Pigeon Summer

by Ann Turnbull

  “Do it again,” said Lennie, when they came to the next hill.

  So the journey was a succession of stops and starts, and they didn’t get much chance to talk until they turned off the road on to some rough meadow land where Mary could release the pigeons.

  “Where are we?” she asked. “Are we near Wendon? My sister works at the Hall.”

  “Wendon’s over there,” said Arnold, pointing to a smudge of trees in the distance. “See that bit of chimney sticking up behind the trees? That’s Wendon Hall. This here’s Cheveley.”

  They trudged up the grassy slope, pulling their bicycles. Lennie ran on ahead.

  Arnold called sharply, “Lennie! Come here!”

  Lennie stopped. Mary said, “What is it?”

  “Quarry.”

  “Oh!” Mary grabbed Lennie’s arm.

  “It’s all right,” said Arnold. “Only the fence is a bit broke, like.”

  They approached the edge. It fell away steeply, and the sagging fence had disappeared completely in one place.

  “I’ve been down,” said Arnold. “There’s a little hollow space down the bottom; a cave, almost.”

  “Could we get down?”

  Mary peered eagerly over the edge at the crumbling footholds. It was a long drop, and too steep for Lennie.

  “I want to go down!” said Lennie.

  “You can’t. It’s dangerous.”

  “Want to!” Lennie began to wail.

  Mary thought quickly. “Let’s have our sandwiches.”

  “Sandwiches,” agreed Lennie. He forgot the quarry.

  Arnold had brought an end of a loaf and some sausages; Mary’s sandwiches were bread and jam. They sat down on the grass and shared it all out.

  The sun was hot. There were butterflies and bees amongst the flowers at the edge of the quarry. They could hear skylarks high up. The pigeons cooed gently in their basket.

  Arnold picked a blade of grass, held it taut between his hands, and blew through it, making a loud harsh whistle. Lennie was impressed. He tried to do the same, dropped the grass-blade, blew a raspberry, and rolled about giggling. Arnold demonstrated again. Lennie rolled and giggled in delight.

  Mary picked flowers. She found clover, buttercups, vetch and trefoil, and – “What’s this?” she asked Arnold, interrupting a whistle. “Is it speedwell? It’s growing everywhere around here.”

  Arnold stared at the nondescript little flower: mauve, pansy-shaped but tiny. “How should I know?”

  “I thought you knew everything,” said Mary.

  “Not about flowers.”

  Mary looked at the flowers. They were something like the speedwell growing in her garden, but smaller, and not so blue.

  “My best bird’s called Speedwell,” she explained.

  “Daft,” said Arnold. He was making a catapult out of a plantain stalk.

  “Daft!” echoed Lennie in delight. “Do it again!”

  The pigeons were getting restless in their basket. Mary decided to let them go.

  They flew better these days. They spent less time circling round, and gathered more quickly into a flock. Today they were heading off east in no time at all.

  “Let’s race them back,” said Mary.

  She was joking. They had no chance of beating the pigeons. They dawdled their way home, and arrived back in Culverton at teatime. Mary stopped to pick ragged robin and Queen Anne’s lace in the hedgerows. Arnold showed Lennie rabbit holes and a fox’s earth. They found a trap at the edge of a wood and Mary sprang it with a stick.

  “It’s cruel,” she said.

  “Girls!” scoffed Arnold.

  When they reached Culverton, Mary took her bicycle back to Arnold’s place and left it there. She found a furry gob-stopper in her pocket and gave it to Lennie.

  “Don’t tell Mum we went with Arnold,” she said. “And don’t tell her I’ve got a bike.”

  Mum was in a more cheerful mood when they got back. She liked the flowers and put them in a jam jar on the windowsill. As she dished up the tea she said to Lennie, “Did you have a nice time? What did you do?”

  Mary tensed.

  Lennie said, “We went a long way. We found some squeaky grass.”

  He swallowed a few mouthfuls of soup, and continued, “Mary hasn’t got a bike. We didn’t go whee-ee-ee down the hills.”

  Mary felt hot. She began to talk rapidly about walking up Foss Bank carrying the pigeon basket. But she needn’t have worried; Mum was only half listening.

