In this engrossing debut by Julia Rampen, we meet the elderly and out-of-touch Arthur, living in a fishing community on Morecambe Bay. When he meets Suling, a refugee with no papers and little English, an unlikely friendship develops which may just prove redemptive for both. Introduce yourself to Arthur in the extract below.

The Bay
By Julia Rampen
Published by Saraband

Chapter Six

Arthur dreamed of Gertie. She’d been cross about something, in that cool, understated way of hers that he only noticed when it was too late. He lay there for a few minutes after waking, eyes stubbornly shut against the sun. She could be up already (she was the early riser), boiling the kettle for a cup of tea in the kitchen, and then, while it was steeping, drawing the curtains in every room. But what if she never came back, but wandered from room to room, retreating further as his memories cracked and broke? The thought pushed him out of bed and into the kitchen, where he flicked on the radio and made tea with as much clatter as he could.

The radio was playing the news – Tony Blair this, Tony Blair that. Some nonsense about women in the boardroom. A strike at an airport he’d never been to. No mention of the foreigners turning up at the bay. Not cocklers. He refused to call them that. The real cocklers had been proud, tanned men who downed their pints after coming in with the catch. They might not have been able to spell much more than their names, but they knew the difference between a bar and an old spot and taught it to him over many years. As a boy, he picked up stray cockles, and later he raked, and finally he was allowed to stir the sand with the jumbo. In those final years before the war, he had believed he would do this forever.

The way he had been brushed off by those plods. He bristled with anger. There was a time in his career when he could walk into the accountancy office and say something, and it was as solid and serious as if it were carved in stone. Now, despite all his experience, he was a laughingstock.

The doorbell rang. He glanced at the calendar. Today’s square, like all the others, was blank. Had he made arrangements and forgotten them? He stopped by the hallway mirror to check he didn’t have a smear of cream on his cheek or some other evidence of senility. An old, bald man looked warily back.

But the door handle was already turning.

‘Hi, Dad,’ Margaret said, dropping her handbag on the hall table. She was wearing a purple quilted body warmer over a greyish fleece, neither of which suited her and looked far too warm. Her short, frizzy brown hair was escaping its clips. ‘Patsy called. She said you were wandering around in the rain, all confused.’

He knew the doorbell was bad news. ‘Patsy should mind her own business,’ he said. ‘I was visiting a friend.’

His daughter marched into the kitchen, checked to see if the teapot was warm and poured herself a cup.

‘She said you were trying to visit a man who was dead.’

‘I don’t know where she gets these ideas from.’

‘Dad, I’m only telling you because she was concerned.’ Margaret opened the fridge, sniffed the milk, and put it back again. ‘I know I haven’t been around as much as I should – it’s this new order from Japan. I’ve been flat out trying to find suppliers.’ She peered up at the cupboard and tested its door. ‘That looks like it’ll come off its hinges at any moment.’

‘It will if you keep bending it like that,’ Arthur said.

‘This house is falling apart.’ Margaret spoke if she hadn’t heard a word. She jiggled the tap. ‘Sink’s going rotten. You need a tap that doesn’t spray everywhere.’

‘It’s served me perfectly well for 50 years,’ Arthur said. They’d bought the house on the hill as newlyweds, after his promotion at the factory. Gertie had liked the idea of looking down at the bay. He’d liked the indoor toilet. He had ways of managing the kitchen tap.

‘You just have to turn it on carefully,’ he said.

But she was already tapping on the cupboards. ‘We should think about getting you a walk-in shower. It might be safer than a bath.’

‘Yes, baths are real killers these days,’ Arthur said.

Margaret kept tapping. ‘I know you’ve always coped,’ she said. ‘But it’s different now. You’re alone. And frail.’

Arthur felt his temper slipping away from him like a soapy glass. ‘You’re alone too,’ he said before he could stop himself.

The tapping stopped. Gertie never liked to tease Margaret. ‘She’s got other interests,’ she’d say firmly when the lack of a husband came up. But if Arthur had hurt his daughter’s feelings, she didn’t show it. Instead, she reached into her pocket and pulled out a silver mobile phone.

‘Look,’ she said. ‘I was just stopping by to give you this.’

‘Why are you wasting money?’ Arthur protested. ‘I already have a telephone.’

‘It wasn’t expensive, Dad. All it means is that you have a way to call me, if you were to get lost, like the other night. Or if you fall.’ She put it on the table. ‘It’s simple to use. Look, I’ll show—’

‘I don’t want it,’ Arthur snapped.

‘Dad, I took a morning off to check up on you,’ Margaret said, her voice breaking. ‘I’m only trying to help.’

‘Well, you don’t have to,’ Arthur said. He left the room before he said anything more.

The Bay by Julia Rampen is published by Saraband, priced £9.99.