(11/13) Celebrations at Thrush Green Page 10

'I thought you would be interested,' said Robert. 'It has been wonderful to talk to the old boy, and the celebrations have really given him as great an interest as they have us. I wish he could make the journey, but frankly it is out of the question. Still, as you can see, his mind is as clear as ever, even if he is frail of body.'

  They talked a little longer, then Harold returned to Isobel in the garden, and told her all about this further evidence of Octavius's affection for his younger friend.

  'It's a sad story,' said Isobel. 'Poor Octavius, standing in the snow by the grave of a friend.'

  'It reminded me of the burial of Mozart in a snowstorm,' replied Harold. 'All the mourners turned back, they say.'

  'Well, Nathaniel had some mourners,' comforted Isobel, 'and a private grave, not the common pit that Mozart was thrown into. When you think about it - the shipment home, the decent burial, the sincere grief and the respect that came to both men - it makes a heartening story, not a tragic one.'

  And Harold, seeing the wisdom of this, agreed.

  At Thrush Green school preparations for the Victorian day were going ahead with all the excitement and set-backs that usually accompany a school project.

  Some of the ancient desks had been tracked down and were to be delivered to the school in good time for the first of October. Only the chapel people were slightly less obliging as Bright Hour took place on the Tuesday preceding the great day, and the desks would be needed to support the chapel china and tea urn as usual. However, Mrs Jones, wife of the landlord of the Two Pheasants, said that she would see that the two desks were brought up after Bright Hour, and woe betide any person who stood in her way.

  Alan Lester had no doubt that Mrs Jones would be a reliable assistant in his endeavours, and concentrated on the many other aspects of the celebration.

  As might be expected, the question of costume was the biggest headache. The girls were quite excited and cooperative about their attire, bringing various garments for approval and comparing notes on length of skirts, the necessity for aprons, shawls and so on. It was the boys who were awkward and self-conscious.

  'We shan't half look clowns,' Alan heard one say.

  'Soppy idea,' agreed his companion. 'I reckon I'll stay home that day.'

  It was Bill Hooper who saved the day. The biggest boy in the school, and acknowledged king of the playground, he had also been included in a local junior football team when a player had fallen ill at the last minute. Consequently, Bill was something of a hero, and due deference was paid to him by his companions.

  When the question of the boys' costumes cropped up, he casually mentioned that his grandfather, a tailor in Lulling, was making him a Norfolk suit for the occasion.

  An unusual hush fell upon the classroom, much to Alan Lester's amusement.

  'It's a bit of tweed I chose myself,' went on Bill, amidst stunned silence. 'The gamekeepers over Nidden way used to have suits of it in the old days. That was before the place was sold. My grandpa always helped to make their suits.'

  'I should like to see it,' said Alan. 'It should look very well on you.'

  'If you like,' went on Bill, flattered by the attention, 'I'll wear it to school one day, before October, I mean.'

  'Splendid!' said Alan. 'And that's enough about our costumes. Take out your atlases.'

  From then on there was little complaint from the male members of the school. In fact, there seemed to be mild enthusiasm as spotted neckerchieves and Eton collars were discussed, and the chance of getting someone's hobnail boots was debated.

  All in all, Alan thought, the school was getting truly involved with this portrayal of school life as experienced by their grandparents and great-grandparents in this selfsame building, and when Miss Robinson and the young probationer were heard to say that they proposed to wear stockings with garters instead of their usual tights, he felt assured of the complete success of the great day ahead.

  9. Getting Ready

  SUMMER THAT year was long and very hot, interspersed with violent thunderstorms which flattened much of the corn. Nevertheless, the farmers had an early harvest in a dry spell, and were hard put to find anything much to grumble about.

  As she dressed one August morning, Winnie Bailey looked across the green to the distant fields towards Lulling Woods. In some the golden stubble still gleamed, but already the ploughs had been at work in neighbouring fields, although the corn had only been collected, it seemed, a day or two earlier.

