(18/20) Changes at Fairacre (2 page)

'If you're going to see Dolly Clare could you give her these?'

'Of course. Come in for a minute. The wind's turned, hasn't it?'

'Ah! Gone round east a bit.'

He put the box on the kitchen table, and dusted his hands down his corduroy trousers.

'All from your garden?' I inquired, admiring the bronze onions, the freshly-scrubbed carrots, a snowy caulifower and some outsize potatoes.

'All except the marmalade,' he grinned. 'I never grew that, but Alice had made a bath and thought Dolly'd relish a pot.'

'I'm sure she will. Have a cup of coffee?'

'Don't mind if I do.'

He sat down and looked about him. 'You got a new kettle?'

'The old one sprang a leak.'

'Hand it over, and I'll solder it for you.'

'As a matter of fact, I took it to Caxley.'

Mr Willet clicked his tongue disapprovingly. 'What you want to do that for? Wasting good money.'

'Well, I didn't want to bother you. You do enough for me as it is.'

'Rubbish! I don't do nothin' more'n I do for most folks around here. And they could do most of the jobs themselves, but they're too idle. With you it's different.'

'How?'

'Well, you're a woman, see, and not over-bright about doin' things with your hands.'

'Thanks!'

'No offence meant, Miss Read. I mean, you can do things I can't. Understand forms and that. Write a good letter. Cook a fair dinner - not as good as my wife Alice's, I must allow, but not at all bad. You has your points, but kettle-mending ain't one of 'em.'

He accepted his mug of coffee, and I joined him at the table with my own.

I did not take umbrage at Bob Willet's assessment of my abilities. As he often says: 'Speak the truth and shame the devil!' I faced his strictures with fortitude.

'And how was Dolly when you last saw her?' he inquired, stirring busily.

'As serene as ever, but she is so frail these days. I don't know that she should live alone.'

'She wouldn't want to live any other way. The only person she'd have settled with was her Emily Davis.'

Emily had been a contemporary of Dolly's from the earliest days at Beech Green. Their friendship, begun at that village's school, had survived until Emily's death some years before. The two old friends had planned to live in Dolly's cottage, but their time together was short, for Emily had died, leaving Dolly alone again.

Luckily Dolly had good neighbours who kept an eye on her, and George and Isobel Annett, the teacher at Beech Green school and his wife, lived close by and were as attentive to the old lady as if she were a near relation. Our vicar, the local doctor, and many Fairacre friends called regularly, and she was fortunate enough to have a stalwart and cheerful cleaner who came twice a week to perform her duties, and often simply to visit her friend.

She was a spry young Welsh woman called Mrs John, and had helped me out once in the school house when Mrs Pringle, our dour school cleaner, had let me down. She had two young children, always immaculately turned out, and her house was a model of good housekeeping. She and Miss Clare were fond of each other, and a great deal of Dolly's knitting ended up on the John children's backs.

'Still keeps herself busy, I suppose?' queried Bob Willet, putting aside his empty mug. 'Tell her I'll do a bit of gardenin' for her any time she wants.'

'I will,' I promised.

'Best be getting back. Got the watering to do in the greenhouse, and Mr Mawne's got summat up with one of his window catches. He's another like you. Supposed to be schooled proper but can't do nothin' much in the house.'

'Then it's a good thing we've got you to look after us,' I told him, and watched him stump away down the path.

It was cold and grey the next morning, and Tibby, my elderly cat, was as loth to get up as I was. However, the thought of the freedom from school was cheering enough to get me going, and by the time I was ready to set off to Miss Clare's, the sun was attempting to dispel the heavy clouds.

I had been invited to lunch, and after some protestation on Dolly's part I had agreed if I could do the cooking. Consequently, I carried in my basket, six eggs and some minced ham ready for the omelette I proposed to make. I had also made an orange jelly and an egg custard - very suitable fare, I considered, for two old ladies - and only hoped that my modest endeavours would have met with Bob Willet's assessment of 'a fair dinner'. I also took some fresh fruit.

With his box of vegetables on the back seat with my basket, I set off for Beech Green. The roads were wet from an overnight shower, and the grass verges were besmeared with dirt thrown there throughout the past winter months by passing traffic.

