Page 49 of A Year at Appleyard Farm
It was the smell that hit her first, acrid and sharp, catching in the back of her throat; but she soon took in the sooty black mess which covered a large portion of the room. The source of the noise was immediately apparent as a terrified crow blundered repeatedly into the window, seeking an escape.
Merry closed the door and hurried across the room, making soothing noises without even realising she was doing so, as she talked to the frightened bird. She tried to get the window open, but the catch was stiff, and the crow’s wings beat against her as she reached past it, dirty puffs of soot rising up into her face. The bird’s eyes were wild, its mouth opening and closing repeatedly although no sound came out.
It darted past her again, flying in a low swoop around the room before hurtling towards the window once more. Merry was sure it would hurt itself if it carried on. She leaned on the window catch again, feeling it suddenly give way as her fingers slid off, banging her knuckle painfully against the metal. She took a step backwards, trying to calm her own heart which was beating hard in response to the bird’s frantic efforts. She started to talk once more, making shushing noises as she would to her daughter, trying to soothe her.
She reached forward with both hands, trying to stop the bird from its ceaseless flapping and suddenly, almost as if it could sense Merry’s intention to help, it stilled, hunched against the corner of the window, its chest heaving.
‘That’s it, little one, don’t be scared. Let’s get you out.’ Merry managed to get both hands around the bird, and gently brought it into her, wrapping the bottom of her fleece around it in an effort to make it feel safer. She managed to free one hand and pushed as hard as she could at the window, flinging it wide. A sudden rush of air flew in, bringing with it a patter of raindrops as she offered the bird up to the wind. It stood perched on her hands for a moment more, and Merry sensed the moment it would fly as it took off, soaring high above her before coming to rest in a tree at the edge of the garden. A minute later and it was gone.
Merry smiled, leaning forward to reach the window and close it once more, only then catching sight of her hands. They were filthy, as was her jumper, and she slowly turned around to see the state of the room. How could one bird make so much mess? And how on earth was she going to clean it up? The chimney had obviously not been swept for a while; a huge ball of soot had fallen with the bird and burst onto the hearth, a black circle of dust fanning out and covering everything in its wake. Where the crow had sought to free itself, black marks covered the walls and carpet, and the furniture stored in the room was dark with the sticky mess.
She knew better than to touch it. She had only seen this happen once before when she was a teenager and still living at home. A crow had come down the chimney in their dining room, and her mother had been adamant that the worst thing they could do was to rub it to get it off. It had to be lifted while it was still dust-like. With a grim expression on her face she went downstairs to get the vacuum cleaner, cross now at the interruption in her day.
A newspaper had been pushed through the front door on to the floor in the hall, and as she bent to retrieve it, she became aware that there was still someone standing outside. A very tall woman was scribbling something onto a piece of paper, and she looked up at the sound of the door opening.
‘Oh, hello. Sorry I didn’t think anyone was home. I did try the bell.’
Merry looked at her quizzically.
‘I’m Pat,’ the woman said. ‘From the village. I wondered if you might like the evening paper delivered. I was just leaving my details in case.’ She handed Merry the sheet of paper.
As Merry reached out to take it, she caught sight of her hands once more. ‘Ah, sorry. I’m a bit mucky. We’ve just had a crow come down the chimney. Could you just leave it with me, and I’ll have a look when I’m less, well…covered in soot.’
Pat gave a nervous smile, looking up at the roofline. ‘Was it still alive?’ she asked, with a slight shudder.
‘Oh yes,’ said Merry cheerfully. ‘I managed to get it out of the window, it was fine. Ungrateful so and so, though, didn’t even say thank you.’
Merry’s humour was met with a stony stare. ‘Well, that’s something I suppose, it’s even worse bad luck if they’re dead.’
24
Freya pulled her hood further over her face, but the wind was blowing in gusts this morning, and her raincoat did little to deflect the rain. It also seriously impeded her vision.
Impatiently, she reached into her pocket and pulled out a hairband, throwing back her hood, and offering her face to the weather. She scraped her hair back as best she could, tucking the loose ends firmly behind her ears. Freya was used to being outside in all weathers; in fact, it was one of the things she loved about her life. It didn’t matter how cold and wet she got during the day, there was nothing that a nice hot shower, a mug of hot chocolate and a bacon sandwich couldn’t cure. People often remarked that there was no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing, but Freya disagreed. Some days it didn’t matter what you were wearing, but the one thing she had learned over the years was that skin, at least, was waterproof.
Hair secured, she returned her attention to the task in hand, anxiously reaching for another branch of the apple tree beside her. The pregnant buds were beginning to swell into beautiful tight promises that would soon offer glimpses of their delicate blushed petals. There was no sign of that this morning, but Freya was standing on the side of the orchard that faced the sun, so these were the buds that would blossom first. She thanked her lucky stars that March had seen a particularly sharp cold snap which had lasted for a couple of weeks. It had held these buds back and, as she surveyed the black pall of the sky above her, she thought once more of the extraordinary alchemy that was Mother Nature. Had spring come early, these buds might be in flower by now, and the driving rain which was now into its third day would have ripped the petals apart. She eyed the sky again, and prayed for an end to the deluge.
After a few minutes, Sam joined her, a grim expression on his face.
‘We’ve another couple of weeks I reckon, what do you think?’
Freya nodded, wiping a droplet from the end of her nose. ‘I think we’ll be okay, just as long as this doesn’t go on much longer. We might lose some of the Devonshires, but the cider apples are okay.’ She screwed up her nose. ‘I’m not so sure about the perry pears, though.’ She looked up at Sam, trying to gauge the expression on his face.
He had turned away from her, and was staring out across the fields. She knew there was no way to see Braeburns’s fields from here, but it didn’t stop Sam from looking.
‘I rode out by Stephen’s this morning, his trees are already like galleons in full sail.’
‘But we’ve had good days of warm sunshine up until this week, and there were plenty of bees around, maybe he’ll be okay? He might still get a good crop.’
Sam sighed. ‘I’m not sure I care any more, Freya. It’s been two weeks since I went to see him, and I thought that perhaps he would have had time to calm down and think about what I said; that maybe he would have got in touch…I’m just fooling myself, thinking things will ever be any different.’
‘Sam, you can’t blame yourself. Stephen is a grown man, he has to take responsibility for his own actions, and that includes how he runs Braeburn. You’ve offered to help, that’s all you can do.’ She took his hand, wondering whether to mention her own conversation with Stephen, but knowing that this wasn’t really the right time. ‘Come on, let’s get back inside. We’ve a lot of homework to do.’
Merry took hold of her friend’s coat later that afternoon, and hung it over the big butler sink in the utility room. Even the short dash from the car into the house had been enough to soak her through.
‘That’s the second time today.’ Freya laughed as Merry rejoined her. ‘I got drenched this morning as well,’ she added, holding up her bedraggled hair as proof. ‘And it’s so windy, the car practically blew itself here.’
‘Dreadful, isn’t it?’ agreed Merry, pulling a face. ‘Rain is most definitely stopping play right now, which is fantastic just as we’ve got the builders actually organised to turn up. I hope when they do arrive that they can put on a turn of speed; everything else is dependent on when they finish, and I’m getting rather impatient.’
