"Harm Me Not"

"The Star" Johannesburg Tuesday August 11th 1959 "Readers' views"
"The highveld needs the right trees"

Excerpt of letter to the editor written by B Powrie - Florida

"In parks and open spaces in Portugal this inscription is displayed:

"Ye who would pass by and raise your hand against me,
hearken ere ye harm me.
"I am the heat of your hearths on the cold winter nights,
the friendly shade screening you from the summer sun;
and my fruits are refreshing draughts quenching your thirst as you journey on.
"I am the beam that holds your house,
the board of your table,
the bed on which you lie,
the timber that builds your boat.
"I am the handle of your hoe,
the door of your homestead,
the wood of your cradle
and the shell of your coffin.
"I am the gift of God and the friend of man.
"Ye who pass by listen to my prayer - harm me not."

Letters To The Editor

Mom enjoyed debate and she used to say to me "The Pen is Mightier than the Sword."

Some of the titles of her printed Letters to the Editor with her "Nom de Plume" when used:

Commercial Broadcasts "Present at Meeting"
The Paradox of the Easter celebrations remains a source of wonder
This time cuckoo made a mistake
Prefers half-clean milk to pasteurized milk "Not Don Quixote"
There is no excuse for drinking "Let's Face It"
("When I signed myself "Ex-smoker and Drinker" I find it strange the printed letter should be signed "Let's Face It"" she commented)
Fireworks on Union Day suggested "Pro Patria"
The Butcher Bird is an accomplished mimic
Keeping warm
Invitation to wholesome entertainment "Clean Fun"
The segregation of non-smokers in cinemas suggested "Also Non-Smoker"
("My face was rather red over the "Also Non-Smoker" one because they printed Florida, where we only have one cinema! I went and apologised to him, because I signed "West Rand" the pertinent paragraph "I asked if he (the local cinema manager) would not be the one to lead the way, but his reply was: "I'm no leader, ma'am." Why not one of the more courageous cinema managers try it out?"")
Spray early and save the lives of the polinators
The highveld needs the right trees
('This letter had very interesting results, a Headmaster of one of the Johannesburg (I did not catch the name) schools phoned to say he would use the poem in his remarks at a tree planting ceremony to be held at the school that afternoon. I wrote and told Mr Baker (Richard St Barbe Baker) about it and we have corresponded, on and off, ever since." - poem "Harm Me Not" in another entry)
Children taught that Bible is ridiculous
Feeling inferior? - climb a tree
A fat housewife's dream of how to lose 20lb "Plump"
The pigeon could not get a drink
Woodman, spare those trees "Disgruntled"
"Horrible" from passenger's point of view "Pro Right Hand"
A repulsive habit "Onlooker"
(About smoking in the cinema)
Anticipating Spring
Man was given dominion over the animal kingdom "Grateful"
Honouring the aged "Disgusted"
They Planted Trees and Down Came the Rain
Trees Benefit Us in a Hundred Ways
If the story of Adam is not true, why was there a need of a Christ? "Veritas"
The "freaks of nature" are not forerunners "Veritas"
Pushing Sahara Back also Our Responsibility

Some of her comments written aside cuttings and copies:
"The "Religion" Editor of the "Star" is very sticky and seems to deliberately block any effort to introduce any "Mormon" doctrine into my letters, he just cuts those bits out"
"I objected to the Editor's remark at the end of my letter, so wrote the second one... he phoned me about it and we agreed to leave things as they were."
"I must admit that it is probably just as well that the Editor does eliminate much of what I write or I would most likely have been lynched or sent int "90 days detention" many times!"
"Oh, well, we all make mistakes!"
"I wrote to Mr Wood of Evolution Protest Movement and received some very interesting literature from him - very close to Mormon Doctrine."
"I wonder now why I never rose to this bait?"
"Round about this time someone had written in complaining about the way in which the Editorial Staff cut letters to pieces, printed "This letter has been shortened" or just rejected them without any explanation, so I guess the Star decided to show people why their letters were rejected! (There is her letter with the pencilled editorial comments stuck in the scrapbook) I "got the message". Maybe someday I will make time to rewrite this and see if I can make it acceptable. What is extraordinary is... I thought I had sent (original copy) in to "The Star"! I must have posted rough copy by mistake - or what?"

