The Butcher's Hook

by Janet Ellis

  ‘Enough!’ He cuts me short. ‘Never mind your gracious thank yous. Your mind is fixed to another post now, I see. I know that I bore you with my meanderings. And that you suspect me.’ Is my head made of glass? Otherwise how can he tell what I am thinking? ‘You shine with purpose.’ He plucked me from the crowd like a man panning for gold.

  ‘What brings you here, Anne?’ He raises his eyebrows in question. ‘Love,’ he answers himself. ‘Love. Ah, love. Love is like water. You need it, but too much and you’ll drown.’

  When I loved my brother, my feelings were like the steady flow of the clearest stream. I am standing under a torrent now, splashed on all sides.

  ‘You can leave me here. I’ll not pine.’ He sits on the ground, puts his back to the bricks and pulls his tatty hat over his face. At once there is a steady snoring.

  The butcher’s sign is propped by the wall, the fixings that once held it above still swing and chinkle as they hang empty. A few lumps of red meat stuff lie in the deep window, and the door is closed. I push at it, just to test if I can open it and it swings wide before I can regret my hasty action.

  Fub stands there, behind the wooden counter. He wears a leather apron, shiny in patches where it is slicked with wet, but it is too dark-coloured to be sure what the dampness is. All around and above him hang the amputated legs and bodies of numerous beasts, each in their caul of fat. Creatures that could never in life have shared the same field, for they would have fought or cowered, have had no choice but to jostle close together in sullen deathly silence. The smell is so strong that it is almost visible, a great sour reek pricked with a sharp tang. Gobbets of blood stick to the sawdust on the floor; they look solid enough to thread on a ribbon like beads. Fub cuts up a small piece of meat, concentrating on his task, so that his head is tilted down and the top of his head is visible. The dark hair swirls outwards in two whorls from a double crown. The sight is so affecting to me that I gasp. I want to stroke him there, or pull hard. The impulse is the same. He looks up.

  ‘Do you need any gloves, Miss Jaccob?’ He gestures along the chopping block to a small mound of empty fur that was once around a rabbit. The little paws are flung wide apart and the head lolls. That is the stuff he slices, then, his small prey. He speaks as if we were mid-conversation, unruffled.

  ‘It is too warm for gloves,’ I say, trying to match his light tone. Not very successfully, for I am breathless.

  ‘I don’t deliver to your house today. Not till—’ He pauses, considering his appointments. ‘Next Tuesday. But you may check the order, if that’s why you are come.’ He lays the little knife down by the raw flesh and wipes his hands over his apron. He gathers the pile of diced meat together and lays it on a square of cloth, then folds it carefully. I watch his hands, thinking of them on my clothes, unpeeling them in the same neat way. He washes off the blood in a pail. There is no sound but the water splashing.

  ‘Is that why you are come?’ He looks at me so directly I feel as if I am on trial. I have not sworn on any bible to be truthful, so I can say what I like.

  ‘Yes.’ My collar feels tight, but I stop my hands from going to my neck, pressing my arms to my sides though it takes a huge effort to be still. ‘My father is most particular about his cuts.’

  ‘And you are not? Any old gristle for you?’

  That does it. A great blush starts at my feet, ice cold at first then warming as it rises. I am suffused with colour when the heat reaches my cheeks, and if I can’t see my bright shade reflected in his eyes, I can certainly tell how much he enjoys my discomfort. Even my breath comes out hot.

  ‘Do you know what this is?’ He holds a short twist of thick metal, in the shape of the letter ‘S’, sharpened at both ends. I shake my head. ‘A butcher’s hook,’ he says, testing the tip of his finger against each point. ‘A perfect design. Whichever way up you use it, it’s always ready. One end to hook, the other to hang. It has only one simple purpose.’ He stands on a stool and fixes it over the bar above him. It waits there, empty. He climbs down. ‘Pleasing, isn’t it?’

  ‘And who is this young veal?’ A man, monstrous in size, looms in the doorway behind Fub. He is as vast as two men joined together, and each of them very large. Great slabs of flesh swell beneath his shoulders and his forearms are broad spreads of pale skin. His neck circles hugely round to his back and balloons in the front where it joins his many chins. Small red-rimmed eyes – I am reminded of a pig – are closer to his ears than each other, set wide apart and leaving all the freckles on the speckled pink expanses between and above his brows to fend for themselves. He wears a vast leather apron, but where Fub’s would have taken the skin of one cow to sew, his must have demanded a whole herd. Despite his bulk, his voice has no strength or depth; he wheezes out his words in a high-pitched tone.

