Beedes maternal grandmother and paternal grandparents were now long gone. Beedes mother had died of breast cancer in 1982. His part-senile father now lived with Beedes older brother on the south coast, just outside Hastings.
Beedes parents had moved to the heart of Ashford (14 miles away) two years before he was even conceived, but Beede maintained a lively interest in their old stamping ground; still visited it regularly, had many contacts among the local Rotary and Cricket Clubs (the cricket grounds were yet another Chunnel casualty), friends and relatives in both of the affected villages, and a strong sense however fallacious that the union of these two places (like the union of his two parents) was a critical almost a physicalpart of his own identity.
They could not be divided.
It was early in the spring of 1984 when he first became aware of Eurotunnels plans. Beede was a well-seasoned campaigner and local prime mover. His involvement was significant. His opinions mattered. And he was by no means the only dynamic party with a keen interest in this affair. There were countless others who felt equally strongly, not least (it soon transpired) Shepways District Council. On closer inspection of the proposed scheme, the Council had become alarmed by the idea that this divisive Northern Access Route might actively discourage disembarking Chunnel traffic from travelling to Dover, Folkestone or Hythe (Shepways business heartland) by feeding it straight on to the M20 (and subsequently straight on to London). The ramifications of this decision were perceived as being potentially catastrophic for local businesses and the tourist trade.
A complaint was duly lodged. The relevant government committee (where the buck ultimately stopped) weighed up the various options on offer and then quietly turned a blind eye to them. But the fight was by no means over. In response, the Council, Beede, and many residents of Newington and Peene got together and threatened a concerted policy of non-cooperation with Eurotunnel if a newly posited scheme known as The Shepway Alternative (a scheme still very much in its infancy) wasnt to be considered as a serious contender.
In the face of such widespread opposition the committee reassessed the facts and in a glorious blaze of publicity backed down. The decision was overturned, and the new Southern Access Route became a reality.
This small but hard-won victory mightve been an end to the Newington story. But it wasnt. Because now (it suddenly transpired) there were to be other casualties, directly as a consequence of this hard-won Alternative. And they would be rather more severe and destructive than had been initially apprehended.
To keep their villages unified, Newington and Peene had sacrificed a clutch of beautiful, ancient properties (hitherto unaffected by the terminal scheme) which stood directly in the path of the newly proposed Southern Link with the A20 and the terminal. One of these was the grand Victorian vicarage, known as The Grange, with its adjacent Coach House (now an independent dwelling). Another, the magnificent, mid-sixteenth-century farmhouse known as Stone Farm. Yet another, the historic water mill (now non-functioning, but recently renovated and lovingly inhabited, with its own stable block) known as Mill House.
Beede wasnt naive. He knew only too well how the end of one drama could sometimes feed directly into the start of another. And so it was with the advent of what soon became known as The Newington Hit List.
Oh the uproar! The sense of local betrayal! The media posturing and ranting! The archaeological chaos engendered by this eleventh-hour re-routing! And Beede (who hadnt, quite frankly, really considered all of these lesser implications Mid-Kent Water plc didnt run itself, after all) found himself involved (didnt he owe the condemned properties that much, at least?) in a crazy miasma of high-level negotiations, conservation plans, archaeological investigations and restoration schemes, in a last-ditch attempt to rectify the environmental devastation which (lets face it) he himself had partially engendered.
Eurotunnel had promised to dismantle and re-erect any property (or part of a property) that was considered to be of real historical significance. The Old Grange and its Coach House were not historical enough for inclusion in this scheme and were duly bulldozered. Thankfully some of the other properties did meet Eurotunnels high specifications. Beedes particular involvement was with Mill House, which it soon transpired had been mentioned in the Domesday Book and had a precious, eighteenth-century timber frame.
Eurotunnel had promised to dismantle and re-erect any property (or part of a property) that was considered to be of real historical significance. The Old Grange and its Coach House were not historical enough for inclusion in this scheme and were duly bulldozered. Thankfully some of the other properties did meet Eurotunnels high specifications. Beedes particular involvement was with Mill House, which it soon transpired had been mentioned in the Domesday Book and had a precious, eighteenth-century timber frame.
