Emmanuel cocks his head and eyeballs me as I walk into the Humphreys’ garden. He’s calculating the odds of my having a cheese sandwich on me. The Duchess, smarter, ignores me, knowing I’ve given up feeding the peafowls. When they first arrived, I always had a titbit to give them but they followed me around so persistently, and after a time, so annoyingly, that I soon stopped.
Emmanuel is quiet, anyway. In fact I haven’t heard his cry for a few days, though that doesn’t mean to say he doesn’t carry on in the mornings when I’m at work. He is a beautiful bird, though, all that luminescent blue and turquoise. I wish Kate and Leon would come over to Poet’s Tenement with me, meet Edna and Hector, but they hesitate and always make some excuse if I mention it. I think Kate’s a bit wary of them, and it’s not just the peacock. She’s used to eccentrics in the city, takes them in her stride from what I’ve heard her say about her old neighbours, but in rural areas she’s uncertain. I’m sure she thinks the Humphreys are barmy, from having seen them in their strange clothes, and heard tales about them from the locals.
Before I reach the house, a loud voice stops me. It’s Doug, in the nearby field, carting dead branches away in a wheelbarrow which he leaves unceremoniously in the middle of the meadow to chat. As usual, Doug’s chats are peppered with dire warnings, accompanied by rolling eyes, puckered lips through which a soft doom-ridden whistle sounds as he finishes a sentence. ‘Hey m’maid, glad you be here. You got to talk sense into them two indoors.’
‘About Emmanuel, you mean? Goodness, Doug, what can Hector and Edna do about their peacock? They can’t stop the bird from screeching now and again.’
This sends Doug into a tizzy of rage. ‘Shite, maid, I ain’t got no problem with that bird of theirs. I like the daft thing, tame as anything, never tries to go for me like a goose or something, nor does his mate, that little peahen. It’s that woman up at the house near yours that don’t like Emmanuel, that Up Country maid, what’s her name?’
‘Do you mean Kate Winterson?’
‘That’s the one. D’you know what she did? She stopped me right on the road, right on me way to the farm to do an honest day’s work, started on gibbering something about noise, can you believe? The bloody peacock! She then shoves this paper under me nose, asks me to sign. A bloody petition to get rid of Emmanuel!’ He’s so indignant he’s turned bright red. After a few head shakes and incredulous whistles, he goes on, ‘I ain’t particularly partial to peacocks, but there’s nowt wrong with that bird. Why, his cry ain’t no worse than your bloody cockerel, maid, now is it?’
Oh dear. I wonder if Kate will start going on about Pavarotti. He does crow rather loudly now and again. ‘Doug, you didn’t say that to Kate, did you? About my cockerel?’
‘Course I did! I told’er, maid, if you want to complain about noise, how about that noisy chicken of Tessa’s?’
‘You never complained about it before. I didn’t know his crowing bothered you.’
He gives me a look he’s often given me before, that of an exasperated Cornishman trying to impart local logic to someone from Up Country. ‘Course it don’t bother me, what the bloody hell d’you think I be? Some city bloke? Why would a cockerel crowing his bloody fool head off bother me?’
‘But – you told Kate …’
He cuts me off. ‘I told her some home truths, maid. If you do be buying a house in the country, you bloody put up with bird noise, be it cockerel or peacock, what’s the difference.’
I think actually there is a bit of difference between the sounds, but Doug’s right. And I have to admit, sometimes Pavarotti does go on all day off and on, when he’s in an exuberant mood. ‘Well, Doug, who knows, maybe Kate will take out a petition against my bird next.’
He shakes his head. ‘No, maid, no fear of that. You be a friend, the only one she got in Treverny. No fear of her spoiling that, maid. You be the only one on her side.’
I have an uneasy feeling that Doug is right. I don’t like it, don’t like being on someone’s ‘side’ especially here in this village that I feel is truly mine, truly home at last. ‘I’m just a neighbour, a friend, Doug. Not on her side as you put it.’
He doesn’t think this worth answering but shakes his head mournfully, then livens up as he remembers why he called over to me in the first place. ‘You got to talk to Hector and Edna, about that tree, the old holm oak. It’s on its way out for sure.’
