Men and Angels

by Elizabeth Cadell

  It was a placid, even a happy household, and its three inmates would have been astonished to learn that Rae found anything lacking.

  Rae woke early on her first morning at Thorpe, and lay for a time listening to the birds. She had heard birds singing before, but she had never been in a place in which the singers had been up against so little competition. There were no steps to be heard, no voices indoors, no murmuring without; the house lay basking in the same peace—or sighing with the same tedium—as on the previous evening.

  A soft shuffling told Rae that her breakfast had arrived; she acknowledged the soft knock and presently slipped out of bed and went into the passage and brought in her tray. There was a jug of coffee, a jug of hot milk, sugar, toast, butter and marmalade. Rae climbed into bed again, propped the tray up on her knees, and ate a light but satisfying breakfast.

  Breakfast over, she lay staring at the bleak day ahead. She would like a bath; her watch told her that the General would be out of the bathroom, and she put on a dressing- gown and made her way down the long corridor and up the three stairs to the bathroom. The sound of water running, however, informed her that Lady Ashton or Miss Beckwith was inside; Rae made the long journey back to her bedroom.

  She tried twice more, unsuccessfully, before getting in. Her bath over, she dressed, put her tray outside, and went slowly downstairs. The house seemed empty and, after looking into one or two rooms, she went upstairs again and began to tidy her room. She was interrupted by the sound of a knock, and found Miss Beckwith at her door.

  “Good morning—did you sleep well?”

  “Yes, thank you. I was just going to—”

  “You won’t make your bed, will you?” asked Miss Beckwith gently. “The gardener’s daughter does all the rooms with me, and we have a nice little routine—I suppose you find in the flat that you can get through so much more if you have some kind of routine?”

  Rae smiled, and forbore to mention that she and Judy had a routine by which they got through nothing whatever. “But you must let me do something!” she protested.

  “No—this is your holiday, remember,” said Miss Beckwith, giving her hand a little pat. “You must get all the fun you can, and forget about work. I wish there was a lake here for you to sail on—what a pity the sea isn’t nearer. One of my uncles used to take me sailing when I was about your age, at Geneva. He went down later in the Black Prince— it was very sad.”

  Rae made a murmur of distress, and Miss Beckwith gave her another pat, this time of comfort.

  “Never mind. Now you must run downstairs and go out and enjoy yourself.”

  Rae went downstairs once more and met Lady Ashton carrying a small packet.

  “Oh, good morning, my dear. Did you sleep well?”

  “Yes, thank you.”

  “I’ve had some sandwiches made for you—they’re fish paste. Miss Beckwith told me you were very fond of fish paste. Do you think you’ll be thirsty? I could put you up a little bottle of lemonade.”

  “No, thank you—it’s very kind of you.”

  “I have a map somewhere,” said Lady Ashton. “If only I could—Oh, there you are, Bertram.”

  “Good morning,” said the General. “Did you sleep well?”

  “Yes, thank you,” said Rae.

  “Good morning, Dorothy. A lovely morning.”

  “Isn’t it? Bertram, where would that map be—the one that makes everything so clear? It would help Rae to find her way about.”

  “It’s in the library,” said the General. “Come along, my dear, and I’ll get it for you.”

  The map found, he spread it on a table and ran a horny forefinger over it. Rae bent over it, and tried to look interested.

  “Now if you start from here,” said the General, “you can make your way up that hill and walk along that ridge for a couple of miles—then you can drop down at that point there, or you can go and take this fork—it’s rather difficult to see, but it’s marked all right. There—you see it? Now, from there you can either go straight on to that little bend there, or you can—yes, I think this would be the better way—branch right and follow the stream. You’ll pass a nice little bit of water just there—the children used to swim in it, but I’ve closed it for the past few years—you can’t have people using it as a sort of lido. There now”—he folded the map and handed it to her—“I think you’ll be able to find your way home safely. You can’t get lost, whatever you do—come here and I’ll show you why.” He took a shallow bowl from the mantelpiece and held it before her. “Now this bowl,” he said, “is pretty well an exact picture of the Thorpe country. Down at the bottom of the bowl is the village, Thorpe Bottom—it is, actually, just what it sounds —the bottom of this bowl made by the surrounding hills. You see?”

