by Alan Garner
“Now then, Het! Let’s be having you on the Hamestan!”
Phoebe and Matty took Esther by the hand and led her from the oak. A few yards up the bank, and just in the firelight, a narrow block of gritstone, no more than three feet high, stood from the ground. Whether it was rough-hewn or natural, the top of it was smooth. Esther wore a plain white bodice and a red petticoat.
Phoebe and Matty helped Esther to straddle the stone.
“Eh! It’s cold!” Esther shouted in pretended surprise.
“It’ll soon be warm!” answered Sarah from the oak.
Matty straightened the petticoat, so that it fell evenly about the stone. Esther’s toes just reached the ground.
“Are you set?”
“Ay,” said Esther.
Matty called to the women in the oak.
“Ready?”
“Ready!”
“Come on, then!”
“Have you flour enough, Het?”
“Plenty!” said Matty. And she took a handful from her pocket and thrust it up hard under Esther’s skirt. Esther shouted again, again pretending.
“Come on!” said Matty. “Don’t dally!”
Sarah took two pieces of dough, the shape of pasties, and ran to the stone. She pushed one under Esther, and worked the other in her hands.
“Thrutch!” said Matty.
Esther lifted her feet, bore down on the Hamestan, squirmed, and stood again immediately. Sarah reached for the dough, took it and put the second under Esther.
“Thrutch!”
Esther bore down, and up. Sarah ran back to the fire and dropped both pieces onto the griddle.
Esther dismounted from the stone.
“Who’s the next lucky un?”
Matty sat astride, and Sarah came up with a fresh lump of dough, but only one.
“Thrutch!” said Esther.
Matty bore down, and Sarah ran back to the fire. Phoebe took Matty’s place.
“Thrutch!” said Esther.
“Eh up!” Phoebe cried.
“More flour!” said Esther. Matty replenished Phoebe from her pocket.
“Thrutch!”
“And another!”
Sarah followed Phoebe, Ann followed Sarah; and so the women ran backwards and forwards between the oak and the stone, Esther ministering to their comfort with the flour.
“Thrutch! Nay, Betty! Call that cockle-bread? Whatever would Isaac think? Wibble-wabble, woman!”
Until there were eight pieces of dough at the fire, and Esther helped the last rider down from the Hamestan and they went to join the others in the oak.
When the cockle-bread was baked, all the loaves except the first were taken from the griddle, while the first was left until it was black and flames burned blue around. Then Esther flipped it clear into the grass, and, when it was cool enough to hold, she put it with her other loaf and knelt by the fire.
She took earth and skeered the embers. And as she spread the covering, and the light dimmed, Esther sang.
“Acorn cup and oaken tree,
Bid my true love come to me:
Between moonlight and firelight,
Bring him over the hills tonight;
Over the meadows, over the moor,
Over the rivers, over the sea,
Over the threshold and in at the door.
Acorn cup and oaken tree,
Bring my true love back to me.”
The fire was covered. One by one, the women took their cockle-bread and walked away, Esther leading, carrying the white loaf and the black.
They went to their homes. Some by Knaves’ Acre, and Cherry Barrow, some by Katty’s Croft and Missick and Big Eels Moss and Little Furry Field; and all singing. “Acorn cup and oaken tree . . .” Some by Blake Low, Laughing Croft. “Bid my true love come to me . . .” By Prison Barr Bank, by Little Sun Field, Black Pit, Middle Cinder Hill. “Between moonlight and firelight . . .” Farther Senichar, Lanthorne Field. And, in every farm and cottage, the women, young and old, turned to their windows and sang. “Bring him over the hills tonight; Over the meadows, over the moor, Over the rivers, over the sea . . .” Across the parish, by Big Mere Heyes, Sing Pool Meadow. “Over the threshold and in at the door . . .” Nick Acre, Little Lowmost, Clover Croft. The whole parish, in the night, all the women, “Bring my true love back to me,” the singing.
