Snake Ropes

by Jess Richards

  I’m breathing too hard. Two tall men carrying a heavy hessian sack walk up the beach towards me, heading to the path up the cliff. I scramble up, my dress soaked, my legs shaking with cold.

  One of them is the one with Barney’s eyes. Him trails them eyes down my body. I wrap my arms around myself, step backwards into a deep puddle and the sea soaks into my boots.

  I stutter out, ‘You—’ I try to say something else but my mouth won’t speak.

  Him glances down my body again and says, ‘This one looks just like her dead mother.’ Him stares right at my eyes. I look away.

  So him knew Mam.

  ‘Leave this,’ says the other. Them walk away up the beach. I wonder if … I wonder if Barney … I watch them struggle with the sack to the foot of the path what leads up the cliff. I wonder if Barney will ever be a grown-up, and look just like him.

  But Mam can’t have bedded him. She couldn’t want to bed a tall man. Not Mam. Not ever Mam. She were a broiderer. The best broiderer. Everyone says so. If she’d bedded him, them’d never speak of her at all. Mam and Da fought sometimes, like any other pair, but them loved just as loud. Da would’ve smelled that tall man on her, for him stinks. Da would’ve smelled him and turned from her. But though she’s dead, Da loves her still.

  Seawater soaks up my dress. My boots are full of freezing water. I stamp out of the puddle and onto the sand.

  The other tall men are emptying barrels of fish into the boats – them never even saw the owl woman. Mam did a broiderie of an owl with a woman’s face, screaming. It were fearful. That broiderie is stuck in my head, twisting around. No real owl woman. Just a barn owl.

  But that tall man’s eyes are really Barney’s. I watch him and the other tall man carry the sack up the path to the cliffs.

  I dun look up at the Thrashing House while I pass it, dun breathe too loud neither. No one’s been put in there since I’ve been alive, but we all know to be careful. I keep following the two tall men south, along the cliff path.

  Them turn off the path by a crumbling drystone wall. I follow them down the slope and up the next hill to the stone track, past a cluster of cottages and barns. Them are going to the track what leads to the smithy, the cobbler’s and the glass-maker’s cottage and barn, where the furnace chimney blusters smoke into the sky.

  As I walk, my damp dress sticks to my legs. I practise saying, ‘You … took Barney. Did you bed …’ But my throat’s closed up tight. I try, ‘Tell me tell me tell me,’ for I know I’m good at that, but I can’t speak louder than a whisper.

  The tall men rap on the door to the cobbler’s and Moira opens it, her dark hair under a brown woollen shawl. She sees me and calls out, ‘Mary, you’re drenched, get yourself home – you’ll catch your death!’

  The tall men put the sack down by her door. It has the word lime printed on it, and I’ve seen them sacks at Dougan’s furnace, so I think it’s for glass-making. Them’ll be going to Dougan’s barn after Moira’s done her trade. One of the tall men glances over hims shoulder at me, shakes hims head and turns back to Moira. She lets them in and shuts the door.

  The wind blows against me and I’m freezing from the waist down, like there’s half a ghost living inside me. The chimney at Dougan’s barn is smoking. I walk over and bang on the barn door. Dougan screeches the door open, a rush of warm air floods over me.

  ‘Can I stand by your furnace? I’m soaked.’

  ‘C’mon then.’ Dougan wipes the sweat off hims bald head, steps back and I go inside. It’s all dark apart from the fire from the huge furnace. Him scratches hims grey beard and draws a chair up next to the fire. ‘Set yourself down there, I’ve got to get on, but.’ Him heaves an open hessian sack, which has the word silica printed on it, across the rough floor.

  There’s a row of small glass squares on the table next to me. I say, ‘You’re making the windowpanes thinner, but the ripples are still there.’

  Dougan says, ‘Takes years to learn to get the glass this thin and them’re still not even. Still like water, whether them’re thick or thin. My Dad never could get them all smooth, though him tried for near on forty years. Your panes holding firm Mary? Not had your Da round, not since the last storm.’

  ‘Them’re good strong windows at ours, the glass is thick.’ I look at hims big belly. ‘Dougan, Da is my Da, right enough, you never heard any of the men talk of it being … someone else?’

