by Jane Yeadon
‘No, why would we want another when we’ve got Violet?’
He’s probably right. I think of his sister, with her calm brow and sweet smile. If I’d one like her, I wouldn’t want another.
Mine must agree because she says, ‘I’m not sure about the boys, but I’d love Violet to come and play. She’s super at making up games. She makes playing shoppies as good as going to see Mattie.’
I can’t resist: ‘Sell any wafers?’
Ignoring Elizabeth’s scowl, Mum says, ‘Well, I hear Violet’s a real help to her mother, so if she does come, it’ll only be if she can be spared. Having a big family in such a wee house must be hard work.’
‘Oh aye, there’s a fair squad o’ them,’ Dod agrees, then addressing us directly, ‘Jist mind, we dinna want them trampling all over the place. That park especially.’ Standing at the doorway, he points down to a field of ripening oats where the wind is turning them into a sea of rippling green-gold. ‘It’s nearly ready for cutting – it disna need flattening.’ He looks up at the sky. ‘Wi’ a bit o’ luck we’ll start roading the morn. At least this year I’ve somebody to help.’
As if hearing his words, clouds start to gather.
27
AND THE RAIN IT RAINETH
Once past Tombain’s fields, our Knockack burn joins the Dorback, so much bigger we call it a river. It starts at Lochandorb, a wild and lonely place, with its waters surrounding a ruined castle, once a stronghold of someone called the Wolf of Badenoch.
A day we were in Elgin and asked about its ruined cathedral, Mum told us, ‘That was the Wolf’s work.’
‘That’s a funny name,’ said Elizabeth. ‘Surely that wasn’t his real one?’
‘No, actually it was Alexander Stewart, but Wolf suited him better cos he was such a bad lot. Thought that the only way to settle an argument was by imprisonment and murder. He fell in then out with the Church when it wouldn’t allow him to divorce his wife. Since no journey seemed to be complete without raiding and pillaging, he left a trail of havoc and destruction on his way to Elgin, where, amongst other buildings, he torched and destroyed the cathedral. It was so beautiful it was known as the Lantern of the North.’
‘Would that have been a long time ago?’ Elizabeth asked.
‘Uh huh. The fourteenth century. But on a bleak winter’s day, you can imagine the Wolf’s ghost still lingering round the grey waters of the loch.’
It’s the source of the Dorback. Like someone quietly leaving a gathering prone to a change of mood, it eases under a wooden bridge then away from the loch. It winds in lazy curves past a shooting lodge, the Kerrow and Culfearn Farms, before reaching the Tomdow grounds. There, a flat meadow gives shelter and sweet grasses to our cattle, but further on, previous floods have undermined the foundations of sandy cliffs, leaving them at risk of further damage.
They worry Dod. His anxiety grows. It’s been raining for what seems like forever and today so many tears stream down our scullery window they block the view.
Mum, giving up on something that usually inspires her to write her bright newsy Bulletin articles, says, ‘Morayshire so often gets what I call the Lammas Deluge, I sometimes wonder why on earth we hill folk still farm. The farmers further south might already have celebrated their harvest festival but here’s us, up to the oxters in water, and with none of our fields even cut. Still,’ she adds, by way of comfort, ‘I suppose we should be thankful it’s not quite as bad as the 1829 Moray Floods.’
‘Nay yet,’ says Dod, ‘but I’m worried about the Dorback eating away at the Tomdow sand crags. With that river in spate, I can almost believe that story o’ a farmer about these parts losing a whole park to yon floods.’
‘That’s right. Yon Dick Lauder bloke wrote about it in his book. He said that a poor farmer could hardly believe his eyes when he saw a whole field actually moving.’ Mum shudders. ‘I’m sure it won’t get to that stage, bairns, but don’t either of you go near that river until the weather settles.’
She needn’t worry. We don’t often go to the Dorback. It’s kelpie country, and when we’re at school the only threat of water is when we stamp our wellies to splash each other in the playground, where deep pools have collected. Alec and his pals have been putting their skills to more creative use. They’ve chosen a window-less school wall, which allows them a huge canvas, then, using the pool’s muddy depths to soak tennis balls, they’ve been firing them at the wall to make a pattern of round, black shapes. It’s a piece of art unfortunately lost on Miss Milne. Her response is predictable.
