(9/13)The School at Thrush Green Read online

  The School at Thrush Green

  Thrush Green [9]

  Miss Read

  Houghton Mifflin (T) (1987)

  Rating: ★★★★☆

  Tags: England, Country Life, Country Life - England, Pastoral Fiction, Primary School Teachers

  Englandttt Country Lifettt Country Life - Englandttt Pastoral Fictionttt Primary School Teachersttt

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  From Publishers Weekly

  The latest Thrush Green novel by the prolific, pseudonymous "Miss Read" will undoubtedly satisfy those who enjoy simple and undemanding narratives largely about, and from the perspective of, the elderly. Having reached their 80s, the two village primary-school teachers Dorothy Watson and Anges Fogerty decide to retire and buy a new home at Barton-on-Sea. Dorothy alarms Agnes by determining to take driving lessons and Agnes disconcerts Dorothy by adopting a cat. Introducing a cast of stock village characters, the author pokes gentle fun at their foibles while tacitly disapproving of permissive child-rearing and the messily self-indulgent lives of the younger generation. Miss Read's worldwide popularity in translation is understandable in view of the clarity of her prose. Beneath the deceptive simplicity, however, there is arch humor and perceptive character analysis. Goodall's illustrations, having been culled from earlier novels, occasionally strike a slightly discordant note.

  Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

  Product Description

  When two beloved primary school teachers, Miss Dorothy and Miss Agnes, decide to retire, the townspeople are aflutter, musing about the teachers’ replacements and seeking an appropriate farewell gift.

  The School at Thrush Green

  Miss Read

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  Illustrations by John S. Goodall

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  HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY

  Boston • New York

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  First Houghton Mifflin paperback edition 2008

  Copyright © 1987 by Miss Read

  All rights reserved

  For information about permission to reproduce

  selections from this book, write to Permissions,

  Houghton Mifflin Company, 215 Park Avenue South,

  New York, New York 10003.

  www.houghtonmifflinbooks.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Read, Miss

  The school at Thrush Green

  I. Title

  PR6069.A42S36 1988 823'.914 88-9329

  ISBN 0-395-46108-1

  ISBN 978-0-618-88442-1 (pbk.)

  Printed in the United States of America

  DOC 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

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  To

  Betty and Vic

  with love

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  Contents

  Part One Time To Go

  1 Rough Weather 3

  2 Dorothy Watson Takes Steps 16

  3 News Travels Fast 27

  4 Spring Plans 39

  5 Personal Problems 52

  6 What Shall We Give Them ? 64

  Part Two Battling On

  7 Spring at Thrush Green 79

  8 Cat Trouble 91

  9 School House For Sale 103

  10 The Accident 116

  11 Decisions 126

  12 Viewing the School House 139

  13 Bingo Gossip 150

  Part Three Journey's End

  14 Trying Times 165

  15 Agnes Is Upset 176

  16 A Trip to Barton-on-Sea 187

  17 Summer Heat 199

  18 An Intruder 213

  19 The Drought Breaks 223

  20 Last Days 235

  Part One

  Time To Go

  1. Rough Weather

  'JANUARY,' said Miss Watson, 'gives me the jim-jams!'

  She jerked the sitting-room curtains together, shutting out the view of Thrush Green.

  Firelight danced on the walls of the snug room, and shone upon the face of her friend Agnes Fogerty as she placed a log carefully at the top of the blazing coals.

  The two ladies had lived in the school house at Thrush Green for several years, and had been colleagues for even longer. It was a happy relationship, for each middle-aged teacher felt respect and affection for the other.

  In most matters Dorothy Watson, as headmistress, took command. She was a forthright and outspoken woman whose energy and enthusiasm had enriched the standing of Thrush Green school. As mistress of the school house she also took precedence over her companion when it came to any domestic decisions, and Agnes Fogerty was content that it should be so.

