The Wild Cherry Tree

by H. E. Bates

  The intimacy of the moment took her by surprise. A second later his hand was exploring the curve of her breast.

  ‘Do you take everything for free?’ she said.

  ‘They always say the best things in life are, duckie.’

  ‘Well, you’re pretty free with your hands, I’ll say that.’

  She tried to remove his hand from her breast. He merely clasped it more closely.

  ‘Married?’

  ‘I don’t suppose it would make the slightest difference to you if I was.’

  ‘I always say you’re all the same shape, duckie. Only you happen to be a better shape than most.’

  ‘Take your hand away, I run a café here. Not a –’

  ‘I fancy you.’

  ‘Well, you’ll fancy on, that’s all.’

  He made a clumsy, brutish sort of attempt to kiss her. She was sensible enough not to smack his face but merely said, coldly:

  ‘You pick women like you pick strawberries, I suppose?’

  ‘Just about, duckie. Pick ’em up and lay ’em down, that’s me.’

  ‘Excuse me. I’m going. I run a café here, I tell you. I’ve got customers –’

  ‘Always a customer here, duckie. Any time.’

  ‘Do you mind not mauling me?’

  She broke away and started to walk to the door. He laughed.

  ‘I’ll be by tomorrow night and every night till the crop’s finished,’ he said. ‘There’ll be a tray for you whenever you want one.’

  ‘Thanks. I never eat too many strawberries. They bring me out in a rash.’

  ‘Really, duckie? Oh! by the way, Godden’s the name, Bill Godden.’

  After that, for the next two weeks or more, he was in the café every night. The embarrassment of a nightly tray of strawberries left on the threshold of the house provided her with a dilemma she found hard to solve. A mask of coldness seemed the only answer and it was a great mistake.

  It took Godden, cocky, inquisitive, quick-mouthed, a mere night or two to size up Brady as the fig ire of fun.

  Over infinite plates of egg-and-chips and endless cups of tea he was the lead in a nightly game of banter.

  ‘Ever heard of that song, Jim boy?’

  ‘What song was that, Bill?’

  ‘“Billikins and His Dinah”.’

  ‘Can’t say as I ever did.’

  ‘No? Don’t know how it goes?’

  ‘Can’t say I do.’

  ‘“With a cup o’ cold p’ison laid down by her side”.’

  ‘No. Can’t say I ever heard of it, Bill. I heard of Nancy kittle me fancy, though.’

  ‘Kittle, eh? I’ll lay it’s a kittle too. Like a fly settling on a mare.’

  There was always much laughter in the café.

  At first all this went on behind her back. She remained as blissfully unaware of it as she was deluded into the belief that her love for Brady was a secret no one else could possibly share.

  Then one evening towards the end of September she made another mistake. The sight of Godden unloading yet another tray of strawberries from his three-tonner and carrying it across the concrete apron towards the house was suddenly too much for her nerves, tired and ragged already from a long, rushed day in the café. She marched across the apron with lips tightened.

  ‘I told you a million times already I don’t want them. Take them back.’

  ‘Last chance, duckie. Crop’s finished. Last load tonight. More’s the pity.’

  ‘My heart’ll break.’

  ‘I’ll be by every night, though. Cauliflowers from now on.’

  ‘So now it’s choke me with cauliflowers –’

  He set the tray of strawberries down on the threshold of the house, as usual, and laughed in that cool, cocky way of his.

  ‘Ah! come on. Be nice. I still fancy you.’

  ‘Like I said, you’ll fancy on.’

  He laughed again, this time not so cockily but with the first hint of a sneer.

  ‘Perhaps Lover Boy’ll be luckier.’

  Riled, with lips tighter than ever, she said:

  ‘And what was that supposed to mean?’

  Again he laughed cockily.

  ‘Now don’t tell me you’ve never heard of Lover Boy. I thought everybody knew about Lover Boy.’

  ‘I know dirt when I see it.’

  ‘Everybody knows about Lover Boy. Billikins. Don’t tell me you don’t know about Billikins.’

  Again she somehow resisted the impulse to smack his face and frigidly, instead, started to walk away.

  ‘The wild Irish boy,’ Godden called after her. ‘No? Not the wild Irish boy?’

  This sudden betrayal of a situation she had so fondly imagined to be both precious and secret drove her, that night, in bed, closer than ever into Brady’s arms. Pity for him increased and deepened her tenderness.

  ‘I don’t care for myself,’ she told him. ‘It’s not for myself.’

  ‘It’s just how the fellers are.’

  ‘I’ll close the whole place down rather than –’

  ‘I thought of taking a few days off in any case,’ he suddenly said. ‘I’ve been thinking I should go and see my sister.’

  ‘Sister? What sister?’

  ‘The one in Athlone. She’s the eldest. I owe her money. I should have sent it months ago.’

  ‘You can send it now. You don’t have to go to her.’

  ‘One of the lorry fellers promised me a lift as far as Manchester. It’s only a flea hop from there to Liverpool.’

