Summer at the Haven (5 page)

“I presume he or his father have powers of attorney,” said Mr Martin. “They should be informed of the position.”

Honor made another note.

Miss Blackett felt she had done well so far and continued firmly: “If Mrs Langley goes there will be another room vacant. I don’t think I can cope with two new residents at once and besides I think it would be far better for Mrs Thornton to move down from the attic floor which is really not suitable for an old person and it would ease the work considerably.”

“Quite, quite,” said Miss Hughes, but as no one else spoke she felt she had been too precipitate.

“It has always been the custom, as I am sure you know. Miss Blackett,” said Lady Merivale after a short pause, “to allow residents their choice of rooms whenever possible but I quite see your point and, if Mrs Thornton agrees, there perhaps should not be any objection.”

“It will reduce our income,” said Col. Bradshaw.

“Do you know what Mrs Thornton thinks about it?” asked the vicar.

Miss Blackett was an honest woman. She knew that Mrs Thornton had reacted unfavourably to the hints she had thrown out up to the present, but she also believed her to be a sensible person at heart, in other words that she would come to see things as she, Miss Blackett, saw them, so she replied with conviction that though the old always took a little time to adjust to any change, she was sure Mrs Thornton would welcome it quite soon.

“I think then we should wait for the decision to come from her,” said the vicar firmly. Mrs Thornton was a clergyman’s daughter.

“But, Madam Chairman,” said Mr Martin, “if our warden has insufficient help for too many duties, all the residents will suffer. I suggest that we advertise for help at once in the local papers and explore every avenue.”

Miss Blackett knew too well all those dead-end avenues but she merely said a little tartly, “The papers are already full of such advertisements.”

The vicar cleared his throat and this time spoke with some hesitation.

“I do happen to know of a lad who is quite handy and very willing and is anxious to find work. If you would consider him, Miss Blackett, merely as a stopgap, you know, until you can find someone more suitable, and take him on trial, it might ‘bless she who gives and he who takes’,” he finished with a nervous flourish.

“Beggars can’t be choosers,” said Miss Blackett ungraciously, “but I must say I wouldn’t choose a boy. What sort of a boy is he?”

“Well, you may not think the sex the only disadvantage,” said the vicar hesitantly and paused.

“Come, come, out with it. Vicar,” said Mr Martin. “He isn’t a Borstal boy on probation, I hope?”

“Oh, no, no nothing of that sort,” said the vicar hastily, “but he’s a simple fellow, definitely E.S.N., so his school says, but they speak quite highly of his character and I have been employing him a little on odd jobs and find him an attractive lad, though a bit odd – he has a wonderful way with bees.”

“But I don’t keep bees,” said Miss Blackett.

“No, no, of course not,” said the vicar sadly.

“If he’s E.S.N. he can’t expect much in the way of wages,” said Col. Bradshaw.

“Where does he come from?” asked the architect.

“He has been living with his grandmother, old Mrs Hobb at Sturton,” said the vicar. Sturton was the hamlet about three miles from The Haven. “But she is anxious for him to learn to be independent of her though she seems very fond of him. She wouldn’t expect anything but pocket money and his keep.”

“Hobb, did you say?” said Col. Bradshaw. “Family’s
been in these parts since the Conquest I should think but nearly all gone now. The old woman is quite a character, I’ve heard.”

Miss Blackett was silent. The boy sounded very unreliable but she thought of piles of dirty dishes, of unswept floors, of beds to be made, trays to be set and carried about, vegetables to be prepared and all the cooking and the shopping and the fête ahead, not to speak of the possible crises that were apt to occur at any time, and so at last she said: “Well, I’m used to looking after old loonies, so I suppose I can take a young one on, and if the vicar can assure me that he is honest and clean, I dare say he’ll be better than nobody.”

The committee was relieved at her decision, though not for the first time deploring the warden’s way of expressing herself, but still, so they told themselves, her bark was worse than her bite.

