by Unknown
The first-known face our three met was Corp. He was only able to sign to them, because Californy’s specialty had already done its work and glued his teeth together. He was off to the smithy to be melted, but gave them to understand that though awkward it was glorious. Then came Birkie, who had sewn up the mouths of his pockets, all but a small slit in each, as a precaution against pickpockets, and was now at his own request being held upside down by the Haggerty-Taggertys on the chance that a halfpenny which had disappeared mysteriously might fall out. A more tragic figure was Francie Crabb (one and seven pence), who, like a mad, mad thing, had taken all his money to the fair at once. In ten minutes he had bought fourteen musical instruments.
Tommy and party had not yet reached the celebrated corner of the west town end where the stands began, but they were near it, and he stopped to give Grizel and Elspeth his final instructions: “(1) Keep your money in your purse, and your purse in your hand, and your hand in your pocket; (2) if you lose me, I’ll give Shovel’s whistle, and syne you maun squeeze and birse your way back to me.”
Now then, are you ready? Bang! They were in it. Strike up, ye fiddlers; drums, break; tooters, fifers, at it for your lives; trumpets, blow; bagpipes, skirl; music-boxes, all together now — Tommy has arrived.
Even before he had seen Thrums, except with his mother’s eye, Tommy knew that the wise begin the Muckley by measuring its extent. That the square and adjoining wynds would be crammed was a law of nature, but boyhood drew imaginary lines across the Roods, the west town end, the east town end, and the brae, and if the stands did not reach these there had been retrogression. Tommy found all well in two quarters, got a nasty shock on the brae, but medicine for it in the Roods; on the whole, yelled a hundred children, by way of greeting to each other, a better Muckley than ever.
From those who loved them best, the more notable Muckleys got distinctive names for convenience of reference. As shall be ostentatiously shown in its place, there was a Muckley called (and by Corp Shiach, too) after Tommy, but this, his first, was dubbed Sewster’s Muckley, in honor of a seamstress who hanged herself that day in the Three-cornered Wood. Poor little sewster, she had known joyous Muckleys too, but now she was up in the Three-cornered Wood hanging herself, aged nineteen. I know nothing more of her, except that in her maiden days when she left the house her mother always came to the door to look proudly after her.
How to describe the scene, when owing to the throng a boy could only peer at it between legs or through the crook of a woman’s arm? Shovel would have run up ploughmen to get his bird’s-eye view, and he could have told Tommy what he saw, and Tommy could have made a picture of it in his mind, every figure ten feet high. But perhaps to be lost in it was best. You had but to dive and come up anywhere to find something amazing; you fell over a box of jumping-jacks into a new world.
Everyone to his taste. If you want Tommy’s sentiments, here they are, condensed: “The shows surpass everything else on earth. Four streets of them in the square! The best is the menagerie, because there is the loudest roaring there. Kick the caravans and you increase the roaring. Admission, however, prohibitive (threepence). More economical to stand outside the show of the ‘Mountain Maid and the Shepherd’s Bride’ and watch the merriman saying funny things to the monkey. Take care you don’t get in front of the steps, else you will be pressed up by those behind and have to pay before you have decided that you want to go in. When you fling pennies at the Mountain Maid and the Shepherd’s Bride they stop play-acting and scramble for them. Go in at night when there are drunk ploughmen to fling pennies. The Fat Wife with the Golden Locks lets you put your fingers in her arms, but that is soon over. ‘The Slave-driver and his Victims.’ Not worth the money; they are not blooding. To Jerusalem and Back in a Jiffy. This is a swindle. You just keek through holes.”
But Elspeth was of a different mind. She liked To Jerusalem and Back best, and gave the Slave-driver and his Victims a penny to be Christians. The only show she disliked was the waxwork, where was performed the “Tragedy of Tiffano and the Haughty Princess.” Tiffano loved the woodman’s daughter, and so he would not have the Haughty Princess, and so she got a magician to turn him into a pumpkin, and then she ate him. What distressed Elspeth was that Tiffano could never get to heaven now, and all the consolation Tommy, doing his best, could give her was, “He could go, no doubt he could go, but he would have to take the Haughty Princess wi’ him, and he would be sweer to do that.”
