The Birds and Other Stories by Daphne DuMaurier

Author:Daphne DuMaurier [DuMaurier, Daphne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction / Horror, FICTION / SHORT STORIES (SINGLE AUTHOR), Fiction, Fiction / Psychological, Fiction / Thrillers / Suspense, Classics
ISBN: 9780582538221
Google: 9MFhSAAACAAJ
Amazon: 0099866404
Publisher: Hachette UK
Published: 1973-02-15T05:00:00+00:00

Willis was supposed to keep to the vegetable garden. He had never shown his face much round the front when Midge was alive. That was because Midge attended to the flowers. She even used to mow the grass, pushing the wretched machine up and down the slope, her back bent low over the handles.

It had been one of the tasks she set herself, like keeping the bedrooms swept and polished. Now Midge was no longer there to attend to the front garden and to tell him where he should work, Willis was always coming through to the front. The gardener liked the change. It made him feel responsible.

“I can’t understand how that branch came to fall, sir,” he said on the Monday.

“What branch?”

“Why, the branch on the apple tree. The one we were looking at before I left.”

“It was rotten, I suppose. I told you the tree was dead.”

“Nothing rotten about it, sir. Why, look at it. Broke clean off.”

Once again the owner was obliged to follow his man up the slope above the terrace. Willis picked up the branch. The lichen upon it was wet, bedraggled-looking, like matted hair.

“You didn’t come again to test the branch, over the weekend, and loosen it in some fashion, did you, sir?” asked the gardener.

“I most certainly did not,” replied the owner, irritated. “As a matter of fact I heard the branch fall, during the night. I was opening the bedroom window at the time.”

“Funny. It was a still night too.”

“These things often happen to old trees. Why you bother about this one I can’t imagine. Anyone would think…”

He broke off; he did not know how to finish the sentence.

“Anyone would think that the tree was valuable,” he said.

The gardener shook his head. “It’s not the value,” he said. “I don’t reckon for a moment that this tree is worth any money at all. It’s just that after all this time, when we thought her dead, she’s alive and kicking, as you might say. Freak of nature, I call it. We’ll hope no other branches fall before she blossoms.”

Later, when the owner set off for his afternoon walk, he saw the man cutting away the grass below the tree and placing new wire around the base of the trunk. It was quite ridiculous. He did not pay the fellow a fat wage to tinker about with a half-dead tree. He ought to be in the kitchen garden, growing vegetables. It was too much effort, though, to argue with him.

He returned home about half past five. Tea was a discarded meal since Midge had died, and he was looking forward to his armchair by the fire, his pipe, his whiskey and soda, and silence.

The fire had not long been lit and the chimney was smoking. There was a queer, rather sickly smell about the living room. He threw open the windows and went upstairs to change his heavy shoes. When he came down again the smoke still clung about the room and the smell was as strong as ever.

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