Grow Willow

Fog covered the vale day after day. It was autumn, so fog was not unusual in itself, but this thick fog, like a grey blanket had lasted for days. The people of Earls Court woke to its strange presence each morning, feeling simultaneously its dampness, cold humidity and strange claustrophobia. The sounds of the village -  the tolling of the church bell, the calling of crows, the braying of donkeys and horses  - echoed as if in a great chamber rather than in the open air. Most people were saddened by the fog, or if not saddened then subdued. It had covered fields and trees for a week. People had forgotten how the escarpment looked, even the shade of the blue sky above. It was like living in a grey cave, a layer beneath the true surface of the Earth.

Howard, perversely rather liked the fog. It made his clothes damp and it made the wood that he cut for a living more difficult to saw, but the transformation of the woods he loved was startling to him. He could not remember a fog lasting so long. He had heard of fogs haunting the cold coasts of England for weeks, but not this far inland.

But there was a greater problem than the fog, which people of the Vale didn’t complain of openly, but were all keenly aware of: the wolves were back. Howard had noticed it weeks before and had warned the gate keeper of Earls Court - and then the gatekeepers of other villages  - to shut and lock the gates after dark. It was inconvenient at first to the people of the Vale and they complained, but when they started to see the shadows flitting in the fields in the dusk - and then the terrifying howling -  they began to take the threat much more seriously.

So now the gates were shut all over the Vale at night, and the villages became like islands. In the fog you could not see their lights across the dark fields but you could hear the activities that went on, and you could hear the animals that were now often herded into the villages at night by farmers or local people who didn’t have properly fenced fields. You could hear the cattle moaning and the sheep crying as they were crushed up for the night in small green areas in each village. But if the animals were left out, there was no doubt that they would be taken.

The attitude of the people to the wolves was strange, and Howard, who was close to the wolves themselves, found it hard to understand. The villagers knew the terrible risk and would always dutifully close the gate each night, but they’d never speak of the menace. The wolves would only be a topic of conversation if an animal had been taken, or if a child had been frightened at night by their terrible howling. But probably they had simply got used to the presence of wild wolves over centuries and were adapted to living with them.

It was almost – thought Howard – as if the people accepted the wolves as part of the Vale – a bad thing that they were prepared to accept for the otherwise manifest good fortune of living there. The area was famous for its farming, the quality of its soil, the length of the growing season, the abundance of water in the wells. There were places in the Vale where you could grow crops almost throughout the year, even though it was sometimes terribly cold in the winter.

So now with the fog, people would rush in the mid afternoon from wherever they were in the fields to be through the gate before the dim disc of the sun started to descend. From this time, the fields and woods between the villages became like a hostile sea of night.

***********************************

Howard was working close to the village in an old wood of willow, practising the ancient art of coppicing. He had learned it from an old woodsman. A large tree was cut back almost to the ground to make a low stump that was called a stool. From this, in the following months and years, smaller shoots would develop into straight poles. These would be cut or harvested and a new set would grow. The poles were good for fences, tools, roofing and furniture. Through coppicing, a single tree could produce a lot of useful wood for many years.

At first Howard had thought it cruel, because he almost never cut live wood. Most of his work was cutting dead wood. But from his own experience and other woodsmen he found out that the repeated cutting and clearing seemed to prolong the life of a tree, so that mature stools could be huge, the width of a man’s arm span, or even wider. And these enormous stump trees produced very strong vigorous shoots each year – that seemed to grow even as you watched them.

He looked overhead into the bottom of the grey cloud bank and felt on his face the slightest sensation of falling rain. The trees, the grass, the twigs and leaves – what few there were – were dripping with condensed fog and fine rain. His bag was already wet and his boots squelched with mud. But he was strangely happy. The rain was not enough to make him truly wet and the claustrophobic atmosphere, the closeness of the foggy horizon, made him notice the small things around him more.

Something that really charmed him were the new berries: the rosehips, the hawthorn berries and smaller, hard berries of some kind of cotoneaster that he didn’t know the name of. These only grew in this area, and probably did not grow at all outside the Vale. Mrs Van Dijk had shown him - a few years before- how they glowed with their own tiny light and even gave off a little heat. If you cupped them in your hand you could see the faint red light against your skin, and sometimes a little warmth. In this greyness, their light was very cheering - like seeing a light across a wild moorland as the sun goes down, or in deep woods. He wondered if they could be eaten and was about to put one in his mouth, but then thought again. He thought he’d collect a bagful for Mrs Van Dijk. In the autumn, she liked making garlands and little designs with fruit, berries and leaves, and they made the little cottage, which was sometimes dark in the winter, a bit brighter.

He worked quite late into the afternoon. It was impossible to tell the time without seeing the sun, and he couldn’t see the Earls Court church clock, even though he was close to the village; but he could tell that the sun was lowering. The sky became even dimmer than before, and the berries around him that hung in the hedges appeared to glow stronger than before, like little lanterns. He cut five thick willow poles from a coppice where he had laid his bag because he wanted to repair the chair that stood by the fire which had a split leg. He tied them together with some string and held the bundle under his arm. He took his bag of tools and under the low cloud he set forth through the wood to the lane that would take him home.

***********************************

Mrs Van Dijk was reading when he entered the cottage. He had walked the last part swiftly and was out of breath, mainly because the village gate was due to be locked, and he didn’t want to have to shout to be let in. He left the bundle of willow poles by the door to the cottage.

She had lit candles and the stove, and something was boiling in a pot. There was some bread on a plate on the table. It was warm in the little room.

She turned a page of the book she was reading.

He said: ‘I haven’t got a clean shirt. With this fog nothing will dry’

‘We can put the washing in front of the fire all night. It will be dry by morning’

He touched her shoulder.

‘What are you reading Lotte?’

‘About trees’

The book was one of a series of small leather bound volumes that he’d seen her read a few times before.

‘It’s by Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon’ she said slightly loftily, making fun. ‘His Histoire Naturelle’

‘Is it good?’

‘Very good. Very interesting. One of the reasons I wanted to write my own book. He is very good in describing living things. I have a few of the volumes, but not all’

She shut the book and laid her palm down on its dark surface.

‘This afternoon I walked along the lane a little way – the one to Stathern – there’s a big wild apple tree there. The apples are falling off the branches in their hundreds. There was a big pile in the grass. I collected some’

She pointed at a basket on the floor by the fire.

Howard took an apple. It was big and green and very hard in is hand, and its surface was quite waxy to the touch. But the skin shone in the candle light: a green globe of light.

He took a bite and juice spurted out. The apple was very bitter and strong tasting, almost unbearable at first, but then as he chewed the flavour became more interesting.

‘Did you try one?’ asked Howard, his face twisted with the intensity of the apple’s flavour. His eyes were watering and he coughed loudly.

Mrs Van Dijk laughed. ‘I did. It had the same effect on me. It’s so strong’

‘But good for you!’ He coughed again. ‘My dad used to say an apple a day keeps the doctor away’

‘It says in the book that wild apples are much more bitter than cultivated ones’

‘Maybe they store up the spring and summer, the moisture, the cold nights, the dark soil and that makes the apples bitter…’ Howard looked expectantly at Mrs Van Dijk.

