It was a lovely cottage. Bowered deep in the Sussex weald. Deeply thatched and sunk into the rich earth and surrounded by foxes and badgers and rabbits and bats and adders and stoats and pigeons and swallows whose ancestors for a thousand generations had cavorted by night and day in the roses and cabbages and mud walls and straw roof of the little house. And down the generations the people who lived in the house too had shared a lot of DNA.
They were agricultural workers. Descendants of those who perhaps had not moved on to the cities or off to foreign lands because they had a good roof over their heads. They stayed and worked the land until they were no longer needed. Then the house was sold and fetched a fortune and that had every body at the Rose and Crown talking and soon all the little houses were selling for king's ransoms to BBC producers and London barristers because it was just forty five minutes on the train to London.
A chic couple had moved in. They were interior decorators and much in demand. They were very kind to the old house. Really they ruined very little though of course a master suite was a necessity. And proper heating and decent wiring and the kitchen!! Still they did a fair job and got a feature in a Sunday supplement.
Larry took care of the house. Barry loved the garden. He soon found out that some of the roses were spectacularly ancient.
He felt sure that all those long ago people had a natural sense of grace and beauty to have created such a lovely house and garden. Larry just laughed.
``They did what they could with what they had,'' he said.
But Barry looked at the roses tumbling under the cottage windows and in the hedge row, he looked at the lovely contrasts of fox glove and feverfew and valerian in the crowded flower beds and he knew that such elegance could only come from the hands of artists.
It was the people from California who put him right. They came on a Rose Tour of England. They came with books.
``These herbs,'' the leader said, ``pennyroyal to bring on a miscarriage, feverfew for head aches fox glove for cardiac insufficiency and valerian as a sedative...Note these roses under the windows,'' the leader said, ``these were bred to climb the walls and prevent break ins.''
Break ins?
``And along the hedgerow you'll see small red roses with a carnation look. Those are imports. German fence roses. Lots of thorns to keep people out - and livestock in...''
When they were gone Larry and Barry sat outside among the roses with a bottle of Merlot.
``I see it now,'' said Barry, ``an Englishman's house was his castle and had to be defended.''
``They did what they could with what they had,'' said Larry.