Today was Tuesday – their regular lunch day. More often
than not Fraser would be on door guard on Tuesday mornings and Ray would pull
up in front of the Consulate just as the nearby clock-tower rang noon. Tuesdays were becoming sacred to the lovers
and Ray went to extraordinary lengths to avoid having any conflicting
commitments, even to the extreme of allowing Welsh to assign another detective
to stake-outs that promised to end in an easy collar. From this we can conclude
that love shows itself in many forms, not necessarily the ways in which
convention dictates.
On this particular Tuesday they were having barbeque. This
was one of Fraser’s gestures of affection since he didn’t particularly like
messy foods.
“You know what this Saturday is?” Ray asked, around the side
rib he was messily denuding.
Fraser grunted to suggest Ray should speak on. The
question was obviously rhetorical and as such did not require Fraser to go to
the extreme of talking with his mouth full.
(Although he continued to envy Ray the ease with which he was able to do
such a thing. In a family as lavish
with food as it was with decibels, Ma would have had a hard time training her
family to obey an injunction not to vocalize when food was in one’s mouth. )
“It’s our first anniversary. I want us to do something
special for that.”
Fraser swallowed his mouthful of salad before saying,
“Since we’re not married, I’m not sure which event – specifically – this would
be the anniversary of. Do you mean the
first time I told you how I felt? Or the first time we actually made love?
“Aw, come on, Benny. It didn’t really take too long after
you told me what you wanted for me to give it to you, did it?
Fraser smiled and quoted, “Indeed, it followed hard upon.”
Ray choked and sprayed a very unappetizing mixture of
sauce and spittle across the table, so great was his shock. “Benny!”
“What, Ray?”
“You never talk like that in public!”
“Sure I do, Ray. I
quote Shakespeare all the time.”
“Shakespeare?” Ray didn’t get it.
“Hamlet. Horatio says ‘I came to see your father’s
funeral’ and Hamlet says he thinks he came to see his mother’s wedding. Then
Horatio says, ‘indeed, it followed hard upon’ meaning that the wedding came
very soon after the funeral. I really don’t see what’s so wrong with saying
that line in public.”
Ray wiped his mouth first then dabbed at the tablecloth.
“Oh, I thought you meant something else.”
Fraser pondered this for a few beats, caught a possible
meaning, blushed and then returned to the original subject. “So, what did you
have in mind to do for our anniversary?”
“You’re going to love this, Benny. I want you to take me
horseback riding. I never really
learned how to do it and you’re an expert. It’d be fun. You give me the okay
and I’ll call up a stable and set us up for Saturday afternoon.”
“You’d better let me arrange it, Ray. I can better tell the stable exactly what we
need.”
“Works for me. This is going to be such fun!”
After a little research, Fraser chose a stable and called
them from his office. A youngish-sounding male voice answered the phone. Fraser
told him he wanted to arrange the hire of two horses for two hours on Saturday
afternoon.
“You’re both experienced riders?”
“I am. My friend is not.”
“So, you’ll need to buy some lessons.”
“No, I’m going to instruct my friend myself.”
“Sorry, if he’s not experienced we can only give him
lessons or trail rides.”
“I’m experienced.”
“You’re not him.”
Fraser couldn’t deny that, but he pressed on. “I am an
experienced rider. I will teach my friend myself.”
“We don’t allow that. Insurance or something.”
“I’m willing to sign a waiver.”
“Oh, you’ll have to sign a waiver anyway.”
“Then why is insurance an issue?”
“I . . . um . . .” The young voice was stuck at this
point. He was giving this customer the stock answers but the customer wasn’t
asking the stock questions. “I’m going to have to ask my boss and call you
back.”
“You can’t call me back. I don’t have a phone,” Fraser
said.
“But . . .you’re talking to me on a phone.”
“Which doesn’t mean I have one. I’d like one that is older
for my friend.”
“An older phone?”
“No, horse. My friend already has a phone.”
