(3/13) News from Thrush Green (5 page)

'You'll be happy at Thrush Green,' Winnie assured her. The girl's mouth quivered.

'I'm sure we shall,' she said. 'We'll be here in good time for Jeremy to start school there in September.'

The two women looked across the green. The dew was drying rapidly, and from St Andrew's came the sound of country voices raised in praise. A pigeon clattered out from the avenue of chestnut trees, and landed nearby, strutting aimlessly this way and that, thrusting out its bright coral feet.

The girl sighed.

'It's all very comforting,' she said softly, as though speaking to herself. 'And now we must go home. Thank you again.'

They parted with smiles, and Winnie watched the pair run to Tullivers. It was good to see the little house in use again.

She returned to her own garden thoughtfully. Why did the girl use the word 'comforting' about Thrush Green? From what pain did she seek relief? From what torment was she flying? Who could tell?

4 A Shock for Dotty

HALF a mile away, Dotty Harmer was in trouble. She had gone down the garden to feed her hens, when she saw something move behind the garden shed.

An open-ended extension had been built on to house Dotty's winter store of logs. An energetic nephew, staying for a week of his vacation, had obligingly set some flag-stones at the entrance, so that his aunt could step from the path to the logs without getting her feet wet.

'Very nice, dear,' she had commented. 'And I can chop up the logs there. And marrow bones. So useful to have what my dear father used to call "an area of hard standing". It will be most useful, dear boy.'

Its use at the moment, when Dotty stood transfixed, henfood in hand, was unorthodox. For, lying in the sun, was a mother cat suckling five well-grown babies.

Charming though the sight was, Dotty's jaw dropped. How on earth could she cope with six cats - nay, six
more
cats! Already she owned two, a mother and daughter which she had prudently had spayed. What would they have to say about this brazen intruder and her progeny?

Dotty peered through her steel-rimmed spectacles at the family. They were a motley crew, to be sure, but how engagingly pretty! The mother was black with white paws, and one of the kittens had the same colouring. There was a fine little tabby, and three tortoiseshell kittens.

Dotty's heart sank again. Ten to one the tortoiseshells would be female. How long before their first litters arrived? Something must be done before the place was over-run with wild cats.

She took a resolute step forward, and the kittens shot into the stack of logs and vanished. One young quivering triangular tail showed for an instant in a gap, and then was gone. The mother cat crouched defensively, facing Dotty, strategically placed between this enemy and her babies. She was pathetically thin and dusty, and Dotty's tender heart went out to this gallant battered small fighter.

'Good puss! Nice little puss!' said Dotty, advancing gently.

The cat retreated slightly, and spat defiance.

Dotty put down the hen food and returned to the house for a dish of milk. Through the kitchen window she witnessed a remarkable sight. The mother cat gave a curious chirruping sound, and the five babies tumbled from the logs, towards the steaming hen food. Within seconds six heads were in the pot, as the cats ate ravenously.

Dotty stood aghast. That cats, so fastidious as a rule, should fling themselves upon cooked peelings, meat scraps and bacon rinds, all bound together with bran, showed to what excess of hunger the poor things were driven.

She watched them lick the pot clean, their eyes half-closed with bliss, and then sit down to wash themselves.

'Well, that's the last of the chicken's mash,' said Dotty aloud, and philosophically reached for the bag of corn instead. Bearing this and the brimming dish of milk she went once more down the garden path. As before, the kittens vanished, but the mother cat stood her ground. Dotty fed the hens, put down the milk, and retreated to the house, there to work out the best way to cope with an embarrassment of cats.

It was a problem which was to puzzle her, and the rest of Thrush Green, for weeks to come.

One still, hot morning, in the week following Dotty's discovery, Albert Piggott was digging a grave. For this melancholy task Albert's glum expression seemed particularly suited; but although the occasion was a sad one, it was not the circumstances of his labours that troubled Albert that morning, but the worsening conditions of his own matrimonial affairs.

