J. Buckrose - A Bachelor's Comedy

Andy stood idly watching the low sun slant across the graves, and across the woman’s kneeling figure. A cuckoo cried up into the clear, keen air; a little way off a cock was crowing. Something that Andy felt, and tried to grasp, and couldn’t, was in that quiet afternoon.

He came back over the fields with his hands deep in his pockets, unconsciously trying to make out what it was, and he felt inclined to write a piece of poetry that afternoon because he was young and alone and in love with life. It is an instinct, under such circumstances, for people to try to catch hold of the glory by putting it into words, just as a child instinctively tries to get hold of the sunshine, and both occupations are equally silly and joyful and engrossing.

So Andy walked in through his study window and sat at his table, looking out over the green and golden day that shimmered up by most exquisite gradations to a sky just before sunset. Green of the close-cut lawn – green and gold of the holly hedge – gold and green of the trees full in the sun – gold of the lower sky – translucent green of the cloudless upper reaches. No wonder Andy’s growing soul groped and groped after some way of keeping this. No wonder he stretched out baby hands of the soul. And no wonder that he grasped nothing. Or so near nothing that this is all he found to say about the Werrits near the church porch with Mrs. Will Werrit bending over them. He called it “The Others,” and was melancholy – as all happy poets are —

Andy read it over. He thought it was very beautiful indeed, and began to compose an epitaph for himself when he should lie, like Gulielmus, beneath the shadow of the ancient church.

“A great poet and a great priest. Fifty years of untiring service – ”

Oh, he was so young and so happy that he enjoyed it very much indeed. And he was so hungry afterwards that he was able to eat Mrs. Jebb’s pastry.

The next day about two o’clock he went across the lawn to speak to his gardener about the radishes when it suddenly occurred to him that he had seen nothing of that worthy since half-past ten, though he had been about the place all the morning. Evidently young Sam Petch was beginning his games. This should be put a stop to at once. Andy walked over the short grass with a determined step, and was about to start the inquisition when Sam, with a pleasant smile, remarked —

“Nice morning I had of it. Searching high and low, I was, for bits of cloth to nail up the creepers on the stable wall. And in the end my poor missus gave me the clippings she’d saved for pegging a hearthrug.”

Andy looked hard at his gardener, but it was his own eyes which fell before the radiant honesty shining in Sam Petch’s face.

“Very good of Mrs. Petch – I must see if I haven’t an old pair – ”

He broke off, for he had come closer to Sam in speaking, and there was somewhere in the air an unmistakable odour of the public-house.

“Your oldest would be too good for that job,” said Sam hastily. “My wife would sponge ’em with beer with a drop o’ gin in it and they’d look like new. She does that, time and again, to my old clothes. These I have on she did last night. On’y drawback is, you can’t get the smell of the liquor out all at once. You’ll maybe not have noticed, but I smell a smell of drink about this here jacket yet, though I’ve been out in it since morning.”

Andy looked hard again. Again he was met by the clear, blue gaze of honesty and simple candour. He walked away, making no remark.

But half-way across the grass he paused, shook his head, and went back.

“I would have you know,” he said, copying as closely as possible the air and manner of the senior curate, “that I am perfectly able to appreciate the difference between the odour of beer applied externally and internally. Pray remember that for the future.”

Then, head in air, he marched towards the house, feeling greatly annoyed that a dandelion root should trip him up half-way and spoil the exit.

Sam watched him go into the house, and then bent over the mowing machine in a paroxysm of helpless laughter.

“Golly – he’s a rum ’un – but not so soft as he looks.”

For young Sam Petch had many failings, but also the great virtue of being able to enjoy a joke against himself.

Meanwhile, Andy made his way to Mrs. Simpson’s sale, and as he entered the house the auctioneer’s raucous voice could be heard selling the spare-bedroom furniture. Every one was upstairs save a few who waited in the dining-room so as to have a good place when the auctioneer came in there.

Mrs. Thorpe and Mrs. Will Werrit, for instance, had planted themselves firmly by the table on which Mrs. Simpson’s cut glass and china were displayed. They were not surprised to see the new Vicar, as they supposed he would be wanting things for his house, and Mrs. Thorpe tore herself away from a fascinating and confidential conversation with her neighbour to say pleasantly glancing at him over her ample chest —

“I hope you’re comfortable at Gaythorpe, Mr. Deane?”

That was what Mrs. Thorpe wanted every one to be in this world – comfortable – and it was certainly what she hoped for in the world to come.

“I’m more than comfortable,” said Andy. “I love the place already. And after London it seems so peaceful – like one big family.”

Mrs. Will Werrit’s thin lips curled at the corners.

“Are big families peaceful in London?” she said.

“Well, well!” said Mrs. Thorpe, soothingly. “Human nature is human nature. And how does your housekeeper cook, Mr. Deane?”

“Oh, not very grandly,” said Andy, with a laugh.

“Can she make decent pastry?” asked Mrs. Will Werrit.

“No. But I’m not much of a pastry lover – ”

“Oh!” said Mrs. Thorpe and Mrs. Will Werrit. Then they coughed behind their gloves to tone down the ejaculation, and carefully avoided each other’s glance.

But Andy wondered what on earth there was to be so surprised at in the fact that he did not like pastry. He walked to the window and stood there with his hands in his pockets while the two women resumed their interrupted conversation.

“Did you hear?” said Mrs. Will Werrit. “He said he didn’t like pastry. After eating six tarts and eight cheesecakes at a sitting.”

“Well, well. I’m sure I don’t know how that got about. I never told a soul, that I can swear.”

“Nobody,” said Mrs. Will Werrit, snapping her lips together, “can blame a lad for liking tarts and cheesecakes. But what I hate is his lying about it.”

“Come, come! You can’t call it lying,” said Mrs. Thorpe. “Poor lad, he’s ashamed of his appetite, I expect.” She touched a set of glass dishes on the table before her. “I’m bidding for those.”

“Don’t touch ’em!” said Mrs. Will sharply. “There’s a woman looking at you. You don’t want anybody to notice them before they’re auctioned if you can help it. They’ll be running you up.”

“I shan’t go beyond two shillings apiece,” said Mrs. Thorpe.

“You don’t know. Sales are such queer things. You’d think” – Mrs. Will lowered her voice still further and glanced at Andy’s back – “you’d think sometimes when you get home with a lot of rubbish you’ve no use for, that you’d been possessed .” She paused. “I shall bid for the jelly glasses. I remember thinking I should like them the last time we had supper here before Mr. Simpson’s illness.”