his Scouse childhood, Melvyn likewise drew inspiration from Dudley wenches for his alter-ego. He apparently worked the local spit ‘n’ sawdust circuit for years before earning TV success on The Big Big Talent Show in the 1990s.

I met Melba/Melvyn once, through work, at a fundraiser at the Merry Hill Centre. He was a scream, a genuinely warm person, and a generous benefactor of charities.

I knew of Upper B. Country Life’s property column carries regular blurbs about colossal pads for sale there. We keep copies in our reception, to impress influential clients, and I’ve flipped through a few in my rare lunch hours. The fawning copy gushes of swimming pools, stables, six-car garages, and gated junctions to some of the more select Crescents and Drives.

‘We’re parallel with Bratchley Road now, that’s the main road up from Lower B to Upper, through to the next village, which is Swinley. Bit of an infamous rat-run, that one. Good job we’re on this path. The estate itself backs on to the towpath and is coming up on your left. You might be able to spot a roof or two – the residents tend to favour walls of Berlin proportions to guard their privacy.’

There was little to see of Upper B really – as Lyndon said, just tips of roofs protruding over lofty hedgerows and doubtlessly CCTV-rigged walls.

They soon gave way to the more open landscape of Swinley Industrial Estate and aforementioned McCain factory. With that behind us, we escaped the chippy whiffs wafting south.

The trading estate in turn segued into a sprawl of 1980s housing. Swinley is a greatly built-up village. According to Lyndon, it was a medieval settlement, originally agricultural in nature, which evolved commercially and residentially in the latter part of the twentieth century.

The scenery from a canal towpath is similar to that seen through a train window; it’s like looking at pictures of life sideways on.

The landscape then changed again to open countryside as we filtered through Swinley’s heart out towards the less populated Crockington.

It was a beautiful day. Fishermen, cyclists and the occasional celebrity cleric aside, the towpath was quiet.

Shane the quiz show buff was still rattling on about his encounter with this vicar who was apparently so well-known for being a prolific contestant (‘I never met anyone off the telly before, though my cousin once stood behind Lenny Henry in Smith’s.’).

‘Couple of rather fascinating buildings at this lock,’ Lyndon jumped in, as though desperate for the diversion. ‘The tollhouse, as you can see, is octagonal. And there’s a pumping station over to your right that resembles Dracula’s castle. See the turrets there. You can see it’s very ornate for a functional building. The Victorians did like to go to town on their architecture.’

It was another reach-for-the-camera moment. The pumping station was indeed highly elaborate and spooky looking, a testament to Victorian grandiosity. I could imagine its spires, which rocketed out of the trees, illuminated by a thunderclap like a clichéd horror film scene.

Further on, the life-sized flowerpot man fishing on a garden veranda proved also photogenic. Bill or Ben sported a floppy summer hat, and a fishing rod was propped between his terracotta hands.

‘His owners apparently change his clothes and props every day,’ Lyndon told us. ‘There was an article on them in the Express & Star a few months back. They’ve had him about ten years, apparently, he’s quite a local talking point. They’ve turned down hundreds of offers to sell him. He’s been stolen twice, though, but returned each time, after being photographed in some unusual places. I once brought a group down here when the World Cup was on. Even I knew enough about football to see he was togged up in an England shirt.’

******

The waterside phase of our journey came to an end a further mile on, when we took the slip path on to Radford Bridge at Crockington and traversed another snaky lane towards the main A454.

Such a zooming carriageway jolted us into reality somewhat after a day of virtually empty country lanes. The way of the walkers knows no impediment here, though.

As the A-road bisects the official Four Matthews footpath, the road planners were obliged to stick a stile in the middle of the central reservation. It literally bestrode the crash barrier. I had never climbed over one with traffic whooshing past either side of me before.

We crossed the road with great caution, but most of us paused in the middle to photograph this bizarre landmark.

‘I’ve gorra stitch,’ Posturing Polly bleated when we reached the opposite pavement, ‘rub it better for us, will you Mart.’

While the acquiescent Martin was massaging her ribcage, she threw a suggestive look towards Lyndon as if by the power of imagination she could swap Martin’s hands for his.

‘Only another mile to go, Polly,’ said Lyndon heartily, marching on. I found his ‘chop chop’ tone cheering. I liked to think he was saying he had no time for laggers and was not susceptible to her ‘come hither’ signals.

The girl actually did look shattered. The considerably senior Salad Couple, by contrast, had managed to lug a suitcase the best part of ten miles without so much as breaking out in a sweat. A bit odd, granted, but from a fitness point of view fair play to them, they both must have been over seventy and that case looked hefty.

‘Crockington,’ Lyndon shouted over the traffic, ‘is a very ancient village, dating back to the Saxon era of our friend Earl Matthew. His family maintained a lot of links to the area, owning substantial pockets of land over successive centuries.

‘These days the population is just over 1,100. Like Lower B, there’s a little church and school here, few pubs. I’m sure you can see, though, Crockington is rather more agricultural in nature. The housing is less densely distributed. We’re six miles from Wolverhampton, about ten in the opposite direction from Bridgnorth in Shropshire.

‘I think – hope anyway – that you’ll find the Badger, where we’re staying, a very interesting place. Old coaching inn. This was originally a toll road. The Badger was built in 1812, by yet another of Matthew’s descendents, the Right Honourable Guy Theodoric, and provided convenient lodgings, straddling the Staffordshire/Shropshire border.

‘Various tenants leased it over the years, until the Hodgetts Brewery purchased it from the Theodoric family in the early Edwardian era. In recent years it’s gone gastro-pubby. Now I was saying earlier it has a rather unusual menu. Hope you like zebra.’

******

Zebra! ‘I thought you were joking,’ I exclaimed to Lyndon as we were presented with our menus which did indeed offer zebra steaks, in addition to ostrich, kangaroo, crocodile, venison and something called impala.

He grinned. ‘I never take the mick. I can recommend it, in fact. It’s quite beef-like.’

‘Is it stripy steak?’ I asked in jest. ‘The kangaroo is appealing to me actually.’

‘Good job there’s no bat on the menu, eh, Hazel?’ Shane chortled.

‘It’s an offence to slaughter a bat,’ she answered, more curtly than I’d have expected – but then to her I suppose it was akin to a cat-owner not seeing the funny side of devouring their beloved Fluffy with curly fries and a grilled tomato.

‘What’s impala?’ I had to ask.

‘A type of antelope,’ Lyndon supplied. ‘Very tasty too. Very tender and low in fat.’

‘Think I’ll stick with the roo.’

‘Think I will too.’ He smiled decisively at me. My heart flipped pathetically. That was the second night we’d had the same meal. I could have read a lot into that.

The kangaroo was gorgeous, its soft red meat reminiscent of beef brisket which we used to have at home often.

Hazel – perhaps the bat talk had put her off game – went veggie for the evening. Her chickpea, celery and coriander chilli in fact looked delectable.

I had figured Ted and Enid were vegetarians, but even the Badger’s extensive meat-free selection failed to tempt their lettuce-loving palates. They chose the inevitable salad.

