Tomato Cain and Other Stories Page 9

But later he fell into some small dispute with the heiress when she wished to cut down expenses now that there was nobody worth pleasing. He considered a heavy meal would be necessary to keep the family quiet during the will-reading. Particularly this will.

  On the day of the funeral, the old man lay clean and tidy in the coffin Teare had made for him, ready for those who came to make sure he was gone.

  They arrived earlier and in greater numbers than expected, caused the waiting meat-plates to be recast in more and smaller portions.

  Teare received the mourners at the door. Quaggins most of them, the men short and sandy, sharp-nosed, the women pale-faced and shiftily prim. Black clothes, hastily dyed, showed smothered patterns. And expectation showed through the reverence.

  The weather was fine, lighting up the dead man’s fields for valuation. People went to the windows under pretence of admiring his industry, and gazed hungrily out.

  The mourners’ conduct was sober while in the house; sober, too, in the black varnished carriages as they crept in line behind the hearse; sober and musical in the draughty little church, as they listened to a long-winded service. At the graveside they began to cheer up; for the unpleasant part of the day was over.

  On the return journey talk in the carriages grew bright. Quaggin the Cruelty, the animals inspector, thrust his red whiskers out of a window to hail a friend. From another vehicle Teare thought he heard something suspiciously like song. He frowned at his wife.

  The little procession trotted briskly along the road that ran behind the village, and turned up towards the farm.

  A tense proprietary excitement filled each jogging group. Eyes were fixed with modest greed on every field they passed. The dutch barn, the old pigsty, the cows. They rounded the orchard.

  Teare’s carriage was the first. As it drew in towards the house, he saw a figure moving near the rose-covered porch. As if coming from the side where the dairy was, and the back entrance. Teare had visions of unlocked doors. He scrambled out of the carriage.

  “Well who — ?”

  “Hallo, there!” called the man. “I missed the poor ould fella, eh?”

  Short and sandy, with a sharp nose. A Quaggin, undoubtedly.

  “Don’t ye remember me, Tom-Billy?”

  “Uh - yes. Of course.” Teare shook hands dubiously. Now he knew; it was some sort of cousin, a man they called Lawyer Quaggin because he had once worked as an advocate’s clerk. Then a sign-writer or something, and for a time, they said, he had tried to live by raising ferrets. A spry man.

  “Hallo, all!” called Lawyer Quaggin. People were descending from the carriages. “I was just sayin’ to Tom-Billy here, business missed a train for me, an’ I came too late for to see him under!” The relatives hailed him, crowding round.

  Teare hurried in after his wife. He motioned her into the kitchen.

  “Sallie, just a minute —“

  Outside in the hall they could hear old Mrs Kneen weeping over “the beautiful internment” and the bass voices of her three sons.

  “Well?” said Sallie.

  Teare jerked his head and whispered “Did y’ see that Lawyer character? Skulkin’ round the house just as we come up. Keep an eye on him - he’s fit for anythin’, that fella!”

  The parlour was already seething.

  Teare dodged about, fitting people into places for the meal. The three huge Kneen boys were prowling gloweringly about, comparing the size of the platefuls. A child cried to be taken home. Then somehow a chicken had got into the room, fluttering among the black legs. Women pulled their skirts out of the way. Men jostled, shooing and hooting.

  In desperation Teare grabbed a thin arm that led to a long face. “Mr. Cain, for pity’s sake start a hymn or somethin’!”

  The thin man struck a fork on a plate and began to sing “Abide with Me” in a grating voice that struck piercingly through the uproar. Gradually silence came.

  The Quaggins sat, unwillingly, one by one.

  “So beautiful,” said old Mrs Kneen in the hush that followed the solo. She added, to the thin man’s confusion and anger, “I mean the way the table is laid. Look at it, boys.”

  Soon Sallie had the tea-urn working and there were polite murmurs of appreciation. Every one held back patiently while cups joggled perilously round.

  Then the food went down with a rush.

  Quaggin the Cruelty called for a second cup through steaming whiskers. The Kneen boys tore seriously at their cold beef. Pickle glasses emptied. Faces bulged.

