He felt alive. No question about it. But that was probably more because he felt every single one of his tense muscles. Sweat ran down the back of his neck and found its way under his shirt, despite the scarf.
Autumn had not yet fully set in, and yet the increasingly cool wind was already announcing winter, which seemed to be waiting with pawing hooves outside the gates. The sun was deceptive these days, like the peace Sidney thought he had made with fate. Pale, it lurked behind the trees of the adjoining woods, only the next moment to glare almost insidiously with intense rays in its eyes that one could hardly see what one were doing.
But he knew. With every step, every lift of his arms. With every aching breath in the bitingly cool air of the early morning.
Sidney straightened up. Leaned his damp back against the bale of hay he was ordered to roll up, already towering over him. For a silent moment, he paused and let his gaze slide over the field. Looking at this painting-like patch of earth, one could almost forget why he was here. How many such bales he had already rolled up and hoisted onto wagons.
In another place he had already done the same with the straw. He had tied countless piles of mown grain stalks together into sheaves. Once he even had to help with the threshing. In June, beating the ears of grain with the flail had helped him to vent his boiling anger against Tom, even if it did not help to forget. The loss caused by Tom's greed and speculation was too great to ever forgive.
Often Sidney wondered how Tom managed to live with himself each new day.
He would have sacrificed his life, but Tom... no Tom didn't. The recurring pain of grief pierced his heart and gathered as a throb in his clenched fists. He opened them and to distract himself looked at his palms, which were scuffed and rough from the hard work. From the clotted blood of his torn fingertips, his fingernails were the colour of plums. A small smile formed on his face as he thought of how his colleagues all complained of stomach aches when they had eaten too many of the fruits, when they had harvested them the day before yesterday. After that, the wives of the workers had been given an extra portion of plums to make cake with and the rumour was that there would soon be plum wine to drink.
One of the workers gave the impression that he had already tasted too much of it the last days, because he was in a bad mood, like after a night of drinking. He grumbled to himself like a mad dog until he found someone with whom he could argue and, at best, scuffle. Before he would choose him as his latest victim, Sidney turned around and rolled the heavy bale further across the field. He pulled the rope that held the stalks together taut and tried to ignore the feeling of wiping away the drops of sweat rolling down his backside. On another farm that movement had caused his grouchy colleague to acquaint said backside with his boot.
Sidney had never taken kindly to a sneak attack and had reacted accordingly. But he could not afford to lose this job as well. In the truest sense of the word.
After trying in vain to pay off as much of Tom's debt as possible with all the money he and the rest of the family had, the first of Sidney's clients had withdrawn from their business relationship. Of course, it would have been naïve to think Tom's bankruptcy and incarceration in debtor's prison would escape the Beau Mode. After the boy's death became known, no one who cared about himself or his reputation wanted to have anything to do with a Parker. Neither in business nor in private.
Consequently, the sale of the property in London was more of a financial disaster than a help to really minimise the debts. The old family home overlooking the Sanditon hills had been signed over to the tenants for a ridiculous price that did not even cover the funeral costs.
Fortunately, Sidney's two closest friends were still attached despite all the discomfort. Unlike Babington, who had a seat in Parliament and a reputation to lose, Crowe was neither so well known, nor so wanted socially. He had offered his help without hesitation. And it went far beyond what one normally did out of friendship. Crowe had not allowed himself to be deterred from giving sanctuary to the entire Parker family at his country estate, nor, as Sidney gathered from Mary's last letter, from becoming engaged to Diana.
Of course, Sidney hoped there was more to this noble gesture than a financial bailout out of friendship for him. That this promise was kept. For Crowe not only waived Diana's dowry, but also assumed the cost of her bridal trousseau. He was now linked to them and also to the tragedy by family ties and morally obliged to help his bride's family.
Sidney couldn't really imagine his well-behaved and over-anxious sister with the philanderer Crowe, whose biggest task in life so far had been to try out various alcoholic drinks and their effects, but perhaps it was just the excess of caution on her part and his underachievement and carelessness that was the right mix.
As Sidney continued to roll the bale across the field, which seemed to have no end, a pain settled into his shoulders. This kind of penetrating pain that did not let him rest and extended to the head. He then let his head to stretch his neck muscles, pulled his chin up to his chest, turned his head to the right until it cracked and then to the left until he felt a crack there too. What he would give right now for a back massage in Madame Harris' establishment and a chilled drink. A cramp in his calf and left elbow immediately destroyed this thought. His legs and glutes were now already burning with every step and he was glad to have reached the end of the field. The one end.
Sidney went around the bale, wanting to drag it to the next lane first before taking a little break. Having finally managed that and slid to the ground, he pulled out his field bottle, took a sip of the diluted wine and bit into a plum he had brought with him.
In the corner of his eye, he saw something pale brown emerge from the grove and, joyfully expecting to be rewarded for his toil with the sight of a noble deer, he turned his head.
But what he saw delighted him in a completely different way.
It was that girl again who was no longer a girl. Since his arrival a few days ago, he had somehow not been able to get her out of his mind, even though he had not spoken a word to this maid. This pleasant feeling that spread through him when he looked her up
was similar to the moment when he had allowed himself a moment of silence and looked at the picturesque field. There was something light-hearted about the way she hurried down the hill, but the earthy colours of her clothes held her in place and made her part of the surroundings. If someone was less attentive, they could easily miss her.
As if she had melted into nature. Invisible.
It made him sad, although Sidney couldn't name the reason right away. Perhaps it was the fleeting thought that it was unthinkable to miss this natural beauty, or the realisation that, unlike this damsel, he didn't belong anywhere.
Even if by working hard he got Tom out of prison and let him return to the rest of his family, there was nothing left for Sidney to go to. Both family homes now belonged to others, the parental possessions, had all been sold off except for a few small keepsakes. Tom's house was nothing but rubble and ashes. Sanditon was lost.
He groaned, cursed and rather got up before he could brood anymore and started his way back. He counted his steps, the appearance of his left and right shoe toes. Dusty from the dry earth. He kept his gaze fixed on the ground. The ever-changing brown and beige of the field, lulled him almost as much as the crunch of hay under the weight of the bale.
Only when he almost bumped into one of the hay carts did Sidney realise that he had finally reached the end of the path.
