nor Michael attempted to stop the harassment. Reggie says that "it were only a bit of fun. I could see he weren't going to hurt him," while Michael claims he "couldn't see 'xackly what he was up to," a rather doubtful claim as all of the boys were in plain sight on the pavement. Nonetheless, whatever Ian's full intentions were, they came to nothing further. A motorist stopped and demanded to know what they were doing, and the boys ran off.
There have been suggestions that Ian's desire to hurt something that day, having been thwarted, became the root of what occurred later. Indeed, under questioning, Reggie Arnold seems only too eager to point the finger in Ian's direction. But while Ian's anger had in the past certainly led him to commit acts the reprehensible nature of which caused him to be hated even more than the other two boys when the truth came out, the evidence ultimately shows that he was an equal participant (emphasis mine) in what followed.
JUNE
THE NEW FOREST, HAMPSHIRE
CHANCE ALONE BROUGHT HER INTO HIS ORBIT. LATER HE would think that had he not looked down from the scaffolding at that precise moment, had he taken Tess directly home and not to the wood that afternoon, she might not have come into his life. But that idea comprised the very substance of what he was supposed to think, which was a realisation he would only come to once it was far too late.
The time was midafternoon, and the day was hot. June generally prompted torrents of rain, mocking anyone's hope for summer. But this year, the weather was setting itself up to be different. Days of sun in a cloudless sky made the promise of a July and an August during which the ground would bake, and the vast lawns within the Perambulation would brown over, sending the New Forest ponies deep within the woodlands to forage.
He was high up on the scaffolding, getting ready to climb to the peak of the roof where he'd begun to apply the straw. Far more pliable than the reeds that comprised the rest of the materials, the straw could be bent to form the ridge. Some people thought of this as the "pretty bit" on a thatched roof, the scalloped pattern crisscrossed with spars in a decorative fashion. But he thought of it as what it was: that which protected the top layer of reeds from weather and avian damage.
He'd got to the knuckle. He was feeling impatient. They'd been working on the enormous project for three months, and he'd promised to begin another in two weeks' time. The finishing work still needed doing, and he could not hand off that part of the job to his apprentice. Cliff Coward was not ready to use the leggett on the thatch. That work was crucial to the overall look of the roof, and it required both skill and a properly honed eye. But Cliff could hardly be trusted to do this level of work when so far he hadn't managed to stay on task with even the simplest job, like the one he was meant to be doing just now, which was hauling another two bundles of straw up to the ridge as he'd been instructed. And why had he not managed this most mundane of tasks?
Seeking an answer to that question was what altered Gordon Jossie's life. He turned from the ridge, calling sharply, "Cliff! What the bloody hell's happened to you?" and he saw below him that his apprentice was no longer standing by the bundles of straw where he was supposed to be, anticipating the needs of the master thatcher above him. Rather he'd gone over to Gordon's dusty pickup some yards away. There Tess sat at attention, happily wagging her bushlike tail while a woman - a stranger and clearly a visitor to the gardens if the map she held and the clothing she wore were anything to go by - patted her golden head.
"Oy! Cliff!" Gordon Jossie shouted. Both the apprentice and the woman looked up.
Gordon couldn't see her face clearly because of her hat, which was broad brimmed and fashioned from straw with a fuchsia scarf tied round it as a band. This same colour was in her dress as well, and the dress was summery, showing off tanned arms and long tanned legs. She wore a gold bracelet round her wrist and sandals on her feet, and she carried a straw handbag tucked under her