  There were plenty of young pheasants about but, looking at the distant stubble fields, Winnie remembered how plentiful the native partridge had been when she had come as a young bride to live in this same house. Now that the fields had been cleared, sometimes fired, and so quickly ploughed or drilled ready for the next crop, the number of partridge had dwindled. Such a pity, thought Winnie, who had always had a soft spot for these squat plump little birds. She had been told that they mated for life, and that they were exemplary parents. Winnie approved of both constancy and family commitment, and regretted the demise of such charming birds.

  She leant from her window to survey the green. It was the time of day which she most enjoyed, particularly at this stage of the year, when dew was heavy and spangled spiders' webs shimmered on the hedges. Soon there would be mushrooms and blackberries about, and the sharp blue-bloomed sloes which Donald had enjoyed picking for the sloe gin he made every autumn. Soon, too, the conkers would be falling from the horse chestnut trees near by, and already a pale carpet made of the lime flowers and bracts lay under the trees by the church. Albert would not approve, thought Winnie.

  As if on cue, the old man emerged from his cottage door, and stood in his shirt sleeves looking up at the sky, as if daring it to rain. Even at this stage of the day he wore his old greasy cap on the back of his head. Winnie wondered if he wore it at the breakfast table. Even in bed, perhaps?

  She heard Jenny moving about in the kitchen and, idle conjectures shelved, went downstairs to join her.

  With the school holidays in full swing, there was little that Alan Lester could do in the way of preparing for the school's part in the celebrations.

  The timetable for the Victorian day had been devised and rehearsed for timing and effect. A number of relics had been collected, including several of the original desks and some splendid old photographs of classes of the 1890s which people had lent, and which Alan proposed to hang round the walls. It was interesting to see how many of the boys, and the girls, too, had close-cropped heads. Fashion, wondered Alan? Or, more practically, prevention of head lice? Possibly the aftermath of ringworm?

  The girls all appeared to have worn white pinafores, black stockings and laced or buttoned boots. The boys' costumes were more varied: Norfolk jackets, jerseys with collars, coats and trousers obviously handed down from larger brothers, and here and there an Eton collar gleaming among the subfusc ensemble.

  There were one or two ragged children to be seen, but on the whole, Alan thought, studying those long-dead faces through a magnifying glass, they appeared to have been a sturdy lot, toughened by plenty of exercise tramping to school and field work for the bigger boys whenever the local farmer was in need of extra hands.

  Perhaps country children had always had a slightly easier life than their town contemporaries. Alan remembered his father telling him about barefoot boys, fighting over half a loaf, whom he had seen in the dockyard area of the city where he had lived as a child. In those bleak streets there were no apples to scrump, no blackberries on hedges, no young turnips to pull secretly from a field's edge, and too many sharp eyes looking to catch a wrongdoer.

  Looking across the green from his study window, he could see his two daughters playing with their school friends by the swings near the church. All the children were laughing, their hair streaming in the wind, their teeth and eyes gleaming, their limbs straight and strong. They might have been a different race altogether from the crop-headed few who gazed from the old photographs.

  Indeed, thought Alan, there were many reason
s for celebration.

  ***

  Down at Barton-on-Sea Dorothy and Agnes were also looking forward to the Thrush Green celebrations.

  They were busy with jam-making, for their two plum trees, thriving in the hot summer, had produced a bumper crop, and although Agnes was not over-fond of plum jam, Dorothy had insisted on making as much as they could.

  'It's so useful for bazaars and things,' said Dorothy, bustling about with jam jars and little waxed discs which fluttered to the kitchen floor in profusion. 'You know how pleased the vicar was with that redcurrant jelly I made. "Ruby red", he called it. "Ruby red, and a real jewel." I thought it most apt.'

  Agnes, standing over a hot stove, doing her best to fish out plum stones with a spoon, to be deposited on an old enamel plate steaming near by, thought it was a jolly sight easier making jelly than trying to catch elusive plum stones, the present task, which Dorothy had allotted her. She did her best to put this unworthy thought aside, and Dorothy's next words helped a little.