‘Giving the belt,’ she says, ‘hurts me more than you boys getting it.’
I find this hard to believe.
At home as the rain continues, so does tension. Days pass. Even the Knockack’s beginning to look and sound like a river, whilst ditches and ponds fill and so change in character they seep into the countryside, making it look bedraggled, brown and unhappy. With our crops starting to look as if a sea’s swept over them, we’re happy to take refuge in the loft.
Elizabeth says, ‘Mum would have been going daft with us underfoot (where have I heard this before?), so it’s a good job we’ve got here. Mind you, I thought Violet’s brothers might have wanted to come too.’
‘Och, they’d probably spoil the fun.’ Presuming that the little girl must have got bored of living on her own in the Tomdow house and gone, I say, ‘Maybe Violet’s fed up of boys all the time at home, but I love it when she comes.’
I think of the excitement she brings when she’s happy to let Elizabeth and me be the beautiful princesses whilst she doesn’t mind making horrible faces and pretending to be a wicked witch.
‘When I catch you, I’m gonna boil you in my big black pot,’ she shouts, clunking about in the old boots we found in Dod’s kist. The Highland cows gaze down at us, as she chases us round the loft, making wild noises, loud enough to drown out the sound of the rain drumming on the roof slates. Still, and maybe it’s the pervading atmosphere of damp outside, but the loft’s beginning to feel as if it’s being affected by the weather too.
Even Belinda’s clothes are starting to smell a bit fusty and her face feels clammy. I’m not sure that she likes it here, but she keeps Bluebell company.
‘Rabbit and I miss you,’ I tell her one day when nobody else is around, ‘but when we’re not here you and Bluebell can get peace to play with the toys in the play box, even have a go at the bagatelle. Anyway, we need you both to be here when we’re playing schoolies, robbers and Mrs Haggarty-time.’
Belinda says, ‘I don’t mind being a pupil and shaking all about when having a joke with Mrs Haggarty, or even bowing my head after getting a row from Elizabeth when she’s playing at being the teacher, but neither Bluebell nor I like the robbers game. We hate you girls making us prisoners in Dod’s kist.’
I don’t think she’s really unhappy but she’s speaking in a low, but rather nice, husky voice. She’s either getting a cold or she’s listening to Violet so much she’s beginning to sound like her.
I straighten her frock and shake her gently. ‘Look,’ I say, ‘it might be hard being tied up and thrown in a cellar but at the end we always rescue you from it, and once we put the lid back on the kist it’s a bit of magic when it turns into a coach and Violet’s a super driver. She points out things of interest as we go along and, even if Elizabeth’s a bit strict as a conductress, we like being passengers, don’t we?’
‘You talking to Belinda?’ says my sister, unexpectedly appearing at my shoulder.
‘Of course. You didn’t think I was speaking to myself, did you? My doll’s really chatty. Don’t you have conversations with Bluebell?’
Elizabeth picks up Bluebell from the floor, holds her to her ear, then nods.
‘So what did she say?’
‘She says she would speak but with you and Belinda around she can’t get her tongue in edgeways.’ She surges on. ‘Don’t start! And see when Violet comes round? I’ve got an idea. You know that Bible story Miss Milne told us
the other day?’
I point to my lips, which are firmly pressed together, but am curious enough to nod. Elizabeth continues, ‘I think that Dod’s kist would be perfect. Let’s suggest we play Noah.’
Forgetting the sealed lips, I blurt out, ‘The one where Alec wanted to know why Noah needed two of each animal?’
‘Ha! Knew you couldn’t keep your mouth shut,’ she shouts in triumph. ‘But, yes. I bet she knew he was just asking to annoy her. It’s a wonder she didn’t give him the belt.’
‘Well, he’d a right smirk on his face until she said it was a stupid question from a farmer’s son.’
Elizabeth’s idea’s great, but Violet won’t be coming for a while. It’s stopped raining and her mum needs help with a huge washing built up in days when nobody thought they’d ever see the sun return with a drying wind.
28
HARVEST AT LAST
Dod threw Mum out of bed!
‘I dreamt I wis binding a sheaf,’ he said in his defence.
