"LIE THEE DOWN, ODDITY" BY T.F. POWYS
Though the sun shone with summer heat, the damp August warmth giving the rather faded countryside a new glow in her cheeks—for there had been a good all-night's rain—yet Mr. Cronch wore his black felt hat, of the cut that used to be worn by evangelical clergymen in the last century.
The Honourable George Bullman, who employed Mr. Cronch as head-gardener, had spoken to him some years before about this hat of his, which was the only thing about Mr. Cronch that gave a hint of peculiarities. "Your Methodist hat will be the ruin of you one day, Cronch," Mr. Bullman had observed, while discussing with his gardener the making of a new lawn.
Mr. Cronch was mowing the lawn; he had bid the under-gardener work elsewhere. To please and humour Cronch, Mr. Bullman used no motor-mowing machine. Cronch did not like them. But the under-gardener had hardly looked at the old-fashioned mower before he complained that such labour was beyond his power. To push all day such an awkward instrument "that might", the young man said, "have been used by Adam" was out of the question for anyone who understood the arts and fancies of oil-driven machinery. Mr. Cronch did the work himself. "One has, you know, to pay for one's oddities," he told his wife Jane.
At Green Gate House the grounds were always in the best order; there was never a weed in the kitchen-garden or a plantain on the lawn, but in one place, bordering the lawn, there were railings, and over these railings there was the heath. A different world, that looked with contempt upon the soft pelt of a smooth lawn, which was indeed like the skin of a tamed beast that did nothing else but lie and bask in the sun while its sleek hide was being curry-combed by Mr. Cronch.
The heath was a different matter from the garden. All was nature there, and she is a wild, fierce, untutored mother. Flowers and weeds, unnoticed, lived there, fighting the battle of their lives, careless of man, but living as they were commanded to live at the first moving of the waters. The raven and the falcon nested in the tall trees beyond a desolate swamp, and only a solitary heath-cutter might sometimes be seen with his load, taking a long track towards the waste land. Who, indeed, would view such barrenness when there was the Honourable George Bullman's garden to admire?
Mr. Bullman could afford a good gardener. The head-gardener's cottage, where Mr. Cronch and his wife lived, had every comfort of a modem well-built house. No servant of Mr. Bullman had anything to complain of. No one would leave such service, could they avoid doing so.
Over the heath, even the winds blew differently from the gentle garden ones. Out there the blasts could roar and bellow, wrench the boughs from the trees, and rush along madly, but in the summer-time garden all winds were soft.
Mr. Cronch stopped. He took the box from the mower and tipped the cut grass into the wheelbarrow. The wheelbarrow was full of sweet-smelling grass. Mr. Cronch then whistled softly, and Robert, the under-gardener, left his weeding and trundled the barrow to the cucumber-frames. He returned with the empty barrow at a slow, even pace—the gait of a well-paid gardener, as learned from Mr. Cronch.
Mr. Cronch began to mow again. He came near to the railings beyond which was the heath. Then he stopped. He took off his hat and looked into it. He looked at the lawn. Nowhere in the world, out of England, could any lawn have been smoother or more green. There was not the smallest clover leaf there that was not consecrated to the fine taste of a proper gentleman, and ready to be pressed by the elegant foot of a real lady. The smooth banks, the beds of flowers near by, might have been a modern picture in colours; they were so unlike nature. There was nothing rude or untidy there, and every cabbage in the kitchen-garden wore a coronet.
Mr. Cronch should, after a little rest, have continued to push the machine, but instead of doing so, he looked over the railings at the heath.
Mr. Cronch had not changed, as the garden was changed when it became the heath. He was the same Mr. Cronch who had, at one o'clock, cut the finest cucumber in the garden for Mr. Bullman's lunch. He waited for another moment or two and then softly put on his hat. After doing so, he spoke aloud. "Lie thee down. Oddity!" said Mr. Cronch. Then Mr. Cronch shook his head, as much as to say that if the Oddity would not lie down, it was no fault of his. For such a being it was impossible to control. Had the Oddity lain down, then Mr. Cronch would have gone on with his work, as a wise man should, who earns four pounds a week, with a good house and garden, and with leave to sell whatever he likes from his master's.
