by Alan Garner
After the blessing, the women went back to the choir stalls and Esther with them. William gulped at the last brutal crust, and joined the men. The vicar put the paten on the altar, bent his knee, and faced the church. He made the sign of the cross.
“The bee, O Mary, to the bird of gold.”
William choked, but Niggy thumped his back.
The vicar climbed the steps into the pulpit. He tucked his hands into his sleeves, and spoke.
“‘And they saw a tall tree by the side of the river, one half of which was in flame from the root to the top, and the other half was green and in full leaf.’ Hear, too, what Isaiah saith: ‘And the Lord have removed men far away, and there be a great forsaking in the land. But yet in it shall be a tenth, and it shall return, and shall be eaten: as a teil tree, and as an oak.’ And also it is written: ‘And on either side of the river was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.’”
“Gerrit down thee!” whispered Niggy to William.
“Dearly beloved. This day we hold sacred the custom long hallowed in this parish, whereby all that are brought as infants to this House of Oak to be received into Christ’s Church, shall, when they be of mature years, return, and, by tokens of sacrifice and charity, give thanks for the renewal of life and the promise of life everlasting made manifest in these His Creatures of branch and bread –”
There was a hammering of metal on the belfry door, but the vicar continued.
“– so that we may partake of the fruits of the earth and the sanctified pleasures of the flesh, rejoicing in the knowledge that –”
He could not go on. The people were restless, looking to the back of the church; and Tiddy Turnock and Squarker Kennerley were already advancing on the belfry with their staffs. But, before they reached the end of the nave, the hammering stopped and the door was pushed open. The morning light glared on a sheet of paper that had been nailed to the door, and a man in Stanley livery stepped back to allow another in. This one was dressed in a coat of brocaded silk, and he gave his hat to the man at the door without looking at him, and entered the church.
The people were silent, and the man’s footsteps were loud on the stone floor. He walked with purpose, towards the chancel, acknowledging nobody.
Behind him, five others, all but one liveried, came into the belfry. Edward Stanley hung back.
“Sir John?” said the vicar as the man reached the pulpit; but he walked into the chancel and stopped.
“Buckley.”
He spoke without heat or question, but as a claim. William stood in the choir: he had no thought or choice.
“Cuff that man.”
Grandad got to his feet at the back of the church as the six followers entered. “Now then!”
“Sir –” said Edward.
“Cuff him.”
Sam Slack, the constable, moved forward with no haste. “Come on, youth,” he said. “You’re summonsed.” He held out a pair of handcuffs.
“I am never!” said William.
“Yay, but you are. Come along, now, there’s a good lad.”
“What for?”
“Sir John says.”
“‘Sir John says!’” cried Grandad. “I’ve known yon since his bum were as big as me shirt button! ‘Sir John says!’ That’s no law!” His neighbours held him. The church was filled with whispers and the noise of women afraid.
“Father –” said Edward, from the door of the nave.
“Cuff him, constable.”
“As heck as like!”
William jumped the communion rail and seized one of the oak branches and held it before him. Sam Slack stepped backwards. John Stanley motioned his men with his head. They came to the chancel steps.
“Sir John!” said the vicar.
“Remain in your clack-loft, parson.”
“This is sacrilege, Sir John!”
“And this is lewdness and Popery, sir; if you will have it.”
The men closed in, and William came over the rail to meet them, the branch raised as a club.
“I’ll bloody kill you!”
“No, Will,” said Esther. “It’s them as’ll kill you.”
“I’ll do for the lot on ’em! I bloody shall!”
The white skin in the black made his panicked eyes seem bigger, and even the men hesitated before his advance.
“I bloody shall! I bloody –! I bloody –!”
He stopped. The bough quivered above his head.
“Bunj-i-i-i-l!!”
