English Lord On Her Doorstep. Marion Lennox

months ago she’d found a cow wandering along the road at dusk, a hazard to traffic, obviously neglected. Three weeks later it had given birth, much to Grandma’s delight. Cow and calf were rangy, weird-looking bovines with no proven ancestry. No one had wanted them—except Grandma.

      Charlie should have locked them in the sheds for the night. The truth was she didn’t know how. How to make a cow go where it didn’t want?

      Bryn had, though. He’d driven the calf into the shed and Charlie was impressed.

      Now they just had to deal with Cordelia.

      Uh oh. Charlie walked down to the creek with Bryn and her heart sank.

      Cordelia was obviously a cow accustomed to hard times. She’d sunk to her haunches in mud and was gazing down at the mire in deep despondency, as if thinking: If this is the way to go, then so be it.

      ‘Grandma has troughs near the shed,’ Charlie said as they gazed at the cow together. She was wearing jeans and wellingtons and carting a couple of spades. Bryn was wearing his gorgeous city shoes and the trousers and shirt he’d had on last night. He was carrying four lengths of planking and rope. She was trying not to be...aware of him. Very aware.

      It wasn’t working.

      ‘I even left the shed door open,’ Charlie told him indignantly, pushing aside inappropriate thoughts with difficulty. ‘I went out in the rain especially but did she want to go in? No! And how do you get a cow to go where she doesn’t want to go?’

      ‘With a decent dog?’ Bryn said and grinned down at the pack following them. They’d left Flossie sleeping by the stove, but the rest were bounding around them, joyous in the sunshine and the sense of doing. Cattle dogs? Not a one of them.

      ‘You show me how and I’ll train them,’ Charlie told him.

      He checked them for a moment, grin still in place. Possum, a sort of fox terrier. Fred, part basset, part...lots of things. Caesar, a wolfhound who trembled behind the back of the pack as if to say, Protect me, guys. Dottie, a Dalmatian so old her dots were faded to grey. Then there was Mothball, the fluffball, and Stretch, a sort of sausage dog whose tummy actually touched the ground when he ran. And Flossie back at the house.

      ‘I can’t imagine,’ he said faintly.

      ‘Don’t you laugh at my dogs.’

      ‘I wouldn’t dare.’ But still he grinned and she managed a smile back.

      It really was a great morning. The sun was on her face. Her stomach was full of toast and coffee. She was still warmed with the memory of being held in this man’s arms...

      Whoa.

      ‘Tell me where to dig,’ she managed, a bit too fast, a bit...breathlessly.

      ‘I’ll do the digging.’

      ‘You have to be kidding. In those clothes?’

      ‘I already asked... You don’t appear to have wellingtons in my size. Besides, that’s what water’s for. Washing.’

      ‘Bryn...’

      ‘What’s the choice?’ he asked.

      And there wasn’t one. Unless she went next door and borrowed a rifle.

      No, there wasn’t one.

      ‘Right then,’ Bryn said and laid down his planking and took the two spades from her shoulder. He laid one down on the ground. ‘It’s up to me.’

      She picked it back up and glowered. ‘It’s up to us.’

      ‘Right, ma’am,’ he said and grinned again, looking ruefully down at his city shoes. ‘You know, I should be bored out of my mind in a plane right now. How can I possibly regret my change of plan?’

      * * *

      It took skill, strength and patience to dig a cow out of a bog. Firstly there was the imperative of keeping the cow calm. Struggling would make her sink deeper and that was where Charlie came in.

      ‘You’ve been feeding her for the last weeks?’ Bryn asked and when she agreed he set her task.

      ‘Right. You’re the cow whisperer. You squat by her head, block as much of me as you can and tell her all about the hay bales back in the shed.’

      ‘I want to dig.’

      ‘We can’t always get what we want,’ Bryn said, unperturbed.

      Charlie thought, Yeah, tell me about it.

      So she stooped as ordered and tried to do the cow-whispering thing but the cow wasn’t having a bar of it.

      ‘It’s as if she thinks we’re trying to dig her out to turn her into sausages,’ she said indignantly as Cordelia did a bit more thrashing and Bryn nodded.

      ‘Some cows are bred for intelligence. Obviously not this one. Okay,’ he conceded. ‘Let’s go for fast. Grab a spade and help.’

      Excellent. She dug, ankle deep in mud, shovelling the squishy mud from in front of the cow.

      ‘We need to get deep enough to lay planking so she can haul herself up,’ Bryn told her. ‘But if you’re getting blisters...’