'Here who comes?' the doctor said.
'Mrs Clipstone.' He spoke the name proudly, as though he were a commander referring to his bravest officer.
The three of us stood together beside the pumps, looking down the road.
'Can't you see her?' my father asked.
Far away in the distance I could just make out a small figure advancing towards us.
'What's she pushing, Dad?'
My father gave me sly look.
'There's only one way of delivering pheasants safely,' he said, 'and that's under a baby. Isn't that right, Doctor?'
'Under a baby?' Doc Spencer said.
'Of course. In a pram with the baby on top.'
'Fantastic!' the doctor said.
'My old dad thought that one up many years ago,' my father said, 'and it's never been known to fail yet.'
'It's brilliant,' Doc Spencer said. 'Only a brilliant mind could think of a thing like that.'
'He was a brilliant man,' my father said. 'Can you see her now, Doctor? And that'll be young Christopher Clipstone sitting up in the pram. He's one and a half. A lovely child.'
'I birthed him,' Doc Spencer said. 'He weighed eight pounds three ounces.'
I could just make out the small dot of a baby sitting high up in the pram, which had its hood folded down.
'There's more than one hundred pheasants under that little nipper,' my father said happily. 'Just imagine it.'
'You can't put a hundred pheasants in a child's perambulator!' Doc Spencer said. 'Don't be ridiculous!'
'You can if it's been specially made for the job,' my father said. 'This one is built extra-long and extra-wide and it's got an extra-deep well underneath. Listen, you could push a cow around in there if you wanted to, let alone a hundred pheasants and a baby!'
'Did you make it yourself, Dad?' I asked.
'More or less, Danny. You remember when I walked you to school and then went off to buy the raisins?'
'The day before yesterday,' I said.
'Yes. And after that I went straight on to the vicarage and converted their pram into this Special Extra-large Poacher's Model. It's a beauty, really it is. You wait till you see it. And Mrs Clipstone says it pushes even easier than her ordinary one. She did a practice circuit with it in her back-yard as soon as I'd finished it.'
'Fantastic,' the doctor said again. 'Absolutely fantastic'
'Normally', my father went on, 'an ordinary bought pram is all you'd ever need. But then no one's ever had over a hundred pheasants to deliver before now'
'Where does the baby sit?' the doctor asked.
'On top, of course,' my father said. All you need is a sheet to cover them and the baby sits on the sheet. A bunch of pheasants makes a nice soft mattress for any child.'
'I don't doubt it,' the doctor said.
'He'll be having a very comfortable ride today, young Christopher,' my father said.
We stood beside the pumps waiting for Mrs Clipstone to arrive. It was the first of October and one of those warm windless autumn mornings with a darkening sky and a smell of thunder in the air.
What was so marvellous about my father, I thought, was the way he always surprised you. It was impossible to be with him for long without being surprised and astounded by one thing or another. He was like a conjuror bringing things out of a hat. Right now it was the pram and the baby. In a few minutes it would be something else again, I felt sure of that.
'Right through the village bold as brass,' my father said. 'Good for her!'
'She seems in an awful hurry, Dad,' I said. 'She's sort of half-running. Don't you think she's sort of half-running, Doctor Spencer?'
'I imagine she's just a bit anxious to unload her cargo,' the doctor said.
My father squinted down the road at the approaching figure. 'She does appear to be going a bit quick, doesn't she?' he said carefully.
'She's going very quick,' I said.
There was a pause. My father was beginning to stare hard at the lady in the distance.
'Perhaps she doesn't want to be caught in the rain,' he said. 'I'll bet that's exactly what it is. She thinks it's going to rain and she doesn't want the baby to get wet.'
'She could put the hood up,' I said.
He didn't answer this.
'She's running! Doc Spencer cried. 'Look!'
It was true. Mrs Clipstone had suddenly broken into a full sprint.
My father stood very still, staring at her. And in the silence that followed I fancied I could hear a baby screaming.
'What's up, Dad?'
He didn't reply.
'There's something wrong with that baby,' Doc Spencer said. 'Listen.'
