‘Would you mind if I came inside and spoke with you about her? Is she here?’
Evie’s mother waved a hand at one of the curtained upstairs windows.
‘She won’t surface till midday. Out for the count, sh
e is.’
‘I can’t say that surprises me. So?’
The woman grunted ungraciously. ‘S’pose. I’ll put the kettle on. My husband’s out in the fields or I’d get him in too.’
He followed her across the yard, dodging bantams that squawked and ruffled their feathers in his path, then passed through a door curtain into a rather old-fashioned kitchen, all exposed brick and white wood cupboards with catches. In a huge Belfast sink, an array of blackened pots and pans were stacked up. A bluebottle buzzed around an open jam jar and the place smelled of dog food and grease.
Perhaps, thought Adam, such domestic laxity had sunk into Evie’s soul and morphed into sexual licentiousness. A dirty mind begotten by a dirty house.
Her mother hauled a kettle of water on to the range and found some clean cups from a dusty cupboard.
‘Were you at the maypole last night?’ Adam opened, watching the woman fuss with teabags and milk bottles.
‘Me? No. We goes to bed early here. I know what our Evie gets up to and, not saying I disapprove, but I don’t much want to watch it.’
‘How can you bear it?’
The words came out so emphatically that Evie’s mother wheeled around in surprise, drops of milk spilling from the jug she’d been pouring it into.
‘Bear what?’
‘Your daughter – your precious child – used in that way by all and sundry?’
She shook her head.
‘Listen, vicar. There’s a reason none of your kind has lasted long around here, and you’re giving a good account of it right now. You don’t understand our ways, and you don’t try to understand them. You can’t change us. We are what we are and we’re happy with that. Milk? Sugar?’
‘Er, a drop of milk,’ he said after a pause. ‘How long has she been – like this?’
‘There’s been a wild Witts girl every generation of the family since the 1600s, Mr Flint. It’s in her genes. She can’t help it no more than you can help having dark hair.’
‘You expected this?’
She sighed. ‘I thought long and hard about marrying Jim Witts, truth be told. In a way, it’s a bit of a curse. You know it’s going to happen. You try and protect her but as soon as she hits 18, there’s nothing you can do to stop it happening. She’s a grown woman, Mr Flint. And she’s happy. That’s all I care about. As long as she’s happy, I can’t complain.’
‘So you put all this down to biological determinism?’
‘Biological whatamism?’
‘You think it’s inevitable that she will have an ungovernable sex drive? It’s part of her DNA?’
‘It’s her heritage.’
‘When did all this start?’
‘Same as with her grandmother, and her grandmother before her. She was fine as a child, just a happy little soul like any other. Then, when she finished her GCSEs, she got this wild eye for the boys. I tried to keep her in, tried to stop her hanging around the village bus stop at all hours, but it was like she was mad for them. And she’s such a beauty, they weren’t going to ignore a girl like her, were they? Funnily enough, that’s when her gran started to settle down. About time too, coming into her 60s.’
Evie’s mother folded her arms under her bosom, shaking her head.
‘So your mother-in-law …?’
‘She was just the same. Settled down now, mind, with an insurance salesman from Parham.’