Authors: Barbara Elsborg
Flick was looking forward to a day away from everything and everyone. She’d packed sandwiches, a large bottle of water and her gardening gloves. Bob picked her up at 6:30 in the morning. He was large, red-faced guy with a shock of blond hair.
“Morning, Flick,” Bob said as she climbed in his Land Rover.
“Good morning.”
“Now if you see anything you don’t like the look of, for goodness sake don’t put your finger on it.”
“And after I’d decided this was going to be your lucky day.”
Bob laughed.
“How did you know it was me?”
“Because you and trouble are joined at the hip.”
“And you still want me to help?”
Bob glanced over. “As I recall, you told me drystone walling was at the top of your list of skills.”
Flick wriggled. “You shouldn’t have bought me that last vodka and orange. Top of the list was stretching it a bit.”
He sighed. “You have done this before?”
“Yes.” The fact that the first and only lesson had not moved beyond “This is a piece of limestone, this is sheep poo. Don’t get them confused,” did not mean she couldn’t do it.
Bob dropped her off next to a broken-down stretch of wall and then drove further up the hill. Flick gaily waved goodbye before turning to the pile of stones and groaning.
She sorted them by size, by shape and considered sorting by color. There were no corner pieces, no straight edges and the largest stones proved impossible to move. Not as easy as she thought.
While occupied with this, Flick made a mental note to go through her CV, take out skills she had yet to master and put them under hobbies. Included in that was her ability to change barrels. The pub manager had returned on the afternoon of day one to find his cellar inches deep in beer with a soaked Flick trying to lasso a spinning barrel with a hose. There hadn’t been a day two. Grinstead’s sneaked in under her radar and Flick groaned. Who’d set her up? Who hated her that much? She couldn’t think of anyone. Only she had to. She shouldn’t be pretending this was going to go away. Maybe she should write again to the managing director. That would be the tenth letter. Ten could be her new lucky number.
After a while, Flick relaxed and began to sing. Now she’d buried Grinstead’s deep in her mind, this was going so much better than expected. The sheep had left her alone and the sun had come out. The wall did look a bit wonky, but she’d made good progress. The last rock slotted into place and Flick looked up to see Beck striding up the hill on the other side of the wall. It was the wrong moor and she wore the wrong clothes, but she felt like Cathy watching Heathcliffe coming toward her. Beck looked dark and dangerous. No, Flick corrected, the dangerous part would be her. But her heart did a little jump for joy.
Beck put his hand on the top of the wall to hoist himself over on to her side. The stones shifted and suddenly Beck formed part of an avalanche heading in Flick’s direction. She shrieked and fell backward. The whole of the section she’d rebuilt toppled over and spread out at her feet along with Beck who lay motionless.
“Are you still alive?” Flick gasped.
“Just,” he groaned.
“Well, prepare to die. I’ve spent all morning working on that.”
“Drystone walls aren’t supposed to collapse at the slightest touch.”
“I don’t call fifteen stone the slightest touch.”
He levered himself upright. “I don’t weigh that much.”
“Ten stone then.”
“I don’t weigh that little.” He scrambled to his feet and brushed himself down.
I’d like to do that,
Flick thought, then looked behind him at the devastation and sighed. “I’ve too much to do to argue about how much you weigh. I thought it was supposed to be the female of the species who obsessed over weight.”
“You brought it up,” Beck said in a grim voice.
Flick decided to change the subject. “How did you know where I was?”
“Phone call to Giles, another to Willow, a text message to Kirsten and then I spotted you from the road. I could probably have spotted you from outer space dressed like that.”
Flick looked down at her bright red top and the green and black striped shorts. He was right. Her shoulders slumped and she began to move the rocks again. “Fine. Just leave me in peace to finish this.”
She picked up one of the large stones and put it at the base of the wall. Beck picked it up and moved it.
“It’s better that way round,” he said.
Flick bit the inside of her mouth and picked up a smaller rock, tossing it from one hand to the other. Beck caught it in flight.
“I’ll point them out. You pass them to me. I’ll slot them in place,” he said.
“You have to train for ages to master the craft of drystone walling.” Flick passed him another stone.
