He did not. The next morning, before the office was open to the public, he saw the senior administrative officer in the social security wing. She said she was grateful for the information and they would ask Stock about it next time he came in, but these casual earnings were impossible to assess with accuracy. Crawshaw challenged this assumption. He said it was no good tamely asking Stock for information. It should be the subject of a departmental investigation. He went on to mention the parties. ‘I counted fifty-six guests. Anyone with the means to entertain on that scale should not be living off the state.’
The senior administrative officer said she would do all she reasonably could to see that Mr Stock was not defrauding the department, but Crawshaw heard no more about it.
That is, until the incident in the garden shop.
‘I tell you, he bought an axe,’ he told Joan as soon as he got back, ‘and Padmore said it was obvious what he wanted it for — to attack the neighbours.’
‘He must have been joking, Gilbert.’
‘What sort of joke is that? I don’t find it funny.’
Joan sighed and shook her head. ‘People are not very tolerant. The Stocks dress differently from most of us, so it gives rise to silly comments. It’s a basic instinct, a tribal thing.’
Crawshaw sniffed. ‘I don’t need you to tell me that. I can recognise a couple of savages for myself.’
‘Gilbert, that’s unworthy of you. I took you for a tolerant man.’
‘Not much use being tolerant when there’s someone coming at you with an axe.’
‘Now you’re being melodramatic. What have we ever done to antagonise Mr Stock?’
Crawshaw turned his head and stared out of the window. He hadn’t mentioned his conversation with the senior administrative officer in social security. Joan had tried to discourage him from reporting on the neighbours. It was no use talking to her about social duty. She hadn’t progressed beyond the morality of the playground, when ‘telling’ was a crime.
Yet he was beginning to wish he hadn’t interfered.
No more was said on the matter until mid-afternoon, when Crawshaw was in the garden mowing his lawn. He favoured the conventional mower with a roller that left a pleasing pattern of stripes. He had sometimes looked at the rotary mowers in Padmore’s shop, but they didn’t give the same finish. It was while he was making his journeys up and down the lawn that he heard a sound above the whirr of the mower. He thought at first that a stone had lodged between the blades, but when he stopped, the sound persisted. It was coming from the next garden, a knock as steady as a steam-hammer.
There was a six-foot fence between the gardens, so he had to go indoors and upstairs to see what was happening.
Joan was already in the spare bedroom watching. ‘You see?’ she said, as he joined her at the curtain. ‘I told you there was nothing to get alarmed about.’
Crawshaw stared down at the spectacle of his neighbour Stock hacking with the axe at the only tree in his garden.
He said, ‘Disgusting.’
‘Oh, come, Gilbert,’ said Joan. ‘It’s a stifling afternoon and that’s warm work. A man is entitled to take off his shirt in the privacy of his own garden. It’s in no way offensive.’
‘I can see it doesn’t offend you,’ Crawshaw commented pointedly.
Joan coloured and said, ‘What do you mean?’
‘If you really want to know,’ Crawshaw said with condescension in his voice, ‘I wasn’t speaking about his naked torso when I used the word "disgusting". Obviously that sprang to your mind first. What I had in mind was the destruction of that apple tree, which I regard as an act of senseless vandalism. That tree is the last beautiful thing in their neglected garden, and there he is destroying it.’
Joan was silent, nursing her private hurt.
‘If it falls against our fence,’ Crawshaw went on, ‘he’ll be hearing from my solicitor.’
Joan said, ‘At least we know why he bought the axe.’ She waited for some response and, getting none, added, ‘He wasn’t planning to attack you.’
‘I’m going down to finish the lawn,’ said Crawshaw. ‘No, there’s no need for you to come. You carry on goggling at the ape-man.’
‘That’s unfair, Gilbert,’ Joan said, but he was already on his way downstairs.
A short while later, Crawshaw looked up from his mowing and saw the top of the apple tree shudder and lurch. He stopped to watch which way it fell. There was no damage to his fence. The tree fell the other way.
He still said, ‘Vandal,’ before resuming his work. Later, he was obliged to go indoors. Stock had started a bonfire to burn the tree. Smoke was billowing across Crawshaw’s garden.
‘That’s green wood,’ he told Joan as they stood in the bedroom watching. ‘It’s not fit for burning. It’ll smoke out the entire neighbourhood. The man has no consideration for other people.’
During that week, Stock made more bonfires, generally in the evening when Crawshaw was home from work. By sheer persistence, the wood was reduced to ashes by the weekend.
Crawshaw called at the garden shop on Saturday. He needed something to treat a patch of moss which had appeared on his lawn. Mr Padmore selected a packet from the shelves behind the counter and handed it to Crawshaw.
‘That should do the trick,’ he told him. ‘One sachet to a gallon of water. Funny you should come in, Mr Crawshaw. We were talking about you earlier this morning.’
‘In what connection?’ Crawshaw asked uneasily.
‘Nothing personal. That neighbour of yours came in. Long-haired chap. He does live next door to you, doesn’t he?’
Crawshaw nodded.
‘That was how your name came up,’ said Mr Padmore.
‘Did he mention it?’
Mr Padmore’s mouth gave nothing away, but his eyes glittered artfully. ‘Don’t you two get on very well?’ he asked.
‘We don’t have much in common,’ Crawshaw guardedly answered.
‘I can see that, Mr Crawshaw, I can see that.’
Crawshaw didn’t altogether like Padmore’s tone, but curiosity kept him from cutting the conversation short. He remarked, ‘I can’t think what my neighbour would want from this shop. He hasn’t shown any interest in his garden in the time he’s lived there.’
‘He bought a spade,’ said Mr Padmore. ‘Last week it was an axe.’ He winked at Crawshaw. ‘You keep an eye on him, Mr Crawshaw.’
‘Why?’
‘It’s obvious, isn’t it? What does he want with a spade if he doesn’t go in for gardening? He must be planning to bury something.’
When Crawshaw got home, he told Joan precisely what Mr Padmore had said.
‘And you took it seriously?’ she said. ‘Gilbert, what’s the matter with you?’
‘There’s nothing the matter with me.’
‘You must have a persecution complex, or something.’
Crawshaw reached out and gripped her by the arms so tightly that she gave a cry of pain. He said, ‘Listen to me, will you? If anyone is behaving oddly, it’s that blighter next door. You won’t find me scrounging off social security, or squatting in the subway with a begging bowl between my legs. I don’t hack down healthy fruit trees and pollute the atmosphere with filthy bonfires. Just think of that before you try your pseudo-psychology on me.’
‘Gilbert, you’re hurting me,’ said Joan.
That afternoon they watched Stock use the spade to dig out the stump of the apple tree.
‘Are you satisfied?’ Joan asked.
Crawshaw didn’t answer, so she went downstairs and put on the television.
The next morning, she was surprised to find when she woke that her husband was not in bed. She checked the time and found that it was not yet 8 a.m. It was Crawshaw’s invariable custom on Sunday mornings to remain in bed until 8.15 a.m., when the papers came. Joan drew on her housecoat, sensing that something disturbing had occurred.