Forgetting Tide , livre ebook

Title Page
THE FORGETTING TIDE
by
Mike Hoinville



Publisher Information
Published in 2015 by
Andrews UK Limited
www.andrewsuk.com
The right of Mike Hoinville to be identified as the Author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998
Copyright © 2015 Mike Hoinville
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Any person who does so may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.



Dovesign
Chapter 1
The house was tall and thin but very deep. One of those relics that are hard to find now in any but the most out-of-the-way little towns, hiding from the developers and squatters, the converters and spoilers... The door was of pale pine, hugely thick and fitting the doorframe like a cork. When you opened it the inside hall door often swung open on its weak catch and when you closed the door it made the air whoosh back at you and made your ears almost pop with the pressure like in an airlock.
Inside the rooms were high-ceilinged and decorated with running plasterwork borders of eggs and leaves and the rooms had high wooden picture rails. The staircase was a rich chestnut coloured mahogany wonder and bearded men’s faces peered gloomily down from the supports of the arched hallway. The large front room, as in all the rooms, had thick doors with strange wavy patterned varnish on them and brass handles or big white china knobs. Marble fireplaces and little cupboards in every available corner gave the house an intriguing air of hide and seek. No cellar but little pantries and walk in hanging spaces and a second staircase that twisted its way up to a little bedroom at the back of the house. And an enormous loft - with a window that opened out onto the slate grey sea of the other houses’ rooves and a view over the little city... the iron bridge nearest then a bit of the curve of the railway track. In the middle distance the massive pointed spire of the church high on its hill overlooking the river. The river itself, contained in the city by concrete paths with neat grass verges, often refused to be tamed a little way up stream and from this window - if you craned out far enough, you could catch glimpses of whole fields under water after the autumn and early spring storms and high tides. If you looked left out of the window you could see the nearest houses lower down and green squares of back gardens and then the road over the iron bridge led to the first part of the town which was not so interesting as all you saw was largely the wall of the multi-storey car park that served the nearest Sainsbury’s.
Sibil liked to look past the massive arrow of the church to the river, letting her thoughts wander with the water. She was often letting her thoughts drift somewhere and was often told off for it. That’s why she liked it up here looking our of ‘her’ window as she called it.
She was there now, elbows on the ledge and staring idly down at the tiny people and cars going over the Iron bridge - but always her gaze would go back - to the spire and beyond to the river.
She sneezed suddenly and that broke her daydream. She wiped away the water that had sprung to the corner of her eye and shouted over one shoulder.
“What are you doing. Look at this dust, you can see it going out of the window,” she sneezed again... “Rowan ! Did you hear me?”
Her brother was up to his armpits in a large tea chest that apparently contained books. It was too heavy to move and he was piling some of the books and bundles of magazines down on to the loft floor. Clouds of dust swirled up with every bundle. He sneezed too and wiped his mouth and brushed away the lock of black hair that always fell over one eyebrow with the back of his blackened hand - his forehead showed the passing of his hand now. He answered crossly and impatiently.
“Well what do you expect, If you were down here helping instead of perching up in your nest as usual we would have been finished by now. Mum said to tidy up the loft ‘ ‘OK” you said but all you’ve done is to act like a bird trying to leave the nest. Why don’t you fly down here and help?”
Sibil was about to reply but, looking at the piles of things that her brother had moved and his sweaty, dusty face and hands she felt sorry for him and silently agreed that she had not been exactly fair - she hadn’t meant to be so long... it was just so interesting looking out so high over everything - time just seemed to - seemed to... oh well... she scrambled down from her ‘nest’ of two face to face wicker armchairs (‘be careful not to stand on those chairs”) and squatted down beside Rowan. She opened and peered inside some of the books and magazines - boring! Sibil gazed around the collection of chests, trunks and cartons that largely filled one end of the big loft. Their Dad’s things - had to be sorted out and moved somewhere... where? There was mountains of the stuff - clothes, shoes, old business stuff, tools that Mum couldn’t use... Rowan brought her back from the start of another daydream.
