The Ballad of John Clare

by Hugh Lupton

  On Monday afternoon she returned. She found a lift to Helpston in a tradesman’s cart. As dusk settled she made her way to John Close’s farm with her empty baskets. As she drew close she heard the shouting of Richard Royce and the Plough Bullocks. Knowing which day it was and not wanting her best cottons and shawl to be smeared with sooty grease from a Witch’s ladle, she followed the fence and then walked behind the stables so that she could slip un-noticed through the kitchen door.

  Out in the yard the Plough-boys had drunk John Close’s ale. It was the last call of the day. The Bullocks put down their pole and Richard Royce stepped out from between the stilts. He put his hands to his mouth and bellowed up at the house:

  “Give us a bloody rope will ye!”

  Inside the drawing room Mr and Mrs Close were sitting with their two daughters. Mrs Close lifted her fingers to her ears:

  “Oh that horrid man, however did he get chosen as King of the Harvest.”

  “Because,” said John Close, “he’ll do twice the work of any other. He’s strong as an ox. No one can match him.”

  He called down to the kitchen:

  “Give them a length of cart-rope!”

  Mrs Close shuddered as though all her sensibilities had been offended.

  Outside in the yard Richard Royce was enjoying himself.

  “We’ll finish the day with a tug o’ war! Witches against Bullocks.”

  A rope was thrown out into the snowy yard.

  “Come on! Stand to!”

  Befuddled with John Close’s strong ale, the Bullocks staggered to one end of the rope and lifted it. At the other end the Witches were throwing down besoms and ladles and conferring, there was a shout of laughter. Then they lifted their end.

  Richard Royce unfastened the handkerchief from his throat and tied it to the middle of the rope. He scraped two lines into the snow with his heel.

  “There …pull it across your line and you’ve won.”

  He raised his arm:

  “Take the strain!”

  The rope tightened between the two teams.

  “Heave!”

  The tug began. Iron-shod heels dug through the snow into the frozen muck of the yard below. Every man was leaning his weight against the other team, but the handkerchief was moving slow and steady towards the Witch’s line.

  Richard Royce turned to the Bullocks:

  “Heave you useless sods!”

  The handkerchief was almost over the line when Richard seized the rope and joined the Bullocks. He leaned backwards and grunted. The handkerchief began to move the other way. The Witches were being pulled forwards and slowly, inch by inch, the handkerchief drew close to the Bullocks’ line.

  “Heave …heave …heave …”

  The team was working to Richard’s rhythm.

  Then Jem Johnson whistled and all the Witches opened their hands and let go of the rope.

  The Bullocks staggered backwards across the yard. Richard Royce crashed into the iron pump and fell senseless to the ground. The others collapsed in drunken heaps. The Witches, laughing, pelted them with snowballs.

  John Clare, holding his balance longer than most, was loosed like a stone from a sling. He staggered backwards across the yard into the shadows by the stable wall.

  There was a woman’s voice:

  “Careful!”

  Then he was aware of colliding with something and falling into a softness that was warmer than snow. He was on his back, laughing, and tangled up with another. His head was against the stiff cotton of a woman’s lap. He opened his eyes and looked up at her.

  Betsy Jackson had pulled herself up into a sitting position, her baskets half buried in the snow to either side of her. She peered down into the Plough-Bullock’s face, smeared with soot and grease, and in the moment she would have pushed him aside and cursed him for his drunken antics she recognised him.

  “John Clare!”

  Before John had time to answer her lips were soft and warm against his mouth.

  “How does that feel John?”

  John was filled with a drunkard’s oblivion to all but the sensation of the moment. He smiled up at her and she kissed him again, loosening the buttons of her coat and blouse and lifting his hand to one of her breasts. John could feel her nipple between his fingers. She recoiled and then relaxed at the sudden coldness of his touch. She kissed him again, more urgent, and John was lost to all but the prompting of his blood and the sweetness of sensation … for he had never run his hand across a woman’s naked skin before. She whispered:

  “Come with me!”

