Dovetail

by Bernard Pearson

  It seemed unfair somehow to be ill in summertime. You could understand having a cold or the flu in winter, but when you felt like shit on a bright, warm summer day, you felt betrayed by your own body. But at least Bill knew and liked Dr Hall, and had been able to do him a few favours when he tried to dabble in antiques. They enjoyed each other’s company when they met in the pub, too, but going to see him professionally was not something Bill relished. The good doctor saw him on time and examined him in his small consulting room, as Bill had expected. What he hadn’t expected was to then be immediately hauled off to Chris’s study in his house next door and asked to look at a small bureau the doc had recently bought and wanted an opinion on. This ‘professional examination’ was accompanied by a cup of coffee and a bright ‘hello’ from Chris’s wife, who then left them to their discussions.

  These eventually included Bill’s symptoms.

  He was told in no uncertain terms that his smoking and the dust he inhaled all day long was doing him no good at all. He might have a very bad infection or it might be something more serious – very serious, in fact.

  Bill looked at Dr Hall. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Are we talking about the ‘Big C’ here?’

  ‘We can’t discount that, but we won’t know for certain until we’ve done some tests. Anyway, let’s not go down that road until we have to, eh? It could well be just a severe infection of the lungs.’

  Bill was given a prescription for painkillers and antibiotics and told to get as much rest as possible and throw that bloody pipe away! He was also given a referral to the local hospital for x-rays and tests.

  ‘Sooner rather than later. Phone the hospital and get an appointment as soon as possible, right?’

  Right it was, and a very thoughtful journey home from the surgery into the bargain. Even Bess caught his mood and drooped in her seat rather than watching out the window for rabbits as she usually did.

  Bill sat in his kitchen that night, radio on, unopened book beside him, and looked around as he pondered on the day. All the new locks on the windows and door shone against the old paintwork. They were an intrusion; he hadn’t needed them before Skates. His life had been comfortable, gentle, even well-ordered. Now his routine had been shattered, his health was in question, his loved ones were threatened, and for the first time since he was a child, he felt utterly helpless. He kept remembering Warren’s hands on his shoulders, pinning him to his chair…

  When he finally went to bed, the windows he would normally have left open to catch the fragrant breeze on the warm night air were closed and locked. The room was hot and humid, and sleep was elusive. When he did slip off, his dreams were troubled. Waking from them, he found he was worrying about Lucy in addition to all his other problems.

