The Willows at Christmas Read online

  THE TALES OF THE WILLOWS

  By Kenneth Grahame

  The Wind in the Willows

  By William Horwood

  The Willows in Winter

  Toad Triumphant

  The Willows and Beyond

  The Willows at Christmas

  ALSO BY WILLIAM HORWOOD

  The Duncton Wood series

  The Stonor Eagles

  Callanish

  Skallagrigg

  The Wolves of Time

  WILLIAM HORWOOD

  The Willows at Christmas

  Illustrated by Patrick Benson

  I

  Mr Mole Takes Action

  “O my!” murmured Mr Mole of Mole End most unhappily as he stoked up his coal fire against the bitter December night. “O dear!”

  There were only three days till Christmas Eve, but the Mole seemed to have quite lost all sense of seasonal excitement and good cheer. He traced his unwonted festive malaise directly back to a tea—time tête à tête he had had with his new friend Mr Toad of Toad Hall at the beginning of December.

  Mole had been looking forward to this occasion with great anticipation. He had prepared well in advance, taking with him a greetings card he had made himself, as well as some of those festive sweetmeats he so expertly concocted in his kitchen. He was naturally a little surprised, therefore, that an unusually subdued Toad barely glanced at the card so lovingly made, and hardly picked at the sweetmeats.

  The kind-hearted Mole put this down to there being something on the mind of Toad, whose changeable emotions, sudden enthusiasms and impulsive likes and dislikes were so well known along the River Bank. However, when a lull in the conversation prompted the Mole to produce his diary so that he might discuss with his host his idea of entertaining their mutual friends Badger, Ratty and Otter to a festive celebration at Mole End, with Toad as guest of honour, an alarming change overtook Toad.

  He frowned, shook his head, folded his arms across his chest and declared, “Absolutely impossible! I never accept engagements over the festive season!”

  He said this with such force that poor Mole felt he had committed a crime even to suggest such an idea.

  “Mole,” continued Toad very seriously, “I could not possibly see anyone over Christmas. For one thing, I shall have relatives staying and they, or rather she, would not approve. Added to which, there is the plain fact that for me this is not and can never again be a time to celebrate, as I would have thought you might have known. No, no! It is quite impossible! Indeed, I feel most upset that you should spoil our tea by suggesting such a thing!”

  With this, Toad took out his red spotted handkerchief and dabbed at his eyes with an apparently genuine show of misery and grief.

  “But, Toad…” began the bewildered Mole, “I simply — I mean to say — O dear!”

  For Toad had risen from his chair now and before the Mole could ask more — or enquire who “she” might be — he had escorted Mole to his front door, bringing the tea to a summary end.

  In the days following, try as he might, the Mole had been unable to rid himself of the dark mood that then overtook him. For Toad’s inexplicable attitude had stirred within the Mole’s heart memories he preferred to leave buried. He had reminded Mole of his great regret that over the years he had lost touch with his family. He had not heard anything directly from his errant brother for at least a decade, and only had news via a third party that a son had been born, and that Mole therefore had a nephew.

  As for his much-loved older sister, who had cared for him when he was young through those difficult years of his mother’s illness and from whom he had learnt so much of the domestic arts, she had moved as far away from their place of birth in one direction as he had in another, and sadly communication had in recent years ceased altogether.

  Though every Christmas the Mole took pains to send each of these lost siblings his loving greetings at their last-known address, he had heard nothing for so many years that he had been forced to admit he ought to give up trying. Yet old habits and hopes die hard, and they had left in the Mole a lingering and bittersweet desire to share once more a Christmas with others with that same joy as he had felt when he was younger.

