Let Slip the Dogs of War - Part 6
Title: Let Slip the Dogs of War
Authors: waffleguppies and marshwiggledyke
Fandom: Hot Fuzz
Rating: R for war and language, 1940's attitudes, mild PTSD
Characters/Pairings: Eventual Nicholas/Danny, Frank Butterman, Doris Thatcher, Bob Walker
Author's Notes: Been a while since I've updated a new chapter, isn't it? Jeez, I'm sorry. More later this week, I promise.
I used to do a bit of fishing when I was in the single digits, but I never caught much more than minnows (and I always let them go). Sorry if we got anything wrong in that category.
After the Berlin Olympics of 1936, there were no Olympics worldwide for twelve years- in 1940, Tokyo was stripped of its hosting city qualifications and the Olympics cancelled- twice- due to everyone killing the shit out of each other. The 1948 Olympics were indeed held in London and opened by King George the Sixth. Japan and Germany were not invited, and the USSR chose to ignore the event altogether.
Nicholas has been living within walking distance of the Limehouse Chinatown, if not living directly inside the district, and so probably popped by for a cheap vegetarian meal now and then. As a result, he's got a rudimentary understanding of Mandarin and probably has had a few friends among the restaurant owners.
Eating horsemeat is/was supposedly taboo in Britain, much as eating cats or dogs in our culture is taboo. But with the anonymous nature of tinning foods, many people were eating rations mislabeled as 'beef' for years after the war.
I was reading the Charioteer an awful lot while writing this bit, particularly drawing on the second half of chapter four for inspiration, and reading it now- over a year later- it really shows.
Skinny-dipping back in the 1940s among same-sex friends doesn't seem to be nearly so taboo as it is nowadays. Aside from a cultural blindspot for homosexuality (especially from war heroes, who were seen as too rugged and manly to possibly do anything of the sort), it seems to have been an acceptable outlet for boyish good spirits, especially during/after the war, where men had to share extremely close quarters. I have seen so many B&W photos of nubile young British men from the 1920s to the 1940s, grinning up out of streams/ponds/etc, found with only a bit of googlefu. There's such a sense of unabashed innocence in these pictures to make them impossible to titillate or be pornographic- it's rather sweet.
With that said, this is probably the most damn homoerotic part of this story. Let the splashings- innocent or not- begin.
*
Part 5
Danny pulled a stack of folded sheets out of the airing cupboard and lugged them across the landing, trailing pillowslips like a haberdashery Hansel and Gretel.
“...and you have to sort of bang on the water heater to get it goin', I dunno why, a mate of mine tried to fix it but all he did was change the place where you have to bang it.” He dropped the pile on the bed and started making it up. The bedroom was of medium size and prevalently blue, and it looked a bit more spacious now that Danny had dragged all the boxes out of it and stuffed them, variously, in his own bedroom and the cupboard under the stairs. The cream wallpaper had a slightly faded pattern of blue peonies on it, and there was an electric heater built in to the place where the hearth would have been, blocked in by a grid of glazed blue tiles.
“I'm gonna have to go get a hammer,” he said, after a moment, “and pull all them nails out of the window. I dunno what Mrs. Kershaw thought was gonna try gettin' in.”
Nicholas picked up the pillow-cases after him, folding them carefully and piling them in his arms, ready to go back into the cupboard.
“Students, perhaps?”
“You never met Mrs. Kershaw,” said Danny. He patted the bed straight, and poked the little oval rug back into place with his foot. “Ve you got your suitcase?”
Not letting the pillowcases slip, Nicholas set his case next to his new bed, reluctant to dirty the sheets with the dust from the road. It wasn’t exactly small, but it was everything he owned in the world, and looking at the cheap leather cobbling his possessions together was strange. “I’ll unpack in the morning.”
“There's the wardrobe,” said Danny, a bit redundantly. The thing was the largest piece of furniture in the room, apart from the bed. He leaned back on a small bookshelf, which was half full of volumes that the mysterious Mrs. Kershaw had probably left behind, unless Danny was a secret fan of flowery Victorian novels and BE-RO cookery books.
“Oh, yeah, an' hang on...” He grinned, suddenly, and ducked out of the room. “Forgot.”
Nicholas sat on the bed, testing it out for squeaks. It didn’t seem real, yet. Less than six hours ago he hadn’t a place to stay, no job prospects, nothing. And here he was, as if such things as best friends were delivered with the milk in the morning.
Something in the airing cupboard in the hallway went clonk, a door banged, and then Danny was back, dropping a neat, folded pile of khaki into his lap.
“If it smells funny it's just the camphor, I didn't want moths gettin' at it,” he said. Something about this situation was a bit backwards. Nicholas was the one with touches of the canine about him, but Danny was the one shifting on his feet, feeling all anxious for no good reason, finally fetching something that had been thrown in his direction a long time ago.
Nicholas took it, still feeling slightly numb. It was like being presented with an old shell of himself, just before everything had gone to hell. On instinct, he buried his face in it, nose already working away at the tangle of scents. “It doesn’t smell like camphor, that much. Smells like...” Pause. Another deep inhalation. “You.”
Danny's ears got a bit hot. “I s'pose I was carting it round with me for a while.”
“Yes, but you’ve washed it a bit since then.” Nicholas looked up. “Thank you.”
Danny shrugged, pleased. “I just thought you'd like it kept nice. Like my dad says, it's good to see where you've been so you c'n see where you're goin'. An' anyway... it was good havin' it. Like a, a thingy. Keepsake, 'til you got back.”
Nicholas nodded, that strange, hesitating look on his face again. Awkwardly, he held out an arm. It wasn’t precisely like asking for a handshake, and it didn’t seem to have enough courage to move forward into an embrace...
Looking back, afterwards, Danny found it easy to pinpoint this as the moment when he first realised that he really did sort of love Nicholas Angel, a little bit. Although he wouldn't have been able to say exactly why, it was the heart-hurting uncertainty of this single gesture, most of all, and the things it said about Nicholas and his difficulty, for all his brilliance, understanding the things that should have been simple.
He didn't have to think. He just moved forward himself, instead, and drew Nicholas, arm and all, into a big bear-hug. Nicholas smelled of smoke and cider- to an inferior human nose, anyway- and Danny propped his chin on the shorter man's shoulder, which felt like a natural resting-place for it. It felt like a hefty sort of lump was shifting from his chest, too, and he hadn't even really been aware that it had been there in the first place.
Nicholas made a muffled, relieved little noise into Danny's neck, hugging Danny back tightly under the arms. The neat little bundle of khaki got sandwiched between the two of them. Nicholas didn't seem to care, tucked under Danny's chin and folded into his arms, kept safe and whole, even if there wasn't a machine gun nest nearby, no enemy chasing him through the farmland and forest with a tin in his mouth. His hands were warm on Danny's back, at first still just relying on his arms for the embrace, everything else curled and uncertain and upset, then open-palmed and finger-spread.
“It gets easier,” promised Danny, into his neck. He could feel the tension in Nicholas's body, in the hands spread on his back. “It just takes a while, s'all.”
He would have been hard pressed to explain exactly what he meant. You got used to the world being halfway sane again, after a while. You got used to tomorrow being more than a shaky possibility. Eventually, maybe, you could get back to being sort of the same person you were before. It did get easier, and the sooner it did for this quiet, intense werewolf who, by the sounds of it, had barely made it back at all, the better.
At the same time, he was dimly aware that his own situation could easily get a whole lot more tricky. He'd thought a lot about seeing Nicholas again, but he hadn't expected that Nicholas would need- or want- his help like this, or that the feeling of Nicholas's arms around him could make his heart beat quite so fast.
Nicholas said nothing. Danny's collar got a little damp.
“'Ey,” A hefty paw patted Nicholas's back, gently. “Maybe we could go fishing tomorrow? After you been down the station. 'S a bit boring on your own, but y'could borrow Dad's kit an' we could go up the Tor- that's the river.”
The hand on Nicholas's back faltered, as Danny realised that it was getting... well, just a bit too kind of intimate, for one bloke giving another a sort of friendly hug. He ploughed on, regardless, half-hoping Nicholas hadn't noticed, and half- bizarrely- sort of hoping that he had. “'Parently tor means like, hill, but don't ask me why the river's called after a hill. There's brook trout an' dace an' that. I c'n show you around on the way over... not that there's that much to show.”
Nicholas paused again, then let Danny go, and stepped back and smiled. If he'd been troubled at all by the gesture, his face didn't show it; just a bit red about the eyes, and even those were clear and dry and calm, now.
“That's not a bother. I've never been fishing before.”
It was clear Danny was presenting him with something to look forward to. Something to distract from the uncomfortable alien feelings from the war that Nicholas didn't know how to approach, and Nicholas was just as clearly grateful for the change in subject.
Danny forgot any awkwardness in a moment, steamrollered by sheer gawping disbelief.
“You never been fishing before?”
