Harbinger of Spring

by Hilda Pressley

  ‘I am trying to apologize. I admit it’s all my fault and I’ll pay for any damage I’ve done.’

  ‘My dear girl, beyond bumping my dinghy rather heavily and nearly knocking a valuable camera out of my hands you’ve done me no harm. It’s the way you navigate that I object to. Heaven only knows what would have happened if you’d been going any faster!’

  ‘But I wasn’t, was I? I’ll repeat that I’m sorry and just back away from you.’

  She turned with the intention of clambering over the seat to re-start the outboard engine and saw it was tilted at a most unusual angle. Then, before she could express her dismay, a strong brown hand reached out, tugged at something and the engine dropped to its usual position. Scarlet now with embarrassment, she stepped over the seat into the stem, but his voice came from behind her in a commanding tone.

  ‘Wait. Hold tight.’

  Instinctively she obeyed and the next moment the launch rocked and swayed before going stern-first half way across the river.

  Sara turned to shout her thanks, but he was out of the dinghy, his back half turned to her and standing in reeds almost up to his shoulders, a camera at eye level.

  She started the engine, went back to the driving position and headed for the boatyard feeling rather miserable. How could she have been such a fool as to not watch where she was going? There must be some damage to her own small craft, and now after all Ted’s kindness to her, she would have to admit that he had misplaced his trust in her. The man whose dinghy she had crashed into had every right to be angry, and it was a wonder he had not said more.

  She reached the boatyard in about twenty minutes and saw a youth working on the quay. He glanced in her direction, then came towards her to take her mooring line.

  ‘‘Morning, Miss Seymour. Everything all right?’

  ‘Is Mr. Barker in his office?’

  ‘Ted? No, he’s gone to see about a bulldozer for you.’

  ‘Then I’d better tell you. I’ve had a collision.’ She detailed the rest in a rush of words.

  He stood back a little way, then laughed. ‘The only thing I can see is mud on your bows. However, if you’ll step ashore, I’ll pull her on the slipway and have a proper look.’

  Sara did as she was asked and the youth hauled the boat half way out of the water then mopped the mud off the bows.

  ‘There you are, miss. Not even a scratch.’

  ‘That’s a relief; But what happened when the engine tilted up?’

  ‘It’s on a spring catch. See? It tilts up if anything underwater fouls it.’

  ‘I must seem an awful fool to you, er—’

  ‘Peter. Not at all. You should watch some of the day-trippers in the busy season.’

  ‘Well, thank you, Peter. I think I’ll go back to the Mill now and make myself a strong cup of coffee.’

  ‘And thank you, miss. A lot of people who have an accident don’t even mention it—which can make it very hard for us.’

  Sara made her way back up river to the house, thinking inevitably of her encounter with the man whose dinghy she had knocked into. Didn’t he have a job to do? It was the wrong time of year for a holiday on the river, surely? She passed the spot where she had encountered him, but there was now no sign of him. Then as she conjured up a vision of him in her mind’s eye, she gave an exclamation. Of course! Waders, grey duffle coat, floppy waterproof hat—it was the same man she had seen thrusting his way through the undergrowth. The man was beginning to intrigue her.

  CHAPTER II

  Sara had just got a coffee percolator bubbling gently when the telephone rang. As she expected it was her father.

  ‘This is the second time this morning I’ve tried to reach you,’ he began.

  ‘I was out on the river, Father.’

  ‘Hardly the time of year for boating.’

  ‘At the present moment a boat is the only way of getting to and from the Mill.’

  ‘You’d better tell me all about it. Mrs. Worthing gave me some sort of an account.’

  ‘Well, first it’s a simply wonderful old house with beautiful furniture, and there’s a giant of a windmill attached which I haven’t been into yet.’

  She went on, giving a very detailed description, then her father asked for particulars of the will and she could imagine him making the little notes he always made when anything he thought important was being discussed. Then he made a comment.

