(4/13) Battles at Thrush Green Page 13

  'That was good, Winnie dear,' she said thankfully, replacing her empty cup. 'I don't usually bother with tea.'

  'Did you bother with lunch today?' asked Winnie, emboldened by the improvement in her guest's condition.

  'Well, no. To tell the truth, I was a little upset yesterday, and didn't sleep last night.'

  She stopped, took off her glasses and began to polish them with the hem of her petticoat. Without her spectacles, Winnie noticed, her face seemed very small and vulnerable. A short-sighted child might look like that, bewildered and questioning.

  Winnie said nothing. She was determined not to pry into Dotty's troubles. She knew about the impending court case and suspected that this breakdown might have something to do with it. But somehow, it was not in keeping with Dotty's habitual chirpiness. She had given no sign, over the last few weeks, of caring deeply about the affair. It was odd that she should collapse now.

  Dotty accepted her second cup of tea and stirred it slowly, her eyes on the dancing flames.

  'I went to see Mrs Cooke yesterday,' she began. 'At Nidden, you know. The mother of the child who swerved in front of my car.'

  'I know,' said Winnie.

  Dotty put down her cup, and began to tell Winnie the whole appalling tale. The anxiety, the daily bulletins, the horror of the child's relapse, the possibility of the boy dying, of taking another's life – it all poured out, until the dreadful climax was reached of Mrs Cooke's blood-chilling cry of 'Murderess!' which had haunted poor Dotty ever since.

  'And so you see why I was in church, Winnie. I simply had to tell someone. Someone I could trust. Living alone does tend to make one exaggerate one's fears and I wouldn't stay in the house a moment longer.'

  'You did the right thing,' Winnie assured her. Dotty's fingers were pulling her handkerchief this way and that in her agitation.

  'And now I've burdened you with it,' cried Dotty distractedly. 'You won't ever tell anyone, will you, Winnie dear? I couldn't bear Thrush Green to get wind of my shameful fears.'

  'No one will learn anything from me,' Winnie promised. 'And you know, Dotty, we all have fears, and I'm beginning to realise that we must accept them and not feel ashamed of them.'

  She went on to tell Dotty about her own nervousness at night-time in the house, and how difficult it seemed to overcome it. As she spoke, she noticed that the handkerchief was put away, that Dotty was nodding agreement, and drinking the second cup of tea, engrossed in someone else's troubles now.

  'Perhaps I could come and sleep here,' said Dotty eventually, 'at least for a bit, until you feel better about things.'

  'I shouldn't dream of allowing you to,' said Winnie. 'If you can cope alone, down at Lulling Woods, which is far more remote than this place, then I can too. I shall get used to it in time, but what I'm trying to say, Dotty, is that it does no good to torture oneself with guilt and shame simply because one has fears. We're right to have fears about some things; evil, for instance, and violence and lying, and I'm not going to add to my misery by feeling ashamed of my loneliness. I am lonely now, but it will pass. You are desolated now by what might occur, but that will pass too.'

  Dotty sighed.

  'What a comfort you are, Winnie.'

  'I don't know about that, but you've certainly cheered me by giving me your company.'

  Dotty stood up and began her usual disjointed quest for her belongings.

  'Must you go so soon?'

  'I really must. I feel so much better for the tea and sympathy. Where's my raincoat? And did I have a scarf?'

  Winnie piloted her old friend into the hall, and helped her into her raincoat.

  'Would you like me to walk back with you?'

  'Not in this rain, Winnie dear. I promise you that I shall be quite all right now.'

  'Then you must borrow the umbrella. No hurry for its return. It's an old one of Donald's that lives in the porch here for just such a downpour.'

  Dotty, accepted the umbrella, but before putting it up, she gave Winnie a rare kiss.

  With something of her usual jauntiness she set off down the path. Beneath the great umbrella her thin legs in their wrinkled stockings splashed purposefully through the puddles.

  Winnie watched until she vanished from sight across the darkening green, and the closed the front door and began to bolt and bar ready for the long night.

  Twenty miles away, in the children's ward of the county hospital, the doctor on duty sat on Cyril Cooke's bed.

