Summer 1934
Hampton Dryden was one of Tom's best decisions. The man was a mechanical genius who kept the estate farm machinery in top condition ever since Tom hired him.
Dryden was re-grinding a valve from one of the tractors as Tom peered over the work bench. Matthew and Kieran stared at the engine cowling leaning against a wall pointing and smiling knowingly at the bird droppings covering the metal.
Tom doffed his hat, wiped the sweat from his forehead and asked, "Will it be done by the morning?"
Dryden smiled at Tom, looked at the boys, "I'll work late me. She'll be as right as rain tomorrow."
Matthew studied Hampton Dryden, "Why is your skin so dark and mine so white Mr. Dryden?"
Tom turned sharply around. "Don't be impolite Matty."
Mr. Dryden just laughed. "Oh that's alright Mr. Branson." He squatted so he could face the boy. "It's because my Da's Irish and my Ma Indian."
Kieran pointed to the engine's cowling, speckled with myriad droppings of bird wastes. "Why do the birds do that there Mr. Dryden?"
Dryden looked up to the rafters of the barn to the nests. "Say good bye to them because their homes are overhead, and tomorrow they'll be gone."
Matthew looked at the mechanic. "How will you get them out?"
Dryden pointed to a net on a long pole leaning against the barn's wall. "I go out at night. Flash a torch into their eyes, then while they're confused and blinded, I net them. Next day, I go far into the pastures and release them. Sometime they come back, but most times they just fly away."
The next morning the tractor was working again just as Dryden had promised. Tom had a meeting in York that he had to attend but gave the twins a spin in the car before he left. He stopped at the equipment barn to help his mechanic store and organize the tools. When finished he turned to Kieran and Matthew. "Well I'm off to York. You two trek back to the house."
"But father, can't we stay a little longer?" Kieran asked.
Matthew looked sad. "Please father?"
"No, Mr. Dryden worked late into last night. He needs his sleep."
Mr. Dryden waved. "It's alright sir. I promised Mrs. Patmore to walk with her into the village to help carry her shopping."
Tom thought a bit. "Well alright then." Tom lifted the boys out of the car. "You go tell your mother, and wait for Mr. Dryden with Mrs. Patmore." As the twins ran off to the house Tom called after them. "And I expect you to be helpful to Mrs. Patmore." He watched the boys a minute longer as their ginger heads bobbed back to the Mansion then turned to Dryden with a couple schillings. "Lady Mary would be angry if she knew, but swing by the candy store. Kieran likes peppermint, and Matthew butterscotch. Take what's left for your trouble."
"No trouble sir, good lads them." Mr. Dryden tipped his hat to Tom.
Later, as they walked through the village the boys helped carry Mrs. Patmore's purchases. The valets had asked her to check on the availability of a few buttons so she went to the haberdashery while Mr. Dryden took Kieran and Matthew to the candy store. When they entered, Mr. Hagar, the proprietor, pulled a long, scowling face at the sight of Dryden. Both boys noticed the tension in the store owner. But they soon turned their focus to the treats in the candy jars.
Mr. Dryden placed the money on the counter.
Scowling, Mr. Hagar spit. "Don't take quid from some half-wog Geordie."
Acting as if he'd endured this before Dryden calmly answered. "It's not mine. It's Mr. Branson's, for his boys, truly." A trace of menace hissed out of Dryden's voice.
Mr. Hagar nodded in the direction of the boys. "I'll take it from one of the little masters but not from some foreigner."
Dryden protested. "I was born here. My brother died at the Somme."
"Well mores the pity you weren't among the dead heroes." Hagar sneered.
Kieran and Matthew witnessed the exchange from in front of the candy jars. Suddenly they lost the taste for the sweets and stood looking back from man to man.
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Later that evening, before dinner, Kieran and Matthew approached Mary as she sat next to Tom in the drawing room before Robert and Cora came down for dinner. "Mother, what's a wog?" Kieran asked.
Mary's eyes widened in horror, Tom stepped around the sofa.
"It's a naughty word." Mary stroked Kier's hair.
"And one you shouldn't use." Tom added. "Where did you hear it?"
"When Mr. Hagar was shouting at Mr. Dryden at the candy store." Matthew finished.
Tom's face reddened in embarrassment, as if he'd been caught stealing a cookie.
Mary was about to complain to him until she saw Tom run his tongue along his upper lip as if he was enjoying a piece of chocolate.
Mary cast a doubtful look at Tom. She then turned to their boys. "Well my little princes, such a word is said to make people with darker skin feel bad, and to make them feel less of a person than you, Sybbie, Geory, me, or your father." Mary whispered.
"And you must promise us that you will never use such a word." Tom added.
"We promise." Kieran and Matthew said as Sybil and George came in to the room to fetch their brothers upstairs.
Later that night the boys hatched a plan, a plan so original that Tom and Mary spoke about it all the rest of their years.
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The next morning Mrs. Hughes knocked on Lady Mary's sitting room door about midday. "I don't wish to trouble you My Lady but Masters Kieran and Matthew are acting very strange this morning."
"How so?" Mary lay the pen down beside the letter she was writing.
"It seems the little men have made their own beds. They washed themselves and have been nice to nanny all morning long, doing everything she asks and often before she asks it." Mrs. Hughes smiled belying the confusion etched into her face.
Mary looked around the room. "That is odd. Have you checked all the vases, sculptures, paintings? It sounds to me like they're trying to get on my good side." Mary frowned, "Perhaps they've broken something?"
Mrs. Hughes shook her head. "I checked my lady, nothing is wrong. There's not so much a toy out of place." Mrs. Hughes shrugged her shoulders and finished. "I just thought you should know."
"I'm glad you told me Mrs. Hughes. And please, not a word to Mama or Papa about this?"
