The Innocent Moon

by Henry Williamson

  The girls are well, and Doris takes up her new appt. at a school in Eastbourne after Christmas. She is a B.A. now so if you write to her don’t forget to put B.A. on the envelope. Ah well, I suppose all children have to grow up, how Time has flown since you were little! Write soon and tell me you will be coming for Xmas, and do keep yourself warm and eat plenty of proper food, eggs and milk should be cheap, and also fresh vegetables. No more now, from

  Your loving Mother.

  Put away old feelings: think with your head. Think of Charley first. Charley was suffering from a grievance. He was mentally tortured. Then why did Mother pass him by? Charley had been promised the house next door by Gran’pa. He had heard Gran’pa talking to Mother about a new Will, again and again. The old boy had always been chopping and changing his mind. Surely the thing to do now was to suggest to Mother that she ask Leppit the lawyer to send Charley a copy of the record of these chops and changes? With appropriate dates? Ah, that would cost money, and Uncle Joseph the co-Trustee had already asked Leppit the solicitor to knock off some of the scheduled charges for administering the estate. Uncle Joey—who had refused to write and thank Hemming the managing director of the Firm for his letter saying that he, Joseph Turney, Esq., after Gran’pa’s death, had been appointed to a directorship! Why? Because Joseph Turney “didn’t like Hemming”! God, what a little man! Still, he was a little man, with the little man’s kindness and the little man’s obstructive stubbornness. Very well. He, Phillip, would offer to pay Leppit’s charges, for making a list of Gran’pa’s chops and changes. But, of course, Uncle Joe and Mother would object!

  It was hopeless. Still, he must go through with it. How could he widen the minds of Mother and Uncle Joe? They were entirely unconscious of their cruelty towards their brother, so far away across the sea. They did not know what they did.

  He began to write carefully. But soon the pen moved faster. Two pages were covered, then three. Halfway down the fourth page he stopped. It was hopeless—— He threw the letter in the fire, and shouted at the top of his voice, WHY DON’T YOU LEAVE ME ALONE?

  The sounds of arguing next door, and the cries of a child, stopped. They must have heard him.

  *

  The cottage interior was now dreadful to look at. What was the good of going on? His novel was an escape from reality to another world of the imagination. The supper plate, still on the table, caught his eye. Three lots of eggs and bacon had been eaten off it in succession: he had been writing almost continuously for three days, and there had been no point in washing up what would have to be used again almost immediately—for time passed without knowledge of the hours while he wrote. Also, cooking was a bore, a waste of time, an irritation, so slices of bully beef and acidulous Piccaninny Pickles had replaced eggs and bacon.

  His withdrawal from the normal world had induced fear of going to the village shop, of entering among women standing there and talking until his arrival among them caused sudden silence, and he could feel them thinking about him. After one visit the shopkeeper’s wife, her hair permanently in curling strips of an old sheet during the six days of the week, in preparation for Sunday church, had explained the reason.

  “They reckon you be mazed, some do. And others do zay you be a German. ’Twas they beards you and that man with you, his was a red one, wasn’t it. They do talk zo in thissy village, tidn’t right, I reckon. But that’s what they’m tellin’, only don’t ’ee zay what I told ’ee, wull ’ee?”

  “No, Mrs. Pinn, I’ll be as discreet as you are, depend on it.”

  The woman was reassured by this, and encouraged to continue. “Also, you do zay things different from us sort of people sometimes, don’t ’ee? Zome reckon there ban’t no sense in what you’m tellin’, if you’ll excuse of me tellin’ ’ee.”

  “Oh, yes, I can quite understand, Mrs. Pinn. Two tins of Bullyboy beef, please.”

  “Us calls’n bully yurr, ’tes like you ’ad last time. Yurr ’tis,” and she took down two tins of Fray Bentos ex-W.D. surplus stock, slightly rusty at the corners.

  “Be your shirts dry yet? They do zay you put them up to keep the wind off the ackymals what roost under your thatch.”

  “Dual purpose, Mrs. Pinn. The tomtits’ wings fan the shirts as they fly after spiders, and help dry them, and in return the shirts keep the ackymals warm at night. Also they act as mommets, to keep away evil spirits and ghosties. Well, I must be getting back. Good morning!”

