The View From the Cart

by Rebecca Tope

  I had risen and gone outside with the rest of the people, and Frith stood beside me, his arm about my shoulders. I had said nothing to him about my bodily sensations, but he began to guess, as my breathing changed, and I cradled the great lump of my belly in my hands. It felt good to be standing, and the absence of any pain in my back was deeply reassuring. I had already reasoned that I might do myself most good by standing, or crouching forward, so that there would be little strain or pressure on my spine, and now I believed that this would prove my salvation. Only the prospect of an unnaturally large infant continued to frighten me.

  ‘A man cannot worship two gods,’ Cuthman cried, again as he urged the oxen forward.

  ‘Come, you men, come and save our Stone,’ Fippa bellowed, desperately. Her sons, perhaps angry more about the oxen than the Stone, trotted forward at her demand. Three or four others followed. Then came a trial of strength between the men and the beasts, which seemed to last an age. There was much shouting, and cursing, and I heard Fippa above the others.

  ‘I call upon the Great Goddess of the Earth, in her power and goodness, to curse you, Cuthman of the cart. I call upon you a sickness which will never leave you, and a restless spirit which will know no peace. Nothing that you do, from this day forward, will bring pleasure or contentment. If you do this thing, you will suffer for it. I promise you that.’

  She repeated this and more besides, shrill and furious. I shuddered and pitied my son more than the frantic witch-woman who saw the centre of her life falling away.

  The oxen strained at the ropes, but the force of six strong men and the skilful planting of the Stone itself, defied their efforts. The sky above was ragged with wispy cloud, as if reflecting the uncertain struggle on the ground below. Suddenly Cuthman released the beasts, which he had been pulling forward, and stood back. For a moment, everything went quiet – even my blossoming belly.

  ‘Woman,’ he hissed, more malevolent than I had ever seen a person be. ‘Be silent with your foolish curses. What folly leads you to think they can have any power over me?’

  ‘You overreach yourself,’ she screamed. ‘You are nothing, and nobody. We accepted you, gave you a place to live though you did no useful work, food to eat which you had not grown. We allowed your church to disfigure our hill. And how are we repaid? By this evil act of desecration. You and your God will suffer for this, believe me. You may achieve fame, you may convert the whole of this country, and yet it will bring you no joy.’ Her ranting became muddled in my head after that, a voice echoing and throbbing, tied in with a new pain which gripped me and made me moan.

  Frith became fully alert to what was happening to me. ‘The child?’ he questioned, looking into my face. I nodded, biting my lip. I wanted to walk a little, to stay on my feet and behave as normally as I could. But there was a great downward-pulling weight, dragging me to the ground, buckling my knees. ‘Come,’ ordered my husband. ‘Back to the hut, and I will call the women.’

  And so I missed the next stage in the struggle between my son and the heathen Fippa. The shouting continued and the oxen bellowed, a long low cry of protest which struck pity and fear through me. They were handsome beasts, willing workers, and I had admired them from the first. It would shame me if my son injured or ill-treated them.

  I would not lie down, even then, but knelt on a soft pile of sheepskins, leaning onto my hands when a pain came, rocking a little and muttering all the old prayers for an easy delivery. The women came with their charms, which they laid out around me. One rubbed goose-grease into my fanny, which was soothing. I felt that the day already had some great magic glimmering through it, and for my child to be born into this great drama thrilled me. Frith stayed close by, helping the women, but also watching the great events taking place outside.

  My body quietened again and I offered my helpers ale and nuts. They stoked the fire and warmed the wrappings I had prepared for the child. I called to Frith, where he stood just outside out hut, ‘What are they doing now?’

  He did not reply but his face was pale when he came into sight, hovering in the open doorway. Instead of a spoken account from him, we heard the howling of a great wind, wilder and stronger than any I had ever known, even on the winter moorlands. With it came a high and despairing scream, which pierced through me, so that I have never yet forgotten it. Frith added his voice, as did many others. A long ‘Aaarrhhh’ of awe and fear and terror. As quickly as I could, I struggled to my feet and stumblied to the door. Just in time, I glimpsed the unearthly figure of Fippa, a tumbling bundle in the sky, as high as two of the tallest trees in the forest, taken up by the wind. She sailed overhead, screaming and kicking, as if held in a giant hand, and circled the church on the knoll. Then she fell, like a stone, towards the ground, and my heart stopped. She would be smashed to pieces like a discarded doll.

