Love Among the Chickens Read online

  BUCKLING TO

  V

  Sunshine, streaming into his bedroom through the open window, wokeGarnet next day as distant clocks were striking eight. It was a lovelymorning, cool and fresh. The grass of the lawn, wet with dew, sparkledin the sun. A thrush, who knew all about early birds and theirperquisites, was filling in the time before the arrival of the wormwith a song or two as he sat in the bushes. In the ivy a colony ofsparrows were opening the day well with a little brisk fighting. Onthe gravel in front of the house lay the mongrel Bob, blinking lazily.

  The gleam of the sea through the trees turned Garnet's thoughts tobathing. He dressed quickly and went out. Bob rose to meet him,waving an absurdly long tail. The hatchet was definitely buried now.That little matter of the jug of water was forgotten.

  "Well, Bob," said Garnet, "coming down to watch me bathe?"

  Bob uttered a bark of approval and ran before him to the gate.

  A walk of five minutes brought Garnet to the sleepy little town. Hepassed through the narrow street, and turned on to the beach, walkingin the direction of the cob, that combination of pier and breakwaterwhich the misadventures of one of Jane Austen's young misses have madeknown to the outside public.

  The tide was high, and Garnet, leaving his clothes to the care of Bob,dived into twelve feet of clear, cold water. As he swam he compared itwith the morning tub of town, and felt that he had done well to comewith Ukridge to this pleasant spot. But he could not rely on unbrokencalm during the whole of his visit. He did not know a great deal aboutchicken farming, but he was certain that Ukridge knew less. Therewould be some strenuous moments before that farm became a profitablecommercial speculation. At the thought of Ukridge toiling on a hotafternoon to manage an undisciplined mob of fowls, and becoming moreand more heated and voluble in the struggle, he laughed and promptlyswallowed a generous mouthful of salt water. There are few thingswhich depress the swimmer more than an involuntary draught of water.Garnet turned and swam back to Bob and the clothes.

  As he strolled back along the beach he came upon a small, elderlygentleman toweling his head in a vigorous manner. Hearing Garnet'sfootsteps, he suspended this operation for a moment and peered out athim from beneath a turban of towel.

  It was the elderly Irishman of the journey, the father of theblue-eyed Phyllis. Then they had come on to Lyme Regis after all.Garnet stopped, with some idea of going back and speaking to him; butrealizing that they were perfect strangers, he postponed this actionand followed Bob up the hill. In a small place like Lyme Regis itwould surely not be difficult to find somebody who would introducethem. He cursed the custom which made such a thing necessary. In aproperly constituted country everybody would know everybody elsewithout fuss or trouble.

  He found Ukridge, in his shirt sleeves and minus a collar, assailing alarge ham. Mrs. Ukridge, looking younger and more childlike than everin brown holland, smiled at him over the teapot.

  "Here he is!" shouted Ukridge, catching sight of him. "Where have youbeen, old horse? I went to your room, but you weren't there. Bathing?Hope it's made you feel fit for work, because we've got to buckle tothis morning."

  "The fowls have arrived, Mr. Garnet," said Mrs. Ukridge, opening hereyes till she looked like an astonished kitten. "_Such_ a lot of them!They're making such a noise!"

  And to support her statement there floated through the window acackling, which, for volume and variety of key, beat anything thatGarnet had ever heard. Judging from the noise, it seemed as if Englandhad been drained of fowls and the entire tribe of them dumped into theyard of the Ukridge's farm.

  "There seems to have been no stint," he said, sitting down. "Did youorder a million or only nine hundred thousand?"

  "Good many, aren't there?" said Ukridge complacently. "But that'swhat we want. No good starting on a small scale. The more you have,the bigger the profits."

  "What sort have you got mostly?"

  "Oh, all sorts. Bless you, people don't mind what breed a fowl is, solong as it _is_ a fowl. These dealer chaps were so infernallyparticular. 'Any Dorkings?' they said. 'All right,' I said, 'bring onyour Dorkings.' 'Or perhaps you want a few Minorcas?' 'Very well,' Isaid, 'show Minorcas.' They were going on--they'd have gone on forhours, but I stopped 'em. 'Look here, Maximilian,' I said to themanager Johnny--decent old chap, with the manners of a marquis--'lookhere,' I said, 'life is short, and we're neither of us as young as weused to be. Don't let us waste the golden hours playing guessinggames. I want fowls. You sell fowls. So give me some of all sorts.'And he has, by Jove! There must be one of every breed ever invented."

  "Where are you going to put them?"

  "That spot we chose by the paddock. That's the place. Plenty of mudfor them to scratch about in, and they can go into the field when theywant to, and pick up worms, or whatever they feed on. We must rig themup some sort of a shanty, I suppose, this morning. We'll go and tell'em to send up some wire netting and stuff from the town."

  "Then we shall want hencoops. We shall have to make those."

  "Of course. So we shall. Millie, didn't I tell you that old Garnet wasthe man to think of things! I forgot the coops. We can't buy some, Isuppose? On tick?"

  "Cheaper to make them. Suppose we get a lot of boxes. Soap boxes areas good as any. It won't take long to knock up a few coops."

  Ukridge thumped the table with enthusiasm.

  "Garny, old horse, you're a marvel. You think of everything. We'llbuckle to right away. What a noise those fowls are making. I supposethey don't feel at home in the yard. Wait till they see the A1residential mansions we're going to put up for them. Finishedbreakfast? Then let's go out. Come along, Millie."

