A Simple Country Funeral

by Blythe Baker

  We followed after him, stepping inside the inn.

  The first thing I noticed was the heavy scent of ale and firewood, as well as polished floors, which gleamed beneath our feet. Every table was neatly and evenly arranged, and the chairs were spaced equally apart from one another.

  There were even roses in small bud vases on each table.

  The bar along the back wall ran all the way from one side to the other, and barstools ran along in front of it, all equally spaced once again.

  There wasn’t a thing out of place. There were no dirty tankards or plates on the tables, and not a crumb to be seen on the floor.

  “This might be the cleanest inn I have ever been in,” I said, staring around in amazement.

  “Mrs. Diggory, the innkeeper’s wife, is a very meticulous woman,” Irene said with a smile. “She would no more allow her husband to wreck this place than she would let him feed their own child to the Loch Ness monster.”

  That much was clear.

  There was a rather surly looking man up behind the counter, wiping down the polished wooden surface with a clean rag. The way he polished that one spot, it was as if it had personally wronged him in some way.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Diggory,” Irene said kindly as we walked toward the bar. “How are you doing?”

  The man looked up, and immediately I sensed Irene’s question was the wrong one. His face seemed gaunt, his eyes sunken in. The irises, deep blue, were rimmed in red veins as if he hadn’t slept in weeks.

  “What’ll it be?” he asked, tossing the rag onto the counter rather forcefully.

  Irene seemed surprised, too. “Oh, nothing for us. Helen here just needed to make a quick delivery to Mr. Newton. Is he here?”

  “Down in the kitchens,” Mr. Diggory said sourly, snatching up the cloth once again and aggressively going after the same already pristine spot on the counter.

  “Right,” Irene said, watching him warily. “We’ll be out of your way shortly.”

  I followed her back to a wooden door that was the same material as the rest of the warm wood paneling around the rest of the room. She pulled it open and we stepped inside.

  A wooden stairwell surrounded by rough, stone walls met us, and welcomed us downward. Lanterns hung in regular intervals all the way down.

  The bottom floor of the inn was like stepping into a medieval building. The walls were all formed from stone, with an arched ceiling that was so low I could reach up and brush my hands against it. Open doorways lead off the hall, which was also made of stone that had been worn smooth by years of footsteps passing over it.

  It smelled of rosemary and thyme as we wandered down the hall, and steam hovered near the ceiling, billowing out of one of the doorways at the end of the short hall.

  We stepped inside a kitchen that was three times the size of my own, and was the exact opposite of the inn’s tidy dining room upstairs.

  Pots were stacked along the far wall, and piled high in the sink, all stained with sauces and residue. Bowls were coated with flour, and pans with crusted bits of pies and roasts.

  There was a large counter in the center of the room, and every bit of its surface was covered in herbs and foods that were in the middle of being prepared. Knives and bowls were waiting for more ingredients, already partially filled with chopped meats, or boiled potatoes, or stewed tomatoes.

  The stove was covered in pots that were simmering, steaming, or boiling over. Everything seemed chaotic, and there was only one man at the helm, working to keep it all under control.

  “Well, hello there, Mrs. Driscoll,” said the round-faced man standing at the stove. He wheeled around, the front of his apron splattered with a bright red tomato sauce, and flecks of spattered oil. He wielded a spatula, which dripped its porridge-like mixture onto the floor beneath him, unnoticed entirely by the man.

  “Hello, Mr. Newton,” Irene said.

  “Ah, and I see you’ve come with Mrs. Lightholder,” Mr. Newton said, grinning at me. “It’s wonderful to see you.”

  “It’s a pleasure to see you as well, sir,” I said. “I brought your order for you.”

  “Oh, splendid, splendid,” he said, setting the spatula down beside a raw slab of beef that was apparently waiting to be seasoned and cooked. “How fortunate it is for me that you brought these when you did. My wife will be so pleased.”

  I passed him the box of silks that he had chosen for his wife.

