Thrush Green

by Miss Read

  "There's Molly!" shrieked Paul with joy, and breaking from Ruth's grasp, fled across the battlefield in the thick of flying balls to join his friend.

  "'Oy!" shouted Ben, laughing. "You'll get your 'ead knocked off for a coconut!" which sally Paul thought the very essence of humor. He recognized Ben, despite a swelling cheek and some discoloration of the eye, as Molly's particular friend, and looked suddenly up at her with a questioning glance.

  "He said he was coming to see you?"

  "He did," said Molly, nodding reassuringly at the little boy. He had known her feelings from the first and she did not intend to try and keep secrets from him now.

  "Then it's all right?"

  "It's all right," repeated Molly, with such a delicious smile that Paul hugged her around the waist, in a sudden embrace that showed his joy, relief and congratulations in one swift movement.

  "Going to try your luck?" asked Ben, approaching.

  "Please," said Paul, and Ruth handed over sixpence. Ben gave Paul three balls and took him to the halfway line. While he took his stance solemnly and eyed the tempting coconuts, Molly inquired about the little boy's parents.

  Ruth gave her news of their return in two days' time, and they exchanged gossip about their families. All the time, Ruth noticed, Molly's eyes followed the figure of the young man.

  At last, as though wishing to share her pent-up happiness, Molly spoke rapidly to Ruth.

  "I been to tea with Mrs. Curdle today. That's her grandson, over there—Ben, his name. Paul knows about him, and p'raps you do too."

  "I don't, you know," said Ruth, "but he looks very handsome."

  Molly flushed with pride.

  "He's a lot handsomer than that really, but he had a bit of a fight before tea." Molly made it sound as though physical conflict before a meal was the most natural thing in the world, but she rattled on before Ruth could go further into this interesting disclosure.

  "We've got to see my dad later, and I must say I don't relish it, but Ben don't show a bit of fear."

  "Does this mean you're thinking of leaving us?" asked Ruth tentatively.

  "Not yet," answered the girl, "but I reckon I'll be gone before the winter."

  "Oh Molly, we shall miss you!" said Ruth, putting out a hand with genuine concern. Molly smiled gaily at her.

  "I'll be back next May the first," she promised, "with Curdle's Fair. Shall I look out for you, or will you be gone by then?"

  Ruth shook her head slowly and returned Molly's smile.

  "I'll be here," she said.

  At that moment Paul ran up, appealing for another sixpence.

  "I hit one but it didn't fall off. Did you see? I hit one. Were you looking? I actually hit one! This time I'll knock it right off!"

  "That's right," said Ben. "He'll get one this time, you see."

  Ruth handed over another sixpence and the two departed to try again. This time Paul's shots went wider than ever, but Ben spoke to Molly before returning to his customers and she vanished into a corner, returning with a coconut, which she presented to the astounded Paul.

  "But I didn't hit it!" he protested.

  "Sh!" said Molly, one eye on the customers. "It's what's called a consolation prize. You tried hard so Ben's give you this. Save a bit for me!" She gave the child a swift pat on the cheek, waved farewell and returned to Ben's side.

  Bearing the hairy trophy like some sacred relic Paul, enraptured, led the way toward the swing boats.

  One of Mrs. Curdle's daughters, as massive and dark, but not a quarter as majestic as her mother, greeted them boisterously.

  "Come along, my ducks. 'Op in now and give yerself a treat!" She lifted a long plank that was attached to the gear and applied it as a brake to the bottom of a scarlet boat. It slowed down abruptly, much to the vociferous annoyance of two young ladies whom Ruth recognized as two of the genteel assistants at "The Fuchsia Bush." Their refined accents had vanished under stress of circumstance and been replaced by a more plebeian, and far less painful, mode of speech.

  They clambered out, displaying a prodigious amount of leg, and Paul began to climb the wobbly stepladder that stood beside the swaying boat.

  Ruth suddenly felt that she could not bear the motion of the swing so soon after the roundabout and in the general noise which surrounded her.

  "Can you work it alone? I'll wait here," promised Ruth. Paul nodded his agreement, settled himself importantly on one red cushion, gripped the furry sally, still warm from the clutches of one of the young ladies, and began to haul himself into glorious motion.

