Parson's Nine

by Noel Streatfeild

  “ ‘—and put “her” hand into “her” bag, and took thence a stone, and slang it.’ ”

  “Well, Crossy,” said Catherine after lunch. “So you have come back.”

  “Yes. I realised in prison how much Judith means to me. I suppose I look upon her much as an artist looks at his best picture or an author at his best book. I find I can’t let anything stand in the way of my completing my work.”

  “You may have to. David wants to talk to you. I am afraid you are only here on sufferance. I don’t know what he’s going to say. I’ve said all I can to him. The ultimate decision must rest with him. I won’t force my wishes on him. I should think your best plan is to say very little, and look meek.”

  David and Miss Crosby met suddenly. They were gazing enraptured at the beauty of a pink-blossomed cherry tree against the blue of the sky. They were both so engrossed that they were blind to the world around, and so ran into one another. When they had done apologising, David asked her if she were busy, and on hearing that she was not, led her to a small arbour. There was a bench in it. They sat down side by side and faced the cherry tree.

  “I’m afraid, Miss Crosby, this has got to be rather a serious talk.”

  “Yes,” agreed Miss Crosby vaguely, her vagueness due to the fact that her mind was on the glory of pink before her. She was so needing beauty after her weeks of prison walls.

  “You see,” David continued. Then he was silent, for he had caught the reflected splendour in her face, and had to turn and marvel at the cherry. The wind blew. A shower of pink blossoms sprayed gaily on to the grass.

  “I never can make up my mind which blossom I love most, cherry or apple,” said Miss Crosby happily.

  David looked dreamy.

  “I think apple. I remember as a small boy—”

  Half an hour later, Catherine found them. They were still sitting in the arbour.

  “Have you two finished your talk?”

  David and Miss Crosby looked guiltily at each other. Catherine laughed.

  “I don’t believe you’ve been talking business at all. What have you been talking about?”

  “Flowers,” they exclaimed simultaneously.

  “And a very sensible thing to talk about. You needn’t worry about Crossy, David. She’s going to be good.”

  David looked from the cherry tree to Miss Crosby.

  “I’m sure of that,” he said.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  In the August of 1913, the twins had their thirteenth birthday.

  “This is where we begin to grow up, Baruch,” said Susanna sadly.

  “I’m glad.”

  “Why?”

  “I want to grow up and go away.”

  “Go where? To our land?”

  “No, stupid. You know that’s not real, only just what I’ve thought.”

  “Well, where then?”

  “Come for a walk and I’ll tell you.”

  They made a leisurely progress through the village, exchanging “good afternoons” and opinions on the weather with half the people they met. They stopped at Mrs. Honeysett’s, and having pooled their resources, bought half a pound of vividly-tinted mixed sweets. They loitered outside a cottage and had a few words with a shaggy sheepdog who lay among the hollyhocks. Then struck out across the fields, and presently sat down beside the stream which smelt of musks and meadowsweet. Simultaneously, they dived into the bag and selected a handful of sweets.

  “Well,” said Susanna with her mouth full. “Now tell me.”

  Baruch shifted a peardrop to the side of his mouth.

  “Sukey, have you ever learned about Canada?”

  “Of course I have, you poor rabbit. Canada, dominion of, occupies all the north of North America, except Newfoundland which is independent, and Alaska which belongs to the United States of America. Its capital is Ottawa, and its chief exports wheat, oats—”

  “Oh, shut up!” Baruch rolled her over, and sat on her.

  “Peas, fruits,” she continued wheezily.

  “Shut up, Sukey, or I’ll throw you in the stream.”

  “Cheese, eggs, bacon.” She had to break off, as she needed all her breath to defend herself. But the fight came to an abrupt end.

  “Hi! Pax!” Baruch yelled. “The sweets are upset.”

  “Now tell,” said Susanna, as she rubbed the mud off the sweets on her skirt. “I won’t fool this time, I promise.”

  “Well, we had a man come and lecture to us last term about emigrating.”

  “About what?”

