The Caxley Chronicles (39 page)

Pale-pink sticks of rhubarb with yellow topknots, the first pullets' eggs and bunches of primroses graced the market stalls. People were buying bright packets of flower seeds and discussing the rival merits of early potatoes. Felt hats were brushed and put away on top shelves, and straw ones came forth refurbished with new ribbon and flowers.

In the wide fields around Caxley the farmers were busy drilling and planting. Dim lights shone from lonely shepherds' huts as lambing continued. Along the hedges the honeysuckle and hawthorn put out their rosettes and fans of green, among the tattered tassels of the hazel catkins, and hidden beneath, the blue and white violets gave out the exquisite scent of spring from among their heart-shaped leaves.

Bertie, driving his mother to Beech Green one spring afternoon to visit her sister Ethel Miller, noticed the encouraging sights and sounds with a great sense of comfort. He always enjoyed being in this familiar countryside and remembered the long bicycle rides which he and the Howard brothers took when these same lanes were white with chalky dust and most of the traffic was horse-drawn.

It grieved him to see the new estates going up on the slopes flanking Caxley. People must be housed, but the gracelessness of the straight roads, the box-like structures packed too closely together, the narrow raw strips of gardens and the complete lack of privacy, saddened him. He would hate to have to live in a house like that, he thought, passing one garishly-painted one with a board outside saying:
SHOW HOUSE
, and he guessed that many future occupants would feel the same way, but be forced by circumstances to make the best of a bad job. It seemed to Bertie that for so little extra cost and care something lovely might have been built upon the fields he remembered, to give pleasure and pride to the dwellers there as well as to the town as a whole. As it was, this new development, in Bertie's opinion, was nothing but an eyesore and, as a block of houses embellished with moulded concrete weatherboarding came into view, he put his foot heavily on the accelerator to reach the sanctuary of leafy lanes beyond, unaltered since his boyhood.

It was good to arrive at the old farmhouse. Nothing seemed to have changed in the square panelled room which the Millers still called 'the parlour', and through the windows the copper beech, pink with young leaf, lifted its arms against the background of the mighty downs. Only such an observant eye as Bertie's would notice significant details of a fast-changing way of farming. Sacks of chemical fertiliser were stacked in a nearby barn. Strange new machinery had its place beside the old
harvest binder which Bertie remembered his Uncle Jesse buying at a distant sale. Jesse's sons, it seemed, were abreast of modern methods.

The two old ladies gossiped of family affairs. There had been a letter that morning from Joan in Dublin.

'She's invited Edward to visit them later in the summer. That's the best of having a hotel, isn't it?'

'It could work both ways,' Bertie pointed out, amused at his mother's matter-of-fact approach. 'Suppose all your relations wanted to come for the summer. You wouldn't make much profit, would you?'

'Don't be tiresome, dear,' said his mother automatically, in the tone she had used ever since he could remember. Bertie smiled, and sampled his aunt's gingerbread in contented silence.

'Will he go?' asked Ethel. 'Who knows? He might meet a nice Irish girl.'

'Heaven forbid, Ethel! We've had quite enough mixed marriages in our family as it is!'

'They're not
all
Catholics over there,' said her sister with asperity. 'I know very well that quite a few of them arc Christians.'

'You mean
Protestants,
surely, Aunt Ethel,' put in Bertie mildly. The old lady looked at him frostily and then transferred her gaze to her sister.

'That boy of yours, Hilda,' she observed severely, 'interrupts his elders and betters even more than he used to.'

'I'm so sorry,' said Bertie with due humility, and sat back with his gingerbread to play the role of listener only.

But, driving home again through the thickening twilight, Mrs North said:

'You musn't mind what Ethel says, dear.'

'I don't, mamma,' replied Bertie calmly.

'She's getting old, you know, and a little peculiar in her ways.'

Bertie was about to say that Ethel was some years younger than she was herself, but had the sense to hold his tongue.

'Fancy suggesting that Edward might marry an
Irish
girl!' There was an outraged air about this remark which amused Bertie. If Aunt Ethel had suggested that Edward was considering marriage with an aborigine, his mamma could not have sounded more affronted.

