The Harbottle Skylon
Following on from my last post about business cashing in on
the Festival of Britain, I was inspired to write this short story:
The Harbottle Skylon
Mrs Bartholomew shook the Illustrated News and expelled a
high-pitched “Ha!” Mr Bartholomew paid little heed to his wife’s
exclamation. He sat with a piece of
paper and a pencil, trying to work out an exciting new display for this
season’s salad vegetables. He wondered if it was possible to create a face. Perhaps lettuce hair, radish eyes and a
cucumber smile. That would make them stop and look. Another “Ha!” came from behind the
Illustrated News, this time accompanied by a disdainful sniff. Mr Bartholomew failed to respond again.
“Have you seen this, Father?” The Bartholomews were of the
age where Christian names had been long forgotten. They had no place in their home or shop.
“What’s that, Mother?”
“This advertisement here, using the festival dome thing to
sell tinned peas. Blatant cashing in it is, I
don’t know how they’ve got the cheek.”
She held up the offending page for her husband to squint at. He moved his glasses up and down his nose.
“Well, that’s processed pea sellers for you. Always taking
the lazy way, just like their customers.”
“What, I ask you, has a tin of peas got to do with the
festival?”
“Nothing Mother, nothing at all.”
“Blatant.” She turned
the page, they both returned to the previous silence.
Mr Harbottle parked his wheelbarrow outside the Bartholomews’
shop on the following afternoon. He brought in a wooden crate which overflowed
with tomatoes, filling the air with the smell of hot greenhouse. He placed the
crate on the end of the counter and immediately began to rub his buttocks and
puff out his cheeks.
“You should have called out, Mr Harbottle. I could have carried those in for you.”
“It’s what keeps me going though, isn’t it? I reckon I’m in just as good shape as you,
lad.”
Mr Bartholomew laughed as he began to pick through the
tomatoes. They were the first of the
season, some of them still not quite ripe.
“These’ll sell well, I reckon. Got any more lettuces ready?”
“Not be long. I’ll get
you a few by the end of the week if this warm sun stays with us.”
Mr Bartholomew took a handful of coins from the till and
passed them over to the old man. A group
of schoolboys paused outside the shop and giggled at the window display. One of them came inside and bought an
apple. He rubbed it on his short
trousers before taking a greedy bite.
“Like your salad face, Mister!”
“Good lad! You tell
your Mum to come and get her salad here.
Tell her not to bother with old Hoole…misery guts he is.”
“Right-oh, I will!”
The boys raced off along the High Street.
“Is he giving you trouble then, this Hoole feller?” Mr
Harbottle leaned on the counter.
“Well, I reckon people are going around there to see what
he’s like. He’s a novelty. But he’s new to it all. People know that I’ve
been in this game much longer than him and I know quality fruit and veg.”
“So custom has dropped off a bit since he opened then?”
“Perhaps a bit, but they’ll be back.”
“So that’s why you’ve gone all out with the window display
then. I see.” He staggered over for
another look. “Good idea. That cucumber
reminds me, I’ve got some lovely marrows on the way, shall I bring a few?”
The greengrocer hesitated. The marrows hadn’t gone down very
well last year, and people had been speculating on exactly what Harbottle had
been using as fertilizer. They were a
lovely size, they gave old Harbottle that, but the taste was odd. One or two people had tried to find out what
he put on them by leaning on the allotment fence and gently probing him as he
hoed between the rows of carrots. But his only response had been to tap the
side of his nose and change the subject. Mr Bartholomew had ended up throwing a
considerable number of browning marrows onto his compost heap.
“Well then, Mr Harbottle. There just wasn’t the demand for
them last year. The old marrow’s not a
favourite vegetable. Tell you what, you
just bring me a couple and we’ll see how they go.”
“Alright, next week or two then.” He lifted up his hand and
shuffled out of the shop.
The marrows arrived at the end of the following week,
ballasting Mr Harbottle’s wheelbarrow beneath dark green lettuce heads. He had wrapped them in sheets of newspaper to
stop them from rolling around and gathering at one end as he tackled the
incline on Station Road
“These are a good weight again Mr Harbottle. Have you been putting your secret fertilizer
on them again?”
“Of course. Plenty
more of them if they sell. Just keeping
two or three back for the show.”
Mr Bartholomew took the marrows inside, straight through the
shop and into the kitchen, where his wife was boiling up raspberry jam.
“I think we’d better try one of these, Mother, before we put
them on sale.”
“Oh, not Harbottle’s marrows again? I had enough of those
last year.”
“Well, we’ll just have a taste of one later, just to see.”
“Alright. I’ll stick
some in a cheese sauce. Now clear off
while I get these jam pots ready.”
The glut of raspberries resulted in the jam-making session
overrunning a little. Mrs Bartholomew
was behind with the evening meal. This
irked her more than it did her husband.
“That jam brings in plenty of custom, Mother. Don’t you worry.”
She whipped a wooden spoon around a milk pan, stopping to
sprinkle in a handful of grated cheese.
“Well, sit yourself down and put your feet up for five
minutes, Father. Won’t be long now.”
He rolled up his sleeves and did as he was bid. The sheet of
newspaper that one of the marrows had been wrapped in lay on the table,
discarded in a hurry. He pulled it
towards himself and began to read. Most
of the left hand side was taken up with pictures from the festival in London
“I only used a bit of it.”
Mrs Bartholomew sat down by her husband with her own plate. “The other
half’s in the larder in case we like it this time.”
She watched her husband.
He stabbed the smallest slice and pushed it into his mouth. As he chewed, the corners of his lips curled
downwards, while his nose wrinkled upwards.
“Cor. It’s worse than I
remember it. I can’t sell that!”
“Can’t you even stomach it in the sauce?”
“You try it, Mother, and tell me what you think!”
She did so, and immediately followed it down with half a
glass of water.
“What DOES he grow them in?”
“Search me. They’ll
have to go on the compost heap again. Or
you can give them to your sister.”
“I don’t think even our May could make a decent chutney with
these.”
Mrs Bartholomew began to clear the table while her husband
went to stack the marrows in the outhouse.
“Put that on the newspaper pile, dear.”
She handed him the crumpled sheet that had been used to wrap
the marrow. He looked at it again, and
then at one of the marrows. He took them both straight through the outhouse and
into his little workshop, calling back to his wife that he was just going to
have half an hour on an idea that he’d had.
She rolled her eyes and stacked the dishes in the sink.
Two days later, Mr Harbottle had a little trouble parking his
wheelbarrow outside the shop. A group of
four women stood on the pavement, shifting their shopping baskets from arm to
arm and laughing. One of the women leaned over to squeeze a tomato and nodded
to her friend.
“There’s some more of those, freshly picked, in my barrow,
Missus.” He manouvered in, partly blocking the display in front of the ironmongers
next door.
“Is that one of yours as well, Mr Harbottle?” The group began
to laugh again, peering into the window. Mr Harbottle followed their pointing
fingers, then bent over, squinting over the top of his glasses.
“That looks like it could be one of my marrows, yes. What’s he done with it?”
The marrow had been pared back to make it look thinner, it
was somehow suspended in mid air by several sticks of celery.
“He’s turned it into a Skylon, hasn’t he?”
“A what?”
“Skylon, Mr Harbottle. Like what’s at the festival in London
Mr Harbottle took his cap off and wiped his forehead with
it. “Whatever next.”
posted by Sarah Miller Walters @ 05:13
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