The Tale of Cuckoo Brow Wood (32 page)

32

The Village Gets Ready for a Celebration

 
The next two days were busy ones in Sawrey, with all the ordinary activities that go on when April turns into May and the landscape is fresh with delightful scents and sounds and colors and the whole world feels new and optimistic and full of importance. Monday was Washing Day, so when the skies finally cleared on Monday afternoon, the women hurried into their gardens to hang their freshly washed laundry, ensuring plenty of work for Tuesday, which was Ironing Day. Since cows and sheep often give birth in April, the men had new calves and lambs to tend to, along with the usual spring chores that keep every farmer occupied. The village smith was shoeing horses (all the village horses seemed to have lost their shoes at once), and Roger Dowling, the joiner, was building a new wooden counter for the village shop, which was operated by his wife Lydia, in their cottage. The schoolchildren were excitedly rehearsing their program for Wednesday’s May Day celebration. Tuesday brought showers, but everyone was confident that Wednesday would be fair, for no one in the village could remember a time when it had rained on May Day morning.

The May Day celebration was a village affair, the preparations taking several days and involving any number of people. On Monday afternoon, Dimity Woodcock (who had charge of the May Day tea) sent Lester Barrow’s youngest boy around the village, reminding members of the Ladies Guild to bake enough cakes and biscuits and tarts so that each schoolchild could have at least two sweet treats, as well as a cup of lemonade. On Tuesday, fearing that they might be short on biscuits, she sent Jennie with a note to Sarah Barwick, asking her to do some extra baking for the event. Sarah, who had laid in an extra supply of flour and sugar in case she was asked, was glad to oblige.

On Monday night, the Village Volunteer Band (Lester Barrow on trombone, Mr. Taylor and Clyde Burning on clarinet, Lawrence Baldwin on coronet, and Sam Stern on the concertina) met for practice in the pub—thirsty work, to judge from the several half-pints required to wet their whistles. While the band practiced, the band members’ wives brushed their red wool coats and red hats and made sure their Sunday boots were polished. Meanwhile, several fathers were setting up the wooden platform in the schoolyard, where the May Queen would be crowned, Captain Woodcock would make his usual speech, and the usual prizes would be awarded for perfect attendance, scholarship, and deportment. When that was done, they retired to the pub to listen to the band practice and wet their whistles, too, for building wooden platforms is also thirsty work, as you will know, if you’ve ever done it.

On Tuesday morning, at High Green Gate, Mr. Llewellyn washed and curried David, his large white horse, who had the honor of carrying the May Queen to the grand event. David would be led by Mr. Llewellyn and wear the new blue horse blanket that Mrs. Llewellyn had already made for the occasion, as well as the flower garlands that Abigail Llewellyn was making. Whilst Mr. Llewellyn was washing David, Mrs. Llewellyn washed Mr. Llewellyn’s best Sunday shirt. And whilst Mrs. Llewellyn was pegging the shirt on the clothesline, Mrs. Grace Lythecoe, who lived over the way in Rose Cottage, was writing the May Queen’s annual proclamation, calling on all creation to join together in peace and love (which is, after all, the point of any spring celebration).

On Tuesday afternoon, the schoolchildren went out into the lanes to gather flowers and then back to school to construct hawthorn garlands and daisy chains and ropes of primroses and apple blossom. Meanwhile, Head Teacher Margaret Nash undertook the important task of making the May Queen’s crown under the critical eyes of the May Queen and her Court. The May Queen herself (this year, she was Ruth Leech) was already so nervous that she had to go outside and throw up, but the other girls were happily discussing their dresses and ribbons, and the boys’ mothers were making sure that their sons’ best white shirts had all their buttons and their Sunday neckties were not berry-stained.

