He was wheeling carefully up the land that dwindled to the point where she had stood. He was taking the rise diagonally and half-way up changed direction, unexpectedly facing partly to her. She stepped back flustered, and wrongly imagined the shelter of the hastily accepted thorn bush to be very slight. He paused and seemed to gaze straight at her. She wondered at her foolishness in coming so near the edge. While she hesitated between stopping there or making a dash for the oak he began to labour again and rolled slowly up the bank on his new tack. Then he was at the top, and she saw him coast from view. Nevertheless she stayed on, knowing that he must show again as he travelled to the road. Only when he was safely on the macadam did she climb back to the path. He was still in her thoughts when she reached the dam at the foot of the lake.
Chapter 12
Flo was diffident about mentioning to Bert anything about Dick Goldbourn. There were, indeed, very few chances, Bert staying out nearly every day now. She gathered that it was because of the wild duck in the willows. There were at least fifty pairs, Bert said one dinner-time. Even after dusk Bert stayed out, and many a night Flo never heard him come in. Often in the mornings, too, he was out before she got down. He seemed not to bother about the farm work at all. Clem went on in the same easy way, generally late down, off for two and three hours when he took the milk, and Flo felt sorrier and sorrier for Mr. Nadin who was always busy. Whenever she got chance she slipped out to help him. She stood by the water-trough while Colonel drank after being unharnessed from the cart, and then took him into the stable. She began to feed the calves regularly and took on the feeding of the pigs and the poultry, whose cabin was at the back of the barn away from the road. She was scattering maize for them one evening while Mr. Nadin loaded the red cart from the midden which was a little closer to the lane, when Dick Goldbourn came up and stopped at the open gate. The farmer straightened and asked if he had had any luck. Dick bent and held up by the tail a pike nearly three feet long. The farmer dug his fork in and went to inspect the fish. Flo, wondering where he was going, turned to stare, and saw Dick beckoning. For a moment she ignored the signal, then went towards him. Mr. Nadin was hefting the fish in his right hand.
“What d’you think of that, eh?” asked Dick. “Who said I never caught anything?”
Flo stared at the monster’s blue and silver bars, and at its cruel jaws. It seemed to have died with a snarl and she wondered how he had managed to land it.
“Fishing wasn’t slow when I hooked that, I’ll tell you,” said Dick with a twinkle of pride.
Flo thought how boyish he looked, much younger than when she had been with him before. His front hair had got blown up or pushed up into an absurd tuft suggesting a miniature palm tree.
“I bet he’s put some trout into his guts,” said the farmer. “Twelve pounds, eh?”
“Shouldn’t wonder. I looked out for Bert, but he wasn’t about.”
“Ay, he’s a right old cannibal; Bert’ll be glad.”
“Cannibal?” said Flo.
“Ay, he’s eaten anythin’ he could get, that mon,” said the farmer, putting the pike back on the chair footrest.
After a little talk on the long dry spell they had had Dick turned his chair back to the road. “’E wasna allus like that,” said the farmer as he went back with Flo. “Got sunstroke when he was a youngster an’ it paralysed ’im.”
“I don’t know how he can catch fish like that,” said Flo.
“Surprisin’ what he con do,” said the farmer, stopping with his hand on the fork handle. “Most chaps ’ud be full o’ grumbles if they was like ’im. He’s just lucky, ’e’s got plenty o’ brass, so ’e doesna need ta worry”
“Isn’t it dangerous him going so much by the water?”
“Eh, I dunna know what ’e’d do ’bout fishin’. . . . ’E gets stuck now an’ then, but non often.”
“I helped him the other day,” said Flo.
The farmer spat on each palm in turn. “I thought ’e seemed ta know you. ’E’s a good straight chap, is Dick.” With his foot, the farmer shoved the fork prongs deep in and levered backward. The muck broke away with a sucking, and Flo went back to scatter the remaining corn from the scoop. In their eagerness some of the hens pecked her boots, but she was thinking of the wheeled chair going up the bank out of the valley. If he came so often, then he would be used to it, though it must be a hard climb. She wondered if he had far to go. Where did he live? What an awful thing for the sun to make a cripple. She decided to take care if ever she had to go out in the hay.
They were all sitting eating supper of currant-bread and sage cheese when Mr. Nadin remembered the pike.
“If it didna weigh twelve pounds, I’m damned.”
“You’re damned all reet then,” said Clem. “There’s no twelve-pounder ever come out o’ that puddle.”
“I dunno,” Bert put in. “I was a good way off—at the point—but I saw it landed.”
“’E wastes enough time theer. It’s time ’e caught summat. ’E were lucky ta get left wi’ some brass,” said Mrs. Nadin.
“It’s a wonder someone doesn’t marry him for it, cripple or no cripple,” said Dot. “Though I’d want something more than him, even with money.”
“He’s a quiet decent enough chap. If there was none worst nor Dick it wouldna be so bad.” The farmer looked up from his plate for a moment and as he happened to be sitting opposite Flo, she saw his eyes grey and steady.
“Ay, he’s awreet, is Dick,” Bert confirmed. “I reckon he’d never have landed yon pike though, if there hadna happened to ha’ bin Jack Knight theer. He was in th’ float an’ Dick shouted . . .”
“They’d mek a good pair,” Mrs. Nadin said harshly. “If Jack were lad o’ mine I’d have him tek reg’lar work.”