The Beekeeper's Apprentice - Laurie R. King [130]
They used five cars on the journey, which proved the money behind them. I wrote down the numbers from their plates when I could read them, which was in three cases, and noted carefully the cars and all their drivers. (I doubt that the doctor would have considered the exer-cise less distracting than aorist passives, but I avoided all accidents and do not think I was the cause of anyone else’s.) When I took lunch in a pub before reaching Guildford, the young couple kissing in the front of the roadster pulled out of the parking area three cars behind me. When I stopped for tea on the road to Eastbourne, the old man who had re-placed the couple twenty miles earlier drove past, but the woman in the old Morris, who was walking a (familiar?) bulldog behind the inn, was soon behind me on the road. Her lights drove on past only when I turned into my own road a few miles from Eastbourne. I breathed a sigh of relief that they hadn’t lost me. I wanted them here, to witness my in-nocent behaviour and report it to their boss.
My aunt was—well, she was herself. In the morning I saw that the farm was looking well, thanks to Patrick. He accompanied me on a tour. We greeted the cows, discussed the state of the barn’s roof, ex-amined the new foal that his huge plough mare Vicky had recently borne, and touched upon the possibility of investing in a tractor, which other farms in the area had turned to. I hung over the stable door and watched the beautiful dun colt, with his stubby black tail flapping furiously, nuzzling at his mother in the warm, straw-strewn barn, and knew that I was seeing the end of an era. I said as much to Patrick, but he only grunted, as if to say that he was not about to get sentimental about a horse. He didn’t fool me.
It was the first time in well over a month that I’d worn trousers and waterproof boots, and they felt good. I invited Patrick up to the house for tea, but he, having no great love for my aunt, suggested his own little house instead.
The tea was hot, strong, and sweet, necessary for a cold spring morning. We talked about bills and building, and then suddenly he said, “There was some men in the village, asking about you.” Not much went unnoticed in a village. These were obviously city people we were dealing with, but then I had assumed that.
“Yes? When was that?”
“Three, four week ago.”
“What did they ask?”
“Just about you, where you was from, that kind of thing. And about Mr. Holmes, wanting to know if you was seeing much of him. They asked Tillie, down the inn, you know?” He and Tillie had been seeing each other for some time now, I noted. “She didn’t realise they was askin’ ’til later, though, ’cause it was just a conversation, you see. Wasn’t until she found they’d asked the same questions down the post office that she put the two together, like.”
“Interesting. Thanks for telling me.”
“None of my business, but why aren’t you seeing him anymore? It seems to have hit him bad.”
I looked at his honest face and told him what would have been the truth, had I been telling the truth.
“You know that race horse of Tom Warner’s that he’s so proud of, wants to start a stud farm with?”
“Yes, it’s a fine runner.”
“Would you hitch it up with Vicky to pull a plough?”
It was such a patently foolish question that he looked at me for a minute before answering.
“You’re saying that Mr. Holmes wants you to be a plough horse?”
“And that, right now anyway, I need to run. Nothing wrong with a plough horse. It’s just that if you force a race horse to work along with a plough horse, they’ll both get upset and kick apart the traces. That’s what happened with Holmes and me.”
“He’s a good man. He came and took out a swarm from under Tillie’s eaves last year. Didn’t fuss.” Not fussing was Patrick’s highest accolade. “See if you can hold yourself in