The Green Man Read Free Page B

vaguely remembered from my youth. I even began to feel carefree.
    Fool! I should have known better.
    As I pushed open the door of my house, the air was redolent with the delicious aroma of roasting pork with its sizzling fat, a smell I had been deprived of for what seemed like years.
    â€˜I’m home!’ I shouted.

Two
    â€˜R oger, my old friend!’
    The familiar voice, accompanied by an equally familiar figure as Timothy Plummer emerged from our parlour, made me jump nearly out of my skin. During the short walk from the Green Lattis to home, I had so convinced myself that my original suspicion had been at fault, that to find it true was a greater shock than if it had never entered my head in the first place.
    â€˜You!’ I exclaimed, recoiling.
    â€˜Me, indeed!’ he returned, arranging his narrow features in a smile as false as a woman’s promise to obey her husband. He added reproachfully, ‘You might sound pleased to see me.’
    â€˜Well, I’m not!’ My reply was uncompromising.
    He sniffed the air suggestively. ‘You’ll note I’ve brought my welcome with me.’
    I pointed out that that in itself was unusual enough to make me suspicious.
    He tried to look hurt, but gave up the attempt after a short struggle and grinned instead. Before he could say anything else, however, Adela appeared from the kitchen clutching a large ladle with which she had been basting the roast.
    â€˜What does he want, Roger?’ she demanded truculently. ‘Whatever it is, don’t agree to it.’
    Timothy clicked his tongue reprovingly, but offered no comment; a fact that made me uneasier than ever. This was his cue to wheedle, ‘It’s for Duke Richard, Roger. He needs your services. You can’t refuse him.’ But he didn’t. He merely stared hard at me and said nothing, although with such an air of authority in both look and silence that my heart began to beat uncomfortably fast.
    â€˜Is he staying to supper?’ my wife asked ungraciously, ignoring our unwanted guest by the simple expedient of turning her shoulder to him and addressing me.
    I shrugged. ‘I suppose he’ll have to. He provided it, after all.’
    Timothy bowed ironically.
    â€˜You’d better come and have it then. It’s ready,’ Adela snapped, and marched ahead of us into the kitchen.
    The three children – my daughter, Elizabeth, my stepson, Nicholas, and Adela’s and my son, Adam – were already seated around the table. The latter, who would be four the following month, was now considered old enough to sit on his little chair without the necessity of being tied to it; although the way in which he was wriggling around suggested that a few falls were in store for him before he mastered the art of behaving properly.
    Adela had already removed the pork from the spit and put it on a plate which she placed in front of me. She handed me a knife as I took my seat at the head of the table, at the same time waving Timothy Plummer to a vacant stool between herself and Adam. She had boiled some vegetables to accompany the meat – cabbage and root vegetables and those little water parsnips known as skirretts – and she spooned a portion on to each plate as I handed them round, a proceeding accomplished in complete silence. Even our normally ebullient brood seemed cowed, as though aware that something unusual was going on. Finally, when everyone had been served, I said grace and picked up my knife, spearing a mouth-wateringly large chunk of pork on its tip; enough to preclude conversation for several minutes.
    At last, however, I had emptied my mouth sufficiently to ask, ‘So, why are you here, Master Plummer? What do you want with me?’
    If he noticed the formality of my approach, he ignored it. He put down his knife, sucked his greasy fingers and beamed.
    â€˜Roger, my lad, this is your lucky day!’ I knew at once that I was in serious