  'I always start thinking of the new school year at about this time,' said Dorothy, rescuing some jam-pot covers from the floor.

  'So do I,' agreed Agnes.

  'And I must say, I really relish the thought of not having to go back,' added Dorothy.

  'I'd rather like to,' confessed Agnes, pursuing a particularly slippery stone. 'The new babies were so sweet.'

  'You were always so patient with the newcomers,' said Dorothy. 'I must admit that I really could not have coped with the reception class - all those tears and trips to the lavatories. No, I like them rather more mental and a little less physical. What on earth is that cat doing?'

  The two ladies suspended their operations to gaze down at Tim, who was under the kitchen table. To their horror they saw that the cat had his paw firmly on a small and terrified mouse.

  'Timmy,' said Dorothy, in her headmistress voice. 'Take that thing outside.'

  The cat growled.

  Dorothy snatched up the washing-up mop, and bent down. 'Timmy, be reasonable!' she adjured the animal. 'We simply can't have a mouse in here, it's unsanitary.'

  'Insanitary,' corrected Agnes automatically, 'and in any case Tim might get splashed with hot jam. And the mouse too, for that matter.'

  Dorothy, red-faced, straightened up. 'This is no time for humanitarian nonsense,' she puffed. 'Let's just shoo both of them outside.'

  She opened the door into the garden and Agnes, abandoning her jam, bent down to persuade Tim to relinquish his captive.

  In true cat fashion, he strolled casually away to the open door, and the mouse fled to take refuge under the refrigerator.

  'Really!' said Dorothy, much exasperated. 'How typical! Now we shall have the impossible task of getting that mouse out.'

  Agnes took charge. 'I'm turning the heat down, and making us coffee. Leave the door open, dear, and it's bound to run out eventually. It's time we had a rest in the sitting-room.'

  There was a thump at the front door, and Dorothy went to collect the letters.

  By the time they were ensconced in the peace of the sitting-room, with their coffee and post, the friends were calm again.

  'Look,' said Dorothy, holding up a card. 'It's a proper invitation to the school on 1 October.'

  'I've one, too,' said Agnes. 'How nice of Alan Lester to send separate ones!'

  'Very extravagant,' said Dorothy, taking a biscuit, but she sounded pleased, and they began to discuss their plans for the journey, and the all-important problem of what to wear.

  Out in the kitchen a quaking mouse emerged from its hide-out and made a dash for the fresh air.

  From his perch on the sunny rooftop of the garden shed, Tim ceased to wash his paws and watched the mouse with a languid eye.

  Really rather a bore, this mousing, on a hot morning.

  The new school term at Thrush Green began in the usual back-to-school weather of cloudless skies and warm sunshine, causing much irritation to those who had spent a great deal of money taking a holiday on the rainswept coasts of this island or, even worse, at the far more expensive and even more weatherbeaten resorts overseas.

  The first priority was, of course, the final preparations for the great day.

  Alan Lester, as an experienced head teacher, had no doubt that all would go well on the day. He also knew that there would be untold hazards to overcome before the dawn of 1 October.

  Bill Hooper, true to his word, appeared a week or two before celebration day resplendent in his tweed Norfolk suit. His schoolfellows were duly impressed, and he strode round the classroom amidst awe and admiration.

  There was no doubt about it: Bill's unseen grandfather still knew how to cut and sew, and Alan blessed him for smoothing his path on this occasion, for although no other boy could aspire to such sartorial perfection, at least they all looked forward to parading in garments which they would have scorned before Bill's and his grandfather's initiative.

  The girls had been enthusiastic about their dressing-up from the first. Alan and Miss Robinson had planned the general look of the rooms, and had been almost overwhelmed by the amount of bric-à-brac sent in by parents and well-wishers.

  But a hindrance to progress had been Mrs Gibbons.

  From the first, Alan had realized that her position on the Parent-Teacher committee would give her every excuse for interfering, and he was prepared.