  It was not that she always agreed with her headmistress's actions. Beneath her mouse-like appearance and timid ways, Agnes held strong views, but at this moment, with Dorothy's opinion of January, she entirely agreed.

  'At its worst today,' she said. 'And the children are always so restless in a strong wind.'

  A violent gust threw a spattering of rain against the window at this point, and Miss Watson sat down in her armchair.

  'Must blow itself out before morning,' she said, taking up her knitting.

  All day Thrush Green had been buffeted by a howling gale and lashing rain. Rivulets rushed along the gutters and cascaded down the steep hill that led to the nearby town of Lulling. The windows of the stone Cotswold houses shuddered in the onslaught. Doors were wrenched from people's grasp, umbrellas blew inside out, and the chestnut trees along one side of the green groaned and tossed their dripping branches in this wild weather.

  It had made life particularly exhausting for the two schoolteachers. Every time the classroom door opened, a score of papers fluttered to the floor pursued by delighted children. A vase of chestnut twigs which little Miss Fogerty was nurturing in order to show her children one day the fan-shaped young leaves and the interesting horseshoe-shaped scars where the old leaves had once been, was capsised by a sturdy infant intent on rescuing his drawing.

  The ensuing chaos included a broken vase, a miniature Niagara down the front of the stationery cupboard, a sodden copy of The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin from Agnes's own library, and a great deal of unnecessary mayhem which was difficult to suppress.

  Through the streaming windows the two teachers, in their respective classrooms, had watched the inhabitants of Thrush Green struggling to go about their daily affairs.

  Mr Jones, landlord of The Two Pheasants hard by, had lost his hat when he was staggering outside with a heavy crate of beer cans. He pursued it, with a surprising turn of speed, across the grass, where it came to rest against the plinth of Nathaniel Patten's statue.

  Molly Curdle, who lived in a cottage in the garden of the finest house on Thrush Green, home of the Youngs, wheeled out her bicycle, and little Miss Fogerty was anxious on her behalf as she wobbled away townwards. Surely it was highly dangerous to cycle in such wicked weather! But then Agnes remembered that she had heard that Molly's father, Albert Piggott, the surly sexton who lived only yards from the school, was in bed with bronchitis and perhaps Molly was off to get him some medicine. No doubt his wife Nelly could have fetched it, but perhaps she too was ailing? With such conjectures are village folk made happy.

  It was certainly a relief to be in the comfort of the school house at the end of such an exhausting day, and the fire was burning comfortingly.

  Agnes opened a crack in a large piece of coal with an exploratory poker. A splendid yellow flame leapt out and she surveyed it with pleasure.

  'I often think,' she mused aloud, 'that it must be trapped sunshine.'

  'What is?' enquired Dorothy, lowering her knitting.

  'Flames from the coal. After all, coal comes from very ancie
nt forests, and it stands to reason that the trees must have seen sunshine. And when, after all these millions of years, we crack the coal - why, there it is!'

  Dorothy, who was not given to such flights of fancy, considered Agnes's theory for some minutes. It might not be scientifically feasible, but it was really rather poetic.

  She smiled indulgently upon her friend. 'It's a nice idea, dear. Now what about scrambled eggs for supper?'

  Molly Curdle, tacking along Lulling High Street in the teeth of the gale, was indeed going to fetch some medicine for her father.

  What a problem he was, thought Molly! Every winter now, it seemed, he had these spells of bronchial coughing. His second wife Nelly could not be said to neglect him. Her cooking was as splendid as ever. Albert was offered luscious soups, casseroles, roasts, pies and puddings in abundance.

  Nevertheless, thought Molly, swerving to dodge a roving Sealyham, it was a pity she was not at home more often. Nelly was now a partner in The Fuchsia Bush, a flourishing cafe in Lulling High Street, and her duties took her out from the house soon after eight in the morning, and her arrival home varied from five to seven o'clock.