  “I like going whee-ee-ee down the hills,” said Lennie.

  “Do you, dear?” Mum said. Her mind was on other things.

  “I’ll take him next Saturday, if you like,” said Mary.

  And she did. The next Saturday Mary and Lennie and Arnold went to Bugle Hill, and the one after that to Hazeley. And in all those weeks they heard nothing from Dad.

  Most of the time Mum didn’t say anything, but Mary noticed the change in her. She stopped singing. She grew thinner – the food was going to the children. The food changed, too. There was less meat, cheese and bacon. Soon they were down to soup – thin, with cabbage in it – and potatoes and sago pudding to fill up on.

  “I’ll have to go to the Assistance,” said Mum. “If he’d only write! Tell me what’s going on.”

  Phyl’s money, sent from Wendon at the end of the month, saved them from charity for a little longer. But it wasn’t much; not enough to keep a family on. When it came, Mum went out and bought fish and chips – an extravagance, but heaven after the grey days of cabbage soup.

  On the Tuesday after her trip to Hazeley, when another Monday had passed without the postman calling, Mary went to see Mrs Greening about a delivery job. She explained about the bicycle.

  “I’ll be twelve on the twenty-eighth,” she said. “I could start the next day. I could come when you like, because the school holidays will have started by then.”

  “I don’t know,” said Mrs Greening doubtfully, looking over her shoulder at her husband. “We’ve always had lads for deliveries. I was going to ask Bobby Lee.”

  “I’d be just as good,” said Mary. “Better.”

  “I thought you were going to the draper’s,” said Mrs Greening. “Like your sister.”

  “I don’t have to do everything the same as Phyl,” said Mary. “Anyway, I know Doris Brown wants to do that, and she’s twelve before me. I’d be good at the deliveries, honest. Better than Bobby Lee. And I could help in the shop, too –” she noticed what Mr Greening was doing at the back – “weighing out sugar, and that.”

  Mr Greening called out, “Give her a chance, Alice. At least she’s keen.”

  “All right,” said Mrs Greening. She smiled at Mary. “Twenty-ninth of July, then. Three and six a week.”

  “Three shillings,” said Mr Greening.

  Mrs Greening looked at him sharply. “If the lads get three and six, so can Mary,” she retorted.

  Mary skipped home. Now she could safely tell her mother about the bicycle; Mum was sure to be pleased now.

  But she was too late. As she came in, her mother, with a tight face, said, “I was chatting to Mrs Mullen today. She was out on Saturday, visiting her sister, up Hazeley way…”

  Mary felt herself blushing.

  “You’ve been out with that Revell boy. Riding a bike. I can see it’s true.”

  Mary began to explain, but her mother exploded. “Why didn’t you tell me? Sneaking about like that behind my back. I felt such a fool. And Mrs Mullen all surprise: ‘Didn’t you know, Mrs Dyer?’ I could have strangled her. It’ll be all over Culverton by now. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Mary’s chin wobbled, and tears spilled over. It was a mixture of self-pity, disappointment at having her good news snatched away, and the realization that if “it was all over Culverton”, people would be whispering behind her back at school tomorrow.

  Her mother took the tears for a sign of repentance and softened a little. She began to nag instead of shout.

  “It�
��s the sneakiness I don’t like, Mary. You can’t be trusted.”

  “I can!” sniffed Mary.

  “And I don’t like that family, the Revells.”

  “Arnold’s all right,” said Mary. “Lennie likes him and—”

  “That’s another thing. Bribing Lennie not to say anything. How could you? Sneaking about behind my back…”

  “Arnold fixed that bike up great,” said Mary.

  “You can give it back. I’m not having you accept that – not from Sid Revell.”

  “It wasn’t Sid. It was Arnold.”

  “Just the same.”

  “And I said I ought to pay for it.” Mary explained about the pigeons. It was the wrong thing to say.

  “Those pigeons!” her mother exclaimed. “They’re the cause of all this trouble.”

  “It’s not trouble,” said Mary. “It’s good. Mum, I’ve got a job. I’ve got a job for after school when I’m twelve. And I needed a bike for it and I’ve got one.”

  “What do you mean? I haven’t spoken to Mrs Coleman yet. And you don’t need a bike.”

