Ross Raisin - Gods Own Country

It is. Sour-faced bastard. I meant it funny, but she didn’t laugh. She hadn’t remembered. We quieted again.

The sky was getting dark, clouds clenching together further down the valley, deciding which way to go. Hmm, shall we druft off over the tops there, or shall we go to Marsdyke’s and piss it down? I sped up some. I was itching for a gleg across at her, to get a look at her face, but we were too close so I looked down at her feet instead, bugger knows why, they were only feet. We were stepping together, I marked. Our legs moving forward same time, like we hadn’t four legs but two between us.

It’s going to rain, isn’t it?

It is, yes. Best be quick about it, I said, as I unsnecked the back gate and shunted it open, following behind her after she’d gone through. Her backside was hid underneath the jumper. There were splatters of mud up the back of her jeans.

He’s through this way, I said, and I took her into the yard, keeping clear of the kitchen. There were marbles of sheep shite everywhere.

In here.

There was only one bulb in the stable, hung over the door, and I couldn’t see where the pup was through the dingy light. We stood a moment, still as stones, until he poked his nose out the straw, here I am, Marsdyke, selling me too are you?

She picked him up. Hello, little man, hello there. He looked like a bagpipe, with his belly bulging through her hands and his legs all angles.

What’s his name?

Not got one. He’s the runt.

She didn’t like me saying that, I could tell. She moved off, other side the stable with him, to where a weak shaft of light jabbed through two bricks missing out the wall, bouncing him up and down, babbling into his big sock ears. You’re not the runt, are you, baby? No, you aren’t, are you? And he wasn’t and all, the runt had gone first, I didn’t know why I told her that.

You can name him, if you like, I said. But I couldn’t have said it loud enough, for she didn’t answer, else she was blanking me. I watched as she moved next the hole and the light showed her face, pale, soft, the hair pulled back, tucked behind her ear. The clasp had shut up now, minding his own business, smiling away.

She looked toward me. Is he for sale? I saw the sign.

No, he’s not, I said. Father should’ve took it down by now. The others are sold already. Outdoors, it was shuttering down, I didn’t know how long since, I’d not marked the start. He’s not the best of them anyhow, I said. There was another I’d named, was bonnier than this.

She set the pup down. Why did you sell it, then?

The pup bounded over to me and went at biting my boots — great lumping articles with balloon toecaps, like a pair of clown’s shoes.

I didn’t. Father sold her.

You should’ve told him you wanted to keep her, she said, staring right at me.

I did.

I looked away, out the door, at the fields misting up with rain. He was still out there, Father. I couldn’t hear him, but I knew he was there, clagging wet. Rain! Fuck rain. We made of sugar, eh? He’d be out there until the sheep were penned before he came indoors, not bothering to change his clothes, and sit down by the fire, steaming like a plate of spuds.

You don’t like your dad, do you?

That froze me up. I didn’t know what she was saying that for — I’d never talked about Father or anything like that before, not to anyone, except for doctors. I made like I’d not heard her, the words drenched out by the rain. I just gawped out the door.

We had to sell her, I said after a while. I turned and looked at her. She was knelt stroking the pup, a patch of light in her hair. You don’t know how a farm works.

Smart, that was. I hadn’t meant to say it, but it was out now, the words spinning toward her, into her head, there was no getting them back. She stood up, and I thought she was going to walk off into the rain, but she kept still and looked at me. Who did you sell her to?

New people, I said, for I didn’t want to tell her it was towns, and nettle her even more. From the city, in these red, puffed up coats. I thought she’d say, oh, which was it, was it Jim and Jilly? or something like.

Snobs, she said instead, making a study of her feet.

The pup had scurried back into the straw to hide himself, a scratching, rustling sound coming from underneath, and one portion of the bedding quivering from his movements.

I know what you’re thinking, she said.

That wasn’t so likely. I hoped not anyhow. I was thinking what a queer, bonny article she was.

You’re thinking, I’m a snob too. And I am, I guess, but the people round here, they…She stopped there, so I didn’t know what she meant, all I knew was I’d stoked her up and now I hadn’t a clue what she was saying all this for.

We could get her back, you know, she said.

Eh?

Your dog. Steal her.

I didn’t rightly know what she meant at first — Sal was gone now, there was no finding her, she was off with the giant tomatoes someplace, carrying slippers.

Look, I should get home. Mum’ll think I’ve drowned. I’m not kidding, though. You should think about it.

We walked through the far side of the yard, and I opened the gate for her.

See you later, she said, and ran off down the field with her jumper pulled over the back of her head, slipping once further down and almost falling over, then carrying on at a jog until I lost her in the mist. Groups of sheep were clotted together against the inside of the pen, piss-wet through. I wasn’t worrying about them, mind, they weren’t made of sugar neither, and I had better things to think over. I turned for home, a great daft smile on my chops. I’d not dreamt all that up, I could be sure. I didn’t need my old charver the hair clasp to tell me that was real.

The mud lasted out the week. Our fields, which had a cold, dry crunch previous the rain, were turned to soft, slimy blutherment, keeping the sheep to their pen and Father to the yard, stalking round kicking at a bucket. After a couple of days, and more rain, he said the weather had beat him, and he made me help get the barn fettled up with a bedding of straw and troughs of water and feed. He was riled, having to do that. He usually waited a while yet before housing them up, until it was biting cold and every final patch of grass was grazed up. It’d cost him, he said, housing this early, before tupping week had even come. That was why I kept other side the barn from him, and why the yard bucket didn’t sit straight on its arse any more without keeling over.

It was lucky that next time I saw her, Father wasn’t about. It was lucky, too, I wasn’t curled up on the rock like a babby — I was in the tractor, off down the track to fetch the sign. She was on one of her walks. She asked me if I’d thought more about getting Sal back. I thought she’d have forgot about that, but I told her I had, I’d give it a try, no matter I couldn’t see we had chance of doing it. Don’t worry. Leave it with me. Let’s meet here at four o’clock tomorrow. Then she had to be getting off, like always.

I went up to the stable after I’d got the sign. Well, little feller, you ready to be a snob, are you? I said quiet to the pup. He was pressed into a snug he’d made in the straw, tearing at a plastic bone with sharp, new teeth. A champion slipper-carrier, I thought, laughing, even though I had something of an ill feeling about the affair. Not much, just a griming, though it clung over the hubble-shoo I felt for getting Sal back, and stealing from towns, and seeing her again.

The sky was glistening like a mighty slab of steel as I watched her coming up the track, bright enough the ramblers needed their sunglasses.

All right? I said, when she got nearer and I could see her smiling. Fine day, eh? She didn’t hear me, I said it too early.