  “These are wonderful,” he said. “Such fine silks. My wife intends to make one of these into a tie for me.”

  “That does sound nice,” Irene said. She looked around. “I see you are hard at work, as usual.”

  “Oh, yes, of course,” he said. “The Diggorys are expecting a large group of guests this evening. Apparently the family of Elizabeth Warner is coming in for their wedding.”

  “Oh, is that this weekend?” Irene asked. “Thank you for reminding me. I shall have to find a suitable gift, as I’m sure Nathanial will want to go.”

  Then her gaze hardened slightly, and she folded her arms.

  “George…is everything all right with Mr. Diggory?” Irene asked. “He seemed perturbed when we spoke with him.”

  Mr. Newton’s face fell, all traces of his smile disappearing. “Oh, yes…that,” he said. He sighed, shaking his head as he moved from the stove to one of the bowls of chopped veggies, grabbing a large salt grinder and twisting the freshly ground flakes into the bowl. “It’s dreadful news, really…straight from London, it was.” He looked up, his eyes full of sadness. “It seems their boy’s plane was shot down by the Luftwaffe recently.”

  “Their son was in the Royal Air Force?” I asked, my stomach twisting into knots. I was all too familiar with the danger that could come without warning from the skies these days…as the German airplanes had been the ones to drop the bombs over London when Roger was killed… It was boys like this one Mr. Newton spoke of who protected the rest of us or died trying to.

  “Yes,” Mr. Newton said with a fervent nod. “It just happened about two weeks ago. I suppose they haven’t told many people in town, yet.”

  “I heard about the downed planes over London,” Irene said. She shook her head solemnly. “Oh, poor Nancy…she and Jonathon must be devastated.”

  “They certainly are…” Mr. Newton said. “I only had a brief moment to talk with them this morning about it, but Jonathon is taking it a great deal harder than his wife is. He believes it is his fault, through and through.”

  “How could it be, though?” Irene asked. “It isn’t as if he was the one who sent their son to enlist, right?”

  Mr. Newton gave her a pointed look.

  “He…did?” Irene asked, laying a hand over her heart. “Oh, good heavens…”

  “He urged the boy to become an RAF pilot, told him to make his family proud,” he said.

  “How could he have known this would happen?” I asked. “It’s a terrible idea for him to blame himself the way he is…”

  “I couldn’t agree more, but I don’t think that’s something he will be able to hear for some time yet…” Mr. Newton said. “He is going to need time to heal. They both are.”

  We said goodbye to Mr. Newton shortly after that, making our way back upstairs into the inn.

  Some of the guests that Mr. Newton had spoken of seemed to have arrived, and were sitting at the bar, chatting with one another while Mr. Diggory served them drinks.

  “…At least it’s better than that blasted German beggar skulking around here…” I heard Mr. Diggory say, the bitterness coating his every word. His nose wrinkled, and the hand holding the glass began to tremble, clattering against the surface of the bar.

  I stopped near the door, and stared across the room at him.

  The German beggar? He couldn’t mean –

  “That fool came around here and had the audacity to ask me for food! And shelter! For free! What did he think I was, some sort of sympathizer?” Mr. Diggory exclaimed, his gaze distant, his cheeks splotchy and red. />
  Some of the guests were giving each other nervous looks, others staring fixedly at Mr. Diggory.

  It made me wonder how this whole conversation had started in the first place.

  I swallowed hard. If he was talking about the refugee that had just been killed four days ago, then –

  “What’s the matter?” Irene asked.

  My eyes stayed fixed on Mr. Diggory. “It’s Mr. Diggory, he’s – ”

  “He won’t be bothering me anymore, no sir. No he will not. He’s as dead as can be now. Good riddance, if you ask me. One less German in this world is – ”

  I went to step forward toward the bar, but Irene laid her hand on my shoulder.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  Irene shook her head. “I don’t think it’s wise to confront him,” she said in a low voice.