Shane opted for the crocodile – purely, I think, so he could use the ‘and make it snappy’ line. Which he did. Three times.

Martin had the croc too, and Polly Pocket the ostrich. Nobody chose the zebra in the end. Perhaps the animal’s ‘horse in pyjamas’ image made it a touch too cuddly to contemplate on a plate.

‘I always remember,’ I decided to share, ‘our Creative Writing tutor at uni telling us we should never turn down the opportunity to try new and unusual foods, as we should think of the good story it could one day make.’

Lyndon was drinking cider tonight. He took a meditative sip, actually nodding along as though I was imparting the teachings of the Dalai Lama. ‘Profound advice.’ His face, so introspective one minute, erupted into one of his gorgeously eager smiles. He literally seemed to shine with inspiration, in a manner almost childlike while at the same time deep. ‘On that theme then, why don’t we each come up with one word to describe what we’re eating? Only one allowed apiece, to sum up what’s on your plate. We’ll go round – let’s start with you, Naomi.’

I flushed at being placed on the spot, like a schoolgirl who’s been asked to read out her homework essay. ‘Succulent,’ I sputtered, wishing to kick myself because it sounded so trite. I could imagine people thinking ‘And she’s an English graduate?!’

Hazel’s adjective was ‘Sizzling.’

Shane (he was really labouring that pun now): ‘Snappy.’

Martin: ‘Erm, chicken-like.’

Polly had adopted the old elbows-on-table-chin-in-hand posture to display her general contempt for the idea. ‘Dunno, I’m no good with words.’ She sounded proud of that, and made a sort of wiggling motion as though to display where her assets did lie. Martin gave her an encouraging nudge, and she pouted an insolent, not-even-a-word ‘Ostrichy.’

A housing estate could have been constructed in the time Ted and Enid took to confer over their inevitably joint choice. Just as the pause was becoming embarrassing, they mumbled in chorus: ‘Salad.’

‘What’s yours then, Lyndon?’ An expert in body language – or in fact a novice in it – would have described the way I leaned towards him, cupping my wine glass, as ‘flirtatious,’ but I was rather too tipsy and happy to care about coming across as obvious.

I was exhilarated from a day’s walking and enjoying a wonderful meal, accompanied by equally wonderful wine, in shadowy, characterful surroundings, in company that was – in the main – delightful. I don’t know why I had never been before to the Badger, which was a lovely old coaching inn with oak beams and gothiccy ambient candle lighting. I could imagine Dick Turpin plotting in a nook. The place was heaving; according to Lyndon it always was. I may not have been dressed like one of the Pussycat Dolls, as Polly was, but I had got over my nothing-to-wear calamity of last night. I had no more dresses – and could hardly have requested that we detour off the Matthews path via River Island – and tonight had teamed brown linen trousers with a scarlet top. I decided I was feeling pretty good.

I actually held my breath as Lyndon pondered his gastronomic adjective. He maintained prolonged eye contact as he answered ‘My word would be succulent too.’

‘Would it?’ I drooled inanely.

‘Yes,’ those eyes beamed tellingly at me, ‘it would.’

The restaurant might at that moment have been empty of all but Lyndon and me and the in-no-way-phallically-symbolic pink candle dripping down an old wine bottle between us.

Only when a hesitant ‘Would anyone like to see the dessert menu?’ from the young waiter broke the trance did my breathing resume its usual tempo.

It was as though the chatter and general restaurant hubbub had stopped too, and now began swelling around us again like someone had pressed play after the pause button had been on.

The puddings were as fabulous as the main courses, though we were not invited to critique them. I chose the rhubarb crumble and vanilla custard. I focused on its homely tartness to divert me from ‘the Lyndon moment,’ which had definitely passed.

While Martin was in the loo at one point, I saw Polly giggling filthily over a text message then stabbing a reply with her huge false nails. The little ‘message sent’ jingle dinged just in time for Martin’s return. She happened to catch my eye as she stuffed the phone into her handbag.

‘Who was that, petal?’ He slid his arm around her.

‘Aunty Maureen.’ She kissed him and shot me a silencing look. I didn’t really care. As long as Martin seemed convinced by petal’s explanation, what did my speculations matter?

‘Again? She called you yesterday, bless her.’

I avoided eye contact with either party this time. My heart could have broken for the bloke, but I judged it unwise to involve myself.

******

Post-dinner, we withdrew to the busy lounge, with the exceptions of the Salad Couple who made their usual scuttle up to bed. I had hoped to return Lyndon’s first-night favour of a drink but unfortunately, as my breath was not the only thing I’d been holding in, my need for the loo surpassed that hope.

I returned to find Shane had collared Lyndon at the bar for another saga, Polly and Martin were eating each other on an armchair and Hazel had saved the only unoccupied seats for herself and me. She had bought me a wine too.

I toasted her with it. ‘Thank you for listening today, Hazel.’

‘No problem, dear. We all have our moments when we need to offload.’ She sat back, circling her whisky glass. ‘You know, I could people-watch for hours. It keeps me occupied just observing their interactions and mannerisms.’

‘Me too. Fascinating creatures, people.’

Our group certainly were. Polly’s handbag buzzed intermittently, presumably with texts from her convivial aunty. Shane and Lyndon would become intermittently lost amid the swarms of locals who bunched around the bar.

‘Apparently there’s a disco at tomorrow night’s place,’ Hazel confided. ‘Perhaps you might be able to corner him in a conga.’

‘A disco? Blimey.’

‘The Wednesday grab-a-granny night, by all accounts. Never know your luck!’

‘Nor yours, come to that.’

‘I suppose I can live in hope.’

I caught half a conversation in which Shane lamented ‘Hurts, doe it?’ in a tone that suggested he was not referring to a bunion.

To which Lyndon intriguingly responded: ‘My ex-wife left me for a bloke she met at a breakfast seminar.’

Ex-wife, ex-wife, ex-wife?

Were I a cartoon character, my ears would have been zooming out on stalks at this point.

Shane’s facetious riposte, ‘My Debbie would have enjoyed that, if it involved fried egg and bacon butties,’ annoyingly precluded further confidence. (And did he have to mention her fondness for food in every conversation?) Their conversation was also repeatedly swallowed by the babble around them.

So Lyndon had an adulterous ex-wife. The bitch! It was hard to suppress an instinct to offer my services as mender of his broken heart.

Additionally, the reference to a breakfast seminar actually went ‘ding dong’ with me. I just as quickly dispelled my inkling, however. Plenty of affairs must blossom between attendees at business breakfast seminars. I took a deep slug of wine and told myself to stop being silly.

Monday
Sneydley – The First Matthew

Monday had a definite ‘first day of the rest of my life’ feel to it.  The spring sun flooding my room seemed auspicious; the sensation of being bathed in it on that guesthouse candlewick could not help but uplift me.

The three computer printouts I’d been rereading surrounded me like dog-eared islands.  I planned barricading my bedroom door at Julian Crowfoot’s place on Saturday, on the off chance he lapsed into infamous habits – especially as Cadbury’s recently re-launched the Wispa.