  She drew him more closely down in the bed.

  ‘You promised you wouldn’t go away from me. You promised me a dozen times.’

  ‘I’ll not go away. I’ll be back. This feller’ll give me a lift back.’

  ‘Don’t go,’ she said and again she found herself constricted between tears and laughter. ‘Don’t go, please. I can’t bear it if you go.’

  Two nights later, while she was still busy in the café, Brady slipped out, hitched his lift to Manchester and left without a word. It never once occurred to her that this abrupt departure of his might have been his way of saving her great distress. Until well past midnight she walked crazily about the place, calling his name. Sleeplessly, after that, she sat alone in the café, lights full on, making and drinking endless cups of tea, staring into empty space, brooding bitterly.

  After a week had gone by, and then another, she began to be aware that whenever she walked into the café the air seemed to become charged with sudden tension, dangerously clenched. She had always treated every driver, with the exception of Godden, with equal friendliness. Now she found herself withdrawn from them, hostile, defensive, not speaking, at times unable even to pass the time of day. Soon this first withdrawal led to an even deeper one. She could no longer bear to be seen in public. Utterly reclusive, she began to keep to her room, leaving the running of the café to the two sisters from down the road. Gnawing at her own thoughts, not sleeping, she brooded alone.

  The wind of winter began to whip in from the sea. Every day there were fewer lorries parked on the concrete apron. Presently one of the sisters got herself a job in a canning factory. The money was good, the hours were short and soon the other sister followed. Soon drivers began to arrive at the café to find no tea, no chips, no Francie and often no heating. The sign that Brady had earlier proudly painted and put up outside, saying A HOT MEAL AT ANY HOUR began to seem like a mere mockery of itself and on a day in December she took it down.

  The next day she locked the café. Once again she was left with only services to offer: petrol, oil, and where was the nearest place you could get a decent cup of tea or coffee.

  ‘Six gallons please, miss.’ On a bitter January afternoon two men drew up in a jeep on the concrete apron. There was a touch of snow in the air. ‘By God, it’s cold. Open for tea?’

  ‘Pardon?’ Francie said.

  ‘I said open for tea?’

  No, she said, no. She didn’t do teas now. That was a thing of the past.
>
  She finished putting the six gallons into the tank of the jeep. The driver gave her two pound notes and she put them into her pocket. Bitter though the air was it seemed to her suddenly that she could smell the sea. In a flash she was thinking of a summer morning, a sea-poppy that was pale yellow, a sea-thistle blue as steel and four fresh herrings wrapped in newspaper.

  ‘Forgotten something, haven’t you, miss?’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘How about my change?’

  Without a word she counted out the driver’s change. The jeep started up. She watched it move, gather speed and finally vanish down the road.

  A few thin sharp flakes of snow started to whip in from the direction of the sea. Unaware of them, she stood there for some long time afterwards, staring, eyes empty, alone in the middle of nowhere.

  Bonus Story

  A Waddler

  The bonus story ‘A Waddler’ is Bates's first published story, and is a village sketch with colourful dialogue. It follows a man as he deals with the death of his overly critical wife, as he is conversely complimented by a fellow widow on carrying his grief so well.

  ‘Jonathan!’ said his wife angrily as they went slowly on their Sunday afternoon walk, ‘don’t walk like that!’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Don’t waddle!’ she burst out.

  He sighed. ‘I can’t help it. I really can’t,’ he told her. ‘It’s the trousers I’ve got on.’

  ‘Rubbish!’ She impatiently declared. ‘You’ve always done it. It isn’t the first time I’ve said it –always!’

  ‘I tell you it’s these trousers!’ shouted Jonathan. ‘You don’t know – the tightness! Any man might waddle!’

  They gesticulated furiously.

  ‘It’s too ridiculous!’ reiterated his wife. ‘I’ve told you before. You’re like a tortoise – the years I’ve stood it! And I won’t any longer – it’s too silly.’

  Miserably he repeated, ‘It’s these trousers – I can’t—’

  ‘Nonsense!’ she said, waggling a finger at him. ‘You even do it in your nightshirt!’

  ‘I don’t!’

  ‘You do!’

  ‘You can’t remember any other time except when I’ve—’

  ‘I can!’ She interjected; ‘last month at the communion-rail – you waddled! At the last garden party in the summer – you waddled … you! ...’

  ‘Yes!’

  ‘Don’t say “yes” like that, as if you thought I was telling lies!’

  He tried to smile.

  ‘I didn’t mean … look here. It’s when I wear these trousers. I wore them at communion. I wore them at the garden party. It’s simply they’re too—’

  Shaking her head ferociously at him, she declared: ‘I don’t care … you do it in your nightshirt …You always have!’

  Together they argued and gesticulated, always walking farther on, in their impatience and anger and misery not noticing the dark-clouded west; where the lower yellow sky was already overridden by the blackness. Driven by a strong wind the clouds came overhead. It began to rain.

  ‘Oh! Maria! ... Maria!’ He protested.