  “Going to Canada.”

  “Why, who wants to?”

  “I do.”

  In surprise Susanna looked at him. The sun was glinting on the spectacles he had lately been ordered; they made him look very wise, she thought. He was staring across the stream with an intent expression. Obviously he wasn’t fooling.

  “Go on. Tell.”

  “He said,” Baruch raised his eyes, and fixed them on the distant church spire, “there was heaps of room there. There’s no need for anybody to live near anybody else unless they want to. That if a person learned how, and could buy some land, quite soon they could have miles and miles of things growing. Almost everything they needed.” His voice tailed away.

  “Just like our land.”

  “That’s what I thought.”

  There was a long pause. Susanna made a leaf into a boat, and removing from her mouth a sweet she didn’t like, placed it on board as cargo, and pushed her craft into midstream. Then she said:

  “Would they let us go?”

  “Well, I’ve been thinking they might. There’s Esdras to train for something, though he hasn’t thought what, and there’s Tobit to learn to be a gardener, and Sirach a vet, then after me there’s Manasses and Maccabeus, they’ll have to learn something—I should think they’d be glad one of us would emigrate.”

  “One! You won’t go without me?”

  “Of course not, you poor fool.”

  Susanna speared a sweet on a long grass. She sucked it loudly and thoughtfully.

  “Doesn’t it seem queer, us all growing up and being things?”

  “You aren’t being much.”

  “As a matter of fact I was going to tell you something. You see, things are different at lessons. Because now Judith knows she can’t go to college she’s stopped fussing, and she’s away quite a lot—you know, being a parish puss. And we have less lessons on being a famous woman, because Crossy found you went to prison being one. Anyway, now there’s more time for Esther and me—and what do you think Crossy found out?”

  “That you needed spectacles like me.”

  “No. That I could write essays. She said I had a very nice way of expressing myself.”

  “Trumpeter dead?”

  “No. I only told you because you said I wasn’t much.”

  “Well, that isn’t being much. I’ve written almost a book.”

  “Yes, that’s why. I meant if you wanted a book written about Canada, you could say it to me, and I’d write it down.”

  “If you can write so jolly well, why don’t you write your own book?”

  “I can write things, but I can’t think of them.”

  “Well, that’s a fat lot of use.”

  “Yes, I know,” agreed Susanna sadly.

  “I say, Sukey, promise you won’t tell anybody about Canada. I’m going to read about it next term. I don’t want to say anything till I’m sure.”

  “I won’t tell.”

  “Swear, then.”

  “‘See this wet, see this dry, cut my throat’—Oh, look, there’s Sirach with Samson. Hi! Sirach.”

  Sirach heard the shout. He came over to them with Samson snuffling at his heels. He threw himself down full length beside them. His chin on his arms, he gazed into the water. He wrinkl
ed his nose.

  “I do like the smell of musks. Funny how different places smell. On the first day of each hols, my nose sort of wags as it comes out of the station, sort of glad to be back with smells he knows. Have you ever noticed how different Grandfather’s house smells to ours?”

  “Grandfather’s smells richer, I suppose,” Baruch suggested.

  “And ours nicer,” Susanna added loyally.

  “Much more than that,” said Sirach. “Use your noses, my children. Grandfather’s house smells most of people being old, and then it’s got a nice smell of horses and dogs, and then a sharp smell of whisky and leather. And ours smells most of oilcloth, and Bibles, and the feet of parish pussies, then a lovely smell which almost takes away all the others, of flowers, and—” He broke off suddenly. “Look! What’s old Samson found? Bring it here. Clever boy.”

  Samson, barking and growling, was making sudden pounces and gay little springs at an object on the ground before him. Sirach’s shouts aroused him to frenzy. A terror seized him lest his capture was to be taken from him. The fur on his back stood up. His long brown ears flapped wildly. Sirach got up.

  “Come on, let’s see what he’s found.”

  They wandered over.

  “Oh, Baruch, don’t look,” Susanna exclaimed.

