The Flowering Thorn Page 6

  When the last throb had died away, leaving all still again, she took out the big key and pushed it into the lock.

  “I don’t like this place,” said Patrick suddenly.

  From the sound of his voice she knew the tears to be near: but no impulse to console awoke in her, only a faint shiver of revulsion. A crying child, a dark house.…

  “I don’t like it either,” said Lesley.

  The door gave under her hand, they were over the threshold. From a blackness deeper than the night’s, and far colder, the dim proportions of walls and furniture gradually emerged. (Where was the electric light switch? To the left or to the right?) What with fatigue, darkness and excitement, Pat’s tears, the only sound in that unnatural silence, were rapidly overwhelming him.

  “Be quiet, Pat,” said Lesley coldly. A deep and secret antagonism hardened her voice and her heart. To the pressure of his body against her side she deliberately denied response.

  And now the light leapt out under her fingers, so that they were suddenly standing in a strange room. It was hideous, neat and dusty, and the clock did not go.

  Part II

  CHAPTER ONE

  About four centuries before the invention of cottage architecture, someone built the White Cottage. That there were ever any ground-plans is extremely doubtful: rather is it to be supposed that one day in the late sixteen hundreds a man and a boy went with spades, paced their distances, and began to dig without further deliberation. They dug well: like oak-trees the outer walls took surface-level at scarcely less than their middles. But it also seems probable that the boy paced the south side and the man the north, for the rectangle they drew was not a true one; all the floors ran together a little, and no corner was absolutely square. By the great brick chimney, of course, they cannot be judged: it bears unmistakable signs of rebuilding, and indeed could scarcely have smoked so badly for three centuries without someone laying a hand to it. The barn, too, dated from a good deal later, wood-built throughout and beamed with quartered tree-trunks: men had worked on the place from generation to generation, until when Lesley Frewen took it the amenities included an outside lavatory and a substantial tool-house. But none of the builders, one felt, had been professionals; they were all just men who could build a bit, and with an amateur’s self-distrust they had each of them made sure and built solid. From without at least the effect was not unpleasing: the cottage squatted down like a hare in its forme, close-pressed against the earth and friendly to the apple-trees.

  Once over the threshold, one might have been in Brixton.

  “Brixton, darling?” echoed Elissa, making her first call over the new telephone.

  “But exactly, darling,” Lesley assured her. “The wallpapers have chrysanthemums on them.” With a conscious effort she flicked her voice to irony. “And there’s a lot of stuff I think must be rep—it’s got bobbles all round the edge.”

  “Darling! How terribly funny! Is there an aspidistra?” asked Elissa greedily.

  Lesley glanced over her shoulder.

  “No, but there’s a coloured picture of two cats sitting under an umbrella. And a china mug—this is perfectly true, darling—with ‘A Present from Margate’ on it.”

  “My dear, you mustn’t alter a thing,” said Elissa, audibly impressed.

  “I’m not going to. It’s only temporary, thank God. When are you coming down to the house-party?”

  “Darling, but the minute you invite me! Only not perhaps this week or next, because I’ve rather a lot on.… And then of course it’s June, which is always hopeless. But I’ll see you soon, darling.…”

  Lesley hung up the receiver and went to the window. Outside in the orchard a couple of Walpole pigs were grunting round the apple-trees, but the technique of chasing them away was utterly beyond her. Patrick was out there too, thumping up and down with a bean-pole between his knees: she looked at him with an intensity of dislike so nearly bordering on hatred that her own features, could she have seen them at that moment, would have seemed completely strange to her. And even without seeing, it was as though she guessed: for in all their enforced companionship she never once spoke to him without consciously masking her face. It was a hatred to be ashamed of, ignoble and unjust: but she did not love him the more for making her ashamed.

  Nor was there anything endearing—for so variously does hatred feed—in the fact that half-an-hour later it would be time for his bath: which meant that water would have to be drawn from the well, poured into the copper, bailed out again, and finally thrown away. With a deep and passionate conviction she reflected that it wasn’t worth it.