  ‘Nobody else would have married a man who waddled!’

  ‘I didn’t waddle then!’ He protested.

  ‘Nonsense! You know you did … you always have …’ She checked her place. ‘It rains! That’s a good thing … Oh! Yes, that’s nice … Now we shall be wet through!’ She hurled at him.

  A little quicker they retraced their footsteps. They did not talk much. They had no umbrella. As best they could they sheltered each other. But it was true: the man waddled. He waddled conspicuously, like a fat duck. No one could deny it. The woman was now and then infuriated.

  ‘We shall be wet through!’ she would fire at him.

  And later: ‘We are wet through.’

  She indicated her skirt while he fingered his trousers, shining black and painfully chilly and tight against his skin.

  ‘Yes,’ he assented.

  ‘It’s a nice thing, too!’ she rapped, as if to say, ‘It’s your fault, you silly, fat, ridiculous old waddler!’

  And at last they reached home, wet to the skin, tired, hungry, cold, the woman disgusted, her husband miserable. Although they changed, drank tea, and sat over a fire, the woman could not get warm, and at last went to bed coughing. Jonathan waddled about for her wants. When bedtime came he waddled about moodily in his night-shirt before getting into bed. He said his prayers and waddled round again to pull up the blind.

  ‘Get in bed, man!’ wheezed his wife angrily.

  He waddled in obedience to the bed and lay down beside her.

  ‘You do do it in your nightshirt!’ she declared once more. ‘I tell you … you’ve always done this waddling …’

  ‘No Maria, no …’

  ‘Yes, yes.’ she grew angrier. ‘You’ve always done it. What’s more, your father did it and your grandfather. Your brothers do it … The whole family of you, I tell you.’

  ‘Maria, it’s too bad.’

  ‘It’s right! ... Go to sleep!’

  After a little trouble he did so – he even snored.

  His wife lay in bed a week. About her Jonathan waddled for her wants. Again and again she would say, ‘Don’t waddle, Jonathan!’ until pneumonia, after the rain and cold, set in, and she said it no more.

  Dressed in the black suit with the tight trousers, he waddled behind her coffin. He was upset, of course … To think that only the week before last! ... It was really too much. He tried to be calm, pulling himself up, but it hurt him to think she only thought of him an ugly old waddler.

  ‘I shall be a widower all my days,’ he told himself, waddling along.

  The coffin was lowered. He walked back slowly. It hurt him to think that! To think that he and all his family had been ugly, ridiculous, irritating to her!

  He waddled on. When he accosted a widow he and his wife had always known he was glad. Her sympathy teemed out:

  ‘This is so sad for you … it’s so very sad …’

  ‘Yes’ He tried not to waddle.

  ‘But you carried it so well,’ she told him. ‘I admire the way you walked there – so straight and steady.’

  He glowed. ‘It’s nothing,’ he said. ‘I assure you it’s nothing to be proud of. As a family we have always been noted for the way we walk. Ah! ...’

  Smiling proudly, he said ‘Good afternoon,’ and, waddling more than ever, in his joy went home.

  A Note on the Author

  H. E. Bates was born in 1905 in the shoe-making town of Rushden, Northamptonshire, and educated at Kettering Grammar School. After leaving school, he worked as a reporter and as a clerk in a leather warehouse.

  Many of his stories depict life in the rural Midlands, particularly his native Northamptonshire, where he spent many hours wandering the countryside.

  His first novel, The Two Sisters (1926) was published by Jonathan Cape when he was just twenty. Many critically acclaimed novels and collections of short stories followed.

  During WWII he was commissioned into the RAF solely to write short stories, which were published under the pseudonym ‘Flying Officer X’. His first financial success was Fair Stood the Wind for France (1944), followed by two novels about Burma, The Purple Plain (1947) and The Jacaranda Tree (1949) and one set in India, The Scarlet Sword (1950). Other well-known novels include Love for Lydia (1952) and The Feast of July (1954).

  His most popular creation was the Larkin family which featured in five novels beginning with The Darling Buds of May in 1958. The later television adaptation was a huge success.

  Many other stories were adapted for the screen, the most renowned being The Purple Plain (1947) starring Gregory Peck, and The Triple Echo (1970) with Glenda Jackson and Oliver Reed.

  H. E. Bates married in 1931, had four children and lived most of his life in a converted granary near Charing in Kent. He was awarded the CBE in 1973, shortly before his death in 1974.

  Discover other books by H
. E. Bates published by Bloomsbury Reader at

  www.bloomsbury.com/hebates.

  Share your reviews and comments with us via info@bloomsburyreader.com.

  First published in Great Britain in 1968 by Michael Joseph

  ‘A Waddler’ first published in Great Britain in 1926 in the Manchester Guardian

  This electronic edition published in 2016 by Bloomsbury Reader

  Copyright © 1968 Evensford Productions Ltd

  The moral right of the author is asserted.

  Bloomsbury Reader is an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

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  eISBN: 9781448215294

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