  Not that you could blame Nelly, Molly commented to herself. She could never really take to this step-mother, far too fat and vulgar for Molly's taste, but at least she took good care of Albert and not many would do that for someone as pig-headed as her father. This job at The Fuchsia Bush gave her some respite from Albert's constant moaning, and her salary was now the mainstay of the Piggott household.

  By now she had reached the chemist's shop, and tried to lodge her bicycle against the kerb, but the wind made it impossible. She wheeled it across the pavement and leant it against the shop window.

  'Not against the glass, please,' said a young woman peremptorily, and Molly pushed it wearily a few paces along to a brick pillar.

  The chemist's assistant, resplendent in a white coat, watched smugly from the shelter of the door. When she caught sight of Molly, whose face was almost hidden in a sodden headscarf, her mood changed.

  'Why, Moll, I never knew it was you! Come on in. You're fair soaked.'

  Molly recognised a schoolfellow, Gertie, who had shared her desk at one time at Thrush Green school.

  'I've come to get Dad's cough mixture. Doctor Lovell's given me a chit.'

  She followed the snowy coat towards the back of the shop. It was marvellous to get out of the raging wind, and she was glad to sit down on a high stool by the counter.

  'I'd have thought your ma could have come in for this,' observed the girl. 'She's only a few doors down the street.'

  'She has to be at The Fuchsia Bush dead early. Long before Doctor Lovell's surgery opens. Anyway, he's my old dad. I don't really mind.'

  The girl handed the prescription through a hatch behind her, and settled down for a few minutes' gossip.

  'And how's Thrush Green then? I'm in one of them new houses behind the vicarage here. Don't get up your way often.'

  'Much the same. The Two Pheasants is doing well. My Ben likes his job, Anne, my youngest, goes to play school, and our George is doing well with Miss Fogerty.'

  'She still there? I heard as she and Miss Watson were thinking of retiring.'

  'Well, that's been on the cards for some time, but they're both still at the school.'

  'Proper bossy-boots that Miss Watson,' said Gertie, blowing some dust from a row of first-aid tins.

  The hatch opened behind her, and a disembodied hairy hand passed out a large bottle. Gertie took it, the hatch slammed shut, and Molly looked in her purse for money.

  'Hope it does the trick,' said Gertie. 'I'm not saying it will cheer him up, Moll. We all know him too well for that, don't we?'

  Molly smiled. As a loyal daughter she had no intention of agreeing with this barbed remark, but nevertheless she knew it had the ring of truth.

  People in Lulling and Thrush Green knew each other too well to be deceived, and there could be no hidden secrets in such a small community.

  Whether this was a good thing or not, Molly could not say, but she pondered on the problem as she set out again through the twig-littered street to her home at Thrush Green.

  Meanwhile, Albert Piggott looked gloomily about his bedroom. Beside him on a small table stood a glass of water, a medicine bottle containing the last dose of cough mixture, a tin of cough lozenges, so strong that even Albert's beer-pickled tongue rebelled at their potency, and an egg-cup containing his wife's cure-all for ailing throats and chests, butter, sugar and lemon juice mixed together. At least, thought Albert grudgingly, Nelly's stuff tasted better than the rest.

  He could hear the familiar sounds of pub activity going on beyond the window. The clattering of crates, Bob Jones's hearty voice and the occasional crash of the bar door made themselves heard above the roaring of the wind in the trees surrounding the churchyard opposite his cottage.

  If only he were that much fitter he would damn well get out of this damn bed, and have a pint with the rest of them! But what was the use? Any minute now Molly would be in to fuss over him, and that dratted doctor had said he'd call. Trust him to come if he ever tried to go next door! He'd read the riot act if he even found his patient out of bed, let alone abroad!

  Albert remembered his old mother had always maintained that doctors waited around the corner until a hot meal was dished up, and then they knocked at the door to create the maximum confusion within.

