Christmas At Thrush Green

by Miss Read

  ‘You fill me with good intentions,’ said Phil. ‘I will put bird nuts on my shopping list as soon as I get home.’ She waved goodbye to Winnie and then walked across the corner of the green to Stable Cottage.

  It proved to be a successful visit. Molly was sure that Annie would be thrilled to be the Virgin Mary and confirmed that both her children had had chickenpox. She also agreed to go down to the cottage where spotty Louise lived and collect the blue robe. It would need to be shortened, but Molly was good with her needle and said it would be an easy job.

  Having thanked her profusely, Phil walked back towards Tullivers. There was a glimmer of sun in the sky - the first they’d had for some days - and Phil tipped her face up towards it. She was sure she could feel the faintest of warm rays on her cheeks. A robin celebrated from a nearby chimneypot, fluting its melody sweetly, and Phil stopped to listen to it, her eyes closed.

  Peep - peep! Peep - peep - peeeeeep!

  Phil opened her eyes, and saw her husband’s car draw up outside the house. From out of the car flew her beloved son, Jeremy.

  ‘Hi, Mum, I’m home! Oh, happy, happy Christmas!’ And, reaching her, he gave his mother a great big hug.

  ‘Jeremy’s home,’ remarked Harold Shoosmith, who was standing at his sitting-room window that overlooked the green.

  ‘Phil’ll be pleased,’ replied Isobel, looking up from a pair of socks she was darning. ‘She loves that boy.’

  ‘He still seems to be a nice lad. It’s sad how adolescence makes such a mess of the young nowadays, the boys especially.’

  ‘And you would know,’ Isobel responded, smiling. ‘So much experience.’

  Harold turned from the window to look at her. The remark had rather wounded him. ‘All right, I know I haven’t had children, but I like to think I’m broad-minded. I read the newspaper every day and—’

  ‘And listen to the news twice a day,’ Isobel continued. It was a well-worn theme.

  ‘Mock me if you must,’ Harold said ruefully, ‘but I consider myself up to date with the present day.’

  ‘Of course you are, dearest. Now, what are you going to do this afternoon? You’ve finished the newspaper, including the crossword, and there’s another four hours until the six o’clock news.’

  ‘If you don’t mind, I thought I would pop over and see Ella, make sure she’s quite recovered from that fall she had.’ The village grapevine had ensured the news of Ella’s fall on the way to see Dotty was common knowledge in less than twenty-four hours. ‘I think she sometimes gets lonely over there on her own,’ Harold continued.

  ‘I don’t, for a moment, think Ella is lonely. From what everyone tells me, she and Dimity got on well together when they both lived there, but I think Ella is someone who appreciates her own company. Think how often she leaves some gathering or other and goes off home, long before the party has broken up.’

  ‘That’s true,’ Harold conceded. ‘It’s almost as though she gets bored with the small talk. Anyway, if it’s all right with you, I’ll go over and chat with her for a bit.’

  ‘Fine by me,’ replied his wife. ‘I could pretend I’m quite happy darning these socks but, I’m warning you, my New Year’s resolution is to darn no more socks. Life’s too short both to stuff mushrooms and to darn socks. You must learn to wear socks that are a mixture of wool and nylon, or whatever. Something that doesn’t go into holes.’

  ‘But those are my favourite yellow cashmere socks,’ protested Harold. ‘And it was only a tiny hole.’

  ‘Tiny holes turn into bigger ones,’ replied Isobel. ‘But I know you love these socks and since I love you, I’m darning them.’

  Harold bent over the back of Isobel’s chair and kissed the top of her head. ‘I won’t be long.’

  The pale sun that Phil Hurst had turned her face towards was still shining as Harold left the house. He hesitated whether to go via the green, which was the shortest way, or go round by the road. How wet was it? He went and stood on the edge of the green: it looked dry enough so he set off across it.

  ‘Good afternoon, Nathaniel,’ he said as he strode past the statue of the missionary on its plinth. Harold was gratified to see that it was still gleaming clean from his ministrations earlier in the month.

  A large black bird flapped lazily across the sky ahead of him. ‘Lots of crows is rooks, one rook is a crow,’ he murmured. It was one of his favourite adages. ‘And good afternoon to you, Mr Crow.’