  The red-headed Beale, discovered leaning in an attitude of thought onthe yard gate, and observing the feathered mob below, was roused fromhis reflections and dispatched to the town for the wire and soapboxes. Ukridge, taking his place at the gate, gazed at the fowls withthe affectionate eye of a proprietor.

  "Well, they have certainly taken you at your word," said Garnet, "asfar as variety is concerned."

  The man with the manners of a marquis seemed to have been at greatpains to send a really representative supply of fowls. There were blueones, black ones, white, gray, yellow, brown, big, little, Dorkings,Minorcas, Cochin Chinas, Bantams, Orpingtons, Wyandottes, and a hostmore. It was an imposing spectacle.

  The hired man returned toward the end of the morning, preceded by acart containing the necessary wire and boxes, and Ukridge, whoseenthusiasm brooked no delay, started immediately the task offashioning the coops, while Garnet, assisted by Beale, draped the wirenetting about the chosen spot next to the paddock. There were littleunpleasantnesses--once a roar of anguish told that Ukridge's hammerhad found the wrong billet, and on another occasion Garnet's flanneltrousers suffered on the wire--but the work proceeded steadily. By themiddle of the afternoon things were in a sufficiently advanced stateto suggest to Ukridge the advisability of a halt for refreshments.

  "That's the way to do it," said he. "At this rate we shall have theplace in A1 condition before bedtime. What do you think of those forcoops, Beale?"

  The hired man examined them gravely.

  "I've seen worse, sir."

  He continued his examination.

  "But not many," he added. Beale's passion for truth had made himunpopular in three regiments.

  "They aren't so bad," said Garnet, "but I'm glad I'm not a fowl."

  "So you ought to be," said Ukridge, "considering the way you've put upthat wire. You'll have them strangling themselves."

  In spite of earnest labor, the housing arrangements of the fowls werestill in an incomplete state at the end of the day. The details of theevening's work are preserved in a letter which Garnet wrote thatnight to his friend Lickford.

  * * * * *

  "... Have you ever played a game called 'Pigs in Clover'? We have justfinished a bout of it (with hens instead of marbles) which has lastedfor an hour and a half. We are all dead tired except the hired man,who seem
s to be made of India rubber. He has just gone for a stroll tothe beach. Wants some exercise, I suppose. Personally, I feel as if Ishould never move again. I have run faster and farther than I havedone since I was at school. You have no conception of the difficultyof rounding up fowls and getting them safely to bed. Having no properplace to put them, we were obliged to stow some of them inside soapboxes and the rest in the basement. It has only just occurred to methat they ought to have had perches to roost on. It didn't strike mebefore. I shall not mention it to Ukridge, or that indomitable manwill start making some, and drag me into it, too. After all, a hen canrough it for one night, and if I did a stroke more work I shouldcollapse. My idea was to do the thing on the slow but sure principle.That is to say, take each bird singly and carry it to bed. It wouldhave taken some time, but there would have been no confusion. But youcan imagine that that sort of thing would not appeal to Ukridge. Thereis a touch of the Napoleon about him. He likes his maneuvers to bedaring and on a large scale. He said: 'Open the yard gate and let thefowls come out into the open, then sail in and drive them in a massthrough the back door into the basement.' It was a great idea, butthere was one fatal flaw in it. It didn't allow for the hensscattering. We opened the gate, and out they all came like an audiencecoming out of a theater. Then we closed in on them to bring off thebig drive. For about three seconds it looked as if we might do it.Then Bob, the hired man's dog, an animal who likes to be in whatever'sgoing on, rushed out of the house into the middle of them, barking.There was a perfect stampede, and Heaven only knows where some ofthose fowls are now. There was one in particular, a large yellow bird,which, I should imagine, is nearing London by this time. The last Isaw of it, it was navigating at the rate of knots, so to speak, inthat direction, with Bob after it barking his hardest. Presently Bobcame back, panting, having evidently given up the job. We, in themeantime, were chasing the rest of the birds all over the garden. Thething had now resolved itself into the course of action I hadsuggested originally, except that instead of collecting them quietlyand at our leisure, we had to run miles for each one we captured.After a time we introduced some sort of system into it. Mrs. Ukridge(fancy him married; did you know?) stood at the door. We chased thehens and brought them in. Then as we put each through into thebasement, she shut the door on it. We also arranged Ukridge's soap-boxcoops in a row, and when we caught a fowl we put it into the coop andstuck a board in front of it. By these strenuous means we gathered inabout two thirds of the lot. The rest are all over England. A few maybe in Dorsetshire, but I should not like to bet on it.

  "So you see things are being managed on the up-to-date chicken farm ongood, sound, Ukridge principles. This is only the beginning. I lookwith confidence for further exciting events. I believe, if Ukridgekept white mice, he would manage to knock some feverish excitement outof it. He is at present lying on the sofa, smoking one of his infernalbrand of cigars. From the basement I can hear faintly the murmur ofinnumerable fowls. We are a happy family; we are, we _are_, we ARE!

  "P. S. Have you ever caught a fowl and carried it to roost? You takeit under the wings, and the feel of it sets one's teeth on edge. It isa grisly experience. All the time you are carrying it, it makes faintprotesting noises and struggles feebly to escape.

  "P. P. S. You know the opinion of Pythagoras respecting fowls. That'the soul of our granddam might haply inhabit a bird.' I hope thatyellow hen which Bob chased into the purple night is not thegrandmamma of any friend of mine."