Miss Seeton Quilts the Village

by Hamilton Crane

  Nowhere Lane. Miss Seeton smiled. Plummergen—always so fond of a joke...

  “Miss Seeton, how splendid to see you! How are you?” Once again an old friend had greeted her return with what sounded like relief. The vicar’s sister was on her way to the shops, having given her brother the early lunch she had organised so that he might the sooner be despatched on his home visit duties. “And be sure not to forget little Anne Knight—Ranger, I mean—and her baby now she’s staying with her parents at the nursing home,” she had warned as the vicar searched for the hat he was sure he’d left on the hall chest.

  The Reverend Arthur Treeves had stared. “Nursing?” He was alarmed by visions of milky embarrassment. “I had no idea—that is to say, is she—is it—he—are they ill?” He ran an unhappy finger round the inside of his clerical collar.

  Molly Treeves sighed. “Arthur, you know that it was difficult, but even you can hardly call her ill. Childbirth is a perfectly natural experience and Anne has been a nurse. Both she and the baby are doing very well now. They’re only staying with her parents because Bob is apparently snowed under at work—some very important case—and it seemed better for her to be out of his way somewhere she can be sure of regular care, rather than the odd hours they sometimes work at Scotland Yard, and Bob is never there when she needs him.”

  The Reverend Arthur caught at her final words. “Bob Ranger? He’s not there? But they were married only a short while ago. I performed the ceremony myself, and thought them ideally suited. If he has indeed left her, so soon, and with a small baby, this is very sad news. I will be sure to visit and commiserate with her, although—”

  “Nonsense, Arthur! Bob is a working policeman. His wife and baby simply need some cosseting—and what he needs is not to worry.” Molly saw his unhappy look, and softened as she handed him his hat from the peg behind the door. “You might like to ask about the christening, although I gather they haven’t yet made up their minds, so you mustn’t be too disappointed. The legal period for registering a birth is six weeks, so they can wait a little longer before anything has to be arranged...”

  Bumping into Miss Seeton had come as a welcome change from her brother’s muddled conversation. Molly Treeves was delighted to see her. “And I see you’ve been sketching—Lady Colveden phoned and told me you’d agreed. We are most grateful. May I look?”

  “I haven’t exactly begun yet, I fear. Such a lovely day—I thought the church bells first, but then I planned to take a look at Summerset Cottage, having heard so much about it from Lady Colveden.”

  Molly nodded. “Which comes as no surprise—but there, it’s an ill wind. While Louise continues at the Hall, there’s no excuse not to have a Colveden panel for the map. And she can teach the technique to others—yourself, perhaps, to make a representation of Sweetbriars.” Miss Seeton looked startled. Molly ignored her. “She is such an obliging girl, like Miss Maynard, who has worked so hard to organise the children. Mr. Jessyp used a whole block of squared paper to work it all out before they began to paint it.”

  Miss Seeton smiled. “Lady Colveden told me that Nigel offered some of the farm tarpaulins for the base, if that is the correct term, but Miss Armitage insisted on linen.”

  “A special order from Welsted’s,” said Miss Treeves. “Mixed media, Miss Armitage called it. Once the foundation has been painted, we will start to sew on the houses as they are finished. But if you don’t have the time to sew, with all your sketching—which is very kind of you—then I know Miss Wicks would oblige. She has almost completed her cottage, and is working on her history panel at the same time.”

  “There is so much history,” said Miss Seeton. “And some, so dramatic. Viking raids, the Peasants’ Revolt, the great storm in the thirteenth century that changed the course of the river...” Out of deference to Louise she ignored the French burning in 1380 of the whole of Plummergen, and much of its church, dramatic though this had been. Not for nothing did Miss Seeton belong to the local library, and that noted historian Martin Jessyp was always happy to lend further reading, should she ask. Miss Seeton could be trusted to keep her hands clean and never to break the spines of his books, or turn down the corners of the pages to mark her place. Since becoming resident in Plummergen she had learned much about her new home, and was always happy to learn more when she could.

