Anthony Powell - Hearing Secret Harmonies

The quarry-owners were offering undertakings as to ‘landscaping’ and ‘shelter belts’, to demonstrate which an outdoor meeting had been arranged. Men carrying flags would be posted at various spots round about, indicating both the proposed extension of the workings, and related localities of tree-plantation. The assembly point for those concerned, timed at nine o’clock in the morning in order to minimize dislocation of the day’s work, was a gap in the hedge running along a side road, not far from the scene of action. A stile led across the fields to the rising ground on which The Devil’s Fingers stood, within a copse of elder trees.

‘Quite a good turnout of people,’ said Isobel. ‘I’m glad to see Mrs Salter has shown up. She won’t stand any nonsense from anyone.’

The previous night had been hot and muggy, a feeling of electricity in the atmosphere. The day, still loaded with electrical currents, warm, was uncertain in weather, bright and cloudy in patches. Cars were parked against gates, or up narrow grass lanes. All sorts were present, representatives of the quarry, officials from local authorities, members of one or two societies devoted to historical research or nature preservation, a respectable handful of private individuals, who were there only because they took an interest in the neighbourhood. Mrs Salter, noted by Isobel, was in charge of the Nature Trust. A vigorous middle-aged lady in sweater and trousers, whitehaired and weatherbeaten, she carried a specially designed pruning-hook, a badge of office from which she was never parted.

‘Who are the three by the stile?’

‘Quarry directors. Mr Aldredge and Mr Gollop. I don’t know who the midget is.’

The small energetic henchman with Mr Aldredge and Mr Gollop, almost as if he were shouting the odds, began to pour out a flow of technicalities on the subject of landscaping and arboriculture. Mr Aldredge, pinched in feature, with a pious expression, seemed at pains to prove that no mere hatred of the human race as such — so he gave the impression of feeling himself accused — caused him to pursue a policy of wholesale erosion and pollution. He denied those imputations pathetically. Mr Gollop, younger, aggressive, would have none of this need to justify himself or his firm. Instead, he spoke in a harsh rasping voice about the nation’s need for non-skid surfacing on its motorways and arterial roads.

‘I shall not make for Mr Todman immediately,’ said Isobel. ‘I shall choose my moment.’

Mr Todman was from the Planning Authority. Upstanding and hearty, he had not entirely relinquished a military bearing that dated from employment during the war on some aspect of constructing The Mulberry. That had been the vital experience of his life. He had never forgotten it. He had the air of a general, and brought a young aide-de-camp with him. Mr Todman was talking to another key figure in the operation, Mr Tudor, Clerk of the Rural District Council. Mr Tudor’s appearance and demeanour were in complete contrast with Mr Todman’s. Mr Tudor, appropriately enough, possessed a profile that recalled his shared surname with Henry VII, the same thoughtful shrewdness, if necessary, ruthlessness; the latter, should the interests of the RDC be threatened.

‘I can’t remember the name of the suntanned, rather sad figure, who looks like a Twenties film star making a comeback.’

‘Mr Goldney. He’s retired from the Political Service in Africa, now secretary of the archaeological society.’

There were quite a lot of others, too, most of whom I did not know by sight. The thicket of The Devil’s Fingers was not to be seen from the stile. We set off across the first field. It was plough, rather heavy going. Mr Aldredge, the quarryman putting up a policy of appeasement, addressed himself to Mrs Salter, with whom he had probably had passages of arms before.

‘Looks like being a nice Midsummer’s Day. We deserve some decent weather at this time of year. We haven’t seen much so far.’

Mrs Salter shook her head. She was not to be lulled into an optimistic approach to the weather, least of all by an adversary in the cause of conservation.

‘It will turn to rain in the afternoon, if not before. Mark my words. It always does in these parts at this time of year.’

Mr Gollop, the pugnacious quarryman, took the opportunity, a good one, to draw attention to rural imperfections unconnected with his own industry.

‘We quarry people get shot at sometimes for the fumes we’re said to cause. It strikes me that’s nothing to what’s being inflicted on us all at this moment by the factory farms.’

The smell through which we were advancing certainly rivalled anything perpetrated by the Quiggin twins. Mrs Salter, brushing away this side issue, went into action.

‘It’s not so much the fumes you people cause as the dust. The rain doesn’t wash it away. The leaves are covered with a white paste all the year round. After they’ve had a lot of that, the trees die.’

Mr Tudor, a man of finesse, must have thought this conversation too acrimonious in tone for good diplomacy. He had steered the Council through troubled waters before, was determined to do so this time.

‘We do receive occasional complaints about intensive farming odours, Mr Gollop, just like those we get from time to time regarding your own industry. The Council looks on animal by-products as the worst offenders, even if poultry and pig-keepers cannot be held altogether blameless, and some of the silage too can be unpleasing to the nostrils. The air will be fresher, I hope, when we are over the next field. There’s a lovely view, by the way, from the top of the ridge.’

Individual members of the party being concerned with different aspects of what was proposed, the group began to string out in all directions. Isobel, discussing with Mr Goldney the contrasted advantages of stone walls and hedges, a tactical feint, would quickly disengage herself, when opportunity arose, to obtain a good position to command the ear of Mr Todman, the figure likely to be most influential in the outcome of the morning’s doings. Somebody, who had not joined the party at its point of departure by the stile, was now coming across the fields from the west. When he drew level this turned out to be Mr Gauntlett. He would usually appear on any occasion of this kind. Today he was wearing an orchid in his buttonhole.

‘Good morning, Mr Gauntlett.’

‘Morning, Mr Jenkins. Beautiful one too just now, tho’ t’won’t last.’

‘That’s what Mrs Salter says.’

‘Not where the clouds do lie, nor the manner the rooks be flying.’

Mr Gauntlett’s professional rusticity did not entirely cloak his faintly military air, which was in complete contrast with Mr Todman’s soldierliness. Mr Todman suggested modern scientific warfare; Mr Gauntlett, military levies of Shakespearean days, or earlier.

‘How are you keeping, Mr Gauntlett? Haven’t seen you for a long while.’

‘Ah, I can’t grumble. There was a sad thing last week. Old Daisy died. She was a bad old girl, but she’d been with me a long time. I’ll miss her.’

‘I remember you were looking for her — it must have been two years ago or more — when those strange young people came to see us in their caravan.’

Still feeling rather self-conscious about being caught by Mr Gauntlett with the caravan party, I said that with implied apology. Mr Gauntlett brushed anything of the sort aside.

‘Daisy was just where your young friend said. She’d whelped, and there was one pup left alive. It were a good guess on his part.’

‘So he was right?’

‘It were a good guess. A very good guess. He must know the ways o’ dogs. Well, what are we going to be shown this morning, Mr Jenkins?’

‘I wonder. There’s quite a fair lot of people have come to see. It means local interest in preventing what the quarry want to do.’