“Oo allus were wild,” said Mr. Nadin disapprovingly. “You stay, an’ I’ll get top side, then oo’ll go through th’ willers.” He went into the little path and Jenny stopped and stared at Flo. The calf began again to nuzzle blindly under the dewlap, but felt instinctively nearer and nearer towards the udder. After a few minutes Flo saw Mr. Nadin step out of the bushes twenty yards on the other side. Jenny facing partly to Flo, partly towards the lake, apparently did not see him. He moved up and called softly, “Coom up, lass.” Jenny tossed her head and sprang round. Before either of them had made a move to intercept, she was in the water trotting nervously straight outward. Twelve yards out, immersed to her knees, she paused tensely, uttering a brief, plaintive “Moo!” The calf staggering haphazardly seemed to understand and moved quicker.
“Stop yer: turn back!” yelled Mr. Nadin, waving long arms and suddenly running into the water obliquely towards the pair.
Jenny turned fearfully a little from him and plunged spasmodically onward. The calf struggled after her. Flo scarcely moved; later she was muscle sore from having kept so stiff. She saw the farmer suddenly stop his impetuous dash. He stood still in two feet of water and cajolingly called, but Jenny plunged on, deeper and deeper, deaf, controlled only by the will to escape. With her dewlap submerged she paused a second time, momentarily, glancing round and uttering a second low cry. The puny youngster was belly deep. Flo held her hands clenched, certain that he would drown. But he went on with head held out and big mute eyes fixed uncomprehendingly.
“Turn back, you young fool; you’ll drown ’im,” shouted the farmer, helpless and beside himself.
It only made Jenny go on. Soon the calf’s back was awash. Flo could not believe that he was swimming; it seemed like a miracle after his so recent birth, which to her had also seemed something like a miracle.
“Can he swim?” she demanded foolishly.
“Seems like it,” answered Mr. Nadin in his old slow manner, resigned, wading towards her and coming out on the weed and shingle, though all the time keeping his stare over the water.
Soon both animals were swimming. The calf lagged badly, Jenny now and then appearing to delay and encourage him. Their course curved a little, as if Jenny had made up her mind where she would land on the opposite side. But it was half a mile across and to the anxious watchers looked much farther.
“Cawfe’ll never do it, no’ow,” said Mr. Nadin. “The silly rantin’ bitch.”
Flo stared, all apprehension. She did not want to watch the calf drown, yet she could not turn away. Now only the heads were to be seen, Jenny’s horns standing wide and clear. Beside her the bull-calf’s head was insignificant. Although close in shore the water was still, far out there were tiny travelling ripples. Sometimes they made it seem as though the calf had disappeared, and Flo held her breath. Then again she would see him, still moving slowly, very slowly, after the mother.
“No use worritin’ naa, anyway,” said Mr. Nadin lifting his cap a little and scratching the centre of his crown with the third finger of the same hand, and then beginning to shake his boots free of mud and water one after the other comically.
“Is it a big loss if they drown?” queried Flo.
“It’s non th’ cawfe . . . but I dunna want ta lose Jenny,” he said thoughtfully, standing stiffly and staring again. “By gum, it’s a long way,” he added, impressed anew by the traverse.
The swimmers had got so far that it was now only the cow’s horned head that they could make out with certainty. Flo wondered why the farmer hadn’t hurried off to help at the far side; then she realized what a long way it was round. And, of course, anyone on the opposite shore might only scare Jenny back again.
“Cawfe’s still with oo, I reckon,” said Mr. Nadin, as if it were incredible.
Flo stared till her eyes hurt. Sometimes she thought she saw the calf, but most times not. She did not reply. How long they had been staring neither of them knew. The farmer for rest looked away, over the dam to the western hill rampart. When he stared across the water again it seemed as though Jenny might be higher. He remembered that it was shallow there, the shallow extended for a hundred yards, a kind of submerged island. Perhaps she was resting, waiting for her calf . . . if it had not already gone under. And then he plainly saw the calf, and he understood that Jenny was not resting, but had won through the choppy central water and was in the smooth, approaching land. Flo, not as tall, could not see so well, but she noticed the set mask of the farmer’s face begin to relax, and then a faint smile came.
Flo on tiptoe stared and saw Jenny emerge, very distant and small; and then the bull-calf, incredibly tiny. Jenny shepherded him ashore, and on the first green he flopped as though his legs had given way. Jenny put her head down and must have been licking him.
“By God, the little beggar!” exclaimed Mr. Nadin with such happiness that Flo’s eyes filled.
“Will they be all right?”
Before she got a reply they were disturbed by a shouted, “Gosh, that beats everything, doesn’t it?” and turning together they saw Dick Goldbourn urging his chair from the direction of the road. He had approached within fifteen yards unnoticed. He had just been coming round the corner of the willows a quarter-mile away when Jenny took to the water. “What is it?” he asked. “By jove, I should christen it Captain Webb; I’ve never seen a swimmer like it.”
The farmer said he would go round, but if the pair seemed all right, most likely he would leave them to recover in their own way. Later he would take the boys to bring them back when Jenny had got calmer. He trudged off towards the dam.
“How old is it?” asked Dick.
“Only last night . . . I saw it happen,” said Flo. He had never seen her quite so animated. “You wouldn’t think it could . . . it looked so very . . . very shaky,” she went on, unconscious of her fervour. “He . . . he seemed too weak even to moo. I made sure he’d drown!”
“Don’t you think he ought to be called Captain Webb?”
She laughed; she did not quite see that point. But her own thoughts were moving quickly.
“Isn’t it different from an ordinary baby? That would have drowned straight away.”
“It couldn’t have stood the cold even,” said Dick, hoping to make her go on. “But then a baby hasn’t a coat like that.”
“Of course not. Wouldn’t it be funny?” She laughed again, entirely forgetful of herself; then all at once she turned grave. “Do you think it’s because it hurt so much; made Jenny so she didn’t . . . sort of mad?” she asked, staring anxiously.
“Eh,” said Dick, not quite following. “D’you mean what made her do it? What makes cows do anything? They’re the silliest beasts.”
Flo looked dissatisfied and he hastened to ask if she hadn’t heard of cows jumping fences and all kinds of things, for no sensible reason. But she hadn’t. Her animation was ebbing. “I must be going,” she said. “Missis will wonder what’s become of me. She’ll be mad.”
“Not if you tell her what happened,” he said, turning his chair and travelling along the beach back the way he had come. Flo did not speak, so he went on: “It must be over half a mile; I bet Bert won’t believe. I’m glad I saw it.”