Seedtime and Harvest (The Apple Tree Saga Book 5)

by Mary E. Pearce

‘I’ll tell you this much ‒’

  ‘What?’ she asked.

  ‘You’ve still got a dirty face!’ he said.

  He walked away and climbed into the cart. She went and opened the gate for him. He raised his hand in a little salute, looking down at her as he passed, and Philip doffed his cap to her.

  ‘Thanks for the cocoa, Mrs Shaw!’

  After breakfast on Christmas Eve, Charlie and Philip walked into town. The motor-van had broken down and Charlie wanted to buy some spares. While he was at Sutton’s garage, Philip went shopping by himself. He bought a yellow duster for Linn, a packet of razor blades for Charlie, and a handkerchief for Mrs Shaw. He bought some paper-chains for himself and three little pine-cones painted gold.

  They walked back across the fields but as they approached Scampton village Charlie turned off at the railway sidings and, after a glance up and down the road, lifted Philip over the fence and nimbly vaulted after him.

  ‘We’ll take a short cut along the line.’

  ‘Won’t we get into trouble?’

  ‘Not if nobody sees us, we shan’t.’

  ‘Auntie Linn told me off for coming down to the railway line.’

  ‘Yes, well, and she’s quite right.’ Charlie took a look at his watch. ‘But there’s no train due till twelve o’clock. That gives us half an hour or more, and we only need ten minutes, that’s all.’

  He shouldered the sack containing his spares, and together they scrambled down the steep bank, on to the narrow railway track. It was quite warm between the two banks and only a few patches of snow lay in the shadows of the trees.

  ‘Supposing a train was to come along?’

  ‘It won’t,’ Charlie said. ‘There isn’t one due.’

  ‘Yes, but supposing?’ Philip said.

  ‘Well, what if it did?’ Charlie said. ‘You’d hear it a mile off, wouldn’t you?’ And then, as they walked along, he said: ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of, you know. You’re perfectly safe if you walk at the side.’

  ‘Oh, I’m not afraid!’ Philip said.

  And to show how unafraid he was, he walked between the glistening rails, enjoying the thud of his boots on the sleepers and stretching his legs to make them reach. After a while he came to a stop and stood looking up and down the line. ‘Which way is it to London?’ he asked.

  ‘I told you before,’ Charlie said. ‘The London trains don’t come this way. This is only a loop-line.’

  Philip frowned. He did not understand.

  ‘We’d have to go into Mingleton to get the London train,’ Charlie said. ‘Don’t you remember, when you arrived, you came to the station in Mingleton?’

  ‘London is that way, then,’ Philip said. He stood looking back the way they had come, to where the narrow single-line track curved away into the distance. ‘How far is it, along the track?’

  ‘It’s about a hundred and fifteen miles.’ Charlie studied the boy’s wistful face. ‘Not thinking of walking it, are you?’

  ‘No, it’s too far,’ Philip said.

  ‘Come along, then,’ Charlie said.

  When they were close to Scampton Halt they had to walk on the side of the bank, taking cover among the trees, so as not to be seen by the man in the office. They went crouched low, like Red Indians, stealthily making their way past the Halt and then dropping down to the line again.

  In many places along the track the granite chips that formed its ballast were littered with fragments of broken shell, some yellow and some brown, some patterned with swirling black stripes. Philip kept stopping to look at them. He saw they were snailshells, broken in bits.

  ‘Why are there so many snailshells here?’

  ‘Because of the thrushes,’ Charlie said. ‘They bring the snails to the railway line and smash them on the granite chips. They eat the snails and the shells are left.’

  ‘What about when the trains come along?’

  ‘If they’ve got any sense, they fly out of the way.’

  But about a hundred yards further on, they came upon a dead thrush, lying just inside the rail. Charlie turned it over with the toe of his boot.

  ‘There’s one that left it too late,’ he said.

  Philip stooped and picked it up. It was hard to believe the thrush was dead, so warm was its body between his hands, so bright were the feathers on its breast. But dead it was; there was no doubt of that; its head lolled on its limp broken neck and its eyes were just two blobs of blood.