  He was shortly pushing open the gate leading to Ella’s house. He saw the formidable bulk of his friend standing in her sitting-room window, and waved to her. But she didn’t wave back. She was peering at something in her hand, and obviously hadn’t seen him so Harold hailed her.

  ‘Ella, hello-o!’

  Ella looked up then, and raised her hand in greeting. A second later the front door opened and she ushered him in.

  ‘How lovely to see you. It means I can put this wretched piece of needlework aside and have a ciggy. You don’t mind, do you?’

  ‘It’s your house so of course I don’t mind. Any chance of a cup of coffee?’

  Ella shoved her cigarette-making equipment back into the side pocket of her capacious trousers. ‘Of course. Let’s go into the kitchen. Warmer there.’

  Harold followed the large figure through into the kitchen at the back, and settled himself at the table. Ella put some water in the kettle and turned it on. She then plumped herself down in a chair opposite Harold. ‘Well, then, what’s new?’ she asked.

  This was a typical Ella Bembridge opening. She might as well have said: ‘I’ve got a good bit of gossip, but you go first.’

  ‘I don’t think I’ve got any news. Jeremy Prior has just got home for the holidays. And I hear Frank and Phil are having a bit of trouble with the Nativity service. A number of children going down with chickenpox.’

  ‘Joan told me that Molly had told her that Phil had told her that they were hanging in there for as long as possible. But they may have to cancel if any more children fall out.’

  After a moment, the kettle boiled and Ella pulled herself to her feet and went to attend to the coffee. She made it straight into a mug, added a bit of milk, and put it in front of Harold.

  ‘Not having any yourself?’ he asked.

  ‘No, I had some earlier. Actually,’ she said, leaning across the table to peer at Harold’s mug, ‘is it all right? Mine tasted most odd.’

  Harold took a tentative sip and immediately spluttered. ‘This isn’t coffee, Ella! I’m not sure what it is, but it’s certainly not coffee.’

  ‘Oh dear!’ cried Ella. ‘I hope I haven’t poisoned you.’

  Harold got up to fetch a spoon from the draining-board and he stirred the brown mixture in his mug. ‘It’s got bits floating in it. It’s not one of Dotty’s concoctions, is it?’

  ‘Heavens, no! I know when to leave well alone.’

  Ella turned to the shelf above the stove, took down a jar and peered at it. ‘That’s coffee in there, isn’t it?’

  Harold looked at the glass canister. ‘Well, if it is, it’s the funniest-looking coffee I’ve ever seen.’ He took the lid off the canister and cautiously sniffed inside. ‘Don’t know what it is. It doesn’t have much of a smell. But it’s certainly not coffee.’

  Ella took the container from him, and tipped a little of its contents into the palm of her hand. She tilted her head on one side and peered at it. Then she stuck out a pink tongue and licked at the pile.

  ‘Do be careful,’ Harold cautioned. ‘It might be poisonous. ’

  ‘If it’s on that shelf, it’s certainly not poisonous. I keep everything like that in the garden shed.’ She had another lick, a bit bigger than the first.

  Harold looked at the shelf she’d pointed out, and took down a jar of instant coffee. ‘Here’s the coffee,’ he said and took off the lid to check inside. ‘Yes, that’s coffee all right. But what’s in your jar?’

  ‘I know!’ said Ella triumphantly. ‘It’s bran! I heard a piece about it on th
e wireless the other day, about how it’s good for you, fibre and all that. Thought I’d have a try. Didn’t like it much. Got in the teeth.’ And with that, she tipped the contents into the pedal bin beside the sink.

  ‘I could have used that for my slug traps,’ said Harold. ‘Now sit down, Ella, and I’ll make us both some coffee with this.’ And he held up the jar of instant coffee.

  Over the mugs of perfectly decent coffee, Harold talked to Ella about her eyesight. He knew Ella was a very proud, independent person, but they’d always got on well and Ella appreciated Harold’s good sense.

  ‘I went to see the eye man a week ago, and he wants me to go back to the specialist in Oxford. He reckons the macular degeneration has got worse . . .’ Her voice trailed away, then she added very quietly, ‘Much worse.’

