(3/13) News from Thrush Green (10 page)

She turned again to her typescript.

'But how on earth can I make it
stronger
? I wish editors would either reject a thing outright, or take it as it is. I do loathe messing about with a piece of writing which, after all, you have made as near perfect in the first place as you possibly can.'

'I'd be inclined to send him another,' advised Harold, 'while the going's good, and mull over this one for a bit. Tell him you will let him have it later, when you've had a chance to revise it.'

He watched the girl turning the pages, a worried frown creasing her brow. Damn Frank, he thought suddenly! And that wretched husband too! Why should such a nice woman have all this confounded work and worry? She should be enjoying life, not fighting for existence.

'Come and see my last few roses,' he said, rising abruptly. Suddenly, he longed for fresh air and sunshine.

Harold's garden was quite six times the size of Tullivers' but was in a state of exquisite neatness.

'With no help at all?' queried the girl unbelievingly, gazing about her.

'Piggott comes for an hour or so when he needs a little extra drinking money,' said Harold. 'But I find I can keep it fairly trim now that it's in order.'

He snipped another rose to add to the bouquet he was making.

'I wish you would let me help you with your garden,' he continued. 'It would be such a pleasure to me, and if it is straightened up this autumn it should be so much easier to manage next year. As you see, I'm well ahead here, and could easily spare the time, if you would allow me to trespass.'

'You are very, very kind,' said Phil warmly, accepting the bouquet gratefully. 'And these are simply lovely. To be honest, I'd be terribly thankful for a hand with some bramble bushes which seem to have roots from here to Lulling.'

'I'll be over tomorrow afternoon, if that suits you,' said Harold briskly.

They walked together to the gate, and Harold watched her cross the green, the bunch of late roses making a splash of colour against her pale coat.

Another figure was advancing, in the distance, from his right. It was Dotty Harmer, struggling with a large cat basket. Heavy though it appeared to be, Dotty was making good headway, so that Harold, who felt unequal to Dotty's conversation at the moment, retreated strategically to the peace of his study, chiding himself for cowardice and lack of chivalry the while.

Dotty was bound for the Youngs' house, a bewildered ginger kitten mewing its protests as they made the uphill journey together.

She was glad to rest the basket on the doorstep as she rang the bell. The kitten, relieved that the motion had stopped, now sat mute among its blankets, but watched warily.

Paul opened the door, and fell upon his knees in front of the basket adoringly.

'You nice little puss! Are you coming to live here, then? Dear little cat, nice little—'

At this point, Dotty poked him sharply, bringing his ecstasies to an abrupt halt.

'Where are your manners, boy? What about speaking to me before you fuss with the cat!'

Scarlet with shame, Paul struggled to his feet and made apologies, just as his mother arrived.

'Please come in; I'd no idea you were going to bring the kitten. We intended to come and fetch it to save you trouble.'

'No bother,' said Dotty, about to lift the basket again.

'Let Paul do it,' said Joan. 'It really is very sweet of you to have carried it all the way here. What a very pretty one!'

They stood and admired the minute scrap, crouching among its bedding.

'Now, if I were you,' said Dotty, taking charge, 'I should put the basket in an empty warm room, and put its earth box and a saucer of milk there too. Then make sure it cannot get out of the room, open the door of the basket, and let it explore for some hours.'

'What about buttering its paws?' asked Paul, anxious to show his knowledge.

'Fiddlesticks!' snapped Dotty. 'You do as I say, and he'll soon settle down.'

'Do you think it is a he?' asked Joan, with some anxiety.

'That I can't be sure of. Cats are very difficult to sort out. But the vet will cope at six months either way.'

'But I should
like
it to have kittens!' protested Paul. He was on his knees again, one finger stroking the kitten's head through the wire door of the basket.

'Precocious, that child!' said Dotty to his mother, in a dark aside. 'Who said anything about kittens, young man?' she added forthrightly. 'We know what we're about, and what's best for that cat. Just you go and do as I said.'