“The Thames'd kill just about anything you put in it.” Nicholas shrugged. “No fish, no fishing. Also, I'm not sure you'd want to fish off the piers, and you certainly couldn't reach the water from the bridges.”
There'd been a river a bit like the Tor a few day's march after Hannover, Danny recalled. Winding and shallow, with reedy, sandy banks. By the time they reached it the water had been so churned up from tank-tracks that the remaining fish were clustered at the surface, fighting to breathe. It had felt wrong, a bit sickish somehow, to eat them, but they'd done it anyway.
He shouldered the memory aside.
“What, really? I thought the Thames was all... boat races an' cream teas an' lily pads an' shit.”
“The water moves quite fast in Central London,” said Nicholas, sitting back down on the bed and picking up his uniform from where it had fallen on the floor. “Too big for plant life. Most of the posher types go to the country for that sort of thing, after the Princess Alice, and bring their tea and crumpets with them.”
“Huh.” Danny started fiddling with the fireplace, testing it out. It hadn't been used for a while, and a smell of warming dust started to rise from the bars. “Don't get many tourists 'round here. Artists, sometimes. Bunch of evacuees durin' the war, o' course. Dad said they weren't bad, f'r city kids.”
Nicholas grinned. “I was a city kid. What were you, a country boy?”
“S'pose I was. Always liked the idea of seein' London someday though.” Danny touched the electric fire's wire grille and squeaked, yanking back and blowing on his fingers. This seemed to be his night for getting burned. “Fuckin' hell. I'll get you a guard for that. Don't go runnin' into it with your tail or nothin'- do you get a tail?”
Brief pause, but Nicholas seemed to want to keep this going as naturally as possible, and his voice attempted a casual bent that he normally never carried. “Um, yes, as a matter of fact. Worst part about the uniform. You alright?”
“Yeah, I'm always doin' that on the one in mine.” Danny thought about the whole 'tail' issue for a moment or two, then winced. He found himself wondering if the Nazi werewolves had been expected to keep their uniforms on, too.
“Dad won't mind you not wearin' your kit when you're a wolf, o'course. He gets a right snit on if you lose your helmet, mind.”
“Warning taken.”
Personally, Nicholas wasn't sure he'd look at all at home in a helmet, but he certainly wouldn't go losing something given to him.
“Would he expect me to be on duty as a wolf?”
Danny shrugged. “I dunno that he would. I mean... this's Sandford, Nic'las. S'not a lot goes on. Since I got back the most sort of intense action I seen is catchin' old Pat Miller poachin' rabbits, an' all that happened was I got bit by a ferret. Long as you got the job done, I dunno that he'd mind what shape you wanted to be while you were doin' it, y'know?”
Nicholas sniffed in agreement, and smushed his hand into the right side of his face, as if this would wipe away the nervous lines on his forehead. “I'm going to tell him the truth, so you know. Not that he wouldn't grasp it eventually, or if he followed up on my papers, but... if he's going to give me a chance, he deserves to know.”
“Hold on, hold on...” Danny's slightly scorched index finger wobbled in the air as he put two and two together. “Is that what you were on about? You can't get a job 'cause your papers say you're a werewolf?”
Nicholas smiled. This, unlike his other ones, wasn't necessarily a nice smile. “Punishment for turning down the agent job, I expect.”
“Fuckers,” said Danny, with feeling.
“Quite.”
“Fact, that is just about the most ridiculous thing I ever heard.” Danny thunked the little wooden-case clock he'd picked up back down onto the top of the bookshelf, making the innards jingle. “'F that's how they treat their heroes I'd bloody hate to see what they do to the Russkies. You got out well ahead there, mate.”
Spywork during wartime was all good and well, Nicholas had thought. But peacetime? Being put into the position of lurking about government-involved families and reporting any weaknesses to be patched or exploited? Training for assassinations? No bloody thank you.
His smile eased. “I'm not a hero. But thank you, Danny. I really do appreciate it.”
*
Danny spotted Nicholas as soon as he came out of the station. To say 'spotted' was actually passing up a good opportunity to use the word 'ambushed.' One moment there was no Danny, and then there was a musical clatter of wooden rods, and then there was.
“'Ey! How'd it go! What'd he say?”
It was another warm, sunny day, and in his hurried entrance Danny had managed to kick up a swirl of dusty earth from the station forecourt. He swatted at his trousers to stop the dust settling on them, and nearly had Nicholas's eye out with one of the fishing rods in his other hand as he leaned over.
