Winter in Thrush Green Read online

  'I'm so very sorry,' said the rector. 'We had no idea of this, naturally.'

  'Do you know his address?' asked Harold practically. Mrs Mulloy's face took on a mutinous look, and the rector spoke hastily.

  'You see, we've come such a very long way, and I have to be back tonight ready for my Sunday services tomorrow. It would be so kind of you if you would tell us where he is. We might be able to see him if he is not too far away.'

  The woman's face softened as she looked at the rector's cherubic countenance. The man need have no fear, thought Harold watching her, of not having any charm over women. It's partly that child-like look and partly his genuinely kind heart, he decided, content to leave the negotiations in his friend's competent hands.

  'He's left me for a low common woman I wouldn't demean myself to speak to,' burst out Mrs Mulloy. 'He's at her house now, no doubt. Two miles up the valley, and the name is Taylor. It's a farmhouse. Anyone will tell you.'

  She stopped suddenly, and the rector saw that her eyes were wet.

  'Does he provide for you?' he asked.

  'Not a penny,' she said bitterly. She was talking to the rector as though no one else were present, and Harold sat very quietly. 'I'm to go to court next week.'

  'How do you manage?' said the rector.

  'I've got a job at the big house. Dulcie comes there after school for her tea, then we come home. I don't go Saturdays, unless I'm wanted specially.'

  'I see,' said the rector. He put the letters in his pocket, and held out his hand. 'We won't worry you any further, Mrs Mulloy,' he said. 'But I think we will try to see your husband, while we're here. I will write to you, if I may, when I return, and perhaps I can be of some help. I hope so.'

  The woman held his hand trustingly and gave him a watery smile. Harold rose to make his farewells and they made their way through the kitchen to the bleak garden. Dulcie was cutting up cabbage in a business-like way with an enormous fierce-looking knife. The scene quite terrified the rector.

  'Here,' said Harold firmly, at the door, 'buy something for the little girl from me.'

  'Thank you, sir,' said the woman, almost sketching a bob, as she took the note. 'And I hope you both have a good journey back.'

  'How brave of you to give her money outright like that,' said the rector, when they were back in the car. 'I just couldn't do it!'

  'You did the real dirty work,' answered his friend. 'She'd have told me nothing. Now let's go and find the malefactor.'

  The farmhouse, by Cotswold standards, was a humble affair. It consisted of a two-storey box, which had once been white-washed, with a grey slated roof. A jumble of outhouses, made of corrugated-iron and rough timber, clustered at its side, and the sound of animals could be heard coming from them. They drove the car up a steep track, axle-deep in mud, as near to the house as was possible, before picking their way on foot to the front door. A black and white sheepdog, tied to a post with a stout rope, barked hysterically at them, standing on its back legs and pawing the air in its frenzy.

  Before they had time to knock, the door was opened by a young woman with a cigarette in her mouth.

  'Yes?' she asked shortly, squinting at them through the smoke that curled into her eye. 'You from the insurance?'

  Harold Shoosmith began to wonder if all strangers in Pembrokeshire were welcomed in this way. What was it, he wondered, about their appearance which suggested that they were connected with an insurance company? Or why, for that matter, were the householders of Pembrokeshire so anxiously awaiting the arrival of insurance men? It seemed a pity that he would never know the answer.

  'We've called to sec Mr Mulloy,' began the rector diffidently.

  'He's here. Come in,' said the woman without preamble, and they followed her into a small smoky room almost filled with a gigantic three-piece suite upholstered in shabby black leather. It reminded Harold Shoosmith of the radway station waiting-rooms of his boyhood as he looked at the buttons dimpling the back of the couch.

  From the depths of one of the chairs a massive man arose. His shirt collar was open and he wore no tie. His creased grey flannel trousers were tied round his vast stomach with a dressing-gown cord. His hair was long, his eyes bleary, his teeth were stained brown with tobacco smoke and Harold Shoosmith judged that his last shave took place three, or possibly four, days before. If this were Nathaniel's grandson then he was glad that the spruce old man could not see his descendant.

  'Mr Mulloy?' he asked abruptly, disappointment sharpening his tone.

