Dark Harvest (5 page)

Then she had had an idea. Meeting a refusal from Cyril Mutter at Robin’s Farm, she mentioned idly that George Thorn had also refused and it was nice to see them in agreement about something. Next day his son Norman Mutter had appeared at the Rectory to announce they had changed their minds, they’d be only too pleased. They would undoubtedly deter as many Thorns as encourage Mutters into adopting her scheme, but she banked on mercenary motives bringing the Thorns into line in due course.

Women had been quick to volunteer: women like Lizzie Dibble, left on parish relief of five shillings a week and what her parents could spare after Rudolf was recalled to Germany; or
Ginny Patterson, trying to manage on the stingy family allowances with four small children. The last of the Mutters had finally fallen into line with his clan, ‘I need a gel to turn manure muck ready for me mangold wurzels,’ he announced belligerently.

‘You shall have one,’ she had replied cheerfully, ‘even if it has to be me.’ That had silenced him.

This morning, however, she faced a formidable assignment and one she had been putting off. William Swinford-Browne’s hop farm. His lordship had generously offered her fifteen minutes of his valuable time.

Caroline knocked at the door of The Towers determined on peaceful negotiation. Its butler answered after a short pause. Most of The Towers’ staff had volunteered—the Kaiser, it was rumoured in the village, held fewer terrors for them than the Swinford-Brownes. The butler remained, but in the gargoyle stakes he was on long odds against Parker at Ashden Dower House. The Towers, Caroline thought, as she marched in, could have stepped right out of a Grimms’ fairy-tale, only it wasn’t the princesses who dwelt within this one but the beasts.

The dark trees surrounding the house made it seem even gloomier than its architecture. It tried so hard to be grand with towers, gables and crenellated roof edges, that it was bound to fade as soon as one was ushered into the presence of the Swinford-Brownes: William, pear-shaped with his small darting eyes and hands that were only too eager to follow suit (witness
his former housemaid Ruth Horner) and Edith, over-anxious, over-fussy in dress and manners, and over-organising. Caroline had been careful to make it clear to William, that this was a business meeting and to choose a day when she knew from Isabel that Edith was in London visiting the headquarters of the Belgian Relief Committee.

‘Good morning, Caroline.’ William heaved his bulk up from behind his desk.

What a nuisance that being related by marriage through Isabel gave him the right to call her by her Christian name.

‘I’m here about our Ashden Agricultural Labour Organisation, Mr Swinford-Browne. I expect you have heard about it.’

‘I have, yes. Go on.’

‘Your hopgardens. Can we organise you paid women’s help for stringing, digging, hoeing, and nidgeting? And in due course, picking?’

‘I could take a few. I pay by eight bushels to the shilling.’

‘By the hour for stringing and hoeing,’ she interrupted firmly. ‘Four shillings for one eight-hour day. And most hop farmers are paying five bushels now.’

‘Ridiculous. We’re talking about untrained women.’

‘We’re talking about the cost of living, which is forty per cent up from before the war.’

‘Maybe, young woman. That’s not my concern. What is, is that with men at the front there’s less beer drunk. The brewing business isn’t thriving. I might grow and brew
my own hops, but I have to sell beer at the end of it. That clear to you?’

‘Perfectly, thank you. Unfortunately I can’t guarantee workers for you unless you guarantee our standard wages.’

She held her breath. It was a gamble, for she needed his support. To her amazement, after drumming his fingers impatiently on the table for a moment or two, he gave in. ‘Have it your own way. You can discuss all the details with Eliot. I told him to expect you. Not too hard to guess what you were coming for. You take after your aunt.’

Delighted at her easy victory, and taking his comparison to Tilly as the compliment he had not intended, Caroline escaped. She was still very puzzled—perhaps, she reasoned, he really did have an acute labour shortage, for all his brave words. Many of the farmers freely acknowledged they had a problem. Schoolboys were being paid half a crown a day for scaring crows, and cutting nettles, but there were few jobs of this sort they could do, and their interest in weeding vanished rapidly when faced with muddy fields and a Canterbury hoe.

She set off down the track to Frank Eliot’s home, Hop Cottage. It took her past Hop House where Isabel was living. Caroline debated whether to call in to see her but decided to get her business concluded first. As it happened Isabel spotted her going by and ran after her.

