A Donkey in the Meadow (3 page)

I am able to believe in the reality of my story so far, but there is also an event in my memory so horrifying that it is strange that no one in my family can vouch for it. My mother when she was alive, and when I asked her about it, laughed at my foolishness, and surely she would have remembered so violent an incident to her youngest son.

The donkey, so my memory tells me, kicked me in the teeth as I lay helpless beneath him.

This memory, or childish nightmare as it must have been, was vividly present during my conversation with Jeannie. Donkeys, as cats had once been, were to me unfriendly creatures; but whereas my original distaste for cats was merely because I thought them vulgar, detached and selfish, I was, as far as donkeys were concerned, a little scared.

They were bony and heavy, and dull-witted. I did not see how one could trust a donkey. A cat at least was not dangerous. It might scratch when frightened, or might even lacerate you if enraged, and you happened to be in the way. That was all. A donkey, on the other hand, was an unruly creature. It might kick without reason. Or bite. It was uncouth. I could not foresee how a donkey could ever enter the stream of our life except to excite our pity. There it would stand forlornly in a meadow, nothing to do, reproachfully demanding our attention which it would be too stupid to appreciate.

Jeannie, of course, had long ago forgiven her sugarmad donkeys, and I guessed she only needed a little encouragement from me for her to answer the telegram by setting out forthwith to have a look at the donkey. I, on the other hand, remained on guard.

‘The first thing I’m going to do,’ I told her, ‘is to have a word with Jack Baker.’

Jack Baker was a landscape gardener, and at this time was designing a new part of our garden. He was a practical man, an expert horticulturalist, a mechanic, a tree feller and, what interested me particularly, he had had experience with donkeys.

‘Tell me, Jack,’ I said when I found him, ‘what do you think about keeping a donkey as a pet?’

Jack had a merry eye but a lugubrious nature. He wanted to enjoy life but the fates had checked him so many times that he was inclined always to outline the tedious side of a problem at the expense of the happier side. He was in his fifties, tall and broad-shouldered, an individualist who, during the war, preferred to remain a sergeant in the Guards rather than accept the commission he was offered. He was one of those rare people one would instinctively want to be with in a jam. He would, I felt sure, be calm while the threat – whatever it was – received his attention. I anxiously awaited his donkey views.

He took the pipe from his mouth, knocked the ash from the bowl on a rock, then pronounced:

‘You’ll have a packet of trouble.’

I was, of course, prepared for a douche of cold water. He was only being true to my knowledge of him, a harbinger of bad news before good; and yet his attitude, because it coincided with my own, was pleasing to listen to.

‘How do you mean?’ I asked.

‘Well, the first thing you’ll find out, for instance,’ he said solemnly, ‘is that it will eat up the garden.’

Even to my ears this remark sounded biased. What about a horse or a cow? Wouldn’t they eat up the garden if they were given a chance?

Jack was leaning on his shovel, amused, delighting in his mission to discomfort me.

‘Ah,’ he said knowingly. ‘A horse or a cow can be kept in a field, and it’s only bad luck if it gets out. But a donkey! You can’t keep a donkey loose in a field. It’ll get out. It’ll jump a fence or a wall, and go roaming all over the district. And it’ll be eating up other people’s gardens besides yours.’

‘What do people do about donkeys then?’

He grinned at me.

‘Best thing to do is to tether it. You get a swivel anchor from the blacksmith, fix it firmly in the ground, and the donkey goes round and round eating the grass. Then twice a day you move it.’

‘Twice a day?’

‘Oh yes, otherwise as soon as it has eaten the grass it will start braying.’

‘It’s a bit of a job digging up the anchor and then fixing it again, isn’t it?’

‘Certainly. But that’s what people do.’

I could not see myself doing it.

‘There’s another point,’ Jack went on, and he was now talking as if he believed he had got me on the run, ‘and that’s water. A donkey drinks a lot, and you’ll have to keep a bucket always full beside it. If a donkey is thirsty even for a minute the braying will start up.’

‘How loud is the braying?’

‘They’ll hear it in the next parish.’

‘But surely,’ I said, ‘you’re exaggerating. You’re making out that a donkey is only fit for a zoo. After all, lots of people
do
keep donkeys.’