  “Yes.”

  “Now up here is where we stand—not quite on the rim, but almost. You could keep on this level and walk completely round without catching a glimpse of Thorpe Bottom, and from Thorpe Bottom you can see nothing on the hills— that’s what makes this part of the country so nice and quiet —we’ve all got our little dips or hummocks or woods to keep us to ourselves. I suppose you’ve noticed that?”

  “Yes, I have.”

  “Good. You’ve got eyes in your head—not like Judy, who never notices anything beyond her nose. Now off you go and enjoy yourself. Why don’t you take Bess with you?—The exercise will do her good.”

  Rae left the house, and, followed by Bess, walked through the garden and out at a gate leading into a wood. She had only one object—to get out of sight of the house, hide behind the nearest dip or hummock, and stay there until it was time to go back and ask for a boiled egg. The day had to be spent, but she was not going to spend it in walking, a pastime which she regarded as the slowest known, only second, in her estimation, to watching cricket. Bess appeared to share her views, and seemed ready to turn and go home at the first possible moment.

  Rae wandered on listlessly, stopping now and again to survey the inanimate scene. Climbing on to a gate, she sat moodily on it, her thoughts gloomy. Less than thirty miles away was London, teeming with life, swift, supercharged.

  She would have given all she had to be in the flat with her aunts, even if it meant tying a cotton duster round her head and going into the corners. Had they, she wondered, discovered that accumulation behind the gas-stove? Where was Judy? Would she ask the artist—whatever his name was— to paint her mother? How many hours were there between now and the week-end?

  Rae, musing unhappily, became aware of unfamiliar sounds. She listened and heard them again: voices.

  She waited; there was, after all, life on the planet. Yes— here it was; young life. Boys, two, in age about twelve. Rae wished wistfully that they were both ten years older.

  The boys, pulling a little handcart between them, drew abreast of Rae, and looked at her with frank curiosity. She saw that they were brothers—they looked almost exactly alike, with brown freckled faces, clear grey eyes and thin, brown bare legs. They had passed her and were going on steadily when it occurred to Rae that they might prove to be the only humans she would see in the long day stretching ahead. She jumped off the gate and called after them impulsively.

  “Hey!”

  The boys turned swiftly, and Rae thought there was apprehension on their faces, but that was absurd—what was there to be apprehensive about? She walked up to them.

  “Do you live here?” she asked.

  The older boy nodded.

  “Yes—Thorpe Farm, just over there.”

  “Just over where?” enquired Rae. “I haven’t seen any human habitation since I came here yesterday. I was beginning to think I was in Siberia, only warmer.”

  “But you can see the farm, practic’ly,” said the younger boy. “If you climb that tree, you can see it from the top branches, easily.”

  “Thanks—some other time,” said Rae. “I’m staying at Thorpe Lodge.”

  Once again she thought she saw wariness in their eyes, but the next moment t
he older boy smiled.

  “My name’s Hugh and this is my young brother—his name’s Alan. What’s yours?”

  “Rae Mansfield. Aren’t you supposed to be at school?”

  “We went at the beginning of the term,” said Hugh, “but we were sent home. Fire.”

  “Fire! Did it do much damage?” asked Rae.

  “Not ’smuch as it could have done,” said Alan regretfully. “It burnt our dorm, though, and—”

  “—and at first they put us into other dorms, but there weren’t enough beds and it was overcrowding, so the school’s been sent home for a fortnight till they get new beds and everything and get it all right again.”

  “Bad luck—for the school, I mean. Are you going anywhere in particular,” asked Rae, “or can I come, too? I’m not really used to being alone in Siberia—I live in London.”

