The Tale of Briar Bank

by Susan Wittig Albert

  And then, all of a sudden, she wasn’t dismayed at all. If she could not write to her mother, her mother could not write to her. And if the ferry wasn’t working and the steam yacht was shut down and the roads were closed, she could not go back to London, no matter how urgently she was wanted. She would have to stay right here until the snow melted and the ferry was repaired, and if luck was with her, that might be a good long time. That knowledge made her feel incredibly light and easy, as if she had suddenly shed a burden she didn’t know she carried.

  “Right. We’re stranded. But it’s not too bad, if you like snow.” Sarah smoothed her dark hair. Her face was long and narrow, her mouth wide, her nose freckled, and her eyes shone with intelligence and an irrepressible good humor. “I’ve been out and about for the past two hours, battling the snowdrifts and the cold, and I am hungry enough to eat a horse. You handle the eggs and sausage, Bea, and I’ll manage the rest. We’ll have breakfast in a jiffy.”

  Sarah was right. In a very short time, they were sitting down to a nicely laid hot breakfast, with eggs, sausage, buns, marmalade, orange juice, and coffee. Both were famished—Beatrix always felt much hungrier at the farm than she did in London—so they said scarcely a word whilst they ate their breakfast. When they had finished, Beatrix poured them each another cup of coffee with cream, eager to catch up on all the village news.

  “What have I missed in the past month or so?” she asked. “I’ve scarcely heard from anyone. Both you and Dimity have been much too busy to write. Margaret Nash posted a thank-you note for some books I sent to the school, but didn’t include any news. Jeremy Crosfield writes that he’s doing well at school, but he didn’t have any village news. And Mr. Heelis sends me word of the renovations at Castle Farm, but he never sends any gossip.”

  At the mention of Mr. Heelis, Beatrix noticed that Sarah’s cheeks turned pink. She knew that her friend was nurturing a romantic interest in the handsome, well-liked solicitor. She wanted to know more—after all, he had helped her with the purchase of Castle Farm, and was very kind. She hoped for the best for him, and for Sarah, too, of course. Mr. Heelis was very tall and straight, with a shy smile and a look in his eyes that hinted at inward depths; Sarah was lithe and athletic, with an outgoing, friendly directness. It was easy to picture them together, and to think how nicely they complemented one another.

  Beatrix gave an unconscious sigh. She was more than a little envious of Sarah, although she explained this to herself by thinking of Norman—it was Norman she missed. It had been four long years since she had lost him so suddenly, so devastatingly, only a month after their engagement. But she was a deeply loyal person. She tended Norman’s memory like a hearth fire in her heart, warming herself by it, fueling it by rereading his letters to her, and never letting it die down. She owed that to him, and to herself.

  Still, if Beatrix had been able to look just a little deeper into herself at that moment, she might have found someone else in her heart: Mr. Heelis, whom she pictured as one-half of a happy pair, with Sarah Barwick. However, I think it would have been very hard—perhaps impossible—for our Beatrix to acknowledge that what she felt for Mr. Heelis was anything more than friendly affection and gratitude for his help with her property purchase. How could she feel warmly toward another man without being disloyal to Norman, to the good work they had done together, to their hopes and dreams? And how could she feel warmly toward someone her friend Sarah cared for? That, of course, would be equally disloyal. Impossible, on two counts.

  Sarah took a sip of her coffee. “As to news,” she said, “well, there’s Lady Longford’s barn. But that’s new news, since it just burnt this morning, very early.”

  “My goodness!” Beatrix exclaimed. “Did somebody overturn a lantern?”

  “It was the hay barn,” Sarah said. “Mr. Snig was milking in the cow barn, which is a little distance away. He said he saw a fireball, and then it just exploded. But other than that—well, let’s see. Of course you know that Dimity’s expecting.” Their friend Dimity Woodcock had married Major Kittredge of Raven Hall the previous year, and the Kittredges had immediately started their family, so that their adopted Flora would have a playmate. “The baby should be here very soon now.”

  “I’m hoping for a boy,” Beatrix said with genuine pleasure. “Flora needs a little brother.”