He threw the branch high in the air and caught it and whirled it about him, from hand to hand; and, in the whirling, William danced, mocking, taunting, defiant, unafraid before the men, turning his back on them as he leaped high, facing them as he crouched, mouth open, nostrils flared, whooping and howling, and from his mouth came words.
“Mulla-mullung mulla-mullung Tharangalkbek! Goomah! Goomah! Goomah! Minggah! Minggah! Minggah! Thundal!”
“He speaks in tongues!” said the vicar.
The men drew together, uncertain. Children cried.
“He is a clown that gibbers, and is lunatic,” said Stanley.
“No, Sir John. Does not Saint Paul say: ‘He that speaketh in an unknown tongue, speaketh not unto men, but unto God: for no man understandeth him; howbeit in the spirit he speaketh mysteries’?”
“I say that he is lunatic.”
“Tundun! Binbeal!” declaimed William. “Thuroongarong! Neeyangarra! Murrangurk!”
John Stanley held out his hand behind him, and one of his men put a pistol, ready primed, into it.
“Then let him speak unto God.”
He walked forward to where William danced and pointed the pistol at him. William stopped, and held the branch, not as a club, but as a spear. His mouth was a gash in his black face.
Esther came from the choir, set herself between Stanley and William and took hold of the branch.
“Give us it.”
William looked at her, and frowned.
“Purranmurnin,” he said.
“Give us it. Come on, love. You can’t do nowt.”
“Tallarwurnin.”
“Give us the branch.”
William opened his hands. He was silent. Then:
“I have been dead before.”
Squarker Kennerley looked across at Tiddy Turnock. “Eh heck.” He raised his staff. “Hallelujah! Shick-Shack!”
Tiddy raised his staff. He turned to the people.
“Yay! Hosanna, and all!”
“Shick-Shack!” The voice of the people made the timbers of the church boom. “Shick-Shack! Shick-Shack! Shick-Shack! Hallelujah!”
At once, William sagged; the grace and arrogance were gone. “Het. Don’t leave me.”
“Come on, love.”
Esther led him to Sam Slack, and the cuffs were put about his wrists and the men took him. John Stanley returned the pistol.
“Yet he did speak in tongues,” said the vicar.
Esther rounded on John Stanley.
“My thanks to you – Cumberbach?”
“Esther Cumberbach. Sir. Now! What’s up with you? What the holy buggery is up?”
“Whose hand is this?” said John Stanley. He took a paper from his pocket and held it in front of William.
“It’s me practice,” said William.
“Did you write this?”
“Ay.”
“Sir!” said Edward. “That was in my chamber!”
“And how should I not know it?”
“Sir!”
“By the God!” said Grandad. “The youth’s done nowt wrong!”
“This not wrong?” said Stanley. “‘The strongest poison ever known came from Caesar’s laurel crown.’ ‘Ancient abuses are not by their antiquity converted into virtues.’ ‘Man has rights which no statutes or usages take away.’ This Jacobin treason not wrong? What, then, may be right?”
“You talk like a pig pi
ddles!” shouted Grandad.
“It was me practice,” said William.
“The man does not comprehend!” said Edward.
“It was me practice: for writing,” said William. “What’s he on at, Het?”
“He writes, and does not comprehend?” said Stanley. “Let him comprehend me this.” He held out his hand to the man who had nailed the paper to the church door. The man gave him another, rolled up, which Stanley passed to William. William struggled in the cuffs to unroll the paper.
“What is it?” he said.
“Read,” said Stanley. “It would seem that you are able. And let all hear.”
William read aloud, hesitating.
“‘Any person lopping oak trees for the ridiculous custom of decorating houses on May the twenty-ninth will be prosecuted under the recent Act which allows transportation for life for such an offence. J. T. Stanley’.”
There was a murmur of anger through the church.
“You read well,” said Stanley. “But do you comprehend?”
“What does he mean?” said William.
“How may he comprehend, sir?” said Edward. “The man has little use of words!”