The time for talking was over. Beede put his money where his mouth was. He shut up and pulled on his overalls. And it was hard graft: dirty, heavy, time-consuming work (every tile numbered and categorised, every brick, every beam), but this didnt weaken Beedes resolve (Beedes resolve was legendary. He gave definition to the phrase a stickler).
Beede was committed. And he was not a quitter. Early mornings, evenings, weekends, he toiled tirelessly alongside a group of other volunteers (many of them from Canterburys Archaeological Trust) slowly, painstakingly, stripping away the mills modern exterior, and (like a deathly coven of master pathologists), uncovering its ancient skeleton below.
It wasnt all plain sailing. At some point (and who could remember when, exactly?) it became distressingly apparent that recent improvements to the newer parts of Mill House had seriously endangered the older structures integrity
Now hang on
Justjust back up a second
What are you saying here, exactly?
The worst-case scenario? That the old mill might never be able to function independently in its eighteenth-century guise; like a conjoined twin, it might only really be able to exist as a small part of its former whole.
But the life support on the newer part had already been switched off (theyd turned it off themselves, hadnt they? And with such care, such tenderness), so gradually as the weeks passed, the months the team found themselves in the unenviable position of standing helplessly by and watching with a mounting sense of desolation as the older parts heartbeat grew steadily weaker and weaker. Until one day, finally, it just stopped.
They had all worked so hard, and with such pride and enthusiasm. But for what? An exhausted Beede staggered back from the dirt and the rubble (a little later than the others, perhaps; his legendary resolve still inappropriately firm), shaking his head, barely comprehending, wiping a red-dust-engrained hand across a moist, over-exerted face. Marking himself. But there was no point in his war-painting. He was alone. The fight was over. It was lost.
And the worst part? He now knew the internal mechanisms of that old mill as well as he knew the undulations of his own ribcage. He had crushed his face into its dirty crevices. He had filled his nails with its sawdust. He had pushed his ear up against the past and had sensed the ancient breath held within it. He had gripped the liver of history and had felt it squelching in his hand
Expanding
Struggling
So what now? What now? What to tell the others? How to make sense of it all? How to rationalise? Worse still, how to face the hordes of encroaching construction workers in their bright yellow TML uniforms, with their big schemes and tons of concrete, with their impatient cranes and their diggers?
Beede had given plenty in his forty-odd years. But now (he pinched himself. Shit. He felt nothing) he had given too much. He had found his limit. He had reached it and he had over-stepped it. He was engulfed by disappointment. Slam-dunked by it. He could hardly breathe, he felt it so strongly. His whole body ached with the pain of it. He was so stressed felt so invested in his thwarted physicality that he actually thought he might be developing some kind of fatal disease. Pieces of him stopped functioning. He was broken.
And then, just when things seemed like they couldnt get any worse
Oh God!
The day the bulldozers came
(Hed skipped work. Theyd tried to keep him off-site. There was an ugly scuffle. But he saw it! He stood and watched three men struggling to restrain him he stood and he watched jaw slack, mouth wide, gaspingas History was unceremoniously gutted and then steam-rollered. He saw History die
NO!
Youre killing History!
STOP!)
just when things seemed like they were hitting rock bottom (You need a holiday. A good rest. Youre absolutely exhausteddangerously exhausted; mentally, physically) things took one further, inexorable, downward spiral.
The salvageable parts of the mill had been taken into storage by Eurotunnel. One of the most valuable parts being its ancient Kent Peg Tiles
Ah yes
Those beautiful tiles
Then one day they simply disappeared.
They had been preserved. They had been maintained. They had been entrusted. They had been lost.
BUT WHERE THE HELL ARE THEY?
WHERE DID THEY GO?
WHERE?
WHERE?!
It had all been in vain. And nobody really cared (it later transpired, or if they did, they stopped caring, eventually they had to, to survive it), except for Beede who hadnt really cared that much in the first place but who had done something bold, something decisive, something out of the ordinary; Beedewho had committed himself, had become embroiled, then engrossed, then utterly preoccupied, then thoroughly
Irredeemably
fucked up and casually (like the past itself) discarded.
And no, in the great scheme of things, it didnt amount to very much. Just some old beams, some rotten masonry, some traditional tiles. But Beede suddenly found that hed lost not only those tiles, but his own rudimentary supports. His faith. The roof of Beedes confidence had been lifted and had blown clean away. His optimism. He had lost it. It just went.