  Suddenly, with the sheets clinging to him like a shroud, he hauled himself out of bed, put on the light, and yelled, ‘Bugger this for a game of soldiers!’ He opened the windows in his bedroom, then stomped downstairs and, with many a ripe curse word, opened every window on the ground floor. Bess padded sleepily after him, taking her master’s expletives and strange behaviour in her stride. He just did these things sometimes.

  ~~~

  The next morning was bright and warm. The sweaty anxieties of the previous night were dispelled by the strong sunshine that cast dark shadows under the open-sided cart shed and would have bleached the woodwork even more if that had been possible. Bill decided to spend the day pottering. His ostensible reason for doing so was in order to put a few considered trifles into some local sales to recoup some of the money spent on all those locks and chains, but the fact was something in the back of his mind told him time was no longer on his side. He was ill, and he wasn’t getting better. Putting it all down to dust was, he knew, just a cop-out.

  But he put that aside as he sat in his workshop, both doors propped open, the sun shining in and the radio tuned to its usual station. He heard a scrunching sound in the yard and, looking up, saw the thin shape of Miss Templeton astride a bike silhouetted in the doorway.

  Bess wandered over and got a genteel greeting from the old lady. Bill invited her into the house and brewed tea. He sat opposite her, his arms on the table holding his big mug of tea, listening in polite silence whenever she spoke. After a short but apparently necessary exchange of small talk, the real reason for Miss Templeton’s visit rose to the surface like a pike in a garden pond.

  ‘Two nights ago it was a full moon and a mild night and, being restless, I took a walk,’ she said.

  Bill nodded; he sometimes saw her strolling in the moonlight when he came back late from the pub.

  ‘I was on the field edge just up the path from here when I saw a large, white vehicle drive slowly up the lane and turn into your yard.’ She went on to describe how a man had gotten out of the car and seemed to fiddle with Bill’s back door. She indicated the one behind her, and the wise old eyes noticed the new lock and the cleaned bolt, then swept over the new hardware on the kitchen windows.

  ‘I see you have taken precautions,’ she said. ‘That is just as well. I didn’t like the look of that man, or rather the way he moved. He was obviously up to no good. I had Bess with me, so I knew you were not expecting visitors.’

  ‘Visitors?’ asked Bill. ‘There was more than one man?’

  ‘Yes. The one in the passenger seat stayed in the car while the driver went into your house.’

  ‘You… you didn’t speak to them, did you?’ asked Bill. ‘Certainly not.’

  ‘I’m glad,’ said Bill with relief. ‘They are not very nice people. But you mustn’t worry, I don’t think they’ll pull a stunt like that again. I’m sorry if you were frightened.’

  Miss Templeton looked at him hard and drew herself up. ‘Mr Sawyer,’ she said, ‘I have not been frightened of any man since my training in 1942. And, although old, I am not without resources. I could see them; they could not see me.’

  ‘No, no, of course not, Miss Templeton,’ Bill replied quickly, but inside he was thinking, 1942! That may as well have been a hundred years ago!

  Bill was sitting upright in his chair now and felt as if he were being judged in some way and probably found wanting.

  Miss Templeton held his gaze with china-blue eyes that were as hard as diamonds, but in her usual refined manner said, ‘Not all young women stayed at home knitting or working the land in those dreadful days. Some of us took a more active part in the proceedings.’

  Then, having shared her news, she departed, telling Bill she would keep an eye on his home and he was to let her know if he was going away again. She also said that, as he drove up to his house, there was a gap in the trees through which he could see her attic window. She told him she would have a lamp lit in that window if there was any danger, and if he saw it he was to drive straight up to her cottage with his lights off.

  Bill thanked her appropriately, though as she cycled off he thought, ‘That’s all I need, an eccentric old lady watching over me.’ But, strangely, it did give him some comfort to know there was another pair of eyes looking out for him. He certainly slept better that night than he had the night before.

  Chapter 9

  WEDNESDAY, 22 AUGUST

  The next day the good August weather continued, and Bill thought it was about time he caught up with his family. It was coming to the end of the school holidays, and he felt it would be a criminal shame not to have a day in their company. Bill telephoned and it was agreed that a trip to the seaside was in order. They chose Seaton because it was less than a two-hour drive for them both. The small seaside town of Seaton was just on the Devon/Somerset border. No longer a big crowd puller, it was run-down in a gentrified sort of way that had always suited Bill. It was one of those towns that had grown up from a fishing port and become, with the benefit of the railway, an Edwardian resort of genteel pretensions. The beach was nothing special, but it had a plethora of charity shops, a few pubs and cafés, and a nice prom to walk on. Climbing into the van, rolling down the windows, and tuning the radio to someth
