On The Black Hill (Vintage Classics) (16 page)

‘Girls with jugs of ale and cider kept the heroes’ glasses topped to the brim; and the sound of laughter carried as far as the lake.

Lewis and Benjamin helped themselves to a bowl of mulligatawny at the soup-kitchen, and sauntered round the shrubbery, stopping, now and then, to talk to picnickers. The weather was turning chilly. Women shivered under their shawls, and eyed the inky clouds heaped up over the Black Hill.

Lewis spotted one of the gardeners and asked if he’d seen Rosie Fifield.

‘Rosie?’ The man scratched his scalp. ‘She’d be serving lunch, I expect.’

Lewis led the way back to the dressage-school, and pushed through the crush of people who were thronging the double doors. The speeches were about to begin. The port decanters were emptying fast.

At his place at the centre of the table, Mr Arkwright had already toasted the Bickerton family
in absentia
and was about to embark on his oration.

‘Now that the sword is returned to the scabbard,’ he began, ‘I wonder how many of us recall those sunny summer days of 1914 when a cloud no bigger than a man’s hand appeared on the political sky of Europe –’

At the word ‘cloud’ a few faces tilted upward to the skylight, through which the sun had been pouring but a minute before.

‘A cloud which grew to rain death and destruction upon well nigh the whole continent of Europe, nay, upon the four corners of the globe …’

‘I’m going home,’ Benjamin nudged his brother.

An N.C.O. – one of his torturers from the Hereford Barracks – sat leering at him loutishly through a cloud of cigar smoke.

Lewis whispered, ‘Not yet!’ and Mr Arkwright raised his voice to a tremulous baritone:

‘An immense military power rose in its might, and forgetting its sworn word to respect the frontiers of weaker nations, tore through the country of Belgium …’

‘Where’s old Belgey?’ a voice called out.

‘… burned its cities, towns, villages, martyred its gallant inhabitants …’

‘Not him they didn’t!’ – and someone shoved forward the Refugee, who stood and gaped blearily from under his beret.

‘Good old Belgey!’

‘But the Huns never reckoned with the sense of justice and honour which are the attributes of the British people … and the might of British righteousness tipped the scales against them …’

The N. C. O.’s eyes had narrowed to a pair of dangerous slits.

‘I’m going,’ said Benjamin, edging back towards the door.

The speaker raked his throat and continued: ‘This is no place for a mere civilian to trace the course of events. No need to speak of those glorious few, the Expeditionary Force, who pitted themselves against so vile a foe, for whom the meaning of life was the study of death …’

Mr Arkwright looked over his spectacles to assure himself that his listeners had caught the full flavour of his
bon mot
. The rows of blank faces assured him they had not. He looked down again at his notes:

‘No need to speak of the clarion call of Lord Kitchener – for men and yet more men …’

A serving-girl, in grey, was standing close to Lewis with a jug of cider in her hand. He asked if she’d seen Rosie Fifield.

‘Not all morning,’ she whispered back. ‘She’s probably off with Mr Reggie.’

‘Oh!’

‘No need to record the disappointments, the months that lengthened into years, and still no chink was found in the enemy’s armour …’

‘Hear! Hear!’ said the N.C.O.

‘Everyone in this room will recall how the demon of warfare swallowed up our most promising manhood, and still the monster flourished …’

The last remark obviously tickled the N.C.O.’s fancy. He shook with laughter, bared his gums, and went on staring at Benjamin. A clap of thunder shook the building. Raindrops pocked on the skylight, and the picnickers pressed forward through the doors, pushing the twins to within feet of the speaker.

Undeterred by the storm, Mr Arkwright carried on: ‘Men and more men was the cry, and meanwhile submarine piracy threatened with starvation those whose lot it was to remain at home …’

‘Not ’im it didn’t,’ muttered a woman nearby, who must have known, at first hand, of the solicitor’s black-market peccadillo.

‘Sshh!’ – and the woman fell silent; for he appeared to be moving towards the final coda: ‘So at last, righteousness and justice prevailed and, with God’s help, a treacherous and inhuman foe was laid low.’

The rain slammed on the roof. He raised his hands to acknowledge the clapping; but he had
not
finished: ‘In that glorious consummation, all those present have played an honourable part. Or should I say,’ he added, removing his glasses and fixing a steely stare on the twins, ‘almost all of those present?’

In a flash, Benjamin saw what was afoot and, clawing his brother’s wrist, began to squirm towards the door. Mr Arkwright watched them go and then turned to the tricky topic of contributions to the War Memorial Fund.

