Chapter 42 – Frisian horses
The couple at the other table had a similar discussion with similar low voices.
"Tom, that couple with their baby doesn't seem to be Dutch. And not German either.."
"Mmm", Tom said, "maybe you're right. That man looks familiar to me.
"Was he with you in Boarding school?"
"No.. no, I don't think so. By the way, we don't even know for sure that he is British".
"Oh come on, Tom, no one is more British than this bloke! Look at him, his is probably on holidays and still wearing a suit, tie and impeccably polished black shoes of a type that nobody wears anymore these days.. except you maybe, when you visit your cousin Mathilda".
They continued their meal for a while and then their eight year old daughter asked
"Mummy, may I be excused for a moment?"
"Of course darling, the lavatory is in the hall, at your left."
The slender blond girl walked away. She returned a few minutes later. She seemed to hesitate a moment, but then deliberately took a detour and had to pass the table where the Ellinghams were enjoying their lunch. The little girl tapped Martin softly on the shoulder.
He briskly turned around, scowled and opened his mouth to shout "what on earth do you think you're doing!…", but when he saw the little girl standing there, her arms behind her back and shyly balancing from one foot on the other, he swallowed his outburst and just frowned at her. The little girl took a deep breath and asked
"Are you Dr Ellingman?"
"Mmm, Dr EllingHAM, yes… and who are you?"
"I am Kathy Fitzhenry… Second in a long line of Kathy's, according to my father".
The little girl came closer to him, wrapped her little arms around his neck and gave him a kiss on his cheek. Martin froze under her movements, but didn't dare to yell at her. The flickering eyes of his beautiful but temperamental wife withheld him from that.
"Thank you Dr Ellingham, for saving Mrs Robbins's life!", young Kathy whispered.
Martin scraped his throat. "You're welcome..", he said in a soft voice, in the meanwhile trying to undo himself from her tied embrace.
"Kathy", Louisa said kindly, "that's very kind of you to come and say thank you to Dr. Ellingham. Mrs Robbins must be a very important person in your life, am I right?
Martin's eyes softened when he looked at Louisa. He admired the way she seemed to reassure the little girl. He felt suddenly relieved that he had been able to keep his rude words for himself.
From a distance, Tom and Kathy had followed the little event and Tom rose from his chair and came to their table.
"Kathy, what are you doing! Sorry for my daughter's behaviour, Mr and Mrs.. ?
"Ellingham", Louisa completed.
"Now Kathy, say sorry and go upstairs to your room!" her father said on a harsh tone.
"No, wait a minute, Mr Fitzgeorge! Your daughter only came to say thank you. I can assure you that not many persons do that!"
Martin stood up and his voice grew louder with every word he said. By the time he finished the sentence, he stood eye in eye with Kathy's father, who strangely enough appeared to be exactly of his own size.
"Martin!", Louisa warned him.
Tom Fitzhenry crouched in front of his daughter and took her in his arms. "I'm sorry darling. I was a bit frightened. We have told you very often that you shouldn't talk to strangers, haven't we?"
Kathy nodded, but added,
"Dr Ellingham isn't a stranger, daddy, he saved Mrs Robin's life, when she had her heart problems.."
Louisa took a pragmatic decision. "Mr Fitzhenry, this needs some clarification, don't you think so? Why don't you and your family join us for dessert. Then Kathy can explain us what she was talking about".
Martin sighed, because his quiet lunch was spoiled now, but on the other hand, he was also a bit intrigued and wished to know how the little girl knew that he was the surgeon who carried out the cardio-vascular procedure of this Mrs Robbins.
Kathy ran to their table to get the rest of the family and Tom and Martin rearranged two tables to make one big table for all of them. They quickly shook hands and got to know each other. Tom and Kathy Fitzhenry's two sons, Tom, five years old, and Bernard, two years old, were more interested in the choice of their dessert than in the story about Mrs Robbins and their mum assured that they kept quiet. She summoned them to share their books and toys with James Henry, which they eagerly did, after Louisa installed James on his play-blanket on the floor.
During the dessert, Martin concentrated on his slices of apple and he tried to recall the operation on Mrs. Robbins. It was one of the last ones before his blood phobia occurred. A simple procedure, but necessary to save her life… the girl was right. But how could this little girl know him?
Using her teacher's skills, Louisa encouraged the little girl to tell her story.
"Well, when Mrs. Robbins fell ill and the GP said that she had to be operated right away, Mummy and Daddy weren't at home. And Grandpa Bernard was spending a week at his sister's home in Bristol.. So Mr. Robbins had no choice as to bring me to the hospital too. It was a funny ride in the helicopter. Mr. Robbins was all white faced and scared, but he took really good care of me. Also in the hospital when we had to wait an aaaawful lot of time.. We couldn't do anything but wait until you had finished the operation, Dr. Ellingham. It was really boring. Mr. Robbins got really tired, so the nurses told him to lie down on the other bed in the room and he soon dozed off."
Martin's frown grew deeper. He started to recall the whole situation, with the elderly woman in the theatre, her even older husband whose health was worrying him as much as the health of the woman he had been operating on and then this little girl, with silky blond hair and big round eyes. She never seemed to be asleep. At every moment he came into the hospital room to check on Mrs. Robbins, the little girl had been staring at him. He now remembered that she looked like a little guardian angel. She sat there and talked to the old lady. Soft words, reassuring words. Just little girl's babbling mostly, but definitively having a comforting effect on the elderly couple.. Back at that time, he hadn't taken much notice of her. He was just glad that she hadn't been annoying him. He hadn't remembered her, but Kathy had remembered him. The whole event must have had a huge impact on her little life.
Louisa asked, "where were your daddy and mummy, Kathy?"
