The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories (25 page)

"Well,” said Harriet, meeting Mark breathless on the path outside, “did you do it?"

Mark nodded. “Took Miss Eaves round out the back door and popped her in the van."

"Loose?"

"No, I put her in an empty apple-polish carton. She'll get out in half an hour or so."

"That should be enough,” said Harriet, satisfied.

They hoped they had heard the last of Miss Eaves.

Next morning though, at breakfast, Granny sat looking very puzzled over a letter on lavender-colored writing paper on which the printed heading “Wildrose Eaves” nestled among a cluster of forget-me-nots.

"Most extraordinary,” said Granny suspiciously, “here's some woman writing to thank me for her delightful visit when to the best of my knowledge she's never been near the place. Says how much she's looking forward to another visit. Must be mad—isn't Eaves the name of the person who wanted my quince tree?"

In fact, it soon appeared that Miss Eaves found catching mice in Granny's apple rooms much more to her taste than writing untruthful gardening articles for the
Sunday Times
. After three days she was back again, purring beside the kitchen stove, and the children gave up trying to persuade her to go away, though Harriet never really became accustomed to waking up and finding a lady journalist who was also a witch sleeping on the end of her bed.

"Dear me,” Granny said, some weeks after the children had gone back to school, “there must have been a gale one night recently. That quince tree has blown completely around. The big branch used to be on the south side. And I never heard a thing, not a thing. Just fancy that, puss."

But Miss Eaves, purring round her ankles, said nothing, and Granny strolled on to look at the medlar tree, murmuring, “I'm getting very old; very, very old, puss; very, very old."

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It was a black day for the Armitage family when Great-uncle Gavin retired. In fact, as Mark pointed out, Uncle Gavin did not exactly retire; he was pushed. He had been High Commissioner of Mbutam-Mbutaland, which had suddenly decided it needed a High Commissioner no longer but would instead become the Republic of Mbutambuta. So Sir Gavin Armitage, K.C.M.G., O.B.E., D.S.O., and so forth, was suddenly turned loose on the world, and because he had expected to continue living at the High Commissioner's Residence for years to come and had no home of his own, he moved in with the parents of Mark and Harriet.

The first disadvantage was that he had to sleep in the ghost's room. Mr. Peake was nice about it; he said he quite understood, and they would probably shake down together very well, he had been used to all sorts of odd company in his three hundred years. But after a few weeks of Great-uncle's keep-fit exercises, coughing, thumping, harrumphing, snoring, and blazing open windows, Mr. Peake became quite thin and pale (for a ghost); he migrated through the wall into the room next door, explaining apologetically that he wasn't getting a wink of sleep. Unfortunately the room next door was a bathroom, and though Mark didn't mind, Mr. Armitage complained that it gave him the jumps to see a ghostly face suddenly loom up beside his in the mirror when he was shaving, while Harriet and her mother had to take to the downstairs bathroom, which Mr. Armitage had built onto the house after Mark's outdoor prize bathroom was destroyed by a pair of feuding Druids. Great-uncle Gavin never noticed Mr. Peake at all. Besides, he had other things to think about.

One of his main topics of thought was how disgracefully the children had been brought up. He was horrified at the way they were allowed to live all over the house, instead of being pent up in some upstairs nursery.

"Little gels should be seen and not heard,” he boomed at Harriet, whenever she opened her mouth. To get her out from underfoot during the holidays, he insisted on her enrolling in a domestic science course run by a Professor Grimalkin, who had recently come to live in the village.

As for Mark, he had hardly a minute's peace.

"Bless my soul, boy"—nearly all Great-uncle Gavin's remarks began with this request—"Bless my soul, what are you doing now?
Reading?
Bless my soul, do you want to grow up a muff?"

"A muff, Great-uncle? What is a muff, exactly?” And Mark pulled out the notebook in which he was keeping a glossary of Great-uncle Gavin.