'Take it up to the spare bedroom,' directed his mother, 'and I'll come up in a moment. Don't undo the door until I come.'

Paul picked up the basket. Without being prompted, he smiled upon Dotty and spoke his thanks.

'That's more like it,' said Dotty grudgingly. 'Remembered your manners after all! Now, take care of that mite. It's the tamest of the litter. It wants plenty of love, warmth and food, in that order. And if I hear you've tormented it
in any way,
I shall
take it back
!'

'Yes, Miss Harmer,' said Paul meekly, and began to mount the stairs with his treasure.

'Not a bad child,' conceded Dotty, watching his departing back.

'We find him fairly satisfactory,' agreed Joan drily. The mild irony was lost upon her guest.

'It's because you haven't kept many animals,' said Dotty. 'Now, they are
completely
satisfactory. Which reminds me, I must return to mine. I've left a saucepan offish simmering, and I don't want it to boil dry.'

'Nothing worse,' said Joan, 'than the smell of boiling fish, I agree.'

'It's not the smell I worry about,' cried Dotty, stepping out of the front door, 'but the dear cats won't touch fish if it's the slightest bit caught.'

She set off at a fast trot towards the pathway to Lulling Woods and her animal family.

***

True to his word, Harold Shoosmith made his way to Tullivers the next afternoon. The girl came to the door immediately, for she had seen him pass the window. Papers were spread upon the table, and her typewriter stood among the litter.

'Don't let me stop you,' said Harold. 'I think I know where the brambles are.'

He pointed to the wall which divided Tullivers' garden from the Baileys' orchard. A border lay at its foot, but was so overgrown with many weeds, including the brambles, that it was practically invisible.

'There are some tools in the shed at the back of the house,' said Phil. 'I'll get them for you.'

'No, no! I can find them,' said Harold. 'Don't let me interrupt the writing.'

He made his way round the house as the girl returned to her typing.

He found the shed easily enough, but surveyed the tools with mingled dismay and pity. There were very few of them, and all looked hopelessly inadequate or outworn to Harold's sharp eye.

The only fork available was a very large, heavy old veteran with wide flat tines, meant for digging up potatoes. The spade was equally heavy, and coated with dried Cotswold clay. The handle was badly cracked and had been bound, in an amateurish fashion, with string. Two trowels, a rake with a wobbly head, a birch broom, and a rusty bill-hook comprised the rest of the gardening equipment, except for a lawn-mower whose newness simply threw the age of the other tools into sharp relief.

Very quietly, Harold went round the back of the house to the gate, so that he did not need to pass the worker's window, and went to collect his own shining equipment from across the green.

Half an hour with a swinging mattock loosened the worst of the roots, and Harold enjoyed piling up the rubbish on the ashy remains of earlier bonfires. Brambles, elder shoots, and lofty nettles removed, it was possible to see the remains of the border. Among the shorter weeds which clothed the earth, Harold found clumps of irises, peonies and pinks still surviving suffocation. At one time the border had been well-stocked. It would be very rewarding, thought Harold, to see it trim and colourful again.

With his light fork he loosened wild strawberry runners, groundsel, docks, chickweed and yards and yards of matted couch grass roots.

The pile of rubbish grew higher and higher, and Harold was just contemplating the possibility of lighting a bonfire, as he straightened his back, when Phil came out from the house to admire his handiwork.

'And I believe you've got some nerines among those clumps of bulbs,' said Harold enthusiastically. 'It's an ideal spot for them there. Don't disturb them. I'll put a marker by them next time I come.'

'But you can't spend too much time among my weeds,' protested Phil. 'Your own will sneak up on you.'

Harold, flushed with his exertions, looked contentedly at the first few yards of border revealed.

'I'd like to finish this job,' he said. 'Three or four afternoons should see it cleared.'

