by Adam Thorpe
As I watched them go, preparing to clear the site of our implements, Ernest came up with the wooden box in which he had placed the smaller finds. I asked to see them, perhaps for the last time, before they were assigned to some dusty glass case. Like a boy with his stone collection, he handed them to me one by one: the bronze dagger, and the iron hair-pin; a polished greenstone wrist-guard (or so we guessed), with nine holes at each end capped with sheet-gold, and broken – probably as part of a ritual; and a bone pendant, stained by the corroding dagger, found beside the ribs, carved into the form of a leaping animal (a hare?) and painfully crude. Hardly a treasure. But each, as it lay in my hand, had an extra weight; of silence perhaps, ‘deep as Eternity’, and the value of silence, that had lain unstirred under tussocks and cloud for four thousand years, until the Squire smote through the turf with his blade.
11
Wing
1953
MAGNETIC RECORDING No. 24 (Transcript)
File under Broadcasts/Way of Life (B/WL)
BBC Home Service (West) ‘That Was My Day: Cartoonist Herbert Bradman talks about a very special day last month.’ 10.10 p.m. March 6th 1953
(Note: first five-and-a-half minutes lost due to magnetic tape snapping.)
[…] BANGS THE TRAY with his small hammer and the toffee cracks. Then comes the tattoo. Well, the crumbs bounce up and down as if electrified. Now I have no idea why Mr Bint must perform this tattoo with his little hammer. It makes the tray clatter frightfully. Perhaps it is in order to release the cracked toffee from the grease paper. Perhaps it is in order to make a very loud noise. One day, I will ask him. But not today. No, not today. For today is a very special day. Isn’t it, Sidney? But Mr Bint just snaps a paper bag off a hook with many other paper bags upon it, and whistles a single bar from the opening of Chopin’s B minor Sonata. At least, that is what it sounds like. And he is always whistling it. One day, I will ask him. Not today. No, not today. Meanwhile, I will continue to – well, marvel. Now come on, I hear you say, what exactly are you marvelling at? Well, dear listener, at the great strides we have made in communication by means of the wireless. Even our shopkeepers bend an ear to the Third Programme.
Mr Bint slips the dark toffee into the paper bag. He knows I cannot bear to have my fingers stickied. Who can, but grubby little creatures, as don’t know better? Talking of these, there are quite a few strung out behind me. Oh dear, I think they are rather impatient today. Well, I have never seen Bint’s Bakery so full. And that applies to the shelves, too.
‘A quarter of liquorice pomfret cakes, please, Sidney. And four acid drops.’ Do I hear a groan behind me? Someone drops their penny. Consternation. And today of all days. Do not worry, she has got it. She is called Marjorie. She has just got over the chicken-pox. But did I not see her in the Village Stores? Of course, her parents have the shop. ‘But it don’t sell sweets, sir. Just bleach.’ Just bleach? Well, that is a shame. Just bleach.
Goodness me, I have been quite distracted by little Marjorie. The liquorice pomfret cakes have tumbled into the scale-pan. What a satisfying rattle! And the smaller boys and girls think so, too. They press forward a little. A tiny grubby face pops up beside me. ‘Hurry up, mister!’ That is too much for Mr Bint. His shop is neat as any pin. It is not made for them young grubs, fresh from ditch and road, from farm and misty orchard. But he has to make a living, just like all of us. Out, all out! In a trice they are exactly that. Well, they know the ropes. But I would not wager on his windows staying clean for long. Yes, I am right. He looks at the faces smudged against the glass, then he looks at me. His look says: today, one has to make allowances. Today, it is only proper. Yes, that is the spirit, Mr Bint. That is the spirit that will see us through this anxious age, if anything will. Tolerance, I think they call it. Alive and well it is too, in our little village. Now can I have my acid drops, please?
Yes, indeed. Today, we are going to go the whole hog. I take out – well, you have guessed it: my ration book. I place it on the polished wooden counter, just as I do every time. But today, Mr Bint smiles. He knows. The liquorice pomfret cakes slide off the scale-pan into a second paper bag. What a satisfying rustle! Now I hope he does not mind me saying this, I really do, but Mr Bint has a rather impressive wart on his forehead. And at this juncture, I usually glance towards it. I usually think: well, how surprising, this inability of many people to take advantage of the considerable medical advances made in our time. To burn out a wart, or lance a carbuncle, is the least of the challenges facing medical science, under the benign auspices of our National Health Service and the many technical instruments at its command. And so on. You know the type of thing. But today is different. Today we have quite other thoughts in the head. Quite other, as Mr Bint spins the paper bag round and round to close it, and the mingling aromas of confectionary, and fleed cakes, and bags of flour, and cottage loaves, and jam doughnuts, and goodness knows what else one finds in an English country bakery seem to spin me round and round, too.
