The Yorkshire Shepherdess

by Amanda Owen

  I was also given a Toggenburg goat called Flymo. She was a very pretty brown and white creature and quite a character. Her name tells you what she was good at. There was a wide verge on the other side of the road from my cottage and I’d tether her there. She ate all the weeds, including the nettles. I had people knocking on my door asking if I could tether her outside their homes: she moved up and down the village clearing the weeds. She came with me to Ravenseat, which Clive wasn’t thrilled about, as he’s not a big fan of goats. I have to admit, he was right to have his doubts about her, but we’ll come to that later . . .

  I increased my menagerie with a horse called Bruno. I had befriended a retired farmer called Colin who still had a few sheep and would, on occasion, need a bit of a hand with them. In return for this he let me have a stable and I, of course, needed something to go in it. I bought a foal at the Cowper Day sale, which is a very big horse sale held every autumn in Kirkby Stephen. I paid the princely sum of twenty guineas and got a friend with a trailer to bring him home. He wasn’t anything special to look at – he was a small, forlorn, raggedy piebald pony – but he was mine. My first ever horse.

  The VW Polo had served me well but eventually driving the bumpy, potholed farm tracks caught up with us, and proved fatal for the car. It was never the right vehicle for farm work, completely wrecked inside from carrying lambs, dogs and other farming accoutrements. It was in a disgusting state but I managed to sell it for a few quid. The chap who took it said he’d never seen a car in such a mess. I was just amazed it was worth anything at all.

  My next vehicle was a four-wheel-drive pickup, a Hilux, which was much better suited to the needs of a freelance shepherdess. Or so I thought. It was advertised in the local newspaper at £1,000 which, although a lot of money to me, seemed a bargain for what it was. It was exactly what I was looking for and within my price range. It was only after I bought it that I found out why it was so cheap: it ran on petrol, not diesel. I couldn’t afford to fill the tank and I quickly found out how much each petrol station’s minimum delivery was. I would put in two or three pounds’ worth at a time, as that would be all the money I had. I got to know certain quieter, steeper roads where I would freewheel in order to save on fuel. That’s how tight my budget was.

  One farm I worked at, the wife was not into farming at all, and she was very suspicious of her husband hiring a woman. He took me aside and told me, ‘Whatever yer do, I want yer to look miserable at all times. I dunt want ’er indoors to look out that window and see yer with a smile on yer face.’

  Another farmer who I worked for would occasionally ring me on a Sunday morning asking me to work later that same day. I was surprised the first time, as he came from a devoutly religious family where Sunday was reserved for chapel, quiet contemplation and essential work only. The rest of the family would assume he was feeding the cows and sheep and doing all the necessary farm work, when the reality was that I was doing it and he was sneaking off to a neighbour’s to watch the football.

  I didn’t have any serious romantic relationships during the two years I lived at Crosby. Although I made many friends and was invited to a few parties, I sometimes felt incredibly lonely and, although I enjoyed my work very much, it could seem relentless, getting up at 5 a.m. to milk cows, working day in day out without a break. It wasn’t always easy – the times with no work and no money would play heavily on my mind – but there was never a moment when I regretted my career choice. I learned a lot about life, and self-preservation, and realized that a great deal of determination is needed to make your dreams come true.

  I also learned that you never know what is round the next corner.

  4

  Ravenseat Only

  My life was certainly busy. I had my regular customers, one of them being Martin Dent. Martin wasn’t the typical farming type I was used to meeting. The number of farmers I knew who played bass guitar in a rock’n’roll band and drove around their fields in an old Jaguar were few and far between. I was used to being summoned to milk the cows at short notice on account of Martin being missing in action, or at least missing at milking time. There were many occasions when I’d be summoned by a slurred message on the answerphone with the sounds of ‘Born to be Wild’ pounding in the background. Martin also ran a livestock haulage business and at certain times of the year would be away for long spells, and then I would take full charge of his small dairy herd and flock of sheep. It isn’t uncommon for farmers to have a sideline to help them through the vagaries of farming and, quite honestly, I loved being left to my own devices, pretending that it was my own farm and animals.

