by Miss Read
'You come and sit down, Mrs Tilling," she said gently. 'I think it was real nice of you to think of Dad at Christmastime. We're just making a pot of tea, so have some with us.'
Somewhat mollified, Nelly sat down on a chair by the door, her basket by her feet. Albert, dumbfounded by this unexpected alliance against himself, decided to retreat.
'Want somethin a bit stronger, lad?' he asked Ben, hoping in this way to assert his independence before Nelly and Molly, before taking flight.
'If you like,'said Ben politely.
'Come on next door then,' said Albert, rising hastily from the table.
He was past Nelly and through the door in half a minute. Nelly looked grimly down her nose, her massive arms folded upon her chest.
Ben paused by her chair and touched a large shoulder gently. He smiled at her, his eyes crinkling in the way which had so charmed his wife. Nelly looked less grim.
I'll look after him for you,' said Ben gently, and was rewarded with Nelly's grateful smile.
There was silence for a short time in the Utile room, broken only by the singing of the kettle on the shining hob. Then Molly said shyly:
'Thank you for looking after my dad. He's not much of a hand at housework and all that.'
Nelly permitted herself a gusty sigh.
'That he ain't,' she said honestly. 'Don't go thinking too much of this, Molly. I've only been acting neighbourly, and it fair cut me to the quick to see him so short with me just now. More than "uman flesh and blood can stand, it was.'
'He's a bit awkward,' confessed Molly, in sublime understatement. 'The place looks beautiful. I could see someone who knew what she was doing had been at it.'
Nelly gave a gratified smirk and accepted her tea graciously. She loosened her coat and prepared to enjoy this tête-à-tête. After ten minutes' polite conversation she rose to go, and Molly decided that now was the time to show Nelly that she was her friend.
'Would you like to see my baby?' she asked.
'I'd love to,' said the widow, following Molly up the narrow stairs so recently brushed down by her own sturdy hand.
The baby lay deep in slumber, his eyes screwed tightly shut and his small mottled fists clenched each side of his mop of black hair. Nelly clucked maternally.
'Eh, what a little love!' she wheezed rapturously, after the steep ascent. 'Don't he favour his dad? You're a lucky girl, I must say.'
She rummaged in her handbag, drew out half a crown and slipped it gently beneath the sleeping child's small fingers.
'Oh no!' protested Molly.
'Ah yes,' said Nelly firmly. 'It'll bring me good luck to cross your baby's hand with silver. And, believe me, I can do with it!'
She made her way on tiptoe to the door and descended the narrow stairs, followed by Molly.
I'll leave the basket,' she said, as she stood in the doorway outlined against the darkness of Thrush Green. 'Use what you want, and I hope you'll all have a very happy Christmas."
'But won't you come and join us for dinner?' asked Molly, now genuinely fond of Nelly after her appreciation of the baby.
'No, dear,' said Nellie firmly. 'It's real nice of you, but Christmas is a family time.'
She turned and made her way into the darkness.
I'll be seeing Albert afterwards,' she said, and in her tone was something which brooked no good for that backslider.
It seemed to Molly, as she closed the door, that her father had met his match in more ways than one.
Ella and Dimity were spending the evening by the fire. Both women were tired with the bustle of the day. Dimity had made one trip to Lulling in the morning, only to find, on her return, that she had forgotten several urgent articles needed during the Christmas holiday, which meant another journey down the steep hill and up again, during the afternoon.
She was touched by Ella's offer to make the second trip, but had refused, for dear Ella had been very busy delivering Christmas presents of her own making to nearby friends.
Now they sat comfortably enjoying the peace after the storm. Ella smoked one of her rank shaggy cigarettes, her sturdy brogues propped up on a string stool, while Dimity knitted placidly a matinee coat for Ruth Lovell's coming baby. Upstairs, carefully packed in one of Thatcher's dress boxes was a thick ribbed cardigan for Ella's Christmas present, only finished just in rime, for Dimity had been obliged to work at it only in Ella's absence from the room, as she intended it to be a surprise.
