by Lucy Daniels
‘Of course I will. You’ll be the first to know.’
‘These two look like they’re in good shape,’ she told him as she examined his charges.
‘I’m so glad you think so.’ Mr Thomas beamed. ‘Don’t you think they’d make lovely Calendar Girls?’ he said. ‘I’m hoping they make the front cover.’
Mandy laughed. Every year at the show there was a calendar competition for sheep. It was always fiercely contested. ‘Well, good luck,’ she told the old man. Polite till the last, he nodded at her as she moved on.
Alongside the other animals, there were several llamas in the lines. Mandy had read in the Dales News that there was a whole new class this year for llama agility. She had wondered whether it was a mistake, but she had consulted her computer and had been amazed to discover videos of the curious creatures being led up and down steps, kicking balls and even reversing out of tightly spaced lines. She was looking forward to seeing Welford’s version.
They were fascinating creatures, she thought as she slid up the side of one of the tall animals to check its head. They looked so alert with their long ears and huge eyes. Their luxuriant eyelashes gave them a bashful look.
‘Hello again,’ said a voice, and Mandy looked up to see Peter Warry strolling up to her.
‘Hello Mr Warry! I thought I recognised Dora,’ said Mandy, and they shook hands warmly.
Beside her, Dora twisted her head to snuffle in her ear, then stuck out a long tongue and licked her hair. With a slight laugh, Mandy reached up and gently pushed away the soft muzzle.
‘Sorry about that,’ Mr Warry said with a grin. ‘Dora’s a friendly old thing. She does love licking people’s hair for some reason.’
‘Are you entering the agility competition?’ Mandy asked. Dora breathed in her ear, making her want to laugh.
‘We are indeed.’ Mr Warry reached out and scratched Dora’s furry rump and she turned away from Mandy to cast her enquiring gaze over him instead. ‘Not that we’ll win, but it’s all good fun.’
He did seem very pleasant, Mandy thought. It was obvious he was fond of Dora and as well as being friendly, the llama looked in good shape.
‘We’ll need to arrange a new date for me to come and see Holly and Robin … if that’s okay still?’
‘Absolutely,’ Mandy replied.
She glanced round just as another livestock trailer was turning into the field. The lettering on the side said, West Mitling Safari Park. ‘There’s Polly Cormac,’ Peter Warry said when he saw it. ‘I must go and have a word. Polly’s a bit like you,’ he went on. ‘She takes all kinds of exotic rescue animals when they’re unwanted or have been mistreated.’
‘Is she bringing exotic animals to the show?’ Mandy wondered. She hadn’t had much experience with species outside of regular pets, native wildlife and livestock.
‘Oh, Polly has non-exotic animals too,’ Peter explained. ‘I think she’s bringing her pygmy goats today. Would you like to meet her?’
‘I really would,’ Mandy said, as a tiny blonde lady jumped down from the trailer. She was wearing a patched jumper and frayed jeans and when she turned, Mandy saw she had bright blue eyes.
‘Polly!’ Peter Warry hailed her.
Polly waved and trotted over.
‘Polly, I’d like you to meet Mandy Hope, she’s one of the vets at Animal Ark and she’s on duty at the show today. Mandy, this is my friend, Polly. She owns West Mitling Safari Park.’
Polly smiled and stuck her hand out. ‘Lovely to meet you! Although don’t let the goats hear you say I run the park, Peter. They’re very much under the impression that they’re in charge!’
Mandy laughed, feeling herself warming to Polly already. ‘You’ve brought your goats today?’
‘I have,’ Polly said. ‘Well, five of them at least. I have ten more back at the park. These are my calmest so they’re my park ambassadors. Although calm is a relative term – they’re a handful pretty much all of the time …’
Mandy laughed again. ‘I’ll have to do a health check, but I can come back and see them last, so they have time to settle from the journey, if you like.’
A comical grimace passed over Polly’s face. ‘That’s probably for the best and I’m sorry in advance!’
Two hours later, all the animals had arrived, and Mandy’s examinations were complete. Polly’s goats did indeed prove to be as much of a handful as she had warned, but with a little help, Mandy was able to quickly examine them and Sporty, Posh, Scary, Baby and Ginger were happily playing in the sunshine. For now, unless there was an announcement, she was free to enjoy the rest of the fair. She had a fleeting moment of disappointment. It would have been nice to walk around with someone.