  ‘In any case, it’s only his face and hands,’ thought Lesley. ‘There’s enough for that in the kettle.…’

  As once before, her spirit wavered. To give in, to let things slide, to be ruled, if only for an hour, by the weary body instead of the exacting mind! … And then as once before, from some deep and unexpected reserve, she found either courage or obstinacy to set her teeth and hold on. On the table with the telephone lay her heavy gloves. Lesley picked them up and went out to the well.

  2

  The first week was a pure nightmare of laying fires, drawing water, driving out pigs, making beds, washing-up and wrestling with the Primus: a squalid domestic turmoil, during which Lesley gathered only the vaguest notions of her general surroundings. At the bottom of Pig Lane, she was aware, lay the main thoroughfare of High Westover: half street, half square, with the Three Pigeons on one side and the Post Office on the other. The Post Office was simply a cottage with a notice-board, the Three Pigeons a late Victorian edifice of bright yellow brick; and neither of them lent the least picturesqueness to an essentially uninteresting view. From the other end of the square a road ran slanting to the church and Vicarage, which could also be approached across country from Pig Lane: but this Lesley did not expect to do. There was always, of course, the possibility of a Parochial visit, those impertinent descents which loomed so large in the conversation of Aunt Alice; but Lesley felt confident that by a little judicious atheism, or at any rate by a little judicious incivility, she would be perfectly able to nip them in the bud. In the meantime, however, the days went by and the only callers were a remarkably saturnine postman, and Arnold Hasty the constable, who appeared very early one morning to ask if she had lost a small white-and-tan terrier.

  “No, I haven’t,” snapped Lesley, with her wrists in the washing-up water. “I don’t keep a dog.”

  “Ah,” said Arnold reflectively, “then it wouldn’t be yours, then. I just thought it might.” He smiled at her bashfully; he was as young as a duckling. Lesley pulled out a meat-dish and began to swab it vigorously.

  “Well, if you should be wanting eggs,” said Arnold suddenly, “my mother’d be very pleased to let you have them.”

  “Thank you,” said Lesley, “but I’m getting everything from Town … good morning.” And that was the end of Arnold.

  Apart from that one visit she spoke to no one at all except Patrick and Florrie Walpole, a handsome red-haired slattern, who supplied the cottage milk. Patrick, she believed, talked occasionally to the pigs. For bread Lesley telephoned to Aylesbury, where a baker named Twitchen offered to deliver twice a week, and punctually on the Wednesday morning a van arrived from Fortnum and Mason and decanted her first order: an attractive selection of ready-cooked foods, rusks for Patrick, and a small piece of bacon for angels on horseback. That same afternoon, the state of the kitchen becoming at least noticeable, she realised with a shock of dismay that in addition to the duties already enumerated it would also be necessary to scrub, sweep, dust and polish. For three days she did so; and at the end of the first week, with roughened hands and aching shoulders, came to the reluctant conclusion that she would have to get help.

  ‘Some local woman’ she thought, ‘who can come in in the mornings, do the heavy stuff, and then clear out again. She can draw water, lay the copper, keep the Primus clean, wash up—all that sort of thing.’ The picture grew attractive. ‘And re
ally if she can cook,’ thought Lesley, ‘it’s going to be quite possible.’

  From this hopeful conclusion, however, the next step was not so simple as might have been imagined. The village of High Westover supported no registry office, and Lesley had a shrewd idea that most business of that kind was probably transacted through either the Post Office or the Vicarage. The dilemma thus presented—between Church, so to speak, and Home Office—was sharp indeed: to apply to the former, without at least some show of civility, was obviously impossible: but the ice once broken, what might not result? Invitations to tea, quite possibly, followed by questions and advice and conversation about Girl Guides.… The Post Office, on the other hand, was a Government Department, impersonal and aloof: so after getting her own breakfast for the eighth time in succession Lesley put on her hat, confined Patrick to the orchard, and walked down Pig Lane to Rose Cottage. There was a notice-board in the porch with a good deal of varied information about wireless licences, foot-and-mouth disease, how to join the Army; over the door itself, in clear official lettering, the words ‘High Westover Post Office’ stood boldly forth. Her mind now almost completely at ease, Lesley pushed open the door and walked in.

