Flowers in the Morning

by Irene Davidson

  He had then picked up and transferred all the trimmings to a heap in the centre of the clearing, the same one that he had discovered that day when he had emerged from the woods, using a new, brightly painted red wheelbarrow for the job that had been favourably compared to a racing car, a Porsche no less, by the garden shop. Hamish, who had driven Steve and Linda’s Porsche, sold soon after Jamie’s birth, to be replaced by something more suitable for a family of four, thought that the barrow lacked something in the handling, especially on tight corners, compared to that vehicle.

  Job done, he mentally ticked it off the long list of tasks that he had decided to work through, in whatever order took his fancy. Next, though, looming high at the top of his list was more pruning ...including the tall yew hedge that separated the clearing from the rest of the garden. That was when he realised he would need a ladder ...and went off in search of one. When he found it, lying rotting in the overgrown grass behind the glasshouse, it became clear to him that a more exhaustive list of tools, both for the house and the garden would be necessary if he was to save himself from wasting half his life over the next weeks going backwards and forwards from shopping expeditions. The house was still without a phone, so he went inside to retrieve his mobile and call the garden shop … with any luck they would be able to courier the items he needed, and he could get on with some other work in the meantime...

  Once the ladder had arrived, part of an impressive package of tools and equipment recommended by the garden shop, it had taken a couple of days of constantly scaling up and down its rungs before Hamish was satisfied that he had the sides and top of the tall hedge straight. He’d also cleared the entranceway, taking out the overgrown holly bushes that had given him so much trouble on his first visit to the garden, and replacing them with two tall spirals of topiary Buxus in large terracotta containers that had arrived with tool order number two. He had spotted them on his first visit, and while they didn’t perhaps qualify as garden tools, they more than made up for that with their presence. The clearing had proved to be an ideal spot for his bonfire, protected as it was from any breezes that might come up over the day that could potentially fan the fire out of control. Though looking up for a moment at the blue, cloudless sky, Hamish thought that any possibility of that happening was pretty remote. Still, he preferred not to take chances. It would be embarrassing, he thought, to say the least, to have to explain to Miss Kendal how he had burnt down her house or the surrounding woods.

  He leant on the rake he had been using to push the last errant leaves back into the pile, and watched the fire greedily gobbling up the products of days of labour. Well not so much products, thought Hamish, yawning, as debris created by a lot of hard work. The real products of the past fortnight were a house which once more had windows through which one could see, and a garden with hedges and topiary shrubs neatly trimmed. He knew that he had barely scratched the surface of work that needed to be done to make the house habitable and return the garden to its former glory, but it was a start. He let his thoughts drift a little, imagining what it would all look like by the time he reached the end of his list, but there were still too many uncertainties, especially about how long he might stay, that made too much daydreaming seem pointless. Better to think about what he was doing right here and now. As if in agreement, the fire sent up a shower of sparks that made him take an involuntary step backwards and brought his attention scurrying back to the present task. There was no danger though, it had just been an old, dry rotten bough collapsing into the flames, one of the branches he had cleared from under the orchard trees, and the sparks that flew around hissed into nothingness the moment they touched the frozen grass. He’d used some of the dry wood from the orchard to get the fire started, ...with so much green material to burn he had thought it might prove difficult, but the way it was burning now it would be all down to ash before lunchtime.

  The flames were mesmerising. He was watching them, and despite his best intentions, drifting once again into daydreams, when a polite ‘harrumph’ suddenly interrupted the quiet. Startled, he spun around to see where the sound had come from. An elderly man stood, cap in hand, in the gap between the yews. Hamish estimated that he could have been anywhere between seventy and eighty years old, his hair snow-white, but his body still ramrod straight.

  “Terr’bly sorry. I never meant t’ scare you, but I seen the smoke from home and were a mite worried it could be kids from the village, playing with matches.” saying this, the white-haired man pointed upwards at the drifting plume of smoke from the bonfire. “Not that they’ve ever been a problem, like, but I couldn’t think who else it might be. Instead ...it looks like you’ve saved meself a job.”

