A Drake at the Door by Derek Tangye Read Free Book Online

had to leave their cars a quarter of a mile away from us. We could sense in their manner on arrival at the cottage that they labelled us as amateurs; which we were, of course, but not in the way that they inferred. We were not playing at growing as they hinted. We were so painfully serious that we were touchy.
    This touchiness came to boiling point one day when an official called on behalf of the Ministry of Agriculture to investigate our qualifications for a road-building grant. This grant, which meant that fifty per cent of the cost would be paid for by the Ministry, was obviously vital to our plans; and when, through the sitting room window, I saw the official arrive, I determined to be on my best behaviour. Here was an occasion when I must not display my allergy to officialdom.
    He wore a smart tweed cap, a check flannel shirt, a bow tie, and a loosely cut country suit, the uniform of a prosperous farmer on market day. He was indeed a farmer, one who was engaged by the Ministry to serve on Agricultural Committees that watched over the affairs of fellow farmers. An unpaid job. An overworked one. But one which carried with it the pleasures of prestige.
    I came out of the cottage and down the sloping path to where he was standing, a smile on my face and my hand outstretched.
    ‘Good afternoon,’ I said warmly, ‘it’s very nice of you to come.’
    I had scarcely uttered these words when I sensed he did not wish to notice my arrival. He was gazing round at the broken-down walls, the shells of disused buildings of long ago. He threw a glance at the cottage. He stared across the untidy moorland to the sea. He looked at some boulders heaped on one side of the path. It was obvious he was performing an act for my benefit.
    ‘Gosh,’ he suddenly said, ‘What a place!’ And had I looked close enough I would have seen him shudder.
    I knew at once what he was up to. The Ministry quite rightly had to guard against unwarranted claims as there were, in any case, enough genuine claims to soak up the grant allocations. Hence it was perhaps inevitable that people like ourselves were looked upon with suspicion; for we might be pretending to have a market garden in order to gain the advantage of the grant.
    ‘Good afternoon,’ I repeated. But I no longer offered my hand. Whatever his suspicions he had no need to be tough.
    ‘Don’t tell me you live here all the year round?’
    He had addressed me for the first time, looking me up and down as he did so, as if he were judging the points of a steer. I felt uncomfortable.
    ‘Yes, indeed,’ I said, keeping my voice calm, ‘it is the most wonderful place in the world.’
    I was rather like a father whose child has been unfairly criticised. Here was our beloved Minack receiving the scorn of a stranger. Our life was being questioned. Someone who did not know anything about us was daring to suggest to my face that Minack was not a fit place to live in. My touchiness was awake. His attitude could not have been better calculated to make me lose my temper.
    ‘You had better show me round,’ he said.
    It was February and in Minack fields the green shoots of the early potatoes were breaking through the ground. Down the cliff the haulms were already beginning to cover the rows; and over at Pentewan the two acres of meadows we rented were a picture of possible prosperity. Facing due south and earlier than Minack they had long rows of youthful potato tops, a foot apart, lines of healthy, dark green; and we were very proud of them.
    ‘I don’t see how you can expect to get a potato crop from
this
meadow.’
    The tour, I had expected, would prove to the official that we were, after all, serious growers. We had seven tons of seed potatoes. We were one of the largest growers of cliff early potatoes west of Penzance. And I confidently felt, as we set out, that the official would quench his asperity as soon as he took stock of our efforts. Now he was criticising the condition of a meadow; and the