by Tim Pears
Edwin’s son Henery told Leo he must be shown the best way to collect firewood. He said that he had seen Leo twisting saplings and bending branches full of sap that made smoke when they burned and he felt pity, that’s what it was. Henery was a young version of his father, a lean and jittery youth not many years older than Leo but able to grow a thin moustache. He applied some kind of pungent pomade to his black hair and plastered it down close to his skull. His dogs were never far from him. He told Leo to watch. He slid a long pole with a hook on the end off the side of his father’s waggon and led the way into the nearby wood. ‘You look around,’ he said. ‘This is you.’ Henery leaned his neck forward and adopted an imbecilic expression so that he resembled a backward member of some jungle race other than man. He walked in deliberate circles, saying in a slow, deep voice, ‘Wood. Wood.’
Henery resumed his normal posture. ‘You’re gropin in the wrong direction, see,’ he said. He lifted his head and Leo did likewise. They looked up into the branches above. ‘There,’ Henery said. ‘That’ll do us.’ He raised the pole and hooked a length of dead wood from where it had been caught, and tugged it loose. Leo jumped back as it fell at their feet, breaking. ‘The trees store their rejects up there for us, see, ready-dried and all,’ Henery said. He handed the pole to Leo and walked back to the encampment.
Leo collected wood in this manner for the campfires and left a stack beside each one. He then took buckets, emptied them of any residue, and refilled them from the spring Rhoda had told him of. He understood what he now was. A hewer of wood and drawer of water. This was how he should repay the favour of having his life saved. Otherwise none enquired where he came from, who were his kin, how he’d come by the bruises that were almost healed now. A lack of curiosity or a surfeit of discretion? The boy did not know but he was glad. He did not wish to speak of Lottie, or of his mother, for he missed them too much.
*
The gypsies returned to the camp in twos and threes throughout the afternoon. The man of each vardo took the money that was handed over but gave his woman some back. Gully appeared without the pair of ponies he’d left with but one other instead: a squat and muscular chestnut cob Leo reckoned fit for pulling one of the trolley carts.
In the evening they ate the pheasants, which, hung overnight, had been boiled for much of the day. A layer of yellow fat was lifted off and new-caught rabbits put in along with onion, carrot, potato, swede. In her pot Rhoda made dumplings too and when it came time to eat Leo thanked her and said he had never eaten such tasty food.
‘It’s not me,’ she said. ‘It’s bein cooked outside that does it. I’d never cook inside if I’d a choice. George’ll tell you, it needs to be bloody cold for me to use the stove in there.’
*
On the morning of the day following Leo rose early and helped Gully open up the gap in the hedge and retrieve his horses from the farmer’s pasture before the sun came up. The new chestnut cob stood some way off. Gully brought the draught horses one after the other through the hedge and, attaching a rope to their halters, the boy took the ponies alternately. They left the cob till last. A little light had come, enough for him to see as they approached that the cob was injured. A triangular flap of skin had been ripped from his hindquarters. When they got too close he took fright and turned and trotted away across the field.
‘They’ve turned on im,’ Gully said quietly. They were the first words Leo had heard him utter. ‘Gyres will do it to a stranger sometimes. One a them’s give him a good kick.’
‘One a the big horses?’
‘More likely the ponies.’
‘Why?’ Leo asked.
‘I’ve wondered that myself many a time,’ Gully told him. ‘I’ve not quite worked it out.’ He watched the frightened animal come to a halt and stand still as before. ‘Strange beasts,’ he said.
Leo walked across the field. Some yards short of the cob he stopped. ‘It’s all right, young feller,’ he said. ‘Don’t be afeared a me. I won’t kick you and you don’t have to kick me neither.’ The boy did not know whether his gritty voice was capable of calming a frightened horse but he spoke to the cob anyhow for it felt natural to him to do so. ‘I’m a comin over to you now, old boy, and I’m goin to come and greet you.’
