The Skeleton in the Grass

by Robert Barnard

  “Oh, you must be Mrs. Battley. I know Mrs. Hallam was very sorry about your dog. She knew how upset you would be. That’s really disgusting, killing an animal like that.”

  “That’s right. They didn’t ought ter ‘ave done that. ‘Tworn’t like as if it were a rabbit, or a stoat. He had no harm in him, that owd dog. But you tell Mrs. Hallam I’m right sorry.”

  In spite of her words Liz Battley seemed to have a stoical lack of indignation: the dog was dead, and that was it. Sarah had a sharp vision of village life in which death stood shoulder to shoulder with life in strange intimacy, in which stoats and rabbits were natural prey and their carcases had a grim familiarity. Suddenly she saw how the village lads had gone over the top into the mud of France and Flanders, to a death that was all but certain, with a dogged acceptance of the inevitable, without thought of resistance or mutiny.

  Both she and Chan were quieter on their way back.

  When, heavy-footed, they came up to the house, they saw that the company had arrived. The familiar tables were set out on the lawn, and Pinner and Mrs. Munday were going backwards and forwards, taking out crockery and goodies. From the deckchairs talk and laughter came, floating across the lawn to them. As she turned and walked with Chan towards the assembled group, Sarah felt no twinge of nervousness, no sense of strangeness, as she had so recently on her first day. She was part of this scene, a member of this company. The vicarage in Derbyshire seemed very far away. She was at home.

  CHAPTER 5

  Towards the end of Chan’s stay the Hallams had a postcard from Will. Sarah was reading a letter from home, in which her mother was worrying over some dizzy spells she had had recently, but she put it aside when Helen began reading Will’s message. He was near Hendaye, where they were setting up a camp for refugees and wounded from Spain. There was a tremendous spirit among the Republican supporters, and if it was enthusiasm that counted, Will said, they couldn’t lose. He would be going to Spain in a week or two’s time, to join up with some foreign volunteers already there, with the pro-governmental forces. He sent his love to all of them—and he showed himself a typical Hallam by including Sarah by name.

  They were quiet for a few minutes after this. Then, as if by mutual consent, they resumed their breakfast and their discussion of neutral topics.

  Elizabeth was still agonizing over whether to “do the Season” next year. Fiona Macauley was putting pressure on her, and really she did think it might be rather fun.

  “Of course, I know you’d rather I didn’t do it,” she said to her parents.

  “There’s no question of us preferring that you didn’t,” said Dennis. “Of course you must do as you want.”

  “Well, you’d rather I didn’t want to do that sort of thing.”

  “Perhaps it’s something you have to get out of your system,” said Helen comfortably.

  “I don’t think Elizabeth realizes the appalling and unsuitable young men she will have to mix with,” said Dennis.

  “It’s the unsuitable young men who are the main attraction,” drawled Elizabeth.

  The topic dissolved in laughter, but Dennis added:

  “Actually you’ll find that most of them are younger versions of Cousin Mostyn.”

  Men, one way or another, were on Sarah’s mind too. She had ascertained that the picture shows at the Willbury Village Hall were on Thursdays and Saturdays, and she had begged Thursday evening off from Helen, should she need it. She looked into the telephone book and got the number of Matchett the baker, and was just about to ring him and leave a message for Roland when she realized that she did not know his surname. Chloe apparently just knew him as Roland, and beyond the fact that he lived next door to the baker’s she knew embarrassingly little about him. Elizabeth would probably know, but Sarah shrank from the girlish confidences that might be expected from her if she asked. Oliver certainly knew, but to ask him was out of the question. Mrs. Munday always knew everything that was to be known about the characters and doings in the villages, though how she found out when she seemed to be on her feet and bustling around at Hallam from morn to night Sarah did not know. But she was a frightful gossip, and Sarah shrank from providing her with material for conjecture.

  In the end she just picked up the phone and managed as best she could.

  “Oh, I’m sorry to bother you, but I believe you’re willing to take messages for next door . . . For Roland.”

  “Oh yes, miss. Mrs. Bradberry will be in later. Can I give it to her then?”