  But her cry came too late. Baruch’s eyes were fixed in sick horror on the disembowelled hedgehog before him. Suddenly without a word he turned away and was violently sick. The other two sat down again by the stream, waiting for him to recover. Presently he rejoined them.

  “Better?” enquired Sirach. “Or would you like to do it again? I’ve left the bits in case you wanted another look.” Baruch shuddered. “Oh, well, let’s go and have tea, then. I say, if it’s strawberry jam what’ll it remind you of?”

  Baruch looked a shade greener than he had before.

  “Don’t be so hateful, Sirach,” Susanna burst out. “You don’t suppose he likes being sick, do you? Why can’t you leave him alone?”

  “Because he’s such a mug,” said Sirach scornfully.

  He said no more, but stalked ahead of the twins, whistling.

  As they neared the Vicarage, Baruch caught hold of his sleeve.

  “I say! You needn’t tell the others.”

  “Of course not, you fool. Why should I?”

  The last day of Baruch’s holidays there was a school treat on the Vicarage lawn.

  “I’ve got an idea,” Susanna said to him. “Let’s ask if we may take our dinner out for a picnic, and let’s be late coming back, so we miss the treat.”

  “Would Mummy mind?”

  “Not a bit, she knows we all hate treats, and Daddy would only mind because he thought we’d be disappointed at missing it.”

  Catherine agreed at once to their lunch-in-the-woods programme, but added:

  “You must be back by half-past three, darlings—to help with the tea.”

  “Oh, Mummy, must we?”

  “Yes. Daddy will be very disappointed if you aren’t there.”

  “But all the others will be there, and we do hate it.”

  “I don’t know that the others exactly love it.”

  “But it’s Baruch’s last day.”

  “Don’t wheedle, darling,” said Catherine, and kissed her.

  The twins set off early. It was a perfect day. Pine-needles crunched under their feet. They saw a squirrel. The lunch Catherine had given them exceeded their wildest dreams. They ate it half-buried under bracken and heather. After finishing the last crumb, they lay on their backs and stared at the sky. The fir trees stood darkly against the background of blue. Now and then a little animal or a bird rustled. Otherwise the wood was curiously hushed. The peace crept into the children. They lay in blissful silence. At last Baruch gave a wriggle.

  “I wonder how late it is? We’ve been lying here some time.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I wonder if we climbed a tree if we could see the church clock.”

  “What a good idea; let’s try.”

  They selected a comfortable old tree with wide branches. Baruch clambered up. Susanna followed him.

  “Can you see it?” she panted, as they neared the top.

  “No, there’s other trees in the way.” Susanna looked down.

  “Oh, look!” she exclaimed. “There’s Esdras. Let’s drop something on him.”

  “Shut up!” Baruch whispered. “You can’t do that; he’s got a lady with him.”

  “That’s not a lady, silly,” she retorted. “That’s Fanny Griggs from the farm.”

  “He’s got his arm round her!”

  “Oh, look, they’re going to sit down, oughtn’t we to tell him we’re here?”

  But Fanny spoke:

  “Oh, you didn’t ought to, Mr. Esdras—”

  “Don’t you like me, Fanny?”

  “You are a naughty boy; leave me be.”

  “I can’t, Fanny.”

  The minutes slipped by. The leaves rustled. Esdras and Fanny stirred on their bed of heather.

  “Come on, Mr. Esdras, we’d better be getting ’ome.”

  The twins watched them out of sight. Then in silence they climbed to the ground. They hurried with bent heads out of the wood. There was no more peace in the afternoon. Even the trees looked objects of terror. A kind of panic seized them, and they began to run. They ran till they had no breath in them. Then threw themselves down exhausted in a field—Susanna felt better now she was out of the wood; the sun was shining so brightly, the grazing cows looked so normal. But Baruch neither felt nor saw anything; he was in a mood of black despair.

  “I wish I’d never been born,” he moaned. “Everything’s so beastly. And we won’t get away from beastliness ever.”

