(5/20)Over the Gate (22 page)

'She was reading my letter—' began Alf, but was brushed aside.

'As though it's not bad enough having you here all the time, burning the firing and the lights, eating us out of house and home—'

'I pay my own way!'

Ursula gave a derisive snort.

'Pay your way?' she echoed. 'And how far do you reckon your bit of pension goes these days?'

Sandra, seeing attention slipping from her, set up a further bout of snivelling.

'Mum, I believe I've got mastoid. I do, really! My ear 'urts somethin' awful where 'e 'it me!'

Ursula threw an arm protectively round her daughter.

'We'll take you down to the hospital after tea.' She rounded again on the old man.

'And if she's got a broken ear drum and is deaf for the rest of her days, she'd have you to thank! The ingratitude! That's what gets me—the ingratitude! Here I am, slaving day in, day out, with never a word of thanks for my trouble, and how am I repaid?'

'Stop play-acting-' began Alf.

'Play-acting!' screamed Ursula. 'Don't you dare insult me after ad the harm you've done. I've just about had enough of you and your ways!'

She flung out of the room, dragging Sandra with her. The boy, who had watched the proceedings with sly enjoyment, slid after them. At the door he turned, poked out an impudent tongue, and vanished. Alf was left alone.

He was more shaken than he cared to admit. He shouldn't have hit the girl, he told himself. He was enveloped in a hot wave of guilt and shame. It receded, leaving him shivering with shock. God, what a hole, he thought, looking round the room! To think of spending the rest of his days in
this
place, with the added misery of Ursula and the children!

His eye fell upon Dusty's letter. In ad that bleak room it was the only spot of comfort. Why should he stay? Why should he endure the humiliation of living with Ursula? He had his pension. He had a true old friend—a friend, moreover, who offered him a real home.

With growing purpose he went to his bed, reached beneath it for his battered suitcase, and set it open upon the white counterpane.

Methodically, with the exactitude of an old soldier, he began to pack his possessions. He was off.

'That was Thursday,' said the old man, reaching for his glass. He sounded bemused. 'And now it's Saturday. Seems a lifetime ago, miss—a lifetime.'

He gazed into the distance towards the towering downs, but I guessed that he was looking beyond them to the life that he had left behind in Northampton. He looked very old, very vulnerable, to be alone and with no home. I felt uneasy.

'And your daughter?' I enquired. 'You told her where you were going?'

I could imagine the remorse which might well be gnawing at any woman in her position, despite the portrait of flinty-hearted indifference the old man had drawn of her.

'Left a note,' said the stranger perfunctorily. 'Just told her I'd had an invitation from Dusty, and this seemed a good time to go down there.'

'So she'd expect you back some time?' I said. It was a relief to know that he had not burnt his boats completely.

'Never!' he shouted, sitting bolt upright. 'Not if she begged and prayed of me! I've had more'n I can take there. Never again!'

He scrambled to his feet, still looking belligerent. His gaze flickered over the sunny garden as though he saw it for the first time, and he turned to look directly at me. The anger faded into a smile.

'You bin good to me, miss, letting me run on like I have. I must be getting along.'

He fished inside his jacket and brought out a smad creased map. He unfolded it carefully, and I noticed that his fingers shook. Across its grubby surface a thick ruled line ran from Northampton to Weymouth.

'There's my route,' he said proudly, holding up the map. 'Always like a bit of map work ever since my Army days. I'm a bit off true here, but no matter. Reckon if I make for Salisbury Plain I shan't be far off'

He stuffed the map back in his pocket and began to hoist the case across his shoulders again.

'You're not walking ad the way?' I asked anxiously.

'Not me!' he said. 'I've hitch-hiked most of it so far, but took a fancy to have a walk this morning. Haven't seen the country on a sunny day—not to notice it, I mean—ever since Jessie died. Brought her back to me somehow, being alone and peaceful, out in the fresh air.'

'Make for Caxley,' I said. 'But wait here a minute.'

I returned to the house and looked in my purse. As usual it was remarkably light, but there was a pound note. Why, I wondered, was it always the end of the month when such emergencies arose? I hastened out again and pressed it upon him.

'No, miss,' he protested. 'I got a bit by, you know.'

