10 THE POTTING SHED
Easter came round again, with its two weeks of separation and suspense. At last the day came when Douglas and Louise were reunited at Craigton Hall. March had given way to April and spring had banished the twilight shadows in Blackford Park. Even the chill of an Edinburgh evening failed to keep the local residents indoors. Overfed labradors, heavy with winter fat, waddled up the steep track behind panting old gentlemen from Libberton. Around the duck pond, children played noisily, screaming with innocent laughter as ducks and geese quacked and splashed about in joyous mating displays.
Amid all this renewal of life, Douglas and Louise wandered about like lost souls. Wherever they went, hovering park keepers and Morningside matrons dampened the atmosphere.
Soon after the beginning of term, Louise consulted her best friend, Moira.
They had grown less close after Louise fell in love with Douglas, but Moira's was
always a
sympathetic ear.
'I see the problem,' she said, when Louise had poured out her frustration. 'You totals can't look about for good winchin' spots, can you?'
'Are there any?'
'Oh yes, there are. If you turn left at the park gates instead of right, and walk up the steep track you'll come to the whins.'
'The whins?'
'Yes, the gorse bushes. That side of the hill is overgrown with them. Lots of courting couples go there. Dick and I did last summer.'
'And was it really private?'
'Oh you can do almost anything there. Nobody will disturb you.'
Louise conveyed this information to Douglas and they found the whins with ease on their next outing. Neither felt it was as overgrown and secluded as Moira had suggested, but Douglas threw down his raincoat and the lovers spent an hour undisturbed.
A few days later, when Douglas was putting on his raincoat to go to school, Miss St John, the hostel matron, stopped him at the door.
'Douglas, your coat is a terrible mess, did you know?'
'No, Miss.'
'There are big black smudges all down the back. What have you been doing?'
Douglas frowned. He could not think, for a moment or two, what the cause could be.
'What do they look like?' he asked. 'Paint?'
'No, more like ash.'
Then the penny dropped.
'I bet it was those whins in the park,' he said, through gritted teeth. Miss St John was a good sort and he felt he could be truthful with her, at least to some extent. 'Louise and I sat down among them on this coat the other night. I remember I half noticed a smell of burnt wood. We must have been sitting on the ashes.'
'Well, you'll just have to change your "sitooterie",' laughed Miss St John, using the comical old Scots word for a place where courting couples sit together out of doors.
Douglas told Louise what had happened.
'But how is it that Moira and Dick went there last summer and didn't have the same trouble?' she wondered.
'I've been thinking about that. Isn't it just like Edinburgh? The Morningside gentry must have been complaining about courting couples in the whins, and the authorities have ordered the park keepers to burn them off this year.'
It was true. South Edinburgh took respectability very seriously.
* * *
One cold evening, when the park seemed almost deserted, Douglas and Louise took yet another path that climbed steeply to the shoulder of the hill. When they gained this contour, they could hear, far below, the faint cries of children at play around the duck pond. They wanted to press on and leave the madding crowd even farther behind, but fear weighed on them when they thought of the quarry that lay somewhere in the vicinity. Even sighted people had been known to fall into it. Perhaps the spot they had already reached was lonely enough.
They turned off the path to climb farther up the hill, which was exposed to a stiff evening breeze. Douglas listened out for a bush or tree that could shelter them, but heard only wind sweeping over the grass.
'I'm afraid to go higher, Louise,' he said. 'Even if we come to no harm we'll only find ourselves blocked by the Observatory. We must be quite near it now.'
They agreed to stop at this spot and Douglas spread his duffel coat on the grass. He lay down beside her, feeling glad, at least, that he could not hear anyone about.
They lay holding hands and talking. After a little time they felt cold, so Louise removed her overcoat and spread it over them like a blanket.
'Kiss me, love,' she whispered, snuggling up. At that moment a voice brayed harshly from somewhere behind them, 'Can't you find somewhere else to do that?' It was evidently a genteel Morningside matron, the kind who signed herself 'Disgusted' when she wrote to The Scotsman to complain of latter-day morals.