ing mindless, he and Bess set off. Bess, as always, sat on the front passenger seat with her tongue lolling out, scanning the fields and hedges for rabbits. Bill looked at her lovingly. She was probably the most sensible friend he had. She was certainly the most loyal and, except for insisting on eating what Bill considered to be a particularly posh (and expensive) dog food, undemanding.

  The van purred along country roads that wove their way across an ancient landscape. Bill was as happy as he could be that morning, all things considered, and was the first to arrive at the agreed-upon car park. He let Bess out, filled her water bowl, and sat in the open back of the van, admiring a very colourful caravan park that was clinging to a hill above the town. Before long his family arrived. With Bess at his heels, he walked over and hugged his son, his daughter-in-law, and, with a great laugh full of joy, his grandson. In the back of Bill’s van were three antique deckchairs and all the other old beach equipment he had been able to find. Passing some of this to his son to carry – and, of course, the ‘most important’ piece to young Jack – Bill and his family made their way onto the sand.

  Once the venerable constructs much amended by Bill with the help of bailing twine and scrap timber had been erected, they had a camp: deckchairs, a small and very rocky picnic table, and a windbreak. Jack and Gloria were despatched with a £10 note to buy ice creams and a ball plus any other essential that had not been essential until Jack spotted it.

  The sun shone, Bess lolled in the shade, and Bill wore his holiday hat. This was a strange, straw device that might once have been an elegant Panama but was now discoloured and tatty as only a much-loved hat can be. He even took off his habitual tweed jacket and showed the world that a true Englishman wore both braces and a belt.

  Gloria had brought a wonderful picnic, and as they ate it Bill thought what a lucky man his son was. As they sat amidst the ruins of the feast, Bill took from the jacket at his side a small, thin, elegantly turned cylinder of wood, glowing a mellow yellow in the warm sunlight. He put it to his lips and blew a long, pure note like that of a bird or perhaps an angel.

  Jack looked up, then literally sprang to his feet. Bess lifted her head and thought about springing up, too, but decided it was too soon after lunch for so much activity. Philip laughed out loud, and Gloria turned to look at Bill.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s a recorder,’ said Bill, ‘but a small one. They used to be called flutes years ago.’

  He blew a few more notes, then paid for his efforts with a spasm of coughing. His family looked at him with concern. Bill raised both his hands to silence them before they could speak.

  ‘It’s all right,’ he said, a bit breathlessly. ‘I’ve got it in hand.’

  Gloria gave him such an old-fashioned look it might have come from the last century, but simply asked ‘Did you make it?’

  ‘Yes, years ago,’ replied Bill. ‘I found it during a clear-out and gave it a bit of a polish.’

  He turned to Jack and asked him if he would like to try it. Jack took the flute and, putting it to his lips, blew. No clear, bright sound this time; just a shrill noise. Poor Jack looked desolate.

  ‘Not as easy as it looks, eh? Go on, give it to yer dad and see what he can make of it.’

  Jack did so and Philip put the instrument to his lips and blew three clear notes that danced in the seaside air like gulls in the clear blue sky. Jack looked up at his father, wonder on his face. This was a skill he had no idea his dad possessed. This was a bit of magic and, love him as he did, he had never thought of his father as being magical before. A man in his mid-forties, not very tall, balding, and with glasses over which he sometimes looked at you like a quizzical owl. That was his dad, not this amazing being sitting back in his deckchair, shirt open at the neck, playing a sea shanty that had his mother laughing and his grandfather clapping along.

  Finishing the tune, Philip gave a bow to them all and handed the flute back to Jack. ‘I’ll teach you how to play it if you like,’ he said. ‘Your granddad taught me when I was about your age.’

  Gloria put her arm around her husband and kissed him on his forehead. Sitting back, she looked at him and said, ‘Philip Sawyer, I never knew you had it in you. Sod the accountancy; become a busker and we’ll travel around in a gypsy caravan!’

  Jack thought about that. He hoped that if they did, he would still be able to have his computer.

  Gloria then turned back to Bill. ‘So how did all this come about, and why didn’t Philip take up music rather than boring sums?’

  Bill looked at Philip but said nothing.

  ‘My mum would never have allowed that,’ Philip said. ‘Besides, though I liked music, it was never a burning ambition with me. And I knew I would never have my father’s skilled hands, so I opted for working in an accountant’s firm as soon as I finished my A-levels.’

  ‘How about you, Bill?’ asked Gloria. ‘Would you have liked to be a musician?’

