The Power of the Dead

by Henry Williamson

  Why not begin now, with milk calves? Lucy’s private cow could suckle them—the house didn’t want four gallons of milk a day.And yet, he knew he was doing wrong in going to that calf-ring for milking calves: they were a mixed lot, most of them throw-outs. The trouble was, he was always in a hurry, always with so much to do; and after a spell of writing he was scatterbrained, unable to assemble himself properly to find out, beforehand, where to buy really good milk-calves.

  He looked again in the pens, and having noted the number stuck on the backs of the two Ayrshire heifer calves, shiny of coat, mild of eye, with good frames and clean tails, he waited to bid for them. He knew about the ‘rings’ at most auctions, ruled by one or two dealers, who bought for regular customers, charging commission, and that they did not bid against one another: but they were likely to ‘run’ a stranger who bid against them, to scare him off next time, and so induce him to buy through them.

  He bought the two calves, paid for them, and gave his sacks to one of the regular shag-haired drovers. The calves were lifted up, each put in its sack, hind-legs first; and while they struggled, the mouth of the sack was twisted about their necks, and tied there, and again by the hind-legs, so that they could not kick free. And thus each little beast was kept warm and wrapped up for its journey in the sidecar beside its new mate.

  The auctioning of calves had started about 12.30 p.m.; the sacking-up was done by 1.30 p.m. Now for a drink and a sandwich. During a former visit he had had a pint of beer in The Drovers Arms, and a ham roll; the two bars were crowded on Market Day. He liked being among the small farmers, dealers, and drovers rather than in some hotel or café. He had his pint, with a beef sandwich; and was about to get astride the motor-bicycle when a low green sports-car passed him and drew into the kerb ahead. Phillip had time to notice the leather flying helmets of driver and passenger, and the two exhaust pipes, sheathed in coils of polished brass, coming out of the side of the bonnet, when the normal market din of squealing pigs and blaring cattle was increased by the clatter of cloven hooves, and a redpoll cow ran down the middle of the road followed by a shouting drover. It stopped near the sidecar, skidding on the cobbled surface, and let out a long bellow.

  The animal’s bag was swelled, milk dripped from its quarters as it looked about it, horned head raised and blood-shot eyes distraught. The two calves lying in the sidecar, only their heads free, began to struggle within the sacks. The cow saw them and uttered a short cry sounding like merr as it went to them.

  The drover came up, stick raised to prod the cow, shouting “Hi! Hi! Garn! Garn!” The cow lowered her hornless head, four streams of milk now spirting from her quarters.

  “No!” cried Phillip, as the drover thwacked the cow upon the point of hip. “Don’t do that. Whose animal is it?”

  “Her be mine.”

  A short man in breeches, gaiters and cheap coat of dark fustian, came across the road. Phillip particularly noticed the celluloid collar of red and black stripes without a tie. A large cap was set at an angle on his head.

  “Want to buy her?”

  “Well, I hadn’t thought of it, to tell you the truth. My idea was that she might suckle these calves, and so do two good jobs in one.”

  “Aye, her’ll do thaccy proper. Will ’ee make me a bid?”

  “Is she all right?”

  “What’s wrong with her?” The man pointed at the overloaded milk bag. “They’m your calves?”

  “Yes.”

  “What’ll ’ee bid me?”

  The driver of the sports car, pulling off his leather helmet and tossing it into the back of the car, got out. His passenger followed, after fluffing up her hair and adding lipsalve by the aid of the car mirror. Then the two, bare-headed, strolled over and stood talking together outside the Drovers Arms. Piers had a Byronic look, with his dark curly head. He laughed suddenly at something the girl said. How like him, thought Phillip, to appear to be unaware of any bargaining a dozen feet away from where he and his friend were talking.

  “Before I make a bid, why are you selling her, if you don’t mind my asking you?”

  “Ban’t you wanting vor buy her, tho’?”

  “Well yes, I suppose I do. But if you’ve just bought the cow, don’t you want to keep her?”

  “Aye, if ’ee doan’t want ’er. I’m ready vor take a profit.”

  “You mean you can buy another instead, if you sell this cow?”