  When Hamish looked quizzical, he continued. “I should intr’duce meself. Arthur Blaine, at yer service.” The Arthur, came out Arffer, just as think in the sentence before had become fink. He stretched a wrinkled, sun-spotted hand to shake Hamish’s, his grip firm, while explaining, “...I used t’ work here as a lad, with me father. He were Mr Kendal’s gardener, like, and well, he loved them old yews so much that I just couldn’t let ‘em go, ...even after his stingy sister stopped paying t’ have them kept tidy, like. Them’re over three hundred years old, y’know. I were coming over t’day, t’ make a start on that twisty box nightmare, but I see’d you got to it first. Can’t tell you what a relief it is t’me aching back that I don’t need t’ cut that accurs’d thing. I’ve been keeping the yews and box clipped since me father passed away in ‘75, but it’s really gettin’ too much for me old bones. I gived up on the rest of the garden, years ago like.”

  Since Arthur tended to replace his ‘th’s’ with either ff’s or v’s, Hamish found he had to concentrate in order to understand just what it was that he was saying.

  “Well, that solves a mystery.” Hamish said, introducing himself. ”I was hoping I’d be able to find out who had been taking care of the yews. I’ll admit I wasn’t exactly looking forward to shaping those, so if you’re happy enough for me to do the work, your advice would be much appreciated.” he said.

  “You’re on. There’s a bit of an art to it ...more of a knack, you might say. Still, I’ll be more than ‘appy to stand down ‘ere on the ground and give advice. So long as I aint going t’ have t’ go up and down that there blessed ladder.” Arthur replied, looking relieved that someone had offered to take over the job.

  They stood and chatted idly for a few minutes. After small talk about the cold weather and the prospect of a long winter, Arthur explained that he had recently retired from his own gardening and nursery business, based just over the rise beyond the woods to the east. He’d vacated the nursery, he said, in favour of his daughter, who now ran the business. Not that he’d had to move far, he said, being less than a mile away in a little cottage in the village of Thornden. He invited Hamish to visit, saying that if he turned left after leaving the driveway, he would find himself there before he knew it.

  “You can, o’ course, walk over by that there woodland path. It’d be more direct, like,” Arthur pointed south towards the bottom of the garden as he spoke. “Starts down there be’ind the pool, an’ it would bring you right out there by the village churchyard. There once were paths all through them woods, but no one except the village kids - playing ‘Robin Hood’ and suchlike, or maybe smoochin’ couples lookin’ for someplace quiet like to be by theirselves, has used ‘em much these past years. It’s all got pretty overgrown now.”

  “I know what you mean.” Hamish concurred. “I found one of those paths the first day I saw the house. The next time I venture into the woods, it’ll be with a chainsaw.” Arthur was, naturally, curious as to how Hamish had come to be there, so he spent some time explaining how he had found, and came to be living in the house.

  “Well, that’s a bit a luck, to be sure. I’m that pleased that someone ‘as finally come t’ look after the place.” Arthur remarked. “Goes without sayin’, it needs fair bit o’ work ...still...,” he looked Hamish over critically, “you l
ook young and strong enough t’andle it a’right. By the way ...it ‘as a name y’know ...White Briars. S’prised you aint found it ...chiselled in fancy letters in the stonework next t’ the front door, though, when I think about it ...its most likely ‘idden behind that ‘orrible creeper. When I were a lad, wonderful white roses growed all over the front o’ the ‘ouse ...then, with hisself dead an’ gone, that damned vine jus’ took over the place. Bane o’ my father’s an’ my life, it were, grew a mile a minute and we jus’ couldn’t keep it off the house, so ‘ventually, we lets it go. I see ya cleared the winders ‘an left the rest ...me, I’da ‘auled ev’ry last strand o’ the fing off the ‘ouse ...an’ poisoned its roots.”