As for Adrian stupid Raybould, about whom my dad often told me I had grounds for complaint to an employment lawyer, it was remarkable how my de-frazzled mind was already downgrading him to panto baddie status.  His pudgy hands and ‘comedy’ ties might at this moment have been on another planet.

The little tosser had snubbed me for the rest of Friday, after his e-mail, which incidentally pointedly failed to address my more incriminating motives for resigning.  Well it was understandable there were things he wouldn’t be admitting in writing.

Nova Bagnall’s family connection to the firm, for example.  Adrian oh-so-earnestly denied that was an automatic basis for his accepting her word over mine (distress or no distress, I know she never passed me that message).  Then there was his hideously patronising suggestion to sharp-clawed Sian and me, who have never exactly clicked, that ‘you girlies have a bonding session sometime over a nice lunch.’

April Fools Day was the proverbial final straw the other week, though.  I tore over to the Copthorne Hotel – and yes, I was somewhat slow on the uptake that day – to greet bemused staff who had no knowledge that they were hosting any ‘urgent press conference.’  Only when the receptionist sympathetically thumbed towards her desk calendar did I twig the date.

When I returned incensed to the office, my dear boss guffawed that it was ‘just a more sophisticated version of the old “go and get a long stand” trick’ and ‘if you’re not blessed with a sense of humour I’m afraid you ain’t going to get far in this life, my wench.  No harm done.  Here, I think you’ve earned yourself a biscuit.  You’re just in time for tea break.’  He jiggled the tin in my face.  I declined, not caring to take a chance on it containing rubber biscuits, or one of those fake packets with a finger trap inside.

I now sipped tea on my bed, thinking elatedly of how I was free of the abominable Ade, for this glorious week and then shortly for good.  Any ‘little chats’ we’d be having in a week’s time would be only for the purposes of agreeing my departure date.

I wondered whether there was any merit in lodging a complaint now I was leaving.  I really hadn’t the funds for solicitors, due to my impending unemployment (temporary unemployment, I assured myself).  Dad had offered to pay for a consultation, but I refuse to leech off my parents.  And I certainly had no intention of dipping into Uncle Terry’s inheritance yet.  That was a backup, on which I would allow myself to subsist only if desperate.

I had career plans brewing, you see, and actually hoped this week would assist me in that direction.

I covered Adrian’s e-mail with the third printout on the bedspread, from the BFF website, the very reason for my presence in what he called ‘the wilds of Shropshire.’  His definition of ‘the wilds’ is a location devoid of a Starbucks.  Sneydley village, according to its Wiki page, boasts a large primary school, small supermarket and post office, Chinese takeaway, Norman church – and the ‘distinguishing ratio’ of one pub to every four-hundred residents.

And The First Matthew (dubbed thus for our purposes – it’s the Fourth one, of course, to walkers following the southbound route), the country peak I was to spend this afternoon scaling with seven strangers.  A gentle ascent to ease us in, with a packed lunch at the summit.

I wondered what friendships I might have forged by the time I returned to Wolverhampton on Sunday; whose numbers I might have added to my mobile; in what ways – if I wanted to get all philosophical about it – I might have grown as a person.  What decision I might have reached regarding a prospective vocation.

I could employ any number of clichés here, about ‘finding myself’ or ‘going on a journey.’  People talk a lot these days about going on a journey, if not always a literal one.  I have quite simply been avid about walking ever since childhood Sundays when Mom and Dad packed my brothers and me in the Astra to Baggeridge Park or Kinver Edge to exert our tiny legs.

Innumerable walkathons, rambles and casual strolls later, completion of the Four Matthews path became an aspiration as I reached my twenties.  I nurtured it as my pet project – to the extent that, six years on, I had chosen to fulfil it with an organisation which promoted itself as friendly to ‘the solo traveller.’

I had Majorca to look forward to with Kathryn in September, but this week was my thing.  She and my other friends either couldn’t get the time off or didn’t share my twin passions for walking and local history.

As far as my soon-to-be-ex-workmates were concerned, though, I was with Kathryn this week too.  I felt silly and weak for telling a white lie, but without it I’d be ‘Norma no mates’ in no time.  I had enough natural apprehension as it was about taking my first solitary holiday. The fact that with BFF I was actually unlikely to be a Gore-Texed gooseberry would never hinder their derision.

They thought it hilarious enough that I was ‘going to Shropshire for a holiday.’  (Hmm, OK Adrian I’ll get them to move the hills to Ibiza in order to meet with your approval, eh?)

Quarter to one.  Right.  I folded the printouts and weighted them down with my alarm clock on the bedside table.  Flipping my mobile open, I dashed off a text to Mom – ‘Arrived safe. Just about to go & meet the others. Love u loads xx’ – while simultaneously draining my last slosh of tea, swilling the mug in my minuscule sink and standing it upside down next to the tub of tea bags.

The vista of sky and hill from my window was the uncompromising blue and green of a primary school painting.  The vivacious shades were so energising.  Standing up straight and determinedly, I flexed my arms and fists into a ‘right, here we go’ kind of marching posture.  It’s an instinctive little ritual I do at the outset of every walk.  Then I zipped my rucksack and headed downstairs.

****** 

My first sight was of his back.  Cagoule-clad, of course, and in extremely heavy-duty hiking boots, he seemed to fill the tiny lobby of the Earlcott guesthouse (yes, the first of many Earl- or Matthew-derived names gracing the route) where he was engrossed in the rack of leaflets.

I guessed at once the long-haired man was our leader.  Besides all the super kit, he had the assured, tranquil posture of an organiser.  He didn’t pace the carpet, or compulsively check his watch.

As soon as I approached he attentively turned, putting back a Severn Valley Railway brochure, and greeted – nay, dazzled – me with the most deliciously gregarious smile.  Now I hate to sound teenage, but this was a real ‘helllooo!!’ moment.  Already he was proving worth coming for, even without the walk.  I only hoped I wasn’t blushing too garishly – a tomato in turquoise Gore-Tex was never a good look.

‘Are you with Best Foot Forward, by any chance?’  His voice was gentle; his whole being exuded calmness.  I hated to think what I was exuding, in the beam of those expressive grey eyes.

‘Yes, I’m Naomi Ball.’  

‘Lyndon Hyde.’  Mmm, strong handshake.  Calm down, Nay, he’ll have women in every national park in the country, I cautioned myself, even as I was inspecting the other hand and thinking: Way hey, no wedding ring!  ‘Welcome.  I shall be leading you all this week.  Should be a good ’un.  The long range weather forecast looks promising.’

‘That’s good,’ I responded limply.

‘Well it seems you’re the first, Naomi.  Oh, here’s another one.’

A spindly man whose snug tracky bottoms revealed he’d be a frontrunner in any knobbly knees contest materialised from a ground floor room, terminating my time alone with luscious Lyndon.  For the time being.

‘Shane Craddock,’ he declared in a Black Country twang, pushing up his tiny glasses.

