House That Berry Built (13 page)

At half-past six on Tuesday, the platform was done – and the cloud was still thick about us, filling the valley with vapour, drenching the world with rain too fine to be seen, and blotting out things material at fifty yards. In fact this weather prevailed until Saturday afternoon; but by Thursday night it was clear that the game had been won. No frost, however severe, could now damage the work of our hands: the concrete had set – and that, under perfect conditions – conditions seldom encountered upon the plains.

On Friday, by our desire, the men were told that the morrow would be a day off, though all would be paid: by this, rather natural gesture, Joseph was deeply impressed and, because, I think, of what he had said, every man came to thank us, high and low: but he would not avail himself of it and spent the day, as usual, upon the site.

He was, of course, jubilant. So, indeed, were we all: for a very great effort had been made – men had done their utmost, and Nature had rewarded their efforts as they deserved.

As though to ram this home, on Saturday even a glorious sun set red. That night the sky was clear, and, as Ulysse had predicted, there was a very sharp frost. When we awoke the next morning, the mountain-tops were covered thick with snow. And the forests had changed their habit. Autumn was in.

We all went to Church on Sunday – out of pure gratitude.

And then we walked up to the site and took our stand on the platform which we had helped to build.

It was an impressive experience.

For the very first time we could capture the days to come and could tell what it would feel like to live and move upon the terrace of what was to be our home. We could see exactly the prospects which we should command and could hear exactly the sounds which would reach our ears. We could judge when the sun would meet us and when he would take his leave; and we could consider the lay-out of the gardens we meant to make.

“Oblige me,” said Berry, “by keeping twelve feet from that brink. I know it’s quite all right and that all last week men did contortions upon it and waltzed all over the scaffold and never fell down. But to me, standing here, the illusion of depth is frightful. I shan’t feel safe till they get that parapet up.”

For this point of view there was a lot to be said. The waste of concrete jutted into the air. In fact, it concealed at most a forty-feet drop: but, standing back from its edge, we could not see the valley, but only its opposite side, rising out of the depths, and a man who had been taken there blindfold and then permitted to see might well have supposed that he stood upon the brink of some canyon which might be bottomless.

My sister lifted her voice.

“I don’t want to be silly, but—”

“I know,” said Berry, “but don’t you take it to heart. It’s an accident of birth. And we’ll always protect you, darling. Forget the word ‘asylum’. People may stare sometimes, but—”

“Come and look at the view,” said Daphne, advancing towards the edge.

“No,” screamed Berry. “I forbid you. It makes me go all bugbears – I mean, goosegogs. U-u-ugh!”

“Am I wise?” said Daphne, who has a good head for heights.

“You’re Pallas Athene,” howled Berry. “If I’d been Paris, you should have had the apple. My sweet, I implore you…”

“That’s much better,” said Daphne, turning. She was less than one foot from the edge. “And now I’ll begin again. I don’t want to be silly, but I simply cannot believe that this is where we’re to live. It – it’s so fantastic.”

“It’s like a dream,” said Jill. “Think of waking up in the morning and seeing this – this bird’s eye view.”

Berry looked up from the business of drying the palms of his hands.

“Think of coming home in the evening and seeing two hundred steps between you and a drink.”

“Good for muscular rheumatism,” said Jonah. “If you’d had steps to climb for the last twenty years, you would not in your old age—”

“No doubt,” said Berry; “no doubt. And if I’d been making grilles ever since I was ten, what stumps I had left would now be tipped with horn. And what’s biting The Blue Boy?”

“I’ve been thinking,” said I.

“Stop that noise,” said Berry, addressing The Columbine. “The sage is in travail. And may we, poor scum, be permitted to foul the luscious meads of philosophy on which you stroll?”

“You,” I said shortly, “would foul a neglected grease-trap. All the same, this is a matter to which you must be admitted. I mean, it’s of some importance – even to you.”

“Oh, Boy,” said Jill, “don’t say you’ve discovered some snag.”

“Call it a snare, my beauty. But I think I must point it out.”

