‘Oh brother, I got seven and six for a basket,’ he said, ‘five shillings, seven and six.’
I said, ‘Did ye ever get a pound for a basket?’
‘No, brother, I never got a pound for a basket. I couldnae make a basket,’ he said, ‘that ye would get a pound for.’
I said, ‘Look, Aunt Katie – ye wouldnae gie her a handfu – a wee taste o yir wands tae mak a basket, would ye? Ye wouldnae let her touch the wands tae mak a wee basket. And she went to that bush and she filled it in broom, strips o green broom.’ And you can’t peel broom, the skin’ll no come off it. ‘And there a young lady and this young gentleman cam in here, I think they were Americans, and they stopped. They wouldnae look at your basket, nor they wouldnae look at mine. Noo, Katie filled it with broom and the bene mort gied her a pound for her basket.’
‘Nah,’ he said.
I said, ‘Aye, he gied her a pound fir it. They wouldnae look at me ’n yir baskets.’
He said, ‘Is that right, Katie hoy?’
‘Aye,’ she says, ‘that’s the truth.’
He says, ‘Look, any wands you want, take the lot!’
I said, ‘I should think so! Look, me and you we’re wastin wir time. She, she can sell baskets; she can mak them. Me and you cannae mak baskets. Folk wouldnae look at wir baskets.’ And from that day on to the day that I left him, he never stopped her from interfering with his wands again.
So Isa and I sat all that night and made all these flowers. Old Katie had got a couple of packets of dye. You got packets of dye in muslin bags, and you poured water into a pot and popped them in – yellow was a great colour. So we sat and dyed all these flowers.
Sandy says, ‘Wumman, you’re only wastin yir time gaun tae the games.’ Next morning was Lonach Games. ‘You’re only wastin yir time gaun wi the flooers.’ Now, she had a pound in her pocket, she wasn’t caring. And we had plenty messages, because we had picked up a few things along the way. You see, that was the only thing the traveller women hated long ago, when they used to call the houses, they hated to go away in the morning to their hawking if there were nothing left at home for them who stayed behind. That was the only thing that bothered them. Because they didn’t know how long they would be away.
So she says to me, ‘Brother, if you come along in the morning tae the first wee shop, I’ll get ye a pint o milk and a packet o fags. And I’ll send it back wi ye. And then I’m no carin, I could stay the whole day.’ It was a worry to them, you see. Honest to God, they were really good.
‘That’s aa right, Aunt Katie,’ I said, ‘I’ll go along wi ye in the morning.’ At the first of the wee toon, Lonach, there was a shop. And there was a hillside and a big field at the back. This was the games park. I told Katie after I’d made all this heap of flowers, ‘There’s nae privet tae put them on.’
‘Oh, dinnae worry about that. I’ll get privet tomorrow masel.’ And Isa always went with her to give her mother a help with the flowers. She was an awfully clever lassie for thirteen.
She says, ‘Aye, Mammy, I’ll go wi ye in the morning.’ And Winkie stayed with me. And Ningen, the wee totie lassie. But Sandy would just jump on his bike and cycle away, never give a thought to the weans. As long as I was there, he kent I wouldn’t leave them. Sandy liked me being with them.
So the next morning I got up, picked all the hedgeroots and got a big fire on, got the kettle on and made a cup of tea. It was a beautiful morning, sun was scorching hot. They got a lovely day for the games.
And we were just having a cup of tea when I heard the patter of feet going along the road. This was a traveller man, his wife, two boys and two lassies with a donkey cart. And they came in. A big old, tall man. Oh, I came to know him, even work with him later when I was married. He was in his late forties. His two boys were about my age; one was younger. And he had this donkey.
I had never seen a donkey yoked before. With the big, old long ears, you know. I’d seen plenty in pictures and I’d seen folk swapping them, but travellers weren’t partial to donkeys. I’d like to tell you the God’s honest truth; the travellers felt ashamed, because they hated to burden the holy animal. That’s what it’s supposed to be. As far as they believed, if you were yoking a donkey you were insulting God by making it work for you. They believed it had already done its work. It wasn’t needing anything else, just be a pet. Now this goes back a long way to the story from the beginning. The reason they didn’t yoke and burden it was not that it wasn’t fit for doing these things. It was the respect they had for the animal, back to the time when it carried Mary and Baby Jesus to Jerusalem. You see, travellers are very religious people. I know they curse and they swear and they take the Lord’s name in vain. But when it comes down to earth, they really believe. Because they’ve got all the truth in their own mind and they’ve got all their own facts and their own ways and their own truth. They never go to church and they don’t like ministers. But that doesn’t mean to say they’re not religious. It’s hard to understand the idea, but this traveller was doing something another traveller wouldn’t do.