Mrs Van Dijk continued looking at the book and didn’t answer immediately. She sighed.

‘Howard, put the wooden poles by the fire, someone will trip over them if you leave them there’

She was preoccupied with the book and more serious than usual, but she was right – he should move the poles. He carried them to the other side of the room and sitting in his big armchair, took the broken stool and studied its split leg. It had probably split in the dry weather over the summer. The furniture didn’t last forever. But he could fix this. He looked closely at the grain of the wood of the stool and its carefully planed finish. The wood was willow, just like the poles he had cut that afternoon.

***********************************

Mrs Van Dijk lay in the bed next to Howard. She had really enjoyed reading Buffon’s book. It was a book for autumn.

She said to the sleepy Howard who was looking up into the eaves at the thatch in the ceiling : ‘It’s a beautiful book. People should know about trees, and in an area near a village all the trees should be known, each individual tree. People should know what the trees could bring them – fruit, wood, shelter, medicine’

She shifted onto her side.

‘Tell me more’ said Howard, still sleepy but playful.

She said slowly, remembering: ‘The yew tree, for example, can live for thousands of years. The elder tree has healing powers. The oak is strong and courageous, and the elm is a tree of mystery, home to elves. The holly’s leaves shine even in the deep winter. And the apple tree is a symbol of beauty and love. Even if the fruit is so bitter to taste!’

She laughed a little.

Howard thought of the trees outside in the dark swaying in the wind. He was amazed that she could remember so much from her reading.

‘What about the willow?’

‘Ah, the willow is very special. It has a life force. It makes you sensitive to your deepest feelings, dreams, visions, intuitions’

Howard stared up into the thatch of the ceiling thinking about the willow trees in the wood.

Later Howard couldn’t sleep. He was unusually restless. Mrs Van Dijk was sleeping very deeply next to him. He thought of the big apples glowing green in the basket, maybe glowing on the tree in the fog before Mrs Van Dijk picked them. He remembered he had picked a bag of the red cotoneaster berries to give to her. Because he couldn’t sleep he got up and looked for his shirt. The stone floor was very cold under his bare feet and it was very dark because of the fog obscuring stars and moon. He bumped his leg against the table, but found his shirt, still damp from the work of the afternoon. The small cloth bag was in the chest pocket.

He took it carefully into the bedroom, trying to be quiet. But his cry when he hit his leg had woken Mrs Van Dijk.

She turned toward him as he came around the bed.

‘Are you alright?’ she asked sleepily

‘I forgot – I collected berries for you’

He didn’t know whether she wanted to see them or go back to sleep.

He slowly undid the string and looked in. There was a warm red light inside. In the dark Howard thought he could even see the rosy light through the cloth.

‘Ah yes’ she whispered.

She opened the bag and took a handful of the berries. They were like little glow worms; they even emitted a tiny heat. She held one between her thumb and forefinger and rolled it back and forth looking at it closely.

‘Where does the light come from’ he asked absently.

‘I don’t know. They are very rare. They only grow commonly in the Vale. I’ve never seen them anywhere else’

Howard yawned. He put the bag on the blanket and a few of the berries rolled out. He was too tired to pick them up. As he fell asleep he saw their little lights in the dark of the room, like the lights of farmhouses, or the lights of the Vale villages shining out.

***********************************

In the morning it was cold, the first cold day of autumn. The window of the bedroom was a little steamed up from their breath in the night, but Howard could see from the dullness behind, that the fog still lay on the land. He wiped the window and it made a squeaky noise. The path outside was damp and the bushes were covered in dew droplets. Mrs Van Dijk was still asleep.

There was a knock at the door. Howard looked surreptitiously through the window and saw Margaret, an old woman from down the lane, waiting expectantly on the doorstep. When she called, she always wanted Howard to do a little work on her house, repairing door frames and furniture. But Margaret was a good baker and she often offered Howard bread when he was working, as well as frequent cups of tea, so he didn’t mind.

He dressed hastily and put some wood on the fire in the living room, then opened the front door.

Margaret smiled, brushed her hair from her forehead and looked shyly up at Howard.

‘Good morning Howard. I saw you carrying some willow poles last night. It reminded me that I have some problems with the roof in my sitting room. One of the smaller roof supports has become rotten – it’s very old – I’m worried that it will break through. I was hoping that you might help to fix it?’

She spoke very rapidly. It sometimes seemed that she didn’t draw breath at all while she talked. She was a well known gossip.

But she was bright and friendly that morning and Howard thought that he would help her. Sometimes Margaret would give him a whole loaf and rolls in exchange for his work, and Howard thought that he could bring this home to Mrs Van Dijk afterwards and they could have tea and bread together for lunch. Then he would go back to work in the woods. Perhaps it would be warmer by lunchtime.

He called to Mrs Van Dijk to say that he was going to help Margaret and heard her sleepy acknowledgement from the room next door. He smiled and Margaret winked back. He always got the impression that Margaret thought that Howard indulged Mrs Van Dijk.

He followed her down the damp lane, the gravel scraping under his boots. He carried three of the willow poles under his arm, and his hammer. His pocket jangled with nails.

Margaret’s house was spotless. There was no garden; the house being surrounded by flagstones. The door was tiny and red painted, and behind it was a charming living room, almost as large as the whole of Mrs Van Dijk’s cottage. It was nicely, but fussily furnished with small chairs and stools and an expensive looking chaise longue. It was as if Margaret was trying to imitate a great mansion and its grand furniture. There was a tiny bedroom beyond.

Margaret spoke rapidly describing her difficulties in the house, but Howard could see that she expected him to complement the room and its decor.

This he did and she smiled, pleased. Then she pointed up at a thin beam in the ceiling.

It was strange because although the room was trying to be grand in a way, the ceiling – the roof – was very simple. There was no real ceiling in fact, because the underside of the thatch roof was visible and you could see into the dark eaves. But the thatch was dense and well maintained and obviously did not leak.

Margaret pointed to one of the smaller cross beams, one that was mainly designed to support the thatch rather than the structure of the roof itself. One of these small beams close to the edge of the roof was cracking. Howard could see this even from below.

‘I can fix the beam with these poles’ he said.

Margaret looked pleased. She went off to make tea and find some bread.

***********************************

When Howard returned to the cottage, Mrs Van Dijk was reading again. She wore an old gown and her boots, but it was very warm and humid inside the living room, mainly because a lot of the washed clothes of the day before were arranged around the furniture facing the fire. It was still very foggy and damp outside so there was no chance to dry anything outside. Howard had few dry clothes to wear.

She took Margaret’s loaf from Howard and put it carefully on a plate. She went to make tea. The book that she had been reading the day before was still on the table: a volume of the Histoire Naturelle.

They had some tea and bread with butter and cheese. With the fog, the light was very weak, so Mrs Van Dijk lit two candles for the table. She looked at him over her tea cup while she chewed on some of the bread.

Howard said: ‘is it possible to tell the wood of a particular tree?’

‘Yes, of course Howard. You know that. Oak and willow are easy to tell apart’

‘Yes I know that. But that’s not what I meant. Can you tell an individual tree? The wood of a particular individual tree?’