“Oh, I can’t bear it,” said Daphne.

“Don’t worry,” said I. “It’s going to be quite all right. About three weeks ago, the one and only Joseph asked me in so many words why we had chosen this site. I said that we’d looked all round and we liked it best. He said that no doubt we were right, but that, the evening before, he had walked up to Besse, and that he had been struck by that meadow.”

I pointed to the one on the other side of the
ruisseau
– a really beautiful field and easily twice the size of any one of our three.

“He said that, had we built there, the ground rose so much more gently that Hadrian’s Wall need not have been half its height and that, since the road is very much higher just there, we could have made a drive that ran right up to the house. I said that we’d marked all that, but that any house built there would be looking straight on to the graveyard, and that it was for that reason that we had turned it down.”

This was quite true. The graveyard stood on a spur on the southern side of the road which ran from Lally to Besse – the only spur that there was in all that mile. It was very beautifully placed, and I think the dead must lie happy in such a spot. But graveyards in France have not the beauty their fellows in England have; and, in any event, it would have lain full in the foreground, and that was a shade too much. But, because the road curled higher up, from the platform itself we could only see the edge of its wall.

“Well, Joseph is very polite and he said that he quite understood. But to me it was clear that he didn’t. He could see no objection at all to looking over a graveyard; and he found our distaste peculiar – no doubt about that. Now his point of view is the point of view of the French. Till then, it hadn’t entered my head: but now I’m perfectly sure that, had we been French, and not English, we should have built in that field.

“Well, there you are. This house will attract much attention. What we have done so far seems to be the talk of the
Basses Pyrénées
. Is it too much to suppose that any day somebody else may think that to build up here is not such a bad idea? And may stroll up here to look for a possible site? And may be struck, as Joseph himself was struck, with the eminent desirability of that very handsome meadow next door?”

“Oh, Boy!”

“Exactly,” said I. “It’s very instructive to stand where we’re standing now.” I pointed to the elegant meadow, down on our left. “We need have no fear of that. No one could ever build there. It’s much too wet. But what of the other side? We never intended our home to be one of a row. And how should we like some Frenchman’s conception of beauty slapped down in that field? For one thing alone, it would blast our view to the west.”

“It would ruin everything,” cried Daphne.

“The bare idea,” said Berry, “has given me a pain in the stomach. I mean, that’s quite true. I very much doubt if I can eat any lunch.”

“Lunch be damned,” said Jonah. “Boy’s perfectly right. If we can buy that field, we must buy it at any price. A residence there, however beautiful, would simply tear everything up. And, as Boy hinted just now – well, we all know what the French architect can do when he really tries.”

“Conceive,” said Berry, “a neo-Moorish trifle in ruby pink, kitchen-yard running down to the
ruisseau
– convenient for garbage and washing and clear of the sanitation which would enter slightly below. I wonder where they’ll put the conservatory.”

With one voice, we insisted that he should hold his peace.

“I’m thankful you saw it,” said Daphne, “but it is a bit of a blow.”

“It’ll be all right,” I said. “But we mustn’t waste any time.”

“But what do we do? De Moulin?”

“He’s back in Pau. Besides, he advised us next time to deal direct.”

“But we don’t know the owner,” said Jill.

“We’ll soon find out,” said I. “I’ll talk to Joseph tomorrow. He’s no damned fool. But neither are the peasants. We’ll have to pay through the nose.”

“That can’t be helped,” said Jonah. “If they like to ask the earth – well, we’ve got to have that field.”

It was a question of protection. When you build a house in the country, you hope for a country-house. High upon the list of amenities stands privacy. And, with never a tree between, a dwelling sixty paces away will kill that privacy dead. In our case, too, we had selected our site for the very lovely prospects commanded on every side. And a house built right in the foreground would blot out those to the west.

The meadow, which now we called Naboth, at no place touched the road. Between it and the road, lay a long rectangular field – very steep and narrow, not fit to be built upon. This had been proved by its owner, for the ruin of a half-built cottage stood in its midst: whoever had started the construction had given it up in disgust, for the steepness of the ground was against him, and a landslide of earth and stones was its only occupant. And above this poor neighbour stretched Naboth – broad, deep, well-walled and good to look upon.