‘Not for long. They’re excited when they get them at first but soon tire of them when they find out the trouble they cause.’

I found at this moment, contrary to reason, that Jack’s attitude was engaging my sympathy for donkeys. His arguments against them seemed, even to me, to be overloaded.

‘Now tell me honestly,’ I said, ‘how
friendly
can a donkey be?’

He sat down on a rock, put his palms on his knees, laughingly looked at me with his head on one side, and replied:

‘How friendly? You ask me how friendly? . . . all I can say is I would never dare keep a donkey myself!’

This should have been enough to make up my mind. Armed with Jack’s arguments I could have gone to Jeannie and explained to her that a donkey at Minack was quite impracticable. He had confirmed my suspicions. A donkey would only be a nuisance.

But there were other factors involved which I felt would be fair to consider. Jack himself, for instance. He knew us both well enough to realise that in any case Jeannie would have her donkey if she really wished, and, therefore, he could without qualms take humorous pleasure in trying to scare me. He had had his joke but, contrarily, he had awakened my interest. My talk with him had the effect of an appetiser; and I was beginning to be intrigued as to where the ownership of a donkey might lead me.

I had also to admit that Minack would provide a wonderful setting for a donkey. It could roam along the grey boulders of the moorland, wander down the steep slopes of the cliff to the sea’s edge, and for most of the year when the daffodils were not growing, it could be loose in the bulb fields. There was land enough, therefore, for it not to have any reason to escape; and I also saw a practical advantage. A donkey would help to keep the grass down.

Nor could I forget that in the past I had always objected to the arrival of a new pet, and then soon agreed that my objections had been wrong. I had not wanted Monty or Lama or the drake or the fox cub which Jeannie looked after when it was brought to her with an injured foot. I suffered the contradictory emotions of enjoying responsibility once it had been imposed upon me, but of fearing any addition to those I already held. An animal was a responsibility. I had been brought up to believe that once an animal is accepted into a household it must be treated as a member of it, and not as a piece of furniture. And I remember my father telling me, when he gave me my first puppy, that it was my job to make the puppy happy, and not the other way round.

I was, therefore, in two minds what to do; and in the end I decided to surprise Jeannie. I would act in a holiday spirit. When she set out to persuade me to go and have a look at the donkey, I would immediately agree. What harm could there be in just having a look?

So an hour later we were in the Land Rover, and I was innocently driving towards Mr Teague. We were about to arrive when Jeannie suddenly said, ‘If we like it, we will have the donkey, won’t we?’

‘No,’ I said firmly, ‘certainly not.’

And I knew I was lying.

We reached the Plume of Feathers soon after opening time, and Mr Teague greeted us with a glint in his eye. He saw a sale in the offing.

‘Come in,’ he said jovially from behind the bar, ‘have a drink. What’ll you have, Mrs Tangye?’

Mr Teague, or Roy as he now insisted on us calling him, was in the fortunate position of being able to do his bargaining on his own licensed premises. Sales could be conducted in convivial circumstances, and though a purchaser might succeed in reducing a price or a seller in increasing it, the cost of the evening had to be considered. I was aware of this. I had therefore decided, in the event of us wishing to buy the donkey, to complete the deal with the minimum of argument. I might lose a pound or two on the price, but this was a sensible sacrifice if it meant we could speedily return to Minack.

‘We’ve just looked in to see the donkey,’ I said casually, ‘it was very nice of you to send the telegram.’

‘Not at all,’ he said, ‘I’ve got a nice little donkey and thought I’d let you have the first chance.’

He had got us our drinks and was now leaning with elbows on the bar, hands interlocked. I could see he was about to turn his charm on Jeannie. She was a vulnerable target.

‘Lovely-tempered little donkey,’ he said, smiling at her, ‘good as gold. Comes from Ireland, from Connemara or somewhere like that. They ship them over by the dozen these days.’

‘What for?’

‘They go for pet food mostly.’

‘How cruel,’ said Jeannie.

He was now fiddling with an empty ashtray on the counter.

‘The only trouble is she is not in very good condition. Nothing serious. Nothing that Dr Green can’t soon put right.’

‘Dr Green?’ I asked, puzzled.

‘Grass.’

‘Oh, of course.’

He turned again to Jeannie. His eyes were twinkling.

