But suppose people didn’t know! They hadn’t seen that stone woman walk in Broomy Vale Arboretum, but she might, in the dark night. They hadn’t seen Santa Claus and his sleigh, but that was because they were not quick enough. Susan had nearly caught things happening herself, she knew they only waited for her to go away. When she looked through a window into an empty room, there was always a guilty look about it, a stir of surprise.
Perhaps Santa Claus had left the marks of his reindeer and the wheels of his sleigh on the snow at the front of the house. She had never looked because last year there was no snow, and the year before she had believed in him absolutely. She would go out before breakfast, and perhaps she would find two marks of runners and a crowd of little hoof-marks.
She pinched the stocking from the toe to the top, where her white suspender tapes were stitched. It was full of nice knobs and lumps, and a flat thing like a book stuck out of the top. She drew it out – it was a book, just what she wanted most. She sniffed at it, and liked the smell of the cardboard back with deep letters cut in it. She ran her fingers along like a blind man and could not read the title, but there were three words in it.
Next came an apple, with its sweet, sharp odour. She recognized it, a yellow one, from the apple chamber, and from her favourite tree. She took a bite with her strong, white little teeth and scrunched it in the dark.
It was delicious fun, all alone, in this box-like room, with the dim blue-and-white jug on the washstand watching her, and the pool of the round mirror hanging on the wall, reflecting the blue dark outside, and the texts, ‘Thou God seest Me’, and ‘Blessed are the Peacemakers’, and ‘Though your sins be as scarlet they shall be white as wool’. They could all see the things although she couldn’t, and they were glad.
Next came a curious thing, pointed and spiked, with battlements like a tower. Whatever could it be? It was smooth like ivory and shone even in the dark. She ran her fingers round the little rim and found a knob. She gave it a tug, and a ribbon flew out – it was a tape measure to measure a thousand things, the trees’ girths, the calf’s nose, the pony’s tail. She put it on her knee and continued her search.
There was a tin ball that unscrewed and was filled with comfits, and an orange, and a sugar mouse, all these were easy to feel, a sugar watch with a paper face and a chain of coloured ribbon, a doll’s chair, and a penny china doll with a round smooth head. She at once named it Diana, after Diana of the Ephesians, for this one could never be an idol, being made of pot. She put her next to her skin down the neck of her nightdress, and pulled the last little bumps out of the stocking toe. They were walnuts, smelling of the orchards at Bird-in-Bush Farm, where they grew on great trees overhanging the wall, and a silver shilling, the only one she ever got, and very great wealth, but it was intended for the money box in the hall. It was the nicest Christmas stocking she had ever had, and she hugged her knees up to her chin and rocked with joy. Then she put her hand under her pillow and brought out five parcels which had made five separate lumps under her head. They were quite safe.
She heard the alarm go off in her father’s room and Dan’s bell go jingle-jangle. Five o’clock, plenty of time yet before the hoof-marks would disappear. The wind swished softly against the window, and thumps and thuds sounded on the stairs. She slept again with the doll on her heart and the tape measure under her cheek and the book in her hand.
She was awakened again by the rattle of milk-cans below her window. Joshua and Becky were coming back with the milk, and it really was Christmas Day. All else was strangely silent, for the deep snow deadened the sound of footsteps. She jumped out of bed, pressed her nose against the window, and rubbed away the Jack Frost pictures. Everything was blue, and a bright star shone. From a window in the farm buildings a warm gleam fell on the snow. Dan was milking the last cow by the light of the lantern which hung on the wall.
Then she heard his cheerful whistle and the low moo of the cows as he came out with the can.
What had the cattle done all night? Did they know it was Christmas? Of course, all God’s creatures knew. Becky said the cows and horses knelt down on Christmas Eve. She could see them going down on their front knees, the cows so easily, the horses so painfully, for their legs were wrong. Sheep knelt when they had foot-rot, it would be easy for them. But down they all went, bowing to the New Saviour as she bowed to the new moon.