  ‘Not much meat there.’ He wrinkles his pudgy nose. ‘But the liver and lights would be all pearly pink and sweet.’

  Fub laughs, and says: ‘Thomas Jaccob’s daughter.’

  ‘Ah, Thomas Jaccob,’ the man mountain repeats. My blush is fading. He does not react to my father’s name nor show me any deference.

  ‘Fine veal. Not hung enough yet.’ The ape continues to cast his eyes over me as if he really were about to take me to market. ‘Shall we fatten you in darkness, then?’ He winks. I am keeping still.

  ‘I am here to peruse our order, Sir,’ I say. Does he hear my haughty tone? I hope so. I do not intend that ‘sir’ to confer any status.

  ‘Then I shall fetch our ledger, Mistress.’ He fully intends me to hear the slight mockery in his voice. ‘Accounts and orders for the Jaccob household for your perusal.’ He giggles. It is a shrill and silly sound from a grown man.

  ‘Enough, Titus. Don’t mind him.’ This is said to me. He waves a hand at each of us, indicating one to the other. ‘This is the master butcher, Titus Levener.’

  The Levener fellow squeezes back through the passageway behind him, still snickering to himself. I’d like to suggest he puts animal grease on the door frame, so he could slide more easily through.

  There is a pause. Fub looks at me again with amusement.

  ‘Do you continue your education in the baker’s next, or the farrier’s?’ Fub undoes his apron, hauls it over his head, hangs it on a hook on the wall then comes around the counter towards me. All the while, I feel as though I have my hands cupped over my ears, there’s such a rushing sound in my head. Just as soft hot wax gives to the touch, so I would yield now to take any shape he fashioned. He picks up two small stools, swinging them in either hand, and places them on the floor next to the counter.

  ‘Here.’ He sits on one and gestures to the other. It is set close by him. ‘Something to play with.’ He picks up the little knife he’d been dicing the rabbit with, wipes the blade on his leg then twirls it quickly around.

  ‘Watch.’ Then he places his left hand, fingers splayed, on the wooden block. He begins to stab the point of the knife, quick and darting, first in the gap between thumb and forefinger, then forefinger and middle, next middle and ring finger, lastly in the small space between his ring and little fingers. There’s a little ‘pock’ as the tip connects to the wood.

  I cannot take my eyes from him, but Fub looks only at the knife’s journey as it speeds and blurs. I blow air into my cheeks in a noisy sigh, laughing with delight at how clever and how deft he is. When the knife can go no faster, he raises it high above his head, his arm extended, then slams it down with a flourish. Stuck upright by its tip, the knife trembles. I make to clap my hands at him, but he seizes them both in his.

  ‘Miss Jaccob,’ Fub says. My name in his mouth is the sweetest sound I have ever heard. Let me sit here, on this stool on the sawdust floor in this place and keep my hands in yours for ever. His eyes are blue, but in the right one there is a dash of dark brown on the iris. A perfect flaw.

  He takes my left hand now, and spreads my fingers on the block a
s his were. Thus opened I wait, tense. The blade flashes, pricks wood, lands safely. When he is done, Fub leans closer in to me. He bends over my hand then nicks with the knife’s tip at the taut skin next to my smallest finger. The sudden pain is an affront, a shock. I breathe in through my nose, hard, but I do not flinch. I clench my other hand into a tight fist, chafing at a hangnail on my thumb to distract from the hurting. Only when he releases my hand does it fly to my mouth, unbidden, and I suck at the blood that flows where he cut.

  ‘That is what would happen if I didn’t have the skill.’ He takes my hand to examine the small wound.

  ‘Did you come to harm from his party piece?’

  I did not see this woman come in. She has appeared in the same doorway as the giant went out, but she takes up a scant sliver of it. For the first time, Fub is discomfited. He shies like a horse at a gate, flings my hand back to me, wipes his sleeve over his mouth and stands up, the stool falling over behind him.

