As soon as Henry began to rub my back, I knew he was going to be too gentle to be of much use. ‘You need to get really stuck in,’ I advised, then just as he was beginning to get a little braver, I flinched when he accidentally hit the spike of rough bone that Nat had learned to avoid.
‘Oh my goodness!’ Henry leaped away as if stung. ‘What on earth is that?’
‘The break. I told you it was a bit of a mess.’
‘I don’t think I’ve got the temperament for this, I’m afraid. Perhaps Finn could do a better job?’
On cue, Finn stalked into the kitchen, Bran at his heels. ‘Better job at what?’ He gave us both a glare of pure malice. ‘We’ve already ascertained that our esteemed artist here isn’t into the kind of services I provide.’
Before I could respond, Henry stepped up to Finn and peered at his face. ‘Finn Strachan, are you drunk?’
Finn brought a near-empty vodka bottle out of his back pocket and waved it at Henry. ‘I should fuckin’ hope so.’
‘Oh, Finn, it’s only seven o’clock -’ Henry began.
‘Henry, rearrange the following words into a sentence. Off. Fuck. So, what’s the problem? Painter’s cramp?’
‘No. As I was explaining to Henry before you made your graceful entrance, I broke my collarbone when I was at school. Well, strictly speaking someone else used their hockey stick to break it for me.’
Finn gave a superbly derisive snort of contempt. ‘Fuckin’ hockey. What happened? Did that naughty Anastasia Fotherington-Smythe tap you too hard in the bully-off, huh? I’m surprised matron didn’t make it all better for you.’
‘It wasn’t quite like that,’ I tried to figure out what the hell I’d missed that was provoking such rancour. ‘Do you have a problem with me that you’d care to share?’
‘No. No fuckin’ problem at all, thank you very much for asking.’ Finn picked up a newly-opened carton of milk from Henry’s pristine work surface and took a long drink before setting it back down so clumsily that half the contents splattered across the floor.
‘Oh Finn,’ Henry sighed, and wearily picked up a cloth. Finn steadfastly ignored him.
‘So, Ms Bresson, d’you ride?’
‘Yes. Why?’
Finn gave me a mocking smile. ‘Course you fuckin’ ride. Goes with the territory, doesn’t it? Bet you were on your first pony and hitting the gymkhana circuit before you were out of nappies. Blaine has suggested that I take you across to the mainland to visit her stables. Wants us both out of the way for the morning – she’ll be giving some lucky guest a good buckin’ herself. Got somethin’ to see to first, but I reckon we’ll be ready to go in an hour. So if you’d be so kind, Henry old chap, we shall be needin’ a lift to shore once you’ve finished in here.’ He turned unsteadily to me. ‘See you soon. Only if you reckon you’re up to it, eh?’ He summoned Bran to his side with a soft whistle and stalked from the kitchen in a cloud of brimstone.
‘What the fuck was that about?’ I asked.
‘I’m not entirely sure,’ Henry replied, then gave a frown. ‘Ooh, hang on a mo, what day is it?’
‘Thursday. Why? Does that make some kind of difference?’
Henry nodded and pushed his glasses back up his nose. ‘Blood test day. I’d forgotten about that. No wonder he’s full of hell.’
‘What day?’
‘Lady Albermarle insists that all her, um, workers are tested for anything nasty every three months. Nature of their job and all that. The same thing’ll be going on at her London place.’ Henry stuck his head out into the corridor to check that Finn had gone before he continued. ‘He’s terrified of needles, poor boy – something from his unenviable past, no doubt. He deals with it by getting completely loaded and then Blaine calls for Coyle and a couple of his gorillas across from the mainland to hold him down while Doctor Parnell does her thing.’
‘I can imagine Coyle loves that.’ I remembered the man’s ill-disguised smugness on the night of my arrival.
‘Indeed he does. Coyle O’Halloran isn’t one who needs an excuse to ‘have a go’, so to speak.’
‘God, I hate this place.’ I shivered and pulled my bathrobe back around my shoulders.
‘Will you be going riding?’ Henry asked. ‘Because I warn you now, he’s not likely to be good company. There are certain aspects of his lifestyle that make him a little volatile on occasion.’