  “Some silly people,” said Miss Treeves, “take it amiss that others are so much more skilled with a needle than they are.” She knew Miss Seeton had far too much sense to be of this number. “They’re afraid the better ones will sew their houses for them without asking, and that we’ll agree. We’ve tried to explain it’s for everyone. With Miss Maynard painting with the children that ought to prove it’s a project for the whole village rather than a select few, but you know what they can be like...”

  But of course, as Molly Treeves recognised, this was what Miss Seeton did not know. Miss Seeton, as a true English gentlewoman, did not interfere with, or become too closely involved in, the doings of her neighbours and even—perhaps, especially—of her friends. As she valued her own privacy, so must they (she was sure) value theirs.

  Miss Treeves rather envied Miss Seeton.

  Chapter Six

  NOWHERE LANE WAS Plummergen’s little joke. Before the Royal Military Canal was dug in 1804, the lane had been the main road from the village across the Marsh to Romney. The Corsican Tyrant never came, but the canal proved of undoubted benefit to the area, helping to drain the low-lying land nearby where mosquitoes had flourished, bringing the dreaded three-day ague Kipling called the Bailiff of the Marshes, who “rode up and down as free as the fog” for many centuries. When the new canal blocked the old way, the road dwindled into a lane that led nowhere in particular except a farm or two tucked away beyond the churchyard and a few quiet houses, Summerset Cottage being one.

  Hardly quiet now. Miss Seeton had said goodbye to Miss Treeves, and set off with her sketchbook along Nowhere Lane. In the distance she heard a thudding, low-pitched grumble Miss Treeves had warned was the petrol generator used by the builders because Mr. Hickbody the electrician told Grimes & Salisbury that the wiring wasn’t safe.

  “Griselda Saxon,” said Miss Treeves, “never let anyone in there, not even Lady Colveden, and the Brattles had to do as they were told or face the sack. They had nothing but oil-lamps and candles by the end, poor things.”

  “Picturesque,” said Miss Seeton doubtfully, “but hazardous, one would have thought, for elderly persons.”

  Miss Treeves, eloquently, said nothing. Miss Seeton thanked her for the warning, and headed to Summerset Cottage. The sky was blue, the sun was bright. Had she only worn earplugs, she thought as the generator grew louder, it would have been a perfect setting. Except that now she could feel vibrations pulsing up through the soles of her shoes. She wondered how far they travelled. Did they reach as far as the vicarage? She supposed they must, or Miss Treeves would not have sounded so...frippy.

  In the lane she hesitated. Her hearing was excellent, and she wished it to remain so. The smell of petrol did not disturb her unduly: to one accustomed to oil paints, for which the brushes must be thoroughly cleaned, such fumes were tolerable even if one personally disliked them. But this unpleasant noise...Perhaps she should come back another—

  The generator shuddered, emitting a shower of sparks and a very loud bang. Miss Seeton, clapping her hands to her ears, dropped her sketchbook and umbrella. From inside the cottage came another bang. The generator stopped generating—dust and smoke and curses erupted from the open windows—and Miss Seeton, her head in a whirl and her ears ringing with such intensity she missed every blasphemous syllable, decided that another day would simply have to do.

  She wondered what had caused this tumult and shouting. A gentlewoman does not display undue curiosity. Something mechanical, no doubt; she herself possessed no mechanical expertise. Quickly realising that the curses—if curses they were—continued with fluency but no accompanying screams or cries for help, she stooped—y
oga, such a help to one’s balance when one’s ears still rang—and gathered up her scattered belongings, then headed back down the lane.

  In her sitting room, she hesitated. She supposed she should really start work on her sketches from the Legends and History List, but...There would be other sunny days when she could return to Summerset Cottage. Or she might try what she could do from memory. The trained eye of an artist, even so mediocre an artist as herself, ought surely to be able to summon an image of what she had seen only a few minutes earlier...

  Miss Seeton sat quietly, eyes half-closed, hands resting lightly on the table in front of her. She concentrated.

  Miss Seeton sat up, opened her eyes, seized her pencil and opened her sketchbook. Her fingers flew.

  Miss Seeton gasped. There before her was Summerset Cottage—recognisably Summerset Cottage—but the house was dwarfed beneath a swirl of thick black cloud that filled and overshadowed the rest of the page. Jagged flashes and showers of sparks pierced the cloud, and they came from—Miss Seeton gasped again—they surrounded and glorified the unmistakeable figure of...of his satanic majesty. The devil.