  “I’m not going to Colemans. I’m going to Greenings. As a delivery girl. With my bike.”

  “A delivery girl? But we agreed—”

  Mary lifted her chin. “No we didn’t. Just because Aunty Elsie arranged for Phyl to go to Colemans. No one asked me. Mrs Greening wants me. Deliveries and weighing-out and helping at the back. Three and six a week.”

  That was Mary’s trump card. The drapers, who didn’t need deliveries, would only have paid two shillings.

  “Three and six,” said Mum. There was reverence in her voice.

  “Yes,” said Mary.

  Mum sighed. The steam had gone out of her. “I don’t know what I’m going to do with you,” she said. “You’re – you’re that different.”

  Different from Phyl, Mary knew she meant. Phyl wouldn’t go around with unsuitable friends. Phyl wouldn’t bribe her little brother with gob-stoppers and tell lies to her mother.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about the bike,” said Mary, looking at the floor. “I meant to. I kept putting it off.”

  “Well,” said Mum. “We’ll say no more about it. Three and six a week! Pity you can’t earn it this week. I’ve only made a few bob from the mending; and it does try my eyes of an evening. Once Doreen’s weaned I can maybe leave her with Mrs Lloyd and get a cleaning job, mornings, but right now… You know, that money from your dad isn’t going to come. It’s three weeks now. He must have lost that job.”

  “Perhaps it’ll come tomorrow,” said Mary.

  But it didn’t.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Mum went the next day to the Public Assistance Committee. Mary knew, as soon as she came in from school, where her mother had been. There was bacon frying in the pan, but her mother wasn’t singing. She looked defeated. Her photograph – the one Mary loved – had been moved from its place on the mantelpiece to the kitchen table. Mum must have been looking at it. Mary picked it up.

  “You can stuff that thing in the drawer,” said her mother in a voice of suppressed anger.

  “Why? I like it. You look lovely.”

  Her mother banged pots on the stove.

  “It was all phoney, that. The hat belonged to my Aunty Ann. The parasol was one of the photographer’s props. The trees weren’t real.”

  “But you were real.”

  “I was then.”

  “You still are.”

  “But I’m not Adeline Hill, with her parasol and her dreams. I’m Lina Dyer, miner’s wife, mother of six – two in the churchyard and three on the parish. Three children at home and no money coming in except charity and the pittance I can earn. Oh, I shouldn’t be talking like this to you! You’re too young.”

  “Dad’ll send something soon,” said Mary.

  “But where is he? Why doesn’t he write?”

  “Maybe he can’t afford a stamp. If he’s out of work again…”

  Her mother nodded. “That’ll be it, I suppose. Well, I’ve screwed some money out of them at the Assistance, but it’ll barely keep us alive. And whether it’s worth the degradation…”

  Mary said, tentatively, “We’re sending Speedwell to Bordeaux tonight, me and Uncle Charley…”

  “Pigeons!” Her mother’s voice was bitter. “They don’t go hungry, do they? They’re strutting about in that loft, all sleek and glossy, while we starve. Where does the money come from to feed them?”

  “From Uncle Charley,” said Mary. “But it doesn’t cost much. And Speedwell—”

  “I don’t care about Speedwell,” said Mum. “The best place for her is the pot.”

  Mary retreated. She put the photograph back on the mantelpiece and crept upstairs. Speedwell could win, she knew; it wouldn’t be much, but it could mean shepherd’s pie for dinner one day next week instead of soup.

  Later that day, when Mary came back from the railway station, her mother was more cheerful; she was nursing Doreen and telling Lennie a bedtime story.

  Mary went upstairs. She found Bordeaux on the map and lay on her bed, gazing at it, imagining blue skies and the sudden uprush of thousands of birds. On Saturday they would be released. Le Mans had been over four hundred miles away. Bordeaux was over seven hundred. From there Speedwell would fly north, straight to Mont St Michel. She’d hug the coast, then, as far as Cap de la Hague. She wouldn’t cross open water until she had to. But by Sunday night she should have reached Lyme Regis. Could she get back on Monday – maybe even late on Sunday? Could she set a record? “A record for Culverton Pigeon Club, maybe,” Uncle Charley had said, smiling indulgently. But a nationwide record was Mary’s dream.