  Phillip’s sense of fun had been partly responsible for the local reputation of being mazed, otherwise having no sense. His three flannel shirts, hanging on a line nailed under the brow of his cottage thatch, were objects of ridicule. He washed them himself, boiling them in the iron crock hanging over the fire, and after every boiling they were seen to have shrunk smaller.

  “Whathivver be you a-doin’, puttin’ up of a row of mommets?” asked Mrs. Pinn.

  Previously the village washerwoman, a hefty young person with a large face looking to be the rounder for her tightly screwed-back hair, and wearing a man’s boots with wooden soles, had called weekly for his washing. Always, when Phillip had passed by her cottage late at night, he had seen a light burning in the upstairs bedroom. Mrs. Crang had told him that she had slept with a night-light beside her mother since she was a li’l maid, and after her mother’s death she had kept on the light in the bedroom because, Mrs. Crang said, she was afraid of the dark. She now lived with her father, a man very quiet and reserved as he went to and from his work as a labourer in wooden-soled boots, clumping past Phillip’s cottage every morning and again every evening. A quiet, seldom-speaking widower—until, every half-year, for days on end, he spent his savings on brandy, drinking quietly in his cottage, whence shouts and counter-shouts arose between father and daughter.

  One Monday morning when she had knocked as usual on Phillip’s door his head had appeared above her saying that he had been writing all night, and would bring round his washing later.

  “Aw, I can’t wait vor no washin’ to be brought round, I’ve got to cop in wi’ my work! Why don’t you work in the daytime like other people?”

  “Because I’m living in another world, and it’s quieter at night.”

  “What be you writin’ about?”

  “Oh, what I see in the fields, and on the shore.”

  “There ban’t much to zee nowadays, I know. What you want is zomeone to look after ’ee, and get ’ee to bade (bed) at the proper time like other people!”

  “I don’t know anyone.”

  “But you know several young leddies, don’t ’ee? Why don’t you marry one of they?”

  “No one would have me!”

  “Because you’m afraid to ask ’m, I reckon. You’m gettin’ to be a proper ole moucher! Look at your candle on the table down there”—pointing through the open window—“’tes like an ole snow-man, all thaccy grease rinned down the bottle! Why don’t you buy a proper stick for ’n?”

  “Ah, that’s a very special bottle! St. Julien, 1895!”

  “Wasn’t that the name of the man who was yurr with ’ee, what they called ‘the German’?”

  “Well, ‘St. Julien’ is the name of a French château wine——”

  “I don’t believe thaccy! That man wi’ the red beard, I mean, wasn’t he a German?”

  “Well, you’ve got red hair, that doesn’t make you a German, or should it be a Gerwoman?”

  “Aw, there ban’t no more zense to ’ee than in a baby’s bottom!” and with that she clumped away on wooden soles, a sturdy Saxon type.

  *

  There came a knock on the door. He opened it, and saw Walter Crang’s face. “Beg pardon, zur, but Mis’ss says, Would you like a cup of tea?”

  Phillip went next door with him. The sugary tea restored confidence with the friendly faces.

  “Would ’ee care vor some bread and cheese?” asked Mrs. Crang.

  “Well, thank you ever so much, but I am just about to get my supper, Mrs. Crang.”

  “You’m q
uite welcome, zur!”

  “Well, I would like some bread and cheese, thank you very much!”

  “Tidden right vor deny ’ees stumick, you knaw,” said Mrs. Crang.

  He determined to go to the shop in the morning, and buy them a pound or two of boiling bacon. And send them a hundredweight of coal.

  “You want vor get married, zur, beggin’ your pardon,” said Crang, after the meal, as he puffed contentedly at some of Phillip’s tobacco.

  “That’s right!” exclaimed Mrs. Crang. “Don’t ’ee knaw a nice young leddy to look after ’ee? Now that Miss Barley, if only she was older, would be the very wife for ’ee!”

  “Bootiful li’l maid, her be,” declared Crang. “Best li’l maid I ivver did zee, beggin’ your pardon, zur!”

  Phillip went to bed happily. Let them think that he was keen on Barley: thank heaven they hadn’t found out that it was Annabelle—— He could not finish it, even to himself.

