Kisses on a Postcard

by Terence Frisby

  There were sheep to be rounded up with a companionable dog, and pigs pleased to have their backs scratched in their evil-smelling sties. Tractors had mostly replaced horses on the farms but we got the occasional ride on Crago’s big farm horses.

  To watch the various ponies and workhorses being shod at Uglow’s the blacksmith in Dobwalls was thrilling and a bit frightening. There is an awful lot of horse when you get close to one, especially when you are a smallish eight-year-old. Cows look at you with trust, but horses look at you suspiciously. And with good reason. Each new shoe was heated in the furnace till it was red-hot, then, while malleable, beaten and bent to the right size, plunged into cold water to cool it just enough before it was fitted to the hoof, hissing and smelling of burning hoof and horsehair as it was nailed on. Although this was painless for the horses, they did not care for the business, not surprisingly. They stirred uneasily and laid back their ears as they smelled themselves scorching. Occasionally the more spirited or nervous ones would lash out. Mr Uglow would dodge the kick, swear, pick up the red-hot shoe with tongs and start again.

  On Saturday mornings we could earn pocket money from local farmers by herding pigs, sheep and cattle into the pens in Doublebois goods yard by Blamey and Morgan’s mill. The thrill of being partially responsible for getting the animals down a mile or two of lanes without them diving through a hedge or running off somewhere was enormous. The difficult bit was when we left the road and had to get them into the pens without them escaping across the goods yard and on to the main line, a disaster that rarely happened. We stood in a row with arms spread, holding sticks and making noises, yet still some independent-minded animal would dash through our line and make a break for it. Difficult for a boy to stop a full-grown cow, or even a pig, once it has made up its mind. The sheep you could grapple with, hanging on to their wool. Once a goods train coming up the line from the valley was brought to a halt as the main line was dotted with men and boys trying to usher a lowing, terrified steer away from a very messy end, back to the one planned for it. One Saturday we had a very randy pig who tried to mount every other pig of whatever sex that was in its pen. We boys were delighted and urged it on, amazed at its pink wriggling corkscrew penis. The pig finally made the mistake of climbing onto one of its companions at the wrong end and got its penis bitten. It ran squealing round the pen, barging the others aside in its agony while we chortled with glee. Once all the animals were in, we swung on the rails round the pens, slapping the pigs and cows like knowledgeable farmers, complacent in the skill we had shown and each with a sixpence in his pocket.’

  As I remember, it was mixing with and aping these impressive men that had the most influence on the vackies’ speech. In Cornish, if you wanted to know where something was, you asked where it was to, pronounced ‘tu’. One Cornish expression I remember well was the use of the word ‘directly’, always pronounced ‘dreckly’. ‘Her’s coming dreckly’, ‘Us’ll do that dreckly’, meant anything from five minutes to eternity. It was, and is, the Cornish equivalent of mañana.

  I always maintained that I never acquired a Cornish accent in my years there, unlike many of the other vackies, who, after initial resistance, eagerly copied their elders and embraced a new way of talking. I consciously resisted it, perhaps through pride or perhaps through loyalty to my home. But perhaps it was partly because I was with a Welsh couple, also proud of their own identity, with Uncle Jack scathing about ‘yokels’. When I returned to London, aged nearly eleven, I walked into Dad’s office one day. It was empty. I turned to those in the outer office and said, ‘Whirrs Dad tu?’

  It gave great pleasure to everyone.

  Chapter Eleven

  One day jack and I joined Ken and Elsie Plummer behind the row of outside privies that sat across the foot of the gardens of Railway Cottages: a raid on Granny Peters’ gooseberry bushes. Scrumping was to us vackies an occupation of our childhood, to the village kids it was unknown. It just didn’t seem to have occurred to them, or perhaps they were used to taking what they wanted. Nor did we vackies do it because we were hungry for fruit, or greedy. There were all sorts of wild fruit and nuts in the woods, fields and hedgerows all round us. No, it was simply something we did. Granny Peters was Jimmy Peters’ grandmother, which might explain why he didn’t feel inclined to rob her. She was, to us, half funny, half witch and lived in the Court at number 4. Her gooseberry bushes were laden with golden hairy goosegogs.

  Jack and Ken were in charge of our raiding party, planning it with military precision. ‘Look, Ken, it’s best if Elsie keeps watch here and we crawl across the paths.’