The sun was rising and the sky was blue but with the last stars still visible. Gully had disappeared. Leo put his hands behind his back and walked over slowly to the horse, speaking all the while of his intentions, and of his wish for the cob to trust him and to be not afraid. The cob stood still, shivering as if cold. When he reached him, Leo leaned forward and blew softly into the pony’s nostrils and stood back. The cob raised his head towards him and Leo blew into his nostrils once more. The animal was still trembling but the boy spoke to him and in time raised one hand and stroked him. ‘It’s all right, old feller, you’re all right now, they’ve had their fun. You’re good again, old boy.’ The horse trembled less. Leo tied the rope he’d been using to the cob’s halter and led him across the field and through the hedge.
Gully had rekindled his campfire. In a pan of boiling water he was sterilising needles and gut. Leo held the cob steady. Gully poured some anaesthetic solution over the wound, then threaded a needle. Leo spoke to the cob. He told him quietly what the old man was about to do and that if he felt a twinge or two of pain he should abide, for they intended only to heal him and could do so if only he let them. Then Gully lifted the loose flap of skin and began to suture it back in place.
Afterwards, Gully told Leo that it was good to have someone else with a feel for horses. ‘None a this lot do,’ he said. ‘They’re my blood, but they don’t have it.’
3
On the morning of the third day in that spot Gully harnessed one of the draught horses to a trolley. Henery told Leo to help him lift a strangely configured contraption onto the trolley. They could not. It was too heavy.
‘Wait up, lads,’ someone called. George strode over. Most of the gypsies were shorter than the average man. George was six inches taller. He was like a being from a different race walking amongst them. Leo and Henery stood aside and let the giant lift the machine on his own, with little apparent effort. It resembled a bicycle in that it had a frame and seat and pedals. There were no wheels, but rather a stand, and the chain was attached to some other axle, on each end of which was a circular stone. Gully led the horse and the lad Henery accompanied him. Leo looked around the camp, where those who had not yet left bustled around as on each day. There was wood and water stored. Leo ran after the trolley cart.
On the outskirts of a village they came to the rectory. Henery knocked upon the door. A woman answered and the gypsy lad told her they had the finest grinding barrow in England here if she’d cleavers or cutlery or carving knives to sharpen.
‘You’ll know us from last year, missus, we’re the best in the west.’
‘It’s you,’ she said.
‘Hedge clippers and cutters,’ he told her. ‘Shovels and spades, all your gardener’s tools. Your cook’s finest knives . . . where is she now? She’ll be wantin to see us. Your husband’s razors we’ll edge for him, don’t worry about that.’
The Rector’s wife sent them round the back. Old Gully and the lad and the boy lifted the grinding barrow off the trolley cart and set it on the ground. Gully filled a bucket of water from a pump in the yard and poured some into a can attached to the machine. When the maid brought the first implements out of the house, Henery climbed onto the seat, put his boots in the stirrups, and began to work the treadle. The shaft turned. On each end was a grindstone, one fine, the other coarse. Gully held a coal shovel to the rough stone. It made a screech like that of an angry seagull. Henery pedalled a little harder. Sparks flew from the shovel blade. The maid reappeared with a tray of small tools she must have collected from around the house. Scissors, penknives, razors.
Henery pedalled at a steady rate. He began to sweat. Gully held each implement with his right hand and pressed it to the stone with his left. Water dribb
led onto the fine stone. Periodically the old man felt the tip of each blade with the callused nub of the index finger of his left hand. After a while Henery climbed down and said, ‘Your turn.’ Leo took his place. It took a little time to find a rhythm, and the speed Gully wanted. ‘Faster,’ he said. ‘Slower.’ A gardener wheeled a barrow full of tools into the yard.
In due course a woman came out with a tray of knives. She greeted Gully and told him she was glad to see them, twas about time. All her kitchen knives were blunt, she could no longer get an edge on them with her steel. Also upon the tray were three glasses of rosehip cordial and biscuits, which the gypsies and their gentile consort stopped working to consume. The cook spoke with Gully, telling him of the problems she had.
‘Talk about the taste a bread,’ she said. ‘My old mum says German flour ain’t the same as ours and never will be. No one never ate white bread in the old days.’ She leaned forward and glanced behind her before continuing, more quietly, ‘And you’d think old Ed was still on the throne . . . oh, yes, the Rector and the missus do crave their patisseries. Out a fashion in London, I heard, but down here we takes years to catch up, don’t us? I likes to bake but does they have any idea how fiddly they patisseries is?’