  'That's right,' said the man. 'My wife send you?'

  'She told us the way,' replied Harold. 'But we came to sec you, not your wife.'

  'Take a seat,' said the woman, removing a pile of newspapers from one end of the couch and tossing them pell-mell into the corner of the room. A startled mew gave evidence of a cat's presence in the murky corner, but it remained in hiding. 'I'll clear out if you're going to talk business.'

  'Really, there's no need,' protested the rector. 'It's just a little matter of a memorial.'

  'Who to? The wife?' asked the man, guffawing loudly. Td give you a bit towards that, wouldn't I, Ethel?'

  The woman smiled grimly, but made no comment. The rector looked disconcerted, and not a little shocked.

  It was Harold who took command at this interview, and in a few curt phrases outlined the purpose of their errand. William Mulloy slouched forward as he listened, his stomach heavily pendulous inside his grubby shirt, sucking his revolting teeth and swallowing noisily. The gentle rector, almost overcome by the rank smells of the stuffy room, prayed that their visit would be brief.

  'What d'you want me to do about it?' asked William Mulloy, when Harold finished. 'Want money, do you, to put up this 'ere statue? You'll get not a farthing from me, I can tell you. I heard enough about that old bundle of misery from my mother–she was just such another Holy Joe–and I want nothing to do with it.'

  Harold Shoosmith's face so openly expressed the disgust he felt that the rector decided that he had better intervene.

  'We had no intention of asking you to contribute towards your grandfather's memorial. We simply wished to find out if you were interested. We felt that it was common courtesy to get your opinion on our venture.'

  'Well, my opinion, gents,' said William Mulloy, with a shrug of his massive shoulders, is that the lot of you are plain barmy. But if you like to throw good money away by sticking up some tin-pot effigy to that dismal old sky-pilot, why, you're welcome. But don't expect me to take any interest in it. My life was made a misery with his ideas. If it hadn't been for my dad giving me a good time now and again I reckon I'd have gone loopy the way my mother kept talk, talk, talk about what grandad would have said.'

  'He was a very fine man,' said Harold, with controlled passion. 'A man who did so much good in his life that he is remembered with affection and respect all over the world.'

  'Aw! Stow it.' yawned William Mulloy. 'You and my ma would have made a good pair.' He heaved his great bulk from the chair and held out a sticky fat hand.

  I'll say good-bye. Sorry you've had a long journey for nothing. But you've got my blessing for this crack-brained scheme, if that's what you came for. If there's any money over, you might think of the old chap's descendants, you know.'

  Harold Shoosmith could not bring himself to take the extended hand, and contented himself with nodding and hastening to the door; but the rector shook it politely and murmured his farewells to them both.

  The sheepdog kept up its insane barking as they backed away from the house and regained the lane. Harold seemed speechless with fury and disappointment, and the rector spoke with some diffidence.

  'He obviously takes after the ne'er-do-weel father,' he commented. 'Not a very attractive person, I thought.'

  'What I thought,' remarked Harold grimly, is unprintable.' He pulled the wheel round savagely and set off on the long journey home.

  They stopped only once, and that was at Ross, for a late lunch. By that time their disappointment and sh
ock had somewhat evaporated. The rain had ceased and the wind had dropped, so that they were able to enjoy the winter beauty of the wooded countryside.

  The air was iron-cold and hurt the lungs. The sky's menacing greyness was tinged with the slight coppery colour which precedes a snow-storm, and the two men were glad to regain the warmth of the car after the walk from the hotel.

  Darkness fell earlier than usual and they drove for several hours through the ominously still blackness. As they climbed the last steep hill to the haven of Thrush Green the first few snowflakes began to waver across the windscreen.

  'Hello,' said Harold, 'here it comes at last.'

  They got out of the car stiffly and stretched themselves luxuriously. Around them the snow whispered its way to the ground, although as yet, it faded to cover it.

  'It's been a wonderful break,' said the rector, by way of thanks. 'Though disappointing perhaps.'

  'At least we know where we are,' replied Harold. 'We certainly don't need Mr Mulloy's help in the unveiling ceremony. Come inside and get warm.'

