Juan, however, is determined to have his say: “The Señor, he bring Señorita Beatrice in from the fields,” he says, triumphantly, “and then he give her brandy.”
Clarrie’s head feels as though it’s about to split open, she’s beginning to be queasy again. “Well as long as she’s better now, there seems no need for worry.” Juan, looking disappointed, continues to hover. “That will be all now, Juan, except could you ask Mrs Bogg to come and see me as soon as she arrives.”
“But certainly, Señora,” Juan bows, with dignity makes for the door, shuts it behind him, and Clarries breathes a sigh of relief. About to take a sip of orange juice, she suddenly knows without a doubt she’s going to be sick again. Again makes it to the bathroom just in time. Back in bed she feels a little better. Better enough to take a sip of orange? Perhaps not. She’d wait a little and see what happens next. Could she have eaten something that disagreed with her? Possibly. Was it a bug? And Beatrice had it too. Although to dash into the fields to be sick seemed a bit over the top. Anyway, she’d lie still for a minute or two and try thinking of something else. That might do the trick. Breathing deeply and doing her best to relax, she picks up the Guardian newspaper – Juan always brings it with her breakfast tray – and tries to concentrate on the headlines. It’s no good. Apart from everything else the damned rooks are making such a noise, she can’t hear herself think. Something must have disturbed them. Shouldn’t they be out in the fields by now doing whatever rooks are supposed to do?
It’s while she’s pondering on this entirely unimportant point that it comes to her: a bolt out of the blue; hammer blow; flash of inspiration; whatever you like to call it. The reason for her sickness, general up and downness lately, everything. She’s pregnant. She’s bloody pregnant! Clarrie Woodhead, beautiful, warm, caring human being, hostess par excellence, has managed to get herself in the family way, and randy, conceited, common as muck Jack Fulton must be the father. But she’d been so careful, always put her diaphragm in before they met – the pill disagreed with her, and Sel having had the chop years before she knew him, on the rare occasions when they had sex they didn’t use anything. Of course nothing was a hundred per cent safe; perhaps she’d not put the damn thing in properly, been in too much of a hurry; doing it in the car probably didn’t help. Who knew?
Then another hammer blow strikes; she remembers she missed her last period. In her case missing a period was not an unusual occurrence, she’d been irregular even as a girl and doctors had always said it was nothing to worry about, she was perfectly OK in that department, so she hadn’t taken much notice, but now…
Miserably she bites into a piece of dry toast, it tastes of ashes and the tears start to fall. “Oh God!”
“My dearest heart, my rose, my queen, what on earth’s the matter?” Sel is in the doorway looking harassed. “No more trouble with Juan and Mrs Bogg, surely?” Clarrie, wiping her eyes on an already sopping handkerchief, shakes her head. “What then?”
“I feel bloody ill, that’s all.”
“All?” He sits down beside her on the bed, takes her hand, feels her forehead. “Have you rung the doctor, or would you rather I get hold of old Poncy Adams and ask him to come down? He owes me a favour and you never know with these country GPs. They –”
“No!” The word comes out somewhere between a wail and a shriek. “I don’t need a bloody doctor. It’s not that.”
“Not what, my love?” He pulls her gently into his arms, her head resting on his shoulder. “You must tell me; how else can I be of help?”
Clarrie cuddles up to him, closes her eyes, she never can resist Sel when he’s like this. “I think,” she says in a little girl voice, “I may be pregnant.”
“Ah…”
Silence for a moment. Sel, his eyes far away, absent-mindedly kisses the top of his wife’s head, while his formidable mind weighs up the pros and cons of the situation. He knows something Clarrie doesn’t know; even then it seems unlikely the child is his. At length, turning her face, still blotched with tears, to his, and looking deep into her eyes, he makes his pronouncement. “My darling,” he says, between kisses, “I am so very happy.” Clarrie looks at him doubtfully, she has a nasty feeling she’s going to be sick again.
Downstairs in her office Beatrice sits stoically typing. “Everyone lies about sex,” Sel’s voice says through the earpiece in her ear, “has anyone noticed? If they have had it they say they haven’t, and if they haven’t had it, they say they have. Exclamation mark and dots.”
