A Spell of Swallows

by Sarah Harrison

  I don’t know why he talks to me the way he does, except he’s not entirely comfortable with rank. You’d have thought someone who’s known nothing but the top drawer and the silver spoon would be, but no. I’m sure he’d like to know a lot more about me, but he’s never going to. For one thing, he’s too polite to ask and for another he’d be shocked. All he knows is that I’m from London and I don’t have any brothers or sisters. He’s an only child too—about the one thing we have in common.

  He’s a funny mixture, Jarvis. Very clever—no, cultured, knows his books, his paintings and his music, and can talk about them. But a bit of an innocent. It’s hard to say what he’ll be like under fire. The one thing we haven’t discussed is death. It’s interesting; on the face of it he’s got a lot more to live for, but he’d probably say that as an officer and a gentleman his life is forfeit. I have absolutely nothing waiting for me in England, but I still want to get back to it. I want to come out of this, alive, and I’ll do whatever it takes to make sure I do.

  I work hard for Jarvis. Perform small miracles, he says. I’m what he calls ‘a good man’. Let him think what he likes, so long as it keeps him happy. In the meantime, there’s more mules waiting. Bastards.

  Chapter Three

  Saxon was strict with himself about observances. He might not be able to offer up very much by way of a congregation, let alone converts, to God, but he could at least ensure that he maintained a regular presence in God’s house. To this end he crossed the churchyard, twice a day where possible, to say matins and evensong, or sometimes simply to pray. He tried hard to be humble, to thank God for his great blessings—his wife, his poetry, his modest success, the beautiful surroundings in which he lived—and to confess his manifold sins, chiefly those of pride and vanity. He prayed for greater understanding and tolerance. He hoped he was heard. He knew that to doubt for even a moment showed a sorry lack of faith, but there had always been a part of him which asked uncomfortable questions such as: Why should God, who had so many more pressing calls on his time and attention, heed the petitioning of a self-centred country parson who was not doing a particularly good job?

  Still, Saxon persisted. He might lack natural gifts, but he could be dogged. He referred often to Luke, 18, verses 1 to 8, the parable of the persistent widow. His prayers, murmured in the deep seclusion of St Catherine’s, Eadenford, were like the steady drip of water on rock. They would make a difference in the end.

  This morning, the day after the first edition had arrived, Saxon had a lot on his mind. In the end, rather than write, he had at great expense telephoned his editor, and the conversation had been unsatisfactory in a way that he found hard to pin down. George Lownes was a big, smooth, handsome man of the sort Saxon had avoided at school and at Oxford, but with whom in later life it was as well to get on, since they were almost guaranteed to wield power and influence in the world. Saxon was far from being unworldly himself (another thing he mentioned to God), but he lacked George’s suave bonhomie, his ability to wrongfoot an interlocutor by simply swamping him with charm. Which was what had happened on the telephone.

  ‘Saxon!’ he’d cried. ‘Congratulations! I hope you’re pleased, because we’re all absolutely delighted. And I do hope you feel we’ve done justice to your work which quite simply gets more and more interesting. Tremendously impressive, and so—’ here George seemed to struggle to find le mot juste for Saxon’s writing, eventually coming up with two which Saxon felt sure had been put in place for just this occasion some time earlier ‘—so finely wrought, so simple yet so complex. Oh dear, am I allowing my enthusiasm to run away with me?’ George laughed genially. It was another of his tricks always to introduce, early on, a disarming and pre-emptive note of self-deprecation.

  Any response of Saxon’s was bound to sound a little lukewarm after such a torrent of approval.

  ‘I am pleased, of course. Vivien commented on how elegant it—’

  ‘Vivien—how is she? It’s much too long since you brought that charming wife of yours up to London. We must have a little celebration and my only condition is that Vivien accompanies you.’

  ‘Thank you. I will, of course. George, there are one or two things I wanted to discuss. About the book.’

  ‘Beyond Self,’ said George, enunciating the words as though the very title were a source of wonder to him.