She washed in the basin with blue daisies round the rim, but she could see neither water nor soap. Candles were for night, not morning use. She brushed her hair in front of the ghost of a mirror, where a white little face looked like a flower-in-the-night. She slipped the round comb through her hair and put on her Sunday honey-combed dress with seven tucks in the skirt and two in the sleeves, a preparation for a long and lanky Susan.
Then she buttoned her slippers and said her short morning prayer, and down she tripped with her stocking load of presents and the five parcels. She walked boldly past the fox and went to the landing window that overlooked the grass plots and lawn. The beeches were still, the apple trees stood blue and cream against the white hills, and there was a thin moon like a cow’s horn in the trees.
She went into the hall and turned away from the closed kitchen door, where all was bustle, the noise of milkcans, the roar of the fire, and the chatter of voices. The front door was unlocked and she lifted the heavy iron catch and slipped out into the virgin snow, blue and strange in the early light.
She lifted her feet high and walked to the gate in the wall surrounding the house. The monkey tree held out its arms to her, and she waved a hand. She crossed the walk and looked over the low stone wall at the lawn. There was no doubt something had been there in the night, footprints, but not hoof-marks, a fox, maybe, or a dog visiting Roger.
She returned to the house, shivering with delight, and opened the kitchen door. She was wrapped in colour and light, in sweet smells of cows and hay and coldness, brought in by the men, and new milk and hot sausages, tea and toast, warmth and burning wood from the hearth. The strongest smell was cold, which rushed through the back door sweeping all the other smells away, until the doors banged and the flame of the fire shot out.
‘A merry Christmas, a merry Christmas,’ she called, kissing everybody except Dan, which wouldn’t be proper. ‘Merry’ was the word Susan liked, not the limp word, ‘happy’.
She presented her paper parcels all round and sat down on the settle to watch the different faces. Dan opened his quickly in the passage and took out a pencil. He licked the point, wrote on the back of his hairy hand, stuck it behind his ear, and grinned his thanks as he went off with his churn.
Becky had a pen-wiper, made out of a wishing-bone and a piece of Margaret’s black skirt, and a quill pen cut from a goose feather.
‘Just what I wanted,’ she cried nobly, for she didn’t write a letter once a year, the reason being that she couldn’t.
Old Joshua had a tiny bottle of scent, ‘White Heather’.
‘Thank you kindly, Susan,’ said he, as he held up the minute bottle between his big finger and thumb, and struggled with the infinitesimal cork which was too small for him to grip. ‘It will come in handy when I clean out the cows.’
To her mother she gave a text, painted by herself, and framed in straw and woolwork.
‘O Death, where is thy sting? Where, Grave, thy Victory?’
She had spent many secret hours making this, and she looked anxiously to see what her mother thought of it.
A flicker passed over Mrs Garland’s face as she kissed her cheek.
‘It’s very beautiful, my dear. Why did you choose the text?’
‘Because it made me think of summer, of bees and wasps,’ replied Susan with a joyful smile.
Her father’s present was a big blue handkerchief with his initials embroidered in the corner, T.G.
Then Becky brought from out of the copper tea-urn a string of blue glass beads which she had bought for Susan at Mellow and hidden for months. Mrs Garland gave her a workbox like a ho
use whose roof lifted off and inside there lay little reels of black and white cotton and a tin thimble. And, most startling, the chimney was a red velvet pincushion!
But Joshua’s present was the most wonderful. It was nothing else than the purse with mother-of-pearl sides and red lining which she had seen at Broomy Vale and coveted so long. A miracle!
Susan displayed her stocking whilst they had breakfast. She was secretly rather disappointed over the book, which was called Three Wet Sundays. It was obviously a Sunday book, she had only Pilgrim’s Progress and the Bible to read on Sundays, so it was a change, but it seemed to be about some children who talked of nothing but the Israelites for three wet Sundays.
When it was wet at Windystone she played with the Noah’s Ark, that blessed present of three years ago, still as good as new through being kept for Sundays only. The stags had not lost their antlers, nor the cows their horns. The spotted dogs and blue calves were just as exciting. A camel had lost his leg and walked on a matchstick, and an ostrich had broken its beak, and the ducks and swans were pale through so much swimming, but Noah and all his relations were in the best of health, and slept in their matchbox beds or sent the dove from the window or looked after the guinea pigs which were as big as dogs.