The cook rambled on in this manner. Then she asked Gully about him and his tribe and where they’d been. ‘Here and there,’ he said. ‘All over, mostly.’ He resumed sharpening the knives. The cook watched while hers were done then took them back inside upon the tray, along with empty plate and glasses.
*
In the afternoon they called on smaller houses around the same village. As they travelled from one to another Henery spoke. ‘We’re hawkers of brushes and baskets, Leo. Peddlers of ladles and pots. We’re sellers of matches, and laces for shoes or boots. Gully here’s a horse trader. Me father’s a chairmaker and mender. He’ll bottom a chair for you, no problem, any kind. Take it away and bring it back like new or do it on the spot, it makes no difference to him. Me . . . I love dogs, don’t I, Gully? I’m a dog clipper. Catcher or killer. I’ll destroy a litter if it has to be done, but me, I’m a dog fancier, am I not, Gully? A dog thief. He’ll tell you, Leo, that’s what I am and no mistake.’
The old horse plodded along pulling the trolley cart. The boy came to the conclusion that amongst the gypsies some spoke and some did not. Those who did could not stop. Henery orated with a cadence akin to singing.
‘We’re drain cleaners and chimney sweeps. We’re goat trainers and pickpockets. You wait till we get to Okehampton Fair in the spring, you’ll see. Our women are midwives. Me Grandpa Samson’s a ballad singer a the old school. We’ve been a buskerin from Barnstaple to Brixham. Me uncle Belcher’ll make you a beehive fit for a queen. We’re clairvoyants and clowns, Leo. Me uncle George is a fairground boxer like his father before him, only George is twice the fighter Samson ever was – Grandpa will tell you so himself. We change our names to stay one step ahead a the law, but we’re all of the Orchard tribe, Leo, don’t you fret about that.
‘Me aunt Rhoda’s duckerin through the villages now, she’s readin palms and givin out zodiac advice. The girls’ll be with her learnin, but you can only learn the talk. You can’t learn the gift. You’ve got it or you’ve not. Foresight. Me aunt Rhoda has it, Leo, it’s uncanny – I’ve seen it. What she tells comes to pass, good or bad, she can’t help it. She’ll not tell fortunes for the family, no, she won’t look into our futures. No, boy, she won’t. She won’t do it.’
So Henery spoke as they walked along the lanes. He kept the stub of a pencil behind his ear and on occasion took it and made a swift inscription on a door or gatepost. He did so when they were turned away from a house by a woman who said she wanted nothing to do with scoundrels such as they, and if they did not leave forthwith she would call the constable. As if some such were waiting on her word in the vicinity.
Gully turned the horse and led the trolley out along the drive of the house. Henery told the woman they’d be on their way, then. They’d be taking their leave, if she didn’t mind. Going out into the lane he scrawled a sign on the gate, the letter X. ‘No good,’ he told Leo. ‘Warn the others. No good at all.’
When they returned to the camp, Samson called the boy over. ‘Ye went out, Leo. Ye went out with my brother and the lad there. But be careful, boy, we keep an eye on you, all of us. Do you understand? You’re ours, aren’t you? With your debt to pay. You’ll be with us till your debt’s paid, won’t you?’
The boy nodded. He did not know how long such repayment would take.
‘No ideas now, Leo, you don’t want any a them. We saved your life, we can take it back any time.’
*
The pregnant woman went into labour. Leo had taken her for Edwin’s wife or one of her sisters. But Keziah told him that she was one of Belcher’s daughters, by the name of Augusta, and that the father-to-be was Augusta’s cousin, Henery. While the girl wept and yelled, the camp grew quiet. The older women went in and out of the low bender. A boy was born in the night. In the morning his grandmother took him out and washed him with dew. When on the day following Augusta emerged from her confinement, the men avoided her. They burned the bender, and moved on.