  The boy was sitting up. His flushed face was between the doctor's two cold hands. They strayed over the cheeks, behind the tousled hair, and massaged the glands behind the ears and down the neck.

  The child winced.

  'Ever had mumps?' enquired the doctor.

  Cyril, never a garrulous boy, was even less articulate in his present pain. He shook his head.

  'Positive?'

  He nodded, and emitted a squeak of agony.

  The doctor stood up.

  'Well, son, you've got 'em now,' he said laconically. 'See to him, nurse.'

  Part Three

  The Outcome of Hostilities

  15 The Sad Affair Of The Bedjacket

  THE cold dry weather continued. Most nights there was frost, blackening the few remaining dahlias and stripping the last of the leaves from the trees.

  'Do you think we might get a white Christmas?' asked Charles Henstock of Harold.

  'No good asking me, my dear chap. Most of my Christmases were spent with the air conditioner going full blast, and the sweat still running down my back.'

  'It does seem extraordinary,' ruminated the rector, 'how mild the winters are these days. I haven't been skating for years.'

  'Skating?' Harold looked at his friend with new respect. 'Can you really skate?'

  'Good heavens, yes? Most of us older folk can, you know. I learnt on Grantchester Meadows. A splendid chap from Durham taught me. He was up at Cambridge with me. I often wonder what became of him. He took part in an arctic expedition – that I do know – because he used to practise paddling his kayak on the Cam, mostly upside down. He loved it.'

  'Paddling upside down, or skating?'

  'Both really. He loved life – a great capacity for enjoyment. I think of him often, especially in cold weather.'

  'And you think we might get some at Christmas?'

  The rector sighed.

  'I suppose not. It will be mild and muggy, I expect, and everyone will tell me the weather will make a full churchyard.'

  He stopped. His chubby face began to pucker with concern.

  'And that reminds me. I really came to tell you that there is a special meeting of the parochial church council at the rectory on the twenty-second. Can you manage it?'

  'Of course,' said Harold.

  'Seven thirty, as usual.'

  'I was afraid so,' replied Harold. 'I'll have an egg to my tea, as they say up north.'

  'And a very sensible idea too,' responded Charles. 'I shall suggest it to Dimity. An empty stomach produces a lack of concentration, I find.'

  'In me,' said Harold, 'it produces the most extraordinary noises.'

  'You don't think,' said Charles, 'that this business is likely to go on for years? I really want to get things started. I read only the other day of a similar affair concerning a churchyard in East Anglia where controversy has continued for eighteen years.'

  The rector turned troubled blue eyes upon his friend.

  'Eighteen years!' he repeated. 'Can you bear to think of it, Harold? Why, I shall no doubt be among the blessed dead myself, if we take that time.'

  'At least you wouldn't be worrying about it,' pointed out Harold reasonably.

  On the last day of term, little Miss Fogerty carried her attaché case with extra care to school.

  It contained two presents. One for Miss Watson, and a smaller one for the detestable Miss Potter.

  Miss Fogerty had had mixed feelings about the presents, and was ashamed that she had harboured them. Never before had she felt anything but
unalloyed pleasure at giving dear Miss Watson a Christmas present. This year, she had begun to wonder if she would give her one at all after the pain she had caused her during this most unpleasant term.

  But the knitted bedjacket had been started last summer, long before Miss Potter arrived on the scene. The pattern was intricate, involving sixteen rows to each feather-and-shell design. Executed in pale pink three-ply wool it had taken Miss Fogerty many hours of fiddling work – and some of unpicking – to complete the garment, and even now she had her doubts about the scalloped edges to the collar and the width of the much-too-expensive satin ribbon which ensured modesty.

  It should have been a labour of love. It started that way. It was in November, when the first sleeve was begun, that Miss Fogerty started to wonder if Miss Watson really deserved such efforts. She told herself that such thoughts were unworthy of a practising Christian, and continued to knit. But the thoughts intruded many times before the bedjacket was pressed and wrapped in Christmas paper.