  ‘Now what’d make you say that? You know your Da’s your kin. You got it in your head you dun look like him or what?’ Him drags another opened sack of silica across the floor. ‘I should make you a proper mirror, girl.’

  ‘You’re all right, I’ve got a little mirror of Mam’s. But listen, there’s more women than men what live here – how do we know each Da is our own, for all of us? What if there’s not enough Da’s to go round?’

  ‘What’ve you gotten into your head? You got soaked down that there beach and come wandering – you getting all feverish? Just more women, for women have more daughters than sons is all. Heard you were sick. Should be in bed.’

  ‘But is him mine?’ I ask.

  ‘Course hims your Da, daft one.’ Him drags another open sack across the floor.

  ‘What about Barney?’ I ask. ‘Is him Barney’s Da too?’

  Him lets the sack drop, the fine sand spills onto the dirt floor. Him stretches hims back, comes over and frowns at me. ‘Now what’s got you to thinking like this? What’s rattled you? It’s sad Barney were took, but what—’

  ‘Nothing.’ I pick up one of the windowpanes from the table and look at him through the ripples.

  Him takes the glass from my hand, puts it back on the table. ‘Something’s done the rattling, not every day a girl comes round asking if her Da’s really hers …’ him says, quiet.

  ‘Think I’m seeing things. Now I’m sat by your fire, it feels like it were all in my head.’

  ‘Seeing things is it? My, you’re still sickly, but. Here.’ Him goes to the corner, snatches at a pile of cloths, comes back and throws a thick woollen checked blanket at me. ‘Wrap up in this and get yourself home. Your Da should get Valmarie to check on you. Get you some of her herbs.’

  ‘No, I’ll be right.’ I wrap the blanket around myself. ‘You getting a sack of lime from the tall men? Them’re next door.’

  ‘How d’you know it’s lime?’

  ‘It’s got lime wrote on the sack. Like them ones over there.’ I point at two other sacks of lime leaning up against the wall, both opened. ‘And the ones you’ve been dragging’ve got silica wrote on them. Looks like a kind of sand to me. If you look at the letters, you’ll get to know them’re different without opening the sack before you need to use it. I could show you—’

  ‘Aye. Well. Best see about this lime then.’

  ‘You remember I broke that windowpane at home, the moment you’d just fixed it in.’

  Him smiles. ‘Little ‘uns throw things all the time. You just had a better aim than most. Now, your Grandmam it were, set you off hurling things that day, if I remember right.’

  ‘You must’ve had to trek all the way back up here to get another pane, then bring it back to fix it again.’

  Four raps on the door. Four raps again.

  Him says, ‘Well.’ Him goes to the door. ‘Dun break anything while them’re here. Got to keep an eye on you.’ Him looks round at me, a spark in hims eye, and opens the door.

  With the light behind them, the two tall men are like shadows. All three wander off to talk. Dougan looks simple in hims waistcoat and baggy trousers next to the tall men’s clever long coats and hats. I fold up the checked blanket, put it on the chair and stand in the doorway. The tall men have thems backs to me. Dougan leans on the drystone wall. I go outside and pretend to trip over the sack of lime them’ve left lying in the grass. I curse, loud, and rub at my foot.

  The tall men glance round. Dougan winks at me and him goes off around the side of the barn to hims cottage.

  The tall men stand waiting.
Them’re talking to each other, quiet. I’m staring at the one with Barney’s eyes and thinking Mam must’ve shut her own eyes so tight and pretended him were Da, but I dun want to think about that, so I think about him taking Barney, and how him could’ve done it without me seeing, when I searched all the boats. I dun want to say anything till them’ve finished the trade, for I dun want Dougan to hear.

  All the same, I step towards them.

  But Dougan comes round the side of the barn, frowns at me and strides over to them. Him is carrying a white bulging pillowcase. Him says to the tall men, ‘My Nell says you can take these as a trade for the lime. One sack this month and two next. Them’re well hooked, you’ll see that.’

  The tall man with Barney’s eyes pulls out a crochet bobble hat. Him nods, puts it back in and says, ‘Till next month.’