“What about an address?”
“He most assuredly does have an address.”
“Yeah, but . . .”
Fraser sensed the youth’s confusion, pressed his advantage
and obtained the booking. Adverse as he
was to lying, the Mountie had become an expert in confusing people in order to
get what he wanted.
Saturday turned out to be fine day, just warm enough to be
comfortable and cool enough to be refreshing.
Ray threw open the door of the Riv for Fraser to get in.
He was disappointed to see that the Mountie was wearing jeans, a flannel shirt
and his usual leather jacket.
“I was expecting you to wear the poofy pants. Aren’t they
supposed to be for riding?”
“I’m not on duty, Ray. There’s no reason for me to wear my
red serge.”
“Except it’s our anniversary and you do sort of look hot
in it.”
“I did wear something special for the occasion. See here,”
and after slipping into the Riv he handed his Stetson to Ray to examine.
“That’s your regular hat, Benny.”
“No, Ray. Look at the front. See that bullet hole.”
“Aw, that’s from where she shot you in the hat. So, um,
why is that special? I mean for us. I’m not the one who shot you in the hat.”
Ray cringed a little after saying that, afraid that his lover would say
something like: no, you shot me in the back – which wouldn’t have been a very
romantic turn of conversation.
“No, Ray. But right afterwards you reached down to help me
pull up out of that pile of boxes.”
“Yeah. So?”
“Ray, that was the first time I held your hand.”
Ray fairly melted when he heard that. He felt all warm and
fuzzy as he drove out of the city towards the stables.
“You didn’t bring Dief,” he commented as they drove.
“Oh no. I didn’t want to take a chance that he wouldn’t
get along with the stable dog.”
“So, you’ve been to this place before.”
“Oh no. I just called them.”
“So how do you know they have a dog?”
Fraser smiled indulgently. “Oh Ray. There’s always a
dog. And invariably the horses either
love or hate the dog, depending on whether the dog taunts the horses or is
friendly with them.”
“Always a dog.”
“Yes, Ray. It’s not a proper stable, otherwise.”
Ray thought about it. “OK, Benny. You realize what this
means. If we get there and there’s no
dog, we have to leave.”
As they drove into the stable grounds, Ray had actually
worked himself up into a state of anxiety whether or not there would be a
dog. As he opened the door of the Riv
and slid out, he was relieved to see not one but three huge beasts of
indiscriminate breed but unmistakable friendliness come bounding towards the
car. Fraser got out of his shotgun seat
and astounded Ray by throwing himself at the dogs, clasping his arms about their
necks one by one, then offering his arms and legs for them to pretend to fight
with him. Fraser romped and frolicked
with the animals in a way Ray had never seen him do with Diefenbaker. He inched closer, so engrossed in what he
was seeing that he neglected to look out for horse-residue on the ground.
“How come you and Dief never play like that?” Ray
marveled.
“Dief’s a bit of an old stick-in-the-mud, I’m afraid,”
Fraser tossed off to Ray from the ground where he was now rolling about with
the dogs, ruffling their huge hairy heads and poking teasingly at them so they
could pretend to bite him.
At length, Fraser detached from his new friends and stood
up. “I’ll have to be going now,” he explained to them apologetically, “I
promised Ray I’d teach him to ride. Maybe we’ll talk some more later.”
The two men went towards a door at the side of one of the
buildings labeled “Office”. Ray let
Fraser take the lead and handle the discussions, until the time came to present
a credit card. Then, after they had both signed a few forms, they were led out
to a corral.
As they trailed along behind the employee, Fraser
whispered to Ray, “Don’t let on that you don’t know how to ride. This isn’t the same young man I spoke to on
the phone. They don’t like inexperienced riders going out without an instructor
so just do what I do exactly until he goes away.”
Ray flashed a quick ok sign and winked. Fraser, as he
walked, wasn’t entirely convinced that Ray could pull off looking like an
experienced rider but he hoped for the best.
