They all worked very hard to make the performance perfect, and it was quite late when Master Pennifeather said, ‘There, that’s enough for tonight, my lords and masters. Just remember to loosen up as you go into the cask, Dusty, and everything will be superb – completely superb!’
‘Might as well go to bed,’ yawned Benjamin. ‘Early to bed and early to rise, I always say.’
‘’Tisn’t early,’ sighed Jasper, looking in a weary but admiring sort of way at his legs. ‘S’late an’ s’beastly cold.’
‘That’s the wind. It’s blowing half a gale from the east, and the sky is ablaze with stars,’ said Jonathan, who had opened the half-door of the stables and was looking out and up. ‘It’s not going to be such a green Christmas, after all.’
‘Argos will be so cold,’ said Hugh, who had had time to get worried again now that the rehearsing was over.
But Jonathan said, ‘Not he! He’s got a good thick coat, Brother Dusty-Feet.’
And Ben suggested cheerfully, ‘You know, he might quite likely bring himself along here. He’s a sensible beast, and he’s been here before.’
Everybody had something cheering to say, as they piled up the bedding-straw higher yet, and kicked off their shoes. (They didn’t take off anything else, it was too cold in the tumbledown stable, where little bitter winds whistled through the window and the thin places in the thatch.) And Jonathan came and squatted down beside Hugh in his corner, and spread a warm, rather greasy-smelling cloak over him.
‘He’ll be all right, you know,’ said Jonathan.
‘But it’s so dark and cold and – and wintry – and perhaps he’s fallen down a hole or something,’ said Hugh, miserably.
Jonathan tucked the ragged cloak in under his chin, and said, ‘Surely not. It’s Christmas, and that is a very special time for animals.’
‘You mean – because of the animals in the stable?’
‘Ye-es, partly that,’ said Jonathan, settling down into the straw.
Nicky blew out the lantern, and the darkness seemed like deep blue velvet, after the smoky yellow light. ‘Jonathan Whiteleaf will now oblige with a story,’ said his voice a moment later, rather muffled, as though he was talking with his head under the clothes.
There was a rustling and a settling down in the darkness, and then a hopeful silence. Jonathan was the story-teller of the Company, as well as the Doctor and the Playwright and the Tumbler between scenes, and the one who did most of the mending, and his stories were always worth listening to.
Even Hugh pricked up his ears, because he loved Jonathan’s stories.
Then, ‘I’ll tell you a Christmas story, my masters,’ said Jonathan’s deep, quiet voice out of the darkness. ‘I will tell you about the fourth guest who came behind the shepherds to the Bethlehem stable, that first Christmas.’
‘Wasn’t it a shepherd boy?’ put in Nicky’s voice, muffled in the straw.
‘Be quiet an’ let him get on wi’ th’ story,’ said Jasper Nye; and Nicky gave an apologetic grunt, and held his peace.
‘People said it was a shepherd boy, after they had forgotten the truth,’ said Jonathan. ‘But I have heard that it was Pan, the master of all furred and feathered things, who followed the Star that night.’ And he told them this story:
One autumn, when the field-mice and the tiggyhedgehog and Brock the Badger were all making places for themselves to sleep in through the winter, Pan made a warm place for himself deep under the roots of an ancient tree. He lined it with rushes and fern, and curled himself up there to sleep through the dark, cold months until spring came again: just as though he was a harvest mouse, instead of the lord of all fur and fin and feather.
He fell asleep, and dreamed the things that the animal-kind do dream in their long winter sleep; until one night he awoke with a start. There was a tingling in his finger-tips like the tingling in the twigs of a withy when the sap rises, and something seemed to be calling him out into the world beyond his hole. At first he thought it was the spring, and he remembered the sun’s warmth and young lambs crying and hawthorn smelling of cream and honey, and the long, hot days of summer to follow after. But the earth was still cold to his touch, and there was no whisper of seeds shooting and sap rising all around him; the mouth of his hole was narrowed with banked-up snow, and the stars that looked in at him through the gap that was left were bright with frost. It was still mid-winter, and Pan turned round again and tried to sleep.