‘It was one thing your knee landing on my stomach, then twisting my nightie into a knot was a surprise, but shoved out of bed? All I can say is that it’s just as well there was a rug to break my fall.’
We’re delighted that she’s neither injured, upset nor too surprised. Dod and Violet’s dad have been scything a pathway round the side of the harvest crop. It’s called roading and means clearing a way for the binder to get into the field without spoiling any of the growth. The cut stuff then has to be made into sheaves and done by hand.
First, the men make ties out of the grain’s long stalks. The repetitive job that’s crept into Dod’s dreams has been when he’s been kneeling on scythed bundles to squash them into neat sheaves to secure them with the home-made ties. When Mum sailed overboard, he must have thought he’d made a sheaf and thrown it to the side of a newly cut track.
Later, she says, ‘Well, now you’ve the roading done, it’s time to hand over to Bob and his binder.’
Dod beams as she links arms with him. ‘Och, but isn’t it a great moment when it starts that first round? Having worked all year with our hands, heart and brains, it’s proof that we really are providers of food.’
‘Too true,’ says Dod. ‘It’s the crown of oor farming year, and even if the crop’s still a bit to ripen it should do that once it’s cut and in stooks.’
Compared to the smooth, rhythmic sound of scything, the binder makes a noisy, metallic clatter. Frightened by the sound, and routed from their hiding places by the windmill-like whirling wooden paddles feeding the crop into the advancing greedy teeth of the binder, rabbits flee whilst hares escape in zig-zag flight.
If Nell hadn’t grown so fat and lazy, she might give chase, but she’s lying on the sofa at home dreaming of her next meal. Anyway, Mum wasn’t keen on letting her out. She explained, ‘I heard, recently, that someone’s dog got its paws cut off with a binder.’
Dod, well out of the way of those treacherous teeth, sits up on the binder’s high metal seat, watching for any problems with the canvas that catches the cut grain, the knotters that tie it into sheaves and making sure that the blades make proper contact on the ground. The seat is even harder than the one on the tractor pulling the binder, but neither driver Bob nor Dod complain. The farm help starts on the stooking. It’s not as easy as he makes it seem. ‘Even if there’s a drying wind, the sheaves are still gey wet. It makes oxtering them heavy,’ muses Dod. ‘And we’ve aye to be on the lookout to keep the dry corn heads on the inside of the stook.’
Still, they manage, and after two days the crop’s been cut. Now the shorn field’s been transformed into pale-green stubble-striped streets, with stooks that look like wigwam dwellings lining them.
In the playground at the start of another school day, Alec is holding court. ‘I’ve got something to tell ye, I bet ye wouldna credit it.’
Tucking his thumbs into imaginary braces, he says, ‘Aye, you’ll mebbe nay believe it, but it’s right enough. My dad told me. Of course, mine wouldn’t allow such a thing, but this wee bairn’s dad did.’ Sure of his audience’s attention, he pauses long enough for some impatient soul to shout, ‘Whit did his dad dae? Och! Get on wi’ it, Alec.’
Alec continues. Now, speaking as disapprovingly as a church elder, he says, ‘He let him stand on the binder board. Well! He wis only on it for a minute when he fell onto the canvas.’
‘But that’s where the knotters are!’ someone says. ‘Next you’ll be telling us that the bairn was made into a sheaf.’
Alec turns to give the speaker a long look. He scratches his black hair; his blue eyes sparkle. He must be helping with the harvest at home. He wears his sleeves rolled up. They show scratches on his sunburnt arms, which are worn like badges of honour and prove that he’s a stook builder.
‘That’s jist whit happened,’ says Alec.
‘Whit rubbish!’ says my sister in her direct way.
Alec laughs. ‘Och, it’s true enough. Dad read it in the papers.’
Despite herself, Elizabeth has to ask, ‘So what happened?’
‘Everybody got a fleg, of course. Then once they opened the sheaf, they found him an . . .’ Alec draws a long breath: his audience waits impatiently, wondering how many bits were found and how much blood spilt. If this is a true story, it’s even better than the made-up Boys of Glen Morach we all listen to on the wireless.