Grizel reflected: “If I had a whip like the one the Slave-driver has shouldn’t I lash the boys who hoot my mamma! I wish I could turn boys into pumpkins. The Mountain Maid wore a beautiful muslin with gold lace, but she does not wash her neck.”
Lastly, let Corp have his say: “I looked at the outside of the shows, but always landed back at Californy’s stand. Sucking is better nor near anything. The Teuch and Tasty is stickier than ever. I have lost twa teeth. The Mountain Maid is biding all night at Tibbie Birse’s, and I went in to see her. She had a bervie and a boiled egg to her tea. She likes her eggs saft wi’ a lick of butter in them. The Fat Wife is the one I like best. She’s biding wi’ Shilpit Kaytherine on the Tanage Brae. She weighs Jeems and Kaytherine and the sma’ black swine. She had an ingin to her tea. The Slave-driver’s a fushinless body. One o’ the Victims gives him his licks. They a’ bide in the caravan. You can stand on the wheel and keek in. They had herrings wi’ the rans to their tea. I cut a hole in Jerusalem and Back, and there was no Jerusalem there. The man as ocht Jerusalem greets because the Fair Circassian winna take him. He is biding a’ night wi’ Blinder. He likes a dram in his tea.”
Elspeth’s money lasted till four o’clock. For Aaron, almost the only man in Thrums who shunned the revels that day, she bought a gingerbread house; and the miraculous powder which must be taken on a sixpence was to make Blinder see again, but unfortunately he forgot about putting it on the sixpence. And of course there was something for a certain boy. Grizel had completed her purchases by five o’clock, when Tommy was still heavy with threepence halfpenny. They included a fluffy pink shawl, she did not say for whom, but the Painted Lady wore it afterwards, and for herself another doll.
“But that doll’s leg is broken,” Tommy pointed out.
“That was why I bought it,” she said warmly, “I feel so sorry for it, the darling,” and she carried it carefully so that the poor thing might suffer as little pain as possible.
Twice they rushed home for hasty meals, and were back so quickly that Tommy’s shadow strained a muscle in turning with him. Night came on, and from a hundred strings stretched along stands and shows there now hung thousands of long tin things like trumpets. One burning paper could set a dozen of these ablaze, and no sooner were they lit than a wind that had been biding its time rushed in like the merriman, making the lamps swing on their strings, so that the flaring lights embraced, and from a distance Thrums seemed to be on fire.
Even Grizel was willing to hold Tommy’s hand now, and the three could only move this way and that as the roaring crowd carried them. They were not looking at the Muckley, they were part of it, and at last Thrums was all Tommy’s fancy had painted it. This intoxicated him, so that he had to scream at intervals, “We’re here, Elspeth, I tell you, we’re here!” and he became pugnacious and asked youths twice his size whether they denied that he was here, and if so, would they come on. In this frenzy he was seen by Miss Ailie, who had stolen out in a veil to look for Gavinia, but just as she was about to reprove him, dreadful men asked her was she in search of a lad, whereupon she fled home and barred the door, and later in the evening warned Gavinia, through the keyhole, taking her for a roystering blade, that there were policemen in the house, to which the astounding reply of Gavinia, then aged twelve, was, “No sic luck.”
