Village Affairs Read online

  'You haven't clumped in, straight from muck spreading, all over that new runner?'

  'Well, I had to answer this call.'

  'I despair of you. I really do.'

  'You didn't ring me up to tell me that old chestnut, surely?'

  Amy's voice became animated.

  'No. I've just heard some terrific news. Guess what!'

  'Vanessa's baby's arrived.'

  'Don't be silly, dear. That's not for months yet. Try again.'

  'I can't. Come on, tell me quickly, so that I can get down on my haunches to clean up this mess.'

  'Lucy Colgate's engaged to be married!'

  'Well, she's been trying long enough.'

  'Now, don't be waspish. I thought you'd be interested.'

  'Do you think it will come to anything this time? I mean she's always been man-mad. Remember how she used to frighten all those poor young men at Cambridge? And I could name four fellows, this minute, who rushed to jobs abroad simply to evade Lucy's clutches.'

  'You exaggerate! Yes, I'm sure this marriage will take place.'

  'Well, my heart bleeds for the poor chap. Who is he anyway?'

  'He's called Hector Avory, and he's in Insurance or Baltic Exchange, or one of those things in the City. This will be his fourth marriage.'

  'Good heavens! What happened to the other three?'

  'The first wife died in child-birth, poor thing. The second was run over, and the third just faded away.'

  'He doesn't sound to me the sort of man who looks after his wives very well. I hope Lucy knows about them.'

  'Of course she does. She told me herself!'

  'Ah well! Rather her than me. I take it she'll stop teaching?'

  'Yes, indeed. He's got a whacking great house at Chisle-hurst which she'll be looking after.'

  'I bet she won't have muck on her hall carpet,' I observed.

  'I'm going to ring off,' said Amy, 'and let you start clearing up the mess you've made. Don't forget the contribution to my rhubarb, will you?'

  'Come and collect it tomorrow,' I said, 'and have a cup of tea. We never seem to have time for a gossip.'

  'What was this then?' queried Amy, and rang off.

  Spring in Fairacre takes some beating, and we took rather more nature walks in the exhilarating days of March and early April than the timetable showed on the wall.

  At this time of year, it is far better to catch the best of the day sometime between ten in the morning and three in the afternoon, so Fairacre saw a ragged crocodile of pupils quite often during that time of day, while the weather lasted.

  The birds were flashing to and fro, with feverish activity, building their nests or feeding their young. Mr Roberts had a score or so of lambs cavorting in the shelter of the downs, and in the next field was a splendid lying-in ward, for expectant ewes, made of bales of straw. Sometimes, when the wind was keen, the children suggested that we sheltered in there, and it was certainly snug enough to tempt us, but I pointed out that the ewes, and Mr Roberts, would not welcome us.

  Polyanthuses, yellow, pink and red, lifted their velvety faces to the sun, and the beech leaves were beginning to show their silky green. Friends and parents would straighten up from their seed planting to have a word as we passed, and this brought home to me, very poignantly, the strong bond between the villagers and their school.

  Joseph Coggs attached himself to me on one of these outings. He was obliged to walk at a slower pace than the others for the sole of his shabby shoe was flapping, and he had secured it with a piece of stout binder twine tied round his foot.

  'Do you think you ought to go back, Joe?' I asked, when I saw his predicament.

  'It'll hold out,' he said cheerfully, as he hobbled along beside me. He seemed so happy, that it seemed better to let him take part with the other children, and if the worst happened we could leave him sitting on the bank, and collect him on our way back to school.

  'That lady come again last night,' he volunteered.

  'Which lady?'

  'The office one. Comes to see Mum.'

  I realised that he meant the Probation Officer. Naturally I had heard from several sources—including Mrs Pringle—that the Officer in question was doing her duty diligently.

  'She brung us—'

  'Brought us,' I said automatically.

  'She brought us,' echoed Joe, 'some little biscuit men. Ginger-bread, she said. They was good. The leg come off' of mine, but it tasted all right. His eyes was currants, and so was his buttons.'