Joseph Skead, the sexton at St. Peter’s and the man who helped to maintain the school, was charged with the task of attaching Dimity’s colorful crepe paper ribbons to the top of the May Pole and planting the pole in the middle of the school yard, in preparation for the Ribbon Dance. Traditionally, the boys went one way round the May Pole and the girls went the other, holding their ribbons taut. Each girl was supposed to carry her ribbon under the ribbon of the first boy she met, then carry it over the ribbon of the next boy, while the boys did the opposite. If this rather complicated pattern was done right, the dance created a colorful basket-weave of ribbons all down the pole, and everybody congratulated everybody else. If it was done wrong, and somebody went backward instead of forward, or over instead of under, there was a huge tangle of ribbons and dancers, and everyone ended up in a helpless heap of giggles.

But forward or backward, perfectly woven or irretrievably tangled, the children always had a great deal of fun, and the mothers and fathers who cheered them on enjoyed the spectacle immensely. After all, when they were children, most of them had danced that very same Ribbon Dance around that very same May Pole in that very same school yard on this very same day, and perhaps that memory was as fresh and sweet as the happy scene before them, a reminder of a gay and innocent time, before the grownup cares of work and family began to weigh on their shoulders.

So as far as the village was concerned, May Day was one of the very highest points of the year, the day when winter’s chilly gloom faded into the past and all of the Land between the Lakes could look forward with cheerful smiles and light hearts to a season of sunshine, clear skies, warm breezes, and bright flowers.

May Day morning could not arrive soon enough.

33

Major Kittredge Learns the Truth

But behind all this happy flurry of preparations, another, darker game was afoot. Immediately after breakfast on Monday morning, Captain Woodcock and the vicar drove through the rain to the vicarage and confronted Mr. Thexton with what they knew—without, of course, mentioning the source of their information.

At first, and with a great deal of outraged sputter and vehement indignation, Mr. Thexton denied the whole thing. But when he saw Captain Woodcock’s threatening expression (which seemed to suggest dungeons and thumbscrews) and heard the detailed report of the conversation in the Raven Hall garden, he became rather more cooperative. In fact, he may even have thought that since he and Mrs. Kittredge (or rather, Mrs. Waring) had been entirely alone on the occasion of their talk, she must have decided to make a clean breast of things. It must be she who now accused him of attempted extortion—an idea that Captain Woodcock did not attempt to discourage. So, convinced that he had been betrayed by the woman he was attempting to blackmail, Mr. Thexton decided that he had no other choice. With the hope of making it easier on himself when he stood in front of the magistrate, and to discredit his accuser, he agreed to tell as much as he knew about the Waring marriage.

Which turned out to be just enough. Mr. James Waring, who had indeed survived the blast that had wrecked his ship, resided at a London address which Mr. Thexton was able to provide. Captain Woodcock immediately dispatched a telegram of inquiry—without revealing the circumstances, except to say that a woman meeting his wife’s description was living in the Lake District.

The answer arrived within a few short hours. Mr. Waring confirmed that he had married a red-haired actress named Irene some five years previously, and that they remained legally married. She had left her lodgings, leaving no forwarding address, and he had been searching for her frantically. He was posting a photograph of his wife with the hope that it would confirm that she was the lady who had been discovered living in the Lake District. He would be arriving at the Windermere Station on Wednesday and would bring with him a copy of the marriage certificate, in case further proof were required. He was prepared, he said, to take her back immediately and without question.

The photograph—a wedding photo—arrived by the Tuesday morning post, and when Miles Woodcock and Will Heelis opened the envelope and studied it, there was no doubt in either of their minds. Mr. Thexton had been correct in his identification. Mrs. Irene Waring and Mrs. Diana Kittredge were, regrettably, the very same person. (Mr. Thexton himself was conveyed to the Hawkshead gaol, to await to magistrate’s hearing. Mrs. Thexton, saying not a word, packed her bags and left the vicarage, leaving Vicar Sackett feeling that his prayers had indeed been answered.)

So, just after luncheon on Tuesday, armed with the tell-tale photograph, Will took himself off to Raven Hall for a quiet talk with his old friend Christopher Kittredge. They met in Major Kittredge’s study, and when Will was sure that they were alone and that the door was securely shut, he told the major the full story, from beginning to end.

The major was at first incredulous and disbelieving, as I daresay you would be, if someone told you, completely out of the blue, that the person you thought you had married was already married to someone else. But when he had read James Waring’s telegram for the third time and looked at the photograph for the second and third and fourth, the major had to agree that the woman he had thought was his wife was legally married to another man. He paced back and forth in front of the fire, his incredulity turning into a sense of tearful injury.