  Beatrix was speaking from personal experience, for she remembered her own delight when her brother Bertram was born and she had someone to love and look after. As well, she had a deep personal interest in Flora, the baby who had been left on the Hill Top doorstep. By a stroke of great good luck (or perhaps with the aid of some magic or other—who can tell about such things?), Beatrix had managed to discover the identity of Flora’s mother and obtain her permission so that Dimity and Major Kittredge could adopt the baby.

  But there. I shan’t spoil the story for you. You can read it for yourself in The Tale of Hawthorn House, and be as puzzled as I am (I confess to not quite understanding the whole affair) about the intervention of the mysterious Mrs. Overthewall. She always seemed to be at exactly the right place at exactly the right time to make things happen in exactly the right way. You and I should be so clever.

  Flora was now walking and babbling in her own little-girl language, and Major and Mrs. Kittredge loved her, and each other, very much, and the three were so happy together that only the birth of their expected baby could make them any happier. And even Captain Woodcock—Dimity’s brother, who had at first opposed the match, preferring his friend, Mr. Heelis, as a husband for his sister—had to admit that he had been mistaken when he predicted that Dimity would rue the day she married Major Kittredge.

  There it was again, envy! If Norman had lived and they had been able to marry, Beatrix knew that they would have been every bit as happy as Dimity and her major, and very likely happier. They might have had children, too, or perhaps they would have taken a baby or two to raise as their own. Norman found enormous pleasure in making toys and dollhouses for his nieces and playing games with his nephews. He would have been a wonderful father. And Beatrix would have loved to read her own little books aloud to her own little boys and girls, and hear them laugh at Jemima Puddle-duck and Ginger and Pickles and all the rest.

  But Beatrix did not like to dwell on what could not happen or fret about things she could not change, so she pushed all these thoughts aside. She was determined to find her own happiness, whatever that was. And just now, sitting in the snug, warm room of her very own farmhouse, with the winter snow and the out-of-service ferry keeping the dragons of the world at bay, Beatrix felt that, while she could not be entirely happy, she was certainly contented.

  4

  In Which We Look into Sarah Barwick’s Heart

  Sarah Barwick, sitting on the other side of the table, caught a glimpse of her friend’s contentment and was glad. After all Beatrix had been through, she ought to have some happiness. Sarah stole a glance, admiring the way Bea’s unruly brown hair curled lightly around her forehead, the high color in her cheeks, and the brilliant blue of her eyes. There was something wistful about her look, though, something sad and far-away.

  Well, she would be wistful, wouldn’t she? Sarah thought. Rotten luck, her fiancé up and dying the way he had, just a month after they’d got engaged—although from little things Bea had said from time to time, she guessed that it would have been a while, years probably, before they could be free to marry. Proper dragon, that wretched old mother of hers! Mrs. Potter had better not come to Hill Top Farm, or Sarah would give her a piece of her mind. Not that the old lady would come, of course—she was much too toffy to dirty her dainty London shoes on a real farm. A great pity, too. Beatrix had put her whole heart and soul into this place. She’d made it beautiful and perfect, to Sarah’s way of thinking, cozy and comfortable and everything looking exactly the way it should. And her mother refused to come and see it, the wretched old lady.

  But nothing would be gained by letting on that she was thinking any of this, so
Sarah lit a cigarette and crossed her trouser-clad legs. “I see you’ve brought a pair of pretty little friends with you on this trip.” She nodded toward the two guinea pigs in their cage by the fire—one brown, the other with an astonishingly long black coat, streaked with silver.

  “Did you hear that, Thackie?” Nutmeg, who had been telling Thackeray all about her mother and her brothers and sisters, interrupted her long story with a giggle. “A pair of pretty little friends. La-de-da! I like that!”

  “We are not a pair,” snorted Thackeray. “And I am not pretty. Handsome, if you like. Intellectual. A book lover. But not pretty.” He wished crossly that his companion—if he had to have one—were more intellectual than Nutmeg. Failing that, he wished she would not talk so much. He wished she would not talk at all, actually.

  “They are promised to Caroline Longford,” Beatrix said, getting up to fetch the Queen Victoria ashtray. “I planned to take them to Tidmarsh Manor today, but I doubt that Winston and I could get up the lane.” Winston was the Hill Top pony, responsible for pulling the pony cart wherever it was required. “Tomorrow, I think. P’rhaps we’ll take the sleigh.”

