by Miss Read
'I had My Magazine too,' cried Diana. 'My parents thought I should learn such a lot from it. The first thing I did was to turn to "The Hippo Boys"! They once made a sledge out of an upturned table, and flew Union Jacks from all the legs.'
'A fat lot of education you seemed to have gleaned from My Magazine,' commented her husband. 'I don't think you picked up many of the pearls cast by the editors before all the young piglets. I had Rainbow, and was brought up on Mrs Bruin. I wonder why she had her frock decorated with a poached-egg pattern? It used to intrigue me.'
'Easy to draw, I expect,' said Henry Mawne. 'I wasn't allowed such luxuries, but I used to buy Sexton Blake in secret when I was at school, and read him under the bed clothes with a flickering torch.'
The party broke up about eleven. The rain still tumbled down. The Thornes had come from Caxley by car, but the Mawnes had come on foot, sheltering under golf umbrellas. By this time, there were formidable puddles everywhere, and despite protestations by Henry Mawne of enjoying a good splash through the rain—Mrs Mawne, for once, remaining silent—the Thornes insisted upon taking them home, and the Hales waved them all goodbye.
Diana looked anxiously towards Sergeant Burnaby's cottage. It was in complete darkness, as was Mrs Fowler's, but this was only to be expected at that time of night.
She found herself listening for sounds of life, as she lay in bed an hour later. It was very quiet, and she made up her mind that she would call next door first thing in the morning, and risk the old man's wrath.
Then, faintly, she heard coughing. It was the old familiar rasping cough of the heavy smoker.
Much relieved, Diana turned over and fell asleep.
It was still raining the next morning when Peter went off to school. A long puddle, dimpled with raindrops, lay along the edge of the brick path, and the trunks of the trees were striped with little rivulets.
Still anxious, Diana peered through the hedge at Sergeant Burnaby's doorstep. She was shocked to see two full bottles of milk standing there in the rain. This must be the third day that the old man had been unable to go outside.
At that moment, the postman arrived. He called at the soldier's house first and then came to Diana's door. She enquired if he had seen Sergeant Burnaby.
'Come to think of it,' said the young man, dripping droplets from his peaked cap over the letters in his hand, 'I haven't. He's usually up and about. And now you mention it, yesterday's letter was still stuffed in his letter slit. You reckon he's okay?'
'I'm not sure,' replied Diana, 'but I'm going round immediately.'
'Shall I come too?'
'No, you've got your duties to do, many thanks. I'll manage. If need be, I can telephone for some help.'
The postman looked a trifle disappointed, Diana thought, at being denied a little drama, but she was sure that the fewer people who visited Sergeant Burnaby the better. No doubt she would get a hostile reception anyway, but she was willing to take the risk.
She shrugged on a mackintosh and splashed her way to the adjoining cottage.
The door was shut. She knocked and waited, watching the raindrops slide down the wood, and noting that all the windows were securely shut. After a minute or two, she tried the door handle.
The door was not locked or bolted, she was thankful to find. She opened it a little way and called. There was no answer.
Now she began to feel afraid, and wished she had accepted the offer of the postman's company. Suppose the old man lay dead? The house was unnaturally quiet, and had the frowsty smell of an old house shut up for days without air.
She picked up the milk bottles. They rattled together in her shaking hand, and seemed to make a terrible din.
Taking a deep breath, she entered the living room. The fire-place had a few cold ashes in it. The windows were slightly misted with condensation. A crumpled newspaper lay on the floor by the old man's armchair. It was dated, Diana could see, three days earlier.
Behind the door were more newspapers and two or three letters. She picked them up and put them on the table, still listening intently for any sound.
'Sergeant Burnaby!' she called at the foot of the stairs. There was no reply.
She called again, louder now, her heart beginning to pound. Should she return, and fetch help? No, she told herself, he might simply be sleeping soundly, and it was obviously sensible to find out first.
