by Garner, Alan
Richard Turner half opened one eye.
“And what’s yon huzzing effort?”
“It’s me little whizzler,” said Jack.
“And what’s it for?”
“I don’t know. Nor did the chap I got it off. He didn’t think much on it, so I did him a favour. It helps me think. And me beasts follow it. And there’s times when a man’s weary and feeling far from home; and then it can put him right for another day. There’s all manner of thing can be fetched round a fire at night, if a man looks.”
He watched the spinning drum.
“I saw some queer chaps this last jag, Father.”
“Oh, ay?”
“They kept jumping up at markets and flustering folks. But folks were moths in a candle wi’ ’em, and having a right good skrike and acting feart.”
“Oh, ay?”
“Where’s sense in being feart and skriking, and then shouting as they’d had a right good time? I heard ’em.”
“And what were these chaps on about?”
“They were promising as we were all going to burn in big ovens when we die, because we were all born nowty, and there was some governor as had it in for us, choose how much we said we were sorry. But sorry for what? No matter o’ that, his gang were going to shovel us in ovens and roast us on forks, day and night for evermore. Leastways, that’s what I made on it. But these chaps were chelping all the same tatherum-y-dyal, I couldn’t rightly say what they were at. First one as I heard, I thought he was just bad luck top end. But if he was, there’s many same as him now. And folks seemed to be enjoying theirselves. Why? That’s what I can’t plunder. Where are they from? And is it catching?”
“I can’t find any from where I’m sitting,” said Richard Turner. “So I’ll not lose sleep on it. Twiddle yon huzzer at ’em, next time, and tell ’em to get away with their bother. Bezonter me! Here’s a sight for sore eyes!”
Nan Sarah was waddling down the lane from Jenkin. She had her pockets round her, hands still in them, and the red silk gleamed as she waved.
“And where’ve you been?” said Richard Turner. “Is there no work to be done?”
“It’s such a grand day,” said Nan Sarah. “I thought I’d go over to Lomases and see if they were well.”
Jack stood and put away the drum.
“Nan Sarah. Woman. I don’t know why I bother.”
They laughed, and she took one hand out of its pocket to put round his neck. He held her wrist.
“What’s them?”
There was a ring of red spots under the frill of her sleeve.
“Flefs,” she said. “Now give us a kiss.”
21
SHE SAT IN the car and made no move, but looked out at the hills and into her bag.
“What have you got there?” he said.
“My new hat. Do you like it? It’s de rigueur. I have to wear it all the time when I’m out now. Help me put it on.”
She handed him the padded helmet. He fitted it around her head, and fastened the chin piece.
She adjusted the mirror.
“I’d look fine on a bike,” she said. “It’s better quality than they’re wearing.”
A string of cyclists from Saltersford crested Pym Chair, crouched over their narrow handlebars.
“Watch it, lads!” she shouted. “It plays all hell-up with your sperm count!”
She was inert again.
“Where do you want to go?” he said.
Her head moved and rolled, almost a grin.
“Do you want to go along the ridge?”
“No.”
“Do you want to go to the valley?”
“Yes.”
He drove back down towards Jenkin Chapel and left the road at Howlersknowl. He helped her out and onto the poles.
“You must be sick and bloody tired of this,” she said.
“Not in the least.”
“You are. I know you are. I can tell.”
“I am not going to argue, Sal.”
“But I am! It’s just bloody brownie points! So you can go back feeling moral! God, you’re so bloody virtuous! How dare you feel sorry for me?You make me sick! You and your bloody vocation! Bloody sanctimonious bastards!”
“I do not feel sorry for you.”
“Show some emotion, damn you! You, you do it all in your head! The rest of us have to do it out in a real world! Christ Alcrappingmighty! And those notes! What are you going to make of them? Write a best-seller? Become an authority? Have your own website? And why not? Help yourself! Mate! You’ve put enough hours in! I hate you! I hate your self-righteous bloody face! You calm, smug, wanking shit! Shit! Shit! You ineffable shit!”
“I’d rather it were more uneffingly, Sal.”
“Oh, Ian.” She turned to him. “Don’t hide with words. You scare me when you twist them. I think it’s me not getting it right. Silly Sally. Sally Malley. Silly Sally Malley.”
She sobbed and laughed. He held her and lowered her onto a boulder by the track.
“We sat here, before,” she said. “There’s a ring in the stone. It pinched.”
“There isn’t one now,” he said. “But you’re right. It was this stone. And I saw a ring, too.” They looked at the yellow top. It was smooth, with spreads of lichen. “There’s no sign of there ever having been anything. It’s weathered evenly.”
“Well, there we are, then,” she said. “At least we’re dementing together. Let’s walk. I want you to make a promise.”
“What promise?”
“Let’s walk.”
They climbed into the valley. She stopped and leaned on the poles and against him.
“Ian. Thanks. You’re kind.”
“Sal, I am not kind. That is not what I am. Thanks are not appropriate. You are what matters.”
She looked at him sideways, and they walked on.