The man tellt us later, ‘Sandy, I’m ashamed that I’m burdenin the wee animal, poor wee cuddy.’ It was loaded up and you couldn’t put shoes on its feet, you see. ‘But Sandy,’ he says, ‘I couldnae get nothing else. I hadnae got nae money or coppers.’ Oh, he apologised, oh yes, definitely. Otherwise he wouldn’t have been company to us. The man said, ‘Sandy, I’m a wee bit sorry.’
Sandy says, ‘It’s aa right, dinnae worry about it.’ Once the man said that, then he was okay.
He said, ‘I ken it’s no fair, but the first chance I get tae swap it awa fir a wee pony . . .’
‘It’s aa right,’ Sandy says, ‘it’s okay.’ I didn’t know anything, I mean, I wasn’t in the horse trade. But I knew in my mind the man shouldn’t have been yoking a donkey in the first place. But it was all the man had. So in this way he was forgiven.
Mr Stewart was the man’s name. This donkey was loaded with covers and camp sticks and wands and everything. And it was a female, that made it worse. If it would have been a wee jack, it wouldn’t have been half so bad. And it was a bonnie wee cratur. Sandy was a wee bit upset in his own way. Every traveller was. But, not to be rude and not to be selfish, and not to be against the man, it was only against the idea.
After the man apologised yet again, ‘Och,’ Sandy says, ‘it’s aa right, dinnae let it bother ye! Put it up there, up the road. The laddie’ll gie ye a hand tae put yir tent up. And tether it up the auld road there an gie it plenty tae eat. Are ye gaun tae the games?’
‘Aye,’ he says, ‘wir gaun tae the games, man.’ And he was after the cranberries!
This man was an expert in cranberries. He had these wooden boards with six-inch nails chopped into them, round like a horseshoe, like combs. And he and his family set sail every morning from June till the end of August, and all summer they collected cranberries. They grew wild among the heather in bunches. They used these steel combs and combed them off the top of the heather, and put them into sheets. They combed leaves and everything. On a windy day they held them against the wind and poured them into another clean sheet. The wind blew all the leaves away, and the cranberries were beautiful in red heaps. I’d never seen this done. So I gave Mr Stewart a hand to put his tent up. The man built a big bow tent and me and the boys carried up some sticks and his water.
By evening time everybody was back from the games and the donkey was up the old road. I made sure she was tied in grass to her knees. Everybody had their tea, so we all gathered round the one fire. I made sure I had plenty sticks. Winkie and I gathered all the hedgeroots that were rotten. We always called them ‘auld gadgies’, old men, meaning they were too old to grow any longer. We pulled them out of the hedge. They weren’t good for anything. The farmers didn’t bother you because you weren’t doing any harm. You left spaces in the hedge right enough, where the sheep could go through. But they were the greatest things in the world to burn. So we got a fire of these old gadgies on, k
en! And Mr Stewart was the greatest storyteller you ever heard in your life. Cracks and stories for evermore. But he was awfully fond of ghost stories, believed in ghosts. And we spent a fair night with him. They really were good company.
So next morning I was up early, put on the kettle and made the tea, shouted at Sandy. Sandy got up. And old Katie, the first thing she got up in the morning she had to get the pipe. Pipe before she tasted anything in the world, to get a draw. And Winkie and Isa, after they got their faces washed and their bit breakfast, they said they were going to the games. Now the games didn’t open till about ten o’clock. So the night before Isa and I had packed all the flowers in Katie’s square basket.
And Sandy says, ‘Wumman, you’re only wastin yir time gaun tae the game wi flooers! Different if ye had white heather or something, wumman!’
I said, ‘Lea her alane, man. Wha’ dae you ken? It’s no you sellin them is it? If she wants to stand at the game wi flooers it’s aa right.’
So she said, ‘Come along wi me, brother, and I’ll get a pint o milk tae send back tae mak a cup o tea fir wee Winkie and yirsel, and I’ll get ye a packet o fags. It was only two pence for a pint of milk and four pence for ten Woodbine. We came along to the wee shop. She bought me the fags and milk. On the road there we came to this wee house at the corner. And the privet was growing away up, beautiful. She went into the house and asked the woman.
The woman said, ‘Aye, misses.’
She says, ‘I’m only wantin tae put wee bits o privet, stick on ma flooers tae go to the games.’
‘Oh!’ the woman says, ‘go and help yirsel.’ So Katie chose three beautiful flowers and put three bits o privet in them. She gave them to the woman.
‘Oh,’ the woman says, ‘thank you very much.’
Katie said, ‘That’s for the wee bit privet.’ And they were beautiful!
I said, ‘Auntie, I’ll come along and meet ye at night-time after the games is finished.’
She says, ‘Brother, I’m no gaun nae farther than the games.’ It was only about half a mile from the games field to the shop. ‘After I sell ma flooers I’ll get some messages and come hame.’
So I had taken the bike with me, but I walked with it. After Katie had put the flowers on the privet and I’d said goodbye to her and Isa, I jumped on the bike and cycled back. When I got back to the camp here’s Sandy and Mr Stewart, at the fire. Sandy was peeling wands and Mr Stewart was sitting cross-legged. His wife was away to the town, his laddies away to the hill. So I came in, put the bike against the dyke. Sandy’s sitting, pipe going well and the pocket knife lying aside him. Mr Stewart’s cracking to Sandy, he’d never seen him for months.
I said, ‘I’ll go and mak a cup o tea.’
‘Aye, brother,’ he said.
Winkie was running about making bows and arrows. So I got the tea on, good cup of strong tea and a full pint of milk. And the travellers didn’t carry cups in these days, it was wee bowls. Katie wouldn’t give you two pence for a cup. She loved these wee cheeny bowls. You could pack them into each other when you shifted, you see, they wouldn’t break. Katie had about half a dozen of these. And while she was away I used to go for a can of water, roll up my sleeves and wash all the dishes, turn the barrow upside down and put all the clean dishes on the top for her coming back. I was really good about the place. Then I went for sticks and sat down beside Mr Stewart. Sandy and he were telling cracks about travellers and about ghost stories and burkers, cracking about horses, dealing the horses and the fast horses he had and the horses that wouldn’t go and the anes that would! And the good deals he’d had and the bad deals, and the swaps he’d made and the good swaps he’d had and the bad swaps. Who had the best horses at the present moment, how far a horse could go in a day and driving up the glens, how much they could get in one day and all these things, the natural crack among travellers. So anyway, I came out with these two big bowls of tea.
I said, ‘Mr Stewart, do ye want a bowl o tea?’
‘Oh, cove,’ he said, ‘aye laddiekie!’ That’s what they called me in Aberdeenshire, ‘laddiekie’. ‘God bless ma sowl and body, man, that’s a braw cup o tea.’ He was kind of droll to me, ken? I gave him this bowl of tea and Sandy a bowl. So they sat and cracked and I helped Sandy peel the wands for a wee while.
Mr Stewart said, ‘It’s a wonder these laddies o mine’s no comin back. It must be gettin round about evening.’ And here his laddies came down, and they had bags on their backs.
‘In the name o God,’ I said, ‘whaur were they, Mr Stewart?’
He said, ‘They were awa tae the hill, man, cranberries!’
I said, ‘What?’ Now berries to me were juicy things you packed in a pail. I said, ‘Ye cannae carry berries on yir back, Mr Stewart!’
‘Oh aye, man,’ he said, ‘cranberries.’ I’d never seen these because there were none in Argyllshire. You got blaeberries there. ‘Oh, I’ll hae tae gang and gie them a wee bit helpie,’ said Mr Stewart. So I walked up with the man. And the man had the donkey yoked, the laddies had two bikes forbyes. They were cycling along, and they put their bikes lying against their father’s tent. He said, ‘Did ye get a wee puckle, boys?’
‘Aye,’ they said, ‘Father, we got a puckle.’ So he went to his donkey cart and pulled out this beautiful, clean burlap sheet. He spread it on the top of the ground and the boys cowped about half a hundredweight of these things like red pellets out of their bags onto it. And they had these combs and a string on them around their wrists.
‘In the name o creation,’ I said, ‘Mr Stewart, tell me a wee bit about this. I’m a wee bit strange tae this, I dinnae understand.’