  ‘Oh, my dear, I’m so sorry,’ said Harold, with immense sympathy for Ella. ‘I knew you were having problems with your eyes, but I didn’t know quite what. Tell me about it.’

  Ella gave a great sigh and she didn’t speak for a moment.

  ‘Ella,’ prompted Harold, ‘a problem shared is a problem halved.’

  Ella shifted in her chair, and looked at Harold. ‘It developed quite slowly to start with. About eighteen months ago, the optician thought there’d been degenerative changes to the back of both eyes, and sent me to Mr Cobbold, the specialist in Oxford. He confirmed the onset of macular degeneration, which was worse in the left eye. Both eyes are affected but because the right eye wasn’t as bad as the left, I’ve been managing.’ Ella stopped to cough, a wheezing chesty cough. ‘But now the right eye is in trouble. If I look at you head on’ - and Ella turned her head so she was staring straight at Harold - ‘then I can hardly make you out at all. But if I turn my head, and look at you sort of sideways, I can see you a little better but your face is still blurred.’

  ‘Can anything be done to stop the degeneration?’ Harold asked.

  ‘Apparently not. The chap told me they’re throwing a great deal of money into research but it won’t be in time to help me.’

  ‘And what of the future?’

  Ella sighed. ‘I don’t know. He wants me to go back to see Mr Cobbold. He said the disease can progress at different speeds. I won’t go completely blind and will always retain a little peripheral vision but the central vision of the right eye is damaged, which is why I’ve recently been having such difficulty with the things I love most - my handiwork, my sewing and knitting. And reading. Soon I may not be able to do them at all.’ She swallowed hard and looked away.

  Harold sat quietly and waited for her to get her emotions under control.

  Then Ella got up and walked through to the sitting-room. She returned with the piece of needlework that she had been inspecting when he had arrived.

  ‘Look at that,’ she said, tossing it onto the table in front of him.

  Harold picked it up, and then turned it so the design was the right way up. He recognized the rabbit and the unicorn from the famous tapestries he had seen in the Musée de Cluny in France. He didn’t know anything about tapestry or needlepoint, but he had always admired the way Ella’s chubby fingers were able to produce such tiny stitches.

  ‘Just look at it! Stitches all over the place.’

  Even Harold, who seldom had the need to hold a needle, was able to see there were a great many false stitches and, in several places, the coloured thread seemed to be in quite the wrong place. The unicorn’s horn, for instance, definitely had a kink in it.

  ‘More than anything,’ Ella said, ‘is my worry about what I shall do when I can’t do my needlework or handiwork any more.’

  ‘What did the optician say?’ asked Harold, handing the needlework back to Ella. ‘What about using a magnifier? I’ve seen advertisements for those.’

  ‘But it won’t work if my central vision goes completely. At the moment, it comes and goes, but I’m finding it much more difficult. It’s fine at one moment, then the lines go all distorted and squiggly. That’s why I am putting the stitches in the wrong place.’

  Ella heaved a great sigh, and then in what Harold realized was an act of great frustration, she hurled the piece of needlework across the kitchen.

  ‘To be honest, Harold, life just won’t be worth living.’ And with that, she turned her back on Harold and stared out of the kitchen window.

  ‘Ella, I’m so sorry—’ began Harold.

  ‘Don’t,’ said Ella fiercely. ‘I can’t be doing with sympathy. Just go, will you?’

  Harold put out his hand and touched Ella’s shoulder. ‘Chin up, old girl. We’ll think of something. Bye now.’

  When Harold looked back as he left the kitchen, she was in the same position. But as he put his hand on the front door knob to let himself out, he thought he heard a faint, ‘Thanks for coming.’

  When Harold got home, he found Isobel in the kitchen icing the Christmas cake, and told her of his worries about Ella.

  ‘It’s not that I think she’s a danger to herself. It’s not like someone beginning to lose their mind. You know, like putting the electric kettle onto the gas ring to boil. But she seems so utterly depressed.’

  Harold pulled out a chair and sat down. He dipped a finger into the bowl of icing, like a child might do. And Isobel, equally as she might with a child, gently admonished him. ‘Don’t pick! You can have the bowl to lick out when I’ve finished - although too much sugar isn’t good for you.’ She dipped her palette knife into a jug of hot water standing on the table beside her, and continued to smooth down the icing.

