AlEx had retiRed from riding pacer horses and had taken up bird spotting. He was particularly knowledgeable about wader types of bird. These things Sid, his best friend knew. What Alex never told Sid was of the time he lived in Derbyshire and had nearly got caught one night when he was one of a caver gang stealing ore from the local mine. The narrow escape cured Alex of that and it was part of his secret past. Giving it up had been a sort of saver for him as he turned his energies to being well educated. It wasn't easy and he often had to cadge lifts from his friends in order to get about. At university he studied on one of the rarer courses, gaining his degree in ornithology (wader). He'd become so good that, when his colleagues tried to play a prank on him and float a model bird from the Southern Hemisphere on the river Alex was studying, he spotted the faker instantly. This evening, Alex and Sid were deep in discussion, though they did stop to buy an ice cream; an oyster ice-cream for Sid and a block with a wafer top and bottom for Alex from a quirky shop that sold older ice-cream products.
No comments:
Post a Comment