“Err,” said Nicholas, who had the dazed expression on of someone who hadn't expected to survive the shark tank.
*
“We're a small force,” said Frank Butterman, sitting down behind his desk and indicating the seat on the other side to Nicholas. “Myself, Sergeant Fisher, Danny, Constable Turner. Oh, and we'll have our secretary back soon, after her period of notice with the ATS is up. Doris Thatcher, who I believe you've met?”
“I believe we have,” said Nicholas, eyes skittering away at the memory of her. Who was she to Danny, anyway? Close childhood friend? More, perhaps?
“Well, I'll get to the meat of it.” Frank leaned forwards. “I find myself severely understaffed, Nicholas. Sandford's one of the most crime-free places to live in Gloucestershire, statistically speaking, but I still can't get by with three men, two of whom are operating at, shall we say, less than maximum ability. You couldn't have come at a better time.”
“You haven't looked at any of my credentials, sir,” said Nicholas, bracing himself.
“You were an NCO,” said Frank, looking a little surprised. “I've heard nothing but good things about you from Danny. I'm sure you'd be up to the job.”
“Sir,” said Nicholas, scared shitless. “I'm a wolf. W-would that change anything?”
Frank didn't answer immediately. He looked thoughtfully at Nicholas over his glasses for a moment, then laced his hands together and sat back.
“I was at Passchendaele, you know, Nicholas. I wasn't that much younger than you. And I tell you what... we could have done with someone like you showing up for us in our hour of need. But they didn't, because- as I'm sure you're aware- dear old D.H decided in his infinite wisdom that there would be no wolves in his Army, thank you very much.”
He shook his head. “And don't you go thinking this is about pity, either. I expect results from my officers- if you weren't up to scratch, I'd let you know right enough. But I'd be a fool to pass up having you on my team. That is, if you're interested?”
“I don't have any training,” said Nicholas, quietly. “But... Yessir. Thank you.”
*
“Nic'las?” Danny extricated his hand from the tackle box and snapped his fingers a couple of times in front of Nicholas's nose. “You in there?”
“Yeah,” said Nicholas, taking a pole and trying to shake off the shock, “all present and accounted for.”
Danny grinned. “Said yes, din't he?”
Nicholas just gave him a look. It said, 'I can't believe I'm living in a world where people can be unutterably cruel, and there's still room for you two.' “Yes. How do I hold this thing so I don't put someone's eye out?”
Danny demonstrated, hiking his own rod safely over his shoulder. “Just don't turn round sharpish, you c'n take enough kids out that way if you're not careful. You fit?”
“Yes,” said Nicholas, then added, hopefully, “Did you pack some of the cold pie?”
“Yep,” said Danny, happily, leading the way through a gate and into a field full of grazing sheep. “Couple other things too. You liked that, then?”
“Not that I won't miss the occasional Chinese,” said Nicholas, “but yes. I'm rather looking forward to it.”
“Chinese?” Danny shooed off a sheep and looked back at him, curiously. “Is it true, right, they eat cats an' that?”
“Only some Cantonese, I think,” said Nicholas, working his turn through a narrow sheepgate and waiting on the other side for Danny, “and it's not a big deal to them, no more so than keeping some fish in a bowl and eating others. Over here, they usually leave the cat out, out of respect.”
He paused.
“Did you know that some of our rations labelled 'beef' were actually tinned horsemeat? I smelt someone cooking some yesterday.”
“Don't really surprise me,” said Danny. “Swings an' roundabouts, innit? S'only a fast cow with big teeth. Mind you, a few times durin' marches I'd've eaten my own boot if you'd put gravy on it.”
“I knew a corporal who liked to chew on his whenever we stopped for a breather,” said Nicholas, thoughtfully.
Danny had to think about this for a bit, but then he laughed. “Oh, right, cause, cause he was a werewolf. What d'you like, then? Sticks?”
His friend shrugged as they walked along the long, expansive fields, where blooming cocksfoot spurted out between the stones and honeysuckle crawled over it. “It's a bit more complicated than that.”
“Bones?” Danny shifted his haversack onto the other shoulder. “How 'bout pig's ears?”
“Too splintery, and... I'd just rather not, altogether. My mum's fond of the latter.”
“Your mum's a werewolf?”
Nick eyed him sidelong. “You thought it could be caught like a cold?”
“I s'pose,” said Danny, ducking under a low-hanging branch. “I knew you said you was born, but I figured maybe, you'd had some kind of chemical agent what gave you abilities beyond that of the common man, like Hugo Danner. Yunno, bulletproof kittens an' that.”
