Winter Solstice (35 page)

Horace was already down there, waiting for her. But not looking Lucy’s way. He had, it was obvious, sensed strangers. He stood, ears pricked, with his plumy tail up like a flag. Watching. Lucy looked, and saw, coming up the slope from the direction of the town, another dog walker, striding out in purposeful manner. She was dressed in boots, thick trousers, and a sheepskin coat, and wore a tam-o’-shanter slanted at a cocky angle over cropped grey hair. Her dog, running free, spied Horace and stopped dead. The two animals eyed each other for a long moment, and Lucy was all at once petrified with dread, because the other dog was a Rottweiler.

“Horace.” She had meant to call him, but her mouth was dry, and his name came out in an agonized whisper.

Horace either didn’t hear her, or pretended not to. And then, stupid mutt that he was, began to bark. The Rottweiler slowly moved forward, his shining body tense, muscles flexed. A snarling sound came from deep in his throat, and his dark lips rolled back from his teeth. Horace, holding his ground, gave another timid bark, and with that, the Rottweiler pounced.

Lucy screamed. Horace screamed as well, a dog-scream that sounded like a howl for help. He was being flattened, bitten, and bruised, and however he struggled, could not escape.

The dog’s owner was of no use at all. She had a chain leash in her hand, but it was obvious that she was too wary to start manhandling her pet while he was in this frame of mind. Instead she produced a pea whistle, which she blew sharply, and proceeded to shout orders, like a sergeant-major.

“Brutus! Brutus! Down, boy! Down! To heel!…”

The Rottweiler took absolutely no notice whatsoever.

“Brutus!”

“Get hold of him,” Lucy wailed, hysterical with horror. Horace, Elfrida’s darling dog, was about to be murdered.

“Do something. Stop him!”

She had forgotten about the approaching tractor. Now, like the cavalry in some old Western, it trundled into view, in the nick of time; the door was flung open, the driver jumped down and, sprinting the last few yards and without showing ; (he slightest fear or hesitation, went straight into action, tending his heavy boot into the muscled backside of the Rottweiler.

“Get off, you bloody brute!” The startled Rottweiler abandoned Horace and turned to attack this new enemy, but the young man grabbed his studded collar and, with some strength, hauled him away from his prey.

Lucy, in a thousand years, could never have imagined any person being so level-headed, strong, and brave.

“What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?” he demanded of the dog’s owner, grabbing the chain leash from her hand and somehow clipping it to the collar of the snarling, struggling beast. He then dragged the animal towards her, and she took the leather loop in both her hands.

There then followed the most stupendous row.

“Don’t you swear at me-”

“Why didn’t you keep the dog on its chain?”

“He was attacked” Now that danger was over, she became belligerent. Her voice was not the voice of Sutherland. In fact, she sounded as though she came from Liverpool or Manchester.

“He was no such thing. I saw it all-”

“There’s no harm in Brutus unless he’s attacked….” She was having a terrible time trying to control her dog and became quite red in the face with effort.

“He’s a monster-”

“Roobish!”

“Where do you live?”

“And what’s that got to do with you, young man?”

“Because if you lived here, you’d know better than to walk a savage dog on a public footpath.”

“I do not live here,” said the woman, as though this were something to be proud of.

“I’m a visitor. Staying with my sister in her caravan.”

“Well, go back to her caravan, and take your dog and shut him up.”

“Don’t speak to me in that tone of voice.”

“I’ll speak to you any way I like. I work for the Golf Club; I’m one of the staff.”

“Oh, hoity-toity, are you….”

“Take that dog and go. Just go. If I see him running free again, I’ll report you to the police.”

“And I shall complain of impudence-” But at this point, Brutus took charge. He had spied two innocent golfers striding down the fairway, and with his blood up, and a desperate need to sink his teeth into some other throat, set off on the hunt. His owner, willy-nilly, went too, trailed in his wake, her short, trousered legs going like pistons.

“Never been so insulted,” she threw back over her shoulder. Clearly a woman who liked to have the last word.

“I’m not forgetting this….” They heard no more. She was out of earshot, and her voice blown away by the wind.

She was gone.