With the darkness, too, crept into the Muckley certain devils in the color of the night who spoke thickly and rolled braw lads in the mire, and egged on friends to fight and cast lewd thoughts into the minds of the women. At first the men had been
bashful swains. To the women’s “Gie me my faring, Jock,” they had replied, “Wait, Jean, till I’m fee’d,” but by night most had got their arles, with a dram above it, and he who could only guffaw at Jean a few hours ago had her round the waist now, and still an arm free for rough play with other kimmers. The Jeans were as boisterous as the Jocks, giving them leer for leer, running from them with a giggle, waiting to be caught and rudely kissed. Grand, patient, long-suffering fellows these men were, up at five, summer and winter, foddering their horses, maybe hours before there would be food for themselves, miserably paid, housed like cattle, and when the rheumatism seized them, liable to be flung aside like a broken graip. As hard was the life of the women: coarse food, chaff beds, damp clothes, their portion; their sweethearts in the service of masters who were reluctant to fee a married man. Is it to be wondered that these lads who could be faithful unto death drank soddenly on their one free day, that these girls, starved of opportunities for womanliness, of which they could make as much as the finest lady, sometimes woke after a Muckley to wish that they might wake no more? Our three brushed shoulders with the devils that had been let loose, but hardly saw them; they heard them, but did not understand their tongue. The eight-o’clock bell had rung long since, and though the racket was as great as ever, it was only because every reveller left now made the noise of two. Mothers were out fishing for their bairns. The Haggerty-Taggertys had straggled home hoarse as crows; every one of them went to bed that night with a stocking round his throat. Of Monypenny boys, Tommy could find none in the square but Corp, who, with another tooth missing, had been going about since six o’clock with his pockets hanging out, as a sign that all was over. An awkward silence had fallen on the trio; the reason, that Tommy had only threepence left and the smallest of them cost threepence. The reference of course is to the wondrous gold-paper packets of sweets (not unlike crackers in appearance) which are only seen at the Muckley, and are what every girl claims of her lad or lads. Now, Tommy had vowed to Elspeth — But he had also said to Grizel — In short, how could he buy for both with threepence?
Grizel, as the stranger, ought to get — But he knew Elspeth too well to believe that she would dry her eyes with that.
Elspeth being his sister — But he had promised Grizel, and she had been so ill brought up that she said nasty things when you broke your word.
The gold packet was bought. That is it sticking out of Tommy’s inside pocket. The girls saw it and knew what was troubling him, but not a word was spoken now between the three. They set off for home selfconsciously, Tommy the least agitated on the whole, because he need not make up his mind for another ten minutes. But he wished Grizel would not look at him sideways and then rock her arms in irritation. They passed many merry-makers homeward bound, many of them following a tortuous course, for the Scottish toper gives way first in the legs, the Southron in the other extremity, and thus between them could be constructed a man wholly sober and another as drunk as Chloe. But though the highway clattered with many feet, not a soul was in the double dykes, and at the easy end of that formidable path Grizel came to a determined stop.
“Goodnight,” she said, with such a disdainful glance at Tommy.
He had not made up his mind yet, but he saw that it must be done now, and to take a decisive step was always agony to him, though once taken it ceased to trouble. To dodge it for another moment he said, weakly: “Let’s — let’s sit down a whiley on the dyke.”
But Grizel, while coveting the packet, because she had never got a present in her life, would not shilly-shally.
“Are you to give it to Elspeth?” she asked, with the horrid directness that is so trying to an intellect like Tommy’s.
“N-no,” he said.
“To Grizel?” cried Elspeth.
“N-no,” he said again.
It was an undignified moment for a great boy, but the providence that watched over Tommy until it tired of him came to his aid in the nick of time. It took the form of the Painted Lady, who appeared suddenly out of the gloom of the Double Dykes. Two of the children jumped, and the third clenched her little fists to defend her mamma if Tommy cast a word at her. But he did not; his mouth remained foolishly open. The Painted Lady had been talking cheerfully to herself, but she drew back apprehensively, with a look of appeal on her face, and then — and then Tommy “saw a way.” He handed her the gold packet, “It’s to you,” he said, “it’s — it’s your Muckley!”
For a moment she was afraid to take it, but when she knew that this sweet boy’s gift was genuine, she fondled it and was greatly flattered, and dropped him the quaintest courtesy and then looked defiantly at Grizel. But Grizel did not take it from her. Instead, she flung her arms impulsively round Tommy’s neck, she was so glad, glad, glad.
As Tommy and Elspeth walked away to their home, Elspeth could hear him breathing heavily, and occasionally he gave her a furtive glance.
“Grizel needna have done that,” she said, sharply.
“No,” replied Tommy.
“But it was noble of you,” she continued, squeezing his hand, “to give it to the Painted Lady. Did you mean to give it to her a’ the time?”
“Oh, Elspeth!”
“But did you?”
“Oh, Elspeth!”
