14. The Picnic
Once more to Cherry Walden, leaving Robin Hood and Smokoe Joe asleep on either side of the stove with the wind knocking at the window and Gyp – alias Bang – also lost in slumber before the dying embers.
Aunt Ellen and the Whiting, Miss Holcome and all the staff of that well-ordered establishment have almost been forgotten. Since the disappearance of Harold, Aunt Ellen had given herself up to despair: the boys were quite beyond her control and she had almost reached the stage when she dreaded their return. They would, no doubt, subject her to yet more ridicule.
The affair at High Wood had made her crimson with shame. When the Whiting told her about the episode, especially the incident of the wood white and the outraged squire, he had been unable to conceal his mirth. Aunt Ellen, without a word, had primly gathered her gloves with a ‘we are not amused’ expression and walked out of the house. Moreover, she did not go to matins the following Sunday, an unheard of thing for Aunt Ellen.
And then, after an ominous lull, there came the bombshell of the Brendon affair – the Bunting trouser epic did not, regrettably, reach her ears until years later. The headlines in the papers, more photographs, more reporters ringing at the bell – all these tortures had to be undergone afresh. To think that a nephew of her’s, a Hensman, should have stooped to assault and battery, to say nothing of absconding with poor Mr Hawkins’s van! Aunt Ellen, the family pride at stake, hired the village fly – she would not keep a carriage, though she could well have afforded it – and drove over to see the baker at Cheshunt Toller.
‘But my good man, are you sure it was one of my nephews?’ Aunt Ellen kept repeating, until the baker became, as Aunt Ellen said afterwards to Miss Holcome, quite rude and disrespectful. She then made the mistake of offering him money – no damage had been done either to his person, horse or van. He, Thomas Hawkins, to be so insulted!
It was a very subdued Aunt Ellen who returned to Cherry Walden.
All her faults might have been put down to an appalling insensitiveness and a lack of knowledge of the ways of the world, but most of all to her lack of a sense of humour.
On the very day of Robin’s dramatic introduction to Smokoe Joe she had a note from the doctor’s wife at Yoho.
Twelvetrees House,
Yoho
August 25
My Dear Miss Hensman,
We are having a little picnic for Angela’s birthday tomorrow and several of her little friends are coming. She had intended to ask your three nephews but since that is not possible she is very anxious that you should come. I am sure it would do you good, and it will be a change for you, after all your dreadful anxieties. Your Vicar is coming, too, and has kindly offered to bring you in his car. He is so good with the children. Do come if you can: forgive such short notice!
Yours very sincerely,
Elizabeth Bowers
‘It will do you good, ma’am, I’m sure,’ said Cook, when Aunt Ellen told her she was going. ‘It will take your mind off your troubles. You haven’t been outside the village for months.’
‘The reason is, to tell you the truth, Cook, I dare not show my face in public … the shame of it all …’
‘Still,’ consoled Cook, ‘you go, ma’am, it’ll do you a power of good, especially if it’s a nice day. I expect Lady Bramshott will be there, too, ma’am, and the children; it would be nice for you to see company.’
‘I suppose it would,’ said Aunt Ellen with a sigh, ‘I suppose it would!’
The following day it rained in the morning and Aunt Ellen half hoped it would continue. But a little after midday the sun came out and the afternoon promised to be hot. Punctually at two-fifteen Aunt Ellen heard rumbling sounds at the gate and clouds of evil-smelling smoke advertised the fact that the vicar’s car was awaiting her. She would have much preferred to go with Lady Bramshott, but she did not wish to appear rude to the vicar, who, after all, had been a very present help in trouble.
‘Ah, Miss Hensman, here you are,’ said the Whiting brightly, as Aunt Ellen appeared in motor veil and wrap, ‘what a glorious day for the picnic!’
The Whiting was quite smart in a grey flannel suit and a white panama.
‘Yes, so fortunate, Vicar, especially after the wet morning.’
‘There we are, dear lady,’ said the Whiting, arranging rather a grubby dust sheet over her knees as she sat down in the back seat. ‘We are calling at the Hall for one of the Bramshott children and the nurse, as their wagonette will not hold them all.’
‘Is Lady Bramshott going too?’ asked Aunt Ellen, adjusting her veil.
