Short Story
A BRIEF ENCOUNTER
I
Jan Garner, Sherborne Scribblers
was disappointed that the Chelsea Flower Show in May had been cancelled, but it was just one of many casualties during the pandemic. Still, the BBC had come to the rescue and was airing a week of highlights from previous years. That evening, as I settled down to wait for the first programme to begin, my mind strayed back to that May in ‘92 and to the troublesome thoughts that had plagued me over the years about the tiny woman, with the watery blue eyes and hair the colour of weak tea, that I’d met on the train. She boarded at Sherborne and made her way through the crowded carriage. I recognised her once fashionable accordion-pleated skirt and buttoned-up blouse, topped with a row of pearls, as something I’d worn myself back in the fifties. ‘23B, that’s me,’ she said. I glanced up and smiled as she put her bag down on the table and took the window seat opposite me. As the train glided out of the station and gathered speed, I went back to reading my magazine. ‘Snap,’ she said. I looked up; she was holding an identical Gardener’s Weekly. ‘Are you going up to Chelsea?’ she asked. ‘Unfortunately not,’ I replied. ‘Are you?’ ‘Yes, I never miss it. It’s the only time of the year that I bother to get dressed up. It’s a wonderful day out, isn’t it?’ I agreed with her and asked if she was, as I suspected, given her rough hands and broken nails, a keen gardener. ‘I am, I’ve over half an acre.’ ‘Gosh,’ I said, ‘that must be a lot of hard work.’ ‘Well, it’s a lot easier now,’ she replied and brushed away a stray lock of hair. ‘When my husband Graham and I first discovered it, it was overgrown with pernicious weeds and nettles taller than me. But the views of the countryside were breathtaking and even though the cottage was derelict, I just knew we had to buy it. We had to be patient for almost a year whilst it was fixed up. But that was fine because we both agreed that this was going to be our forever home and we wanted it to be perfect. And of course, it gave me time to plan the garden of my dreams.’ ‘How lovely,’ I said. ’Was your husband a gardener too?’ ‘Oh, no. He couldn’t tell one flower from another and the only roses he liked
110 | Sherborne Times | August 2020