  “We used to live in London—at least, Croydon—that’s just outside. We’re just going down to the village—it’s Tuesday.”

  “That’s market day,” explained Alan, seeing her bewilderment. “D’you want to see market day? It isn’t much—just a few stalls, that’s all.”

  “I’d like to come, if you don’t mind.”

  The three walked on, Rae happy, the boys at ease.

  “How long have you lived here?” she asked.

  “ ’Bout two years,” said Hugh. “Before that we were in Croydon.”

  “You said that, silly,” put in his brother. “That’s twice you’ve said we were in Croydon.”

  “I didn’t. The first time I said we came from there, and then I said we were there before. We came with my mother,” he explained, “and she died just after we came, and now we live with my stepfather. His name’s Selwyn— we call him Uncle Lewis, ’cos that’s his name—Lewis Selwyn, but our name’s Moore.”

  “Do you like being here?”

  “Yes, a lot. I liked farms before—I mean, before we came to this one, but this is a jolly nice farm, nicer than the ones we used to stay on for hols before we came here. We’ve got cows and two horses, and pigs and a ferret, and Alan’s got four white rabbits. He was going to sell one to-day, but there were rather a lot of strawberries so we didn’t bring the rabbit.—How long’re you here for?”

  “Three weeks, I’m afraid.”

  “Well, you can come and see the farm,” said Hugh. “Uncle Lewis’d like to show it to you. He likes it like anything—he was in London too, all his life until three years ago, working in an office.”

  “A Government office,” said Alan.

  “Yes. And then his grandmother left him some money and—”

  “His godmother, silly.”

  “Well, his godmother. He didn’t know anything about it —that she was going to leave it to him, and he says it knocked him sideways.”

  “Endways.”

  “Sideways. He didn’t know what to do, and he went on working just as though he’d got no money, and one day he had to come down here to see somebody, and he saw the farm and from that minute he wanted it. But you can’t buy a farm straight away—you have to wait ages, but he got it in the end. Uncle Lewis tries to learn farming, but he never will—he doesn’t even look like a farmer, Mart says.”

  “Mart?”

  “Martha—she’s our housekeeper. She’s nice. She and her cousin do all the work.”

  “Her cousin’s potty,” put in Alan nonchalantly, “but she’s nice, too. Her name’s Reeny.”

  They came out on to a wider road and, for the first time, Rae caught sight of the village lying below them. The road descended in a series of bends; the little cart was disposed to go more swiftly now, and Hugh put it in front, where it pulled him along like a puppy straining at the lead.

  The village consisted of little more than two rows of whitewashed cottages. The market stalls were placed on the roadside beyond the farthest cottage, but the boys made no attempt to approach them. Instead, Rae found that they were to do a house-to-house sale. The sales organisation looked fairly efficient—the door being opened, Hugh uttered the one word ‘Strawberries’; Alan did the weighing on a toy-like machine and Hugh collected the money. Before the last of the fruit disappeared, Rae had a thought.

  Look, she said. “I’ll buy those. Our strawberries aren’t doing so well this year, I’m told. I’ll pay you for them and take them home with me.”

  “Home to the Lodge?” enquired Hugh slowly.

  “Well yes, of course—I’m not going back to London for three weeks.”

  The boys appeared curiously hesitant, and Rae, a little puzzled, added: “Of course, if you’ve promised them to someone, then—”

  “No, they aren’t promised,” said Hugh.

  “Well, let me buy them, then.”

  The two boys looked at one another.

  “Go on,” said Alan. “Let her have ’em.”

  “All right,” said Hugh. “You can buy them, but just say you bought ’em in the market, see? Because you did, in a way.”

  Rae gave them a long look.

  “See here,” she said in her cool, slow way. “No funny business?”

  Two pairs of the most innocent eyes she had ever looked into were raised to hers.

  “What funny business?” asked Alan.

  “I’m asking you. Whose strawberries are they?”

  “Ours.”

  “Off your own place?”

  “Some.”

  “And the others?”