  Ken agreed, holding just enough reserve in his tone to show that he was joint leader, not second-in-command. ‘Yes. I vote for that.’

  Elsie had her own ideas. ‘I want to come with you.’

  ‘You can’t,’ Ken said.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because you’re useless.’

  ‘You’re mean you are, you sod.’

  ‘You always make a noise or get seen or something.’

  ‘I can’t help it if people notice me.’

  Ken sighed. ‘She makes me sick.’

  This routine family spat over, we got on with the serious business. Jack resumed. ‘Well, Terry’s the smallest. He can get right in under the prickles and pass out the goosegogs.’

  I was glad of my important role. ‘Yeah, no one will see me.’

  ‘Then you and me, Ken, can get round the back there and get all them there.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘And Elsie can stay by the corner and see all the windows and if anybody comes to the bogs.’

  Elsie was indignant. ‘I’m not staying here, it smells.’

  ‘Stop moaning or we won’t give you any,’ Ken threw in.

  ‘Don’t want any.’

  I suppose any plan which included an unwilling Elsie in a vital role was doomed, but Jack ignored this. ‘All right, come on. Terry first.’ We wriggled round the odorous privies on our stomachs with an excess of secrecy that would have excited attention from a mile away. We boys slid in among the bushes while Elsie kept watch and communed with her changing body.

  In the cocoon of the gooseberry bushes it was both cosy and painful. No matter how careful I was, they pricked.

  Jack whispered, ‘Come on, Terry. Pass ’em out.’

  Ken could see me. ‘He’s eating ’em.’

  They were delicious. ‘I only had a few,’ I said.

  Suddenly there was a distant female voice calling, very Cornish, very old: Granny Peters. ‘Hey, you. You boys. What you to?’

  Ken saw her first. ‘Oh no. That’s her.’

  ‘What b’you doin’ in there?’

  Jack turned on Ken. ‘Where’s your cousin?’

  ‘She’s gone.’

  Granny Peters was on top of us now. ‘Why be you lying down there?’

  In my anxiety to get out, my clothes were impaled on the barbs. Gooseberries in my pockets were squashed as I struggled. Ken ran for it; Jack stayed with me. Granny Peters stood over us, a figure to frighten you from sleep.

  That evening in 7 Railway Cottages Jack and I were standing in the dock, in the court of Auntie Rose and Uncle Jack, an intimidating tribunal. Uncle Jack opened the proceedings. ‘So you two tried to steal Granny Peters’ gooseberries, did you?’

  We were silent.

  ‘Well, did you?’

  ‘We were only scrumping,’ I mumbled miserably.

  ‘What’s that, then? Cockney for stealing?’

  ‘Scrumping is when it’s apples and things,’ said Jack helpfully.

  ‘I know what it is.’

  Auntie Rose joined in. ‘I’ll never hold up my head in the Court again. Ashamed, I am of you both. Poor old Granny Peters.’

  Our heads drooped further.

  Uncle Jack stared at us. ‘What are we going to do with you?’

  We didn’t know, but Auntie Rose did. ‘You’re going to go in to her and say you’re sorry, to start with. And you take h
er in some of my rock cakes.’

  ‘Yes, Auntie Rose.’

  ‘You know she do make jam from all her fruit and she earns her money from it and she do give us a jar every Christmas. And then you steal ’em.’

  Uncle Jack was as unforgiving. ‘If you wanted some gooseberries why didn’t you ask? Were you hungry? Don’t we feed you?’

  More shuffled feet.

  ‘You take my rock cakes and you go in there and you ask her what jobs you can do for her.’

  We knocked timidly on Granny Peters’ door. No answer. ‘Perhaps she’s out,’ I said hopefully to Jack, ready to run.

  ‘She’s never out.’ He knocked louder. ‘Granny Peters? Granny Peters?’

  Suddenly she was there before us. I am not sure how old she was, certainly the oldest inhabitant of Doublebois, though the trio in 1 Railway Cottages at the opposite end from us, an elderly man and his two sisters about whom there were incestuous defamatory rumours, must have run her close. Her voice was cracked, barely of this world, she wheezed; she wasn’t really there in one sense, though with the support of her relatives near by and the neighbours she managed. ‘Who’s tha’?’

  ‘Jack and Terry, Granny Peters, the boys from Auntie Rose’s.’

