Twenty years ago, I walked up a steep path, up a chalk cliff face. The wee town lay at my feet, behind me, the barren wilderness of broken rocks ahead of me. The fact that it was man-made born out by the squat, squared chimneys which were sprinkled on the landscape. The old miners were long gone, but the spoils of their labours remained. Silence reigned. The wind sighed in what grasses and heathers grew there, and the early evening warmth still hung around.
Presently, the path angled down, and reached a tarred roadway. Turning right, I walked down from the farmhouse and reached the miners' cottages. Shiney Row. Coming uphill, from the other direction, were two familiar figures. Tanned by the summer sun, happy having completed the walk by Schoolmaster's Pasture. It had been a while since I saw them, but the reunion was happy and we spent a few hours catching up. When darkness began to fall, I was offered a ride back to the wee town I had started my own walk from.
Fast forward twelve months. Much had changed. This time, we all arrived in a car. Myself from a distant railway station, the others because walking was now beyond one of the two. I stayed with them for two nights, trying to get my breath back, although not physically. I don't remember much of the visit, perhaps a drive by car to nearby towns. She was looking out at the soothing landscape of gently rolling hills, yellow flowers bowing in the wind and pheasants and owls visiting the garden. At the end of my visit, I was given a lift back to the railway station. Platform 1. I saw her face at the window of the carriage, worried, disappearing from sight as the train pulled out. The train back to London. Except I diverted at York.
Five years later. Once more, I returned to platform 1. He was there, alone. She was now at rest in the forest cemetery, and I joined him for a trip down memory lane. Seahaar had drifted far inland, and was shrouding the hilltops. We walked to Schoolmaster's Pasture. We went over the edge to the wee town below in the valley. The pheasants remembered, as did the owls. Silence reigned the empty moors. And when we left, in the soft light of early morning, I knew he would not be back. The next year, the cottage was sold. This time, I left on platform 4, northbound.
Thirteen years later. He had joined her in his rest in the forest cemetery. The cottage stands alone in the empty moorland, with broken rocks and deserted chimneys. I am minded to return there, but the time is not yet.