‘Where are you going?’

‘Hop Cottage. About workers for the hopgardens.’ Caroline stopped as Isabel reached her.

‘I’ll come with you. I need some fresh air—I’ll just get my coat.’

Fresh air? Isabel? Caroline laughed to herself, but if Isabel needed company, why not? She led a lonely enough life and somehow she couldn’t see her sister putting her name down on the Government register for women prepared to work, which was being set up this month.

Beside Isabel, Caroline felt dowdy in her old costume which dragged round her ankles. Isabel’s new walking skirt showed not only her ankles but some of her calves as well. Her neat little boots picked their way daintily over the rough track while Caroline strode ahead in her well-worn ones. She had had quite enough fresh air in the last two weeks without dawdling.

Isabel, she suddenly realised, was looking remarkable pretty this morning, quite her old self again, her fair hair and blue eyes sparkling in the chilly sunshine. She listened while her sister earnestly impressed on her the advantages of the new ‘military curve’ in corsetry, until she grew bored.

‘How is Robert?’

Isabel’s mouth twisted down immediately. ‘Enjoying playing soldiers. Excited at the idea he might be going overseas soon. Never a thought of me.’

‘Surely he’ll have some leave first?’

‘I suppose so. I think he mentioned it in his last letter, in between lamentations that he wouldn’t be able to get to Wimbledon this year.’

‘You don’t seem very enthusiastic about it.’

‘Oh, I
am,
’ her sister assured her. ‘You’ve no idea how dull life is. Organising concerts for Ashden Manor is the most exciting thing I do. Maud is talking about arranging them for the soldiers billeted in Tunbridge Wells. I might even sing there too. She’s a splendid organiser.’

Yes, thought Caroline bitterly. Of everything and everyone. Between Lady Hunney and Mrs Swinford-Browne the whole village was sandwiched, squeezed on both sides. To Isabel, Lady Hunney had been first ‘Aunt Maud’ and now ‘Maud’.

She was becoming uncomfortably aware of a gulf between her and her elder sister brought about by more than Isabel’s marriage. She did not understand her any more. The old Isabel, careless, transparent and laughably selfish, seemed to have given way to a more petulant, determined woman who could no longer laugh at herself.

Frank Eliot’s eyes flickered in surprise, even as he bowed his head, when he saw Isabel. He ushered them into his parlour.

‘I appreciate your taking an interest in the hop gardens, Mrs Swinford-Browne.’

Caroline never knew what to make of Frank Eliot. He had the reputation of being a hard manager, yet stories of individual kindnesses kept circulating round the village, and Phoebe, curiously, would not hear a word said against him. He had a slightly rakish, ungentlemanly appearance, and dressed gaudily, with a brightly coloured cravat that resembled a costermonger’s
scarf. This didn’t help his reputation, Caroline decided, nor did his piercing tawny-brown eyes which had no hesitation in staring at you till they had taken in all they wanted.

‘Not at all,’ Isabel replied graciously. ‘I have already told Caroline I’ll be only too happy to help her organise workers for the hopgardens.’

Caroline tried not to look surprised. It was the first she had heard of it.

‘How kind.’ Frank Eliot was staring at Isabel in a way that suggested to Caroline he was echoing her own amazement.

‘I’ve agreed daily and piecework rates with Mr Swinford-Browne.’ Caroline decided it was time to establish her position. ‘And now I’ll need a list of your requirements, numbers of workers, how many days and which months.’

‘I’ll draw one up, Miss Lilley.’

‘My mother will supply you with a copy of the rota as soon as possible after you let us have your list.’

‘Give me a few days to sort out my own men. Some are still talking about leaving the land to volunteer or go into munitions. I’ll bring the list down to the Rectory, say next Monday, and you can reckon to have three at work next week.’

‘If you let me have the list, Mr Eliot,’ Isabel said quickly, ‘I’ll take it down for you. I could call for it on Sunday, when I’m dining at the Rectory?’

Such thoughtfulness was rare in Isabel. Curiouser and curiouser! Caroline began to feel the gulf between herself and her sister might be more like Alice in Wonderland’s rabbithole.

‘Have you seen the
Courier,
my dear?’