“So how long did you train?”
“Two hours.”
Beck turned and grinned. Flick tried not to blush and failed. He made this look so easy, working at twice her speed, picking up two rocks for every one she handed him and jamming them in far more forcefully than she’d managed.
All Beck had to do was tell her how he felt. How difficult could that be? Very.
“So why aren’t you working?” Flick asked.
Beck crouched with a huge stone in his arms. “I am working.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be digging holes?”
“I’ve given everyone the day off. The Hall has been invaded by the press. Henry seemed keen they didn’t get hold of your name.”
“That was nice of him.”
“Where do you want to put the ties?”
Flick stared. “Is that a trick question? In the wardrobe?”
“Do you call them throughs?” Beck shoved another rock in place.
“Are you speaking English?”
“Do you know anything at all about what you’re doing?”
He winced when she scowled. He was supposed to be asking her out, not pissing her off. “I’ll take that as a no. Brief lesson. The wall has to slope inward from both sides to be stable. Two stones wide with the occasional tie or through going the whole width. Fill in the centre and gaps with smaller stones. Large flat stones on top and then add a coping made up of flat, rounded stones laid on their edge.”
God. Seal my mouth now.
Beck could see her working up to some smart quip and knew he deserved it. “Thank you,” she mumbled.
He was shocked. “At least the foundations are okay. You weren’t strong enough to move the really large boulders.”
Flick bristled and he rushed on. “Drystone walling is quite an ancient skill. There’s some evidence it began in the thirteenth century, though it wasn’t until the sixteenth century that people began to use it as a method of enclosing their holdings.” What the hell was he doing? Where was the witty repartee?
“Really.” Flick yawned.
“Most of these walls were built in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Did you know you need one ton of stone for each square yard of wall?” If he’d had a gun, he’d have shot himself.
“Is that a fact? And how much would it take to cover a body?”
Beck stopped working. “Sorry. I talk too much when I’m nervous.”
Ask me why I’m nervous.
“So do you think you could get a body in the gap? I wonder if there are any in all these miles of walls.”
“I’ll shut up,” Beck said.
“Just don’t stop working.”
What the hell was he doing? All he had to do was tell her he felt the same way as her.
———
Fifty minutes later they were nearly done. Fifty minutes of mostly silent, hard work where Flick had gone through a million different things to say and dismissed all of them. Beck had given up his day off to look for her and then help her, only he’d not said anything she wanted to hear.
Bob pulled up in his Land Rover as Flick pushed the last rock into place.
“Persuaded a passing motorist to help?”
“I’m a friend of Flick’s,” Beck said.
Her friend? After he’d worked quietly next to her for so long, she’d begun to think he wasn’t interested.
“I’m only paying one of you.” Bob ran his hand over the wall and tested a couple of the stones with his fist. “You made a good job of that, Flick’s friend. Saved me having to do it all over again. I’ve got to go back home for an hour or so. Start on that next section and I’ll pay you when I come to pick you up.”
“Pay her now and I’ll give her a lift back.”
“That all right with you, Flick?”
“Oh, had you noticed I was here?” she said in a sweet tone.
Bob laughed and handed her fifty pounds. “You grow more like your Mam every day.”
As Bob drove back to the road, Flick offered half the cash to Beck. “You did most of the work. You can go now. I’ll do the rest on my own and hitch a lift back.”
“So what do you actually do for a living?” he asked.
“Drystone walling. You can see samples of my craft over there, there and there.” She pointed to sections where the wall had collapsed.
Beck laughed. “What do you really do?”
“Astro-physicist,” Flick said, stepping into the minefield she’d been trying to avoid. She could have made up a more convincing lie. “Veterinary nurse specializing in small furry creatures.” Now she’d managed to talk herself into a black hole. Might as well give up while she only looked stupid rather than a raving lunatic.
“Lunch,” she suggested, hoping to deflect him.
“Brought enough to share?” Beck sat down in the sun with his back against the wall.
“Peanut butter and Marmite sandwiches.”
“Peanut butter, please.”
“No, I mean there’s peanut butter and Marmite on the same sandwich.”
