And Berry Came Too (19 page)

As soon as I could speak—

“You wicked girl,” I said. I put an arm about her and held her up to my heart. “You wicked – Now I shan’t eat a carp on St Anthony’s day. Oh, and put up your mouth, will you? I want to…straighten my tie in one of your eyes.”

With her face in my coat—

“Not before the mill,” bubbled Perdita. “Besides, there might be somebody looking.”

“Hush,” said I. “Number Six is waiting – to give them to Number Five.”

Seated upon a loose cushion that came from the Rolls, his back against the milestone, his right foot shoeless and resting upon a carefully folded rug, my brother-in-law greeted our appearance by raising his eyes to heaven and demanding a cigarette.

As I felt for my case—

“Lame for life,” he said shortly. “That’s what I am. I want to go home, but they say they can’t spare the Rolls.”

“But how did it happen?” said Perdita.

Berry sat up.

“The history,” he said, “will hardly go into words. You may or may not remember that I offered to erect a pavilion – a work of supererogation, which, no doubt for that reason, found favour in the sight of those I love. On my offer being accepted, I humbly desired to be furnished with the appropriate tools. You can’t make ropes without sand – or whatever they use. These were not forthcoming. Instead of the maul and pegs which I had a right to expect, one was given a blacksmith’s hammer, and a lot of iron nails – harsh and bestial equipment, which, if we may believe the old masters, has figured in other martyrdoms. But it is, as you know, my practice to accept without comment such trials or disabilities as a jealous Fate may appoint. I, therefore, offered up a short prayer and fell to work. Was I permitted to labour as man has always laboured, working out his own salvation in the sweat of his trunk? I was not. From the instant that I began to put into action my design, my beloved consort saw fit not only to disparage my methods – thereby exposing the running sores of ignorance with which her mind is diseased – but actually to vomit instruction the nature and quality of which would have been most justly resented by an infant of tender years. The result was inevitable. Trembling with indignation and thirsty only to bring to an end a tribulation which I in no wise deserved, I failed to invest with the requisite degree of accuracy the elegant parabola my hammer was about to describe; and the blow which had been intended not only to relieve my emotions but to blot out the bullnosed bung which I had already missed twice, fell instead upon the toe or toe-cap of the Russia-leather ‘Oxford’ in which this foot was enshrined.” As though the reminiscence were repugnant, he shuddered violently. “One might have hoped, one might, without presumption, have supposed that a
contretemps
so hideous would have commanded concern, if not dismay. One would have been wrong. The act of self-immolation was greeted with yells of mirth. Like those of the early Christians, my screams were drowned in an obscene derision which, till then, I had always believed to be the prerogative of the abnormal baboon. So far from – Oh, St Vitus’ Trot! Look what’s escaped.”

It was with a shock that, following Berry’s gaze, I perceived the approach of a pageant which justified his remark.

A small caravan, painted to resemble a doll’s house in red and white, had been fitted with shafts, instead of the trailer bar: between these a mule was strolling with the nonchalance of his kind. The equipage was preceded by a man of perhaps thirty-five. He was wearing an apple-green beret, a pair of blood-red shorts and a sleeveless vest, no one of which became him in any way. A permanent grin illumined his wide-eyed face, and he looked up and down and about, as one who is pleased with life and delighted with all he sees. He was tripping, rather than walking, as though in ecstasy, and had he indeed been some prisoner, lately enlarged, he could hardly have revelled more plainly in his estate. By the side of the van was plodding another soul: but, though his attire was as wanton as that which his fellow wore, his demeanour was that of a man who would welcome death. For the most part he hung his head, but now and again he would lift it to glance at the van and the mule, after which he would cover his face as though he had seen some vision too dreadful for him to bear. Indeed, I felt sorry for him, for he plainly loathed his adventure with all his might and the relish of his companion must have inflamed his despair.

Carefully veiling our interest, we waited for the three to go by, proposing perhaps to direct them and certainly to give them good day. Of such is Life… It never occurred to us that the tents which Jonah had set up were declaring a fellowship which if anyone pleased to invoke we could not deny.

The leader of the procession ripped the scales from our eyes.

Raising his headgear to Perdita, he pranced to Berry’s side with an outstretched hand.

“Well met, brother,” he brayed. “What of the pitch?”

