The Stone Book Quartet

by Alan Garner

  ‘I shall,’ said Mary.

  ‘I recollect it puts a quietness on you, does that bull. And the hand. And the mark.’

  Mary went to wash the Tough Tom from her boots in the spring when they reached home. The spring came out of the hill and soaked into Lifeless Moss, and Lifeless Moss spilled by brooks to the sea.

  Father sat with Mother for a while. Old William had picked up his usual rhythm, and the loom rattled, ‘Nickety-nackety, Monday-come-Saturday’. Then Father collected his work tools and sat down at the table and sorted through the pebbles.

  He weighed them in his hand, tested them on his thumbnail, until he found the one he wanted. He pushed the others aside, and he took the one pebble and worked quickly with candle and firelight, turning, tapping, knapping, shaping, twisting, rubbing and making, quickly, as though the stone would set hard if he stopped. He had to take the picture from his eye to his hand before it left him.

  ‘There,’ said Father. ‘That’ll do.’

  He gave Mary a prayer book bound in blue-black calf skin, tooled, stitched and decorated. It was only by the weight that she could tell it was stone and not leather.

  ‘It’s better than a book you can open,’ said Father. ‘A book has only one story. And tomorrow I’ll cut you a brass cross and let it in the front with some dabs of lead, and then I’ll guarantee you’d think it was Lord Stanley’s, if it’s held right.’

  ‘It’s grand,’ said Mary.

  ‘And I’ll guarantee Lizzie Allman and Annie Leah haven’t got them flowers pressed in their books.’

  Mary turned the stone over. Father had split it so that the back showed two fronds of a plant, like the silk in skeins, like the silk on the water under the hill.

  And Father went out of the room and left Mary by the fire. He went to Old William and took his ophicleide, as he always did after shouting, and he played the hymn that Old William liked best because it was close to the beat of his loom. William sang for the rhythm, ‘Nickety-nackety, Monday-come-Saturday’, and Father tried to match him on the ophicleide.

  William bawled:

  ‘ “Oh, the years of Man are the looms of God

  “Let down from the place of the sun;

  “Wherein we are weaving always,

  “Till the mystic work is done!” ‘

  And so they ended until the next time. The last cry went up from the summer fields, ‘Who-whoop! Wo-whoop! W-o-o-o-o!’

  And Mary sat by the fire and read the stone book that had in it all the stories of the world and the flowers of the flood.

  GRANNY REARDUN

  They were flitting the Allmans. Joseph sat at the top of Leah’s Bank and watched.

  The horse and cart stood outside the house, by the field gate. Elijah Allman lifted the dollytub onto the cart first and set it in the middle. Then Alice and Amelia climbed into the dollytub, and Elijah packed them round with bedding. Young Herbert was carrying chairs.

  The Allmans loaded the cart with furniture, stacking from the girls in the dollytub, so that the load was firm. Mrs Allman came out of the house backwards on her knees. She was donkey-stoning the doorstep white, and when she had done she stood up, and reached over the step and pulled the door to.

  Elijah helped her up onto the carter’s seat. Young Herbert sat next to her, holding the reins. Elijah took the bridle and walked the horse through the field gateway, down the Hough and onto the Moss.

  Joseph listened to them go. He went to the top corner post of the field, ran three strides and slid down Leah’s Bank. It was such a steep hill, and the grass so hard and slippery, that he could slide for yards at a time, standing. And when the grass was brogged by old cow muck, he had only to keep his balance, skip, and be away again.

  He pushed the door open.

  The house smelt wet with donkey—stone and limewash. The rooms were enormous empty. All the floors were white, all the walls and beams and the ceilings white. The stairs were sand-scoured, and the boards too. There was no dirt anywhere.

  Joseph looked out of the bedroom window. The Allmans were away across the Moss. He left the house and went home for breakfast. He lived at the bottom of the hill.

  Grandfather had finished his breakfast and was smoking a pipe of tobacco in his chair by the fire. His hard fingers could press the tobacco down hot in the bowl, without burning himself.

  ‘They’ve flitted Allmans,’ said Joseph.

  ‘Ay,’ said Grandfather.

  ‘What for?’ said Joseph.

  ‘The years they’ve been there,’ said Grandfather. ‘It’s a wonderful thing, them in their grandeur, and us in raddle and daub.’