  His sheep were mainly Rough Fell, which is a hardy breed found only in South Cumbria and around the Lake District: they are a breed which seems to have fallen out of fashion. He also had a small flock of Swaledales, an altogether more popular and profitable breed. Sensibly, Martin saw Swaledales as the way forward and was keen to improve and increase his flock, so once a year he would borrow a Swaledale tup to louse (put in) with his yows, and that’s when he would call on his old chum Clive. They had known each other since they were sixteen, both keen farmers and both keen partygoers (it never really left Martin).

  It was late October, and with tupping time approaching I was to be sent on a mission.

  ‘Will you take the trailer and fetch a tup from a mate of mine? He’s a right good Swaledale breeder, and he lends me a tup every year.’

  Darkness was falling by the time I’d finished milking and foddering the cows. I hitched the rickety wooden trailer to the back of Martin’s pickup and connected up the lightboard (it didn’t work – they never do, not even after a squirt of WD40 into the socket). Mart’s directions were basic: go to Kirkby, turn right to Nateby, then turn at the sign for Swaledale and just drive until you see a sign for Ravenseat.

  I have now driven this route many, many times and know it like the back of my hand, but this was the first time. I’d travelled plenty of back roads and country lanes in my time, but this was something else. When I left Ash Fell at darkening it was starting to rain, and there was a real nip in the air. It wasn’t long before I was in the small village of Nateby, driving slowly, uncertain where I was going. Then my headlights picked up a sign: YOU HAVE JUST PASSED THE LAST PUMPS FOR 22 MILES. I checked the gauge. Yes, Martin had given me a good tank of diesel.

  In daylight there are wonderful views from the road, rugged hills and imposing rocky outcrops, and when you cross the border from Cumbria into Yorkshire you see the mysterious Nine Standards Rigg, a line of massive drystone cairns which dominate the skyline. Nobody knows their history: they could have been a lookout post, a warning to the marauding tribes from the north to keep away from the sheep and the women of Swaledale, or perhaps they are more recent, a boundary marker between Westmoreland and Yorkshire erected hundreds of years ago.

  I didn’t see any of this in the dark. All my headlights picked up was the narrow single-track road ahead of me, with the glint of metal barriers along the side which told me there were steep drops, and snow posts, tall wooden pillars that mark the road when the snow lies deep across it, their height an indicator of just how bad this route is in winter. The road twisted and turned and pitched up and down like a fairground ride. Martin had not told me how far I had to drive: I kept wondering if I had missed the farm, knowing that many farmers rely on a handwritten sign on cardboard or spray painted on a large stone. But I had passed nothing. Occasionally there was a broken-down stone barn that gave me hope I was near habitation, but then the road would carry on unwinding ahead of me, snaking round tight bends, the wooden trailer rattling behind. My lights reflected back the glinting silver eyes of sheep, and I’d have to slow down as they stood, rooted to the spot, before scurrying away into the blackness.

  Eventually, after what seemed like hours of nervous driving, I saw it. A large, proper road sign which read RAVENSEAT ONLY, 1¼ MILES. Relief flooded through me: I wasn’t going to have to retrace my tracks looking for it. Every time the trailer clatter
ed across a cattle grid I felt it would shake itself to pieces, but it was still there. I couldn’t see the fields and ghylls, the stone barns, the imposing hills ahead of me: all I had was the view in my headlights which was the uneven track and more sheep to scare from my path.

  I passed a neat farmhouse, but I knew this wasn’t the one, as it was only a few yards from the road, and too orderly to be a working farm. Another cattle grid, and then my headlights picked up the humped shape of a small, very narrow stone bridge. I looked at it apprehensively: was I going to have to get the pickup and trailer across it? At the last moment the road swung to the left of it and I realized thankfully that I wasn’t going across the bridge. No, I was going through a river instead.

  In the muddy farmyard I was greeted by the noisy dog, and then the farmer emerged from the doorway of the ancient stone farmhouse.

  This was my first sight of Clive.

  ‘Away in, mi lass, I’ll get t’kettle on.’

