***chapter 49***
***Friendship***
"To Elizabeth," Colonel Maddocks announced, adding with a sigh. "I'll never forget the beautiful snowy evening she told me she was to marry Rodney." And for a moment, whiskey glass in hand and not touching his lips, he gazed wistfully out from the drawing room window, at the rolling hills and windswept moors far beyond Folly foot Farm, as though his dearest wish was for the scene to change to that of a white-blanketed winter landscape, and for the couple in question to appear on a bell-jingling fairytale sleigh pulled by eight black horses.
"To Elizabeth," Slugger rejoined, after an ever so slight clearing of his throat.
Geoffrey Maddocks, thus gently chastised, returned to the present and raised his glass. Two tumblers containing the finest malt whiskey clinked together and two men each took a sip of the amber liquid. Then, as was custom, it was his companion's turn to raise a toast.
"To Betty." Slugger blinked back tears, remembering his late wife. "Always remembered."
"To Betty. Always remembered," the colonel repeated, and the ritual was performed once more. And then both sank into the worn easy chairs at either side of the empty fireplace, and into a comfortable silence to sip the remainder of their drinks and reflect.
They made an odd pair, these fast friends. The horses never could fathom it. Colonel Geoffrey Maddocks, tall, elegant and silver-haired, in his bespoke tailored suit, with his proud aristocratic bearing and crisp, upper class accent, was the very epitome of elegance. Slugger Jones – his real name was lost somewhere along the road of life and never found again - in his old woollen hat and work-clothes, with his weather-beaten face and ex-boxer's broken teeth, with his mixture of thick Yorkshire and Cockney dialect, and a heavy dose of swearing thrown into the pot, was the very epitome of rough and ready.
To further add to the horses' confusion, they were far removed in status. The colonel gave orders and Slugger all but doffed his woollen hat (they were inseparable, Slugger and the hat, and so a vague, occasional touch had to suffice) though he more usually clutched it even tighter to his head in a gesture of despair at some problem inevitably caused by a certain red-headed, denim-clad youth.
But although both the colonel-turned-owner-of-Follyfoot-Farm and the ex-batman-turned-chief-cook-and-bottlewasher went through the motions of knowing-one's-place it was played out for the benefit of old time's sake and because old habits, like old soldiers, die hard.
Oh, Dora and Steve (without knowing the other did) explained it all to the puzzled horses. It seemed, having shared the battlefield and senseless horrors of War, the colonel and the ex-boxer now shared confidences as only true friends can. Of course, the horses nuzzled against Steve and Dora and nodded, trying to look wise, and wished so very much they could speak so they could ask why these two young folk, who were, too, so different in their accents and mannerisms and backgrounds, hadn't yet become, seeing as how theyhadn't shared a battlefield and the horrors of War, much, much more than just true friends?
And so it came about that every year, on the morning of Jimmy Turner's birthday memorial service, Colonel Geoffrey Maddocks, who'd been born with a silver spoon in his mouth, and his great friend Slugger Jones, who'd been born into such dire poverty and hunger that he spent his babyhood yearning for any spoon at all to be put into his mouth, retired to the drawing room of the disused manor house, where, with two whiskey glasses and a bottle of the finest malt whiskey that Jones had always deferentially fetched from the colonel's study in the farmhouse - the two adhered closely to the know-one's-place tradition – would drink an annual toast to lost loved ones. But Elizabeth was not lost to this world. No, indeed.
She was lost to a would-be suitor.
The would-be suitor, one Geoffrey Edward William Albert Maddocks, as the years passed by, had mellowed and come to terms with his loss. He could not do otherwise. Elizabeth and her husband Rodney, childhood sweethearts, and their three children were very happy together in their home in France. Twins, a boy and a girl, had been born within two years of their firstborn son and the trio kept their au pair on her toes with their mischief. Geoffrey knew because Elizabeth and Rodney sent letters and photos and in turn he kept the couple up-to-date with all his news. The family was fascinated by Follyfoot Farm and the little ones loved to hear stories of horses rescued and brought to live on the Farm owned byGrandpapa Angleterre, as they called him. Elizabeth and Rodney quickly adopted the nickname too. "Darling Grandpapa Angleterre, you are as dear to me as my own father and as dear a grandfather as he is to my children," Elizabeth told him fondly in one of their regular phone calls.
And only Slugger, his closest friend and confidant, would ever know how a man stepping into the twilight of his years so nearly made a complete fool of himself when he'd planned to propose to a pretty young girl over thirty years his junior, who never would, he realised now, have looked at him twice as a beau. Thankfully, Elizabeth never did discover that someone her father had asked to be in loco parentis while he was in another continent ever harboured such thoughts, innocent and platonic though his feelings were. A timely phone call came on a wild winter's night, when a fierce blizzard hurled thick snowflakes against the window-panes and dressed the trees in gowns of white.
