Sarah Morris Remembers

by D. E. Stevenson

  One Saturday afternoon in early June I went up to the tree by myself. There was a big cricket match at Bells Hill so Willy couldn’t come home.

  It was a perfect day; there wasn’t a cloud in the sky; the old tree was in full leaf and the hedge was a mass of May-blossom, which smelt as sweet as honey in the warm sunshine. I could hear two cuckoos calling to each other in the woods and, far in the distance, a lamb was bleating.

  I had brought Puck of Pook’s Hill with me; it was a lovely copy with a soft red-leather cover and pictures but it had seen a lot of service since grandmama had sent it to Willy on his ninth birthday and it was almost falling to pieces. I sat down on a big stone with my back against the tree and read some of the poems aloud, trying to pretend that Willy was here, listening:

  “‘Sing Oak, and Ash, and Thorn, good sirs

  (All of a Midsummer morn)!

  England shall bide till Judgment Tide

  By Oak, and Ash, and Thorn!’”

  Suddenly the bushes parted and a little old man appeared. For a moment or two I stared at him in amazement; I really thought it was The Old Thing himself! Then I saw it was only Farmer Rickaby.

  “Were you reading to yourself, Sarah?” he asked, surprised at finding me alone.

  “I was pretending to read to Willy.”

  “You didn’t know I was listening, did you? ‘Oak, ash and thorn,’” he said, sitting down on one of the big stones. “There’s oak and thorn but where’s the ash?”

  “We planted a little one; I hope you don’t mind, Mr. Rickaby.”

  He grinned at me. He really was quite like Puck, small and thin with a brown wrinkled face and bright brown eyes. “I don’t mind,” he said. “I’ve seen you sitting here having your tea. You come here often?”

  “Yes, but we’re very careful; we never light a fire or leave bits of paper and we never——”

  “The gate was left open on Sunday.”

  “Not us!” I exclaimed. “Honestly, not us! We never come in by the gate.”

  He nodded. “I’ve seen you climbing over the wall. It was one of those trippers that left the gate open – I’d trip them if I could get hold of them! If you happen to see any trippers about you might tell them to shut the gates. Ask them if they’d like Farmer Rickaby to walk into their house uninvited and leave their front door open.”

  “Yes,” I said doubtfully. I saw what he meant, of course, but I didn’t relish the idea of accosting a stranger and giving him the message.

  “I like you coming here,” said Farmer Rickaby. “It’s a nice place to play games. Nothing grows in this corner of the field and I’ve been told by some that the old tree should be taken down for the sake of the hay, but——”

  “Oh, no!”

  “No,” he agreed, smiling. “In any case I can’t, because a gentleman from London came to look at it and said it was ancient. He said the stones were put here by the Druids – the same people that made Stonehenge.”

  “Then it is magic!”

  “I don’t know about magic. It’s an old place – that’s what the gentleman said – hundreds of years old. He said I wasn’t to cut down the tree or move the stones. Well, I never thought of it – but it’s a funny thing that you can’t do what you like with your own land.”

  “But you don’t want to?”

  “No, I don’t want to. All the same it’s a funny thing.”

  We were silent for a while. I tried to think of something to say because mother had told me that I was quite old enough now to talk to people and be friendly instead of sitting and looking from me as if I were dumb. (To “look from you” is a Scots expression; I can’t think of anything in English which means the same thing.)

  At last I said, “There’s a cricket match at Bells Hill; that’s why I’m here alone.”

  “Cricket is a grand game,” said Mr. Rickaby. “I was a slogger; hit or miss was my motto. Mr. Morris used to play when he first came to Fairfield. He was a fast bowler and many’s the time he sent my stumps flying . . . so maybe his sons take after him.”

  “Willy doesn’t like cricket but Lewis is a very good bat. Lewis isn’t at Bells Hill now; he’s gone to Barstow.”

  “Barstow is a public school, isn’t it?”

  “Yes – and Lewis likes it. He can’t come home so often because it’s too far away; he only comes home for the holidays and his half-term week-end.”

  “That’s a pity.”