  She scrambled to her feet, took his hand and pulled him upright.

  “This way.”

  Unseen by any she pushed open the door of the stable. They went inside. It was dark. The air was full of the sweet, musky smell of horses and hay, and the sound of snorting and the scraping of hooves against the stone floor. She led him to the corner of the stable where some coarse woollen blankets had been thrown across a heap of hay. She threw herself down onto them.

  “John …”

  She pulled his hand and he fell down against her. Their lips met again. As they kissed she reached down and unbuckled his belt. She reached inside.

  “How does that feel, John Clare?”

  She did not need to hear his answer for she could feel in her hand how he wanted her now. With her other hand she pushed his fingers against her breast and for a long moment their mouths were pressed together, drinking thirstily and gasping against each other.

  Then she hitched her petticoats up to her waist and drew him atop of her.

  “John …”

  But he silenced her mouth with his kisses, and for that little while that seems to be both an eternity and but a few short heartbeats they clung to one another as though all life depended upon it, as though all else before and after was lost in some faint mist that could only be dispelled by the quickness of their breath. And then with a sudden shudder and a cry she lifted her knees and drew him to her, and he lowered his mouth to her neck and folded against her, and she held him in her arms like a child.

  Outside the Helpston Ploughboys were still shouting. Betsy lay back under John’s weight and listened. As time passed the voices began to grow fainter. One by one they were leaving the farmyard and making their way home through the snow. John had fallen asleep. She eased him gently onto his side and pulled away from him. She folded a blanket over him. She climbed down from the hay-pile and brushed down her petticoat and gown. She buttoned up her blouse and coat. She made her way across the stable and pushed open the door. The night air was cold against her face. She picked up her two baskets and shook out the snow. The last of the Ploughboys was staggering out of the yard. She crossed quietly to the kitchen door, lifted the latch and pushed it open.

  Elizabeth Close was standing in front of the fire pouring hot water from the kettle into a china pot.

  “Oh Betsy, good, you’re back at last …”

  Then she gasped:

  “Oh Betsy! Those horrid Plough Witches! They have smeared your face all over with their awful filth.”

  She put down the pot, poured hot water onto a cloth, ran across and dabbed Betsy’s cheeks with it.

  “There should be a law! Mother says so and I agree with her. It is a barbarous custom.”

  Betsy sat down on one of the wooden kitchen stools. Her body felt alive with a sleepy, triumphant song. She enjoyed the busy sensation of the cloth against her face. She smiled:

  “’Tis an old custom, Miss Elizabeth …and I have never seen any great harm in it.”

  14

  St Valentine’s Day

  Snow has given way to rain again and everywhere is mud. In the fields the men at their ploughs, or hedging and ditching, curse the cold wet that lashes their faces and the cloying mud that clogs their boots and drags them to a standstill. The shepherds set their backs to the wind as the winter lambing begins. The enclosure teams, at their fence-setting and stone-breaking, listen for the chiming of the chur
ch clock and count the hours until dusk when spades and hammers can be dropped and forgotten. The women, hurrying from dairy to coop, from kitchen to midden, lift their gowns and scold the wet that soaks their feet and the puddles that stain and bedraggle the hems of their petticoats. They curse the splashing horses and carts that throw up their stinking mud from the street. Only the ducks and geese in the yard-ponds rejoice at the wetness of the world.

  Under the trees in the skirts of Oxey Wood and Royce Wood and beneath the blackthorn bushes on the commons the nodding snowdrops are come, that with the first crying lambs signal that the winter season is beginning to slacken its hold.

  John Clare has told no soul his secret. In the weeks since Plough Monday maybe those who know him best – Dick Turnill, Parker, Ann, Sophie, Sam Billings, Mary Joyce – maybe they have noticed some slight, subtle shift, some new turbulence in his inner weather that they cannot put a name to.