  Till now the Mole had never allowed the black dogs of despair that sometimes barked at his door at Christmastide to enter his home. Instead, he decorated Mole End yet more brightly, lit his candles more plentifully, and made and ate his seasonal savoury delicacies and sweetmeats with ever more relish. Then, when the darkness of the evening finally fell upon Twelfth Night, he would light a fire that was especially bright. This was the night his father had taught him to wassail the orchard of his childhood home. These days he had no orchard, yet the Mole would make a draught of wassail all the same, for old times’ sake. Then he would take it hot and steaming across the fields towards the River Bank to toast the crab-apple tree that grew there, from which, each year, he gathered enough apples to make cider and jelly for the winter months.

  After this ritual, Mole would return to his home, and with the heady scents of his Twelfth Night Pie baking in his range, he would take down the decorations one by one and put them away for next year. Then he would cut himself a generous slice of pie and sit back in his most comfortable armchair, staring into the fire. Finally, when its embers began to die and midnight approached, he would stand and raise his glass — filled with his famous sloe and blackberry — and drink a toast to those he loved.

  “To my parents,” he would say, “whose memory will never die. And to my errant brother, that he may find greater happiness in the year now started than perhaps he had in the one just ended. Lastly, to my beloved sister, wherever she may be, that this coming year may see our reunion at last. A Happy Christmas to you all, my dears, and to all who love you!”

  Such, for more years than he cared to remember, had been the way of the Mole’s festive season.

  Perhaps Toad’s tea-time rejection might not have mattered had it not been prefaced by a curious lack of enthusiasm for the coming Christmas season from Mole’s other River Bank friends, namely Ratty, Badger and Otter.

  The truth was that this year of all years the Mole had very good reason for believing that in the festive department things might improve at last, and improve greatly! In the past eighteen months his happy acquaintance with the practical Water Rat, the wise Badger, the stout—hearted Otter and the exalted and munificent Toad had, as he had thought, blossomed into friendship.

  It was a friendship forged in all the excitements and adventures that had followed Toad’s imprisonment for stealing a motor-car and his subsequent escape from gaol. Most notable, perhaps, was the battle with the weasels and stoats from the Wild Wood after they had so impudently taken possession of Toad Hall — a memorable battle in which the Mole had excelled himself and earned his friends’ respect and admiration.

  Through the long, contented summer months — more blissful than any he had known since his childhood —hardly a day had gone by that had not found him at the River Bank, there to greet the Rat and pass the time of day. Or, better still, to share a luncheon-basket filled with the good food and drink the domesticated Mole took such pride in providing and which added so much to a day’s boating and conversations.

  In this way the River Bank and its inhabitants had introduced him to a whole new way of life. It had never occurred to the Mole in his earlier years that there might come a time in his life when he would be permitted to mix in such distinguished and exciting company, and be counted among their friends. They had made him realise that he must not be quite so reclusive, and that it might be better to enjoy the present rather than dwell on a past that could never come back, not even for a day or two, however much he might wish it.


  So when autumn came, the Mole had begun to harbour secret hopes for a more sociable festive season. Indeed, modest though he was, the Mole might have justifiably expected to see his considerable contribution to River Bank society recognised and celebrated in some small way at Christmastide. Which was why Mr Toad’s peremptory rejection of his seasonal invitation had hit him so hard.

  Yet he had to admit that there had been other intimations that Christmas was not celebrated quite as he would have liked along the River Bank. He had, for example, sent out early feelers concerning their plans to each of his new friends, but not one of them had responded positively about the idea of sharing an evening or two at his home over Christmas. The Mole had been so perturbed by this that he had consulted the Otter upon the subject.

  As gently as he could the Otter had tried to make the Mole understand that the practical Rat had little interest in something as frivolous as mere festivity, especially at a time when winter storms caused trees to fall and the River to rise, which made it a busy and dangerous season for one whose task in life was to see that the River Bank stayed safe and manageable for those who lived along it.

  “You might see him along the Bank somewhere,” explained the Otter, “and you might even get a wave from him, but that’s all. Don’t make the mistake of thinking he’s idling, for he’s hard at work communing with the River. She can rise to her limits in minutes, and if there’s nobody about to open the sluices into the canal — and Ratty’s the only one who knows exactly how and when to do that — then we’d all be flooded, at goodness knows what cost to life, and limb, and property! Why do you think there’ve been no serious floods since Ratty took control of such matters?”

