The Tale of Applebeck Orchard (12 page)

“I cannot say.”
The professor’s tone was irritated, for he always hates to admit to not being fully informed on a topic of some importance, as he had been required to do twice in the last few sentences.
“It was dark, and I was flying quite high overhead. It is fair tooo say that I have spectacular vision, but even I cannot be expected tooo see through a cloak and bonnet, into a

person’s heart.”
He fluffed his feathers crossly.
“You wished tooo ask me a question?”

“What? Oh, yes.”
Bosworth recovered himself.
“I’ve been thinking about the
Genealogy
and
History.
I need to name a successor to wear the Badge of Authority and manage everything after I’ve gone. I thought it would be Thorn, but he seems to have . . .”
Bosworth swallowed the harder word.
“He seems to have disappeared.”

“Ah, Thorn,”
the owl said regretfully.
“A very fine lad. Yes, well, dooo gooo on, dear fellow. Whooo are you thinking of as a successor?”

“Hyacinth,”
said Bosworth, and found as he said her name that he was quite happy with the idea, even though it was a radical choice. She would bring a female’s insight to the historian’s task, which was all to the good. And of course, she would be right at home managing The Brockery.

“Whooo?”
the owl asked, turning his head to gaze at Bosworth and opening his eyes very wide.
“Whooo was that yooou said?”

“Hyacinth. Thorn’s sister,”
Bosworth explained.
“She is a very intelligent, diligent, thoughtful badger, and—”

“But she is a
female
,”
the professor said definitively.

Bosworth shifted in his chair.
“Yes, of course,”
he admitted.
“But as I say, she is intelligent and diligent. There’s no question that Hyacinth can do the work. It’s only a matter of precedent and—”

“Far be it from me,”
the professor intoned in an authoritative voice,
“tooo make pronouncements concerning the way yooou badgers dooo business.”
(That’s exactly what he was doing, of course, but the owl was never one to shirk an important task.)
“However, the
History
is not just a history of badgers, as yooou know. It documents all that goes on in the Land Between the Lakes. Hence, it must be compiled by the best qualified animal.”

“But what if Hyacinth is the best qualified?”
Bosworth asked, perplexed.
“I’ve searched all through the
History
, and I can’t find anything that says that the historian must be a male.”

Bosworth could not find a rule excluding females because nobody had thought to put one there. For the most part, badgers are open-minded animals who value the contributions of both sexes equally. In fact, the Tenth Badger Rule of Thumb states that all badgers, regardless of sex, age, and state of health, are important to the well-being of the badger clan and must be honored for the roles they play in maintaining a stable and productive community life. It would not have occurred to the badgers to even mention the issue of gender. But the professor saw it differently.

“It is not mentioned,”
said the professor grandly,
“because it is tacitly assumed. The question has not come up, yooou see, because it does not merit examination.”
He put down his cup and settled his feathers.
“This is because, as the French novelist Guy de Maupassant has said, ‘The experience of centuries has proved tooo us that females are, without exception, incapable of any true artistic or scientific work.’ ”
He paused, then added portentously,
“This is only toooo true, as I feel sure yooou will agree, Badger. It is an indisputable fact that females suffer from certain innate and irremediable intellectual deficiencies. The celestial flame that warms and sets fire tooo the masculine soul is simply—”

“Thank you, Professor,”
the badger said loudly, rattling his cup. Once the professor began to lecture, one had to plug a stopper in the flow however one could, or one was in for it. But it was already too late.

“—Simply lacking in females,”
the owl went on, not noticing.
“Which is not tooo say that the fairer sex lacks the finer feeling. Oooh nooo, not a bit! It is only tooo say that our charming females lack the disciplined, deep understanding of fundamental truths that is granted tooo males, and are consequently unable tooo undertake abstract speculation in those intellectually demanding branches of knowledge, such as history or philosophy or the sciences. This was the view of the great Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) and I myself am of the same opinion, for which reason I am strenuously opposed tooo female suffrage. Females dooo not have the intellect required tooo cast a considered vote, nor dooo they—”

He was (thank heaven!) interrupted by the opening of the front door.
“Parsley says to tell you that lunch is ready, Uncle,”
said a crisp young female voice.
“Cold cucumber soup and cress sandwiches.”
It was Hyacinth herself, an attractive badger with a gleaming black and silver coat, a long, delicate snout, and a very pretty black nose, as shiny as patent leather. Bosworth was not her blood uncle, but she (like Thorn) had adopted the term as an endearment, and he liked it.

“Thank you, my dear.”
Gratefully, the badger stood and brushed scone crumbs from his fur.
“Will you join us, Owl? There’s plenty, you know. And I should like to hear more about what you saw the night the haystack burnt.”

Indeed, there was always plenty. The corollary to the Fifth Rule of Thumb (regarding hospitality) was that a badger’s table should be spread in generous abundance, with enough food for any visitors who happened by at mealtime. As a consequence, a great many visitors made it a definite point to happen by at mealtime, and almost every seat was almost always occupied.

But the owl had another urgent appointment.
“Lunch!”
he hooted.
“My stars—is it that late already? My midday nap has been expecting me for the past quarter-hour, and I dooo not

like tooo keep it waiting.”
He pulled his flying goggles down over his great round eyes and raised his wings.
“Mind what I say, Badger. Surely there is an alternative tooo—”
He cast a significant look at Hyacinth.
“You take my meaning, I am sure,”
he added. And with that, he lifted himself heavily into the air.

