She was a glowing, russet-coloured girl, and looked her best that afternoon, striding across the causeway with the wind snapping at her hair and moulding her summer dress into the explicit of a shift. Behind her ran, stumbled and tacked poor Wally, who gave from time to time a squawking cry not unlike that of a sea gull.
When they arrived on the Island, she told him she would like to see his mother. They turned right at the jetty, and round a point into Fisherman’s Bay. The Treherns lived in the least prepossessing of a group of cottages. Jenny could feel nothing but dismay at its smell and that of Mrs. Trehern, who sat on the doorstep and made ambiguous sounds of greeting.
“She’m sozzled,” said Wally and, indeed, it was so.
Jenny said: “Wally, would you be very kind and see if you can find me a shell to keep? A pink one.” She had to repeat this carefully and was not helped by Mrs. Trehern’s suddenly roaring out that if he didn’t do what his teacher said she’d have the hide off of him.
Wally sank his head between his shoulders, shuffled down to the foreshore and disappeared behind a boat.
“Mrs. Trehern,” Jenny said, “I do hope you don’t mind me coming; I just felt I must say how terribly glad I am about Wally’s warts, and — and — I did want to ask about how it’s happened. I mean,” she went on, growing flurried, “it’s so extraordinary. Since yesterday… I mean — well — it’s… Isn’t it?”
Mrs. Trehern was smiling broadly. She jerked her head and asked Jenny if she would take a little something.
“No, thank you.” She waited for a moment and then said: “Mrs. Trehern, haven’t you noticed? Wally’s hands? Haven’t you seen?”
“Takes fits,” said Mrs. Trehern. “Our Wally!” she added with an air of profundity. After several false starts she rose and turned into the house. “You come on in,” she shouted bossily. “Come on.”
Jenny was spared this ordeal by the arrival of Mr. Trehern, who lumbered up from the foreshore, where she fancied he had been sitting behind his boat. He was followed at a distance by Wally.
James Trehern was a dark, fat man with pale eyes, a slack mouth and a manner that was both suspicious and placatory. He hired out himself and his boat to visitors, fished and did odd jobs about the village and the Island.
He leered uncertainly at Jenny, and said it was an uncommon brave afternoon and he hoped she was feeling pretty clever herself. Jenny at once embarked on the disappearance of the warts, and found that Trehern had just become aware of it. Wally had shown him his hands.
“Isn’t it amazing, Mr. Trehern?”
“Proper flabbergasting,” he agreed without enthusiasm.
“When did it happen exactly, do you know? Was it yesterday, after school? Or when? Was it — sudden? I mean his hands were in such a state, weren’t they? I’ve asked him, of course, and he says — he says it’s because of a lady. And something about washing his hands in the spring up there. I’m sorry to pester you like this, but I felt I just had to know.”
It was obvious that he thought she was making an unnecessary to-do about the whole affair, but he stared at her with a sort of covert intensity that was extremely disagreeable. A gust of wind snatched at her dress and she tried to pin it between her knees. Trehern’s mouth widened. Mrs. Trehern advanced uncertainly from the interior.
Jenny said quickly: “Well, never mind, anyway. It’s grand that they’re gone, isn’t it? I mustn’t keep you. Good evening.”
Mrs. Trehern made an ambiguous sound and extended her clenched hand. “See yurr,” she said. She opened her hand. A cascade of soft black shells dropped on the step. “Them’s our Wally’s,” she said. “In ’is bed.”
“All gone,” said Wally.
He had come up from the foreshore. When Jenny turned to him, he offered her a real shell. It was broken and discoloured, but it was pink. Jenny knelt down to take it. “Thank you very much,” she said. “That’s just what I wanted.”
It seemed awful to go away and leave him there. When she looked back he waved to her.
That evening in the Private Taproom at the Boy-and-Lobster, Wally Trehern’s warts were the principal topic of conversation. It was a fine evening and low tide fell at eight o’clock. In addition to the regular Islanders, there were patrons who had strolled across the causeway from the village: Dr. Mayne of the Portcarrow Convalescent Home; the Rector, the Reverend Mr. Adrian Carstairs — who liked to show, as was no more than the case, that he was human; and a visitor to the village, a large pale young man with a restless manner and a general air of being on the lookout for something. He was having a drink with Patrick Ferrier, the stepson of the landlord, down from Oxford for the long vacation. Patrick was an engaging fellow with a sensitive mouth, pleasant manners and a quick eye which dwelt pretty often upon Jenny Williams. There was only one other woman in the Private besides Jenny. This was Miss Elspeth Cost, a lady with vague hair and a tentative smile, who, like Jenny, was staying at the Boy-and-Lobster and was understood to have a shop somewhere and to be interested in handicrafts and the drama.
The landlord, Major Keith Barrimore, stationed between two bars, served both the Public and the Private Taps: the former being used exclusively by local fishermen. Major Barrimore was well set up and of florid complexion. He shouted rather than spoke, had any amount of professional bonhomie and harmonized perfectly with his background of horse-brasses, bottles, glasses, tankards and sporting prints. He wore a checked coat, a yellow waistcoat and a signet ring, and kept his hair very smooth.
“Look at it whichever way you choose,” Miss Cost said, “it’s astounding. Poor little fellow! To think…!”
“Very dramatic,” said Patrick Ferrier, smiling at Jenny.
“Well, it was,” she said. “Just that.”
“One hears of these cases,” said the restless young man. “Gypsies and charms and so on.”
“Yes, I know one does,” Jenny said. “One hears of them, but I’ve never met one before. And who, for heaven’s sake, was the Green Lady?”
There was a brief silence.
“Ah,” said Miss Cost. “Now that is the really rather wonderful part. The Green Lady!” She tipped her head to one side and looked at the Rector. “Mm…?” she invited.
“Poor Wally!” Mr. Carstairs rejoined. “All a fairy tale, I daresay. It’s a sad case.”
“The cure isn’t a fairy tale,” Jenny pointed out.
“No, no, no. Surely not. Surely not,” he said in a hurry.
“A fairy tale… I wonder. Still pixies in these yurr parts, Rector, d’y’m reckon?” asked Miss Cost, essaying a roguish burr.
Everybody looked extremely uncomfortable.
“All in the poor kid’s imagination, I should have thought,” said Major Barrimore and poured himself a double Scotch. “Stilclass="underline" damn’ good show, anyway.”
“What’s the medical opinion?” Patrick asked.
“Don’t ask me!” Dr. Mayne ejaculated, throwing up his beautifully kept hands. “There is no medical opinion as far as I know.” But seeing, perhaps, that they all expected more than this from him, he went on half-impatiently: “You do, of course, hear of these cases. They’re quite well established. I’ve heard of an eminent skin specialist who actually mugged up an incantation or spell or what-have-you and used it on his patients with marked success.”
“There! You see!” Miss Cost cried out, gently clapping her hands. She became mysterious. “You wait!” she said. “You jolly well wait!”
Dr. Mayne glanced at her distastefully.
“The cause of warts is not known,” he said. “Probably viral. The boy’s an epileptic,” he added. “Petit mal.”