She made her way past the show ring, which was being prepared for the llama agility. A small pond had been set up for them to walk through. Mandy knew that later it would be used as the water jump in the gymkhana. There were steps up and down, a tunnel made of bent hoops and a number of wooden structures: squares to stand in and zig-zag pathways. She was looking forward to watching, especially now she knew Mr Warry would be taking part.
Back over on the village green, the stalls were alive with people. The sweet scent of candyfloss filled the air as Mandy walked between the brightly coloured awnings. There were plenty of local goods on sale. Mandy recognised one of the women from Welford Hall cheese shop standing behind a large array of Yorkshire cheeses. Prudence Ruck was there, selling hand-woven rugs and various knitted goods. It wasn’t the right time of year for mittens, but Mandy couldn’t resist buying a gorgeous red and white Argyll knit pair. She could always give them to someone for Christmas, she thought. To her dismay, Prudence was quite distant with her. Mandy supposed Harriet had been telling her mother about how Mandy was ruining her job prospects.
Heart sinking, Mandy walked on. She had never felt set against so many villagers at once before and it hurt. She stopped in front of some hand-carved house signs, not really registering what was on them, when a voice from behind her said, ‘One of those would look amazing on Wildacre’s gate.’
She turned and looked up into the green, smiling eyes of Jimmy. For a moment she quite forgot the coolness between them over the squirrel, and she grinned.
‘You made it!’ she said. She thought about hugging him, but then she remembered the tension with the twins over the squirrel and the donkeys and shifted awkwardly.
She shook herself and found her smile again. It was hard to bear a grudge against Jimmy at the worst of times, let alone when all around them were the lovely sights and smells of springtime in Welford in full swing.
She reached out and took his hand. ‘Let’s go.’
Gran and Grandad were running the cake stall. Gran was serene as ever as she took payment for some fruit scones. Grandad was grinning roguishly as he persuaded Mrs Ponsonby to try a piece of Gran’s carrot cake. As ever, Mrs Ponsonby was carrying her beloved Pekinese, Fancy. She was also wearing a rather unlikely hat, which seemed to be shaped like a two-tiered wedding cake, complete with icing roses and purple ribbons.
‘Go on,’ Mandy heard her grandfather say. ‘It was baked fresh this morning.’
With an almost theatrical nod of thanks, which emphasised the unusual height of her hat, Mrs Ponsonby handed over her payment and received a large slice of the delicious-looking cake.
‘Here, Fancy.’
Mandy and Jimmy turned away to cover their laughter as Mrs Ponsonby, pillar of the community, held out her gran’s delectable cake for the little dog to eat. Gran’s face was a picture, but Grandad chuckled. ‘Good to know your baking’s still appreciated in the upper echelons of Welford’s society,’ he said in a loud stage whisper and Mandy laughed again.
Mrs Ponsonby turned and spotted Mandy standing there. Her face instantly clouded. ‘Ah Mandy, you’re here. I’m pleased the show wasn’t disrupting the wildlife too much for your taste.’ She swept away from the stall, trailing crumbs as they fell from Fancy’s mouth.
‘What was tha
t about?’ asked Jimmy, looking perplexed.
Mandy sighed. ‘I’m Welford’s public enemy number one at the moment.’
She explained to him about the sign in the post office and the scene it had caused.
‘But that’s ridiculous!’ exclaimed Jimmy. ‘It’s not your fault if something shady is going on. I’ll back you up. I’ll tell everyone I saw the squirrel too!’
Mandy felt a rush of warmth at his indignance on her behalf.
It feels like a while since we were both properly on the same side.
But she knew she couldn’t let him. ‘Jimmy, Sam owns the land you work on. You don’t want to publicly accuse him of lawbreaking,’ Mandy pointed out.
‘She’s right,’ said Grandad. ‘Besides, our Mandy has been taking on Sam Western since she could walk and talk!’
‘Hello there.’ Mandy turned to see Mr Chadwick behind her.
‘Oliver, great to see you.’ That was her gran’s voice.
Mr Chadwick waved. ‘Hello again Dorothy.’ How different he sounded, Mandy thought as he greeted her grandparents. ‘Tom.’ He nodded at her grandad. Mr Chadwick looked different as well. His sad expression had been replaced with a grin. He was wearing a fur hat with teddy bear ears and, somewhat unexpectedly, he was clutching an inflatable shark under his arm.
