by Jess Smith
The poor soul clung on to the doctor, shaking his head until it looked as if it might fall from his shivering shoulders.
Rory didn’t help by curling a brute-sized arm around him and saying, ‘We’ll eat you later for the feast.’ His growl sent the poor man white, and if Bruar hadn’t supported him from behind it’s a certainty he’d have fainted.
Anyway, Doctor Mackenzie promised to have him home in time to catch his train, and said they could only stay a short while.
‘Please, good friend,’ asked big Rory, ‘stay with us to watch the mixing. After that you can go.’
‘Well, why not, there’s a later train, I’m sure we’ll make that one. You will come to no harm among these good folks,’ he assured the skinny wee man, clinging to him like a limpet on a rock.
As the small band closed in a circle round Megan and Bruar, the non-tinkers stood back. They were allowed to witness, but not take part in the circle of joining.
Doctor Mackenzie folded his arms, chewed on his clay pipe and watched as the pair wed. He remembered that not that long ago they were complete strangers, yet when he saw them together his thoughts were, ‘If ever a pair was suited it is them’. He nudged the man close by his side, who by now had stopped shaking, and, although still not sure about these strange creatures who dwelt in rounded humps of stick and tarpaulin, had relaxed a little. ‘You’ll not see that in any church,’ he said, pointing at the tin bucket Rory handed to his son, who then in turn gave it to his bride.
She, without a glance at anybody, straddled the bucket and urinated in it. Her face beamed with pride, while the photographer turned deep red with embarrassment, and didn’t know where to put his eyes. Bruar urinated into his own bucket.
Then his father poured the contents of the two vessels together, so mixing their fluids. Bruar then very carefully cut a small incision with a sharp knife into Megan’s ankle. She, with the same knife, made a cut in his forearm. Needless to say, this brought raised eyebrows from the good doctor, while the mild-mannered photographer nearly fainted for the second time. Bruar then rubbed his forearm over her ankle and mingled the blood. The incisions, being minute, quickly congealed and would leave the smallest scars. Then, finally, both held the bucket of their combined body fluid and poured it over the fire.
‘Thank God for that,’ whispered the astonished photographer into Mackenzie’s ear.
‘For what?’
‘I thought they were going to drink it!’
With a final hiss and puff of blue smoke the ceremony was complete. No rings or promises, just a simple whisper of ‘forever love’ finalised their vows.
Soon Mackenzie was trotting off, bottle of ale in one hand, reins in the other. He had promised the couple that as soon as the picture was ready, he’d deliver it himself. What noone knew then was that one day, that wedding photo would play a powerful part in the lives of Megan and Bruar.
His companion couldn’t bring himself to accept the hospitality of the nomads, and had declined food and ale. The incident with the metal buckets was sufficient to put him off food for the remainder of his day. O’Connor laughed at this, as he piled more sticks on the vigorously burning campfire. ‘For sure, some folks come into this world and don’t even know they’ve been alive. Did ye see the eyes of that skin-flinted photographer?’ he asked everyone, adding, ‘They were sitting on stalks wit the fear of him. I’ve never seen such a mouse-like creature. I should have poured a pint of the brown stuff into him, I’m sure he’d be lifting his spindles o’ legs a-jigging wit the rest of us. Mind youse, I’m thinking yon lad’s trousers were filled wit the other brown stuff.’
Into his trouser pocket Rory rammed his hand, drew forth a Jews harp, positioned it between his teeth and let rip. ‘Come on then, you big galoot of an Irishman, let’s me see the jigging of yourself.’
O’Connor needed no further prompting. With an almighty yelp he grabbed Rachel, threw her skyward and birled her like a peerie top.
She drew in her breath, released a fine volley of mouth music and the party began.
‘If Robbie Burns just happened to be passing and him full of the drink, he’d have added tinkers alongside his witches and warlocks to his poem Tam O’ Shanter,’ whispered Jimmy into Bruar’s ear, then added, ‘Aye, and then no doubt Tam would have blamed them for cutting off his old mare’s tail.’
