The Country Escape - Jane Lovering Page 0,87

tarmac of the lane, the whippy feel of his mane as it flopped with each stride. I knew this. I could do this.

He was slow, slower than anything I’d ridden since I was about six. His canter was straight out of a rocking-horse factory, but so easy to sit that I hardly had to think about it and could concentrate on the steering, with the long reins bunched up in each hand. I leaned across the piebald withers, pushing him on with hands and seat as we rode on into the gale, tears stripped from my eyes by the force of the wind.

I slowed as we approached the fallen tree. Patrick blew once, twice, then his head came up and he fell into an easy trot as I steered him right, off the road and down into the narrow footpath that Gabriel had mentioned. Down, splashing through mud, no faster than a trot because I couldn’t see underfoot, enjoying the relative shelter, then bursting out onto short cropped grass, turning left, with the sound of the sea booming somewhere underneath us and Patrick was galloping, stretching his chunky body into the wind as I urged him on.

The wind took the breath from my lungs and the water from my eyes; it was coming at us from seemingly every side as we thudded along the bare stretch of grass. Patrick balanced himself like a pro – he even jumped a small log that lay in our path, as though he was enjoying himself. As we breasted a small rise, I saw a lone house, and then, further down the hillside, a beaten track that led down to the flickering lights that bled into the gale and indicated the presence of Christmas Steepleton.

I let Patrick have a breather and walked him along towards the house, then swung down, leaning to open a gate that led onto the track. There was a stile but I wasn’t quite sure of Patrick’s jumping capability and figured that it was safer to open the gate than to try and clear it. Patrick stood like a rock as I unhooked the gate, and backed up when asked so I could swing it onto its catch. He’d been well schooled at some point, taught to respond to leg aids as well as my hands, and it seemed that all his experience had cut in at the same point mine had.

We careered down the steep hill into the village proper. Patrick was blowing a lot by this point, sweat was foaming along his neck and under my seat, the cold damp replaced by hot, slick wetness, and we cantered down the tarmac. I knew I shouldn’t be cantering downhill on an unfit pony, but the image of Mary lying there in the van, face pulled to one side, was uppermost in my mind, and I kicked him on, grateful for the grip of unshod hooves. Metal against this gradient would have seen us slide down into the sea in a shower of sparks.

There were small knots of people walking down the hill. They pressed themselves into the doorways of houses as we passed, flickering lanterns illuminating bits of piebald coat, white sweat, shocked faces. When we got to the turning circle at the bottom of the hill, there was quite a gathering, music playing out through the doors of a building; inside I caught a glimpse of stalls, a snatch of laughter as we fled by, until I pulled Patrick to a puffing, blowing stop outside Thea’s shop.

I didn’t even pause to tie Patrick up. I just jumped down, my legs achy and jellified, dropped the reins and pounded on the door of the illuminated shop, as spray from the sea swept up over me and the pony. I think I yelled a bit too, until Thea appeared in the window and opened the door, when I gasped, ‘Phone. Landline. Now,’ and she steered me to an old-fashioned dial telephone behind the till.

The reception was much better on the landline. I managed to give instructions about the helicopter, the fallen tree, the stroke and the despatcher reacted accordingly. When I put the phone down, everything gave up and I sat down hard on the floor of the shop, with Thea standing over me looking puzzled in a multicoloured way, and Patrick backed into the doorway to get away from the waves that were sending spray splashing against the shopfronts.

There was quite a crowd collecting outside now. Despite the furious