A Drake at the Door (13 page)

Naturally enough we had plenty of advice as to what to do with him. We should look after him for three months. We should let him go immediately. And there were the unsophisticated countrymen who, untrammelled by complications of thought, innocently proposed we should keep him for good. No subtle emotion behind the proposal. Just the plain fact that if we kept him, he would become like a dog.

What was so odd was that these blunt minds, no conscious cruelty in their stories, would proceed to tell us what had happened to other foxes which had been treated like dogs. One farmer kept a fox for three years, locking it in a pen when the Hunt was around. But one day the Hunt came on his land unexpectedly and before he had time to hide his fox, it rushed out with the other farm dogs to see what was happening; and came face to face with the hounds.

There was another fox which was happy enough with the farmer who had adopted him, which sauntered one day gaily through the front door of a neighbouring farm. He had no sense of danger. He was only doing what he had always done, being friendly. But they locked him in a room until a gun was brought.

Jeannie, who does not like to read or hear unhappy stories, would walk away and worry about what would happen to her Sammy. For he belonged to her. He would never have anything to do with me; but Jeannie could pick him up or play with him as if he were indeed a puppy. He had no fear of her, and he seemed grateful that she had nursed him back to health and strength. So it was Jeannie who was the saddest on the evening we decided to let him go.

We knew, however, that he was ready because he had been trying to dig his way under the door on the previous few nights. His foot was healed and he was big enough to look after himself, but there was the doubt as to whether he would know how to do so. Would his instinct be enough? Or would he try homing the ten miles to the earth where he came from? Or would another vixen, and there was one with cubs nearby, be ready to adopt him?

We said good-bye to Sammy, watched him slip out of the greenhouse door into the long grass, then to the side of the hedge and over the bank into the wood. And as he went Jeannie suddenly had an idea. Supposing he stayed in the wood enjoying his freedom but relying on her to feed him until he felt big and bold enough to start on his journeys? It was the kind of practical thought which softened the parting; and that night dog biscuits soaked in milk awaited Sammy’s return in a saucer in the open doorway of the greenhouse.

It was gone next morning, not a crumb left; and Jeannie was naturally elated. Sammy was being helped. Sammy had the good sense to know that he could rely on her. So dog biscuits soaked in milk were put out every night, and every morning the saucer was clean. This programme continued for ten days until one early morning, soon after dawn, Jeannie got up with the idea she might see Sammy having his meal. She didn’t, of course. Sammy had never been back. He was far away by now. It was only our wishful thinking that made us believe the food had gone to him; for Jeannie that early morning saw who were enjoying their breakfast, dipping their tiny beaks into the saucer.

A family of bluetits.

It was in that early spring that Shelagh returned to Minack. She had been laid off for a few weeks by the shop in Penzance where she worked, and she came to us for a temporary job; and this time we were able to give it to her. We welcomed her with delight. For the summer-like weather had brought on the flowers in profusion, and Minack was ablaze with daffodils, wallflowers, anemones, violets, calendulas and stocks. Here was the harvest of last year’s planning and within the space of six weeks we had to win the reward.

Six weeks. There can be no neat production line on a flower farm. The results of a period of overproduction cannot be stored in a warehouse, awaiting the moment when the demand is there again. Flowers do not pause in their blooming for our convenience, nor do they hasten. Jeannie and I are at their mercy. Nor can we plan with any exactitude; for this week may be warm and the next bitterly cold, holding back the flowers instead of forcing them on. Only one thing is certain, we have to clear our harvest by the end of March whatever the weather is like, for by then the great flower farms in the centre of England are storming the markets with their produce.

It was part of the charm of Shelagh that she fitted into our ways as if she had been working regularly for us as long as Jane had done. We did not have to explain to her what was at stake. She had not come to do a job of work just in order to collect a wage at the end of the week. She seemed to show that she wanted to be part of something, as if the nature of her background provided her with a vacuum which she was searching to fill.

