Remembrance Day by Leah Fleming Read Free Book Online Page B

to be grateful that our local workers are singing from a hymn sheet rather than a striker’s ballot paper.’ They all laughed.
    She’d bought the boys new dinner suits and they looked so handsome together, so grown up. They could pass for eighteen, they were so tall and strong. It was alarming.
    What if war came? Should she go to London or stay here? Her place was close to her boys and the village where she would be expected to take some leadership in parochial matters. She would see that no son of hers would be allowedto slip underage into the forces, cadet or not! Plenty of time for them to enlist should such a time come.
    Oh, why did such thoughts have to sour their festivities? Charles’s warning, like Angus’s recent fits, hung heavy on her heart. Surely the Royal Navy would make enough noise to see off the Kaiser’s affectations? Suddenly she was not looking forward to 1914.
    Guy and Angus joined the crowd gathered in Elm Tree Square outside the Hart’s Head for the traditional send-off to the Boxing Day meet. The snow had come to nothing and the ground was sure enough for a full hunt. Hounds were wagging their tails ready for the off, horses snorting breath and dumping manure for the allotment holders already waiting with buckets at the ready. A crowd of spectators and followers were assembled on the pavement, watching the colourful spectacle of masters in their scarlet coats, ladies in veiled black top hats and riding habits, younger riders in tweed hacking jackets and jodhpurs circling round with their ponies; a magnificent turnout. It was going to be a brilliant meet.
    Guy’s eyes searched through the crowd to see if Selma Bartley had bothered to see them off but the door of the forge was shut, with no sign of life from the cottage. Perhaps they were visiting or out walking, as was the custom in the village on this holiday.
    He’d never been interested in girls before. It wasn’t encouraged even to flirt with the maids in school. There were careful articles in his Boys’ Herald about gentlemanly behaviour towards the weaker sex and such rot. He just thought it was a shame that boys and girls couldn’t be friends, brothers and sisters, and equals. Why couldn’t youtalk to a girl without sniggers from chums? Funny, though, when he looked at Selma, all he saw were those huge chocolate-brown eyes and smiling face, and how her wet shirt clung to her body when she had stood out of the beck after the accident. A strange yearning churned him up inside at the memory.
    It was not as if he didn’t meet pretty girls at the family gatherings, girls all buttoned up with frills and ruffles, and simpering glances in his direction.
    Selma was different, full of life and fun. He’d once watched her leap onto one of the horses grazing in the paddock waiting to be shod. She would make a fearless horsewoman, confident and yet gentle at the same time. That talent was innate; riding skills could be taught but not that sense of oneness with your mount. The Bartley boys too were skilled with the farm horses, leading the huge beasts, checking their forelocks, calming them down. It was a pity that none of them had the use of a horse to exercise.
    Perhaps it was that tomboy bit of Selma he was attracted to. How he’d love to lend her Jemima, Mother’s chestnut, which she hardly rode, but he knew it wouldn’t be proper to single her out. The Bartleys and Cantrells didn’t mix socially and it would be taken amiss if they did. Pity, he sighed as he searched the crowd again. Riding high it was so easy to look down on villagers as if you were somehow above them.
    Then he saw her watching him from the corner of Prospect Row, almost hidden. She was wearing a bright scarlet beret and scarf over her usual winter coat. He gave a short wave so as not to embarrass her and she smiled back mouthing ‘Good luck’. How he wished he could ask her to come and join them. Now the landlord was carryinga tray full of stirrup cups. Soon the