"By all means raise some celery," I said coldly. "Take the spade and raise some for lunch. I shall be only too delighted."
"This here isn't the season for celery, as you know well. This here's the season for crocuses, as any one can see if they use their eyes."
"James, you're right. Forgive me. It is no day for quarrelling."
It was no day for working either. The sun shone upon the close–cropped green of the deer park, the sky was blue above the rose garden, in the tapioca grove a thrush was singing. I walked up and down my estate and drank in the good fresh air.
"James!" I called to my head–gardener.
"What is it now?" he grumbled.
"Are there no daffodils, to take the winds of March with beauty?"
"There's these eleven croc―"
"But there should be daffodils, too. Is not this March?"
"It may be March, but 'tisn't the time for daffodils—not on three shillings a week."
"Do you only get three shillings a week? I thought it was three shillings an hour."
"Likely an hour!"
"Ah well, I knew it was three shillings. Do you know, James, in the Scilly Islands there are fields and fields and fields of nodding daffodils out now."
"Lor'!" said James.
"Did you say 'lor'' or 'liar'?" I asked suspiciously.
"To think of that now," said James cautiously.
He wandered off to the tapioca grove, leant against it in thought for a moment, and came back to me.
"What's wrong with this little bit of garden—this here park," he began, "is the soil. It's no soil for daffodils. Now what daffodils like is clay."
"Then for heaven's sake get them some clay. Spare no expense. Get them anything they fancy."
"It's too alloovial—that's what's the matter. Too alloovial. Now crocuses like a bit of alloovial. That's where you have it."
The matter with James is that he hasn't enough work to do. The rest of the staff is so busily employed that it is hardly ever visible. William, for instance, is occupied entirely with what I might call the poultry; it is his duty, in fact, to see that there are always enough ants' eggs for the gold–fish. All these prize Leghorns you hear about are the merest novices compared with William's protegées. Then John looks after the staggery; Henry works the coloured fountain; and Peter paints the peacocks' tails. This keeps them all busy, but James is for ever hanging about.
"Almost seems as if they were yooman," he said, as we stood and listened to the rooks.
"Oh, are you there, James? It's a beautiful day. Who said that first? I believe you did."
"Them there rooks always make a place seem so home–like. Rooks and crocuses I say; and you don't want anything more."
"Yes; well, if the rooks want to build in the raspberry canes this year, let them, James. Don't be inhospitable."
"Course, some do like to see primroses, I don't say. But―"
"Primroses—I knew there was something. Where are they?"
"It's too early for them," said James hastily. "You won't get primroses now before April."
"Don't say 'now,' as if it were my fault. Why didn't you plant them earlier? I don't believe you know any of the tricks of your profession, James. You never seem to graft anything or prune anything, and I'm sure you don't know how to cut a slip. James, why don't you prune more? Prune now—I should like to watch you. Where's your pruning–hook? You can't possibly do it with a rake."
James spends most of his day with a rake—sometimes leaning on it, sometimes working with it. The beds are always beautifully kept. Only the most hardy annual would dare to poke his head up and spoil the smooth appearance of the soil. For those who like circles and rectangles of unrelieved brown, James is undoubtedly the man.
As I stood in the sun I had a brilliant idea.
"James," I said, "we'll cut the croquet lawn this afternoon."
"You can't play croquet to–day, it's not warm enough."
"I don't pay you to argue, but to obey. At the same time I should like to point out that I never said I was going to play croquet. I said that we, meaning you, would cut the lawn."
"What's the good of that?"
"Why, to encourage the wonderful day, of course. Where is your gratitude, man? Don't you want to do something to help? How can we let a day like this go past without some word of welcome? Out with the mower, and let us hail the passing of winter."
James looked at me in disgust.
"Gratitude!" he said indignantly to Heaven. "And there's my eleven crocuses in the front all a–singing together like anything on three bob a week!"
XXIV
The Landscape Gardener
Really I know nothing about flowers. By a bit of luck, James, my gardener, whom I pay half–a–crown a week for combing the beds, knows nothing about them either; so my ignorance remains undiscovered. But in other people's gardens I have to make something of an effort to keep up appearances. Without flattering myself I may say that I have acquired a certain manner; I give the impression of the garden lover, or the man with shares in a seed–company, or—or something.
For instance, at Creek Cottage, Mrs. Atherley will say to me, "That's an Amphilobertus Gemini," pointing to something which I hadn't noticed behind a rake.
"I am not a bit surprised," I say calmly.
"And a Gladiophinium Banksii next to it."
"I suspected it," I confess in a hoarse whisper.
Towards flowers whose names I know I adopt a different tone.
"Aren't you surprised to see daffodils out so early?" says Mrs. Atherley with pride.
"There are lots out in London," I mention casually. "In the shops."
"So there are grapes," says Miss Atherley.
"I was not talking about grapes," I reply stiffly.
However at Creek Cottage just now I can afford to be natural; for it is not gardening which comes under discussion these days, but landscape–gardening, and any one can be an authority on that. The Atherleys, fired by my tales of Sandringham, Chatsworth, Arundel, and other places where I am constantly spending the week–end, are re–adjusting their two–acre field. In future it will not be called "the garden," but "the grounds."
I was privileged to be shown over the grounds on my last visit to Creek Cottage.
"Here," said Mrs. Atherley, "we are having a plantation. It will keep the wind off; and we shall often sit here in the early days of summer. That's a weeping ash in the middle. There's another one over there. They'll be lovely, you know."
"What's that?" I asked, pointing to a bit of black stick on the left; which, even more than the other trees, gave the impression of having been left there by the gardener while he went for his lunch.
"That's a weeping willow."
"This is rather a tearful corner of the grounds," apologised Miss Atherley. "We'll show you something brighter directly. Look there—that's the oak in which King Charles lay hid. At least, it will be when it's grown a bit."
"Let's go on to the shrubbery," said Mrs. Atherley. "We are having a new grass path from here to the shrubbery. It's going to be called Henry's Walk."
Miss Atherley has a small brother called Henry. Also there were eight Kings of England called Henry. Many a time and oft one of those nine Henrys has paced up and down this grassy walk, his head bent, his hands clasped behind his back; while behind his furrowed brow, who shall say what world–schemes were hatching? Is it the thought of Wolsey which makes him frown—or is he wondering where he left his catapult? Ah! who can tell us? Let us leave a veil of mystery over it … for the sake of the next visitor.
"The shrubbery," said Mrs. Atherley proudly, waving her hand at a couple of laurel bushes, and a—I've forgotten its name now, but it is one of the few shrubs I really know.
"And if you're a gentleman," said Miss Atherley, "and want to get asked here again, you'll always call it the shrubbery."
"Really, I don't see what else you could call it," I said, wishing to be asked down again.
"The patch."
"True," I said. "I mean, Nonsense."
I was rather late for breakfast next morning; a pity on such a lovely spring day.
"I'm so sorry," I began, "but I was looking at the shrubbery from my window and I quite forgot the time."
"Good," said Miss Atherley.
"I must thank you for putting me in such a perfect room for it," I went on, warming to my subject. "One can actually see the shrubs—er—shrubbing. The plantation too seems a little thicker to me than yesterday."
"I expect it is."
"In fact, the tennis lawn―" I looked round anxiously. I had a sudden fear that it might be the new deer–park. "It still is the tennis lawn?" I asked.
"Yes. Why, what about it?"
"I was only going to say the tennis lawn had quite a lot of shadows on it. Oh, there's no doubt that the plantation is really asserting itself."
Eleven o'clock found me strolling in the grounds with Miss Atherley.
"You know," I said, as we paced Henry's Walk together, "the one thing the plantation wants is for a bird to nest in it. That is the hallmark of a plantation."
"It's Mother's birthday to–morrow. Wouldn't it be a lovely surprise for her?"
"It would indeed. Unfortunately this is a matter in which you require the co–operation of a feathered friend."
"Couldn't you try to persuade a bird to build a nest in the weeping ash? Just for this once."
"You're asking me a very difficult thing," I said doubtfully. "Anything else I would do cheerfully for you; but to dictate to a bird on such a very domestic affair― No, I'm afraid I must refuse."
"It need only just begin to build one," pleaded Miss Atherley, "because Mother's going up town by your train to–morrow. As soon as she's out of the house the bird can go back to anywhere else it likes better."
"I will put that to any bird I see to–day," I said, "but I am doubtful."
"Oh, well," sighed Miss Atherley, "never mind."