  The woman is so thin that she seems flat, her dress hanging from her bony frame as if there’s no body beneath to give it shape. Perhaps Titus rolls on to her as they lie in their bed, pressing her like cider apples. White hair escapes from underneath her cap, each strand following a different path to its fellows so that it sticks out from her head like a frill. She has very small eyes, set so far back in her head that she appears to squint.

  ‘Does it need a tincture? Ayee.’ This last sound is not a question, it is a jarring tune that starts with great emphasis on the first note then sweeps the full length of the stave from the lowest to the highest. It is like an elaborate bow that ties up the end of her sentences. I suspect if I spent much time in her company, I might catch her habit of ‘ayeeing’ too. I do not intend to spend much time in her company.

  ‘Bet, this is Mistress Jaccob.’ Fub straightens the stool, recovers himself.

  ‘Thomas Jaccob’s child?’ She looks me up and down, gathering her skirts into a bunch in each hand and bending both knees together, as you do when you begin a dance. ‘Mistress.’ She bows her head to the floor. I think she looks at me when she rises, though her hidden eyes make it hard to tell.

  She turns to Fub, then clips him lightly about the ear. ‘If you persuaded her to sit while you jumped your knife near her little mitts, Fub, it’s no wonder she came to harm. Ayee.’

  The mother tiger will wield her sharp claws trying to protect her cub and, seeing her lay hand on Fub so casually, I wish I were a beast and could strike at her. There’d be four tracks down both cheeks where each claw pierced. Off she’d scurry, clutching her bloody face, and leaving us in peace.

  ‘I am not very hurt, Ma’am.’ I hold out my hand and show her where the blood begins to set.

  ‘Good.’ She peers at the wound as much as her tiny peepers will allow. No wonder she is dressed in poor gabardine spotted with black marks and two of the buttons on her blouse are unfastened. There must be much effort in looking at things properly if you see the world from such a narrow point. ‘What will you show her next, Fub, if you’ve begun with your greatest talent?’

  Again, he looks awkward and embarrassed. She messes at his hair, catching it in clumps and tugging. The tiger growls.

  He ducks his head away, smooths his hair down and smiles at her. ‘Bet! There’s more to me than that!’

  Her eyes become little straight lines as she smiles back. If she were a cat, she’d purr. But I would slit her open with my tiger strength.

  ‘Now, hold these, my darling.’ Titus is returned. The ledger has sheaves of paper tucked inside higgledy piggledy and she has to push the covers together to keep everything inside as she takes it from him. Several pages land on the floor and she picks them up with haste, shaking the sawdust from them. She looks at me, raising her eyes to heaven to share her irritation at his slovenliness.

  ‘Don’t bring these here, Levener,’ she says. ‘There’s muckment about might get on the pages. Ayee.’

  He tips his head to indicate me, as if I couldn’t see him. ‘The mistress wants to check our accounts.’

  ‘Why, Miss?’ She looks nervous. ‘Is anything wrong?’

  That is not my purpose at all – I hardly want to look at lines of numbers. ‘No,’ I tell them, ‘I want to understand about—’ They look expectant and nervous, like children caught taking apples. ‘I am interested in household matters. In ALL matters of cooking, or preparing—’

  They both lean towards me. They are like puppets on my hands, both bending to left or right as I choose. If I look one way or the other, their eyes will follow. Titus has the groggy stare of someone newly awoken, while Bet is hunched attentively. I have to suppress a desire to clap my hands or shout aloud, to watch them start back in perfect symmetry.

  ‘Miss Jaccob is ordering for the household while her mother is confined.’ Fub looks at me while he says this.

  ‘Oh, I had heard your mother was delivered. But not of a boy . . .’ says Bet, her voice full of sympathy. ‘A lovely daughter!’ she adds, to soften her message. ‘Another fine girl. Ayee.’

  There might be more in this vein, all beautifuls and preciouses, if I don’t stop her. ‘We are blessed,’ I say curtly.

  She folds her arms. ‘Indeed,’ she says, thoughtfully. ‘Well, let us begin then.’

  Titus Levener appears behind her shoulder. He is anxious. ‘Begin what, love?’ he squeaks.

  ‘If you wish to see all the preparation of your meat,’ Bet goes to the counter, pulling a small crate towards her as she speaks, ‘then you should bring an apron or suchlike. You cannot avoid blood here and I regret I have none to spare for you. Ayee.’

  ‘I shall borrow one from our cook.’ She can’t imagine I have many in my wardrobe, surely?