  He cannot lie down to sleep at night without his thoughts turning to Betsy. He knows it would take only a word, a sign, a note slipped into her hand after the village band had played, and she would meet him, and all that had happened before would happen again. His body aches with desire for her, every drop of blood urges him to creep out of the cottage to John Close’s yard and throw a stone at her window, if only he knew which window it was.

  And then he remembers Mary.

  Then he remembers Mary Joyce and his heart wakes up and his head sinks back against the pillow. He remembers her in every detail: her lovely, wild spirit; her tender, funny, kindly ways; her trusting, soft, bold kisses. And he hates every part of himself that could entertain the thought of betraying her.

  Every Sunday John and Betsy have played together in the church band, without any word or glance being exchanged between them. As John is often silent and will stare at his boots rather than speak his thoughts, little notice is taken of his reticence by the rest of the band. And Betsy does not let John’s silences keep her tongue from its cheerful chatter that gives away little of her thought.

  On the third Sunday of this new year of our Lord that is 1812 she lingered in the church porch and waited for John, who himself had hung behind, hoping she was gone ahead. As he came out of the church door she called to him:

  “John.”

  He blushed and carried on walking towards the church gate, his fiddle under his arm. She stood and walked swiftly to catch him up. The congregation was dispersed, the parson was still in church.

  “John …Have you forgot me?”

  The echo of his words to Mary when first he’d seen her at Snow Common made him blush deeper. They also served to harden his resolve.

  He whispered:

  “Let what happened be forgot. I have a sweet-heart. She is not thee.”

  “Not once again John?”

  He felt his cock stirring in his breeches:

  “Never.”

  He broke into a run and left her behind.

  That afternoon, when the Close’s Sunday luncheon had been served and cleared, Betsy Jackson asked if she might have a piece of paper and the use of one of Mr Close’s quills and a bottle of ink.

  “Ay Betsy,” said Mrs Close. “Take what you need.”

  She carried them upstairs to her little room. She bolted the door. She put the ink pot on the chair. She knelt on the floor put a board on the bed and spread the paper on it. She dipped the pen into the ink.

  ‘Dear John’ she mouthed and scratched. ‘You have pointed her out before. I warrant she hasn’t shewn ye such sweets as I. Ay, and would again. Though I would not come between ye. Our secret is safe. Do not fear me. BJ.’

  She read the page several times over to herself, then tilted her head to one side, smiled and set the pen down on the chair. And in that smile was writ far more than her letter contained. It was sad and knowing and defiant and seemed to say to itself: ‘For all that I have you hooked to my line, I will not die if I lose you, for I have known enough of love and loss to live another day without regret for what I have and have not done.’ She tossed her curls, folded the paper, tucked it into the wooden box where she kept her oboe, and carried quill and ink downstairs.

  The next Sunday she slipped the note to John.

  It was not until he was walking the new road through Woodcroft Field on his way to Sunday luncheon at Joyce’s Farm that he pulled it from his pocket and read it through. He tore it into tiny pieces and scattered them over the low hedges to the ploughed fields on either side as though he was scattering corn. There was little in the letter to ease his torment for it was clear enough that, Mary or no Mary, there would be a welcome from Betsy if he was to go to her.

  But providence has been kind, for in the fortnight since the passing of the note she has not appeared in church. She has sent word that she is not feeling altogether well. And with her absence John has, at last, been able to begin to push Plough Monday to the back of his mind. He was after all, he tells himself, in his high altitudes. He was not altogether himself. And without Betsy’s presence he has been able to dream that it is Mary’s soft legs enclosing him, Mary’s flesh against his hand.

  And every Sunday he walks to Glinton and sits beside her at table and rejoices in her. He tells himself that he is shaking away the taint of Betsy Jackson and in his heart he thanks her for her absence.