‘I don’t know. Why are you interested?’

‘Well in the last two days I’ve looked at furniture in this house and in Margaret’s house and it’s all willow wood….you know - yellowish, a little soft, with deep brown grain’

He stopped and looked at the table.

‘This is willow as well!’

The old table, which had been in the house for many years and in fact predated the house because it had come from another cottage, was indeed made of willow. The long central planks of the table surface, although dark now, had the same pattern of delicate light and dark, a grain.

There were three of the willow poles left that he had collected the day before and he remembered that he ought to eat some of the big apples in the basket. He didn’t like to think of them being wasted – even if the were very sharp and bitter to taste.

‘Would you like one of the apples?’

She smiled. ‘I’ll share one with you’

They ate the apple together laughing at how bitter it was and how they had another ten to eat.

‘Maybe I can work out a way to tell if wood comes from a particular tree’ she said.

But she thought nothing more of this and began to feel sleepy. Howard yawned and stretched his legs toward the fire.

‘This weather makes me very lethargic’ he said.

***********************************

They slept for a time in the afternoon resting on top of the bed covers, which was quite out of character for both of them. But Howard woke and decided that he should at least do some work, from the middle of the afternoon onward until dark, so he left Mrs Van Dijk sleeping. He put on his jacket, two pullovers and boots, thinking it would be cold, but outside it was quite warm and the fog seemed thinner than it had been before, because he could see the church tower.

Along the lane he looked across the fields into the grey indistinct distance. Trees loomed up as he walked. First they would be grey shapes and then clearer, dripping with water, their trunks shiny with moisture. He was aware, as he sometimes was in his more contemplative periods, of their size and presence: that they were living things, spectators of the human world rather than inanimate. He tried to imagine what it would be like to stand in all weather anchored in the soil, rigid, staring up into the sky or across the fields. But it was hard to imagine.

But both he and Mrs Van Dijk were not themselves. He was sleepy, a bit dreamy and distant, and full of dreams; and Mrs Van Dijk was quiet, contemplative in her own way. In the last day or two she had been more placid than usual and inclined to want to sleep in late, or sleep in the afternoon.

Was it something as simple as the fog, making them listless, lethargic? Maybe the lack of light, the claustrophobia, the loss of the sky, of the sun?

Could it be the apples?  He smiled.

He walked slowly in the fog to the wood of the willow coppice; his mind was foggy but easily led, easy to wander.

***********************************

In the space that he had made the day before amongst the willows, he started clearing some of the undergrowth. In the bushes around, the cotoneaster berries were faintly red in the pale light. A bird in the hedge close by, sang in short bursts and Howard tried to see it, but it was already too dim and the spaces in the hedge were gloomy. But he didn’t feel at all cold, and he worked for an hour or so, though much slower than he usually would. He cut a few more poles from the coppiced level. He had brought some water with him, so he sat to drink a bit. He cleared the grass and leaf litter around and found a smooth surface underneath that was alright to sit on. As soon as he sat he began to feel rather tired. The water did not revive him, so he lay back and immediately found the grass and leaves underneath his head and his thick jacket rather comfortable. He felt very warm as well. He closed his arms across is chest and felt the warmth inside his chest spread. He thought of the trees again and opened his eyes briefly to see them gathered across the dim grey sky.

His mind wandered a little and he remembered a path leading from a cottage down to a river, amongst big trees, on a sunny day. He remembered walking down the path when he was a boy, remembered the sound of buzzing bees.

He woke freezing, shaking violently. He was uncertain of where he was. His eyelashes were wet. He opened his eyes and noticed no difference. It was very dark. His face was wet. With rain, with the dew? Water ran down his nose as he moved. His legs were so cold he couldn’t feel his feet or his knees. He wondered if he could walk. He couldn’t remember how he had got to this place. He shook himself, lifted his head, looked around. It was dark but he was in the wood, the willow wood. He stood slowly. The warmth of movement coursed through him. His hands were completely numb. He had fallen asleep. How could he have fallen asleep in the cold? His eyes began to adjust. He saw his bag of tools at his feet, and around were the tiny dim red lights of the berries.

He put his hands in his pockets to warm them. He felt the pain of the blood coming back. He was wet through. Either it had rained or he had simply absorbed water through the ground, or both. He was close to home, so would be alright if he moved now.

He stumbled as his legs warmed up and his eyes struggled to see, but crashed through the undergrowth between the dense strip-like leaves of the willow onto the path. It was a mile to Earls Court, and long after sunset. He set forth quickly and looked back fearing what there might be behind. There was nothing in the lane. But he felt some dread of the willow, of the coppiced willow. Looking back he imagined a malign presence in the dark trees behind him.

***********************************

‘What frightened you Howard’ asked Mrs Van Dijk, when he got back.

She was very anxious. She had waited after sunset, even walking down to the main gate and waiting there for a while. But he had not arrived home until long after dark, and when he had arrived there had been a wild look in his eyes. His hair, which had grown long in the months previously, was wild as well in a halo around his white face.

Howard sat by the fire his legs apart, his boots almost in the fire. He shook his head as if he were trying to wake himself up.

‘I don’t know Lotte. I’m sorry to be late. I fell asleep’

‘You fell asleep!’ she was angry now.

‘I don’t know what happened, Lotte. I lay back and slept. It was warm. The long grass was very comfortable’

‘This was after dark?’

‘No. I must have slept for hours. When I woke I was freezing, and wet with dew’

‘Howard!’ she looked fiercely at him.

It was unusual for Mrs Van Dijk to be so angry. On other occasions she would not have been afraid to go out into the woods herself after dark, leaving by the back gate.

‘I’m sorry’

‘It’s alright’ she said.

There was another book on the table with a candle burning next to it.

‘I read a lot this afternoon. I found an old book that I thought I had lost’

‘What does it say?’

‘A book that says a lot about the willow tree. It’s very interesting. The willow is a symbol of fertility, a protector of life. What frightened you?’

Howard thought about being in the dark and looking back and feeling dread. It had not been the coppice – the woods – that had scared him, it had been something moving about. He had only sensed it and hadn’t seen anything. He realised what it had been.

‘I think there was a wolf out amongst the trees’ he said.

‘I heard it. I think other people in the village heard it. Apparently a calf was taken and killed, not long after dark’

Howard was shocked.

‘I was worried about you!’ she said.

‘You shouldn’t worry about me’

She was quiet for a few minutes.

‘I’ll read some of the book for you. More about the willow’

She took the book into her hands and read slowly. He watched her eyes move across the page, and he saw little images of the candle in them. She had forgotten her fear.

She read:

‘The willow is sacred. Orpheus received his gifts of eloquence from the willow tree because he carried its branches with him while he journeyed through the Underworld. Apollo gave Orpheus a lyre and asked him to make music. When Orpheus played music he charmed the wild beasts of Mount Olympus’

‘But the willow is associated with grief and death. Circe, the sorceress, planted a riverside cemetery with willow trees. Willow branches are put on the coffins of the dead, and willows are planted on  graves. Some English people believe that the spirit of the dead can rise up into a tree, which would grow and contain the essence of the dead. Cemeteries in England are planted with willow trees to protect the spirits of the dead’

‘The witches' broom was traditionally made with ash and birch twigs bound together with strips of willow, and willow is used to make wands’

Howard smiled: ‘the broom and the wand!’

She looked over the book at Howard, realising he was making fun of her.

‘Witches – village wisewomen - don’t really have those things. Only in stories’

‘You don’t have a wand?’ he smiled raising his eyebrows.

‘No Howard I don’t. Shut up and listen’

She read again:

‘The willow inspires dreaming and enchantment. Deep unconscious thoughts and memories speak to us through our dreams, so if you have lost touch with your dreams, place a piece of willow under your pillow when you sleep. You will find your dreams will immediately become more vivid and meaningful’

She smiled, reading: ‘Willow people -  those born in March - are beautiful but full of melancholy. They are dreamers and are restless but honest. They are easily influenced but are not easy to live with -  being demanding. They have good intuition, but suffer in love and sometimes need to find an anchoring partner’

Howard snorted sceptically: ‘I don’t believe that’

‘Full of melancholy’ said Mrs Van Dijk. She yawned, she shut the book and left it on the table. She was tired again and wanted to sleep.

Howard felt tired too. He looked down to undo the laces of his boots. They were stained with something dark. It was blood.

***********************************

Howard lay awake again. It seemed he could sleep in the day but not at night. He was thinking about the book and what it had said about willow trees.

He loved books. He had only learned to read well recently and Mrs Van Dijk had taught him most of what he knew. He tried to read books about adventure, about magic. He thought books were a window on other worlds. They were stories from a wider world than the Vale. One of the things that had attracted him to Mrs Van Dijk was her books and the way that she could read so well. He could no longer imagine a world without books and knowledge.

But tonight he was also troubled by the blood on his boots. He had seen it before going to bed, but curiously he had not mentioned it to Mrs Van Dijk. He didn’t know why. He lay in the dark now, worrying.

He tried to think why he was worried. It was simple. The calf had been taken and killed - or so Mrs Van Dijk had said - about the time when he had been asleep in the willow coppice. Had he really been asleep? He thought back to previous times when he’d lost consciousness or he had been unaware of his actions, an automaton: that time when the two ethnologists had come to Earls Court. One of them had talked about Howard and his susceptibility to the ferocity of the wild, that idea of the trance-like state brought on by the presence of a ferocious predator nearby. There was no disease – he had been told – no tendancy to violence. More like a tendancy to capitulation in the face of violence: the mouse paralysed by the close-up stare of the cat; the rabbit kitten caught by the fox; the man cornered by the wolf.

Perhaps the blood had come from somewhere else?

He turned to look at Mrs Van Dijk sleeping. There was some light coming from outside. Perhaps starlight. Perhaps the fog had gone? He thought he would get out of bed to look at the stars, but the peace that thinking of the stars brought him suddenly made him sleepy. His mind slipped away and his breathing became very steady.

***********************************

In the morning it was still foggy. Even inside the cottage it was beginning to feel damp. The stone floor was very cold underfoot and their clothes and the walls felt cool to the touch. But the air was not cold so it seemed unnecessary to light the fire to dry things.

Howard thought he would go to the willow coppice in the morning only. He didn’t want to be out in the late afternoon, in case something happened again. He had stopped worrying about the blood – after all it could just have been something he picked up on his boots walking home – but it would be better to be home before dark.

Mrs Van Dijk got up. She drank the tea that Howard made her and strode around the living room looking for her purse and her bag.

‘I forgot to tell you Howard: today I have to go to a farm near Redmile, to make a protection spell for the cattle’

‘What time will you be back?’

‘Maybe lunchtime. The farmer is in an isolated farm – one of the walled farms where the cattle are brought into the centre each night in the winter, or when there’s danger’

‘Lotte, when did you hear about the dead calf?’

‘Last night. Quite early. The calf was found close to the lane – out toward where you were working. I’m surprised you didn’t see it’

‘I came home too late. Probably they moved the calf’

‘What’s wrong, Howard?’ she patted his hand and bent down to pull on her boots.

‘I had blood on my boots last night. I didn’t see until I came to bed last night’

She put her grey bag over her shoulder: ‘you probably walked through the grass. Apparently it was a sorry sight. The calf had been eviscerated’

Howard stood and thought while she pulled on her coat. She opened the door. It was still foggy outside. You couldn’t even see the church tower.

‘Until later Howard’ she said, and she was gone down the lane, her coat flapping around her legs.

Howard sat by the fire and finished his tea.

***********************************

He thought he should repair the stool by the fire with the willow poles that he had brought home, but he felt unsettled. The cottage seemed a little lonely with Mrs Van Dijk gone. She would probably return at lunchtime with a box of vegetables, some fruit – probably more apples! Sometimes she brought home a few pennies. It depended what the farmer could afford to pay.

But this morning he didn’t want to do anything. The strangeness of the fog, his sleepiness - and of course the calf - preoccupied him.

He went to the front door and opened it. He looked out across at the view that he knew so well. There was the lane to his left with the line of cottages, all with a plume of smoke from the chimneys. The lane disappeared into fog at the bottom end where there was a small square of village green, and beyond that the main gate. To his right was the overgrown birch, thorn and holly wood that extended from their garden to the inner part of the village wall. In front was the small open area in front of the churchyard, and then the church itself with its white tower. Behind the church were the only big trees within the village  - and these marked the far margin of the churchyard. These were the trees he loved. He could see them from the windows in the living room of the cottage and from the bedroom. In winter the escarpment was clear behind, but the rest of the year a bustle of leaves shook in the wind over the church roof obscuring the view, and high flying birds came and went sometimes twisting and turning around.

The fog was gathered as a bank behind the trees and there was nothing to be seen. For the fifth or sixth day in a row, Earls Court was like an island out in a sea of unknown dimensions.

He went back in to fix the stool. A piece of the wood that he had taken from Margaret’s house lay by the fire. He’d brought it home thinking that he could use it for something. It was the same length as the stool leg. If he used it, he would be able to save the other poles for something in the garden or the house. He looked at the grain of the wood and compared it with the pole, and with the intact legs of the stool. There was a similar light and dark pattern in the growth lines. The same pale yellow willow wood.

***********************************

Mrs Van Dijk was glad to be out walking. She found the fog claustrophobic, and the dampness in the house and in her clothes was quite unpleasant, especially in the morning when she put them on. The farm was about four miles to the north east, but the route she took could go past the willow coppice and on the lane where the calf was taken. Since she had time she thought she would have a look.

In the open, past the gate there was usually a nice view of the escarpment to the east and the big beech woods that spread over its slopes, but this morning the world was swallowed up in the grey fog. The large fields were visible and then  some of the big woods beyond were dark shapes. Past this there was nothing. After so long in the fog, she wondered to herself if anything did exist beyond the immediate surroundings of Earls Court. The return of the wolves, and the fog, had contributed to making everything very insular. As far as she knew no one had visited the village from the outside for several days – not even in the daylight. Perhaps people were afraid of the fog; perhaps people thought that the fog might make them more vulnerable to the wolves.

