Young Phillip Maddison (16 page)

He had his own idea how the boy had managed to arrive home before him; but for the moment he said nothing. If the boy were caught by the police crossing gardens, after climbing the fences of passage-ways behind them, and summoned for trespass, he would have to declare that he was out of his parent’s control. If the boy’s mother encouraged him to be deceitful, then she alone must bear the consequences. He felt that the beneficial effect of his entire afternoon had been spoiled by deceit and subterfuge—and he forbore to ask any questions to avoid being told any lies.

Phillip, unmoving in bed, was wondering dejectedly if Father would forbid him to be a scout in future. He waited in suspense for some time; and as full darkness came over the slate roof and red ridge-tiles of Gran’pa’s house, he hid his head under the bedclothes, and closed his eyes tight, the better to make real once more all the happenings of the afternoon.

His reverie was interrupted by Hetty coming upstairs with some bread and butter and a glass of milk.

He hid the food hurriedly when he heard Father coming.

“Until you learn to obey, my boy, you are not fit to command others. Therefore I forbid you to go scouting until such time as
you show yourself to have some idea of obedience. Is that clear?”

“Yes, Father.”

Phillip cried himself to sleep that night; but the next day, after giving “his solemn word and promise” not to be late again, he was told that Father would think over the matter of withdrawing his veto.

“I don’t always want to be bully-ragging you, Phillip, but you must learn to be punctual.”

“Yes, Father, thank you very much indeed!”

“You’ll thank me later on, you know, even if you don’t now, my boy,” replied Richard.

By the end of July the Patrol Tent Fund had risen to nearly five shillings; this sum, however, was on paper only, and belonged, with the tent, to the future.

Meanwhile summer holidays by the seaside occupied most of Phillip’s thoughts. The Maddison family, less Richard, was going to Hayling Island for the first fortnight in August. When Richard asked Phillip what he intended to do about Timmy Rat, Phillip replied that a boy had promised to look after it for him, while hoping that Father would not ask who the boy was, since it was Cranmer.

Richard had revised his opinion of this boy, after he had seen him carrying a smaller boy on his back. But why did not Phillip confide in him? Why must he always be underhand in his ways?

Early on the morning of departure Phillip met Cranmer at the cemetery gates, and handed over the box. Timmy Rat, he knew, would be safe in his hands.

Hetty had promised the children a bell-tent by the sea-shore, where they could undress for bathing, and also shelter from the rain. Their new apartments were in the middle of the island, some distance from the beach.

The morning after their arrival, upon calling at the only shop where tents were to be hired, Hetty was told that all were in use.

“Oh dear, what a pity,” she said to the woman in the shop.
“I ought to have written and bespoken one, I suppose, how very foolish of me not to have done so. And I had promised my little boy, too, that he should have a tent this year. I should have written to you, of course.”

“We cannot reserve any tents by post, ma’m,” replied the woman. “We only let on demand, by the week. You see, visitors are always asking for them, like yourself, ma’m, and we could let them many times over.”

“Yes, of course. Well, it cannot be helped now, I suppose,” and thanking the woman, Hetty left the shop. “You’ll have to undress under your cycling cape, that is all, Sonny, as you did last year.”

“But can’t we
buy
a tent, Mother? There’s a very nice one in the other shop near the hotel, for seven and sixpence.”

“That’s a lot of money, dear. I am afraid we cannot afford it just yet.”

“But the bell-tent would cost half-a-crown a week, Mum, and if we buy this one, we can use it again and again, for nothing.”

“It’s the outlay, dear. We could only just have afforded the five shillings for the two weeks.”

“But I shan’t want any new plimsolls or bathing costume this year, Mother. Can’t we have the tent, as part of my Christmas present? I mean, the other two-and-sixpenny worth. I can give you back my share as soon as I get it at Christmas, then you’ll have not only nothing to pay for that part of my present, but have my part of the tent for yourself into the bargain.”

Hetty laughed at this idea; and taking advantage of her good humour, Phillip pressed her the more.

“I’ll tell you what, Mum, if you buy a tent now the patrol will hire it from you for our camp in Whitefoot Lane woods. A shilling a week, or sixpence for three days. I am sure my men will agree. If they don’t, I’ll take it out of the fund.”

“Well dear, I don’t like to say No, since I did promise you should have a tent; but really, Sonny, I cannot afford to buy one. Next year perhaps.”

“Well then, will you lend me half-a-crown, Mum, until we get home? I can draw it out of my Post Office Savings Bank.”

“Certainly not, dear, I’ve never heard of such a thing! The money in your bank is part of your grant. You know very well that your Father has forbidden me to draw out any money for anything except your clothes and school bills. Besides, if you
were ill, it might be needed for the doctor’s bill. No, I won’t hear of it!”

“I might get ill undressing in the cold, sitting on that icy bare shingle. It’s very chilly on it, sometimes.”

Hetty could not forbear to smile at the ingenious way her little boy tried to get her to buy the tent. She suspected that the main reason he wanted it was for his scout camp, but she could not bring herself to tell him that Dickie would never permit him to go camping by himself: at least, not if he wanted to sleep out at night. It was not as though there were a proper scoutmaster to look after them. If she bought the tent, Phillip would certainly be the more disappointed later on, when he learned that he would not be allowed to go camping.

“Mother, my lungs aren’t very strong, are they? Seriously, I often feel shivery when I undress on the shingle. I mean at first, not when I come out of the sea, with the brine to protect the pores of my skin.”

“That reminds me, you must promise me not to stay in so long this year, dear. Your lungs are all right, of course. Doctor Cave-Browne found nothing wrong with them, but you were extremely delicate as a baby; and both Father and I naturally want you to grow up into a big strong man.”

“Mum, if you buy the tent, I promise you I won’t stay in more than ten minutes this year. I swear it on my Scout’s honour! Now here’s the shop. Look, isn’t it a spiffing tent? Seven and sixpence, brand new, not like those old grey Boer War things. This one is water-proof when it’s raining, if you don’t touch it with your finger.”

The tent stood open, under the verandah before the shop. It was a flimsy affair, of thin white cotton, with an umbrella top edged with red, just large enough for one adult at a time; if that adult was prepared to stand crookedly within and, awkwardly avoiding the central pole, undress—in fine weather. But to Phillip it was a tent, the most desirable possession next to a wide-awake hat—a tent for the Bloodhound Patrol.

“I must think about it, Sonny, I cannot decide at a moment’s notice, dear. You see, I have had to save up for this holiday ever since Christmas——” but Phillip was not listening; all he wanted to hear was his mother saying yes.

Which Hetty did that afternoon, after Phillip, having undressed behind the life-boat house, limped over the shingle with
blood on one foot, a cut from a broken bottle used as a cock-shy by some other boys.

Fortunately the weather remained fine during the fortnight’s holiday, although for three days the wind blew in from the sea, and twice the tent was blown over. Phillip set about making it secure. He sought some heavy weights to lay around the redlined skirt, finally lugging up from the beach two old rusty anchors, which he buried in the shingle, tying the guide ropes of the pole to their shanks. The tent held against the fiercer wind of the third day which tore spray off the tops of rearing waves and carried foam inland across the common, where a new wooden stage for a concert party was being built.

The holiday seemed to go much more quickly that year upon the island which Phillip had come to regard almost as his own. The life-saving cable, with its ride of hardly more than half a minute, holding to the handles of a pulley-block, was an old story now—it was a swizz to charge tuppence a go on that little thing! Phillip kept his pennies for ice-creams, sherbet-bags, licorice bootlaces, bottles of ginger pop, and of course
The
Scout.
Every minute of the long days was filled with interest; always there was something to see—Dreadnoughts and other battleships off Spithead, sometimes showing their searchlights at night—fishermen hauling their nets upon the brown shingle ridge at high tide, turning out thousands of mackerel threshing upon the wet stones as the seine was drawn in with a wave; or maybe it was a shoal of garfish—long, thin, and green—with mouths like narrow beaks. Their bones were green when you cooked them.

Phillip decided that his special friend was a stonechat. Upon the bramble flats behind the ridge the little bird everlastingly watched him as it flitted from one salt-dead bramble stalk to another, uttering its cry like two pebbles lightly struck together. But the stonechat would not make friends.

The blackberries there were red and hard, unripe; good only for using as ammunition, to be lobbed sideways through open windows as you passed by quickly, looking the other way; and also to throw at cats and dogs, just before hiding yourself, and, keeping still, watch how they looked about them to try and find where they came from. It was your wits against theirs.

Once Phillip rattled an extra special handful against Miss Barber’s windows in Seaview Terrace, just to show the old hag what he thought of her for saying that she would never again
have him in her house—just because he had sometimes been a few seconds late for meals when they had stayed there on the first visit to Hayling Island!