  “But he thinks that poor refugee was German,” I said. “We both know he wasn’t. What good is there in him hating a man for reasons that aren’t even true?”

  “It won’t do any good,” Irene said. “All he will think is that you are trying to protect him.”

  “You don’t think he would believe me?” I asked.

  “He wouldn’t want to believe you right now,” she said. “Think about it, Helen. The man just lost his son…it will be a long time before he will be able to think rationally about anything that has to do with his son’s death. The military, the war, the enemy…it won’t matter.”

  My heart ached at hearing the Polish man’s life being so despised by this man, but in a way, I understood what Irene was trying to say.

  “You’re right,” I said. “I suppose it doesn’t really matter now anyways, does it, since he’s dead…”

  Irene led me from the inn, my mind whirling.

  I had known that many in the village had thought the refugee was a German, and for the first time, I questioned Sidney’s initial understanding of the man as well. What if he was simply pretending to speak Polish? What if he was, in fact, someone from the German military who was undercover? Maybe a German pilot who’d been shot down over English soil and found himself stranded?

  These ideas were troubling, but it helped me to understand why Mr. Diggory might have been as upset as he was.

  “It’s a shame that Mr. Diggory was so angry with that poor beggar,” Irene said. “Especially since the police haven’t yet found a killer.”

  My stomach flipped, and I stared up at her. “You don’t think…Mr. Diggory?”

  Her brow creased. “I cannot imagine it…” she said. “I have known Mr. and Mrs. Diggory for many, many years. Nancy since we were children. Yet I have never experienced the anguish of losing a child. Would the pain of it drive someone to such extreme measures?”

  The thought was truly a troubling one, and neither of us could seem to talk the other out of it. We could not know for certain, yet at the same time, and equally as frightening, we could imagine why someone would lash out like that.

  “Well, I’m sure it won’t be long before Mr. Diggory’s dislike of anyone of German descent reaches those who might have influence in the situation,” Irene said. “We won’t have to worry.”

  I hoped she was right. For the time being, the idea of someone being pushed so far to the breaking point that they would ever consider harming another person in such a manner…

  Grief and sorrow were dark emotions, ones that I was far too familiar with. I knew how horrible those first weeks could be…how desperate, how hopeless.

  Worry prevented me from feeling any peace for the rest of the day.

  6

  The next morning, things seemed less hopeless to me. Taking time to rationally consider the situation, I realized it was less likely that Mr. Diggory had killed the beggar than I had originally thought. Irene knew him to be a good man, and he was a respected member of the community.

  That, and if he had been the one to kill the beggar, then why would he have been so brashly talking about his death in the inn the way he had been? Wouldn’t that just be asking for unwanted attention?

  Even still, the memory of Irene’s uncertainty kept popping up in my thoughts as I tended to customers and filled orders the next day. My thoughts were never far from the poor refugee, once again.

  I closed the shop at three, just like I did every day. I was just locking the door when there was a knock upon it.

  I saw Irene’s face smiling in at me from the window in the door.

  “Oh, hello, Irene,” I said, opening it back up again. “I wasn’t expecting to see you today. Please, come in. I can make us some tea.”

  “That’s quite all right, dear,” Irene said. “I was coming by to ask if you might be available this evening.”

  “Yes, as far as I’m aware,” I said. I noticed that her arms were laden with packages and bags. “Can I help you with anything?”

  She tipped a few boxes and one of the bags into my arms, sighing. I noticed sweat glistening near her hairline. “I was wondering if you would be interested in going with me to the Evermore estate this evening.”

  “Evermore – ” I said, and then Mrs. Trent’s story at the tea shop came back to me. “Oh, is that the place that was converted into a hospital?”

  “The very same,” Irene said, glancing down at the packages. “These are all meant to be for the soldiers, and some for the staff. It’s a variety of items I’ve collected from those generous enough to donate necessities. Things like bandages, food, and blankets.”

  “Oh, what a wonderful idea,” I said, a warm glow of generosity spreading through me. “I might have some things to contribute, as well.”

