Read Online Narrow Minds by Marie Browne - Free Book Online Page A

smile, ‘I don’t suppose you’ve lost a sheep have you?’
    I stared at him as I went over his words in my head. Well, that wasn’t what I’d expected at all. ‘Erm, no,’ I said wondering if this was a new sales tactic, start with a completely mad sentence to get me on the back foot then go in for the kill, I looked over at his car and hesitantly returned the wave of the woman sitting in the passenger seat with a scruffy terrier on her lap, not a salesman then.
    He continued to smile at me and I felt pressured to expand. ‘I don’t have any sheep.’ I gave him an inane smile.
    â€˜Do you know anyone who has?’ He was obviously a little frustrated with my reticence.
    I took a moment to cudgel my brain into a semblance of working order then asked, ‘Have you found a sheep?’ This was turning out to be a very short, succinct and slightly surreal conversation.
    He nodded enthusiastically. ‘Yeah it was wandering along the road all by itself and yours was the first drive I came to.’
    Right, that made sense. I felt I could actually contribute to the conversation now. ‘Well, I haven’t been here long but our landlord Kevin will probably know which of his neighbours keep sheep.’ I nodded and smiled, yes this was definitely a problem I could palm off on someone else. ‘If you could tell me where it is, I’ll pop round and see him and he’ll no doubt do something about it.’ I waved over his shoulder as John the postie pulled into the drive.
    â€˜It’s in the back of the car,’ he replied and grinned, pointing at his new, un-muddied bespoke 4x4.
    â€˜What?’ I stared at the car and sure enough in the shadows of the tinted boot windows I could just make out the distinctive surprised, black and white face of a small Swaledale, male by the look of the horns, not yet very long but certainly beginning to develop that distinctive curve. ‘You’ve got it in your car?’ I must have sounded a complete half-wit. ‘How the hell did you get it in there?’
    The man frowned ‘I just picked it up.’ He shrugged. ‘We’ve got the back all caged off for the dog so I just moved the dog and bunged him in there.’
    John joined us, a bunch of letters in his hand. ‘Morning.’ He grinned at the man, then frowned as I blubbered through a sentence that contained the words, sheep and car then stared as I pointed toward the now rocking 4x4. Its remaining passengers were beginning to look decidedly worried.
    Swaledales are the local sheep, they are tough, hardy and opportunistic. Approximately two years ago I’d had a coat that, when I walked, obviously made a noise like a feedbag and I still have outstandingly clear memories of being chased for over half a mile by a very, very intent flock of these things much to the amusement of Geoff, his mother and the kids. I finally got rid of them by ditching the coat and had shivered most of the way home. Ever since then I’d been very careful to buy only silent cold weather gear.
    As we all stood in silence staring at the car, the young sheep became bored and decided that, while travelling in style was great for a while, it was now time to go back to finding those lovely ladies it had obviously been searching for when this well meaning but obviously insane person had kidnapped it.
    We all winced as the sheep smashed its head into the window, the lady in the passenger seat gave a short scream and the dog began to bark which only seemed to infuriate the sheep even more.
    â€˜Hey … HEY!’ The man made a leap for his car (evidently his name was Graham, the lady in the passenger seat was now screaming over and over, ‘GRAHAM! Make it stop!’), I thought he was going to, sensibly, open the door and let it out. No, he ran to the window and began to hammer on it. ‘You stop that,’ he yelled as though to his dog, ‘stay!