“I haven't seen that one,” said Nicholas, spotting a wild-grape vine on the branch, and noting it for later in the season. “Why on earth would someone shoot a kitten?”
“T'see if it were bulletproof?” guessed Danny. “I dunno. I wouldn't risk it.”
“I appreciate that.” Nicholas's nose was working away, doubletime. So many smells. “I've never been in a wood where I haven't been shot at.”
“No-one's gonna shoot you here.” Danny ambled down through the trees to the riverbank. In this place it sloped gently, grassy and sandstoney-pebbly, and the water was dappled with sunlight filtering through the trees overhead. “If you keep out Monk's Woods at night, anyways.”
“You get shot in Monk's Woods?” said Nicholas, who despite being awed at the perfection of this spot- not a sound of cars for miles, just flowing water and the occasional clonk of cowbells from the pastures beyond the trees and the lazy buzzing of insects; for someone with the ears of a wolf not to be able to detect the sounds and smell of petrol, this was saying something- got a little nervous at this remark. “Whatever for?”
Danny stopped and looked back at him. “That was a joke,” he said. “Them's pheasant woods, is all. Gamekeeper's not gonna shoot at anything 'less he thought it was a fox.”
“Oh,” said Nicholas, who had never considered a criminal element present in the countryside. “Poaching?”
“Gamekeeper's got a shotgun,” explained Danny. “For pigeons an' foxes, mainly. Carries it broken so he's got time to think. He's not gonna take a shot at nothin' on two legs, even in the dark. Poachers get a good tickin' off an' between you an' me, you don't want a good tickin' off from Harry Collins. 'E's built like a brick shit'ouse.”
He dumped his clutter on the bank. “Then if it's someone we know about, we c'n deal with it. Fines for trespass, usually.”
“Oh,” said Nick again, and sat to take off his shoes and stick his hot feet in the sandy shallows. The water was freezing, but clear and perfect. “I suppose Harry Collins wouldn't be in the Police Guide, would he?”
“You'd want 'im on your side in a fight, that's all I'm sayin'.”
“I think I could easily make do without,” said Nicholas, and then grinned mischievously and splashed him with a palmful of water. “If you were backing me up, that is.”
Danny flailed, laughing, then whipped out the bait tin and held it threateningly in front of him like a crucifix, wiping water off his face. “You wanna be diggin' mealies out y'r undies, do that again.”
Nicholas squinched his mouth up into a tight frown, but he couldn't stop the corners of his mouth turning up. “Oh, very well.” And he got up out of the water and sat down on the tufted hummock above the bank next to Danny.
Danny showed him how to bait his hook and cast into the river, paying out the line into the deep channel in the middle.
“Now you got to just sort of wait.”
“Ah,” said Nicholas. “There's not any jiggling the bait about to make it look more interesting?”
“It's doin' it's own jiggling,” Danny pointed out. “Anyway, would you rather eat a sandwich on a plate or a sandwich that was jumpin' about like a loony an' you didn't know why?”
“It'd certainly get my attention,” said Nicholas, but scooched closer to the haversack. “But speaking of sandwiches...”
“Pass me an egg while y'r at it,” said Danny, wiggling his rod a bit. He was impatient too, for different reasons. He didn't want Nicholas to get bored.
Nicholas pulled out a hardboiled egg, and cracked it expertly on a rock, and started peeling off the shell for him. “Hope you don't mind a few fingerprints.”
And then he passed the naked egg back.
“You've got a nibble,” Danny observed.
Nicholas jerked on the rod between his knees so hard that the hook flew up out of the water from the fifteen feet it had drifted downriver. But the line wasn't taut, and the fish-less hook fell back into the water, with a little less mealie on the end of it.
Danny bit the end off his egg.
“Never mind, 'ey?” he said, unconcernedly. “Prob'ly just as well; even if it had managed to hold on, we'd be lookin' for it in the next field over. Try it a bit slower next time.”
“Alright,” said Nicholas, and glared at the water as he felt out a bit of pie in the sack, as if fishing could be mastered with all the training of the British Army and the ferocity of one's own will.
“Nic'las.” Danny was looking at him.
“I'll be slower next time.”
“Right, but...” Danny had to think for a moment, to try and get what he meant to say organised in his head. “Look, the fish en't got anywhere to be rushing off to, an' neither have we, right? I mean, we got some lunch, an' it's a proper nice day... it don't matter that much. It's just s'posed to be a bit of fun.”
He poked Nicholas quietly in the side of the head. “Don't have to catch 'em all. They'll still be here tomorrow.”