She mounted the stairs, calling as she went. Both doors at the head of the stairs were shut, but she knew that the old soldier's room was on the right-hand side, his wall adjoining their own house.
She rapped on the door, and stood listening, head on one side. There was no sound.
She rapped again, rather more loudly, and now there was the squeak of bed springs, and grunting noises.
'Can I come in?'
'Who's there?'
'Diana Hale. Are you all right?'
'What d'yer want?'
The voice was surly, but not unfriendly. Emboldened, Diana pushed open the door.
The old man's bristly face peered suspiciously over the bed clothes. The room was stuffy, and the bed looked as though it had been used for two or three days without being made afresh.
'I was rather worried about you,' said Diana. 'We haven't seen you about and I wondered if you were ill.'
'I bin a bit rough,' admitted the old man. He looked thinner and his yellow face sagged. The fierce moustaches were down-bent, giving him an unusually depressed appearance.
'Let me get you a drink,' said Diana. 'What would you like? Hot milk, or tea, or something stronger?'
'I thought I had some tea,' said Sergeant Burnaby, looking about vaguely.
Diana took the empty cup from his bedside table. It was dry and stained, and had obviously been there for a day or two.
'I'll make you a fresh cup. When did you drink this?'
'Last night, I think. What's today?'
Diana told him. He looked disbelieving and slightly affronted.
'I come up here Monday night. Just after "Z Cars". Felt a bit rough with me chest.'
'I think you've been here ever since,' Diana said.
He put a hand to his ribs and winced.
'Got a sharpish pain here. Better sit up.'
She shook up the pillows and helped the old fellow upright. A spasm of coughing tore the man, and Diana was alarmed at the violence of the attack.
She waited until it had passed and he leant back upon the pillows exhausted.
'I'll get your drink,' she said, 'and then I think we must get the doctor to have a look at you.'
'Don't want no dam' doctor messin' me about,' wheezed the old man spasmodically.
Diana left him to make the tea. She could hear the sergeant's heavy breathing as she waited for the kettle to boil. She found a tin of biscuits and put them on the tray. There seemed to be remarkably little food in the pantry, but she did not like to pry too much. She resolved to bring him some home-made soup from home, and perhaps a boiled egg, if he could manage it.
He was grateful for the tea and drank it thirstily. Diana watched his trembling hands anxiously.
'Now, I'm going to pour you out a second cup, and while you drink it I'll ask the doctor to call on his rounds. Who do you have?'
'Young Barton at Springbourne. He's no good—like all of 'em. I tell you, I don't want nobody. I'll be all right if I rest.'
Diana said no more. She did not want to agitate him further, but she certainly intended to get help.
On her return to the cottage, she rang the surgery and was told that Doctor Barton, though excessively busy, would call about twelve.
A little before midday, Diana went round again, bearing a light lunch. The old man was dozing, but woke at once and seemed almost pleased to see her.
She sat by the window and watched him eat. It would be best, she thought, to let him finish the meal before breaking the news of the doctor's impending visit.
When he had finished, she brought him a bowl of warm water, soap and sponge, spreading t
he towel which hung from the bed rail across the old man's lap.
'That's better,' he said, mopping the drops from his chin. 'You bin a good neighbour to me this morning.'
He smiled upon her and Diana took courage.
'You may not think so when I tell you that Doctor Barton's calling.'
'You ain't rung 'im?' protested Sergeant Burnaby, his face clouding.
'I must,' replied Diana. 'You need an examination. It's the right thing to let your doctor have a look at you.'
'That's the worst of women,' said the old soldier viciously. 'Too dam' interfering.'
He tugged crossly at the bedclothes, and was smitten with another racking attack of coughing.
It was whilst this was in progress that the door opened and in walked the doctor.
Later, he came downstairs to where Diana was waiting.
'Are you a relative?'
'No, just a neighbour. The sergeant is our tenant.'
'He's pretty frail. Pleurisy and bronchitis, and his heart's not all it should be. What age is he?'
'Late seventies, I believe.'
