South Riding (40 page)

She went by dale, and she went by down.

With a single rose in her hair!”

“What d’you think of that—for seventy-two? I don’t suppose I’ve seen it since I was at school.”

“Marvellous,” he praised her, unable to resist her goodness, her simplicity.

“The lily-white doe Lord Ronald had brought

Leapt up from where she lay,

Dropt her head in the maiden’s hand,

And followed her all the way.

“Are you going to the champagne luncheon?”

She indicated the striped marquee where the committee entertained.

His thin face clouded. The bright spots of colour burned in his cheeks.

“You know they’ve put me on Public Assistance?” he said. “Do you know how I spent yesterday from half-past ten in the morning till four in the afternoon?”

She saw the relevance of his apparently nonsensical reply. She said: “But this is their day. You can’t blame the farmers. They put a brave face on it. But many are having hard times. They make sacrifices for a show day.”

She was thinking of Carne.

“Sacrifices? Champagne lunch? Two shillings for car park, half a crown for the grand stand? Don’t talk to me of sacrifices. Do you know what we did yesterday? Cut down one chap’s benefit from thirty-three and threepence—for man, wife and five children, mark you—to ten shillings—because he had a disability pension of two pounds a week. He lost his leg in the war. He’s had eight operations. He suffers perpetually from neuritis. He says he can feel the kids laughing at him when he can go dot-and-carry-one in the street. He’s terrified of going out on a slippery morning. He’s fallen twice on the stump and it hurts like hell. I tried to make the committee see that his two pounds were a wretched little attempt at compensation for what he suffered when these farmers were taking good care of their skins.”

She sighed. She had more sympathy with his impatience than with the complacency which surrounded her at Willow Lodge. All effort, all urgency appealed to her, but she had learned acquiescence in a hard school, and Astell, though she respected him, was a firebrand, a troubler of the peace.

She said doggedly: “We must have some kind of a check on public spending. The rates are too high already.”

“The rates? Who complains? Carne, Gryson, Whitlaw—the very men who made fortunes out of the war and who now demand wheat quotas and beet bonuses and what all—and get them. They draw their own dole all right under polite names—but it’s the ten shillings a week they call pauperism!”

Life was never simple. The people you most respected scorned each other. Astell’s voice pronouncing “Carne” was a lash of contempt. Jim despised Carne. Sarah Burton disliked him. . . . Why were men and women so blind to real virtue? Emma Beddows changed the subject.

“You know the Shacks, between Kiplington and Maythorpe?”

“I do indeed. A public eyesore and a scandal.”

“I was out there yesterday. Dr. Campbell’s sent one of the Holly children into the fever hospital with measles. I’m getting the Medical Officer of Health to put the camp in quarantine. Those children are all certain to get it. Since their mother died there’s no one but Lydia to look after them, and she’s only fifteen. They run wild. There’s no chance of isolation.”

“That’s the scholarship child.”

“Yes.”

“Miss Burton told me about her. She never should have left school.”

“But that baby? Her father’s so feckless. If they had neighbours who could help—as a matter of fact—there are the Mitchells.”

“The Mitchells?”

Mrs. Beddows explained the Mitchells—their struggle for respectability, their failure, their adored baby, their terror of infection, Mrs. Mitchell’s pregnancy.

“We’ve got to do something for that poor fellow Mitchell. He came to see me when I was leaving the Hollies’ place. ‘She’s half out of her mind,’ he said. ‘And I’m sure I am. We’ve nothing in the house and only fifteen shillings in the post office. My book’s not bringing in ten shillings a week now. I’ve no dole to draw. I was above insurance level. What are we going to do? What shall I do?’ I said, ‘You must do what every one else would do in the same circumstances, Mr. Mitchell. You must apply to the relieving officer.’ ‘That means the poor law,’ he said. ‘That makes us paupers.’ ‘Nothing of the kind,’ I said. ‘It’s public assistance.’ And I urged him to apply for immediate relief. I said I’d speak to Mr. Thompson, the relieving officer. He’s a friend of mine. I’ll see he helps them until the next committee. You see, if we close the camp, they can’t even sell their eggs or bits of lettuce. But when the case comes before the committee, I want you to make things easy for him—a man like that—a five-hundred-a-year-man— it’s hard on him.”