I sigh. ‘I know that, Doug, and so do they. A proper tree surgeon has even had a look at it and agrees it’s got to come down. Only they won’t have it.’
He makes his exasperated face again, with the whistle, ‘Because of them bloody rooks.’
‘Exactly. The rookery’s been there for years.’
‘But that’s the point, maid. Don’t you see, it be so overcrowded now the new rooks are nesting in t’other trees around the place. So t’will allus be rooks here, if that’s the worry.’
I hadn’t thought of that. Doug goes on, ‘Talk some sense in to them, maid. I like them two. They be good old-fashioned sorts.’
I’m not sure Doug would say that if he’d witnessed Hector’s display of Tai Chi in the kitchen last January, but I keep quiet. Again, I know what he means. They’re from a bygone era, without computers, mobile phones and all the other paraphernalia of modern life. Despite their travels, their vast knowledge of so many different things, there’s a real old-fashioned innocence about the couple which makes the locals very protective of them.
‘I’ll try, Doug.’
He nods and goes back to his wheelbarrow and his work while I seek out the Humphreys. I’ve got my usual supply of eggs for them from my hens. I find Edna and Hector in the back garden, sitting in rickety ancient deck chairs apparently asleep, their faces turned to the sun, arms spread out on the wooden struts of the chairs, palms facing upward. They are so still that for a moment I fear the worse, especially when a discreet cough or two doesn’t rouse them. I call out their names and when there’s no response, I start quickly towards them, my heart beating fast. Before I reach them, Hector’s low voice, murmurs, ‘Hello Tessa, my dear. Lovely to see you.’
I wonder how he can, when he hasn’t opened his eyes, but his voice sounds normal and reassuring. Edna, though, has opened hers, and smiles at me, ‘How nice to see you.’ She beckons me to sit down on the old moss-covered tree stump which has been there for years. There is no other place to sit in this ramshackle back garden, which is no more than a wilderness with a space cleared outside the back door where granite slabs have been laid to make a kind of rough patio. Doug has made some attempt to keep down the weeds and excess foliage and, though it’s often a losing battle, right now the land is at its best here. It’s a sea of bluebells, some of the biggest, bluest, I’ve ever seen. The bluebells here always seem to come out slightly later than others on the south coast, and now they’re glorious, the scent amazing.
I say, ‘Sorry if I’ve disturbed your afternoon sleep. Great idea, a nap after lunch, especially in this weather.’
Hector opens his eyes and sits up, ‘Oh, we weren’t napping. We were practising our deep breathing.’
Edna beams, ‘An old sage in India told us once that when a person is born, they are given a certain number of breaths to use in their lifetime. So, of course, the secret of longevity is breathing slowly, deeply, to eke out those breaths.’
Hector is nodding in agreement, ‘The worst possible thing to do is to breathe fast, shallowly. You use up your lifetime’s breaths too soon, you see.’
They look at each other, smiling. Edna says, ‘Well, we shall see whether it works or not. I suppose we won’t be sure until we reach a hundred.’
They are both out of their deck chairs now and before we can talk about anything else, or even have a cup of the tea which Edna promises is forthcoming, they give me a little lesson in deep breathing. ‘In through the nostrils, that’s right, Tessa, slowly, deeply, first feel your belly expand as your diaphragm sucks the air in, then feel your chest expand as you breathe deepl
y into your lungs, hold it there for a second or two before slowly – with control, Tessa! – breathing out. That’s right, slowly, in, in, in, then out, out, out.’
When they’re satisfied I know how to breathe properly, they bustle me into the kitchen where we have a good cup of English breakfast. I must say I feel very relaxed after my session of deep breathing. If that’s what got these two to such a fit old age, I’m all for it. But then it could be their Spartan diet, or the concoction of strange herbs Edna uses for her various teas, or the meditative walks they do up and down their garden path winter or summer, or the Tai Chi – or any one of the other things they must do that I don’t know anything about yet. That’s the delight of these two, I’m always finding out new things about them.