  “Oh, no,” said Miss Seeton. One was not, of course, superstitious in serious matters. The tossing over one’s shoulder of a spilled pinch of salt, a greeting to the first magpie of the day: harmless practices, even amusing. But this. One did not lightly concern oneself with...Satan. As with witchcraft—that nonsense a few years ago, when she and young Mr. Foxon spent the night together in a ruined church so that she might draw one of the IdentiKit pictures for which the police paid her such a generous retainer—yes, as with witchcraft, it was nonsense.

  But most distasteful nonsense. Even to herself, she did not care to think of her sketch as an omen. Certainly it could not be used as she had intended. Nigel and Louise must have no cloud, even an imaginary one, over the start of married life in their new home. She would return another day and try again. With one firm movement she tore the sketch from her book, and was about to crumple it when she paused. Thinking of Mr. Foxon reminded her of Superintendent Brinton, then of Chief Superintendent Delphick who had first recruited her—if that was the correct term...who had seen to it that she was paid that generous retainer for any sketch she might make, should it be required of her.

  Carefully, and with reluctance, Miss Seeton slipped the stormcloud sketch into a folder in the bureau’s bottom drawer, and could relax only once the drawer was shut.

  She no longer felt in the mood for sketching from the quilt’s secret List. She packed away pencils, eraser, sketchbook. She fidgeted a little, then remembered Cousin Flora’s sewing machine. Might now be the time to examine it for possible use? Dear Martha had talked of quilting, and an even safer case for the pencils so carefully sharpened to points with the little folding knife she had, when at school, kept well away from the children.

  Miss Seeton removed the sewing box from the top, and opened out on its hinges the heavy oak lid that revealed the sewing machine down in its cabinet. She seemed to recall that one simply pulled, and the machine—counterbalance? counterweight?—rose to the same level as the open lid and locked itself in position. She pulled. It did. Smiling, she bent to open the little doors near the floor. She fetched a chair of the appropriate height and sat down. Cautiously, she put two neatly shod feet on the black metal fretwork rocker—she thought of Daniel Eggleden and his smithy—and rocked.

  Instead of the up-and-down rhythm of a clattering needle, there came a strange sound that was part whirr, part whispery, scraping hiss.

  Miss Seeton treadled harder. The needle stayed still, the hiss grew more scratchy. It came from the right-hand side of the oak cabinet. She bent down and opened a narrow wooden door.

  The leather belt meant to turn the wheel and power the machine was rigid to the touch, and flaking. Something like powder clung to Miss Seeton’s fingers as she ran them along the part that was visible.

  “Oh, bother,” said Miss Seeton.

  This year a fine crop of dandelions bloomed along the banks of the canal. Miss Nuttel and Mrs. Blaine favoured these for making wine because of the lead traces sure to linger in any weeds—wild flowers—growing by the roadside. Few Plummergen gardeners would admit to dandelions in their gardens, and public opinion had quickly suppressed the only attempt of the Nuts to cultivate a patch of their own. The wind, said Plummergen, blew everywhere. No need to go looking for more trouble when there were already plenty and to spare of the dratted things down by the canal, free for the asking.

  Miss Seeton, deep in conversation with Dan Eggleden outside the smithy, paid no heed to the ladies from Lilikot as they made their way down The Street towards the canal bridge. Near the blacksmith’s shop they paused to bicker over which of them should return home for a string bag for the bread (a sudden whim) from the bakery on their way home from filling their hessian tote-bags with nature’s golden bounty. They did not raise their voices in the squabble—they were discreet—and they didn’t see why others in the open air could not likewise moderate their tones. They really couldn’t help overhearing what was being said.

  “Easy. Treat it like part of a harness,” said the smith, twiddling at the long narrow band Miss Seeton had given him. “Unusual, these days, most folk using electric—but while Len Hosigg’s a likelier bet if you fancy it in canvas, you can’t beat leather for quality. I can whip you something up in no time...”

  The squabble faded. The Nuts gazed at each other. They hurried away.

