The Hollow

"What a penetrating remark of Lucy's," said Henrietta as she drove round the house, Midge accompanying her on the running board. "You know, I always prided myself on having completely escaped the horsy taint of my Irish forebears. When you've been brought up amongst people who talk nothing but horse, you go all superior about not caring for them. And now Lucy has just shown me that I treat my car exactly like a horse.

It's quite true. I do."

"I know," said Midge. "Lucy is quite devastating.

She told me this morning that I was to be as rude as I liked whilst I was here."

Henrietta considered this for a moment and then nodded.

"Of course," she said. "The shop!"

"Yes. When one has to spend every day of one's life in a damnable little box, being polite to rude women, calling them Madam, pulling frocks over their heads, smiling and swallowing their damned cheek whatever they like to say to one-well, one does want to cuss! You know, Henrietta, I always wonder why people think it's so humiliating to go 'into service5 and that it's grand and independent to be in a shop. One puts up with far more insolence in a shop than Gudgeon or Simmons or any decent domestic does."

"It must be foul, darling. I wish you weren't so grand and proud and insistent on earning your own living…"

"Anyway, Lucy's an angel. I shall be gloriously rude to everyone this weekend."

"Who's here?" said Henrietta as she got out of the car.

"The Christows are coming." Midge paused and then went on: "Edward's just arrived."

"Edward? How nice! I haven't seen Edward for ages. Anybody else?"

"David Angkatell. That, according to

Lucy, is where you are going to come in useful. You're going to stop him biting his nails."

"It sounds very unlike me," said Henrietta.

"I hate interfering with people and I wouldn't dream of checking their personal habits. What did Lucy really say?"

"It amounted to that! He's got an Adam's apple, too!"

"I'm not expected to do anything about that, am I?" asked Henrietta, alarmed.

"And you're to be kind to Gerda."

"How I should hate Lucy if I were

Gerda!"

"And someone who solves crimes is coming to lunch tomorrow."

"We're not going to play the Murder

Game, are we?"

"I don't think so. I think it is just neighbourly hospitality."

Midge's voice changed a little.

"Here's Edward coming out to hunt us."

"Dear Edward," thought Henrietta with a sudden rush of warm affection.

Edward Angkatell was very tall and thin.

He was smiling now as he came towards the two young women.

"Hullo, Henrietta. I haven't seen you for over a year."

"Hullo, Edward."

How nice Edward was! That gentle smile of his, the little creases at the corners of his eyes. And all his nice knobbly bones… I believe it's his bones I like so much, thought Henrietta. The warmth of her affection for Edward startled her. She had forgotten that she liked Edward so much…

After lunch Edward said, "Come for a walk, Henrietta."

It was Edward's kind of walk-a stroll.

They went up behind the house, taking a path that zigzagged up through the trees.

Like the woods at Ainswick, thought Henrietta …

Dear Ainswick 3 what fun they had had there! She began to talk to Edward about Ainswick. They revived old memories.

"Do you remember our squirrel? The one with the broken paw? And we kept it in a cage and it got well?"

"Of course. It had a ridiculous name- what was it now?"

"Cholmondeley-Marj oribanks!'?

"That's it."

They both laughed.

"And old Mrs. Bondy, the housekeeper -she always said it would go up the chimney one day."

"And we were so indignant…"

"And then it did…"

"She made it," said Henrietta positively.

"She put the thought into the squirrel's head."

She went on:

"Is it all the same, Edward? Or is it changed? I always imagine it as just the same."

"Why don't you come and see, Henrietta?

It's a long, long time since you've been there."

"I know…"

Why, she thought, had she let so long a time go by? One got busy-interested-tangled up with people…

"You know you're always welcome there at any time."

"How sweet you are, Edward!"

Dear Edward, she thought, with his nice bones…

He said presently:

"I'm glad you're fond of Ainswick, Henrietta."

She said dreamily, "Ainswick is the loveliest place in the world…"

A long-legged girl, with a mane of untidy brown hair… a happy girl with no idea at all of the things that life was going to do to her… a girl who loved trees…

To have been so happy and not to have known it! If I could go back, she thought…

And aloud she said suddenly:

"Is Ygdrasil still there?"

"It was struck by lightning."

"Oh, no, not Ygdrasil!"

She was distressed. Ygdrasil-her own special name for the big oak tree. If the gods could strike down Ygdrasil, then nothing was safe! Better not go back…

"Do you remember your special sign, the

Ygdrasil sign?" Edward asked.

"The funny tree like no tree that ever was I used to draw on bits of paper? I still do, Edward! On blotters, and on telephone books, and on bridge scores. I doodle it all the time. Give me a pencil."

He handed her a pencil and notebook, and laughing, she drew the ridiculous tree.