apart from Johnny’s nose. What I’m certain I left behind was the jacket and tie I’d taken off at Sir Leon’s suggestion.
He came round to Birkstane with them that evening.
I was in my bedroom. Naturally I’d said nothing about the events of the day to either Dad or Aunt Carrie, just muttered something in reply to their question as to whether I’d had a good time.
I heard the car pull up outside and when I looked out and recognized Sir Leon’s Range Rover, I thought of climbing out of the window and doing a bunk.
Then I saw there was still someone in the car after Sir Leon had climbed out of the driver’s seat.
It was Imogen, her pale face pressed against the window, staring up at me.
For a moment our gazes locked. I don’t know what my face showed but hers showed nothing.
Then Dad roared, ‘Wilf! Get yourself down here!’
The time for flight was past. I went down and met my fate.
It wasn’t as bad as I’d feared. Sir Leon was very laid back about things. He said boys always fight, it’s in their genes, and he was sure my blow had been more in sport than in earnest, and Johnny’s nose wasn’t broken, and he was sure a little note of apology would set all things well.
Dad stood over me while I wrote it.
Dear Johnny, I’m really sorry I made your nose bleed, I didn’t mean to, it was an accident. Yours sincerely Wilfred Hadda.
Dad also wanted me to write to Lady Kira, but Sir Leon said that wouldn’t be necessary, he’d pass on my verbal apologies.
As he left, he punched me lightly on the arm and said, ‘Us wolves need to pick our moments to growl, eh?’
I expected Dad to really whale into me after Sir Leon had gone, but he just looked at me and said, ‘So that’s a lesson to us both, lad, one I thought I’d learned a long time back. My fault. Folks like us and folks like the Ulphingstones don’t mix.’
‘Because they’re better than us?’ I asked.
‘Nay!’ he said sharply. ‘The Haddas are as good as any bugger. But if you put banties in with turtle doves, you’re going to get ructions!’
And that was it. He obviously felt in part responsible. Me, I suppose I should have been delighted to get off so lightly, but as I lay in bed that night, all I could think of was Imogen, and why she’d accompanied her father to Birkstane.
I found out the next day. She wanted to be sure she knew how to get there by herself. I left the house as usual straight after breakfast, i.e. about seven a.m. Dad got up at six and so did Aunt Carrie. Breakfast was the one meal of the day she could be relied on for, so long as you were happy to have porridge followed by scrambled egg, sausage and black pudding all the year round. If I decided to have a lie-in, the penalty was I had to make my own, so usually I got up.
It was a beautiful late July morning. The sun had been up for a good hour and a half and the morning mists were being sucked up the wooded fellside behind the house, clinging on to the tall pines like the last gauzy garments of a teasing stripper.
I hadn’t any definite plan, it might well turn into a pleasant pottering-about, basking kind of day with a dip in the lake at the end of it, but in case I got the urge to do a bit of serious scrambling, I looped a shortish length of rope over my rucksack and clipped a couple of karabiners and slings to my belt.
I hadn’t gone a hundred yards before Imogen stepped out from behind a tree and blocked my path.
I didn’t know what to say so said nothing.
She was wearing a T-shirt, shorts and trainers. On her back was a small pack, on her head a huge sunhat that shaded her face so I could not see her expression.
She said, ‘Johnny says you punched him ‘cos he was rude about my dancing. He said if I saw you to tell you he’s OK and it was a jolly good punch.’
I remember feeling surprise. In Nutbrown’s shoes I don’t think I’d have been anywhere near as gracious. In fact I know bloody well I wouldn’t!
I said, ‘Is that what you’ve come to tell us? Grand. Then I’ll be off.’
I pushed by her rudely and strode away. I thought I’d left her standing but after a moment I heard her voice behind me saying, ‘So where are we going?’
I spun round to face her and snapped, ‘I’m going climbing. Don’t know where you’re going. Don’t care either.’
In case you’re wondering, Elf, how come I was talking like this to the same girl I’d fallen for so utterly and irreversibly just the day before, you should recall I was a fifteen-year-old lad, uncouth as they came, with even fewer communication skills than most of the breed because there were so very few people I wanted to communicate with.
Also, let’s be honest, standing still in shorts and trainers with her golden hair hidden beneath that stupid hat, it was hard to believe this was the visionary creature I’d seen dancing on the lawn.
My mind was in a whirl so I set off again because that seemed the only alternative to standing there, looking at her.
She fell into step beside me when the terrain permitted, a yard behind me when it didn’t. I set a cracking pace, a lot faster than I would have done if I’d been by myself, but it didn’t seem to trouble her. When I got to the lake, that’s Wastwater, I deliberately headed along the path on the south-east side, the one at the foot of what they call the Screes, a thousand feet or so of steep, unstable rock that only an idiot would mess with. Even the so-called path that tracks the lake’s edge is a penance, involving a tedious mile or so of scrambling across awkwardly placed boulders. I thought that would soon shake her off, but she was still there at the far end. So now I crossed the valley and went up by the inn at Wasdale Head into Mosedale, not stopping until I reached Black Sail Pass between Kirk Fell and Pillar.
This was a good six miles over some pretty rough ground and she was still with me, no more out of breath than I was. Now I found I had a dilemma. The further I went, particularly if as usual I wandered off the main well-trodden paths, the more I’d be stuck with her. But she could easily retrace the path we’d come by back to the valley road, and on a day like this, there would be plenty of walkers tracking across Black Sail, so I felt I could dump her here without too much trouble to my conscience.
I sat down and took a drink from the bottle of water I carried in my sack. She produced a can of cola and drank from that.
I said, ‘That’s stupid.’
‘Why’s that?’ she said, not sounding offended but genuinely interested.
‘Because you can’t seal it up again like a bottle. You’ve got to drink the lot.’
‘So I’ll drink the lot.’
‘What happens when you get thirsty again?’
‘I’ll open another one,’ she said, grinning and shaking her rucksack till I could hear several cans rattling against each other. ‘Like a drink?’