“Now what! I don’t know Sib - wake up and give me a hand will you? Mum will be shouting up in a minute for tea or something and we haven’t done much ... “as if to order a woman’s voice sailed up the echoing stairs from far below somewhere.
“Row, Sib! How much longer are you going to be? Ten minutes and it’s on the table... and wash your hands before you come down - not the big white towel mind, the small blue one. Oh - and bring it down with you when you’ve finished OK?”
Over the months they had lived there Sibil and Rowan could tell exactly where on the stair their Mum was standing when she shouted and therefore how urgent or serious the call was ... this one was the first half-landing. Not serious... first floor landing and above was danger level.
“See,” said Rowan “I told you. Now then help me drag this over here with the trunks.” They pulled and pushed the box, squeakingly and with clouds of dust over to the corner which was just barely lit with the light from the fanlight window in the roof. They paused, coughing dryly in the grey swirls, then went back for the books and magazines and reloaded the box. Sibil pulled a face.
“This is going to take forever. What are we going to do with all this?”
“Sort it out Mum said. You know what that means. Chucking most of it away before we have had a chance to look at it.”
“But it’s just his old business stuff and tools and things. We’ll be old before we use it or understand it even if we wanted too.”
“Not all of it is business stuff and tools. Some of it is really interesting. Some good atlases here look - and look at this book on Magic and this on ‘The Alchemists’ “
“What’s the alchemists then if it’s so interesting?” She picked up the proffered book and picked over the pages of strange pictures and signs. “Looks like rubbish to me.”
“You’re just like Mum - five seconds look - rubbish - throw it out. I don’t want to do that. I want to see what there is and decide properly. It’s like his whole life here. Don’t you find that fascinating? We never had a chance to look at all this before. This is our last chance. Once it’s gone it’s gone.”
Rowan looked at Sibil looking at him, Her eyes grown moist. She turned away, ashamed of her tears for no good reason.
“What’s the matter Sib? What did I say? Why are you crying? C’mon now. Here.” He held out a grey dusty handkerchief. Blowing of nose, sniffing. Wet eyes turn to him.
“You sound so much like Dad sometimes Row. Just the way your hair is, and you say what he used to say. Oh - you don’t mean to I know and I know I’m stupid for crying but it’s just... just... “She turned away again.
Rowan didn’t know what to do when his sister cried. He felt suddenly tired and sad himself and there was an empty space somewhere near the bottom of his throat that threatened to fill up with tears if he didn’t do something...
“Rowan, Sibil! It’s on the table. I said to be down here by now. What are you two doing?” Mum’s voice came from the first floor landing - danger zone.
“Do hurry up you two. Aunt Percy’s called to say she’s at the station now. She’ll be here in ten minutes and I want us to be ready to have tea together. Come on now!”
Rowan jumped up - “C’mon Sib. Aunt Percy’s nearly here. We’d better wash and go down. Look at you! You look like a chimney sweep!”
Sibil sniffed the last of the tears and stood up looking down at her stained jeans and dirty sandals then up at her equally dirty brother.
“Well if I’m the sweep then you are the chimney.” She said and raced away down the loft ladder to be first in the shower room.
“Hey!” said Rowan - too late to stop her “I’m first, I’ve done all the work!”
He jumped from half way up the ladder but still couldn’t overtake Sibil as she kicked off her sandals and barefooted it into the shower room and just managed to slam the door as Rowan arrived ... “Stop jumping on the stairs - for the hundredth time!”
“Sorry Mum.” Came Rowan’s voice from where he sat on the lower step to the shower room.
It was a familiar game they played with their Mum, part of the ritual of their family, sometimes he was genuinely sorry for annoying his Mum and not only when she was really cross - he wanted to be better but sometimes he just felt so sort of choked up, so sort of... the front bell ran