Page 28 of A Recipe for Love
‘Well they seem to think you’re their shepherd.’
‘I don’t know anything about sheep.’ The flock had stopped, the front row just inches from Bella’s legs. ‘What do I do? Where’s Dipper?’ Dipper would be helpful, surely. Sheep did what dogs told them, didn’t they?
‘Like she’d be any good. Couldn’t herd a housefly. I think they want to follow you. They’re a herd animal. They follow the leader.’ Flinty smirked slightly. ‘They’ve decided you’re top sheep.’
‘What?’ Bella glared at her new woolly fanclub. ‘Shoo! Shoo!’ She waved her arms in the general direction of the gateway. ‘Shoo!’ The sheep stared. They did not move.
‘What do I do?’
‘Lead ’em back out to the hillside I reckon. Come on.’
Bella inched through the space between the sheep and the castle wall, and hopped awkwardly towards the gate. ‘They’re not going to follow me.’
Flinty was staring behind her. ‘That’s what you think.’
The flock trotted after Bella. She led them through the gate and then paused, hoping the sight of fresh grass to munch on the hillside would encourage them to head off their own way. They stopped and watched her. ‘I can’t be followed by sheep the whole time I’m here.’
Flinty was failing to hide her laughter.
‘It’s not funny. I can’t spend my days wandering around the hillside looking for fresh… what’s it called? Pasture?’
‘Aye. I do see that.’
Bella stared at her helplessly.
‘Why don’t you just limp your way up onto the grass a bit, and then maybe once they’ve got some food to distract them you can sneak off?’
‘Fine.’ Bella managed twenty yards up the hillside, attended by her woolly entourage.
‘Stay up there,’ Flinty yelled. ‘Let them get settled. I’ll pick you up in the Land Rover!’
A few minutes later the battered old four by four pulled up alongside her and Bella jumped in, to a chorus of unhappy bleats. ‘Thank you.’
‘Where were you off to anyway?’
Where was she off to? ‘I don’t know. I was getting a bit bored.’
‘Right, well. Adam and his grandmother are…’ Flinty frowned. ‘Well, I think they’re occupied. I’m going down to the village. You might as well come along now you’re in.’
‘OK.’ The village was building into something of a place of wonder in her imagination – a promised land of shops, civilisation and possibility.
‘Right then. We’d best get on. I don’t want to leave things too long and come back to a kitchen full of toilet roll…’
Bella could definitely picture Dipper going full Andrex puppy without proper supervision.
‘…or all my egg cups upside down on top of the door,’ Flinty continued.
What on earth? ‘What was that about egg cups?’
The older woman shook her head. ‘She only did that one time.’
‘Sorry. What?’
‘You’ll see soon enough.’ Flinty grinned. ‘Now do you need anything from the shop?’
Bella rolled with the change of subject.
‘I think I need to get some better shoes, and maybe a waterproof?’
