'Going, Going, Gone' by Martin White

‘For the last time -is there any advance on twenty eight thousand pounds? Twenty eight thousand for this desirable property, The Rectory, Hodge Bower. Twenty eight thousand.’
The auctioner paused and looked around the small group of people assembled in the dingy assembly room of the Tontine Hotel in the centre of Ironbridge.
'For the last time twenty eight thousand pounds. Going, going gone! Sold to the gentleman in the second row.’
It was 1979 and Martin felt the shock of acquiring a three-storey, semi-derelict house in an overgrown bramble-laced Edwardian garden. He and his wife had noticed the house for sale in the evening newspaper a week before. They visited and found it had been empty for two years after the death of the Rector of the local church , a much loved man in the locality.
Those years had taken their toll with dampness and fungoid growths in the rooms, no central heating , an ancient bathroom and a cramped kitchen. It was not an inviting prospect for their young family. And yet ......
The house stood on the northen slopes of the Ironbridge Gorge looking toward the tree- covered slopes of Benthall Edge on the other side of the river. A network of paths and narrow roads connected them with the heart of the village, the Iron Bridge, the Tontine Hotel and the market square. It was a romantic location. And it was an exciting time; Martin had come to work on the New Town that was rehabilitating the ravages of the worked out East Shropshire coalfield and Ironbridge was just beginning to attract people reckless enough to attempt to colonise and reinvigorate a very derelict town.
Martin and Judy spent a week of frenzied activity , estimating the cost of making the house habitable, arranging a mortgage, agreeing a loan with a very reluctant bank manager. They had hardly any time to consider the life changing implications of what they were taking on. There had not been many bidders at the evening auction. Just them and another couple, surrounded by onlookers curious to see who would be mad enough to buy a property that most probably thought best demolished.
And so the tap of an auctioneer’s gavel signaled a life-defining moment.