  I was relieved to have reached my destination with the pickup and trailer in one piece, and I didn’t particularly want to hang about for too long but I liked the sound of a cup of tea, before getting my arse back to civilization. I followed Clive into the farmhouse, cracking my head on the lintel above the door. These doorways were designed in days when everyone was smaller. I’ve learned when to duck and I’m proficient at it now, but I still occasionally get caught out by them. So that wasn’t exactly a great start.

  The house didn’t impress: you can’t ever say I went after Clive for his beautiful home, because back then, it wasn’t. He had been married before, and his wife had left about a year previously. The carpets still showed the imprints of the furniture she had taken, the walls had green wallpaper tinged with yellow because of Clive’s smoking, and the lovely big room where we now have an old-fashioned range had a wooden partition shutting it off from the front door. I imagine that years ago some old farmer said, ‘I’s sick o’ tha’ bloody draught, it’s bloody freezing.’ So with a hammer and nails they cobbled together a tongue-and-groove partition. There was nothing fancy about it, it just cut the room in half.

  There was a bare light bulb hanging in the middle of the room, and apart from a well-worn sofa there was just a collection of flock books and shepherd’s guides scattered about the floor. Flock books are a sheep farmer’s most prized possession: they tell the history of his flock. I now think if Clive had to choose between me and his flock books, it would be a close-run thing . . .

  The sitting room had a green carpet that felt like walking on moss: it was so damp it squelched under foot. The radiators were not attached to the walls, just leaning against them. It was used as a provender store, for animal feed. The place was, in a word, a wreck. Clive was farming all day and just sleeping and eating – and smoking – in the house. But I couldn’t be critical, could I? That was more or less what I was doing in my cottage, minus the smoking.

  He made tea, and we chatted, but I can’t remember any of the conversation. No doubt the weather was the main topic: weather and sheep are what people talk about. Sheep are the main preoccupation. They say round here that if your fella goes missing it’s not because he’s off with another woman or gambling or drinking, it’s because he’s studying sheep somewhere.

  We headed back outside and Clive took me to a dingy-looking loose box in the farm buildings behind Ravenseat, where he had corralled the tup. He strode in confidently to catch it, but the tup had other ideas. Clive now says that he was trying to impress me, but the tup was distinctly unimpressed. It evaded him and began to run round and round the edge of the box, Clive trying to grab hold of it. The tup built up speed and in the end was doing a wall of death, like display motorcyclists do: going so fast it was nearly running up the walls. I couldn’t stop laughing, while Clive was cursing, getting hot and bothered, and looking quite amateurish. Eventually he managed to get hold of the creature via a double folding body press culminating in an unscheduled parachute roll by the two of them. Then he manhandled it out of the box, we dragged it between us across the bridge, back to the farmyard and with a struggle got it into the trailer. There was a chorus of heavy breathing when it was over, Clive lighting up a fag and the tup staring malevolently from the trailer.

  Before I set off back to Martin’s, Clive asked for my phone number. I happily gave it: I gave my phone number to any farmer who might put some work my way and I didn’t think any more of it, although I knew I liked him. I was intrigued by this wild place that I’d briefly glimpsed through the darkness, and the easygoing, funny man who lived there. Still, at the time I was more concerned about getting the belligerent tup back to Ash Fell along that twisting road, which at least seemed easier now I knew where I was heading.

  Clive tells me that from the moment he saw me he was quite taken with me and that his intentions weren’t exactly honourable. ‘I wooed thi so subtlely yer di’n’t even notice,’ he says. ‘What I saw when thi came was a striking blonde lady wit’ lovely long legs, an’ it di’n’t take me long to make up my mind about thi. ’Twas just a case of hooking yer up an’ reeling yer in.’

  In his dreams.

  He rang the next day, leaving a message on my answering machine.

  ‘Clive here, yer know, thi came to borrow a tup.’

  I didn’t return his call. In fact, I ignored all of his calls, partly because I guessed he fancied me and I was playing hard to get, but also because I wasn’t looking for love right then. But he persisted, and after about a week he left a message that guaranteed I would reply.