  ‘Oh, the vackies. Aaah. Hallo, my boodies.’

  ‘We brought you some of her rock cakes.’

  Granny Peters took us in, talking wheezily all the time. ‘Aun’ee Rose. Oooh. Her rock cakes. Aaah. Give ’em here. I’ll soak they in my tea. You boys be from Lunnen, eh? I was there once, with my Arthur. Too many ’osses. Everywhere. ’Osses all round you. Worse’n Plymouth, ’twas.’ She gestured to me. ‘Come yere, my pretty. Come closer.’

  I was rigid. ‘Oh no.’

  ‘Go on,’ urged Jack, in no danger.

  ‘She smells funny,’ I whispered as I submitted to an embrace of old person’s smells.

  ‘Oh, you’m pretty ’n no mistake. Don’t wriggle, I won’t hurt ’ee. You mind me o’ my Billy. Ginger, they call ’ee. All down Dobwalls Street they chanted, “Ginger, you’m barmy, you oughtta join the army,” ’n he did.’

  To my horror she started to cry.

  Jack tried to interrupt. ‘Auntie Rose said—’

  ‘Oh Billy, my firstborn, my pretty, where you to now? South Africa, he went, and the Boers shot ’ee. There’s his medals. He warn’t simple. The army took him. So he couldn’t a’ bin, could ’ee? They maids led him on. ’Twas they fault, not ’ee. He didn’t hurt they. You wouldn’t hurt a fly, would you, my pretty?’

  I struggled in folds of enveloping cloth. ‘She won’t let me go.’

  ‘Don’t worry. I think she’s all right.’

  ‘His father, he was the simple one. I ’ad eight from ’ee. All gone to God. He took ’n all: three in the war; two when they was little like you, my boody. Henry, he went on the railway. Working on the line. Down the valley. They threw a bottle from a train and it hit his lovely face. Oh. The 4.12 to Snozzle, ’twas.’ (All locals pronounced St Austell like that.) ‘Oh, I outlived all my own children. ’Tis not natural. ’Tis wonderful lonely.’

  ‘Isn’t Jimmy Peters’ dad your son?’ asked Jack.

  ‘Oh yes. Yes. I forgot ’ee. Huh. I don’t count ’ee. He’s still here.’

  I tried a new tack. ‘If you let me go, I’ll take your jug and get some water from the pump.’

  ‘Wha’ for? ’Tis half full.’

  ‘Auntie Rose said we got to.’

  ‘Oh, Auntie Rose. Yes. Her rock cakes: they’m well named.’

  Jack got to the point. ‘And we’re sorry we tried to steal your gooseberries.’

  ‘You want some gooseberries? Go on, then. They be yansome now. Take that bowl and bring me some. I’ll make you some jam. Yere, come yere, little one. Let me touch your hair.’

  ‘I got to go. Auntie Rose is calling.’

  ‘Give me a kiss, Billy. Henry, give your mam a kiss ’fore you go to work.’

  But we were out of the door with jug and bowl.

  ‘We’ll bring you some gooseberries in this bowl, Granny Peters.’

  ‘Come on, quick.’

  And we were gone, her ethereal, quavering voice floating behind us, still echoing in my head to this day.

  Elsie Plummer was a very good girl.

  She went to church on Sunday

  To pray to God to give her strength

  To kiss the boys on Monday.

  In our tiny community we all knew each other’s characters very well. There was no escape. Elsie had her reputation, she had worked hard enough for it, but I don’t know whether our liaison was known about or not. I never got teased about it so perhaps it wasn’t; one secret she managed to keep. Perhaps it was just too unlikely. With my first winter in Cornwall over we met again and again in the house in the woods as I grew more and more jealous of her and confused about my own feelings. I was nowhere near puberty.

  ‘Terry, let’s play families.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Oh, go on. You be Dad and I’ll be Mam.’ By now she had learned from the cinema what to say and how to say it. She threw herself into the scenarios she had invented for us. ‘I love you, Dad. You can tell. Listen to my heart.’ She paused at my lack of response, entirely due to inhibition. ‘Feel it.’ I could do it only half-heartedly. ‘No, inside. Undo them, can’t you?’

  ‘Don’t want to.’

  ‘You do.’

  ‘You’re older’n me.’

  ‘I’m fourteen.’

  ‘I’m eight. Boys should be older’n girls.’

  ‘Who said?’

