Out of India by Michael Foss Read Free Book Online Page A

with wire and baling-string; holes in the buckled tin roof of the tractor shed; the neglected farmhouse itself, blistered and blotched with weather marks. The ploughed fields shone dully, the colour of raw meat.
    Mrs Griffith cooked turnips and swedes and beets in watery stews, with occasional hints of chicken or rabbit. A greyish bread was wrapped in plain paper. Meals were eaten in a general silence, with now and again a sharp word or two about the weather. It did not seem to be polite to mention the war. My brother and I scraped the plates, making as much noise as possible. We kicked each other under the table. After each meal Mr Griffith removed his false teeth and put them in a glass of water on the mantelpiece, and there they stayed in public view until the next meal. I had never seen detachable teeth before and went out of my way to give them a good inspection. They looked cruel and filthy, but I respected the farmer for his confidence in displaying them.
    The farmhouse was cold, standing square in the way of the prevalent north-easterlies that swept down from Siberia. It was scarcely warmed by single-bar electric fires that could never be left on in a vacant room. The light bulbs were almost too dim for reading. Only a few fingers of hot water were allowed in the bottom of the bath. My brother and I grew morose, pushing and shoving to be first out of the house, lashing out at each other in sudden tempers. The vitality was draining out of us. Heads down, we kicked stones in the yard and poked sticks into the rabbit hutches. The animals learnt to avoid us. The dog warned us off with low growls, the muck-flecked hens flew apart clucking, and the geese, hissing with outstretched necks, got into a phalanx to repel us. The animals seemed as wretched as the farm.
    One afternoon of bright winter sunshine Mr Griffith slaughtered a pig. It was a big sow with floppy ears andwhat looked to me even then a worried expression. I was surprised by the two remarkable rows of its teats. The farmer and a labourer despatched it with brutal efficiency, not caring whether we children were watching or not. Executions of the farmyard were no mystery to the country child – chickens with necks wrung, rabbits stunned and killed, partridges shot for the pot. The pig, squealing and backing and sliding in the mud, often down on its knees, was jammed in a metal frame and its throat expertly cut with one long motion of the knife. A bloody bubble like a sigh burst from its mouth. Then the hind feet were secured by a rope to a block and tackle and the upended beast was hitched up to a beam over the barn door, and left there for the blood to drain. After the first rush, a thin frothy flow leaked into the bucket beneath.
    At the end of the winter at Copse Farm I fell ill. Despite a warning from my brother I had been larking about on the rim of the cattle-trough and I had fallen into three feet of dirty, icy water. Though fished out quickly, and bathed, and sent to bed with red flannel and a hot-water bottle on my chest, I went down with pneumonia, which my mother attributed to congenital bronchial weakness. In my fever I saw nightmares, a naked rabbit wearing its own flayed skin like an ill-fitting overcoat, and a recurring vision of a pig thrashing and drowning in a pool of blood.
    The doctor said, under the circumstances, bad dreams were not unexpected. I had a high fever, and besides it was wartime. Horrors were normal enough. With many patients to see, the doctor left in a hurry. I heard the farmyard gate groan on rusty hinges and clang behind him.

THREE
Corridors
    A NOTHER DEPARTURE, ANOTHER cold destination. Money was the problem. While we were in Lincolnshire, two or three times my mother had found it necessary to go to London to see the bank manager.
    A railway journey, in those days, with the trains flushed from their normal routes by bomb damage and troop movements, was like a prolix argument set down in broken grammar. Trains puzzled by