'If you don't get a lift, go by train,' I urged him. 'You don't want to arrive absolutely knocked up.'

He pocketed the note and we walked together to the gate. He was smiling now, as though at some pleasurable secret.

'Can't wait to sec ol' Dusty's face when I turn up,' he said, over the gate.

'You haven't told them?' I asked, my heart sinking.

'Why should I?' he replied reasonably. 'I know ol' Dusty means it when he says I can go any time.' His tone was warm and affectionate. His wrinkled old face glowed at the thought of the welcome ahead.

He straightened himself up and gave me a smart salute.

'Thanks for everything, miss, bless you. Think of me paddlin' in a day or two!'

Within two minutes I watched the little figure disappear round the bend of the lane. Despite the sunshine, I shivered, for I could not help dunking of the woman that Dusty should never have married, the stringy one with the sharp nose, who was 'white and spiteful'.

Poor Alf, I mourned, poor Alf!

Yes, some of our Fairacre visitors arc lively birds. The gipsies, in their clashing colours, look as exotic and gay as any parrot from the East. But I remember Alf as a wren, perky and completely English but somehow infinitely pathetic in his smallness.

I think of him often, the stranger who called but once. Will he ever return?

I can't be certain, but I have a feeling that Alf was on his last flight that summer day.

11. The Old Man of the Sea

'I
T'S
my belief,' announced Mrs Pringle, as she baled boiling water from the electric copper into the washing-up bowl, 'that they over-ate themselves.'

'I thought they were rather more abstemious than usual,' I replied. 'Uusally they start eating as we reach the end of the lane, and continue until we get to Barrisford.'

'Shameful!' ejaculated Mrs Pringle, flinging a trayful of sticky cutlery mto the water. The noise was deafening.

'Then it's a quick dash into the sea, out again, and time for a solid lunch. This time they didn't appear to eat so much on the journey. Unless I'm getting used to it,' I added.

We were trying to probe the mystery of the many absences from school on this particular Monday morning. Almost a third of the desks were empty, and I suspected that general inertia was the common complaint after a long day at the sea on Saturday. Mrs Pringle argued for gluttony alone, but I have never found Fairacre children suffering from delicate digestions. Their appetites, quickened by the winds which sweep the downs, are enormous, and their digestive tracts are quite accustomed to coping with a steady supply of ices, sweets, fruit, fizzy drinks, as well as four hefty meals a day.

'Could be typhoid, of course,' said Mrs Pringle chattily. 'There was a bit on the telly about the sewage going into the sea. Fair gives you the creeps! I said to Pringle: "The way folks live! Thank God we've got a nice wholesome cess-pit!"'

She plunged her hands into the steaming water and withdrew a fistful of dripping dessert-spoons, lately used for gooseberry pie.

'But can't do you no good, say what you will, to go bathing when that sort of thing's goin' on. As well as dumpin' this atomic rubbish they don't know what to do with. The sea must be proper unhealthy these days. My heart bleeds for those poor fish, it do indeed!'

She was now drying the spoons and setting them rapidly in rows. She counted them hissingly, stopped, scrabbled again in the cloudy water, drew blank, and turned to me. Her unlovely face was made even unlovelier by dark suspicion.

"Ere!" said Mrs Pringle truculently. 'You bm featherin' your nest again?'

This charitable remark referred to an unfortunate incident a few weeks earlier when Mrs Pringle had come across a school dessert-spoon in the kitchen drawer at the school house. I had not been allowed to forget this lapse. Mrs Pringle guards the school cutlery—as battered and dingy a collection of plate as one could find anywhere—as if it were the Crown Jewels.

'I find that remark offensive,' I said coldly, moving off to ring the school bell.

'So's stealing!' shouted Mrs Pringle after me, above the clatter. With what dignity I could muster, I pulled the school bed-rope to summon my depleted pupils to afternoon school.

The outing on Saturday had started in brilliant sunshine. By ancient custom, Fairacre Sunday School and Church Choir Combined Outing takes place on the first Saturday in July. Evidently, many years ago, the schools in this area used to have a fortnight's holiday at the end of June to enable the children to pick the soft fruit crop. At the end of that time their wages were paid and there was money, as well as the longing, for a jollification. Somehow, the first Saturday in July still remains as the only acceptable day for the annual outing.

