Bat with outstretched wings and a heart

The bat came back again last night, and I've stopped pretending I'll be the one to move it. It has taken to the heart-shaped iron trellis Dad bolted to the back wall of the shed the summer before he went, the one Mum wanted for the sweet peas and never got round to planting. Every dusk it drops off the top rail and hangs there by its feet for a minute, then unfolds those long wings like a wet umbrella and goes off over the damsons.

I went down with the torch on Tuesday to see if it had a roost in the shed roof. It didn't. It only looked at me, very sideways, with that round black eye, as if I were the one who'd turned up uninvited. Its clawed hands were gripping the curl of the iron where the heart comes to its point, and I thought, that's a grip you wouldn't shake off with a broom.

Mr Pell from number nine says it's a pipistrelle and will eat the midges off the lettuces, which is more use than the slugs ever were. I've left the back gate open and put a saucer of water on the step. I don't know what I expected from it. Perhaps only that something in this garden would keep to its routine.

Last night the trellis was empty when I looked, and there were fresh scuffs of rust on the iron where the claws had been. I'll sow the sweet peas along the fence this weekend. Come up when you can, and bring the good secateurs.

Love, Jean