"I don't know"
Her mother answered that question. "We were at a hospital too, that night, I gave birth to Thomas Jr."
"How did you know my name, Kathy?", you must have been far too small to be able to read it?", Martin wanted to know.
"Well, at a certain moment, I had to use the bathroom, so a nurse took me there. While I was washing my hands, she discussed with another nurse.
'Ellingham is impossible tonight' she said, 'as always yelling at everybody, that t….' but then the other woman said that Dr. Ellingham had saved three lives that night. One of them was Mrs. Robbins. I want to become a surgeon, just like you Dr. Ellingham"
"You have a good memory and excellent observation skills, Kathy, both necessary competences to become a doctor. Make sure you work hard and do your homework, then you'll manage", Martin complimented her. The little girl radiated with joy and said, "Thank you Dr. Ellingham.
Utterly surprised, Louisa beamed her biggest smile towards her husband. Martin actually giving her a compliment was already a rare event , but giving a compliment to a complete stranger was something she had never experienced before. She made a mental note to thank him for that later.
Using her social skills once again, Louisa addressed the word to Kathy and Tom.
"Are you just on holiday, or are you visiting this region with a special purpose, if I may ask you?"
"Of course, you may", Kathy said. "We are enjoying these rural surroundings. It's calm, we love the landscape and we also went to see the flower fields in the Noordoost Polder. Acres of red, pink and yellow tulips… wonderful!"
"Yes they are", Louisa agreed. "I visited the flower fields near Lisse and Hillegom. Stunning!"
"But we are also here with a special goal. Maybe it's best that Thomas explains it. Thomas, dear?
Thomas Fitzhenry smiled at his wife and then started speaking.
"Well, we have quite a few acres of land and the Kathies love horses, so we also have some horses and ponies in our stables. Mostly abandoned, abused or rather old animals that my dear women wanted to rescue, because they couldn't bear to see them put down. But there are too many of them that after our rescue actions appear to be younger than anybody thought and they are quite capable of being used as riding horses. Kathy is amazing with them, she is capable of turning the most frightened or wild horses into gentle, calm child loving creatures.
There are too many of them for us to ride all of them, so I wish to start a riding school. But not one where rich families send their annoying and spoiled little girls to. I'd like to do more than that, use the riding school to help children with anxiety issues, or children with mental or physical handicap. It will be hard working and I am sure that we'll need to hire expertized trainers and maybe even physiotherapists and so on. But we have the space, we have the horses, we are motivated and as a family, we all want to facilitate this project.
We have done some research and we are visiting several different riding schools where they do similar projects. We have been in Halsteren, in the south of the Netherlands, where we saw a riding school that organizes riding lessons for children suffering from epilepsy, autism and mentally disabled children. Each boy or girl on a horse or pony was accompanied by one volunteer, sometimes young adolescents, sometimes adults.
This afternoon, we will visit another one, close by Dokkum. This one working with children that are physically disabled. Also here, there will be one or maybe even two volunteers for each boy or girl".
"How wonderful", Louisa answered enthusiastically.
"Quite a project and a social one to, because it will be necessary for us to ask help form a lot of persons in the village. Quite something for this man", Kathy said. "He hardly dared coming out of his house before he met me! You can come with us if you like", Kathy suggested.
"Oh Gawd", Martin thought.
Louisa bit her lip. "I don't know… it's James's nap time and…"
"Louisa, why don't you go with them. I'll stay here with James. And ehm, it may be better for the little Benjamin here to stay out of your way as well. Then you two can concentrate on the business… I guess he also needs a nap? He can stay here too. If you trust me with him, that is.." Martin said, scraping his throat, pulling his ear and after that busying himself with folding his napkin, waiting for their reaction.
"Would you do that Martin?"
Once again Louisa gave him a huge smile.
"Of course! Otherwise I wouldn't suggest it"
Thomas and Kathy looked at each other and decided to accept Martin's generous offer.
"Be careful not to get bumped by Bernard's head, Martin. We Fitzhenry's are famous for knocking people out just by an accidental kick of the had", Thomas joked.
Kathy and Louisa put the two babies to bed. James in his cot and Bernard on their bed. Louisa kissed her husband goodbye and Martin installed himself at the desk to do some research on his laptop. He looked forward to a couple of quiet hours.
About two hours later, Martin has installed himself in the lounge of the hotel, with a toddler on each of his knees and a book in front of them. With his velvety voice, he read the story to the boys, alternatively asking interactive reactions from both of them. He enjoyed the fact that Bernard already gave more understandable answers to his questions. He had to admit that Louisa was right. He always thought that it was useless to read to a baby, but now he could see the benefits of it. James was eager to copy the gestures and the sounds Bernard made.
Then, the Fitzhenry's and Louisa came back from their exploration. Kathy and Louisa were chatting and laughing like two persons who had known each other since decades. Just like the children, who ran towards James and Bernard to tell them all about their adventures, Kathy and Louisa burst out in enthusiastic explanations of what they'd seen.
Louisa just got a glimpse of her dear husband calmly reading to his son and to Bernard and she started to think that her husband finally started to become normal…
But then, when she wanted to wrap her arms around him to greet him, he wrinkled his nose and said
"Please Louisa, go and get a shower, you smell horse..!"
To be continued
When you read these lines, it means you have been patient enough to wait for a new chapter. It took really long this time, real life was a bit demanding this first quarter of 2017.
This chapter is dedicated to 4runners. Check her profile to get information on her wonderful project Battling Demons related to TheHorseCourse. You'll certainly understand why I inserted this chapter on horse riding for special children.
I also had to bring Tom and Kathy Fitzhenry in the story (I love the movie Beauty very much). I do hope you like the way I did it.