  ‘You will have to wrap Jane’s apron many times around you,’ Fub says. ‘She is outside a great many pie suppers, that one.’ He holds his hands apart.

  ‘But there is a quick thing I can teach you.’ Bet opens the crate, setting its lid carefully on the counter, and reaches inside. She holds out an egg. It is still stuck with chicken mess and dirt; sticks of straw cling, too. She brushes it clean with great care, and motions me to take it.

  ‘Put your lips to the larger end,’ she says. The egg looks equally sized each end to me. I look to her for guidance. She turns it gently in my cupped palm, rubs at one end tenderly with the point of a finger and then I can see there is one end slightly bigger and flatter. I do as she bids me, putting the hard shell against my mouth and feeling the swell and warmth underneath. It smells of manure and fresh air, in that order.

  ‘What do you sense?’ Bet raises her sparse eyebrows, her small eyes unblinking.

  The egg is smooth against my skin, its heat almost a heartbeat. ‘It is alive,’ I say, seeing Fub in sharp focus in front of me.

  ‘If it’s cold there, don’t buy it.’ Bet takes the egg from me and places it back in the crate with slow movements. ‘It must be bought and cooked as close to the laying as possible, and some heat stays awhile. Your next lesson might require more stomach. Ayee. Do you faint at the sight of blood, Miss?’

  I don’t know as I haven’t been tested, but I’m not about to admit that to her. ‘No,’ I lie. ‘I am not given to vapours. I have a stout constitution.’

  ‘Then when you’re next come, we will show you some processes.’ She turns to her husband. Titus no longer looks nervous, indeed they both seem to have grown in confidence. I know they think I am the sort to fail or fade, while they are always unsqueamish and robust. I doubt I will pass out, but Fub will be there to catch me if I should become light-headed and so I cannot see that I lose either way.

  ‘I should take my leave,’ I say, and Fub says: ‘Do you go alone? It is a fair way.’

  I had almost forgotten my unlikely escort, but when I look to the door he is already there.

  ‘Hey!’ Titus lunges at him. ‘Be off with you, Scotsman!’

&
nbsp; ‘Mr Levener, Angus showed me the way here.’ I’d better defend him, though he looks shabbier than ever.

  Titus recoils. He glares at the man, then at me. ‘These types are not allowed on our streets, Miss Jaccob.’ He is gruff, put out at having to keep his fists to himself. ‘This garb is illegal.’ He grabs a handful and shakes the thin tartan about Angus’ legs.

  The soldier swings away from him, with all the dignity he can muster. ‘I’ll thank you to keep your hands to yourself, butcher.’ He almost growls like a dog.

  ‘Do you have a tiny dirk to threaten me with?’ Titus advances on him, waggling his little finger suggestively in the soldier’s face, his bulk dwarfing the man. ‘Where is your sporran?’ He grabs at his own crotch, thrusting and taunting. ‘Where, indeed, are your precious highlands?’ He pretends to cry, pushing his pudgy fingers to his piggy eyes. ‘Oh woe for the king over the water and his throne!’

  ‘I’ll go, I’ll go.’ The wretched man walks clumsily backwards towards the door and his escape, Titus lumbering at him all the while.

  ‘Titus.’ Fub speaks low. ‘I’ll see him off. And Miss Jaccob,too. I’ll see her safe along her way.’

  Levener slows to a wobbling halt. ‘Och aye,’ he whines, not giving up on his prey. ‘Fare ye well, then, you scrag. I would throw you a bone if I’d any to spare, but I let the dogs have ’em first and that is the right order.’ His squeaky giggle shakes his body from top to toe.

  We make to go, a ragtag trio, but Bet calls ‘Fub!’ and he turns to her. ‘Do not be too long on this errand.’ It is a sharp little instruction. He goes back and stands close to her and while he speaks, he fastens the two buttons on her blouse that she had left undone.

  ‘I’ll not be long, Bet. Our friend must be directed away and Miss Jaccob shown the route to take. That’s all.’

  ‘Oh, was I undone, Fub?’ She looks coyly at him, her hand over the place where he neatened her clothes.

  ‘A good thing in a woman!’ he says. And her hand goes to his neck, stroking. Jealousy winds through me like a snake and twists tight coils round my heart. Her eyes are set too far back to see them, but I bet they sparkle at him like jewels under water.