7
WILLIAM WAS WEARING his Sunday best. He trimmed the freshly cut bough of oak with a hatchet. The young leaves glowed with a green that hurt. The light was in the leaves.
Edward Stanley rode up the lane to the farm.
“Good day, Will.”
“Ay,” said William.
“May I see what it is you are about?”
“Ay.”
Edward opened his book and began to sketch details of how William worked.
William bound the oak to the gatepost with rope, pulling each turn, so that there was no play between bough and post.
“I have read your hand practice,” said Edward.
“Ay.”
“It was done well.”
“Oh, ay?”
“But have you contemplated what it signifies?”
“It’s me practice.”
“The words, Will. What do they mean?”
“Me practice.”
William tested the bough.
‘The strongest poison ever known came from Caesar’s laurel crown,’” said Edward.
“Ay. I recollect.”
“But do you not question?”
“No.”
“It says that all men are equal, none beholden to another.”
“Oh, ay?”
“They have killed their king in France on that account.”
“Ay, well, France.”
“And many such of high degree.”
“I shouldn’t wonder.”
William put an extra turn about the post, and tightened the knot. He checked the firmness of the bough once more, and stood back to see that it was upright.
“She’ll do,” he said. “Be good, Yedart.” And he went into the house, leaving Edward. Edward sat for a while, then put the book in his pocket, and rode on.
Esther was in the kitchen. She was wearing an apron over the red petticoat, and the white bodice above. She crumbled bread into a bowl, sprinkled salt over it, and poured hot milk from a pan. She stood at the sideboard and spooned the mess into her mouth.
“No pobs for you today, me lad,” she said.
“I don’t want none,” said William.
He sat at the table, but ate nothing. He took the swaddledidaff from his pocket and turned it in the light.
“You think a lot on that, don’t you?” said Esther.
“You give it me,” said William.
“But it’s nobbut a stone. Yet I’ve a month’s mind you’d rather have that than my china.”
“Oh, I would,” said William.
“What for?”
“You give it me. And, when you turn it, you can see lights, pictures, all sorts. Yon china’s one picture; and it’s a rum un.”
“It’ll wear your britches out,” said Esther. “And it’s me as’ll have to mend them – What the dickens is going on? What’s he up to now?”
There was shouting in the lane, and a horse galloped away. A dog barked.
The kitchen door was banged open and Grandad came in, his stick under his arm, his eyes glittering, as he crumpled a sheet of paper in his hands and thrust it into the fire. He held it down in the ashes with his stick until the flames died. “Right!” he said.
“Whatever is it?” said Esther.
“What is it?” said Grandad. “I’ll tell you what is it! I shall! One of Stanley’s gawbies, that’s what is it! One of Stanley’s gawbies comes riding up, fine as a new scraped carrot, and starts at driving a nail in our gatepost for fixing yon paper. ‘And what are you at?’ I says to him. ‘Oh,’ he says, ‘Sir John told me.’ ‘Well,’ I says, ‘you can tell Sir John it’s on fire back; and you’ll take
that nail with you when you go, out of my gatepost.’ ‘Oh, shall I?’ he says. ‘Ay,’ I says, ‘you shall.’ And I ketches him a clinker with me stick aside of his head. ‘Oh!’ he says. ‘Give over!’ ‘Then you get that nail out,’ I says, ‘else I’ll ketch thee another!’ And that were it. Ay! He hoiked out the nail, and away. Ay! I wound his watch for him! What? I did that! I wound his watch!”
He sat in the man’s chair. “Eh dear! Dear, dear!” And he mopped the tears of laughter with his neck cloth. “Now hadn’t you ought get yourselves fettled?”
“We’re ready,” said Esther, and took off her apron.
William put the swaddledidaff in his pocket.
Grandad went with them as far as the gate. He looked at the post, trying to find the nail hole. Then he grasped the oak bough and tested its firmness. “You’ve done a grand job there, youth,” he said.
“Heel, Gyp,” said William.
“Be good, and then,” said Grandad.
