In Good Company

by Mika Paananen

  'Because you were not intended to; before now,' my father just replied me.

  It was a thick oak forest; I had never seen trees so tall and noble. Most of it was really old, good timber. So I almost dropped from my feet when my father said that the forest or merely all the tallest oaks were sold and should be felled soon; and taken to shipwright. There had been some wealthy visitors not long time ago, measuring the woods and knocking around the oaks.

  'These be the timber merchants,' my father said and added that our master was well paid for the oaks but the merchants even more.

  But there, as we were standing in the edge of that oak forest, my father looked sternly at me and said:

  'I want you to overlook the felling of these oaks, bid the farewell, and see that everyone is gone after it is over.'

  He put such a weight in the word 'everyone' that it got me a wee bit started. I couldn't think some logger staying dwelling around after those oaks were taken away. I questioned this and got a strange answer:

  'Well, ye return here just before the sun goes it's way; and if I have brought ye up to be a tall man in these lands, just pray our Lord if something else than the everyday growth shows up, but do not show if yer affright. Everything that is there belongs there by right before it is carried away.'

  I did not get the idea at all. Later at home, I tried to ask my mother but she only got frightened and said:

  'So now the time has come; ye promise me to be careful out there!'

  She took her Bible--she used to keep it next to her everywhere--squeezing it so firmly that I got nervous, I must admit. Then I asked my father one of the horses and he just nodded behind his pipe and knew where I was headed. So I mounted when afternoon was giving way for the evening. I was so deep in my thoughts that I took my beast to our destination without thinking of miles it took. The oak forest was all shadows; shrubs and coppices making their strange forms that anyone with beliefs towards faerie tales would stay away. Ravens croaked and magpies replied; some buck took a start across the fields when I dismounted. I tied my beast under a couple of ash trees; my father had not pointed me any certain spot to dwell, so I chose a tall stone and sat down. Except for the big birds everything was silent. When the sun got lower, even they stopped; and I just sat there and didn’t know what to expect, felt a wee silly.”

  ~~~~

  The trader picks a watch from his vest and looks impatient.

  ”Trader, sit still, yer cart and purse will not move without ye, do they?” boatswain exclaims.

  The trader seems very uncertain as he wants to hear the rest but the valuable timepiece goes on without mercy. I fear I shall not hear any recordable account from this trader, so imprisoned is he by his chosen life. He now lets out a loud sigh and settles back.

  ”Aye, that's me thought as well. Pray continue,” boatswain turns to the yeoman.

  ~~~~

  ”The forest went all dark and I had to take a new seat, an old stump, closer to the trees. That's when I started to hear some voices; like whispering but also rustling. Any other time I would not have paid attention but I was prepared for something else, the nature of which I had no idea. I got shivers but recalled my father's teachings; so I calmed down and after a while I could hear at least two men discussing quietly. I thought first 'Well, no use for Holy Book with these; they be poachers!' I darted to my beast and picked the blunderbuss. Ye know, poachers are never talking with others but with violence. They can murder a forester as easy as a deer. I returned quietly to my watch. They had gone all quiet and I thought they'd seen me. No sound followed; either they were now preying on me or something else. But then I got them at sight, two lumpy and black figures in a spot that was not occupied moments before, some twenty yards off; so much I trusted my eyes. After a while I could see some details; they were looking deeper into the forest. Something made a rustle there, and I saw by the moving bushes that it must be a deer. Now the other man raised a bow; I reckoned they were carrying blunderbuss as well for defense, so it was no use for me to rush in getting killed. The bow was let go with a 'Swoosh!' and I heard the thud of an arrow hitting something smooth. But then the silence returned, no noise of prey falling to ground; no wailing of wounded or dying creature. I noticed the poachers' wonderment; and about that moment it happened: A great light blinded me for a moment; I heard poachers cursing and stumbling onto each other and bushes. I heard them shouting:

  'It's a trap, it's the bloody forester; or constable!'