"A muff, why, a muff is a—a funk, sir, a duffer, a frowst, a tug, a swot, a miserable little sneaking
milksop!
"

Mark was so busy writing down all these words that he forgot to be annoyed.

"You ought to be out of doors, sir, ought to be out playin’ footer."

"But you need twenty-two people for that,” Mark pointed out, “and there's only Harriet and me. Besides it's summer. And Harriet's a bit of a duffer at French cricker."

"Don't be impident, boy! Gad, when I was your age, I'd have been out collectin’ birds’ eggs."

"Birds’ eggs,” said Mark, scandalized. “But I'm a subscribing member of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds."

"Butterflies, then,” growled his great-uncle.

"I read a book, Great-uncle, that said all the butterflies were being killed by indiscriminate use of pesticides and what's left ought to be carefully preserved."

Sir Gavin was turning eggplant color and seemed likely to explode.

"Boy's a regular sea-lawyer,” he said furiously. “Grow up into one of those confounded trade-union johnnies. Why don't you go out on your velocipede, then, sir? At your age I was keen as mustard, by gad! Used to ride miles on my penny-farthing, rain or shine."

"No bike,” said Mark, “only the unicorn, and he's got a swelled fetlock; we're fomenting it."

"Unicorn! Never heard such namby-pamby balderdash in me life! Here,” Great-uncle Gavin said, “what's your weekly allowance when your pater's at home?"

With the disturbed family ghost and the prospect of Uncle Gavin's indefinite stay to depress them, Mr. and Mrs. Armitage had rather meanly decided that they were in need of three weeks in Madeira, and had left the day before.

"Half a crown a week,” said Mark. “I've had three weeks in advance."

"How much does a bike cost nowadays?"

"Oh, I daresay you could pick one up for thirty-five pounds."

"
What?
” Great-uncle Gavin nearly fell out of his chair, but then, rallying, he pulled seven five-pound notes out of his ample wallet. “Here, then, boy; this is an advance on your allowance for the next two hundred and eighty weeks. I'll collect it from your governor when he comes home. Cut along, now, and buy a bicycle, an’ go for a topping spin and
don't let me see your face gain till suppertime.
"

"But I don't want a bicycle,” said Mark.

"Be off, boy, make yourself scarce, don't argue!—On second thought, ‘spose I'd better come with you, to make sure you don't spend the money on some appallin’ book about nature."

So Great-uncle Gavin stood over Mark while the latter unwillingly and furiously purchased a super-excellent, low-slung bicycle with independent suspension, disk brakes, three-inch tires, five speeds, and an outboard motor. None of which assets did Mark want in the least, as who would, when they had a perfectly good unicorn to ride?

"Now, be off with you and see how quickly you can get to Brighton and back."

Day after day thereafter, no sooner had he eaten breakfast than Mark was hounded from the house by his relentless great-uncle and urged to try and better his yesterday's time to Brighton.

"Gosh, he must have led those Mbutam-Mbutas a life,” Mark muttered darkly in the privacy of Harriet's room.

"I suppose he's old and we ought to be patient with him,” Harriet said. She was pounding herbs in a mortar for her domestic science homework.

The trouble was, concluded Mark, gloomily pedaling along one afternoon through a heavy downpour, that during his forty years among the simple savages Great-uncle Gavin had acquired the habit of command; it was almost impossible not to obey his orders.

Almost impossible, but not quite. Presently the rain increased to a cloudburst.

"Drat Great-uncle Gavin! I'm not going all the way to Brighton in this,” Mark decided. “Anyway, why
should
I go to Brighton?"

And he climbed a stile and dashed up a short grassy path to a small church nearby which had a convenient, dry-looking porch. He left his bike on the other side of the stile, for that is another disadvantage of bikes: you can never take them all the way to where you want to go.

The church proved to be chilly and not very interesting, so Mark, who always carried a paperback in his pocket, settled on the porch bench to read until the rain abated. After a while, hearing footsteps, he looked up and saw that a smallish, darkish, foreign-looking man had joined him.

"Nasty afternoon,” Mark said civilly.