  “Aye. I be a milkman. Ask anyone i’ th’ market. They all know who I be. Wo, wo, my b’uty!” He held off the redpoll with his stick, while the drover stood by expectantly, feeling that it was partly due to him that his boss was doing a deal.

  “How much will you take for her? But first let me make sure: will she suckle two calves at once?”

  “You could rear four on they quarters,” pointing at the bag. “What’ll ’ee bid for’n?”

  “I’ve no idea of her value, to be frank. But what I do feel should be done, is that she should have some relief.” He turned in the direction of Tofield and called out, “I’m thinking of buying a cow, Piers, I won’t be long.”

  “We’re in no hurry.”

  “You know that gen’lman?” asked the milkman.

  “Yes.”

  “Where be ’ee farming, sir?”

  “Rookhurst. My name’s Maddison. Look, we must do something about this unhappy cow.”

  “I’ll tell ’ee what, sir. I paid eight pun for ’er, I’ll take a profit. ’Er’s a good coo, I won’t let ’ee down. You give me ten pun, that won’t see ’ee wrong.”

  Phillip still hesitated. “How old is she?”

  “’Er be ’efer, just ’ad ’er first calf.”

  “How can I get her to Rookhurst?”

  “Give me another crown an’ I’ll arrange it for ’ee.” The short man waited, right hand poised.

  “What’s her name?”

  “‘Rosebud’.”

  “All right,” said Phillip, and received a light blow on the elbow with the hand. Thus the bargain was struck.

  The drover lifted out one red-and-white calf, removed the sack, and carried it into a pen, followed by the cow, which with a low mer-r accepted it. While Phillip wrote out a cheque, Piers and the girl watched the second calf being placed at another quarter by the milkman wary, for the calf, of a possible side-kick from the cow.

  “Bootiful li’l ’efer,” he said, when both calves were feeding. “Well, zur, I must be off to the ring. If my miss’s sees me come ’oom wi’out a coo, ’er’ll wonder what I’ve been up to. I’ll see they’m delivered at your place before six o’clock. I knows it well—I’ve bought many a heifer from Mr. Temperley in the old days. They’m gone now, more’s the pity. No disrespect to you, sir.”

  “I knew Frank Temperley. And his son, Jack.”

  The drover was waiting expectantly. “I’ll keep an eye on they for ’ee, zur.”

  Phillip gave him a shilling, and turned to the waiting couple.

  “We thought of having a drink. Won’t you join us? Gillian, this is Phillip Maddison.”

  She had brown eyes and a brilliant smile revealed even white teeth. He was a little afraid of those artificially red lips; but felt easier when she said, “Isn’t she a love?” as she patted the cow’s shoulder.

  “She’s called Rosebud.”

  “How too, too sweet.”

  They strolled past pens filled with mournful cattle up the other side of the hill to an hotel. While the girl was away Piers said, “I’d no idea you were such an expert judge of stock. All done so quickly, too. How much more easy life would be if one could get a wife like that, and sell her again if she wasn’t up to form.”

  Phillip was a little surprised at this; it wasn’t like the courteous Piers he had known so far. Did the remark apply to his companion? He was wary when she rejoined them, the more so that the girl drank neat whisky, pouring it down her throat and following it immediately with water. Piers was soon signalling for the waiter.

  “You prefer beer t
his time, Phil? Rather than a short one?”

  After his third pint of draught Bass he felt that he would come to market every Saturday; the room was buzzing with the talk of yeomen, a few gentlemen farmers among them. Why hadn’t he come here before? The hour passed quickly. He would be late for lunch at home.

  “Must you go? Won’t you stay and have luncheon with us? We’re going on to the Yacht Club this afternoon, to look at my new racing eighteen-footer being built. I suppose we can’t persuade Lucy to come too?”

  “Well, thank you very much, Piers, but I ought to get back and see to the calves.” He meant, I must get back and finish my novel.

  “Another time, perhaps. Give my love to Lucy and Billy.”

  *

  The time came to take Fiennes and Tim to London. The brothers took turns to sit on the carrier. They were due at Tilbury at noon the following day. It was a dull journey; the end of all they had known together. They arrived, by way of the northern suburbs, at Liverpool Street station.

  “Well, let’s have some tea.”