  We did not see her land. The church was between her and us. But we heard the faint splash as she was plunged into the deep pool on the far side of the knoll. And we knew that we would never see her again.

  It was too terrible a miracle. Even the Christ Jesus had never committed such an act, if the Gospels are to be believed. The people’s white faces registered nothing but shock. I just had time to shiver for the soul of my son, who had done such a thing, when my belly gripped me again, and I staggered back to my bed.

  The next hour was lost in the rhythm and passion of birth. The child was gentle this time; no twisting or tearing, no sudden pains, but the gradual thrusting forth, with the burning and stretching that assuredly brings pain, but also a sense of rightness and good purpose. It seemed only a few moments before my second little son fell forth, into my waiting hands.

  Frith came close from his place by the fire, out of the women’s way. ‘A son,’ I smiled at him, swallowing my disappointment that it was not a daughter for my old age. Frith had tears in his eyes, and he reached to touch the tiny damp head. The child had thick black hair, and a chin which I could already see was a repeat of his father’s. Relief filled me, and a delight that the birth had been so easy.

  ‘The child is small,’ said one of the women, puzzlement in her voice. ‘Barely half the size we might have expected.’ Her voice shook, and I realised that we had scarcely spoken since witnessing Fippa’s fate. There had been nothing meaningful to say, and perhaps they were rather afraid of the woman who had brought Cuthman into the world. Perhaps they expected this new child to be another pitiless miracle-worker.

  I took the child and held him to me, trying to lie back and curl into the skins. But something was, after all, amiss with my body. No pain, but a strange heavy awkwardness where there should have been empty flesh. I put an exploratory hand to my belly.

  ‘It is still very hard,’ I said. ‘And big.’

  As one, we understood. For myself, I recalled my bitch as she whelped, and how I had squeezed her gently to discover whether there were more pups yet to be born. It had been easy then, and it was easy now. In great wonderment, I gazed at Frith.

  ‘There is another child,’ I breathed, and the others all nodded. On this day of miracles, we were perhaps less amazed than we might have been. I had never known a woman to give birth to two babies together, although I had heard stories of it. When it happened to the sheep, the lambs were mostly sickly, and often one was born dead or died soon afterwards. It had always been regarded as great misfortune when a cow had twin calves.

  We none of us knew what should be done. There were no more pains, no sign that another birth was soon to take place. As we tried to absorb the truth, a shadow filled the doorway. ‘Do I have a brother?’ came Cuthman’s voice.

  He was changed. I could not see his face, against the light, but his voice was very different. A hollowness, a kind of defiance which could not conceal the horror at his heart. He had killed Fippa; he was a murderer. From this time on, people would shrink from him in fear and allow him his way in everything. There would be no arguments, no challenges. He had bought a kind of freedom which would have no fulfilment in i
t. He would convert the villagers and they would attend his church, terrified of his slightest frown. Fippa’s curse was already coming true, whispered a voice in my heart, and I wanted to weep for my sainted son.

  But there was joy on that day, too. ‘Yes, you have a brother,’ I trilled, showing the baby. ‘He is a fine young fellow.’

  The tiny boy threw his arms wide as I moved him through the air towards Cuthman, and gave a small splutter of protest. His cord was not yet severed, and his skin shone with the fluids of birth, so that Cuthman grimaced slightly and stepped back.

  ‘I am pleased,’ he said. ‘He is born on a great day. Now I must drag the fallen Stone up to the church, where I shall carve it into a Holy Cross.’ Frith and the women all gasped at this cold determination to carry through his destruction.

  It was by a silent conspiracy that we said nothing of the second child, hiding so quietly inside me. We, too, were afraid of Cuthman, and had no wish to offer him anything as strange as a twin birth in that volatile aftermath of his struggle.