At this point, Mrs Clipstone was about two hundred yards away from us but closing fast.
'Can you hear him now, Dad?'
'Yes, I can hear him.'
'He's yelling his head off,' Doc Spencer said.
The small, shrill voice in the distance was growing louder every second, frantic, piercing, non-stop.
'He's having a fit,' my father said. 'It's a good thing we've got a doctor handy'
Doc Spencer didn't say anything.
'That's why she's running, Doctor,' my father said. 'He's having a fit and she wants to get him in here quick and put him under a cold tap.'
'Some noise,' I said.
'If it isn't a fit,' my father said, 'you can bet your life it's something like it.'
'I doubt it's a fit,' the doctor said.
My father shifted his feet uneasily on the gravel of the driveway. 'There's a thousand and one different things keep happening every day to little babies like that,' he said. 'That's right, isn't it, Doctor?'
'Of course,' Doc Spencer said. 'Every day'
'I knew a baby once who caught his fingers in the spokes of a pram wheel,' my father said. 'It cut them clean off'
The doctor smiled.
'Whatever it is,' my father said, 'I wish to heavens she'd stop running. It'll give the game away'
A long lorry loaded with bricks came up behind the pram and the driver slowed down and poked his head out of the window to stare. Mrs Clipstone ignored him and flew on. She was so close now I could see her big red face with the mouth wide open, panting for breath. I noticed she was wearing white gloves on her hands, very prim and dainty. And there was a funny little white hat to match perched right on the top of her head, like a mushroom.
Suddenly, out of the pram, straight up into the air, flew an enormous pheasant!
My father let out a cry of horror.
The fool in the lorry began roaring with laughter.
The pheasant flapped around drunkenly for a few seconds, then lost height and landed on the grass by the side of the road.
'Crikey!' Doc Spencer said. 'Look at that!'
A grocer's van came up behind the lorry and began hooting to get by. Mrs Clipstone kept on running.
Then WHOOSH! - a second pheasant flew up out of the pram.
Then a third and a fourth.
'Great Scott!' Doc Spencer said. 'I know what's happened! It's the sleeping pills! They're wearing off/'
My father didn't say a word.
Mrs Clipstone covered the last fifty yards at a tremendous pace. She came swinging into the filling-station with birds flying out of the pram in all directions.
'What on earth is happening?' she shrieked. She pulled up sharp against the first pump and seized the screaming infant in her arms and dragged him clear.
With the weight of the child suddenly lifted away, a great cloud of pheasants rose up out of the gigantic pram. There must have been well over a hundred of them, and the whole sky above us was filled with huge brown birds clapping their wings.
'A sleeping pill doesn't last for ever,' Doc Spencer said, shaking his head sadly. 'It always wears off by the next morning.'
The pheasants were too dopey to fly far. In a few seconds down they came again and settled themselves like a swarm of locusts all over the filling-station. The place was covered with them.
They sat wing to wing along the roof of the workshop and about a dozen were clinging to the sill of the office window. Some had flown down on to the rack that held the bottles of lubricating oil, and others were sliding about on the bonnet of Doc Spencer's car. One cock bird with a fine tail was perched superbly on top of a petrol pump, and quite a number, those that were too drunk to do anything else, simply squatted in the driveway at our feet, fluffing their feathers and blinking their small eyes.
My father stayed remarkably calm. But not poor Mrs Clipstone. 'They nearly pecked him to pieces!' she was crying, clasping the screaming baby to her bosom.
'Take him into the caravan, Mrs Clipstone,' my father said. 'All these birds are making him nervous. And Danny, push that pram into the workshop quick.'
Mrs Clipstone disappeared into our caravan with the baby. I pushed the pram into the workshop.
Across the road a line of cars had already started forming behind the brick-lorry and the grocery van. People were opening their doors and getting out and beginning to cross over to stare at the pheasants.
'Watch out, Dad!' I said. 'Look who's here!'