  They left the sidecar combination among the taxi-cabs, and went into the buffet. Phillip paid for two pork pies and cups of tea and asked if they would mind him leaving, since he wanted to visit his parents before returning to Rookhurst.

  “Well, goodbye, chaps. All the best to you both.”

  He spoke bleakly, he felt drained by the formless city streets, the noise, the multitudinous movements before his eyes. It was a relief to enter the house in Hillside Road and sit with his parents, to whom his coming, although he did not fully realise it, had brought harmony.

  *

  Father and son were soon on common ground. Richard wanted to know about the various fields, and landmarks—recalling their names—Booley, Lobbett’s, Copse Pasture, Galley Copse, Hangman’s Marsh, the Longpond—with a mind revitalised by boyhood memories.

  “Ah, I remember Johnson’s Iron Horses,” he exclaimed, the light of past days coming into his eyes. “We boys were forbidden to ride on the plough, on pain of being sent to bed with a tanning, and bread and water for supper. I hope you don’t allow young Billy to indulge his fancy in that direction?”

  “Oh no. A child falling off could be cut to pieces. Uncle John told me that it had happened when he was younger. I’m afraid I got into Hilary’s bad books by that bit of ploughing, but——” He told his father of the plan to sow catch crops on the sour soil.

  “The snow may make all the difference to the take. I’ve borrowed a heavy Cambridge rib-roll to conserve the moisture, and then work up a seed-bed. It’s not exactly the policy as laid-down, but the only thing to be done, as I’ve reported to Hilary in my last letter.”

  “Well, old chap, you have to remember that Hilary is used to having everything cut and dried beforehand.”

  “But it was pretty useless land as it was. The sensible thing is to lay down sheep-feed and so restore the fertility. I agree that the golden hoof has become the leaden hoof, and the only remedy is to have some sort of control of imports of mutton from abroad. But Baldwin’s just an old figurehead with a pipe. It’s the financiers of the City of London who are the real government.”

  “Ah well, I’m afraid the Socialists’ universal panacea for all our ills won’t work in practice, Phillip. Also, they’re hand in glove with Russia—remember the Zinovieff letter? After that you surely don’t want a Socialist Government back in office. You, as a prospective landowner, must know that under Ramsay MacDonald all land would be confiscated, and then where will you be?”

  After tea Phillip said to his mother during a brief time together in the kitchen, “My book is coming out in the autumn. But I can’t write nowadays. One needs to be a sort of sleep-walker, day after day, never to be shocked out of one’s semi-trance.”

  Hetty could see that he was still thinking of Barley, and hoped that, in his new life, he would be able to settle down with Lucy, and forget the past.

  “You must think about your family responsibilities now, you know. Do tell me about Lucy and the baby. I am so looking forward to the christening.”

  “Lucy and the two boys make a happy little world of their own. I’m not really wanted.”

  “Oh Phillip, whatever you do, don’t let yourself feel that. Your father did, when you children came, and accused me of neglecting him, but it was not true, you know. He seemed to want to be left alone——” she said, with a sigh of resignation.

  He set out for home thinking a little sadly of Tim and Fiennes. If only he had been a little less irritable with them—

  Part Two

  THE SOLITARY SUMMER

  Chapter 6

  A SIGN OF REGENERATION

  Phillip determined to concentrate on farming. He got up every morning, now that it was midsummer, at 5.30 a.m. and was at the farm premises before the stockman arrived to bring in Rosebud from the meadow to be milked in the stall, while the calves called in an adjoining box. Afterwards Phillip fed them out of a tilted pail. At first he had to put a finger in each calf’s mouth, while it was learning to suck, but now they drew up the milk unaided. Their coats were glossy with bloom, their eyes, with full lashes, a clear brown with dark pupils. Rosebud, now in what the stockman called profit, gave an extra gallon for the house, from which Lucy made butter, remembering the lesson of the farm-wife on Exmoor during her honeymoon.

  The deep-ploughed arable had been cultivated, and left rolled-down after several harrowings. The seeds for the layers—cowgrass, wild white clover, sanfoin, ryegrass, black medick, alsike, and vernal grass—his own idea for successive grazings—stood in five sacks in the barn, weighing nearly sixteen hundredweight between them. White owls regularly flew in through a circular hole in the eastern gable, for the mice and young rats beginning to gnaw through the jute sacking.