The three of us gazed upon him, dumb with dismay. Our fond preparation, recoiling upon itself, seemed likely to bring to ruin the hopes we held. The frightening fool before us was proposing to rest by our side, to establish a post of surveillance,
to spend the night within earshot of all we did
. We were ready for interruption: the supervision, however, of such a man was something with which we were not prepared to cope.

Dazedly Berry made answer.

“What pitch?” he said, shaking hands.

“Why your pitch,” said the other, beaming. He pointed to the tops of the tents. “The blithesome spot you have selected for your repose.”

There was a frightful silence. Then—

“Oh, it’s not too bad,” said Berry, faintly. “Not – not at all what we’d hoped though. Too – too many bumblebees.”

“Bumblebees?” cried the other.

“Bumblebees,” said Berry. “Great, big, blundering brutes.” He pointed to his foot. “I’ve been stung already.”

“But bumblebees don’t sting.”

“These do,” said Berry, firmly. “That’s what’s so awful about it. Then again the water’s too far.”

“That’s all right,” said the other. “We’ve got a tank.”

“Oh, is it?” said Berry. “I mean, have you? That’s, er, very convenient, isn’t it?” He got to his feet and wiped the sweat from his brow. “I hope you’ve plenty of carbolic. There’s a terrible smell of drains.”

“Drains?” said the other, starting.

“That’s right,” said Berry. “Drains. I’m inclined to think it’s a sewage farm.” The other was snuffing the air. “It comes and goes, you know. The stench, I mean. A moment ago it was enough to knock you down.”

“It can’t be the drains,” said the stranger. “And any way it’s no odds. As long as you can smell it, it’s quite all right. It’s the smell you can’t smell that matters.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” said Berry; stooping to put on his shoe. “You see, you can’t smell it now.”

“Then it doesn’t matter, does it?” said the other, gleefully.

“Well, you can’t have it both ways,” said Berry. “If it doesn’t matter when you can, then it does matter when you can’t, doesn’t it?”

“Doesn’t what?” said the other.

“Smell,” said Berry. “I mean, matter.”

“Well, what if it does?” said the stranger.

In a silence big with emotion Perdita made her escape and Berry fastened his lace with all his might. As he straightened his back—

“The unprintable answer,” he said, “is the biggest, burliest bumblebee that ever buzzed – and many of them.”

“Now don’t you worry,” said the other, clapping him on the back. “If you don’t think about them, you’ll be as right as rain. And you can’t move now: you’ve got your tents up and all.”

“Oh, no,” said Berry, shakily. “We – we’re going to stick it somehow, just for one night. But what with that and the snakes…”

“What snakes?”

“I don’t know what make they are,” said Berry, gloomily. “I’ve only seen six so far. But they’re black and red, and they make a gurgling noise.”

The other shuddered. Then he turned to the caravan, which had come to rest on the opposite side of the road.

“D’you hear that, Harold? This gentleman’s seen six snakes.”

From his seat on the step of the van—

“Only six?” said Harold, miserably.

His fellow returned to Berry.

“That’s the best of a van,” he said. “Once in a van, you’re safe. But I’m sure you’ll be all right. You must try not to think about them. Is this your first night out?”

“Oh, no,” said Berry. “We – we’re really just finishing, you know. That’s what’s so – so unfortunate. I mean – now take last night. Only last night we had a peach of a – of a…pitch. That’s right. Pitch. More like the Garden of Eden than anything else.”

“Was it?” said the other excitedly.

“Oh, scrumptious,” said Berry. “Everything you could want. Field like a bowling green, a lovely rill of water, absolute privacy—”

“Harold, the map,” said the other. “We’ll mark this down.”

As Harold rose to his feet—

“You don’t want a map,” said Berry. “It’s only just up the road.”

“Only just up the road? Then why on earth—”

“Ah, now you’re asking,” said Berry. “Because our car’s broken down. There’s that pearl of Arcady only ten minutes from here – just the other side of Coven, and Coven’s four minutes’ walk – with a farmer to do your cooking…and there’s another thing. This fellow’s a tartar – the fellow who owns this field. He wouldn’t have had us, you know, if we hadn’t broken down.”