“I’m sure you won’t regret it,” said the vicar. “When can I send him round to see you?”

“Tomorrow evening,” said Miss Blackett.

“The next item,” said Lady Merivale, “and one that Miss Blackett feels is urgent to put in hand before next autumn, is the felling of the deodar tree.”

“It’s a fine tree,” said Col. Bradshaw. “Must be over a hundred years old.”

“It is far too near the house,” said the little architect. “People will make that mistake in planting trees. They seem unable to grasp the fact that trees grow and houses can’t run away from them.”

Miss Blackett looked gratified at this support.

“That is exactly the case here,” she said. “The tree makes poor Mrs Dawson’s room very dark and cheerless and in wet weather the rain collects on the branches which brush against the walls. I feel sure this causes damp.”

“Then there seems a strong case for the felling,” said Mr Martin.

“It’s a fine tree,” repeated the colonel sadly, “and it will cost a good deal to fell, though the timber ought to fetch something.”

The architect was asked if he knew of any reasonable and trustworthy tree doctors, but it was Mr Martin, of course, who was able to supply names and addresses. The matter of repairs and repainting was soon dealt with and at last the meeting was over. The warden went to help Gisela bring in the tea. The architect and Mr Martin both swallowed a hasty cup and disappeared. Col. Bradshaw, after disposing of one of Miss Blackett’s uninteresting little cakes, asked Honor Bredon to come and inspect the damage done by the bullocks. Lady Merivale was left with Miss Hughes. Lord Jim, who had been sulking at having been shut out of the dining-room all the afternoon, had bolted in as soon as the door was opened and after taking a look from the window to make sure that nothing of note was happening in the drive, made straight for Miss Hughes, who disliked all animals but perhaps more especially cats. He wrapped himself ecstatically round her ankles. She exclaimed, stepped back hurriedly and jerked Lady Merivale into upsetting her cup of tea down her pale grey linen suit. Miss Hughes apologized effusively, Lady Merivale said it really didn’t matter in the least, and Lord Jim went to the door which someone had closed again and demanded to be let out immediately.

“A very useful meeting, don’t you think, Miss Hughes?” said Lady Merivale pleasantly.

“Oh, yes, very!” agreed Miss Hughes.

“I wonder if you could spare some of your valuable time to help with the fête,” went on Lady Merivale, “perhaps as a stallholder?”

“I think I could manage it,” said Miss Hughes delightedly.

“That would be most kind,” said Lady Merivale drawing on her gloves. “Well, I think I must be off now, Miss
Blackett. Thank you as usual for all your splendid work for us and for your hospitality this afternoon. I am sure you have decided rightly in giving this poor boy a trial and I do hope he will prove a real help to you.”

“I hope so too,” replied Miss Blackett, but the hope was faint. Life had not taught her to be very hopeful.

THE VICAR
often liked to go about his business on his push bicycle. He said it was good for him and besides, it left the car free for his wife. She was the better driver and by far the better mechanic of the two. On the morning after the committee meeting, he set out to visit Tom Hobb and his grandmother. The weather at last had taken a turn for the better. The east wind which had blown relentlessly since early April had veered to the south-west and everything beautiful could stop looking brave as well and instead rejoice in shining with a quite remarkable loveliness. The vicar sped along the road leading to the hamlet and as he passed The Haven he waved courteously to the house, thinking that one of the old ladies might chance to be looking out of a window and be cheered at the gesture. Soon he turned into a lane bordered thickly with cow parsley, the hawthorn was out in the hedges and there were great clumps of campion on the banks and here and there a single foxglove reared up like a sentinel. A few white clouds were rapidly disintegrating in a sky of deep secure blue and the sun felt really hot for the first time that year.

The vicar could not contain himself. “Praise God from Whom all blessings flow,” he roared out and flew down the lane at a dangerous speed. He was a man given to happiness. He had his bees, a wife who was admirably fitted to be a vicar’s helpmate, two pretty small daughters and an
uncomplicated mind. Of course he was sometimes troubled about erring or sorrowful parishioners, and he made himself miserable for a short time once a day by reading or listening to the news. But this he felt was enough. His wants were few and he had no ambitions to speak of, so on this fine May morning he sang the Doxology as he sped through the sunshine.