  Almost without thinking, I put my new son to my breast, aware of how small he was when his mouth could scarcely open wide enough to take the nipple. He lay in my hand, as light as a month-old pup, perhaps, and much the same size. But he was well formed, and seemed to be a good colour. Frith built up the fire, and wrapped me round with a wolfskin which had been his own most valued possession.

  As the child began to suck, I felt my body stir again. With an abrupt and involuntary push, the afterbirth came forth, and we cut the cord with a sharp knife. The woman took it away carefully and set it on a shelf where the dogs could not reach it. It must be blessed and then buried deep, as thanks for the healthy child.

  Drowsiness crept over me, and I made no effort to think about anything. I was in the hands of destiny, and was content to let events unfurl as they would. The quiet baby fell into his own deep sleep and I let Frith take him, well wrapped, to show to anyone who wished to see him outside. ‘Say nothing of the other,’ I murmured.

  Perhaps I assumed the other child would be nothing more than a shapeless lump of flesh, or would be stillborn. Or that I would carry it within me forever. Whatever was the case, I could not speak of it.

  The day passed, still breezy, but with a sky thick with cloud. I lay suspended, numb at all that the day had brought. The day before, with the King’s messenger and his demand for tribute, was forgotten.

  And at sunset, my last child decided to be born. Deep downward tightening gripped me, and I heaved myself onto my knees again, gasping and panting, amazed at the renewed power. I was grateful then for the long rest. This child demanded hard work and I gave it somewhat unwillingly.

  At last the head pushed out, again with no injury to my back. Wearily, the women assisted in the final emergence, and Frith sat in his place by the fire, cradling the little boy. When it finally fell in a slither onto the damp skins between my legs, the child gave a loud angry cry, as if annoyed at the long wait to be born. It was a girl, much bigger than her brother, and less gentle. Eyes tight shut, fists clenched, she vented her rage loudly.

  Nobody spoke, but we exchanged tentative smiles. It was accomplished, and there was nothing more to say. Night fell as we washed and wrapped the second infant. Frith lit rushlights, thanked the women, who left as soon as the second afterbirth was safely put away, and fed the fire again.

  I put my new daughter to the breast, and she sucked strongly. She was almost half as big again as the little boy. He mewled a little and Frith helped me to suckle him too, so that I had an infant tucked beneath each arm, and was helpless to move.

  It was an unreal night. The sky cleared, and the just-waning moon shone into the hut, so we could see almost as clear as day. I wept for Fippa, and for Cuthman and for myself, somehow blessed and cursed together by my double birth. The girl child scarcely slept, and cried loudly if I tried to move her away from me. After a while, she opened her eyes and stared at me unblinking. I tried to believe that she was like Wynn, my firstborn, with the same plump cheeks and hair growing low on the back of her neck, but she was in truth not like Wynn at all. Nor was she like either of her brothers. The anger I had seen in her in those first moments was changing into something just as fierce, but less disconcerting. In those magic hours, as the moon drifted away across the sky, I almost believed that it was love that she was feeling. Love for me, her mother; a love which would never fade or die.

  I wept again, then, for the little quiet son, sleeping in a wooden box by the fire, who I feared would be almost incidental to my life. A small humble soul somehow gone astray, finding himself sharing a womb with a strong lusty sister. I would be certain to rear him, that much I promised to God and myself. But what his fate might be was hidden from me. All I could think was that he must be protected – from his brother, Cuthman – as he grew.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  And so events unrolled, from year to year. The King’s messenger returned and took his tribute. Cuthman made sure that he collected five fine sheep and goats. Young animals, ripe for breeding in the coming season. The ale was good, the corn dry. Nobody demurred at this, no muttered complaints or mutinous glances. Cuthman was supreme in the settlement. His church was complete, the roof tightly thatched with reeds from the seabeds, the inside walls finished with great care, so they were smooth and clean.