  ‘Yes. For instance, I was a little disappointed in the paper quality. And on page twenty-one, ‘Standing Souls’, there is a misprint which alters the sense of the whole line. I proof-read minutely, as you know, and it’s disappointing when something like this . . . as a matter of fact it’s not the only one, on page seventeen—’

  ‘Hang on, hang on!’ George was laughing—laughing. Saxon was not a choleric man, but he was extremely glad they weren’t in the room together, because he might well have done something he would later regret. ‘Let’s not take all the gilt off the gingerbread!’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘Let’s revel in publication of your masterpiece for at least one day!’

  Saxon, whose touchy literary skin already felt flayed, could hardly fail to notice the pinprick of sarcasm in the use—the wrong use—of that word ‘masterpiece’.

  ‘It is not a masterpiece,’ he said icily.

  ‘Now then, no false modesty.’

  ‘A collection cannot properly be called a masterpiece.’

  ‘My dear chap, call it what you like. These are wonderful poems. Yours is a small but discriminating readership. The odd tiny imperfection in the production process is not going to affect their pleasure one way or the other.’

  ‘You misunderstand me,’ said Saxon, knowing he sounded pedantic but unable to help himself. ‘It is I who am affected.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry about that, Saxon, I really am.’ George allowed a second to elapse, and went on as if that dealt with that. ‘When can you come up and wet the book’s head—with Vivien of course?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ll have to look in my diary.’

  Unusually, there was no suggestion from George’s end that he look now, so that a date could be arranged.

  ‘Good, but don’t be too long, d’you hear? It’d be nice to celebrate while the book is still, as it were, in flight. Congratulations again. I’ll look forward to hearing from you.’

  Saxon had replaced the receiver with a burning sense of grievance.

  At this moment, kneeling in his place at the end of the choir stalls, Saxon experienced that unpleasant feeling again. Masterpiece . . . small but discriminating . . . while the book’s still, as it were, in flight . . . There was no doubt whatever that George was deflecting Saxon’s wholly justifiable concerns by reminding him, none too gently, that the aforementioned flight would be brief, and that his slim volume was unlikely to trouble the bestseller lists. S.J. Mariner (the J stood for Julius) was a well-regarded, but minor poet, whom if push came to shove Lownes and Peart could easily do without. But Saxon Mariner, it was clearly implied, could not do without them. His clasped hands showed white knuckles. Dear God! he thought, and then, in a different vein: Dear God, forgive me my pride and temper, and help me towards greater forgiveness and humility.

  He repeated this, or something like it, several times until his heartbeat slowed and his fingers unclenched. The power of prayer was something he believed in, at least where it affected himself.

  After this he sat quietly, eyes closed, and tried to make his mind a blank, a receptacle for God. But inner peace eluded him and in no time at all he began fretting about this issue of the dog, which Vivien had raised at breakfast. In retrospect he was surprised she hadn’t chosen an earlier time when he would have been literally unmanned and prepared to agree to more or less anything. He attributed her timing to an innate sense of fair play—another quality he respected in her.

  Qua dog, it was not the animal itself so much as the disruption he dreaded. Saxon liked calm, and order, and a dog about the place—a puppy, for heaven’s sake, as it would be to begin with
—was as he understood it inimical to both. Also, the puppy in question could grow to be of enormous size and uncertain temperament; you never knew with these casual couplings what the result would be. He liked the Clays, but they were a rough and ready village family and any puppies of theirs would be the same.

  ‘Just think,’ Vivien had said, waving her slice of toast excitedly, ‘what fun it will be taking it for walks!’

  ‘We can go for walks now, whenever we want.’

  ‘Yes, but we don’t. At least you don’t—or hardly ever.’

  ‘I manage perfectly well without.’

  ‘Saxon! It would do you good.’

  ‘All right,’ he said testily, ‘so this dog will need walking—in all weathers, remember. Is that a reason in itself for getting one?’

  ‘And it will be fun, too!’ She leaned forward, smiling her sweet, wide smile that came from some unfathomable source in her, some deep natural wellspring of pleasure and enthusiasm. ‘Company—it will lie by the fire, and welcome us when we’ve been out, and run around after sticks in the garden. It will keep me amused!’

  It was a sort of joke, but he had heard something else, just as he’d heard the sarcasm in George’s compliment. ‘Don’t I do that?’ he asked childishly.

  ‘You do when you have the time, of course you do, my darling, but you’re so busy, and sometimes I just need to—’ she smiled and shrugged, mock-sheepishly—‘to play.’

  ‘What about Hilda?’

  ‘What about her?’

  ‘Unless I’m an even worse judge of character than I thought, Hilda is not a playful woman, and dogs create dirt.’

  ‘Let me worry about Hilda. She’ll be fine!’ Vivien lowered her voice to a more circumspect level. ‘And anyway, the dog will be ours, and any mess that it makes will be ours too, in our house. QED,’ she concluded triumphantly.

  ‘We don’t want to lose her.’

  ‘We won’t. I promise, she’ll learn to love it.’

  Saxon tried hard to remember how they had left the matter. He had a strong sense that though no hard and fast decision had been reached there was an underlying assumption on Vivien’s part that they would be getting the dog. She was going back to look at the puppies again and would probably have chosen one by the time she returned.

  Once more, he closed his eyes and prayed, this time for an open mind, and for forbearance. Vivien would care for the dog. It might, as she said, be fun, but Saxon had never been quite sure what constituted ‘fun’ in that sense. There were pleasures in life, great and small—his car, his writing, his married life, the church—but they couldn’t be said to be ‘fun’ in the way he knew Vivien meant. Fun was a closed book to him. He was already aware of another, far more shameful, reaction to the proposed dog: jealousy. He could picture the scene all too clearly: he would be sitting in his study, head bowed over his work, while his wife and the dog larked about outside in the sunshine, ‘playing’.

  Appalled, he addressed himself once more to God. This was one of those occasions when he envied the Roman Catholics their recourse to the confessional. How comforting and cleansing to declare your sins and to receive, along with a small and undemanding penance, absolution. A sensible transaction. He knew, of course, that God was listening to his prayers, but there was no absolute certainty of forgiveness, no answering voice, no matter what he said to his congregation on Sundays. All was a matter of faith.

  He remained on his knees for another few minutes, trying to focus on others in the parish who needed his prayers—the old, the sick, the unbelievers, the bereaved, of which the last remained by far the largest group. Then he said the Lord’s Prayer, as being the one which summarised and encapsulated all the others, and stood up. His knees were getting stiff, so maybe Vivien was right about the walking.

  The ladies had done their stuff; the church looked lovely. One could not fail to be moved by people’s hidden talents. Or, in the case of Felicity Delamayne, not so hidden. He took a turn, up to the altar rail, and back past the pulpit and down the north aisle. The air was full of the delicate scent of jonquils. Someone had arranged primroses in moss so they seemed to be growing on the grey stone windowsills. Another pleasure, this ancient place . . . Saxon actually preferred the building when it was empty, a place of seclusion and contemplation. Perhaps, he thought, I should have been a monk. But then there would have been no Vivien, without whom life would be quite simply insupportable.

  Propelled by a warm rush of feeling for his wife—she should have her dog!—he left the church by the south porch and strode quickly down the path, through the lych-gate and into the vicarage drive. He was uncomfortable using the back door because the kitchen beyond it was Hilda’s territory, where he was conspicuously out of place. He had no wish to be there any more than he wanted others in his study.

  Perhaps due to his thinking about the dog, he did not go in at once, but paused in the drive. It was spring; very soon the garden would undergo a tremendous surge of growth, and they’d need to contact the lad from the village to come and cut the grass once a week. Vivien did a lot of the work in the garden herself, but like her its appearance was always slightly out of control. When the lawn at the rear of the house was short and dry enough, the badminton set would emerge from hibernation in the greenhouse, and they’d have the occasional game. It was the only form of outdoor exercise that Saxon enjoyed. He was less energetic than his wife, but had a better eye, and very often won. Afterwards he always wanted, urgently, to take her to bed.