Now for the other jar. The one crammed with yellow acid drops, of course. Oh dear – the lid has been split slightly, in its long and busy career. The lid is made of Bakelite. I do not wish to cast aspersions. Oh no. But I have to say this: I do feel a sense of relief when the plastic lid is off – and most especially today. Mr Bint’s plump, floury hand squeezes through the neck. Down it goes. Viewed through the blueish glass, those fingers do resemble something rather nasty moving along the sea-bed, do they not? No, not today. Today, there is nothing nasty about it. All is glowing, all is happy. Let us rather say, it is like watching the Derby on my twelve-inch television. That is the spirit. And out those fingers come, with four acid drops … well, clawed, I have to admit it, off the congealed honeycomb. Always four. Nothing nasty about that, either.
Now comes the third paper bag, and in they go. Thud thud. Thud thud. I say, you are calling out over your cocoa, what’s all this thudding about? Ah yes. You see, Mr Bint always lets the acid drops fall from a rather extravagant height into their little paper bag. Videlicet, dear listener, if you don’t mind a bit of Latin – the full vertical stretch of his long right arm. That crisp blue cuff of his baker’s coat gets caught at the elbow, so high does he stretch up. What strange characters, you are thinking to yourself – what strange characters there are in our villages! Well, it is all for my benefit, of course: those crisp thuds send a flutter through my (I have to say) ample frame. Likewise, the faces pressed against the door flutter […]1 open under the weight. Little creatures spill onto the floor. Mr Bint sweeps them out. The door tinkles shut. We are quite alone. As should be. Never mind the faces smudged against the glass: the hour has come. The moment beckons. For the first time in our transaction, Mr Bint speaks. ‘Let’s take it from here then, Mr Bradman,’ he says, in what I understand to be a Jimmy Edwards voice. At least, that is what a little fellow told me last week. Last week: how far away that seems today, how dismal, how colourless, how empty of the vital! Hey, look out – is the hour not coming, and the moment beckoning, and so forth? I pick up my ration book and tear out several stamps. No prizes for guessing which ones, now.
‘Well, Sidney, old fellow, at least we have come through.’ I tear up those stamps into tiny pieces. I lean over the counter and scatter them over his head like confetti, standing on my toes to do so. If I were a poetic sort of chap, I’d say they fell upon his hair as the snow falls upon a glistening tilth, or some such. But as I am not, I shall stick with confetti. Mr Bint did not quite stop smiling. He saw the joke. Of course he did. As did the youngsters outside, from the sound of it. After all, I did thereupon purchase, in celebration of this memorable day for all we sweet-toothed folk, a dozen more acid drops and as many aniseed balls, one pound weight of liquorice allsorts, one shilling’s worth extra of Mrs Dorothy Bint’s luscious dark toffee, a clutch of barley-sugar sticks, a giant bag of mint humbugs, and an elegant box of a certain well-known store’s aptly-named ‘Regal’ milk chocolates. And I am quite sure that there was enough left for the lit
tle ones outside. Quite sure. But I do not suppose he remembered to pick out that confetti from his hair before he let the hordes in with that familiar merry tinkle of the door. Never mind. This has been a happy day. A very happy chewing, and sucking, and munching, and tearing-up-of-stamps sort of day. Indeed it has. Not for you? Look, I have two mint humbugs left. Oh, come on then: you can have one, too.
END OF BROADCAST
Sat. 7th March 1953
Cold, sleety. Dumplings.
Filing & collating a.m. Typing up Herbert’s broadcast p.m. A bit sniffly today. H. miffed at being called ‘cartoonist’ in Radio T., but all smiles about broadcast last night. Said what did I think of his ‘masses’ voice? I said if I’m one of the masses, then you’ve certainly scored a hit with me, Mr B. But a different sort of hit, I’m afraid, with Mr Sidney Bint. Oh, really? The wart, Mr B. What about the wart, Violet my dear? Only reporting Mrs Bint who had a little word, as you might say, outside the Post Office this morning, Mr B. Well, said Herbert, perhaps he’ll get it burnt out now it’s famous. (Oo ouch, as Mother wd say.) Both listened to magnetic tape recording of broadcast in study at 6.30 + transcript. Herbert rather snarly about lost start. I said I couldn’t quite get hang of it (magnetic tape recorder). It just snapped, Mr B. He lent me a book – ‘Magnetic Recording’ by Dr S. J. Begun. Must keep abreast, Violet my dear.