  The rector held his face up to the whirling snowflakes as Harold fumbled for the key. It was good to be back again at Thrush Green. He remembered, with sudden pleasure, the conversation on the way down and realised, with deep happiness, that more had been resolved, for him, than simply the unveiling of Nathaniel Patten's memorial.

  16. Snow at Thrush Green

  THE inhabitants of Thrush Green woke on Sunday morning to find an eerie lightness reflected from their ceilings and a hushed white world outside their windows.

  Snow was still falling, steadily and gently, and had settled by breakfast time to a depth of two or three inches. The steep Cotswold roofs, white beneath their canopies, showed sharp and angular against the leaden sky which promised more snow. A light powdering had settled along the branches of the chestnut trees, and round the many bird-tables of Thrush Green the footsteps of dozens of small birds made hieroglyphics as they came seeking charity.

  The reactions of the Thrush Green folk to their changed world varied considerably. Paul Young, waking to see the whiteness on his ceiling, leapt from his bed with wild delight and rushed to the window. Heaving it up, he scraped the new snow from the sill and crammed it rapturously into his mouth. The crunch with which it clove deliriously to the roof of his mouth, before melting into icy nothingness, entranced him. In the distance he could see the milkman, trudging to each house from his van and leaving a neat row of footprints to each door. The sight of Thrush Green stretching smooth and virginal, in all its wide spaciousness, offered a challenge to run and jump, to roll and frolic, and to make that vast anonymity his own, signed with his own ecstatic markings. Shaking with excitement, he thrust himself into his clothes.

  Albert Piggott's response was typical as he gazed morosely from his bedroom window.

  'Would 'appen on a Sunday. All that muck trod into the coconut matting in the aisle when the folks come to morning service! This'll take some clearing up!'

  Gloomily, he stumped down the narrow stairs to prepare his breakfast.

  Nelly Tilling, in her distant cottage near Lulling Woods, took one look at the snow, another at the threatening sky, and went barefoot and in her vast nightgown to check her provisions. There was flour in plenty in the enamel bin. Sugar, butter, tea and rice gave her silent comfort from one shelf, and bottled fruit and jam of her own preparing from another. Onions dangled from the beam above her head, jostled by a bunch of dried herbs. A shoulder of mutton waited to be cooked and there were eggs and cheese in plenty. She could live comfortably for a week at least, she decided.

  But firing was a different matter. There was some coal, but that was lodged in a small shed at the end of the garden, together with logs which needed splitting for kindling wood. Nelly, suddenly conscious of the chilly floors, returned to the bedroom to dress. She must collect as much fuel as she could manage to store indoors before the snow engulfed the little shed.

  Dotty Harmer, in her solitary cottage in the hollow behind Thrush Green, was also up betimes. Her spirits had soared as she surveyed the dazzling purity of the fields which surrounded her. Snow had always delighted her. She remembered the tobogganing parties which she and her small friends had enjoyed on the sledge made for her one Christmas by her schoolmaster father. How well he had fashioned it and of what stout stuff was proved by the fact that it still hung in Dotty's lean-to at the side of her house. Two or three winters before she had dragged home her shopping on it from Lulling in just such weather, she recalled, and had later lent it to her neighbour to draw fodder to some cattle at the end of the small valley.

  Unlike Nelly Tilling she did not think of her own provisions, but her first anxiety was for her chickens at the end of the garden, and for Mrs Curdle and the new kittens. She put on a man's overcoat and a pair of Wellington boots and made her way through the scrunching snow, with a double measure of corn in the zinc dipper.

  The chickens were delighted at this largesse and pecked at the yellow grams which studded the unaccustomed whiteness of the rim. Dotty threw a large groundsheet over the wire roof, so that the snow should not get too thick. She thrust a bundle of straw into the hen house for extra warmth, and cut three large winter cabbages from the patch. These she shook free of snow and dropped into the run. She could do no more, she decided, filling the water bowl. They were well provided for.

  As she bent to her tasks, she was conscious of an ache across her chest as she breathed. For the past week she had been troubled by a cold and a cough which kept her awake at night.

