‘Well, if your ma can put up with behaviour like that, she’s got a deal of patience,’ Sylvia observed. She drained the tea in her tin mug, then got to her feet. ‘You’re a lucky feller, Alec. Your ma’s the best cook I know and your dad’s goin’ to be one of the biggest farmers in these parts, so you’ll do OK.’
Alec, following suit and standing up, chuckled. ‘My dad may own the biggest farm but at five foot five he’ll never be the biggest farmer,’ he said. ‘Only three more fields to go and Farmer Reed’s fields to tackle and we’ll have finished harvesting for the year, so let’s get goin’.’
Chapter Seven
When the lorry had delivered a great many bundles of what looked like twigs wrapped in straw and sacking, Alec had been unable to believe that this was the new orchard his parents had planned. They did not look worth the bank loan which Mr Hewitt had had to raise in order to pay for them. They meant to go in for fruit in a big way – apples, plums, pears, cherries and the like – and this, of course, would mean a good deal of work for everyone, for his mother had declared, stoutly, that she was as capable of planting a tree as any man, would probably prove better at it since increasing the size of their orchard had been her idea.
Ever since the time they had doubled their holding, Betty Hewitt had been active in how they used the extra land. She had put a whole field down to gooseberries, and red, white and black currants, and though the cropping had been fairly light the previous summer the bushes were showing great promise, their branches a good deal sturdier than they had been twelve months before.
‘I know everyone’s grumbling about cheap imports hitting our markets and lowering our prices,’ Betty had said as they harvested the currants, ‘but soft fruit doesn’t take kindly to much pushing and shoving around. There’ll be a good sale for these locally – in Stalham and Acle, Norwich even – when they begin to fruit in earnest. And we needn’t go through the big suppliers – we can cut out the middle man and sell straight to the greengrocers themselves.’
Some of the first crop, therefore, had gone to shops in Stalham and Acle and the rest had been bottled and now stood in shining rows on the top shelves of Betty Hewitt’s enormous walk-in larder. Bob, who was mortal fond of gooseberry pie, had been happy to see the jars of green and gold fruit outnumbering even the currants, though his wife had been a little disappointed that they had not sold quite as readily as her other produce.
The fruit trees had arrived the previous week, since the grower thought mid-November the best possible time for planting. By an annoying coincidence, the ten new dairy cattle which Bob had bought to augment their herd had arrived at the very same time. Since the weather was cold and clearly about to get colder, Bob, worried for the comfort of his new stock, had commandeered his son to help with the building of an extension to the cowshed, which meant the orchard planting had had to wait. The two of them had worked from dawn till dusk, helped by the farmhands, and when the job was finished and the new cows safely housed, had turned with some dismay to the hard, frost-crackled field which was to be the site of the new orchards. Alec had pointed out that they could scarcely dig holes for the trees in such fearful weather, but when he woke the next morning rain was falling in a steady torrent from lowering grey clouds and there was a mildness in the air which augured well for the planting. Accordingly, the family and two of the farmhands assembled in the yard as soon as it was light enough to see what they were doing. The men draped sacks around their heads and shoulders and Alec followed suit, but his father wore the oilskins which he had inherited from a fisherman uncle, and Betty wore her elderly mackintosh and a thick, though faded, headscarf. Thus clad, the five of them began to cart the young trees out into the field and to place them at intervals along the furrows which had been ploughed earlier in the year. Then Bob began to dig holes at six-foot intervals, into which Bert dropped a good dollop of muck from the pile close by the gate. Joel came behind him scattering soil so that the roots of the young trees would not plunge straight into the richness of the manure. Behind Joel, Betty carefully sank each tree into place whilst Alec brought up the rear, filling in the holes and firming down the soil. Loopy, who always accompanied Alec whenever she could, tried to snatch at the branches of the little trees and was sharply reprimanded. After that, she trailed, sulkily, in her master’s wake, getting wetter and wetter and muddier and muddier, but refusing to abandon him, even for the comforts of the farmhouse or the warmth of the straw-filled barn.