Loyal and firm in her opinions and causes was my mother!

Another Prize for Her Letter To The Editor

Mom received a prize for her letter letter titled "Bridey Murphy" published 23rd August 1956.
"The prize for this letter was 10/6 (R1.05) but my letter was hopelessly cut and actually altered... this is why I now keep a carbon copy of original letters." she wrote.

"Abolish Homework"

Mom wrote a fiery Letter to the Editor of the Outspan endorsing the sentiments of an article called "Away with Homework". Her letter was one of the guinea letters published in August 1951.

Some quotes from "Abolish Homework":

"Any reasonably intellingent adult, knowing how exhausting a full day's work at the office is, will be able to appreciate that our older children are expected, not only to work for an almost equal number of hours, but to absorb and memorise new knowledge during these hours.

"The child's young brain, like a baby's young muscles, needs plenty of rest and relaxation between short periods of learning and effort...

"After all, how many adults can remember what they learned in school, other than those things which have remained in daily or, at any rate, fairly frequent usage?"

Of her winning letter she wrote "I received this very pleasant surprise when I was in the Nursing Home just after Jane was born. I promptly wrote a lettle poem "Jane Elizabeth" and sent it off to the Outspan but it was rejected...

"Unfortunately I did not win a second guinea with my second letter (which was also published) "School Chaff" (continuing the debate about abolishing homework.)"

The final paragraph of "School Chaff":

"With the present amount of drudgery it's hardly worth being young even once, is it? None regrets a care-free, healthy childhood."

"The Enchanted Poplars"

P Powrie - 1964

Foreword -
Many years ago, when I was nineteen, a 'boy-friend' (Peter) and I went for a lovely ramble up on the hills above Rondebosch, Cape Town, in a very old poplar plantation.

After arriving back at his home in Newlands and after supper, he threw himself down on his back on a large couch, closed his eyes, held out his hand to me and said "Tell me a story." So I sat down on the edge of the couch, held his hand and told him this story of the poplar wood and the ruins of the old house we had discovered somewhere in it. (This story was finally finished off in the 1970's and called "The Enchanted Poplars")

As I look back over the young years of my life I remember many occasions upon which friends would gather around me and say "Tell us a story" - I suppose in those days, there was no radio, TV and not as many books, or toys or places to go, so we had to amuse ourselves in other ways and "story-telling" was one of those ways. We sometimes told stories which were told by all present. One would start on a theme, talk for a few minutes and then say "now you carry on" and the next person would take over and continue the story until they decided to pass it on to the next person. This way nobody ever knew how the story was going to change or end and it was great fun. We should have one of these parties again sometime.

But many wonderful tales of secret passages, treasures and excitements would be told to a rapt audience! As a matter of fact, a fact that I had forgotten, I was always seeking and knocking on the walls of our fairly old house "Bronta" in Tamboerskloof, Cape Town, because I was sure that there must be a secret passage somewhere, as this is South Africa and not England, and our 'old' houses are many generations younger than the old English mansions!

Later, in the middle 'teen' years, a group of three to five of us girls used to get together and dress up in my marvellous collection of clothes, garnered from those thrown out by my three older sisters. Cast-off dance dresses. Arts Ball costumes and other clothes. We acted out story after story, from smugglers to four sisters, the youngest of which had been captured by some fabulous tribe who had made her a Priestess of their Temple. After many months of adventure and searching all over the world, just about, we finally located her - only to discover that she had come to so love her position as "Daughter of the Dragon" that she no longer wanted to come home with us!

These plays were always impromptu and no one ever knew how the story would come out in the end and in this case the other three of us were so completely stunned by her response to our rejoicing discovery of her and I remember that we all ended up in tears, begging her to come home with us and her resolutely refusing! Trying to explain to us why now, as a Priestess, she could no longer change her path in life. We were all in tears and a glorious time was had by all!
My wonderful Mother had had one of our cellars whitewashed and turned into a 'den' for us and this was, in turn, anything from a pirate's treasure trove or smuggler's cave to a beautiful 'stately home' just depending upon the present mood of its occupants. I remember another
time when we were all supposed to be in a row-boat and one girl walked forward guiding us, while the others, two or three, walked backwards, rowing for dear life. (Nowadays young ones just seem to flop and watch TV living off other people's imagination!)