  ‘The property being entailed is a nuisance to you.’

  ‘Not very much. I’ve practically decided to lease it as soon as the formalities are settled.’

  ‘Yes, I suppose you can’t very well live in it on your own. If you were married—’

  ‘And if my husband could leave whatever business he had and would lead a life of retirement—’

  ‘H’m. I was thinking the pair of you might turn it into a superior kind of guesthouse—build a few more rooms on or something.’

  Sara laughed. ‘What a wild idea, particularly as there isn’t a pair of us. Anyway, I just don’t see myself living a country life. As a matter of fact I’ve been wondering what on earth I’m going to do with myself while I am here.’

  ‘Oh, you’ll find some way of passing the time. Begin by planning what you’ll do with the income from the place once it starts coming in.’

  ‘Well, Des did say we could expand the business if we had more capital.’

  ‘That fellow! He would have an idea like that.’

  ‘He’s been a good business partner to me.’

  ‘Of course he has. With your money. Look—I never pry into your affairs, but I’d be a fool if I didn’t realize that you found nearly three-quarters of the capital. If you want to expand in that ghastly business, do it on your own.’

  ‘But Des does have the business head—the knowhow.’

  ‘Stuff and nonsense. He’d be nowhere without your flair for dress-designing. You’ve more brains in your little finger than he has in the whole of his body.’

  ‘Father—’ Sara’s voice rose in a note of warning.

  ‘All right, I’ll say no more about him. Look, I can’t get away from London this weekend, but I’ll come on the following Saturday and stay until Monday morning.’

  ‘Lovely. You shall have the fourposter bed. ‘Bye now.’

  She made her coffee and took it along with biscuits and cheese into the sitting room. One of its windows looked on to the bad: garden which was somewhat of a wilderness, the distant view cut off by dense scrub and weeds. There were, however, brick paths and what must have once been a tidy lawn with a fountain in the centre. With the cold winter sunshine flooding over it, it was a very pleasant prospect.

  She drank her coffee in a leisurely way, then became aware of the sound of distant machinery at work. She listened for a moment or two, then remembered that Ted had gone somewhere to see about a bulldozer. Curious to see if this was the machine, she ran up the stairs, but could see nothing of it—in fact nothing much beyond her garden except spindly-looking trees. Then she thought of the mill tower. She had not been inside that yet. She took the key from a hook in the kitchen and went out of the back door. The lock on the mill door was stiff to turn, but the door itself swung easily enough. Her torch flashed on and a little to her surprise she saw a light switch. As she pressed it a solitary bulb glowed brightly. She did not know what she expected to see but was nevertheless surprised to see a vast room swept clear except for a few cobwebs. There were very stout wooden steps and she went up them. Here, another light made her look curiously at the huge grinding stones and at the thick steel shaft rising vertically to the floor above her. There were more wooden steps. She climbed them and stood in a smaller room, shafts of daylight streaming in through two small windows. A small door was set in the circular wall and she unbolted it and let in a keen wind. Outside was a little wooden platform, and after a moment of hesitation she stepped gingerly on to it, grasping at the handrail firmly to ward off a slight feeling of dizziness. She looked up and saw she was just below t
he timber-constructed cupola of the mill. Then her eyes ranged the distant view and she could see the line of the roadway very plainly. About half a mile away a bulldozer thrust its scraper blade into scrubby growth. She watched it back away, then come forward for another thrust. She smiled. How ignorant Ted must have thought her when she talked of ploughing her way through with a car!

  Sara watched the machine at work for a few minutes longer, thinking what an extraordinary amount of trust there was between people in this part of the world. Whoever was operating the bulldozer had not come to her to make any contract for the job, or to ask for any payment in advance. Ted had told him she wanted the work doing and that was that.