  However, she told herself as she hurried along to school, this was the season of goodwill, and Miss Watson would really appreciate her handiwork. It gave her a comfortable glow to think of her headmistress sitting up in bed reading, snugly embraced by the pink woolly.

  As for Miss Potter, well – at Christmas one must be generous. A box of good linen handkerchiefs, bought at the church bazaar, accompanied the bedjacket, wrapped in similar Christmas paper but with a slightly smaller tag and a slightly more formal message. Privately, Miss Fogerty thought, the girl was very lucky.

  Miss Fogerty put her attaché case on her desk and lifted out the two parcels. She carefully opened one end of Miss Watson's parcel to assure herself that the bow was uncrumpled. At that moment, Miss Potter entered.

  'Brought your spencer?' she giggled, peering over Miss Fogerty's shoulder, in the rudest fashion.

  Miss Fogerty closed the parcel swiftly.

  'I fail to see anything funny about spencers,' she responded. 'But for your information I have not had occasion to wear mine as the weather has been so mild.'

  Miss Potter had the grace to look slightly abashed. To tell the truth, she had been under the impression that such garments went out with Queen Victoria. That they were still winter wear at Thrush Green only confirmed her view that her present abode was abysmally behind the times.

  Miss Fogerty produced the box of handkerchiefs and a creditable smile, and wished her young colleague a merry Christmas.

  'Crumbs!' ejaculated that lady. 'Do we do all this present-giving? I haven't done anything about you or Miss Watson. But thank you very much,' she added hastily. 'I'll keep it till Christmas Day. We put all our presents round the tree, you know.'

  The clanging of the hand bell announced that Miss Watson was in charge of the playground that day, and the two teachers hurried out to marshal their charges.

  What with one thing and another, Miss Fogerty did not get the chance to give her headmistress the present until school was over. For one thing, Miss Watson was in the playground most of the time. Then the children were unusually boisterous, and there had been two infant puddles caused by pre-Christmas excitement (and still no sign of the emergency knickers, an unsolved mystery!), with the added complication of Albert Piggott's cat which had taken it into its head to explore the premises during the reading of 'The Tale of Mrs Tiggywinkle', thus distracting the children's already wayward attention.

  Recognising defeat, Miss Fogerty had allowed the children to give it half a bottle of school milk in the saucer lately occupied by mustard and cress, which the poor animal lapped so ravenously that, as she suspected, it was obvious that Piggott neglected it. Only when it had consumed half a digestive biscuit, the end of a ham sandwich, and a piece of chocolate pressed upon it by its doting hosts, did the animal settle to sleep by the tortoise stove and allow Miss Fogerty to resume her reading. Even then, she was exhorted to:' Read soft, miss!' in case she disturbed the intruder.

  The children had streamed home. Albert Piggott's cat, carefully wrapped in someone's scarf, was accompanied by a dozen well-wishers although, as Miss Fogerty had pointed out, the cat knew its own way home and would probably prefer to make the fifty-yard journey on foot.

  Miss Potter put her head round the door and called: 'See you next term! Happy Christmas!' in a perfunctory manner, and promptly vanished, and Miss Fogerty and Miss Watson were, at last, alone in the building.

  Miss Fogerty, back to her usual warm-hearted self in these familiar circumstances, put the parcel on Miss Watson's desk and stood back, smiling.

  'Oh, Agnes dear, how very kind!' exclaimed the headmistress. 'And what pretty paper! You are always so clever about finding something that little bit different.'

  Her eyes were sparkling. Miss Fogerty's hard thoughts had long ago vanished. The spirit of Christmas warmed her.

  'Can I open it now, Agnes? I can never bear to wait until Christmas Day. I'm sure it's something wonderful.'

  She began to undo the paper, Miss Fogerty watching indulgently. Just like a child, she thought, the same excitement, the same lovable impatience! Dear Miss Watson!

  By now the parcel was opened and Miss Watson began to lift up the creation.

  'Another bedjacket,' she cried with delight.

  'Another?' quavered Miss Fogerty faintly.

  'And what a beauty!' gabbled Miss Watson, struggling valiantly to cover her slip. 'Did you do all this wonderful work yourself, Agnes dear?'

