The Trouble With Harry Read Online Free PDF Page B

man and the landlord had shown a turn of speed and ingenuity that no pheasant or hare of Henry’s experience had ever shown. Henry strained his heart. He was on his death bed for six months, but never once did he regret his action, for right to the end his shop retained a Catholic purity of stock.

PEOPLE WITH HATS ON
    Such was the background of the Wiggs’ Emporium, standing that hot, summer afternoon between the world and the woods; between Sparrowswick and ‘The Rest’.
    Mrs Wiggs attended her stall. The stall was a number of planks thrown across trestles and covered by a white oilcloth. This stall stood half a dozen yards in front of the cottage and almost on the verge of the road. It was a stall designed to stop motorists and other road users. There was still lemonade on this stall and cut flowers and sandwiches and aspirins. Some of the brighterwatercolours signed ‘Sam Marlow’ leant against the front and above them the wisps of poetry, threaded by their corners with darning-wool, hung from drawing pins.
    This was Mrs Wiggs’ summer enterprise. This was a way of capturing trade other than her staple trade. Once, on a Thursday, a charabanc had stopped at this stall and she had sold all her still-lemonade and a bunch of asters. Somebody had talked of buying one of the pictures, but it had come to nothing. Ever after that Mrs Wiggs watched the road for charabancs but never did she see another. It was to be supposed that that particular charabanc had wandered from its route.
    Mrs Wiggs, then, sat in the shade of a chestnut tree, behind her stall, and waited for trade. She was a narrow woman with a broad, accommodating mind. Narrow shoulders and hips and a narrow mouth. She had no colour, either florid or pale. She was a neutral woman, with nothing positive or negative about her. She was so insignificant that even if you saw her many times in a single day you would find it hard, under close examination,to swear that you had seen her at all. Yet she was a kindly woman and tolerant, thoroughly agreeing with everybody.
    Suddenly, yet gradually, to this woman came a song. Amidst the occasional traffic noises, the straining of lorries over the hill, the changing of gears going down the hill, the whirr of faulty crown wheels, the rhythmic flip of asymmetrical tyres, above and through all these noises came a song. A strong, virile, baritone voice floating high above the trees behind her singing the song
Jerusalem
:
    ‘And did those feet in ancient time
    Walk upon England’s mountains green …’
    A song that swelled into the sunshine and became a part of the strong, hot light. A song that might well have come with the sunshine as one of Heaven’s odd amenities.
    As she heard the song she sighed a little and reached over to set the paintings to better advantage. She looked at the paintings and in them she could recognise the voice she was hearing. It had the sameconfident, carefree style. The same ethereal yet earthy style. It was the same man. It was Sam Marlow.
    ‘Bring me my bow of burning gold …’
    Down through the trees and the shrubs came the voice. Down past ‘The Ship’ and ‘The Haven’ and ‘Bon Vista’ and ‘Chaos’ and ‘The Chestnuts’ and ‘The Woodlands’ and all the bungalow names in the world. Down through the woods and up over the heath went the voice. Swelling into the limitless spaces of the summer sky. All heard it save one and he was dead. All heard it and in some way were gladdened by it. Abie’s mother, in the garden of ‘Chaos’, heard it as she was feeding cakes to her son and she watched the wonderful figure striding down through the foliage. Miss Graveley heard it as she was combing her hair and smiling to herself in a mirror in ‘The Haven’. In Miss Graveley, who had heard that voice so many times and remained unmoved, it wrought painful, ecstatic emotions. As the young god went past she covered her face with her hands and cried for joy. Up on the heath a tramp heard