  Joe's eyes were alight at the happy memory. My opinion of this particular officer soared higher than ever. It looked as though the Coggs family had found a friend.

  'We've got a tin now,' went on Joe, 'to put money in. When we've got enough, my mum's going to buy me some more shoes.'

  Looking down at his awkward progress, I observed that he would be pleased when that happened. His eyes met mine with some puzzlement.

  'It don't hurt me to walk like this,' he explained. He was obviously troubled to know that I was concerned on his behalf, and anxious to put me at ease.

  I realised suddenly, and with rare humility, how much I could learn from Joseph Coggs. Here was a complete lack of self-pity, uncomplaining acceptance of misfortune, delight in the Probation Officer's generosity and thoughtfulness for me.

  I wished I had as fine a character as young Joe's.

  Mrs Pringle arrived one sunny morning, bearing a fine bunch of daffodils lodged in the black oilcloth bag which accompanies her everywhere.

  'Thought you'd like some of our early ones,' she said, thrusting the bunch at me. I was most grateful, I told her. They were splendid specimens.

  'Well, yours are always much later, and a bit under-sized,' said Mrs Pringle. 'It always pays to buy the best with bulbs.'

  'What sort are these?' I enquired, ignoring the slight to my own poor blossoms still in bud.

  'King Alfred's. Can't beat 'em. I likes to have King Alfred's, not only for size, but I likes his story. Burning the cakes and that, and fighting them Danes round here. Some time ago, mind you,' she added, in case I imagined the conflict taking place within living memory.

  I was still puzzling over the reason for this unexpected present when Mrs Pringle enlightened me.

  'And talking of battles, I've just had one with Doctor Martin, and feels all the better for it!'

  'About the dieting?'

  'That's right. Half-starved, I've been all these months, as well you know, Miss Read, and fair fainting at times with weakness. And yet, to hear doctor talk, you'd think I'd done nothing but guzzle down grub.'

  'I know you've been trying very hard,' I said diplomatically, admiring my daffodils.

  'Well, it all come to a head last night, as you might say. Got me on that great iron weighing machine of his, up the surgery, like some prize porker I always feels balancing on that contraption, when he gives a sort of shriek and yells: "Woman, you've gone up!" Woman, he calls me! Woman, the cheek of it!'

  Mrs Pringle's face was flushed, and her pendulous cheeks wobbled, at the memory of this outrage.

  'So I gets off his old weighing machine, pretty smartly, and I says: "Don't you come calling me Woman in that tone of voice. You takes my money regular out of the National Health, and I'll have a bit of common courtesy, if you don't mind!" And then I told him flat, he was no good as a doctor, or I'd have been a stone lighter by now, according to his reckoning. He didn't like it, I can tell you.'

  My heart went out to poor Doctor Martin. I remembered Minnie's remark about Auntie always winning when it came to a battle.

  'What did he say?'

  Mrs Pringle snorted.

  'He said I'd never kep' to my diet. He said I was the most cantankerous patient on his list, and the best thing I could do was to forget about the diet, and go my own way. What's more, he had the cheek to say that for two pins he'd advise me to go to another doctor—'

  She stopped suddenly, bosom heaving beneath her purple cardigan.

  'Yes? What else?'


  'Go to another doctor,' repeated Mrs Pringle, quivering at the memory, 'but that he wouldn't wish any such trouble maker on any of his colleagues. Those was his very words. Burnt into my brain, they is! Like being branded! A trouble maker! Me!'

  'I shouldn't let it worry you too much,' I said soothingly. 'You were both rather heated, I expect, and after all, Doctor Martin's only human.'

  'That I doubt!'

  'Well, getting old, anyway, and rather over-worked. He's probably quite sorry about it this morning.'

  'That I can't believe!'

  She sniffed belligerently.

  'Anyway,' she went on more cheerfully, 'I felt a sight better after I'd had my say, and I went home and cooked a lovely plate of pig's liver, bacon and chips. It really set me up after all that orange juice and greens I've been living on. Had a good night's rest too, with something in my stomach instead of wind. I woke up a different woman, and went to pick some daffodils afore coming along to work. Sort of celebration, see? Thrown off my chains at last!'