The owl’s precipitous departure leaves us rather dissatisfied, I should think. I for one would like to have heard more about the cloaked and bonneted person who might have been responsible for Mr. Harmsworth’s haystack catching fire—although since she, or he, was carrying a lantern, perhaps it was accidental, rather than deliberate.

I would also like to give the professor a good, hard shake on account of his attitude toward females, although I know it wouldn’t change a thing. This owl may be very learned, but he (like everyone else in this story; indeed, like all of us) is the product of his times and cannot help himself. And he is certainly no more bigoted and intolerant than that celebrated philosopher, the eminent Immanuel Kant, whose ideas he has borrowed. I must warn you that, in the course of our story, we shall hear more comments like these, and counsel you to keep your temper.

Bosworth sighed as he gathered up the cups and the empty plate and put them all on the tray. An alternative to Hyacinth? If there were, he had not yet come up with the name. And for the life of him, he couldn’t think why there should be any serious objection to her.

But then, he was only a badger. The professor and Mr. Kant certainly knew better. It was a perplexing problem, a conundrum. Perhaps he should put off making a decision until he’d had time to think some more.

“Let me, Uncle,”
Hyacinth said, adding the teapot to the tray and taking it from him.
“I wonder if you’ve heard about the closing of the Applebeck Footpath.”

“The professor was just mentioning it,”
Bosworth said, holding the door open for Hyacinth. Really, she was such a capable badger. Surely—
“You’ve heard about the situation, then?”

“Ah, Fritz,”
Bosworth remarked. They were walking down the hall.
“Not a very sociable creature, I’m afraid. Standoffish.”

“Oh, he’s just shy,”
Hyacinth said in a cheerful tone, over her shoulder.
“He’s much friendlier after you’ve got acquainted. Did you know he’s an artist?”

“Mysterious?”
Bosworth asked.
“What was it?”

A cloak and bonnet? Why, that was what the owl had reported, Bosworth thought. So they had both seen the same thing. As an historian, he always appreciated confirmations. And confirmations from two unrelated sources were the very best.

Hyacinth was going on.
“Anyway, what Fritz said about the barricades made me curious about the path—how long it has been in use and all that sort of thing. So I took the liberty and looked it up in the
History.
I hope you don’t mind.”

“Mind!”
exclaimed the badger.
“Why, bless my stripes, I don’t mind at all, my dear. You may make free of the
History
anytime you like. And what did you discover? The path has been in public use for a very long time, hasn’t it?”

“Oh, yes,”
Hyacinth replied
. “And what’s more, I discovered an interesting mystery about that path—and about the orchard, as well.”
She gave an excited little laugh.
“It appears that the orchard is haunted, Uncle! And I think it’s entirely possible that the ferret actually saw the ghost!”

Bosworth paused.
“Now that you mention it, I believe I do recall my great-grandmother speaking of a ghost—a human ghost, that is, the ghost of a woman—who occasionally appeared in Applebeck Orchard.”

Casting his mind back into the far distant past, he could see himself as a tiny badger, sitting at Great-Grandmother’s knee in front of the winter fire and listening to her old, cracked voice as she told the stories her own great-grandmother had told her, many badger lifetimes ago. But it was no wonder that he had forgotten, for Great-Grandmother had told many stories and most of them had been ghost stories, in one way or another, since animals have a very strong sense of the immanent and pervasive realities of the spirit world. The Fourteenth Rule of Thumb states it very clearly:
Our badger ancestors have crossed the bridge to the Back of Beyond, but their spirits are constantly with us, in the form of what humans like to call “ghosts.” The prudent badger is mindful of their presence, and always behaves as if he is in the company of watchful elders.

“That’s the one,”
Hyacinth said excitedly.
“The ghost of Applebeck Orchard!”

“I’m afraid I don’t remember the details of that particular ghost,”
Bosworth remarked ruefully.
“There have been so many.”
It was true. The Land Between the Lakes sometimes seemed peopled by ghosts, who were often said to take an active hand in human affairs. But in this case, Bosworth thought he ought to remember, and felt a twinge of worry. It was just one more sign of his growing forgetfulness.

“Perhaps the ghost’s story is recorded in the
History
,”
he added. The dozen large, leather-bound volumes contained thousands of pages, all covered with neat, tiny writing. It was impossible for even the most devoted badger historian to have read them all.

“It is, indeed,”
Hyacinth replied.
“And it’s fascinating. Apparently, the ghost only appears when there’s trouble in store for the village. In fact, I wonder if she might have something to do with—”

But they had reached the kitchen. Parsley took the tray from Hyacinth and set her to work filling the soup tureen, while Bosworth was handed a plate of cress sandwiches and a stack of napkins to carry to the table. So we shall have to contain our souls in patience until lunch is over, the washing-up done, and Hyacinth and Bosworth can sit down together and read their ghost story.

And in the meantime, we have something else to do. When we left Miss Potter at the end of Chapter Five, she was on her way to answer a knock at her door. I think it is time to go and see who is calling at Hill Top Farm.

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