  I started to see again and wondered if any lantern could be that bright. Then I saw it--or her, actually--she was walking her feet off ground, I say she was floating and approaching from the very spot the deer was shot. The poachers were now seeing her and blunderbuss went off; and then another, both villains had one. I grasped mine firmly but did not raise it, before I noticed that both poachers were rushing out of the forest, towards my spot. Now my weapon settled onto my cheek but it said only 'Pfsh!', it misfired but I cannot tell anymore what I was actually aiming at. I started but the other poacher ran onto me, knocking me down and shouted something like:

  'Yer all damned!'

  Twenty yards off in the open field, they stumbled down onto their faces and remained there. The light from the forest was now brighter than the rest of daylight, the sun had gone down. I rushed to poachers and turned them around; their eyes and their mouths were wide open and no physician was needed to tell me they were dead and cold already. Then I turned around and saw her watching me from between the treeline. She had very long white hair, covering all the way down to her waist; she was wearing something of a night gown; barefooted she was. I could have sworn she was out of some bedlam; but there was this light about her, she carried no lantern. I tried to say something but she was just floating there, her feet off the ground. Then I wished I had my own Bible to squeeze there. She had killed those men without touching them, I was certain of it; and I had only a useless piece of blunderbuss with me. Suddenly everything became calm; noises ringing in my ears, they were gone. Her face was a beauty but it was of great sorrow, of true grief. That caught me also, I was not affright anymore. What I know, I wanted back home as soon as possible, to see my parents; I felt like a small child left into solitude. I carefully stood up, kept my eyes on this strange lady or maid and she was just staring back at me. The thought hit me; she was looking at my weapon, was she going to kill me also as an offender? But she just stared; I stepped backwards to my beast, untied him from the tree and mounted. I saw my beast was calm as ever; there had been more noise than with any tall hunting party; but my beast was the tranquility itself. He did take a start when told so, though. I went like a wind once I had mounted; I turned to look back once and she was still there. Only when I turned through another forest path, she was there no more.

  When I got home, my mother rushed to the yard shouting:

  'Quick, it's yer father!'

  I left my beast to her and rushed inside. My father was in bed, odd-colored and ill. He had heavy breath but opened his eyes and asked me smiling:

  'So, young forester, did you see anything?'

  I started to explain him everything, he had to slow me down but he seemed to understand everything, though the death of those poachers got him puzzled.

  'Yes, I have met her before; we never talked but she means no harm if one harms not her home, the forest that is. You see, I think she's the forest herself. No, I'm just ill, not out of my mind. At first I thought her as some witch, as people like to make up the tales around here; but she's the forest, that I am certain about.'

  My father had it difficult to speak but he continued:

  'She'll probably be gone with the oaks, be there new ones growing or not. That I know. And that's what I want you to overlook when they are gone.'

  I found no sense of this at all; but in a few days the oaks--and my father, may he rest in peace--were gone. I took a watch in several nights there but no maids nor deer; no ravens nor magpies. It seemed to me everything was gone. The forest is
growing again there but I know that kind of tall oaks are gone.”

  ~~~~

  The trader sighs:

  ”Oak maids and poachers with weak hearts; I say, I have been through countryside and I say you people don't spit into your tankards. Bright maid, I say! Behold: An angel!”

  The yeoman looks sulky:

  ~~~~

  ”Quiet! Isn't finished yet! You see, a few summers later, my master got visitors with an odd business; Navy uniforms among others, they were knocking and measuring around the remains of oak forest. I overheard them telling my master about the trouble with shipbuilders getting ill, if not insane; the timber was suspected to be the culprit with some unknown disease. My master inquired what kind of insanity they might have; and officers told him--cautiously--about them babbling about some bright lady wandering about the decks and piers during nights and keeping disappearing when someone tries to say a word! So, they came asking if there was some substance used or growing in this forest that caused men seeing faeries, into which my master only replied that such substance should be sought from taverns of Chatham. That's it. You may laugh to these tales but I say, there's a forest spirit onboard some unfortunate man-o-war!”

  ~~~~

  The trader lifts his eyebrows and tries to hold his laugh back.

  ”Perhaps you should be hanged for treason then, if you were aware about such a possibility, a terrible maid smuggled into our man-of-war? Now, if you are not into some delicate tales of more earthly women...”

  The yeoman mutters back:

  ”Wasn't a good tale then? Perhaps you have one or I suspect you cannot lay but numbers in front of us?”

  ”Not correct, my friend; actually I might have some tale which gloriously combines unlucky mariners and the spirit of outlaws. And if you find this entertaining, might you say your master a good word about a humble trader offering best wines and finest fabrics?”

  Trader looks complacent about the idea of some advertising agreement against a qualifying tale. Yeoman lowers his eyebrow but grumbles:

  ”Agreed. This better be good! Though my master is more than close with his purse. But that's yer problem.”

  Boatswain shows no lesser contractor when he adds:

  ”Ha! Perhaps our trader could offer a sample of wine and a nice piece of some ladies cloth to me for offering them to the next bonny lass I stumble upon?”

  Trader sits back glaring the overjoyous mariner.

  ”Should drunken beasts drown my tale under their waffling, the agreement and my presence shall be non-existent.”

  Boatswain stares back with drunken awe while yeoman shakes his head:

  ”If you are going to grow speeches like that, I agree to stop here. Sell the tale yarned with clarity.”

  Trader makes a slight bow.

  ”Pardon me. Us traders must be able to maneuver in all levels. Now let me see...”

  By this untoward nitpicking chatter I lay my quill down and raise the snifter but it is empty. I have managed to take swigs without noticing my act at all, so great has my concentrating been while recording yeoman's tale. I stand up and walk past inn-keeper's table into back room to fetch a new bottle, dropping a couple of coins to inn-keepers table when walking back. The keeper turns his head around but just mutters and swings his hand a bit, like fending off a fly. I pack the tale-filled, animal-skin parchments into my satchel and grab fresh ones into table; in the nick of time as the trader begins.

  ~~~~

  ”This happened far north, on the north cliffs of Caithness, where waters--named by the savage conquerors of north very long time ago--are swift and merciless between Highlands and Orkneys, thus this is a mariner tale; for which I apologize our bosun here, for invading his territory of tales. Any ship passing that fatal channel needs a pilot, an able navigator to guide the ignorant shipments through horrible tidal movements. So they would hire or even seize any local in possession of necessary skills. Up there I learned that while some local pilots returned unscathed in matter of days, some took years to return for their employers did not care to return the unfortunate mariner until they harbored at foreign lands. And the rest, you can guess; they were gone forever like ships they entered, to the bottom. Back then I was working for a local merchant and at the moment in a painful process persuading a local landlord to sign a trade agreement about some merchandise; which, according to my employer's wishes, also covered landlord's tacksmen as well. My employer, being Edinburgh-born himself, suggested me using a perfect practice of invoking the very Scottish clan spirit; of course this practice included suggestions about neighbouring clans' trade agreements. Thus the business was fortunate ever after; apart from one, most unnatural incident: On a dark evening I was travelling to tell one of the tacksmen of his needs towards my employer's merchandise; jumping back and forth in my coach on a coastal track where one could see the wallowing black mass behind the cliffs, making one grateful not to be out there.

  It happened though that before we reached our destination, I heard coachman shout and horses halted like there was a curtain wall dropped in front of them. I quickly insisted the reason to this halt but coachman and guard only muttered and pointed in front of the horses. In the dim lighting I could see there was someone so I stepped out and inquired if this was some highwayman in absolutely incorrect place. Guard sprung down from his seat with musket ready. However, we both looked this figure closer and he was quite ordinary, formally clothed from well looking tricorne down to boots; except he was bleak and soaked, dripping water. Now, it wasn't raining at the moment but our surroundings were wet. More interesting point occurred when he made a bow towards us, taking his hat off and there came a miniature waterfall from it. Then he turned on his heels, moved to the side of the tracks and waved us to pass with the coach.