‘Exclamation mark and dots’, she types mechanically, then realises what she’s done and angrily rips the paper out of her machine. It’s no good, she can’t work this morning. Too much has happened.
She longs for a cigarette; if she has much more of this she’ll have to take up smoking again. So Tavey, presumably Octavia, had a father, then. A father who’d forbidden her to go out, but returned unexpectedly. It surely must have been him they were carrying in the litter, but who was the old woman? Were they ghosts, or just figments of her imagination? “Leave it to me,” Sel had told her following their breakfast session, “we have something very interesting going on here, but I need time to think it through. What I do feel, however, is we need the advice of an expert, possibly several experts. This is, after all, the age of the expert, so someone who can combine a knowledge of the paranormal with that of the period of Roman occupation shouldn’t be too hard to find. Meanwhile, dear, not a word to anyone.” It was all very well for Sel, she thinks miserably, all this isn’t happening to him. The phone buzzes beside her:
“Good morning, Mr Woodhead’s secretary speaking, can I help you?”
“It’s Sam.”
“Oh.”
“Look, Beatrice, please forgive me for yesterday, it’s imperative I see you, there’ve been developments…”
“It wasn’t your fault, Sam, I behaved like a bitch, I know, and I agree we must meet. There’ve been developments here too: something happened last night, something connected with the rookery…”
“I better come round at once.” The voice of Major Mallory; concise, positive, almost a bark, not like the Sam she knows at all and despite her worries, Beatrice experiences a small thrill of excitement. Should she tell him Sel knows – better not perhaps, not yet.
“Eyes were watching me,” she says, “the Guardians…”
“I know, me too. See you in half an hour.” And the phone goes dead.
Thirty minutes later, he’s at the front door, bearing with him a box of frogs’ legs in aspic. “Good morning,” he shouts uncertainly, as Juan, looking snooty, opens the front door, “I promised Mrs Woodhead I would deliver these, and I have an appointment with Miss Travers.”
Juan takes the box of frogs’ legs with a look of disdain and places them on the hall table. “The Señorita Travers, she is at present occupied and the Señor and Señora Woodhead, they are out. I cannot –”
“In the back in the office, Major,” Mrs Bogg interrupts, appearing out of nowhere, “down the passage on your right, you can’t miss it. Selly and his missus have gone to the clinic in Belchester, said they’d be out for lunch.” She gives him a lewd wink.
“Nothing wrong, I hope?” He feels he ought to ask, he’s not in the least interested whether there’s anything wrong with them or not, but even in a crisis one had, he supposes, to keep up appearances.
“No, my love, leastways not that I know of,” Mrs Bogg says, looking as though she knew a great deal more than she was letting on, but Sam’s already hurrying away down the passage. Juan gives Mrs Bogg a look and, picking up the box of frogs’ legs, stalks off towards the kitchen. Mrs Bogg makes a rude gesture.
He hears the clack clack of a typewriter, opens the door and there she is, his beloved, looking miserable and happy at the same time, and before they know it they’re in each other’s arms pressed up against the filing cabinet.
“Sam we mustn’t, supposing it starts up again and we turn into the others, it could happen any time.”
“I agree, we should proceed with care, we must not rouse the Gods…” Sam relinquishes her, and she’s not sure whether it’s him or Brian talking. But before she can say anything else she notices there’s this rook watching them from the window sill.
“Oh God, Sam, look!”
Sam looks, the rook stares insolently back, Sam flaps his arms. “Get out of here, you bastard,” he shouts, “how dare you upset this lady.” The rook continues to look, then, squirting a message on to the pristine pile of manuscript carefully placed out of harm’s way on the window sill, flaps away up the valley.
Holding hands, they watch it go. “We can’t talk here,” Sam says, “but it’s essential we pool our resources.”
Beatrice nods. “We could go for a quick stroll in the garden, I suppose, but I can’t be out of the office long because of the phone; anyway, I’ve loads of work.”
“And I must be back in the shop by twelve, it’s Karen’s lunch hour and Emmie’s gone to Belchester. What about meeting this evening after work? There’s a pub on the main road, The Trojan Horse. Pretty ghastly, but the locals don’t tend to go there.”