The newlywed groom couldn’t take his eyes of Megan as she lifted her wedding dress, showing perfect knees. He rose up and howled at the top of his voice, grabbed her narrow waist and began dancing around the tents.
Jimmy shook his head watching both O’Connor and Rory, who were screeching and howling like wolves, and commented, ‘Nobody does weddings like the tinker.’ He was aware that he and Bruar were only half-bred, but on that night and after such a ceremony, no one could have told the difference.
Hours of fun and frolics passed before an exhausted Rachel called for calm. Well needing a lie down to catch their breath, the men did as she asked.
‘Sister,’ she said, holding out her hand to Megan who was curled into her husband’s arms, ‘Flowers of the Forest.’
Megan got up, sat by her sister, pulled a shawl around both of them and, while stick ash smouldered in the circle of hot stones round the fire, they sang the beautiful haunting song of lost love, about the young men who never returned from some faraway battlefield. A single blackbird joined in from a nearby tree branch, and when the last note was sung, not one dry eye could be found among them. Even the nearby McAllisters, who had stayed silent in their tent through all the day’s events, were heard sniffling.
So, as that wonderful, long-awaited day finally ended, a happy band of travellers slept in perfect peace. Love ruled in the tent of the newlyweds but only under a mound of heavy blankets. Each might have frozen to death if one inch of flesh had been exposed to the bite of winter.
As day followed d,ay each rallied to help in whatever way they could, making sure baby Macallister had enough food while keeping a watchful eye on O’Connor, who drank more with the passing of each week. Many nights Rory and his sons scoured the frost- and moss-covered dykes calling his name, thinking that sooner or later their shouts would fall on dead ears. But he was a hardy Irishman with the luck of the leprechauns, and like a blind dog would find his way home. However, he soon discovered that trekking to the pub and broiling in fights with the ploughmen was becoming more of a hazard with the snow drifts and freezing winds, so he began to stay in his tent, brewing worse home-made concoctions than ever before.
Rory stayed off the demon liquid, and seemed to enjoy seeing to himself now his sons had wives to look after. Rachel and Jimmy too found sharing a bed their choice for the future. There was no ceremony, just a night beneath the covers and the bond was made. Jimmy expertly recovered Annie’s dingy tent with deerskin and old cardboard boxes, to serve as their home from then on.
Trapped rabbits, pheasants and hare were few and far between at this time, because the rabbits dug deep down in their burrows, opting to live off their own droppings. Pheasants filled fox bellies before they came within reach of humans. Hare were the hardest to catch, staying as they did on the high mountains. Anyway, tinker people feel uneasy about eating hare. The old belief that they were shape-changers, like werewolves, put a fear in their minds. But hard foot-slogging by the men kept everyone half-fed.
The women walked once a month into town and hawked mouthfuls of bread from people hardly able to feed themselves. Doctor Mackenzie must have taken to his bed, for neither hide nor hair of him was spotted throughout the long winter months. Perhaps, they thought, the good doctor was dead. He was an old man, and Scotland saw droves of over-seventies succumb to death in those wintry days.
Farmers were a godsend to the nomads; they gave turnips, potatoes and milk without condition. Well, maybe not entirely freely, because Bruar and Jimmy had a pile of hard chores to do before the men of the land paid them in kind. Rachel hated the turnips, better known as neeps. ‘They’re for making soup rather
than boiling,’ she’d say. ‘They are fit for ewes’ bellies, not folks’.’ She now had reason to think about eating healthily, because the first stirring of life had begun in her own belly—she and Jimmy were expecting a child.
That winter had been extremely harsh, but soon buds appeared on sleepy willows, along with bleating lambs in the fields; their fingers thawed out. ‘Survival will be easy now’, they all thought. Spring sang along dykes and hedgerows, in tune with the birds, which began their mating rituals.
Bruar and Megan joined the birds and the bees. ‘Let’s have a dozen sons,’ he laughed pulling down the camp door one warm evening, ‘and fill the glen with our own tribe!’
