Shallowfield sat on the southern edge of the Finchbottom Vale and was
bordered on the other side by the Dancingdean forest and the town’s fortunes
had always relied largely upon forestry and agriculture for its survival.
In the post war years with rationing and a shortage of work a lot of
people moved away from the area and it only just survived and the community
around Teardrop Lake fared even worse.
Only a few of the houses around the Lake were thriving, a lot of the houses
had been rented out and those that hadn’t were in a poor state of repair, some
too such an extent they were little more than ruins.
But by the 70s however things were beginning to change, thanks mainly to
tourism as a result of an increase in leisure time.
This trend was reflected by the fact that the previously derelict
Shallowfield Lodge, which had been inherited by a young couple from
Lincolnshire, Rob and Sheryl Brown, was being turned into a Hotel.
From then on Shallowfield went from strength to strength which was
echoed by the fortunes of the Claremont Hotel.
It was once the home of a wealthy Downshire family but like so many
similar great houses in the county it fell into disuse as the fortunes of the
owners suffered after the Great War.
It had had many reincarnations since then, particularly in the years
between the wars and had been used for many things over the post war years but
it wasn’t until the 60s that it became the Claremont Hotel.
However things had got tough in the Hotel trade with the success of
Travelodge, Premier Inn and Holiday Inn Express and so places like the
Claremont needed to offer something extra to attract the guests which was why Clara Davits was in
Shallowfield, because she was an events manager and in December there was an
awful lot of scope for such things and Clara was good at her job.
She was also exceptionally hard working, and that December she was working
even harder than ever although that was due in no small measure to the fact
that she needed distracting.
That was because her
husband Owen was a sergeant in the Downshire Light Infantry and was currently
on exercises with the regiment firstly in Brunei
for jungle operational training and from there to Canada for battle training on
the prairies of Alberta.
It was a three month absence which was passing agonizingly slowly for
her.
She was able to skype him occasionally and he messaged her when he
could but it wasn’t ideal, but it was better than nothing.
However the two back to back deployments meant she wouldn’t see him
until the New Year and as that would have been their first Christmas together
she had been very down, which is why she threw herself into her work.
Despite that however she was prone to bouts of daydreaming as she
unpacked the Christmas table decoration.
She knew she should
get busy on the rest of them to meet her target but she was overcome with
tiredness so she decided to have a mug of coffee instead to try and wake
herself up, so she sat down on one of the sofa’s to drink it and promptly fell
asleep instead and had a long luxurious nap.
When she awoke it was
two am and the place was in darkness, obviously someone had come along and
thought the room was empty and turned out the lights.
She was still feeling tired so she decided to go outside for some fresh air so
she donned her coat, hat, scarf and gloves and went outside.
The snow that had
fallen on and off all day had petered out and when she looked up at the night
sky she could see breaks in the cloud and the multitude of twinkling stars
beyond.
Clara looked back at
the hotel where her Christmas lights were visible and then up to the stars
again and she addressed them curtly
“Yes I know you’re
beautiful, but you’re just showing off”
She walked around the
grounds for about half an hour through the fresh fallen snow and when she was done
she made her way back towards the hotel when her phone vibrated in her pocket.
Even if she had been
able to retrieve it from her pocket with her gloved hand she wouldn’t have been
able to operate it so she waited until she had tromped back across the terrace
to the warmth of the hotel before she removed her glove and checked her phone.
The source of the
vibrating was a text message so with her un-gloved finger she selected “unread
messages” and her heart skipped a beat when she realised it was from Owen.
The message seemed to
take an eternity to open but when it did she couldn’t believe her eyes as she
read,
“Just landed in
London, exercise cut short, unexpected ten day leave, see you in 36 hours,
counting the minutes”
“Me too” she said and
hugged the phone before she ran back outside and she began to laugh out loud as
she ran around like a child experiencing its first sight of snow culminating in
her falling backwards into a virgin bank of snow.
Despite the lateness
of the hour, she was seen by one of the guests on the second floor.
“Look at that crazy
woman, making snow angels at this time of night” he said to his wife who agreed
wholeheartedly that she was crazy.
And Clara would not
have disagreed, she was crazy, crazy in
love, and her love was coming home for Christmas.