  “Yes . . . Yes, I’m sure that will be all right. Could you say that Sarah says she can be free on Thursday evening?”

  By the afternoon the whole thing had been arranged.

  Before she had her night out, Sergeant South had paid another visit to the house, and had brought the Hallams up to date with his inquiries.

  “I’ve got as far as I can go with the boys,” he said, sitting rather gingerly on the chintz sofa in the sitting-room, which was in panelled oak and apparently taken over by books, which stretched up the walls and littered all the table-tops and most of the chairs. Sergeant South approved of the panelled oak, but he didn’t see how even a literary gentleman like Dennis Hallam could possibly have read all those books. “Short of actually finding the culprit, which I don’t think at the moment I’m going to do, I’ve done all I can. Luckily there’s a number of young men, as we said, who’ve been subject to the Major’s influence and have come out—what’s the word I want?—”

  “Unscathed?”

  “That’s it. Or rather like going down with the measles and coming through, and never likely to have it again. To these chaps the Major’s something of a figure of fun. On the other hand, there’s a sort of clannishness . . .”

  “We know, we know,” said Dennis.

  “And that means that those who’ve gone through that stage don’t feel inclined to split on those lads who are still going through it. Still, I’m pretty sure I know the leaders in the Major’s little pack now, and I’ll be keeping an eye on them.”

  “Who are they?”

  The sergeant hesitated.

  “Well, I’d say Christopher Keene, Bertie Marsh and Jim Fallow. It’s them I’ve had a word with. Separately. Told them they’re being watched, and that the moment they step out of line I’ll be down on them like a ton of bricks.”

  “Why?” Dennis’s voice was tired, disappointed. “Why do you think they should do this to us?”

  Sergeant South seemed puzzled how to reply. He was not always good on the whys of village life.

  “They’re three very different boys,” he said hesitantly. “So I think there’s a different answer in each case. A bit of fun in the one instance. Under influence in the second. Rebelliousness in the third.”

  “And do you think your ‘word’ with them will do any good?” asked Helen.

  “I don’t know,” admitted South. “Ten years, five years ago, it would’ve, no question. Somehow there’s not the same respect any longer. The villages have gone the way of the towns. There’s a new spirit, a spark—which is not all bad—”

  “No, no,” put in Dennis.

  “—but still it means I can’t rely on my telling-off having the effect it once had. We’ll hope that, combined with the feeling that I’ve got my eye on them, it will make them watch their step.” He stood up. “You can be sure I’ll keep it very much in mind—and the whole situation with the Major.”

  “You haven’t spoken to him?” Dennis asked, following him to the door.

  “No. I’m going to, that’s for sure. But I want an occasion when I’ve got him at a bit of a disadvantage, when I’ve got something on him that I can bring up, if necessary. I want to catch him on the hop.”

  “That sounds very sensible.”

  Sarah, who was crossing the landing from her bedroom to the schoolroom, saw what happened next through the deep oaken well of the staircase. On the table by the sitting-room door Pinner had put a silver tray with the mid-morning post on it. Absently, still pay
ing farewell courtesies to Sergeant South, Dennis picked up a light blue envelope. It seemed to be of a somewhat superior brand: inside it was lined with dark blue paper, on which had been stuck a large white feather which stood out against the sombre background. Dennis gazed at it for a second or two.

  “Too absurd,” he said, handing it to Sergeant South. “But I suppose it means the campaign goes on.”

  South took the envelope gingerly by its edges. Silently, almost sheepishly, he went through the door, and got on the bicycle which he had left against the wall of the house.

  The whole business, Sarah decided, as she went through her day, was silly rather than anything more menacing. The Hallams had said nothing to other household members about the feather, and they were right to say nothing. Of course they had had to call in Sergeant South about the dead dog, so Dennis had had to show him this new manifestation. But as far as the others were concerned it was better to meet these lesser persecutions with a dignified silence. Whoever it was would soon get tired and go on to find their amusement elsewhere. She didn’t intend to let it interfere with her enjoyment of the cinema show.

