Free (11/13) Celebrations at Thrush Green by Miss Read

adventure. There had been some preliminary correspondence with the Dr Maurice, already in Africa, mentioned in Nathaniel's first letter, and who was obviously about to welcome the young man on his arrival.
    Oliver Lovelock's account gave something of Octavius's background. His wealth came from the Lancashire cotton industry. The fact that earlier generations in his family had thrived at the expense of slave labour in the cotton fields of America seemed to weigh heavily upon the clergyman's conscience. Was this one of the reasons, wondered Charles and Harold, which prompted his compassion and generosity to his contemporaries?
    As a young man he had travelled extensively, mainly in Europe, visiting various capitals rather in the manner of earlier travellers undertaking the Grand Tour. Russia in the days of the Tsar had much impressed the young man, and he evidently gave a lecture on the subject later in Lulling, according to Oliver Lovelock's biography.
    After being ordained he spent some time in the poorer parts of London, taking great interest in the children, and in his early thirties he was given the living of Thrush Green, where he was to spend the rest of his life.
    Charles Henstock's comment was typical. As a home-loving man himself, he told Harold that Octavius must have felt as if he had found a safe haven after so many trips abroad.
    But Harold wondered if such a lively mind as Octavius's ever looked back upon his adventures with nostalgia. Would he ever have secret regrets for the life he had given up? On the other hand, Harold reminded himself, he, too, had travelled widely but had not regretted, for one instant, his decision to settle in the little world of Thrush Green.
    No doubt Charles was right and Octavius was content with his lot. Certainly his diary gave proof of that.

    There was a photocopying machine at the stationer's in Lulling High Street, and Harold used it to make copies of the relevant pages of 'Local Benefactors'.
    On his way back, he called at the Lovelocks' house to return the leaflet and the torch to the ladies.
    He was invited into the drawing-room, and sat among the clutter of occasional tables, armchairs, china cabinets, book cases and even a what-not, and told the three sisters how much he had appreciated their father's account of Octavius and his good works.
    'My father had a great regard for him,' said Bertha. 'Of course, we hardly knew him, as we were in the nursery then. In fact, I doubt if Violet was born. If I remember rightly, Octavius died just before the 1914–18 war.'
    'Quite right,' said Harold.
    'He brought Father a charming little paperknife from St Petersburg. It is still on the desk in his study.'
    'And he gave us a Russian egg,' recalled Ada. 'I wonder what happened to it?'
    'I think I saw it in the loft,' Harold told them, 'with other toys.'
    'One day,' said Bertha, 'we must get someone to clear out that loft for us, and dispose of the contents.'
    She gazed speculatively at Harold. He saw again, in his mind's eye, the stack of iron bedsteads, the heavy trunks crammed with the detritus of years, the decrepit chairs, the hip baths, the towel rails and the floor sprinkled with mouse droppings.
    'I really must be off,' he said rising. 'Thank you again for your help. Your father's notes have been invaluable.'
    Violet escorted him to the front door.
    'What a nice man!' she remarked to her sisters when she returned. 'And he has put a new battery in the torch, too.'
    'We may as well keep it downstairs,' said Ada. 'There's no point in having a new battery in a torch which is going to be kept in the loft.'
    'It would be a wicked waste,' agreed Bertha. 'Put it in the hall, Violet dear; it will save us switching on the electric light.'

    The diary was probably of greater interest to Charles than to Harold, for the good rector was intrigued with the view of Thrush Green and Lulling seen through the eyes of a man doing the same work a century earlier in much the same surroundings.
    He was