But something that Howard had said returned to her as she walked. He had said that people here were very harmonious, that people accepted most things, even the wolves. People might retreat behind the village walls at night but they rarely complained. They saw the wolves as much a part of the Vale as they themselves. Perhaps it was because they knew that there was something privileged about living in the wide flat valley east of the big river. Here farmers could grow crops most of the year. The wells never dried up. There was a part of one of the villages, Colston, between the old church and the new church, where the soil was so good that you only needed to throw seeds down for them to grow. In this strange area huge apple and pear trees grew, and farmers could even grow lemons.

She entered the lane that ran north for about a mile, toward the willow coppice. The village people reported that the calf had been attacked somewhere along the lane. A farmer had heard its cries just after dark. Someone else had gone out to look, carrying a lantern and a shotgun. They had found the calf dead, mostly eaten, lying half on the verge and half in the trees. Because it had been dark, no one had taken the time to look. But she would look now and find out what had attacked.

The place of the attack was obvious. There was blood everywhere – in the long grass and in the mud. It was clear how Howard had got the blood on his boots. He had walked right through the grass the night before without seeing it.

There were tracks all around, of the calf and its attacker. These were unmistakably the tracks of a wolf. They were quite small and dog–like. She pushed a little at the undergrowth beyond the track and saw blood stains on the grass leading off, even blood on low leaves. The wolf – there seemed to have been only one – had gone off into the woods taking the meat with it. It was probably sleeping somewhere in the trees, maybe watching her. It wouldn’t attack in daylight, but she immediately felt a little wary. She hurried back to the main road without visiting the willow coppice, and continued to the farm, her hands thrust deep into her pockets for warmth.

***********************************

The farm was difficult to find, hidden in trees on the road to Redmile, but quite a long way outside the village. There was a rough stone wall surrounding the farm buildings and the house itself, an old two story building, was built into the wall. The gate was open and inside was a small area of muddy ground where the cattle were obviously kept at night. The smell of animals was strong, and the buildings including a barn and a dovecote were dilapidated. The mud was terrible, but Mrs Van Dijk had to find her way across it to the door of the house.

Perhaps the house had once been large and grand, but now it was faded and dark. A window by the door was boarded up and the door was rotten at one corner. As she approached the door a dog began to bark frantically and she heard the dog running around inside, knocking things over. A loud voice shouted from the back and the dog stopped running.

The door opened and an old man with white hair and beard appeared. He was shorter than Mrs Van Dijk. His face was red and his skin lined with wrinkles around his eyes and mouth. He smiled merrily though and asked her to come in. The dog went wild again with excitement running back and forth across the room and on to the shabby furniture.

The old man shouted sharply at the dog and it seemed to calm down a little. It sat expectantly.

‘We don’t get many visitors’ he said. ‘Please sit Mrs Van Dijk. Would you like some tea?’

‘I would, thank you, Mr Lockhart’

The room was very poorly furnished. The chair in which she sat was the only thing that it seemed safe to sit in, all the others were fragmentary or broken in some way. She looked back at the main doorway. Through its rotten corner she could see the muddy yard outside. The room was very cold and damp.

Towards the back was a bed, and beside that a small stove with a tin chimney fixed to the wall. The old man lived in this one room. Mrs Van Dijk wondered what he did with the rest of the house. It was probably in a worse state than the room in which she sat. She thought back to her contemplation at the beginning of the walk – on the wealth and fortune of the farmers of the Vale - and realised that in some cases she was wrong. There was poverty in the Vale. This farmer was very poor.

He brought tea in large mugs. His hand shook as he held the mug out to her. The tea steamed. The old man’s hands were huge and coarse – too large for his body – and his nails were ragged and thick like the rough hooves of horses.

He sat opposite her, smiling. He stroked the dog, now placid beside him, and drank his tea.

She wondered when he would say something but he simply sat and stared with the smile on his face.

‘We don’t get many visitors’ he said again. The dog looked up at Mrs Van Dijk.

‘But’ he continued, ‘I don’t wish to keep you long. Could you deliver a blessing on the cows?’

‘Of course’ smiled Mrs Van Dijk. ‘Do you live alone?’

‘There’s only the dog and me’

‘Do you have many cattle?’

‘I have twenty. It’s difficult to look after them in normal times, but now with these wolves…’

‘Do you bring them in every night?’

‘Yes. They make a terrible noise. I can’t sleep. They eat everything too. I bring hay in for them each night but I’m running out’

‘Can’t you let them eat in the day?’

‘I don’t want them straying too far from the house. I have to find them and bring them in each night’

They finished their tea in silence. When he stood, the dog became excited again. Mrs Van Dijk followed him into the yard.

‘We’ll eat lunch after you’ve done the blessing. I have some turnip. We can talk too’

Mrs Van Dijk liked these jobs. She was always amazed by the variety of people that lived in the Vale. They were poor and rich, lonely and sad, happy and garrulous. It was a service that she could easily offer and she could provide some protection to the cattle and sheep. The farmers never knew, but the main charm that she wove on these occasions was one of visibility - to make the cattle a little more inconspicuous in the dusk and dark. She couldn’t protect them from wolves directly, but she could make them a little less easy to see, and she could disguise their smell.

It took an hour in the grey twilight of the fog to find all the cattle amongst the shrubby woods and small meadows of Mr Lockhart’s farm. But Mrs Van Dijk made all the charms and concentrated hard on her work. They returned after the blessing to the house, and Mr Lockhart warmed a stew with turnips and carrots. He served the stew in two large bowls, each with a big wooden spoon sticking out. While he arranged them on the table Mrs Van Dijk looked at a line of old pictures on the wall. There were drawings and a small painting of a view of the Vale with a church tower that she thought she recognised. On its own was a small drawing of a woman with a thin, sad face and long dark hair like curtains parted.

Before they ate, Mr Lockhart took a bible from a table in the corner, and clutching it, said a short prayer.

Mrs Van Dijk was surprised at the mixed beliefs that some people had. Religious and pious people often believed the most in magic. They seemed to believe in two ideas, perhaps conflicting ideas, simultaneously. Mr Lockhart believed in magic but also said a prayer before eating. Though he seemed lonely, there was also a self containedness about him.

Mrs Van Dijk tasted the soup. It was terrible. Filled with some kind of pepper taste as well as the weak watery taste of turnip. She would have to eat it, so as not to upset him. She looked over his shoulder at the huge pot on the stove and wondered how much more soup there was.

‘There’s plenty of soup Mrs Van Dijk. You should eat some more. You look a little cold’

Mrs Van Dijk tried to make conversation, to take her mind off the soup.

‘Have you lived alone for a long time, Mr Lockhart?’

‘My wife died twenty years ago. I’ve run this farm alone since then. It’s difficult alone. It keeps me poor’

‘Is that a picture of your wife?’ She pointed over his shoulder.

‘Yes’

‘Did you have children?’

‘No never. We wanted them, but they never came’

‘I’m sorry’

‘No. Don’t be. I’m happy. The farm is hard work, but I like being out under the sky. I like the cows. I like to draw’

‘You draw?’

‘Yes. The drawings are mine. I use pencil, or charcoal. They make charcoal around here. I’ve not drawn anything for a long while. But I used to sell pictures. I would like to have taught a son or daughter how to draw. But we couldn’t manage’

He smiled a little playfully.