“What time?”
“Shall we say, eight thirty, or would you rather –”
“No that’s fine. I’ll see you out.” They reach the front door and there’s Mrs Bogg, duster in hand, looking interested.
“Sorted things out, then, dear?”
“Yes thanks, Mrs Bogg.” She turns to Sam, “That’ll be fine, Major, and I’ll tell Mrs Woodhead when she gets back, you’ll give her a ring around eight thirty this evening.”
Sam for a moment looks bewildered, then nods vigorously. “OK, Miss Travers, will do.” He knows he sounds too theatrical, he hasn’t done any acting since his schooldays, even then he’d never progressed beyond third messenger, in Macbeth, and is miserably aware his performance leaves a lot to be desired.
“Such a nice gentleman,” Mrs Bogg says as the front door closes behind him, “what he’s doing running the village shop I’ll never know, and there’s that wife of his gadding about all over the countryside with that Jack what’s-his-name. My Josh saw them the other night, out beyond Dibden Cross, snogging away like two ferrets in a sack, Josh said, in the back of his Volvo and what’s more –”
“I think I can hear the phone, Mrs Bogg, I’d better get back to the office…”
Sam feels deflated: he’d rushed over to Brown End, a knight in shining armour, ready to save his lady from the powers of darkness, or anything else for that matter, and instead he seems to be performing rather badly in some sort of bedroom farce. The grocer and the secretary, he smiles wryly as he walks across the gravel to the gate leading into the yard, acutely aware of Mrs Bogg’s eyes following his progress from the hall window. She knows something’s up, that’s obvious, and once through the gate and out of her vision, he breathes a sigh of relief. His car’s parked under the lee of the barn. About to open the door, he becomes aware of the noise the rooks are making in the trees behind it, surely unusual for this time of day. He stands listening, one hand on the car door, and the thought comes; it’s always the rooks. Anything odd that happens, there they are. What is it with them? Are they responsible in some way for what’s happening? If so, why? Perhaps now’s his chance to investigate.
The paddock grass is long and straggling and full of thistles, the hedge surrounding it rampant and uncut. In the corner, towering over the barn, are the ash trees, their branches a fuzz of nests. Feathers and droppings litter the ground and the noise is now deafening. Without conscious thought he walks over to the tree in the centre, and slowly raises his arms in supplication. “My Lords,” he shouts above the din, “I’m here to do your bidding.” The rooks fall silent, the sun goes behind a cloud and Sam kneels down and begins to dig; first scrabbling with his hands, then with a sharp stone lying on the ground beside him.
Fascinated, Josh Bogg watches him from behind the hedge. He’s been ploughing that morning, and has stopped to have a lunchtime break and eat his sandwiches. There’s a gap in the hedge and he can see quite clearly what’s going on under the ash tree. Radio Belchester mutters to itself from the cab of the parked tractor, a hopeful blackbird waits for crumbs – a lump of cheese if he’s lucky – and Josh, excitement driving him through him like a red hot wire, watches mesmerised as the pile of reddish earth beside the major gets bigger by the minute. At last he can stand it no longer.
“Looking for something, Major?” But Sam, ignoring his shout, continues to scrabble. Josh decides to investigate. Leaving his jacket and lunch box on the grass – the blackbird in luck, seizes his chance and flies off with the lump of cheese – he squeezes through the gap in the hedge and confronts the major.
“Anything wrong, Major?” No answer. “ANYTHING WRONG, MAJOR?” This time he bends down and shouts the words in Sam’s ear. At last the digging stops, and Sam sits back on his haunches. Slowly, seemingly quite bemused, he gets to his feet; brushes the earth from his immaculate, cavalry twill trousers.
“I seem to have lost one of my buttons,” he says, and both of them are aware of the total inadequacy of his explanation.
Josh’s eyes travel slowly over the mound of earth and the already sizable hole beside it. “I see, Major, I see. I thought perhaps you needed some help, I was having my lunch, see and…”
“Awfully kind of you to offer, but everything’s fine. It’s just these buttons are difficult to match, and I was sure it fell off somewhere round here.” Josh glances surreptitiously at the buttons on Sam’s khaki shirt; they all appear to be intact.