  "The young gentleman'll be all right, mum," said Mrs. Girdle's daughter heartily. "If you gets nervous lift this 'ere stick, or 'oiler for me. I'll be 'andy!" She bustled off to another client, leaving Ruth very content to stand alone enjoying the rush of air as Paul's boat beat its rhythmic way back and forth above her.

  For Paul, had she known it, this solitary splendor was the high light of his day. Always, for months and years now, he had longed to ride alone in a swing boat, to be master of this flying craft, with no one to fuss about him or to slow his progress.

  This, he told himself, as he soared blissfully above the trees on Thrush Green, this really was flying! He remembered his imaginary flight of the morning when he had peered inside the school, the church, and all the pleasant corners of Lulling. How much more satisfying was this heady swooping! He hauled vigorously, thrilled with his own prowess, and as the boat curved skyward he could see the pale lane that led to Nod and Nidden, and the buttercup fields that lay behind the little yard of the village school.

  He must be nearly as high as the weathercock on the steeple, he told himself ecstatically. The light was beginning to thicken now, so that the sleepy gray town below the hill was indistinct, but in bright sunshine he was sure he could have seen every roof top and chimney, and perhaps still farther afield, the sea and glimpses of those foreign lands he so wanted to visit when he was a grown man.

  He paused in his pulling for a moment, for his young arms were aching, and was content to swoop tranquilly back and forth while he mused upon those distant places that were beginning to welcome the sun which had now slipped away from Thrush Green. At this very minute, thought young Paul, there were people there laughing and playing—swinging, perhaps, as he was, but on bright tropical trees that grew by seas as blue as the swing boat that lay idle beside his own.

  It was a game that he often played when he was alone, letting his mind dwell on things that were happening all over the world at the same moment, and today the motion of the swing boat and the unaccustomed height added to the range of his fancies. A gleam of distant water caught his eye, and he knew that it was the river Pleshy where he picnicked and paddled on summer days. And now, as he swung on Thrush Green, and over the sea those brown gay people played under their flowered trees, among the watery weeds of his much-loved river the minnows would be wavering in shoals, all headed upstream, their eyes gleaming like jewels. And far away, in waters much more cold and turbulent, the great seals would be splashing and diving. And farther still, sharks and myriads of other fishes, cruel or benign, slid mysteriously among the sea forests and caverns which helped to make this colorful round ball of a world the wonder that it was.

  This power of transporting himself elsewhere was never to leave Paul. It came from a sympathy and kinship with all forms of life, and from an awareness of the smallness of the world around him. At the moment Thrush Green was his real world. He saw that the people there knew, and relied on, each other. It was a closely knit community of individuals, each sensitive to the other and related by ties of kinship, affection, dislike, or work. With the eyes of a six-year-old Paul looked down upon the small familiar green face of his little world. In later years, after much traveling, he was to find the greater one about it very much the same.

  ***

  Dr. Lovell had very few patients at his evening surgery, which did not surprise him. There is a therapeutic quality about a one-day fair that works more healing t
han a visit to the doctor.

  Tomorrow, as he well knew, the sad familiar faces would line the walls of the waiting room, but meanwhile, those who could forget their aches and pains had taken themselves and their children to enjoy the fun.

  A message about Ella Bembridge's accident had been left on his desk, and now that the last patient had gone, he decided to walk along to the corner cottage.

  The sky was a glory of color, pink, gold and mauve, with here and there a tinge of apple-green that told of the clear skies which had smiled all day upon the First of May.

  Dr. Lovell stood by the gate enjoying the air and the lively scene. At his side stood a young lilac tree, its buds now so tightly furled that they looked like bunches of red currants in the rosy light. Soon it would be adding its heady fragrance to the wallflowers and narcissuses at his feet.

  A man passed by with a bundle of stout bean poles balanced across his shoulder, and Dr. Lovell felt a pang of envy as he saw him, so confident that he would be here in Thrush Green to enjoy his beans in July and August, so secure in his plans and his provision for the future.