'Irish girls are quite famous for their charm and good looks,' said Bertie. 'But I don't think you need to worry about Edward. No doubt he can find a wife when he wants one.'

'If ever!' snapped old Mrs North shortly. Bridling, she turned to watch the hedges flying by, and spoke no more until Bertie deposited her again at Rose Lodge.

The invitation to Ireland pleased Edward mightily. He missed his sister Joan, for despite their promises to visit each other, various reasons had prevented them from meeting and it was now eighteen months since they had seen each other.

Business affairs would keep Edward ceaselessly engaged for the next two or three months, but he promised to cross to Ireland during the last week of August. It would be his first visit to a country which had always intrigued him. He hoped, if he could arrange matters satisfactorily at the factory, to go on from Dublin to see something of the west coast. He looked forward eagerly to the trip.

When the time came he set off in high spirits. He was to make the crossing from Holyhead to Dun Laoghaire, and as the train rattled across Wales, Edward thought how little he knew of the countries which marched with his own. The war had fettered him, and for the last few years London had claimed him, apart from the occasional business trip abroad. Catching glimpses of Welsh mountains, and tumbling rivers so different from the placid Cax of home, he made up his mind that he would explore Wales and Scotland before he grew much older.

He slept soundly during the night crossing, and awoke to find the mailboat rocking gently in the great harbour of Dun Laoghaire, or Kingstown, as the old people at home still called it. Beyond the massive curves of the granite breakwaters, the little town basked in the morning sunshine. Gulls screamed above the glittering water. A maid twirled a mop from a window of the Royal Marine Hotel. A train, with a plume of smoke, chugged along the coast to Dublin. Edward's first glimpse of Ireland did not disappoint him.

He breakfasted aboard before meeting Joan and Michael who had driven the seven miles from Dublin to meet him.

'You both look younger—and fatter!' cried Edward with delight.

'It's Irish air and Irish food,' replied Joan. 'You see! You'll be twice the man at the end of your holiday.'

There was so much news to exchange on the drive to Dublin that Edward scarcely noticed his surroundings; but the soft, warm Irish air on his cheeks was strange and delicious.

Michael's father had died recently but his mother still made her home with them. Edward found her a gentler edition of his
grandmother North, with some deafness which rendered her endearingly vague. Sarah, not yet two years old, with red curls and a snub nose, flirted outrageously with her uncle from the instant they met. She was in the care of a good-looking young nursemaid whose broad Irish speech Edward found entirely incomprehensible. She was equally incapable of understanding Edward, and for the duration of his stay they relied on smiles, and occasional interpretation from the family, for communication.

The hotel was small, but well-placed in one of the quiet streets near Stephen's Green. Joan and Michael worked hard here and the business was thriving. Edward explored Dublin, mainly on his own, browsing at the bookstalls along the quays by the River Liffey, and admiring the hump-backed bridges which crossed its broad waters. Michael took time off from his duties to show him Trinity College, not far from the hotel, and Edward thought that the vast eighteenth-century library, its sombre beauty lit by slanting rays of sunlight, was one of the most impressive places he had ever seen.

On the third morning Joan received a letter which she read at the breakfast table with evident satisfaction.

'She can come. Isn't that good?' she said to her husband.

'Maisie Hunter,' she told Edward. 'She's staying with an aunt in Belfast and said she would come down if she could manage it. She's arriving tomorrow by train.'

Although Edward liked Maisie, he felt a slight pang of regret. He was so much enjoying his present circumstances in this new place and among the friendly people who always seemed to have time to stop and talk with a curious stranger. At the moment he was content to forget Caxley and all its inmates.
He chided himself for such selfishness and offered to meet Joan's friend at the station.

'Take the car,' said Michael. 'She's bound to have a mountain of luggage.'

But all Maisie carried were two neat matching cases when Edward first saw her, in the distance, stepping from the train. She was thinner than he remembered her, and her brown hair, which used to hang to her shoulders, was now short and softly-curled. It suited her very well, thought Edward, hurrying to meet her. Her obvious surprise delighted him.

