Spotted Hemlock

chapter one

Rhubarb

‘Nothing has ever moved me more than the sight of this splendid vegetation.’

The Swiss Family Robinson

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Rhubarb?’ repeated Lord Robert. ‘I hardly think so. I could enquire, of course.’

The occasion was the summer dance given by the students of Highpepper Hall, a place recognised by the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries as an approved institution for the training of gentlemen-farmers. Lord Robert, the younger son of a duke, whose inheritance consisted largely of piggeries and tillage, was in residence at the Hall for thirty weeks of the year, and spent most of this time as a gentleman and what he could spare of it as a farmer.

Noblesse oblige, plus a three-line whip from his Common Room chairman, had been instrumental in bringing him on to the dance-floor to do his part in entertaining a bevy of somewhat beefy beauty from Calladale, an agricultural institution for women, situated in a pastoral countryside some twenty-five miles from Highpepper. The no-man’s-land between the two colleges had seemed sufficiently wide to discourage private and unnecessary fraternisation between the men and the girls. It proved, however, that the majority of the gentlemen-farmers possessed cars, and it was a sobering thought that the dances given alternately by the two colleges marked an unavailing attempt on the part of the authorities to sublimate conditions against which all disciplinary action had proved useless. The heavy weapon of rustication and the heavier one of expulsion were used sparingly at Highpepper, and fines had proved but a challenge to the young men to break those particular rules which appeared to have a monastic bias.

Lord Robert’s partner, beneath some ill-advised make-up, was a fresh-faced, healthy girl of nineteen. She was at Calladale on a scholarship plus a very inadequate grant, and, although she was doing her best to disguise the fact, she was feeling both flattered and alarmed at finding herself in the arms of the aristocracy. She had introduced the abortive rhubarb-motif in a desperate attempt to provide common ground for discussion, for Lord Robert’s interests, on the whole, hardly coincided with her own.

‘You can grow it anywhere,’ pursued the misguided girl.

‘Oh, really?’

‘Only, of course, it needs good rich manure.’

‘Oh, quite.’

‘Or you can force it. In a greenhouse, you know, or a cellar or shed. You put the roots in boxes and cover them loosely with soil and straw. Or you can put an old bucket with a hole in it over the top of the crowns and mulch well, all round, with plenty of stable dung. I suppose, as all of you at Highpepper go hunting in the season, you’re very well off for dung, so, if you ever did think of growing rhubarb…’

‘Oh, quite,’ said Lord Robert. ‘What about some coffee and a bite? There’s a running buffet next door.’

The subject of conversation which had failed to strike an answering note in the breast of the noble lord had made some slight appeal to a commoner named Soames, who had also danced with the girl.

‘It would be rather a rag,’ he said meditatively to his friend Preddle when the dance was almost over.

‘What would?’ demanded Preddle. ‘I’m much too exhausted to rag. Gome on up to my room. I’ve got a bottle of Scotch. I really need a restorative after rockin’ and rollin’ those truly dreadful girls. Why do they seem to get heavier and uglier and clumsier every term?’

‘Mother Nature would know,’ said Soames, taking the stairs two at a time. ‘Anyway, you’re quite right about ragging them. It would be a waste of time and trouble. Are you going down tomorrow or leaving it until the weekend?’

‘Oh, weekend, I think. My people are going to Cannes on Saturday, and I’ll have more scope with them out of the way.’

The two young men gained Preddle’s room and Soames sank luxuriously into an armchair while his host rummaged among sports gear for the whisky. Relaxed and comforted,. the friends maintained silence. Preddle poured out the second drinks and Soames lighted a pipe. Then Preddle said:

‘What was on your mind? What rag?’

‘Rhubarb. Plant it all over Calladale on top of dead rats.’

‘Crude, old boy.’

‘All ragging’s crude, if it comes to that.’

‘Where would we get so many crowns?’

‘Order them on the College notepaper, of which I achieved a few useful sheets while I was waiting for Sellaclough the other day. There was a whole rack stuffed with headed stationery on his desk, so I helped myself. Never know when it might come in useful. The nurserymen will think the rhubarb’s an official order from College, and bung it along like nobody’s business.’

‘Bung it along? Yes, and where to? You’d need a lorry to do a job like that.’

‘Old Brown goes down tomorrow. We could have the rhubarb crowns delivered at his house and unloaded there, just inside North Gate. We’d have to be on hand, of course, to reload it into the boots of people’s cars and run it over to Calladale at dusk. We should need half-a-dozen extra chaps, not more, to help with the carting and planting. Don’t want too many people in a rag.’

‘What about the dead rats?’

‘Old Benson.’

‘Yes, of course. But we’ll miss the cream of it, you know.’

‘You mean we shan’t be there when the girls dig it all up? No, but you can’t have everything, and we’ll hear about it all right.’

There came a tap at the door. It opened and disclosed the wistful countenance of their tutor, Mr Gardien.

‘I heard you had whisky,’ he said. Preddle rose to his feet. Soames took his off the mantelpiece.

‘Come in, sir, do,’ said Preddle. He rummaged among riding boots and tennis shoes and found another glass. ‘I didn’t see you at the dance, sir.’

‘Too old for dancing. Spent the evening at the Tally-Ho in Garchester. Nice girls, those barmaids.’

‘Preferable to the girls we’ve been supporting tonight,’ said Soames. ‘When do you go down, sir?’

‘Tomorrow, with Mr Brown. Going rock-climbing in Cumberland. Thanks very much. Well, cheers. Do as much for you another time. Been drinking nothing but draught beer this evening. Offered no hospitality, with all you fellows at the dance. Beer always makes me thirsty. And what devilment were you planning when I came along?’

‘Devilment? We’re serious types, sir.’

‘Don’t forget I always listen at doors.’ He drained his glass. ‘Another spot? Thanks very much. I think I will. Remember the great coach-rag? No. Before your time. Well, mud in your eye.’

‘How much d’you think he heard?’ asked Preddle, when the tutor had gone. Soames looked nostalgically at his empty glass, pushed it forward to be refilled and then shook his head.

‘He was fishing. He hadn’t heard a thing. Even if he had, there was nothing that mattered. He’d probably join in if we asked him. All the staff suffer from retarded mentality.’

‘What about us? Are we really going on with it?’

‘Well, we’ve more or less committed ourselves, I feel. Put our hands to the plough, so to speak.’

‘Put our hands to the spade, you mean. Don’t you see that it will be the most frightful fag?’

‘Never mind. Think of the girls digging up old Benson’s rats. We’ll be doing it for the good of their souls.’

‘Girls don’t have souls. They only have vital statistics.’