Sun. 8th March 1953
Cold, sleety. Roast.
Holy Communion. Sermon on fasting. Stiff in joints & bit feverish. Big dose of Fenning’s made me a bit ‘squiffy’. Walter de la Mare on wireless reading own poems. That brought it all back. H. silent over luncheon. Went down to my room earlier than usual. Plum tapping on bathroom window in gusts again. Must lop it. Bed by 8 p.m.
Mon. 9th March 1953
Cold, gusty. Bovril.
Indexing a.m. Still bit feverish. Onto my throat. Appt at Moon’s Garage: said Lanchester needs new gearbox & suggested Mr B. purchase a Hillman Minx (‘Just happen to have one here, Miss Nightingale’). Old Dick (Mr Lock) passing, said Hillmans ‘load of old bolts’ (I think that’s what he said). Mr Moon said Hillman Minx won London to Cape Town last year. Old Dick said who wants to drive from London to Cape Town? Got rather chilled while they were arguing. Thought of King George bidding farewell to Princess Eliz. at London Airport without scarf or hat in biting wind this time last year. Dead a week later. Over lunch H. fixed date of Burial: night of Coronation (June 2nd). I said that’s going to be a rush, Mr B. He said come on, my dear, that’s not how we won the war. In bed by 7 p.m. Low.
Tues. & Wed.: down with ’flu.
Thurs. 12th March 1953
Cold, drizzly. Tomato soup.
Up and about at last. H. rather unsympathetic. Slow Mrs Dart broke Hoover but at least she brought me hot milk each day. Greatness has no time for ailments, I reflect. BURIAL date fixed publicly – letter for local paper. Repository blueprint passed by factory, but steel supplies a bit so-so, Mr Bradman. Like Mother wd say: a bit so-so this week are we, Violet? H. so good on ’phone – used his clipped, civilisation-at-stake voice, and loud man on other end quite cowed. My Mosley tone, Violet. Always gets results out of the vulgus. Typing a.m. and p.m. Glass of sherry (Dry Fly? Fly Dry? anyway, prefer sweeter) with H. at 6.30 after combing session. H. ventured I shd contribute something OF MY OWN MAKING to Project. Oh surely not, Mr B! A sort of short ‘impression’ of my thirteen years with Herbert E. Bradman. To be STRICTLY honest. PROMISE not to read it, my dear. YOU MUST NOT SAY NO. Little chance of that when Herbert’s got brace between teeth, as nasty Lionel Maddocks used to say about me. To my face. Like having a gate in your mouth. Did some good, I suppose. In the end. Still feeling weak. Used up three bottles of Fennings @ 1/9d each! H. to buy Hillman in instalments. Which end first, I joked. Big thump on my bathroom window just before tea. Almost broke it. Rugby ball from Manor School. Such an ugly dirty heavy leather thing. Had to fish it out of the thuya by hand. Reminded me of raising Father’s head up in his last days. It’ll be cricket balls next.
Fri. 13th March 1953
V. cold, grey. Cod.
Typing. Didn’t venture out. Harriet Barlow fell under wheel of articulated lorry outside Sale Lido on a Friday 13th – A.F.C. Gala Dance Night, mind you. We did have some times. Bed early to start The Nanking Road. Scalded my midriff with cocoa, for my indulgence.
Sat. 14th March 1953
Muggy, overcast. Spam fritters.
Typing. Feeling blue. Don Carlos & his Samba Orchestra on wireless saved my day over supper once again. Gets my toes tapping. Close my eyes, can almost see the Astoria. Kenneth on the clarinet, bless him. Pranged on ops, how Gordon put it. Wd always send a card on my birthday. Shd really have gone back for the funeral. Old times. Maybe if I’d stayed up North, etc. Like a fish out of water here. Not that he had a penny to rub, just a load of charm. Went a bit far that time, though. Artificial knickers, Violet my love? Best off, I’d say. Best off. Funny Up from blowing clarinet. Feel it now. Poor Kenneth. Cd have been a widow, I could. And her mite. Children. In loving memory of our dear husband and father, F/O Kenneth Lingham (33 Squadron) killed on operations June 9th, 1944. Loving Wife Violet, and Your Son & Daughter … What a thought. Hope it didn’t burn, that’s all, like that poor chap who came down near Mapleash Farm. Right over our heads, Mrs Stiff said, and into Gore Field luckily, so he didn’t smash the crops. (Ruined the orchids, though.) So low we could see his gloves trying to do something, said Mr Stiff. Same year I think. Might have been Kenneth, except it was German. I couldn’t go and have a look. Smelling it was enough. Filthy black smoke. Didn’t hear a thing, though, that’s the funny part. Always asked after me, acc. to Gordon, did Kenneth. Herbert rather snarly over lunch. Meat-paste doesn’t agree with him, he says. I said it’s lifting up all those boxes. Suggested Doan’s. Must catch ruptures early.