  In the morning he awoke as usual just before the postman’s steps sounded on the slate before his door.

  “Only one letter this mornin’, zur,” the postman called up. “Be ’ee awake, surenuff?”

  Phillip lived for the post; and pushing cat and dog off his feet, ran downstairs. No letter from Annabelle, he told himself, against disappointment. I told you so. But the handwriting on the envelope was familiar; and with a start he saw that the postmark was Chelmsford.

  “Thank you, thank you, Gubby dear! One of my great friends in the war! I wonder what he says?”

  “I’m sure I be very plaized vor bring you good noos, zur.” The postman, wearing peaked blue cap and leaning on his red bicycle, lingered to hear more.

  “Ha, Denis Sisley has read my book and likes it! He says, ‘It has started well a career I foresaw in 1918 at Landguard.’ We soldiered together in the Mediators! Denis Sisley invites me to spend Christmas with him and his family in Essex, at Chelmsford. Good heavens, that’s where the Selby-Lloyds live—you remember them, Gubby? That family at Turnstone. ‘I can promise you a day or two’s hunting, so bring your riding kit.’ He goes on to say he’s contract ploughing by tractor for other farmers in the district of heavy clay called the Rodings. Ever seen a tractor, Gubby? It pulls several ploughs at once, a sort of motor car. Right, I’ll be going! Gubby, you won’t see me for dust, or rather mud!”

  “I’m sure I be very plaized, Mr. Madd’z’n, I be!”

  “I’ll give you your Christmas box now, Gubby!”

  “Thank ’ee, zur, you’m a praper gen’l’m’n, I’m sure,” and Gubbacombe went away the richer, or rather the less poor, by half-a-crown.

  Valerian Cottage, Malandine, S. Devon.

  7 December 1921

  Dear Mother

  I have already accepted an invitation to spend Christmas with an old friend of war-time days, in Essex; but I shall be coming up soon to London and may I spend a week or so with you all? Thank you very much for offering to do my washing. I am sending by separate parcel two of my shirts, which don’t dry very quickly nowadays in this damp air.

  I note what you say about Uncle Charley’s possible letters to me—he hasn’t written yet: but I do feel that you should send him a simple statement of facts—how Grandpa was always changing his mind, for instance, and if possible the dates of his Will changes. (I will pay Mr. Leppit the solicitor for these if you ask him to prepare a statement). This may help to resolve the unhappy feelings which, I feel sure, are spoiling the lives of at least three people—you, and your two brothers. With love to everyone, (he sighed)

  Phillip.

  P.S. Valerian grows on my garden wall. The local name for this plant, which has red flowers, is “drunkards”. It is also the local name for this cottage. But don’t worry, they are nice flowers.

  It was a strange feeling to be seated in a new black 1922 Ford, and leaving the village. London was at the other end of the earth. What had been happening in the old world he had left so long ago? He had not read a newspaper for nearly a year, except those bought on 13th October, and those had only been scanned for his own name. Occasionally the postmistress would say, “What do you think about the Golf Links murder case?”, following this up with, “Isn’t it terrible the crime there is in the world today? What it’s all coming to, goodness knows, but something ought to be done about it. Oh, aren’t you interested in murder cases? And you supposed to be a writer?”

  The little tank-engine drew its two coaches up the single line laid above the valley with its river views below. It stopped at a few stations with large oil-lamps on posts and leafless rambler-rose bushes hiding the railings of the wooden platforms. It entered woods, the engine chugging away up the gradient; it ran into winter sunlight with views of the moor rising before it. At last it clanked to a stop at the junction, where he got out, one of two passengers to await the express from Penzance in Cornwall.

  The express ran south of the moor for many miles, now under hillsides of spruce fir plantations, now making sudden hollow thunder on iron bridges over rivers. At Exeter there was time for a glass of beer and a sandwich in the refreshment room, while constantly eyeing both clock and handbag: for in that bag was the corrected typescript of his second book, which was to be handed over to the authentic Mr. J. D. Woodford at about a quarter to five that day. He was on his way to London, and something surely was about to happen. London—could it be the same London, after all the things that had happened—Julian, Porky, Ivan the Terrible, and all the other events of his adventurous life? He was a changed man, even as the perpetual sunshine had bleached the crown of his hair from black to brown. His presence in the train was slightly unreal.