Two coachloads set off at eight o'clock, packed with parents and friends as well as the vociferous children. It was a sparkling morning. Bright drops glittered on the fresh hedges, sunshine glinted on cottage windows, the village pond, and the glossy backs of Mr Roberts' herd of Friesians as they ambled back from being milked. It was most exhilarating.

'Won't last,' said Mr Willet morosely, following his wife into the coach.

He was dressed in his best blue suit, and his boots shone like jet. No gaudy beachwear for Mr Willet when he accompanies us to the sea! He is sexton of St Patrick's, a public figure, and he shows himself to the world as a man worthy of the dignity of his office. He now rammed a smad case containing their lunch upon the rack and then bent down to whisper conspiratorially in my ear.

'Where's old misery sitting?'

'Right at the front,' I whispered back, knowing at once to whom this referred.

'Thanks, miss. I'll make for the back,' said Mr Willet, pulling the case from the rack, and departing. I heard him settle with a satisfied sigh, as Mrs Pringle entered, took her place in the front and intimated to the driver that it was now in order for him to proceed.

'Old 'ard, ma,' said the driver irreverently. 'Just gotter check we're all 'ere.'

He hoisted himself from the wheel and turned round to count us.

'All aboard?' he cried at length.

'All aboard!' we echoed cheerfully, and set off for Barnsford.

***

Mr Willet, as a weather prophet, is usually right, and by the time we had driven through Caxley, the sky was overcast, and remained so for the most of the day. Not that this dimmed the spirits of the Fairacre children. They tore along the famous sands, rushed into the waves—but not too deeply, I noticed, for the sea is not really trusted by us landlubbers—and wielded buckets and spades energetically for most of the exciting day.

Their elders enjoyed themselves more sedately, walking along the short pier, scanning the distant horizon through the penny-in-the-slot telescope, and studying the photographs outside the immature theatre at the very end of the pier. It was a pity, we told each other, that we had to set off for home so early, otherwise we could have seen the variety show. Twelve acts—and all spectacular—it said so!

The air was wonderful, despite the lack of sunshine, tangy and salt upon our faces, and we all had prodigious appetites when we foregathered for high tea at Bunce's, the famous restaurant on die front.

The vicar counted heads earnestly. Were we all assembled? Would someone else check the numbers with him?

Thereupon half the company rose to count the other half, and confusion reigned. Order was eventually restored, but we were, it was agreed, one missing.

'Joseph Coggs!' shouted Patrick. 'I saw him mucking about under the pier. Shall I run and fetch him?'

'I think,' said Mr Partridge, the vicar, in his gentle voice, 'we'll wait for five minutes and then send out a search party if he hasn't arrived. No doubt he will be along.'

At that moment, Joseph wandered through the brown and gold swing doors. He was excessively grubby and looked pale and bewildered. No adult from the Coggs' family was present so I took charge of him. He was remarkably quiet during tea, but ate his way steadily through a plate of ham and salad, three iced cakes, a butterscotch sundae and two cups of tea. I was not perturbed by his taciturnity, as I watched his eating prowess. He obviously had enough to engross him, at the rime, and was, in any case, a somewhat uncommunicative child.

Just before six we said a sad farewell to lovely Barnsford for another year, and mounted the coach. Still the skies were sullen. At nine we were back in Fairacre, and at ten o'clock I, for one, was in bed.

Now, on Monday afternoon, it all seemed a very long time ago. Confronting my depleted class I mentally rearranged the timetable. The song, which I had proposed to teach them, must wait until the others returned. A spelling test, and then some revived memories of Barrisford, in words and pictures, should fill our afternoon very usefully and happily.

The spelling test was greeted with groans. Perhaps because they are unbookish children, as a whole, and do not see the printed word as often as I should like, spelling is a weak point at Fairacre. Even their names, when they are first in my class, at the age of seven or so, give some of diem trouble, and I silently curse the parents who saddle their poor spellers with 'Penelope', 'Francesca' or 'Reginald.' Perhaps the worst one is 'Ronald.' It has been my lot, for many years, to wrestle with 'Ronlads', 'Rondals' and even 'Ronslads' and very exhausting I have found it.