  'It was kind of you to include me in the celebrations.'

  'Well, you've looked a bit peaky off and on, these last few months. Thought they might cheer you up.'

  There was no trace of a limp as she made her way to the door. Discarding the diet had obviously had a good effect on all aspects of Mrs Pringle's health, and we at Fairacre School might benefit from this unusual bout of cheerfulness.

  George Annett was buying a sweater in Marks & Spencer's in Caxley when I saw him next. He seemed to be in a fine state of bewilderment.

  'Which would you choose?' he asked me.

  'What about Shetland wool?'

  'Too itchy round my neck.'

  'Botany wool then. That washes very well.'

  'Not thick enough. "What's the difference between wool and nylon?'

  'How? In expense, do you mean?'

  'No. The stuff itself.'

  I looked at George in surprise. Surely, he knew the difference.

  'Well,' I began patiently, 'wool is a natural fibre, from the sheep's back, and nylon—'

  'I know all that!' he said testily.

  He really is the most impatient fellow at times.

  'Say what you mean then!' I answered.

  'Which wears better? Which stands up to washing better? Is one warmer than the other? Will one go out of shape quicker? Which, in fact, is the better investment?'

  I began to get as cross as he was.

  'All Marks & Spencer's stuff is good,' I began.

  'Have you got shares in them?' he demanded suspiciously.

  'No. I wish I had. Honestly, I think I'd choose a woollen one, but some people like a bit of nylon in with it.'

  George flung down a rather fetching oatmeal-coloured confection he had been fingering.

  'Oh, I don't know. I'll let Isobel choose for me. It's all too exhausting, this shopping! Come and have a cup of coffee.'

  Over it, he asked if I had heard anything recently from the office.

  'The usual flood of letters exhorting us not to waste anything,' I replied. 'Not that I get much chance at Fairacre, with Mrs Pringle keeping her hawk-eye on me. She handed me an inch stub of pencil she'd found in the wastepaper basket only yesterday, and she certainly sees that we don't waste fuel.'

  'We're going to need more drastic cuts than that,' said George. 'Since these government announcements about making-do and cutting-back and so on, in education, I've seen nothing more of the chaps who were measuring the playground for those proposed new classrooms.'

  'You mean we shall all stay as we are?' I asked, the world suddenly becoming rosier.

  'Well, nothing definite's been said yet, but I've had no reply to a whole heap of numbers I was requested to send to the office, "without delay" a term or two ago.'

  'What sort of numbers?'

  'Oh, footling stuff like estimated numbers on roll if the Fairacre children came along. How many were leaving? How many desks were available, and what sizes were they? How many children could be seated at school dinner? How many trestle tables were in use? You know, the usual maddening questions involving us crawling about with a yard stick, and counting dozens of pieces of furniture.'

  'I've heard nothing,' I said cautiously.

  'That's the point. It's all delightfully negative at the moment. I think we shall have to hear one way or the other pretty quickly. After all, if the county is going to go ahead with re-organisation as planned, it will need to give plenty of notice. If not, we should be told very soon. Either way we ought to know where we are before next term, I should think.'

  'Mr Salisbury said we should be consulted at every stage,' I agreed. I suddenly felt extremely happy.

  'Have a chocolate biscuit,' I said offering the plate to George, the dear fellow. Any passing irritation with him was now forgotten, for was he not the harbinger of hope?

  When Amy came to collect a second sack of manure for her garden, I told her of my encounter with George Annett.

  She looked thoughtful.

  'As you've heard nothing definite, I imagine that some committee or other is going into which would be cheaper—to take yours to Beech Green, or to hang on as you are.'

  'That shouldn't take long to find out.'

  'Well, you know what committees are,' said Amy. 'Sometimes vital decisions get lost in transit between the steering committee, and the pilot committee, and the finance committee, and the general policy committee and Uncle-Tom-Cobley-and-all's committee. James talks about these things sometimes, and what with all the complications, and the Post Office thrown in, I wonder if it wouldn't be simpler to be completely self-supporting in a comfortable peasant-like way with just a potato from the garden to eat, and a goat skin to wear.'