“Isn’t that largely sentiment? Is it really harder than for the others, the skilled artisans, the—? No. All right, I won’t argue. I’ll see what I can do. But it’s the economists you’d better tackle. Carne’s on our committee.”

“Oh, I’ll speak to him. He’s a friend of mine too.”

When she said, “He’s a friend of mine,” she felt the colour deepening in her face, and peace embraced her. For he was her friend. She was going, in a few minutes, to take her seat on the grand stand to watch him jumping. For five years running he had won the Hunter’s Cup with Black Hussar. She loved his triumphs. She might turn the show ground into a lobby where she could canvass help for the Hollies and the Mitchells, but her high moments of the day would be Carne’s jumping.

Gryson called her, waving his stick, and Mrs. Gryson, elegant in pale grey linen. They were on their way to the stand. Wouldn’t she join them? She turned to Astell.

“That’s settled, then?”

“Oh, I’ll do what I can.”

“I know you will.”

She went off towards the stand with the Grysons.

A group of judges with blue rosettes in their buttonholes, flushed and talkative with champagne, left the luncheon tent. Willie and Jim were with them. Emma Beddows realised that Jim had got himself invited in there. His cleverness never failed to astonish her, yet humiliation clouded her pleasure.

She tried not to see him. There were happier sights—the people pressing forward to the grand stand, the county in well-cut tweeds and linens, the farmers’ wives in vivid silks and printed chiffons. The girls that year were wearing organdie muslin—pink and blue and primrose—unserviceable but pretty. There were children licking toffee-apples, and young red calves on their way to the judging ring. The competitors were mounting their horses, grooms leading out thoroughbreds, children on ponies, young hunting women on ladies’ hacks. The hawkers, the stall holders, gipsies, farmers, labourers, the animals, the competitors all boiled and bubbled together like stew in a cauldron, shouting, excited, happy.

A groom was holding the reins of a great black horse as Emma Beddows followed the amiable Grysons. Three men emerged from the marquee and one went forward to the horse, felt the girths, examined the bridle, clapped a hand on the round ebony rump, then put a foot in the stirrup and was up. Emma saw him towering above the people. It was Carne.

She waved, but he did not see her. He was riding slowly away from her through the crowd. Her heart melted with joy and pride in him. He was her friend.

Two men just behind her were discussing him.

“Grand-looking beast.”

“Was.”

“Carne can ride him.”

“Could.”

“Fine chap.”

“Has been.”

The dry laconic damnation of the North.

Emma would have moved away, but the crowd blocked her. They were paying their half-crowns for the grand stand seats. The merciless dialogue continued.

“He’s nowt but a has-been altogether. You can’t keep cup by riding same horse year after year. You can’t keep solvent by never paying your debts. You can’t keep in with county by a marriage twenty-five years ago—especially when wife’s in asylum. You can’t starve a farm for ten years an’ have it.”

“That he hasn’t done. Maythorpe’s stocked well enough. House may be in ruins, but farm’s well enough.”

“Aye—with a monkey in the chimney. If Carne’s not careful, bank’ll sell over his head. They say council wants land for smallholdings.”

“I’ve got the tickets, come along. Can you manage?” asked the polite Captain Gryson.

They climbed on to the stand.

Oh, God, prayed Mrs. Beddows. Let him win. He needs success. Give him this small unimportant victory to cheer him.

She knew that credit in the country depends upon such unsubstantial things. Carne’s stock was down, but a silver cup, a ribbon in his buttonhole, such minor triumphs could restore it. They would give him confidence when he most needed it Lord, let him win.