‘Yes, yes, I believe so, I believe so,’ said the Whiting, grasping the starting handle and going round to the front of the car. The whole vehicle shook with his robust efforts at winding and the cherries on Aunt Ellen’s hat quivered. A sudden hideous bolt-shaking roar suddenly burst forth and the Whiting climbed into the front seat. ‘She always starts up so well,’ he said over his shoulder, ‘never any trouble!’
Aunt Ellen was thinking of a suitable reply when she was flung violently forward and her pince-nez fell down inside her veil. She gave a slight cry. Her dentures had also been badly rattled.
‘Sorry,’ grinned the Whiting, ‘my fault, these gears are rather harsh, it’s want of practice, you know, simply want of practice.’
‘Please don’t drive too fast, Vicar,’ implored Aunt Ellen, ‘I cannot bear speed.’
They turned out of the drive, where Rumbold was holding open the white gate, touching his cap and grinning as they passed. The Whiting noticed that many of the villagers smiled now when they saw him coming; they seemed much more friendly than they used to be. He did not know it was the story of Bunting’s trousers which provoked the smiles.
As they bowled along, with dust clouds whirling behind them, the Whiting discoursed on the crops. They had ripened well with the hot weather and the rain and wind in the night had not been sufficiently heavy to cause any damage.
‘Where is the picnic to be, Vicar?’ asked Aunt Ellen, who was quite beginning to enjoy herself.
‘Ah – Brendon Chase,’ he said, ‘I hope – ah …’ There was an awkward pause. ‘I hope we shall meet the others all right.’
At the sinister words ‘Brendon Chase’ Aunt Ellen made a small unintelligible noise. ‘Oh dear, that’s where the police have been hunting for my nephews … I … I think that Mrs Bowers might have chosen a … er … chosen another place for her picnic.’
‘Oh, but it’s ideal,’ said the Whiting enthusiastically, ‘so handy for Mrs Bowers, and the children will adore it.’ Aunt Ellen noticed a green butterfly net sticking out of the Whiting’s pocket and she sniffed. ‘As a matter of fact it was I who suggested to Mrs Bowers that we should go to Brendon Chase,’ confessed the Whiting.
‘I suppose you did not think of the mosquitoes,’ said Aunt Ellen severely. ‘I suffer terribly from mosquito bites.’
They arrived at the gate which was familiar to the Whiting to find the magnificent equipage from the Hall standing in the shade with a cockaded coachman by the horses’ heads. A squealing concourse of children, in their best clothes, was being herded by grown-ups and nurses into the green ride.
‘Ah, here is our good shepherd,’ said Mrs Bowers with unintentional profanity. ‘So you’ve got here all right, Vicar; we thought something had happened to you!’
‘Not late I hope?’ said the Whiting, raising his panama. ‘We started on time you know.’
‘No, no, we’ve only just arrived,’ said Mrs Bowers. ‘Isn’t it a heavenly place for our picnic, Vicar? The children will love it.’
The chattering, laughing crowd followed behind him down the ride, Mrs Bowers’s chauffeur bringing up the rear, staggering under an ample wicker picnic basket full of good things.
It seemed an unendurable walk to the clearing which the Whiting had chosen for the party. One of the young Bramshotts stung its fat pink legs on some nettles and the forest rang with its cries. Lady Bramshott fanned herself delicately with a scented handkerchief and her red parasol trembled. ‘Not much farther I hope, Vicar? The little ones …’
‘Only a few yards more,’ said the Whiting cheerfully, scanning the tree tops on either side of the ride as he walked along.
Aunt Ellen began to lag behind. She found herself among the camp followers, the nursemaids and infants.
‘Oh dear, ma’am, I hope it isn’t much farther,’ gasped a fat nurse in grey, ‘Master Jeremy is getting so tired and he’s stung his leg so badly.’
‘Boo! Hoo!’ yelled Master Jeremy, ‘I want to go home! I want to go home!’
‘It’s madness,’ burst out Aunt Ellen, who was by now in what Rumbold would have vulgarly called a ‘muck sweat’. ‘I can’t think why Mrs Bowers ever consented to the vicar taking charge like this. Bachelors cannot be expected to understand children.’
‘Indeed no, ma’am, I fear Her Ladyship is feeling the heat dreadfully.’
By sheer British grit, however, shown, be it said, by children and adults alike, the party at last reached an open glade and the Whiting called a halt.