Tom Hobb’s grandmother lived at the bottom of a steep, rough little footpath leading off the lane that continued on its way to the hamlet. The vicar proceeded down this path on foot. The Hobbs’ cottage was tiny, humped and thatched, and sat square across the path with a lilac bush and an old apple tree, both in flower, on either side of the gate. On the crest of the thatch, which was in need of repair, crouched a black cat watching the sparrows and in the cottage doorway sat old Mrs Hobb stirring something in a basin. She was noted in the hamlet for her herb potions and her homemade wines and was held to be very ancient and crafty. “A hundred years or so ago she would certainly have been the village witch,” thought the vicar, as he propped his bicycle against the hedge, and indeed she looked the part, with her black cat and her pot. The village children were a bit frightened of her, though they all liked Tom. She had had a husband once, it was supposed, and children and other grandchildren, but Tom now seemed to be the only one left. He had always lived with his grandmother and no one could remember his parents being around.

“Good morning, Mrs Hobb,” shouted the vicar, coming up the path, “what a lovely day at last.”

“And so it be, sir,” said the old woman looking up at him with eyes surprisingly bright in a face as brown and crumpled as a winter leaf. “And what can I do for you today?”

It was, as a greeting, the other way round from those he was used to, and took him a little aback.

“Well, it’s about Tom. He’s been helping me with my bee swarms after school, you know, and now he’s finished his schooling, he tells me you’d like him to find a regular job away from home, but not too far away, and I think I’ve found just the place for him.” He paused, she had not taken her eyes from his face and now she nodded vigorously.

“T’would be best for the lad to see a little more of the world,” she said.

“I’m afraid you may miss him and the help he is to you,” said the vicar. He had thought of this before and wondered if the old woman would be all right on her own, but her gaze did not falter.

“I can manage, sir, and if you have somewhere in mind that is not too far, perhaps he can come and see me of a Sunday.”

“It’s at The Haven,” said the vicar. “Miss Blackett, who is warden there, needs help now, though it may be only temporary.”

“The Haven,” said the old woman slowly, “that’s what they calls the New House that was raised where the Old Farmhouse stood.”

“Well, it’s scarcely new now,” said the vicar smiling.

“Why, no to be sure, but my Mammy, she allays called it the Old Farm when she were a slip of a girl. She’d be pleased for Tom to go there, I expect, even though it is the New House now.”

“Miss Blackett wants to see him first,” said the vicar, and felt bound to add: “Of course, she may not think him suitable.”

“My Tom will suit all right, there’ll be no need to be wary of him – there’s more corn than chaff in Tom,” said the old woman quietly.

“She’s as proud of him as if he had left school top of the class instead of not knowing how to read or write and only counting on his fingers,” thought the vicar, but aloud he
said: “I know he’s a good boy and will do his best. Miss Blackett would like to see him this evening. Where is he, by the way? I’d better have a word with him if I can.”

“He be gone to gather a bit o’ fire wood, sir, and I can’t say exactly when he’ll be home again.” Then, “Ah yes, but I can,” she added smiling, for the black cat had suddenly leapt to the ground and streaked round the corner of the cottage. “Sweep allays knows afore I do. Tom’ll be here in a moment, you’ll see.”

Sure enough, the boy came up almost at once with Sweep on his shoulders and a bundle of wood under one arm. He was small for his age but with a big head, and his large ears standing out from it made it look even bigger. His arms seemed too long for his body. His hair was straw-coloured, coarse and thick, he had a snub nose, freckles, greenish eyes set wide apart and a large cheerful mouth. Those eyes did not appear at all vacant, yet there was something not quite usual in the way they looked at you: they turned the same intent disinterested gaze on everything alike. It always reminded the vicar of the way babies he christened gazed at him – if they were not yelling, that is.