The Hunter’s Class did not come early in the programme. She had to watch the Children’s Jumping, the smartest turnout for tradesmen, the sheep-dog contest, the four-horse wagons, a superb event, the wagoners driving at a hand gallop down the track and between the stakes that left only an inch or two on each side of the thundering wheels.

It was impossible not to catch one’s breath as they swept rattling past the stand.

At last came the class for hunters, hunted that year with the South Riding hounds.

The first competitor was the young land-agent from Lissell, riding one of Sir Ronald Tarkington’s thoroughbreds—a good performance; but he lost a couple of points at the turf-covered wall.

“Spoiled by the riding. First-rate mount,” said Gryson. He too was a friend of Carne’s; he too was anxious.

The second was old Lady Collier, aunt to the chairman of the governors of the High School. She was so stiff with rheumatism that her groom had to lift her to the saddle. She weighed under eight stones, “and a half of that is corsets and cosmetics,” said her enemies. She had a seat like a circus monkey; but her high silk hat, flowing habit and white gloves gave her dignity, and once up, she was a holy terror. Any man in the South Riding was scared of her. She would cut across any one, go anywhere. Deaf as a post and very nearly blind, she rode the best horses in the country with such ripe experience, such tried and instinctive knowledge of the district, such complete selfishness and unfailing courage, that she could not be beaten.

“She says she’ll die in the hunting field, and no doubt she will,” observed Captain Gryson. “But, by God, she’ll send a score of good men to Heaven first.”

Yet not even he could withhold his admiration when she rode straight at her fences, not hurrying but with an easy lolloping canter, leaving the judgment to her mount, and, now that she rode alone, without the temptation to cut in, making an almost perfect circuit.

“Eighty-three if she’s a day, and tough as wire. She’s game, anyhow.”

She was gone. She trotted out of the ring cheered uproariously. A local legend, she had lived up to her reputation.

The third was an ex-cavalry man, who dashed at the hurdles, the thorn-hedges, the in-and-out and water jump as though he were riding in the Grand National. But his horse refused at the five-barred gate, bucked and threw him ignominously.

Then Carne came. He rode out gravely, slowly, as well aware as his critics that Black Hussar was not the horse he had been. Nor was he the man. Mrs. Beddows leaned forward, twisting her cotton gloves on her knee, and praying. Oh, God! Let him win. She felt her love for him, her desire for his success, flow out towards him as though it were a ray from a lighthouse. She was seventy-two and had lived through disappointments, but she still prayed the wild prayers of desire.

Black Hussar knew his business. Slowly, sedately he started on his round. The crowd, the band, the artificial fences were familiar to him. Nothing would shake his nerve. The water-jump and in-and-out were stiffish, especially to a big heavyweight carrying fourteen stone; but timing, action and judgment all were faultless, and Carne could control his big body to reduce its load to a minimum at any given moment. He never looked behind between jumps; he knew that he was over.

As he came down the central track, his pace was quicker. There was a broad dyke to jump, but that was tolerable. A nasty bank and rails depended more upon experience than power, and he and the black horse both had experience in plenty; yet as he cantered round for the ride home, for the wall and the fence and ditch and the five-barred gate, Black Hussar was already breathing heavily. He was game enough; but this was no longer fun.

The crowd in the grand stand was silent. This was serious riding. Carne had won the cup for five years. There was money on it. A good deal of private betting went on his chances to hold it. They had seen that the farmer was nursing his mount round two-thirds of the course, but now he changed his tactics. Coming up to the wall, he raised his crop and gave the black flank a light cut. The horse started, quickened, and went all out, paused, steadied, then they were over.

“Beautiful,” breathed Gryson. “Beautiful.”

Black Hussar was crashing up to the fence and ditch. His hoofs thundered on the turf; Carne’s face was white and set; his hand with the crop was raised. He was riding right forward on his horse’s neck till he eased off as the mighty haunches crouched back for the spring; the body stretched itself; a great liberation of muscular force convulsed both horse and rider, and they were up and away, over the fence, over the ditch triumphantly.