"Geoffrey, I have the most wonderful news and just couldn't wait to tell you! As my dearest, dearest friend, I wanted you to be the very first to know. Rodney and I have decided to marry next summer!"
The memories of how she'd been bubbling over with happiness, of how he'd blown out the candles lit for the special dinner he'd cooked, of how he'd sat alone in the darkness silently weeping, all too often returned to haunt him. Nowadays however those recollections were tinged with relief rather than heartache, for Geoffrey Maddocks had long since come to his senses and now regarded Elizabeth as an adopted daughter, thanking Heaven he'd never been stupid enough to propose marriage and broken a friendship so precious.
But our yesterdays always remain close to our hearts, filled as they are with bittersweet dreams and the echoing footsteps and fading voices of those who walked across the stage of our lives past. For both Geoffrey and Slugger, the memorial service was not just a time to remember their friend Jimmy. It was also a time to reflect on the years that for all of us slip silently by, though surely we are young still, and gaze upon the aged with the same gentle pity of our youth. For the two old friends there was plenty of time yet – ironically, they always allowed themselves time though time was not theirs to give - to remember those gone before. And there were many. Family and friends, neighbours and acquaintances comrades stolen by the cruelty of War, all had taken that great journey unknown.
After several minutes of respectful silence and when they had drained their glasses, Slugger, with a vague touch of his faithful woollen hat, would collect the empty tumblers together with the remainder of the whiskey and they would leave for the memorial service. And as this is the final time, reader, that we enter the grand building let's look around quickly before the door closes on it forever.
Though it still holds itself aloof, it is many years ago since the manor house, cold and draughty now, with its large, empty rooms and silent sweeping staircases, hosted exclusive dinner parties, or glittered with jewellery worn by distinguished guests, or listened to the clash of dishes from the kitchens and the gossip of household staff.
Curtains and carpets, artwork and antiques, clocks and chandeliers, all have been sold and left an almost empty shell. The maintenance company needs do nothing more these quieter days other than keep it clean and carry out any necessary repairs. Only the drawing room contains any furniture at all and it isn't much: two worn and elderly arm-chairs that once sat in the staff quarters, a small, rickety table that knew far better days and far wealthier people, and a summer day painting of a striking young woman with auburn hair, pale blue eyes and peaches and cream complexion, who sits demurely under a rose-covered arbour with hidden laughter in her careless smile.
The portrait of Elizabeth is the last of the hundreds of expensive paintings that used to grace the manor house walls and, as previously arranged by Colonel Maddocks, this, too, will shortly be collected and auctioned off. Every penny raised can and does go towards the heavy expenses incurred in the running of Follyfoot Farm.
The inhabitants of its stables suspected a piece of Heaven must have been stolen and brought to Earth, but as it was so wonderful here on the Farm they made up their minds they'd never breathe the secret of the theft to anyone. Each and every horse was different, with a different history, but all blossomed under Follyfoot's special and tender care.
Tilly and Tammy, the shy young ponies now grown in confidence, who'd come to the Farm when their kindly owner could afford to keep them no longer, burn off energy as they play together in the paddock. Neither has ever known a harsh word – unless you count Stryker's "Yer nowt but a pair of useless s**t machines" but as he spoke with a twinkle in his eye and a smile on his lips they didn't believe any of it, and waited for him to fuss over them as he always did.
Three of the horses, older and wiser than others, lift their heads and toss their manes, watching curiously as the Follyfoot Land Rover trundles out of Follyfoot Farm with the two most senior Follyfooters inside.
Jessie, the chestnut mare who lost her foal through being kept half starved; steady, reliable Dante, a gentle giant, who was found tightly tethered, barely able to stand, covered in sores in a tiny stable full of his own filth; and Drummer, the nervy horse, who'd been abandoned and left to fend for himself, who bit and kicked and thundered his hooves ferociously on the ground when first brought to the Farm, trusting no-one.
The nurturing all that winter and bleak spring had been painfully slow, night after cold, snowy night Dora sat covered in a blanket whispering to him, comforting him, until the sleep she fought against so valiantly finally overwhelmed her and she was carried to her bed. Drummer is still wary of most, but often now he calls in his own special way to his patient nurse, with a nicker of greeting and a stomp of his hoof, quiet and content to nuzzle against her.
No, in this magical place of love and faith and confidences the horses never forget their friends either.