For the first hour, the work proceeded with a will, but in the pouring rain they were all soon soaked to the skin, even Bob admitting that the water had somehow managed to get in around the collar of his oilskin so that he was wet from neck to waist. Despite the fact that it was warmer than it had been, Alec soon noticed that his hands were blue with cold and, though he rubbed them vigorously as he stamped down the soil around the little trees, feeling would not return. After what seemed like an eternity of hard, back-breaking work, he looked anxiously through the driving rain at his mother. Her job was not a particularly exacting one for she did not use a spade but merely had to hold the trees in position whilst he filled in and firmed down, but he was sure she was even colder than he, lacking the warming activity of digging and stamping.
Betty interpreted his glance and smiled reassuringly. ‘Thass cold, int it, bor Alec?’ she said, imitating the broad Norfolk accent of the farmhands. She often told Alec how she and her sister, Irene, had been forbidden to talk Norfolk in the house and had consequently grown up with two languages – broad Norfolk when they were with other children or the farmhands and the King’s English at home. Alec, almost without realising it, had done exactly the same, for though Bob was Norfolk born and bred, his marriage had caused him to tone down the broadness of his speech.
‘Yes, it’s terrible cold,’ Alec said now, in answer to his mother’s question. ‘But isn’t it about time you had a break, Ma? That’s not so bad for the rest of us because we’re using our muscles and that makes the blood flow quicker and warms us up. But you are only steadying the trees and spreading the roots. You must be frozen stiff.’
His mother was about to reply when Bob came back along the row. ‘We’ll take a break now,’ he said, pulling a large turnip watch out of his breeches pocket with some difficulty, and examining its face. ‘We’re done three hours’ hard graft and I told young Mrs Wright to bring a basket wi’ flasks of tea and a foo scones down to the lean-to. I seen her just now so though we’re not halfway yet I think thass time for a break.’ He turned to survey the great, puddled field. ‘I reckon we’re done a good third,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘That int a bad morning’s work but we’ll do another hour before we have a real break for our dinners.’
The five of them went thankfully into the small lean-to and Joel’s wife greeted them cheerfully. When he had bought Mere Farm, Bob had helped the farmhands to convert the house into three respectable dwellings, moving the workers out of the run-down and dilapidated little tied cottages they had inhabited into the comfortable, roomy farmhouse. All the men were married and their wives had been delighted with their change of circumstance. Annie Wright, the only one with young children, came up to Honeywell Farm three or four times a week to help Betty with the cleaning. The extra money came in useful and despite a considerable difference in age, for Annie Wright was not yet thirty and Betty was in her forties, the two women had become good friends. Now, Annie tutted disapprovingly as she handed a tin mug of hot tea to her employer. ‘You’re soaked to the skin, Miz Hewitt; you’re doin’ a man’s job, and a hard job at that,’ she scolded. ‘I seen you a-bendin’ down to spread out the roots and then standing stock still holdin’ the little tree steady while young Alec here firmed that down. You aren’t no chicken, Miz H, and the fellers could manage very well without you. Why, Fred’s finished milkin’ and cleanin’ down the cowshed and doin’ his jobs around the yard. Why not send him up to take your place? Then you could help me make the dinner once you’ve dried out a bit.’
It was a sensible suggestion and kindly meant but Alec was not surprised when his mother shook her head firmly. ‘It was a kind thought, but a bit of rain won’t hurt me. I’m not made of sugar,’ Betty observed. ‘Going in for fruit and doubling the size of the orchard was my idea, and anyway, by dinner time we’ll have done half.’ She glanced up at the sky, blinking as the rain ran into her eyes. ‘Besides, the rain looks likely to stop soon,’ she added, and Alec had to laugh at the complete, lack of conviction in her tone. You did not need to be a weather prophet to see that the rain had set in for the day.
Annie shook her head but did not argue further, handing round the scones and filling tin mugs from the flasks in her basket. Alec shared his food with Loopy, feeling truly sorry for the dog but knowing it was useless to order her back to the farmhouse until he went home himself. Presently, warmed and fortified, if not dried, by the break, the five workers returned to the field, with Loopy trotting dismally behind, and began their task once more.
That night, when the family had finished work for the day and eaten their supper, they gathered round the fire which Annie had lit in the parlour, thankful for the softness of the chairs and their warm, dry clothing. Alec was aware that he was more tired than he had ever been before. The work in the new orchard had been back breaking and, despite their best efforts, they had been unable to finish before daylight faded. Alec had expected his father to call the workers off when it grew dusk, but instead Bob had sent Joel and Bert to fetch hurricane lamps. Betty had been summarily dismissed, Bob telling her that she’d done a grand day’s work already but now her job was to ‘feed the troops’, and the four of them would manage the work that was left without troubling her.
Alec had glanced towards his mother, half expecting to hear a refusal, but Betty had nodded exhaustedly, her face grey with fatigue and her clothing black with rain, and had begun to walk slowly back in the direction of the house. Alec, Bob and the two farm workers had finally finished planting the trees at nine o’clock. Having to work by the light of the hurricane lamps had slowed them up but they were glad they had persevered when, at half past eight or thereabouts, the clouds had rolled back to reveal a full moon and a sprinkling of stars. ‘A clear sky; that mean a frost,’ Bob observed, digging more furiously than ever. ‘Thass a good job we’re all but finished, ’cos once the frost gets a grip on this wet old soil we shan’t be plantin’ anything, not even cabbages.’
Alec, groaning as the work speeded up, remembered planting a field with cabbages earlier in the year. At the time, because of the constant stooping and straightening, he had thought cabbage planting the worst job in the world. Now he knew better. Planting an orchard beat it by a good head. However, one set an orchard once in a lifetime, whereas cabbage planting was an annual event.
Now, sitting by the fireside, with his stomach comfortably full and the glow of achievement making him feel relaxed, Alec remembered something strange that had happened earlier in the day. It had been when they had temporarily abandoned the work for their dinners. He had been holding the weathered old gate open for his mother and the men to walk through and had swung it closed, glancing rather bitterly at the puddled field as he did so. His mother was beside him and she, too, had turned to look at the scene of their uncompleted labour. She had gasped as she did so and Alec had half turned towards her, and in that moment had known why she had gasped. When one turned one’s head quickly, an optical illusion occurred. One saw the field as a sheet of water, almost a lake, and the little fruit trees looked like the tops of larger trees, just showing above the flood.
It was over in a flash. The eye blinked and the picture was once more a puddled field and scores of immature fruit trees standing forlornly in the rain. Alec had turned to his mother, grinning with relief. ‘Did you think what I thought?’ he asked her. ‘Just for a minute, it looked like an orchard in a lake. That gave me quite a turn.’
His mother nodded and caught hold of his arm. ‘Daft what you can see when you’re tired,’ she observed, giving a little shiver as they turned their steps towards the house. ‘I remember the floods of 1912 when Norwich was under water for days and houses collapsed. There were terrible stories – a lot of folk got drowned – and even in country places we were flooded out. At this end of the county, it’s usually the sea which comes in aways and does damage, but in 1912 it was torrential, unbelievable rain and tempests which went on for two or three days. Then the rivers burst their banks and it was every man for himself. We were luckier than most, being on high ground, but my father took Irene and myself into the city and we saw with our own eyes how folk were suffering. They say it’ll never happen again, the houses are made stronger and drainage is better, and I just hope they’re right.’
Sitting warmly by the fire, it was difficult to imagine the chaos of those long ago storms and Alec was just letting his mind drift comfortably off into a sort of half-sleep when his mother got to her feet and went over to the old bureau against the wall. She drew from its depths a large book of cuttings, frowned over the contents for a moment, then handed it to her son, already open. ‘Alec and myself were talking about the 1912 floods earlier,’ she told Bob, who was dreamily sucking on an empty pipe. ‘I was telling him how devastated Norwich was so I thought he might like to look at these old newspaper cuttings.’
Bob grunted. ‘Sometimes thass best forgotten,’ he observed. He grinned at his son. ‘It were a long time ago but us as saw it won’t ever forget.’