Esther took William’s hand. They walked off down the lane, the dog following.
“Ay. Be good,” said Grandad, and looked again for trace of the nail.
“There’s bits everywhere,” said Esther. “What’s it for?”
“Yay,” said William.
“See at them. They’re all over.”
“What?”
“There’s paper stuck all over.”
“Oh, ay.”
Every house had its bough of green, at gate or gable or window or door. And on the posts and the hedge trees there were sheets of paper fastened.
“There’s writing.”
“Sarn it, Het! Hush up, can’t you?”
“Suit yourself,” said Esther. “They weren’t there before, and that’s a fact.”
They came to the oak.
The men of hoodman blind were waiting in the tree. The dead fire had been spread out and pieces of charcoal sorted from the ashes. The men had blackened their faces with the charcoal, and were wearing harness bells tied below the knee, and holding the two halves of a flail. Two branches, the length of William, had been wrenched from the oak and laid against the trunk. Edward Stanley stood, in his normal dress, and clean faced, making notes. No one spoke.
Esther let go of William, and he went and sat on a root.
Niggy Bower took a knob of charcoal, spat into his hand, rubbed the charcoal in the spit and began to daub William’s face. He blackened where he touched: the eyes and ears and neck were harshly white. When that was done, he tied bells below William’s knees and stepped back.
Esther reached inside her bodice and pulled out the ground net. She went forward and cast the net over William and rolled it to form a halter, holding him by the two ends around his neck. Niggy lifted the big branches and gave them to William, one in each hand, so that his body was covered with leaves and his face framed by them. Esther pulled gently on the net, and William stood up, and Esther sang.
“I’ll dye, I’ll dye my petticoat red;
For the lad I love I’d bake my bread;
And then my daddy would wish that I were dead.
Sweet Willy in the morning among the rush.”
The men started to knock their flail halves together in time, and processed out of the tree, Esther and William going before them. They moved with a hopping, stamping tread, everyone but William singing, and Esther leading, dancing backwards, with the net.
“Shoorly, shoorly, shoo-gang-rowl!
Shoo-gang-lolly-mog, shoog-a-gang-a-low!
Sweet Willy in the morning among the rush!”
They danced away. Edward mounted and rode after, past a horseman wearing Stanley livery who had been watching. The horseman touched his forehead to Edward and walked the horse towards the oak. Edward nodded in reply. The horseman took a sheet of rolled paper from a pouch, opened it and nailed it with a hammer to the tree. Edward hesitated.
“— Sweet Willy in the morning among the rush!”
Edward turned, and followed the dancers.
“I’ll dye, I’ll dye my petticoat red;
For the lad I love I’d bake my bread;
And then my daddy would wish that I were dead –”
The dog gambolled round, backwards and forwards; gambolled, and herded.
“– Sweet Willy in the morning among the rush.”
They danced towards the church on its mound. The belfry door was open, and on the shingled spire, below the yellow painted weathercock, was fastened a branch of green oak.
“Shoorly, shoorly, shoo-gang-rowl!
Shoo-gang-lolly-mog, shoog-a-gang-a-low!
Sweet Willy in the morning among the rush!”
As they reached the belfry, the door was slammed shut against them from within.
The dance ended. The dog sat apart.
The men went to the door and banged rhythmically upon it with the butt ends of their flails, chanting.
“Open the way and let us in!
We have your favour for to win!
Whether we sit, stand or fall,
We’ll do our best to please you all!”
The two church wardens, with their staffs, opened the door, and the dancers entered. The door closed; and the dog lay down.
The belfry was a frame of huge timbers, like the trunk of the oak, as big as the oak, but pegged and jointed from its root to the dark narrowing of the spire above; and it held them all about.
The vicar, in his robes, stood in the open doorway to the nave. He said:
“Who stands in the belfry tree?
What have you to do with me?”
William drew his breath and spoke all in one tone.
“Here comes Shick-Shack who has never been It,
With my big head and little wit.”