“That’s no you greeting, is it?” she asked, softly.
“I’m near the greeting,” he said truthfully, “but I’m no sure what about.” His sympathy was so easily aroused that he sometimes cried without exactly knowing why.
“It’s because you’re so good,” Elspeth told him; but presently she said, with a complete change of voice, “No, Grizel needna have done that.”
“It was a shameful thing to do,” Tommy agreed, shaking his head. “But she did it!” he added triumphantly; “you saw her do it, Elspeth!”
“But you didna like it?” Elspeth asked, in terror.
“No, of course I didna like it, but—”
“But what, Tommy?”
“But I liked her to like it,” he admitted, and by and by he began to laugh hysterically. “I’m no sure what I’m laughing at,” he said, “but I think it’s at mysel’.” He may have laughed at himself before, but this Muckley is memorable as the occasion on which he first caught himself doing it. The joke grew with the years, until sometimes he laughed in his most emotional moments, suddenly seeing himself in his true light. But it had become a bitter laugh by that time.
CHAPTER XIX
CORP IS BROUGHT TO HEEL — GRIZEL DEFIANT
Corp Shiach was a barefooted colt of a boy, of ungainly build, with a nose so thick and turned up that it was a certificate of character, and his hands were covered with warts, which he had a trick of biting till they bled. Then he rubbed them on his trousers, which were the picturesque part of him, for he was at present “serving” to the masons (he had “earned his keep” since long before he could remember), and so wore the white or yellow ducks which the dust of the quarry stains a rarer orange color than is known elsewhere. The orange of the masons’ trousers, the blue of the hearthstones, these are the most beautiful colors to be seen in Thrums, though of course Corp was unaware of it. He was really very good-natured, and only used his fists freely because of imagination he had none, and thinking made him sweat, and consequently the simplest way of proving his case was to say, “I’ll fight you.” What might have been the issue of a conflict between him and Shovel was a problem for Tommy to puzzle over. Shovel was as quick as Corp was deliberate, and would have danced round him, putting in unexpected ones, but if he had remained just one moment too long within Corp’s reach —
They nicknamed him Corp because he took fits, when he lay like one dead. He was proud of his fits, was Corp, but they were a bother to him, too, because he could make so little of them. They interested doctors and other carriage folk, who came to his aunt’s house to put their fingers into him, and gave him sixpence, and would have given him more, but when they pressed him to tell them what he remembered about his fits, he could only answe
r dejectedly, “Not a damned thing.”
“You might as well no have them ava,” his wrathful aunt, with whom he lived, would say, and she thrashed him until his size forbade it.
Soon after the Muckley came word that the Lady of the Spittal was to be brought to see Corp by Mr. Ogilvy, the schoolmaster of Glen Quharity, and at first Corp boasted of it, but as the appointed day drew near he became uneasy.
“The worst o’t,” he said to anyone who would listen, “is that my auntie is to be away frae hame, and so they’ll put a’ their questions to me.”
The Haggerty-Taggertys and Birkie were so jealous that they said they were glad they never had fits, but Tommy made no such pretence.
“Oh, Corp, if I had thae fits of yours!” he exclaimed greedily.
“If they were mine to give awa’,” replied Corp sullenly, “you could have them and welcome.” Grown meek in his trouble, he invited Tommy to speak freely, with the result that his eyes were partially opened to the superiority of that boy’s attainments. Tommy told him a number of interesting things to say to Mr. Ogilvy and the lady about his fits, about how queer he felt just before they came on, and the visions he had while he was lying stiff. But though the admiring Corp gave attentive ear, he said hopelessly next day, “Not a dagont thing do I mind. When they question me about my fits I’ll just say I’m sometimes in them and sometimes out o’ them, and if they badger me more, I can aye kick.”
Tommy gave him a look that meant, “Fits are just wasted on you,” and Corp replied with another that meant, “I ken they are.” Then they parted, one of them to reflect.
“Corp,” he said excitedly, when next they met, “has Mr. Ogilvy or the lady ever come to see you afore?”
They had not, and Corp was able to swear that they did not even know him by sight.
“They dinna ken me either,” said Tommy.