his ginger hair away from his eyes.
âIâm clearing the blanketweed,â he said. âAnd youâre not really dressed for it, are you?â
I looked down at my tee-shirt, khaki shorts and sandals, and shrugged. âI suppose not,â I said.
âThen youâd better take off,â he said. âIâm busy.â
âCan I stay and watch.â
He turned back to the pond but I saw his shoulders shrug. âPlease yourself,â he said and started to drag more weeds from the water.
I went down to the spot where Iâd sat with my uncle the previous evening, plucked a long blade of grass and stuck it between my lips.
âI was looking for Amy,â I said. âHas she gone to town?â
âDonât know,â came the surly reply. He didnât look round.
âOnly I canât find her in the house.â
No response.
He turned and dumped another mound of weeds on the bank a yard away from me. Water drained out of it, and as the weeds settled I saw that it was alive with small pond creaturesâsome water boatmen, three or four thin, black leeches, a newt and a couple of sticklebacks. Had I a jam jar, I would have collected them.
Instead, I just watched as the leeches squirmed and the sticklebacks gasped for life. The newt managed to crawl across the weed and drop back into the pond.
âWere you here when the children from the orphanage used to come for their holidays?â
The question made him pause. He pulled the rake upright, rested its head on the bottom of the pond and seemed to lean on it. âWhy dâya ask?â
âWell, were you?â
âYes, I was here. Why?â
âI was wondering if you remembered any of them.â
He gave a sort of rueful grin and shook his head. âI stayed away from them. Bloody kids with their stupid questionsâ¦a bit like you.â
âSo you donât remember any of them?â
He shook his head again. âDonât think soâ¦apart from Amy. I remember her. â His face twisted into a kind of lewd, lopsided grin I decided I didnât like very much.
âDo you remember Hugh, Mrs. Rogersâs son?â
âYeah, of course, but he wasnât from the orphanage.â
âBut Michael was. Michael OâHerlihy? He was. Remember him?â
He glared at me. âWhat is this? Twenty bleedinâ Questions?â
âI just wondered if you remembered him, thatâs all. He was Irish, about my size, with light hair that flopped over one eye.â
A spark of recognition flared in his eyes. âWhat if I do?â
I took the blade of grass from my teeth and replaced it with a fresh one. âI just wondered if you knew what happened to him. Amy said he just disappeared one day. She thinks he might have been adopted.â
âWell, there you go then. These kids, they were never here very long. There was lots of coming and going. I never got involved with them. I left that to them up at the house.â
âBut you do remember him.â
âI remember him, the cocky little sod. Full of himself. Thought he was better thanâ¦well, thought he was better. I was glad when he didnât come here again. Adopted, you say? Well, God help the poor people who got lumbered with him.â
He threw out the rake again and started to drag. When he turned back to the shore to deposit another load of stinking blanketweed, he saw me still sitting on the bank.
âAre you still here? Go on, bugger off. Iâve got work to do. Canât spend all my time blathering to you.â
âAmy seems quite worried about him,â I said. It was stretching the truth, but it seemed to engage his attention again.
âWorried? Amy?â
I nodded. âShe thinks something might have happened to him. Somethingâ¦nasty.â
He frowned. âWell, him and Hughie were always getting the rough edge of old Mother Rogersâs tongueâ¦the old