Then the rest surfaced in succession.  I fancied they’d been listening behind their doors for activity, none wishing to be first at the one o’clock meeting point.  There were actually two couples – one elderly, one around my sort of age – plus a fun-looking lady in floral waterproofs and a ton of eyeliner.  We exchanged fleeting introductions, but all their names I had yet to memorise by the time we ventured outside for the afternoon.

Lyndon shepherded us into the little lounge for a brief preface.  We shyly clustered in front of the armchairs.  Nobody sat down, as though to make a point.  We’re hardy hikers, you know – sofas are for wimps!

‘Now this afternoon we’re going to be climbing five hundred metres, or just over sixteen hundred feet for those of us not quite up to speed on the old metric.  This is the second highest of Matthew’s hills, the southernmost tip of the ancient Earldom.’

He stood in front of the fireplace, authoritative and mellow, like a favourite college lecturer.  Were abseiling a required element of this trip, I knew I could cheerily dangle off a mountain and trust him with the other end of the rope.

‘Our journey this week, as you know, will take us the entire length, bottom to top, of Rosterbury, which comprised chunks of what became Shropshire and Staffordshire.  These historic Earldoms – they also included Wessex, Mercia and Northumbria – often encompassed numerous shires, or counties as we would now term them.  In fact following the Norman Conquest the vast Earldoms were dissolved and carved up into shires.

‘We’ve got a reasonably leisurely ascent today, just to break you in for the week.  The path is nice and wide, not too craggy, and the view up there is something else, so I hope you’ve brought your cameras.  We’ll have lunch at the top, then stroll back down in plenty of time for tea, or something stronger if you’d prefer, before we go in for dinner at half-six.  Any questions along the way, just shout, it’s what I’m here for.  Now,’ he did a self-conscious little point in the direction of the front door, ‘let’s get going!’

****** 

‘To tell you the truth, bab,’ Shane Craddock was jabbering, ‘I don’t know much about ’istory.  Ha, sounds like that song, dunnit?  Who was it sung that now, Marvin Gaye or someone?’

‘Sam Cooke, I believe.’  Ten minutes along the path, he appeared to have latched on to me.  He was interested in comparing our motivations for taking this trip.

‘Oh ah, that’s the chap.  But I’ve got the fitness bug since me divorce.  The ex used to stuff me up with chips, y’see.  Every day.  That was all she knew how to cook.  Fish and chips, pie and chips, steak and chips, faggots and chips.  Eighteen stone I was by the time she left me last year, bab.’

‘Really?’  It was hard to picture scrawny Shane carrying any surplus lard.

‘I must admit I used to eat whatever was put in front of me.  She wanted to be an old-fashioned housewife.  Her choice.’  He raised his hands, as though fending off an onslaught from the feminist police.  ‘Then she ran off with her manager at Netto.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that.’

‘She’d only been working the tills three months – gone back after having the kids, like.  Got two – Bart’s me lad, named after Bart Simpson, he’s nine, and the little girl, our Myleene, is coming up to four.  I only see ’em twice a week now.  Well it turned out this manager fella was slipping Debbie – that’s the missus – a lot more than cheap groceries, if you catch my drift, bab.’

‘I do, unfortunately.’  At the head of our little convoy, the female half of the younger couple who had come was simpering up to Lyndon while her partner/husband drooped silently in her wake.  I sensed somehow she could be of Debbie’s ilk.

‘Sorry to be crude, like.’  Shane turned burgundy, and toyed with his glasses again.  ‘They’re in a fancy house together in Sedgley now.  She’s fattening him up.  When she left she took the chip pan, of course.  I’m sure you ladies’ll think it’s shocking that I couldn’t cook,’ he addressed myself and Floral Cagoule Lady, who had drawn level with us, in this sheepish admission, ‘but I’d lived with me mom, see, right up ’til I met Debs, which worn’t ’til I was thirty-four.  Anyway, I enrolled on a cookery course at Dudley College, learned how to do amazing things with vegetables.  I started eating salad and took up walking in a big way.  Lost seven stone in a year.’

‘Wow!’  I was impressed.

‘I could see me feet for the first time in yonks.  The old gut’s as flat as a dodo now.’  He patted his diminished stomach with an expression of coy pride.

‘Bravo Shane.’  Floral Cagoule Lady actually slapped him on the back.  ‘That’s noble spirit.  Noble spirit.’  Shane ducked his head, doing that thing with his glasses again.  As though sensing he was a touch overwhelmed by his own openness, our floral friend tactfully changed the subject, sweeping out her hand as if to embrace the boundless greenery before us.  ‘Now isn’t this all just glorious?’

‘Idyllic,’ I agreed.  We had progressed now from meadow to the gentle gradient of Matthew number one.  We were blessed with comfortable walking weather: resplendent sun, but its fire diluted by a jaunty breeze.

‘You don’t get scenery like this in Vietnam or Peru.’

‘You’ve done a fair bit of travelling then – sorry, what was your name?’

‘Hazel.  Boden.  And you’re Naomi, yes?  Oh Naomi, these boots have tramped across continents.  But give me the Pennine Way any day over the Inca Trail.  There’s just something about the English countryside that calls to the heart, I find.’

Hazel Boden took an exaggeratedly hearty breath in, as though attempting to ingest Shropshire.  She had hair like a sooty dandelion, and an actressy manner which would grate on some people though I rather warmed to her.

‘My father used to say I was probably a dandelion in a previous life,’ she said, spookily, and warbled with laughter.  ‘He had a quirky turn of phrase at times, bless his soul, but I do I thrive outdoors.  I am not a person who can be contained within walls.  Consequently I chose landscape gardening as my profession.’

‘Interesting job.  Must be so rewarding making people happy for a living.  I’ve just walked out of a horrid one.  PR company with a boss who’s a reptile in human form.’

‘Good for you, darling.  Life is far too short to be discontented at work.  I’m long retired now actually, hence I have so much time for rambles.  This is my fifth with BFF in the last twelve months.’

‘You rate them then,’ I had my ‘research’ hat on now, ‘as an organisation?’

‘They’re a super group to be with.  The leaders really know their stuff.’

I decided to confide in Hazel.  Shane had dropped behind now, and was regaling the mousey older couple at the back with his diet history. ‘To tell you the truth, I’m considering becoming one.  As an alternative career.  I’m finding it increasingly difficult to be contained by walls too, I suppose.  That’s another part of my motivation for being here, to see whether I’d be suited to this kind of vocation.  I assume I could train.’

‘I suppose so.  No harm in making enquiries.  I imagine a sort of Butlins redcoat type with map and compass skills is what they’d be after.  You seem pretty passionate.  I think you ought to go for it, girl.’  Her jolly hockey sticks gusto was infectious.

‘You do?’

‘I’m sure the good Earl himself would approve of your enterprise.’  She jabbed with her thumbstick towards the bare summit from where the marble Matthew once surveyed his subjects.  She made me laugh.  ‘Why not have a little word with that nice young man?’  She pointed towards another impressive male figure, Lyndon Hyde.

I smiled surreptitiously.  ‘I intend to.’

****** 

The climb was steady but energising, and by the time we sat down to eat in Earl Matthew’s spot the first layers of thermals were coming off.  Though it was reasonably breezy up there, being so exposed, there was real intensity in the sun when it burst forth.

I tethered my cagoule round my waist, and delved in the rucksack for my ham rolls.  My new pal Hazel and I did the old school trip thing of comparing sandwich box contents.  She had slabs of delectable looking rustically nutty bread, encasing tuna and lettuce.

‘Homemade?’ I enquired.

‘I bake all my own loaves.  Got a freezer full of ’em.’

‘You should go into business.’

I made ravenous inroads into my more prosaic but nonetheless delicious Tesco subs.  One thing regular walking teaches you is that the childhood cliché about food tasting better outside is so, so true.

The collage of fields and ant villages might have been all there was in the world at that moment, stretching below us into Staffordshire on the north-facing side and towards Kidderminster to the south.

‘There you go, bab, this is what I looked like.’  Shane was thrusting a photo at me.  An engorged version of himself in a West Bromwich Albion top the size of a trade show gazebo.  ‘I keep this on me all the while.’

‘As inspiration?’

‘Yow gorrit,’ he beamed, ‘it reminds me of what I never want to go back to, and how much better off I am without bloody Debbie and her vegetable oil.’

‘Good on you, Shane.’  He was an open, sweet and surprisingly profound soul.  The contrast between this scarcely recognisable image and the Ryvita-crunching Shane of today was peculiarly touching.

I had a sudden vision of Adrian, Sian and their undoubted sneering reactions to such a person, and felt extraordinarily protective towards this man I had just met.  More Shane Craddocks and fewer Adrian Rayboulds, that’s what the world could do with.

‘And here,’ his face glowed with love, ‘are my nippers.’

‘Aw, they look lovely.’  Bart was a mini Shane, specs and all; little Myleene dainty, with a bubble of curls.

‘Right little bosters.’

I handed his pictures back, and he showed them to the older couple – ‘There you go, Ted, Enid’ – who exchanged mutters in a low, fast, kind of animal language before returning to their forage of Tupperware salad.

Meanwhile Lyndon was striding over to Hazel and me.  I actually felt blush seep up through me right from my feet.  How pathetic.  Hazel winked at me over her tuna doorsteps.

‘Enjoying yourselves so far, ladies?’

‘Yes thank you, Lyndon,’ we chorused like schoolgirls answering the register.

He was clearly only circulating, to make sure none of his charges had sprained an ankle or knee, or been eaten by ferocious squirrels, but even this innocuous attention was resented by a certain faction.

Lyndon’s blonde fan was watching me, her eyes like bullets.  She had a tight cerise fleece on, strategically unzipped to allow liberal boob overspill.  She wore more make-up than a West End chorus girl, had nails that could tear out a rival’s eye if need be, and her pink boots were pristine and impractical-looking.  The tall, timid man she was with might as well have been invisible.  I recognised it was Lyndon she had in her ruthless sights.

Lyndon continued, ‘I truly think this is one of the best views in Shropshire.  I was just saying to Martin and Polly over here’ – so those were their names – ‘this was reputed to be Earl Matthew’s favourite of “his” hills.  How jolly nice to have a selection at one’s disposal, eh?’  I somehow doubted Posturing Polly was enthralled by Lyndon’s views on, well, views.  Martin was more likely the walker or history buff.

My own conversation skills were hardly stunning at that moment.  ‘Quite,’ I gulped. 

‘He used to relax up here, no doubt with his goblet of mead and his bag of Monster Munches, and survey his domain.’

‘Who could blame him?’  Woo, four words that time.  My voice as I chuckled at his wit sounded strained and loud in the open air.  I was conscious of Polly who, with her hostile eyes still on me, was now virtually fellating a Flake bar.  She was so affected.  I felt like yelling at her: ‘Yeah OK, we get it, you’re The Sexy One!’

Lyndon repeated his ‘Any questions, just ask’ encouragement, smiled gorgeously at me and loped away to check on Shane, Ted and Enid’s progress.

And – oh cringe! – I noticed a wodge of tomato had plopped out of my roll while I was talking to Lyndon, and landed on my lap.  I flicked it on to the grass, thinking it was no wonder he was smiling.

****** 

Tomato stains aside, the post-lunch descent was more propitious in terms of interaction with Lyndon.  It was Polly and Martin’s turn to be filled in on Shane’s divorce-and-diet saga, and the comical sight of bored Polly pouting as Dudley’s slimmer of the year ploughed on obliviously about chips gave me confidence to monopolise our leader for a while.

‘You must have done this route a few times,’ I ventured.

‘A few dozen.  It’s one I never tire of, though.  You?’

‘I’ve never done the Matthews before.’  I always giggle needlessly when I’m self-conscious.  I did so now, cringing at how dippy it sounded.  ‘Well, only sections of it.  Actually this is the first time I’ll have attempted a route this length.’

‘What made you choose this one?’  He had an attentive manner that was so appealing, as though everything you said was of real interest to him.

‘I’ve lived in the Midlands all my life, know the area well.  And history always fascinated me at school.  I loved learning about the Four Matthews, and when I found out there was a footpath across the land it became a bit of an obsession that I just had to get it out of my system before it drove me mad.’  Gabble, gabble.  Shut up, girl!

Hazel, who had slunk diplomatically apart from us, caught my eye and grinned, however, as though approving that I had found my voice.

‘You’re an experienced walker then?’ Lyndon asked.

Why does the urge to spout inane one-liners strike when you’d really prefer to appear sophisticated?  I swallowed ‘Been doing it since I was a year old – I’m shattered now,’ and instead responded, ‘When I was a kid, my parents took my two brothers and me out every weekend in the summer.  Gary and Simon used to moan and groan – they preferred to stay in and watch The Chart Show – but I always loved it.  We used to pile the bag up with cheese and tomato sandwiches and a box of Mr Kipling cakes, and play poohsticks if we happened to be near a river.’

‘Sounds like me and my sister.  I bet the sun seemed to be permanently shining on your excursions too?’

‘Absolutely.’  I’d got carried away blethering about my childhood, but sod it, he seemed more interested than he had in whatever Posturing Polly was saying to him before.  ‘Only downside was, I also seemed to be permanently sticky with orange juice.  Happy days.  I think we did every beauty spot within a twenty-mile radius of Wolverhampton.  Gaz and Si grew out of picnics with the parents, and so did I eventually but I’ve always kept up with the walking.  That’s why my big brothers are lard-arses now!  No, they’re not really, it’s just that I’m the family mountain goat.  As I grew up, I progressed to longer and longer trails.’

‘You get such a buzz from pushing yourself that bit further, don’t you?  Saying that, I only have to get a couple or three miles under my belt before I feel as though I could carry on and on until I’ve reached the Equator.’

