I Capture the Castle

by Dodie Smith

The bedstead was there when we first came — a double one, rather fancy, now a mass of rusty iron. Father meant to have it moved but when he saw it with the cow-parsley growing through it, stretching up to the light, he took a fancy to it. Rose and I found it useful to sit on — mother was always complaining because our white knickers got marked with rust rings from its spirals. “It’s pure Surrealist,” said Simon, laughing. “I can never understand why there are so many derelict iron bedsteads lying about in the country.” I said it was probably because they last so long, while other rubbish just moulders away. “What a logical girl you are — I could never have worked that out.”