“What sort of wood have ’ee got there, then?” asked the old woman.

“A bit o’beech, Granny,” said Tom. His voice was pleasantly pitched and he talked like his grandmother and not as they had tried to teach him at school.

The old woman looked pleased. “Good boy, I thought you’d have more sense than to bring any of they dead elm branches from yonder. Burning elm’s no better than burning churchyard mould for the warmth.”

The boy put down the bundle he was carrying without haste and held out his hand, which the vicar took and solemnly shook. He was, by now, used to Tom’s ways.

“Well, Tom,” he said, “I think I’ve found a good place for you and your Granny’s willing for you to try it. You’re to go and see about it this very evening.”

“Where be it then?” asked Tom.

“It’s at the Darnley Ladies’ Home.”

The boy looked puzzled. “There’s many a lady’s home at Darnley,” he said, “there’s Jenny’s mother’s, and Mary’s, and Tim’s and old Mrs Martin’s and –”

“No, no,” said the vicar, “not that kind of home, Tom, but a big house called ‘The Haven’, you must know it well – it stands by itself a little way out of town. A number of old ladies live there together – it’s rather like one of my beehives, Tom,” he went on, warming to his exposition. “They each have a room to themselves like a cell and there’s one lady who looks after them all. Her name is Miss Blackett and you must ask for her when you go there.”

“Be she like the queen bee, then?” asked Tom.

“Well, yes, something like that,” said the vicar. “You are to go and see her at six o’clock and I’ve told her you are a very good boy and will do your best to help her.”

“Aye, that he will,” said the old woman. Tom nodded and held out his hand again as there seemed to him there was nothing more to be said on the subject.

Mrs Hobb got up stiffly to bid the vicar goodbye. She thanked him for coming but it was clear from her manner that she felt she was conferring a benefit and not receiving one. The vicar thought: “I hope she
will
be able to manage without the boy, but it’s clear she’s made up her mind to part with him and nothing will budge her. Well, anyway, his keep will be a saving for her. I hope, too, he’ll make good at The Haven.”

“You’ll let me know how things go,” he said to them both. “It’ll be easier to start now summer’s really come. We’ve waited long enough for it this year and it was a hard winter, too.”

“Oh, well,” said the old woman, “we’ve never died of a winter yet.”

Tom presented himself at the correct hour that evening. He wore a clean darned pullover with sleeves that were too
short for his long arms and his trousers were patched. His hair looked very bristly and he was smaller and more childish looking than Miss Blackett had expected, so altogether he did not make a favourable first impression when Gisela had pushed him disdainfully through the office door. The warden did not think it necessary to get up to receive him but Tom came forward at once and held out his hand in his usual way saying:

“Be you Queen Miss Blackett, lady?”

Miss Blackett mechanically shook his hand but was struck dumb by this unlooked-for greeting. She had expected some stupidity perhaps, certainly shyness and even becoming awe. Tom waited for her to speak and looked round him with his wide detached stare. He saw Lord Jim, asleep on his special cushion and immediately went up to him.

“Don’t touch him,” said Miss Blackett, “he doesn’t like to be disturbed, especially by strangers.” But neither Tom nor Lord Jim took any notice of her words. Tom stooped and stroked him and the big cat opened his eyes, rolled over on his back and began to purr loudly.

“What be his name?” asked Tom.

“Lord Jim,” said Miss Blackett, once more taken aback. Tom nodded his head in approval. Lords, he knew, were very fine people and this was a very fine cat.

“He’s bigger nor our Sweep. Do ’ee know why we calls him Sweep? It was one day, Gran and I be sitting by our fire and right through our window he came a-leaping, and across the room and up the chimney afore we could stop him. Gran says a fox must a bin after him. We got a pail o’ water quick and threw it on the fire, so as it wouldn’t burn him, and after a long while down he comes and all the soot with him. We never found out where he comes from and he’s bin with us ever since. So we called him Sweep – it’s a good name ’cause he’s black as soot anyways.”