‘We used to place willow leaves under the pillow, and under the bed’

He said this, then seemed to think he had said too much and embarrassed Mrs Van Dijk. He looked down at his soup.

‘Sorry’ he said.

‘No. Don’t be sorry’. Mrs Van Dijk smiled.

‘Willow makes the baby easier?’ She couldn’t think of another way to put it. But he understood.

‘Yes. I think so’

‘People in Earls Court think that the willow makes you dream - if you put it under the pillow’

‘Perhaps it’s the same thing’ said Mr Lockhart.

Mrs Van Dijk didn’t understand what he meant, but the old man looked back at his soup and said nothing for a minute.

Then he said:

‘Mrs Van Dijk. You must have more soup before you go. And I’ll give you a present. Eat up!’

***********************************

They ate the soup and then bread. After this, Mr Lockhart took out a folder of his drawings. He sat next to Mrs Van Dijk on the broken sofa looking through them. He said that he had not looked through them for many years and so he was as fascinated as she. As she turned one of the pictures over to see the next, he would often exclaim or cry in surprise, seeing things he’d drawn years before.

Most of the drawings were charcoal and very intense. Mrs Van Dijk thought that he had been a very committed artist. When she looked at the images, which were sometimes impressionistic and sketchy, she was often aware that he saw something different. His bony fingers shook as he pointed at this feature or that. Many of the pictures in the top part of the folder, probably the later ones, were landscapes – scenes of leafless trees in a winter landscape. They were desolate, but powerful.

‘I drew them after my wife died’ he said in explanation.

The pictures were different in the lower part of the folder – these were the older pictures. They were startling. There were a series of drawings of the woman with the long hair like curtains. Some showed her smiling, looking down modestly. One showed her looking directly at the artist; and behind her face was her bare shoulder, nicely drawn with the smooth skin very clear and perfect.

‘We were not married, you know’ he said. He seemed surprised to admit it. He glanced at Mrs Van Dijk embarrassed. ‘We never married. I used to write to her every day when she lived in Redmile. Then after three years she came to live with me. She liked my letters!’

‘I remember the day I drew this’ he said. ‘It was many many years ago. A foggy day like this one. We simply did not go out to work in the fields, because of the fog. I remember we decided to stay in. We stayed in the bedroom with the fog outside. There was a candle burning. I drew her in the light of a single candle. That’s why there’s so much shade in the picture’

Mrs Van Dijk wondered how such rough hands could draw so well. She looked back at the picture and then at him. He was looking at it, absent mindedly, admiring his own work.

‘It’s beautiful’ said Mrs Van Dijk. She was moved by the picture. She could imagine the gloom of that day long ago: the candle and its melancholy light in the room.

But the present came back to her when she realised how dark the room in which they sat had become. She glanced at the window and saw the fog close to the glass and fading light on a tree outside.

‘It’s getting late Mr Lockhart. I didn’t realise’

He stood clutching the folder of pictures and looked a little alarmed.

‘I’m sorry. I was lost in the pictures. It’s getting dark. You should go, of course. Or perhaps even stay here. With the danger, I mean’

‘I think there’s an hour or more of daylight left. I don’t think it’s really so late. It’s just that the fog is very dense’

‘I’ll walk with you to the lane. It’s only half an hour to Earls Court from there. We should go now. Or you can stay here’

‘No. I should go’

She felt a little sorry. He seemed to have reached out to her. She would visit him again, she thought. But Howard would be worried if she was late, or if she didn’t come home. She had to go now.

He put a coat over his shoulders and put the folder under his arm.

He looked about for his cattle as they left the yard. He’d have to bring them in before dark. At the junction with the lane he shook her hand and held out two pennies.

‘For you’ he smiled. ‘And this…’

‘Oh I can’t take it’

It was one of the landscape pictures. A winter scene showing a wide field with trees to the left. There was a field behind and then a low hill. It was a very simple drawing but there was a feeling of infinity in it, as well as a feeling of desolate winter. But it was a human vision of winter, and so therefore perhaps not so desolate.

He insisted that she take it. She rolled it carefully and put it in one of the deep pockets of her coat. She’d hang it in the living room of the cottage.

‘My wife drowned you know’ he said suddenly. ‘She was always strange when the wolves came – sleepy and absent. She would disappear and sometimes fall asleep in the fields, even in the winter. She went one day and drowned in the river. They found her’

He wasn’t looking at Mrs Van Dijk but at the grey trees across the lane.

He left her and scurried quickly back to his farm. She heard him calling his cows in the gloomy trees.

***********************************

Howard finished repairing the stool. Removing the broken leg was easy and he used a small saw to cut the willow pole to the right length. He had a knife and sandpaper to smooth the surface of the leg and then he fixed it into the socket where the broken leg had been. He fixed willow with willow. He put the stool on the stone floor near the fire and checked how stable it was. It seemed alright. He patted its surface and then put his own weight onto the wood. It was steady.

He thought he should make some food so that Mrs Van Dijk would have something when she got home. It was not cold perhaps because of the thick fog, but with the damp it was nice to have something hot to eat at the end of the day. He thought he would make some soup. There were turnips and potatoes and carrots and some ham. This would be good with bread. She’d come home to something nice to eat, he thought.

After he had peeled the vegetables and put wood on the stove he looked out from the living room window. The fog was thicker than ever. Even the church was just a shadow. With the density of the fog, the light was weak and grey. It was probably only mid afternoon but the light was not enough to illuminate the small living room. The books that sat on the table were just shapes and the only light in the room came from the red glow of the stove.

He watched the soup bubble, and stirred it, feeling the moist steam from the pot rise into his face. He looked into the fire and felt its warmth on his hands and legs. He daydreamed, thinking of the jumping flames, imagining the flames were flowers blowing in a summer field. He smiled at the pleasantness of the image. He turned his head to look over his shoulder and perhaps the contrast with the brightness of the fire made him suddenly realise how dark it was outside.

So dark, so quick! Where was Lotte? She was still at the farm, or perhaps walking back. It was almost dark and the wolves would be moving, or at least the wolf that took the calf.

He took the pot from the fire and laid it carefully beside the stove. Quickly he put on his coat. He looked around and found a hammer from where he had been working with the stool and put it in his pocket. He pulled on his boots and went outside. The village gate was open but the man that was responsible for closing it was already there. He stood talking to another man, holding onto to the big wooden structure, swinging it on its hinge.

Howard waved to the gate keeper. He set off on the lane toward Redmile, walking very quickly.

The fog was extraordinary. He had never seen anything like it. The margins of the lane were clear - the hedges - but nothing beyond. Howard could barely see his hand in front of his face. It was dark and gloomy; the light itself seemed grey or even grey-green. Water from the fog condensed on his eyelashes and hair. He felt the dampness enter his lungs as he breathed in.

She would be coming the other way. He didn’t know whether to call for her, or just walk in the lane and hope to meet her. Perhaps she was alright – perhaps staying with the farmer. Perhaps she was walking another way, maybe coming across the fields after collecting flowers, or visiting someone else. He should call out.