Beck looked at her as though she was mad.
“They’re really good.” She sat down beside him.
He took a tentative bite.
“What do you think?” Flick asked.
“I think we’ll finish this wall and I’ll take you for a pub lunch. Then I can apologize for all the stupid things I’ve said and you can tell me again that I take your breath away and this time I can say something sensible back to you and…”
Flick scratched at a dirty mark on her shorts.
“Why won’t you look at me?” Beck asked.
“Can’t.” She could barely breathe.
“Why not?”
Because if I look, I’ll kiss you and I might not be able to stop.
She fixed her eyes on the ground next to Beck’s left hand.
“What are you frightened of?” Beck asked.
“Snake.” Flick croaked the word out.
“That’s not what I meant.”
“No, there’s a snake by your left hand.”
Beck turned his head as Flick threw her sandwich. The snake recoiled, either from the blow or the Marmite. Beck yanked his fingers away, but it was too late, the telltale puncture wounds were evident on the back of his hand.
“Shit, it bit you.” Flick was horrified. “I was trying to frighten it away. I’m so sorry. Speak to me. Are you all right? You’re in shock. Do you need CPR or a tourniquet? I could take off my bra. I’ve done first aid.”
Despite the fact that he was seriously freaked out, Beck wanted to laugh. “If you’re asking if I need CPR, I think your first-aid skills might be a bit rusty. I’m not averse to the removal of the bra, though I think your timing’s a bit off.”
“I meant I could use it as a tourniquet,” Flick said in indignation and jumped to her feet.
“I know and much as I’d like you to do that, I think we’d better go to hospital and let the experts take a look.”
“You’re very calm.” She bounced up and down.
“It’s not my first time.”
She stopped bouncing.
“I’ve been bitten before.”
“Oh God. Should we take the snake?” Flick asked.
“I don’t think it was injured.”
“No, I mean for identification.”
“It’s an adder.”
Flick’s heart lurched. “Adders are poisonous. You could die.”
Beck sighed. “Do you have to articulate every thought?”
“Sorry.”
By the time they’d reached the car, his hand had swelled up and Flick felt sick.
“You know, I’m beginning to wonder if there’s some force at work that wants to stop me kissing you,” he said.
“You want to kiss me?”
“Yes, but not right now. Could you drive? I need to keep my hand still. The calmer I am, the less the poison will spread.”
“Okay.”
The tires spun on the gravel as Flick slammed her foot on the accelerator.
“Take it easy. It’s not my car,” Beck said.
Flick kept glancing at his hand. “Does it hurt?”
“The pain is excruciating.”
Flick whimpered. God, what had she done?
“Do you feel faint or short of breath,” she asked.
“Only when I’m next to you because I’m always wondering what’s the next way you’re going to try to kill me.”
Flick flinched.
“Is that why Henry wants to keep your name out of the papers? Do you already have a criminal record for disposing of guys?”
Beck had been joking but realized at once he’d said something to alarm her. Flick gripped the wheel so tightly her knuckles went white. He thought back to the first time they’d met. He still hadn’t found out why she thought he was a policeman. She didn’t want to tell him what she did for a living. She’d been kidding about the drystone walling but was it to avoid telling him the truth? Surely she did more than these part-time, dead-end jobs? Working for Celia? Selling ice-cream? Building walls? She was hiding something and it was coming between them.
The hospital was only a couple of miles away in Otley. It had a minor injuries department rather than the full accident and emergency provision of the infirmary in Leeds so Beck hoped it could handle a snake bite.
“Coming through. Snake bite. Coming through.” Flick pushed open the doors and propelled Beck into the reception like a presidential candidate.
She’d looked for a wheelchair in the entrance and expressed her deep disappointment when Beck ushered her on.
“It’s an emergency. It’s a snake bite,” Flick told the lady behind the counter.
“Name.”
“Adder,” said Flick.
“Your address, Mr. Adder?”
“Thank you, Flick. I think I’ll take it from here. My name’s Alexander Beckett.”
“It’s an emergency,” Flick repeated.
She hopped from one foot to the other as Beck provided the rest of his details.