Whispering Back

by Adam Goodfellow

  So I was not overjoyed when I discovered that the kids hanging around in the lobby in school uniform were actually my riding club. Several of them did not have any kind of coat, and none had outdoor footwear. I sent them off to get better equipped, knowing this would take ages, and went off to find some umbrellas. When the kids finally reappeared, they were still woefully ill protected, for the rain was still bucketing down outside. We clambered into the school minibus, which rapidly filled with steam as we drove the 10 miles or so to the yard. The students started out with a lively chatter, until one of them asked, ‘Does it always rain like this?’

  I made light of it, but it wasn’t until we started to get out of Milton Keynes that I realised there was actually something pretty serious going on with the weather. The roads in MK were all so new and well made that you hardly noticed the volume of water on them. Once we got off the main road into the countryside, it was clear this was going to be a flood. Roadside ditches were already overflowing, and torrents of water were gushing out of gaps in the hedges and from gateways on the side of the road. The only time I had ever seen rain like this was in Africa. It was thumping down on the roof in great blobs, and the windscreen wipers, working at full throttle, could not cope. We descended into a wide valley, and found ourselves going along a narrow raised causeway between fields usually full of sheep, already completely flooded. By the next day the road itself would be submerged in more than 2 feet of water, and impassable for over a week.

  We made it to the yard, however, and Jane met us in the car park. She had kindly volunteered for the job of assistant tutor, and as soon as the kids saw her smile, I knew they would get on well. But she couldn’t hide the anxiety in her voice as she told me, ‘You’d better drive down to the barn. You couldn’t walk it. The track’s under water.’

  So, rather than stop in the car park, I drove down the flooded track to the barn where I knew the horses would be. As we drew round the corner, however, I couldn’t believe my eyes. The area outside their barn had turned into a fast-flowing stream about a metre wide. The students would have to leap across this to get into the barn, unless I carried them. Wails of protests and exclamations of ‘Samui!’ greeted me when I explained what they would have to do. They hardly noticed Sensi and Major, standing behind the waterfall pitching off the roof between us. Putting up my hood, I stepped out into the rain.

  I found the horses warm and dry. With a deep bed of straw throughout the barn, and mangers all round stuffed with hay, they had little to complain about. But they seemed to have an air of dejection about them, which I could not put a finger on. Surely for once, they must be grateful not to have been out in the rain. I beckoned to the students. ‘Look, all you have to do is jump over this,’ I said, pointing at the torrent of water that ran between me and the barn, on a normally dry path. ‘As soon as you get inside, there’s dry straw.’ It was a big jump but I leaped forward confidently towards a big hummock of straw just inside the entrance.

  As I landed on it, it was all I could do not to fall unceremoniously onto my backside, for the hummock turned out to be an island floating on a bed of water about 4 inches deep. No wonder the horses were looking so miserable. The entire barn was flooded. The students, complaining every inch of the way, shrieked and exclaimed as they negotiated the short distance between the van and the barn, while Misty cowered in the corner, terrified of the noise they were making. But as soon as they were inside, trying to find a lump of straw big enough on which to stand without being immersed in the water, the magic of horses took over, and their shouts and cries gave way to hushed tones and expressions of wonder. ‘Cho kakoee! Misty wa ee desho! I love Misty!’ I looked at Nori, who was smiling for the first time all day.

  It wasn’t long, however, before the thrill of standing in a dark, flooded barn began to wear off, and it was clear my bag of doughnuts was going to prove invaluable. Leslie had assured us he had plans to build a proper tack room, but for the moment there was only an old shipping container, a long, windowless steel box with a naked light bulb suspended in it, and more importantly, a kettle. This was not exactly a quality venue for a school excursion, but it would have to do, and the mention of coffee and hot chocolate perked the children up immediately. We said sayonara to the horses and jumped back across the stream as best we could, and I drove back to the top of the yard.

  There wasn’t a great deal of room, or a sufficient number of mugs, and all the kids were cold and wet, but as I had anticipated, the sight of a fresh doughnut made it all much better. I began an impromptu vocab lesson, in my most enthusiastic manner, trying to explain to them the difference between hay and straw, when Leslie suddenly appeared around the doorway. Interrupting me, with a face transparent with rage, he asked if he could have a word with me, and it was clear he meant to do so without delay. I stepped outside, leaving Jane and Nori to fill the silence as best they could.

  We stepped around the corner, under cover of an old carport whose foundations were peppered with large rat-holes. It was obvious that Leslie was furious, for his face was a seething purple. He turned around and raised his fist, and I really thought he was going to hit me. Barely able to stop himself from screaming, he managed, ‘Who the f* * * are these Japs and what the f* * * are they doing here on my yard?’

  I was for once glad that the tack room was a large steel box, because I hoped the noise of the rain hammering on the roof would be loud enough to drown out our conversation so that the kids would not realise what was going on. Feeling the anger rise in me, I began to explain my position, but there was no telling Leslie he had made an agreement that we would be able to teach our clients at the yard.

