Back from a few days trudging around the hills east of Inverness. Very much a case of the stags getting their own back. 40 mph winds and driving rain chilled to the bone. I have a bruised and cut nose after underestimating the recoil of a .270 rifle and the length of its telescopic sight. And on the first day the nearest we came to shooting a stag was in self defence as it moved in on us with some intent. No. Safe to say the highlight of my trip north was finding myself at dinner on the first evening sitting across the table from none other than young Miss N*pple Lashes. You may remember me telling you about her the other day in the context of a 21st Tarts & Vicars Birthday Party that Hen was commissioned to take photographs of. It so happens that Hen has just been asked for permission to use her photos of that event which will feature in a forthcoming edition of Tatler. Remarkably I managed to keep a straight face whilst revealing this bit of news to Miss NL and pretending ( to preserve her modesty you understand ) that I had not actually seen any of the photos! Oh well enough of that, but whilst still on the subject of country sports we had Bob back on his first leave-out last weekend. Needless to say we grilled him intently about how it was all going at school; was he finding the work difficult, being organised, making friends etc etc. All seemed to be fine, but then some way through dinner he told us that he has been christened “Pigeon Boy” by everyone in his House. I am not a pessimist. I think of myself as a realist, and here it was, my worst fears were being realised. My little darling heart was being bullied. Tentatively I probed for some more detail. The story is this.
On his way back to Sheriff House for lunch a couple of weeks ago Bob spotted a pigeon sitting on the bonnet of a car. Handing his books to a fellow pupil he sneaked round the back of the vehicle, crawled along the side and leapt up managing to grab the startled pigeon by its tail feathers. He then tucked it underneath his jacket – for which he subsequently received reprimand and a lecture on hygiene from Matron - and wandered on to his House where he found a bunch of his housemates kicking a football about in the garden. Surreptitiously he took the pigeon in both hands, called to one of the boys “Hey, Duncan.....catch” and, at this point it would help if you could picture a two-handed spin pass from a diving scrum half, lobbed the poor pigeon at the unsuspecting boy. Bob, rising to his story and by now evidently not the miserable little victimised boy I had imagined, described how the bird flew straight on past the aghast Duncan and into the safety of a nearby tree happily none the worse for its adventure. The boys who witnessed this event, betraying their solidly Anglican education, and before deciding on the more mundane “Pigeon Boy” as Bob’s new name, apparently described the incident as almost biblical. Hmmmm. Perhaps.....
P.S. It appears Pigeon Boy is taking his title to heart. Sophie received a text message from him this week asking her to send up his flat cap!
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