Sun. 15th March 1953
Overcast. Roast, ice-cream.
Holy Communion. Sermon on refugees crisis, needless to say: 70,000,000 without homes as result of wars! What with this & world hunger & rising prices & chill, felt rather hopeless. Jesus hardly comes into them (sermons) these days. Sort of tacked on at end. Period started early over tea with H. in middle of one of his ‘lectures’. Difficult to find space between sentences to excuse oneself. Miss Enid Walwyn also present. I pretended to have coughing fit and ran out. Caught a glimpse of Herbert looking astonished. Went to drawer in my room but no Tampax. Suspect H. has been rifling it for Material (‘Health & Hygiene?’). Felt my blood boiling. Have to approach him. Used flannel instead. Most unsatisfactory. Pains. (Feeling so-so are we, Violet? Yes, Mother.) Returned to H., who looked peeved. He had lost thread. Miss W. had departed in interim. I do apologise, Mr B.: a moth in the oesophagus, as my father used to say. Herbert spent next forty-five minutes extolling virtues (intellectual & physical) of Miss Enid you-know-who. I said Miss Willington much missed all the same. Miss Willington? Miss Walwyn’s predecessor at the village school, Mr B. Was that deliberate, Violet? Deliberate, Mr B.? (Awful headache by now.) To drag in that rotting stuck-up old bag when the subject is Miss Walwyn must have been deliberate, Violet. There was nothing slatternly about Miss Willington, Mr B. Are you suggesting that Miss Walwyn is a slattern, Violet? Not at all, Mr B.; I am referring to your unfortunate term of abuse, for I am quite sure that Miss Walwyn is a clean-living young lady, as every schoolteacher ought to be, at least where I come from. H. just glowered then. ‘What’s My Line’ night, so he let me watch in living room, as promised. Freezing. All the way through felt guilty at taking on so with Herbert. Eamonn Andrews has a nice voice.
Mon. 16th March 1953: my birthday! 42!
Cold, sleety. Spam.
Typing. Uncle Eric sent bottle of Cherry Heering: somehow leaked in post and parcel stuck up. Auntie Pamela sent usual stockings. Cousin Roy forty Gold Flake. Shirley Leatherbarrow Aertex corset plus six Lavender Bathjoys. She is a funny sort. Vernon Crawshaw I red rose (crumpled) & I gramophone record (Ivor Novello: ‘Weave Your Spell Soft Mel
ody’). I don’t know. He knows I only have the wireless. Disappointing. Nothing from Mother. Had a little weep over Kenneth, which surprised me. He wd always remember. Those cheeky cards from Germany. Got ’bus to Odeon: ‘It Always Rains On Sunday’. Saw it several years ago but penny dropped too late. Ghastly cough next to me, loads of sputum – rays from projector lit it up. Makes you realise how far it (sputum) sprays normally, like with cigarette smoke – thick in light shafts, hardly visible otherwise. Looked like cinema was on fire. As also with dust in sunlight. The country’s full of floating matter. Miracle we can breathe at all. Got back late, no lights on, but cd have sworn heard front door put to soon after. Feel a bit nauseous from ’bus. All those twisty bends. Rocking. And pitch black either side over those downs. Cd have been at sea. At least in war you had the camps. Who was it saw a Roman in his headlights? Lots of little fires flickering in the valley where it should have been electrics. And this Roman with a spear. And rather unshaven, he said. Who was it? Never think of Romans as being anything but clean. Funny Mr Vic Tuck the postman, probably. Bed around midnight on glass of Cherry Heering. Page all sticky now. (Chin up, Violet. Chin up.) Awful spoonerism that time on ’phone. With Mr Vic Tuck. Happens all the time, Miss Nightingale. Does it now? Feel like giggling. Old times. Whirling about. Too much Cherry Heering. Cheery Herring. Herry Cheering. Bappy Hirthday Violet! Oh golly