  ‘It’s not that I’m racist,’ he began with that time-honoured lie, ‘but nobody told me anything about loads of kids,’ he said. ‘Get them off my yard right now. You’ll have to find somewhere else for them.’

  I found myself shaking with rage, which I was barely able to suppress. After the first few days of our being at Long Street, during which Leslie was reasonably polite, his demeanour had begun to degenerate until none of the liveries liked or respected him, and he had become a constant source of irritation. A number of incidents around the yard, as well as a constant stream of childish notes stuck up around the place to remind people to do this and not do that, had alienated everyone. But this was beyond the limit. We were paying for the use of his facilities, we had agreed the terms, and now, all of a sudden, he was banning my clients from using them, on the basis of their race. With a supreme effort, I managed not to tell him what I thought of him, his horsemanship and his yard, as I just couldn’t risk the hassle of finding my five horses wandering outside in the road that evening, up to their knees in flood water. I wouldn’t have put it past him.

  Taking a moment to compose myself, I pretended everything was all right as I breezed back into the tack room. Trying not to seem in too much of a hurry, I got the kids back into the minibus, and waved goodbye to Jane, promising to come and pick her up as soon as I had dropped the kids off, and collected my own car, as she needed a lift back home. She set about the arduous job of trying to sort out a dry area for the horses in the barn, by spreading about twenty bales of straw out at the back, which was a bit higher than the rest, until eventually they had a patch they could stand on. Still close to exploding every time I thought of Leslie, I hardly noticed that the rain was still coming down as hard as ever, and it was now nearing rush-hour.

  Having deposited the kids and their minibus, and arranged to meet them the next day, I got in my car and headed straight back to the yard. I got almost to the edge of Milton Keynes, before finding myself in a traffic jam. It wasn’t long before I realised that this was not an ordinary traffic jam, but there was nothing I could do. The car did not move at all for about an hour. The Ml had been closed and all the traffic had been diverted onto the A5, which had now become blocked. I only needed to get about a mile further before I could turn off towards Long Street, but it took me more than an hour and a half to get tha
t far.

  By the time I finally did get back to Long Street, Jane had long reached the point where her sense of humour had failed. She exploded into a tirade until I managed to get a word in about the traffic. But as her anger receded, she was suddenly gripped by a panic. ‘We’ve got to get back to my place as soon as possible. Last time it rained like this, the river broke its banks and the house was under a foot of water!’ I remembered her boyfriend Patrick, whose recording studio was on the ground floor, as she lamented the fact that, after the last flood, they had been unable to get any insurance.

  Knowing that to go back the way I had come would mean waiting for hours to get past the A5 roundabout, we opted for a cross-country route. This was not easy, for in several places there were lines of cars stranded where they had flooded their engines through bad luck, bad judgement or through staying on the left-hand side of the road instead of driving through the shallowest part of the river that once had been the road. The emergency services and AA were overwhelmed, as this was the worst flood we had seen for many decades. We came to a place where the road curved around the edge of a hill, leaving a wide dip that would normally have coped with any runoff, but was now a lake overflowing with muddy water that filled the road. A queue of cars had built up on the other side, and several were lying broken down in between. I took off my shoes and socks, and waded through it, to find it came above my knees. It was obvious that if we tried to go through we would break down. There was nothing else for it. On one side was the lake; on the other, a large wall gave notice of a fancy country house, its gateway bracketed by stone pillars topped with ornamental carvings. Sensibly, the wall had been well set back from the road, to allow a clear view to either side when emerging from the driveway. The space between this and the road was filled with a fine lawn, edged with a small white chain-link fence. Reaching down, I found that the posts were easily pulled out. Without pausing to consult my conscience, I removed them, rolled up the fence and put it neatly to one side, before getting in the car and driving over the lawn.

  So we managed to get back to Jane’s, where we found to our amazement that the river had not burst its banks. Nevertheless, Nicole being on tour, I took up Jane’s offer to stay for the night, in case they needed to make a sudden evacuation of the contents of their ground floor. I spent most of the evening on the phone vainly trying to contact Nicole, to see if she could talk to Leslie and negotiate a stay of execution for a few days so that we would have time to make an arrangement with Milton Keynes Eventing Centre, to hire their facilities for the Japanese students. This would cost extra, and would require riding and leading the horses along the road every day, but at least we would be able to fulfil our contract. In the event, the road in the valley on the way was so badly flooded that it was impossible to get near Long Street for almost a week, without a boat or a tractor.

  And all the water in that valley had to go past Jane’s house, or else right through it, which, in the end, it did. We went to bed that night with a sense of distinct unease, leaving wellies at the top of the stairs, rather than the bottom as they had done the last time, only to find they had floated away in the morning. Patrick got up every hour to check the state of the river. Suddenly, at about 6.30, he woke us up with a shout. ‘This is it, it’s coming in the yard!’

  We stumbled outside to find water advancing at a rate of several feet a minute into the cobbled yard outside the house. Frantically we set about rescuing Patrick’s artwork, motorbikes and assorted equipment from an outhouse, before racing into the house to stuff the contents of the ground floor up the stairs. Computers, keyboards, guitars and amps underarm, we ran up and down while Jane desperately battled to delay the water with a rampart of sand-bags. The last item was impossible to move, a full-size Hammond organ weighing about as much as a small car. Setting two stools at either end, we lifted it up as best we could and placed it on the stools and turned off the electricity supply just in time, as the first water broke over the sandbags, inundating the house to a depth of one foot.