  ‘Why?’ said Joseph.

  ‘Eat your pobs,’ said Grandmother.

  Grandfather knocked the ashes of his pipe out onto his hand and pitched them in the fire. He raised himself. ‘Best be doing,’ he said. ‘Damper Latham’s getting for me. And think on,’ he said to Joseph, ‘I’ll have half an hour from you before school. Is your mother coming up for her dinner today?’

  ‘And fetching Charlie,’ said Joseph. ‘She promised.’

  Grandfather picked up his canvas bass and took his cap off the doornail. The chisels and hammers clinked together in the bass. ‘Be sharp,’ he said to Joseph.

  Grandfather was old. But he still turned out. He was building a wall into the hedge bank of Long Croft field, down the road from the house, under the wood.

  Joseph washed his basin and spoon at the spring in the garden, and ran down the road to Long Croft.

  Grandfather was rough-dressing the stone for the wall, and laying it out along the hedge. Joseph unwound the line and pegged one end in the joints Where Grandfather had finished the day before, and pulled the line tight against the bank. His job was to cut the bank back to receive the stone and to run a straight bed for the bottom course.

  He chopped at the bank.

  ‘Sweep up behind you,’ said Grandfather. ‘Muck’s no use on the road. It wants to be on the field.’

  Joseph had to throw the clods high over his head to clear the quickthorn hedge.

  ‘Get your knee aback of your shovel,’ said Grandfather. ‘There’s no sense in mauling yourself half to death. Come on, youth. Shape!’

  Joseph chopped, shovelled and threw. Grandfather worked the stone.

  ‘I don’t know why I bother,’ he said. I’d as lief let it lie. The rubbish they send! I doubt there’s not above a hundred years in it. Watch your line!’

  Joseph was sweating. Grandfather took the spade from him and looked along the bank. He walked down the raw cut edge and shaved the earth with light swings of the blade. ‘You’ve got it like a fiddler’s elbow,’ he said.

  Damper Latham came with his cart up the road under the wood from Chorley. The cart was heavy and pulled by two Shires. Their brasses glinted. Suns, moons and clovers chimed on their leathers. Damper Latham kept his horses smart as a show.

  ‘Now then, Robert,’ he said.

  Grandfather looked over the side of the cart. ‘What’s all this?’ he said. ‘It’s never stone.’

  Damper Latham winked at Joseph. ‘Eh, dear, dear! Robert?’ he said. ‘Has the Missis been sitting on your shirt tail?’

  ‘Take it away,’ said Grandfather. ‘I’ll not put me name to it.’

  Damper Latham let down the boards and the sides of the cart and climbed onto the load. He began to walk the stones to the edge and slide them down two planks to Grandfather.

  ‘You’ll take what you’re given, Robert,’ he said. ‘Else go without. I’ve had a job for to get these.’

  Grandfather grunted, and swung the blocks to he as he wanted. They seemed to move without more than his hand on them.

  Joseph tried to help, but he couldn’t even pull the weight from the slope of the plank. He pulled and shoved, and the block shifted its balance and came at him. He couldn’t stop it and he couldn’t put it down and it was fighting him. He twisted away, but he still couldn’t let go. The living dead weight of it all gripped his hands and wre
nched his shoulders. Then it fell clear and smashed on the road.

  ‘You great nowt!’ shouted Grandfather. ‘See at what you’ve done!’

  Joseph ran up the plank to the cart.

  ‘See at it!’ shouted Grandfather. ‘I can’t use that! I’m not a man with string round his britches!’

  The chapel clock struck eight.

  ‘There’s not better to be got, Robert,’ said Damper Latham.

  ‘Well, I’ll not abide it,’ said Grandfather.

  ‘Must I go fetch you a load from Leah’s Bank?’ said Damper Latham.

  ‘No!’

  ‘Where’s stone on Leah’s Bank?’ said Joseph.

  ‘It’s eight o’clock,’ said Grandfather. ‘Time you were off.’

  ‘Stay and give us a tune,’ said Damper Latham. ‘I’m going down the village. You can have a ride.’

  ‘He’ll be late,’ said Grandfather.

  ‘He’ll not,’ said Damper Latham. ‘The E-Flat’s under me coat there.’