I was always dreaming and living in my imagination until eventually my brother-in-law, Don Wessinger said "Why don't you write down all your dreams to share with others?" (because I was always telling them all about my latest experiences) so I started my book, which I couldn't decide whether to call "Jill's House of Dreams" or "Unfinished Castles" - because most of the dreams were unfinished because I was interrupted and had to go to meals, school or something! But over the many years, various odd episodes were written for inclusion in the book and I have a box full of poems, stories, articles in various degrees of completion! I wonder, will the total book ever be finished?

Towards the end of the war I married and the years since then have been so full of wife-hood and mother-hood to five children (who have never asked me to tell them a story) that I seldom got a chance to slip away into that trance-like state where dreams become reality, and have contented myself with odd "Letter to the Editor" on many subjects, so far having had about 35 to 40 letters printed, which are gathered, together with the carbon copies of their originals (which don't always agree with the letters printed, in some ways) and in some cases, with the rejection slips from the Editor, all this in several bulging scrap books!

Perhaps one day when my very demanding children are older and off my hands - the eldest is now 19 years old - I will have time to finish "Unfinished Castles" (Written 1964, typed 1979 retyped 1983 - and this retyping 1995 by Judy)


THE ENCHANTED POPLARS

Philippa Dymond (now Powrie) 1937

I went for a walk one day, up into the poplar wood on the mountains above Kenilworth, Cape, on one of those Cape days which can only be described in one way, a magic day. A soft feeling in the air and a myriad insect sounds, with just enough faint breeze every now and then to stir the poplar leaves into a rustle of whispered conversation.

There, somewhere in the heart of the woods - I had searched for it twice since then but have not found it again - I came across the ruins of a cottage. All around the poplars were curiously twisted and bent, as if they had been writhing when suddenly struck still by a magic spell.
I sat down on the carpet of leaves with my back against the trunk of a tree and a dream came to me... it was as if I lived again, as an unseen watcher in a time long passed. This is the dream conjured up from the ruins of an old cottage, which had at one time possibly been a slave dwelling in the copse of poplar trees.

In the old Cape days there lived, in the mountain cottage of a large estate on the slopes of the Wynberg mountains, a father, Sir Bertram and his daughter, the Lady Elizabeth.
Sir Bertram had plans for building a house more suitable to the size of his estate, the cottage having been intended as a temporary dwelling.

As time went by, he became more and more attached to the cottage where his daughter had grown from gawky child into lovely maiden of nineteen.

They had only come out from England a few years previously, to the small cottage, after Sir Bertrams' wife, Lady Julia, had died, to make their home in this new country.

There was, of course, the villain of the story, Sir Bertram's cousin, Charles, who had visited them and now coveted the estate and therefore wished to marry Elizabeth, but both she and her father hated the pompous scheming cousin and whenever he called, Elizabeth would order her horse, Fidelis, and ride away into the wood where, the slaves said, she talked to the trees, telling them her secrets and listening to theirs. For certain it was that she talked to the trees and sure it was that they rustled in answer and as later events seemed to prove, they understood each other.

The next Spring Sir Bertram fell ill, having caught a severe chill. For days he was delirious and then just before he died, he begged Lady Elizabeth never to marry Charles, who had evil blood in him. He begged her, his only child, to keep this lovely estate clear of the wicked influence that Charles would bring and this Lady Elizabeth promised to do.

For five weeks after Sir Bertram's death Charles accepted the old slave woman's statement that her mistress was too ill and distressed to see him but one day he struck the slave with his riding whip and ordered her to fetch her mistress immediately. When Lady Elizabeth entered the room she ordered him to leave at once and never to return again. He threatened her with unpleasant consequences if she did not accept his offer of marriage. Again she refused, repeating her wish that he should leave immediately and he stamped out in a fury.

When he had gone, Elizabeth called for Fidelis and rode away to her friends the trees. She followed her favourite path until she had gone some half-mile from the cottage when suddenly a bird fluttered up almost from under Fidelis' forefeet and he reared and twisted.