  It was not nearly so impersonal as she had wished.

  Of the two little girls presumably in charge, one was nursing a baby, the other peeling potatoes. They did not stop to parley, however, and at the sudden (and apparently unexpected) sight of a customer at once jumped up and disappeared through an inner door. Thus abandoned—though presumably not for long, for she could hear their cry of “Father” all down the garden—Lesley turned her attention to the Post Office itself. There was a counter, a yard or two of grill—all the paraphernalia, in fact, that the public demands; but there was also a red plush overmantel, a down-at-heel rocking-chair, and half the stock of a small general store: from a brief inspection of whose leading lines Lesley gathered that the village in general wore strong cotton underwear and suffered from constipation. Before there was time to go further, however, the inner door opened again, and she had a confused impression of several newcomers all trying to see through at the same time. But only the Postmaster came in.

  “Good morning, Ma’am,” said the Postmaster, so huskily that Lesley wondered how on earth he managed the telephone.

  “Good morning,” said Lesley: “I’m Miss Frewen, from the White Cottage. Do you know of any reliable woman who could come and work for me?”

  “Mrs. Sprigg,” replied the Postmaster, without the least hesitation. “She’d suit you nicely.” He masticated.

  A trifle taken aback by such readiness, Lesley elaborated.

  “I want someone who can manage all the rough work of the cottage, and possibly cook a little. If you think Mrs. Sprigg can do it, you’d better tell her to come up and see me.”

  The Postmaster nodded: and suddenly, as though he had at last succeeded in disposing of some impediment, his voice rang like trumpets.

  “Agnes! Agnes, when could Mrs. Sprigg go up’n see Miss Frewen?”

  With the extreme promptness that apparently characterised the whole establishment, the door flew open and Agnes joined them.

  “Eleven o’clock before dinner or one-thirty after, whichever Miss Frewen says.”

  “Eleven o’clock, then,” snapped Lesley, not to be outdone: and returning to the cottage sat down to await the interview. The unwarranted repose was extremely grateful to her; and though feeling determined to sift, with the extreme of domestic perspicuity, all Mrs. Sprigg’s qualifications, it is nevertheless worthy of notice that she made no attempt to wash up.

  3

  At eleven o’clock precisely (and thus earning a good mark for punctuality) Mrs. Sprigg arrived. She was considerably older than Lesley had expected, with brown, bright eyes, very thin wrists and ankles, very large hands and feet: and in short resembled nothing so much on earth as an aged but still active shrew-mouse.

  When they had done looking at each other, Lesley repeated her incantation.

  “I want someone who can do all the rough work, Mrs. Sprigg, and if possible cook a little. Do you think you could manage it?”

  “Plain cooking I can,” admitted the shrew-mouse warily. “But I wouldn’t want to be ’ere at dinner-time, because I got my own lot to give it to. But I could leave it ready p’raps, and then come back afterwards to clear.”

  “What time would that be?” asked Lesley, with a lift of her eyebrows. One didn’t want her there at all hours!

  “Oh, not more’n two o’clock or so,” said Mrs. Sprigg surprisingly. “My boy, ’e gets ’ome at ’alf-past twelve; and in the morning I could get ’ere just before eight.”

  “And your wages?”

  Behind the bright shrew-mouse eyes passed a flicker of speculation.

  “A shilling an hour, Miss Frewen, according to how long I work.”

  Lesley hesitated. In all her life she had never before been in the position of directly employing labour. Taxi-men, of course: but that was different. One hired taxis by the fraction of an hour, not for two or three hours a day; they did not cook one’s meals or handle one’s crockery. A question suggested itself.

  “When could you begin, Mrs. Sprigg? Could you stay now and wash up?”

  “I’ll just run back and get my apron,” said Mrs. Sprigg, rising to her feet; and with a slight shock of surprise Lesley realised that everything was settled. Already, indeed, the old woman looked remarkably at home: her glance travelled frankly round the room, but rather to recognise it, it seemed, than to discover.