  “That would be most kind,” said Miss Seeton. “I never thought of canvas, but they are so busy on the farm—and this, of course, is leather. It does seem wise to keep as close as possible to the original, and if it should require more than one layer for strength, it might not fit. You can see how slim this is, and canvas must always be more bulky.”

  “You could always chop up one o’ your old paintings, and use that instead.”

  Miss Seeton twinkled at him. “Now, that is something else that never occurred—but the metal footrest, and the sparks when the generator blew up, made me think of you, rather than Len, although he is a helpful young man and I’m sure would do his best if asked. Only with dear Nigel not yet fully back at work, I wouldn’t really care to. Ask, that is, although I know belts of varying size may be used in all manner of farm machinery.”

  “Not many so small as this, Miss Seeton. You leave it to me. I’ll pop across later to measure the wheel, but it looks a straightforward job...”

  The Nuts had abandoned all thought of dandelions. Mrs. Blaine’s plump cheeks were pale. Miss Nuttel seemed in shock. They staggered as far as the bakery, struggled into the tearoom, and sat down.

  Mrs. Wyght was surprised to see them. Mrs. Blaine liked to make her own bread, when in the right mood, and both Nuts spoke of sugar with disdain. Icing and buttercream rotted the teeth and hardened the arteries, they told anyone who would listen.

  “Two teas, please,” Miss Nuttel brought out with visible effort. “Sugar—brown sugar.” Mrs. Blaine grimaced. “For shock, Bunny,” said Miss Nuttel.

  “Summat upset Mrs. Blaine?” Mrs. Wyght knew it didn’t take much to upset either of these unwonted visitors, and was prepared to hear of a low-flying magpie, or a sudden mouse scuttling from a hedge.

  “Incitement to violence,” said Miss Nuttel.

  “In our peaceful village,” moaned Mrs. Blaine.

  Mrs. Wyght took a cautious step backwards.

  “Bold as brass,” said Miss Nuttel. “Right outside the blacksmith’s—encouraging him to join in, what’s more.”

  “And when you consider the difference in age, it’s disgraceful,” said Mrs. Blaine.

  “Heard them yourself, Bunny—beating, whipping, leather—saw the whip, too. Brazen. She’ll be off buying jackboots next thing we know.”

  “Electricity,” shuddered Mrs. Blaine. “Torture—oh, Eric, it’s simply too dreadful.”

  “Jackboots and canvas uniforms,” concluded Miss Nuttel. “Proves it!”

  Mrs. Wyght
thought it proved only that the Nuts had somehow stirred a few, surely confusing, facts into a broth of wild conjecture. She had no intention of supping said broth. She would give no encouragement to whatever nonsense they were hatching about Dan Eggleden, son of the village, and someone at whose identity she could guess. Mrs. Wyght liked Miss Seeton. As a neighbour she was quiet. As a customer she shared her custom fairly round the local shops. Always polite to the bakery cats when she met them, she differed greatly from the Nuts, who muttered about murder and innocent birds...

  Mrs. Wyght frowned. “Two sugared teas, then—or would you rather have a whole pot?”

  So shaken were the Nuts that they agreed, without argument, to the pot.

  At Rytham Hall four Colvedens sat over a late breakfast, discussing the sensational news delivered yesterday afternoon by Grimes & Salisbury’s foreman regarding a discovery made in Summerset Cottage. They hadn’t at first been able to take in what Fred was saying.

  “Eyes? Staring? On the wall?”

  “More like glaring, your ladyship.” Fred ran his thumbs behind the shoulder straps of his dungarees, and shifted on his feet. “Angry eyes, scowling down.”

  “From the wall?”

  “From the wood under the plaster, your ladyship, where it was all shook off when the generator played up.”

  His gaze took in Sir George, summoned from the farm, and Nigel and Louise, returned from sightseeing. Fred didn’t mean to be rude, but men understood better about machinery than any amount of women, especially young and pretty foreign women. “The vibration, see, and the plaster being so old.”

  “And in poor condition,” supplied Sir George, who had winced when the surveyor’s report first came in and poured himself a double double whisky-and-soda before he read it in detail. It had taken another double double before he could explain to his wife that he didn’t blame her, of course he didn’t, but he did rather wish she’d insisted on going inside when she paid her weekly visit to the Saxons.