We wondered whether it was the rook that, years before, had been raised as a fledgling by Father Adams's grandson, Timothy, and used to chatter to people as they passed the gate. Whether it was or not, his nattering as he accompanied the flight down the valley caused people to look up, and so, by force of country habit, did his nattering on the flight back. It was on the return flight, however, that the onlookers stood open-mouthed and stared. When they came back the entire armada of rooks – including the natterer, still talking indefatigably away but rather more muffled this time because his mouth was full – were carrying pieces of bread Charles and I recognised the source of the phenomenon the moment we saw it, of course. Annabel. The cook in Charles's favourite lunching place, who insisted on presenting him with a bag of bread crusts for her every day, had, as winter approached, increased the supply on the ground that the dear little soul could do with a bit of feeding now the colder weather was coming. The dear little soul, filled to bursting point with hay and pony nuts, couldn't encompass another crumb. Most of it was lying uneaten in her bowl now that Robertson was getting proper cat food. There weren't even any rats about to eat it, thanks to Robertson himself, who kept leaving large fat dead ones in the path just to show us what a handy cat we'd taken on. And so – no doubt with the same Big-Eared Lady Bountiful expression on her face that she used when patronising Robertson. Annabel was letting the rooks have it.
Charles didn't like to say anything to the cook for fear of offending her. She, enthusiastically doing her good turn for the winter, went on stepping up supplies to the point where he was coming home every night with two large carrier bags overflowing with bread-crusts. Even the rooks couldn't cope with that lot, of course and, as inexorably as things always happen with us, eventually we reached a state where we were running round after dark tipping bagfuls of it over hedges, near foxholes and badger setts – anywhere where we felt something might be glad to eat it, yet far enough away not to encourage rats or foxes near the cottage.
In the end, after several occasions on which we were caught in the headlights of neighbours' cars either having just ditched a bagful over a hedge and trying to look innocent, or with the bag clutched like loot in Charles's arms and our looking extremely guilty, he just had to explain to the cook before we got ourselves arrested.
She, without curtailing his own meals by way of retribution as Charles had apparently feared, agreed to cut down supplies. There was still enough bread for the rooks, and the natterer, who returned on his own at odd times during the day, could always find a spare piece or two to talk to himself about as he flew contentedly up the valley. A happy situation indeed, and there was nothing at all to worry Charles as he went out one day, with the idea of winter activities in mind, and bought a lathe he'd seen advertised in the paper.
For wood-turning it was, and it was worked by treadle, and Charles wasn't the least deterred by the owner explaining that he was selling it on his doctor's advice because one of his legs was longer than the other as a result of too much treadling and he was switching to an electric model. The seller was only twenty. He – Charles – was older and had stopped growing, said Charles when I pointed out the possibility of one of his legs getting longer too. It couldn't happen to him.
So, the following Saturday morning, the young man arrived towing the lathe in a box-shaped trailer through the swirling fog. Charles, who'd been feeding Annabel, came hurrying down to meet him and in his haste didn't tie up Annabel's gate. He and the young man bent over the trailer to unfasten the lathe and the young man commented on what an isolated place we lived in. Didn't go much for the country himself, he said. Gave him the willies it did, particularly in this sort of weather.
At that point there was a tapping of hooves in the lane, a donkey appeared apparently supernaturally through the fog, and the young man had the willies in earnest. Even when we explained about Annabel – that she'd pushed her gate open and come to see what was going on and that standing there looking accusingly at us from under her fringe didn't mean that she was going to bite anybody... merely that she was letting us know she'd caught up with us – he still wasn't reassured. A lonely, fog-bound cottage. A donkey wandering the place like a Newfoundland dog. It obviously wouldn't have surprised him if we'd taken to our broomsticks at any moment. After delivering the least possible instruction on the vagaries of the lathe – even that with one eye over his shoulder in case there was anything behind him – he was off back to civilisation like a shot.
I could have done with a broomstick that afternoon. After lunch Charles put Annabel back in her paddock, came down to get her some hay, went into the woodshed en route for a quick look at his beloved lathe, and the next thing I knew, he was treadling happily away oblivious of anything, while Annabel – Charles having once more forgotten to fasten her gate – was again wandering happily along the lane.
Round the corner she went, past the cottage, through the Forestry gate and up the track towards the moor, with me in hot pursuit. Charles, engaged in a particularly intriguing piece of wood-turning, said he'd be with me in a second. Annabel, obviously feeling like a successful suffragette after getting out twice in one day and nobody was going to put her back in her paddock until she felt like it – kept me at bay all the way up the track with Pankhurst-like kicks. And at the top, where there was a field whose gate somebody had obligingly left open, she went in.
Easy, you may say. Shut the gate (which I did) and you've got your donkey. But she is a very fast donkey and it was a twenty-acre field. We began with Annabel pulling nonchalantly at a tuft of grass and then raising her head to study the view across to Wales. I crept quietly up behind her and, just as I stretched out my hand, Annabel decided the view was better a couple of yards away and strolled innocently across to look at it from there. We continued with the pair of us rambling round the field seemingly oblivious of each other and my making sudden dashes at her. At this Annabel made corresponding dashes, this time looking sideways at me as she ran with her head raised, which is the donkey equivalent of hearty laughter. Eventually I threw subterfuge to the wind and started to run after her openly – a mistake which ended with Annabel twenty acres away and me flat on my face over a furrow.
It was cold. It was getting dark. Annabel obviously had every intention of staying there all night – though if I had left her there and gone home Annabel's howls about there being ghosts up there and somebody fetch her home at once would, as I knew from experience, have rent the valley like a dinosaur. I got her in the end by climbing over the field fence into a coppice and pretending to study the undergrowth. Annabel immediately came and stuck her head over the fence to see what I was doing. I, bent to the ground, pottered disarmingly away from her. Annabel snorted to indicate where she thought people like me should be kept and moved away to graze in the field – with her back towards me to express disinterest but near enough for a front-row view in case I went completely bonkers – and I nipped stealthily back over the fence and grabbed her by the tail.
We took off then like John Gilpin's ride to York. Across the field we went, I hanging on like the tail end of a kite, till I realised I'd never stop her standing up. The only thing was to sit down – the way I stopped her when she was going too fast on her halter and sitting down, holding the rope with both hands, had the effect of suddenly dropping anchor.