  It was going to be hard to leave Thrush Green if that were to be his fate. His eyes strayed to the Bassetts' house and his thoughts turned again to Ruth, as he had found them doing so often lately.

  He opened the gate and turned left to pay his visit to Ella. The clamor of the fair blew like a blast from the green across the road, but above its noise a shrill voice could be heard.

  "Look at me, doctor! Look at me!"

  His first patient of the day attracted his attention. He waved cheerfully to the small flying figure, and would have passed on, but at the same instant he saw Ruth waiting patiently below.

  With a heart behaving in a most unorthodox way for the property of a medical man, Dr. Lovell left the path of duty and joined the girl.

  15. Mr. Piggott Gives His Consent

  DIMITY DEAN, a little weary in body, sat in the creaking wicker armchair in the corner of her patient's bedroom.

  To the observer it would have appeared a serene domestic scene. Dimity was engaged in knitting a gray jumper, to enhance her mouselike appearance the following winter, while Ella, propped against her pillows, perused the magazines which Mrs. Bailey had left.

  The reading lamp beside the bed shed its light upon the fading narcissus flower still perched over one ear. The large cat had settled itself comfortably upon the bed, and soon the curtains would be drawn against the night which was beginning to envelop Thrush Green.

  The noise of the fair was muted by the closed window, but the bright lights of the revolving roundabout and switch-back passed and repassed across the low ceiling of the little room.

  The scene may have looked peaceful, but Ella's stringent comments on her reading matter contrasted strongly with her tranquil surroundings.

  "Now, here's a damfool idea!" protested Ella energetically, folding back the thick magazine with a loud cracking noise. "Sticking something you've broken together again, painting the cracks with scarlet lacquer and giving it away to a friend! Wouldn't be a friend for long, I'd say! Can you beat it?"

  She glowered upon the picture with some relish, before turning over.

  "And this is even worse! Listen to this, Dim. 'How to make a set of dainty table mats.' And how I do hate 'dainty'!" gibbered Ella, in a frenzied aside.

  "How do you?" asked Dim equably, genuinely interested.

  "I'll tell you," said Ella, with fiendish satisfaction in her tone. "You cut up pieces of lino that you have no further use for—"

  "Like that bit in the shed," exclaimed Dimity, eyes brightening.

  "Like that bit in the shed," conceded Ella grimly. "That is if you really want dinner mats made of lino covered with mildew like Prussian-blue fur, or even just made of lino without the Prussian-blue fur—"

  "Well, go on," said Dimity.

  "I am going on," shouted Ella rudely, "but you keep interrupting."

  "You'll upset the fireguard," warned Dimity.

  "Do you, or do you not, want to hear about these infernal mats?" inquired Ella furiously.

  "Why, yes," cried Dimity. Ella turned back to the magazine and continued truculently.

  "Then you cut out sprays of flowers from plastic material. And then you stick these horrible sprays onto the lino mats, varnish the lot and there you are. As evil a set of vicious-looking table mats as ever saw the dim religious light of any church bazaar!"

  She leaned back upon her pillows contemplating these innocent suggestions as if they had been some dreadful rites connected with black magic. Dimity hastened to change the subject.

  "I think it's time you had a dose of medicine for your rash."

  Ella continued to watch the lights revolving dizzily across the ceiling for a minute. When she spoke it was in a changed tone.

  "D'you know, Dim, I feel quite extraordinary. Whether it's those dam' lights, or something I've eaten, I don't know, but I feel jolly queasy."

  Dimity, with a guilty start, recalled Dotty Harmer's quince jelly.

  "Could be that ghastly fish in parsley sauce," continued Ella speculatively. "Never could stomach the stuff. Might as well eat whitewash or that muck they make you swallow before X-rays."

  She turned a searching glance upon the wilting Dimity.

  "You feel all right? You ate it."

  "Well, yes," faltered poor Dimity. "I feel quite fit, but—" She hesitated, wringing sad limp hands still rosy from the dye.

  "But what?" asked Ella. Her face was contorted with a sudden spasm of pain and she put a hand upon her capacious stomach.

  Dimity took a brave deep breath and made her confession.

  "I forgot to tell you—that quince jelly, dear. It was made by Dotty. She sent it up this afternoon."