“Taking a walk, were you?” he asks politely.
“Er, not really. It was just I heard the rooks making such a noise – I was in the yard about to get in my car, and wondered what had disturbed them.”
“Been delivering at Brown’s, then?”
“Yes, frogs’ legs, Mrs –”
“Frogs’ legs?”
“Well, yes. Mrs Woodhead wanted some, and I managed to get a consignment, apparently she’s very fond of them.” At the mention of frogs’ legs Josh’s suspicions change course: his old gran, who’d been in service as a girl with the Durlston family, used to tell tales about those trees. “I wouldn’t go near ‘em after dark,” she’d say, “not for all the money in the world.” The plot, it seemed, was thickening.
“Don’t go burying those frogs’ legs in that hole, then, Major,” he says, in a futile attempt to lighten the tension.
Sam shakes his head. “No, no I won’t do that,” he says heartily, “they’re quite hard to come by as a matter of fact.”
“I can believe that.” Josh stands for a moment in silence; for the life of him he can find nothing further to say. The whole extraordinary situation is quite beyond anything he’s previously had to deal with. “Must be going, then,” he manages at last, “work won’t wait…”
“I have to be on my way too, I must be back in the shop by twelve.” Sam looks doubtfully at the hole he’s made. “Do you think I ought to fill this in? I seem to have made a bit of a mess.”
“I wouldn’t bother. Mr Woodhead’s thinking of having those old trees down; get rid of the rooks, he said, his missus don’t like ‘em. I’ve heard talk he’s going to build a swimming pool.”
“I’ll leave it then. They certainly do make rather a mess, the rooks, I mean.”
“Bye then, Major.” Josh turns away and makes for the gap in the hedge.
Standing by the wicket gate is a tall, grey haired lady in a blue robe; gold at her throat. She looks at Sam with angry, reproachful eyes. “There’s a lady…” he calls after Josh, but Josh has already disappeared. Sam turns back to the visitor, “Mother,” he says, “I’m so sorry, so very sorry…” But she too has disappeared.
*
“Don’t make too much of a thing over it, Sel, please,” Clarrie says, knowing that he will, “I’d rather we didn’t tell anyone yet, after all you never know what might happen, and Dr Hardcastle did say we must wait for the test resu
lts before we know for sure.”
“Your wishes, my darling, as always are paramount,” Sel says, slowing down as they approach the village – as a driver he tends to take risks; today is special, however, and he’s curbing his enthusiasm – “but later on perhaps… let me see, how old are you, my love?”
“Thirty-nine. And what’s that got to do with it?” Clarrie, already cross, feels herself getting crosser.
“Think, dear, think. You are to become a mother for the first time at the age of forty,” Clarrie winces, “you are, albeit indirectly, a minor celebrity.” Clarrie snorts derisively. Sel, ignoring her and continues, “As such, your thoughts and feelings on this great experience will be of interest to many women in your position, and a piece or two on the subject, syndicated of course, would not, I think, come amiss; perhaps even a little TV coverage, with a follow-up visit as the months go by.”
Clarrie closes her eyes. “I want to get rid of it,” she says. Sel merely smiles and pats her hand, his eyes on the cloud of rooks wheeling above the barn as he turns the car into the yard at Brown End.
Josh Bogg is waiting for him by the old pigsty.
Chapter 9
It’s raining as Beatrice, already half an hour late for her rendezvous with Sam, sets out for The Trojan Horse. It’s the first time she’s seen Brown End in the rain; it looks gentler, less menacing, the trees at the top of the hill beyond the river shrouded in mist.
Dinner that evening had been a silent affair. Clarrie barely ate anything, and scarcely uttered a word throughout the rather meagre repast – this one especially meagre as today was one of their twice weekly diet days – and Sel appeared preoccupied. However, the meal over and Clarrie retired to her room with a headache, he’d suggested that they should repair to the conservatory ‘and have a talk’. She’d looked at her watch, 8.15 already, she was going to be late, really late.
“You have a date, dear?” Beatrice nodded. “Never mind, I’m sure Major Mallory can hang on for just a few minutes.”
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