  *******

  Ever since Christmas morning, when the news reached Glinton that Will Bloodworth had vanished, Farmer Joyce has been uneasy. Every grain of evidence and every long-held prejudice point to foul play. He lies awake at nights telling himself that his willingness to testify on the gypsy’s behalf and his complicity in his escape were grave misjudgements. He mutters to himself: “Maybe the Boswell youth should have hanged after all” and “Poor Mary is led astray, and I have been swayed by her”. His good name is in danger of disgrace, and there is no soul to whom he dare speak his mind. He blames himself for being blind, and for letting himself be over-fond. “And was it not” he tells himself, “John Clare’s influence on poor Mary that was the cause of all my distress …I should have listened to first promptings and nipped him in the bud?”

  He governs his farm with an eye to every fault so that Will and Nathan are in a constant flurry of brushing and sweeping, and the women in dairy and kitchen wary of every smut.

  And though he welcomes John Clare to his table on a Sunday it is clear in the tenor of his voice that his doubts have won the upper hand. Where he had been lax he feels that he must now be firm. And Mary, for her own happiness and for his peace of mind, must be made to see sense.

  So it was that last Sunday, when John’s visit to Glinton was ended and he was making his way out of Joyce’s yard and Mary was standing in the kitchen door watching him, she felt her father’s hand upon her shoulder.

  “He won’t do Mary.”

  She turned to face him.

  “What d’you mean he won’t do?”

  “He won’t do at all. I was riding home from Helpston on Friday and I saw him breaking stones for the new Glinton road with the enclosure team, and I thought to myself that he will never do for my Mary. He ain’t going anywhere.”

  “He’s a better man than any …”

  “I’m not saying there’s any harm to him …but think about it Mary, that’s all I ask. Think about who you are and where we stand. And think about John Clare who has no land, no prospects and no fortune beyond his last week’s wage …”

  Mary’s eyes filled with tears:

  “Is that all you can think about? Is a man to be measured by the acres he owns?”

  “I bear him no grudge Mary, but could he keep you? Could he make you happy? Love is blind, but marriage is a great eye-opener …”

  “Whoever spoke of marriage?”

  “Sooner or later you’ll have to turn him down Mary. And the sooner it is the less you’ll both be burned. Think on it.”

  *******

  On Valentines morning Mary Joyce was up before the dawn. No word of her father’s would sway her from her resolv
e. Sooner or later – she told herself – he would see sense and give her and John his blessing. She had laid out her yellow dress the night before, the one she’d worn on Rogation Day and May Day, for it seemed to her that it had good fortune sewn into every seam. She washed herself and cleaned her teeth with twigs until they seemed to shine. She dressed and combed her hair. She made her way downstairs to the kitchen. Kate Dyball was already up and busy. Mary drew her into the pantry. She whispered:

  “How do I look Kate?”

  Kate looked her up and down. She brushed a stray hair from Mary’s shoulder. Then she spoke from her heart:

  “You look a picture Miss Mary. I reckon John Clare is the luckiest man in all England.”

  Mary laughed with delight at Kate’s earnest face, and at some intimation that she spoke true. She kissed Kate’s cheek.

  “Listen. Here’s my plan. I shall ride over early.”

  Mary cut a slice of bread. She cut herself some cheese. She took a mouthful.

  “And I shall hide behind a tomb-stone, and when John comes he shall wait and wait and think that he’s forsook. And the clock shall strike a quarter past the hour, and he’ll be pacing up and down …and when his back is turned I shall creep up and surprise him from behind. What do you think o’ that Kate?”

  Kate’s red fingers were spread out on her plump cheeks, her little eyes were round and shining and her mouth was open at the romance and the rashness of the plan.

  “Oh I wish I had such notions as you Mary …but with Nathan I’d fear after five minutes he’d give up an’ go home … and not see the funny side when I did jump out at him.”

  “But John’ll wait,” said Mary with conviction.

  “Ay, I reckon he will …” Kate looked at Mary and smiled, “leastways he’s a dolt if he doesn’t.”

  Mary crammed the last of the bread into her mouth and winked. Kate laughed and then a shadow of concern played across her round face: