The Cadgers One of the most ramshackle old lorries I
have ever seen turned into the road that goes up to R's farm. It stopped while one of the passengers got down to open the gate. He was a jaunty character with a black hat on the side of his head, a knotted kerchief round his neck and an unbuttoned waistcoat that flapped with his unbuttoned jacket. The cadgers had arrived. A small boy popped his head out of the cabin and grinned at me as the lorry went through the gate. I saw that the back of the lorry was littered with odds and ends, bits of iron, a broken churn, part of a mangle and a wicker basket. The man left the gate open and scrambled up over the tailboard. A little later they came back along the road. I saw that they had persuaded R to part with a horse-collar and a broken plough. The man in the black hat greeted me as the lorry went on its way. He winked too, and I had a feeling that he guessed that I knew his kind and their wheedling talk. When the lorry turned the corner and went out of sight, he was standing up sorting rags in the -wicker hamper. They had left old R's gate open, I discovered, but I was not surprised.
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