‘Six boys, the same amount of girls or I’ll not have any,’ she teased.
‘Deal!’
Their laughter within the tent, smothered by kisses, filled everyone with hope of days to come, expectation of fresh growth and an overwhelming feeling of being alive and thankful for it.
Rory called over to O’Connor, ‘Will you listen to them in there going at it like rabbits! If they’re not careful the tent will collapse on top of them, and we’ll soon see how fast they shift.’
‘Ah, fur sure we hear them, and what a beautiful sound they make. Who cares if the tent falls down, winter’s over an I’m for a belly of rotgut at the public house, may God bless its solid walls. My gut’s done in wit supping the green-brown dregs from my still jug. Come on, man, an’ join me!’
Rory had passed a milestone in his life, a winter without the company of demons. ‘I don’t need the blasted stuff,’ he told the Irishman sternly, speedily heading into the distance to chop wood for the fires; any chore that would take the yearning from his stomach.
Over his shoulders O’Connor slipped a shabby threadbare coat and leaped the grey stone dyke, slipping on its mildewy coating. For a minute he stopped. The yearning in Rory would surely master him, and he’d be joining him on the low road to busty, sweet-tasting women and alcohol, he was certain of that. ‘You’re a drinking man, me old mate, whether you like it or no, the want is there under the surface. Stay aff the stuff as long as you can, but remember this from one who knows; once you’ve booked inta Hell Hotel you can leave, but never check out. Remember that, Rory. And here’s another thought for youse—“a tiger stays striped”.’
The Irishman’s words sent a shiver through Rory as his mind rushed back to his sister—her flaming eyes, pale drawn face, her parting words when he collected his sons. But the determination had never been as strong, he’d beat the craving, even if it meant his end; he’d made enough wrongs in times past; now for the rights. With two daughters-in-law to help him, things would be different. Soon he’d be big Rory, the grandfather. So many had been wronged, but more than anything else, that promise he’d made so long ago to his lassie would keep him on the right path. Sleepless nights and long guilt-filled days had hounded him until now; yes, he would stay away from the demon.
Summer came with a blaze of colour and warmth. Jimmy gathered armfuls of reeds for basket-making as Rachel continued to feel the stirring of growing life in her belly.
Bruar and Megan spent long days chasing the grouse and pheasants high up on the heather moors, stealing rich moments for passionate love-making and swearing on one another’s lives that nothing would separate them.
Doctor Mackenzie hadn’t succumbed to the ravages of the past winter as they’d imagined, and was soon tethering his horse to the same gnarled oak as before, and sharing the thick hot tea that big Rory was now supping instead of the liquid poison bubbling forth daily from O’Connor’s still. ‘Have you been well, Mackenzie? We thought Father Time had taken you.’
‘Och no, no. There were six babies born over the winter, and we lost four old bodies to a blasted flu. I’ve been kept busy.’
‘We only had the frost and the belly to see to. We never got any flu thing.’
‘I never did see your kind take bugs, I wonder why that is?’
‘Doctor, you know I’m not a true-blood tinker, and my boys are only half, but I think Mother Nature has a way of dealing with those flu things, it’s her who kills the infections. You never see a fox or a rabbit with a cough or running nose.’
‘That’s a fact, right enough, big Rory. Now how are the girls?’
‘Oh, just dandy. My boys are men now and that’s for certain.’
As a warm day passed the two shared tales, laughed and gently whiled a few hours away. Before the old doctor left, he gave Rachel the once-over, saying, ‘If all my mothers-to-be were as healthy as you, I’d have more time for my roses!’
Life was sweet and rich to the tinkers that summer, but autumn was approaching, and with the growing of Rachel’s unborn infant, something else was awaiting birth!
Little did they realise that across the English Channel a race of ordinary, peaceable people was being transformed by a minority of war-mad leaders into a war-mad nation. A nation about to unleash upon the western world a horror of immeasurable magnitude; one that would reach into and tear apart the little band of tinkers hidden in the Angus Glens and nestling at the feet of the great Grampians.
