Lamb in Love by Carrie Brown Read Free Book Online

the doughnuts with jam from the canvas bag, setting themout on their paper-covered trays. At eleven, when the sun arrives at the windowsill and lights up the cool, whitewashed walls in the bakery, the geraniums glowing in the window box, she knows that Mrs. Blatchford will come and fetch Manford for tea and a bite to eat. Mrs. Blatchford tells her that he holds her hand when she comes to lead him to the table, but only for a moment. He seems a little wary still, she says. He puts his hands over his face when she speaks to him if he’s feeling too shy for conversation.
    I N THE EVENINGS, during their supper, Vida has been working on his manners. She’s ashamed that she hasn’t spent more time on this—she believes that it pains him to be so awkward. But it isn’t easy, and sometimes she thinks it’s better just to let him eat in peace, without always nudging him about where his elbow is or leaning over to wipe his chin for him.
    During their practice sessions, which she has begun since he started at Niven’s—as he takes both lunch and his tea there now—she holds the cup to his lips, touches his mouth with her finger, speaks softly to him. His eyes watch her face. He tries.
    â€œGently, Manford,” she says. “As though kissing a flower.”
    She spills a bit of tea into the saucer and he practices holding it, watching the tea lap the edge.
    â€œLittle bites,” she says, passing him a triangle of toast spread with jam. He tries.
    â€œYour napkin goes here,” she says, spreading it on his lap where he pats it. She doesn’t like it tied around his neck anymore. Makes him look the baby.
    A T N IVEN’S THEY have elevenses and lunch and tea, and after each meal Manford goes back to the dairy to work. Now they have him icing the cakes as well. This he does surprisinglywell, Mr. Niven says to Vida, the tiny garlands and miniature roses each set in their place, sometimes a fantastically shaped leaf or cluster of petals that the others come gradually to recognize as a likeness—a good likeness, in fact—of some native plant, nettle or cowslip.
    Mr. Niven, who isn’t usually one to appear surprised by much of anything, likes to stop his work and look over Manford’s efforts from time to time. “It’s quite remarkable,” he tells Vida. “It’s as if he’s—memorized things. The way they look.”
    â€œHe does have a talent for it, doesn’t he?” Mrs. Blatchford agrees. She cocks her head and looks over a tray of cakes. “Though they’re not what you would call traditional looking, are they?”
    Mr. Niven frowns at a particular cake, iced with a tapestry of rampant, though lovely, green weeds. “Shall we have trouble selling it, do you think?”
    â€œWell, we mustn’t discourage him,” Mrs. Blatchford says with conviction. “No one wants it, we’ll just give it to the vicarage. They slice all their cakes aforehand.”
    T HE IDEA OF the job at Niven’s came to Vida so suddenly one day that she couldn’t quite believe it hadn’t ever occurred to her before. It wasn’t that she hadn’t wanted to see him feeling useful. One time, in fact, she’d explored the possibility of the Spastic Society’s workshop, where people like Manford could have a job. She and Manford had gone on the bus one day into Winchester, and they’d had a look at the place.
    The workshop was in an old garage, converted into a hall so brightly lit that Vida found herself squinting as she introduced herself to the woman who bustled over to greet them and introduced herself as
Matron,
of all things! As if Dickens or Trollope or someone might have invented her, Vida thought.
    The employees—the clients, as Matron referred to them—some of them tied up in wheelchairs with twisted sheets so they wouldn’t slump over, sat at long tables, nodding off over their work. As far as