Page 64 of Right Place, Right Time
‘It’s not a case of believing,’ Orla says serenely. ‘It’s a case of knowing. The Celtic word for the oak tree isdaur, which is where it is believed we get the word “door”from today. So it makes perfect sense an oak tree is the door to somewhere new. Are you all right there, Eve? You look a little unnerved by what I’m saying?’
‘Not at all, Orla. It all makes perfect sense to me.’
Orla looks surprised I’ve taken what she’s said so easily, and without question.
I calmly turn to Adam. ‘Adam, I’ve just remembered where I’ve seen that other oak tree before … In fact, we both have.’
21
‘Are you sure it’s in there?’ Adam says. ‘Maybe we left it in the house?’
‘I’m certain of it,’ I reply from behind a pile of boxes. ‘I have an inventory of everything I brought from your grandfather’s house, I remember clearly noting it down.’
I closed up the shop a little early tonight, and Adam and I travelled to the lock-up in my little van. Now, while Adam waits, I’m scrabbling about behind a load of boxes trying to find it.
‘Yes!’ I exclaim as I see a flat piece of oak wedged behind the frames of some large oil paintings. ‘I’ve found it.’ I tug at the wood, but it’s stuck tight. ‘Argh! I can’t shift it.’
‘Do you want me to try?’ Adam says.
The area behind the boxes is small, cramped and also very dark without the use of a torch, and after what Adam told me yesterday, I’m worried about asking him to go in there. But if we don’t get the piece of oak out this way, we will have to move all the boxes and then the paintings before we can get to it, and it will take ages.
‘If you’re sure?’ I ask hesitantly. ‘The area behind here is quite … snug.’
‘Claustrophobic, you mean?’ Adam says, knowing exactly what I’m suggesting. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll be fine, Eve. Now let me help you back over the top.’ I climb back over the boxes and Adam offers me his hand as I’m about to jump down.
His gesture is very sweet and gallant, and once more, as I take hold of his hand, I can’t help but like it. ‘Thank you,’ I say, feeling a little shy, as what can only be described as a warm glow spreads right through me.
Is it my imagination or is Adam holding my hand for a little longer than is strictly necessary now I’m back down on the ground?
I glance up at him to see if he might be feeling something similar. But as our eyes meet, this seems to jolt him back into action and he quickly drops my hand.
‘Right, then,’ he says with a brief nod of his head. ‘My turn!’
Adam, looking incredibly athletic, leaps effortlessly up onto the boxes and then does a sort of vaulting movement down over the other side, looking like a gymnast doing the perfect dismount from the pommel horse. Whereas when I climbed over, I sort of grappled myself up on top of the boxes, then rolled, or rather fell, inelegantly over the other side.
‘Can you see it?’ I ask, holding my phone torch high in the air so he’s not in the dark for too long.
‘Yep, I can see something that looks like what you described, wedged behind these paintings.’
‘Yes, that’s it. Can you get it out?’
I hear some tugging sounds and Adam grunting.
‘Christ, it’s wedged tight,’ he says. ‘Right, one … last …pull!’
I hear a sort of scraping noise. ‘Have you got it?’
‘Yep! I’m going to pass it over the top to you.’
A thick piece of oak appears from behind the boxes and I carefully lift it down over the other side. It’s followed by Adam, looking a little more red-faced than before, climbing carefully this time over the top of the boxes.
‘You were right,’ he says, standing back to look with me. ‘There is a tree carved on there that looks just like the others. So now we have three trees – four if you include the one in the middle of Clockmaker Court.’
What we’re both looking at is a small door carved in solid wood. It has a bronze handle and bronze studs around the outside, and, just like the door on the grandfather clock, in the middle there’s the simple carving of a tree.
‘It’s small, isn’t it?’ I say, looking at the door. It can’t be much more than five feet tall. ‘If this is a standard door, it’s going to be pretty old. People were much shorter in the past, so they didn’t need such tall doorways as we do now.’
‘Why would my grandfather have this in his house, though? It definitely wouldn’t fit any of the door frames there – they were all standard height. Remind me where you found it again?’