'I'd no idea you were here! What a nice surprise.'

Her smile was warm, lighting up her sun-tanned face and grey eyes. No one could call Maisie Hunter a beauty: her features were not regular enough for such a description, but her skin and hair were perfect, and she had a vivacity of expression, combined with a low and lovely voice, which made her most attractive. Edward was now whole-heartedly glad to see her again.

'I've had a standing invitation to visit Joan,' she explained, as they drove towards Stephen's Green, 'and this seemed the right time to come. My aunt has her son and daughter arriving for a week's stay. But I didn't realise that I was interrupting a family reunion.'

Edward assured her truthfully that they were all delighted that she had come, and constituted himself as guide on this her first visit to Dublin.

'A case of the blind leading the blind,' he added, drawing up outside the hotel. 'But it's amazing how ready people are to drop what they are doing and take you wherever you want to go. Time stands still over here. That's Ireland's attraction to me.'

'You know what they say? "God made all the time in the world, and left most of it in Ireland." Now, where's my goddaughter?'

The next two or three days passed pleasantly. Edward and Maisie discovered the varied delights of Phoenix Park, revelling in the long walks across the windy central plain, watching the fine racehorses exercise and the little boys flying their kites in the warm summer breezes.

It was Michael who suggested that they took his car and set off to explore the western part of Ireland.

'I've a good friend who has a little pub on the shores of Lough Corrib,' he told them. 'There's no such modern nonsenses as telephones there, but tell him I sent you. He'll find room for you, without doubt, and the views there will charm your hearts from your breasts.'

Michael, waxing lyrical in the Celtic fashion, always amused Edward. Ireland was the finest place in the world, Michael maintained, and it was a positive sin not to see as much of its glories as possible during Edward's short stay. Persuaded, the two set out in the borrowed car, promising to return in a few days.

Edward had envisaged hiring a car and making this journey on his own. He had secretly looked forward to this solitary trip, stopping when and where he liked, sight-seeing or not as the mood took him. But now that he had a companion he found that he was enjoying himself quite as much. They were easy together, sometimes talking animatedly, sharing memories of Caxley characters, or sometimes content to relax in silence and watch the rolling green fields of Ireland's central plain slide past.

The welcome at 'The Star' was as warm as Michael had promised. It was a small whitewashed pub, set on a little knoll above the dark waters which reflected it. The sun was setting when they arrived, and long shadows streaked the calm surface of the lake. Edward thought that he had never seen such tranquillity. His bedroom window looked across an expanse of grass, close-cropped by a dozen or so fine geese, to the lake. Here and there on the broad waters were islets, misty-blue against the darkening sky. Moored against the bank were three white skiffs, and Edward made up his mind to take one in the morning to explore those secret magical places fast slipping into the veils of twilight.

But now the welcome scent of fried bacon and eggs came drifting from below, and he hurried down, trying to dodge the low beams which threatened his head, to find Maisie and their waiting meal.

Their brief holiday passed blissfully. They explored Galway and made a trip to the Aran Islands in driving rain, and lost their hearts, just as Michael said they would, to the sad grey-green mountains and the silver beaches of Connemara. But it was the waters of Lough Corrib, lapping beneath their windows at night and supplying them with the most delicious trout and salmon of their lives, which had the strongest allure.

On their last day they took a picnic and set off in the boat to row across to one of the many islands. Maisie was taking a turn at the oars and Edward, eyes screwed up against the dazzling sunshine, watched her square brown hands tugging competently and thought how much he would miss her. He
had been happier in her company than he would have thought possible. He tried to explain to himself why this should be. Of course they had known each other, off and on, for almost ten years, so that they had slipped into this unexpected companionship with perfect ease. And then there was no tiresome coquetry about the girl, no playing on her feminity. She had tackled the long walks, the stony mountain tracks, and the quagmires too, with enthusiasm and with no useless grieving over ruined shoes. He remembered an occasion when they descended a steep muddy lane beside a tiny farm, lured by the distant prospect far below of a shining beach. Out of the cottage had run a stout Irishwoman who threw up her hands in horror to see their struggles through the mud.