The Tale of Hawthorn House

by Susan Wittig Albert

  Jackboy spread his iridescent black tail into a glossy fan. “Bat and wicket, wot’s the ticket?” he chuckled. “Wot’ll ye give me t’ spill me bill?”

  “The ticket?” Kep bared his teeth. “What’ll I give you, snitch? I’ll yank out all your tail feathers, that’s what I’ll do, bird-brain. You won’t look so smart then, will you, nincompoop?”

  Jackboy took two giant hops backward. “Wot?” he cried, his bright magpie-eyes anxious. “Me whistle and flute? Me weasel and stoat? Me black tail-coat?”

  “Yes, your whistle and flute,” Kep growled. “Every fine feather in that fashionable magpie tail of yours.” He narrowed his eyes and flexed his claws. “And I’m big enough and fast enough to do it, too. If you value your feathers, you’d better squawk, stool pigeon!”

  Jackboy gave a lurid shriek. “Stranger ranger under-the-manger! Spy with yer mince pies!” And off he flew.

  Jackboy’s directions might seem incoherent to us, but Kep was a clever collie. He put his head under the feedbox and spied the duck. She was standing over her nest, tenderly turning her eggs, counting them with the counting rhyme that country children used in those days to count birds on a roof. Perhaps you will recognize it:

  One for sadness, two for mirth; three for marriage, four for birth; five for laughing, six for crying; seven for sickness, eight for dying; nine for silver, ten for gold.

  She stopped, turned, and settled herself on the nest, gently quacking the last line to herself: “Eleven a seCRet that will never be told.” And then she tucked her head under her wing, in preparation for a nap.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” a voice asked severely.

  Startled, Jemima pulled her head out from under her wing and her eyes flew open. She was frightened until she realized that it was Kep. “I am QUACK hatching my duCKLUCKLINGS,” she said, with as much dignity as a duck can muster. “Please go baCK to whatever you were doing so I can CArry on.”

  Ducklings! Kep thought in surprise. “But you’ve been gone for nearly two months,” he replied, in a more kindly tone. “It shouldn’t take that long to—”

  “Two months!” quacked Jemima. “Alas, alaCK, I am thunderstruCK! I had no idea! Why, I COuld have hatched two CLutches in that amount of time!”

  Kep frowned. He did not like to alarm Jemima, but he didn’t have to be Sherlock Holmes to know that something was obviously wrong here. Chicken eggs took twenty-one days to hatch, give or take a day or two. Goose eggs took thirty. Duck eggs took twenty-eight. Why were these eggs taking twice as long to hatch? It was time to find out what was going on.

  “Is it possible that they are . . .” The word he wanted was “infertile,” but it seemed a very indelicate word to use in conversation with a lady. “Is it possible that your eggs have no ducklings in them?” he asked gently.

  “No duCKluCKlings?” Jemima squawked indignantly. “Of COurse there are duCKluCKlings! I have been feeling movement in them for some time now.”

  But there was another question to be asked. Hesitantly, he said, “Well, then, are they your eggs, Jemima?”

  “My eGGs? Indeed they are my eGGs!” Jemima quacked, flapping her wings in high dudgeon. “In faCT, I have been sitting on them for such a protraCTed time that a certain part of my anatomy—it would be improper to name it—is thoroughly numb. These eGGs belong to me and to no one else. Are you QUestioning my ownership?”

  Kep sighed. This was clearly a sensitive issue. “I shall re-phrase,” he said. “What I mean to say is—what I want to know is—” This sort of thing was not at all up his line, and he was at a loss as to how exactly to put it. He took a breath. “That is to say, did you, er, did you lay these eggs yourself?”

  “Did I QUACK lay these eGGs?” The duck’s eyes flashed and she ruffled her feathers in a great show of outrage. “Did I lay them myself? What sort of unKIndly QUestion is that, sir? You should be ashamed, asking a lady QUACK such a thing.”

  Kep was ashamed. But the question had to be answered. He waited until the ruffled feathers had subsided, then, very humbly, he lay down and put his nose between his forepaws. “Well?” he asked. He wagged his tail gently. “Did you?”

  Jemima gave him a sulky look. “Did I what?”

