Free Pumping Up Napoleon by Maria Donovan Page A

the Commander unhooked the rabbits and pigeons from his shoulders.
    â€˜Coffee for the hunters,’ said the Commander. He made it himself then left Michael alone in the kitchen, while he took a tray upstairs to his wife.
    The stove hissed. Moments passed before a door banged and Vanessa came in carrying a basket of mushrooms. He got up to take it from her; it wasn’t heavy.
    â€˜Look,’ she said, ‘a parasol. And there was the most enormous puff-ball I’ve ever seen, but it had gone spongy.’
    â€˜Vanessa,’ said Michael.
    She took the basket from him and set it on the table. ‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘You’re doing fine; just be yourself.’
    Just then Mrs Brightwell busied in with an armful of wood, slammed it down next to the stove, said, ‘Now then, you two,’ and bustled out again.
    Michael’s voice dropped to a whisper. ‘Actually, I think your father’s getting used to me; he was telling me all about Brandy.’
    That afternoon, the Commander set Michael to work in the garden. Michael had to be shown how to lift potatoes from the soil, a task the Commander clearly regarded as something every schoolboy should know.
    Michael filled the sacks, working the garden from side to side. But he always seemed to be at the wrong end of a row whenever Vanessa went past. His back ached and he wanted to hear her say a few words of encouragement. The fourth time she went out with her basket she waved and smiled. He stood as upright as he could and waved back, grimacing.
    He went on lifting potatoes from the soil with the fork, and bending to gather them, for what seemed a very long time. But he had to admit that it felt good to be outdoors on this quiet, white-skied autumn day.
    Mrs Brightwell came past with a plastic box full of red and blue-black berries, followed by the Commander wiping on his trousers the soil from some carrots he had pulled.
    Mrs Clifford, like an afternoon ghost, appeared at her bedroom window, wrapped in the same peignoir as yesterday. She waved at Michael, smiled and moved out of sight.
    The Commander hauled away the full sacks of potatoes. His ancient trousers were smeared with soil and dried blood, to which clung wisps of rabbit fur.
    Late in the afternoon Michael and the Commander went down to the sea.
    They walked down across the fields in silence. Michael had put on his new wellies and Barbour. The Commander, dressed in an old jacket and sea boots, had looked him up and down and grunted.
    Both men carried a rod and a bucket. Michael was expecting that now would come the questions – about his job, his background and his prospects – and he had his answers racked like sardines ready for the grilling. When they got to the shingle bank the Commander pointed out the source of the sea kale they had eaten the night before. ‘Blanch the stems,’ he said. ‘See the way we heap the shingle up around them?’
    A wooden bridge took them across some reed beds through which brackish water seeped. A short distance away was the car park at West Bexington and they crossed a track smothered by large pebbles, only suitable for horse or tractor, or going on foot. The Cliffords’ old rowing boat lay behind a clump of bushes growing out of the shingle. Michael helped the Commander to turn it over and then they lifted it together and began to carry it between them, up the pebble bank.
    As they topped the rise Michael felt the sea-wind and saw the whole curve of the Bay. Nearer the car park, the sea’s edge was dotted with fishermen standing at the shoreline or seated behind rods perched on stands. Some had made encampments: tents, foldout stools, windbreaks, fires or portable barbecues. A few children were fishing with their fathers, and there were one or two women; mostly the females were well wrapped up, and reading, sitting on rugs with their legs stuck straight out in front of them, looking up now and then at the