Such a mood was understandable. She had been well brought up in a comfortable home but, however comfortable it might have been, there was no possibility of her sensing the natural love she saw others of her own age enjoying. She was illegitimate and, in a small village, there was no way of hiding the fact. Who was my father? Who was my mother? The questions must have tormented her over the years. The secret battle within her that no one could share. Perhaps the outsiders could have given her the answers. Perhaps they knew as they whispered and pitied. Shelagh on one side of the frontier, the rest on the other.

It was inevitable that Shelagh and Jane should like each other. Neither of them suffered from any pretensions and both were incapable of being jealous. Both were quiet and so neither of them would churn the friendship away by endless chatter. Indeed they were so quiet sometimes in each other’s company that Jeannie and I at first thought their silences represented disagreements. It was a foolish mistake. They were, in fact, sufficiently at ease with each other to dispense with unnecessary talk. Jane was now sixteen, Shelagh was seventeen.

But Shelagh looked younger than Jane, and Jane did not look sixteen. Shelagh was a little taller but she took away the inches of height by hunching her shoulders and walking head bent downwards. We used to tease her about it, the tease which is meant to improve a habit. ‘What are you looking for, Shelagh?’

She had a little heart-shaped face with a perfect complexion, a slow smile, mischievous, a smile that she used as a manifest of her affection. Jeannie or I used to surprise her sometimes suffused by this smile as she watched a mouse sitting on her knee, sharing her lunchtime sandwiches.

She had soft light brown hair and she took much pride in it. While she worked she protected it with a grey and blue woolly skull cap with a red tassel; and on Saturday mornings before her weekly visit to Penzance she carefully set her hair and added a scarf to hide the curlers.

Her eyes were grey-blue and since her accident, when she fell off her bicycle and was on the danger list, she had to wear glasses. They were the conventional, ugly glasses and they spoilt her prettiness; and the first thing she saved up for after the flower season was over and it was decided that she should stay with us permanently, was an elegant black pair.

She had a flair for dress and, if she had wanted to do so, could have earned her living as a dressmaker. She was dainty and very appealing. When Jeannie and I saw her off-duty in Penzance, we used to say to each other that it would not be long before Shelagh was married.

She loved giving presents. She used this giving as a backbone to her life, as if here was something she could grasp firmly. It gave her a sense of security because the dates of birthdays, Christmas and Easter were on the calendar. They gave her opportunity for being appreciated and they gave her something to look forward to. All her presents were thought out well in advance.

And so were Jane’s. There was one Christmas before Shelagh came when Jeremy, Jane’s brother, arrived at the door on Christmas morning with a large brownpaper parcel. Jeremy, aged ten, often complained of living in a house of women, Jane and his mother; and about this time he had been helping us on Saturday mornings by washing jam jars. He had broken one or two and Jane had ticked him off when I, out of fun, said to him that I thought women were awful the way they nagged. Jeremy stopped his work, looked at me and heaved a great sigh:

‘You’re telling me!’

But on this Christmas morning he was at the door with a parcel. And when he brought it into the cottage, unwrapped the brown paper and then the tissue paper, we found a beautiful blue velvet cushion, piped in gold braid with a tassel in one corner; and in another, woven in red and gold, was a crown and under the crown was the letter M. As Jeremy handed it to us he bowed solemnly like a medieval pageboy.

M, of course, was the initial for Monty, and he had many a pleasant sleep on this cushion. And for Jeannie and me, the cushion remains as evidence of the happiness we shared with Jane. She had no need to spend the time, or the money, making that gift for ‘His Lordship’ as she always called Monty. It was a gesture of her enthusiasm and her affection.

March was a busy time for Shelagh’s spirit of giving. There were two friends who had birthdays and there were Jeannie and myself; myself at the beginning and Jeannie in the middle. Even when she was in casual contact with us she used to send us birthday cards, but now she was working at Minack, and she would see us on THE day, she had to contrive to give us something that measured up to her standard of giving.

At the beginning of March, I received a box of cats’ tongues chocolates. And Jane gave me something which to this day gives me pleasure. There is in the smaller of the flower packing sheds a beam which stretches across at the height of my forehead. Day after day, month after month, year after year, I used to forget that beam and walk down the packing shed, and bang my forehead against this beam. It cut me. It bruised me. It made me angry that I always forgot. And so Jane decided to do something about it for this particular birthday.