  Joseph picked up the bright cornet from beneath the seat and set his tongue to the mouthpiece and loosened the valves with his fingers.

  ‘What must I play?’ he said.

  ‘Give us a Methody hymn for to fetch this load off,’ said Damper Latham. ‘One with a swing.’

  Joseph played ‘Man Frail and God Eternal’ twice. Grandfather and Damper Latham worked together, as they had always done. The stone moved lightly for them.

  ‘The busy tribes of flesh and blood, with all their lives and cares,’ sang Damper Latham, ‘are carried downwards by the flood, and lost in following years.’

  ‘Couldn’t wait,’ said Grandfather. ‘One week to flit. Out.’

  ‘Where’ve they gone?’ said Damper Latham.

  ‘The Moss,’ said Grandfather.

  ‘Give us a swing, youth!’ Damper Latham nudged Joseph. Joseph had stopped playing.

  ‘Let’s have some Temperance,’ said Grandfather.

  So Joseph played ‘Dip your Roll in your own Pot at Home’.

  ‘How’s Elijah? said Damper Latham.

  ‘Badly,’ said Grandfather. ‘Them as can’t bend, like as not they break.’

  ‘Eh,’ said Damper Latham, and he looked both ways on the road before he spoke. ‘Is it true what it’s for? A kitchen garden?’

  ‘True? It’s true!’ said Grandfather. ‘Kitchen garden! Rector’s wife must grow herself a vine and a twothree figs, seemingly. She caught a dose of religion, that one; and there’s Allmans out. Hey!’

  Joseph was looking at his own stretched face in the swell of the cornet. Someone must have taken the brass and shaped it and turned it, with valves for every note, tapping, drawing it to soprano E-Flat.

  ‘Hey! Let’s hear “Ode to Drink”. This lot wants some raunging.’ The cart shook as Grandfather pulled at the base of the stack.

  Joseph sucked for spit, but his mouth had dried.

  Grandfather and Damper Latham began without him, and he had to catch up when his lips were wet.

  ‘Let thy devotee extol thee,

  And thy wondrous virtues sum;

  But the worst of names I’ll call thee,

  O thou hydra monster Rum!’

  The stones thumped off.

  ‘Pimple-maker, visage-bloater,

  Health-corrupter, idler’s mate;

  Mischief-breeder, vice-promoter,

  Credit-spoiler, devil’s bait!’

  Damper Latham swept the cart with his broom, and danced and marched to Joseph’s music. Grandfather had his chisels out and was hitting the notes on them with his hammer, like a xylophone.

  ‘Utterance-boggler, stench-emitter,

  Strong-man sprawler, fatal drop;

  Tumult-raiser, venom-spitter,

  Wrap-inspirer, coward’s prop!’

  Joseph had stopped playing. His neck hurt for thought of the Allmans. He couldn’t swallow. But Grandfather and Damper Latham went on, singing louder and louder, tenor and bass, by turns.

  Joseph shut his eyes.

  ‘Virtue-blaster, base deceiver!

  Spite-displayer, sot’s delight!

  Noise—exciter, stomach-heaver!

  Falsehood-spreader! Scorpion’s bite!’

  Grandfather and Damper Latham were laughing too much to work.

  Joseph opened his eyes. He was looking straight into Grandfather’s, and they were hard, fierce, kind and blue.

  ‘That’s it, youth,’ said Grandfather. ‘Strike or laugh. You’ll learn.’

  Damper Latham backed the cart round for the village. ‘Shall you be wanting anything, Robert?’ he said.

  ‘If you’re going by the smithy, tell Jump I need a four-pounder. And tell him I’ll see him.’

  ‘Right, you are, Robert,’ said Damper Latham. ‘Coom-agen, coom-agen,’ he called to the horses, and the two Shires scraped sparks with their shoes, and pulled. Damper Latham nodded towards the brass cornet in Joseph’s hands and went on singing, his head and shoulders going back and to like a big clock.

  ‘Quarrel-plotter, rage-discharger,

  Giant-conqueror, wasteful sway…’

  Joseph picked up the tune again.

  ‘Chin-carbuncler, tongue-enlarger!

  Malice-venter, Death’s broad way!’