  The cold wind was beginning to nip at her face and she was about to come in off the platform when she noticed a slender tree about a hundred yards away shake its branches vigorously. Then she saw the cause of the commotion. The man whose dinghy she had crashed into had climbed the trunk and was stretching precariously along a branch which bent under his weight. She watched with some amusement as he attempted to point his camera, then gave a cry of alarm as he pitched to the ground about twenty feet below.

  For about half a minute Sara waited to see him get to his feet, then as there was no sign of him she raced down the two flights of steps and out of the mill. At the end of the garden she was almost halted by a thick growth of brier, but she jumped and plunged through it, hardly noticing the thorns tearing at her hands and catching at her clothing, or the dead bracken and humps of long, coarse grass that sought to trip her. There was a nagging thought at the back of her mind that before she began her run she ought to have telephoned for the police and an ambulance. The man could have serious injuries.

  But having gone so far she sped on until she was sure she had reached the right tree. Indeed, although there was no sign of the man there was trampled grass all around.

  Relieved, but still slightly apprehensive, she ran along an obviously newly-made track and came to a single wire fence. The track continued for a few yards beyond the fence and ended at a narrow stream of water. A moment later, above tall reeds she saw the head and shoulders of the man, and from the way he used an oar with both hands he was evidently punting his dinghy along the stream.

  Sara turned, distinctly annoyed. The man was entirely unhurt, while she—Now the various scratches she had received began to make themselves felt. There were several on her hands and arms and one on her cheek which burned like fire. She also discovered a large tear in her new slacks. She made her way back to the Mill, taking twice as long as she did in running from it, but still getting more scratches from unseen briars. She locked the Mill again and went into the house. When she looked at herself in the bathroom mirror she was shocked at the sight. As well as the long, ragged scratch on her cheek her face was dirty and her hair looked as if it had been neither brushed nor combed for a week.

  She could have spared herself the trouble, she fumed. The man was becoming a positive menace! Who did he think he was—crashing around her property, climbing trees and sneaking around at all hours of the day and night? The next time she saw him she would order him off.

  She washed her hands and face, wincing a little at the sting of the water on the raw scratches. Then she changed into a frock which was stylish and very suitable for sitting around the house but quite ridiculous for any kind of country or river activity. Still, ridiculous or not, she had to buy another pair of slacks and she needed an ointment of some kind for her hurts. Another visit to Wroxham was indicated.

  There appeared to be no one about when she reached the boatyard, so she moored the launch in the way she had been shown and went in search of Peter. He got the keys of the car for her and grinned when he saw the scratch on her face.

  ‘Did you run up against a thorn bush, Miss Seymour?’

  ‘A briar, Peter, and a very sharp one.’

  Coming close to Wroxham she thought she might just as well journey on to Norwich. It was only another seven miles and the large shops might be more interesting. She parked fairly close to the four-square castle high on its giant mound and after an enquiry found her way to the shopping centre and a suitable restaurant for lunch. As in Wroxham she found the shops she wanted conveniently close together and was intrigued by the colourful market square with its gaily striped awnings in shades of blue, yellow, pink, red and so on. No student of history, she could not but feel that almost every public building was part of a great past. Yet there was no doubt that, judging from the bustle of activity around her, the city also had a great future. This definitely was not a city of dreaming spires, but one that thrived and yet preserved its character.

  Tired of shop window gazing, Sara found a quiet cafe for a cup of tea. As she drank it and looked at the street map she had bought she felt thoroughly relaxed. She spent a little time studying the one-way streets of the city so that she would not be trapped into taking a wrong direction. Then she had a look at the glossary of places of interest on the back of the map and was surprised at the number of them. Historic churches seemed as numerous as trees in a forest and craft museums hardly less so. She looked at her watch and decided she had ample time to see one or two places before leaving the city, and picked on the Cathedral and a building with the odd name of the Samson and Hercules, both being in the open space called Tombland.