  “Oh, Lewis doesn’t mind. There’s lots of cricket – he likes that better than anything – and he’s hoping to get into the Colts’ Eleven next summer.”

  “Well, well, they all grow up, and we all grow old,” said Mr. Rickaby. “I’m too old for cricket now.”

  “Father doesn’t play either.”

  There was another silence. This time I didn’t bother to make polite conversation so we sat there for a long time without saying anything. The cuckoos were still calling to each other in the woods.

  “I’ll be cutting this field next week if the weather holds,” said Mr. Rickaby at last.

  “Oh, good!” I cried. “We’ll all help! Haymaking is fun.”

  “But the boys are at school.”

  “It’s Lewis’s half-term holiday – and Willy always comes on Saturdays when he can – and Lottie will help too.”

  “Dear me, is Lottie old enough for haymaking? It seems only yesterday that she was christened. ‘Charlotte Mary’ – that’s right, isn’t it?”

  I nodded. “She’s got two names and the boys have got two names but I’ve only got one,” I said sadly.

  “What do you want with two names? You don’t use more than one – and Sarah is a fine name,” declared Mr. Rickaby. “If we’d had a girl she’d have been Sarah. What do you want with two names?” he repeated in a grumbling voice.

  “I’d have liked two names,” I said. “Lewis is called ‘Lewis Henry.’ Lewis after mother’s brother who was killed in the war, and Henry after father. Willy is ‘William Maidand’ after grandpapa. He was born at Craignethan, that’s why.”

  “Yes, I see,” said Mr. Rickaby. “I remember the day Mr. and Mrs. Morris came here with the two little boys. It was a very wet day and Mrs. Rickaby went down to the Vicarage to light the fires and air the place before they arrived. She was asked to stay to tea and came home later in very good spirits. She said Mrs. Morris was a gem. Dear me, I remember that as if it was last week.”

  It was so interesting to hear about things that happened before I was born that I hoped he would tell me more . . . but he didn’t.

  “It’s time I was getting along,” he said. “We’ve had a nice talk, Sarah. You’re very like your father and you couldn’t be like anyone better. He’s a real gentleman, is Mr. Morris.”

  I smiled and said, “Yes, I like being like him.”

  Mr. Rickaby rose and added, “Don’t forget if you see any trippers, tripping about my fields, you’re to tell them what Farmer Rickaby said.”

  “I won’t forget,” I told him. It was all right to say I wouldn’t forget.

  Mr. Rickaby nodded and went through the gap in the hedge and I went home to tea.

  Chapter Three

  The weather remained fine and dry so Mr. Rickaby and his men cut the hay. It was a small field; they finished it in two days and by Saturday it was ready to turn. We had expected Lewis to come for the week-end but he had rung up to say that Tom Meldrum had asked him to spend the day at Riverside so he wouldn’t be home until supper-time. The Meldrums lived about five miles from Fairfield and Lewis was great friends with Tom.

  Willy came home from Bells Hill as usual, so he and I and Lottie went up to the field to help to turn the hay. It was done by hand in those days, you took a fork and turned it over to dry in the sun. The hay was light and sweet-scented and the sun was warm and golden. Lottie and I worked together; I was showing her what to do.

  Presently I looked round for Willy and saw him lying under the oak-tree in the shade. I was surprised! Willy was usually a whale for work.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.

  “It’s frightfully hot and I’ve got a headache. Sit down and talk to me, Sarah. Did you come up here last Saturday?”

  “Yes, I came by myself.”

  “I thought you would. I thought of you when I was watching the match and wished I was here. I hate cricket and I hate school. I hate never being alone.”

  “Perhaps you’ll like Barstow better. Lewis likes it.”

  “I’m not Lewis.” He sighed heavily. “Well, tell me what happened last Saturday.”

  “I was reading aloud, pretending you were here, when Mr. Rickaby came through the hedge. I thought for a moment it was Puck.”

  “Yes, he’s rather like The Old Thing,” agreed Willy, smiling.

  We were still talking when Mr. Rickaby came by. He stopped and said, “It’s warm this afternoon.”