  'It's this cold air,' said Dotty to the hens, who were almost delirious with joy at so much food at one rime. Td better take some of my coltsfoot and raspberry cordial. Good-bye, my dears.'

  Dotty turned and battled her way through the whirling snowflakes to the shelter of the cottage. She was not to see her dear hens again for many a long day.

  'D'you know what?' demanded Ella, bursting into Dimity's bedroom. 'The whole place is full of dam' snow!'

  'Indoors, do you mean?' asked Dimity, wrenched thus brutally from sleep and understandably bewildered.

  'No, no, no!' said Ella testily. Just everywhere.' She stumped across to Dimity's window, a thickset figure wrapped in her old red dressing-gown, and gazed with dislike at the wintry scene.

  'All in the trees,' went on Ella disgustedly, as though this ready was the last straw. 'All over the roofs,' she added despairingly.

  'It's usual, you know, with snow,' responded Dimity, with unwonted irony. 'How deep is it?' She sat up in bed to get a glimpse of the whirling flakes.

  'About a couple of inches, I should say,' answered Ella. 'But plenty mere to come. Let's have breakfast in our dressing-gowns, Dim, and then get dressed and clear the paths.'

  The thought of action against this infiltrating enemy cheered Ella at once, and the two drank their coffee and ate their habitual toast and marmalade in the snug kitchen and made plans like a pair of generals at the beginning of a campaign.

  'We must bring the spades inside tonight,' said Ella briskly, 'in case we have to dig ourselves out tomorrow. It looks quite likely. I'll bring in extra coke, coal and wood, and it might be a good idea for you to take extra milk today. The milkman's on the other side of the green. Let's put a note out now.'

  'You think of everything,' said Dimity, with admiration. 'I must put out more food for the birds, poor things, before I go to church.'

  'I suppose you have to?' queried Ella. 'It'll be perishing cold, and everyone will be teeming with revolting germs. There's flu about, they tell me.'

  'Yes, of course I must go,' said Dimity with quiet firmness. 'Charles would be most upset, if I failed to go.'

  Ella's massive hand held the coffee pot arrested in mid-air as she looked at her friend.

  'I believe you're right,' she said slowly.

  It snowed for two days without ceasing, and an easterly wind, which sprang up during Sunday night, caused drifts several feet deep. Banks of snow reached to the windows of 'The
Two Pheasants' and completely covered the white fence at the village school hard by. The lane to Nod and Nidden was impassable by Tuesday, and the two hamlets were cut off from the outside world. The snow ploughs were out along the main road from Lulling to the north, but the steep hill was so slippery that little could be done there. The older inhabitants spoke longingly of the handrail which had once lined the path to the town, as they slithered, with socks over their Wellingtons, to gain a foothold on the slope.

  The Lulling shops were under-staffed, for many of their assistants lived in outlying villages and were unable to get into the town. Delivery vans were few and far between, and neighbours lent each other cupfuls of sugar and packets of tea as supplies became short.

  Influenza had spread in the little town, with such alarming rapidity that the preparatory school attended by Paul and his friend Christopher had closed for a week in the hope that this might arrest the spread of infection.

  After the first few days of joy Paul soon became bored. Snow showers continued intermittently throughout the week, and the nights were bitterly cold. His mother only allowed him to play outside for short spells, but towards the end of the week she invited Christopher to play during the hours of daylight, as both boys were in the rudest health and were obviously not going to succumb to the prevaing plague.

  Paul was delighted to have company. In the afternoon, a watery sun tried to shine through scudding clouds, and Joan said that they might go out for a time.

  'Let's go to the camp,' said Paul as soon as they were outside. 'It's years since we were there.'

  They crept through the hole in Harold Shoosmith's hedge, skirted the shrubbery which had protected the path from the worst of the snow and struggled along to the tree.

  Here a deep drift made it impossible for them to go further. The snow had been swept into a vast billow delicately patterned with a tracery of whorls and curves. Beyond it stretched the snowy valley, with Dotty's cottage a mere hump in the vast-ness. The house looked dead. No smoke rose from the chimney, no one moved behind the closed windows and there was no sign of life anywhere.