  Tom-Billy glanced round. Lawyer Quaggin was at the second table and it was difficult to see him. He seemed very quiet. Teare shifted back uneasily. The meat was tasteless in his mouth.

  “My boys say they’re enjoying it ever so much, my dear,” called Mrs Kneen. Her sons chewed on, unnoticing.

  Teare whispered to his wife, “Is anybody out, watchin’ the kitchen?” She shook her head . His face sagged. “Come, come, Mr Teare! Eat up!” said a neighbour. “Don’t let this sad business distress ye too much.”

  Plates were collected and fresh courses sent round. Creamy cakes and scones oozing with butter. As appetites grew less, droning reminiscences began. Teare heard everywhere the working-out of remote family connections.

  He suddenly stiffened. His wife had nudged him. She whispered, “Look - Lawyer!”

  He screwed round, trying to make his face seem lightly interested in the company. Lawyer Quaggin’s place was empty. He was not in the room.

  Tom-Billy half rose. He sat again, heart tapping, and whispered, “Did ye see him go?”

  “No, I just turned round, and - oh, look, look! Here he is again.”

  The short sandy man was sliding into his seat, a strange look upon his face, it seemed to Tom-Billy. A mixture that might have been self-conscious innocence and satisfaction; uneasy satisfaction. He caught Teare’s eye and grinned. A nervous smile that suddenly became too hearty.

  Tom-Billy felt his face tighten. He stood up. One or two people looked at him, and his wife’s hand touched him warningly.

  “Uh - get more bread,” he mumbled, and pushed his way between the chair-backs. Once the door was safely shut behind him, he ran the few steps to the kitchen. He pulled a stool up beside the dresser, climbed on to it, and clutched the tin deed-box down from its place. A bead of sweat fogged his eye as he opened the lid.

  The heart folded up inside him, and he grasped a shelf for support.

  Ezra’s will had gone!

  He stumbled down and scattered across the table all the contents of the box. The loose papers,

  prayer-book, the letters. He swayed as the empty black bottom of the tin stared back at him. A moment later an old chair’s wicker seat split under his sudden weight.

  Like scalding steam, a stream of explosive hissing curses reddened his face. Then the remembered need for silence bottled up his fury, and drove it into his head and muddled his thoughts. They took several minutes to clear.

  It was Lawyer all right! He must have found out the will’s hiding-place by spying through the kitchen window during the funeral. And now he had stolen it; the guilt was there on his face when he sneaked back into the parlour just now.

  Tom-Billy sat trying to control himself and picture the next move.

  The other room was full of Quaggins waiting to hear the thing read. If he showed the empty box, they would rend him, the keeper of it. Useless to protest that Sallie had been left everything; each man jack of them would fancy: himself cheated out of a huge legacy.

  Go in there and denounce the thief? No, that was as bad. Lawyer would be ready, knowing the Quaggins distrusted him nearly as much as they did Tom-Billy. He would have the will hidden somewhere and brazenly deny everything. And later, in his own crafty time, he would tell the Quaggins in secret what it said.

  Either way, the will would never be seen again. The farm would be divided amongst the whole brood.

  Tom-Billy groaned with anguish.

  Something must be done immediately; he had no idea
what. Often he had wondered what a fattened beast felt like when it sniffed the smell of slaughter. Now he knew; it prayed for the neighbourhood to be struck by catastrophe, to give it a chance of escape.

  An earthquake. At least a whirlwind.

  Words were dancing in front of his eyes. “All your problems solved,” they read. He to blink them away like liver-spots, but they persisted. They seemed to be printed on a packet lying by the wall. A little more cold sweat formed on his face.

  He rose. He approached the improbable packet.

  "Vesuvius Brand Lighters. All your firelighting problems solved!” he read. So he still had his senses. His pulse slackened. He had been tricked by the crumpled label.

  A bag of patent things that Sallie must have bought; old Quaggin would have died of cold before spending money on them. “Vesuvius Brand.” There was a clumsy little picture of people in long nightshirts running about clutching bundles and boxes, and a flaming mountain in the background. He slowly picked up the smelly packet.

  A desperate idea was coming. The most desperate he had ever had.