But Mr. Cronch did not start work again. It was no good; whatever happened to him the Oddity must be obeyed. The Oddity knew best. Mr. Cronch left the machine where it was, near to the railings. He walked with the same slow gardener's walk—that showed, as much as any walk could, a hatred of all untidiness and disorder—and came to the potting-shed. Then he put on his coat.
The hour was three in the afternoon. Mr. Cronch learned that from his watch. Then he listened. What he expected, happened; the church clock that was just across the way struck three. Mr. Cronch's watch was always right. It was no use mentioning that to the Oddity. He would not lie down the more because Mr. Cronch's gold watch—a gift of Mr. Bullman's—went with the church time.
Mr. Cronch shut the potting-shed door and went home. He remarked, when he saw his wife, as though he said nothing of particular interest, that he had given up work at Green Gate House. He told her to begin to pack, for they were leaving the gardener's cottage as soon as possible.
Jane thought him mad, and when the under-gardener, Robert, heard of it, he blamed the mowing-machine. "To have to push anything like that would drive any man away," be said to Mr. Bullman.
The Honourable George Bullman was anxious that Mr. Cronch should still remain in the gardener's cottage. He would give him a pension, he said, for he did not want to lose so good a neighbour, whose advice he valued so highly. Mr. Bullman, of course, blamed the hat for the trouble. Jane wished to stay, but as the Oddity would not lie down, Mr. Cronch said they must go.
About two miles away from Green Gate House, upon the heath, there was a wretched cottage that had once been inhabited by a rabbit-catcher. Mr. Cronch chose this hut as a residence. About an acre of land went with it. Mr. Cronch repaired the cottage with his own hands, and put up new railings round the garden. In order to do this neatly he spent most of the money he had saved in service. Then he began to reclaim the garden, that was fallen out of cultivation and had become heath again.
The wild spirit of the waste land struggled against him. But here the poverty of the soil met its match. Nature is no respecter of persons; she gives alike to the good and to the evil. The potato-blight will ruin a good man's crop as well as a naughty one's. The heath was not a curry-combed creature, tamed with milk and wine. It was a savage animal, now friendly and kind, now cruel and vindictive, then mild. One day smiling like a pretty maid, and the next biting at you with ugly-shaped teeth.
There was no pleasant shelter there, no glass-houses. No high walls, no trimmed box-hedges. The winds of Heaven had free passage, a snake could roam at large and find only its natural enemies to attack it. The wild birds had rest. Mr. Cronch bowed his head and laboured. It needed something stronger than nature to cast him down. With the Oddity asleep, he could go on with his work. There was no need for him to rest, he was an obedient servant. He required no telling what to do in the way of work: even the Honourable George Bullman had put himself under Mr. Cronch's guidance. While he had hands and tools he could compel the most sour-tempered soil to serve his needs. His broad shoulders were ever bent over the ground as he turned the earthen clod.
It was not long before Mr. Cronch compelled the heath to pay him tribute, and soon a pleasant cottage and a large well-cultivated garden arose in the wilderness. There were many who respected Mr. Cronch for leaving so much good at Mr. Bullman's to do battle with nature upon the heath, but others said he only left his master out of pride. Mr. Cronch smiled when he heard that. "Here was a fine matter, indeed," he thought, "that a mortal man should have pride—a nice folly to call a leaf proud that is driven willy-nilly before a November gale. A fine pride that leaf must have when, at the last, it is buried in a dunghill!"
But if Mr. Cronch was proud, as some thought, it was only because he had the knowledge that, within him, something slept....
Mr. Cronch was resting contentedly one Sunday, reading a country paper. Even that morning he had been busy in his garden, and was glad now to rest while Jane prepared the dinner. Mr. Cronch sat there, a simple, working-class man, respectable—in years too—wearing spectacles, and reading his paper. He found something to read that interested him, for he read the same paragraph three times.
This was a police case. An old woman, who was employed on Saturdays by the Stonebridge town clerk to scrub his floors, had found upon the dining-room floor a blank cheque. This cheque she had filled in herself, and because she was a simple woman, without pride, she had written the town clerk's name instead of her own.