“Yet comprehend or no,” said Stanley, “my oaks were lopped, though I have had this intelligence posted throughout the parish, where all may see.”
“Few can read!” said Edward.
“I don’t know what he means, Het!” said William. “All them words!”
“He means, Buckley, that you may take your tracts with you to New Holland, and entertain and plot with your fellow Jacobins and Levellers to your heart’s delight. And I wish you God’s speed.”
“Sir John,” said the vicar. “The man is plainly innocent.”
“The oaks are on your altar, sir. Remove him.”
The men marched William towards the belfry. When he reached Grandad he put his shackled arms over the old man’s head and neck, embracing him.
“I’ll be back, Grandad, never fret.”
The old man was crying.
“My song, youth. Fair wind to your arse and a bottle of moss.” Charcoal was smudged on his cheek.
The men took possession again. Esther stood mute on the chancel steps.
John Stanley paused at the font and picked up the twig of oak and crumpled it between his fingers and dropped it to the floor. He spoke to the vicar. “Here’s a thought your teeth should clench: all green comes to withering.”
Helpless shouts began. The people were trying to move among the pillared trunks of the nave, under the curved bracing, the limbs of the roof, lost in a wood. The vicar strove to restore them.
“Hear what our Lord saith!
“‘Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness’ sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“‘Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely, for my sake –’”
The church emptied of Stanley, and the people responded to the vicar and his words in that place. They knelt. Esther remained, looking to the door.
“‘Ye are the salt of the earth –’”
As he passed from the belfry, William turned his head over his shoulder to Esther at the chancel steps. Framed in the arches of oak she stood, and their eyes became their memory along the separation of the church.
“‘Let your light so shine before men –’”
“Het! I’ll be back for you! I promise!”
“‘Think not that I come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.’”
William was flung onto the mound. The dog watched. “Gyp! Seize ’em! Seize ’em!”
The dog flattened its ears, and lay still.
Alone in the belfry, Edward blocked his father’s path.
“The man is innocent, sir.”
“He writes. The example is to be made. And my oaks are lopped.”
“This darkness must end.”
“Gyp –!!”
“They shall not write.”
II
CRANK CUFFIN
And Þer he festnes Þe fete and fathmez aboute,
And stod vp in his stomak Þat stank as Þe deuel.
Þer in saym and in sorǵe Þat sauoured as helle,
Þer watz bylded his bour Þat wyl no bale suffer
“Patience”
lines 273/6
8
“I CHASES ’EM. I flaps my apron at ’em. But they sees me coming. They sees my apron. But I’ll get ’em, one day.”
“‘– her black joke and belly so white, so white; her black joke and her belly so white!’”
Oh, give over.
“We was flying a blue pigeon; but before we can bite the ken, some mollisher whiddles beef, and I’m bummed and naps fourteen penn’ orth.”
Across the deck, forrard. Too dark.
“The cove’s so scaly, he’d spice a mawkin for his jasey.”
Not his jasey. Never. It were his weskit.
“Shema yisroel, a-don-ai elo-henu, a-donai echod.”
“Mother of God! Who’s the porker?”
“The Geordie Smous kid.”
“Chelsea College to a sentry box, there’ll be indorsing dues concerned!”
Give over!
“How long shall us be on the Herring-Pond?”
“Six month, within ames ace.”
“Somewhat more than three days and nights in the belly of this whale, I fear.”
That’s a nob! What’s he at?
“Not entirely star-crossed in his solitude, was Jonas; before St Giles’s Greek was noised.”
Who is he?
“Aye aye! There’ll be indorsing dues concerned.”
“I chases ’em. I flaps my apron at ’em. But they sees me coming. They sees my apron. But I’ll get ’em, one day.”
“Come on, mates! Bear a bob!
“‘Oh, we are the boys of the Holy Ground,
And we’ll dance upon nothing, and turn us around.
We’ll dance upon nothing and turn us around;
For we are the boys of the Holy Ground!’”