  With a good memory for maps, Sara easily found her way to Tombland. The two gigantic and well-muscled figures guarding the entrance to what was now a large dance hall intrigued her, but the cold wind blowing across the open space made her cross quickly through the traffic and enter the Cathedral precincts. There in the shelter of the high walls she paused to look up at the slender spire, thinking as she did so that this was something she had never done in London. She could have directed anyone to most of its numerous historic buildings, in fact she prided herself on knowing London very well, yet she never stopped to look at anything. The Tower, St Paul’s Cathedral, Westminster Abbey, the Houses of Parliament—they were just places you passed on the way to somewhere else.

  She entered the Cathedral itself and was almost immediately halted by a large mirror placed at such an angle that it reflected the wonderfully constructed roof. She moved on slowly, looking at carved stone and woodwork, thinking for the first time in her life about the infinite patience of the men who had slowly chiselled to such perfection.

  Sara spent so much time in the Cathedral that it was almost five o’clock when she emerged and the traffic which had been moving freely through the street was now reduced to a peak-hour crawl. She hurried to the car park and joined the stream of traffic. She was not exactly anxious, but would have liked to have been near the boatyard by now as she had made no arrangement for having the car out after normal working hours.

  Five minutes later she realized it was likely to be turned half-past five before she was clear of Norwich and her conscience about keeping Ted or one of his employees waiting for her return began to trouble her. She saw a telephone box where the road was fairly wide and stopped beside it.

  Within a few seconds she was speaking to Ted.

  ‘Ted, I’m terribly sorry. I’m going to be a bit late. I’m just leaving Norwich. I’m afraid I spent too much time sight-seeing.’

  ‘That’s all right, Sara. So long as I know you’ll be back at the yard before dark. We don’t have any lights about, see.’

  ‘Oh, I won’t be more than half an hour at the worst. Have I kept you waiting?’

  ‘I was just beginning to look at the clock and wonder about you,’ he said mildly.

  ‘I am really sorry. I promise it won’t happen again.’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t want you to think you were some kind of prisoner. In any case the road to the Mill will be open in a few days’ time.’

  ‘Will it? That’s good. Then I’ll see about getting my own car and stop being a nuisance to you.’

  ‘You’re not that at all. Just take care of yourself.’

  ‘I will. Thank you again.’

  Sar
a edged her way carefully back into the slowly moving traffic and in about a quarter of an hour she was free of the city and making a good pace towards Wroxham. The humpbacked bridge over the river there caused another slight delay and she noticed that the sky had become heavily overcast. Still, it was only six o’clock and she had only a few more miles to go now, so she should be home well before dark.

  As she came to the open road beyond Wroxham she noticed that the steering seemed heavier, but thought little about it until on a left-hand curve she came dangerously close to the grass verge. She gave the appropriate signal and stopped. When she got out of the car she found her worst fears justified. The nearside front tyre was very soft. Stooping beside it, she heard the hiss of escaping air and a brief examination of the tyre showed her the head of a very large nail. Now she blessed the fact that she had once attended evening classes in elementary motor-car repairs.

  Opening the boot, she hauled out the spare wheel, then the jack and wheel key. She checked the hand-brake, then put the jack in position and gave it just enough lift to make sure it was steady. Next she prised off the chrome-plated wheel disc and placed it upside down ready to receive the wheel nuts as she took them off. So far everything was ‘by the book ‘and she could expect to complete the job in about fifteen minutes. The next thing was partly to slacken the wheel nuts before jacking it off the ground.

  Sara put the key on the uppermost nut and pulled with all her strength, but the nut did not move. However, she had been warned about wheel nuts possibly tightened with garage equipment and tried a manoeuvre which called for some agility. She held the end of the key with her right hand and contorted herself to get her left foot to bear down on the key. Then she pushed hard with her foot. Exactly what happened she did not know, but suddenly the key shot into the long grass of the verge. Sara gave an impatient exclamation and went to where she thought the key had landed. She trod about for a few seconds, then took another step forward and only just stopped herself from slipping into a ditch.