  Sarah chuckled to herself, thinking that it was a good thing Winston hadn’t heard of the possibility of a trip through the snow. He had his own opinions about where to go and when to get there. She’d wager he wouldn’t much like the idea.

  Thackeray didn’t, either. “Snow,” he grumbled. “All that bouncing and bumping on the train yesterday, and now a sleigh. Will there never be an end to it?” He glanced down at the fresh newsprint and brightened a little. “Although I do have something to read, even if it’s only Mr. Churchill’s latest speech in Parliament. I would rather have a book,” he added loudly, directing his remark to Miss Potter. “Gibbon’s The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire would be quite acceptable. All six volumes, preferably.” If he had a favorite book, it was this, partly because he enjoyed the footnotes but chiefly because it was so long that he had never quite got to the end of it. Other books seemed always to end just as he had become properly engaged with them.

  “But don’t you want to meet Tuppenny and Thruppence?” Nutmeg asked. She sincerely hoped that at least one of them would have a positive outlook on life. Thackeray was a dismal fellow. No sense of humor, always going off in a corner to read. What fun was there in a lot of words on paper?

  “Two more fellow cell-mates?” Thackeray replied gloomily. “I think not.” He began looking in his pocket for his reading glasses.

  “Funny little creatures,” Sarah said, getting up and going to the cage. She put her finger through the wire, scratching Thackeray. “It gets a bit lonely at Anvil Cottage,” she said over her shoulder, “and I’ve been wanting a pet. I’m allergic to cats, but I’ve never been around guinea pigs. Maybe they’d be better for me than—OW!” She jerked her finger back. “It bit me!”

  “I’m sorry, Sarah,” Beatrix said contritely. “I hope he didn’t hurt you.”

  “I thought I was scratching his rear end,” Sarah muttered. “I had no idea I was anywhere near his teeth.”

  Beatrix chuckled. “It’s a bit hard to tell which end is which, I’m afraid. And Thackeray is rather antisocial.”

  “I am NOT antisocial,” Thackeray retorted loudly, retreating behind a large cabbage leaf. “I prefer not to be scratched on the nose, that’s all.” He sniffed. “And I’d rather my fur not be singed, thank you very much.” (Before you blame Thackeray, you might try to understand his point of view. I daresay you wouldn’t like it if a giant stranger, some fifteen or twenty feet tall, bent over and scratched you on the nose while you were looking in your pocket for something—especially if she were waving a burning stick that might catch your fur on fire.)

  “It’s just a nip,” Sarah said, nursing her finger. She sat back down at the table. “Not to worry—although perhaps I shan’t have a guinea pig, after all. A fish, maybe. Or a bird. I admire Grace Lythecoe’s canary. Such a cheerful creature, Caruso, always warbling in the window when I walk past.” She picked up her coffee cup, frowning at Thackeray. “Guinea pigs aren’t good for much, I don’t suppose.”

  Thackeray rolled his eyes. “What does she expect us to do?” he groused. “Sing? Fly? Dance on our toes? Pull rabbits out of hats?” He found his glasses, put them on, and retired with Mr. Churchill’s speech, which to his pleasure proved just as full of bombastic language and unintelligible asides as The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire.

  “Speaking of Grace Lythecoe, I hope she’s feeling better,” Beatrix said. “When I was here last, she wasn’t very well.”

  “She’s better,” Sarah replied. “I’m not much for gossip, you know.” She paused, considered the truth of that claim, and added, “Unless it’s really important, that is, in which case it’s not really gossip, in my opinion.” She pulled on her cigarette. “It appears that Grace and the vicar have struck up a special friendship. A romantic one, it’s said. There are a great many opinions on the subject, as you can well imagine.” She shook her head. “It’s rubbish, of course. I wish people wouldn’t be so small-minded. But quite a few don’t approve.”

  “Whyever not?” Beatrix asked, puzzled. She tucked a lock of loose hair behind her ear, thinking that perhaps, next time, she would ask Sarah not to smoke in the house. “I shouldn’t think a romantic friendship would trouble anyone, especially when it’s between two such likable people.”