He was the first to admit that he was cunningly hooked at the outset. There were a few aspects of married life which, in all fairness, he would agree were an improvement on the single state, for a man in his position. His house was warm and clean. His clothes were washed and mended. And his meals - ah, his meals! - were superb.

But once you'd said that, Albert told himself, squinting along the side of the grave for any unsightly irregularities, you'd said the lot. Nagging, whining and money-grubbing, that's what Nell was, and lately he had detected a new unpleasant note in her diatribes. There was far too much about that oil-man who came with his clanking van every other Thursday, for Albert's liking. A smarmy fellow, if ever there was one, a proper sissy, a regular droopy-drawers! And Nell was taken in by his soft soap, the great fool, and talked about it being 'so nice to see a gentleman for a change, and what a pity it was she had married beneath her'.

Albert set his spade to one side, pushed back his greasy cap and mopped his sweating brow. It was about time Sam Curdle arrived to give him a hand. He could do with it. Cotswold clay makes heavy digging in any weather. On a blazing August morning it was doubly intractable.

Sam Curdle, grandson of Mrs Curdle who once ruled over the Fair, had been released from gaol early in the New Year. Most of Thrush Green thought, and said openly, that Sam Curdle had a nerve to return to the place where he had so misbehaved.

'How he can face that poor Miss Watson he stole from, and battered into the bargain, I really don't know,' they told each other indignantly. 'It's a pity he doesn't take himself off, with that blowsy Bella of his, and find a living elsewhere.'

But that is just what Sam was incapable of doing. Here, in Thrush Green, as well he knew, were a few soft-hearted souls who would give him a little work for the sake of the children - and a
little
work was all that Sam Curdle wanted. Bella had found a daily job at a farm at Nidden while he was doing time, and had developed into a passably good worker under the brisk direction of the farmer's wife. They still lived in the battered caravan, converted years ago from a bus, in a sheltered corner of the stackyard. Here the Curdles reckoned themselves well off, with water from an outside tap, free milk, and a dozen or so cracked eggs weekly.

'You can stay there as long as you go straight,' the farmer had told Sam. 'But you try any of your gyppo tricks here, nicking eggs, knocking off the odd hen, and that sort of lark, and you get the boot, pronto!'

And Sam had toed the line.

The rector had found him odd jobs to do, both in his own garden and in the churchyard. Albert Piggott was glad to have an assistant when it came to such tasks as grave-digging and coke-sweeping. The fact that Sam Curdle was a wrongdoer and had been in prison troubled the sexton not at all.

It was Albert himself, in fact, who had helped to bring him to justice. If anything, Albert felt now a certain proprietorial warmth towards the local malefactor. Just bad luck he'd been caught. He'd simply met a master mind, was Albert's opinion. Plenty of people were quite as bad as Sam, but got away with it.

A shadow fell athwart the grave and Albert looked up to see Sam's face peering down at him.

'And about time too,' grunted Albert. He indicated the second shovel with a jerk of his black thumb.

Sam jumped down and began scraping some crumbs of earth together in a languid manner.

'Don't strain yourself,' said Albert tartly.

Sam stirred himself to attack the other end of the grave with rather more vigour. They shovelled together in silence.

A robin hopped about the growing pile of soil looking for worms. The morning sounds of Thrush Green were muffled by the height of the earth walls about them, but in the distance they could hear the children playing on the two swings on the green. There was a rhythmic squeaking as the chains swung to and fro, and occasionally the thud of the see-saw and the cries of excited children.

The two men worked steadily until St Andrew's clock struck twelve above them.

'That's it then,' said Albert, clambering painfully out of the grave. Sam followed him.

'Time for a quick 'un?' asked Sam.

'Who pays?'

'We goes Dutch.'

'Humph!' snorted Albert, but he quickened his pace, nevertheless, as he shambled towards the open door of "The Two Pheasants".

But his thirst was not to be slaked immediately, for, directly in his path, stood Dotty Harmer.