Louise dived under her coat, giggling. Douglas sighed in exasperation, but bit his tongue. Answering back was always unwise, unless you wanted to run the risk of a complaint to Major Royle. They stood up.
'Let's go,' he said angrily, and they hurried down the path towards the park gates.
* * *
On their next visit they retraced the path they had followed on winter evenings. It was now frequented by strollers, but they remembered hearing the tall hazel bushes which swayed and sighed in the wind opposite the wood above the duck pond. It might be possible to find this thicket and hide in it. Finding it proved quite easy, but it seemed to afford less cover than Douglas had expected. The season, he realised, was not sufficiently advanced to give the bushes their full mantle of green. They lay down, feeling that the thicket screened them at least partially from the gaze of strollers on the path, but the noise of children playing on the slopes above dampened their ardour. Douglas embraced Louise under her coat, kissing and fondling her, but she was obviously ill at ease. It was like making love with gloves on and Douglas recalled the frosty winter nights. Those at least had had a future. These seemed barren of all promise.
As things turned out, the evening had consequences of a very unpleasant kind.
'Douglas Barr, come to my office.' Douglas's stomach seemed to hit an air
pocket. There could be no doubt this time what the Major wanted with him at the
conclusion of
morning prayers.
It was all Douglas could do to stop his knees knocking together as he stood on the doormat outside the head's office. Waves of panic swept over him. Was he going to be reported to his parents? Worse still, expelled from school?
The Major made his usual theatrical approach, floor shaking beneath his godlike tread. Once inside the office, he spoke in tones of severest reprimand and deployed the heavy artillery of his Latinate vocabulary.
'From time to time I hear stories of inappropriate conduct concerning pupils at the school. Sometimes I ignore them as trivial. Last night I heard a particularly disgusting anecdote concerning yourself which has shaken my faith in you completely. You were seen in Blackford Park with Louise Cummings, embracing and osculating in the most unseemly manner, which must, if allowed to continue, bring opprobrium upon Craigton Hall. I cannot tolerate this kind of behaviour from you any longer. I must warn you that any repetition will have the gravest consequences for you both. Do you understand?'
Douglas would have liked to say that he did not understand - not one little bit. What was this all about, this fuss about two young people of nearly 18 years, who were doing just the same as everyone else at their age. He would have liked to explain. They were in love and exploring that blissful state. There was no need to worry. Neither had any intention of seduction and felt they knew what they were doing. He would have added that he had seen young people going much further in parks than anything he and Louise had done the previous evening. Why was it appropriate behaviour for them and not for him and Louise? Why was love seen everywhere - on cinema screens and posters, in novels and magazines, up country lanes and down city alleys? Come to that why were they always singing about love at Craigton Hall: "It was upon a Lammas nicht"; "It was a lover and his lass"; "My love is like a red, red rose"?
But there was no reasoning with Major Royle. He had simply dismissed Douglas's reference to blind lawyers in England, saying that he couldn't succeed as a blind lawyer in Scotland because Scots law was different from English. Evidently, Major Royle was not above weighting the dice to win his point. And Douglas thought again of the promised typewriter that never existed.
* * *
Following this threat of serious action, Douglas and Louise passed two weeks in abject misery. They were desperate for a suitable hideaway, but neither could think of one. One evening during this gloomy interlude, they entered the duck pond enclosure and took a path that led between tall rhododendrons to a clearing in the wood. This had once been a gypsy campsite. It had been cleared by decorum and was now the location of 'the summer house'. Built to look vaguely like a Red Indian lodge, it was little more than a large, three-sided shed, open to the elements at the front, with glass windows all round the other three sides. A bench seat ran right round, affording strollers a resting place from which to view the bird life of water and wood. Douglas and Louise sat disconsolately in one corner, as far away as possible from the prattling children and the gossiping mums.
'Will we have to sit, just holding hands like this until next winter?'
Douglas
asked resentfully.
'That's how it's got to be, I suppose,' Louise said. 'He'll kick you out if we
get
caught again.'