  “Did you lay them yourself, Jemima?”

  Jemima preened a feather, ignoring him. But her silence told him the answer. She had taken the eggs from another bird’s nest. Stolen them, if you like. She was guilty of egg-napping. But while Kep was fully aware that one must pay for one’s crimes, he could also understand why Jemima had done it. A mother duck could scarcely be blamed for longing to do what ducks had done since ducks had been put on this earth with the instruction “Be fruitful and multiply” in their pockets.

  However, there were other considerations. The mother from whom the eggs had been stolen, for one, who must be frantic about their loss. What mother bird would not worry if she came back to her nest and found her entire clutch gone, vanished without a trace? And just as importantly, he had to think what sort of bird that would hatch from these eggs. What if they weren’t duck eggs? What if Jemima had somehow managed to collect the eggs of some predatory bird, thereby introducing nearly a dozen dangerous strangers to the barn lot? The idea turned him cold from the tip of his nose to the tip of his tail.

  Trying to hide his apprehension, Kep said, very quietly: “I know that maternity is a delicate subject, and must be approached with respect and consideration. But you do want to clear up the mystery, don’t you?”

  “Mystery?” Jemima shot him a defensive look. “What QUACK mystery?”

  “The mystery of your eggs, my dear duck, and why it is taking so long to hatch them.” Kep managed a reassuring smile. “If you could tell me where they came from, I might do a spot of detective work and tell you when you may expect the blessed event.”

  Once he knew the location, Kep thought, it should not be difficult to locate the real mother. Whether he should then have to restore the eggs to their rightful owner, he wasn’t sure, but he was confident that he would sort it out somehow. Of course, if you know anything about collies, you know they are always exceedingly confident about everything. There is no puzzle that is too difficult for these self-assured, self-reliant dogs to solve, no challenge too formidable for them to meet. Give them a simple task, such as fetching the newspaper, and they will fetch tea and toast and a bucket of coals and a shawl in case you are cold. And then they will go belowstairs to make sure that the cook has ordered the fish and that there will be hot water for your bath.

  But even among collies, Kep stands out. It is no wonder that he could speak with such confidence to Jemima.

  There was a long silence. Finally, Jemima quacked, in a tentative way, not quite rejecting, not quite accepting, “Do you aCTually thinK that’s liKely? That you could tell me . . . when?”

  Kep smiled with that calm, encouraging demeanor that makes collies such pleasant dogs to have in one’s life. “Yes, it’s possible. But to be of the greatest help, I should need to see your eggs—that is, if you would be so kind as to show them to me.”

  Another silence. “Oh, very well, then,” the duck said finally. She heaved a heavy sigh, resigned. “TaKe a looK, if you feel you must.” Her face averted, she stood up and lifted her wings so that her eggs were clearly visible.

  Kep leaned over to look. He counted. There were ten. And even though his experience of eggs was rather limited, they looked right to him. They were not stones or croquet balls or figments of a duck’s fertile imagination. These eggs were smallish, nicely rounded, white, and—to the eye, at least— perfect in every respect except one. They had not yet hatched. And they should have done, had they been duck eggs.

  “Thank you,” said the dog respectfully, recognizing how difficult it had been for the duck to show him her treasures. He waited until she had rearranged her feathers and was settled back on her nest. “Now, if you will be so kind as to tell me where you got them—”

  “Must I?” she whispered.

/>   “I fear so,” he replied softly. “Otherwise, how can I investigate?”

  Another silence. Then, in an even lower voice, she said, “I don’t fancy QUACK all the other duCKs knowing. They’ll want some for themselves, you see.”

  “I promise not to say a word to anyone.” He held up his right paw. “Collie’s honor, Jemima.”

  Persuaded at last, Jemima leaned forward and whispered her secret into Kep’s ear. But because she did not mean anyone else to hear, you and I will retire a discreet few paces and turn our backs. And I hope, as our story continues, that you will not think too unkindly of Jemima. For even though she has perhaps been too eager, and has rushed too quickly into a situation she did not understand, she intended neither malice nor harm, which is a good deal more than can be said of every human in this unhappy world.

