“Are you as fond of raspberries as all that?  Why didn’t I know?”

“I’m not a bit mad about them, really, but they’re a symbol of Summer.  On a sloshy day in November, as I grope my way through the fog, I say to myself, ‘Courage, the raspberries will soon be ripe.’”

“But that means that summer is half over.  The cuckoo is what I’m listening for all through November.  I heard it in April this year.”

I looked round to see that nobody was within earshot.

“I haven’t heard it yet,” I confessed.  “It wasn’t really so much to see the lobretias as to hear the cuckoo that I came to have tea with you.  I feel just the same about it; it’s the beginning of everything.  And I said to myself, ’Miss Middleton may not have a first-rate show of lobretias, because possibly it is an unfavourable soil for them, or they may not fit in with the colour scheme; but she does know what is essential to a proper garden, and she’ll have a cuckoo.’”

“Yes, we do ourselves very well,” said Miss Middleton confidently.

“Well, I didn’t like to say anything about it before, because I thought it might make you nervous, and so I’ve been talking of other things.  But now that the secret is out, I may say that I am quite ready.”  I stopped and listened intently with my head on one side.

There was an appalling silence.

“I don’t seem to hear it,” I said at last.

“But I haven’t heard it here yet,” Miss Middleton protested.  “It was in Hampshire.  The cuckoos here are always a bit late.  You see, our garden takes a little finding.  It isn’t so well known in—­in Africa, or wherever they come from—­as Hampshire.”

“Yes, but when I’ve come down specially to hear it—­”

“CUCK-oo,” said Miss Middleton suddenly, and looked very innocent.

“There, that was the nightingale, but it’s the cuckoo I really want to hear.”

“I am sorry about it.  If you like, I’ll listen to you while you tell me who you think ought to play for England.  I can’t make it more summery for you than that.  Unless roses are any good?”

“No, don’t bother,” I said in some disappointment; “you’ve done your best.  We can’t all have cuckoos any more than we can all have lobretias.  I must come again in August, when one of the pioneers may have struggled here.  Of course in Hampshire—­”

“CUCK-oo,” said somebody from the apple tree.

“There!” cried Miss Middleton.

“That’s much better,” I said.  “Now make it come from the laburnum, Lieutenant.”

“I’m not doing it, really!” she said.  “At least only the first time.”

“CUCK-oo,” said somebody from the apple tree again.

There was no doubt about it.  I let my deck-chair down a rung and prepared to welcome the summer.

“Now,” I said, “we’re off.”

EPILOGUE