“I want to go to that stone again,” she said.
“Which?”
“Where we heard the man calling.”
“Where we heard something.”
“Where I heard the man calling.”
“There’s plenty of time,” he said.
“Is there, indeed?”
They tracked across the slope from the ruin up to the stone. He helped her to sit with her back straight.
“What a golden day,” she said.
“Do you want to eat?”
“No. We must make the most of it before the cold.”
She watched patterns of cloud and sun on the slope across the brook and the swing of the shadow of Andrew’s Edge. She waved her hand.
“There’s someone by that old well. Looking at us.”
“I can’t see anybody.”
“They’ve moved.”
“They?”
“He. She. It.”
“What did you mean by a promise, Sal?”
“What promise?”
“Nothing. Do you want to eat?”
“Yes.”
“Drink first. I’ve brought your cup.”
He took the stone out of his bag.
“Let me have a proper look. Turn it over. Aha. It is carbon fluoride. Organic staining gives it that colour. And it is Tray Cliff bull-beef.”
“But what is it? What is it for?”
“There’s quite a tourist industry. I wonder why he threw it away. It’ll have cost him.”
“Who?”
“The man I heard.”
“It’s honey and water mixed,” he said. “Yes?”
“Fine.”
He poured the thick liquid from the Thermos into the stone cup and gave her a drinking straw. He held the cup as she drank.
“I’ll save some,” she said.
He unwrapped the sandwiches. Half of them were cut into small squares. She opened her mouth.
“Breathe in first, Sal.”
He put a square to the side of her tongue.
“Close your mouth.”
“It’s –”
“Don’t talk until you’ve swallow
ed. Right. Have another drink.”
“It’s hard to chew,” she said.
“That’s why you must take your time.”
“Time, time, time. It seems to be in every sentence. Then I suppose it is.”
“Drink?”
“Yes. But my feet need anchoring. Any of those stones will do.”
He put a flat wall stone across each instep.
“Sit straight again, Sal; and tuck your chin in. Now. Open.”
22
“LAND MAN WAS here while you were gone,” said Richard Turner.
“Was he?” said Jack. “And what did that high-learnt letter gent have to say for himself?”
“He was a new un; one of the best of the worser kind of folk. T’other chap died seven year back, seemingly.”
“I wondered we’d been spared.”
“Yay, but now we’ve a young master all set to be a green broom.”
“He’ll want some learning, then.”
Jack and his father were bringing the cattle down from the summer pasture. The dogs were with them.
“He will,” said Richard Turner. “He’s a sprightly youth, full of newfanglements. Not a patch on that old un, as took as he was told.”
“What did he think on us?”
“He had to find summat wrong, o’ cause. Shippon doors must be mended; and Bean Croft wants liming. This and t’other. But he was decent enough, in his way, from what I could make on him. They talk that far back, some on ’em, a man can’t hardly plunder where they’re at. He gave Tally Ridge a bit of what-for; but he said he’d write our place a good word for Lord Cag-mag, bless him.”
“And rent?”
“Oh, he’s putting that up, and no error. He wants more; he does that. For improvements, he said.”
“Is old chap going to build himself a castle, then?”
“No. It’s for here. He said.”
“What wants improvements here?”
Richard Turner did not answer.
“Father?”
“I said he was sprightly. Not like others, as you could send along the brook from Nab End to Toddscliff and back and leave ’em be. This one was at looking for himself.”
“Where?”
“All over.”
“You’re holding summat, Father. What is it?”
“He’s for taking in every inch of land; walling right up Tors.”
“He can’t do that.”
“He says he can.”
“What’s the use? He can’t wall them places. Them hills. They’ll not wear it.”
Richard Turner was silent.
“Father? You never showed him Thursbitch?”
“There was no need, youth. He found it. And how could we stop him? He’s for taking it in, cutting it up, setting drains. He says he’ll make it a farm and build a house there.”
“He can’t do that, Father.”
“I’m of opinion for to think as how nowt can stop that one. He’s set on it. What tickled his fancy were us high stones. He’s for raunging ’em out, mostly. And what’s left, he says, will do champion for setting field lines and gates and that.”
“He can’t, Father. Never. He can’t. If he does, it’ll be a land of great absence.”
“We tried to tell him. But he wouldn’t be. We all did. But there’s things as we can’t tell, isn’t there?”
“And where’s this house he’s going to build?”
“At the ford. Agen old Thrumble.”
“Damn it and sink it, Father! No!”
“But what’s to be done, Jack?”
“He can go for a short walk on a long night. That’s what.”
“It’d not help. He took drawings back with him.”
Jack squatted on his heel.
“Damn it and sink it. I should’ve been here. I should’ve been here. I never should have went.”
“You couldn’t have done nowt, youth,” said Richard Turner.
“Could I not? Could I not just! Father, you take your kyne down.”
Jack climbed back to the Tors, and up. He stood at the ford.
“A water is as I must pass.
A broader water never was.
Yet of all waters I did see,
To pass over with less jeopardy.”