The twins stood under the cedar of Lebanon, alone, in the rain.

‘We didn’t ought to have come,’ said Benjamin.

They sheltered until the rain blew over. Benjamin still wanted to leave, but Lewis lingered on and, in the end, they stayed for the Carnival Pageant.

For four days, Mr Arkwright and his committee had ‘moved heaven and earth’ to prepare the ground for the afternoon’s events. Hurdles had been erected, white lines drawn on the grass, and, in front of the finishing-post, a canvas awning covered the podium to shield the notabilities from sun or shower. Garden seats had been reserved for the heroes and pensioners: the others had to sit where they could.

The sun shone fitfully through a confused mass of cloud. In the far corner of the field, beside a stand of wellingtonias, the entrants for the Carnival were putting the finishing touches to their floats. Mr Arkwright looked anxiously from his watch to the cloud, and to the gate of the Italian garden.

‘I do wish they’d come,’ he fretted, wondering what on earth was detaining the Bickertons.

To occupy himself, he darted about, blew his whistle, escorted the pensioners and made a show of pushing the Bombardier’s wheel-chair into the place of honour.

At last, the gate swung open and the luncheon party emerged through a gap in the topiary like a parade of prize beasts at a show.

The crowd parted for Mrs Bickerton, who walked ahead of the others in her Red Cross uniform. On seeing the Jones
twins
, she stopped: ‘Do give your mother my love. I wish she’d come and see me.’

Her husband limped along on the arm of Lady Vernon-Murray, an ample woman from whose hat a bird-of-paradise plume curled downwards and tickled the corner of her mouth. A frock of fog-blue voile framed her ankles, and she looked extremely cross. The Brigadier, an immense purple-faced presence, appeared to be trapped in a web of polished brown leather straps. Members of the local gentry followed; and, lastly, in magenta, came the Bickerton war-widow, Mrs Nancy. A young man from London was with her.

She was halfway to the podium when she paused and frowned: ‘Re-ggie! Re-ggie!’ she called with a stammer. ‘N-now whe-ere’s he gone? He was here a se-econd ago.’

‘Coming!’ a voice called back from behind the topiary peacocks, and a youngish man, in a blazer and whites, appeared in the open, on crutches. His left leg was off at the knee.

At his side, conspicuous as a magpie against the evergreens, was a girl in a maid’s uniform, with white flounces on her shoulders.

It was Rosie Fifield.

‘I told you,’ Benjamin said, and Lewis began to tremble.

The twins moved towards the podium where Mr Arkwright, as Master of Ceremonies, had the privilege of escorting the guests-of-honour to their seats.

‘I hope we shall be amused,’ said Lady Vernon-Murray, as he slid a cane-seated chair beneath her haunches.

‘Surely yes, my lady!’ he replied. ‘We have a pot-pourri of entertainment on the programme.’

‘Well, it’s dashed cold,’ she said, sourly.

Reggie had chosen a chair on the far left of the platform, and Rosie was standing beneath him. He tickled her vertebrae with the toe of his shoe.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ Mr Arkwright succeeded in silencing the crowd. ‘Permit me to introduce our illustrious guests – the Hero of Vimy Ridge, and his lady …’

‘Gosh, it’s perishing,’ said her ladyship, as the Brigadier acknowledged the cheers.

He was preparing to open his mouth when two stable-lads rushed forward carrying effigies of the Kaiser and Prince Ruprecht, gagged and bound to a pair of kitchen chairs. On top of the Kaiser’s helmet was a stuffed canary, smeared with gold paint.

The Brigadier glared, with mock ferocity, at the foe.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he began, ‘soldiers of the King, and you two miserable specimens of humanity, whom we shall soon have the pleasure of consigning to the bonfire …’

Another round of cheers went up.

‘Now sewiously sewiously …’ The Brigadier raised a hand as if passing to serious matters. ‘This is a memowable day. A day that will go down in the annals of our history …’

‘I thought we said we weren’t having speeches.’ Mrs Bickerton turned coldly to the solicitor.

‘Unfortunately, there are people here today who may think they can’t wejoice with us because they’ve lost a dear one. Well, my message to them is this. Wejoice with the west of us now the whole thing’s over. And wemember that your husbands or fathers, bwothers or sweethearts have all died in a good cause …’

This time the applause was fainter. Mrs Bickerton bit her lip and stared at the mountain. Her face was white as her nurse’s cap.