  It was unfortunate that the lady took to entering the schoolroom unbidden to make her suggestions and criticisms. Alan Lester knew, as well as she did, that any confrontation before the children put her at an advantage, and he was quick to point out that it was not convenient to discuss plans during school hours.

  'I simply wanted to have a look at the setting,' protested Mrs Gibbons, waving a hand. 'I had an idea which I think could improve the early part of the proceedings. It concerns the piano, and the children marching to their places.'

  'That is already arranged,' Alan told her, with one eye on two giggling girls at the back of the class. 'Miss Robinson and I have been into it thoroughly.'

  'But have you chosen the hymns? I have been looking through Hymns Ancient and Modern and Songs of Praise—'

  Here Alan led her firmly to the door.

  'I really cannot discuss it now. I will telephone you after school and perhaps we can talk about things then.'

  'We certainly will,' replied Mrs Gibbons emphatically, and went, seething, into the lobby.

  There had been one or two other visitations, but on the whole she kept her attacks until after school hours. They ranged from strong disapproval of the sort of food the children would bring to school for their Victorian snack, to the fact that the whole school would go to the church service on the morning of 1 October.

  'I feel quite sure,' she told Alan, 'that the chapel children would never have entered St Andrew's. It is quite wrong that they should go on this occasion.'

  Alan explained, as patiently as he could, that this particular act of worship had nothing to do with the Victorian day celebrations, but was a contribution by the school — a Church of England school, he emphasized — to the general honouring of Nathaniel Patten and Octavius Fennel.

  The lady, though still antagonistic, gave way grudgingly.

  'It will be rather a relief,' said Alan to his wife, as he replaced the telephone, 'to get back to the humdrum of daily teaching when these celebrations are over.'

  One morning towards the end of September Charles Henstock received a letter which gave him surprise and delight.

  It was beautifully typed on crisp white writing paper and the address was embossed, something which the rector rarely saw these days.

  It read:

  Dear Mr Henstock,

  I wish that I could accept your very kind invitation to the festivities at Thrush Green on / October, but ill-health prevents me from travelling.

  My young friend Robert Wilberforce has kept me informed of the plans to honour Mr Nathaniel Patten and my kinsman the Reverend Octavius Fennel. I have followed the proposals wi
th great interest, as you may imagine.

  I understand that it is hoped to send a donation toward the building of an extra room at the African mission school, and should like to contribute. Robert Wilberforce is attending your celebrations, be tells me, and I shall entrust him with my donation then.

  I shall be with you in spirit on i October and feel sure that all your endeavours will be successful.

  Yours sincerely,

  Frederick Fennel

  Half an hour later, Charles rang Harold to tell him about the proposed donation.

  'That's most kind of him,' said Harold, 'and will be very welcome. I must admit, Charles, that contributions are not coming in as I had hoped, despite your note in the parish magazine.'

  'I felt that might be the case,' said Charles. 'There are so many claims on people's purses, and charity begins at home, of course.'

  'Naturally, and I believe that our school fund is receiving more support than Nathaniel's, which, I suppose, is only to be expected. I feel rather a fool, though, looking back at all the high hopes I had of raising a goodly sum for Nathaniel.'

  'Don't worry,' Charles said. 'There's still time.' But was there?

  'By the way,' added Harold, 'a warning! Mrs Gibbons has a new idea for adding to the glory of the great day, and may be coming to tell you about it.'

  'Oh dear!'

  'Oh dear, it certainly is. She thinks it might be nice to have large photographs of Nathaniel and Octavius propped up on their graves in Thrush Green churchyard during the celebrations. The Gauleiter would be glad to make the enlargements from the photographs we have.'

  'The Gauleiter?'

  'Sorry. I mean Mr Gibbons. Just my facetious name for him.'

  'But I don't like the idea at all,' cried Charles pathetically.

  'Neither would anyone else,' Harold assured him. 'I told her that she was trying to turn an English country churchyard into an Italian cemetery.'

  'Oh dear,' repeated Charles. 'Was she offended?'

  'Very!' said Harold, with intense satisfaction.