What a book that would have made, Three Wet Sundays in Noah’s Ark!
The postman came through the wood with a bundle of letters and Christmas cards. He stood by the fire and had a cup of tea, and admired the decorations whilst Margaret opened her letters with cries of happiness, and excitement. She didn’t stop to read them, she took out all the cards which had no names on them and popped them into envelopes. Then she readdressed them, dexterously reshuffling and redealing, so that the postman should take them with him, a thrifty procedure.
Susan had a card which she liked above everything, a church with roof and towers and foreground covered in glittering snow. But when it was held up to the light, colours streamed through the windows, reds and blues, from two patches at the back. She put it with her best treasures to be kept for ever.
It was nearly time to start for church and all was bustle and rush as usual. Margaret dressed herself in her plum-coloured merino trimmed with velvet, and dived under the bed for the bonnet-box from which she took her best bonnet and the sealskin muff. It was always wrapped up in a linen handkerchief with a sprig of lavender and lad’s love, it was so precious.
Susan dragged on her brown coat running downstairs as she pulled at the sleeves, and her beaver hat with silky pom-poms at the side. She wanted to kiss her father once more under the kissing-bunch before she went.
Then everybody began to run, last-minute directions about the turkey and the stuffing, hunts for threepenny-bits, for Prayer Books, for handkerchiefs and lozenges, Joshua bumping into Susan’s hat, Becky letting the milk boil over, Tom shouting, ‘You’ll be late again, and Christmas morning’, and Susan running to play ‘Christians awake’ in the parlour, at the last minute, but they got off before the bells began to ring.
Down the hill they went, Mrs Garland first, Susan walking in her tracks, through the clean snow, like the page in ‘Good King Wenceslas’, along the white roads unmarked except by the hoofs and wheels of the milk carts, to the tune of gay dancing bells to the ivy-covered church.
Inside it was warm and beautiful, with ivy and holly, and lovely lilies and red leaves from the Court. The rich people wore their silks and furs, all scented and shining. Susan looked at them and wondered about their presents. She had heard they had real Christmas trees, with toys and candles like the one in Hans Andersen, which stood up in a room nearly to the ceiling. She would just like to peep at one for a minute, one minute only, to see if her imagination was right.
She was almost too happy, and her heart ached with joy as she stood on a hassock by her mother’s side, with her hymn book in her hand, singing ‘Noel, Noel’, feasting her eyes on the coloured windows and bright berries and flowers, wrapped in scents and sounds as in a cloud of incense. She buried her face in her muff in ecstasy. No thoughts of hell or idols today, only of Baby Jesus in the manger, and the singing angels.
It was over, they went out into the sweet air, with music pouring from the organ loft, and choirboys scrambling out of their surplices. The river ran swiftly by, with edges of ice. The yew trees spread their long branches over the white graves. Poor dead, did they know it was Christmas? Susan felt she would like to lay a present on every grave, an apple and an orange, and she looked round with interest to see the reds and yellows in the snow. She nearly ran into a gleaming silk dress, only half covered by a mantle.
Why did it stand out all by itself, like that? How did it make that lovely noise, shir-r-r, shir-r-r, like the scythe cutting down nettles?
She put out a finger and touched the ruby silk. It was colder than her own wool frock, like a dock leaf.
Mrs Garland had stopped to speak to someone, and Susan walked on silently in the snow, absorbed in the softness of silk and the loneliness of the dead.
It was Mrs Drayton’s dress she had touched, and she was the mother of the girls with shining hair. They had a Christmas tree, the governess had told Mrs Garland. She must be very happy today, and Susan pressed close to her to smell the happiness.
‘What a very plain child that Garland child is! Positively ugly,’ said Mrs Drayton to her husband.
Susan gasped and stood still. The world was filled with sorrow. The gleaming snow was dulled, a cloud swept over the sun and the sky drooped.
Mrs Drayton turned round and saw the girl’s startled eyes.
‘Will you please ask your mother to send two shillings’ worth of eggs?’ she said stiffly, and passed on like a queen.
‘I do hope that child did not hear what you said,’ exclaimed Mr Drayton nervously, for he was continually embarrassed by his wife’s loud remarks.
‘It will do her good,’ replied Mrs Drayton calmly; ‘those Garlands are too independent.’
Susan dropped behind; her heart ached and lay heavy in her breast. She didn’t mind being called ‘plain’, but ‘ugly’ was like the toad, rough-skinned and venomous, which walked round the garden, or the old witch at Dangle. She was numbed by the pain.
Her mother came hurrying up and together they walked through the crisp snow by the black river, frothing over large stones in cascades of spangles, like the lustres in Aunt Harriet’s sitting room. White boughs dipped curious fingers in the water, and gathered ice in the quiet pools. From a rock by the roadside long icicles hung, and as Susan looked at them she forgot her sorrow. There was beauty, and she climbed up to pick them, and carried them delicately in her fingers to preserve them.
She wouldn’t be sad, she didn’t care if she were ugly; she had accepted her wistful elfin face as she accepted the birds and trees, as something which was part of the earth.
Ice crackled under her boots as she walked along the frozen puddles and cleared away the snow with her toe. Below the surface she could see leaves and grass imprisoned like a ship in a bottle, like the soul in a man.
Mrs Garland sent thoughts running first up the hill, little servants, to make the bread sauce, set the table with the best dinner service, pour out elderberry wine, and baste the turkey.
Susan dragged behind, peeping at the landscape through the icicles, watching her shadow move on the snow, climb little trees and slide up walls. A friendly thing a shadow is, neither ugly nor unkind, a fantastic dancing friend.
They climbed the hill and stopped at the first gate. There was the square church tower, far away, with turrets like little black trees growing on the corners, and above it hung all the hymns and prayers, a bunch of white clouds.
There lay the great mass of Eve’s Court with little spires of soft blue smoke coming from many chimneys, like the gentle breath from a dragon’s many mouths. Susan pictured the cooks and kitchen maids, with butler and footmen, racing round, piling wood on the fires, roasting pheasants and turkeys and geese, great sirloins and haunches of venison, carrying silver dishes of
jellied moulds, rainbow colour, and golden fruits, to a vast dining room where guests sat in high-backed chairs under the shade of a Christmas tree, glittering with candles and toys.
Her own chimneys were smoking, too, blue and grey against the clear sky, and Becky was running in and out of the kitchen with the basting-spoon in one hand and the flour-dredger in the other. She would far rather be on her high hill among her own treasures than down there in the valley, with the great ones of the earth.
She suddenly remembered the message.
‘Mrs Drayton wants two shillings’ worth of eggs, mother.’
‘Did she mention it today? On Christmas Day? She shouldn’t order eggs on Christmas Day,’ cried Mrs Garland indignantly. ‘I always knew she was no lady.’
There! Susan was vindicated. Of course Mrs Drayton wasn’t one of the gentry, Eve’s Court never called on her, everyone knew that, but she was no lady either, so she couldn’t know whether Susan was ugly or not.
Susan had an infallible test for ladies. No lady turned round when she had passed. Often she had walked backwards for a mile or two, when she had been to Mellow on an errand, to see who turned round and who walked straight past with unseeing eyes. There were very few ladies, they all turned round to look at the little girl in the grey cape, who dawdled and twisted her lonely way along the road.
There was some secret abroad, Susan felt it as soon as they got in, by the odd silence, and the knowing glances she intercepted between Joshua and her father. The house tingled with it.
‘Susan, go into the parlour and bring out my concertina,’ said Tom, when Susan had put her gloves and Prayer Book in the bureau in the hall, and hung up her hat.
‘What do you want a concertina now for, Tom?’ asked Mrs Garland astonished, but such a flock of winks and nods flew about the room, she followed Susan across the hall.
‘Mind it doesn’t bite you,’ called Tom.
The Country Child Page 12