‘Ain’t it loverly though,’ said the nurse to the chauffeur.
‘It reminds me of a place I know in Burma,’ said Lady Bramshott in rather a faded voice to the vicar. ‘I never knew there was such a delightful spot so near to us.’
‘Yes, yes, it’s a favourite haunt of mine, Lady Bramshott, quite a favourite spot. Bless me!’ exclaimed the Whiting suddenly. ‘If that isn’t a comma over there, on that blackberry bush!’
‘I beg your pardon, Vicar?’
But the Whiting had already unshipped his net and was off in pursuit, with a party of children rushing at his heels. Lady Bramshott sighed. ‘How the children love him,’ she said to Aunt Ellen. ‘Don’t you think it’s clever of him to find such a heavenly place for our picnic? It was quite worth that too, too tiring walk, don’t you think?’
‘I’m afraid your youngest must have found it very tiring,’ said Aunt Ellen, ‘the poor lamb has stung his legs dreadfully.’
‘Oh, Jeremy always cries,’ said Lady Bramshott – who was quite a good sort – ‘he’s really too small to bring out on a picnic but it will do him good. He’ll be all right when they start to play. The children are still a little shy. How pretty Angela looks, Mrs Bowers. How old do you say she is?’
‘Thirteen today. Yes, she’s a pretty child.’
Angela at that moment was peering over the Whiting’s shoulder at some object he was disentangling from his net. ‘So fond of nature, don’t you know, she adores birds and things. That’s where the vicar is so good with children.’
There were cries of ‘What is it?’, ‘Oh, let me look, please,’ and, ‘Comma, what a funny name. Why not call it a full stop!’
‘I hope the little ones won’t wander too far and get lost,’ said Aunt Ellen.
‘All my brats except the youngest can look after themselves,’ said Lady Bramshott. ‘My husband believes in them being self-reliant. A good thing, don’t you think?’
‘But surely, Lady Bramshott … if one of them did get lost, it would be a terrible experience for the poor lamb.’
Lady Bramshott, who had by now recovered from the hot walk, began marshalling the children for a game of hide and seek. The unhappy Whiting – who would have far rather been allowed to go off after butterflies – was called upon to organize.
Mrs Bowers directed that the picnic hamper should be carried into the shade. The time to eat had not yet arrived and the fish paste sandwiches might suffer.
‘Where would you like it, ma’am?’ asked the chauffeur, staggering under his weighty burden.
‘Oh, anywhere in the shade; under the bracken will do, Burton, but see Master Jeremy doesn’t find it.’
Master Jeremy, Lady Bramshott’s youngest, was a fat and immensely greedy child, as greedy as a puppy. Mrs Bowers had not forgotten that on a former picnic in the Chase he had discovered where the basket lay and had helped himself, privily, whilst the other children and grown-ups had been otherwise engaged. And Jeremy had been rushed home, a dolorous journey, as he had been continually sick in the carriage all the way to Cherry Walden.
The grown-ups, who had not yet been roped in to assist with the children, now spread themselves in the shade, where they talked scandal and appraised each other’s offspring.
The chauffeur soon found a nursemaid to entertain, the Whiting disappeared into the forest with the children at his heels – he reminded Lady Bramshott, so she said, of the Pied Piper of Hamlyn – and everybody seemed happy and to be enjoying themselves, all save Aunt Ellen, who had already been bitten twice on the neck by a mosquito.
Big John and Little John spent a lonely night in the tree. Without Bang and Robin for company they felt very depressed. They had caught no fish at the Blind Pool and the rain did not help matters. When, on the following morning, the skies were still overcast and the rain still fell in steady lines, they felt more depressed than ever. For the first time since they came to the forest they were bored and almost wished they could go back; even Banchester was better than mooning about doing nothing.
‘Why should Robin have all the fun?’ growled Big John, kicking the wood dust and staring out at the dripping trees. ‘He’s taken the rifle and if he doesn’t come back today we shall run short of food.’
‘I know. I vote we insist on keeping the rifle next time, if he wants to go off again by himself. Hullo! Big John, I believe it’s going to clear up!’
It had stopped raining and very soon the sun gleamed forth and set the whole forest steaming.
‘Hurrah! Let’s go for a swim in the Blind Pool. Robin will just have to wait here until we come back!’