“She has stabbed me in the back,” he muttered brokenly, taking out his handkerchief and wiping his eyes. “I thought she loved me. How could she wrong me so unmercifully? How could she betray me?”

Will had no answers to these rhetorical questions and felt that he wasn’t very good at this sort of thing. He stuck his hands in his pockets and said nothing.

Finally, after a few moments of this sort of tearful blame, the major’s injury turned to anger, first at the lady’s unfeeling deception and betrayal, and then at himself, for jumping into marriage with a woman about whom he knew next to nothing—in which, of course, he was entirely right, for he had taken the decision without the proper thought.

“If I hadn’t acted so hastily,” he said in a tone of bitter self-accusation, “if I had waited, had insisted on learning more about her, I wouldn’t be in this situation. I gave in to my passion, and to her flatteries. I failed to look any further than her beautiful face and her attractive figure. I never asked myself who she was or where she came from, or why she wanted to attach herself to me. It is my fault. All my fault.”

Will, now feeling completely out of his depth, tried to say something that might make his friend feel better, something to the effect that a man in love rarely asks such questions, and that Kittredge ought not blame himself for being merely human.

But the major, anguish written all over his face, overrode him. “No, don’t try to excuse me, Will,” he said brokenly. “I should have known better. No woman in her right mind could love a man like me, face hideously scarred, missing an eye, missing an arm. Diana—Irene, rather—had to have wanted something else from me, my money, my property, my name. How could I have failed to see through her?” His tone was bitter with self-reproach. “How could I have been such a conceited, dull-witted
dolt
?”

At last Will found his voice. “Please don’t reproach yourself, Christopher. You have been ill-used, yes. But you’re not unique. It’s happened to other men before you. The responsibility for her falsehoods is entirely with her, not with you. The question you must answer now is whether you want to press charges against the lady for fraud. You would be perfectly within your rights to—”

“No, no,” Kittredge said, giving his head a violent shake. “I don’t want to make this ugly business even uglier by dragging it into the public view. I’m at fault, too, for not insisting that we wait and get to know each other better. I must share some of the blame.” He eyed Will worriedly. “I’m not obliged to go to law on this, am I?”

“Technically, yes,” Will said. “Bigamy is a serious crime. But I’ve been consulting with Captain Woodcock, and both of us are of the opinion that—unless you want to have the lady prosecuted for fraud—it may be best to simply send her back to London with her husband. That might be punishment enough.”

“Yes, I suppose,” Kittredge said gloomily. He fell silent, and I don’t suppose that we want to inquire what was going through his mind.

Finally, Will spoke. “What’ll it be, Christopher? Do you want to decide now, or take a day or two to think things over?”

Kittredge straightened his shoulders and tightened his mouth, a man who has decided that it is time to face the music. “It’ll do no good to put it off. I’ll tell her to pack her things, give her enough money to tide her over, and send her off with Waring.” He gave Will an oblique glance. “Once she’s gone, what then? It’s as if we were never married?”

“Yes,” Will said, “although I would feel better if she would sign this affidavit.” He reached into his pocket and took it out. “It simply states what we know and requires her to acknowledge the facts with her signature. Of course, we have Waring’s telegram, and the letter that accompanied the photo. I will see to it that he signs a similar affidavit, but it would be better to have hers, too.”

Kittredge nodded glumly. “Very well. I suppose I will let her keep the gifts I’ve given her, except for the family jewelry, of course.” His eyes widened. “The jewelry, by Jove!” He went quickly to the wall, took down a large painting, and twirled the lock. After a moment, he let out an audible breath. “It’s all here. For a moment, I wondered if she had somehow managed to make off with it. It’s worth tens of thousands of pounds, you know.”

Will nodded. “I suppose you’ll want to revoke the last will and testament you executed recently.” He hesitated. “And then there’s that business about the villas.” The villas. They had hung like a dark cloud at the back of his mind for days. “Will you go on with that?”