FIVE
‘You go into Kirriemor without me today, Megan, to dae a bit hawking. I’m feeling stirrings in my lower back, and think baby is making up its path soon for the wide world. Do you mind, sister?’
Megan picked up Rachel’s basket and added its contents to hers. ‘No, but I’ll make it half a day, in case you need me.’
Rachel stretched her back, and when she felt only a small pain run down her legs she brushed off her sister’s concern, ‘First babies take ages—I’ll be heaving this wee bisom out this time tomorrow.’
‘Och, listen to you, like you’re the expert with a heap of bairns. Mammy always said first babies could come as fast as tenth ones, so I’ll be back to help you this afternoon.’
The McAllister family had left the campsite in early spring, and with the men away for a long day’s harvest, Rachel would get little or no help from O’Connor snoring away the drink doldrums. She was relieved that Megan would be home early, and although she would not admit her anxiety, she watched until the skipping figure had gone before slipping in to her tent and taking up a position on the straw birth bed to get ready for the imminent arrival.
Kirriemor was quieter than usual. Megan wondered if she’d mistaken her days—it seemed more like a Sunday than a Monday. But when a brown and white mongrel dashed from the butcher’s with a chunky bone in its mouth she knew she’d made no mistake. Still, it certainly was a very quiet morning.
‘I think I’ll go see Doctor Mackenzie, tell him Rachel’s baby’s coming,’ she thought. After that she’d hawk her pot-scourers.
‘Hello Megan, what brings you to visit me this fine morning? I hope your sister’s well. Don’t tell me O’Connor’s got the gut ache, or is it yourself? Are you pregnant, lass?’
‘Not yet, and the Irishman doesn’t own a gut, he’s got insides like that ticker thing there in your hallway.’ She grimaced, and covered her ears as a loud gonging sound came from its depths. ‘How can you be doing with such a thing?’ she added. ‘You wouldn’t see us heaving that beast around on our backs. The sun wakes the blackbird and the moon the owl. We don’t watch our life being forced around a numbered face without eyes. But I came to tell you Rachel nears her time. She’s in pain, my sister, I thought you should know.’
He ignored the remark about clocks. ‘Aye, seeing as it’s her first time you did the right thing. Now before you take off like a linty round the doors with those pot-scourers of yours, give me the paper and the mail lying on the floor behind my own door. I’d get it myself but you’re a lot more agile than me.’
Megan stooped down, picked up both items, and thought, ‘Look at all these wavy lines, how can folks make head or tail of them? Bruar and I can hardly read a word between us. His Auntie brought him up, and as there wasn’t a school nearby, well, it remains a doubtful point whether he ever found the need to read and write. I think
big Rory can, though.’
‘Well, Megan, you sell me a handful of those scourers of yours, and I’ll pop the kettle on and read you a few paragraphs from The Times. Mind you, lass, news is usually a day old before it reaches me, but surely there’ll be wee bit to interest us. We’ll finish our tea, and then I’ll go back with you to see to Rachel.’
Megan was more than pleased to sell her scourers to the doctor. She wasn’t looking forward to trekking around braeside cottages through dung-furrowed farmyards.
Sauntering through to a warm kitchen, Doctor Mackenzie withdrew from the breast pocket of his old creased waistcoat a pair of thin-rimmed spectacles, which he positioned on the point of his nose. Megan sat down in an armchair in the parlour to wait. After what seemed like an eternity, she wondered if he was still in the house.
‘Sir, do you need a hand?’ she called through the half-opened kitchen door. Silence followed. She called again, not getting an answer, entered the warm kitchen of the big house and raised her voice. ‘Doctor, I think perhaps I’ll get myself away home to Rachel.’
The old man was sitting head down into his newspaper, his brow furrowed thick and tight, the spectacles slipping off his nose and dangling from his ears.
‘What terrible news. This is an awful day, a real bad one for sure!’