Ella, too, had packed a garment in one of Thatcher's boxes for Dimity's Christmas present, but it was not of her own making. She had bought a soft fluffy blue dressing-gown for her friend on one of her trips to London. Too long, she decided, had Dimity wrapped her thin form in a shabby grey flannel garment which she admitted to buying long before the war. Since Ella's heart-searching, by the Cotswold stone wall on her lonely walk, she had done her best to be less selfish, and it had not gone unnoticed.
'I thought we'd have eggs for supper,' said Dimity, letting the knitting fall into her lap. 'Boiled or scrambled, Ella dear?'
'Boiled,' replied Ella. 'Less bother. No filthy saucepan to clean up either.'
Dimity began to wind the wool round the needles, but Ella got up before her.
'You stay there, Dim. You look a bit done up. I can do boiled eggs easily enough.'
'Oh, Ella, you're much too kind! You're tired yourself!'
'But I'm not going to early service tomorrow, don't forget.'
'I feel I must,' said Dimity, clasping her thin hands earnestly. 'The rector docs so like to have a full church at early service. Harold's going I know.'
Ella stubbed out her cigarette violently. She seemed embarrassed at the mention of their new friend's name, thought Dimity, somewhat bewildered.
'He's a good chap,' said Ella gruffly, and stumped towards the kitchen.
Left alone, listening to the crashing of saucepans from the kitchen, Dimity pondered on Ella's generous heart. She had been even more thoughtful lately, she told herself-more gentle, more sympathetic. She remembered Ella's unusual embarrassment when she had spoken of Harold Shoosmith. They said that love often had a mellowing influence, and certainly Ella had always thought highly of the newcomer. Could Ella's recent gentleness have anything to do with affection for their handsome friend, asked Dimity in wonderment?
Darkness thickened over Lulling and Thrush Green. The Christmas tree twinkled and blazed in the market square dwarfing the stars above to insignificance.
Excited children for once went willingly to bed, stockings clutched in their rapacious hands and heads whirling with delirious thoughts of joys to come. Exhausted shop assistants sat at home soaking their aching feet in warm water. The patients in Lulling Cottage Hospital thought of the long gruelling day ahead, complete with boisterous surgeons carving turkeys, paper hats, hearty nurses singing carols and all the other overwhelming paraphernalia of Christmas in the wards, and they shuddered or smiled according to temperament. Housewives, flopping wearily in armchairs, congratulated themselves upon remembering the decorations for the trifle, the cherry sticks for the drinks and other last minute details unI'll they were brought up short by the horrid thought that in the pressure of so much unaccustomed shopping they had completely forgotten salt and tea, and now it was too late anyway.
But away from the lights and worries of the town the quiet hills lay beneath a velvety sky. No wind rustled the trees and no bird disturbed the night's tranquillity. Sheep still roamed the slopes as they had that memorable night so long ago in Palestine, and low on the horizon a great star, bright as a jewel, still held out an eternal promise to mankind.
14. Christmas Day
'IT might almost be September instead of Christmas Day,' exclaimed Dimity, as they walked down their garden path on the way to the Baileys' house. 'Look, Ella, there are still some marigolds out!'
It was certainly mild, and the midday sun had a slight warmth. Ella snuffed up the fresh air like an old war-horse and nodded her shaggy locks with approval.
'Something to be thankful for, anyway,' she responded. 'I can't say I relish these Dickensian Christmases with snow up to your knees and a lot of wild skating parties. Far more likely to make a full churchyard, they are, thea a nice seasonable green Christmas–whatever old Piggott may say!'
Winnie Bailey was at her door to meet them.
'Happy Christmas,' she said. 'You're the first to arrive. It's just an elderly party. And a very small one.'
It was a punctual one too, for Ella and Dimity had only just greeted the doctor when Dotty Harmer, the rector and Harold Shoosmith arrived together. The doctor dispensed drinks and the chatter began.
'Doctor Lovell rang up a few minutes ago,' confided Winnie to Ella quietly! 'The baby is due to arrive today.'
'Bad luck,' said Ella. Winnie Bailey's eyebrows rose.
'Only because it will have its birthday on Christmas Day,' explained Ella hastily. 'Always tough on children, I think. Who's with her?'