‘We thought you’d gone,’ Grandad said.
‘Have you come back for more cake?’ Gran asked. She was smiling warmly.
Mr Chadwick shrugged and looked round at the wooden toys on the next stall and the open-topped cart opposite, which was filled with enormous swirly lollipops. ‘I couldn’t possibly go home yet,’ he told them. ‘I won this shark on the ball-in-bucket and the hat from the hook-a-duck stall. In a few minutes I’m going to dance round the maypole and I’m definitely staying for the llama agility. He looked almost sheepish as he turned back. ‘Do you need any more help?’ he asked Gran.
‘I think we can manage,’ Dorothy Hope replied with a laugh.
Waving goodbye, Mr Chadwick passed on down the line.
Gran, who had finished tidying the stall, offered Mandy and Jimmy a large plate of chocolate chip cookies.
‘How much are they?’ Jimmy asked.
‘Seventy pence each,’ Gran replied. Jimmy handed over the money and Mandy grabbed a cookie happily. The takings from the cake stall and various other activities went to local charitable causes each year. This year the proceeds would go towards buying a specially equipped minibus for the care home where Robbie Grimshaw, the previous owner of Wildacre, now lived.
‘So, have you been seeing much of Mr Chadwick?’ Mandy had been itching to ask. They seemed to be well acquainted from the way they had all greeted each other.
‘We have, actually,’ said Grandad.
‘We’re very glad you put him in touch,’ added Gran, who had put Mandy’s money away into a box and was bustling round the stall, moving cakes an inch here and there.
‘He seemed so different,’ Mandy said.
‘Yes, he’s really coming out of his shell,’ said her grandmother. ‘He’s already volunteered to drive the minibus for the Rowans once it’s bought. And he’s been helping out with the Pop-In Club, driving some of the older members home.’
Mandy felt a rush of warmth run through her. Even if Mr Chadwick hadn’t rehomed Pixie, her visit to his house and the discussion they’d had seemed to have sparked something good.
‘Are you going to go and watch the Welly Wang?’ Grandad asked, holding out the printed programme to Mandy. ‘I think it’s starting in a few minutes.’
‘Ooh, I love a Welly Wang,’ said Jimmy, taking the paper.
‘I bet you’re good at it too,’ said Mandy. ‘But I’ll have you know it won’t be an easy win. I’m a pretty good Wanger myself, you know. And last year there was a major upset – you know Liz Butler, who lives in the bungalow near Hope Meadows? She managed twenty-nine meters! To be honest, having seen Liz control that enormous Bernese Mountain Dog of hers, I wasn’t that surprised.’
In the end Jared Boone, the farm manager at Upper Welford Hall and Jimmy’s closest friend in Welford took the cup, and Jimmy and Mandy both clapped so hard for him their palms ached. There was a hair-raising moment when his rather wildly thrown boot appeared to veer off course. For a second, it looked as if it might unseat Mrs Ponsonby’s wedding-cake hat, but it curved back at the last minute, falling between the lines at just under thirty metres. Despite her best efforts, Liz conceded defeat with a handshake and a grin.
Nicole and Braveheart gave the most beautiful dressage demonstration. Mandy had never seen a more beautiful collected canter and Nicole rode out of the show ring to the sound of enthusiastic applause.
The highlight of the afternoon was undoubtedly the llama agility. Mandy and Jimmy stood together by the sidelines with plastic cups of sweet tea, grinning like loons as the llamas did their very best to navigate the course. Dora, with gentle encouragement from Peter Warry came a very creditable third, having failed to make her way under the hoops, despite her owner’s persuasion. Mandy had been delighted to see how calm Mr Warry was, and how gentle and patient. Dora looked properly proud as she stood in line waiting for her prize and licked the judge’s hair as he pinned the rosette to her halter.
‘I have to go,’ Jimmy said, as the excitement of the llama event drew to a close and the crowd began to disperse. ‘Gotta pick up the twins. But this was wonderful. We should come every year.’
‘It’s a date,’ Mandy grinned. She leaned up and kissed him. She wished with all her heart things could always feel this easy. When it was just her and Jimmy, it was just right. But they needed to be able to handle all the other things: work, family, life.