“My friend,” was the genial answer, “you have a lot to learn. ‘Use first and ask afterwards’ is the—”

“That’s just what we did,” said Berry. “And he came down in a fury to turn us out. We – we managed to bring him round, but he’s coming back in an hour to assess the damage we’ve done.”

“But what have you done?”

“Marked the grass,” said Berry. “It costs us eighteen pence each time we sit down.”

“You’re not going to pay it, are you?”

“He’s going to seize the tents if we don’t. I tell you, the man’s not safe. And what with the smell of snakes – I mean, drains, and the drakes – snakes and the bumblebees…”

The other threw out his chest.

“Let Eden wait,” he declared. He found and wrung Berry’s hand. “Be of good cheer, my brother, I’m going to see you through. Come all malevolent farmers, I’ll put them where they belong.” He turned to his wretched companion. “Lead on, Harold,” he commanded. “We spend the night with our friends.”

With that, he skipped to his van, laying hands upon it, laughing and cheering – and pushing, like a clown in some circus, before the mule itself had decided to take the strain.

As the doll’s house lurched through the gateway into our field–

“Well, I’m damned,” said Berry. “He may be a full-marks fool, but he’s made me ashamed of myself. Goodwill like that must be honoured – at any cost. We must help them to settle down, and then they must come and dine. A bottle of Clicquot’ll do old Harold good.”

Before five minutes had passed, the reason for Harold’s depression was clear as day. A ‘weaker vessel’ born, it was his misfortune to find himself allied with a man who combined a distracting energy not only with the instinct of managing direction but with a blasting incompetence which had to be seen to be believed. Indeed, I shall never understand how the three had contrived to get as far as they had, for they had been twelve days on the road, yet all were alive and well.

To pitch their camp was the simplest thing in the world. They had only to choose their site, bring the mule to a standstill, let down the sprags or props which were waiting beneath the van and lead the mule from the shafts. This, however, they proved unable to do – thanks, of course, to Horace: for that was the leader’s name. By his excited direction, the mule was released before the sprags were let down, and the doll’s house, which had but two wheels, immediately tilted back after the manner of a tumbril which is made to discharge its load. Everything loose within it fell to the lower end, and it settled down to the crash of breaking vessels and the frantic convulsions of the water within its tank. Before we could interfere, Horace, laughing like a madman, had actually entered the van – I suppose to assess the damage which had been done: ill-advisedly moving forward, he more than restored the balance the van had lost, and, after the way of a see-saw, the doll’s house flung suddenly forward, to come to rest on its shafts. By this manoeuvre, of course, its contents were rudely transferred from aft to fore and Horace was thrown against the window through which in his efforts to rise he immediately put his foot. Though we cried to him to lie still, he preferred to pick himself up and make for the door. Since this lay behind the axle, before he could gain the threshold the van once more tilted back, thereby returning its contents to their original site and, of course, pitching Horace headlong against its end. It only remained for him to make his way to the middle and balance the thing: and this he did almost at once, whereupon, because of the slope, the doll’s house ran violently backwards and came to rest in a hedge some seven yards off. In no way disconcerted, Horace emerged full of orders and laughing to beat the band and forgetting in his excitement that he had seen fit to open the tap of the tank. Why he should have done so, I cannot conceive, but since no one but he was aware of what he had done, before we had salved it the doll’s house was fairly awash, while the tank, of course, was as empty as when it was new. As for the mule, by Horace’s insistent direction, Harold had let the beast go without removing the harness upon its back, and when we had time to look round, we saw it languidly rolling, as bare as the day it was born, while its gear was distributed about the meadow as though it had been flung away to forward some headlong flight.

I set down these curious facts, not at all in malice, but simply because they are true, and I must most frankly confess that, observing their creation, I never laughed so much in my life.

What was, perhaps, the gem of the harlequinade was the instant understanding between the mule and the Knave. That the two agreed together there can be no doubt, for, before they took any action, they nosed one another kindly and considered each other’s points in evident amity. And then they began to play. To see them chase one another would have made the sternest ascetic split his sides. Even poor Harold laughed till the tears ran down his face, and when Horace, perceiving the frolic and assuming that the two were in earnest and ought to be stopped, ran violently after them both, pursuing their utmost abandon with all his might, to be himself pursued as one who had no business to interfere – then we lifted up thankful hearts that we had made the acquaintance of such a man.