Concluding (29 page)

She left his remark alone.

"No Liz, they're out to comb the undergrowth for poor Mary."

"They might have, you know, this morning. I expect you didn't listen but it was just after you set off. I mean, they were round the cottage, and you had gone by that time. Still, they aren't looking now, Gapa, you can be sure."

"Is there any news, then?"

"News? Not that I've learnt. Don't you remember I told you? They're simply fiends."

The old man and his granddaughter had come to the beginning of a ride. Every twenty yards or so there was a separate marsh of moonlight, but the way looked lonely to him.

"Wait a moment for me to light my torch," he ordered, as though he had to strike a match for this. He fumbled.

When he had the thing on, he shone around him. Immediately there came a string of startled grunts. He shuddered, then waved the small megaphone of light here and there through a black shadow of trees till he lit on his pig. Daisy was caught looking full in their direction, until she turned, began to make off", squealing. There was somewhat round her neck. He switched the light away and called his pet. She seemed to have halted. He slowly brought round the long cone of daylight, very quiet in great, open stealth, so as not to alarm her. He picked out a white leg, held it quivering while Daisy's tail flickered to and fro, and, once uncovered again, the pig began to grunt. As, with gentle patience, he gradually turned his wrist to bring his dunce's cap of moonlight on all of Daisy, she grunted crescendo, but held firm. Till he saw a slipper in white satin had been tied round her white neck.

"They'll have been torturing her," he cried in the swill man's tones at once, upon which the animal squealed twice, then stayed dumb. He switched his light out. There was utter silence.

"Oh, you don't know what they're like, you can't, you're a man," Elizabeth announced, lazily, at last, from the morass of her thoughts.

"I shall not overlook it," said Mr Rock, in his deepest voice.

She again began to be made nervous. She dreaded this sort of intervention on his part. But she just had enough sense to keep quiet.

"Should I take the thing away immediately?" the old man demanded, afraid Daisy might run off if approached.

"Try if she will follow," Elizabeth said, coming to earth. "I told you we should find them when we got back, don't you remember?"

Accordingly Mr Rock shone the light once more, but this time at his toes. As they set out along the ride he called encouragingly to Daisy. He kept it up, and was answered, every so often, by a squeal of unease. From which he judged that she followed, like a cat, in fits and starts.

The old man maintained outraged silence. He was oppressed by the dark, by the next dirty trick that might be played.

He did not have long to wait.

When they were in the centre of the second pool of moonlight which was let through by a break in trees, and Daisy skirted this, keeping to black shade, Mr Rock heard Ted, his goose, burst into sharp cries of alarm not sixty yards in front. He halted dead. Next there was a rush out there towards him, a rising string of honks like an old fashioned bicycle, and the goose, which had never flown before, came noisily by at speed six foot off the ground, while Daisy grunted. The granddaughter stepped to one side. But the old man knelt, trembling.

He feared a collision.

Then Ted was gone.

He listened, intent for giggles. He heard no hint of such.

"Are they at the bottom of this, too?" he asked.

"Have you hurt yourself? Oh Gapa I mean, what are you doing?"

"Really, Elizabeth, you can be very absurd. She came straight for my spectacles. And now where is Daisy?"

"It's all right, dear, take my hand, she's not gone, there, at last we're on our feet again. I suspect Daisy's only too glad to be led home. My goodness, but didn't Ted come by in a rush."

"I'm a bit stiff about the joints these days," the old man admitted, dusting off his wet, cold trousers. "No, but even you will agree, this is too much, Liz, altogether. No-one has to keep silent under persecution, except dumb animals of course. Tomorrow I shall have it quite thoroughly gone into."

"All's well that ends well," the young woman comforted.

"How d'you know they haven't even put Alice in a sack to drown," he asked, in quavering tones. He called "Daisy," in the swill man's voice, and was at once answered with a grunt, close.

Once more they started on their way. Mr Rock did not speak. He was wounded at having been made to look ridiculous, profoundly disquieted for what might come next.

Elizabeth said no word. It would not be long now before she got back to Seb. Meanwhile she gave herself over to the young man once more.

So they came at last to the outskirts of their cottage, by which time Mr Rock had almost recovered. The first outpost, or guard house, was Ted's kennel. As this was in full moonlight, Mr Rock switched off the torch. And he would never, for the rest of his days, be able to explain why, but he bent down to put a hand inside. He was answered, slowly, by the bird's low hiss.

"Good God," he said. "Ted's home." She paid no attention. "We shall never know the truth," he said.

"Gapa," she broke in. "Now we're here, I'm going back. I don't suppose I'll stay long. You won't be nervous, will you?"

"Nervous? How many times have I to tell you I am never nervous. It's only my eyes, can't you understand. Very well, then, not that anything I can say will make much difference, I suppose."

She moved off at once. Then he remembered.

"Wait," he called. "Where's Daisy?"

"She ran into her sty," the young woman sang over a shoulder, stepped out of moonlight, and disappeared.

Mr Rock moved across to shut the gate on his pig. What with the torch, the case he carried, and that latch,
he
fumbled a good deal. Then he listened for, and heard, Daisy's heavy breath. He leant inside, felt about. The moment he touched her, she squealed terribly. But he got hold of the slipper and jerked it from her neck. She yelled as though about to be stuck and then, as soon as he moved off, she stopped. He hurled the shoe away. Once it was no longer in moonlight it disappeared, the thing might have flown. He did not, of course, hear it fall. Upon which he realised he still had Elizabeth's shoes in the despatch case. She could scarcely dance in rubber boots. He thought to call her back, but decided against. Gum boots would not help Birt, he considered, not realising they would force her to take the young man outside.

He entered the cottage, switched on a light, began the routine he carried through each bedtime, set things to rights. When he was just about done he heard a cat discreetly yowl. He went to the door. It was Alice. After getting her in with some milk, he climbed the stairs to bed.

On the whole he was well satisfied with his day. He fell asleep almost at once in the yellow woollen nightshirt.

THE END