  He pulled the split wicker-chair into the middle of the room and stacked the firelighters carefully upon it. Five of them the packet held. Quickly he added crushed newspapers, some greasy cleaning rags he found in a cupboard, and two meal sacks. The old stool and table he arranged close to the chair, in natural positions. A jarful of rendered fat completed the preparations.

  He placed the scattered papers in their tin box, and put it exactly where it belonged, up on top of the dresser.

  In fearful haste now, dreading that someone would come to look for him, Tom-Billy struck a match and put it to the tarry shavings. The flame crept over the problem-solving lighters.

  As he closed the kitchen door behind him, he began to count slowly.

  One, two, three —

  He wiped the sweat from his face. At about a hundred it should be safe to raise the alarm.

  Conversation was lively when he re-entered the parlour.

  Only the Kneen boys were still eating, urged on by their mother’s busy hands. The animals inspector was performing a balancing trick with lumps of sugar. Crammed, a child had fallen asleep.

  Foxy Lawyer was sitting without any expression, as if biding his time.

  Tom-Billy sank into his place beside his wife. He answered nothing to her questioning eyes.

  Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three.

  He accepted another cake and ate it slowly, as calmly as he could.

  Fifty-seven. Fifty-eight.

  He was praying that no one would leave the room yet. Once, to his horror, Quaggin the Cruelty rose and squeezed from his place, but it was only to borrow another basin of sugar. Tom-Billy watched him sit again and go on with his tricks.

  Seventy-one. Seventy-two.

  The family histories were still proceeding. Nearby, a monotonous voice worked out a line that was proving intricate: “- And this Quine I’m tellin’ about was a cousin of Quine the draper, an’ he married the widow of a fella that had a brother in the mines; now let me think what his first name would be — “

  Eighty-three.

  A sandy man leaned across the table and winked.

  “What about the will-readin’, Mr Teare?” he said quietly.

  Instantly, it seemed, they were all deathly still; full of fierce attention. “Yis, the time is suitable enough now,” said a woman, with a kind of desperate reasonableness.

  There were murmurs of, “The will!”

  “He's goin' to read it!.

  “Oh, yes, the will! I’d clean forgot about that!”

  “Is it you that has charge of it, Tom-Billy?”

  Teare was frozen in his chair. Bright eyes were on him from every side. In his head he had counted ninety-one. He nerved himself to pretend that he suddenly heard crackling or smelt smoke.

  He was forestalled.

  “D’ye smell burnin’?” said a voice. There were sniffs.

  “Somethin’s on fire!”

  There was a moment of silent alarm. Then Quaggin the Cruelty dropped his sugar and scrambled towards the door. He pulled at it. A cloud of thin, foul smoke was swept into the room.

  There was uproar. People rushed to the narrow hallway, Tom-Billy Teare fighting to be at the head. Behind, there were frightened, coughing cries; a banging at the jammed window. Somebody was roaring, “Save the women!”

  When they reached the kitchen the smoke became black and choking. Flames could be seen in it. Men hung back unhappily.

  “Come on! Quick!” shouted Teare, and dived inside to kick apart the evidence of his fire-raising. His eyes streamed. “Fling everythin’ - out of the - the back door here!” He heaved it open as he shouted, and threw a smouldering cushion into the stone yard. Drew breath, then back into the room.

  Men were blundering about the sides of the kitchen, eager to save what might become their own property. Mrs Kneen’s voice was raised somewhere, commanding her sons to keep out of danger.

  A chair was tossed outside, then a glowing table leg.

  The women crowded in the yard, filling buckets at the pump and passing them from hand to hand.

  Watching savagely, Teare was in agony. Through the smoke faces were hard to recognise. He felt a small draught of despair; if Lawyer had run away, the whole plan was wasted.

  Suddenly he saw the little clerk on the other side of the kitchen, jostled in from the hall by a bulky helper; he looked nervous.

  Teare sprang for the dresser and snatched down the black box. Almost in the same movement he had Lawyer held fast in the hug of a thick arm, and rushed him strongly through the burning room to the yard door. Into clear earshot of everybody; particularly the women. “Here, take this! An’ keep it safe!” he shouted. “Uncle Ezra’s will is inside it!”