20
Goodbye, Mr Hazell
The big shiny silver Rolls-Royce had braked suddenly and come to a stop right alongside the filling-station. Behind the wheel I could see the enormous pink beery face of Mr Victor Hazell staring at the pheasants. I could see the mouth hanging open, the eyes bulging out of his head like toadstools and the skin of his face turning from pink to bright scarlet. The car door opened and out he came, resplendent in fawn-coloured riding-breeches and high polished boots. There was a yellow silk scarf with red dots on it round his neck, and he had a sort of bowler hat on his head. The great shooting party was about to begin and he was on his way to greet the guests.
He left the door of the Rolls open and came at us like a charging bull. My father, Doc Spencer and I stood close together in a little group, waiting for him. He started shouting at us the moment he got out of the car, and he went on shouting for a long time after that. I am sure you would like to know what he said, but I cannot possibly repeat it here. The language he used was so foul and filthy it scorched my earholes. Words came out of his mouth that I had never heard before and hope never to hear again. Little flecks of white foam began forming around his lips and running down his chin on to the yellow silk scarf.
I glanced at my father. He was standing very still and very calm, waiting for the shouting to finish. The colour was back in his cheeks now and I could see the tiny twinkling wrinkles of a smile around the corners of his eyes.
Doc Spencer stood beside him and he also was very calm. He was looking at Mr Hazell rather as one would look at a slug on a leaf of lettuce in the salad.
I myself did not feel quite so calm.
'But they are not your pheasants,' my father said at last. 'They're mine.'
'Don't lie to me, man!' yelled Mr Hazell. 'I'm the only person round here who has pheasants!'
'They are on my land,' my father said quietly. 'They flew on to my land, and so long as they stay on my land they belong to me. Don't you know the rules, you bloated old blue-faced baboon?'
Doc Spencer started to giggle. Mr Hazell's skin turned from scarlet to purple. His eyes and his cheeks were bulging so much with rage it looked as though someone was blowing up his face with a pump. He glared at my father. Then he glared at the dopey pheasants swarming all over the filling-station. 'What's the matter with 'em?' he shouted. 'What've you done to 'em?'
At this point, pedalling grandly towards us on his black bicycle, came the arm of the law in the shape of Sergeant Enoch Samways, resplendent in his blue uniform and shiny silver buttons. It was always a mystery to me how Sergeant Samways could sniff out trouble wherever it was. Let there be a few boys fighting on the pavement or two motorists arguing over a dented bumper and you could bet your life the village policeman would be there within minutes.
We all saw him coming now, and a little hush fell upon the entire company. I imagine the same sort of thing happens when a king or a president enters a roomful of chattering people. They all stop talking and stand very still as a mark of respect for a powerful and important person.
Sergeant Samways dismounted from his bicycle and threaded his way carefully through the mass of pheasants squatting on the ground. The face behind the big black moustache showed no surprise, no anger, no emotion of any kind. It was calm and neutral, as the face of the law should always be.
For a full half-minute he allowed his eyes to travel slowly round the filling-station, gazing at the mass of pheasants squatting all over the place. The rest of us, including even Mr Hazell, waited in silence for judgement to be pronounced.
'Well, well, well,' said Sergeant Samways at last, puffing out his chest and addressing nobody in particular. 'What, may I hask, is 'appenin' around 'ere?' Sergeant Samways had a funny habit of sometimes putting the letter h in front of words that shouldn't have an h there at all. And as though to balance things out, he would take away the h from all the words that should have begun with that letter.
'I'll tell you what's happening round here!' shouted Mr Hazell, advancing upon the policeman. 'These are my pheasants, and this rogue', pointing at my father, 'has enticed them out of my woods on to his filthy little filling-station!'
'Hen-ticed?' said Sergeant Samways, looking first at Mr Hazell, then at us. 'Hen-ticed them, did you say?'
'Of course he enticed them!'
'Well now,' said the sergeant, propping his bicycle carefully against one of our pumps. 'This is a very hinterestin' haccusation, very hinterestin' indeed, because I ain't never 'eard of nobody hen-ticin' a pheasant across six miles of fields and open countryside. 'Ow do you think this hen-ticin' was performed, Mr 'Azell, if I may hask?'