Lucy, by now, was sitting on the wet, prickly grass with Horace gathered up in her arms, his head pressed against the front of her new red jacket. The young man came to kneel beside her. She saw that he was very young, his face wind-burnt, his eyes blue. He had short yellow hair which looked as though he had dyed it, and there was a gold ring in his left ear.

He said, “Are you all right?” And Lucy, to her eternal shame, burst into tears.

“Yes … but Horace Here.” Gently he touched and examined poor Horace, stroked the long hair off his face, making comforting, murmuring noises as he did so.

“I think he’ll be all right. Just superficial cuts and bruises.”

“He only barked” Lucy sobbed.

“He always barks. He’s so stupid. I thought he was going to be dead.”

“Lucky he isn’t.”

Lucy sniffed. She couldn’t find a handkerchief. She wiped her nose with the back of her hand.

“He’s not even my dog. He’s Elfrida’s. We just came for a walk.”

“Where from?”

“Creagan.”

“I’ll take you back in the tractor. I can take you as far as flje clubhouse. Can you walk from there?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“Well done. Come along then.”

He helped her to her feet, stopped to lift Horace up, and, carrying him, led the way back to the tractor. This he had abandoned with doors open and the engine throbbing. Lucy clambered up into the cab. There was only one seat, but she perched herself on the very edge of this, and Horace was placed at her feet, where he sat and leaned heavily against her knee. Then the young man jumped up beside her, slammed the door shut, and put the tractor in gear. Lurching over the bumps and with the bogie rattling away behind them, they moved forward.

Lucy had stopped crying. Tentatively, she asked, “Do you think Horace will be all right?”

“When you get home, give him a bath, with disinfectant; you’ll be able to gauge the damage then. If there are any really bad bites, he might need stitches. Might need to go to the vet. He’ll be bruised, that’s for sure. And stiff for a couple of days.”

“I feel so guilty. I should have looked after him better.”

“Not a thing you could do. I think that female must be barmy. If I see her hellish animal again, I’ll shoot it.”

“He’s called Brutus.”

“Brutus the Brute.”

Despite everything, Lucy found herself smiling. She said, “Thank you so much. For helping.”

“You’re staying at the Estate House, aren’t you? With Oscar Blundell?”

“Do you know him?”

“No, but my father does. My father’s Peter Kennedy, the minister. I’m Rory Kennedy.”

“I’m Lucy Wesley.”

“That’s a pretty name.”

“I think it’s horrible.” It was rather snug, sitting high up in the cabin of the tractor, sharing a single seat with this young and kind young man. She liked the feel of his sturdy body pressed against her own, the oily smell of his thick jacket, the warmth of unaccustomed physical contact.

“It sounds like a missionary.”

“Well, there are worse things. I’ve got a small sister called Clodagh. She doesn’t like her name either. She wants to be called Tracey Charlene.”

This time Lucy laughed.

“Didn’t I see you in church yesterday?” he asked.

“Yes, but I didn’t see you. I suppose because there were so many people. I wanted to see the lights turned on, shining on the ceiling. It’s beautiful. Elfrida came with me. Carrie would have come, too. She’s my aunt. But she’s had this cold and she stayed indoors. This morning the doctor came, and she’s got to stay in bed. There’s nothing awful wrong with her. She just has to rest. Otherwise, she’d have been with me, and probably that dogfight would never have happened.”

“Nothing worse than a dogfight. But not a thing you could have done to stop it.”

This was comforting.

“Do you work on the golf course?”

“Yes, for the time being. This is the start of my Gap year. I finished Highers in July, and next year I go to Durham University. I caddied for Americans all summer. That was really lucrative, but they’ve all gone home, so I’m helping out for the head green keeper “What are you going to do then?”

“I want to go to Nepal. I can get a job there, teaching in a school.”

Lucy was impressed.

“What will you teach?”

“Reading and writing, I suppose. Just little kids. And sums. And football.”

She thought about this. She said, “I’m rather dreading my Gap year.”

“How old are you?”

“Fourteen.”

“You’ve time enough to make plans.”

“The thing is, I don’t want to go somewhere strange and scary. All by myself.”

“Scary?”

“You know. Crocodiles and revolutions.”

He grinned. He said, “You’ve been watching too much television.”

“Perhaps I’ll just stay at home.”