Douglas tried to think of any spot in the grounds of Craigton Hall where they might be safe. Nothing recommended itself. The shrubbery and the lower green were still patrolled each night by Jimmy Riddell and the others. He suspected it was Riddell or Drury who had reported them to the Major for 'inappropriate behaviour' in the park. Nor was there any safe haven within the school itself. Classrooms could provide it only under cover of darkness. On summer evenings, anyone passing could glance through the high windows or glass-panelled doors.
'Hell!' said Douglas fiercely. 'I feel as if I'm in a tank at the aquarium.'
* * *
Yet Craigton Hall had, even now, secrets to yield and havens to afford. One was just a few steps away from the back door of the boys' hostel where Douglas lived.
The hostel was an imposing Victorian villa in a salubrious street of south Edinburgh. Its interior was bare and austere, like Craigton Hall itself, but passers by could be impressed by its double elevation at the front, its deep porch, and pillared gateway. It was at the back, however, that it best preserved its aura of gracious living. Here a wide, south-facing terrace fell over steep rockeries to a sunken lawn, bordered by shrubbery in formal lines and flanked by straight gravel paths. Some of the shrubs were crowned by specimens of topiary, leafy cocks and hens, eyeing each other from their perches.
The boys had a lawn to the right side, on which they played cricket during long summer evenings. To the left, the terrace was clothed by a miniature grove of holly, rhododendron and laurel, which spread densely down to a small vegetable garden. This miniature grove screened the utilitarian end of the house, where there was a potting shed to the rear and a garage at the front.
The potting shed was the more interesting of these two features. Built in the days when utility had to go with decorum, it resembled a small cottage more than a shed. A square window faced rearward, as did a stout timbered door, painted green and studded with great wooden bosses. This door could not be seen from any direction, hidden from the house by a huge laurel bush, and from the garden by the thick shrubbery of the terrace.
A gravel drive gave access to the garage from the front, continuing as a path which wrapped round the house and passed the green door at the back. Anyone wishing to enter the shed unseen could feel relatively safe from prying eyes once they had passed the garage. It was an ideal hideaway, as I knew from my own time at Craigton Hall, but Douglas knew nothing of it until one of the organ students, Bill Carter, told him about it. Bill lived on the top floor of the hostel, in a room next to that occupied by Douglas and Dick. One evening the three were having a confidential chat after lights out. The talk turned to girlfriends. Douglas told Bill about all the trouble he had been in with the Major and the difficulty of being private.
'What do you do with Davina, Bill?' he asked. Douglas knew that Davina, the
dining-room maid, had teamed up with Bill after her former boyfriend, Danny
Dangerfield, had left
the school.
'She finds places where we can't be seen,' said Bill, who was a total.
'We can't do that,' said Douglas mournfully.
'Why don't you go into the potting shed at the back here? We go there sometimes.'
'What's the potting shed?' asked Douglas. Bill explained and offered to show it to Douglas next evening after supper.
At the appointed hour, therefore, he and Douglas slipped out of the hostel by the back garden door. He led Douglas past a bench, and around the bay window of the sitting room. Taking care not to trip over the rockery that fringed the path, they reached the green door of the shed among the laurels. Bill took Douglas's hand and showed him the large key that always hung on a nail behind the laurel bush. He took it down and inserted it into the big keyhole. It turned easily and the heavy door swung open. Bill drew him quickly inside and locked up.
The shed was surprisingly warm and inviting, with its pleasing aroma of timber and potting soil. Bill showed him the fireplace, equipped with a hob and tin kettle, where the gardeners made tea. In the middle there was a small table at which they ate their lunch-time sandwiches, with two cane chairs standing one on either side. Potting benches, laid out with plants, lined the walls.
'Who comes here, Bill?' Douglas asked.
'Only the gardeners in the day time. Nobody ever comes in the evenings except the odd couple. You'll have peace in here.'
Douglas crossed the shed to the far side and found a door. 'What's through
here?'
he asked.
'It leads out into a little well between this shed and the hostel garage. The garage has a back door on the other side of the well - and an exit at the front, of course.'
