(lively piano music) - Mr Herriot?
- Yes.
Sorry I'm late.
- I'd almost given up on you.
- I'm Farnon, Siegfried.
- I'm James.
Thank you for this opportunity.
Yes.
Well, let's see how we rub along first, shall we?
- Good luck.
James is this wonderful, pure, naive, lovely young man who comes into the house.
- Mrs.
Hall, slightly behind my back, is getting me to see these assistants.
We agreed there'd be no more.
- She knows they need extra help in the house, and she's quite key to Mr Farnon employing him.
- Give the boy a chance.
- Siegfried has his eccentricities, you know, can be difficult (chuckling).
But James knows how to handle that.
- All the previous assistants have just gone, "But you told me the exact opposite yesterday."
And he went, "What are you talking about?
Don't be ridiculous."
- Even if it's not his fault, "Yes, Siegfried, I'm sorry."
Or if Siegfried's forgotten something, "Yeah.
Sorry, my mistake.
I should have remembered that."
- So there a certain amount of soft-shoe shuffling that has to go on around Siegfried.
- How'd you find him?
My brother, I mean.
- He's not without his inconsistencies.
- Inconsistencies!
The man's a lunatic.
- Tristan comes along.
It's just great fun.
Like, they are like brothers, like best pals, thick as thieves.
I think they just balance each other out so well.
- James makes Tristan maybe more studious and more attentive to the veterinary side.
And I'd like to think that Tristan makes, maybe, James a little more relaxed and maybe a bit more fun-loving.
Here you go.
And there's plenty more where that came from.
- He's unassuming, he's calm.
He's reflective, he thinks.
And I think that brings out a different side to Helen.
- Up in the Dales, surrounded by those hills.
There's no place on earth like it.
Careful.
Once it gets in your bones it's hard to get out.
And because he isn't kind of a very strong male, she doesn't have to put on her armor, like she does with some people.
And that's really interesting.
(lively music)
