ODOUR OF CHRYSANTHEMUMS
I
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THE small locomotive engine, Number 4, came
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clanking, stumbling down from Selston with
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seven full waggons. It appeared round the corner
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with loud threats of speed, but the colt that it
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startled from among the gorse, which still flickered
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indistinctly in the raw afternoon, outdistanced it
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at a canter. A woman, walking up the railway line
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to Underwood, drew back into the hedge, held her
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basket aside, and watched the footplate of the
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engine advancing. The trucks thumped heavily
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past, one by one, with slow inevitable movement,
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as she stood insignificantly trapped between the
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jolting black waggons and the hedge; then they
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curved away towards the coppice where the withered
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oak leaves dropped noiselessly, while the birds,
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pulling at the scarlet hips beside the track, made off
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into the dusk that had already crept into the spinney.
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In the open, the smoke from the engine sank and
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cleaved to the rough grass. The fields were dreary
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and forsaken, and in the marshy strip that led to
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the whimsey*, a reedy pit-pond, the fowls had
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already abandoned their run among the alders, to
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roost in the tarred fowl-house. The pit-bank loomed
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up beyond the pond, flames like red sores licking its
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ashy sides, in the afternoon's stagnant light. Just
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beyond rose the tapering chimneys and the clumsy
