The
Pepperstock Hills National Park stretched from the bare and often barren crags
of Oxley Ridge in the North to the dense wooded southern slopes on the fringe
of the Finchbottom Vale and from Quarry Hill, and the Pits in the West to
Pepperstock Bay in the East.
It is an area of stark contrasts and attracted a
variety of visitors.
The Quarry Hill side of the park
to the west, as the name suggests, was heavily Quarried over several hundred
years, though more extensively during the industrial revolution, the Quarries
had been un-worked for over fifty years and nature had reclaimed them and the former
pits had become lakes and were very popular with anglers and the sparse
shrubbery and woodland made it a popular spot with courting couples whereas the northern
crags and fells were popular with climbers and the more hardy folk.
To the south and east was an extensive tract of
magnificent mixed forestry and was rivalled only by the ancient woodland of the
Dancingdean Forest, which was where Paul McConnell lived in the village of
Springwater.
He wasn’t a native of Springwater and only moved to
the village when he took the post of tree surgeon with the Forestry Commission,
which he loved, but in addition he had two other loves in his life, one was
bird watching while the other was Dawn Fowle, and the irony of the latter’s
name was not lost on him.
Springwater was a perfect location to fulfil his love
of bird watching however his love for her was not so perfect as she was with
another man, her husband Mick, and she was not free for him to claim, even
though her husband was cruel and uncaring, she was still married to him.
However, he was hopeful he might win her away from
Mick, as he was sure his feelings were reciprocated but after six months he was
no nearer to his goal, so he planned an intervention.
Dawn was a Paramedic by profession, but when she
wasn’t working she was often to be found volunteering as part of the
Springwater Mountain Rescue Team.
It was his knowledge of her activities with the SMRT
that would aid him in his pursuit of her heart.
The Pepperstock Hills National Park was very popular
with climbers and walkers of all abilities so there were a number of
Rescue Stations in the hills which were
permanently manned during the busiest times of the year, and two nights every
fortnight she would take her turn with the first responders on the hill, and
furthermore he knew when she would walk down
the hill to the Mountain Rescue HQ in Springwater, and which route she would
take.
The
only thing he didn’t know for sure was whether she would be on her own when she
walked through the woods at the end of her shift.
Paul McConnell was often up in the woods in the early hours of the day enjoying
the full majesty of the Dawn Chorus, which was how he knew Dawn Fowle’s route
and timetable.
He was
enjoying the chilly morning, walking in the wood, listening to the wind stirring the canopy above his head and the cacophony of
birdsong, but then he stopped suddenly in his tracks and his ears pricked up,
and he smiled as his quarry was approaching and she was performing a Dawn
Chorus of her own.
He clearly heard the
pleasing melodic tones of her sweet voice, competing with the singing of the
birds in the morning air.
# Light up, light up
As if you have a choice
Even if you cannot hear my voice
I'll be right beside you, dear
Louder, louder
And we'll run for our lives
I can hardly speak I understand
Why you can't raise your voice to say #
The voice definitely
belonged to Dawn as she sang The Snow Patrol song, Run, though very much in
the style of Leona Lewis, to
every tree and critter.
He waited quietly in the
shadows, and enjoyed the performance, so he kept quiet and listened, but as she
passed him he
stepped forward onto the path and said
“Morning songbird” and she
jumped fully half a foot in the air and went as white as a sheet.
“Oh my God” she exclaimed “I
nearly had a heart attack”
But then the colour returned
to her cheeks and she roared with laughter, a laugh which was so infectious
Paul was soon laughing along with him.
Their hearty laughter
filled the air as they began to walk back to Springwater but after a few
minutes she looked him up and down and said
“Aren’t you cold in
shorts?”
“We “Woodsman” types are a
hardy breed” he responded
“You don’t look very hardy”
she lied as her eyes examined every inch of the muscular outdoorsman.
“I think you had better
come to HQ with me and have a hot drink”
“Ok” he retorted “I bow to
your superior knowledge and expertise in these matters and I put myself in your
hands”
“I wish” she thought to
herself
For the rest of the walk
they chatted in the same casual, flirty manner that they normally did until
they reached HQ.