Nicholas jammed the cork handle of the pole into the sand and looked back at him, eyebrow raised. “So... What did you want to do instead?”
Danny blinked at him.
“I wasn't sayin'...”
His own pole jumped.
“Right, here.” He passed it into Nicholas's hands, keeping a hand on the reel. “Keep it slow, now.”
“Alright,” said Nicholas, watching the cork spread ripples that moved lazily downstream. Unconsciously, he backed up sideways into Danny's arm, letting Danny have full control of the rod while they both held it.
“Like this?”
“Yeah.” Danny leaned on Nicholas's side and stepped hurriedly over the other fishing rod to give them both more room to manoeuvre. He steered his friend's hand over the reel. “You c'n feel it tugging, yeah? Bring it in, nice an' easy.”
The cork-like bit attached to the line bobbled temptingly as Nicholas started reeling it in. The fish in the darker area of the river must have been annoyed at lunch being tugged upstream, because there was a jerk on the line, and the bobber disappeared. Danny's pole craned painfully in the direction of the line slanting into the water, sharking crazily back and forth across the river.
“Get the rod a bit lower,” suggested Danny. “You got to sort of point it at the fish, an' reel in a bit quicker.”
“Point it at the fish?!” screeched Nicholas in excitement and slight panic. He was trying to reel it in, but the more he tightened the reel, the more the fish pitched and pulled in all directions. “It won't stay still long enough for me to point anything at it!”
Beneath the water, something silver flashed, again and again, as the fish fought back, turning every which way in the dappled sunlight. A tail broke the surface and lashed, powerfully. The rod strained.
“Right- if it runs, let it. Soon as it slows up, start liftin' the rod up an' then lettin' it back down as you reel it in.”
“Okay, okay...” Nicholas let the fish flail about in semicircles like a dog on a lead. Unknowingly, with all his attention nailed to the angry line describing their locus like a compass, he'd let himself fall companionably back against Danny's side-podge.
“That's good,” said Danny, with only a momentary confusion about which 'that' he meant. “Keep it up...”
Nicholas kept on letting the fish exhaust itself, pulling the rod up clumsily when it drifted in his direction and letting it run about on a increasingly short lead when it fought. And finally, finally, amongst curses and winding the struggling weight in, the fish flapping at the end of the line, it breached the water, and dangled helplessly from the pole, still fighting yet.
“Shit,” said Nicholas, sweating. “It looks smaller than it feels.”
“Yeahh!” cheered Danny, slapping him on the shoulder. He caught the line to still it and got a better look at the fish. It was quite small, hooked through the mouth, flapping.
“Wanna let it go?”
Nicholas nodded, and reached out to touch the gasping gills, then snatched his hand back at the soft slime on the subtle, mud-colored scales. “How do I help it?”
Danny was already reaching for his penknife, folding out the crude pliers. “Let it back in the water, hold on-”
He splashed a palmful of water over Nicholas's hands. “Hold it facing into the current.”
Nicholas watched him unhook the fish with fascination, then took the river trout himself in both hands, and strode out barefoot into the shallows. The fish was still flapping now and again, but it was clearly weakening. Carefully, Nicholas placed it back in the water. Gills flared like an engine gunning, and the fish was gone, hiding in some reeds in a still spot, and the next second it was gone, the silvery mud colour blending it in perfectly.
“Think it's glaring at me?” said Nicholas, still standing in the river and eyeing the last spot he'd seen it.
“Yeah,” said Danny, flopping down on the bank, a bit out of puff after all the action. He could have sworn that he hadn't been quite so easily tired a few months ago, but their shared success made him forget about his shortness of breath. “It's gonna go tell all its fishy mates you're a wanker.”
He washed the gunk off his hands in the water, then retrieved his boiled egg, which had been tossed aside in the excitement, and rinsed it off as well. “An' that's pretty much all there is to it.”
Nicholas watched this as blankly as he could. The concept of washing things to be eaten in rivers didn't strike him as a very healthy practice, but then again, this wasn't London. “Shame. They'll all bugger off and that'll be the end of that.”
Standing in ankle-deep water- which was getting his trouser-cuffs a bit soggy- he glanced upriver, and around at the tree cover, and then undid the top button on his collar. “People come by here much?”
“Nope,” said Danny, his attention now focused on poking about in the haversack. The remaining bait looked a bit like it was trying to make a bid for freedom, so he levered the tin shut again with his penknife, absently eating another egg.