But still something called to him, called and called from the world above, and Pan turned round once more, and looked up through the mouth of his hole; and suddenly all the brightness of the stars was gathered up into one great Star that shone straight into his eyes with a piercing golden light that made him blink. Now he knew what was calling to him; it was something to do with that Star, and he knew that he must answer the call.
So he gathered his hairy goat legs under him, and took his pipes, which had lain in the curve of his arm while he slept, and scrambled up through the opening of his hole, pushing his way through the snow that had drifted round it. All the world lay quiet, sleeping under the stars; the hills looked strange in their covering of snow, and the wind cut like a knife; but still something was calling, as joyously as spring, and still the great Star burned and pulsed, hanging low out of the sky just over the scattered lights in the valley below, which he knew were the lights of Bethlehem. ‘Whatever it is,’ said Pan to himself, ‘it must be in Bethlehem.’ And he set out, leaping along over the snow, his great round hooves leaving a track behind him as though a huge goat had passed that way, and the golden light of the Star shining on the splendid sweep of his curved horns.
But he had not gone far when he heard a pitiful bleating and turned aside to see what it might mean; and in a hollow of the hillside he found a flock of sheep all huddled close together, outside their stonewalled fold, their eyes like green lamps in the light of the Star, and the mist of their breath hanging like smoke above them.
‘What is the matter, my children?’ asked Pan.
And the old scarred bell-weather pawed the snowy ground with a small sharp hoof, and said, ‘Master, we are afraid. First there came a great light in the sky, and then a strange thing like a man with the wings of a golden eagle, and it spoke to our shepherds, and in a little while our shepherds went away, hurrying down the path to the town, without even folding us first. And now we smell wolf, and we are more afraid than ever!’
‘There is nothing to be afraid of, my children,’ said Pan; and he folded the sheep himself, and went on down the hill.
A little farther on, dark shapes loomed up suddenly all about him, and he knew that they were wolves. Savage and milky-toothed, their eyes gleaming red as hot coals in the light of the Star, they gathered round him, and the great grey leader came and nuzzled his head against him as a dog might have done.
‘Whither away, Grey Brother?’ asked Pan, rubbing him behind the ears.
And the pack-leader said, ‘Yee-ow! Master, we smell sheep!’
‘Turn back from your hunting,’ said Pan. ‘It is Peace tonight, my brothers.’
And an old she-wolf answered him: ‘Master, if you say that it is Peace between us and the sheep-folk, then it is Peace, and we turn back from our hunting for tonight, even though our cubs are hungry.’
Pan watched them slink away into the shadows, and then he went on again, until he came out on to the valley road that led to Bethlehem. The trees were dark on either side, and the straight, white roadway ran between, with the golden Star hanging at the end of it; and Pan went on, following the Star. On the outskirts of the town he met three shepherds hurrying back towards the hills; and one was old and grey, and one was brown and of middle years, and one was young and golden.
‘I have folded your sheep, whom you left forlorn on the hillside,’ said Pan wrathfully. ‘It is a worthless shepherd who leaves his flock in the night time!’
‘We followed the Star,’ said the golden shepherd.
‘And it led us to a stabl
e,’ said the brown shepherd.
‘Master,’ said the grey shepherd gently, ‘a Child is born tonight – a little King; and He is greater than Pan.’
And they went on towards the hills where they had left their sheep, and Pan went on following the Star.
In the narrow streets of Bethlehem the snow was churned to brown slush by the many feet that had trodden it, and Pan’s tracks were lost among the others. The sky between the roof-tops was turning green, for it was near to dawn, and soon the stars would fade; but the one great Star burned as brightly as ever, hanging low at the end of the street. And the town slept, and there was no one to see Pan go by.
On he went, up one street and down another, following the Star, until at last it hung above the stables of a tumbledown inn.
