Free Wish Me Luck by Margaret Dickinson

young WAAF was sitting in his chair.’
    Fleur sat down, balancing her cup carefully. ‘When …’ she began tentatively, thinking that this was as good a time as any to broach the subject of the garden, ‘When did your Arthur … ?’
    The old lady’s face dropped into lines of sadness. ‘Three years ago next month. Very sudden. Heart attack. Out there in the garden.’ She smiled fondly. ‘But it was just the way he’d’ve wanted to go. With a spade in his hand, doing what he loved best.’
    ‘And the … er … um … garden?’
    Mrs Jackson sighed deeply. ‘It makes me so sad to see it like that. Poor Arthur. All his hard work overgrown and so quickly too. Who’d have thought it could’ve gone wild in only three years?’
    ‘Would you mind if I worked on it when I’m off duty? I mean, if you’d rather I didn’t,’ she began, fearing she might have upset the old lady, but Mrs Jackson’s face was alight with joy.
    ‘Oh, my dear, that would be wonderful. Really wonderful.’ Her face clouded. ‘But do you really want to? I mean surely a young lass like you wants to be out enjoying herself. And besides, I mean, do you know much about gardening?’
    Fleur laughed. ‘Born and bred on a farm, Mrs Jackson. What I don’t know already my dad will tell me.’
    The old lady laughed along with her. ‘Well, you won’t have to go very far for a bit of advice, love. Old Harry next door will be only too pleased to help. In fact’ – she smiled – ‘you’ll have a job to stop him.’
    ‘Right then,’ Fleur said jumping up, glad to have something physical to do. With her first duty looming and maybe with Robbie flying with his new crew for the first time, she needed something else to concentrate on. ‘No time like the present.’
    Mrs Jackson’s garden shed in the back yard was cluttered; there was hardly room to step inside it.
    ‘Another job for a rainy day,’ Fleur murmured as she unearthed some rusty gardening tools. There was a sickle but no scythe, and cutting the grass at the front of the cottage and the overgrown kitchen garden would be a long and back-breaking task on her hands and knees.
    ‘Mrs Jackson?’ she said, going back into the house. ‘Do you know anyone who’s got a scythe?’
    The old lady washing up at the deep sink in the small scullery turned in surprise. ‘Whatever do you want a scythe for?’
    ‘To cut all the overgrown grass back and front. If
    I get it dug over there’s still time to plant some vegetables.’
    Mrs Jackson’s eyes were filling with tears. ‘D’you know, when Arthur was alive I never ‘ad to buy vegetables all year round.’
    ‘You’ll have to tell me what he used to grow,’ Fleur said gently. ‘I’m sure he’d be pleased to think we’d got it like it used to be.’
    ‘Oh, he would, he would.’ Mrs Jackson wiped the corner of her eye with the back of her hand and sniffed, but she was smiling through her tears. ‘A scythe, you say? Harry next door might ’ave one or ’ee’d know someone who has.’
    ‘Right then.’ Fleur began to turn away but then paused to ask, ‘What’s his surname, Mrs Jackson? I can hardly call him “Harry”.’
    The old lady chortled. ‘Oh, Harry wouldn’t mind. He’s a one for the pretty lasses.’ Her face fell into sad wrinkles. ‘He’s on his own like me now. His wife, Doris, died two years ago. His name’s Harry Chambers.’
    Fleur went through the front gate and along the lane to the next-door cottage. She walked round to the back and as she turned the corner of the house, she gasped in surprised delight. The layout was the same as Mrs Jackson’s cottage and garden, but there the similarity ended: beyond Harry Chambers’ back yard lay a lovingly tended kitchen garden. But after her initial pleasure, Fleur frowned. If he could do his own garden, why didn’t he help the old lady next door? The way Mrs Jackson had spoken of her neighbour, they were friendly, so why …?
    As she lifted her hand to knock