Or it could be luck that the two of them happen to have great genes.
And thinking of longevity, I finish my tea quickly and mention the tree again. ‘Doug is worried about you. So is everyone. I know you like your independence, and it’s your life, but if that tree crashes into your house, with you inside …’
‘We’d be crushed to death,’ Edna says, cheerily.
‘We know that, dear maid,’ Hector adds, also quite cheerful. ‘So we will take the precaution of making sure nice people like you, and others who visit us, don’t come during a storm, or any kind of fierce wind.’
We’re wandering out to the front of the house as we speak, to look again at the tree which is causing all this trouble. It looks even more staggy headed, as Woody put it, than it did a few months ago. Behind it the other trees, English oaks and magnificent beech trees, look positively brimming with health, at least to an untrained eye, although Woody did say they were quite ancient, too, and needed to be watched carefully. But they’re not a probem at present, and it is the holm oak, home to the huge rookery, that’s the worry.
Doug is right, though, the younger rooks are starting new nests in the other trees. I mention this fact to the Humphreys, but of course they’ve already noted this. I say, ‘So if you have the dying tree down, the rooks will all simply move next door. No problem.’
Both the Humphreys look at me as if I haven’t understood a thing, but Hector answers kindly, ‘Would you like to be forced out of your house?’
‘And made to move on, against your will, even if it was only next door?’
‘You see, maid, we choose our homes, fill them with loving care and they become part of us. It’s the same for the rooks.’
I give up. Edna and Hector have settled down on the bench in front of their house to watch their beloved birds. I perch on a wooden stool next to it, since they’ve asked me to stay and watch with them. Edna smiles. ‘Hector and I sit here looking at them for hours.’
I can see why. Rooks are fascinating birds. I look up at the ones nesting in the trees. Once I thought they were all jet black, but now, with the sun slanting through the branches and shining on the rooks, I can see that they have all sorts of glistening colours in their plumage, blues and purples and burnished copper. They are such sociable birds, too, always chattering amongst themselves, or so it sounds. The cacophony of noise now as they feed their young, flying to and fro, busying themselves in the tree, is so loud that it’s a wonder Kate hasn’t also started a petition about the rooks. Neither Edna nor Hector has mentioned the peacock one, so I gather they don’t know about it, and I’m certainly not going to tell them.
As I sit watching the activity in the rookery, stealing a glance now and again at the old couple sitting on the bench, a great sense of peace and calm settles on me. It’s a windless day, with a few clouds but enough sun to cast patterns and shadows in the tree and along the ground, and enough blue sky to contrast brightly against the glossy feathers of the rooks. Other birds are also around: five or six swallows perch on a telephone wire, and a few sparrows are flying in and out of the eaves of the house. A faint scent of some kind of flower or blossom I can’t identify is wafting through the front garden. I could ask Edna, she’d know, but she’s in another world, entranced, watching the rooks. She and Hector look so utterly still, so completely contented and at peace, that I don’t want to disturb them. So I turn my eyes back to the rookery and see the most amazing sight. A kestrel flies down towards the holm oak and suddenly four or five rooks are chasing it away. The bird of prey retreats and the rooks return.
‘That was incredible,’ I say, when they’ve all settled again.
‘Yes, it’s quite a sight, isn’t it,’ Hector agrees. ‘We’ve seen the rooks chase buzzards before. One only has to glide too near the rookery and they work as a team, two, three or more chasing the buzzard away. They never go far after it; the rooks come back as soon as they’ve chased it off.’
As we watch, a great number of the birds fly up out of the tree and circle around high up, before flying into the distance. ‘Good weather,’ Edna says. ‘When they make those sweeping circles low in the sky, bad weather is on its way. They’re much more reliable than the weather forecasts we hear on the radio.’
I finally tear myself away. I can understand why Edna and Hector do not want to cut down the holm oak. And yet all things die, everything has to end. Perhaps by next autumn, when the westerly gales hit Cornwall, they’ll have second thoughts about the tree. I hope so, for their sakes.