  “I don’t understand it myself,” Sarah confessed. “Grace is probably the most respected lady in the village, and Vicar Sackett, of course, is beyond reproach. It’s Agnes Llewellyn who seems to have the most against it. She stands at her front window for hours on end, peering across the street, making notes on the vicar’s comings and goings.” She made a face. “You know Agnes. She’s a terrible busybody. But they all are. The whole village. Give them the hint of a romance and they will speculate. Endlessly.”

  As of course they were speculating about herself and Mr. Heelis, Sarah thought with a half-ironic amusement. What a pity there wasn’t anything worth speculating about.

  Which was not Sarah’s fault. Until she met Will Heelis, she was determined not to marry, being of the opinion (and saying so, too, repeatedly) that men on the whole weren’t worth the turmoil and trouble they caused in one’s otherwise well-ordered life. But Mr. Heelis had turned that determination on its ear. Sarah had lost her heart to him months and months ago at a dinner party at Tower Bank House, on the very night that Dimity and Major Kittredge had surprised everybody, especially Dimity’s brother, by announcing their engagement. Mr. Heelis had been quite friendly and attentive, and she had decided on the spot that he would make a perfect husband (which I should have to say is probably pretty accurate, although the perfect husband for whom is the question).

  Sarah always said of herself that she was not one to let the grass grow under her feet. So in this case, she had taken the initiative. She stopped in at the Heelis and Heelis Law Offices to say hello whenever she was in Hawkshead and attended events when she knew he’d be present, like the fairs and country dances. Mr. Heelis was an enthusiastic Morris dancer, quite handsome kitted out in his gay vest, his tie, his sash, and his hat. She loved to stand at the front of the crowd and applaud his performance.

  And Mr. Heelis was interested in her, or so it seemed to our Sarah. He had asked her to be his partner when they had “happened” to meet at one of the dances Sarah had “happened” to attend. When she met him in the village (he was there quite frequently on business, or visiting his friend, Captain Woodcock), she would ask him to step into the bakery and would give him a sticky bun or a scone. Twice, she had encountered him when she was setting out on her delivery rounds, and it was the easiest, most natural thing in the world to invite him, and easy (or so it seemed) for him to say yes.

  And not long ago, Mr. Heelis had even brought her a lovely bunch of wildflowers he’d picked, Michaelmas daisies and buttercups and fall asters. Wouldn’t you think that was an open declaration of a romantic inte
ntion? Sarah certainly did, and had displayed his wildflowers in the bakery window until they wilted, after which she had dried and pasted them in a scrapbook, on a page hopefully encircled with little red hearts, with his initials and hers, intertwined.

  But still he said nothing.

  Sarah, however, was not the kind of person who gave up easily. Mr. Heelis was certainly very shy with women, although he got on quite comfortably with men. And as long as he remained friendly—and hadn’t lost his heart to somebody else—there was hope. The villagers certainly seemed to think so, anyway. Every time Agnes Llewellyn came into the bakery, she’d ask if Mr. Heelis had stopped in lately and give Sarah a look, as if to say, “You don’t fool me for one minute, Sarah Barwick! I know what you’re up to with that good-looking fellow!”

  And of course, Sarah always looked straight back at her, dead in the eye, daring her to come out and say it, right out loud. Which she never did. Agnes Llewellyn always said what she said behind people’s backs, not to their faces. She probably thought that Sarah and Mr. Heelis were definitely up to something, and went straightaway to Elsa Grape or Bertha Stubbs and told them so.

  Beatrix stirred her coffee. “I imagine the villagers are speculating about Castle Farm, too,” she said quietly.

  “Oh, absolutely,” Sarah replied without thinking. “They’re afraid that you’re about to buy up the whole of the village and put everybody right out in the lane, bag and baggage.” The minute the words were out of her mouth, she saw the hurt look on her friend’s face and desperately wished them back.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Beatrix said with a sigh, but she was not terribly surprised. The villagers had never made a secret of their feelings about off-comers. They hated it when she first bought Hill Top Farm, partly because she was a woman (women should not own farms!) but also because she was from London and had no experience with farming. She’d hoped things would change when people got to know her. But whilst the Crooks and the Dowlings and the Stubbses might respect and even like her a little, she knew now that they would never feel as friendly and affectionate toward her as they did toward the other villagers. She would never quite belong, not in the way they did.