  It was a hard life, sighed Albert. Here he was, for at least another week, living on slops, and not the right sort either. And then, he supposed gloomily, he would not be fit for cleaning the church or tidying the churchyard for weeks after that.

  It was a good thing Nelly brought home a decent pay packet at the end of each week. His own earnings had halved over the last year, and if he felt as wobbly as he did now, what hopes of work in the future?

  He pondered on his wife. True, she was no oil-painting, and had a temper like old Nick himself at times, but she still cooked a good meal, and brought in the money.

  And heaven alone knew how important that was these days, with the price of a pint going up so alarmingly.

  Doctor Lovell finished his surgery stint, and battled his way to his car, case in hand.

  January was always a beast of a month, he mused, setting the windscreen wipers going, but this year it seemed more detestable than ever.

  He decided to visit a family at Nidden before coping with the Thrush Green round. Chicken-pox was rife, and he was concerned about the year-old baby of the house who had seemed unusually listless when he had called the day before.

  He planned to get back about midday to see Albert Piggott and one of his patients in the recently built old people's home, known as Rectory Cottages, on Thrush Green. With any luck he should be in time to have lunch at home with Ruth his wife.

  The lane to Nidden was awash. Sheets of water flowed across its surface, and the ditches each side of the road were full. Heaven help us if it freezes, thought John Lovell.

  The gale had brought down scores of small branches, and one large one which lay more than half-way across the road. It could cause an accident, and the good doctor drew into the side of the road, and emerged into the howling wind.

  The branch was sodden and heavy. His gloves were soon soaked and covered with slime, and it was hard work lugging the awkward object to a safer place on the grass verge. By the time it had been dragged out of everyone's path, John was thoroughly out of breath, and glad to return to the shelter of his car.

  'Too much flab,' he said aloud, fastening his seat belt across the offending flesh. He would have to cut down on the helpings of delectable puddings Ruth made so well.

  The hamlet of Nidden seemed to have suffered even more severely than Thrush Green. A chicken house lay on its side in one of the gardens. A bird-table was askew in another, and a plastic bucket rolled about in the road. Somebody's tea towel was fluttering in a hedge, and the wind screamed alarmingly in the trees above.

  He wondered if the mo
ther of his patients would hear his knocking above the bedlam around him, but she must have seen him arrive for the door soon opened, admitting a swirl of dead leaves into the hall.

  'Come in, doctor. I'll be glad to see the back of January, I can tell you!'

  'Won't we all,' responded John Lovell.

  It was later than he had hoped when at last he returned to look in on Albert Piggott.

  Molly had just taken up a tray with a bowl of soup, a slice of bread, and some stewed apple for her father when they heard the doctor's tread on the stairs.

  'Just like my old ma always said,' grumbled Albert, putting the tray to one side. 'Waits till the grub's ready, then the blighters come.'

  'And how's the patient today?' asked John entering.

  'None the better for seeing you,' replied Albert. 'I was just goin' to have me bit of dinner.'

  'Well, I shan't keep you two minutes,' said the doctor. 'Just want to listen to those wheezy tubes again.'

  'I'll go and keep the soup hot,' said Molly, vanishing with the bowl.

  Albert bared his chest reluctantly.

  'You're a lucky chap to have two good women looking after you,' said John, adjusting his stethoscope.

  'No more'n they should do,' growled Albert. 'I've done enough for them in me time.'

  The doctor applied his instrument to Albert's skinny chest.

  'Cor! That's perishing cold!' gasped his patient. 'Enough to give a chap the pneumonics.'

  The doctor smiled, as he went about his business. How long now, he wondered, since he first encountered this most irascible of his patients? A fair number of years, before he had married Ruth and settled so happily at Thrush Green.

  'You'll do,' he said at length, buttoning the old man's pyjama jacket. 'You could do with a shawl or cardigan round your shoulders. There's a fine old draught from that window when the wind's in that quarter.'

  'Can I get up then?'