It was amazing how the coming of the sun brightened their spirits.
They reached the pool soon after midday. They stripped and had a delightful swim. Then they began to fish. Big John went up to the shallow end, where the stream trickled out of the pool, and the water daisy carpets grew. After the rain the perch were biting and he soon caught a dozen fine red-finned fish, the largest being well over a pound. It was great fun seeing the float move slowly away and down almost as soon as the worm sank to the bottom. A perch bite is decidedly bold and gladdens the heart of the patient angler. A large willow formed a comfortable seat for Big John and under it the water was some four feet deep. The glancing rays of sunlight revealed the bottom; he could see the dead leaves, and the rotten sticks embedded in them, he could watch his worms descending – even the perch were plainly visible as they moved out from under the willow roots to take his bait. Occasionally one dark thick-backed monster would glide up to the worm, examine it, and return to the shelter of the willow with injured dignity, as though to say, ‘What do you take me for!’ Sometimes as the worm touched bottom, Big John could see it wriggling to and fro like a little pink eel. And then a dark shadow eclipsed it and the float dived steadily.
Though these fish were smaller than the handsome bronze tench, they tasted even sweeter and, moreover, they were not so bony. Next to a trout, the perch is the best eating of all the freshwater fish. Very soon Big John saw a disturbance in the water, far out in the pool. At first he thought it was the head of a water rat and he put his hand in his pocket for his catapult. Water rats made good moving targets. But very soon he saw it was caused by a large grass snake. The creature came gracefully along, its head held well clear of the surface of the water, waggling from side to side. It came right in under the willow and Big John saw the long sinuous body waving like a green whiplash behind it.
The snake wriggled out of the water and began to glide away, with a faint rustle, through the fern. Big John, who wanted a snakeskin for a belt, dropped down upon it like a hawk and pinned it behind the head. The clammy green coils, with the black barred underbelly, writhed hideously round his hand in moving tight knots, but he held it firm.
He liked grass snakes. They were harmless creatures and usually the outlaws let them alone, but this particular snake was such a magnificent specimen it would make a fine belt, or even a scabbard for his hunting knife.
He was on the point of killing it when a thought occurred to him. Little John had never seen a grass snake at close quarters; he would keep it alive and show it to him. So he put it in his jacket pocket and a very unpleasant smell it made. Grass snakes when alarmed have this strange skunk-like power. But small boys are not so squeamish as grown-ups, so the snake went into his pocket as a matter of course. It writhed about a good deal and then lay still. It was dark in there and that quietened it.
Big John wriggled back down the willow and dropped into the bracken. He threaded his perch on a withy and walked back along the bank to join his brother. He found the latter in the act of landing a large red-finned perch of quite a pound weight, but as he drew it kicking and splashing to the side, the fish gave another plunge and tangled the line round a lily root. Their combined efforts failed to free it and a moment later the line came slack. ‘Bother,’ exclaimed Little John, ‘it was a beauty too.’
They ruefully surveyed the broken cast and swore it was the finest perch they had ever hooked in the Blind Pool.
‘Never mind,’ sighed Big John, ‘it was a beauty and no mistake, but I’ve got some good ones, enough for a fry. I’ve caught a snake too; I’ll show it you when we get back to camp.’
They gathered up their rods and struck off through the fern in the direction of the oak tree. They had been walking for some time, Big John in the lead, when distant sounds brought them to an abrupt halt. Faint cries came on the air, children’s voices! Children’s voices in the Chase!
Their first reaction was to dive into the thickets but after listening as intently as deer for some considerable time Big John motioned his brother outlaw to follow and very cautiously they began to make their way in the direction of the sounds. The afternoon was so still that it was some time before they seemed to be drawing any nearer to these disturbers of their domain. But at last the clamour became so loud that both outlaws took to their hands and knees and finally their stomachs and at last, when they reached the edge of a glade, an amazing and disturbing spectacle met their startled gaze. For there, grouped about under the oaks, were clusters of children, chattering and laughing, some playing leapfrog, others playing tig and the rest clustered round no other person but the Whiting, who was apparently explaining the complicated anatomy of a caterpillar.
‘Disgusting,’ whispered Big John when he had recovered from his horror and astonishment, ‘fancy coming into the Chase like this on a beastly picnic. Good gracious … there’s Aunt Ellen!’