  ‘Fine,’ says Dougan. ‘You be fair over it – bring me something you think’ll be good for my Nell an’ all, since that there crochet took her some time, and her eyes is going.’

  Nell leans round the side of the barn and calls out, ‘Mary, come here.’

  ‘You’re all right, Nell, I’ll be off.’

  She hobbles over to me, leaning on her walking stick. ‘I said, come.’ She pulls her black shawl away from her chest. She’s wearing the Thrashing House key.

  ‘All right.’ My head bowed, I follow her round the side of the barn towards her cottage.

  At the cottage door, she turns, ‘What’s this about you thinking your Da’s not really your Da?’ She taps her walking stick on a stone. ‘Doug tells me you’re still sick, and talking nonsense. Now, I knew your Mam, and I were there not long after you were born. Your Mam were in a state, for she were so young, and dun know what giving birth were to be like, but your Da were acting like any new father. You’re your Da’s daughter, through and through.’

  ‘But what of Barney?’

  ‘Never saw much of your Mam round then. But it’s like to be that she were scared right through with another baby coming. It’s no good you thinking like this. Barney’s took. You and your Da got to stick together Mary, you only get one lot of kin in this life, and it’s looking like for you, your Da is it. Dun be casting him off, not when him is the only belonging person you got left.’

  ‘Da dun miss Barney, not one bit.’

  ‘Well, for sure hims like to be acting like that. Him might be cutting off hims feelings so him is not full of missing him. Men’re just like that.’

  ‘No, it’s not like that. Him really dun miss him. Not at all.’

  ‘Well, it may be that’s the way of it, and you know your Da the best, I’m sure. And if hims not missing him and you are, that’s like to be hurting you now. But not one boy has come back. Your Da knows that. Dun be seeing blame where there’s none.’ She frowns.

  ‘Have you ever seen this thing, a white owl with a woman’s face? Mam did a broiderie of her, and I saw her, like a real thing, on the beach.’

  She stares at me, her mouth wide open. ‘Them’ve done it,’ she says. ‘Mary get yourself home. Get your Da indoors.’ She pushes me away.

  ‘So she’s real?’ I gasp out.

  ‘Doug!’ Nell shrieks, her eyes wide. Then she says to herself, so quiet I almost dun hear it, ‘I’ve got to get the key to Valmarie. She’s on the bells tonight.’

  ‘I’ll take it to her.’ I reach out my hand.

  She starts. ‘No you will not.’

  Dougan comes round the side of the barn. ‘You all right Nell? Mary, not troubling her are you?’

  ‘Get indoors Doug. You done with the tall men?’

  Him walks up to us. ‘Aye, them’re heading off. But I’ve got the furnace still blazing – I’m not done in there.’

  Nell grips Dougan’s arm. ‘Leave it to die down. Get in.’ She shoves him through the cottage door. ‘Mary, get your Da indoors. Go. Now!’

  I say, ‘But Da’s out on the sea—’ but she shuts the door. Her and Dougan bicker behind it. Him is yelling at her that him dun want to be shut indoors and she’s yelling back that him should be grateful to her, but she’s not going to tell him why. The next thing I hear is a wallop what sounds like one of them has clanged the other over the head with a pan. There’s a crash and it all goes quiet.

  I’m about to look in through the window but Nell opens the front door, comes outside and locks it behind her. ‘You still here? You never heard none of that Mary Jared, get off home. Get your Da indoors.’

  ‘Why?’ I call out, but she scuttles away around the side of the cottage. I follow her but she’s gone over a stile, and hurtles off, scattering brown sheep through the field in the direction of Valmarie’s house. So she can walk fast enough even with her walking stick, when she’s got a purpose.

  I go back to Nell’s cottage and listen at the door. Dougan must be still out cold. Nell’s left the cottage key in the front door so I draw it out. It sings in my hand as I shove it in my dress pocket. It’s mine now.

  The two tall men walk towards the cliff path.

  I call, ‘Wait – you’ve got to tell me—’

  The tall men turn round.

  I choke out, ‘You took—’

  One of them says, ‘Nothing that wasn’t traded.’ Them turn and walk away.

  ‘Wait—’ I walk after them. ‘What’s—’

  The one with Barney’s eyes stops again, turns to face me.