  “That’s good news,” Irene said.

  “Give me just a moment, I know exactly what to bring,” I said. I hurried back inside and ran upstairs.

  I went to the attic and found a box of Aunt Vivian’s blankets that I knew I would never use myself. I had washed them and stored them away, hoping to maybe find a use for the fabric. This, I knew, was a much better cause.

  “Are we ready?” Irene asked, jostling the packages she held.

  “Yes,” I said, doing my best to hold the ones I had. “But…are we walking all the way there?” I asked.

  Irene laughed. “No, dear. We’re just walking back to the house. Nathanial offered to drive us there.”

  “Oh, good,” I said, my arms already sagging under the weight of the packages and bags.

  The Evermore estate was only a few miles outside of Brookminster. It was away from the bustle of the village, but as we pulled into the winding drive that snaked up one of the rolling hills, I could see the village in the distance.

  “It looks like a toy set,” I said. “Surrounded by all those fields.”

  Irene laughed. “It certainly is much smaller when you aren’t in the middle of it, isn’t it?” she asked.

  The house was at the very top of the hill, pressed up against a small, forested stretch of land. It was a stunning property, a true relic of our country’s heritage. The house was made of the same pale stone that my house was, yet where my home was nothing more than a simple cottage, this house was a manor fit for nobility.

  Ivy climbed the walls, circling around the many windows on the front side of the house. The roof, adorned with three large dormers, gave the house its grand character. Two chimneys stretched high into the sky, smoke billowing upward into the cloudy early evening expanse. The front door was nestled in an outcropping of its own, with a peaked roof and a rounded staircase leading up to it.

  “I don’t know if I have ever seen such a magnificent place…” I said as Nathanial pulled the car up right out front. “You said a lord lives here?”

  “Yes, Lord Evermore,” Nathanial said. “The house itself is called Northernwood Hall, but it has been many years since it was referred to by that name.”

  “Yes, perhaps when Queen Victoria was around,” Irene said. “The Evermores have lived here for some time now, several generations I believe.”

  I could only stare out the window, up at th
e marvelous home. I wondered how people like the Evermores dealt with times of war. Would all members of the upper classes step up the same way the Evermores had, and offer up their homes to those in need?

  Upper class or not, I cannot think of many who would be willing to do this at all, I mused.

  “Shall I help you ladies get these things inside?” Nathanial asked.

  “That sounds good,” Irene said. She glanced back at me in the rear seat. “How do you feel about staying for a little while, and meeting with some of the soldiers that are here?”

  Nervousness was my first response, but I swiftly quelled it. “I think that’s a great idea,” I said. “It would be a chance to thank them for their service to our country.”

  “I will make sure you don’t have to see any gruesome wounds or anything,” Irene said with a smile. “Sometimes these poor fellows just want someone they can talk to about ordinary things. If they ask you all about your life, don’t be too surprised. It allows them to leave their own thoughts behind for a little while.”

  I had never thought of that, but even as she said it, it made perfect sense.

  We were greeted at the front door by a smiling man with snow white hair. He was dressed in a fine suit.

  “Good evening,” the man said with a smile. “I am Mr. Rogers. You are Mr. and Mrs. Driscoll, yes?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Mr. Driscoll said, swiveling to the side so that he could see the man behind the stack of boxes he was carrying. “That’s us. And we brought along a friend, as well.”

  The man looked to me, smiled, and bowed his head. “Lord Evermore will be pleased with your willingness to sacrifice an evening of your time to deliver some goods to these poor gentlemen here. Please, allow me to show you the way.”

  We followed him through a grand foyer, with marble floors, gold gilded mirrors on the wall, and wallpaper that very well might have been original to the estate.

  It was quite a shock, though, to see so many things out of place in the house. In the halls, for instance, extra beds and stretchers were lined up against one wall. Medical kits were stacked beside doorways. Nurses strolled in and out of rooms, their white uniforms pristine. These sights clearly did not belong in a home like this.