3rd Prize - Short Story Competition 2013

"The Man at the Allotments" by Veronica Bright

 
To the other allotment holders, Harold Marksby was a bit of a mystery. He arrived on an ancient bike, the skirts of an old mac flapping dangerously close to the back wheel, cycle clips holding his trousers in submission above his boots. He dismounted, and made his way towards his plot. One or two optimistic people nodded at him, raised a hand, passed the time of day, but Harold held them at bay with a slight tilt of the head.

The tools in his shed were arranged in rows, the fork, the spade, the trowel, waiting like friends. There was a folding seat tucked into the corner. On fine days Harold took this outside, ready for the moment when he would survey his crops while he drank tea from his flask, or ate his sandwiches, his eyes upon the book he was reading.

He had a penchant for detective fiction. He looked back to his days as a police officer, evenings when he had tapped away at his typewriter, drawing upon his experience to create his characters. He longed to be a published author, someone who could smile and say those magic words. 'I'm a writer.'

Years ago he'd showed his wife some of his work, but she'd shuddered and said it was all too bloodthirsty.

"Can't you write something pleasant?" she'd asked.

She'd muttered, too. Why would a man who saw so much horror in real life, want to write about it when he came home?
 
All he could do was shake his head. Now Harold often felt the eyes of his long-dead wife upon him. Not only had he been a policeman, and a creator of fiction nobody wanted to read, he had failed to give her the child she had so longed for.

It was a bright spring morning when Harold felt someone else watching him. Opening the shed door, he inspected his tools. Reassured, he unpacked his flask, his sandwiches. He selected a fork, came out of the shed. A small head flashed out of sight.

Harold looked across at the next allotment.

"Good morning." A young man, late thirties, was digging enthusiastically.

"Tom," he announced. "My first day."

The old man nodded. "Harold Marksby."

Tom came over and offered an earth-covered hand. "Pleased to meet you."

A small shape darted behind the shed again. Tom laughed.

"My son, Simon." Then, seeing Harold's expression, he added, "He's seven.

Won't be any trouble. Got a hearing problem. Bit of a loner."

Harold nodded. The young man's last words struck a chord.

After this Harold often felt the eyes of the rather scrawny, eagle-eyed child upon him. The row of runner beans offered considerable shelter, the sweet peas tangled and flourished, raspberry canes thrived. All provided the boy with places in which to hide, to spy.

June arrived. Harold was reading when the boy came round the corner of the shed, carrying a small folding chair. He opened it up and sat down, took a can of Coke out of his pocket, and spoke to Harold in his peculiarly nasal voice.

"Dad's nipped up home," he said. "He told me not to stray. Can I stay with you?"
 
Harold closed his book politely, and looked at the boy, who stared up at him.

"What you reading?"

"It's a detective story."

Harold showed the boy the cover - a body lying abandoned in an alley. Black and white, except for the blood. Harold explained that he used to be a police officer; that he had spent his life dealing with crime; that now he was retired he read about it instead. He didn't say how much he wanted to hold in his own hands a book he had written himself.

The boy listened, watching Harold intently, his head cocked on one side, as if he might have an opinion on all the unsolved mysteries in the world. Harold looked back at him, this earnest little stranger. He remembered how, years ago, he had yearned to be somebody important, somebody people looked up to. A writer whose work was often chosen in the library.

His wife's derision came back once again.

"No sensible person wants to read stuff like that. You're wasting your time."

Harold had tried to explain. It was his way of coping with the things he saw in the course of his work, cruelty, kidnappings, murders. And then some-one, a relative,
a friend, a husband, had to identify the body.

Just as Harold had, in the end, identified his wife's body. He had carried a deep sense of responsibility ever since. He had not made his wife happy. He had made her suicidal. Overcome by guilt, his emotions had closed down; he despised himself.

"I wanted to be a writer," said Harold, looking at his boots. "Too late now, I suppose."

The boy frowned. "It's not late, it's early," he said. "Early summer."
 
Then Harold did something very unusual for him. He laughed, long and loud. And the boy, knowing something must be funny, laughed too.

Harold took out his sandwiches and shared them with this scrawny, engaging little chap.

"Do you know any stories?" asked Simon. Harold smiled. He chose carefully, and embarked upon a tale involving a boy with sharp eyes, who never missed a clue, a boy who solved a mystery that baffled all his teachers.

Tom arrived with more sandwiches, and quietly drew up his deckchair.

"Dad, Dad," said Simon, his mouth full of ham, and his mind full of plans. "I want to be one of those when I grow up."

"You want to be ... what?" asked Tom. "A detective? A teacher?"

The boy shook his head. "A writer," he said. "I want to tell stories like Harold does."

Tom smiled, and told his son he would be a very good author indeed.

Harold watched as the boy skipped off to play an imaginary game among the beanstalks. He waved away Tom's thanks, his admiration.
 
That day when Harold put away his tools, locked up his shed, and cycled home, he was deep in thought.

After tea, he switched on his long-silent computer, and typed. THE BOY DETECTIVE. BOOK ONE.

He paused. He faltered.

Then he banished the dark memory of his former life. He began to write.