  Around this time Jane’s mobile phone rang. It was Nicole, who had finally got the messages I had left. ‘How are things?’ she enquired routinely. I hardly knew where to start. ‘Yeah, I suppose it has been raining a bit,’ she said absently. ‘We’re up in Lancashire at the moment, fantastic demo last night . . .’

  Although my involvement with the riding club continued, it was time to leave the Japanese school.

  It was sad to go because I felt I was making a real contribution to the lives of many young people. I particularly enjoyed teaching them about the war (which remains almost a taboo subject in Japan and has been deliberately misrepresented for years in official Japanese textbooks). It brought a sense of the reality and presence of history in our lives, to be teaching the granddaughters of Hiroshima victims. With Nori, I initiated visits by Second World War veterans, from both sides, involved in reconciliation efforts. These are truly remarkable men who have somehow managed to find it in their hearts to forgive, while making great efforts to ensure we do not forget. It was very moving to see the positive response of the students and several members of the Japanese staff. But there was no hope of survival for the school, which had been chronically mismanaged for years. Soon afterwards, many equally frustrated teachers also decided to leave. The school closed in 2002.

  It was also becoming increasingly clear that we needed our own place. I was about to go on the Monty course at West Oxfordshire College, and just before the latest tour had begun, Nicole had been offered the assistant tutor’s job on the course. The hour-long drive each way, to do just two and a half hours’ teaching every afternoon, didn’t seem sensible. It was time to move on. We succeeded in renting facilities from MK Eventing Centre for the Japanese students, and I managed not to come to blows with Leslie, but it was far from convenient. As soon as Nicole got back from the tour, she had a meeting with Leslie and Karen. They were amicable enough, but the message was clear: We won’t turn you out on your ear tomorrow, but the sooner you can find another place, the better.

  If life hadn’t been so hectic, we might have had time to dwell on the problem and feel really desperate. As it was, our lives were so complicated and fast, we were struggling to keep up almost every second of the day. Nicole’s job on the course came as a complete surprise, the departure of the previous assistant tutor being rather unexpected. Additionally, the course was scheduled to begin just two days after the end of a tour and started early every morning except Monday, when I would entertain the Japanese, but as Nicole was only teaching in the afternoons, we couldn’t even drive in together. So I had to buy another car and spent a few nights a week with some friends who live close to Witney, to cut down on travelling.

  Back in MK, there were several horses in for training, and the usual endless mucking out, and with Julia also on the course, no one to help out. Jane had taken over the role as main tutor to the Japanese students, so she had her hands full. At the same time, Nicole and I were doing an evening course at Bedford College, working towards a qualification in teaching adults in further education. This was a condition of Nicole’s job on the course, but I decided to go for it as well, as the skills were bound to come in useful, and this way at least we got to spend one evening a week together! With all this going on, it was not exactly easy to find time to search for a new yard nearer to Witney.

  Yards to rent are in short supply. In particular, small yards are very hard to come by. We had asked a few people and their responses had been very uninspiring. It seemed everywhere was taken and that prices were high. Buying somewhere was out of the question. We had looked in the classified adverts of a few horse magazines, but there weren’t any yards to rent.

  The decision to leave Long Street was made on a Thursday evening, and on the Friday, Nicole thought she had better buy a copy of Horse and Hound to see what was on offer.

  ‘Not much in this one,’ she said, flicking through the classified section. ‘But this one might be a possibility, if it’s not too far. “Sm
all yard to rent in idyllic Cotswold countryside, ten minutes from Cirencester.”’ She looked at the map on the wall. Cirencester looked almost as far away as Milton Keynes, but other than this yard there was nothing. ‘Shall I ring up and at least find out which side of Cirencester it is?’

  A few moments later, Nicole put down the phone, a hint of guarded optimism in her voice. ‘Well, it’s the Witney side of Cirencester, so it might be close enough. I’ve arranged for us to go and have a look on Sunday afternoon. There’s also some self-contained accommodation available, although it sounds very small.’

  The yard was called Moor Wood Stables, in the small village of Woodmancote.

  It was mid-afternoon on Saturday, and we’d just come home from the morning’s chores at the stables, turning out the horses, mucking out, watering, preparing haynets, training the couple of horses that we had in (almost an incidental task after the repetitive, tiring, but to Nicole, ‘great fun’ daily jobs), and we had a couple of hours’ respite before we had to go back and do the afternoon tasks of bringing the horses in for the night, sorting out evening feeds, et cetera.

  Nicole looked up from her steaming tankard of tea, munching thoughtfully on a chocolate biscuit. ‘The thing is,’ she said, ‘these yards don’t come up very often. If it’s suitable, we should put down a deposit straight away. I think we should bring a cheque book.’ This is possibly one of the most sensible things Nicole has ever said.