‘Hurry up, Alec, the bell might go anytime,’ says someone, so Alec relents. ‘They couldna’ believe it but he wis right as rain, the stook must’ve protected him.’ He grins. His timing’s perfect. The bell clangs.
‘Schoo-all,’ we cry in the harmony that Miss Milne seeks and is so often denied.
As we gather round her at the piano, she says, ‘We’re going to start this week with a new hymn.’
On the piano, there’s a sheet of music with the words, ‘We Plough the Fields and Scatter’.
‘It’s to celebrate harvest time,’ explains Miss Milne. ‘There’ll be a celebration in church soon and it’ll be nice for you to know this tune and words so that if you go to church you can join in.’
After she reads out the first verse and we repeat it after her, she says, ‘I’ll play it to you so you get the tune.’
‘I ken it. Ma granny sings it,’ says Alec, assuming a look of sainthood.
‘Well, there’s others less blessed,’ observes the teacher. ‘After I’ve played it, you can lead the singing.’
I listen carefully. It’s hard to equate the hymn words of breezes, sunshine or soft refreshing rain with any of our recent weather. Not only that but it’s a devilish tune as well. I’ve to stand on tiptoe to hit the high notes and practically kneel down for the low ones. But it’s worth the challenge of singing over Alec.
His chest is out, his back is straight and he’s confident.
‘All good gifts around us.’ He belts it out but heading for the top note’s proving to be a challenge.
‘Thank the Lord, Oh thank the Lord,’ I shriek.
Elizabeth nudges me. ‘Wheesht!’
Back on base home ground and managing to drown out Alec, we all finish in a triumphant cacophony of sound: ‘For all his love.’
Miss Milne sits back in her seat and runs her tongue under her teeth. They make a clacking sound as they get back into position. ‘The corncrakes in my old home in Stoer sound better,’ she says. ‘And I’ve never thought that they were very musical. A pest, in fact. At this time of year they make such a confounded racket nobody can get a wink of sleep for them. I suppose we should count ourselves lucky we don’t have them here as well as you boys and girls.’ She slams down the piano lid, goes to pick up her pointer, then whacks the blackboard with it.
‘Now, I’m well aware that this is a busy time on farms and I also know that many of you will be helping out on them after school, but don’t bother coming to me and saying you haven’t done your homework because of that. It’s no excuse.’
It’s just after dinnertime and Alec’s girning. ‘It’s al
l very well for Fatty Milne. I bet when she finishes her day she goes off to sit on her big backside, with Miss May running after her.’
‘Oh, ah ken,’ says Davy Munro. ‘It’s no as if we can pit off the work at hame until it suits us. My dad’s got the oats cut and we’ve got the field near stooked but the barley’s a bit to go afore the grain swells up. The crop’s still gey green.’
‘Aye, and ye canna cut it afore it’s ready. Nay point.’
The boys warm to their theme. If Miss Milne wasn’t so driven on writing and spelling, she might be surprised at their wealth of harvesting knowledge.
Davy nods. ‘An’ then we’ll hiv tae help wi’ the loading, an’ heaving sheafs up onto a cart’s bloomin’ hard work.’
‘It’s no much better up on the cairt,’ says Alec. ‘If I’ve once heard my dad shouting, “Keep the corners square, the load well forward and heart her up plenty,” I’ve heard him say it a dozen times. As if I’d get it wrong!’ He sounds affronted: pride’s obviously at stake.
When talk moves on to stack building, which demands the same level of brawn, time, energy and architectural skills, some of us drift away. The idea of stooks that look like wigwams provide more inspiration.
‘Come on an’ play Cowboys and Indians,’ someone suggests.
‘Bags me be a Whiteface,’ says a boy with freckles even bigger than mine or James’s.
‘An I’ll be an Indian chief,’ says another, throwing his hand to his mouth and making whooping sounds.
‘I’ll break in some horses,’ says Violet. ‘Come on, James, you can be a really difficult one.’ She holds up a skipping rope. ‘But I’ll need to catch you first.’
As thin little frightened James turns into a runaway, snorting, biting, kicking stallion, the rest of us race round the playing field, avoiding being caught and scalped or becoming steeds about to be broken in. Altogether the threat of capture, losing your head or being kicked to death is a great way to make the dinner hour pass in delicious terror.