  “O my!” the Mole had said abashed. “I had no idea. I shan’t disturb him over Christmas at all then!”

  “Best not, old fellow,” said the Otter.

  “But surely Badger does not have such grave responsibilities, so perhaps you could explain why he was reluctant to commit himself to visiting Mole End?” said the Mole. “I made clear that any time would do —”

  Otter laughed and said, “Badger always goes into retreat when the darker weather comes and rarely puts his nose outside his own front door, let alone inside anyone else’s! He prefers to lose himself in his books and studies till the winter’s passed.”

  “O!” said the Mole, disappointed once again.

  “But surely you might like to come over to Mole End, Otter?” suggested the Mole quietly.

  Otter shook his head.

  “I’ll give it a miss, Moly, old chap, if you don’t mind. I — well, I have work to do,’ said he vaguely, “and I’m not much good at that sort of thing.”

  “O my!” said the Mole very quietly indeed. But he was not ready to give up yet. “But what about Toad? Surely Toad has no good reason to be unsociable at this time of year, has he? So he might like —?”

  “You could always ask him, I suppose,” said the Otter noncommittally, “but — well — he usually has relatives staying up at the Hall and they keep him busy for most of the time.”

  “O! I see,” said the disappointed Mole. “Well then!”

  It was against this disheartening background that the Mole had had his tea with Toad, and it explained the black mood he fell into in the weeks thereafter.

  To think that none of his companions wanted to see him in the days ahead, not one of them! They who had become such good friends in the summer months!

  Now, with only three days to go, he sat listlessly poking at his parlour fire and toying with the cherished baubles and hangings, candleholders and ribbons in the two boxes of Christmas decorations he had brought down from his attic some days before. Till now, he had lacked the will to put them up. Suddenly, his hand happened upon a tin star, its gilt worn with time, its points blunted by use. It had been given to him by his sister, and no Christmas was the same without it.

  “Happy Christmas, dear brother!” she had said so long ago. “Now and for ever!”

  Mole’s eyes filled with tears of fond memory and regret. He held the star to his chest and before long was weeping openly, expressing his utter wretchedness that, once more, he had to spend Christmas alone with nobody to share his simple celebrations.

  Yet the Mole was not one to give in to self-pity for long, or to give up on his dreams. When yet another tear plopped on to the star in his hand it seemed he suddenly saw its light anew He blinked back the tears, and a new look of determination came to his eyes. He stood up and fetched some more kindling for the fire to make sure it was burning as brightly as possible.

  “I will not,” he declared, putting the star in the centre of his mantel, “allow others to spoil my Christmas like this! Really, I will not!”

  Then in a sudden frenzy he put up all his decorations, down to the last broken bauble and torn and tattered angel, accompanying this activity by cries and expostulations such as, “No! I will not have it! I shall enjoy myself! Christmas is for laughter not for tears! This Mole is not for turning!”

  Why, in all his days he had never come across a community that offered such sociable fun during the rest of the year, but suffered from such a malaise during the festive season. It could not possibly be something he had said or done! No, surely there must be some secret about the River Bank and Christmas he did not know.

  “It is most strange!” he told himself a thousandth time as he prepared to retire for the night. “I should feel so much happier if I understood what lies at the root of it all. If I can discover that soon then it might not be too late to do something before Christmas Eve. I shall begin tomorrow by going to the Village Post Office to collect my parcel. I can’t put it off any longer.”

  The parcel contained gifts for his three friends that had been ordered back in October when he still naively thought he would be celebrating Christmas with them. He had received notification some days ago that it was ready for collection.