  For a moment their eyes locked. Seeing the fury in Lawyer’s, Teare knew he had been right.

  There was a tense pause in the clattering and fuss and sluicing of water. The word “will” had struck home. Every jealous eye was on the little foxy man clutching the box.

  “Watch it close and no monkey business!” Teare yelled after him, with a wink round at the rest. He felt that the wink was a good touch.

  Now he had to make sure that Lawyer was left alone with it.

  “Come on, everybody - one last big slap at it!” With something like cheerfulness, he flung himself at the dying fire. The Quaggins followed suit.

  Tom-Billy busied himself in the yard, finding work for every pair of hands. Except one. Lawyer sat alone in a strawy corner, the box on his knees. But there must be no witness to say he had not meddled with it; Teare kept every one on the move, shouting at them, directing, comforting. His flannel shirt was soaked with sweat as well as water.

  Once he caught sight of Mrs Kneen approaching Lawyer as if to sit and share his guardianship. He ran and caught her arm. “Oh, Mrs Kneen, would ye look to the child yonder - I think she’s taken with fright !” Lawyer glowered.

  A minute or two later, when Teare turned from dousing the last smouldering remains of the table, the corner was empty. He thought he glimpsed Lawyer, slipping round a corner of the cowhouse.

  The idea must be working!

  “It’s all out now!” called one of the Kneen boys from inside. Water dripped from everything in the kitchen and swilled across the stone floor. The ceiling was blackened. Otherwise damage was small, though wives’ voices rose when they saw their men’s singed suits, and the Cruelty was anxiously feeling the shape of his beard. Dye had run on splashed dresses.

  Tom-Billy pulled a sack over his shoulders and looked round. There must be no waiting.

  “Where’s - who did I give it to? The will box?” He hoped his frown looked honestly puzzled.

  They knew.

  “Lawyer!” shouted voices. “Where’s Lawyer?”

  I seen him a minute ago!” The unmistakable cry of hungry, suspicious animals. “Where did he get to? Lawyer! Did you see him go?”

  “Lawyer, the fire�
��s out!” shouted Quaggin the Cruelty. “Where the divil have ye put yeself?”

  “Lawyer! Lawyer!”

  There was a hush.

  The little foxy man was coming from the direction of the cowhouse, the box in his hands. His hair seemed a brighter ginger, or his face was whiter. Suspicious eyes were all on the tin.

  Without a word, expressionless, Lawyer handed it to Tom-Billy. This time his eyes told nothing.

  “Ah - thanks,” Teare said. “We wouldn’t have lost this for the world, eh?” Thanks for keepin’ it safe, Lawyer.”

  There was a chorus of excited approval.

  “Good oul’ Lawyer! Bad job if the will had gone on fire!” “If they found even a singe —“

  “Better make sure it’s safe,” said the man who had suggested the reading.

  Tom-Billy’s hands trembled violently as he put the box down among the trickling water and singed cushion feathers that covered the yard. “Heat injures the nerves,” murmured Mrs Kneen, interestedly; nobody noticed her.

  The black box squeaked open. Tom-Billy’s hand went inside and fumbled quickly. A pause.

  He drew out a long, sky-blue paper.

  “This aforesaid document,” he read shakily, “is the only will whatever of me, Ezra John Quaggin, pig, general, dairy and poultry farmer —“

  His head sang with relief as he looked round the grimy, eager faces.

  “Go on! Go on, Tom-Billy,” they cried.

  He found the place, cleared his throat, and read again. Soon, he knew, the real fun would begin.

  END

  Chapter 13

  The Photograph

  When he stuck them sideways out of the bed, his legs felt as if they were doing a new thing, something they did not understand.

  "Dress quickly, now,” said Mamma. “It is easy to catch cold after being so long in bed. I shall call your sister to help you."

  It was hard to keep upright. His legs were still sore in the places where they bent; his arms, too, when he held them up to go through sleeves.

  "Feel funny?” said his sister Gladys. “Hold on to the bedpost while I fasten these buttons. Why, Raymond, I do believe you've grown taller in bed, dear!"