It was located on the
outskirts of Springwater and was they last bit of civilization before you
entered the Park.
It was a moderately sized
complex, which housed a café, and a shop where you could buy everything from
tents, sleeping bags, clothing, and footwear, to Sandwiches and Kendal mint cake.
In addition, there was a manned first aid
station and of course the Springwater
Mountain Rescue HQ, where the team met or assembled and where they stored all
their equipment.
The HQ was as he suspected it would be at that hour,
deserted, which fitted nicely with the plan, but after that he would just have
to wing it.
Dawn unlocked the door and let him in and he sat at
the table in the kitchen area while she filled and boiled the kettle, and they
chatted in much the same vein as they had on the walk and then Dawn put the
drinks down on the table beside him.
“Thanks, that looks just the
job” he said “it’s nice to see that you have more strings to your bow that
early morning bird scaring”
“You cheeky sod” Dawn said as
she stood beside him and tried to clip him round the ear.
He caught hold of her wrist
however and pulled her on to his lap and kissed her slowly and sensually.
“I’ve wanted to do that for
ages” he said
“You’ve wanted to compliment
me on my tea making do you mean?” she asked
“Yes, that’s precisely what I
meant” he said, “I think good manners are so important, don’t you?”
“Oh, very much so” she agreed
“So do you think I might prevail upon you to snog me again?”
“My pleasure” he retorted
“And mine” she concurred and
then they were kissing again.
There’s no way of knowing how
long the kiss might have lasted, but they were interrupted by the sound of the
door opening and a woman’s voice calling.
“Hello?”
Dawn jumped quickly to her
feet and for some reason began rearranging her clothing to make sure that there
was nothing untoward, and then she left the room
“Good morning Jacqui” she
said, Jacqui was her sister in law and she worked at the First Aid Station next
door, he assumed she had seen the lights on and decided to investigate.
After the initial “good
morning” all he could hear were muffled voices, so he finished his tea and
followed in Dawn’s footsteps.
“Are you going home to bed?”
Jacqui asked and gave Paul a disdainful look
“Yes” Dawn replied “I’m going
to drop Paul home first, and then I’ll get a few hours’ sleep before work”
Then almost as an
afterthought Jacqui said
“What’s he doing here?”
“I found him on the hill
dressed like that” Dawn replied
“What’s wrong with him? Is he
mental?” Jacqui asked coldly
“He’s fine but if he’d stayed
up there he could have suffered mild exposure” Dawn replied
“I can well imagine what he
would have been exposing” she said with contempt “Bird watchers are very weird”
“I am here you know” Paul
pointed out
Jacqui had appeared un-phased
by Paul presence, but Dawn was a little uneasy and glanced at her watch
“Let’s get you in the car
Paul” she said in her best patronizing professional paramedic voice.
She turned off the light and
locked the door and Jacqui walked back towards the First Aid Station.
“See you later Jac”
As they reached her car she whispered
“Do you think she suspects
anything?”
“Not for a second” he
replied, “You were after all merely showing off your tea making expertise”
“No seriously” She said as
she opened the driver’s door “Do You?”
“No” he said reassuringly and
got in the car and she seemed satisfied with his answer and drove out of the
car park, but she didn’t drive him home, instead she drove up to a little car
park down in the valley popular with dog walkers and was chosen by her because
the valley was still shrouded in mist, so they could sit in the car and not
worry about being seen.
Dawn parked in a quiet corner
out of view of the entrance and due to the mist out of sight of everyone.
Once they had come to a halt
she switched off the engine and as she stared out into the mist she asked
“I have to know what it
meant”
“What?”
“The kiss, did it mean what I
think it means, or was it just a spur of the moment, take advantage of the
situation kind of thing?”
“I don’t know what you think
it meant” he replied, and she tensed before he added
“But for me it meant
everything”
Now for the first time she
turned to face him as he spoke
“I meant that I need you, I
want you and I love you, and all that that entails” he continued “I want you to
leave Mick and move in with me and eventually I want to marry you, is that what
you thought it meant?”
“No” she replied “But it’s
what I wanted it to mean”
And then they undid their
seat belts and proceeded to kiss and this time there was no interruption.