For a moment they gazed in awe at their unhappy aunt, it was so long since they had seen her. ‘She’s all dressed up like a dog’s dinner,’ whispered Little John, ‘and she’s got her Sunday hat on, the one with cherries in it.’
‘That’s because Lady Bramshott’s there,’ Big John whispered back, ‘and look – there’s that little hog Jeremy, wearing a ridiculous cap as big as a plate. Phew! What a crowd!’
‘Yes, and there’s Mrs Bowers and Angela,’ said Little John, who had just caught sight of the latter on the other side of the glade. ‘Let’s get back to camp before they see us.’
But Big John’s face was undergoing a change. A red tide slowly flooded his cheeks, his ears turned shell pink, ears which had not been washed for weeks. Poor Big John – he was suffering all over again the pangs of calf love. Angela was his ideal of the perfect woman. Now he was suddenly homesick. He wanted dreadfully to join that noisy, happy party and, more than anything, to talk to Angela. How she would love their house in the forest! How she would love to see the bird’s nests and the butterflies! She was wearing a frilly white summer frock and a scarlet ribbon in her blue-black hair, and never, never, never had he seen her looking so adorable. But all this he had to bottle up and keep to himself. He would rather have died than betray these secret emotions. He must worship – alas! – from afar. Besides, what a sight he looked in his old rabbit skin kilt and his ragged clothes! His shoes, too, were wearing out, and the sole of one of them was tied to the uppers with thongs of pig’s hide. An absolute tramp, in fact.
He was awakened, glassy-eyed, from his trance, by Little John’s elbow jabbing him rudely in the ribs. ‘Look, Big John, the picnic basket!’
‘Oh shut up!’ snapped Big John quite angrily. ‘What about it anyway?’
‘Why, can’t you see they’ve put it under the bracken, over there? How about sneaking it? I’ll bet it’s chock-a-block with good things.’
Now it must be admitted that Big John was very hungry. Their breakfast had been meagre and they had just had a swim. In fact they were just about as hungry as growing boys can be who have had an enormous amount of exercise and have also been living rough.
‘There’ll be pies and cakes, sandwiches, and I don’t know what,’ said Little John. ‘I’m off.’
‘Here! Wait for me,’ hissed Big John, Angela’s charms quite forgotten for the moment.
The picnic hamper, a vast bright reddy-brown wicker one, was reposing close to the high bracken. Its guardian, the chauffeur, was flirting with a nursemaid under an oak close by. Certainly it was an opportunity not to be missed. It was easy meat for them, even easier than the removal of Bunting’s trousers.
There was nobody on their side of the clearing; the picnic party had obligingly arranged themselves under the trees opposite to their hiding place, some on rugs – Aunt Ellen was sitting on two rugs because she feared the damp – and all were engrossed in small talk. The bulk of the children had now gone off with the Whiting, though they were not far away, as was borne out by the piercing screams of laughter and excited shouts which, to Big John and Little John, seemed sacrilege in this quiet forest retreat which they had come to regard as their own.
Had anyone been watching that happy picture, and especially the comfortable-looking picnic hamper, they would have seen a strange thing. The ferns moved ever so slightly close beside it and an extremely dirty claw appeared. Very gradually it felt towards the hamper, the fingers closed over the wickerwork and the hamper was mysteriously withdrawn an inch at a time, so slowly that the movement would have been scarcely discernible to the watcher.
Though the chauffeur and the nursemaid were only ten feet away they never heard a sound.
Big John gently pulled the wooden peg which held down the lid and, as gently, the lid was raised. There a wonderful sight met the gaze of those poor famished outlaws. A whole cold chicken! Blocks of sandwiches! Three large cakes, one iced with pink icing and in a box by itself; quite a dozen hard-boiled eggs! Ham! Honey! Pots of jam! And a hundred other mouth-tickling delights, including apples, oranges and chocolates!
In a moment or two every eatable had been removed, together with two aluminium kettles. The cups and plates they did not bother about but the kettles would come in useful.
‘I don’t think we ought to pinch the kettles,’ hissed Big John under his breath, ‘I’ve half a mind to put them back. It’s too much like stealing.’
‘Don’t be a fool; remember Robin Hood. He robbed the rich to feed the poor, didn’t he? We’re outlaws, silly!’ So the kettles were removed.