'Joan, and the daily, and young Lovell's mopping and mowing about, I gather. Mrs Burridge, the aunt who stayed here during the war, was going to come, but decided she couldn't. Do you remember her?'
'Do I not!' said Ella explosively. 'I'm not a womanly woman, as well you know, but the way that cat used to leap to her feet when Dim and I came into the room, and then guide us solicitously to the nearest chair as though we were senile, used to make my blood boil. She must have been a good ten years older than we were anyway!' Ella's normally rosy face had turned quite purple with wrath at the memory.
'Even Donald admitted that she was the embodiment of malice,' agreed Winnie calmly. She became conscious of the rector's mild eye turning upon her, as he overheard this remark, and went over to speak to him. Dimity and Harold were at the window watching the world of Thrush Green taking the air in readiness for Christmas dinner. They appeared happily engrossed and Ella, turning from the sight abruptly, found Dotty Harmer at her elbow. She seemed agitated.
'I don't want to be too long,' she whispered to Ella. 'I've left a pumpkin pie in the oven. It's an American dish -1 had an American cookery book given to me some time ago and I thought I'd like to try something rather different for Christmas Day.'
'If it's anything like marrow,' said Ella firmly, 'you're welcome.'
'It's a great delicacy,' insisted Dotty. 'The Americans have it on Thanksgiving Day, I gather. Though why they should want to give thanks for losing touch with their mother country, I never could imagine,' added Dotty, with a touch of hauteur. 'My father always referred to what the Americans call "The War of Independence" as "The American Rebellion." The new headmaster was quite unpleasant about it, and he and Father had words, I remember.'
'Ah well,' replied Ella, in a conciliatory tone, 'it all happened a long time ago, and the Americans seem to be struggling along quite nicely without us. Can't expect your children to cluster round your knee for ever, you know.'
Dotty did not appear completely persuaded by this philosophy, but allowed Doctor Bailey to take her glass to be refilled, and then fluttered after him to change her mind. Ella remained alone on the sofa and all her old unhappiness suddenly flooded over her.
To all appearances this annual sherry party was like all the others. There was the blue and white bowl filled with Roman hyacinths and sprigs of red-berried holly. There was Winnie, as pink and white and gay as ever, wearing the deep blue suit that she had worn last year. And, she supposed, she herself presented the same tough leathery aspect that she always did.
But what a change had occurred in the last year! What a cataclysm had gone on in her heart! Nothing was the same, nothing was stable. Life had been turned topsy-turvy, and turmoil and conjecture tossed her to and fro. She looked again at the serene room, her old friends, and the placid indifferent countenance of Thrush Green through the window, and Ella could have howled like a dog with abject misery at the hopelessness of ever trying to explain how different all her loved and little world was to her this Christmas Day.
At half-past one, in Albert Piggott's cottage, Molly was washing up the debris of the Christmas feast. Her father and Ben were accustomed to taking their main meal of the dav at twelve o'clock for they were early risers, and Molly too had risen soon after six after feeding her baby.
Ben wiped up vigorously, and his father-in-law leant in the doorway considerably impeding the progress. Occasionally Ben thrust a piece of crockery into his unwilling hands for him to put away in the cupboard. Conversation was carried on above the clatter at the sink and the cries of young George above who was impatiently awaiting his two o'clock feed. The child had been named after Ben's father, the favourite child of old Mrs Curdle, who had lost his life in the war. Doctor Bailey, to whom Molly had proudly shown her son that morning, maintained that he was the image of that baby he had delivered almost fifty years before.
'We'll leave you in peace this afternoon,' said Molly. 'Ted and Bessie Allen want to see the baby and we'll be there till they open the pub at six.'
'No need to hurry back on my account,' answered Albert sourly, squinting at a glass mug, in an unlovely way, to see if Ben had polished it sufficiently.
'Must be back by then,' said Molly firmly, 'to put George to bed. But if you want to go out–to see Nelly Tilling, say–don't wait about for us.'
It was pure mischief that had prompted Molly to speak of the widow, and Albert rose swiftly to the bait.