  “You’ve been here before, perhaps?” hazarded Lesley.

  “Deary me, yes!” said Mrs. Sprigg. “My cousin Annie died ’ere. What time will you want breakfast, Miss Frewen?”

  “Half-past eight,” Lesley told her: and was about to give detailed instructions when they were interrupted by a loud galloping sound outside the window. It was young Patrick, mounted on his bean-pole: and with a ridiculous tremor Lesley took the plunge.

  “This is Patrick Craigie, Mrs. Sprigg, who lives with me.”

  Just as Uncle Graham had done, Mrs. Sprigg glanced swiftly from Lesley’s black to Patrick’s flaming hair.

  “Sturdy, ain’t ’e?” she said approvingly. “There’s nothing like the country for children. I s’pose that means porridge?”

  “Porridge or cereal, bread-and-butter, jam or honey, a glass of cold milk,” said Lesley expertly: and felt herself for the second time go up in the other’s estimation.

  “And tea for yourself, Miss, or will it be coffee?”

  “Black coffee, a glass of orange juice and very thin toast—that’s all.”

  Mrs. Sprigg nodded intelligently.

  “Half-past eight then, porridge and the usuals for Patrick, coffee ’n toast for yourself,” she recapitulated. “It don’t seem much, do it, to get through the morning? But there, I s’pose each stomach knows its best.” She gathered herself together and rose to go, opening the door on such a blaze of sun that Lesley too stepped out and accompanied her to the gate. On the way they were again crossed by Patrick, lusty on his hobby horse.

  “It’s my belief, all men are villains at ’eart,” said Mrs. Sprigg.

  CHAPTER TWO

  One spring morning about three weeks later an odd thing happened. In spite of the difference in their menus Lesley and her young charge generally finished breakfast about the same time: at which point Patrick disappeared into the orchard and Lesley pushed back her chair to continue looking at The Times. On this particular morning, however, and while she was perusing the third leader, her left and unoccupied hand absently reached out across the table and took a piece of Patrick’s bread-and-butter. With equal absence of mind, she then proceeded to eat it.

  The slice and the leader finishing together, Lesley shook out the paper and turned to Drama: in a few seconds the same thing happened again. The plateful had been a large one, the slices thick, for Mrs. Sprigg believed in cutting a good lot of bread-and-butter first thing in the morning and then letti
ng Patrick go at it all through the day: but even so, before she came to the end of the book reviews, Lesley had appreciably altered the massive outline.

  It was pure absence of mind, of course, no more and no less: with a slight self-consciousness Lesley rearranged the pile to something like the original symmetry and went out into the garden.

  Two mornings later there was a strong smell of bacon.

  On the threshold of the sitting-room—for she had just been taking a short pre-breakfast stroll—Lesley paused and sniffed inquiringly. The smell seemed to be strongest near the table, and on the table was a covered dish.

  “Mrs. Sprigg!” called Lesley.

  Like a weather-beaten but still cheerful cuckoo the head of Mrs. Sprigg appeared through the hatch.

  “Mrs. Sprigg, why have you been cooking bacon?”

  “Because it never seemed to get eaten,” said Mrs. Sprigg.

  It was one of those answers whose logic, though so palpably absurd, is almost impossible to invalidate: and Lesley let it pass. She even ate the bacon. For though the old woman’s shortcomings were many and various, a second visit to the Post Office had revealed a complete dearth of female labour for a radius of ten miles. (The Postmaster, as it happened, was Mrs. Sprigg’s cousin by marriage; but this of course Lesley did not know.) The old woman, moreover, was not without her points: she didn’t mind Patrick—in fact she seemed almost to like him: she drew any amount of water; and she was also able, without apparent effort, to drive Walpole pigs in any required direction.

  “But I’ll just step in on my way ’ome, all the same,” she promised, “and give that old ’Orace a piece of my mind. If ’e can’t keep his pigs on ’is own ground you can ’ave the law of ’im, Miss Frewen, and that’s what I’ll say you’re going to do.”