“Where do you live?”

“London.”

“Do you go to school there?”

“Yes. A day-school.”

“Up here for Christmas?”

“I came with Carrie. I live with my mother and my grandmother. My mother is going to America for Christmas. In fact, she’s flying out tomorrow. And my grandmother is going to Bournemouth. So Carrie and I came here.”

“What about your father?”

“They’re divorced. I don’t see him much.”

“That’s rough.”

Lucy shrugged.

“It’s all right.”

“My mother told me I have to lend you my old TV. Do you want it?”

“Have you got one?”

“Sure.”

“Well, it would be kind of you, but I’m managing very well without one.”

“I’ll look it out.” For a bit they thumped along in silence, up and over the bumpy track. Then he said, “I believe you’re all coming up to the Manse for a drink tomorrow evening. There’s a hooley in the school hall, at seven o’clock. Clodagh and I are going. Do you want to come with us?”

“What’s a hooley?”

“A dance.”

Lucy was at once filled with anxiety. She hated dancing, could never remember which was right and which was left. She had been to parties, but never a dance. And at parties she was usually consumed and silenced by shyness.

She said, “I don’t know.”

“What don’t you know?”

“If I want to come to a dance.”

“Why not? It’s just the school-kids, practising reels for the hogmanay parties. Good fun.”

Reels.

“I don’t know how to do reels. I don’t know the steps.”

“So it’s high time you learned.” Still she hesitated, but then he turned his head to smile down at her, in a friendly and encouraging manner, and rather to her own surprise she found herself saying, “All right. Yes. Thank you. Do … do I have to dress up?”

“Heaven forbid. Jeans and trainers.”

All the time they had been talking, it had been growing threateningly dark. It was now that the first large white flakes of snow began to fall. They drifted from the leaden sky and lay on the front of the tractor, and gathered against the windscreen. Rory turned on the wipers. He said, “I wondered when that would start. You could see the snow-clouds, coming down from the north. I heard the weather forecast this morning, and they said we’re in for some heavy falls.”

“Is it going to be a white Christmas?”

“Would you like that?”

“I’ve never had a white Christmas.”

“Good for sledging. Hard work for the road men and the snow ploughs By now they were near the end of their journey, grinding up the slope that led to the clubhouse. Rory turned the tractor into the car-park, killed the engine, opened the door, and climbed down.

“Will you be all right now?”

Snow settled on his hair and the shoulders of his thick donkey jacket. Lucy clambered down behind him, and he reached into the cab and lifted Horace down and set him on his feet. Horace gave himself a shake, and even wagged his plumy tail. The snow drifted and swirled all about them, and the ground beneath their feet was already iced with crunchy flakes. Lucy felt one settle on her nose and brushed it away. She took the lead from her pocket and Rory clipped it onto Horace’s collar.

“That’s it, then.” He grinned down at her.

“You get home now.”

“Thank you so much.”

“See you tomorrow evening.”

“Yes.”

She walked away from him, down the hill, into the falling snow. Bravely, Horace limped along beside her. A disinfectant bath, Rory had told her, and then, perhaps, a visit to the vet. She hoped Elfrida would not be too upset, but was pretty sure that she wouldn’t. She would be sympathetic and would understand that none of it had been Lucy’s fault. Behind her, she heard the tractor start up, and turned back to wave, but there was too much falling snow in the way for Rory to see.

She trudged on, feeling quite shattered by emotion and excitement. It had been a momentous outing. A long walk, a dogfight, a tractor ride, a snowstorm, and an invitation to a dance. She could scarcely wait to get home and tell Oscar and Elfrida all about it.

It was an enormous relief to Elfrida when she heard the front door open and Lucy’s voice calling out. It was now nearly midday, but dark as evening, and the world beyond the kitchen window blanketed with falling snow. Ever since the snow started, drifting down from a granite sky, she had been worrying about Lucy, blaming herself for being irresponsible and letting the child go off on her own, imagining every sort of horror. Oscar, upstairs by the fire, was not nearly so concerned. He read his newspaper and assured Elfrida, each time she rushed to gaze from the window, that the girl was sensible, she had the dog with her, she couldn’t be mollycoddled for the rest of her life.