  ‘Poor little bird,’ Philip said, and held it close against his face, touching its feathers with his lips and feeling its death inside himself, secretly, in his heart, where it hurt. ‘Poor little bird,’ he said again, and stroked its pretty speckled breast, tenderly, with the backs of his fingers.

  He hated the thought of the dead thrush lying on the railway line, where another train might crush its body, so he took it to the foot of the bank and laid it in the long grass, underneath a hawthorn bush, and covered it with handfuls of leaves.

  ‘Come along, Philip,’ Charlie said. ‘We’ll be late for dinner if we don’t watch out.’

  Soon, in another half mile or so, he was leading the way up the steep bank, over the fence by the railway bridge, and out into Ratter’s Lane. They were almost at the farm when the twelve o’clock goods train, running on time, passed along the valley below. Charlie turned and looked back at it.

  ‘There you are! What did I say? You can hear them a mile off, can’t you?’ he said.

  They stood and watched the train’s progress, marked by the travelling coil of smoke, and Philip thought of the bright speckled thrush who had left it too late to fly away and now lay dead in the grass of the bank, buried under a mound of leaves.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Soon after Christmas there was news of terrible fire-bomb raids on the City of London and the docks.

  ‘I hope Philip’s parents are all right,’ Charlie said. ‘I don’t think they’re anywhere near the docks but they get their share of the raids just the same.’

  It was a great relief to him when, early in the new year, Philip had a letter from his mother.

  ‘How are things at home?’ he asked.

  ‘They’ve got burst pipes,’ Philip said. ‘They had to have the plumber in.’

  ‘Sounds as though the weather there is just as bad as it is with us.’

  ‘Yes, it’s bitter, my mother says. The windows have been blown in again and she says the wind is howling through.’

  ‘They’re still getting raids, then, at Hurlestone Park?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Philip said.

  His mother, in her Christmas parcel, had sent him a brown balaclava helmet, a new pair of gloves, and a thick woollen scarf, and now that the weather had turned severe, Philip wore them all the time.

  ‘She must’ve known we were in for a hard winter,’ Charlie said, ‘sending you those warm things to wear.’

  ‘She still hasn’t sent my books, though.’

  ‘Books won’t keep you warm,’ Linn said.

  ‘Tell me something I don’t know!’

  ‘Now, then!’ said Charlie, frowning at him. ‘You mustn’t be rude to your Auntie Linn.’ And a little later he said to the boy: ‘What about Robert’s books upstairs? Have you thought of reading them?’

  ‘No, they’re boring,’ Philip said.

  ‘It’ll be a good thing,’ Linn said, ‘when this young man returns to school.’

  ‘If he can get there,’ Charlie said. ‘The way things are going we shall soon be cut off.’

  Often in the morning, when Charlie went out to feed the stock, he had to dig his way through the snow, which had drifted over the farmyard walls and piled itself up, eight feet high, against the doors of the barn and sheds. The pig-sties were buried to their roofs and so were the hen-coops in the field. Wherever he went about the farm, he had to carry a spade with him, to dig a pathway through the snow and to break the ice on the drinking-troughs.

  For some days the farm was cut off. No baker’s v
an could come up the track and Linn had to bake her own bread. Charlie took the horses out, pulling a snow-plough made of rough boards, and cleared a passage as best he could, all the way to Ratter’s Lane. The Council snow-plough had cleared the roads and they were now roughly passable, at least for those who travelled on foot. Linn began watching for the postman again: she had not heard from Robert for over a month; but the postman never came to the farm.

  ‘I don’t think he’s trying hard enough. He can’t be bothered because of the snow. Surely there must be a letter by now?’

  ‘I’ll go down to Scampton and see,’ Charlie said.

  But when he had struggled down to the village, there were no letters waiting at the Post Office, and he returned empty-handed.

  ‘Try not to worry yourself too much. You know what happened last time. You waited and waited, weeks on end, and then three letters came at once.’

  ‘How can I help worrying when Robert is fighting,’ Linn said, ‘somewhere out there in North Africa?’

  The news from the desert had been very good. The British had taken Bardia, in Egypt, and were pressing on into Libya.

  ‘We seem to be doing well out there. We’re pushing the Eyeties back all the time.’

  ‘It still doesn’t mean that Robert’s all right.’

