Occasionally they had gone into Norbury. There used to be the old horse bus along the main road to take you in, and then you were in the middle of the hum and bustle of it, hundreds of people hurrying along in town clothes. Norbury was wonderful with its three thousand inhabitants. And there was Green the draper’s, Mother fingering the stuffs for her new dress—would it wash, would it wear? it did not look to her like very good quality. And the boot shop, Dapp’s, with the smell of leather and hundreds and hundreds of shoes hung about, and the shop assistant’s hair—like a cascade of glue, Father said once outside, but it wasn’t, it smelt lovely—and his way of trying the shoe on, that little finger. Fool. He would be married now, and she, whoever she was, would have someone to wait for in the evenings, to kiss or to have rows with, and wear his ring. She would have his children and they would watch them together. And the farmers, fat and thin, in their pony carts, getting down at the Naiad’s Calf to have a drink. Father had hated the farmers; “they are making a lot of money,” was what he said. And as evening came on they went sometimes to tea at the Deanery, and she would doze by the fire, sitting very correctly in her chair, hearing the boom of the Dean’s voice to Father, and Mother’s shrill complaint to the Dean’s wife, dozing after the huge tea that she had eaten when they weren’t looking. They would have a fit if she went there now.
She hadn’t been in Norbury for ages. There was Mrs. Donner who sold everything. She was a one, that woman. Three and six for a bit of stuff which she wouldn’t like to put on a horse’s back to keep the cold off!
It had been hard work following Mother about. She had hurried so from shop to shop. She must have been hungry for town life again. Those that are town-bred hate the country. They used always to eat lunch in the Cathedral Tea Rooms. Mrs. Oliver, big and fat, who looked after the customers, always came up and said, “Ah, Mr. Entwhistle, so you’ve come to see us townsfolk again, sir.” Mother would bring out the sandwiches. After they had eaten Mother and she would go off to the shops again, while Father went back to the Library. Mother used to call Mrs. Oliver “a designing woman”—sour grapes. And the chemist, mysterious behind his spectacles, in his shop made of shelves and bottles, and cunningly-piled cardboard boxes. The jolting ride home in the dark, with the walk at the end.
Then there was Nancy. All the last years at the Vicarage had been Nancy. What had become of her now? Married with children, most likely, but not to the baker’s son she had been so gone on. Nancy with her fairest hair and skinny legs, she was not nearly as good-looking as her. Her snub nose, and the small watery pink eyes.
They had met in a lane, had smiled, and had made friends. That is, they had never really made friends, she had been far too stupid. But Nancy used to giggle at her jokes, and she liked that. Dolly had been forgotten then.
They talked a great deal about men, with long silences, and Nancy’s giggle and “Oh you’s.” They walked arm in arm, or more often with their arms round each other’s waists, their heads bent, whispering. Lord, what fools they must have looked. Of course Mother was only too glad that she was out of the way, Father too.
They used to walk most in the lane, just outside the house here. She had been in love, oh, how passionate, with Jim who never spoke, and who worked for Mr. Curry. He had been worse than George. But he used sometimes to come home by the lane in the evening, and they would pass him arm in arm. She would give him the sidelong look she had practised in the mirror, but he never did more than touch his cap. She had dropped her handkerchief once, as Nancy had told her they did in the world. They had talked and giggled for days before she had plucked up courage to do it. But of course he did nothing.
Nancy wore a ring round her neck on a bit of cotton. She said at first that Alfred had given it her, but that time under the honeysuckle when she had shown Nancy her birthmark on her leg, she had confessed that she had only got it out of a cracker at Christmas. Nancy used to think her awfully daring.
Then their walks when evening was coming on, when they wandered down the sunken lane. Thick sunlight and thicker shade, when they twined closer together, and walked slower, and were silent. There was the heavy smell of honeysuckle, sweet, which a little fresh air coming down between the banks would begin to blow away. The birds flew quietly from side to side, there were flowers whose names she did not know, and long tufts of grass full of dew. The flowers made dots of colour in the shade, the ground they walked on buried the sound of their feet. . . . Soon they would come to the gate, and they would sit clinging to each other and balancing, watching the horses scrunch up the grass and the cows lie chewing, idly content. The sky was always different, and the end of a hot day was sleepy. The flies buzzed round, the midges bit. On a piece of fresh manure there would be hundreds of brown flies, and a bee would hurry by. She used to watch the trees most often. There were so many of them, one behind the other, hiding, showing, huddled, alone. Far away a car would blow a horn, or a train would whistle, but it used to feel as if there was everything between them and it. Birds up in the sky that was paling would fly silently with a purpose. They were going to bed, and soon she would go back, have supper, and go to bed. Partridges talked to each other anxiously, as they gathered together, against the dangers of the night. The horses looked round calmly. A dog barked miles away.
Then, as it was getting dark, they would part to go home. Nancy up to the village, and she herself across the fields to the Vicarage. The cows would not rise, and the horses would give her barely a glance. Only a rabbit perhaps would sit up, drum the ground, and flee to his burrow. And he would not bother to go down it, for as soon as she had passed he would be back again nibbling. In spring there would be lambs, absurd and delicious on their long weak legs.