  Hamish chose not to reply, having his own views about the Virginia creeper, which he could see weren’t the same as Arthur’s. Instead, he steered the conversation towards the safer ground of what trees he might plant to replace those that were dead or beyond saving in the orchard, ...he wanted old varieties that would produce fruit with great taste, not the supermarket-style pap that he’d become accustomed to in London, where good-looks and shelf-life were frequently more important than flavour. They discussed the merits of different apples, ...Arthur was a keen cider-maker, suggesting Hamish plant Sweet Coppin and Kingston Black, both very old varieties of small, sweet apples that would be ideal for cider, then talked for a while longer about pears and stone fruits, before Arthur said that he must be getting on, adding that he didn’t want to hold Hamish up when the weather was so favourable to getting work done, especially when he knew that he had so much to do. The fire had died down to embers, so Hamish left it to walk back through the garden with Arthur. As they walked, Arthur described parts of the garden as he remembered them from the days when his father had worked there. Jonathan Kendal, he said, had been more interested in his sculpting than in maintaining the garden, although it was he who had planted the long box hedge and trimmed it into its present shape. The two men crossed the terrace in front of the house, and made their way through to the paved space in front of the conservatory.

  “I see you’ve cut back those infernal shrubs, and found the path again.” Arthur noted, looking around with satisfaction at the cleared path and trimmed shrubberies. “I let a lot o’ the paths go ...only kept up them that was needed t’ get around. After Kendal went, even when me father were alive, ...it got so as we’d no sooner clear a path, ‘specially up ‘ere close to the ‘ouse, than it would be overgrown again, so after a while, with one thing an’ another, we gave it up. M’ father sayed it were like the house were in mournin’, an’ tryin’ to disappear, so we should leave well-enough alone.” Having said this, the old man opened his mouth, apparently about to add something, then shut it firmly, making the multitude of lines around his jaw deepen with the tension of his pursed lips.

  They were starting along the path to the carriage house when Arthur mentioned that there had once been an enclosed herb garden in an area behind the serpentine hedge closest to the house. “It were beautiful, like, with paths in a sort o’ criss-crossed ‘eart pattern like one o’ them old knot gardens but it got too much to keep up after the war,” he said sadly, “and it were one o’ the first parts o’ the garden that we left t’ go back t’ wild.”

  Hamish was intrigued, “If you could remember what the beds looked like, I’d like to recreate the garden,” he said, “after I get some of these other clean-up jobs out of the way, that is.” he added.

  “I’ll have a think about it,” Arthur replied, looking happier. “Y’know, I reckon those brick paths might still be there, under the weeds an’ grass. Be worth yerself havin’ a look for them sometime, ...an’ I’ve got stacks of old pictures o’ the gardens, black an’ white o’ course, some of ‘em’re in albums, but mostly in shoe boxes, no order to ‘em, but I never could throw ‘em out after me father passed on, ...some from ‘em’re from before his time, too. Should be one or two o’ the herb beds among them. It might be of some ‘elp with ‘memb’ring the planting, like.”

  They’d reached the carriage house, where Arthur had left his car, an ancient Wolseley which looked as if it would have been more at home in a wrecker’s yard, than on the open road. It took the old man a considerable effort to wrench open the door. As he was about to clamber in the driver’s seat, he turned to Hamish, frowning as he said, “I prob’bly oughtn’t to say this, but there’s stories you’ll ‘ear about this place, y’ know, like my favver sayin’ it was in mournin’ an’ shroud’n itself up, an’all, ...an’ more besides. I wouldn’t take too much notice if I were you ...I doubt there’s much truth t’ most of ‘em...” From his manner, Hamish could see that he wanted to say more, but was hesitant to continue.

  Hamish, interested, said reasonably, “How will I know if there’s nothing in them if I don’t know the stories in the first place?”

  “I s’pose you‘ve got a point there.” Arthur agreed, obviously relieved that he had an excuse to carry on with his tale. “Like I said, I prob’bly shouldn’t be passing this on, but, well, this place is supposed to have some sort of spirit thing, ...that moves things around and does stuff, ...not in the house, mind, ...more, sort of, in the garden. I figure you ‘ave a right to know, since you’re living ‘ere an all, like.” He looked embarrassed by his admission, his face a bright red contrast to his shock of white hair.

  “What, like a garden poltergeist, you mean?” Hamish questioned. Arthur shook his head, more uncomfortable by the moment. “Well, what then? You don’t mean that I have fairies at the bottom of the garden, do you?” he said, trying, not particularly successfully, to control his smile. When Arthur concurred with a short self-conscious nod, “Well that’s a relief. If that’s all I’ve got to worry about, it shouldn’t be too much of a problem. Bit of a let-down really ...I would have thought that any old house ...or garden, in this case, deserves at least one decent headless ghost or wailing wraith in its lifetime.”

