Perfect Sins by Jo Bannister

for the socially acceptable term, couldn’t remember it, settled for what people said in everyday life—“normal. The DNA will confirm it, but our medical examiner thinks he had Down syndrome.”
    David Sperrin gave a gruff, almost triumphant little snort. “That settles it. There was nothing wrong with my brother, James. Ask my mother. James was frigging perfect.”
    *   *   *
    It was an easy task that Byrfield could have managed alone. It’s always easy moving cows to fresh grass—you open the gate of the new field and stand back. There’s usually one young heifer that thinks it would be really funny to run the opposite way and hide behind the slurry tank, but on the whole cows are ruled by their stomachs—all four of them.
    So there was less running around and swearing than there would have been moving bullocks, and more ambling down a green lane with a switch to keep the animals walking. Which is what Pete Byrfield had hoped for when he’d issued the invitation. He’d also hoped Hazel would be the one to take it up.
    It had rather surprised him, how glad he’d been to see her. Their paths didn’t cross very often these days—she’d been busy building her career, he’d been busy building his herd. And they’d never been an item. But they’d been friends for so long there was perhaps more shared history than if they had been. When Alfred Best mentioned his daughter’s impending visit, Byrfield had found himself grinning, and planning what he could show her and what they could talk about, and only afterward wondered why. He concluded that he must have missed her more than he realized. He wondered if he could persuade her to stay a little longer. He’d hoped David Sperrin’s survey might do the trick. You know what they say: Be careful what you wish for.…
    Hazel was glad to see him, too. Of course, Hazel was usually glad to see people; it was the kind of person she was—open, gregarious, empathic. It was what had made her good at her job—at both her jobs. It probably didn’t mean very much that she’d taken the chance to walk down this lane with him, shooing cows and dodging the inevitable results. But it might have done.
    Then, too, both of them were glad to get out of the house for a while, away from the sadness that had inevitably descended. The discovery at the lake had left them all in a kind of limbo, unable to get on with their lives until a resolution of some sort hove into sight.
    Out in the sunshine, Hazel felt her mood lightening with every step. “It seems a while since we did this last, Pete.”
    He waved an airy hand. “I try to show a girl a good time. You can only have so many nightclubs, casinos, and skiing holidays before boredom sets in. But shifting cows never grows old.”
    Hazel laughed out loud. “On a morning like this, with the hedges full of honeysuckle and bees, who’d want to be anywhere else?” She skipped over a fresh cowpat. “You wouldn’t, would you?”
    He shook his head with certainty. “Never for a minute. I mightn’t have had much choice about the life I was going to lead, but I’ve never wished for another one. I love this place. I love the house, and the land, and all the people on the land. I love the whole idea of getting land to feed you. It just seems so right. ”
    Hazel regarded him affectionately. “I’m glad you’re happy. That you’re not doing this because it’s expected of you, and you’d rather be—oh, I don’t know—lead dancer with the Bolshoi Ballet.”
    Byrfield looked down ruefully at his wellies. “Have you seen my feet? We aristocrats are supposed to be delicate, effete little things. But you wouldn’t get feet like that on a Shire horse.”
    Hazel chuckled. “A bit of common blood must have crept in somewhere.” Then, more soberly, she