About a mile along the road I overtook a small figure trudging along with a plastic carrier bag flapping in the breeze. It was one of my pupils, young Joseph Coggs.

I pulled up beside him. 'Where are you off to?'

'Brown's, miss.'

'Want a lift?'

A dazzling smile was the answer, as he clambered into the passenger seat.

Brown's was Beech Green's general store, and I wondered why Joe had been dispatched on a journey of two miles. After all, we had a very good shop in Fairacre.

'And what are you buying from Brown's?'

'Soap powder, miss.'

'Can't you get that at our shop?'

'Not till us have paid the bill.'

'I see.'

We drove along in silence. A pigeon flew dangerously close to the windscreen, and Joe drew in a deep breath.

'Reckon that frightened him,' he said.

'It frightened me too,' I told him. 'Might have smashed the windscreen.'

Joe pondered on this. 'Could you pay for it?'

'The insurance would cover it.'

'How?' asked Joe, mystified.

To my relief, Brown's shop front hove in sight, and I was spared the intricacies of explaining the principles and practice of car insurance to my passenger.

I drew up, and Joe began to open the door. I reached to the back seat and handed him over a banana from my collection of fruit.

'Eat it on the way home,' I said, 'and don't forget to put the skin in the litter bin over there.'

Ever the teacher, I thought, even on holiday!

'Thank you, miss. And for the ride. Me shoe was hurting.'

Poor old Joe, I thought, as I drove away. Shoes that hurt had been his lot for most of his young life, and he would get little sympathy from the rest of the hard-pressed Coggs family.

Dolly Clare was sitting by a bright fire when I arrived, but rose with remarkable agility for such an old lady.

'I've been counting the minutes,' she told me. 'It's so sweet of you to give up your half-term. Company means a lot when you can't get out.'

I looked about the snug sitting-room. As always, it was cheerful with shining furniture and even a few early polyanthus flowers in a glass vase.

'Emily and I planted them years ago,' she said as I admired them. 'These are the progeny. They do well here, and so do cowslips. I suppose because they are derived from downland flowers. Emily and I picked so many primroses when we were children here at Beech Green, but there aren't as many now as there were in the coppices.'

She followed me into the kitchen where I set out my culinary arrangements, and handed over Bob Willet's present.

'The dear thing!' she exclaimed. 'And all so useful. And homegrown too. I shall write him a note without delay.

Back in the sitting-room I inquired after her health.

'Nothing wrong with me but old age. I have lots of friends who pop in, and Mrs John is vigilant. I only hope I slip away one night like Emily, and don't cause a lot of bother with a long illness.'

It seemed to me that she was even smaller and more frail than when I had last visited her, but she seemed content and happy to talk about times past, and particularly her memories of her friend Emily.

'It's strange, but I think of her more than anyone else. Even my dear Arnold, who would have been a very old man by now, is not as clear in my memory as Emily. I suppose it is because I met her when we were children and one's impressions are so fresh. I have the queerest feeling sometimes that she is actually in the house with me.'

I made a sound of protest. Was she getting fanciful, I thought, getting hallucinations, becoming fearful?

As if she read my mind, she began to laugh.

'It's nothing frightening, I assure you. In fact, just the opposite. I feel Emily's warmth and sympathy, and find it wonderfully comforting. With Arnold, alas, I seem to have lost contact. I remember how dearly we loved each other, but I can't recall his face. For that I have to look here.'

She withdrew the gold oval locket on a long chain and opened it. I knew the portrait well, but studied it afresh before she returned it to be hidden under her blouse.

'And yet, you see, Emily's face is clear as ever to me. What odd tricks the mind plays! I can remember how this cottage looked when I first saw it at the age of six, far more clearly than I can recall places which I've known in the last ten years or so.'

'The brain gets cluttered up,' I said, 'as the years go by. The early impressions are bound to be the sharpest.'

'One of the joys of living in this house for most of my life,' went on Dolly, 'are the pictures I remember of my parents' life here. Times were hard. In those days if you didn't work you didn't eat. It was as simple as that. No cushioning by the state against hardship, and we had a very thin time of it if work was short.'

'How did you manage?'

'We always kept a few chickens, and a pig, of course, as most cottagers did in those days. My mother was a wonderful manager, and could make a shilling go as far as three. We went gleaning too after the harvest, and always had a sack of flour. And neighbours always helped each other in time of sickness and accident.'

'What about parish relief? Wasn't there something called that?'

'Oh, one dreaded "going on the parish"! Mind you, the people in the big houses were usually very generous and sent soup or puddings and such like to needy folk. Somehow we made do until more work came along. In a way, my father was lucky. He was known as a first-class thatcher, and he was in work most of the time. But I can still see my poor mother standing at the kitchen table with a morsel of cold rabbit and onion from the garden wondering whether to make a pie, with far more crust than filling, or to chop it up with hard boiled-eggs and some home-grown lettuce. I think I was about eight at the time, and I remember I persuaded her to make the pie! I didn't like lettuce.'

'She sounds a wonderful woman.'

'We all had to be, and it stood us in good stead in wartime and throughout our lives.'

She began to laugh. 'All this talk of rabbit pie has made me quite hungry. What about us going into the kitchen to see about that delicious omelette?'

So we went.

2 Falling Numbers

DURING half-term I enjoyed the company of another old friend. Amy and I had met at college, taught at neighbouring schools for a while, and kept in touch after her marriage. She lived in a village a few miles south of Caxley, our local market town. She was all that I was not — well-dressed, sociable, much-travelled, lively-minded and, of course, married.

Her husband, James, was a high-powered business man who had an office in the city, and had to spend a good deal of his time visiting European centres of finance, and some in America and Japan. He was energetic, good-tempered and, even in middle-age, devastatingly good-looking. It was not surprising that women were attracted to him and, although he and Amy made a devoted couple, one could not quite accept that
all
his trips were business ones, whatever he said.

I saw Amy frequently, partly because she was alone very often, and also, I flattered myself, because our friendship meant more as the years passed.

She was sitting in her car when I returned from our village shop with some groceries, an unwieldy French loaf swathed in tissue paper and a packet of soap powder which reminded me of Joseph Coggs's errand.

As always, she was elegantly clad. Her tweed suit was of misty blue, and the cloth had been woven in Otterburn, I knew. The matching jumper was of cashmere, and James's sapphire engagement ring added the final touch to Amy's ensemble.

'You should have rung,' I said, opening the door, 'and then I would have changed from this rough old skirt.'

'I don't mind your rough old skirt,' said Amy kindly. 'It's an old friend by now. Incidentally, how long have you had it?'

I stood in the middle of the kitchen and pondered.

Amy removed the loaf, took off the paper and put the bread in the bin.

'Must be getting on for eight years,' I said at last. 'I bought the stuff at Filkins when we toured the Cotswolds one Easter. Remember?'

'Well, it wears very well,' replied Amy. I began to feel pleased. Amy is rather censorious about my appearance.

'It needs cleaning, of course,' she added. 'And hems are up this season.'

'I'll ask Alice Willet to shorten it,' I said meekly, and put the kettle on.

'Well, what news?' I asked over the tea cups.

'Not much. James is as busy as ever, and is doing a Good Deed.'

'Well done James!'

'I hope so, but I can see it is all going to be rather fraught. He came across an old school friend who is down on his luck. Been made redundant, and James is searching for a job in one of his companies that would suit the fellow. But the thing is he's rather a problem.'

'How? Just out of prison? Suffering from something?'

'Not exactly.'

Amy blew a perfect smoke ring, an accomplishment of hers which she knows impresses me inordinately, although I deplore the habit of smoking, as she is well aware.

'He's been terribly depressed because of losing his job, and his wife has left him. Luckily the children are off their hands, but he's one of those chaps who can't do a hand's turn in the house, so he's half-starved and lonely with it.'

I gave an involuntary snort.

'Oh, I know you aren't sympathetic, but not everyone can cope as you do. Even though it is a muddle,' she added unnecessarily, eyeing an untidy pile of washing awaiting the attention of the iron. 'James has invited him to stay for a few days, and I wondered if you would come to dinner next weekend, and cheer him up.'