‘I know what you mean.  It’s addictive.  You know, I’ve never taken drugs in my life.  I get all the natural highs I need from the exercise and fresh air and country landscapes.  My school and college mates thought I was a bit eccentric when I used to say that.  Certain people I know still do.’

‘You never need to worry about what people like that think.’  Lyndon shook his head earnestly.  I expected he’d been on the receiving end of similar digs.

‘Oh, I never have.   A simple stroll brings untold joys.  If swotting for my exams ever got too much, I used to put my boots on and after a few miles I’d walked the stress out of my system.  I do the same nowadays, when work woes start to mount up.’  I veered away from that topic, not wishing said work woes to excessively encroach on this break.  ‘The Matthews has been an ambition of mine for some time.’

‘It is such a picturesque path.  The distance between the hills is so uniform, it’s as though they’ve been carefully placed at those intervals along the edge of some colossal tape measure.  I truly believe the world has seen no greater designer than Mother Nature.’

Lyndon’s passion on the subject was so attractive.  I stole a good look at him while he was waxing lyrical.  He had such a lovely easygoing manner – which made conversing with him comfortable, once I was over my giggly hot blush stage – but there was also vigour in those deep smoky eyes.

He had that long hair thing going on too, which gave him quite an arty appearance though there was nothing hippyish or unkempt about him.

‘I expect I sound a bit of a Matthew anorak,’ he chuckled apologetically.

‘Not at all,’ I answered, mesmerised.  ‘So how long have you been with BFF?’

‘Just over a year.  After a decade of following a very different career path.’

‘Oh?’  I could picture him as a sculptor, throwing clay in a converted barn studio, or perhaps a landscape gardener like Hazel.  Nothing desk-bound.

‘Accountancy, would you believe.’

‘Really?’

‘I’ve only let the old locks grow since those days.’  He gave his shoulder-length mane an exaggerated flick, chuckling at my unconcealed amazement.  The idea of him with sensible hair and a tie was way too silly.  ‘I kind of fell into the profession.  That may sound terribly pathetic and passive, but you know what these schools can be like.  Exam factories, steering gullible teenagers towards super duper careers, hyping you up to thinking you’ll be somebody if you acquire certain letters after your name.  Well I got my degree, qualified, attained these goals I thought I aspired to, then several years down the line finally woke up and twigged that it all wasn’t me, you know.’

‘I understand.  Totally.’

‘I’d always had this love for the countryside too – well, affinity really – and used to escape there of a weekend.  It became a necessity, after spending Monday to Friday poring over audits.  My first step was moving out here.  I fell in love with a cottage half a mile from where we are now.’

‘Handy.’

‘Very.  When I’m on the rota for the Matthews trip at least.  It’s such a haven here.  I’m still at the stage of waking up every day feeling as though I’m on holiday.  I suppose, doing this job, I am in a manner of speaking.  Albeit other people’s holidays.  I’d been on a few of these breaks, and was very impressed with how they ran the show.  Other things had changed in my life, so I took the next plunge, quit the rat race, and here I am.’

‘Good for you.’  What ‘other things,’ I couldn’t help wondering but felt it would be too forward to ask yet.

‘Best thing I ever did, I tell you.  I used to be able to see the Clent Hills from my office window, just about, on a clear day, but they seemed to tug at me.  One day – as I say, this was just over a year ago, and it was a glorious spring day – I happened to look out, and something inside me just snapped.  We were approaching the financial year end, and I thought: why the hell am I not yomping over those hills instead of being caged in this sterile office up to my neck in tax returns?’

I could have married him on the spot.  Was there ever a man who spoke to my heart so?

I opened my mouth, and would have requested an application form for BFF leader training there and then.

‘Lyndon mate, sorry to interrupt like – I was just wondering what that was up there.  That great big wheel.’  It was Shane, pointing out a monument on a distant slope.

‘A memorial, Shane,’ Lyndon flipped back into tour guide mode, ‘to the men who worked in Sneydley Pit.  This used to be a huge mining area.  Earl Matthew’s descendents became wealthy mine owners, among other things.  The pit shut down in the late sixties.  It’s a country park now.  That big winding wheel was put up about ten years ago as a memorial.’

Thus ended my monopoly on conversation with Lyndon for that day.  I could hardly be irked by Shane.  He was entitled to ask questions about the local heritage, and this is what it’s like on long walks anyway.  Folks drift in and out of fluid groups, and sights along the way spark conversation that is by its very nature spontaneous.

****** 

Back at the Earlcott, we dispersed to shower and change and were invited to reconvene for dinner at half-six, or in the bar from six if we wished to partake of a pre-meal drink.

I read Mom’s reply to my text message, spread a few clothes on the bed, put the TV on, flicked through the early evening game shows and left Come Dine with Me on as soundtrack while I climbed in the shower.  Ah, nothing like a fragrant scrub after a few miles.  I have done muddy and far more strenuous slogs, of course, and the anticipation of sluicing my filthy skin and throbbing joints in pretty shower gel is as much part of the experience as the walk itself.

I then ran the stained square centimetre of my walking trousers under the tap, scouring at the faint tomato splodge, and draped them over the bath to dry.

Now for tonight’s attire.  On the telly (I’d seen this episode before) Rod from Keswick was bellowing bleeped-out expletives as he slopped half of his banana soufflé mix on to his kitchen tiles.  I meanwhile was cursing my lack of wardrobe foresight.  I think I’d been half hoping my splayed-out clothes might miraculously breed during my shower, and produce a sexy, Lyndon-wowing outfit.  Nope, there was still just the one dress – River Island’s finest, in summery lilac – looking apologetically back at me.

I am not a ‘skirt’ girl as a rule.  I had earmarked this one for Saturday night at Julian Crowfoot’s, anticipating more casual nights in tops and cut-off trousers at the other boarding houses.  Not that said tops and cut-offs were not presentable, I just hadn’t banked on meeting a Lyndon type, or for that matter a Polly type who was bound to eclipse me in something strapless, backless and frontless.

I donned the strappy lilac, at the same time laughing inside at how silly we girls can be.  I was taking this far too seriously, ignoring the voice in my head that screeched: ‘Let him take you as he finds you.  If he’ll only like you in a frock he must be shallow.  He’s already seen you in waterproofs anyway – any variation on that is going to be an improvement.  And he’s hardly the kind to judge if you wear the same thing twice!’

Obviously I could not pass up an early drink with Lyndon, so I called for Hazel and was bar-bound for six.

‘Woo, you look nice.  He’ll love it,’ she said conspiratorially, which instantly sent my self-esteem soaring.

‘You’re pretty striking yourself, Hazel.’  She was all floaty in a tangerine kaftan, the sort of garment I’d have actually put money on her possessing.  Her cloud of hair looked more windswept, her marker-pen eyeliner smudgier than ever.  Her look would certainly not have suited every woman.  ‘Been watching Come Dine with Me as well?’  The end credits were rolling behind her shoulder.

She zapped it off with the remote.  ‘Don’t care for television much as a rule, but that programme is rather an indulgence of mine.  Can’t believe that ninny with the soufflé won it, though.’