  There was a pause. Rae saw that both chins were set in an obstinate line.

  “Just a minute,” she said slowly. “I’m not here to clean the place up or anything. I’m just staying with—with friends, and they did happen to mention that the strawberries—what I mean is, I wouldn’t like to spend my hard-earned money on something that I could go out and pick in their garden as easily as—as you appear to have done.”

  “We didn’t go into their garden,” said Hugh.

  “But these are their strawberries.”

  “Some. But we bought them. Honestly, we bought them.”

  “Honestly—strictly honestly, you couldn’t have done,” said Rae.

  “We aren’t doing anything,” said Hugh; “but if we tell you, you’ll go back there and—”

  “—and you’ll poke your nose in,” said Alan in sudden indignation. “We’ve sold things every hols, and nobody’s worried, and now you come and—”

  “I’m staying with them,” explained Rae patiently. “If I were staying with you, you wouldn’t—well, you wouldn’t like me to do anything—peculiar, would you?”

  “’Course not. And we’re not doing anything peculiar, either. What we’re doing, we’re just sort of—of trading. We buy something and then we sell it.”

  “That’s all right. But how do you get it?”

  There was a very long pause, but Rae was content to wait. Something, she saw, was emerging.

  “Well, their gardener,” said Hugh slowly at last, “is keen on Mart.”

  “Mart? Oh yes—Mart. And so?”

  “And so when he saw us taking our stuff to the market for pocket-money in the hols, he said he had a right to let us have stuff out of his garden that was sort of extra—that the people didn’t need, and that would only get wasted. So he said, ‘Call on your way down on Tuesdays and see me’—and so we do. And we pay him straight away—”

  “—and we don’t go in at all,” said Alan. “We stand at the garden gate and we don’t even look inside.”

  They stood silent, looking up at Rae.

  “Are you going to tell them?” enquired Hugh after a time.

  “No,” said Rae. “I’m not. If you don’t mind, I won’t buy the strawberries, but I told you—I didn’t come down here to clean up the place. People can look after their own gardens—and gardeners.”

  “That’s all right,” said Alan, brushing the whole matter aside. “Let’s sell this last lot.”

  The last lot sold, the three turned to do the slow journey up the hill. Rae, looking at her watch, saw that it
was almost noon.

  “You going home?” asked Hugh.

  “No. I’m going to find a nice picnic spot and eat my lunch.”

  “All by yourself?” asked Alan in surprise.

  “All by myself—why not?”

  “Well, it doesn’t sound much fun. Why don’t you come home and eat with us? We’ve got lots.”

  Rae hesitated. She found the boys good company and was not anxious to return to her lonely state, but she could scarcely she felt, walk into a stranger’s house with no more solid backing than an invitation from his schoolboy sons.

  “Tel1 you what,” urged Hugh. “You come back with us and see Mart, and if you want to stay then, then stay. Come on.”

  Ray came on. A farm, she reflected, was an open place; if there was a welcome, she would stay—if not, she could make a graceful exit.

  They walked steadily up the hill, the cart now trailing behind. They passed no traffic of any kind, and the road was as deserted as when they had made the descent. At a curve about half-way up, the boys stopped and pointed.

  “Look,” said Alan. “If you sort of look through the trees up there, you’ll see a roof—not our house roof, but the cowhouse roof. See?”

  Rae peered.

  “Well, yes, I think—”

  Nobody ever knew what she thought. There was a curious sound on the road somewhere above them—a whirring and a rustle. Before Rae had time to swing round to see what was coming, Hugh and Alan had dived for the hedge, pulling the cart after them. Hugh, with a belated remembrance of Rae, turned with an outstretched hand, but he was too late. Round the bend came a vehicle which Rae, in the second before it hit her, identified as a bath chair. The next moment it caught her shoulder, swung her into the hedge and went bowling on down the hill. Rae, sitting on the bush against which she had been thrown, had a glimpse of a red, angry face surmounted by a hat of the kind worn by polo players.