For thirty years Mrs. Tibby had kept herself and her husband John—who spent all his time in leaning over the town bridge to watch the water flow under—and now his one wish was to go to London to see the King. His wife wished to give him this treat. "'E do need a holiday," she said.
When a charwoman picks up money she has a right to it Mrs. Tibby thought the cheque money. Money, after a card-party, which there had been at the clerk's, is often left on the floor for the sweeper—that is the custom of the country.
Mrs. Tibby was not greedy; she only wrote "four pounds" upon the cheque. She supposed that sum to be enough to take her husband to see the King. If the clerk were annoyed, she knew she could work the money out in scrubbing the floors.
When she was taken up, she could get no bail, so she went to prison.
Mr. Cronch carefully folded the paper.
The month was November. Over the heath, dark sweeping clouds, like great besoms, were driving. The two ravens, who nested in the high fir tree, enjoyed the wind. The mist from the sea brought memories to their minds; they remembered stories told of men hanged in chains on Blacknoll Mound, whose bones could be pecked clean. The ravens flew off and looked for a lamb to kill.
Mr. Cronch laid the paper on the table, beside a smoking dish of fried beef and onions—there were other vegetables to come—and a rice pudding.
Mr. Cronch rose slowly and sniffed.
But the Oddity would not lie down. So Mr. Cronch told his wife he was going out. The distance to Stonebridge was twelve miles. Mr. Cronch put on his overcoat; he went to a drawer and took out twenty-five pounds. He put on his large black hat, opened the cottage-door and went out—the rain greeted him with a lively shower of water-drops. Jane let him go. She supposed him to be in one of his mad fits, that the Giant Despair in the Pilgrim's Progress used to have.
Mr. Cronch walked along with his usual slow, steady step— the gait of a careful gardener. When he reached Stonebridge he was not admitted into the jail, and so he took a lodging for the night.
In the morning he visited Mrs. Tibby. "I wish to be your bail," he said cheerfully.
Mrs. Tibby was in a maze. She did not know what she had done wrong. She was happy where she was, she was allowed to gossip with the prison charwoman, who was an old friend of hers. She begged Mr. Crouch, if he wished to be good to her, to allow her to stay with her friend, and to take her husband to London to see the King. Mrs. Tibby liked the prison. "Everyone is so kind," she said, "and when I complained to the doctor about my headaches, he ordered me gin. I have never been so happy before."
Mr. Cronch found Mr. Tibby smoking his pipe and leaning over the town bridge. He told him he was going to take him to see the King, and Mr. Tibby agreed to go, but first he knocked out his pipe on the stone coping of the bridge.
When they reached London, the King was out of town. He was soon to return, and Mr. Tibby spent the time happily, smoking his pipe and leaning over Waterloo Bridge, although the fog was so dense he could not see the river. When the King came, Mr. Cronch took Mr. Tibby into the crowd to see the King go by. Mr. Tibby sang "God Save the King", and shouted "Hurrah!" The King bowed.
"Now I shall die happy," said Mr. Tibby, "but how shall I get home?"
Mr. Cronch paid his fare to Stonebridge, and saw him off at the station.
The weather had impr oved; a brisk wind from the south-west had driven off the fog. Mr. Cronch, to please himself, walked into the city. He had fifteen pounds in his pocket, and he looked into the shop windows. He still wore his large black hat and the beggars avoided him. They thought him a Jewish money-lender, or else a Baptist minister. Beggars are shrewd judges of character. They have to decide quickly. Their income depends upon it. To beg from the wrong man means loss of time—perhaps prison.
Mr. Cronch went down a narrow street where some offices were. One of these was the office of a money-lender. A gentleman, who looked worn out by sickness and trouble, came out of the door. A woman, his wife, who carried a baby in her arms, waited for him in the street. The gentleman shook his head. Evidently the security that he had to offer was not good enough.
Then there arose a little conversation between them.
"I could go to mother's," the woman said.
"If I had money, I could go with you," the man observed, "the change would do me good, and I might get work in Bristol"
"Baby will be easier to manage in a few months," the woman said. "Mother will not mind taking us, but you will have to stay here."