He crossed to Bully Thrumble, and went from Bully Thrumble to Pearly Meg’s and down the steps. He raised his hat for the darkness, and took the wooden tube from his satchel and chewed and swallowed three stems; and dipped his hat in the well and drank four crownsful. Then he went back to the stone, and sat, and waited.
He spoke to Thoon.
“O white Bull. O worthy Bull. O noble Bull. O bonny Bull, as lives on hill tops. O striding Bull, as lives on hill tops. O Bull, as in whose highmost step drops honey. Lord over all as close the eye. Say now what must be done, sin you can do owt. Yet don’t you sneap them as can’t know. It’s on me, not them. Anyroad, that’s it.”
He waited. The stone of Bully Thrumble grew cold and dry to his hand, but alive. He stood against it. There was a rustling in the grass and in the reeds. Each one sound was small, but there were so many that he heard them as a great wind with no breath. He looked, and all the earth heaved with snakes coming from Pearly Meg’s. They came to him, and he did not shift, but turned his eyes towards Thoon.
The snakes coiled over his shoes and climbed his legs. They wove about above and below and up to his neck and along his arms and around the stone, binding the two. They worked inside his clothes, and their dryness was smooth on his skin. They held his neck but did not squeeze, and were plaited in his hair. A head entered his mouth and throat, but it did not choke him, into his lungs, through his veins, down to his belly. Each nostril was filled, but still he breathed. They were his ears, and whispered to him their last secret. “The Bull is father to the Snake: the Snake is to the Bull.” The deathless life became his life, so that he knew nothing of him but all that was within and without was one, and the rock and well were one, and the sky and the waters were one, and death and life were one, and he was of them all; and there was no ending of them.
He saw. And, with his understanding, the snakes drew back and left him. Yet something still held. He looked down. The stone, his body. his face were in a net of ivy.
He pulled himself from it. The suckers were on the stone, on his clothes and under them. He ripped from his face and hair and beard, taking no note of the pain. He stripped and tore and spat the ivy.
Then he went down from Thursbitch.
He found Richard Turner in the brewis.
“Father, I’ve set all to rights.”
“Have you now? And how did you manage that?”
“I’ve promised.”
“You’ve promised what?”
“I’ve promised to do what’s needed.”
“And who’ve you promised?” He went up to Jack and looked into his face. “Oh ay. That sort of a promise. I see. Well, you think on. Don’t you be setting yourself up above what you can’t thole, and then. Promise is nowt afore doing. And doing can come by a road you’re not looking for. You’re nobbut a man, when all’s said. And what’s up yonder drives a pretty bargain. And who are you to say what’s needed? It could call for a pocket deeper nor what you’ve got.”
“Pockets?” Nan Sarah came from the houseplace. “You’ve not fetched more, have you?” She was still wearing hers. “Jack! Wherever have you been? You look as if you were pulled through a hedge backwards. Come here with you.”
She brushed the green leaves from him. Richard Turner went into the houseplace.
“Give over, woman,” said Jack, and lifted her hands away. “Now what’s all this?”
Her wrists were ringed with small, flat, dry, black blisters.
“It’s nowt,” she said.
He touched one, and it flaked off.
“I told you. It’s nowt.”
23
“MA MARY, WILL you come and look?”
Mary went into Jack and Nan Sarah’s room, wearing her nightgow
n. Nan Sarah was in bed, and there was the one rush lit.
“What is it?”
“I don’t know. But summat’s up. She went to bed with a sick headache, and now one minute she says she’s cold, and next she’s too hot, and now she’s sleeping.”
“She’s been that road for a day or two,” said Mary. “Sitting by the fire and counting pothooks. I doubt it’s no more than her condition and a touch o’ fever. I’ve not seen her eat much.”
“But she drinks like I don’t know what.”
“There you are, then. Same as they say. Feed a cold and starve a fever. Let her sleep and she’ll be right as rain by morning.”
“But what are these here?” said Jack. He pulled Nan Sarah’s hair to one side and held the light close. “She’s got plums on her neck.” At the side of the neck there were small red and black swellings.
“I’ll fetch Father.”
She left the room. Nan Sarah half woke.
“Jack. I’m going to be sick again.”
He held the bowl for her, and she vomited.
Mary came back with Richard Turner. They both had candlesticks. Nan Sarah put a hand over her eyes.
“Light’s hurting.”
Mary moved the hair back, and Richard Turner looked closely. “Nay!” He caught Mary by the arm and hurried her from the room and down the stairs.
“Father!”
“It’s Great Mortality!”
Jack went to the top of the stair.
“Father!”
“Great Mortality! Them’s plums as ride on flesh wi’ savage jaws!”
Richard Turner and Mary were in the houseplace, with the door shut. Jack was alone on the stair in darkness.
“What are you meaning?”
“Great Mortality! Out! Out!”
“Father?”
“Out! Both on you!”
“Father! Have you lost your wits?”
“Out!”
“Jack? What’s up?”
“Hush, love.”
“Jack. I’m badly.”