  “Yes! It will do me good to get out. I shall set off first thing in the morning. What is more,” he told himself when he was finally in bed, “I shall take the opportunity to call upon Otter again. No doubt he will tell me that I shouldn’t bother with presents at all, but that will give me the opportunity of finding out what I need to know if I am to make an assault upon the River Bank’s collective gloom. I shall go and consult him on this matter on my return from the Village tomorrow afternoon!”

  Feeling much more cheerful and determined, the Mole blew out his candle and settled his head on his comfortable, familiar pillow.

  Dawn brought a worsening in the weather, with storms in the offing, but the revitalised Mole cheerfully readied himself for his journey. Seeing that the fields by the River looked very muddy and close to flooding, he took the drier route, which brought him out on the road a little above the grand entrance to Toad Hall.

  As he climbed over the stile and stood contemplating his journey west to the Village, he heard the sound of a horse and cart behind him. The approaching vehicle was clean and freshly tainted green, with yellow lettering. It was one of those sturdy, well-made carts the better class of victualler use to supply and deliver their produce to the better class of customer.

  On its side the Mole read the bold words “W Baltry, Sole Proprietor, Lathbury and District: Game, Poultry and Quality Smoked Meats”. The driver was a bewhiskered gentleman of late middle age and from the cut of his attire and his air of confidence, the Mole guessed that he might be Mr Baltry himself.

  “Good morning, sir. My name is Mr Mole of Mole End and I am most happy to offer you festive best wishes,” said the Mole cheerfully. “Are you by any chance on your way to the Village?”

  “Indeed I am. Yer can take a ride with me if yer’ve a mind to’t, with the compliments of the season!” he said, making room for the Mole on the seat beside him. “Baltry’s the name and poultry’s the game.”

  Mr Baltry was transporting Christmas fare: one large plucked goose, a splendid haunch of venison and a side of pork. In addition, there were two cages of
scraggy chickens, three dead rabbits and some appetising pies.

  “I’ve to call in at t’ Hall first, though, to drop off the goose and venison. And I’ve a feeling that Mrs Ffleshe will take a fancy to the pork.”

  “Mrs Flesh?” repeated the Mole, momentarily puzzled.

  “Beggin’ yer pardon, sir, but it’s pronounced ‘Ffleshe’ with two ‘f’s’ and not ‘Flesh’ as in meat — she’s inclined to be very particular on that point — as she is on just about everything else!”

  He added this last in a low voice, rolling his eyes skywards.

  “No doubt Mrs Ffleshe is the temporary housekeeper?” said the Mole, thinking it quite likely that Toad’s regular housekeeper might have taken a holiday, which necessitated his employing a substitute to help entertain the relatives to whom the Otter had referred.

  “‘Er an ‘ousekeeper?” cried Mr Baltry, turning the cart into Toad’s gravelled drive. “Why she’d ‘ave yer guts fer garters if she caught you sayin’ that. I don’t know exactly ‘oo she is in relative terms, but I do know she might as well be ‘is mother-in-law, fer the way she carries on.

  “I don’t believe he would ever get married,” declared the Mole jocularly.

  “I don’t believe ‘e would!” said Mr Baltry, laughing heartily. “‘Specially not if it brings the likes of ‘er to ‘earth and ‘ome.”

  “How did it happen, then?” enquired the Mole.

  Mr Baltry was only too eager to tell him.

  “When Mr Toad Senior died,” he explained, “which he did, just like that, a dozen or more Christmases back, his brother, that’s the present Mr Toad’s uncle, what is known as Groat, ‘oo made ‘is millions in tea plantations in Ceylon and now lives in retirement near Manchester, sent ‘is old nanny along to keep Mr Toad company at Christmas, or that was the reason ‘e gave. The talk in t’ Village was that Nanny Fowle, which was ‘er name, ‘ad spoiled ‘is Christmases for a good few years and ‘is wife said it’s ‘er or me. So Groat palmed ‘er off on Toad, along with ‘er daughter, who is the widow Mrs Ffleshe.