Хилари Бэйли: The Ramparts

It is raining this early morning. The sky is dark and cloudy as it moves over my head. The lawn down to the forest is dark and drenched. The men have not arrived to start their work. I feel annoyed that they should be discouraged by bad weather. Not that there is any need for haste, but such inefficiency and sloth gall me— we aim to lead a civilized life but must always strive to prevent cultivation and grace from deteriorating into laziness and enervation. What happens if it rains all summer? We all agreed the work should be completed by October, simply so that it should not drag on all through winter and into spring. As I say, there is no real need for haste, but if a job is being done it should be done swiftly. I shall go and speak to Keeney, who is, no doubt, partially responsible for the delay.

My irritability probably stems from the argument with my wife. At breakfast this morning she said we must make ready for the visit to Juram. I said that the weather was too bad, that the dripping of the trees over the road would penetrate the hood of the car. She demanded to know, if we could not travel in May, when could we travel? I said that the overcast sky, combined with overhanging trees, would make it too dark to drive. She responded by mentioning our car lights. Finally she called me irrational. Perhaps I am.

I do not want to take the forest road to Juram with my wife and child.

In the end she said that if I would not take her she would go alone or ask Keeney, whose business often takes him on visits to the Juram town officials, to take her with him. She began to toss her long hair about, a sign of determination. Eventually I gave in and said we would go. But I do not like it. I really do not like it at all. I like it less and less as the sky becomes more and more overcast and the rain heavier. It will be pitch-black on the Mendip Road and it is not altogether well maintained these days. Why Regan — but there, she must pursue her career. Although it is a pity she will not make herself concentrate and spend more time at home composing. Nevertheless, it would be a poor lookout for a concert pianist if she never played for anyone but audiences of her own townspeople. If you like, that is one of the few disadvantages of our social structure — we are somewhat cut off from each other. Our cars, although pleasant to drive in, travel scarcely any faster than one would on foot. Our journeys are lengthy, if pleasant and relaxing. We have no roar or stink or lung-clogging fumes, but our progress is slower than it was in the days of coaches drawn by horses. But we are not rovers who must go racing from place to place, nor speed-lunatics who will sacrifice all pleasantness for the excitement of crashing along.

Now the sky overhead looks truly black and threatening. I shall put my things together for the journey and hope that at the last moment my wife will see sense. And I shall go to see Keeney and inquire about why the work has not started.

A most alarming experience. I am still trembling.

Keeney was not there. I walked to his house, circumventing the town center, taking the broad and pleasant roads toward the edges of the forest. Even under rain and heavy skies our streets are still beautiful and the smell of the lovely gardens under rain is delicious.

Naturally I was shocked, although I tried not to be, when I reached Keeney s house. It is set on the edge of the town with streets on one side, and, on the other, the expanses of vegetable gardens and fruit trees which extend almost to the forest. What a spectacle met my eyes! To begin with, he has dug up his garden, so that the whole area, about an acre, I suppose, looks like a plowed field. And at the same time he has uprooted every paving stone from the path leading to his door and tossed them, higgledy-piggledy, to one side. To reach his front door I was obliged to trudge along the flattened earth where the stones had been, getting mud all over my shoes and the bottoms of my trousers. I considered it most careless and thoughtless of Keeney. Admittedly, sometimes the desire for change and alteration leads one to drastic action, but one has a duty to use a certain restraint and make sure that the changes are conducted with discretion so that they do not produce an unpleasant effect like that. It is surely unsuitable for a senior town official to reduce his home to such a filthy and depressing condition.

By the time I reached the door, I was in an understandable state of apprehension. I was not looking forward to my task of reproaching Keeney with his laxness over the question of the building work. And other things disconcerted me too, though I did not notice them consciously at the time.

When I got to the porch, the front door would not open — naturally I pushed it, and pushed again, but it would not yield. Can you imagine it? The man had, to all intents and purposes, locked his door, as if someone in the house were in the process of arriving or departing this earth. After my attempts to open the door I thought again and wondered if this were the case. But no one had visited us to tell us not to go to Keeney’s house. Mrs. Keeney had certainly not informed the council that she wished to bear a child — in any case, at her age such a request would never have been granted. Keeney’s daughter, Adela, was unmarried. The council had not been informed that any of the family were ill. The only possibility was that there had been an accident to one of them, or, unworthy thought, that Adela had defied the law again and committed the act which had nearly had such serious consequences for her before. I naturally pushed this thought from me. I reflected at that moment that the oddity which had struck me as I stood pushing the unyielding door was that the curtains in the upper rooms were drawn. But not in the lower — I had seen perfectly well into the living room as I squelched my way up to the house. As I stood on that step with the rain teeming down into Keeney’s chaotic garden, I lost my temper and decided that, unannounced Arrival or Departure or not, I would gain entry. I first found the bell and rang it, and failing to get any result, began to knock and pound on the door. After I had been knocking for some time, I heard the bolts being drawn back. .

clear out the bones I say to my wife and light a light. I can see nothing. She lies in a corner, not answering, so I beat her with my stick. She still says nothing. I beat her till the blood runs. She just groans and rolls over to face the wall. Of course, the child is weeping. I give him a kick, that’ll teach him sobbing, not that he needs teaching, and walk off. I find Hodge, who smashed his wife’s head. We go hunting. Hey, ho, crashing through bush and tree until toe run it to earth near the mere and bash it to death. Carry it back and they all come out and sing. All but my wife still skulking in the home with the women. Feasting tonight, all thanks to yours truly. Hurroo.

. . and Mrs. Keeney put her head out, looking worried. Naturally it would be out of order to discuss a fellow citizen, but I must say her pie and cake baking have fallen off significantly and there is talk of giving her a lighter job. She looks thinner too. Funnily enough, as Keeney increases in bulk, his wife seems to diminish.

I stepped inside the house, although it seemed to me that Mrs. Keeney was a second or two late in opening the door, so that I almost felt I was elbowing my way in.

“I trust I have not come at any inconvenient moment,” I said, really expecting her to tell me that I had. Her depressed air and the locked door all added up to an Arrival or a Departure taking place.

But she said no, I had not come at such a moment. I walked into the living room and asked if Keeney was at home. I observed that he had moved all the furniture since I was last there, somehow crowding it all over to one side of the room, which was large, so that there was a huge space of blank floor (for he had also rolled up the carpet) from the middle of the room to the window, which looked out over the muddy garden. Once again there was the same air of desolation, of changes about to be made, which I had sensed when outside the house.