‘I know!  Gives us all hope for our culinary efforts, doesn’t it?  Shall we call for Shane on the way?  I can remember which room he came out of this morning.’

‘Yes, of course.’

As we walked down, livid voices wafted through Polly and Martin’s door.  Or rather hers was livid; his sounded docile and placatory.

At first I couldn’t distinguish words.  Then I heard Martin say something like, ‘You know it was Sarah’s idea that we come on this week together.’

‘Bloody Sarah,’ Polly shrieked, ‘she’s all I hear about lately.  You’re getting quite boring on the subject, Mart.’

Hazel pulled an ‘Ooh heck!’ face at me.  Hmm, so maybe Polly’s attention to Lyndon was vengeance for Martin’s affair with sexy Sarah?  Somehow, despite apparent evidence, this was not a theory that convinced me.

Shane was already in the bar with Lyndon, as it happened.  His now familiar Dudley twang was audible as we arrived downstairs.

‘And this is the photo I keep on me as inspiration – ooh hello ladies.’  He stowed his now very dog-eared ‘fat’ picture back into his pocket.

Lyndon, with his wallet poised, flashed us one of his hot smiles.  ‘What can I get you both to drink?’ 

He had a black shirt on now, with dark jeans.  Dark hues suited him.  I had an odd fascination with seeing these folks in ‘civvies,’ as it were, after an afternoon in fairly uniform outdoor gear.  It reminded me of mufti days at school.  I’m no fashion judge, it just interested me what my classmates wore in their leisure time.  Clothes reveal character, and all that.

Shane pointed to his pint.  ‘Haven’t had one of these in months.  Not since I found out how many calories are in beer.  Treating myself today, though, bab.’

‘You deserve it,’ Hazel insisted.  ‘Mine’s a whisky please, Lyndon.’

‘Naomi?’

‘Red wine, please.  That’s very kind of you.’  I noticed he was drinking the same.

‘The house red all right with you?’ asked Bryony the barmaid.

‘Great, thank you.’

I was hungry, so it zoomed to my head on first sip.  But with it came that lovely soft sensation wine produces, and also a self-righteous sense that because I’d exercised today this was a glass earned.  I’ve never been one to get pissed for the sake of it.  A glass of good wine is always preferable to a skinful of alcopops, and is a treat I like to savour when I feel deserving.

‘If you like your vino,’ Lyndon said, ‘you should enjoy Julian’s tasting course on Saturday.’

As long as his wine is all we’ll have to taste, I thought, bearing in mind the chef’s reputation, but that seemed too vulgar to voice in not quite intimate company.

My empty tummy chose that moment to rumble like a jet plane.  I clamped my hand over it apologetically.

‘Fancy a look at the menu?’ suggested Lyndon diplomatically.  ‘I can heartily recommend the lamb.’

‘Think I might have that actually.’  I wasn’t saying that to ingratiate myself with Lyndon, I did genuinely favour the roast rack over the braised chicken with beans, salmon fillet or aubergine melts.  A surprisingly broad choice for a rural guesthouse.  ‘Plums baked in sloe gin – mmm, that sounds lush.  I won’t bother with a starter in that case, then I can make space for a pudding.’

My unruly belly gave another yearning roar at the thought.  I golloped some more wine, as though that would silence it.

Polly and Martin made their entrance as it approached half-past six.  While Martin appeared faintly distressed from their row, Polly shimmied in, a defiant sensation in a cerise bustier.  It did make me wonder what she lacked that the ill-famed Sarah could possibly possess.

Her standards were evidently slipping, though, as she wasn’t quite swift enough to bag a seat next to Lyndon at dinner.  I slid into one; Hazel swiped the other.  I had to stifle a smirk when Ted and Enid arrived just as we were being seated and nipped obliviously into the places opposite Lyndon and me, which left our stroppy couple at the other end, across from Hazel and Shane, who I hardly imagined were favoured company for them.

Over dinner – ‘You were right about this lamb, Lyndon, the food’s delicious here’ – I confided my new career ambitions in him.  He had such an attentive way about him.  His eyes unguardedly met mine; I could have been the only person in the room. 

Happily he was receptive to my idea too.  ‘We’re always delighted to welcome new recruits.  I’ll sort you out an application form.’  Hazel signalled me a discreet thumbs up.  I hid my crimson face behind my wine glass, which proved an unwise idea as it only drew attention to my juddering hands.

I attempted to deflect attention by making conversation with Ted and Enid, who I’m afraid to say I thereafter privately christened the Salad Couple.  Apparently unimpressed with the diverse menu, they had both ordered salads.

‘How’s your, er, watercress?’ I ventured.

They looked startled to be addressed.  ‘Very nice,’ Ted murmured, after peeking at Enid as though he sought permission to answer.  They kept their eyes on their leafy plates to preclude further dialogue.

Over coffee, Lyndon said to the table at large: ‘Now I’m sure you’ve all brought your itineraries along but just to refresh you, we’ll be getting seven miles under our belts tomorrow.  We head to Quanswood first – some interesting wildlife there – we’ll get to the village of Lower Bratchley by lunchtime, that’s in south Staffs, then we follow the canal north to Crockington, which is where we’ll be staying tomorrow night, at a place called the Badger.

‘We need to leave here at nine.  Come down for breakfast when you want – it’s served from seven – as long as we’re all ready to assemble in the lobby with our cases at nine.  The mini bus’ll drop the luggage off at the Badger.  So obviously make sure you don’t leave anything behind.  Any questions?’  Nobody had any.  ‘Now the rest of the evening is yours to do with whatever you wish.  Anyone fancy a game of cards?  They keep a pack in here.’

He went over to the dresser and pulled them out of a drawer, which I saw also contained chess and a tattered Guess Who game.

Hazel was up for it, so was Shane, so was I of course.  The Salad Couple conferred with one another before burbling that they would get an early night.

‘Polly?  Martin?’  Lyndon tipped the cards on to the table and started shuffling.

Polly had scowled at us all like shit all night, but now that Lyndon was talking she instantly dimpled and adopted an oozy voice.  ‘Love to, but Mart and I really ought to be getting to bed’ – she emphasised the word – ‘as well.  Come on darling.  Nighty night everyone.’  Despite the cursory ‘everyone,’ she looked only at Lyndon.

I have to say he displayed no signs of being impressed as she glided out like a ship’s figurehead, or wildly jealous when, within minutes, ostentatious bedspring and orgasm noises filtered down from her and Martin’s room.  Anyone would think they were the only people to have ever had sex.  Evidently they were over their squabble.

The four of us far too polite and British to acknowledge the shrieks, other than by talking over them, through an increasingly loud bout of rummy.  I was halfway through yelling ‘Jack of SPADES’ when they suddenly subsided and I found I was echoing.

Hazel proved an adroit card sharp.  She triumphed at rummy, and after the game we decided to disperse and retire.

‘It’s been an interesting day,’ I said woozily as I tucked my chair in.