‘Lotte!’

The sound, long and loud, disappeared into the fog with no trace of echo, no sign that it had travelled more than a few feet from his face. He stood still and listened.

He heard the dripping of water from the hedges, movements of a few sad birds that remained below the fog level.

He looked above into the heart of the fog. There was no sign of blue sky, no sign of anything but grey fog. Up there somewhere, he thought, there was a blue sky. If you could fly, you could fly in perfect blue sky above the fog and it would be like a white undulating beach hiding this terrible grey half-world of no colour and dampness, always dampness.

Ahead and behind was the same. He realised that if he lost his memory now he would not know which way he had come and which way he was going. It was the same both ways, hedges converging on a mass of fog.

He felt it was useless to call out. The fog just absorbed his voice. Also, strangely, he felt that his voice would attract attention. It would be better to find her quietly, and not draw attention to himself or to her. But he had to go forward.

He didn’t know how far he had come. He couldn’t remember. The fog disorientated him. He looked behind and saw his own tracks and set forth again toward the fog.

The hedges changed and the trees came and went silently. He had walked this path for years, knew its gates and trees and pathways, but in this grey world he had no idea where he was. After a while he realised that he was not alone, something was moving in the woods to his left, moving with and towards him. It was low and slow moving; he could hear the sound of breaking branches and twigs and shuffling through leaves.

He heard something up ahead as well, another shuffling sound like the one to the left. This one was coming towards him quicker. It was almost upon him. He stood still and looked into the fog. A shape materialised, long and dark, moving against the grey, something flapping behind it. It was hooded. The hood hid the face. Howard stood paralysed, not sure what was coming toward him.

Mrs Van Dijk crashed into him. He shouted, frightened. So did she. She lifted her hood.

‘Howard I didn’t see you. I was walking with my hood down. This fog is so damp. My hair was getting damp. It’s horrible’

‘I thought you…’

‘Did I frighten you?’

‘I didn’t know who or what it was’

‘It was me.’ She took his hand. ‘It is me’

‘But there is a wolf somewhere near’ he said. ‘To the left. Not far away. It’s been following me - not close - but following me’

‘Will we be alright?’

‘If we walk together and move quickly back to the village, we’ll be all right. We have to move…’

He looked over her head behind her in the direction in which she had come. He saw the wolf crossing the lane very quickly. It was not very big, but it was hunting. If they moved quickly, back through the fog to Earls Court they would be safe.

***********************************

But the wolf was circling them. Howard realised quite quickly. He knew that the wolf was to the right in the trees beyond the hedge because he could hear its tentative movements.

Up ahead, the hedge shook and the wolf crossed the lane suddenly, perhaps ten steps in front.

Mrs Van Dijk stopped abruptly and held Howard’s hand tight.

‘He’s circling us’

‘How do you know there isn’t more than one?’ she whispered.

‘I can hear him moving. See how small he is. Just like a dog’

He was already gone, now into the woods on the left, moving back around them.

They walked slowly and carefully, not wanting to be heard. But the wolf had already found them.

‘Will he attack?’

‘No he’s frightened because there are two of us. If there was one of us, he might. If another wolf comes they will continue circling and they might attack, but we’re near home. Just keep walking’

They walked for ten minutes and again heard the wolf cross behind them.

‘I think there’s only one wolf around. He’s causing all the trouble’ said Howard.

‘Why is he here alone?’

‘Probably he’s a rogue male thrown out from the wolf pack for some reason. Perhaps he’s come from somewhere in the north’

‘But why has he chosen this area?’

‘The fog. He likes the cover he gets. When the fog lifts, he’ll be gone, closer to the main pack’

The gate loomed in the fog at last and they saw the faint yellow light of a candle in the gate keeper’s hut. This meant he was still there and they would not have to call and shout to be let in.

Howard put his hand up at the grimy window and called, and the gate keeper’s head appeared shortly after, above the gate. He looked down at them.

‘You’re lucky. It’s still early. I was going home. Wait a minute’

They heard him climbing down the ladder on the inner side of the gate and then the heavy lock mechanism turning. The gate was open and shut quickly to let them in.

They thanked the gate keeper and walked slowly up the lane of cottages each with its plume of wood smoke, back to their cottage. They were tired and they didn’t eat Howard’s soup but went to bed almost immediately, after Howard had covered the soup with a lid and put a few logs on the fire.

They slept in almost total darkness for a few hours perhaps, but then awoke, both being aware of some change in the air, in the atmosphere. Howard, lying with his arms behind his head, saw the sky change through the window. The colour in the frame was dark bluish, and for the first time for a week he saw stars. The sound of hesitant breaths of wind on the trees came from outside.

The unaccustomed brightness in the room woke them early. The window was a rectangle of deep blue. Howard sat forward and looked again. The sky was absolutely clear. Getting up he saw the church tower and the trees behind with greater clarity than for a week. He felt a surge of happiness seeing the tops of the high trees and their rhythmic swaying in the breeze.

Unbelievable that the fog was gone - as if it had never been.

He sat on the bed in a rectangle of autumn sun coming through the window. Mrs Van Dijk was curled, still asleep.

He remembered a dream of the night before in the early hours after he’d seen the sky clear. The dream had been of a beach. Not like the beaches of eastern England – wild and windy and open – but one where a forest met the sea. The sea was placid and clear and the beach was narrow, only the same width as his height. There were no bare rocks or open grasslands, only a thick forest of trees that hung down along the beach, their limp branches almost stroking the surface of the sea. The branches were like a curtain over the beach, sheltering it. But he remembered it was hot and the sun was strong so it was nice to sit under the trees.

Mrs Van Dijk stirred and sat up quite abruptly. Her hair was a wild cloud over her head.

‘The fog’s gone!’

‘Don’t you remember last night? We saw the stars for the first time for a week, at least’

She nodded, rubbing her eyes.

***********************************

Mrs Van Dijk dressed and went outside. It was warm and bright. The hedges that had been drenched with fogwater were steaming in the sun. Puddles along the lane bore an image of the blue of the sky and the gleaming tower of the church.

She looked up at the blue space that seemed to her like an upturned blue hemisphere, infinitely high at the zenith. The wind was boisterous and quick, unrestrained after the days of fog. It was hard to believe it was the same country.

‘We can hang the wet clothes out on the washing line’ shouted Howard from inside.

He came to the doorstep. ‘I’ll have to go to the willow coppice and get wood for Margaret, and then out to the woods by the river to cut more firewood. People have been burning wood at a rapid rate these last few days. The village will run out’

Mrs Van Dijk had some work in the house to organise dried fruit ready for the winter.

Howard walked slowly, enjoying the air and the warm sun at his back in the south. Near the coppice the fields were bowed and curved by very low hills. The field margins were of hedges or large trees, in the low damp places the trees were ash or willow, in the drier places they were big oaks. The oaks were turning copper, but the willows were just a little silver or grey green. Their foliage rippled and fluttered against the blue sky.

There was a part of the walk that Howard liked. Standing in the corner of the field he looked ahead. At this point for some fortuitous reason the field margin and its low trees and the rough hedge aligned with another hedge in the field beyond and then with another. You could see this conformation because of the slowly rising ground ahead. But Howard liked to stop and look along the line of hedges and imagined it going forever over gentle hills and down into valley after valley until it reached the sea. It was, to him, a glimpse of infinity.