  Which, Mrs. Munday informed her with the relish of a connoisseur, would be a great treat. It was Grand Hotel with Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, and a host of lesser stars. It was by now three or four years old, but excitement in the villages was none the less intense. Mrs. Munday herself would be going to the Saturday showing, with her sister, and they intended buying a box of chocolates to make the occasion complete. Chocolates, Sarah gathered, were a treat that both Garbo and Crawford warranted, even separately. They would not have been indulged in for, say, “that Bette Davis,” or Katharine Hepburn.

  Roland and Sarah had arranged to meet at the crossroads in Chowton, and walk the two and a half miles to Willbury. They would not be the only ones doing so, not by a long chalk, Roland had said over the phone. So when they met by the signpost they were in a small way part of a village celebration, though they were also conscious of being watched. It gave Sarah quiet satisfaction that she was wearing the summer frock that was the nearest approach to prettiness in her whole wardrobe. She thought Roland looked rather handsome too, and unmistakably intelligent. His sports jacket and flannels sat well on his tough frame. They dawdled a little on the way there, because Roland was a friend of the projectionist (who was the son of the Willbury garage owner), and he was going to save them two good seats. Nobody quarrelled with the prerogatives of the projectionist. Sarah and Roland talked about the villages, about their plans for the future, and the political scene. Would Mr. Baldwin retire soon, and would it make any difference if he did? Sarah deliberately said nothing about the Hallams and the spate of persecution they were being subjected to.

  The atmosphere in the Willbury Village Hall was warm—indeed it was more than an atmosphere, closer to a smell: it seemed compounded of well-worn clothes, sweat, potato crisps, with a distinct tang of the stable. It was a smell Sarah recognized from her Derbyshire upbringing. The audience shouted to each other, exchanged news and banter, and above all expressed anticipation for the evening’s entertainment. It was an anticipation Sarah shared, without condescension or detachment: she had seen Garbo only twice before, and never in a speaking part, and she had heard that Joan Crawford was a very powerful actress. They took their seats feeling rather like royalty at a gala.

  The warm-up film was a Laurel and Hardy. Performers and audience were made for each other, and the hall rocked with an uncomplicated laughter. It was quite short, because Grand Hotel was longer than usual. There was a break between films, but Roland said they shouldn’t go out.

  “We’ll get an ice-cream when it breaks down.”

  “But it may not break down tonight.”

  Roland winked at her and smiled. Of course it would break down, Sarah realized. It would because the audience preferred it to break down—liked to stretch their legs, discuss performances, speculate on the story line. And of course when it did the sweet shop and general store next door would find itself open, and do a good trade keeping the audience fed and happy for the second half. Sarah should have realized. She knew village life.

  When it did break down, about half an hour into the film, when all the various characters and plot-strands converging on the Grand Hotel had been presented and intertwined, Sarah and Roland got up with a feeling of satisfaction and went out into the twilight along with the rest, or most of them—for some few of the very poorest stayed in their seats, their meagre resources having run out with the price of the ticket. The fresh air was nice, and Sarah had an ice-cream, and Roland had a cup of strange coffee—gritty, percolated with milk—which he said he liked. Everyone was very jolly, and very involved with the story. Sarah had realized during the first part of the film that she had read a few chapters of the book three or four years before, but that it had been called in by the local library, to be sent down an impatient waiting list. So she could join the rest in uninhibited speculation about motives and mysteries, involvements and fates.

  “See you got a new girl, Roly.”

  The voice was overloud, and Sarah turned, not best pleased. The speaker was a teenage boy. His thin body was clad in rather dirty work trousers and pullover, and his head was too big for it. The expression on his face seemed to combine vacancy with cunning. He was of the village type that was usually said to be “not all there,” though that expression of cunning and—what was it?—relish made Sarah think that appearances might be deceptive.

  “That’s right, Barry,” said Roland—calm, kindly.

  “You be the new girl up at the big house, that right?” Barry asked, turning those large, distant eyes on Sarah. The least she could do, she felt, was be as kind as Roland.

  “Yes. I look after the little girl, Chloe.”