  'Hallo Sire! Can I offer you a ride, there's plenty of room?' I shouted him from the coach once I had embarked again and passing him but he didn't look us again.

  My head still outside, I turned to see what was forward and then looked back again. The man had vanished. Well, it was getting very dark and nothing remains in sight too long even in those opens. I have no great faith in ghosts. I always say that the greatest ghost of mine is losing the contracts and the money; not wet, vanishing people at the lands where such people can be everyday sight and nothing unnatural. I would have forgotten the whole episode, had we not received the strangest reception at the tackman's farm.”

  Trader takes a modest sip and sits back. After all, he is not an apprentice either for spinning tales. I shall have a truly good evening's quarry written down in parchments, for which I consider myself most fortunate. Onward goes the trader's tale:

  ”Halting the horses in front of a representative Scottish farmhouse, we got a gloomy reception from a young man who muttered with his strong accent words that I barely recognized foretelling merely trouble for any trading attempts. But when I met lady of the house, I could see that this was nothing against my person; instead this middle aged, yet attractive matron--whom I would have used impertinently as a tool of trading by bribing her with baubles and trinkets, and thus persuade his old man in trade–-was mournful and told me--if I got any words correct from her accent--that her old man, the tacksman had been usurped previous evening by some unknown men, most probably mariners. The villagers were noted at once but none had seen the usurpers. Only in the morning she had faintly recalled her husband's precarious past before marital life; he was carrying some dark secrets from the time he may have been dealing with smugglers. She wept that his husband was too well known of his maritime skills; thus they might have usurped the tacksman to have him piloting another ship through those treacherous waters. Worse acquaintances, they never leave a soul in peace. I had nothing to say but console her with almost useless phrases; and telling her that I was merely on my employer's task to trade with a man who was not present. Thus I was leaving the otherwise warm but sadly broken home, when I happened to ask about the soaked man on the road. For this she started and
after I gave her description of the strange person, both wife and son rushed out past me, hardly grabbing proper clothing; and onto the track leading out to main road, yelling his name. And alas! there he walked towards the house, soaked and pale as ever, out of the darkness. The very same figure we had met. He stopped there in sight of his family while his wife tried to run the final yards to get a hold of him. His face did not show any change of emotions, they were just plain pale and full of sorrow. Then just before his wife touched him, he took his hat off, made a courteous bow, and vanished. His wife plunged to ground through the previously vacated spot, started on her knees in wonder and then screamed. But what could we do, I was amazed as well but I told myself, the nature and the weather was playing pranks with us. We helped the mourning family inside, saw that the son was taking care of his mother. We left the place in some silence and while the merchant inquired me about this case, I just told him the plain truth, that there had possibly been a tragedy and thus it was not the correct spot for business at the time. I believe the landlord took some care of the family afterwards. There's my tale.”

  ~~~~

  Having said this, trader bows modestly and asks:

  ”How about it, forester, eh? Have I earned the honor to be advertised to your master?”

  The yeoman winks his eyes around the walls, thinking.

  ”I would say yer yarn was dull and poor of action and I think our sailor here agrees with me; true words, bosun?”

  He pokes the mariner who almost falls off from his seat, now unaware of his surroundings and snoring aloud, much to the chagrin of trader who declares:

  ”So be it, now I have to embark as I have no doubt my earnings will be plentiful somewhere else ahead.”

  I must agree with the yeoman; perhaps the absolute and accurate profession of money sheds these souls of their ability to embellish, but with the necessary exception of affairs where these talents of trade shine. Yet I must pass the tale as eligible, for I feel a sudden need for fresh air. A seaside walk would do. The yeoman now sweeps his mouth and mutters goodnights to inn-keeper and boatswain, who has fallen in slumber. Yeoman makes his exit and is soon heading his beast through dark moors, marshes and forests; places where emission of tales enjoys abundance with similitude to high seas and coastlines betwixt.