Then it seemed that Big John replaced something in the basket. Little John did not see what it was, he only caught a fleeting glimpse of some object being forced under the lid which was shut to quickly. Then the pin was replaced, the fern nodded once more and all was still!
‘Ah, Vicar, you must be worn out with all your hard work,’ crowed Mrs Bowers, when the Whiting appeared in a sea of hot red-faced children.
‘Ah well, a little perhaps, but we’ve had a wonderful game of hide and seek, haven’t we, children?’
‘Yes! Yes!’ they all chorused.
‘And you must be famished too, you poor things. We will have tea at once, don’t you think so, Lady Bramshott? It looks so cool!’
‘Tea! Tea!’ everyone shouted, dancing about. Some of the children turned somersaults with delight.
‘I think I have brought enough for us all,’ said Mrs Bowers, smiling at her guests. ‘Now, Angela darling, you must look after your little friends and help to pass round the cakes and things.’
‘Hooray!’ shouted the children. ‘Tea! Tea! Where’s the tea!’
‘Angela shall open the basket,’ said Mrs Bowers, bridling, ‘as it’s your birthday, dear,’ she added, ‘and you may help your little guests to anything they like!’
‘I feel Robin Hood and his merry men must be hiding somewhere in this forest,’ said Lady Bramshott closing her sunshade. ‘We must imagine we are in Sherwood preparing a hunting banquet. Come, children! Sit down anywhere!’
The hamper was pulled to the middle of the shuffling circle and every eye was fixed greedily upon it.
‘This is a jolly picnic,’ said Aunt Ellen – she had quite forgotten her mosquito bites – ‘and how kind of you, dear Mrs Bowers, to ask us all like this!’
‘The banquet is about to be spread,’ boomed the Whiting, undoing the top button of his waistcoat. Mrs Bowers leant across and whispered something in his ear. He nodded his head rapidly, ‘Certainly, certainly.’
‘One moment, Angela darling,’ said her mother, laying a restraining finger on Angela’s arm, ‘before we begin tea the vicar will say grace.’ The shuffling and excited whispers died to silence as the party composed itself reverently with closed eyes.
‘For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful. Amen,’ said everyone present – then – Angela lifted the lid!
The scene which followed is beyond my powers of description. For as Angela opened the hamper there instantly appeared over the side the waving head of a snake, its thin black tongue quivering malevolently, like the feelers of some obscene insect. Dreadful screams rang through the forest. There followed a moment of frozen horror, then the children scattered like rabbits in every direction. Aunt Ellen exclaimed, ‘Oh! Oh! A serpent!’ and fell back in a swoon, disclosing an unseemly length of thick woollen stocking and flannel underwear. Nursemaids and mothers fled, babbling incoherently between the trees.
Four figures remained. Angela, Lady Bramshott, the vicar and the chauffeur.
‘It’s only a harmless grass snake, I assure you,’ the vicar exclaimed. ‘There is no need for all this panic.’
Lady Bramshott, though white of face, seemed now rather amused – but then she had been used to snakes in Burma. And Angela, poor Angela, sat back on her heels, her head hung so that the dark curls fell forward and masked her crimson face. Glittering drops fell, like pearls, upon her knees.
‘Fancy a snake in the picnic basket!’ exclaimed the Whiting. ‘I do declare it is a most strange occurrence! Come, children,’ he said, gazing about him, ‘come, everyone, it cannot harm you. It is no viper but a harmless grass snake!’
‘But it’s eaten the tea!’ sobbed Angela, her shoulders shaking wildly. ‘It’s eaten the tea and spoilt my picnic!’
Mrs Bowers who, like the others, was emerging like a startled faun from the undergrowth, was speechless. Her eyes were staring at the empty hamper. The chauffeur now advanced upon the snake with a stick, but the vicar restrained him. ‘Do not kill it, Burton, it is quite a harmless reptile.’
The harmless reptile was now coiling itself round the Whiting’s arm, for he had taken it gently from the hamper, and was emitting a most skunk-like smell.
‘Oh, Vicar, I’m sure it will bite you!’ wailed Aunt Ellen.
‘It’s eaten the tea!’ wailed Jeremy, who had now reappeared. The fact there was no tea was a far more dreadful catastrophe than the discovery of the snake.
