“—very fast—”
“—cutting the corn like that and stripping the grain off—”
“It’s done three rows already.”
“Bugger me!”
“You can’t hardly see the bits move! What do you think of that, Bill? Bill?”
They looked around.
He was halfway up his second row, but accelerating.
Miss Flitworth opened the door a fraction.
“Yes?” she said, suspiciously.
“It’s Bill Door, Miss Flitworth. We’ve brought him home.”
She opened the door wider.
“What happened to him?”
The two men shuffled in awkwardly, trying to support a figure a foot taller than they were. It raised it’s head and squinted muzzily at Miss Flitworth.
“Don’t know what come over him,” said Duke Bottomley.
“He’s a devil for working,” said William Spigot. “You’re getting your money’s worth out of him all right, Miss Flitworth.”
“It’ll be the first time, then, in these parts,” she said sourly.
“Up and down the field like a madman, trying to better that contraption of Ned Simnel’s. Took four of us to do the binding. He nearly beat it, too.”
“Put him down on the sofa.”
“He tole him he was doing too much in all that sun—” Duke craned his neck to see around the kitchen, just in case jewels and treasure were hanging out of the dresser drawers.
Miss Flitworth eclipsed his view.
“I’m sure you did. Thank you. Now I expect you’ll be wanting to be off home.”
“If there’s anything we can do—”
“I know where you live. And you ain’t paid no rent there for five years, too. Goodbye, Mr. Spigot.”
She ushered them to the door and shut it in their faces. Then she turned around.
“What the hell have you been doing, Mr. So-Called Bill Door?”
I AM TIRED AND IT WON’T STOP.
Bill Door clutched at his skull.
ALSO SPIGOT GAVE ME A HUMOROUS APPLE JUICE FERMENTED DRINK BECAUSE OF THE HEAT AND NOW I FEEL ILL.
“I ain’t surprised. He makes it up in the woods. Apples isn’t the half of it.”
I HAVE NEVER FELT ILL BEFORE. OR TIRED.