The young lady stood true to her word. The lad did come to check up on him, though they had no need to. Then the next day and the next. Twice each day! It all made Alfie feel as though he were burdening them and he never had much truck with that. They had their own lives to lead without having to check on a doddering old codger like him.
True, he had taken the loss of Arthur a little more strongly than he had expected and, mayhap, he should not have tried to honour his memory, and those that had passed on before, by sitting on the wall in the rain. That was a daft thing to do, and no mistake. Now, he had no-one to talk to at all, however. No-one to pass the time of day with. All he had left were his bicycles, his fishing and his allotment, and he had neglected all three for too long.
The workbench sat empty, though, without a bicycle to repair. That boy's bicycle had sat there, beside his squeaking gate, for days before it disappeared and he never did get around to cleaning up the gear mechanism, even after he had spent some time watching videos to understand the new fangled system. That was probably for the best. At his age, learning new things came harder than they once had.
As far as the allotment, he would need to spend a couple of days seeing to that before too long. The out-of-season rain had helped him there, but he would need to do some weeding, clear away any pests that may have set up home since he last set foot there, and, maybe, simply sit there, staring out of his shed with a flask of hot tea to coddle.
On his mind for today, though, was fishing. Or, rather, preparing to go fishing in the morning. First light. Rod and reels cleaned and tended to. A little folding stool and a good few hours teasing and coaxing the fish in the canal to take a bite, or not. Whether he caught a fish or not wasn't the purpose of fishing, after all. The Duchess never took to his fishing and, he supposed, she had good reason for that. It wasn't a task to share with others, and he had shared himself so little back then as it was.
Another reason to thank that rain sat beneath his chubby fingers that now lacked the sensitivity they once held. At one time, he could tell the quality of the worms from a passing touch. Now he had to squint and stare through spectacles that had long since become more and more useless. A free eye check wouldn't go amiss, but he didn't care for bothering other folk less he needed to. He'd get by. As he always had.
As luck would have it, he'd found himself a good selection of fat worms that had burrowed their way to the surface of his garden, drawn by the rainwaters that had sodden the soil. A little turn of the topsoil with a garden fork and he found a nice amount of the little buggers. Dirty and slimy, moving with that slow, weaving fashion that had always turned his stomach. They would move no more, soon, as he picked out the first one from the plastic tub, holding it ready for the craft knife.
"Morning, Mister Dibbs." The lad shouted when he could as easy knock on the door, and Alfie pulled a shaking hand away from the worm. "That's disgusting! What is it?"
"Has thy never seen a worm afore, lad?" The craft knife had almost sliced his own finger as he jumped, but he couldn't say anything to the lad. He picked up the worm, letting it squirm in the air. "There. A worm. Now, thy's seen one and thy's done thee daily check on the old fool. Thy can be off."
"Why do you talk funny?" The boy sidled in, leaning against the bench as a little finger hovered near the worm. "You sound like an old movie. Mum wants to know if you like Ackee and Saltfish? She's making some and she always makes more than we need, but if you say you like it, she'll probably make even more, so there'll still be leftovers. Why do you have worms?"
The way the lad switched between different thoughts beggared Alfie. Bad enough that he'd never even heard of 'Ackee and Saltfish', but then with the thoughts about how Alfie talked and the worms, Alfie hardly knew where to begin. To give himself time to work out the order of replies, he spread the worm out once more and began slicing the creature into sections. The disgusted groan and pretend retching from the lad didn't help Alfie's concentration.
"Ain't never heard of no 'Ackee and Saltfish', so I couldn't say yay or nay as to whether I like it." He gathered the sliced worm pieces and poured them into a second plastic tub. "And I don't talk funny, my lad, but thy does. Don't thee forget, I was born here. And the worms're for fishing."
The lad said nothing for a while, one leg twisting and twirling on the tip of the toes as he watched Alfie retrieve another worm from the first tub. He watched with the quiet intensity that only a child could wear. Part disinterest, part mind wandering to other things, part absolutely entranced as Alfie sliced another worm into manageable pieces. After a moment or so, he leaned both elbows on the workbench, resting his chin on folded fingers.
"It's Jamaican food. My mum makes the best food ever. When she's in a cooking mood." The lad's eyes dropped as he said that and a hand moved to pick up one of the worms, curling his nose as the worm folded up toward his fingers. "But you don't talk like everybody up here. Everybody talks weird, but you talk weirder. It's funny. I've never been fishing. Aren't you fixing any bikes?"