  “No, no, no ...not a ghost ...that’s dead people.” Arthur sounded frustrated that Hamish didn’t understand. “I aint explainin’ it prop’ly. I don’t want nothing to do with all that mumbo jumbo stuff, but I does know that Mr Kendal’s ‘Mrs’ disappeared right away after that there telegram arrived to say ‘e’d been killed, like. And it don’t ‘alf send goosebumps down me spine when I remembers coming into the garden not too long after ‘e died. It was eerie, like ...me father had set me to cleanin’ muck out of the low pond, when all of sudden it was like the ground an’ the trees, all round me, were cryin’ and wailin’, fit to burst, ...you should’ave ‘eard the sound, ...well, I weren’t much more’n a lad, still wet be’ind the ears an’ all, an’ I lit out of ‘ere an’ wouldn’t come back with me father for weeks after. Mind you, I aint never ever ‘eard or seen anything else like that, in all me years since, but it were a fair long while ‘fore I’d go back down near that there pond again. That’s said to be herself down there, y’know ...that there marble lady by the water. It were done long before me father’s time ...Jon Kendal might‘a been a sculptor an’ all, but ‘e’s not the one what done that. Even as a little nipper, I thought it were odd, that old marble statue lookin’ so much like ‘er ...Ms Kendal herself, y’know.”

  “I didn’t realise there was a ‘Mrs’ Kendal?” Hamish questioned, latching onto what he thought was the one pertinent thing in all Arthur’s ramblings. “Jonathan’s sister never mentioned her. If Kendal had a wife, surely she should have taken over the house after her husband died.”

  “Well, folks in the village called her ‘Mrs’, but I don’t reckon they might’ve been ‘ficially married or suchlike, an’ they didn’t have any little uns. People round ‘ere aint inclined t’ throw stones when it aint necess’ry an’ I think it were jus’ their way of being polite to her, like.” Arthur said unctuously. “Anyway, like were sayin’, ‘fore you int’rupted ...she dis’ppeared, mighty mysteriously, a day or so after that there telegram came to say that ‘e weren’t ever comin’ back. Aint been no sign, ‘ide or ‘air of ‘er
since.”

  “Perhaps she had family living somewhere else, and went back to them after her lover died?” suggested Hamish.

  “You might be right, there, an’ all, but I wouldn’ know about that.” Arthur said politely, plainly discounting Hamish’s theory. “Anyway, the stories go back more’n Mr Kendal’s time, an’ me father used t’ tell me things ‘bout the garden too, ...strange goings on …trees flowering all of a sudden, like, not there one day, an’ completely covered in blossoms the next mornin’, in mid-winter, like, ...an’ plants bein’ moved about after ‘e’d planted ‘em someplace, like someone’d disagreed with where ‘e’d put ‘em, ...an’ bunches o’ flowers turning up in the garden shed for ‘im when ‘e’d worked extra late in the garden, ...stuff like that. Me mother accused ‘im, once, of ‘aving a secret admirer when he brung some of ‘em ‘ome, but ‘e said it were the garden’s sprite thankin’ ‘im for all his ‘ard work. After she went spare about not havin’ heathen flowers in ‘er house ‘e took t’ leavin’ ‘em in an old preservin’ jar in the gardener’s shed. I can still remember ‘em ...beautiful bunches they was ...all sorts o’ wonderful colours, and the scent of ‘em were ‘eavenly. And they’d last for weeks without dyin’. He said it were to be our little secret, like ...he weren’t about t’ throw good flowers away, an’ what mother never knowed wouldn’t hurt ‘er.”

  “None of that sounds too ominous to me, Arthur.” Hamish said. “I think I could stand a few bunches of flowers, myself, and if the garden objects to something I plant, well, it’s welcome to move it.” It was obvious from the tone of his voice that he didn’t believe a word of what Arthur had told him, but he wasn’t going to say so to the old man’s face.