And there, of course, lay the danger. Forget the graveyard, and it was an attractive site. As house-agents say, ‘it offered.’ And if someone accepted its offer – well, we were sunk.

On the following morning, Monday, men were set to cut into the mountainside. This, of course, directly behind the platform; for we needed twenty feet more than the platform gave. The soil which we cut away was to go to make the garden: this was to consist of terraces – two or more on either side of the house. But terraces must be retained. And so, with Joseph’s assistance, we settled the lines they should take. And, when we had settled their layout, the masons began at once to build the retaining walls. This labour was simple enough. We only required a long wall, some six feet high, with a wing at either end to block the gap which would yawn between the wall, when built, and the mountainside. Into the enclosure thus made, the soil would be tipped, and when the soil was flush with the top of the wall and its wings, we should have a long, flat terrace, some five yards wide. As soon as this terrace was done, the masons would start upon another directly above. We expected to have enough soil to make, perhaps, four terraces, two upon either side of the house itself. Between these and Hadrian’s Wall, a space of four yards would be left. Here would rise the steps which led to the house: and those same flights of steps would serve the terraces.

To return to the excavation.

Once this was well under way, the building of the house would begin. But not before that, for the trucks must have room to leave the excavation and reach the enclosures where they would tip their soil. Then the front of the house could be started – that is to say, the whole of the cross of the T. The stem of the T must wait until the delving was done.

In the evening, when the last man had gone, I spoke to Joseph of Naboth and told him how we felt.

He heard me out gravely. Then he turned and looked at the field.

“Mesdames and Messieurs are wise. That meadow is dangerous. For you to have buildings there would be a catastrophe. And it might very easily happen, unless you make it your own. But Monsieur must move with great care – unless Monsieur wishes to pay the eyes from his head. I will help, of course. But I must not go directly, for I am not of the country and shall be suspected at once. There are one or two workmen, however, that I can trust. I will approach one of them, and he shall find out for Monsieur what Monsieur desires to know.”

“I want to know the name of the owner and where he lives. And whether, of course, he will sell.”

Joseph smiled.

“Monsieur can omit that question. It is only a matter of price. I think I had better say that Mesdames and Messieurs are thinking of making a drive. You see, it must not be dreamed that you desire the meadow to deny it to anyone else. In that case the price would soar. The owner would get ideas. He might even search for another purchaser; and seek to play him against you, to raise your price. And so I shall say that you have a drive in mind – a drive to come up through that meadow and gain the house.” He looked at me sharply. “But that, sir, is only a ruse. I beg that Monsieur will never adopt such a plan.”

“Not on your life,” said I. Joseph expired with relief. “Oh, no. We’ll never do that. Once we were up in the field, it would be easy enough. But to gain that field from the road… A railway cutting, Joseph.”

“Monsieur has said it.”

“And I think we shall have built quite enough retaining walls.”

Joseph made a wry face.

“With the terraces, six to date. But there is another to come.” He turned and pointed at the mountain. “This excavation, sir, is going to make us think. We have made a start – yes. In one spot even tonight we are nearly two metres in. But, after that, we have four metres to go. It does not sound much, Monsieur. And it does not look very much. But here the eye breaks down. One cannot measure into a mountainside. And the ground is against us just here. You will have your four terraces, Monsieur. In fact, it is my belief that you will have six.”

“Six?”

Joseph nodded abruptly.

“Monsieur will see. And Monsieur must think of this – that the walls of our excavation cannot rise sheer. They must be sloped and planted, so that the soil will not fall. This, of course, above the retaining wall: and that, I think, will have to be fifteen feet high.”

“My God,” said I. “Are we going to dig a quarry?”

“Monsieur has used the word which I had in mind. But never mind. It shall be done. It is but a question of patience. Only, it is a good thing that we have no more than six metres to excavate. If it were ten – well, Monsieur would have to erect a second Hadrian’s Wall.”