'Is anybody likely to come through the garage into the shed?'
'Not at all. As you see, the door is latched on this side, and nobody uses the garage now. There's an old Ford of Major Royle's in there, but it has no engine and he garages his present car at the school.'
'How do you know so much about the garage?'
'Well,' said Bill, shifting a little uncomfortably, 'Ian McDowell and I used to get two old bikes that had been left in there and take them for a midnight spin along the road. Ian had enough sight to guide us both in the lamp light.'
'My God! What happened?'
'We were arrested by the police. They were going to charge us for cycling at night without lights. What a laugh, eh? A blind cyclist without lights. Luckily, they saw the point and dropped the whole business after Royle gave us a good ticking off.'
Douglas stood for a moment, admiring the sheer cheek of his friend. Then a thought occurred. 'Are there any windows in this shed?' he asked. 'Only one and it's frosted glass. Nobody will see in, but you'd be well advised not to clump about too much on this wooden floor. That's the only thing that might give you away.'
'Yes,' said Douglas, 'I think this will do us very nicely.'
* * *
He told Louise about the shed on their next visit to the Blackfords, as they sat chatting in the 'summer house'.
'What's it like, Douglas?' she asked.
'Very cosy and private.'
'No silly, I don't just mean this shed. I mean the boys' hostel. None of us girls has ever been in it, any more than you ever come to ours.'
'Oh, I see. It's very grand in one way and very basic in another. You enter through a deep porch and there's a grand stairway in the hall, with a polished wooden balustrade that has a great newell post at the bottom with an elaborately carved urn on top of it. We all call it 'the Scottish cup'. The stairs lead up to the first floor. The staff have bedrooms there.'
'How many staff?'
'Well, there's Miss St John, the matron, Mr Gentles, the divinity student in
residence, who acts as a part-time supervisor, and the maid. They have a bedroom
each at the front of
the house.'
'Where do the boys sleep?'
'There are two big bedrooms on the first floor at the back, with five boys in one and six in the other. One of them used to be a children's nursery in the old days and is still called "the nursery" because it has a speaking tube for communicating with the attic, where the servants lived, I suppose.'
'And isn't the other room called "the glory hole"?'
'Yes, but Miss St John doesn't like us calling it that. She says it's not a glory hole since it was done up. But that only means it has linoleum on the floor instead of bare floorboards. It has just the same iron bedsteads as we had in the dormitories at school. Oh and every boy has two drawers instead of a treasure bag to keep his things in and there's a rail to hang up the best suits behind a curtain. That's about it.'
'You sleep in the attic don't you?'
'Yes, there are four little rooms up there, all with sloping ceilings and dormer windows. I like it. It's the nicest part of the house. Two of the rooms have three lads and two have two. I share with Dick in one of the two back rooms, overlooking the garden.'
'I wish I could come up to your room, Douglas,' said Louise.
'You can't do that, but I've discovered somewhere almost as good.'
'This shed, you mean? Isn't it ... you know ... a bit basic?'
Douglas explained. 'It's warm and completely private. Nobody can get in because the door can be locked from the inside and we can take the key in with us. It's such a huge key I would be surprised if anyone has a spare.'
Louise agreed to come and explore this new tryst with Douglas on the following evening, which was a Saturday, when most of the staff and pupils went out and the one left in charge enjoyed a quiet evening in. They met at the usual street corner but, instead of taking the route to the Blackfords, turned back towards the boys' hostel, crossing the back road as the church clock struck seven. The whole evening stretched before them, like a path leading into a mysterious wood, for they were not expected back indoors till 10pm. Three hours! What bliss!
Once over the back road, they quickly reached the boys' hostel. Douglas found the garage drive by trailing his right hand along the garden wall, indicating it to Louise by a slight pressure on her arm. His heart began to beat faster. What if some busybody saw them from a house opposite and phoned Craigton Hall? The gravel crunched loudly beneath their feet. Surely the divinity student would hear and look down from his room above the garage?