'Don't go getting ideas in your head about Nelly Tilling,' he growled. 'She be a rare one for chasing the men, as I've no doubt you knows well enough. She ain't "ad no encouragement from me, that I can say.'
'More fool you,' said Ben cheerfully. 'You'd be lucky to get her. Look after you well, she would.'
'Too dam' well,' grunted Albert. 'Never let a chap forget c signed the pledge before his mother's milk 'ad dried on 'is lips.' He sniffed noisily. 'I "opes I've got more sense than to put me 'ead in that noose!'
'Well, it seems to be expected,' said Molly lightly. 'Miss Watson asked me about her when I took the baby past her house this morning.'
'Miss Watson? That old faggot?' shouted Albert, shaken to his marrow. 'What call 'as she got to go linking Nelly Tilling and me?' He breathed heavily for a minute.
'She ain't never been right since she got hit on the head a month or two back,' he continued. 'Must've left her a bit dotty.'
'First I've heard of it,' said Ben. 'What happened?'
Albert gave a garbled account of the robbery at the school-house in the autumn.
'And the police,' he said, banging his hand on the dresser for emphasis, 'is fair scuppered. As a matter o' fact, I'm on the look-out for the chap meself.'
'Well, I hope you find him,' said Molly, undoing her apron. 'Poor old soul! Fancy hurting an old lady like Miss Watson! Why, she must be over fifty!'
Albert looked at himself in the kitchen mirror, and smirked.
'That ain't so old,' he said, with unusual jauntiness, brushing his damp mouth with the back of his hand. He caught the eye of his son-in-law and gave a watery wink.
Miss Watson, happily ignorant of the furore she had caused, was sitting snugly in the schoolhouse parlour, spending her Christmas afternoon in writing letters of thanks.
She was engaged in giving a long account of the morning's service at St Andrew's to Miss Fogerty whose Christmas holiday was being spent with an octogenarian aunt at Tunbridge Wells.
'The church,' wrote Miss Watson in her precise copperplate, 'looked lovely, decorated with holly, red and white carnations and Christmas roses on the altar. You would have enjoyed the singing, and the rector's sermon was very fine, on the theme of generosity. Very much to the point, I thought, in a community like Thrush Green, where back-biting does occur, as we know only too well. It made me feel that I really must try and forgive, even if I cannot forget, that wretched man who attacked me.'
Miss Watson put down her pen for a moment and gazed thoughtfully out upon Thrush Green. The room was tranquil, and she was enjoying her holiday solitude. Now that she had time to collect her t
houghts Miss Watson had gone carefully over and over the incidents of that terrifying night, but further clues escaped her. From the first she had felt that her attacker was someone that she knew. In the weeks that followed she scrutinised the men of Lulling and Thrush Green to no avail. But she had not, and would not, give up hope. One day, she felt certain, she would recognise the brute and he would be brought to justice.
The winter sun was beginning to turn to a red ball, low on the horizon. Above it, long grey clouds, like feathered arrows, strained across the clear ice-blue sky. Somewhere a blackbird sang, as though it were a spring day, and Miss Watson, suddenly finding the room stuffy, opened her window the better to hear it.
A family passed near by, crossing the green, no doubt bent upon taking tea with relatives. That indefinable Christmas afternoon atmosphere, compounded of cigar smoke, best clothes and new possessions crept upon Miss Watson's senses, as she watched the father bending down to guide the erratic course of his young son's new red tricycle. Screaming with annoyance, the child beat backwards at his father's restraining hand. The mother's protests, shrill and tired, floated across the grass to the open window.
'There are times,' said Miss Watson smugly to the cat, 'when an old maid has the best of it.' And she turned, with a happy sigh, to her interrupted letterwriting.
While Miss Watson finished her letter and her neighbours slept or walked off the effects of their Christmas feasting, Ruth Lovell looked, for the first time, upon her daughter.
She weighed seven pounds and two ounces, had a tiny bright pink face mottled like brawn, and from each tightly-shut eye there protruded four short light eyelashes. But to Ruth, to whom good looks meant a great deal, the most alarming thing was the shape of her daughter's head, which rose to a completely bald pointed dome.