'Don't ask me how he did it because I don't know!' shouted Mr Hazell. 'But he's done it all right! The proof is all around you! All my finest birds are sitting here in this dirty little filling-station when they ought to be up in my own wood getting ready for the shoot!' The words poured out of Mr Hazell's mouth like hot lava from an erupting volcano.
'Am I correct,' said Sergeant Samways, 'am I habsolutely haccurate in thinkin' that today is the day of your great shootin' party, Mr 'Azell?'
'That's the whole point!' cried Mr Hazell, stabbing his forefinger into the sergeant's chest as though he were punching a typewriter or an adding machine. 'And if I don't get these birds back on my land quick sharp, some very important people are going to be extremely angry this morning. And one of my guests, I'll have you know, Sergeant, is none other than your own boss, the Chief Constable of the County! So you had better do something about it fast, hadn't you, unless you want to lose those sergeant's stripes of yours?'
Sergeant Samways did not like people poking their fingers in his chest, least of all Mr Hazell, and he showed it by twitching his upper lip so violently that his moustache came alive and jumped about like some small bristly animal.
'Now just one minute,' he said to Mr Hazell. 'Just one minute, please. Am I to understand that you are haccusin' this gentleman 'ere of committin' this hact?'
'Of course I am!' cried Mr Hazell. 'I know he did it!'
'And do you 'ave any hevidence to support this haccusation?'
'The evidence is all around you!' shouted Mr Hazell. 'Are you blind or something?'
Now my father stepped forward. He took one small pace to the front and fixed Mr Hazell with his marvellous bright twinkly eyes. 'Surely you know how these pheasants came here?' he said softly.
'Surely I do not know how they came here!' snapped Mr Hazell.
'Then I shall tell you,' my father said, 'because it is quite simple, really. They all knew they were going to be shot today if they stayed in your wood, so they flew in here to wait until the shooting was over.'
'Rubbish!' yelled Mr Hazell.
'It's not rubbish at all,' my father said. 'They are extremely intelligent birds, pheasants. Isn't that so, Doctor?'
'They have tremendous br
ain-power,' Doc Spencer said. 'They know exactly what's going on.'
'It would undoubtedly be a great honour', my father said, 'to be shot by the Chief Constable of the County, and an even greater one to be eaten afterwards by Lord Thistlethwaite, but I do not think a pheasant would see it that way.'
'You are scoundrels, both of you!' shouted Mr Hazell. 'You are rapscallions of the worst kind!'
'Now then, now then,' said Sergeant Sam ways. 'Hinsults ain't goin' to get us nowhere. They only haggravate things. Therefore, gentlemen, I 'ave a suggestion to put before you. I suggest that we all of us make a big heffort to drive these birds back over the road on to Mr 'Azell's land. 'Ow does that strike you, Mr 'Azell?'
'It'll be a step in the right direction,' Mr Hazell said. 'Get on with it, then.'
' 'Ow about you, Willum?' the sergeant said to my father. 'Are you agreeable to this haction?'
'I think it's a splendid idea,' my father said, giving Sergeant Samways one of his funny looks. 'I'll be very glad to help. So will Danny'
What's he up to now, I wondered, because whenever my father gave somebody one of his funny looks, it meant something funny was going to happen. And Sergeant Samways, I noticed, also had quite a sparkle in his usually stern eye. 'Come on, my lads!' he cried. 'Let's push these lazy birds over the road!' And with that he began striding around the filling-station, waving his arms at the pheasants and shouting 'Shoo! Shoo! Off you go! Beat it! Get out of 'ere!'
My father and I joined him in this rather absurd exercise, and for the second time that morning clouds of pheasants rose up into the air, clapping their enormous wings. It was then I realized that in order to fly across the road, the birds would first have to fly over Mr Hazell's mighty Rolls-Royce which lay right in their path with its door still open. Most of the pheasants were too dopey to manage this, so down they came again smack on top of the great silver car. They were all over the roof and the bonnet, sliding and slithering and trying to keep a grip on that beautifully polished surface. I could hear their sharp claws scraping into the paintwork as they struggled to hang on, and already they were depositing their dirty droppings all over the roof.