They felt like two secret agents, slipping into enemy territory.
At length they reached the green door. Douglas fumbled with the key and it swung open. Stepping through, he drew Louise behind him and locked the door. 'Safe at last,' he sighed. Louise stood like a shy fawn on the margin of the forest, listening with all her might. Not a sound could be heard. Like Douglas she was surprised and delighted by the scent of seasoned timber, so natural and pure. He showed her the table and the basket chair.
'We can cuddle up together on it,' he said.
'Yes,' she breathed. 'We have the same kind of chairs in the girls' hostel. They make them in the blind asylum, don't they? But Douglas, are you sure nobody can see in here?' she asked, still wary as a bird. Louise could hardly believe there was any place at Craigton Hall where you couldn't be seen by someone. He let her feel the window with the frosted glass and the back door latched on the inside.
She relaxed at last and allowed him to lead her back to the chair. Unbuttoning her light summer coat, he helped her out of it and hung it on the handle of the green door. Returning, he sat down and drew her on to his knee. Louise sighed contentedly and pressed closer, as Douglas kissed her.
That was the first of many evenings in the potting shed. As May turned to June, it came to seem like their secret bower. No one came near. The screen of shrubs muffled the cries of "Howzat!" and "Bad light!" from the cricketers on the sunken lawn. No other sound penetrated the thick walls. Beyond themselves, nothing of concern seemed to exist.
As summer warmth increased, Douglas explored the landscape of Louise. She allowed him to occupy it gradually, offering no resistance. Beginning by unbuttoning her blouse, he eventually disrobed her to the waist and she leaned back voluptuously, stretching her body like a highway. He advanced slowly, his caresses travelling farther and farther.
His touch rekindled the rapture of the Blackfords nights and she could hardly wait for him to go on. At last he whispered, 'Can I take everything off, love?'
'Go on,' she murmured, standing up to assist him.
A few tugs and her remaining garments rippled to the floor. She stepped out of them carefully, resuming her place on his knee. To Douglas she felt like an artist's model posing for his touch, shy and proud at the same time.
Even now, he told himself, he would not go all the way. It would not be fair. It did not occur to him that Louise had her own ideas. She felt her body opening to him. Seized by an imperious need to lie down and cradle her lover in her arms, she sprang up suddenly and began to feel about, searching for a suitable spot.
Almost immediately she found what she wanted. In the corner by the fireplace three or four old mats had been thrown down in a heap. They had been cleared out of 'the glory hole' when the linoleum was laid and left forgotten there.
'Oh, Douglas,' she whispered delightedly, 'we can lie on these.'
Douglas hesitated, scared of going farther than he meant. He was conscious that he had taken no account of Jack Wilson's advice and had brought no precautions for a journey to Waverley. Now he imagined that Louise was abandoning self-control, as the sex manuals said girls would when aroused by boys. He ought to check himself at all costs. There must be no ruined maid in the ash grove
. Louise had no intention of being ruined. She was about to take charge of
the
journey herself.
Douglas laid out the rugs and spread her coat over them. They formed a comfortable bed and Louise lay down.
'Do you want me to lie on you, love?' he asked, shyly.
'Yes,' she whispered.
How long they lay there that evening he could never really tell. Louise stroked his hair, his face, his neck, his shoulders, and spread herself like a bow. For a long time he lay motionless. At last, instinctively, he began to kiss her all over.
'I love this, Louise,' he whispered.
'So do I. But what pleasure does it give you?'
'How do you mean?' he asked, surprised by the question.
'You could have so much more.'
Startled, he raised his head, like a cock bird sensing danger.
'Do you want to go all the way?'
'There's nothing I want more.'
He lay down on her again, torn, for what seemed an eternity, between desire and self-denial. Then he reached down to the waistband of his trousers.
'Wait, Douglas,' said Louise, taking firm hold of his hand. 'Do you have anything?'
'You mean ...' he hesitated.
'Yes, of course. I don't want to have a baby just yet.'
He rolled over on to his side and she turned towards him. 'You'll have to get something if you want to do it,' she said simply.