  Susanna longed to talk about what they had seen. She thought it would all be so much less frightening if they thrashed it out. But she knew it was no use. He never would. He would always shudder away from things. He would never look. The church clock struck four.

  “Come along,” she said. “It’s awfully late.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  A calm settled on the schoolroom. Judith was not to go to college, not to train for anything. Miss Crosby accepted it. Judith bitterly yielded to the inevitable. This attitude from them both produced a general feeling of relaxation. Since Miss Crosby first appeared in the schoolroom they had all been, metaphorically speaking, buckling on their swords in readiness for plunging into the arena of life. Now it was obvious nothing of the sort was going to happen. Judith had reached an age when plunging should begin. But no plunging was occurring. No arena was visible. Nothing but a slipping and dropping: slipping out of the schoolroom, dropping without a plop into the parish. Well, if that was all, of what use to strain and strive? Esther and Susanna insensibly slackened, and allowed their natural tastes to filter to the top.

  For years Esther had possessed a secret passion for all things domestic. She darned her stockings beautifully, was always glad to help in the house if cook, Maud, or Millie were away or ill. Maud had often remarked she was a proper “Mrs. Brush and Broom.” But nobody had taken this remark seriously, or realised that Esther’s habit of helping in the house and enjoying mending was the sign of a real talent. But now Miss Crosby awoke to it, and felt bitterly ashamed she had not seen it before. Her own appreciations were so passionately centred on books and brains that she had never given a thought to gifted fingers; but now closer study of Esther having shown her a talent, if a dull one, she was all eagerness to exploit it. She dug up the picture of Florence Nightingale from where it lay buried under Suffragettes.

  “Think, Esther dear—had you lived in the days of this wonderful woman, how useful you would have been to her. She had the brain to organize—we can’t all have that gift—but she needed workers. Doesn’t it make you glow with pride to think that you could have
done that work?”

  Esther looked embarrassed.

  “Oh, I don’t know.”

  “And even today,” said Miss Crosby, warming to her subject, “there are wonderful opportunities. There are colleges of domestic science. Just think if you could rise to be principal of such a place. What a career! What an influence in life you could be.”

  “But I don’t want to go to a college. Couldn’t I just do things at home?”

  “Of course, that’s how you are going to start. But presently, as your knowledge grows and your gift expands, you’ll need a wider field, an opportunity to make your mark.”

  Esther opened her blue eyes in sleepy surprise. “Oh, will I?”

  After this conversation Miss Crosby would not allow the grass to grow under Esther’s feet. Two hours of every morning she spent in the kitchen learning what she could from cook. She learned very little, for cook had strong views on “gentry in me kitchen,” and merely permitted the girl to stand and admire, and very occasionally to stir. Three afternoons a week a woman came up from the village and taught her dressmaking. And on two other afternoons Miss Crosby, still thinking of Florence Nightingale, attached her to the classes held by the local Red Cross, where she learned, on a long-suffering small child from the village, to nurse typhoid and put limbs into splints.

  Catherine watched all these arrangements with a twinkle in her eye.

  “Be careful, Crossy, you’ll turn my poor Esther into a regular Hausfrau before you’ve done with her.”

  But Miss Crosby refused to treat her pupil’s gift lightly.

  “She’s a very gifted girl—a strange talent, but might lead anywhere. I blame myself most severely for not having cultivated it sooner.”

  Esther’s domestic energies, and Judith’s parochial ones, left many hours when Miss Crosby and Susanna sat alone at the schoolroom table. For some time Miss Crosby had realised that Susanna could write a good essay. Now, with more time to spare, she decided to turn this ability into a real gift. Vague visions soared through her head of Susanna becoming a Jane Austen or Charlotte Bronte. She sent for lives of famous women authors and made the bored Susanna read them. She lectured to her on every subject she could think of, and made Susanna turn her words into essays. This she did charmingly. She had a real and natural gift for words. But she was a hopeless failure when it came to self-expression. What she had been told, that she could repeat in her own way. But given a subject out of the blue, with no lesson on it, and she became, as it were, pen-tied.