Free Ferney by James Long Page A

mouth rather than his brain led the way.
    ‘So what’s it all about then?’ he asked, looking around.
    ‘We need to dig a channel,’ said Mike.
    ‘We’re just discussing it,’ said Gally simultaneously.
    He looked at them and shrugged. Gally knew she hated him already.
    ‘You discuss it all you like,’ he said. ‘The meter’s running,’ then to her amazement and indignation he walked over to the corner of the house, unzipped his flies
without a second’s hesitation and released a stream of steaming urine on to the corner of the stonework.
    ‘Where the HELL did you find HIM?’ Gally hissed.
    ‘I told you. The farmer, wotsisname, Durrell. He works for him.’
    ‘We can’t let him do it. He won’t do it right.’
    ‘Look, Gally,’ Mike hissed as the man was zipping himself up, ‘you can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs. There’s no easy way of draining it without making a
mess. We’ve got to do it.’
    He addressed himself to the driver. ‘Sorry, I didn’t get your name.’
    ‘Slash.’
    ‘Sorry?’
    ‘Slash, you know, like Guns ’n’ Roses.’ He mimed playing an invisible guitar with a lot of unnecessary hip movement that went on for far longer than necessary. Gally
looked at the corner of the house where steam was still rising. More likely to be from his personal habits, she thought.
    ‘Right. Slash. Er, it’s just that we need to be very careful not to do too much damage. We’ve got to find where the water’s coming from, okay? Then we want to dig a
channel to steer it away from the house.’
    Slash looked around and whistled for a bit. ‘Going to be a mess,’ he said eventually. ‘Can’t help it, can you? I mean, water and earth, what you got? You got a mess,
right?’
    ‘Well, surely, if we start at the house where it’s coming in and just follow it backwards?’ said Gally, fighting to be reasonable.
    Slash laughed. ‘You ever seen it done?’ he said. ‘Scoop it out, the water comes in, don’t it? Sodding hard to see where it’s coming from. I mean I’ll have a
go but don’t expect miracles.’
    ‘There must be some way of telling,’ said Mike. ‘Suppose we dug holes here and there to see which ones fill up?’
    ‘Yeah,’ said Slash, ‘or get one of them meters the Water Board uses.’ They thought he was being helpful for a moment, but he soon dispelled that. ‘Only thing is,
I’m here now, aren’t I, so there’s fifty quid on the clock for that and it’ll be ticking up while you’re messing about.’
    ‘What about a water diviner?’ Gally said and neither of them bothered to reply. She found her hands clenching at her sides. All the frustration she felt at the brutal arrogance of
ignorant men was focused in her fists. Mike was wearing a hunted expression. She looked at him, then past him as a man walked slowly into view along the lane, a man who would help –
Ferney.
    She ran to the gate and he stopped, his face lighting up with a degree of expectation that astonished her.
    ‘Good morning,’ he said. ‘How is it with you?’
    ‘Fine,’ she said. ‘Well, no. Not fine at all. We’ve got a problem. I just thought you might have an idea.’
    ‘Go on then.’
    ‘This horrible man’s come to dig some drainage ditches and we don’t know where the water’s coming from and I’m absolutely certain he’s going to ruin the whole
place if we leave him to it and I just can’t stand that happening and I thought, well, you knowing the place so well, you might . . . have some idea.’ She tailed off, thinking it
sounded rather silly, but he smiled at her with an expression that stripped years from his age and brought a huge involuntary smile from her in exchange. She felt much better after that.
    ‘I think I might,’ he said, and she opened the gate for him.
    She followed him over to the other two. ‘Good morning, young Eric,’ said Ferney to the digger driver and the unmasked Slash looked a little sheepish.
    ‘Morning, Mr Miller,’