“Where have you been, Shick-Shack?” said the vicar.
“Through Hickety-Pickety, France and High Spain,
Three shitten shippons, o’er three laughing doorsteps,
And now I have come back to England again.”
“What have you fetched, Shick-Shack?”
“I’ve a pill in my pocket to cure all ill:
Time gone, time yet and time that will.”
“Enter in, Shick-Shack,” said the vicar,
“With those at your back.”
The vicar turned and led the way into the nave.
The church was full, everyone standing. The pews had been taken out to make more room, with only the middle of the nave clear to the altar.
There were Buckleys and Rathbones, Slaters, Edges, Sims; Masseys and Thorleys, Barns, Bowers, Beswicks, Lathams, and Birtles. All the parish, filling the aisles, up against the walls, children on shoulders, blocking the windows, crowding the gallery so that the band could hardly play. There were Lawtons and Stubbs and Leas, Worthingtons, Mottersheads, and Baileys. Boys and youths sitting on the windbraces of the roof arches and the boughs of the pillars, making the church one people.
Esther followed the vicar, walking backwards, leading William by the net. Edward Stanley could not find space, and stood at the belfry door, peering where he was able.
The women of hoodman blind were sitting in the north choir stalls, every one holding her cockle-bread. The altar cloth was scarlet and sewn about with oak leaves of gold wire.
The vicar paused at the font, which had water in it, and on the rim of the font lay a twig of oak. Esther and William stood, the men behind them. The vicar dipped the green twig in the font and shook the water over William and said:
“Gently dip,
But not too deep,
For fear you make the golden bird to weep.”
He put the twig back on the rim and faced the altar. The men formed a file, a flail handle on each shoulder. The vicar headed the procession up the aisle, singing.
“Fair maiden, white and red –”
“– Comb me smooth and stroke my head,” the people responded.
“– And thou shalt have some cockle-bread,” sang the vicar.
“And every hair a sheaf shall be �
��”
“– And every sheaf a golden tree.”
They entered the chancel, and the men went to their places in the south choir stalls: Joshua, John, Charlie, Elijah, Sam, Isaac, Niggy.
Esther led William to stand at the end of the communion rail, while she stood on his left, still holding the net, and facing east.
The vicar went to the other side of the rail and closed it behind him. He bent his knee to the altar, then took the branches from William and placed them on the altar one at a time. He took the net, and put it with the branches.
William knelt at the rail. The women came from the choir stalls, in line beside Esther, and they all knelt.
The vicar lifted a paten from the altar, and on it were two loaves of the cockle-bread: one white, and one charred black. The vicar spoke to William.
“Have you come filled, or have you come fasting?”
“I have come fasting.”
“Which will you take: the burnt bread with God’s blessing, or the white bread with God’s curse?”
“The burnt bread with God’s blessing,” said William.
He held his hands cupped, and the vicar put the black loaf into them. William broke the bread, and it snapped as crumbs and lumps of cinder, which he began to eat. The edges cut his mouth and he tried not to gag on the dust as he chewed. He had no spit to soften the hardness, and the dry flakes stuck and burned in his throat when he swallowed. Each mouthful was more bitter than the one before, and he could not keep the tears from his eyes.
The vicar put his right hand on William’s head.
“The morning star, O Mary, to the bird of the bright wing.
“The rainbow, O Mary, to the shining bird.
“‘My son, eat thou honey, because it is good; and the honeycomb which is sweet to thy taste. So shall the knowledge of wisdom be unto thy soul: when thou hast found it, then there shall be a reward, and thy expectation shall not be cut off.’”
The vicar moved to Esther and gave her the white loaf, and said: “Esther. Take, and be fruitful.” And so he went along the line of the women, who held up their cockle-bread in turn to be blessed on the paten. “Betty. Take, and be fruitful. Martha. Take, and be fruitful. Ann. Take, and be fruitful. Phoebe. Take, and be fruitful. Sarah. Take, and be fruitful. Martha. Take, and be fruitful.”