Lady Elizabeth, who had been lost in a dream of lonely despair and longing for her father, was taken unawares - and perhaps a little uncaring - for she was thrown. She fell with her back on a stone, breaking her spine and lay dazed for a while. Suddenly she realised what had happened and told Fidelis to go back to his stable, knowing that when he returned riderless, the slaves would come and find her.

As Fidelis turned homewards he must have heard her words of entreaty to the poplars "Oh dear friends, please help me. I can no longer save the estate from Charles because I am dying, but you, he wants to cut you down, to build a great house with courtyards and formal gardens to show how important he is. He wants to desecrate this lovely mountain with his gambling parties and drinking orgies. He will ill-treat his slaves and his animals. He is wicked. Wicked. Oh help me, please help me."

The poplars rustled a fervent promise that they would haunt this man until they drove him away from the estate - they would see that the house was left with not one stone upon another. The Lady Elizabeth thanked them, blessed them, and died.

When the slaves found her they knelt and wept beside her still, beautiful form, while the poplar leaves whispered a sad farewell. No sooner had the slaves lifted her and carried her away than the whispering became a rustling which became louder and louder. The boughs started to toss and writhe. They seemed to come alive, to move more than just their waving boughs.

The fearful slaves sent a messenger to fetch a doctor and the attorney who was Elizabeth's guardian until she became of age, at twenty one.

The following week, the formalities over, Charles arrived to take possession of the estate only to find that the slaves had fled in terror, for, all the week it seemed that the trees drew nearer and nearer, their branches reaching out to touch the very walls of the house.

Charles observed the nearness of the trees with disgust and ordered the slaves he had brought with him to start cutting them down, but in the morning it seemed that although ten trees had been felled there were more than ten in their places and the boughs now slapped against the windows. The slaves were ordered to work harder, their master himself moving amongst them, cracking his whip and threatening them with what would happen if they slacked off but always it seemed that the trees multiplied and grew closer and closer until he felt as if he was suffocating. The fourth day he awoke to find that his slaves had abandoned him and he was alone in this crazy, frenzied poplar wood. His apprehension increased as he noticed that two windows had broken where the boughs had crashed against them and thrust their way into the house and the rustling of the leaves had become so loud that with a touch of hysteria Charles covered his ears and cried out "Be still, be still. What do you want? What are you trying to do?" Suddenly it seemed that he heard their answer to him "Go away from here. Go away from here. You killed our Lady Elizabeth and we shall kill you, kill you."

Charles pulled himself together and shouted "This is nonsense. Utter nonsense, do you hear? Trees don't talk and I won't give up my heritage so easily. You can do your worst but I'll beat you yet. I'll fetch more slaves and workmen. I'll cut you down, every last one of you!"

Muttering to himself Charles hurried to the stables to find that there was but one horse left, Fidelis, whom he saddled and rode to the village where, he thought, he would arrange for workmen to come and clear away the trees the next day.

Meanwhile the story of the strange trees had spread, his slaves had vanished and there were no more available. All he could manage was for a small party of workmen to come the following week and he rode home, through the twilight, in a state of helpless rage.

That night he decided to stay and prove to himself that the trees were ordinary poplars after all, but he was overcome with weariness and slept the sleep of the dead. Next morning he found a great crack in the wall and, as he stared at it with sleep-dazed horror, it widened and the house began to shudder. He dashed outside and saw that where the steps had been, a poplar shoot had pushed its way through a pile of rubble. The sound of a crash made him turn back to the room to see a roof-beam hanging drunkenly where it had broken away from the wall. The house was collapsing right before his very eyes.

He gave a great shout of laughter in which there was more than a hint of madness and screamed "I'll build a new house, you'll see. A great new house - but I'll cut you all down first." Then he hurried to the stable to saddle Fidelis and galloped to the town to arrange storage for his furniture until his great new house was built. The removers came right away and that night Charles slept in the village.

Next day he returned to the house. He had not meant to but it seemed as if a great magnet, stronger than his will, was drawing him back to the scene that was now one of desolation. The roof had completely fallen, the walls were crumbling and he turned to stare at Fidelis, who had remained faithful - but faithful to whom? Could it be that Fidelis had been waiting patiently to avenge his mistress?

