‘Are you bored?’
Ben rolled off to lie alongside him. His hand came over to play idly with Aleksey’s shirt buttons. ‘It’ll be winter soon.’
It usually did follow autumn, this was true.
After a moment, Ben’s train of thought seemed to shift tack a little, for he said apropos of nothing, ‘Do you think that author bloke ever came here?’
Aleksey mulled this over for a while but was forced to ask, ‘Who, where?’
Ben sighed and sounded so like his daughter making that condescending sound that Aleksey couldn’t repress a private smile. ‘The one who wrote that book about Middle Earth—we watched the films, remember? I was thinking about what Phillipa said.’
‘Tolkien.’
‘Yeah, dunno, maybe. Phillipa said he was inspired by Scilly. Well inspiration comes first, so maybe he cameherewhen all those writers and poets and other famous people came like Winston Churchill, and got inspiredthen, bythisisland.’
This was an intriguing speculation, and the fact that Ben was making it was excessively annoying. He replied a little more testily than he intended, ‘Possibly. What’s your point?’
‘Shadowfax. Maybe he met Shadowfax here first and so named his horse after him.Inspiration.’
Aleksey wished he had a cigarette. This was more than usually taxing. ‘It’s the other way around, surely. Molly called him that because of the horse in the book, no?’
Ben wrinkled his nose, thinking deeply. ‘But Molly said he’dalwaysbeen called that—I told you. It was so weird. How would she know that name? She’s not seen the films or read the book. That’s what I’m really thinking—how would Mol Mol know anything like that or put it that way?’
Aleksey turned his head to regard Ben’s profile. He could think of many reasons for Molly knowing that name, including the fact they probably had a DVD cover somewhere with it on. She might even have a tiny lunchbox with that very horse on it. It had either been that or an Orc, and he’d thought the horse more suitable. But he actually liked Ben’s view of this and glanced once more at the beautiful steed. Shadowfax. Lord of all horses. On Light Island.
It seemed like the ideal time to mention the bear.
‘We’ll be out of gas for cooking tomorrow. How much longer are we staying?’
Aleksey shook himself a little at the prosaic question, and the moment passed. He liked the way Ben phrased this—proper positions within the hierarchy had clearly been successfully re-established.
He would have replied that they could leave anytime they wanted.
The trouble was, they were expecting other visitors some time this week.
And he had not told Ben about these ones either.
He sighed and rolled onto his side, propping his head up on one hand, facing Ben who was staring up at the ceiling. He began to trace small patterns across Ben’s wrinkled shirt, trailing one finger around, occasionally venturing lower, making Ben smile. ‘I thought we would stay until the end of the week at least.’
‘Okay, then we’ll need to top up tomorrow—some new gas cylinders. And food. I wonder if there’s anything left.’ He stretched out his hand and pulled one of Phillipa’s bags closer, presumably to rummage for something to eat that they might have missed, but discovered it contained the forgotten present. ‘I wonder what this is. Too heavy for clothes but it feels soft.’
‘Maybe you should open it and see.’
‘I can’t do that. It’s for Mol Mol.’
‘Well I think it’s a father’s job to check presents are suitable first, don’t you?’
Ben grinned and sat up, dislodging Aleksey’s roving finger. Other than the age and sex, there seemed to him very little difference between father and daughter when it came to levels of paper-ripping enthusiasm. In fact, he seemed to recall the three year old peeling more carefully and wanting to keep all the paper.
Ben laughed when he pulled out the folded object. He flung it open. ‘Oh, my God. This is brilliant.’ It was a heavy, woven pirate flag—an extremely realistic, ivory-coloured skull and crossbones embroidered onto sepia-dyed sailcloth. ‘It must be for the Crow’s Nest.’
‘It has rings and those things, whatever they are, to attach it to a proper flagpole, and then you can buy a winch, so Molly can raise and lower it…’
‘Uh huh. How long did it take you to have this made?’
Aleksey groaned and rolled onto his back. ‘Busted. I am losing my touch.’
Ben ruffled his hair. ‘It’s fantastic and probably better than anything Phillipa would have bought me—Molly.’ He straddled Aleksey’s waist once more.