"I can't let you go," said the man.
He made a curious sound in his throat.
Mr. Cronch stood near on the pavement. Who would have noticed Mr. Cronch? The couple paid no need to him. But presently they turned to where he stood, for Mr. Cronch spoke.
"Lie thee down. Oddity!" he said aloud.
The gentleman smiled, he could do nothing else. The baby held out her arms to Mr. Cronch; she wanted his hat. Mr. Cronch took two five-pound notes from his wallet and gave them to the woman. Then he walked away. For his own pleasure, he walked out of the city into the poor parts of the town. He walked along slowly and looked at the vegetables in the greengrocers' shops. He wondered that people could buy such old stuff. If he offered anything like that at the Weyminster market, he would never find a purchaser. He remembered the lordly freedom of the wild heath. There, nature might be cruel, but life and death joined hands in the dance. The sun could shine, and when darkness came it was the darkness of God. The town was different.
Mr. Cronch went down a dingy court. Clothes were hung from house to house, and barefooted children played in the gutter. The air was heavy with human odours and factory stench. Then Mr. Cronch came upon something worse than misery.
A man sat leaning against a wall, with half his face eaten away. His eyes were gone; he cried out to everyone whose footstep he heard, to lead him to the river. When Mr. Cronch came by, he cried out the more. Mr. Cronch stopped.
"Lie thee down. Oddity!" he said angrily.
"Lead me to the river," the man begged.
"Come," said Mr. Cronch, and led the man to the river. A policeman, who knew the man's wish, followed them. At the brink of the river the man said, "I am afraid; only give me one little push, and I shall die."
"Certainly," said Mr. Cronch, and pushed him into the river. The man sank like a stone.
The police officer came up to demand Mr. Cronch's name and address; he had made a note of what had happened.
"You will appear at court, charged with murder," he said. "But now you may go!"
Mr. Cronch walked out of the great city. He had enough money to take him home by train, but he liked walking. As he went along he decided to plant a part of his garden with spinach. He had seen a good deal of this green stuff in the London shops, and he thought he could sell it at home.
He walked ten miles out of town, and then took a lodging for the night. Since the Oddity had risen last, Mr. Cronch had behaved just as a sober gardener would when out for a holiday.
When he came to an allotment he would look into it to see what was grown. He found the ground good. But he believed that more glass might be used, and the city dung he thought too heating for the soil. He was especially interested in the window-flowers that he saw, but wondered that no hyacinths were seen, the bulbs having been all planted too late to bloom at that season.
Starting his walk again the next morning, Mr. Cronch came upon a large crowd watching a high factory chimney. This immense chimney, as high as the clouds and weighing many hundreds of tons, was being brought down. The workmen were busy at its base, and the crowd watched from a safe distance.
All was ready for the fall; the masons and engineers left the chimney. But one of the men remained to give the final stroke that would cause the huge structure to sway and fall. This mason completed his task, and began to walk to safety. When he was a few yards off the chimney, he trod upon a wet plank hidden in the mud, and fell heavily. The spectators expected him to jump up and run off. But he did not do so. An official held his watch in his hand, "One, two, three," he counted. When he reached sixty seconds the chimney would fall.
Its direction was known. It would fall directly upon the man. He tried to rise, but his leg was broken. He tried to crawl, but the pain prevented him. He raised himself up, and looked at the huge mass above him; he knew what was coming. None of the onlookers moved. It was too late to save the man; to go to him would mean certain death.
The chimney began to totter, to rock.
Then Mr. Cronch said softly, "Lie thee down, Oddity!" but the Oddity would not listen to him. Mr. Cronch spoke in so low a tone that perhaps the Oddity never even heard what he said.
Mr. Cronch walked with his slow gardener's step, to the man.
"What are you afraid of?" he asked him.
"Of the chimney," cried the man, "it's falling."
"What if it does fall," observed Mr. Cronch, looking up as though he thought the huge mass above him was a small pear tree.
"It's coming," cried the man.
Mr. Cronch took off his hat. The man smiled.