  The other one says, ‘Leave her, Langward. Got to get on.’ Him walks away.

  I say quiet, ‘That your name then, Langward? And is that the name my brother should’ve known as hims real father?’

  Hims lips draw up in a smile what dun reach hims eyes. ‘So, has your brother been found?’

  ‘You’re saying you dun know where him is, then?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘But you do know – you took him!’

  Him leans forwards. ‘I don’t have him. I want to find him too.’

  ‘So you are Barney’s Da!’ I cry out. ‘But how can you be – Mam wouldn’t have … not with you, not with any one of you! But you took him.’

  ‘You searched our boats.’

  ‘You could’ve hid him, then put him in your boat when I were crying – my eyes blurred with tears, couldn’t see. Give me him

  back!’

  ‘I said, I don’t have him.’ Langward glances at the other tall man walking away and says, ‘Don’t work yourself up to another fever. I heard your father was very … attentive. But there’s only so much time he can spend nursing. I assume you need to trade something to survive.’

  ‘Folk’ll be so mad if them find out you’ve been with a woman from here!’

  Him glances after the other tall man, still further away, then back at me. ‘Then don’t tell anyone,’ him says. ‘You seem to be good at keeping secrets.’ Hims eyes look cruel for a moment, not like Barney’s at all. ‘Your mother wouldn’t have bothered about searching for him. She’d just have let him … drift off.’

  I dun know what him means. Telling me how to think. Him is messing with my thoughts of Mam.

  ‘You’re so like her. So much anger …’ Him reaches out a pale hand towards my face.

  I step away. ‘Shut your stinking mouth up!’

  Him glares at me. ‘So, where can I find my son?’

  ‘You can’t have him for a son.’

  ‘My blood …’ him says, flexing back hims wrist so the blue veins rise.

  ‘It’s me what loves him. I’ll find him. Blood’s just blood. Nothing more.’ I stamp away towards the cliff path, turn to the south, and dun look back.

  Morgan

  I’m lost somewhere between this wooden spoon and the stew I’m stirring in the pot. I add pepper. And more. And more. My abdomen cramps. I’m the one on the rag, but Mum’s the one who’s sulking. I can feel her heavy sulk all the way through the ceiling, from the room above this kitchen.

  My parents aren’t even trying to fit in. The height of our house – two floors above ground – makes it too exposed. It creaks in the w
inds. Our house was built by my parents, with wood salvaged from a shipwreck. People must have died in that wreck. My parents didn’t care; they just wanted the planks. The people who live on this island must have wanted the planks too, but they will all get good solid coffins – and Dad will provide them with decent burials, given time.

  Dad dragged the wood here, plank by plank, up the hill from the shore. As always, he was wearing his suit. Mum waited for him with me, in the shack they’d made next to the foundations of this house. It was so cold in there, I didn’t even find any spiders. No one who lived on this island came to visit us in the shack. I thought I heard whispers, but each time I said so, my mother croaked. That scared all the whispers away.

  Croaked like a toad, hunched her back, but kept her eyes fixed on me.

  I slice up an onion and four cloves of garlic and throw them in the bubbling pot. I’m cooking in the wrong order today. I chop up the chicken meat. The smell of the flesh makes my stomach clench. Does marrow need to be salted? I can’t remember. I look out of the kitchen window. The tall fence blocks out any kind of view. All Mum said when she built the fence was, ‘I’ve always wanted a picket fence around my home,’ and got on with it. I remember her hammering the slats deep into the ground.

  That’s a bitter taste.

  More flavour … I slash parsley with a gleaming knife.

  I’ve heard people on the other side, laughing at it as they pass by. Why wouldn’t they? It’s ridiculous, but Mum thinks it’s the best thing that’s ever been made. This was my mother’s dream, the home she’d always wanted. A picket fence was the final touch, and it was the final touch that sealed us in.

  Mum built her picket fence thirteen feet high. And painted it bright pink.

  I draw bread from the oven and it fills the room with the smell of warm yeast. It collects Mum’s sulk from the air in this kitchen, pummels it down and flattens it on the floor. The tiles feel damp under my bare feet.