  Grandfather was singing, too, and striking the chisels. His voice and their ringing faded. Joseph played and played.

  ‘Tempest-scatterer, window-smasher,

  Death-forerunner, hell’s dire brink!

  Ravenous murderer, windpipe-slasher,

  Drunkard’s lodging, meat and drink!’

  Damper Latham and Joseph rode in silence. After the music, the horses and the cart were a quietness.

  Your Grandfather: he was a bit upset, that’s all,’ said Damper Latham. ‘It’s hard, at his time of day.’

  ‘I know,’ said Joseph.

  ‘After all the tremendous work he’s done. And now I can’t hardly get him enough red rubbish for a length of wall — him as has cut only the best dimension stone all these years. It comes very hard.’

  ‘He wants me to follow him,’ said Joseph.

  Damper Latham looked sideways quickly.

  ‘And shall you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What shall you do, then? Go for a brick-setter?’

  ‘No. I don’t know.’

  ‘When do you finish your schooling?’

  ‘Today,’ said Joseph.

  ‘And you’re not prenticed?’

  ‘Me Grandfather thinks I’ll be with him. But I’ll never,’ said Joseph.

  ‘I’ve been getting for Robert thirty years,’ said Damper Latham. ‘And there isn’t the call on it now. Everywhere’s brick. They want setters, not getters.’

  Joseph looked at the brass cornet. ‘Is it correct about Allmans?’

  ‘Ay.’

  ‘They’ve been put out?’

  ‘Ay.’

  ‘For a garden wall?’

  ‘Ay.’

  ‘What’s wrong with bricks for a garden?’ said Joseph.

  ‘Wouldn’t suit,’ said Damper Latham. ‘And that house is the last dimension in the Hough. They had to flit.’

  The Shires stopped without telling when they came to the smithy. Damper Latham hitched their reins and went into the farrier’s yard and down the wide steps to the cellar where the forge stood. Joseph put the cornet back under the seat and followed, quietly.

  The smith and all his gang were working in a red and black light, hammermen every one of them, and making things. The noise was tremendous.

  ‘Now then, Jump!’ shouted Damper Latham.

  ‘Now then, Damper!’ shouted the smith, and all the hammering and the noise stopped. Horseshoes quenched in the trough.

  Joseph stayed back from the men, watching, near the bellows of the forge. The long handle of the bellows was above him in the shadow.

  The gang sat down and drew their beer from a keg under the bench and gave Damper Latham his mug.

  Joseph reached up and put hi
s fingers round the bellows handle. The ashwood was like silk to touch. He gripped hold to feel, and the handle moved before he could stop it. It moved just once, down and up, and the bellows breathed, and the coals glowed.

  The smith looked, and saw Joseph. Joseph kept hold of the handle.

  ‘That’ll do, youth,’ said the smith gently, but he meant it.

  Joseph let go.

  ‘Best be off,’ said Damper Latham.

  Joseph turned away from the warmth and the busy men together, up the steps into the farrier’s yard and daylight, and he went excited.

  The chapel clock struck nine.

  Joseph was late for school. He could hear its bell ringing the scholars in. He looked up at the chapel spire. At opposite ends of the village stood the two great pieces of Grandfather’s life: church and chapel. They marked the village for him. Saint Philip’s had a bigger steeple, and the chapel had the clock.

  Joseph walked down the village towards the school and Saint Philip’s, over the station bridge. Everything he saw was clear. He knew something he didn’t know. It was the bell. It was the clock. It was the spires!

  Grandfather had worked the chapel, but he had not given it the time. He had helped on the school, but he couldn’t ring them in. He had topped Saint Philip’s steeple, but it wasn’t the top. The top was a golden vane, a weather cock. Cock, clock, bell and at the chapel a spike to draw lightning. Wind, time, voice and fire — they were all the smith!

  Joseph’s palm sweated on the cold iron latch of the big school door. Inside the hall he heard the end of prayers.

  The carpenter couldn’t lock the door. The carpenter could never open it or close. Latch, lock, hinges were the smith.

  Joseph looked down. The step was stone, and he would not cross it for his last day. Still holding, he faced about. The school porch showed the view, a stone arch around the world, and Grandfather had made that. It framed Saint Philip’s steeple and the weathercock.