Longshot. Part 29

'Company,' I said. 'Someone around.'

He nodded.

'You're welcome,' I said.

'Dee-Dee thinks we take advantage of you,' he said bluntly. 'Do we?'

'No.' I was surprised. 'I like what I'm doing.'

'Cooking, baby-sitting, spare chauffeur, spare lad?'

'Sure.'

'You have the right to say no,' he said uncertainly.

'I'll tell you soon enough if I'm affronted. As for now, I'd rather be part of things, and useful. OK?'

He nodded.

'And,' I said, 'this way I get to know you better for the book.'

For the first time he looked faintly apprehensive, as if perhaps after all he didn't want his whole self publicly laid bare; but I would respect any secrecies I learned, I thought again, if he didn't want them told. This was not an investigative blast-the-lid-off exercise; this was to be the equivalent of a commissioned portrait, an affirmation of life. It might be fair to include a wart or two, but not to put every last blemish under magnification.

The day went ahead as planned and, in addition, in the Volvo on the way to Newbury, Tremayne galloped through his late adolescence and his introduction (by his father, naturally) to high-stakes gambling. His father's advice, he said, was always to wager more than one could afford, otherwise one would get no thrill and feel no despair.

'He was right, of course,' Tremayne said, 'but I'm more prudent. I play poker, I back horses, I bet a little, win a little, lose a little, it doesn't flutter my pulse. I've owners who go white and shake at the races. They look on the point of dying, they stand to lose or win so much. My father would have understood it. I don't.'

'All your life's a gamble,' I said.

He looked blank for a moment. 'You mean training racehorses? True enough, I get thrills like Top Spin Lob, and true enough, great slabs of despair. You might say I wager my heartstrings, but not much cash.'

I wrote it down. Tremayne, driving conservatively, slanted a glance at my notebook and seemed pleased to be quoted. The man himself, I thought with a stirring of satisfaction, was going to speak clearly from the pages, coming alive with little help from me.

In the evening, after Tremayne had departed to his card game, Gareth asked me to teach him to cook.

I was nonplussed. 'It's easy,' I said.

'How did you learn?'

'I don't know. Maybe from watching my mother.' I looked at his face. 'Sorry, I forgot.'

'My mother makes it all difficult, not easy. And she would never let me watch her at home. She said I got under her feet.'

My own mother, I reflected, had always let me clean out raw cake mixture with my finger: had always liked to talk to me while things bubbled.

'Well,' I said, 'what do you want to eat?'

We went into the kitchen where Gareth tentatively asked for 'real' shepherd's pie, 'not that stuff in supermarket boxes that tastes of cardboard and wouldn't feed a pygmy'.

'Real, easy shepherd's pie,' I a.s.sented. 'First of all, catch your shepherd.'

He grinned and watched me a.s.semble some minced beef, an onion, gravy powder and a jar of dried herbs.

'The gravy powder's sort of cheating,' I said. 'Your mother would be horrified, but it thickens the meat and tastes good.'

I dissolved some powder into a little water, added it to the beef, chopped the onion finely, added that, sprinkled some herbs, stirred it all around in a saucepan, put the lid on and set it to cook on a low heat.

'Next thing to decide,' I said, 'is real potatoes or dried potato granules. How are you with peeling potatoes? No? Granules then?'

He nodded.

'Follow the directions,' I said, giving him the packet.

' "Heat eight fluid ounces of water and four fluid ounces of milk" ' he said, reading. He looked up, 'Hey, I was going to ask you- You know you said to boil river water before you drink it? Well, what in?'

I smiled. 'Best thing is a Coca-Cola can. You can usually find an empty one lying about, the litter habits of this nation being what they are. You want to just shake it up with water to wash it out a few times in case there are any spiders or anything inside, but c.o.ke cans are pretty clean.'

'Ace,' he said emphatically. 'Well, for the potatoes we need some b.u.t.ter and salt- Will you write down all you bought last week, so I can get them again and cook when you're gone?'

'Sure thing.'

'I wouldn't mind if you stayed.'

Loneliness was an ache in his voice. I said, 'I'll be here another three weeks.' I paused. 'Would you like, say perhaps next Sunday if it's a decent day, to come out with me into some fields and perhaps some woods? I could show you a few things in the books- how to do them in real life.'

His face shone: my own reward.

'Could I bring Coconut?'

'Absolutely.'

'Mega cool.'

He whipped the potato granules happily into the hot liquid and we piled the fluffy result onto the cooked meat mixture in a round pie dish. Put it under the grill to brown the top. Ate the results with mutual fulfilment and cleared everything away afterwards.

'Can we take the survival kit?' he asked.

'Of course.'

'And light a fire?'

'Perhaps on your own land, if your father will let us. You can't just light fires anywhere in England. Or anyway, you shouldn't, unless it's an emergency. People do, actually, but you're supposed to get the landowner's permission first.'

'He's sure to let us.'

'Yes. I'd think so.'

'I really can't wait,' he said.