  Ned had given him an old fiddle for sowing the small-seeds. This was a contraption of a shoulder sling supporting a canvas bag above a small circular tin tray into which seeds fell from a funnel, fast or slow according to a simple adjustment. The seeds were ‘broadcast thissy way’, said Ned, giving a demonstration as he sawed with the bow, a light iron rod to which was secured a leather cord, twisted round a cotton reel fixed upon the spindle of the tray.

  Simple! Ned walked once up and then down the field, sawing with the bow which worked the circular tray, so that the seeds were whirled in a fan before him. It was with a feeling of delight that Phillip, walking beside him, watched the seeds, each describing its little parabola as it fell through the sunlight. The clover-family seed—sanfoin, medick, and alsike, red cowgrass—each compact and kidney-shaped, dropped fast, to bounce; the Irish rye and vernal grasses, like wingless bleached bodies of miniature song-birds, drifted down upon the earth, to lie among the pale brown and yellow clover seeds already at rest. There they were, ready to grow into green leaf and blossom—pink, yellow, and white the trifoliums, below tall grasses waving in the summer breeze.

  The bailiff, having paced out the first line, set four hazel wands, with paper stuck in their split tops, two upon each headland. The overall sideway cast was a rod, he explained. “So set you up they sticks a rod apart each time, and you can’t go wrong.”

  “I wonder how long this field will take.”

  “Lobbett’s be twenty chain be five wide, so wark it out, guv’nor, how far yar’ll be square-bashin’ under my ‘fiel’ punishment number one’.”

  This was a joke, Ned seeing that the rookie sweated it out.

  “Oh dear me, Ned, I wish I’d paid more attention to the Weights and Measures tables in the schoolroom.”

  “Nuthin’ in it, guv’nor. A chain be dwenty two yards, ten square chain to an acre, Lobbett’s be ten acres. Wark you that one out.”

  “But is a rod square measure?”

  “Nivver ’appen. Four rod be one chain, yar knows that.”

  “I see. How long is a chain?”

  “A hunner links, bain’t it?”

  “How long is that?”

  “Dwenty two yard, a’ recko
n. Why d’yar ask? Yar doan’t need to know.”

  “But I must know if I am to work out your sum.”

  Ned obviously enjoyed tantalising him. He sat down with pencil and paper.

  “You don’t need no theory. See you here, mester, Lobbett’s be dwenty chain long and five chain wide. That’s a hunner’ square chains. That’s ten acres, bain’t it?”

  “I see. The fiddle covers a rod, or quarter of a chain sideways each time up and down?”

  “You’m on the right track now.”

  “I walk up and down four times to cover a chain of width, or twenty times to cover five chains across the field.”

  “You’ve a-got it.”

  “And the field is twenty chains long, or a quarter of a mile. So I walk five miles to sow the field.”

  “Wisht I ’ad your ’ade.”

  “Wish I had yours. You know it all without messing about with all this cross-word puzzle nonsense, Ned.”

  *

  The bailiff, his measuring chain clinking upon the flints behind him, disappeared over the line of the hill. Phillip moved steadily across the field. Larks flitted up before him, finches flew down to alight and take what their sharp eyes instantly perceived. Extra seed had been allowed for the ‘bards’, including partridges. Later the light cylindrical sheet-iron roll was coming up, drawn by Donk, to be followed by six zigzag harrows in line to cover the seed.

  When would the job be finished? Ninety acres seemed an appalling task. How far would he have walked when the last seed was sown?

  Gulls floated over in oar-like flight. Nothing for them, all ploughing done; back to the coast they flew. Were they males? Surely the hens would be on their eggs.

  A kestrel appeared over one corner of the field, to luff and hang, wings flickering rapidly to maintain its weight in windless air as it watched for movement of beetle, butterfly, or mouse below. It hung there, flapping loosely as though the wings had just been attached by Leonardo da Vinci. Then it dropped lower, and volplaned to earth to a beetle. The bird was up again almost at once, rising to swing round and glide down the next field and luff above the borstal.