Miss Barber was too quick for him. The casement shook open, and her brown bewigged head, on which sat a lace cap, poked out.

“I shall report you to your father, when I see him next!”

“And I shall report you to
your
father, when I see
him
next,” replied Phillip, as he raised his cap, and walked away. He knew he was safe, because Father was cycling on Exmoor in Somerset for his holiday, after calling on Aunt Theodora at her cottage in Lynmouth.

Soon Miss Barber, and most other things, were forgotten in the coming of the Merry Minstrels: for with them was a beautiful fair girl, sight of whom made him forget Helena Rolls. Upon the wooden platform of the open-air theatre Phillip listened to every note and word as the concert party sang their songs, made their jokes with the funny man who wore a red wig, and sometimes played scenes from
East
Lynne.
Little Willie in the play who died so sadly was really the girl, with her hair hidden under the lace collar of the velvet jacket. It was the same girl who wore the pink frock and the large pink hat with the pink ribbons hanging from it, as with long hair brushed to her waist she sang, taking little steps on the bare wooden platform and making slight movements with her hands.

With this vision Phillip was enthralled. Every time the canvas curtain was pulled across the platform, revealing the Merry Minstrels on their seats, ready to begin, and the pianist at the cottage piano, he was standing with other boys in silence at the back, behind the last row of twopenny chairs—they were a shilling in the front row, only for very rich people.

At each show the chief Merry Minstrel, who also acted in the play on the stage, came round among the people standing beside and behind the rows of chairs, saying “Thank you, thank you, dear people”, and rattling a wooden collecting box. As he came nearer the back rows, Phillip felt awe mingled with uneasiness, for not only had he spent all his holiday money, but he had not
been able to borrow anything further from his mother. The great man approached, his heavy mulberry-coloured face losing its smile and looking cross as the other boys who had been watching began to move away towards the gorse and brambles beyond the area of thin, sun-dried grasses, leaving Phillip standing there alone—too ashamed to move after them now that he had left it too late.

On the final evening of the holiday, a Friday, there were to be two performances, the second ending after dark. The stage was to be lit by Chinese lanterns! Phillip was supposed to take down the tent and bring it back to his mother in their apartments after the first evening performance, which ended at seven; and also to buy a pound of digestive biscuits, and a pound of tomatoes, for the journey next day, to be eaten with cheese. For this, Hetty had given him sixpence. He intended to return without the tent, in order to have an excuse for going back for it after his supper—and so see the Merry Minstrels’ second performance.

Just before the start of the play, which was to end the first show, the actor with the thick grey hair and raddled face approached the group of boys, rattling his box; this time the girl in pink was with him, Phillip saw with thudding heart. He was unable to move away; he stood there while the actor came right up to him, and shaking the box with a double shake said loudly, for all to hear, “You see the show often enough, why don’t you give something sometimes, eh?” and again he rattled the box. Feeling hot and ashamed, Phillip felt for the sixpence, and put it in the box. An unutterable feeling came over him as he did so, that he was giving away part of his mother; and with the feeling was a dark desire that he would never go back, but wander off and never see her again.

The actor smiled, showing brown teeth with a big brown whiff of whisky close to his face. “You like the show, eh?” he said, nudging him with his elbow, and winking as with a jerk of his head he indicated the girl in pink with the straight fair hair. When she lifted her lashes, and smiled at him, Phillip felt such a surge of happiness that he had to clench his hands to prevent himself from giving a shout. He would eat bread and butter with cheese instead of digestive biscuits, and
not
be sick in the train tomorrow! Then Mother would not mind that he had given the money to the Merry Minstrels.

When the first show was over, he did not return for supper,
feeling no need for food. After packing the tent, he sat on the shingle, watching the little wavelets, sparkling with phosphorescence, almost tinkling on the shore as they formed and broke at the edge of the smooth grey sea. He felt a sad happiness as the sun went down over the gorse and bramble flats, beyond which was the golf course, and the floating iron tanks which supported the West Ferry, whereon he had caught a codling, a pollack, and several small eels. Farewell West Pier, lifting with the tide! Then in the clear, still air he heard voices, and standing up, saw the lighted Chinese lanterns glowing inside the wooden stage. For a moment he found it hard to breathe, with the wonder of it all.

So Phillip, heedless of anything save his own feelings which must be obeyed, once again forgot his life and circumstance as he stared at the girl in the pink frock and large pink hat under the row of round paper lanterns.