Fraser and Ray stood politely while the stable hand
introduced them to their mounts, waved about to give some indication of how far
back the stable’s property went and gave some preliminary instructions. Fraser
tried to give the impression that they both he and Ray knew exactly what they
were doing but still the boy did not leave.
Finally, Fraser approached his horse and Ray copied
Fraser’s movements. Fraser was gratified to see that Ray mimicked his moves
with care: touching his horse’s shoulder first then rubbing it gently. The only time Ray slipped up was when he
made a move to dab at the horse’s nose but a quick look from Fraser stopped
him. He dropped his hand back to the horse’s shoulder and rubbed the animal in
exactly the same kind of circular strokes that Fraser did.
The boy hung around for a few minutes but at last Fraser
convinced him that they were fine now on their own, thank you kindly, and would
be back in two hours. Having other
chores to attend to, the boy left the four of them – men and beasts – to their
own devices.
“Now, let’s get started,” Fraser, um, started, when the
boy had safely gone. “Approach your
horse from the left in order to mount.”
“I remember I heard that before. But I always wondered, my
left facing the horse or the horse’s left?”
Fraser sighed and strode up to his own mount. “This side,
Ray. Call it what you like.”
Ray sensed Fraser’s unaccustomed impatience but put it
down to his just being in a hurry to get to riding. He obeyed and went around
to the correct side of his horse. Still, he couldn’t resist asking “Why the
left?”
“It’s just a convention, Ray. All horses are trained to
expect to be mounted from the left.”
Ray thought it over as he placed one foot in the stirrup
and swung himself up as he had seen people do in movies. “They’re trained to expect the left?”
“Yes, Ray. And you mounted very well.”
“Hold the phone, Benny. You’re telling me horses know
their right from their left? Come off it. I bet even Dief doesn’t know that.”
Fraser, in the act of mounting his own horse, froze in an
awkward position with one foot in the stirrup and the other poised in mid air
over the horse’s back. Then he dropped and settled himself in the saddle all
the while thinking about what Ray had just said. He’d never really thought
about this before.
“I . . . I . . .
don’t know if Diefenbaker knows his right from his left. It never came up in conversation.”
“He better, or else he dumber than a horse.”
Fraser was troubled by this line of reasoning, but he
decided to table the whole question until he could get home later and talk it
over with the wolf.
Expertly he guided his horse around until the two of them
were facing Ray and his horse and said, “Now, Ray. Seating. Lean back in your saddle. Keep your feet inside the stirrups at all
times. Hold the reins in only one
hand.”
“Like in westerns, right?”
“Yes, since these are western saddles. If were riding
English style . . .”
“Don’t confuse me. One
hand. Go on. “
“If you ever feel like you’re losing your balance, hold
onto the saddle horn with your other hand.”
“This thing in front, you mean? Geez, Benny you know what
that looks like?”
“Not now, Ray.”
“Later?”
“No, you’ll be too sore later.”
“What, on our anniversary we’re not gonna . . .” Ray had
to pause, he couldn’t shout this out lest somebody overhear.
“Ray, you’re going to be using muscles this afternoon that
you don’t usually use. You’re likely to
be stiff later tonight.”
Ray rolled his eyes.
“Ray, please. We’re in a public place.”
“What, did I roll my eyes too loud?”
“In any case, I haven’t ridden in so long myself that I
might even be sore.”
“Well, if I’d known that I wouldn’t have suggested we go
riding today of all days,” Ray groused.
“Ray, would you pay attention to the task at hand. We only
have two hours.”
As it turned out, the lesson didn’t go too badly. Ray kept his seat no worse than any other
neophyte and didn’t fall off. They even
spent the second hour outside the corral, exploring the surrounding
pastures. And if afterward, as Fraser
predicted, they were a little too stiff for the kind of activities they might
have otherwise have pursued on their anniversary, Ray was philosophical about
it. They’d done something special together – maybe they could even make a
ritual of it every year.
End