  ‘They always are.’

  ‘Not. Mrs Kitto’s older’n Mr Kitto. By miles.’

  ‘How d’you know?’

  ‘The whole village knows. So’s all right. I like you best. You’re the youngest.’ She tried her new-found seductive tone again. ‘Have you seen my new knickers?’

  ‘Everybody has.’

  She was indignant. ‘When?’

  ‘When you do high kicks.’

  ‘Like this?’ She lay back and demonstrated, foot high in the air.

  I was non-committal as I covertly looked.

  ‘Want to see ’em now?’

  ‘I just did.’

  She leant close to me. ‘Want to touch?’

  I was routed. ‘Don’t know.’

  ‘You knew the other day.’

  ‘Shut up.’

  ‘You want to, really.’

  ‘I’m going.’

  ‘You’re scared.’

  At last it burst out of me. ‘Just stop talking about it all the time.’

  She understood at once. ‘Sorry,’ she said quickly. ‘Sorry, sorry. Yere. Lie down. By me. I won’t speak again. Promise.’

  I did as she asked.

  ‘That’s right,’ she breathed in relief. ‘Give me your hand.’

  Chapter Twelve

  The soldiers stationed in Doublebois House were always being replaced. When we first arrived in Cornwall it was occupied by the men I have described, shocked after the Dunkirk debacle. They soon moved on and the place was taken over by a succession of different regiments, generally under training for some event or other. At one point Canadians were briefly there and suddenly left. We read in the papers a few days later of the ill-fated raid on Dieppe in which so many Canadians died. Doublebois seemed to go into unofficial mourning for a while.

  Every time we got wind of a change of personnel, if we weren’t at school we children would all run into the Park and hang from the beech tree, cheering and waving, excited by all the activity. The soldiers always waved back and were often singing – dirty songs if we were lucky. Sometimes they were marched out to the station and boarded a waiting train. Then we would all run back down the Court and hang over the wire fence behind the wash-house, waving them out of sight up the line. Generally the movement was by road. Soldiers we knew, guards who had let us see their rifles and examine their equipment, went riding away in lorries, waving and smiling, always those two actions. Some
times the replacements came riding in at the same time as the previous incumbents were leaving, so there seemed to be a frenzy of activity with a military policeman directing traffic at the crossroads. As convoys of lorries roared past the end of the Court, it became hazardous even to venture onto the normally empty A38. Nevertheless, we always dashed across it to the Park to watch the newcomers drive in through the left-hand gate and up that drive as the others departed by the right.

  But most often and gloriously, one contingent would leave and there would be nobody there for a few days or weeks. The whole estate became an empty adventure playground for us children, vackies and locals. The two drives up to the big house were lined with rhododendrons and other shrubs. Between the drives was a monkey puzzle tree, beloved of the Victorians who had built this place. We couldn’t climb it and soon gave up trying. There were woods and empty Nissen huts to explore; there was an abandoned swimming pool, full of accumulated water, beside which I spent hours watching tadpoles and newts in spring, and water boatmen making lazy circles on the still surface during lazy summer afternoons. We pushed out little boats made of leaves and twigs with ants as the crews, we trailed our hands, we saw a snake trapped in there one day, swimming anxiously round and round looking for a way out, keeping us at bay, but it was only a grass snake, I think, gone the next day.

  Our glittering prize in the middle of all this was the big house, now empty and at our mercy. Easy entry through a broken window and there was an unoccupied, echoing manor for our playground. We made full use of it, crashing and banging about until the owner of the estate, old Mr Steer, known to us as Old Man Steer, would appear to drive us briefly out. But his heart wasn’t in it after the soldiers’ destructive occupation. We soon returned. He lived in Home Farm, behind the big house, looking out over the valley, alone, I think, or with a housekeeper, because he still worked the farm.

  In the lodge by the right-hand entrance of the twin drives up to Doublebois House lived Mr and Mrs Holman. Mrs Holman was the daughter or granddaughter, I’m not sure which, of Old Man Steer. Mr Holman was a solicitor who commuted daily to Plymouth to practise. They were a gentle, childless couple in their late thirties or early forties who made a point of befriending us vackies. They formed a mixed scout or cub group for all the children of Doublebois and we met in their house and played Kim’s Game, which I loved and still do, did first aid, read books on tree, bird and insect recognition and went on patrols round the estate.