“This must stop,” thought Miss Blackett; the interview
(which could scarcely yet have been called an interview) was getting out of hand and she decided to ignore all that Tom had said or done since he had come into the room.

“You’re small for your age,” she said disapprovingly. “I hope you’ll be able to manage what I shall need you to do, if I decide whether to give you a trial. I shall want you to rake out the boiler and stoke it every morning and evening and fill the fuel pails and keep the boiler room clean.”

Tom nodded.

“And you must sweep the stairs every day and help Gisela to carry the trays up and down and clean the ladies’ rooms.”

Tom nodded again.

“Well,” said Miss Blackett, “we shall see. I am willing to try you because the vicar says you are a good, hardworking boy, but you must prove to me to be so here as he tells me you have been to him at the vicarage.”

“Yes, Queen, Lady Miss Blackett,” said Tom and he held out his hand again.

“You mustn’t be a silly boy,” said Miss Blackett and this time, being more prepared, she took no notice of his hand but continued: “And you must call me Miss Blackett and nothing else.” What could have made him bestow royalty upon her? Nevertheless, a faint absurd flicker of gratification stirred within her. He had spoken in such a natural sort of way, not at all impertinently, though what he said was so ridiculous, and yet he was not exactly polite either. She could not describe it.

“Be I to come tomorrow then?”

Miss Blackett considered. She did not like doing anything in too much of a hurry, but if the boy was to come at all, there seemed no point in putting it off. “You can come tomorrow afternoon,” she said.

After he had gone she sat for a while thinking. “I don’t know quite what to make of him,” she said to herself, “and I doubt if he’ll be of much use. Oh, well, I didn’t hope for
much after all. I’ll just have to see.”

Tom was to sleep in the little attic next to Mrs Thornton. To say that the warden had planned this with a view to reducing Mrs Thornton’s contentment with her room would be untrue, for there was no other place to put the boy. Brenda had shared a room with Gisela. But it certainly crossed her mind. She was sure that Mrs Thornton would see reason eventually but it would be all to the good if the process could be speeded up, and she thought it likely that Mrs Thornton would not welcome Tom’s advent, banging his door morning and night, as likely as not, and probably making his presence felt in other undesirable ways. She went up to the attic floor the next morning to inspect the little room and to tell Mrs Thornton about the boy.

The small attic had retained more of its original appearance than any other part of the house. It still contained the iron bedstead which had been used by the last of the family cooks, and hanging above it was a framed text – “Thou, God, seest me”, illustrated by a huge eye whose black lashes rayed out like beams from a dark sun. There was a scratched deal chest of drawers painted green. Miss Blackett pulled out the drawers, which stuck badly. They were quite empty except for a black-headed hatpin. There was a high bent-wood chair of the kind that used once to be found at every shop counter and a corner washstand, also painted green, holding a chipped white basin and jug. The floor was bare except for a rag rug by the bed. These were all original furnishings but piled along one end of the room were a number of incongruous articles put there to be out of the way – a dressmaker’s dummy topped with a torn red silk lampshade, an old knife-cleaning machine, a pile of bound copies of
Sunday
at
Home
and an umbrella.

Miss Blackett decided that Tom’s first job would be to clean the room. She had no intention of doing it for him – he was coming to reduce work, not to add to it. She must
look out some bedding for him, however. As for the junk, it would have to stay there. She did not think it would do for jumble even and the dustmen were very choosey about what they consented to take away. If only people wouldn’t collect so many articles round themselves; the old ladies’ rooms were a constant source of irritation to her, cluttered up as they nearly all were, and everything having to be dealt with somehow when the poor old things died, and meanwhile having to be kept clean. She always returned to her own sparsely furnished quarters with a sense of relief. There was Mrs Thornton’s room, for instance, smothered in books, and books of all things attracted dust. She knocked at the door.