  “Willy has a headache,” I told him.

  “A headache? That’s bad, that is! You’ve been working too hard in the sun. Perhaps you’ve got a touch of sunstroke, Willy. Your face is a bit flushed. You’d better go home.”

  “Yes,” I said. “Anyhow it’s nearly tea-time.” I called to Lottie and we went home.

  “Don’t tell mother about my head,” said Willy as we went down the path.

  “Sunstroke is serious, Willy.”

  “It isn’t sunstroke. My head was bad when I woke this morning but I didn’t tell Matron because I wanted to come home. I’ll be all right after tea.”

  He seemed better after tea – more like himself – and rode back to school on his bicycle. The next day they rang up from Bells Hill to say Willy had got measles.

  Nobody knew where Willy had got measles – and fortunately he didn’t have it badly – but he gave it to a great many other boys at Bells Hill, and he gave it to me.

  I developed a headache and a streaming cold and the following day I was covered with spots.

  Mother was sure Lottie would get it – she had kissed Willy before he went away – but Lottie remained fit and well and full of the joy of life. Lottie looked fragile and fairylike, and mother worried about her, but she was as strong as a little pony and I can’t remember her ever being ill.

  Measles is a horrible complaint – I felt hot and headachy and my eyes were very painful – but mother nursed me and spent hours sitting beside my bed and reading to me, so once I began to feel a little better it was a happy time. It was a new experience to have mother at my beck and call: mother pulling down the blind because my eyes were painful; mother sponging me between blankets and bringing me a drink of hot milk late at night to help me to sleep.

  When I was better and able to get up and come downstairs I found I had grown thin and tall. I knew I was taller because everyone seemed smaller and because my eyes were now on a level with the chimney-piece in the drawing-room.

  “She’s very thin,” said father, looking at me with a worried frown.

  “She’s had a bad time,” replied mother. “I’d better take her with me to Craignethan this year. The change will do her good.”

  Mother’s visit to her parents was an annual event and always took place in September. She went in the spring as well – after the spring-cleaning – but only for a short visit. In September she went for a whole fortnight and we had to get on without her as best we could. Father said it was good for her to get away and it was good for her parents to have her.

  “It isn’t good for us,” grumbled Lewis.

  “It’s exceedingly good for us to be uncomfortable for a fortnight,” said father.

  We weren’t really uncomfortable – Minnie saw to that – but the comfortableness of mother was absent.

  I wasn’t at all pleased when I heard I was to go to Craignethan; I hoped father would say, “No, no, take Lottie,” – but he didn’t. He said, “Well, if it wouldn’t be a bother to your parents, perhaps you should.”

  “Sarah won’t be a bother,” said mother cheerfully.

  Mother was always cheerful when the time came for her visit to Craignethan. She loved us all, and she loved the Vicarage, but there was a sort of gaiety about her when she set out for Scotland – a sort of suppressed excitement.

  I had never been to Craignethan. One year mother had taken Lewis, because he was the eldest, and another year she had taken Lottie, but neither of them had said much about it: Lewis because he wasn’t the sort of boy who could tell you about things, or at any rate didn’t bother; Lottie because she had been too young. I knew nothing about Craignethan, except that there was an old photograph of it hanging on the stairs. The house stood at the bottom of an avenue and was surrounded by trees and bushes, it looked dark and damp and rather eerie. I wanted to be at home in September (I had been given a bicycle and Willy and I had planned to go for expeditions together) but, when I was young, children were not consulted as to what they would like to do.

  I had grown so tall that mother took me to Larchester to buy some new clothes. I remember a tweed coat and skirt, chestnut-brown with little green flecks in it, and a golden-brown cashmere frock with smocking round the waist. I had set my heart on a blue frock with frills but mother said blue was for people with blue eyes.

  *

  It was a long journey to Ryddelton, with several changes, and I was so unused to travelling that I thought we were never going to get there; my head ached and I didn’t want any food. When at last we arrived at Ryddelton station I felt quite sick and dizzy; we had to bundle out of the train quickly because it didn’t stop there more than a few minutes.