"Bicycles. Thy can say 'bikes' and it could mean owt. Motorcycles, bicycles, them things as go on water, or snow. A bicycle is like what I fix. And, no, like as not I'll not be fixing a bicycle any time soon. Leastways not til I find one worth fixing." As the worm touched the lad's finger, he dropped it with a loud 'ew'. Alfie sliced that worm up, too, before putting the pieces in the tub. "I talk like a Yorkshireman should talk, I'll have you know. Thy never heard no-one talk any different at one time. There's more to the country than London, my lad, and not everyone's a Cockney."
"I'm not a Cockney. They're miles away. Were miles away." The boy lifted himself up by his arms, dangling his legs and then jumped up to sit on the workbench. "I had a bike once. A 'bicycle'. Then Dad said traffic was getting bad so he took it away, but I just think he didn't want me riding around with my bruvs. Plus I got stopped a lot by five-oh saying I'd nicked it and I never nicked nothing in my life, but that don't matter."
That was a lot to sort through and Alfie said nothing for a while. Instead, he focussed on slicing the worms. Once finished, he realised he had probably cut up more worms than he had any need to. Truth told, he could have got away with two worms, at the most, if recent trips to the canal were anything to go by. The fish didn't bite as often as they once had.
In some ways, that was a lot like the way it once was, back when he was a child, following his dad along the towpath, heading to the favoured spot, right at the apex of the a curve in the canal. Alfie favoured that spot even up to this day. In those days, though, the canal had become a sorry sight to behold, far removed from its heyday as canal barges ferried cargo along the canal networks that criss-crossed the country. Far faster and cheaper than ferrying by road upon horse and cart.
Some time later, folks had taken to clearing up the canals, taking away the litter and the abandoned things that folks would throw away into the nearest place they could find. Overgrown footpaths became cleared, the bottoms of the canals dredged and, before too long, fish returned. They were good days for fishermen. Now, things had started to deteriorate once again. The water filthy, old prams and supermarket trolleys clogging the waterway. The world was falling backward into decay, instead of facing forward.
"Tell thee mother, I should like to try this 'Ackee and Saltfish', though I've never eaten it afore and I may not take to it, and that'd be no slight on thee mother's cooking, mind, but my bad taste." He wagged a finger at the boy to make his point. Though why, he could not say. "I'll mean no offence and I should like it if thy makes such clear as thee speaks to thee mother."
The Duchess had tried to get him to eat so many different things and he had always turned his nose up. Stuck in his ways and no gentleman, and no mistake. Ever since he had come to his senses, far too late for any apology to mean anything worthwhile, he had taken to trying different foods. Some he had liked, others not so much, but he always tried. He had finicky tastes and that never went well with more exotic concoctions.
"Cool!" The lad jumped down, setting the workbench to rocking and almost ran through the door, before stopping. "Do you drink beer? Mum always says Ackee and Saltfish needs a good beer to go with it, but she never lets me try it. But you can. She gets the best Jamaican beer."
Before Alfie could even reply, the lad had disappeared. Running at speed from the little shed, the garden, everywhere. Going everywhere at full tilt, never slowing down. His father probably took the bicycle from him because he rode as fast as he ran, full pelt, all the time. With the distraction caused by the lad over, Alfie returned to making his bait.
Sprinkling the goldfish food into the tub of worm pieces, he rummaged them around, mixing the two ingredients until he had a good mulch before taking solid pinches and rolling them into balls, laying each one created to the side. Far too many, but, luckily, he could freeze any excess for another day of fishing later. Nothing would go to waste. He almost had the shock of his life as the lad reappeared, banging into the workbench.
"Ee, lad! Thy'll be giving me a heart attack!" His hand reached out to stop the bait from rolling off the workbench. "Slow theesen down afore thy hurts theesen!"
"Mum says six o'clock sharp for dinner and she always means six o'clock if she says it." Once again, the lad pushed himself from the workbench and, once again, stopped at the door. "And she says if you say it's okay I can come fishing with you and I'm not to make a nuisance of myself but I'm never a nuisance. See you at six, Mister Dibbs."
And he was gone. Again. Leaving Alfie to wonder when he'd actually received an invite to tea. He had thought he would only get the leftovers to warm up as he liked. He also wondered when he had invited the lad fishing. Neither. Neither had happened, but, now, it looked like he had no choice.