The man picked up a handful, about half a dozen. ‘Try two-three, man. Ye no ken about these things?’ They were a wee bit bigger than redcurrants. I took one and burst it in my mouth. Inside it looked to me like a boiled potato. They weren’t juicy in any way, just dry inside. The man said, ‘They’re cranberries, man. We collect them and I’m takkin them tae a man up the roadie a wee bit on the other side o Heugh-head. We stay here for months at a time. We mak a wee bit o livin aff it.’ They kent what they were doing.
I said, ‘Mr Stewart, what will ye get fir that?’
He said, ‘I’m gettin six pence a pound.’ Six pence a pound! And they were pulling berries in Blairgowrie at a penny ha’penny.
He said, ‘We mak a guid livin at it, man. Ye’ve nae idea. Do ye want tae try them? Look up the hill. The hill’s red with them.’ But they were experts at it.
I said, ‘No, I could never dae that.’ You could see them in the distance. The hill was dark pink with berries at the top of the heather. They got ripe before the heather. So he shaked them all out and against the wind. The wind blew the leaves away and they were beautiful. He packed them in this big basket. He jumped on his bike with the basket and away he went. Oh, he must have had half a hundredweight on his bike. I went over to the laddies.
They said, ‘Aye, my daddy’s away along tae see the man aboot these berries. We dinnae hae too much. We dinnae ken, would the man still be interested in them or no.’
Sandy and I had another cup of tea and we peeled some more wands. I said, ‘I think I’ll go and meet Aunt Katie.’ I was just going to go out the road when here’s Katie and Isa coming in. Those flowers only stood them ten minutes at the games. It wasn’t the folk going into the games, it was folk in seeing the things coming out who wanted to take the flowers home with them. And the woman had plenty things, twenty fags to me, tobacco, the messages, everything.
So Sandy says, ‘I think we’ll stay here another couple o days.’ But I was wanting to get on. Sandy knew I was wanting to go, but I didn’t know my way up Deeside to Braemar. The Stewarts went back to their cranberries. They wanted me along but I said I wasn’t interested. I stayed with Sandy and made some more baskets.
But I told him, ‘I want to go to the berries.’
Sandy said, ‘Brother, the berries is aa right if ye want a good time, but ye’re no gaunnae make nae money.�
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‘I’m no makin nae money onyway,’ I said. ‘What difference does it mak? I’m no wantin tae mak nae money. My years’ll come for makin money. I want tae see what’s gaun on at the berries.’
‘Well,’ he says, ‘I’ll tell ye what’s gaun on at the berries. There hunger and poverty, and starvation at the berries.’ These are the words Sandy tellt me. ‘And dirt and filth.’
I said. ‘That’s poor encouragement ye gie me.’
He said, ‘I’m tellin you the truth.’
Aunt Katie said to me, ‘Laddie, you’re no wise gaun there tae the berries. You’re better stayin wi me and Uncle Sandy. We’ll go away back, up tae Braemar and we’ll cut across, go back doon the other side, doon Deeside. We’re thinkin o goin tae Fraserburgh for the wintertime. We’re gaunnae work wir way up roond Inverness and back tae Fraserburgh, look fir an auld hoose for the winter.’ Now I’d never been there. Fraserburgh to me was as well to be in America.
I said, ‘Look, Uncle Sandy, I want to go to the berries. Whaur’ll I get ye?’
‘Well,’ he says, ‘I cannae tell ye whaur I’ll be. Ye dinnae ken the road. But we’ll shift the morn, go up the length o Crathie, across tae Crathie Kirk.’ And the old man tellt me about Balmoral Castle and Crathie Glen. So the next morning we shifted from Heugh-head, and it was only a day’s travel to Crathie Kirk. In the evening we landed there and the first thing I saw was a cart pulled close to the road. And a white horse.
I said. ‘Uncle Sandy, there traivellers here.’
‘Aye,’ he said, ‘I wonder wha it is.’ So we pulled the barrow up and you had to leave your things at the roadend, go down the banking in beside the burn. And this wee man came up. Oh, he was about five foot two inches high, slim built and this great big moustache. But he had the bonniest blue eyes you ever saw in your life. And he only had one ear. Well, a bit o one anyway. And Sandy came up. I stopped the barrow at the roadside. Winkie was hurling the bike, Katie was walking behind smoking the pipe as usual. She and Isa were talking. And this cart was pulled right close to the roadside, just enough room for the traffic to pass. Down the banking was a nice camping place. And I could see a big bow tent and a big fire, and two or three folk round the fire. And this wee man came and shook hands with Sandy. Sandy introduced me.
The Horsieman Page 20