  But Miss Fogerty was still stunned by the blow.

  'You've had another bedjacket?' she queried, bemused. 'This Christmas? Another one?'

  'Just a little thing from my brother,' said Miss Watson, torn painfully between Truthfulness and Kindness-to-Others, and attempting to sound airy at the same time. It was just such a situation, she thought desperately, that could bring on a stroke.

  'It could never mean to me what this perfect present does, Agnes, I assure you! To think that you did every stitch – with your own hands!'

  Not that she would have done every stitch with anybody else's hands, of course, thought poor distracted Miss Watson, but really, what could one say for comfort? Agnes looked positively shattered.

  'How long did it take you?' she pressed, stroking the satin bow.

  'I began it in June,' replied Miss Fogerty. She still sounded dazed.

  'Come and have a cup of tea,' urged Miss Watson, 'before you go home. I'm afraid I haven't wrapped your present yet, Agnes dear. End of term, you know.'

  'I must go,' said Miss Fogerty, as though in a trance, 'I too have a lot to do. I go away tomorrow.'

  'Then I shall walk round this evening, if I may,' said Miss Watson. 'I shan't be leaving here until Christmas Eve. There is a Meeting Extraordinary of the Parochial Church Council on the twenty-second,' she continued importantly, 'so I shall stay to see that through.'

  Little Miss Fogerty did not appear to hear her. She went blindly to her room, picked up her case and handbag, and walked out of the school door.

  Behind her, sorely upset, Miss Watson set about wrapping the bed jacket with shaking hands.

  ***

  Cold with shock, Miss Fogerty scuttled home through the dusk to her lodgings. She should never have said it! Never! Not even if she had received ten, twenty – nay, a hundred – bedjackets, she should never have uttered that dreadful, cruel, unforgivable word 'ANOTHER!'

  To think of the hours, the weeks, the months of constant love – well, almost constant love, conceded Miss Fogerty honestly – which had gone into that bedjacket! And how had it been greeted? With admiration? With gratitude? Not a bit of it. It was 'Just Another Bedjacket'!

  She could imagine the brother's 'little thing', of course. Some splendid quilted article, no doubt, of pure silk, possibly trimmed with swansdown, and costing as many guineas as she earned in a month's teaching. Oh, it was easy to give something splendid if one had a great deal of money, as she knew Miss Watson's brother had, but how much more worthwhile was her own hand-knitted beauty! Or so most p
eople would think, Miss Fogerty told herself, putting her key in the lock. But not Miss Watson evidently! The pink bedjacket might be used for second-best, when the brother's superior article was at the cleaner's possibly, but that's what Miss Watson would think of it. Second best! Another bed jacket!

  'Don't bother with a meal for me, Mrs White,' she called to her landlady. 'I'm catching the evening train after all.'

  Equally unhappy, Miss Watson wandered about her school house suffering bitter remorse. Unable to face even her usual cup of tea, she watched the clock, determined to call at eight upon Agnes. By then she should have finished her meal and perhaps be feeling less upset.

  Dear, oh dear, thought Miss Watson, struggling into her coat, what a trial life was! She picked up the parcel which she had just wrapped. To the original present of Yardley's lavender water she had felt the need to add a box of Yardley's lavender bath cubes, providentially given to her by her cousin. There was something to be said for undoing one's Christmas presents as they arrived, she thought, as she smoothed the wrapping paper.

  She walked through the darkness, across Thrush Green, still in a severe state of self-flagellation.

  Why on earth had she said such a stupid thing? Why couldn't she simply have said: 'A bedjacket'? Why 'Another bedjacket'? Why let slip that perfectly idiotic unnecessary, wounding word? Really, it made one wonder if the devil were still at large, popping such monstrous words into one's mouth! And how to explain? How to comfort poor Agnes? How to comfort herself? It was the sort of ghastly thing which would haunt her on sleepless nights; another to be added to those gaffes over the years which had power to torment her even though they had been committed over twenty years earlier.

  Mrs White answered her knock.

  'May l see Miss Fogerty, please?'

  'Oh dear, you've just missed her,' cried the landlady. 'She left for the station half an hour ago.'