  By Saturday the money from the Public Assistance Committee had almost gone. “There were so many things we’d run out of over the weeks,” Mum explained to Mary, as she dished up the baked potatoes and the soup with a few bits of bacon in it. “That lot at the Assistance, they don’t know what it’s like.” She put on a plummy voice. “‘Make sure the little ones have plenty of milk, Mrs Dyer. And buy herrings; they’re cheap and nutritious.’” Mary grinned. “What they don’t realize is that before you’re driven to crawling to them you’ve run out of bootblack, and string, and matches, and soap, and sugar, and lard … oh, everything! There’s nothing left for herrings.”

  “It’ll be better next week,” said Mary. “Now you’ve got those things.”

  “But they won’t give me any more till Friday, and there’s nothing in the pantry but jam and an end of bread, and three and eightpence left in my purse.”

  “We could tell Aunty Elsie. She’d help,” said Mary.

  “No. I won’t go running to her. We’ll have to manage.”

  Uncle Charley came round first thing on Monday as Mary was leaving for school.

  “Just to put your mind at rest,” he told Mary. “Though you’ll be home yourself before she is, I’m sure of that. They’ll mostly come in tomorrow. Better, any road, if they lie up and rest today. I reckon we’ll have thunder before morning.”

  Mum agreed. “It’s muggy. Thundery weather. So you’ve come to get under my feet, have you, Uncle Charley?” Her voice was friendly. She liked having him around. And the postman hadn’t been yet, so she was still in a hopeful mood.

  Mary spent the day thinking about pigeons. At ten thirty, as the bell rang for the end of break and the children began lining up to go in, she was with Speedwell, resting up on the south coast, gathering her strength for the long flight home.

  “Go on!” Someone prodded Mary in the back. Miss Lidiard’s class had been told to go in, and the three in front of Mary were off. She scuttled after them.

  “Walk, don’t run, Mary Dyer!” bawled bossy Miss Quimby.

  I wish I could fly, thought Mary. If I were a pigeon I’d fly over Miss Quimby and mess on her head. The thought pleased her; she smiled.

  “You can take that grin off your face, Mary Dyer,” said Miss Lidiard as she came into the classroom. “You’ve done nothing but day
-dream all morning.”

  Mary glanced across at Arnold Revell, slouching in last from the yard as usual; she was beginning to know how he felt about school.

  By the end of the day Mary was dreaming about food. She’d eaten her bread and dripping at lunchtime but it had seemed to go nowhere. If Speedwell wins, she thought, we’ll have meat tomorrow. The thought sustained her as she ran home.

  She met Uncle Charley coming out of the passage. He looked odd, she thought; ruffled. “Speedwell?” she gasped.

  “No, love. Not yet. Mary –” he caught her arm as she turned into the passageway – “Mary, go easy on your mother. This is a hard time for her.”

  Mary looked at him, puzzled. “Aren’t you staying, then? I thought you’d be watching with me.”

  “No.” He coughed, leaning on the railings. “No. I’d best get home. Let you talk to your mother.”

  He shuffled off, and Mary turned in to the passageway with a feeling of unease. Something was wrong; the conversation had felt strange.

  A smell assailed her halfway down the passage: strong, rich, savoury. Something she hadn’t smelt for weeks and weeks. Meat.

  She ran indoors.

  Meat! How had Mum managed to afford it? Mary stepped into the kitchen. Her stomach was begging for food. The whole kitchen was full of that glorious smell.

  And then she saw her mother’s face, and understood. She felt cold.

  “Mum! Mum – you didn’t…”

  Her mother turned away and brought a dish out of the oven. Meat. Brown, glistening, coated in dark gravy. Three mounded shapes. Unmistakably pigeons.

  The hunger drained from Mary. Fury took its place.

  “My pigeons! You’ve cooked my pigeons!”

  “Your father’s pigeons,” her mother corrected her. She was prepared, ready for battle. Mary, taken unawares, choked on her anger and couldn’t speak.

  “We’ve had pigeon before,” said Mum calmly. “Your dad doesn’t give them an old age pension, does he, when they’re past it? They go in the pot.”