  Our Jemima may be a very foolish duck, even (by some standards) a criminal duck. But at bottom, I think we must agree that she is a duck with a very good heart.

  9

  In Which Miss Potter Learns a Shocking Truth

  Beatrix had hoped her brother might arrive on Sunday afternoon, but Sunday came and went and he did not appear. This was not altogether a surprise, unfortunately. He was at Stock Park, with their parents, and once you were in their clutches, it was difficult to get away. It wasn’t that they meant ill, of course. But Mama kept finding tiresome little chores for one to do, and Papa simply kept talking, so that one could not even leave the room.

  It was not until midday on Monday that Beatrix finally opened the door to Bertram’s knock. She saw on the porch a thin-faced, dark-haired man, dressed in a gray tweed suit and vest, with a blue tie, an umbrella hung over his arm. He set down his bag and took off his tweed cap.

  “Hullo, Bea. Had you given me up? I meant to come yesterday, but Mama and Papa put up a devil of a fuss.” He sighed wearily. “You know how it is.”

  “No matter, Bertram,” Beatrix said happily, stepping back to let him in. “I’m just glad you could get away.” She would have liked to fling her arms around him, but the Potter family preferred handshakes and brief brushes of the cheek to warm embraces. It was one of the many differences she always noticed when she visited Norman’s boisterously affectionate family. The contrast made her own parents seem cold and distant. “Did you leave them well at Stock Park?”

  “Leave them well?” Bertram raised one dark eyebrow and his mouth took on a cynical slant. He was taller than she, with a full, dark mustache and delicate good looks. “Of course not. They were just as unhappy as usual. Nothing I do suits them.” He chuckled. “But I’m in good company. You don’t suit them much, either, Bea.”

  “We’re a pair,” Beatrix agreed with a rueful laugh. “They’re disappointed in both of us.”

  Beatrix, who was almost six when Bertram was born, had grown up loving to play Big Sister to Bertram’s Little Brother. The two lived together in the third-floor nursery, and when Bertram was old enough, he joined Beatrix for lessons with her governess, Miss Hammond. In those days, the Potters spent the long holiday—August, September, and most of October—at Dalguise House, in Perthshire, in the Scottish highlands, where sister and brother shared a deep, delighted interest in the out-of-doors. Together, the children went on expeditions through the magical woodlands along the River Tay, catching rabbits and hedgehogs and voles and bats to take back to London, identifying wild birds and searching out their nests, and sketching everything they saw. Both youngsters were seldom without their painting supplies, and as they grew older, both became deeply serious about their art, Beatrix in watercolor, Bertram in oils. And both were nature artists: Bertram painted large landscapes, while Beatrix thought of herself as a miniaturist, painting plants and the small animals she loved to collect: rabbits, mice, guinea pigs, frogs, and more.

  Bertram was small for his age, and delicate. But the Potters packed him off to school at the age of eleven, while Beatrix stayed behind to continue her studies at home. Beatrix always felt that she got much the better of the bargain, for Bertram was miserable at school. He could never stand up for himself against bullies, and seemed to have few friends. He had little direction, preferring painting to Latin, Euclid, and most especially to rugby. The headmaster’s reports made Mr. Potter mutter and scowl furiously, while Mrs. Potter dabbed her handkerchief to her eyes and refused to distress herself by discussing the matter.

  Very little changed as Bertram grew older, the Potters continuing to be disappointed in his lack of interest in anything they thought suitable for him. At twenty, with a great family fanfare, he went off to Oxford. But he didn’t stay long, and when he came back to London, he was desperately unhappy and far too fond of the bottle. Bertram’s drinking might have been caused by the family failing that seems to have hastened the end of poor Uncle William Leech (“The story is so shocking I cannot write it,” Beatrix once confessed to her journal). More likely, it was his way of rebelling against his eternally disappointed mother and the carping, critical father whom he could never please. Beatrix, always intensely aware of the emotional climate in the family and continually feeling that she ought to be able to do something to make things happier for all of them, did what she could to shield Bertram from the worst of their parents’ displeasure.