“I chases ’em. I flaps my apron at ’em. But they sees me coming. They sees my apron. But I’ll get ’em, one day.”
“Oi! You! Jaw-me-dead!”
“It’s lag fever.”
“His garret’s unfurnished.”
“I’ll hush the cull, if he don’t stubble it. Bloody end to me if I don’t.”
“I chases ’em.”
“Bloody end to me! Shut your bone box, lobcock!”
“Hey, Teddy-me-Godson.”
“I flaps my apron at ’em.”
“Teddy-me-Godson: couch a hogshead, now. Go box the Jesuit and get cockroaches, eh? Mount a corporal and four. That’ll put you in fine twig.”
“Shema yisroel, a-don-ai elo-henu, a-donai echod.”
“Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum –”
“But they sees me coming. They sees my apron.”
“Vater unser, der du bist im Himmel –”
Sarn it! What’s to do wi’ ’em? Why don’t they shurrup, yowking?
“– ora pro nobis ora pro nobis ora pro nobis ora pro nobis ora –”
Dall yer eyes! Barm pots! All on yer! Talk sense! Or else! Or else! Or else –!
“We’ll dance upon nothing, and turn us around.”
You make the golden bird to weep.
“Shema yisroel, a-don-ai elo-henu, a-donai echod.”
“Unser täglich Brot gib uns heute.” “But I’ll get ’em –”
“— pro nobis peccatoribus –”
“For we are the boys of the Holy Ground.”
“— in hora mortis nostrae.”
“Kiminary keemo,
Kiminary keemo,
Kiminary kiltikary, kiminary keemo –”
“— one day.”
“Het!”
9
WILLIAM UNLASHED HIS hammock and slung it from the beam. The irons around his wris
ts were linked by a chain, and, from the chain, a chain went down to the chain that joined the irons at his ankles, and from his right leg a loose, heavy chain lay along the deck. He bent forward and balanced into his hammock, then, with his fettered hands, pulled the loose chain up to him.
“Why is it me as is double slanged?” said William.
“All on account of you’re a big, bastardly gullion,” said Renter.
“But Jeremiah doesn’t scour no darbies at all.”
“Ah, that’s all on account of the Gorger’s a swell, and full of binnacle words and no bear-garden jaw.”
“It is more that I would not mutiny, than that my station is preferred,” said Jeremiah.
“Binnacles!”
“What was you lagged for, then?” said Eggy Mo.
“I was an attorney at law,” said Jeremiah, “who had the misfortune to be unable to account for a banker’s draft to the sum of two hundred and nine pounds and seven shillings made out to my senior. I also suffered the misfortune to be found protecting his gold watch. For the which, I am to enjoy a southern clime throughout the next fourteen years.”
“And me, I’m served cramp words just for prigging a woolbird!” said Eggy Mo. “How comes you naps only fourteen penn’orth?”
“It must be that I shared your happiness in a more lenient judge at appeal,” said Jeremiah.
“Still, I naps a bellowser, not you,” said Eggy Mo.
“Life, or fourteen,” said Jeremiah: “who is to debate the outcome, whither we are bound?”
“Still,” said Eggy Mo, “I reckon two hundred odd quid and a ridge montra beats one old woolbird as was rig-welted.”
“I chases ’em. I flaps my apron at ’em. But they sees me coming. They sees my apron. But I’ll get ’em, one day.”
“I’ve slept in these slangs more nights than enough,” said William. “And they’re biting in, what’s more.”
“Piss on it,” said Renter. “I pisses on mine. It hardens ’em off; and they’ll not fester.”
“‘Rig-welted,’” said Jeremiah. “‘Rig-welted’. Mr Pye, what may this ‘rig-welted’ mean?”
“It’s when a sheep,” said Eggy Mo, “same as it’s on it back and can’t get up.”
“That’s rean-wawted,” said William.