AMOS HAD ONLY COME back to pick up a longer bit of twine, tie back some of the gorse. The damp was properly in the woods now and the sheep liked to take shelter in it, kept getting hooked up in it.
The envelope sat there at the door, and he knew. Weren’t they supposed to hand deliver that kind of thing? Just as well the sheep had needed him.
He whistled quietly for Bess and turned back into the forest, the letter stuffed into his pocket along with the twine. The ewes could wait.
Amos pushed past a holly bush, brushed off its spikes. Droplets splattered him, tiny woodland tears. Nobody came down this way, not any more. Nobody could remember it how it was thirty-odd years ago when he’d first been here with his May, when they were courting.
He slowed his pace, peering around. It was here somewhere – used to be beside an old stump. That could be the stump, there, covered in moss now, rotting a bit. He prodded his crook at it and an edge clumped off. Beetles scuttled and a woodlouse curled up against the exposure.
Amos took another couple of steps forward. This had to be the right tree.
He hadn’t been down here much these past years. Used to bring Billy at first, after – when Billy was out of the hospital and well enough to be carried around. The house had been full and topsy-turvy. The aroma of the wrong cooking, where it should have been May’s, the clamour of the wrong voices. Well-meaning enough, they all were, but the house shouted of her being gone. Down here by the tree it was still just him and May, so Amos brought the boy down to feel that for himself. Fanciful nonsense it had been, Amos knew that, but who’s to say it didn’t work, blanketing the boy in memories of his mother the same way Amos would shroud an orphaned lamb with the fleece of a stillborn one to make sure it bonded with the mother and thrived. But he’d stopped that as soon as the boy came old enough to go about on his own.
Amos pushed in amongst the branches until they almost held him in an embrace. The boughs dipped down in places, almost to the ground, their weight nearly too much to bear.
This was the spot, right here, where he’d asked May to marry him. Down on his knees amongst the rich arrows of the fallen yew leaves, air full of the spice of the prickles; and May, he could see her now, pushing her hair out of her face, eyes saying everything he needed to know. They’d brought Billy down here when he was a nipper, let him crawl around on the leaves. Billy’s giggles used to set May off; she’d lean against Amos, finding it hard to catch her breath. May should be here with him now, not all these years dead. He’d think he’d got used to it and then it would trip him up like a crook round the ankles.
‘Oh, May. Billy’s gone.’
He groaned, anguish spearing him, and leaned his head against the bark, the furrows of his skin mapping to its grooves. Why hadn’t he written sooner? Now Billy was gone, most likely dead, and Amos had been stupid and stubborn. He’d been all alone out there. Amos had failed him.