and outdoor pursuits such as gardening, walking and – judging from the weathered
chairs and benches in the equally rambling garden – simply sitting still with a tea or whisky to enjoy the unmown lawns, mature trees and distant prospect of the White Horse galloping from
left to right across the scarp face of the steep chalk hill that rose like a wall a third of a mile to the south.
The persistent ringing of the telephones echoed around the house and brought from the first-floor bathroom a sigh of discontent and then a mild swear word as it continued. Finally there was the
wet pad, pad, pad of dripping feet, first on lino then on the thin and faded carpet of the upstairs corridor.
Yet when Arthur Foale finally got within reach of the upstairs phone, a towel around his ample waist, he did not pick up, but let the ringing continue. Instead, with water still running down his
back and stomach, his shins and calves, forming wet patches at his feet, he just stood still.
He was a man in mourning and maybe he thought the call was not for him but for his late wife. Or, if it was not for his wife then it was
about
her, and he had no wish to take any more of
those kind of calls either.
Whatever the reason, he let the phone ring until it stopped and stayed just where he was as the echoes died away into the cobwebs and far corners of their home, which was now his alone with no
one to see him standing there, dripping, cold and, just then, rather sad.
The worst thing about a once-busy home where all the former inhabitants but one have gone is not so much the silence as the fact that nothing moves unless the last person left standing moves it.
In fact nothing happens unless he or she makes it happen.
But for a phone-call, or a knock at the door, or an aeroplane droning overhead in the night as they sometimes did over Woolstone, taking supplies to a war zone, or a disaster, or bringing back
the military dead of some other activity connected with any one of the several military bases in those parts.
Margaret had died a month before, and in the busy days following, Arthur had thought he had informed all her friends. It turned out they had been many and more varied than he
had realized. Now he was tired of conversations that began with him saying, ‘I’m very sorry, but Margaret has . . .’
Arthur was portly, heavily bearded, an aged but still vigorous bear who looked like he still had teeth and claws if he ever needed them.
The phone began ringing again, upstairs and down. He glowered at his feet, scratched his moist belly, and continued to stay where he was.
Why should he move?
What had he to do?
Which direction might he go which had meaning or purpose?
So he stood and listened to the phone, waiting for its ringing to end once more so he could chase the last of the echoing sound round the house in which he – no, which
they
–
had lived and loved for fifty years.
‘I daresay it’s for you, my dear,’ he murmured, bewildered as he was by grief and struggling now to find a reason for continuing on the road alone.
To his side was a wide staircase whose shallow, elegant steps, covered in a worn runner with loose-looking brass rods holding it in place, turned down around corners to the ground floor below.
Vertically above it, another floor-height up, were damp-stained walls of peeling paper which ended with a window-light. An old woven cord used for opening and closing it was loosely attached to a
brass tie on a nearby wall. It was half-rotten and they had been afraid to use it for several years, fearing that it might break and they would not be able to repair it, or ever close the heavy
window-light and then open it again.
‘Catch 22,’ as Margaret had been in the habit of saying as she ascended the stairs in stormy weather, eyeing the cord as it blew about in the draught, drops of rain falling faintly
on her head.
‘Humph!’ replied Arthur, who did not read the same books as she did and had never heard
chairs and benches in the equally rambling garden – simply sitting still with a tea or whisky to enjoy the unmown lawns, mature trees and distant prospect of the White Horse galloping from
left to right across the scarp face of the steep chalk hill that rose like a wall a third of a mile to the south.
The persistent ringing of the telephones echoed around the house and brought from the first-floor bathroom a sigh of discontent and then a mild swear word as it continued. Finally there was the
wet pad, pad, pad of dripping feet, first on lino then on the thin and faded carpet of the upstairs corridor.
Yet when Arthur Foale finally got within reach of the upstairs phone, a towel around his ample waist, he did not pick up, but let the ringing continue. Instead, with water still running down his
back and stomach, his shins and calves, forming wet patches at his feet, he just stood still.
He was a man in mourning and maybe he thought the call was not for him but for his late wife. Or, if it was not for his wife then it was
about
her, and he had no wish to take any more of
those kind of calls either.
Whatever the reason, he let the phone ring until it stopped and stayed just where he was as the echoes died away into the cobwebs and far corners of their home, which was now his alone with no
one to see him standing there, dripping, cold and, just then, rather sad.
The worst thing about a once-busy home where all the former inhabitants but one have gone is not so much the silence as the fact that nothing moves unless the last person left standing moves it.
In fact nothing happens unless he or she makes it happen.
But for a phone-call, or a knock at the door, or an aeroplane droning overhead in the night as they sometimes did over Woolstone, taking supplies to a war zone, or a disaster, or bringing back
the military dead of some other activity connected with any one of the several military bases in those parts.
Margaret had died a month before, and in the busy days following, Arthur had thought he had informed all her friends. It turned out they had been many and more varied than he
had realized. Now he was tired of conversations that began with him saying, ‘I’m very sorry, but Margaret has . . .’
Arthur was portly, heavily bearded, an aged but still vigorous bear who looked like he still had teeth and claws if he ever needed them.
The phone began ringing again, upstairs and down. He glowered at his feet, scratched his moist belly, and continued to stay where he was.
Why should he move?
What had he to do?
Which direction might he go which had meaning or purpose?
So he stood and listened to the phone, waiting for its ringing to end once more so he could chase the last of the echoing sound round the house in which he – no, which
they
–
had lived and loved for fifty years.
‘I daresay it’s for you, my dear,’ he murmured, bewildered as he was by grief and struggling now to find a reason for continuing on the road alone.
To his side was a wide staircase whose shallow, elegant steps, covered in a worn runner with loose-looking brass rods holding it in place, turned down around corners to the ground floor below.
Vertically above it, another floor-height up, were damp-stained walls of peeling paper which ended with a window-light. An old woven cord used for opening and closing it was loosely attached to a
brass tie on a nearby wall. It was half-rotten and they had been afraid to use it for several years, fearing that it might break and they would not be able to repair it, or ever close the heavy
window-light and then open it again.
‘Catch 22,’ as Margaret had been in the habit of saying as she ascended the stairs in stormy weather, eyeing the cord as it blew about in the draught, drops of rain falling faintly
on her head.
‘Humph!’ replied Arthur, who did not read the same books as she did and had never heard
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