Дорин Тови - The New Boy_INSIDES.indd

153

The New Boy_INSIDES.indd 153

25/05/2006 14:24:56

The New Boy

They used to take her out on Saturday afternoons. At first Marian had to lead her – or perhaps tow her would be a better description, since Annabel wasn’t very cooperative.

But within a few weeks they were returning to say that Annabel had trotted… Annabel had cantered… and once, I regret to say, that Annabel had got down and rolled and Julie had fallen off. I watched sometimes from the window as the procession went by – Annabel marching in dependently ahead now, while Marian walked some way behind.

Annabel was obviously imagining she was a proper horse, and Julie sat her well. There was one occasion, admittedly, when Annabel turned to the right as she was passing her stable and marched in, Julie and all – but Marian went in after them and the next moment Annabel, complete with rider, complacently reappeared.

All in all she was pretty well trained now and we weren’t worrying about her behaviour at the fête at all. What we were concerned with was that she should look well-groomed and have a shining coat; Annabel’s own desire being to roll in the dust and look awful.

I combed her. I brushed her. Not too hard, other wise her coat would come right out, as we were now on the verge of summer.

It wouldn’t look like Annabel without her furry coat. We could start getting it out in earnest when the fête was over.

That was what we thought. I noticed her idly rub bing her back under a branch in her field one day. I must remember to saw that branch off, I told myself. Annabel liked to rub herself while she was thinking, and if we weren’t careful she’d look like a poodle. Then, of course, I forgot about it, until two days later we were putting her in at night and Charles said ‘Good Lord! Look at her back!’ It was typical. A week to go to the fête 154

The New Boy_INSIDES.indd 154

25/05/2006 14:24:56

Doreen Tovey

and Annabel hadn’t just rubbed the hair off in patches; she’d scrubbed herself completely raw. Not, fortunately, where her riding rug went (Annabel is too small for the smallest saddle), but right where the edge of it would come, across her withers; just where it would be particularly noticeable.

‘People will think she’s got mange,’ said Charles despairingly. ‘Honestly, you’d think she’d done it on purpose.’ Perhaps she had, too, knowing Annabel; though to do her justice all animals love to scratch. Anyway, I covered the patches with boracic powder to dry them up, put talcum powder on top of that in the hope that the scent might deter the flies, and thus, having sawn off the branch so she couldn’t do it again, we put her in her field next morning and awaited the inevitable comments.

‘Whass the matter with she then?’ enquired Father Adams, who never misses anything. ‘Whass that smell round here?’

demanded Fred Ferry, turning up almost simultaneously and suspiciously sniffing the air. They shook their heads sadly when I told them. ‘She ’ont be givin’ no old rides,’ they said.

She did though. Her back was perfectly healed by Saturday, and with a tartan car rug on top of her usual one, nobody noticed the hairless bits. Thirty-five donkey rides she gave on this occasion – and I, trudging round with her, was practically on my knees.

That was that obligation over – and now, said Charles, we ought to be thinking about a holiday. He reckoned the fruit and the vegetables were just about right to leave. The nets were doing their stuff and keeping off the birds. By gosh, we were going to have some apples.

We were going to have plenty of tomatoes, too, though the peas weren’t looking so bright. Field mice were getting 155

The New Boy_INSIDES.indd 155

25/05/2006 14:24:56

The New Boy

at them and eating off all the shoots. Eventually – he didn’t like doing it, but we couldn’t let the crop be spoiled like that

– Charles went off to buy some mousetraps. He got them in Woolworths in the nearest town and was much intrigued to see the assistant, when he asked for them, pick them up one by one from the counter and carefully examine them.

‘Are some better than others?’ Charles asked with interest.

‘T’ isn’t that,’ said the assistant. ‘Little perishers of kids are always coming in here and setting the ruddy things. You’d never believe the times they’ve gone off on my fingers.’

Charles reluctantly caught a few of the marauders and then the remaining peas grew too big for mice to bother with and he was able to discard the traps. Seeley caught a few mice, too; he was quicker at it than Solomon, though he had the same capacity for letting them get away. Sheba had been a tremendous mouser in her time, but she didn’t bother with it much now, so we were most intrigued by her behaviour one morning. Seeley had caught a shrew – and, to my relief, had promptly lost it, so I didn’t have to go to the rescue. Sheba sat languidly by, apparently not even looking.

That was for Chil dren; her mousing days were Past; she couldn’t be bothered with such Trivia, her expression implied. I was absolutely amazed, therefore, when Charles came in a while later and said that Sheba, who hadn’t been outside the gate in ages, was out in the lane with Seeley and they were watching for mice side by side. ‘What on earth do you think that’s in aid of?’ I said. ‘He’s probably told her that he keeps losing them,’ said Charles. ‘And she’s got him out there giving him a lesson.’

They were certainly fond of one another. When ever Seeley, returning from one of his expeditions, went running up to 156

The New Boy_INSIDES.indd 156

25/05/2006 14:24:56

Doreen Tovey

her with his ‘Mrr-mrr-mrrr’ of greeting, Sheba would give him a deeper ‘Mrrr-mrr’ back. She was still his Number One pin-up girl, too. Often, when they sat together, he’d give a lick behind her ears like a doting parent tidying a child’s hair, and then he’d look at us most proudly. Not bad, Was She? he was obviously asking.

We learned how much she really meant to him, though, the day I put him in his cage on his own. They’d been going in there together daily for about six weeks without any fuss.

Indeed, it worked so well that Sugar and Spice’s owners had now put up a similar cage for them. That greyhound came to visit so often, they said, they couldn’t stand the strain.

This was one of Sheba’s off-days, however. She didn’t fancy her breakfast. She wanted to sleep on our bed. So we decided to let her stay there and, as it was a sunny day and it seemed a shame to keep him indoors, to put Seeley in the cage on his own. Immediately he was in there he began to howl. ‘Because Sheba isn’t with him,’ I said. ‘When I’ve finished these letters I’ll let him out and keep an eye on him.’ By the time I’d done the letters, however, Seeley had let himself out. Unable to get through the laced-up corners, he climbed the wire and, while clinging to one of the front support poles, had chewed a hole clean through what was supposed to be an unbreakable nylon net. Very intelligently done it was, too, with every thread that mattered chewed in a determinedly straight line.

Now he’d discovered how to do that, I said, we’d have to put the cage up permanently, with a proper wire roof. We didn’t, though. Next day Sheba was her normal self so, pressed for time as usual, I mended the hole with string, put them both in there temporarily, expecting Seeley 157

The New Boy_INSIDES.indd 157

25/05/2006 14:24:57

The New Boy

to chew through the net within min utes – and he just didn’t bother. He simply sunned himself happily there with Sheba, occasionally rolling on the rug or getting up to swat a fly, as if the idea of escape had never entered his head. And now – if, as she often does, Sheba goes into the cage voluntarily (it being sheltered in there and strategically placed to catch the sun), Seeley is usually right behind her. Just as, in bygone days, Solomon would have been.