Charles gave a terrible cry and turned to run away from the ruins, the twisting trees, the horse and everything that now represented to him his fate at the hand of Lady Elizabeth's avengers, but a force stronger than himself caused him to mount Fidelis, where he sat as if under an hypnotic spell as the horse turned and galloped off along the path which Lady Elizabeth had taken.

Suddenly, as Fidelis reached the place where his mistress had fallen, a bird fluttered up from almost under his forefeet and he reared and twisted. Fidelis stood and gazed for a moment at the still figure on the ground, then turned and, with a drooping head made his tired and hungry way back to the empty stable, stooping now and then to crop the bits of grass along the way.

So the gang of workers found matters when they arrived a couple of days later. A cottage in ruins, a thin hungry horse, still saddled, standing disconsolately in his crumbling stable and then, upon searching and calling they came upon the body of the man who had hired them, lying amongst grotesquely twisted trees, which seemed to whisper softly to each other as the body was carried away.

I awoke from my reverie and, with a sigh, turned my steps homewards.

"What is Judith?"

P Powrie - before 1950

How can I tell you what Judith is? She is everything - anything and everything!

I remember things that she has done in the past - sometimes she was a mouse that ran up peoples legs and tickled their knees and made them scream. Sometimes she was a spider on a silver thread and she's slip down and down and almost into somebody's porridge, but only when that "Somebody" had their hands full and so couldn't do anything about it. By the time they had freed their hands Judith was gone again.

Sometimes Judith was a ripe red apple just out of reach, sometimes, when Ellen was very tired - and knew how to do the sums anyway - Judith was a "Good Fairy" who did Ellen's homework for her, in a lovely neat handwriting.

But what I was really going to tell you now is the story of what happened to Judith one day - or rather, what happened to other people because of Judith, but we don't know what happened to her in the end, because she just does not live here any more.

Ellen had Judith in her pocket, everyone knew that and even when she got out for a little while, got away from herself, if you see what I mean - because Ellen could even hold Judith in her hand in the bathroom and think that she had her safe but still Judith might be in the kitchen tickling Mrs Midge's forehead - and poor Mrs Midge trying to get on with her baking - but because she was in Ellen's pocket everyone felt that Judith wouldn't do anything really dreadful.

At anyrate, it was Sunday and Mrs Baker wandered around asking idly "I wonder who is coming to Church with me?" Ellen, who had her gaze fixed on something outside the window heard her mother's mumble, pulled her gaze in and hopped and skipped away into Sherry's bed and sat looking at her, head slightly to one side, one dark brow charcot.

"What?" asked Sherry "Mummets is asking herself who will be going to Church with her today." answered Ellen.

"Come on, Baby, lets." Sherry smiled up at Ellen and Ellen smiled back "Just what I was going to say." she nodded approvingly.

Ellen is ten. Long-legged, thin and pigtails, if you know what I mean, but with a quaint elf-like face. Sometimes the family called her "Elfin" or "Little Elf". Ellen's eyes are darkly blue and fringed with dark lashes. Large wide-set eyes. Her hair is dark too and her skin lily-fair. She'll be lovely when she grows up. She takes after Mummet's - that's Mrs Baker - but Sherry is like Daddy, red-blond, twinkling golden eyes, a freckled tip-tilted nose and wide smiling mouth. Sherry is already lovely. Ellen adores Sherry, but for that matter, so do many others, but Sherry is "grown-up" well, almost, she is seventeen.

Ellen said "I'll ask the boys." - in an important sort of whisper and all in one movement she was off the bed, out of the room and tapping on the boy's door. The tapping was in code - life meant mystery and adventure to Ellen - and Peter's quiet deep voice bade her enter.

"Peter" she said "Sherry and I want to know if you and Gordon are coming to Church with Mummets and us." He looked so serious as he sat there, in bed, his dark brown hair all rumpled and his attractive, ugly face quietly considering his baby sister. Ellen just loved him, with a sort of lump of love.

"What about Gordon? Shall I wake him?" "If you're brave enough and if you'll give me time to get to the bathroom first." answered Peter. He heaved his long slender length out of the bed and, grabbing his towel, disappeared.

"Oh Gordon, wake up." said Ellen shaking his shoulder. Gordon groaned and snuggled but the violent shaking continued "Come on, wake up." demanded his young sister's voice. He opened an enquiring eye, under a raised eyebrow and examined the cause of his discomfort. The eye closed and Gordon lay collecting his strength for an effort - suddenly it came. He writhed, sat up, grabbed Ellen by the shoulders and, twisting her and lifting her at the same time, landed her across his knee, all in one breath. Ellen looked at him over her shoulder with surprised and wary eyes. "Explain yourself" demanded Gordon. "Church." answered Ellen. They looked at each other in silence for a while and then Gordon said "On one condition: that we leave Judith at home." "Of course." said Ellen. "Of course." Gordon released her and she slithered back to the floor. Gorden's face cracked into a grin - Gordon had a very attractive, jumbled sort of face - and Ellen grinned back and dashed off to get suitably dressed.

Gordon, golden hair, blue eyes, full of fun. Somehow extremely good looking in spite of his 'jumbled' face, sat gazing at nothing (Or was it at the image of Peggy which was imprinted in his memory?) for a while and then, leaping out of bed in a sort of volcanic eruption, he went singing his way to oust Peter from the shower.

Now you have been introduced to the younger members of the family, Peter, 21, Gordon, 19, and the girls - all in bed except for Ellen who simply couldn't wait in the mornings for the others to rise, except Mummets who sometimes beat Ellen to it, it is time for you to meet Mr and Mrs Baker in a more appropriate place, at the breakfast table.

"Andrew are you coming to Church with us today or..." (Mrs Baker appeared to be fully absorbed in buttering her toast) "is one of the fowls ill?" "Now Margaret, you know I'm not like that..." he protested, "I love going to Church but those roses must be sprayed and the ground dug up a little before the sun gets too high."

Mrs Baker looked up in mock indignation and he tried to look back at her with an innocent and honest expression but his tell-tale eyes started to twinkle and then they both burst out laughing. "You humbug." said Mrs Baker and at that moment there was a sound of running feet and Sherry and Ellen happened into the room followed by Peter and Gordon - and where there had been quiet companionship there was suddenly chaos.

...It was during the sermon that it started. Mr Derry, the clergyman suddenly jerked sideways, as one does when one unexpectedly gets a dig in the ribs, but he bravely continued with his sermon. Then he jerked again with a sort of snort and giggle and looked around him in very evident confusion and discomfort.

Gordon turned and looked at Ellen at the very same moment that Ellen turned and looked at Gordon - but Gordon looked with a look of accusation whereas Ellen looked with a look of honest-to-goodness innocence mingled with slight horror and fervent pleading. Sherry "sneezed" into her handkerchief and poor Mrs Baker tried to pretend that she did not belong to the rest of the
party and hadn't noticed anything strange and Peter simply looked bland - and interested in the sermon.

Tremendous self-control on the part of Gordon and Ellen saved the situation on the Baker-Family-Front and even greater self-control - or perhaps, just perhaps, a twinge of conscience and thereafter compassion on the part of Judith! - saved the situation of the Derry-Front and the service ended without further mishap.

No sooner were the young people outside when Gordon grabbed Ellen by the shoulders and demanded "Where is Judith?" and Ellen firmly answered "In my blazer pocket at home." "Then what happened in Church?" 'I don't know. Honestly." Ellen's elfin face really looked comical with concern.

"I'm sure I shall never be able to look Mr Derry in the eye again. I shall always have a horrible guilty feeling." said Mrs Baker. Sherry chuckled and said "We'll give Judith a good spanking just as soon as we get home Mummets darling. I will leave her very chastened, I'm sure."

Peter and Gordon gave a sort of concerted snort but otherwise said nothing.

When they arrived home Ellen flew to fetch Judith and a moment later everyone flew after her as shrieks issued forth from her room. "Judith's gone." she cried "and left this in her place." She showed the family the hole in her blazer pocket by pushing her two fingers through the opening in the pocket.

There was a horrified silence while the clock on the dresser ticked out eight seconds and then Gordon reacted by throwing up his hands in despair. "Heaven help us. We won't be safe for one moment until she is found. Oh gosh, I'm supposed to be going out this afternoon." (Gordon had a very healthy respect for Judith's powers of prank-playing ever since he discovered, just in time, that the carefully wrapped bunch of flowers he was taking to Peggy Anderson, when she was forced to rest after a fall from her horse, had turned to thistles, which he had quickly hidden behind a bush just inside her garden and thus arrived at Peggy's home empty-handed. On his way he retrieved the bouquet in order to show this terrible thing to Ellen, only to find a bunch of rather faded larkspurs and carnations. Yes. Most certainly he respected Judith's powers of black magic!

Yet, sometimes she was sweet, like the time she put a clean handkerchief into Gordon's pocket when Peggy needed to dry her hands after dabbling them in that stream which laughed and chuckled its way through a near-by wood and another time when she had whispered comforting words into his ear when the family dog, Bunter, had been run over and killed by a run-away truck - "But" he thought "Just what is Judith?"

You know this is the whole point of this story. What is - or was - Judith?

Mr and Mrs Baker said that she just existed in Ellen's imagination - but then, why should she feel bad about Mr Derry? Who knows? I don't!

And we never will know because Judith never came home again! Judith simply does not live there anymore.

"The Haunting Hand"

P Powrie - before 1955

It is all very well to say "Never let your right hand know what your left hand is doing" but when it gets the other way around and your left hand simply doesn't know what your right hand is going to do next - and nor do you for that matter, and your right hand is haunting you - its a bit disconcerting, to say the least!

What actually happened was this - and I'll say right now that I don't expect you to believe me, nobody would, except those who saw and felt the things, that is, my mother, my future wife Jo, the maid Nora and myself. Well, as I was saying, what actually happened was this...

Through a very unfortunate motor car accident about eight years ago, when I was in my very youthful and irresponsible 'teens', I had to have my right hand amputated at the wrist. Yes, just a nice clean cut and an artificial hand in its place. And because it was made of plastic, and flesh-coloured and because I had developed the knack of using that hand only with some job for which it was very well fitted, and otherwise making it look somehow too busy to be useless, people often did not realise that it was artificial. A nice wide leather strap with a watch on it, thus also subtly implying that I was left-handed, helped neatly with the deception.

However, all this is almost 'by the way'. My real hand, over which, at the time, I had become very sentimental, I had decently buried in the place which later, I firmly believed, was to be the burial ground of my own ashes. Yes, I was to be cremated, but my hand, no, I couldn't bear even the thought of it, so it was interred to keep the final resting place for my ashes 'warm' for me, so to speak.

All went well - for my real hand that is, and so indirectly for me, until about eighteen months ago, then things seemed to get a bit out of hand, as you might say. For the first time I seriously contemplated going overseas. Now believe me, I had travelled all over the Country, Cape Town, Johannesburg, Durban and even to the "Falls", all these places had had the pleasure of my presence at some time or other, but never before had I left the shores of South Africa, except just to go up the coast to Durban and my hand - the real one that is - which by this time must have been feeling a bit neglected, as for quite long periods I forgot it had ever existed, took exception to my proposed travels and decided to do something about it. (At least, this is what I presume.)

So, as always happens when one has lived in the same home for many years, grows up there in fact, things accumulate - things like old toys, my half hearted collection of stamps, and old and slightly dilapidated pair of dark glasses (of which more later) a rubber snake (What fun I had with this at school.) and so on. As I was saying, things accumulate and these did - in an old cupboard, all jumbled up, the pair of dark glasses aslant on the teddy-bear's nose. Therefore, this cupboard along with the rest of the house, must be cleared up, as, owing to the acute housing shortage, which had persisted for some years and due to the fact that my Mother was coming with me and Jo, too, I firmly decided that the house must be let while we were away.

Well, the plans were laid and the clearing started, when the queer things began happening, 'though it wasn't until I had reached the old toy cupboard to be sure.

We were all there. Mother and Nora in the kitchen adjoining the lobby where the cupboard stood, Mother sorting and listing crockery and cutlery etc, Nora preparing the Sunday lunch, when Jo and I advanced upon the cupboard in question - I quite determined to be unsentimental and discard indifferently all those souvenirs of my happy childhood and foolish adolescence.

Jo sat on the lobby table, swinging her legs and I opened the cupboard and stared in slight dismay at the seemingly formidable task before me. Well, staring wouldn't get the job done, so I pulled the first object out, causing a slight collapse of the rest, and grinned at it.