  He walked now to the side of the house, to the wooden garage he’d had built to house his car. With summer on the horizon, he looked forward to doing more motoring. He took his keys from his pocket and undid the padlock, opening the doors and pulling back first one, then the other, over the thin gravel with that rasping, crunching sound which never failed to fill him with anticipation.

  There it stood, waiting for him, massive and refulgent like a sacred object in its shrine: a car that was a touch too smart for a country vicar and which in consequence he didn’t drive as much as he would have liked. The maintenance alone was an indulgence—Clay’s bill would have to wait for a week or two. Saxon walked round the car, running his hand fondly over the forest-green paintwork, the shining headlamps and handles. It was a thing of beauty in which design, form and function were perfectly combined. He chastised himself, though only mildly, because he felt much happier now, for being grudging about the dog, which would cost a lot less than this, and repay a hundredfold in terms of Vivien’s happiness. After all, if there were to be no children, a dog was the next best thing.

  As he closed the padlock on the garage doors, he felt greatly cheered, and resolved to write to George Lownes—not apologising, for he had nothing for which to apologise, but in a friendly manner—and suggest a date for their meeting in London.

  The station van arrived at midday to transport the clothes and blankets up to Eaden Place. This was the last port of call and the van was already half full by the time it reached the vicarage. The driver was the station porter, Higgins, a man of few words. The two of them, with Hilda’s help, lugged the bundles out of the back door and round the side of the house to the van. This was to avoid too much cat hair floating about indoors and making Saxon wheeze.

  When that was done Vivien went into the back room, and thought how nice it looked without the piles of bedding and clothes which had been accumulating in the corner for the past two months. The cat prowled about with its tail twitching angrily, looking for somewhere to nest.

  All to the good if it didn’t get too comfortable. She shooed it out of the window. When the puppy arrived, everything would change.

  An unwritten rule at the vicarage decreed that daytime callers would always be passed by first Hilda, then Vivien, as through a sieve, so that only the most important or deserving got through to the vicar himself. There were hours, between four and six p.m., Monday, Wednesday and Thursday at which Saxon was at home to his parishioners. So when half an hour later the front do
orbell rang Vivien looked up from her book, but on hearing Hilda’s footsteps allowed her to answer it.

  A very brief and muted exchange followed. Then there was a tap on her own door and Hilda stepped inside at once, with a distinctly flustered appearance, flushed, pop-eyed and slightly short of breath.

  ‘Mrs Mariner—there’s a man here!’

  ‘Did he say what about?’

  ‘No. I don’t know, but he’s—he doesn’t look right to me.’

  This could have meant any number of things, but there was no doubting Hilda’s consternation.

  ‘I didn’t like to disturb Mr Mariner, but maybe—’

  ‘No, no, Hilda, don’t do that. You were absolutely right. I’ll come.’

  She closed her book and came to the door, where Hilda was dithering and puffing most uncharacteristically.

  ‘Mrs Mariner, he doesn’t look very nice.’

  ‘Never mind, Hilda, looks aren’t everything.’

  ‘Just as well, dear oh dear . . .’

  ‘You get on,’ said Vivien soothingly. ‘I’ll see to it.’

  By the time she opened the front door (which Hilda, in her panic, had closed in the visitor’s face), it had dawned on Vivien who this visitor might be, and she had taken the precaution of removing her glasses.

  ‘Mr Ashe! Hallo again.’

  ‘Good morning, Mrs Mariner. I’m sorry about your housekeeper.’

  ‘Please—what can I do for you?’

  ‘I wondered whether I might have a word with your husband?’

  ‘He’s working at the moment.’ Vivien lowered her voice pointedly. ‘Can I help?’

  Ashe knew at once that this was a more sensitive encounter than the one he’d had with Mrs Clay on her doorstep. Mrs Clay had not been in the business of protecting her husband, so the tenor of the exchange had been pretty straightforward. Though polite and welcoming, Mrs Mariner was a very different proposition.