We can’t exist in a bubble.
Mandy took a deep breath. ‘Jimmy, about the other day. I’m sorry if I wasn’t tactful enough. I can work on that. But the one thing I can’t change is that the animals come first. They always will with me.’
He smiled down at her. ‘I know, and that’s one of the things I love about you. It’s just,’ his eyes broke away from hers, ‘sometimes you’re so laser-focussed that you seem to forget that you care about us humans too. I’m an adult, I can take it. But the kids need to hear it. Especially right now.’ He looked back at her and hugged her close. ‘Let’s just agree: I messed up by moving the squirrel, but you could have been a bit gentler with the twins. Right?’
Mandy nodded. ‘Okay, but I … I don’t know how to be different.’
Jimmy kissed her again. ‘I’ll help you. We’ll get there, I know we will.’ He squeezed her hand before heading off into the crowd of summer dresses and farmer’s tweeds.
Chapter Seventeen
Mandy was just finishing up in the clinic on Monday, when Harriet walked in. Mandy was pleasantly surprised to see her, but a bit thrown – she didn’t have the triplets with her, and she didn’t have a pet who could need treatment.
It had been an exhausting day already. She had been woken at five in the morning by Mrs Waterstone at Woodbridge. Her patient had been a cow with staggers – life-threatening magnesium deficiency – and Mandy had dashed from her bed and up to the farm as quickly as she could. She had saved the cow, but then there had been another call out, this time to a cow that had gone down due to calcium deficiency. That patient had also rallied, but there had been no time to return to bed. Lunch had been three bites of a sandwich between a hoof-trimming session at Baildon Farm and afternoon surgery. Adam had been out at a colic most of the afternoon. It really had been crazily busy.
‘Could I have a word with you?’ Harriet asked Mandy.
‘Of course.’ Mandy checked with Helen that she had time, then led Harriet into the house.
‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ she asked Harriet. Harriet seemed ill at ease, standing by the kitchen door. She seemed wary of meeting Mandy’s eye. ‘Where are the triplets?’ Mandy asked, trying to find a topic her friend would find easy. She didn’t know what Harriet wanted to talk about, but she was willin
g to listen.
Harriet smiled, her face relaxing at the mention of the triplets. ‘They’re at Mum and Dad’s,’ she said.
‘They’ll be knitting before they can walk,’ Mandy joked, thinking of Prudence Ruck and her wool, and was rewarded with a small smile.
‘I will have that tea,’ she said. Mandy motioned for her to sit down as she put the kettle on.
‘I heard you ran into a bit of trouble with Sam Western in the Fox and Goose yesterday,’ Harriet said, once Mandy had set a mug down in front of her.
Mandy flushed and grimaced. ‘You could say that.’
‘You remember I said I sometimes work in Walton?’
She’d said so outside the post office, the first day Mandy had met the triplets. Mandy nodded. ‘Well, it’s quite a fancy place I work,’ Harriet said. ‘Sam Western’s in there quite often.’
Mandy lifted her mug and took a sip of tea. She had no idea where Harriet was going with this, but she didn’t want to interrupt.
‘I was sorry to hear that you’d got into trouble with Sam,’ Harriet went on. She put her hands around her cup as if looking for comfort, then she lifted her gaze and looked Mandy in the eye. ‘I know I was angry before about the factory, but I know you. I know you’re only thinking of the animals. I should too.’
She pulled herself up straight and took a deep breath before going on. ‘So, I wanted you to know,’ she said, ‘that Sam Western sometimes brings members of the council to the restaurant. Dad used to help them out all the time, so I know their faces. Sam Western always picks up the bills.’ She frowned down at her tea, then looked up again. ‘They seem to get through an awful lot of food and wine. Sam always requests a little table near the back. It’s very discreet.’
Mandy stared at Harriet. Sam Western had offered her money in the Fox and Goose and now Harriet had told her that he had been wining and dining members of the council. ‘Do you think he’s been bribing them?’ she asked.
Harriet shook her head and pursed her mouth. ‘I can’t say,’ she admitted. ‘I’ve no proof of anything, not even that they were there, because Sam doesn’t use his real name. I don’t think he recognises me. It’s probably no help, but I just wanted you to know.’