Douglas was taken aback at her straightforward practicality.
'I never thought I'd hear you speak like this, Louise,' he said, laughing softly. 'I thought nice girls were supposed to leave it all to the boy.'
'And nice girls get pregnant,' said Louise firmly.
She stood up and started to dress.
'It's up to you, my love,' she said. 'I'm sure you could get them if you really wanted.'
Douglas was at last beginning to know the real Louise. She took time to make up her mind, considering things from every angle. Yet she now knew very clearly what she wanted and would not be put off by humbug. She wanted Douglas as her lover in the fullest sense, but he must prove himself worthy by overcoming the practical objections.
As to that, both knew what had to be done. Douglas had purchased a Braille copy of The Sex Factor in Marriage. It had required a little subterfuge, for the Braille publishing house in London would only supply it on the purchaser producing evidence that they were married or engaged. Douglas composed his order in a style that reassured them, however, and the book was dispatched without further inquiry.
He read it and passed it to Louise. She had been intrigued to find that he had learned foreplay from a book rather than experience. The volume helped to blow away some of the Victorian cobwebs around her own feelings and gave practical guidance on safe sex. Douglas had also noted this. But the problem raised by Jack's advice on the Crag still remained. How was he to acquire the goods?
This would not be easy. He was reluctant to ask any of his friends at school. There was strong prejudice everywhere against girls who were thought to 'go all the way' and he was unwilling to expose Louise to it.
The book had mentioned chemists. But was that really practicable? Could a blind man just walk in and ask for a packet of three? There might be a young woman behind the counter. Someone from school might overhear.
* * *
On the following Saturday morning, he left the hostel, feeling extremely
conscious of a half crown piece burning a hole in his trousers pocket. He went to
the nearest chemist, finding the door by its characteristic smell. When he
entered, a young female assistant said, 'Can I
help you?'
Douglas asked for a packet of throat pastels and surrendered his precious half crown. This entailed a visit to the post office to cash some of his savings and then a long walk down the back road to another chemist he knew, much nearer Craigton Hall. A bell rang as he pushed open the door.
'Hello, Douglas Barr,' said the familiar voice of Jimmy Riddell. 'What are you here for?'
Douglas imagined his tone was accompanied by a suggestive leer.
'Toothpaste,' he said quickly, mentioning a brand.
'Well, here's the young lady. I'm sure she's got everything you want.
Dirty old man, thought Douglas, feeling certain that Riddell suspected the true nature of his errand.
By the time Douglas had tried four chemists he had quite a collection of unwanted goods - one tin of throat pastels, one tube of toothpaste, one bar of soap and one packet of sticking plasters. But still not what he wanted.
Later in the day, Douglas literally bumped into Jack Wilson on Causewayside. Jack was walking in front of him, wearing civvies - powder-blue drain pipes and thick crepe soles. Since Jack's footsteps were entirely silenced by the crepes, Douglas's nose flattened itself against his long straight back. Jack whirled round.
'Well, suffering catfish! Fancy meeting you like this, Douglas.'
'What are you doing in Edinburgh?' asked Douglas, surprised and mightily pleased.
'I've got a temporary posting to Edinburgh Castle for training. I just got into town a week ago and took time to get my bearings. I was planning on coming out to see you at that school of yours next week.'
The two friends walked round to a cafe Douglas knew. After asking about Douglas's ankle and being satisfied that it was thoroughly mended, Jack asked, 'How's the love life, Douglas?'
Good old Jack, Douglas thought. Straight to the point as always.
'Going very well but for one thing.'
'What's that?"
'I need - er, you know, those things you need when you go out with girls.'
'O-oh, so she really is a girl with her head screwed on. Lucky you.'
Douglas told the story of his search. 'It's not a chemist you really need, Douglas, it's "surgical supplies". They're always staffed by men.'
Within a few moments, Douglas had the information he needed from Jack, who had noticed a supplier at some distance from Craigton Hall and took his friend to purchase the goods. That done, they parted and Douglas returned to the hostel in high excitement.