Mrs. Hughes nodded to Mary, "Nor Mr. Branson?"
"Especially Tom," Mary looked away, "I wonder what those little scamps have done now?" Mary turned to Mrs. Hughes. "Oh those two are turning me gray before my time."
"Yes my lady." Elsie Hughes turned and left, smiling and remembering Mary's antics when she was the boy's age and how she drove a younger Elsie Hughes absolutely mad.
Later that evening, as Mary was saying goodnight to Sybbie the little girl told Mary what the boys were after. "They wanted George and I to ask you for them, that if they did extra chores would you take them to the candy store tomorrow?"
The next morning Mary confronted Kieran and Matthew at their breakfasts. "So that's what all of yesterday was about: The made beds, the picked up toys, the attentiveness to nanny? You want me to take you to the candy store?"
"Please mother?" Matthew asked her pleading by staring like Tom stared into her eyes.
Mary stroked Kieran's hair, and took Matthew's hand. "I will. But do not tell your father. He thinks I do not approve of peppermint and butterscotch." She finished by brushing the noses of her boy's. "It'll be our secret?"
As they walked into the village Mary thought the day quite nice. A bright sun burnished the oats and rye into a glinting gold. Had they walked faster the day would have been hot. But the boys kept their hands in their pockets the entire way into the village. At first she failed to notice, yet by the time they approached the candy store Mary was flummoxed beyond words.
At the store, Mary placed a box of chocolates for her and Tom on the counter. Kieran and Matthew moved through the aisles examining other offerings. Just then Kieran pointed to the ceiling. "Mother, what's that?" As Mary and Mr. Hagar looked up they watched as a starling frantically flew around the ceiling. Another bird soon joined it and both flew helter-skelter, chirping madly as the poor creatures searched for escape. Kieran and Matthew laughed at the cartwheels, twists, and acrobatics of the birds.
But the best was yet to come.
Mr. Hagar turned scarlet in embarrassment. Wild birds invading his store! He picked up a broom, wielding it as a lumberman wields his axe. He started batting at the birds. He swung first one way, then the other, sometimes swinging hard, mostly swinging late, and always swinging wild. He aimed anywhere the birds were not. The poor creatures, stuck in a building with no escape whistled in panic as they flapped the air to no avail.
Mr. Hagar swung his broom so near Mary she was forced to duck. He struck a jar of jaw breakers, spilling the balls onto the floor where they rolled under counters, displays, and into ducts. On another try he destroyed a licorice display.
Mary dove again as Mr. Hagar caught a Cadbury's chocolate stack sending bars and posters flying.
Mary screamed. "Mr. Hagar your broom is not working!"
"Beg your pardon milady; they must've got in through the attic. Have them out soon."
"If you still have a store!" Mary ducked again.
"Mother, Mr. Dryden knows how to capture birds." Kieran tugged at Mary's sleeve as she ducked another swing.
"He does?" Mary pulled Kieran down as Mr. Hagar swung again.
She shouted to Mr. Hagar. "I'll call Downton from your phone. Mr. Dryden should be on his way in a few minutes." Mary crawled around the counter.
Soon Dryden was at the store. He looked around the ruin feeling almost sorry for the owner. "Mr. Hagar, we need to shutter the windows, drop the blinds, and out the lights. Make the place as dark as we can."
And as quickly as he arrived Dryden had both starlings in his care.
Mary, could not understand how the boys knew Mr. Dryden could cage the birds so easily until she noticed the expert way they handled the net and pole. She suspected then the twins were more responsible for the disaster than she cared to think about. "Mr. Hagar I should like to volunteer Kieran and Matthew to help with your clean-up."
"Thank you my lady, they'll be well paid in kind." He turned to Mr. Dryden. "I owe you an apology sir, and I'd be grateful if you found it in your heart to forgive me."
Mary turned to her twins to see them both smiling with a look of triumph, the same way Tom smiled when he was right. The same way she smiled when she was vindicated.
That night, as she brushed her hair she paused after recounting the incident at the candy store. "Those two must have captured the birds and released them. I should have known something was afoot when they did the additional chores."
Hands behind his head, staring up at the canopy his grin could have burned a rip into the fabric. "They thought it up on their own; and did you note how they didn't protest a bit when you told them they'd help Hagar clean up?"
"You're quite proud of them aren't you?" Mary sat at the edge of the bed, her back turned to her husband. Tom moved to wrap his arms around her but she shrugged him off. "Mr. Hagar lost quite a bit of money in that lesson your boys taught him." She wanted to say 'Matthew would not hear of such behavior. He would speak to the candy store owner, rationalize the futility of his prejudice,' but realized that Hagar would not have extended a hand to Dryden any sooner. Matthew had his ways, and Tom's his own.
And Tom was the man she loved now.
Tom leaned on his side. "Sometimes justice is messy Mary. I can't teach them any other way but my own: That when you see an injustice don't let it rest, fight it, however you can." He was about to reach for her then sighed, "If you'd like, I'll go to Hagar, and offer compensation. I'm sorry it damaged his store but he learned a lesson from it, and gained a new friend in the process." Tom looked around Mary's shoulder.
She turned her head away from him.
Then he did something he had not done since her first aborted attempt to kiss him all those years ago; he pulled her to him, turned her face to his and kissed her.
She surrendered into his embrace and sighed into his lips. "What am I to do with you?" She smiled.
Tom gazed down into her eyes. "Don't lie: You're proud of them too."
Mary traced his face with her finger. "Of course I am darling. I would have schemed up the same prank as they did, only I would have done it for spite, not justice."
Tom held a finger to her lips. "Shush now. That may have been like the old Mary. But the woman I love is a lot more selfless than that."
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