Phil was looking at his fork with envy.

'Is it stainless steel?'

He said, somewhat apologetically, that it was.

'One gets used to one's own tools, you know. When you replace, my dear, I do advise you to get stainless steel. It is well worth it.'

'I shan't be replacing for some time,' said Phil, laughing. 'But I came to tell you that I had made some tea.'

It was snug in the little house. Harold had been so happy and busy in the garden that he had not noticed the grey clouds scudding ominously from the west. A spatter of rain on the window heralded a wet evening.

Phil nodded at a large envelope, stamped, sealed and ready for the post.

'I've taken your advice,' she said, 'and looked out another story. I do hope he likes this one. I'm going to alter the one he's just sent back. I had a brain-wave last night in bed which might work, I think.'

'Any more luck?'

'A hopeful letter from a women's magazine in America. I sent an article about how to encourage children to take to books. So many don't, you know. Thank heaven Jeremy likes reading!'

'I must be off,' said Harold, rising. 'Thank you for restoring me with tea. I'll be in London for the next two days, but I hope you'll let me tackle the border when I come back.'

'You know I shall be very, very grateful,' Phil replied, opening the front door.

The rain fell heavily, splashing from the admiral's brass dolphin upon the door mat.

Harold picked up his bundle of tools, neatly swathed in a sack.

'Here, give me your letters,' he said, eyeing the downpour. 'I'll put them in the box as I pass. You'll get drenched if you go out, and Willie's due to collect any minute now.'

She put the bundle of letters, including the large packet, into his outstretched hand.

'You really should spit on the big one, for luck,' she called after him as he hurried down the path.

With his tools across his shoulder and the letters in his hand, Harold made his way to the letter box at the corner of Thrush Green. The Cotswold stone glistened with rain around the red oblong.

Harold inserted the small letters, and then carefully threaded the large one into the aperture. It fell with a satisfying plop, and as it vanished Harold wished it luck.

Whistling cheerfully, he splashed beneath the chestnuts to his home, thinking gaily of work well done and the pleasure derived from a good-looking woman's company.

Little did he think that the packet he had so carefully posted would be the cause of much concern for the pair of them.

On that same rainy evening Sam Curdle, who had managed to conduct his affairs in a relatively honest manner for some months, succumbed to temptation.

It so happened that Percy Hodge, the farmer in whose yard the battered Curdle caravan was housed, had seen some fine wallflower plants going cheaply in Lulling market. He bought twelve dozen and left the twelve newspaper-shrouded bundles lodged against the comer of his back porch.

'If you get that lot put in for me tomorrow, Sam,' he told him, 'there's half a sack of spuds for you. Fill up the round bed in the front of the house, and the border under the greenhouse. You'll need the gross, I reckon, to make a tidy show.'

Sam agreed with alacrity. Half a sack of potatoes would be most welcome to the family, and planting out a few wallflowers was easy work.

It took Sam less than five minutes to plan how he could make a few shillings for himself on the deal. Percy Hodge would be out all day at a sheep sale, Sam knew. By planting the wallflowers carefully, he reckoned he could keep two, or possibly three, dozen aside for sale elsewhere.

That new woman at Tullivers, he pondered, as he lay beside his snoring Bella that night. She looked the sort who might fall for a few plants, and Lord alone knew that garden of hers was in need of something. Sam surmised, correctly, that she would know little about prices, and would not be the type to haggle.

What should he ask now? Six shillings a dozen? Too steep, perhaps, even for a greenhorn such as that Londoner. He'd heard down at 'The Two Pheasants' that most of the locals were getting twopence a plant. Maybe it would be best to settle for fivepence. After all, he reasoned happily to himself, if he swiped two dozen from Percy Hodge he'd make a clear ten bob. With any luck, though, he could appropriate three dozen. Fifteen bob, now that really would be useful! He might even have a flutter on a horse in the afternoon, and make a bit that way too.