The boy got to know the horses, though none had names. He spoke to them. His favourite was the chestnut cob that had been attacked. When he entered a field where the horses were grazing it always spotted him and came over. Leo kept an eye on it but it did not seem to suffer further. The others had accepted it. They were a small draught breed, cobs with broad chests and powerful hindquarters, strong pulling horses. Most of them were piebald. They seemed even-tempered, unbothered by the children. ‘We bred them from cast-offs,’ Gully told Leo. ‘Can you believe it? We used to use mules . . . my grandfather told me that, I never saw it. He was a boy then himself. Then coloured horses went out a fashion. Overnight, gentiles that owned their coloured horses sent them to the knackers, Shires included. We took them, interbred the Shires and Clydesdales with Dales ponies. To make these good pullers, see, strong but small. You don’t have to feed em tons a food.’
When they settled in one place for some days, the boys rode the ponies bareback. Leo did not ask to ride, and no one invited him. Gully would stand and watch. He seemed glad to have Leo beside him, someone who was interested in what he saw. This pony’s effortless flowing movement. That one’s abundant feathering. He pointed out a heavy and clean bone in the leg. He’d lift a horse’s foot to show Leo the strong walls on its hoof, the well-shaped frog.
‘Me,’ the old man said, ‘I like a cold-blood horse.’
*
In one village when it had not rained more than a feeble spattering for weeks they jacked up the vardos and rolled the wooden wheels into the pond to soak.
On what he announced was the first day of October Henery sharpened an old rough-handled knife on the grindstone. He told Leo he’d one small dog, akin to a terrier but with some other unknown breed in him, who waited all year for this. He found a canvas sack for Leo, and a single, left-handed glove made of leather. Before they left, Henery informed his family he was taking Leo with him so none should abuse the boy for his absence from the camp.
They set out into the fields, keeping close to the hedgerows. There was dew on the grass, on sloes in the hedge, on fallen crab apples. The leaves of maple and sycamore were turning from green to russet and yellow and falling from their branches. The dog was an odd little beast, with a terrier’s snout but slighter body and long thin legs. He was neither as strong as a terrier nor fast like a lurcher, but eager. Henery called him Strip. He explained that hedgehogs decide about now to hibernate.
‘He drops his prickles, see, and drags his self along and spikes up a heap a leaves and grass all about him. Then he’ll scrat his self up a hole and roll around in it, and you won’t see him all winter. Only Strip here can sniff him out, Leo. Every dog shall have his day and this be his.’
The dog might have had a nose but he needed his master, for Henery studied the ground as they w
alked. ‘Here, see,’ he said after some minutes. ‘I reckon there’s been one here.’
Leo looked hard but could see nothing but the leaf-strewn ground. Then he could. A line where the leaves lay differently, less thick or uniform or some such.
‘Find, Strip,’ Henery said, putting his foot to where the faint track began, and the dog followed it and pawed at the earth in the hedge, barking. Henery kicked him out of the way and reached his gloved hand into a mulch of leaves and grass and soil and brought out the hedgehog curled up asleep. He slit the animal’s throat with his knife then held it up by one leg and with the same sharp knife scraped off the bristles.
Leo opened the sack he’d been given. Henery dropped the hedgehog inside and they set off searching for the next one, and so continued. By the end of the morning they had a dozen animals and returned to the encampment. Edwin greeted his son and asked where he’d been. Henery said that a hedgehog had laughed at him.
Edwin nodded. ‘That’s a good sign,’ he said. ‘You’ll find luck today.’
‘I already have,’ Henery told his father. ‘I caught the bugger and half his mates and the boy’s got em in his sack here.’
Henery burned off any obdurate stubble and when all the hedgehogs were thus singed he scalded them in a pot of boiling water and skinned them. The process took hours. He told Leo that this was the method he had been taught, though there were others. While waiting patiently for certain parts of the process to be completed he prepared long hazel sticks, and when the hedgehogs were ready he skewered each one and placed it over the fire. They began to roast. Beneath them Henery placed tins and soon fat began to drip from the carcasses. Leo asked what this was for. Henery told him that he would give most of this lard to Gully for the horses’ harnesses, but that his mother would keep some for she believed it to be a balm for children’s earaches, and he would keep a little for himself to use as a hair oil. Of course if his Augusta wished to have a bottle, he must give it her.