The willow coppice was low lying, in a place of wet ground close to a tiny stream. The light was broken up by the swaying leaves. Howard was one of a few people in Earls Court that visited the coppice and sometimes he would leave his tools - his saw and wood wedges - overnight if it wasn’t raining. The coppice had served the village for a century or more. Howard knew that many of the beams of the roofs of houses in the village had come from the larger trees, and some of the trunks had provided wood for heavy furniture, particularly tables. The thinner coppiced branches – the wicker – had been used for furniture and baskets in every house.

Howard sat down surveying the plantation. There was a stump where he always sat. In front were some of the larger trees. One had broken in a storm the winter before and its shattered trunk was like a white splintered bone, but still the foliage that sprouted around it was healthy. Behind in a wide ring were the coppiced stools. There were at least twenty of them, each with a diameter of a few yards. The unharvested ones with the longer straighter wicker, Howard was saving for some bigger furniture - their sticks were his height or a little more. For some reason these grew in a ring, and the central part of the stool was flat and had not sprouted. A few of the stools were cut for thinner shorter sticks for basketry. He thought he would harvest a few of the thicker sticks for the repair that he needed to make to Margaret’s roof beam.

The place where he had slept was close to the centre of the coppiced area.

He went over to look at it again. In the bright sunlight he was not sleepy. He did not know what had come over him.

He looked into the woody leaflitter and noticed the hard willow below his feet. He took his axe and banged the handle end and heard the dull thump of wood. So the place where he’d slept was underlain by willow wood. Perhaps it had been a stool that had been neglected.

He cut a few poles and bound them together. He thought he would cut more and perhaps begin his project to build a wicker chair and moved to some of the smaller stools with the thin poles. He cut a bundle. Between two of the stools he again looked at the leaflitter and scraped it away with the heel of his boot. There was fine hard wood underneath. Again he banged his axe handle and felt it jolt in his hand. More living wood just below the surface.

He strode over to the big willow trunk with its catastrophic split. The pure yellowish wood was dry. He didn’t want to cut anything because the tree was very much alive. He looked down at his boots. Despite the drying sun, they were wet. In the moving wind the trunk creaked and the full branches swayed with a sound like moving water.

***********************************

Mrs Van Dijk had raspberries, strawberries and apples to dry. She had a rack that she used every year about this time before it got too cold, and when there was space by the stove. The weather had been too damp until today. She had built up logs on the stove and opened the window in the living room and the back door to the yard.

She brought apples from the barrel in the pantry. Around half would be good for eating for at least three weeks. The others – perhaps three or four pounds worth – she would cut into slices and dry in the rack above the stove. She would have the stove going now for a few days. The raspberries were easier to dry than other fruit because they had a thinner outer skin. Sometimes the strawberries just spoiled. But she liked dried raspberries and they could last well into the winter, even to the spring.

She hoped that Howard would bring more wood, because the stacks in the yard were running low.

The air began to dry out in the living room and the smell which had started to become musty in the fog began to be warm and sweet with the drying fruit. She would take a look at some of the meat that she had, that might need salting. There was also jam that could be made with the strawberries, if the drying didn’t work.

Mr Lockhart arrived. She heard him at the wide open door. She immediately felt guilty because she hadn’t done anything with the picture he’d given her. It was still rolled up in her bag. She would have to apologise. She wiped her hands on her apron. There was hot water for tea.

She felt happy with the light morning, and the work with the fruit.

‘Would you like to come in Mr Lockhart?’

Mr Lockhart had brought cheese wrapped in cloth. Earlier she had stacked the two chairs together against the wall so that she could get to the stove, so she had to move them back so that they could sit.

‘Mrs Van Dijk, don’t bother. I came only to thank you again, and to give you the cheese. It’s only small, but made by my own hand’

He looked hopeful, his white beard and hair looked all the whiter because of the redness of his face, perhaps because of the cool wind. He grinned: ‘I hope you like it’

She felt the cheese through the cloth. It was cool and hard. It would be nice with bread. She could bake today as well.

Mr Lockhart said: ‘You mentioned that you had apples. Can I ask you for a few? I have no orchard!’

‘Of course’

Mrs Van Dijk went into the pantry, and taking the lid off the barrel grasped a few of the apples, making a small pile on the cloth in which Mr Lochart had brought the cheese. He could use it to carry the apples home.

She called from the dim pantry to Mr Lockhart: ‘How many would you like?’

He didn’t answer so she folded a dozen in the cloth. When she emerged from the pantry her visitor was sitting on the chair facing the fire. The door to the bedroom was open. She was sure she hadn’t left it open.

***********************************

Howard returned late in the afternoon. On the harness on his back, he carried a large bundle of willow sticks and a few of the thicker rods. He had spent most of the afternoon cutting some larger logs of an elder tree midway between the village and the willow coppice. There was a large pile of elder firewood ready for collection the next day. He would borrow the dray horse.

Mr Lockhart had long gone. In fact he had not even stayed for tea. He had gathered his apples up and wished Mrs Van Dijk a good afternoon, as well as commending his cheese to her again. She had watched him stride down the lane to the gate. He had not mentioned the picture that he’d given her. Maybe he had forgotten.

Howard sat down, suddenly tired. With the clear sky it had begun to get cold. His face felt red and was tingling with the long hours of sun. His hands were pale with the dust of cut elder and willow.

Mrs Van Dijk brought him tea. She knew he wanted to say something. He had had an idea. She could see that he was doing what he always did – thinking about what he would say. He was remarkably predictable at times.

‘You know what I’ve realised?’ he said at last.

She was setting the table. She had cut the cheese and there was some bread and butter.

‘No Howard. How can I?’

‘The willows – the coppiced willows. Or rather the willow’

‘Yes?’

‘I’ve realised that – or it seems that – there is just one willow’

She sat down bringing the other chair close to the fire.

‘What do you mean?’

‘Well I walked all around the area: that part where I fell asleep, the shorter and longer coppice, the big broken trunk. I tested, looking under the soil and fallen leaves. There was hard willow under almost all of it. When I walked around, I realised that the edge of the area was almost circular, maybe twenty yards wide. I don’t know why I never realised before’

‘What are you saying Howard?’ She was becoming interested.

‘Well I think the coppice is just one tree. It lies under everything. Even the stream crosses it. One tree. A huge ancient tree’

‘Most of the wood for the houses and the furniture for the village came from the coppice’

‘I know. A single tree for a single village’

She stood and took the copper kettle to pour hot water for more tea.

Howard sat silently, still thinking.

In the early evening the washing had dried and Howard folded up his shirts and trousers and some of the washed bedclothes. He put the bedclothes on the table ready to move to the bedroom. Mrs Van Dijk was reading. The fruit was drying well, so she was pleased.

Howard went to make the bed with the clean sheets. Moving the pillows, he found crushed by their slight weight, two tiny twigs, one under each pillow. He stared, taken aback, recognising the long leaves of the willow.

 © M H Stephenson 2025