Big Pig, Little Pig: A Tale of Two Pigs in France by Yallop Jacqueline

Author:Yallop, Jacqueline [Yallop, Jacqueline]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
ISBN: 9780241977149
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2017-07-06T04:00:00+00:00

A couple of times a day, we hose them down. We stand just inside the fence, turn the water pressure high, fit our thumb over the end of the pipe and spew a shower into the air a foot or so above the pigs so that it patters down steadily all over them, heads and backs, turning the dust on their skin to mud, washing them clean for a while, black. Then, for fun, we make the water come with a rush and spurt it harder, directing it against a buttock or a shoulder, pummelling their toned limbs like a massage, soaking us as well as the pigs. The water is sparkly in the midday light, cool; it’s a fine sport. Everybody loves it: me and Ed, Mo, but especially Little Pig. He stands in the hosepipe shower and laughs with glee. I swear, he laughs with glee. He opens his mouth to catch the water; he shimmies in the flow; he ducks and splashes like a child in a fountain. Long after Big Pig has had a dousing and sauntered off to rummage in the woods, Little Pig is still demanding a soaking. When our visits to the enclosure are delayed, or simply when he feels the heat’s getting a bit much, he makes his discontent heard with a low, persistent squawk . Too dry, too hot; do something. And often Jean-Claude, who can’t fail to hear the full range of pig complaints from his side of the wall, kindly steps in and wields the hose. He doesn’t want to approve of it, this indulgence, but he can’t resist; no one can.

I understand Little Pig’s delight. When the heat crushes us we swim in the river, seeking out the cold pools and currents. Kingfishers slide across us, and damsel flies, equally blue, flick past our arms as we stroke the deep black water. We’ll get hot again quickly, almost as soon as we’ve climbed up the bank, but for a while it’s soft and chill, and there’s always (always) the momentary tingling bliss of cool water on burning skin as we plunge in. So we treat the pigs to a similar pleasure. When it’s too hot and heavy to walk or cycle to the enclosure, and when Mo won’t leave the dampish shade of the pen under the house, we fire up our rackety old moped and putter around on the lanes, seated close together, sweaty. The heat hangs silent and the pigs hear us coming, almost before we’ve left home, and are desperate to be hosed: by the time we pull across the bumpy ground at the edge of the field they’re yelping in anticipation. Water in the sun, cool in the heat: holidays.

Nights can be airless and sweaty, breathless, but we and the pigs all bask in the pleasure of the long, balmy evenings. Towards dusk they’re always to be found in the woods, among the hot-earth smells, bustling and purposeful, and we dig and prune and harvest long after the night crickets begin their burr.

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