Laurence put his head round the boudoir door, only to find his wife absent. Surprised by his own annoyance at this departure from routine, he remembered she had said something at breakfast about organising the women assigned to potato planting at Owlers Farm. He went down to the morning room to try to find the newspaper. It was an established rule that he should read the
Courier
first. It wasn’t there, and so, he deduced, someone was reading it. The Dibbles had their own copy, but he wasn’t going to ask to borrow it when he had one of his own. George was at school. Caroline and Elizabeth were out … He marched upstairs in search of Phoebe.

‘And where, young woman, is my
Courier?’
he asked as soon as she answered his knock.

She jumped up guiltily. Not only had she taken his newspaper, but she had been sprawling on the bed. ‘Here,’ she said carelessly. ‘I’m sorry, Father.’ Laurence took the bundled heap of newspaper without comment.

After he left, Phoebe, who had gleaned all she needed from the
Courier,
wondered whether she had the courage to go ahead with her plan. She decided she did—only she wouldn’t mention it to anyone just yet.

Returning to his study, Laurence wondered idly what Phoebe had found so fascinating in the newspaper. Mrs Dibble cornered him in the hall.

‘If you please, sir, Mrs Lilley not being here, I’ll have to trouble you for some money. The coalman’s called unexpected.’

Laurence looked at her sharply. ‘He normally submits his account.’

‘I said
unexpected,
sir.’ Her voice was heavy with meaning, by which he gathered the Rectory was being favoured above other residences during the current coal shortage. ‘That’ll be three pounds ten shillings. It’s up again. Thirty-six shillings for the ton of best, and thirty-four for the kitchen. I don’t know what things are coming to.’

Nor did he. Reluctantly Laurence counted out the required one pound notes, wondering if he would ever get used to this paper money forced upon them by war. He was tempted to tell the coalman to take the coal away again, but decided discretion was the better part of valour: if the village persisted in stealing his lumps of coal, he had at least some moral right for turning a blind eye. Nevertheless his conscience remained troubled. Before the war the path of right had been comparatively clearly marked; nowadays it was becoming increasingly overgrown.

But he had no right to be vexed over such trifles as coal and newspapers beside the problems being faced by many of his parishioners. Three had gone in the village already. Quite apart from the personal tragedy, there was the financial aspect. How could a widow support a large family on the meagre five shillings a week pension she would receive? Parish Relief was already stretched to breaking point, and he had to top it up from his own equally stretched income. Swinford-Browne, the
greatest tithe-payer on the Union committee, had vetoed any increase. Elizabeth had pointed out gently that Caroline’s scheme could produce valuable income for the needy. He could only agree, but he still fretted at Elizabeth’s frequent absences from home. He had understood that Caroline would do the running around and Elizabeth work in the Rectory. It seemed he was wrong. His wife was being constantly called out to the village for some emergency or other. At that moment she came through the study door in such high good humour that he felt ashamed of his annoyance.

‘I called in on Nanny Oates on the way back.’

‘And how is she?’ He put his arm round her and kissed her on the mouth, rather to her surprise. ‘When did I last tell you I love you, Elizabeth?’

She smiled. ‘In bed?’ she asked daringly, for Laurence liked to separate the twenty-four hours into compartments and, passionate though he was, he seldom liked to be reminded of it during the day.

‘No,’ he answered gently.

‘Then it was at Christmas. I remember because—’

‘Far too long ago. Why have you not complained?’

‘Because I know you love me, Laurence.’

‘That’s true. I sometimes think—’ He broke off. ‘Tell me about Nanny Oates.’

‘You won’t believe it. She’s determined to help the war effort.’

He broke into laughter. The idea of his once formidable nanny, now in her early eighties and rheumaticky, on the march against the Kaiser, bayonet at the ready, was irresistible.

‘Boadicea put it in her mind,’ Elizabeth was laughing too, ‘and it really isn’t a bad idea.’ All Nanny’s hens were named after English queens, but Boadicea being the earliest queen began the rota, and was always the favourite, closely followed by Berengaria. There had been six Boadiceas so far. ‘When the hens are laying she always gets far too many eggs and has to give them away. So she proposes to go round the village collecting other people’s spare eggs and sell them as well as her own from a stall outside her house.’

Laurence looked at her, assuming she had seen the flaw in this plan. ‘If it’s good laying time then no one will need them.’