A week or so later, I’m outside trying to tidy up the back garden when I get a wonderful surprise. We have swifts nesting in the roof of our house. They’ve declined so much, become so uncommon in Cornwall, that the Wildlife Trust has asked people to contact them if we see them nesting anywhere.
The person on the phone at the Trust told me that the reason for the dramatic decline in numbers seems to be modern building techniques which block up their nesting sites. Most of them nest under broken roof tiles, in open eaves, or holes in walls, but now the old properties have been repaired, holes concreted up and eaves fitted with grills. Roof tiles that were put on decades ago have been repaired or, more usually, new ones are fitted closely together. Because of all this home improvement, in the last forty years swift numbers have dropped by forty per cent.
I want to mention this to the Wintersons, for they’ve got Guy back making repairs to Treetops. There won’t be a single place for a swift family to nest on that property. Maybe Kate and Leon haven’t a clue about swifts. I didn’t, until I read about their decline in the local newspaper. At least I know that, unlike seaweed, the Wintersons do like birds; both of them have mentioned how wonderful the bird life is in Cornwall, except for peacocks, of course.
I decide to go over then and there. I haven’t seen Kate for a couple of weeks as she’s been up and down to London catching up with friends, the theatre, new restaurants. Leon is busy there this month with consulting work, so Kate likes joining him. They use a friend’s apartment, some film maker who is abroad half the time.
On my way I stop to watch the swifts. It’s evening and they’re swooping around the sky, making their peculiar screaming sound, looking so graceful with their long streamlined black wings, slender bodies and tails. It’s such a wonderful sight, and such a short time we have the chance to see them, for they’ll be gone again in August.
When I arrive at Treetops, only Guy is there, working on some guttering. After we’ve chatted, mostly about Clara – the relationship is going a storm now, after his initial agonising shyness – I ask if my neighbours are home, for no one has come out. Guy says, ‘Nah, they’ve gone somewhere with some London friends they’ve got visiting.’ There’s a distasteful look on his face. ‘Probably talking about that posh furniture maker from Up Country.’
There’s not much I can say but I try, ‘I don’t blame you for being cross about all that, Guy, but I’m sure if they knew your work, how professional it is, they’d have kept you on.’
‘They didn’t even ask to see my stuff. I could’ve taken them to homes that have shelves, even furniture I’ve made. But those two didn’t want to know.’
I change the subject. It’s done now, no point talking about it. ‘Well,
I’m sorry they’re not in. I was going to mention the swifts, you know we’ve got a nest in our eaves? Treetops has a couple of loose roof tiles that would be perfect for swifts, wouldn’t that be exciting if one nested there? Thought I’d warn Kate and Leon not to repair it. I know they’re interested in the birds around here.’
Guy has stopped work and sat himself down on the new hardwood picnic table in the Wintersons’ garden. ‘Think I don’t know about the swifts, Tessa? I told them I didn’t want to patch up the places where they might have a chance to nest, but Leon told me the birds had plenty of places to make their homes and they didn’t want a leaky roof all summer, so I should get on with it.’
I’m shocked. ‘Surely he wasn’t that rude, Guy. That doesn’t sound like Leon.’
Guy gives me a sheepish smile. ‘OK, those weren’t his exact words. And no he wasn’t rude, in fact he couldn’t be more polite. He used different words, is all, but the meaning, that were the same. He wants his house perfect, and if that means covering up the eaves, so be it.’ His smile is replaced by a frown. ‘I wanted to tell him to stuff it, do his own eaves, especially as he’s happy enough to have me as an odd-job man but not a skilled carpenter. But I need the dosh, Tessa,’ he looks down quickly, but not before I see a blush on his face. ‘For, um, me and Clara, y’know? She wants me to move in to her place, move out of the digs I got. And I want to pay my way, not live off her.’
I totally embarrass him with a huge hug and great kisses on both cheeks. ‘Steady on, Tessa maid,’ he mumbles, face bright red, as I congratulate him and wish them both well.
I leave, sad about the birds, but happy for Guy and Clara. Before I go into my own home, I stand for a long time, watching the swifts, hoping they’ll be around for many more years despite the odds against them.
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