  “That right? . . . She be a pretty little thing, that one . . .” Barry thought, and then he fixed Sarah with a look that she found unnerving because the distant expression had now gone, and been replaced by a concentrated expression of enjoyment, of that relish she had noted. He said with a horrible chuckle: “I hear old man Hallam can’t stand the sight o’ blood, that right?”

  “Here, what do you mean—‘Old man Hallam’?” said a woman’s voice, from the back of the little knot of audience members. Sarah was glad of the intervention, because she had not been sure what to say. “You keep a civil tongue in your head, Barry, when you’re speaking to the young lady.”

  “That right, though?” persisted Barry.

  “There’s a lot of people can’t stand the sight of blood,” said Sarah carefully. “It’s very common.”

  “Wouldn’t be no good on a farm, though, would he? Wouldn’t be able to shoot no rabbits. Not if he goes sick at the sight of a dead dog.”

  “That’s enough o’ that,” said the woman’s voice, and Sarah recognized Liz Battley, who now came up and put herself between them. “I don’t want to hear no more about my owd dog, and I don’t want to hear no more spite agin the Hallams.” She lowered her voice. “He don’t mean no harm, miss, but he’s only ten shillings in the pound, and he’s got no respect at all.”

  Sarah smiled her thanks, and nodded. She said she hoped Mrs. Battley had got a new dog, and Mrs. Battley said she’d wait and see what bitches produced. A bell rang inside the hall, and Roland took her arm to lead her back.

  Behind her she could hear that overloud voice, with its note of gloating, saying: “He do throw up, just for a bit of blood.”

  “What’s his name?” whispered Sarah.

  “Barry Noaks,” said Roland, in a low, troubled voice. “I don’t think there’s any harm in the lad.” Sarah kept a tactful silence.

  When the film resumed she forgot about the incident, and immersed herself in the tangled drama. Films were still a treat and a novelty to her, and she had no difficulty involving herself on a surface level. Decades later, as an old woman, she saw the film on afternoon television, and the suffocating smell of the Willbury Village Hall came back to her. She thought then how
like the film was to the soap operas to which she was devoted, and on which she meditated an article for New Society. At the time she saw it first there was no such thing as soap opera. She murmured to Roland: “It’s rather like South Riding—all these different plots going in and out of each other.” But South Riding was still quite new—Sarah had pounced on the copy at Hallam—and Roland hadn’t read it.

  And then suddenly, when all the rest of the audience were silent, hushed by some moment of drama or pathos on the screen, something in Sarah’s mind posed the question: “How did he know?”

  How did Barry Noaks know that Dennis had retched helplessly at the sight of the dog’s blood? She had told nobody. Chan certainly would not have told anybody, because he had less than no contact with the villagers. It wasn’t something Oliver would have gossiped about, and she doubted whether the Hallams had even mentioned the fact to Sergeant South. Dennis had brought nothing up, so there had been nothing for Pinner or Mrs. Munday to clean up.

  The inference was obvious. Somebody had been watching. Barry possibly, or more likely the boy who had hung the dog on the door. Perhaps they were one and the same person. She could see Barry slaughtering the dog, but she couldn’t imagine him as a member of Major Coffey’s circle. The Major was interested in an altogether smarter sort of boy—and perhaps, she wondered, blushing, in a very much better-looking sort too?

  But somebody had been watching, and had talked. By now that silly, insignificant fact was all round the village.

  It unsettled her for the rest of the film show. If she had been asked how the film ended, she wouldn’t have been able to tell. She came to consciousness as the music swelled and somebody put the lights on.

  “That was lovely,” she said to Roland. He grinned.

  “Marvellous tosh,” he said.

  On the way home they talked about the film, and about the villagers’ reactions to it. “So direct,” said Roland. “You’d never get anything so warm and spontaneous at Oxford.” Sarah was hesitant about bringing up what was really in her mind. Roland was somebody whom she trusted, but really hardly knew. Also, she had no wish to make an issue or a talking point out of such a silly little matter. Her instinct was to let it die. However, eventually, as they were approaching Hallam, she said: