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| Botero, The Garners' Club, 1997 |
Mrs Garcia, from no 6 Seaview Crescent, grows roses
that win rosettes at the annual fair. Only this year she came second.
Vivid reds, soft pink hues, delicate yellows and tiny white blossoms.
Even one speckled with dashes of burgundy.
She gave one to each of the ladies in her gardening group.
Except Gladys Winthrope.
Mavis Bridport lives alone in a bungalow at no 1.
She doesn't like roses and much prefers forget-me-nots.
A far more amicable flower than the rose. Without thorns, you see.
Now Gladys Winthrope, from nearby no 3. Well! She can grow anything.
Unlike poor Agnes Smithson and her dahlias. The less said
the better. She won't be winning a rosette any time soon.
Agnes doesn't very much like gardening,
but there isn't a lot else going on in Seaview Crescent.
She tries but the soil is not very forgiving and her knees less so,
her feeble attempts are the talk of the street.
Especially that nosy Jane Harlow, always poking
around her neighbours' gardens with a rake and fork.
Gladys has a secret. Farmer Downing brings her manure
when he stops by for tea and biscuits. And a tumble.
The others call it her magic touch. And it is, in a way,
she thinks with a smirk. She's not going to tell them otherwise.
Mrs Garcia, her rival in the rose competition, puts it down to luck.
And it would have stayed that way...
Until Miss Harlow started poking around Gladys' roses.
She tried to stop her, of course, but Jane had already spotted
the manure. And she told the others over coffee.
My! What a stir it caused. Poor Agnes spilt tea
down the front of her pretty blue dress.
Mavis said Gladys should return her rosette immediately.
It was Mrs Garcia who asked the question.
Who's giving Gladys her fertiliser? It wasn't difficult to work out.
Not many farms near Seaview Crescent. Mavis wasn't at all impressed.
She'd asked Farmer Downing but found him a grumpy so-and-so.
Agnes had even offered him her famous apple pie.
And so Gladys' secret (or two) was no more.
© the dishonest woman