  ‘I’ve had a disaster, we’ve bin gathering, one of mi favourite yows ‘as broken her leg. I cannae set it on mi own. Can you come and hod her for mi?’

  He went on to say that when they bring the sheep down from the moor they have to negotiate a steep ravine with a beck in the bottom, crossing by a makeshift bridge made of railway sleepers. Somehow this unfortunate yow had slipped her foot through a gap in the rotting sleepers and managed to break her leg.

  He knew how to pull at my heart strings. I went up there straight away, and between us we struggled to set her leg. It was broken high up, and it was difficult to set as there wasn’t much leg above the break to anchor the cast, but somehow, with her sitting on her bum and Clive supporting her, we managed to get a cast on her outstretched leg. She eventually recovered, but forever after had one leg sticking out at an angle: she tripped me up a few times. It certainly didn’t hinder her, she’d shoot past you and the leg would take you out. We kept her for many years, until she died at the age of ten, and we’d forever be having walkers stopping to tell us, ‘Do you know, there’s a sheep up there with a wonky leg.’

  I would explain to them that this yow was special, and she had a lot to answer for as she was the reason that I ended up at Ravenseat.

  It was a fine autumn day when we set the leg, and I saw the farm and Clive properly for the first time.

  ‘There’s plenty that yer haven’t seen. You’ll have to come back,’ he said.

  Lo and behold, I did. I went back to help him out whenever he needed it, and he’d send me home with a bale of hay for my sheep. It was a friendship, not a romance, but we were both finding more and more reasons for me to come up to Ravenseat. Gradually, the relationship deepened. Again, I can’t look back and pinpoint a moment when I knew he was the right man for me: it was a slow awareness.

  So I was spending a growing amount of time at Ravenseat, which was the cause of great gossip down the dale. You may think life up here is remote, so far from our neighbours, and with the population so sparse. But, believe me, you have a lot more privacy in a big city. Up here, the jungle drums start beating when anything unusual happens, and the word was soon out that Clive had a young lady going up and down to see him.

  For me to get to Ravenseat I had to travel the same route I did on that first night, crossing over the border from Cumbria, where my cottage was twenty-five miles away, into Yorkshire. In the winter, that road is no-man’s land, the snowploughs and snow-clearing
gangs don’t touch it. North Yorkshire council aren’t interested in clearing a road that leads to Cumbria: they clear as far as the end of the Ravenseat road, because we are the last habitation. And vice versa: Cumbria doesn’t clear their stretch, after the last houses on their side. So there’s a seven- or eight-mile stretch that is always blocked with snow in winter. The sparse open moorland means that the snow is whipped up by the westerly winds, making it feel almost arctic. I travelled this road often, and one afternoon a farmer on a tractor flagged me down as I drove along in my little blue Subaru pickup (I’d traded in the Hilux – what was left of it – for this smaller, more economical truck). I thought it was something important he had to tell me, but all he said was, ‘Watch thi speed, t’road’s slape.’

  Like I didn’t know already. He was being nosy, he wanted a look at the mystery woman in the Subaru who was a regular visitor to Ravenseat. It wasn’t just me that interested the locals. The farmers in this dale are very close, they’ve all been here a long time and they come from long-established families who have lived here for generations. Clive was a newcomer, even though he’d been here for several years when I came on the scene. So we were naturally a source of great interest and were maybe more scrutinized because of it. And it wasn’t just our relationship that interested them. Folks here have always farmed traditionally, doing the same things, in the same way they’ve always done. To come to Swaledale with new ideas would have been frowned upon; it was a question of watching, listening and learning. Even though Clive had been there a few years, they were still watching to see he didn’t stray from the old, traditional ways.

  Folks saw me coming and going, but the only way to know what’s really happening at Ravenseat is to come to Ravenseat, as we’re at a dead end – the road goes nowhere else. So people had to find an excuse to drive up. And some of them were pretty transparent. Instead of ringing Clive up to tell him to collect a sheep that had strayed, it would be delivered back to him. People would come to talk to him about things they could easily discuss at the auction, friends would turn up with pots of jam. All just a ruse to see what was going on.