The doctor nodded.
'Like most of these old people, he's underfed too. Can't be bothered to cook. All tea and biscuits. I'm sending the ambulance for him.'
Diana felt startled. She had not imagined that Sergeant Burnaby would need hospital treatment. The old man would be furious.
'Can you wait with him until it comes? I've several cases to attend to.'
'Of course.'
'Perhaps you could put a few things together for him? Pyjamas, soap—that sort of thing.'
He went out to his car, and Diana returned upstairs with some trepidation.
'Pleased with yerself?' asked Sergeant Burnaby nastily. 'Gets me out of the way, don't it?'
'Sergeant Burnaby!' protested Diana. Something in her face must have touched the old soldier's heart.
'All right, all right! Don't start piping yer eye. I've got enough to put up with without that. Give us a hand with me clothes, gal. If I've gotter go to the blasted hospital, I'd better go decent.'
16. Amy's Party
MY friend Amy lives in the village of Bent, a few miles on the southern side of Caxley. I can take a roundabout route, through the lanes from Fairacre, and get there comfortably in half-an-hour.
The hedges were festooned with honeysuckle, the fragile trumpets giving out a wonderful scent in the warm evening air. Here and there, a late wild rose starred the greenery, and young fledglings squatted fearlessly among the grit in the road, and had to be warned of danger by a toot from the car's horn.
The corn was now golden, rustling in the light breeze which fanned the expanse, ruffling it like the wind across the sea. Soon the combines would be out, trundling round and round the acres like so many clumsy prehistoric beasts, while the farmers prayed for fine weather and freedom from mechanical breakdowns.
Nettled though I was by Amy's disparaging remarks about my perfectly good black frock, I had to admit that she had seen it a great many times, and perhaps a new one might be a good idea. Consequently, I was attired, not in red, but in an elegant affair of bottle-green, which I had bought at enormous expense in Caxley's leading stores. The hole which this extravagance had made in my monthly budget was truly horrifying. I comforted myself with the thought that it was an investment, and that I could probably live on eggs, which were plentiful and cheap, and the perpetual spinach which was rioting in my vegetable plot. If the worst came to the worst I should have to borrow some money from the needlework Oxo tin, as I had done before in times of financial stress.
Aunt Clara's seed pearls did nothing to enhance my ensemble, I had decided, and had dug out a fat silver brooch from Mexico which looked rather splendid, I thought, after a brisk rubbing with Silvo at the last minute. If I had been richer I should have bought a stunning pair of shoes to match my frock, but in the circumstances I polished my old black patent ones and was quite content.
How nice it is to grow old, I mused, as I trundled along between the hedges. Twenty years earlier, I should have worried about the shoes. Now I didn't care a tinker's cuss that they were old. I really would not care if I were going barefoot, except on Amy's account. There is a limit to eccentricity, even between old friends.
There were several cars in the drive when I arrived. I was glad I was not the first, as I am so often.
'It looks as though you never have a square meal,' Amy scolded once. 'Bursting in on the dot, and sniffing the air like a Bisto Kid.'
'I like to be punctual,' I had replied, with dignity.
Amy's house was built in the 'thirties, and has a prosperous look about it with its wide eaves and pretty stonework. It looks across a valley, now golden with corn, towards distant hills to the south.
There were several people there whom I had met before and, surprisingly, the Mawnes from Fairacre. We greeted each other with unusual enthusiasm, meeting in a foreign part so unexpectedly.
'Let me present Mr Baker,' said Amy. 'Gerard Baker. Mrs Mawne and her husband, Henry Mawne. Miss Read. All from Fairacre, Gerard, and bursting with knowledge about Aloysius.'
I don't quite know what I had expected when Amy first told me about Gerard, but I was pleasantly surprised. Somehow, one does not expect a writer to look normal. If male, one half-expects a beard, or a mop of hair, or both, allied to a certain sallowness of complexion (burning midnight oil?) and either advanced emaciation because of failure to sell his work, or too much flesh because of unusual success.