  Grandpapa had come to meet us; he was very tall and thin with thick white hair and a small military moustache.

  Mother threw her arms round his neck and hugged him.

  Then he turned and said, “And here’s Sarah! At least I suppose it must be Sarah.”

  “Of course it’s Sarah!” said mother, laughing.

  “I hadn’t expected Sarah to be a grown-up young lady,” explained grandpapa. “The last time I had the pleasure of meeting my grand-daughter she was very much smaller.”

  “Oh, Papa, don’t be ridiculous!” mother exclaimed. “You haven’t seen Sarah since she was three years old; it was when you were in London for a regimental dinner and you came to Fairfield for the week-end.”

  “Yes, yes, so it was,” agreed grandpapa, putting his hand through my arm and leading me to the car, which was waiting in the station yard. I can remember now the feeling of that kind old hand gripping my arm firmly.

  It was several miles to Craignethan House. Grandpapa drove himself, up hill and down dale. At first it was dark with the bright lights of the car lighting up the road and the hedges, but in a few minutes the moon rose from behind a ridge of hills and it was almost as bright as day. Mother chatted happily all the time but I didn’t listen. I hadn’t wanted to come but now I was beginning to feel excited; it was all so different from Fairfield: there were hills and rocks and a little river with the moonlight glinting on it and turning it to silver. We crossed the river by a narrow bridge, turned in at a wide entrance and jolted slowly up a steep avenue overhung by trees.

  “The avenue is as bad as ever,” said mother.

  “Yes, yes,” agreed grandpapa. “It’s worse if anything. We got it put into decent order in the spring but no sooner was the work finished than we had a storm and the water rushed down in a torrent and washed all the metal into the road. A sheer waste of good money, that’s what it was.”

  There were some buildings on the right, stables and barns, and then we came over the crest of the hill and saw the house below us with its windows lighted and a sweep of gravel outside the door. In the picture it had looked an eerie sort of place but the trees had been cut down and the bushes cleared away so it stood alone. At the back of the house there was a little stream amongst rocks and, beyond that, a hill with trees. The house itself was not as large as I had expected; it was a solid grey stone house with a slate roof and tall chimneys. There were no steps up to the door; the doorway was level with the ground – and the door was
of heavy wood, studded with iron nails.

  Of course I didn’t see all that on the first night; in fact I saw very little for the door was opened by grandmama herself. She stood, framed in the doorway, with the light shining on her silver hair . . . the next moment we were in the hall and there was a great deal of talk and laughter.

  Grandmama kissed me and said, “You don’t remember me, do you, Sarah?”

  “But you’re just like Mother!” I exclaimed. “Why didn’t anyone tell me you were so pretty?”

  Grandpapa laughed, “Do you hear that, Jane? You’ve seldom had a nicer compliment!”

  “The child is tired and hungry,” said grandmama.

  “Yes, she had better go to bed,” agreed mother.

  “But she must have something to eat,” grandmama declared. “Can she take soup, Dorrie, or would you rather she had a bowl of bread and milk?”

  Mother wasn’t listening (she was looking at a picture which hung on the wall and grandpapa had taken her by the arm and was telling her how he had bought it at a sale) so grandmama led me into the dining-room and gave me a big cup of soup and a brown scone.

  “When those two get together you can get no sense out of them,” she explained confidingly. “We’ll just leave them to it and have a nice little chat by ourselves. What do you like doing best, Sarah?”

  “Playing with the boys,” I said.

  As I ate my soup, which was deliciously thick and full of barley and vegetables, I told her about the old tree and about playing with Willy and pretending we were Dan and Una. I had never told anyone before – it was a secret between Willy and me – so I was surprised to find myself telling grandmama.

  She nodded and said, “Dan and Una – that’s Puck of Pook’s Hill. Who do you have for Puck?”

  “We just pretend Puck,” I told her. “One day when I was there alone I thought I saw Puck, but it was only Farmer Rickaby.”

  “Tell me about it,” said grandmama.

  I told her about it – and about the oak, and ash and thorn. We were still talking about Puck, she knew all the stories, when mother and grandpapa came in.