"Eh? Yes! Yes, indeed!” The man seemed nervous; he kept glancing over his shoulder down the path.

"Is your bicycle, boy, by wall yonder?” he asked by and by.

"Yes, it is."

"Is a fine one,” the man said. “Very fine one. Would go lickety-spit fast, I daresay?"

"An average of twenty miles per hour,” Mark said gloomily.

"Will it? Will it so?"

The little man fell silent, glancing out uneasily once more at the rainy dusk, while Mark strained his eyes to see the print of his book. He noticed that his companion seemed to be shuffling about, taking a pack off his back and rummaging among the content; presently Mark realized that something was being held out to him. He looked up from the page and saw a golden apple—quite a large one, about the size of a Bramley. On one side the gold had a reddish bloom, as if the sun had ripened it. The other side was paler. Somebody had taken two bites out of the red side; Mark wondered what it had done to their teeth. Near the stalk was a dark-brown stain, like a patch of rust.

"Nice, eh?” the little man said, giving the apple to Mark, who nearly dropped it on the floor. It must have weighed at least four pounds.

"Is it real gold all through?” he asked. “Must be quite valuable."

"Valuable?” the man said impressively. “Such apple is beyond price. You, of course, well-educated, familiar with Old Testament tale of Adam and Eve?"

"W-why, yes,” Mark said, stammering a little. “But you—you don't mean to say
that
apple—?"

"Self same one,” the little man said, nodding his head. “Original bite marks of Adam and Eve before apple carried out of Eden. Then—see stain? Blood of Abel. Cain killed him for apple. Stain will never wash off."

"Goodness,” Mark said.

"Not all, however—not all at all! Apple of Discord—golden apple same which began Trojan War—have heard of such?"

"Why yes. But—but you're not telling me—"

"Identical apple,” the little man said proudly. “Apples of Asgard, too? Heard of? Scandinavian golden apples of perpetual youth, guarded by the goddess Idunn?"

"Yes, but you don't—"

"Such was one of those. Not to mention Apples of Hesperides, stolen by Hercules."

"Hold on—surely it couldn't have been both?"

"Could,” the little man said. “Was. William Tell's apple—familiar story?—same apple. Newton—apple fell on head letting in dangerous principle of gravity. This. Atalanta—apple thrown by Venus to stop her winning race. Also, Prince Ahmed's apple—"

"Stop, stop!” said Mark. “I don't understand how it could possibly be
all
those.” But somehow, as he held the heavy, shining thing in his hand, he did believe the little man's story. There was a peculiar, rather nasty fascination about the apple. It scared him, and yet he wanted it.

"So, see,” the little man said, nodding more than ever, “worth millions pounds. No lie—millions. And yet I give to you—"

"Now wait a minute—"

"Give in exchange for bicycle, yes? Okay?"

"Well, but—but
why
? Why don't you want the apple?"

"Want bicycle more.” He glanced down the road again, and now Mark guessed.

"Someone's after you—the police? You stole the apple?"

"Not stole, no, no, no! Did swap, like with bicycle, you agree, yes?"

He was already halfway down the path. Hypnotized, Mark watched him climb the stile and mount the bike, wobbling. Suddenly, Mark found his voice and called,

"What did you swap for it?"

"Drink of water—in desert, see?"

"Who's chasing you, then?"

By now the little man was chugging down the road and his last word, indistinct, floated back through the rain, something ending in “—ese"; it might have been Greek for all Mark could make of it.

He put the apple in his pocket, which sagged under the weight, and, since the shower was slackening, walked to the road to flag a lift home in the next truck.

Great-uncle Gavin nearly burst a blood vessel when he learned that Mark had exchanged his new bicycle for an apple, albeit a golden one.

"Did what—merciful providence—an
apple?
—Hesperides? Eden? Asgard? Never heard such a pack of moonshine in all me born—let's see it, then. Where is it?"

Mark produced the apple and a curious gleam lit up Uncle Gavin's eye.