  ‘If anything had happened to him, you would’ve heard immediately. No news is good news. It must mean he’s safe.’

  ‘Safe?’ she exclaimed bitterly. ‘Robert won’t be really safe until it’s all over and he’s back at home! And who knows when that’ll be? The last war went on for four long years. How long will this one go on, d’you think?’

  ‘We won in the end, though, didn’t we?’

  ‘Only when thousands of men had been killed! Thousands of lives just thrown away!’

  Charlie made no answer to this. He knew he could never comfort her.

  Snow fell again for two or three days. Then it stopped and there were hard frosts. On washday, when Linn hung her clothes out to dry, they stiffened immediately on the line, and she had to bring them in again, to dry them as best she could indoors. They hung from strings across the kitchen and dripped all morning, wetting the floor. The whole house smelt of wet clothes; steam rose and clouded the windows; moisture dripped from every wall. Whenever someone opened the door, thick smoke gushed from the chimney, and the clothes became covered in smuts.

  ‘Must you keep coming in and out?’ Linn demanded, rounding on Philip, and to Charlie she said angrily; ‘I told you that chimney needed a clean but you’re always too busy elsewhere to do what needs doing in your own home!’

  ‘Come on, Philip,’ Charlie said, ‘this is no place for you and me.’

  ‘Grumpy old thing!’ Philip said. He pummelled his way through the wet dripping clothes.

  Sitting on a box in the woodshed, he watched Charlie splitting logs.

  ‘Auntie Linn doesn’t like me. I can tell by the way she looks at me.’

  ‘Nonsense! Of course she does! She gets a bit fussed about things, that’s all.’

  ‘I don’t care, anyway. I didn’t ask to come to this place.’

  Philip had picked up a bunch of straws and was twisting them round and round in his hands until they made a tight-twisted ring. ‘How long do you think the war will last?’

  ‘I don’t know. You’ve got me there. We should all like to know the answer to that.’

  ‘If the war ended tomorrow, I should go home, shouldn’t I?’

  ‘Yes, you’d go back to your mum and dad.’

  Charlie’s axe came down on a log and the two halves, cleanly split, toppled from the chopping-block to the floor. He kicked them aside, on to the heap, and stood for a moment, axe in hand, looking at the boy’s wistful face.

  ‘We shouldn’t see you for dust, should we, once the war was over?’ he said. ‘You’d be off like a shot on the London train and that’d be the end of you.’

  ‘I might come and see you sometimes.’

  ‘Well, now, I wonder!’ Charlie said. He gave a little teasing laugh and touched the boy’s baladava’d head. ‘I don’t think you’ll give us a single thought, once you’re back in your own home. Why should you indeed? No reason at all! Like you said a moment ago ‒ you never asked to come to this place.’

  He set a log on the chopping-block, split it with one stroke of his axe, and paused again.

  ‘As soon as the weather gets better, young Phil, I’ll take you up to Flaunton Heath and show you the Observation Post, where I shelter when I’m on sentry-go.’

  ‘Why not today?’

  ‘I’m too busy today.’

  ‘Are you going to see Mrs Shaw?’

  ‘I don’t know. I might, if there’s time.’

  Philip slid from his perch on the box and threw his twisted straws aside. He came and stood close to the chopping-block, watching Charlie splitting the logs.

  ‘I suppose Mrs Shaw is your fancy piece?’

  ‘No,’ Charlie said, ‘indeed she is not!’

  ‘What is she, then?’

  ‘Just a neighbour, that’s all.’

  Charlie stopped and picked up a log and set it on the chopping-block. His axe lay resting in his hands.

  ‘You shouldn’t say things like that,’ he said.

  ‘Why not? Where’s the harm?’

  ‘I reckon you know that well enough. You were just trying to stir me up.’

  ‘What if I was?’

  ‘You shouldn’t, that’s all.’

  Charlie began to swing his axe, lifting it high above his head. The blade was descending, straight as a die, when Philip’s hand fluttered out below and flipped the log from its place on the block. Charlie saw it and stiffened himself. His heart leapt into his mouth and a terrible heat turned his bones to wax. The axe came down ‒ he could never have stopped it ‒ and the blade bit deeply into the block. Philip, seeing the look on his face, gave a high-pitched crowing laugh and spun in a circle, hugging himself. Charlie stared at him, feeling sick, appalled by the danger the boy had run. His whole body prickled as though on fire.

