The Daily Dormouse. (aka Bike) Part 1415 by Angharad Copyright © 2011 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

“I love the rapport you have with your son, Lady Cameron.”

“He’s a good lad,” I said hoping that Danny was close enough to hear my commendation. I poured us each a mug of tea and we sat and sipped it for a few moments.

I felt like saying, ‘What d’you want?’ but politeness prevented me, I just hoped that she didn’t want me to intercede with the bank, because then I’d have to say no. I left her a few seconds to speak her piece before prompting her.

“I really like this fabric,” she said rubbing her hand over the cushions on the sofa.

“How can I help?” I asked grabbing the brown-cow by the horns.

“Oh yes, there’s some woodland at the back of our garden centre which the owner is talking about clearing and just leaving a screen of trees to hide a slurry pit.”

“I’m not sure what I can do to stop him, especially if he has planning permission.” I felt some sympathy for her, after all the smell would be pretty awful.

“We wondered if there were some dormice there, he wouldn’t be allowed to do it, would he?”

“You want me to do a survey–to see if there are any dormice?”

“Yes, that would be helpful, and if there aren’t any, could we buy some off you and put them in there?”

“I can’t do that, apart from the fact that it would be deception, it wouldn’t be a good idea to just dump dormice anywhere–that would be in breach of my licence.”

“Oh.”

“But I’ll happily come and have a look round the wood and if there are signs of dormice, might be able to insist the council check it first.”

“That would be wonderful, especially if they found any.”

“Someone would then have to commission a full survey, which might be enough to make him site his slurry pit elsewhere. Have you objected on the grounds it could have an adverse affect upon your business?”

“Yes, but the council surveyor bloke said the trees would hide it so we wouldn’t be affected by it.”

“What about the smell?”

“He said the prevailing wind would blow the aroma away from us.”

“I wonder how he’d like it at the bottom of his garden?” I still didn’t like the woman but she did have my sympathy.

“When could you do your survey?”

“At the weekend would be the earliest. I’d need access to walk through the woodland to look for signs of dormice. How big is the wood?”

“A couple of acres, I think. What do I need to do to get you access?”

“Speak to the council and tell them you suspect there might be dormice there. They will then have to organise someone to take a look, they usually ask the mammal group or the university–either usually come to me.”

“That would be brilliant.” She finished her tea and was getting ready to leave when she looked a little embarrassed before she said, “Look, I know we haven’t always seen eye to eye in the past, but I’m grateful for any help you can give us.”

“Speak to the council.”

“Yes, I will.”

My mind was taken from the meeting when we suffered some major damage to the outbuildings with one of those freak whirlwinds–it took the roof off two of them. Admittedly, they were tiled but they were in reasonable repair until a force of nature turned up and turned the tiles to terracotta confetti.

We counted ourselves fortunate that none of the cars were damaged and more importantly, none of my bikes were although some of the tiles belonged to that garage.

Danny helped me drape a tarpaulin over the hole in the roof of my bike workshop and weigh it down with some bits of timber. He scrambled about the place like a monkey, up and down the ladder, but he did the job really well.

He’d come home early from school, his team was in the final of the cricket competition and he’d taken three wickets and made a dozen runs, so he was quite pleased with himself–and I was proud of him too.

I called Maureen to come and survey the damage and organise repairs–the insurance company wouldn’t be too helpful if past experiences were anything to go by and Simon reminded me the whole place was grade II listed, so repairs would have to be very sympathetic to the existing buildings.

Maureen arrived the next day and I left her to do her survey while I expressed some milk for Jenny to feed Catherine, as I was going to watch Danny play in the cricket final–sadly, Simon couldn’t get the time off work, but he promised Danny a new bat if they won.

Two of the girls came to cheer him on, Trish and Livvie–Meems decided to help Jenny and Billie felt it was too much risk, given she’d attended the school previously as a boy. I could see her point.

We left Maureen to it with her tape measure and clipboard, plus her digital camera–what did we do before them? Danny looked very pleased with himself, getting three of us to support him, especially as Livvie had borrowed Simon’s posh camera with its telephoto lens and tripod, to take pictures of the competition.

For a seven year old she seemed to take quite good photos and Trish was there with her compact camera to take some snaps as well. I was quite pleased that Livvie seemed better at something than her sister and that Trish recognised the fact.

Danny’s house is named after Admiral Nelson, who although he wasn’t a son of Portsmouth, sailed from here and had his flagship preserved for posterity here. The rival house was, Dickens, as in Charles, the author who is one of Portsmouth’s most famous sons.

We settled down in the picnic chairs I’d loaded in the boot of the car to watch the match. The first ball had no sooner been bowled than my mobile went off. I noted the number calling and walked towards the car park to take the call.

“Hello, Cathy.”

“Hi, Pippa, how are you?”

“Okay, looking forward to my holiday in a couple of weeks if Tom doesn’t work me to death first.”

“I’ll have a word if you like.”

“Don’t do that, he’ll double his output.”

“Okay, I won’t.”

“Can you do a preliminary survey of a woodland for dormice?”

“When?”

“ASAP–the council are sitting on some planning application and they’re worried that the owner might decide to clear fell on the premise that he’s going to replant.”

“Tomorrow soon enough?”

“I knew we could count on you, we’ve not got any students available who could have done it, and the mammal group are unavailable–least their dormouse person is, and the Mammal Society would have asked you anyway.”

“Looks like it’s my destiny–kismet Hardy.”

“Kiss you Hardy? Who d’ya think you are, bloody Nelson?”

“Yes, no–but I’m watching Danny playing cricket for his house, which is Nelson.”

“Oh okay, I’ll tell the council you’ll do it tomorrow.”

“Fine, I’ll get the results through to you and Natural England if there are any suspected–then we’ll have to organise some nest boxes and survey tubes.”

“Both? Thought you did the tubes first and then the nest boxes?”

“Ah, but there’s a paper been done by some people in Devon who’ve shown that dormice use different nesting places at different times.”

“Have we got a copy of that–I don’t recall seeing it?”

“How would I know? I saw it on the Mammal Society’s website. I’m surprised they didn’t ask me to peer review it.”

“Um–that could be my fault–someone phoned ages ago and you were tied up with something–and I told them you weren’t available.”

“Gee thanks.”

“Sorrreee.”

I felt a hand pulling on my jacket, “C’mon, Mummy, Danny’s going to bowl.”

“Gotta go, Pip, Danny’s bowling.”