  The Stone lay half-chiselled into a Cross, neither one thing nor another. The lovely carvings were mostly destroyed, the polished face chipped away, so that it was ugly and dead. It presented a melancholy mirror for the spirit of the settlement. The shining beauty which had reflected the contented prosperity of the place we had come to less than a year before was lost. Greyness had taken its place. And the people walked in fear.

  My babies flourished. We had a hard time choosing names for them. Cuthman made it clear that he wished them to have names with a fittingly sacred meaning. He favoured Noah for the boy and Brigid for the girl. I conceded the latter, since it was a pleasing name in itself, and I recalled a conversation from the seemingly long-gone days I spent among the women of Maiden Castle, when they spoke of Brigid as a powerful heathen goddess, only latterly transposed into a Christian saint. I liked the secret mischief of it, taking Cuthman’s suggestion when he hardly knew what he was advising.

  But Noah stuck in my throat. It was the name of an old man, not a sweet young baby. Frith, who had much of the care of the little lad, had affectionately named him Brock, in his playing and singing, and this had become our way of speaking of him. He had a way of snuffling and waving his head from side to side which had put Frith in mind of a badger. When we finally chose his baptismal name - Godfrey, which had been the name of a foreign monk in Chidham who had befriended Cuthman - we seldom used it. The child was always known as Brock in the village.

  Garth and Welf, Fippa’s sons, were much diminished by her supernatural death. Cuthman tried his best to sustain his friendship with them, inviting their assistance with the finishing touches to the church, but they did what they could to avoid him. They would sit in the Hall, in a dark corner, drinking tankards of ale and mumbling together. There seemed little harm in them and it was plain that they offered no threat to Cuthman, but they were an uncomfortable reminder of his violent miracle. Welf became ill after some months, his legs failing him until he could no longer walk. His hair turned thin and grey and he seldom came out of his hut. Without him Garth seemed to shrink even more, but he doggedly tilled the land with the oxen that Cuthman no longer needed.

  The King never made his promised visit. He was old at that time and too weary to conduct his planned tour. Cuthman watched the western path, the one which the messenger had used, and by which my son and I had also arrived, first hopeful, then more and more disappointed. Finally another messenger came, with a new list of tributes to be made, and new accounts of the battles and invasions which he claimed were taking place in other parts of the country. It felt to me in those early years that we lived in a forgotten island, where nothing happen
ed. We were part of the great Kingdom now and might be called upon to supply men for soldiers. The King sent orders that we mount a perpetual watch on the sea, for the sails of marauders. Later, the new King bade us build a stout landing stage where his own ships could take shelter, and begin to exchange goods. It happened gradually, but by the time Brigid and Brock were running and chattering, we had grown accustomed to visitations by land and sea, and were very much more aware of events taking place in the wider world.

  By the time my babies were a year old, Steyning was a firmly Christian community. We enjoyed an enforced Sabbath, where no work of any kind was permitted, apart from drawing milk from the goats. Everyone had been baptised in the river Adur, blessed by Cuthman, and promising faithfulness to the Lord and his Holy Son. A burial ground lay to the south and west of the church, with two or three new graves each year. Beyond the graves, in an untouched field where the grass was long and rank and brambles, nettles and small saplings quickly grew, Fippa’s pool lay dark and sinister. No-one ever went there. It became a place of ghost stories and terror. Children were warned to stay away, with dreadful threats of what would happen to them if they ventured close to the Pool. Cuthman planted a row of yews to screen it from his sight, and although they grew slowly, they marked a barrier which seemed to be important to him.

  But still the new church had not been affirmed by any Christian clerics. No bishop had come to consecrate it; no choirs to sing it into life or bring it to God’s attention. Cuthman was a solitary self-styled priest, whose only authority lay in his own mind and in the wonders he had so publicly performed. No-one in Steyning could read or write. Cuthman had grown up in solitude, and the holy stories he had heard were either repeated to him by Edd and me from our own early days, or acquired in the brief visits we had made to monasteries on our travels. The miracle of the loaves and fishes, and the walking on the water were much-used standbys, and were known to the very last word by every villager.