'I shan't keep you,' said Dotty briskly, eyeing the pair. 'But I want you to let me know if you hear of anyone wanting a kitten.'

'Well, now miss—' began Albert.

'I know you have a cat,' cut in Dotty. Her tone implied, rightly, that she felt sorry for it. She looked at Sam Curdle with distaste.

'And I know you haven't room for one in the caravan,' she told him dismissively. 'The thing is, I have five to dispose of.'

Sam's face lit up.

'I'd be pleased to drown 'em for you, miss. Any time.'

Dotty looked at him sharply.

'Out of the question. They are far too big to drown.'

'You wouldn't catch 'em, anyway,' gloomed Albert. 'Them wild cats never gets caught. Where've you got 'em?'

Dotty told him.

'Never get 'em out o' there,' said Albert, with relish. 'Why, I recollect that there was a widder woman over Lulling Woods way who had two -
just two,
mark you - livin' in her logs, and within the year she'd got
eighteen
kittens!'

'That's why I intend to tame them,' said Dotty firmly. 'I am going to get the mother cat spayed as soon as she has confidence in me.'

'You'll be lucky!' growled Albert. 'Best by far have a cat shoot and get done with the lot.'

'Disgraceful!' snapped Dotty.

'You won't never tame 'em, miss,' Sam said, hoping for five shillings, if not by drowning, then by a little erratic marksmanship.

'I should set a dog on 'em,' advised Albert. 'Rout 'em out, like, and then shoot 'em as they run away.'

'Have you thought,' asked Dotty severely, 'that they might simply be
maimed,
and not killed outright?'

'They'd die eventual,' said Albert casually.

'I am not proposing to harm these kittens, in any way whatsoever,' said Dotty, now dangerously calm. 'I shall do my best to get them tame enough to be accepted into good homes.
Good
homes!' she repeated firmly.

'I am on my way to Mrs Young to see if she will be able to have one,' she added, nodding to one of the five houses behind the chestnut avenue. 'All I wanted to ask you was to let me know if you hear of anyone needing a kitten.'

'Right, miss,' said Albert with rare deference. His dirty finger rose of its own volition to his greasy cap. Plain potty-Miss Harmer was, and no doubt about it-but she was still gentry, and some innate, long-stifled instinct to acknowledge the fact had twitched Albert's hand to its unaccustomed position.

'Yes, miss,' added Sam meekly. 'I'll bear it in mind, miss.'

They entered "The Two Pheasants" for their long awaited drink, the kittens already forgotten.

But Dotty, striding purposefully towards Joan Young's house, seethed with indignation.

'Drowning! Shooting! Setting a dog on them! A pity those two have never heard of reverence for life. I should like to have introduced them to Albert Schweitzer.'

She thought again.

'Or better still, my dear father. He'd have given them the horse-whipping they deserve!'

She reached the Youngs' gate.

'How I do hate cruelty!' said Dotty aloud, making for the front door.

Joan Young was the wife of a local architect. Her sister Ruth, who was lunching with her that day, was married to Doctor Lovell who, at that moment, was attending a cantankerous old bachelor of ninety-two to the south of Lulling.

Lunch was set in the large sunny kitchen. Paul Young was already at the table, waiting impatiently with the voracious hunger of a young schoolboy for the chicken which had just been lifted from the oven.

Opposite him, in his own old high chair, sat his baby cousin Mary banging lustily with her spoon.

'What's that?' asked Paul, as the bell of the front door rang sharply.

'Wozzat?' echoed his cousin, not caring particularly, but glad to try out a new expression.

'Oh, damn!' said Joan, tugging the fork from the bird. 'You carry on, Ruth, while I see to this.'

'You shouldn't swear,' reproved her son. 'Miss Fogerty made Chris wash his mouth out with soapy water once because he swore.'

'Sorry, sorry!' cried his mother, struggling with her apron strings. 'It slipped out.'