‘I … I …’ The Brigadier was warming to his theme. ‘I can count myself one of the lucky ones. I was at Vimmy. I was at Wipers. And I was at Passiondale. I witnessed appalling gas-shelling …’

All eyes turned to the five gas victims, who sat lined up on a bench, coughing and wheezing like an exhibition for the horrors of war.

‘Our conditions were absolutely filthy. One went for days without a change of clothes, nay, weeks without so much as a bath. Our casualties, especially among the gunners, were quite dweadful …’

‘I can’t bear it,’ murmured Mrs Bickerton, and shielded her face with her hand.

‘I often think back to the time I was wounded and in hospital. We’d been thwough an absolute bloodbath near
Weemes
. But we happened to have a chap in the wegiment … turned out to be something of a poet. Well, he jotted down a few lines, and I’d like to wepeat them to you. At the time, anyway, they were a gweat comfort to me:

‘
If I should die, think only this of me:

That there’s some corner of a foweign field

That is fowever England
.’

‘Poor Rupert,’ Mrs Bickerton leaned across to her husband. ‘He’d turn in his grave.’

‘Christ, this man’s a bore!’

‘How can we shut him up?’

‘And what of the future for our belovèd country?’ The Brigadier had changed tack. ‘Or should I say our belovèd county? Our cwying need is not just to feed the people of these islands, but to export bloodstock to our partners overseas. Now I have seen Heweford cattle in evewy part of the globe. Indeed, whewever you will find the white man, there you will find the white-faced bweed. I know you must all feel twemendously pwoud of the Lurkenhope Hewefords …’

‘Be damned if they are,’ said the Colonel, reddening.

‘But it’s always been a mystewy to me, why, when one looks wound the countwyside, one sees so many infewior animals. … half-bweeds … diseased … deformed …’

The war-wounded, already in agony from the hard benches, began to look frayed and fidgety.

‘The only way forward is to eliminate second-wate animals for good and all. Now in the Argentine and Austwalia …’

Mrs Bickerton glanced about helplessly; and, in the end, it was Mr Arkwright who saved the day. It was time for the Carnival Procession. Another storm, the colour of black grapes, was brewing over the mountain.

Plucking up courage, he whispered in Lady Vernon-Murray’s ear. She nodded, tugged her husband by the coat-tails and said, ‘Henry! Time’s up!’

‘What, m’dear?’

‘Time’s up!’

So he hurriedly bid his audience adieu, hoped to meet them
all
‘’ere long on the hunting field’, and sat down.

The next item on the agenda was the presentation, by her ladyship, of a silver cigarette-case to ‘each and every man returned from these wars’. Loud acclamations greeted her as she descended the steps. She held out the Bombardier’s, and a clawlike hand shot out from the basket-chair, and grabbed it.

‘Hrrh! Hrrh!’ came the same spongy rattle.

‘Oh, it’s too cruel,’ breathed Mrs Bickerton.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ Mr Arkwright called through the megaphone. ‘We now come to the principal attraction of the afternoon: the judging of the Carnival floats. I give you Number One …’ He consulted his programme. ‘The Lurkenhope Stable Boys, who have chosen as their theme … “The Battle of Om-dur-man”!’

A team of white-fronted shires came into view hauling a hay-waggon, on which was a
tableau-vivant
with Lord Kitchener surrounded by potted palms and half a dozen lads, some with leopard-skins round their tummies, some in underpants, and all smeared head to toe with soot, waving spears or assegais, yelling, or beating a tom-tom.

The spectators yelled back, chucked paper darts, and the Survivor of Rorke’s Drift shook his crutch: ‘Lemme get me mits on ’em Sambos,’ he shrieked, as the cart drew off.

Cart Number Two arrived with ‘Robin Hood and his Merrie Men’. Next came ‘The Dominions’ with Miss Bessel of Frogend as Britannia and, fourthly, ‘The Working Boys’ Pierrot Troupe’.

The boys sang to the accompaniment of a ragtime piano, and when they rhymed the words ‘German sausage’ with ‘abdominal passage’, there was a hushed and horrified silence – except for the cackles of Reggie Bickerton, who laughed and laughed and hardly seemed able to stop. Rosie hid her own sniggers by burying her face in her apron.

Meanwhile, Lewis Jones was edging towards her. He whistled to attract her attention and she stared straight through him, smiling.

The last float but one, showing ‘The Death of Prince Llewellyn’, roused a clique of Welsh Nationalists to song.