  After the failure at Oxford, Bertram simply stayed away. First, he went abroad. Then he began taking long sketching trips to the Scottish border country where he and Beatrix had spent so many happy weeks and months as children. And finally, about the same time that Peter Rabbit became popular and Beatrix began escaping into her little books, Bertram escaped, too. He bought a small north country farm called Ashyburn, where he could spend most of his time painting.

  As the years went on, Bertram saw less and less of the family, joining them only at the holiday, and then for only a few days. Mr. and Mrs. Potter loudly lamented his neglect, but Beatrix understood, all too well. If she had been their son, instead of their daughter, she might have done just what Bertram did. In fact, in one important way she had. Bertram defied their displeasure by buying Ashyburn and going there to live. Beatrix bought Hill Top, and spent as much time there as she possibly could.

  Bertram cast an approving look around the room. “For one who is such a disappointment to her parents,” he said lightly, “you seem to have done quite well by yourself. I like it, Bea. I like it very much.”

  “Thank you,” Beatrix replied modestly. “Shall we have a cup of tea?”

  “I had rather have the grand tour of your farm, starting with this marvelous old house.”

  “You were here when Mama and Papa were at Lakefield a few years ago, weren’t you?” Beatrix asked, hanging his cap and umbrella on a peg. The Potters had taken a holiday house on Esthwaite Water and had boarded their coachman (Mrs. Potter liked to take the carriage out in the afternoon) at Hill Top Farm.

  “Yes, I was here,” Bertram said with a chuckle. “Remember the day we found Hortense and heard all about those blasted fairies?”

  “Of course,” Beatrix laughed, too, remembering. Mrs. Allen, who lived at Willow Bank Cottage on Graythwaite Farm, kept exotic pets, among whom was a pair of tortoises named Hortense and Horatio. Hortense had escaped to the lake, where Beatrix and Bertram had found her blissfully sunning herself on a rock. Mrs. Allen had been so pleased at the return of her wayward tortoise that she had invited them in, served them tea and scones, and regaled them with stories about the various Tree Folk who lived thereabouts, in whom she wholeheartedly believed.

  “I know you’ve made a great many changes in the old place,” Bertram said. “I want to see them all. From top to bottom, if you please—barns and fields, as well.”

  “Come along, then,” she said. “Bring your bag upstairs and I’ll show you where you’ll sleep. Then we’ll begin our tour at the top, with the attics.”

  So for the next hour or so, sister and brother went through the house, Bertram saying all the right things in all the right places and in general approving of the changes his sister had made. A
fter that, they went out into the barnyard, where Bertram looked over the Galloway cows, the Berkshire pigs, the farm horses, and various chickens and ducks and geese, pronouncing them all quite fit, well fed, and extraordinarily handsome.

  Then, accompanied by the two village cats, Tabitha Twitchit and Crumpet (who had made up their quarrel and were once again the best of friends), they toured the garden, the orchard, and the meadow. When they got to the top of the hill, they paused to survey Beatrix’s Herdwick sheep, which were scattered like so many puffs of white cotton across the green grass all the way to Wilfin Beck.

  “So he’s Miss Potter’s brother,” Crumpet said thoughtfully, studying the pair. “I can’t say they’re much alike.”

  “Not in looks,” Tabitha agreed, “although there is something similar in their manner. And they do seem to get along.”

  “I say, Bea, you have a jolly good place here,” Bertram said, leaning back against a tree, the cats sitting nearby. He took out his pipe and began to fill it from a leather pouch. “Close enough to London to be convenient, remote enough so that Mama and Papa aren’t likely to come.”

  Beatrix made a face. “It’s not as remote as all that, I’m afraid. They threaten to come back to Lakefield, as they did before. But happily, they prefer a place with more society. Sawrey boasts only Lady Longford, and Mama can call on her only once a week.” She chuckled. “And poor Papa can find no one at all to listen to him here. Stock Park suits them better.”

  “Mrs. Potter complains that Ferry Hill is hard on their horses,” Tabitha confided to Crumpet. “The Potters take their carriage and pair on holiday, you know.” She gave an amused laugh. “They hire an entire railway car.”

  “They must have pots of money,” remarked Crumpet, but without envy. Animals always feel they inhabit the best of all worlds. While they may be jealous of their own kindred, they never envy other species—particularly humans, on whom they mostly take pity.