‘This is surely the place,’ said Pan. ‘This is where the thing is that called me.’ And suddenly a great awe fell on him; but he pushed open the door and went in.
Inside was yellow lantern-light and the sweet breath of the cattle wreathing upward. Mary slept on the straw, and Joseph drowsed in the shadows, for they were very tired; but the animals of the stable were wakeful and restless, gathered about their manger to look at something that lay in it. An old red ox and a little grey donkey, a brown mare with her foal tottering on long, unsteady legs beside her, a half-starved dog and a tabby cat, and a ruby-combed cockerel who had fluttered up to perch on the edge of the manger itself. Pan could not see what lay in the manger, but all the lovely feeling of spring that had called him from his sleep seemed to flow from it as light flows from a lamp.
The stable-folk knew Pan, and they parted to let him through, and as he passed between them, he saw, lying on the golden straw before the manger, a shepherd’s crook, a ragged cloak, and a loaf of bread – gifts that the shepherds had left behind them for the little King. Then he was standing between the ox and the foal, with a hand on the head of each, and looking down with them into the manger. There was a new Baby in the manger, sound asleep; and as Pan gazed at Him, he knew that the grey shepherd had spoken truth, and this was the little King, and He was greater than Pan.
Pan squatted down on his hairy haunches, and leaned forward to gaze and gaze. All his heart went out to the little King, so that it hurt him inside, as he had never been hurt before, and yet he had never been so happy. Suddenly the Baby awoke, and lay looking up into the brown face, with the surprised, kitten-blue eyes that most very young things have. Then He smiled a small pleased smile, and made a small pleased kicking and waving with His legs and arms, and poked Pan’s cheek with a tiny, crumpled fist.
There was a sudden sharp pain in Pan’s breast and a sudden whimpering deep inside him, and he longed to weep, but he did not know why, for he was happy – so happy, that it was like the kindling of a light in a dark place. He put out one long, brown forefinger, and touched the little King very, very gently on one cheek in return. Then he got up and turned to go; but before he went, he laid his reed pipe among the gifts that the shepherds had left. ‘He has a loaf for food, and a cloak for warmth, and the tool of a trade,’ said Pan. ‘And I will leave Him the gift of music, that is of the Spirit.’ And he passed out from the stable into the chill of the dawn.
The dog went with him as far as the door, and licked his hand with a warm, loving tongue, to comfort him, and then padded back to the manger. And Pan went out alone.
Mary found the Pan-pipes among the gifts that the shepherds had left, when she awoke, and at first people guessed who had left it there; but as time went on, people forgot Pan, or rather they forgot that he was not just a legend, and they said, ‘It must have been a shepherd boy, who left the gift of music for the little King.’
For a while nobody said anything at all, and then Nicky asked, ‘Was that what you meant just now, about Christmas being a special time for animals?’
‘Maybe,’ said Jonathan.
And Hugh asked, ‘What happened to Pan?’
‘Who knows?’ said Jonathan. ‘Perhaps the animals do, but they wouldn’t tell us if they could.’
7
Argos
Next morning the Players turned out in a body before it was even light, to look for Argos, leaving word with the stable-hands to hold him if he should appear while they were away. They searched the country round for hours, calling and whistling, asking everybody they met, ‘Have you seen a dog? A black-and-brown dog – very big?’ But nobody had; and at last the time came when they must give up the search for a while, and go back to the Fountain to get ready for the afternoon’s performance, because they had promised the good folk of Canterbury that they would enact the Life of St Nicholas that afternoon, and the show must go on.
They cut rehearsals that evening, and spent the time searching again over the country they had already searched in the morning, and next day they returned to the search yet again, but they had no better fortune than before.
It was Christmas Eve, and everybody seemed blithe and happy, hurrying here and there about their preparations for tomorrow’s merry-makings. The wind had blown the last of the clouds away, and the weather had turned clear and frosty, and all the narrow streets of Canterbury were full of people carrying home great bundles of holly and ivy, bays and mistletoe and rosemary for the decking of their houses. But the little band of Players, grimly searching ditch and meadow and spinney which they had searched so many times before, did not feel Christmassy in the least, for they had all grown very fond of Argos.
Hugh would not go with anyone, not even with Jonathan; he went alone, searching in the same places over and over again, with his face very white and his eyes very black and his curly mouth straight and hard: calling and calling. But he didn’t find Argos.
At last they had to give up and go trapesing back to the Fountain in a weary, dispirited little bunch. They were going to present the Shepherds’ Play that evening, and they must get the costumes ready and see to the decking of the stage, and the lighting. Usually they acted their plays in the afternoons, as all Strolling Companies did, for it was not easy to light an open-air stage after dark. But on Christmas Eve they put on their play after star-time, and lit the stage as best they could with borrowed stable lanterns, because it was more festive to do it that way. So they collected up all the lanterns the inn would lend them, and there was a great cleaning of horn panes and sticking in of new candles, and a great decking of the stage with branches of evergreens, and a tremendous hurrying to and fro and up and down. It should all have been most gloriously exciting, but none of them had much heart for it, and poor Hugh was so desperately miserable that it screwed up his inside into aching knots and made him feel sick.
Argos was to have been a shepherd’s dog in the play. They had spent hours teaching him his part, and he had learned it beautifully. And now they would have to do without him; and Hugh felt as though his heart would break.
At last everything was ready, and the bells of the Cathedral were ringing high overhead, calling people to the Christmas Eve service. Then the Players washed their faces at the horse-trough, and brushed themselves down and stuck sprigs of rosemary into their caps or the breasts of their jerkins, because they were going to church.
‘You know,’ said Master Pennifeather, scrubbing his face dry, ‘it might be that the Egyptians have – er – acquired our Argos. He’s a handsome brute.’
Jonathan was taking great care with his sprig of rosemary. ‘Tomorrow I’ll go down to the Fighting Cocks Tavern,’ he said. ‘There’s generally an Egyptian fiddler among the folks there; if they’ve taken him we’ll get him back all right.’
‘It’s a trap I’m afraid of,’ said Jasper Nye, gazing mournfully at his worn-out scarlet stockings.
‘Be quiet, you idiot,’ whispered Jonathan; and Nicky deliberately strolled across and thumped him on the head, just to show that he agreed with Jonathan.
‘Yow!’ yelped Japser, rubbing the place. ‘No need t’do that. I’m sorry. I jus’ didn’t think.’
‘You can’t; you never do. You’re just
a pair of lovely legs and nothing to think with. It’s not your fault,’ Nicky told him kindly.
But Master Pennifeather said, ‘Peace, my lords! It’s time we were away to church.’
And Hugh, who had been listening with his face half washed all this while, said wretchedly, ‘I’d rather stay behind. Argos might come back and find us all gone.’
‘The stable-men will hold on to him if he does,’ Master Pennifeather told him very firmly. ‘No member of my Company stays away from church on Christmas Eve, Dusty, nor does he take with him as much dirt on his – er – expressive countenance as you seem to have on yours. So you’d best finish washing it.’
So Hugh sighed, and finished washing his face; and then they all set out.
Once in the street, they joined the gay crowds all answering the call of the bells, and went with them, up Mercery Lane and past the Buttermarket to the lovely Christchurch Gate of the Cathedral. The smooth grass of the Close was still grey with hoarfrost in the shadows, but sparkling gold where the winter sunshine fell, and the tall grey Cathedral towers soared up and up into the blue sky; and the music of the bells was so glorious and so loud that the bell-tower and the naked elm trees in the Close and carved kings and saints above the west door all seemed to dance to it.
It did not seem as though anything unhappy could happen at such a lovely time, when it was Christmas Eve and all the bells of Canterbury were pealing and rocking for joy in their high towers, and the good people of the city were hurrying to church in their gayest clothes and their Christmas humours. And surely, Hugh thought as he scurried along, Argos would be all right – somehow – because of Christmas time.
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