  ‘Don’t make it too level,’ said Harold. ‘I like the top to look a bit like snow. It makes it more fun for the little sledges.’

  ‘Honestly!’ laughed Isobel. ‘Grown men turn into little boys when it comes to Christmas. But talking of sledges, can you fetch the box of cake decorations for me. They’re in the spare-room cupboard.’

  When Isobel had married Harold, she had left most of her old life behind but she had brought the old Clarks shoebox that contained the Christmas cake decorations her mother had used when Isobel was a child. There was a little snowman, his once-red scarf now very faded; a couple of sledges; and a reindeer with only three legs. Isobel now craftily set it against a little crest of icing to compensate for its lost limb. The final decoration, which was always placed in the middle of the cake, was a robin on a log - and the robin was on a tiny spring so it wobbled.

  After Isobel had carefully placed this on the cake, she stood back to admire her work. ‘That’ll do, I think,’ she said, wiping her hands on her apron.

  Harold leaned across the table, and tapped the robin so it rocked back and forth. ‘Hello, robin. Happy Christmas!’

  Isobel smiled indulgently at her husband. ‘Now, once I’ve cleared all this up, what about a cup of tea? You can tell me more about Ella, and we can have a think about what we can do to help.’

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  A Very Special Teapot

  On the Monday morning of the award week, Nelly Piggott at last found time to take an hour off to go shopping. Her plan to look for a new dress had suffered a set-back when Rosa had called in sick the previous Monday, which meant they were one assistant short in the tea-room and Nelly had had to help out. But the girl had sent a message with her sister on Friday to say she was better and would be back to work the following week. It was always quiet first thing on a Monday and Nelly had gone in early to get the lunch preparations under way.

  ‘Just poppin’ out,’ she said to Rosa as she walked through the tea-room. ‘Won’t be a tick.’

  After her large bulk had gone down the handsome steps in front of The Fuchsia Bush and turned left down the High Street, Poppy turned to Rosa. ‘Want a bet that she comes back with a bag from one of them designer clothes shops?’

  ‘And why not,’ her sister responded, sticking up for their boss. ‘Wouldn’t you if you’d won an award? We’ll have to be extra neat an’ tidy on Thursday, too.’

  Nelly was away a little longer than she had intended.
She found just the dress she wanted - hyacinth blue with a white collar - but, after turning this way and that in front of the changing-room mirror, she had to admit that she really needed one size larger and the assistant said they were sold out of that size.

  Typical, thought Nelly, as she struggled out of the dress. Why don’t they order more of the most popular sizes? She seemed quite oblivious of the fact that the size she needed was very close to the top end of the range.

  After searching through the rails of another two shops, she was beginning to despair. One of the problems was that the dress shops were full of party wear - all glitter and tinsel - and she’d had to share changing-rooms with giggling office girls trying on impossibly short and tight-fitting confections in which they would grace their office parties the following week.

  Finally, Nelly had overcome her pride and had gone into a shop in a little arcade that sold ‘clothes for the more generous figure’. And here she found the perfect dress. It was in a colour that the assistant described as a ‘loverly crushed raspberry’, had three-quarter sleeves and a pretty scalloped neckline. It was high-waisted and the skirt fell in soft folds, hiding Nelly’s portly figure. Before she went back to work, she popped into Boots to buy a new lipstick to match the dress. She smiled when she saw it was called Ripe Raspberry.

  She was so pleased with her purchases that she didn’t mind the smirks on the faces of Rosa and Poppy as she walked through the tea-room, not even when the word ‘outsize!’ floated in the air before the door into the kitchen swung behind her.

  ‘So you sees,’ said Albert Piggott to his drinking companions in The Two Pheasants the following day, ‘I’ll be at the wife’s side when she gets her award come Thursday.’

  Percy Hodge snorted. ‘That’s typical of you, Albert Piggott. You runs your wife down at every possible moment, but you’re quick enough to go and bask in her glory.’

  ‘It’s a fair return,’ responded Albert. ‘After all, I took ’er back when she were down on ’er luck.’