A shirt hit the embankment next to Danny, followed by the clank of a pair of trousers, and sound of a splash.
“Christ it's cold,” gasped Nicholas, paddling upstream. His nose thrust up in the air, arms pushing the water down and behind and legs kicking awkwardly, it was more than a little painfully obvious when he'd got his practice in. Nicholas rather hoped Danny wouldn't tease him for it.
After a momentary hesitation, Danny joined him, the deciding factor being the sweat that was starting to trickle down the back of his neck under his collar and knitted vest. He made a rather larger splash upon entry.
“Wargle,” said Nicholas, swallowing a lot more river-water than he'd intended. His toes found the riverbed, and he managed to stand, nearly up to his chest in the deep, slow current. “Plorgh. You get to do this very often?”
“Nah,” said Danny, drifting. “F'r starters, it's fuckin' cold.”
Nicholas agreed. Parts of him were definitely trying to clamber up into him for warmth. But even so, the icy water felt like a purifying brand, stripping off any accumulated nastiness, if only for a little while.
He watched Danny floating serenely for a moment, feeling a tinge of jealousy and wonder. Danny was so at home here, in the pub and in the water and in his own head, it felt almost wrong to disturb his peace of mind. Nicholas poked his arm anyway. “Where did you pick up the tattoo?”
Danny sat up in the shallower water and peered at his own shoulder. “That? 'Lympics. 'Course, nobody knew where it was goin' back then. We won four golds, 'member? Seemed like a good excuse f'r a bit of a knees-up.”
He shook his head, wiping water out of his eyes as it dripped out of the dark spikes of his hair. “Me an' my mates went up to Cirencester on the milk cart. Got proper laddered an a'. I don't really remember much about gettin' it, t'be honest. Dad near killed me when 'e found out, I weren't but sixteen.”
“I was running my own shop during the Olympics,” said Nicholas, touching the knotwork on Danny's shoulder delicately. “But I suppose I was a bit older than you. Did you hear? London's got the vote for the next one in '48. It'll be a madhouse.”
“Whor. Tell you what,” offered Danny, “I'll make sure you don't wake up with a mysterious tattoo after the openin' ceremony if you make sure I don't wake up with another'un.”
Nicholas was smiling. “A sound plan. Shall I be the London guide, then?”
“Yeah!” said Danny, forgetting about the steep dropoff in the river channel in his enthusiasm. He disappeared for a second or two with a sort of 'hurk!' sound and came up, splashing and blowing water out of his nose. “Hffff. Hbllwait, wait- you had a shop? What kind'f shop?”
Nicholas snickered. “The kind with a door? You know, window displays and tills where the money goes in? What, don't you have them in the country?”
Danny retorted with a solid palm thwacking into the water between them, sending a small curtain of water cascading merrily over Nicholas's head.
Nicholas stood there a moment, eyes squinched closed against the cold and wet and his mouth looking like it had just eaten a lemon. After a moment of standing like the most perfectly annoyed Grecian statue, he reached out, blindly, got hold of Danny's ears, and ducked him.
Danny made a surprised bubbling noise as the world went black and cold and clanging around his ears. Opening his eyes, he blinked through a sepia gold-dappled haze of particles and sunbeams and let himself sink until he saw two pale ankles growing up out of the riverbed like the roots of an anaemic tree. In sneaky revenge for his smarting ears, he grabbed them both and neatly divorced them from the riverbed with a sharp forwards tug.
Nicholas's yelp and resulting splash distorted in the water, and the woosh of bubbles scythed down from his flaily arms. When he pulled his feet away, trying to keep them out of Danny's reach, the original force of the pull sent him somersaulting forwards. Underwater, his startled eyes fastened on Danny's, and their expression shifted into that playful, mischievous spark that all too easily would have translated into a dog playing keepaway with his master's shoe. Nicholas howled a warcry, spraying bubbles in all directions, and went for Danny's side, hoping to find a sensitive nerve to exploit.
Underwater, Nicholas's howl sounded more like a distorted WHARGARBL. Danny giggled, unable to help himself, and got water up his nose. He thrashed upright and broke the surface, floundering away, trying to protect his sensitive rib area.
A lucky flail caught his attacker by the scruff of the neck- and now it was Nicholas's turn to get dunked.
Nicholas resurfaced, spluttering, and ran-waded-paddled after Danny, elbows flailing for a bit of momentum.
“Oh, now you're in for it!”
He leapt at the larger man's back and clung like a frog. Knees clamped around Danny's waist in a forced piggy-back ride, Nicholas bellowed up into the treeline, so much like the jowley Prime Minister: “Never surrender!”