  It was growing dark when the train began to pass between dull brick cliffs and dreary roofs and chimneys of the western suburbs of London. A fog was forming. The train slowed. It stopped. The dreary view was now drowned. He felt slightly sick, and was sweating coldly. The phase of regarding London as something that must be actively striven against and dissolved by spiritual force so that trees and fields and sweet human life might arise there again, was passed, thank God; he had seen that chronic exasperation and hollowness come to its physical climax in Willie’s fit in the Embankment Gardens. His own similar feelings had been made the more active or pronounced by the miseries over Spica and work on The Weekly Courier; but apart from that, London was still a dreadful place, although the noisy glooms of the terminus no longer were of wartime’s farewell, fortitude, sadness, and death. Where were the soldiers now? They were ghosts. To his dismay he realised that one of the ghosts was himself. He hurried out of the station, into a London particular with its asphyxiating darkness.

  Mr. J. D. Woodford was waiting for him in Inverness Terrace, seated by a warm coal fire. Tea for two was on a tray. After greetings, Phillip waited for him to speak, not realising that he as guest was offering nothing for an overworked author’s interest. Further, he did not realise then that J. D. Woodford too was a writer, with hopes and dreams akin to his own: for all writers, whatever their age, are buoyed by hope and dejected in the reaction from writing.

  J.D. asked about his journey, and how he liked Devon. Dare he tell him about Porky, who had impersonated him in Devon? Dare he ask him how his novel had sold? As if in answer to his thought, J. D. Woodford said:

  “I’m afraid your book hasn’t done very well. As I told you, I thought it wouldn’t sell when I decided to recommend its publication. But it had a good press for a first novel, and you’re no longer unknown.”

  “I’ve brought up my second novel!”

  “Ah, yes, you mentioned it in your letter. I shall look forward to reading it. How long is it?”

  “About a hundred thousand words. Would you like to hear some of it?”

  A look of patient weariness came over Mr. J. D. Woodford’s face; it passed immediately into a slight smile as he saw Phillip glance with understanding at a pile of typescripts on a table by the wall; there was another heap on the floor.

  “Of course you are keen on it, of course, quite
right, old chap; but I think perhaps I’d get a better idea if I read it myself,” he said in a kindly voice.

  Phillip was feeling wan with hunger: two small cups of tea and two thin slices of bread and butter since breakfast. He eyed the two remaining slices on the plate, but felt it would be bad manners to ask if he might have them, so he arose and said he must be going, while trying to think of something to say about J. D. Woodford’s own work. Was he writing a new novel? Ah, Porky’s enthusiasm! “A friend of mine in Devon is very keen on your trilogy. He says it’s the finest thing in modern literature.”

  “And it hasn’t sold a thousand copies,” smiled J. D. Woodford, slowly. “Good-bye, old chap, keep your spirits up—you’ll win through one day.”

  Phillip went out into fog so dense that nothing was visible until he came to the cold and wet iron of a lamp-post below a dim cocoon of light. With valise on shoulder and other arm held out before him, eyes smarting with sulphurous specks, he shuffled onwards, feeling for a kerb; and finding it, went along the gutter. At last he came to oil-flares in a row, a ghostly policeman directing traffic that crawled with muffled grinding of gearboxes and engines. He came to an Underground station, and with relief bought a ticket to Charing Cross.

  Crowds waited on platforms, dense and silent. He waited for an hour for a standing place. The journey home was through vapours more dense and choking than those which lay upon the metropolitan area; for the flats and industrialised marshes of the Thames had mingled the vapours of vinegar, tanning, glue of bone and fish, rubber, sulphuric acid, and hops with the warmer vapours of untreated sewage which, with phosphorescent glints, poured into Barking creek. These gases, combining with rivermist and coal smoke, had dulled all lights and reduced all movement to a crawl as upon a nocturnal battlefield; for the dull reports of detonators placed on railway lines as fog-signals brought back to him the illusion of sentries’ rifles loosed off into No-man’s-land.