‘And there’s another thing. Something, I bet, you never bargained for when you came along here. She’s in foal. Two donkeys for one. What about that?’

I took a gulp at my drink.

‘Good heavens!’ I said.

‘Now, now, now,’ he answered, looking at me and sensing a momentary setback, ‘as soon as she’s had the foal I’ll buy it off you. Nothing could be fairer than that, could it?’

He turned again to Jeannie.

‘Have you ever seen a little donkey foal? Lovely little things they are. Just like a toy. You can pick it up in your arms. I’ve seen a child do that, honestly I have.’

I watched Jeannie melting. The practical side, the prospect of
two
donkeys charging about Minack, did not concern her at all. All that she could imagine was the picture card idyll of a donkey and its foal. The deal was advancing in his favour. Somewhere in a field behind the pub was a donkey which was on the brink of being ours.

And then Mr Teague played his ace.

‘Sad thing about this donkey,’ he said, fumbling again with the ashtray, ‘very sad thing . . . by the way, Penny’s her name. Pretty name Penny, isn’t it?’

‘You were saying.’

‘Yes, I was going to tell you that if you don’t like the look of her, I’ve got a buyer. Made a good offer he has too, but it’s a sad story.’

‘Why so sad?’

‘Well, I wouldn’t like to see it happen. You see the idea of this buyer is to wait for the foal to be born, then put it in a circus. A donkey foal in a circus would be a big draw, especially on the holiday circuit. Can’t you see the children flocking round it?’

I could see he was genuinely concerned.

‘What happens to the mother?’

He glanced at me, appreciating that I was on the wavelength.

‘That’s the point. That’s what I’m worried about. That’s why I want to find her a good home, and thought of you two.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘The idea of this buyer friend of mine is to send Penny to the knacker’s yard as soon as the youngster can get along without her.’

‘But that’s awful.’ I could not help myself from saying what I knew was in Jeannie’s mind.

‘And what’s more,’ went on Roy Teague, ‘when the season is over and they’ve got their money’s worth out of the youngster, it’ll be too big to keep.’ He paused. ‘They’ll send it to the knacker’s yard as well.’

The emotion he expected erupted.

‘I must go and see her at once.’ Jeannie was picking up the gloves she had dropped on a stool. She looked pained. She was at that moment the ideal example of a salesman’s victim. She was hooked, and so was I. However bad was the donkey’s condition, we must buy her. It was our duty. We had been given the chance of saving her, and of giving a home to her foal. Here was an opportunity which reached far beyond our original inclinations. We would not only be giving a donkey a home, but also acquiring a donkey which would otherwise be doomed . . . first by sadness because of being parted too soon from her foal, then by the journey which ended in the knacker’s yard. I was a donkey buyer with a mission. I had better begin negotiations.

‘You go ahead,’ I said to Jeannie, ‘have a look at her and see what you think. I’ll have another drink.’

My purpose in not accompanying her was to appear nonchalant in front of Mr Teague. I intended to go through the form of bargaining, the pause between sentences, the changes of subject, the sudden return to a point that appeared to be forgotten, the mock laughter over a price which in reality I didn’t think too high, the pretence that I had, in fact, no intention of wanting the donkey at all; all those machinations which one feels one ought to pursue despite the fact that an immediate deal would produce a shout of joy.

‘I suppose you’re getting ready for the season,’ I said, after Jeannie had disappeared to the paddock behind the pub where the donkey was temporarily grazing, ‘all ready for the rush.’

‘That’s right. Winter in a hammock, then a sprint.’

‘I don’t know how you stand it night after night.’

‘It’s a job. Like any job you have to stick to it.’

‘Not for me. I wouldn’t stand it for any money.’

He took my glass, and swung round to the optics.

‘Mrs Tangye is dead keen on that donkey, isn’t she?’ He had his back to me, a finger on the lever of the optic of the whisky bottle. ‘Dead keen, I should say.’

He was forcing the pace.

‘She’s always liked donkeys, ever since she was a child,’ I said, as if I were talking about the weather, ‘of course she’s got a kind heart, and that story you told her upset her a bit.’

‘It’s true.’

‘Now, Roy,’ I felt that I could sound intimate, ‘I believe you are a fair man. What price have you in mind for the donkey?’