‘Glad you’re liking it thus far.’  Lyndon gathered up the cards and crammed them back in the packet.  ‘I hope the rest of the week proves as enjoyable.  I’ll sort you out that application form in the morning.’

‘Thank you Lyndon.’

‘My pleasure.’

All mine, I assure you!  Heading for the door, flooded with lust and wine, I sneaked a last pre-bed gaze at him while he was at the dresser with his back to me.  ‘Good night.’

BEST FOOT FORWARD WALKING BREAKS

The Four Matthews

* 2-8 March, 19-25 April, 12-18 July, 4-10 October 2010
* 7-11 miles a day + ascents of up to 550 metres (1,800 feet)

Roam into Anglo-Saxon England on this 40-mile trek across some of the Midlands’ most fascinating yet forgotten natural landmarks.

The quartet of hills rise at virtually equidistant intervals across the one-time Earldom of Matthew Theodoric, the 11th century Earl of Rosterbury.  The Earl modestly commissioned a marble bust of himself to crown each hill – thus they became dubbed The Four Matthews.

The ‘Matthews’ at Sneydley in south Shropshire and Tunclough in the Peak District mark the perimeters of his former land, with the two in between gracing the Staffordshire village skylines at Manderwood and Hisley.

The Earl’s powers were drastically curtailed during the reign of William the Conqueror, and the Earldom became obsolete.

The busts were torn down over 600 years later by rampaging anti-Royalists who opposed his descendents’ support for the Cavaliers during the English Civil War.

Only the fragmented and centuries-ravaged head of the Manderwood bust remains, preserved in Manderwood Manor near Wolverhampton, the Jacobean manor house owned by subsequent generations of Theodorics before being sold to a family of local entrepreneurs.  Earl Matthew’s ghost is a reputedly frequent visitor!

BFF will be taking groups of up to eight on this idyllic yet testing hike throughout spring and autumn.

We will stay in homely guesthouses along the route, and for our last night have negotiated a very special rate at the prestigious Rosterbury Manor Hotel, owned by famed chef Julian Crowfoot.  That evening’s activity, for those who wish to partake, will be an introductory wine tasting course.

The total cost of the break includes all bed, breakfast and evening meals, packed lunches where provided, and admission to Manderwood Manor on day 3.

We transport your baggage door to door between each destination, so you can enjoy the beautiful countryside free of heavy cases and rucksacks.  Our luxury mini coach will return all participants to the Sneydley starting point on day 7.

For full booking and costs information, see page…

From:  Adrian Raybould
Sent:  16 April 2010 15:53
To:   Naomi Ball
Subject: Jumping ship 

Nay

Just spent my spare 10 minutes between appointments flicking through your resignation letter.

You pick your moments, girl, I’ll say that for you – sneaking that in on a day when I’m in back-to-back meetings and you’re about to escape on your jollies!

Only joking (you know my sense of humour by now), it’s just that you’re a valued employee and I can’t deny I’m gutted to lose you.

All this overtime you’ve put in to help Sian learn the ropes during her first few weeks has been immeasurably appreciated.

As you know, we work as a team here at Raybould Communications.  With Sian being relatively new to PR, and our lunchtimes currently eaten up by appointments with wedding suppliers (we intend getting spliced just as soon as her Decree Absolute comes through), we have had to think outside the box for a while.  Your continued help on these evenings and weekends is crucial.  Obviously some of it can make up for that day you had off for your uncle’s funeral.

I know you were disappointed not to get the senior marketing exec job this time around, and you must be kicking yourself for not correcting those typos in the McConnell Group press releases the other week.

I am unsure quite why you raise that matter again in your letter.  I have long since forgiven your slip-up.  Nova has repeatedly assured me that she passed you the message about the press releases requiring amendment, and I have made allowances for your undoubted distress that day following your unc’s death.  It is unfortunate that they were dished out to the papers containing misinformation, but these things happen.

May I beg you to, whilst slogging across the wilds of Shropshire next week, spend some time reconsidering your decision to quit?  We’ll touch base a week on Monday.

Regards.

Ade

Julian Howard Crowfoot (born 5 May 1943 in Buxton, Derbyshire) is a chef, restaurateur and hotelier who became infamous for a certain sexual penchant which allegedly caused a slump in Cadbury’s Wispa profits.

Career
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Public school educated, Crowfoot achieved no formal qualifications and entered the catering trade at the age of 16, working his way up from washer-upper to owner of a string of restaurants. He won renown as a dessert chef, and also popularised wine tasting courses at his various establishments.

Crowfoot became a household name via his 1985 primetime BBC2 show Choc-wise with Julian Crowfoot, exploring the wonders of chocolate and its many and varied uses in cookery. An eponymous book was published to accompany the series.

A large proportion of his recipes contained alcohol. His speciality, rum and Wispa soufflé, became one of the BBC’s most requested recipes of the 1980s.

However, an infamous appearance on a 1989 edition of the chat show Wogan, during which a clearly inebriated Crowfoot repeatedly swore, despite the programme’s pre-watershed slot, and insulted his fellow guest Su Pollard, saw the demise of his terrestrial television career.

In the 1990s he acquired a short-lived presenting stint on the obscure cable channel Menu TV.

After an ineffective attempt at reviving his obsolete TV career with an appearance on I’m a Celebrity…Get Me out of Here! in 2002, Crowfoot opted to bow out of the public eye altogether and throw himself into the hotel business.

He returned to his Peak District roots to purchase the historic Rosterbury Manor Hotel at Tunclough, where he runs regular wine tasting workshops and residential cookery courses.

Personal life
_______________________________________________________________________
Crowfoot’s first marriage, to teenage sweetheart Pat, the mother of his two children, collapsed at the height of his fame following his high-profile affair with the children’s TV presenter Cassie Pincher, who shortly thereafter became his second wife. 

However, her affairs with two members of the Chippendales male strip troupe were exposed in the media.

In a lurid kiss-and-tell to the Sun following their acrimonious divorce, Pincher claimed her infidelity resulted from her repulsion at Crowfoot’s preference for lolling around the house all day in baggy green Y-fronts, and his fetish for smearing his 16-stone body in melted Wispa and inviting her to lick it off.  Sales of the chocolate bar briefly dipped.

Crowfoot subsequently suffered a well-documented nervous breakdown and battles with alcoholism and obesity. He was banned from driving for 18 months after pleading guilty to driving his Jaguar XJ6 at more than twice the legal alcohol limit.

Following his infamous Wogan interview, he admitted himself to the Priory rehabilitation clinic.

It was there he met his third wife Wendy, a fellow recovering alcoholic, whom he married following a whirlwind romance. That union too ended in a swift divorce, however, when it was discovered that Wendy was allergic to chocolate and thus unable to enjoy her husband’s recipes or indulge his aforementioned Wispa fetish.

References
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1. ^ “‘How Crowfoot’s careless Wispa made our marriage a total choc-up,’ by TV babe Cassie”
2. ^ “‘Cooking sherry doesn’t count,’ pleads troubled chef banned for drink-driving”

External links
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- Rosterbury Manor official website
- Whatever Happened To…?