  ‘That was a damned stupid thing to do!’ he said in a voice tight with control. ‘If I’d hit your hand with this axe of mine ‒’

  ‘You didn’t though, did you? I was too quick!’

  ‘If you ever play that trick again, I’ll give you a hiding you won’t forget, and that’s not a joke, so don’t you smile!’

  Charlie put up a shaking hand and wiped the sweat from his upper lip. He still saw, in his mind’s eye, the boy’s small hand crushed to pulp, under the axe on the chopping-block. The thought of it suddenly blinded him and he was filled with a black rage.

  ‘Go on, get out, you little sod! I can’t trust you. You’d better get out!’

  ‘No, I’m not going to!’ Philip cried.

  ‘Didn’t you hear what I said to you?’

  ‘Yes, I heard! You swore at me!’

  ‘Playing a damn-fool trick like that! I’ve half a mind to tan your hide!’

  Charlie’s anger was still like fire. He stared at the boy and the boy stared back, sullen, tight-lipped, defying him. Then, from the house, they heard Linn’s voice, calling them in to their midday meal. A flicker crossed the boy’s face and he looked at Charlie warily.

  ‘It’s dinner-time. She’s calling us.’

  ‘Who’s she? The cat’s mother?’

  ‘Auntie Linn, then,’ Philip said.

  ‘Yes, all right, you’d better go in.’

  As the boy sidled past him, however, Charlie reached out and grabbed his arm.

  ‘No more tricks in future, mind? Promise me that before you go in?’

  ‘Stop it, you’re hurting me!’ Philip said.

  ‘I want that promise,’ Charlie said.

  ‘All right, I promise. Cross my heart.’

  ‘See that you keep it,’ Charlie said.

  He let go of the boy’s arm and sent him on his way with a smack on his rump.

  There came a few days when the weather r
elaxed. The wind went right round to the west and there was a sudden surprising thaw. The ice in the yard grew treacherous and Charlie worked hard to clear it away, but as soon as he had cleared the flags, snow slid from the roofs of the sheds and the yard was just as bad as before.

  Out in the fields the snow still lay: shrinking a little and flattening itself; even melting here and there; but, for the most part, still lying thick, smooth and wet and glaring white. ‘It’s waiting for more,’ Charlie said, and on the fifth morning, sure enough, the wind went round to the north again and heavy snow-clouds darkened the sky. ‘We’re in for it now and no mistake!’ He could feel the snow in his stomach and bones.

  Linn looked out of the kitchen window and saw the postman coming up the track. She went out to meet him in the yard but the only letter he had brought was a bill for pig and poultry food.

  ‘Isn’t there anything else?’ she asked.

  ‘Sorry, Mrs Truscott, that’s all there is.’

  She watched him trudging away again. It was now more than six weeks since she had last heard from Robert. Her anxiety for him increased every day. This was Saturday and there would be no more deliveries at Stant until Monday morning. Shivering, she went indoors, where Philip was putting on his gumboots.

  ‘Any post for me?’ he asked.

  ‘No, nothing,’ Linn said.

  ‘I wish they’d send my books,’ he said. ‘There’s nothing to do in this old place.’

  ‘Why don’t you go and play outside?’

  ‘That’s what I am doing, can’t you see?’

  Charlie was in the lean-to shed, filling a can with paraffin from the tank on the bench. When it was full he turned off the tap, removed the tundish from the can, and screwed on its cap.

  Out in the yard, close by the door, Philip was lying in wait for him, a wet slushy snowball in his hands. It exploded fully in Charlie’s face. Spluttering, he set down the can, wiped the worst of the snow front his neck, and made a lunge towards the boy. Philip turned and ran for the house and Charlie lumbered after him, stooping to gather snow as he went.

  ‘I’ll get you for that, my boy!’ he said.

  Linn was at the kitchen-table, washing up the dinner-things, when Philip burst in, shrieking with laughter, and Charlie ran in after him. The door swung open against the wall, a chair was sent toppling against the dresser, and the crockery rattled on its shelves.