Mark has returned, having done some more things to Lucy’s kitchen.
He did not get back until I was just starting to think about going to work, which was a bit of an uncomfortable moment because I had forgotten to get any taxi picnic ready for him. I have been only making one picnic for so long that it went completely out of my head, and I had absent-mindedly made only my own. I had been entirely distracted by listening to Mrs. Gaskell’s Ruth on the talking story thing on my telephone, and pouring and frying a stack of pancakes to feed us for the week to come, all at the same time.
I do not think Mrs. Gaskell went to Cambridge. She seems to have no idea that it is important to include jeopardy in a story and there is not a single murder, carriage chase, since it was a long time ago, or explosion in Ruth so far. Also I am astonished by the ease with which the Victorians were prostrated into pale-faced unconsciousness by their troubles. These fits can last for absolutely ages and ages, whilst doctors come and go, pronouncing that life is about to be extinguished at any moment and prescribing medicines, goodness alone knows what was in them, probably they were just as dodgy as anything Pfizer has produced.
Mary Barton did the same. I do not know how the Victorians managed it. The smallest of troubles can precipitate the heroine into oblivion, necessitating her complete bed-rest until the hero has Mended All.
These days it would be called Working From Home and everybody would secretly know that it was a complete shirk although it is fashionable not to say so.
All the same I like the idea. The idea of being so prostrated by grief that somebody would bring me breakfast in bed for a week rather appeals, especially since it can result from relative trivia. Ruth almost dies after her boyfriend of three months leaves her, today the only reason she might retreat back to bed would be for some peace and quiet to scroll through Tindr to find another one.
Victorian heroines can also be brought to death’s door by getting cold, or wet, which would have meant a good fortnight under the duvet for me after my morning walk today. Fortunately somebody had left a macintosh in the back of my taxi, one of the lightweight kind that scrumples up to fit into a teabag, and when I dug it out it had clearly never been worn, so I put it on.
It worked rather better than I had expected, which is to say, it kept me drier than I would have been without it, I have never had much faith in these garments. I have never owned one because I do not like the horrid scrapy, rustling sound that they make, I do not wish to walk along sounding as if I was crumpling newspaper to light the fire, and the sound of them sets my teeth on edge.
This morning I decided that edgy teeth might be better than sodden underwear, and so I put it on and trudged off up the fell.
I was wearing shorts in order to save my trousers, but even these were sticking wetly to my legs by the time I came down, and little rivulets of water were trickling off them. My hair was plastered to my forehead, and my handkerchief was a sodden rag from my attempts to swab the drips from my nose.
The wretched macintosh was rustling like sweetie-wrappers in a pantomime audience.
You will not be surprised to hear that there were no tourists today. The only other people were my fellow hardened dog walkers. There are a very few of us who meet on our daily treks up and down the Lake District fells, exchanging remarks about the prospects for drying washing, the whereabouts of the Galloways and the tadpoles, and reminding one another to look for the first forget-me-nots or to listen for the dunnock. We nodded at one another with surprise and respect this morning, but barely paused, because it was not the weather for loitering.
I thought I would get everything over and done with before I stopped, so I went to Booths and then brought in the firewood. By the time I had closed the door behind me I was so cold and wet that I was shivering. It took hours before my fingers regained any sensation, and only then after I had lit the fire and devoured a restorative bowl of porridge.
I put the macintosh and my boots to drip over the fire.
I hope they have dried by tomorrow.