Gerard Baker, was neither thin nor fat, clean-shaven, with tidy fair hair and an air of cheerful competence. He would have made a reassuring dentist, or a reliable headmaster of a prep school.
All three of us explained hastily that we knew very little about the poet he was interested in, but I told him about Mr Willet's remarks, and he was eager to meet him.
'Aloysius sounds rather a trial,' he said. 'He's the sixth poet I've tackled so far, and to be frank, they are all proving to be hopeless domestically.'
'But surely it's their work you're considering,' said Mrs Mawne.
'Yes, but the men too. I've come to the conclusion that life with a poet—and the more minor the worse—must have been uncommonly depressing for his family.'
At this moment, Vanessa was brought up to meet the great man. She looked tidier than usual, but still pale and unhappy. We drifted away as the movement of guests carried us, and let them converse.
Later, some of us wandered into the garden. Amy is splendidly up-to-the-minute with her garden. There are lots of shrubs and roses, and more foliage than flowers in her herbaceous border. As she is a keen flower-arranger, the place fairly bristles with hostas and dogwood, and lots of things with green flowers or catkins which are difficult to distinguish from the surrounding boskage.
A beautiful old lime tree scented the air, and I made a private bet with myself that not a branch entered Amy's house without being first denuded of its leaves. Did she still, I wondered, pop the young leaves against her mouth with a satisfying report? She had been a notable leaf-popper at college. Probably she had put such childish things behind her.
Whilst I mused, swinging my sherry in the glass, Gerard came to join me, and we went to sit on an elegant white wrought-iron seat which was much more comfortable than it looked.
'It's nice to be in the fresh air,' he confessed. 'Why do even the politest cocktail parties get so hot and noisy?'
I took this to be a rhetorical question and only smiled in reply.
'Do you know Vanessa well?" was his next question.
'Not very.'
'She seems such a charming child, but sad. Crossed in love I suppose. One always is at that age.'
I told him about the four-times-married husband.
'But she looks better than she did,' I assured him. 'Amy tells me she's getting over it.'
'What a blessing it is to grow out of one's first youth,' said Gerard. 'Everything matters so terribly. So much to learn, so many mistakes to make. That lin
e from "Gigi"—"Methuselah is my patron saint"- strikes a chord with me.'
'Me too,' I told him. 'I was thinking on much the same lines as I drove over here this evening.'
'Vanessa's staying here for a few days,' said Gerard. 'I wonder if she'd bring her aunt to lunch with me in Caxley? Do you think she'd find it boring?'
'Of course not. Ask her anyway. I'd say she'd be honoured.'
'Awful to be young,' he repeated, gazing across-the valley.
'So vulnerable at that age—exposed to every blow, helpless, like a—like a—'
'Winkle without a shell?' I suggested, as he sought for words.
He threw back his head and roared with laughter.
'Exactly. I was searching for a much more poetic simile, but that hits the nail on the head.'
'We must go back and mingle,' I said. 'We've had our quota of fresh air.'
'I'll catch Amy now, before I go,' said Gerard, 'and ask about Vanessa.'
'Good luck,' I said, 'and if Amy can't come, I shouldn't let it worry you. After all, Vanessa is now legally an adult.'
As the guests drifted away, Amy took me on one side.
'Stop and help us eat up the bits, darling,' she begged. 'You won't have to wash up. Mrs Thingummy's come to help.'
'You misjudge me,' I said. 'I didn't think you wanted me to stay simply to do a bit of charring. And, yes please, I'd love to eat my way through those smoked salmon fripperies, not to mention the rolled asparagus tips.'
'It is useful to have a greedy friend,' exclaimed Amy.
Later, over enormous cups of coffee, Vanessa and I congratulated Amy on the success of the party.
'If only poor old James could have been here,' she said. 'He was called away this afternoon to some wretched meeting in Leicester.'
'Has he met Gerard Baker?'