She bought a bath mat from Woolworths of a spongy plastic material, and cut it up in strips so that she was able to cover the whole beam, making it a cushion instead of an edge. On my birthday the flower shed was jammed with daffodils waiting for me to bunch, and as usual I went into it without thinking and as usual I hit the beam. But so softly! It will always be one of my pleasantest memories of Minack when I remember the sight of Jane and Shelagh laughing at me. They had seen me through the window. They had been out picking early and in each hand they held a basket of crimson wallflowers until they were laughing so much that they dropped the baskets to the ground.

‘Happy birthday!’ I heard them call.

My cats’ tongues chocolates were only a preliminary. Shelagh was waiting for Jeannie’s birthday before she gave us our real joint present, and it must have taken her many spare evenings to complete it. I remember when I first saw it that I had a nervous reaction. It is always the same when someone gives you something which is meant to be displayed in the home, and the someone is a regular visitor. You cannot put the object away, optimistically hoping to bring it out at the right moment. Sooner or later you forget.

Shelagh had sewn and embroidered a pyjama case of black silk with pink silk lining. It was decorated with stars stitched in gold surrounding the words ‘Good night’ and the words ‘His’ and ‘Hers’. And even if we had not liked it, which we did, we would still have had to keep it on our bed. For Shelagh was working in the cottage as well as outside.

In fact, I gave Shelagh to Jeannie as a birthday present. In the few weeks she had been at Minack she had proved herself invaluable. Jane hated housework. Shelagh enjoyed it; and so no wonder Jeannie wanted to keep her. And as for myself, instead of being irritated by someone dusting and sweeping in our sitting room, I did not mind at all. I felt always at ease with Shelagh whatever I was doing. I did not notice when I was sitting at my desk that she was on her knees brushing the carpet, or at the sink doing the washing-up. Jeannie, who had done all the work herself for years, was astounded that I should be so docile. None of that: ‘I’ve got work to do. I don’t want someone in here disturbing me,’ kind of attitude. I was tamed. I was the meek husband who not only was delighted that his wife was spared housework, but also made no fuss over the presence of the substitute.

One of Shelagh’s tasks which gave Jeannie particular pleasure was the preparation of tea. A small task, it might seem, but in reality the drudgery of it had grown to mountain size in her mind. The custom in these parts is for the staff to bring their own tea for croust, the mid-morning break, and have a cup from the farmer’s pot at lunchtime. In the afternoon they work right through to five o’clock without any break at all.

Jeannie and I, on the other hand, kind perhaps but unwise, chose to be more liberal and set a new pattern. We gave Geoffrey (Jane went back to her cottage) a jug of tea and cake for lunch, and also filled a thermos for his tea and another for Jane’s with more cake for both. If we had casual labour or workmen at the cottage they received the same treatment, and cascades of tea were carried out to wherever those concerned might be.

A gesture such as this is inclined to become a habit which is taken for granted; but for Jeannie it remained a tedious chore around which the day revolved.

‘Oh dear, I’ve run out of tea.’

‘Will you fetch Geoffrey’s thermos?’

‘Be careful with the milk or there won’t be enough.’

‘I wish this kettle would boil. They’re waiting.’

‘I had better make a cake.’

‘Will these biscuits be all right for them?’

‘I must get home because I haven’t done the tea.’

It was this conscientiousness of Jeannie’s that Shelagh was now able to take over. She used to come into the cottage from whatever she was doing outside about an hour before lunchtime, do her cleaning, then depart with that tea. It was a merciful relief for Jeannie.

The flower season, once it starts, proceeds at such a pace that the days mingle into each other leaving one vague to the passing of time. The clock and the calendar are represented by the end of picking one variety of flower and the beginning of picking another. Thus when the meadows of Magnificence, our earliest yellow trumpet daffodil, are thinned of blooms, and then the Sulphur and then the dainty Obvallaris, I know without ticking off the days that, by being in the middle of the California and the King Alfred, we are nearing the end of our harvest, and that a month has gone by, and that in the month we have succeeded or failed in our effort to earn a living.