  Groaning, Ella sank back upon the pillows.

  "You're a fine friend!" she said roundly, but her gruff tone held a hint of kindliness. "You know Dotty. She probably put a cupful of hemlock in to give it a bit of a kick!"

  "Oh, Ella darling!" moaned poor Dimity, "I wouldn't have had it happen for worlds. What shall we do?"

  "Don't suppose it'll be fatal," answered Ella morosely. "Though with all I've got at the moment death would be a mercy, and that's flat! I'll get young Lovell to give me some jollop when he comes."

  She looked at her friend and gave her a sudden warm smile.

  "Cheer up, Dim, it might be worse! Pull the curtains and shut out those vile lights. That'll help."

  Dimity crossed to the window and looked out upon the bustle and glitter of Mrs. Curdle's fair across the road.

  "Why," she exclaimed, "there is Dr. Lovell! And it looks like Ruth he's talking to! Yes, it is. I can see Paul running up to them."

  "Time that child was in bed," snorted Ella. "Ruth should know better, keeping him up while she philanders with her young man."

  "Oh, Ella, really!" protested Dimity.

  "It's been sticking out a mile for weeks," said Ella firmly, her pains momentarily forgotten. "If they don't make a match of it before the year's out, I'll eat my hat. But not tonight," she added hastily, as Dotty's jelly made itself felt.

  "He's coming this way," said the watcher at the window suddenly. "He must be calling here."

  "Then for pity's sake get him up here quickly," urged her friend. "He'll find plenty to do."

  Sure enough, within two minutes the knocker was being attacked and soon young Dr. Lovell confronted his patient. Although he could not take to this brusque ungainly woman, yet so warm and radiant is the power of love that the doctor found himself feeling a new sympathy. The unaccustomed sparkle in his dark eye and his gentle manner only confirmed the suspicions of his tough spinster patient. Here indeed was a man in love.

  He examined the scalds and the rash and listened sympathetically to Dimity's incoherent confession. This was not his first encounter with Dotty's handiwork. He smiled benignly as he scribbled down a prescription on his little pad, and took out two white pills from his case.

  "These wil
l help at the moment," he promised Ella. "Nurse is coming with the cage for your legs and I really think you'll feel much better tomorrow."

  "I should hope so," responded the patient feelingly. "What a day! I never thought so much could happen to me in one day."

  "Nor me," agreed the young man warmly, but his tone held a wonder lacking in his patient's. He stood for a moment as though his thoughts were engaged elsewhere on Thrush Green. The sardonic gaze from the bed brought him to his senses.

  "I'll see you in the morning," he said hastily, collecting his belongings. "You're a pretty straightforward case, you know. Burns, shock, dermatitis and now this last disease."

  "D'you know what it is?" asked Ella.

  "Unique to the district, ma'am, so I understand," said young Dr. Lovell, smiling from the doorway. "Dotty's Collywobbles!"

  From among the noisy activity of the coconut shies Molly Piggott watched young Dr. Lovell emerge from Miss Bembridge's house and make his way briskly back to Dr. Bailey's.

  "Wonder how he found the poor old dear," thought Molly to herself, descending from the rapturous heights which she had inhabited for the last few hours for a brief visit to the everyday world of Thrush Green. But on such an evening the affairs of anyone as mundane as Ella Bembridge could hold Molly's attention but momentarily, for here, beside dear Ben, accepted by his grandmother and with the future glittering as brightly as the fair itself, enchantment lay.

  But despite her joy, one shadow remained. Her father had yet to be informed of her plans and Molly dreaded the encounter for Ben's sake. She had cast anxious eyes toward the cottage for the past two hours, but the windows had remained dark. The master of the house was still enjoying his leisure under the hospitable roof of "The Two Pheasants" next door.

  At last Molly saw a light in the window and her heart sank. Now she was for it, she told herself. Best cut across home, fry the old boy's supper of rasher and egg and break the news as best she could. She turned to Ben and put a hand upon his arm. The noise was deafening about them, and although the girl put her mouth within an inch of Ben's bruised ear, she could not make herself heard. Only by nodding in the direction of the cottage did she make her meaning clear.