  Bill thought a bit then said, ‘All I ever wanted to do is what I did. Make things in wood. When Philip needed a flute for school, I bought a couple from a house sale and repaired them as best I could so he’d have his own instrument and not one knocked about by other kids. To do the job properly, of course, I had to know how they worked.’ He grinned at Philip. ‘And that meant many an excruciating hour for anyone within earshot as I taught myself to make sounds that didn’t frighten the barn cats.’

  Philip grinned back at his father. ‘Tell her about the year we did the Glastonbury Festival.’

  Jack had wandered off a little way to make sandcastles by this time, so Bill was able to tell Gloria the story with no interruptions. It was 1981, Philip was 17 and visiting his father on holiday.

  He had tried to get a ticket for the festival but with no luck; they were all sold out. He was extremely upset because his favourite group, Hawkwind, were playing, and he moped until Bill finally got him to say what the misery was all about. Of course, Bill knew someone who knew someone and they got in as traders. They had to be there early to set up, and they had to agree that a portion of their take would go to help fund CND as that was the aim of this festival.

  ‘Well, that was all right, but we were buggered as to what we could sell. I had a load of old tat from auctions and the like, but that was all wrong for Glastonbury, and besides, we wanted something that would be cheap. Then up came the idea of flutes and whistles.’

  Both Bill and Philip burst out laughing as the memories came flooding back.

  ‘Dad set up the big lathe,’ said Philip, ‘and hollowed out some hardwood dowels he had got for a job but never used. They were great lumps of wood and he turned them down into ten-inch lengths and bored a hole right through!’

  ‘Then I just cut a simple notch, shaped the mouth end, and glued in a smaller dowel to make the part called a ‘fipple’. This gave us a simple whistle, and when we had worked out roughly where to drill the finger holes, job done.’

  ‘Did they work?’ asked Gloria.

  ‘Well, after a fashion,’ said Bill with a chuckle.

  They had made about fifty and took them in on the Friday, selling out almost immediately. While Philip stayed behind, Bill sloped off to make as many more as he could from whatever suitable wood he could find.

  ‘Even used some old chair legs,’ said Bill, smiling at the memory. ‘We had a blast,’ said Philip. ‘It was the coolest thing ever, and we made a mint.’

  ‘How much did you sell them for?’ asked Gloria.

  ‘Well, we started at a pound each, then kept upping the price all weekend till those that had a bit of colour on them and looked suitably ethnic we banged out at a fiver each,’ said Bill.

  ‘Mind you,’ he added, ‘after that husband of yours stuffed some ‘herbal tobacco’ in my pipe, I really didn’t know what was going on. Good time, though, eh, son?’

  ‘It was, Dad,’ said Philip. ‘The best. Really the best.’

  ‘Ever since then,’ Bill said, ‘when I have a bit of cash from a silly jo
b, or one that’s just off the corner as it were, I call that ‘flute money’.’ Gloria looked with admiration at Bill and Philip. Both were good men, had big hearts, and were not afraid of life. Well, Bill wasn’t. There were things Philip wanted to do that he was still too insecure to pursue yet, but that might change, she thought, as she cleared away the detritus from the picnic.

  A few hours later, Bill, Philip, and Jack, with much laughter, dismantled the encampment and loaded it back into the van. The family parted with hugs all round and a big kiss from Jack to his granddad.

  Still warmed by their love and the bit of sun he had caught in spite of his hat, Bill drove home. It had been a wonderful day, and he felt lucky to have such a family.

  All was quiet under a gentle moon as Bill drove into his yard. In the magic of this summer’s night, the farm looked as if the centuries had done little to change their appearance. But Bill was a cautious man and had placed discrete markers around his property that would tell him if anyone had been into the yard or near the front of the house. Luckily, all was as it should be, but even so, the need to have checked took some of the sunshine out of the day.

  He went into his kitchen, put on the radio, made a pot of tea, and sat in his comfy armchair by the stove. Bess curled up in her basket, exhausted by the sea air and unaccustomed activity. As he sat there, relaxed and tired, smoking his pipe, a large mug of tea at his side, Bill savoured the memories of the day as only the old can. When you have more time behind you than you do in front, he thought, such memories are very precious indeed.

  Chapter 10

  LATE AUGUST

  August was dwindling towards September, and the light changed subtly, intensifying the colours of the countryside. Sometimes when he and Bess were out walking the fields that girded the house and yard or in the small lanes round about, Bill would stop and take note of the timber the landscape might yield. Sit him down, put a pint of cider in his hand, give him time to stoke and light his pipe, and he would wax lyrical about trees: their wood, their particular uses, and even the folklore that surrounded them. He could also tell you where the best unharvested trees were to be found and how many years it would be before they would be at their most useful.