Once Upon A Time in the West . . . Country by Tony Hawks

Author:Tony Hawks
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Published: 2015-02-05T16:00:00+00:00

***

Being three months old, in pig terms this probably made Titch the equivalent of a human teenager, which is why she slept on soundly as I went to breakfast.

I was the first into the dining room, eager to make a start before the forecasted driving rain and heavy winds kicked in. However, a glance out at the weather suggested that I might have missed my window of opportunity. That had probably been the day before. Or August.

It was the kind of rain that is noisy as well as damp. It positively rattled against the windows, each cascading drop bringing with it a clear message.

Stay inside and read a book today. I don’t want to see you. At all.

Rod took my order – a cooked breakfast without bacon (come on, I have a heart) – and I was left to sit and suffer. The torment was only in small part down to the sounds of the weather, most of it was actually being caused by those emanating from the radio. Seemingly, a gathering of overly jovial adults had gathered around a studio microphone to discuss banalities and laugh thunderously at each other’s facile quips. These excruciating exchanges were relieved by music – tolerable at most times of the year, but not right now, as I was forced to suffer Christmas song after sodding Christmas song.

Paul McCartney delivered his anthem to the inexorable decline in the quality of his oeuvre, assuring me that he was ‘simply having a wonderful Christmas time’. Jona Lewie had apparently left the kitchen (presumably the party had finished) and was doing his best to ‘stop the cavalry’. Boney M assured me that ‘man would live for evermore because of Christmas Day’. Given the rapidly growing world population and its insatiable appetite for plundering the earth’s finite resources, this seemed to be an over-simplification. I made a note to myself not to seek guidance from the words of Boney M.

After a hearty breakfast, I was ready to begin my quest. Whilst teenage Titch slept on, I got the bike ready for departure, successfully fitting the recharged battery. Despite consulting the short video that I’d shot on my smartphone, with Ken showing me how to tighten and loosen the ratchet on the back of the bike, I tried and failed repeatedly. With each attempt, I felt a deep sense of failure. This kind of practical inadequacy on my part was excusable when I was engaged in my normal career (actually, it’s not so normal, I suppose), but I was now an adventurer, and as such I ought to be able to look after myself. An adventurer needs to be able to solve problems. When you’re at sea, up mountains, in deserts, or even cycling in the wilds of Devon in god-awful weather, there’s no Ken the neighbour on hand to sort you out.

I secretly felt a little better when Rod couldn’t do it either. It took the help of another guest, who volunteered when he saw the two of us struggling.

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