Danny, who had nearly made it into deeper water, managed nearly three waterlogged, Nicholas-burdened steps before physics delivered the inevitable bitchslap, and he pitched forwards, yelling.
“Death or gloryyyy!!”
The impact of both bodies hitting the water was the biggest splash yet, sending bullrushes flying and frogs catapulting into the shallows.
On the opposite bank, a dog started to bark. In the sudden onset of calm from insects, frogs, and whooping veterans in the nuddy, it was surprisingly loud.
Attached to the dog by a lead was a young boy made entirely of twine and cheekbones and a tuft of hair at the top, only just barely taller than the Alsatian at his side. From the look on his mild face, he'd just come along, and couldn't make up his mind whether to be embarrassed at running across them or amused.
Danny came up first, spluttering, galumphing towards the bank. His voice faltered a bit towards the end, when his ears caught up with his brain and pointed out that maybe, being stark naked in broad daylight wasn't the most tactically dignified time to go all officious and do an impression of his dad, but he stuck with it, gamely, mainly for Nick's sake.
“Robert Walker what'n the blue blazes are you doin' out'f school?”
“Queenie nee'jer walkies,” mumbled Robert Walker, still unable to wipe his uncertain grin from his seven year old face. “Cun lergo onner carpe', cud I?”
Strategic cover being priority, Danny picked up the haversack and tossed Nicholas the first thing that came within grabbing distance, which happened to be his own shirt. “I'll give you walkies inna minute. Go on, hop it, an' I won't tell Miss Paver.”
Queenie, apparently, found something about the scene she and her master had stumbled across highly interesting. She danced along the far bank, clearly loth to jump in, barking sporadically in Nicholas's direction.
“Didn' see owt,” said the boy, grinning, and tugged the lead to the much heavier dog, not wanting to be dragged into the Tor with her. “G'won, leave i'.”
Nicholas, who had already turned the enormous shirt into a makeshift loincloth, watched the dog's stiff-legged bouncing for a moment. “Rark.”
“Hynn,” keened Queenie, flat-eared, and tangled the boy's legs around with the clothesline tied to her collar, towing him away from the bank, although he shot a bright look or two over his shoulder as he went.
Nicholas coughed, and bent to retrieve Danny's trousers on the pebbley rise. “Sorry about the swimming.”
Shaking off the momentary embarrassment, Danny grinned happily, picking up scattered socks and shoes and exchanging Nicholas's shirt for his trousers. He dried his face with the back of his arm, or at least attempted to; as both components were wet, this was less than effective.
“Best laugh I had in ages.”
Nicholas ducked his head to hide his smile, and shook most of the water out of his hair with a wild, blurring spin. “Same.”
“Should'f brought a towel though,” mumbled Danny, poking through the haversack. He straightened up and glanced over at Nicholas, doing up his buttons. Shortly, a serious, abstracted look drifted onto his face, the look of someone who could not bear to leave something unfiddled with, and he reached over and picked a strand of waterweed from Nicholas's short, spiking hair.
“You didn't know we'd take a dip,” said Nicholas, reasonably, trying very hard not to mind the grooming business. After all, they'd just thrown each other around in a river, and Danny might take it the wrong way if he slapped his hand away. “What are you looking for?”
“You got bits of green on you,” said Danny, visibly restraining himself from further poking.
“So have you,” pointed out Nicholas, and shucked on his own trousers. “But I meant, what were you looking for in the sack?”
Danny choked, and turned it into a small coughing fit, hurriedly turning away. “Sock.”
Nicholas shrugged, clearly not realizing that his innocent question had spilled into Danny's mind as something, well, rather more... serious. “I'd just as soon walk back sans socks. You don't get a chance to walk barefoot through grass too often in London.” He knotted his shoelaces together and picked them up by the string. “What're you thinking?”
“Not much,” lied Danny, glibly, and gave up on his other sock. He thought it might possibly have gone into the river at some point during the fish battle, and was probably by now several miles downstream and the underwater home of some confused frog. He peeled the other one off instead and joined Nicholas, barefoot, on the grassy slope under the trees.
“What you wanna do next?”
“Well,” said Nicholas, swinging the shoes back and forth with a finger. “Seeing as it's your day off, you could give me a leg up on the training business and show me around your beat...”
Danny huffed a heavy breath out. “S'pose. S'not hard, up High Street and round the back. 'Ve you seen the castle yet?”
Nicholas raised both eyebrows. “There's a castle?”
Part 7