‘Nonsense, nonsense,’ said the Whiting, ‘of course it can’t have eaten the tea! Grass snakes live on frogs and things, not cakes, and …’
‘A whole chicken,’ gasped Mrs Bowers, ‘and there were cakes and sandwiches, everything. I superintended the packing of it myself!’
‘Oh! Oh! Oh!’ Angela collapsed again.
‘My poor child,’ said Lady Bramshott soothingly, ‘it’s most disappointing for you, dear, but never mind. The tea must have been left in the wagonette by mistake.’
‘But the kettles have been taken too!’ gasped Mrs Bowers.
‘Are you sure nobody touched the basket?’ asked Lady Bramshott, turning to the chauffeur.
‘Perfectly sure, milady. I was sitting beside it all the time.’
‘Most extraordinary, a most extraordinary occurrence,’ repeated the Whiting, ‘it is inexplicable unless …’ he swung round on his heel, his eyes glittering as he searched the inscrutable forest about them, ‘unless those Dower House boys have some hand in it!’
Meanwhile, ‘those Dower House boys’, after waiting to see the result of their escapade, were now making their way swiftly and silently by devious paths to the oak tree clearing. Big John had taken off his ragged flannel coat and they had made a hammock of it, in which reposed all their booty. It was a heavy weight indeed, and every few yards they had to lower it to the ground and take a spell of rest. But at last they reached the tree and there found Robin building a fire. He looked up as they came into the clearing staggering under the weighty burden.
‘Hullo, my merry men, what on earth have you got there?’ he exclaimed, gazing in utter astonishment at his brother outlaws: Big John and Little John said no word but gently lowered the coat on to the ground and began to sort out the things. When all was spread they turned to Robin, whose eyes were now out on stalks. ‘There you are, Master Robin, we’ve had good hunting. We’ve robbed the rich. There before you are the contents of a picnic basket, a very large picnic basket, as you can guess.’
Robin went down on his knees and undid the box which contained the iced cake. Reverently he withdrew it from its paper wrapping. The journey through the forest had rather crushed it and the pink icing was melting, but there, still legible, was written in sugar a name – ANGELA.
Big John’s face, when he saw the cake unwrapped, underwent a complete change. A moment before it had been wreathed in smiles of triumph; now it was transformed into a face of someone much older, almost an old man’s.
‘Angela,’ he gasped, ‘I – I never knew …’
‘Never knew what?’ asked Robin, looking up at him, puzzled.
‘Why … that must be Angela’s birthday cake, it was her birthday picnic!’
‘Well, what about it? What difference does that make?’ asked his elder brother.
On a sudden impulse Big John sprang forward, snatched up the cake, and crammed it back into the box. The others watched him uncomprehending. Then he turned and made for the path, the way he had come.
‘Stop him!’ shouted Little John. ‘He’s going to take it back, he’ll be nabbed!’
Robin went after the fleeing Big John like a panther. In a few yards he caught him up and Big John turned at bay, clutching the box. ‘Leave me alone,’ he said wildly, ‘leave me alone I say!’ Tears were running down his cheeks and Robin stopped, shocked beyond measure.
‘I’m going to take it back to her, it was her party and we’ve spoilt it all!’
‘Now, steady on, Big John, you can’t do that you know, you’ll give us away. You’ll get caught.’
‘I don’t care,’ said Big John desperately, ‘I’m going to take it back.’ He turned again to flee, but Robin grabbed him by the collar.
‘You’re mushy on Angela!’ he exclaimed with scorn in his voice.
Big John struck him in the face with all his force; there was an instant of grunting and swaying. Then the box fell to the ground, shattering the cake to a squashy pulp. The two boys fought savagely, rolling over and over, punching and pummelling, until they stopped, like sparring gamecocks, from sheer exhaustion.
‘What’s all the trouble?’ asked the astonished Little John, who had come up with them, drawn by the sound of fighting.
‘I don’t know,’ said Robin wearily, ‘he’s mad I think. Here, take the blessed cake, it’s not much good to anybody now.’
Big John sat among the fern. His nose was bleeding and the wild look was fading from his eye. Both Big John and Robin had just experienced strange primeval passions which neither understood. At last he got slowly to his feet. He came up to Robin and smiled wryly. ‘Sorry, I … I … I’ve been a bit of a fool,’ he muttered. And the three boys went back in silence to the tree.