  'Smelly,' I said.

  'Unless your children can be squeezed into Beech Green without any building being done, I can't see Fairacre School closing,' said Amy. 'And surely, the building programme will simply cease to be, with the country's finances in the state they are.'

  'Well, it's an ill wind that blows nobody any good,' I said. 'I certainly shan't bother to apply for any other jobs. I'm glad I didn't do anything about Mrs Allen's. Things look so much more hopeful now.'

  Amy rose to go.

  'Your trouble is that you are too idle to arrange your own life,' she said severely. 'You simply let things drift and when they appear to be going as you want them to, then you start congratulating yourself on doing nothing. I warn you, my girl, the fact that you haven't heard anything yet, one way or the other, doesn't automatically mean that you are out of the wood.'

  'No, Amy,' I said meekly.

  'One swallow doesn't make a Summer,' she went on, opening the car door.

  'You sound as though you'd swallowed The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations,' I shouted after her, as she drove off.

  It was good to have the last word for a change.

  20 Relief on two Fronts

  THE end of term came, without hearing any more definite news from the office. The Easter holidays were an agreeable mixture of work in the house and garden, and occasional outings with Amy and other friends.

  Earlier in the year, I had been pressed to go with the Caxley Ornithological Society on a lecture tour in Turkey. It all sounded very exotic but, apart from the expense, which struck me as too much for my modest means, I was too unsettled about the fate of Fairacre School to make plans so far ahead, and I had turned down the invitation to accompany the Mawnes, and several other friends, when they set off in April.

  I did not regret my decision. My few trips abroad I have enjoyed, and one with Amy to Crete some years earlier was perhaps the most memorable of all. But Easter, when fine, in Fairacre is very beautiful and there were a number of things I wanted to do and see which were impossible to fit in during term time.

  Mrs Pringle offered to come an extra day to give me a hand with spring cleaning upstairs. I received this kindness with mixed feelings. Left alone I could have endured the condition of the upper floor of my house wit
h the greatest equanimity. Mrs Pringle however, confessed herself appalled by the squalor in which I seemed content to live.

  'When did you last dust them bed springs?' she demanded one day.

  'I didn't know that bed had springs,' I confessed.

  Mrs Pringle swelled with triumph.

  'There you are! When I does out that room, I expects to strip the bed, pull off the mattress, and get a lightly oiled rag into them cup springs. That's what should be done weekly, but as it is there's always some excuse from you about "leaving them". Now, Mrs Hope when she lived here—'

  'Don't tell me,' I begged. When Mrs Hope, wife of an earlier head teacher at Fairacre School, is brought into the conversation, I just give in to Mrs Pringle. According to that lady, Mrs Hope was the epitome of perfect housewifery. The furniture had a light wash with vinegar and warm water before polishing. Everything that was scrubbable was done twice a week. Sheets were never sent to a laundry, but every inch of linen used in the house was washed, boiled, clear-starched and ironed exquisitely.

  My own slap-dash methods scandalise Mrs Pringle, and I sometimes wonder if the spirit of Mrs Hope ever returns to her former home. If so, no doubt I shall see her one day wringing her ghostly hands over the condition of the house under my casual care.

  We were washing down the paintwork together one sunny morning when I enquired after Minnie's affairs. I had not seen her on the previous Friday, having spent the day with Amy, and returned just in time to lift the wet dusters from a row of upturned saucepans on the dresser before going to bed.

  'Ern's back,' said Mrs Pringle.

  I looked at her with dismay.

  'Oh no! Poor Minnie!'

  'There's no "poor Minnie" about it,' replied Mrs Pringle, wringing out her wet cloth with a firm hand. 'She's a lucky girl to have him back at Springbourne. You can't expect her to bring up that gaggle of children on her own. She needs a man about the place.'

  I was bewildered, and said so.

  'Yes, I know Ern left her, to go to that Mrs Fowler who's no better than she should be, as we all know. But it's no good blaming Ern.'