"Mother," I said "look what's come to light, my old skates and there's still some blood on the one from the time I tripped over a stone and shot head-first into old Mrs Warren's fence and tore my leg on a rusty nail. There, you see Jo? I was so annoyed I allowed the blood to run down over my shoes and the skate while I stood and gazed at it swearingly - 'though silently as Mrs Warren had Rev Williams enjoying the beauty of her petunias or something just the other side of the fence.

"Good heavens! What's that!" I exclaimed as the rubber snake hurled itself out of the cupboard to Jo's feet, or at least onto the floor beneath them.

Jo screamed and Mother and Nora dashed to the interleading doorway the door of which, for convenience sake, had long since been removed from its frame and had, if I remember correctly, been used for firewood in the days when we had had a coal range instead of an electric one in the kitchen. It used to get horribly hot in Summer 'though in winter it was wonderful.

We all gazed at the snake in utter amazement and then it gave another wriggle.

Jo screamed once again and climbed right onto the table. Mother reached it and grabbled the big frying pan from its hook and I turned and grabbed my old and very worn cricket bat from the cupboard, thus causing another subsidence, while Nora clasped her hands, rolling her eyes and moaned to God to have mercy on us poor sinners.

Then of course I laughed and said "What nonsense, that's a rubber snake. Old Jack-in-the-box must have shot it out and there's probably a very natural explanation for that last wriggle - perhaps its been bent skew and the rubber just moved back to normal."

Jo sighed and relaxed, Mother lowered the pan, as I did the bat, and Nora turned shakily back to her lunch preparations.

Jo laughed, 'though she stayed up on the table, and said "Well, what's the next surprise you have for us?"

I turned to the cupboard and stood staring. The dark glasses lifted slowly and deliberately off Teddy's nose, floated gently through the air making a half-turn and then, while I stood transfixed, fastened themselves on my nose and hooked behind my ears. The feeling of it was familiar and I frowned, remembering of course, that those glasses were hooked on exactly the way they or any others had been hooked on by my real right hand when my left hand was too busy, as it usually was.

Haunting me - that's what it was - I was being haunted by my own right hand!

I returned to Jo and saw that she was as white as a sheet, staring at me with a mixed expression of stark terror and horror, then I pulled myself together and laughing said "My dear, don't be frightened, it's just that I have the use of my real right hand again. As you know, it is said that hands have an intelligence of their own or musicians, sculptors and artists could never do the things that they do."

Jo shook her head, tears coming into her dear eyes and said in a very trembling voice "I don't like it. It must be some conjuring trick of yours, but I'm scared. I'm going home."

She looked down in horror at the snake and seemed unable to move. I thought quickly.

Something must be done. It was my hand, therefore it must obey me I thought fiercely.

"Move back into the cupboard at once! Do it!" The snake promptly slithered across the floor in a very life-like manner - I had been clever at it I remember - and into the cupboard.

Mother stepped back in alarm and Jo, being given hidden strength, positively leapt off the table and dashed down the passage, thumped down the stairs, three at a time it sounded like, and then the front door banged.

I turned helplessly to Mother (Nora had vanished into the pantry, closed the door on herself and was saying all the prayers she could think of) and suddenly Mother and I burst out laughing and my ghost hand, insulted, started hurling everything out of the cupboard.

Out they came - Hornby train, teddy bear, stamp album, tops, a bag of marbles - which hit me on the shin. Everything. Mother and I were too overcome to do anything save laugh even louder.

The dark glasses were snatched off my nose and crashed onto the floor in a most positive fury.

There was only one thing to be done. I phoned the undertaker and told him to disinter the small box containing the hand and have it cremated as soon as possible.

The hand raved, jerked out my tie, pulled my hair, tried to ruin my artificial hand and, finding that beyond it's strength, vanished, metaphorically speaking.

The next day the remains of my poor hand were cremated and two weeks later we left for England, even Jo, as my new wife.

I pushed everything back into the cupboard, even the lensless glasses, put a stout padlock on it and told the Mulders (who were renting the house) to pretend it did not exist.

And so it stands today, 'though we are back from our trip and Jo and I are expecting our baby shortly. If it's a boy, I am determined that he shall have the key to the cupboard as soon as he is old enough to unlock the padlock.