The Whispering Road

by Livi Michael

  ‘We are now,’ I say, scratching.

  ‘Good, good,’ he says, still loud. I shrink back.

  ‘Come on,’ he bellows. ‘No need to hide now. It's a fine morning and we're off to market. You can ride in the front if you like.’

  ‘We can?’ I say, but he's already off fetching the horse. I'm tired of hiding in the wagon, so I take him at his word and climb out. The air's cool on my face. Annie holds back, but I pull her out with a bit of a struggle, and she lands beside me on the muddy cobbles.

  ‘That's the way,’ Barney says, returning with the dappled mare. ‘No one's going to ask questions here. We're just like any other traders. Man and littl'uns.’

  His face is all mottled with drink, his eyes shot through with red, but he seems in a fine mood. He hitches up the horse and hoists us on to the wooden seat. I pray that Annie won't start playing up, but she seems to have gone numb and quiet.

  It's a fine thing, riding on the front of a wagon. Barney steers us through the gate and we're out in the narrow streets of the town.

  The houses are all crowded in on one another, so close that there's no sunlight here. No snow either, though the wheels sink deep in slush and mire. The town stinks, I'm thinking. There's all kinds of rubbish piled in the street, pigs, and dogs nosing around. There's a bunch of children throwing a stone in a courtyard and hopping after it. One house has a wooden pole with a bunch of gorse strapped to it and a sign in the window. I feel excited by the noise and dirt, but Annie cowers back.

  There's some great clamour that we're travelling towards, and suddenly the narrow street ends in an open space, already full. There are so many people that for a moment I can't see anything else. Men and women and children, setting up stalls, leading animals into pens. Men standing on wooden boxes, shouting out their wares.

  ‘Fine apples for sale!’

  ‘Pots and pans, brushes and brooms!’

  ‘A side of lamb, fresh from the field!’

  There's women with fishbaskets on their heads and donkey carts laden with vegetables, bigger carts with livestock or whole carcasses of meat, milkmaids with pails, stalls with bales of cloth, and a swelling roar of sound.

  Barney gets down to pay another toll and I stand up on the wooden seat to get a better view. The ground's covered, ankle deep with filth and mire, hoofprints sunk deep in it and women's skirts sweeping it about. A thick steam rises from the stinking cows. There's a big tent with a sign outside, and a smaller, stripy one. On the far side of the market the ground rises towards a great hall and the parish church, windows glinting in the sun. On the other side there's a sight that makes me stare. Scaffolding and a gibbet, and a body swaying slowly in the breeze, a group of people clustered below. I've never seen a man hanged before, and right away I know I want a closer look.

  I sit back down again as Barney climbs back in and we steer our way into the crowd. There's more and more people arriving every minute – farmers, drovers, butchers, vagabonds, thieves, mingled together in a thick stew. Toll booths are making a fortune, and you never heard a noise like it. Drovers whistling, dogs barking, sheep bleating, pigs grunting and squealing, bells ringing, and a roar of voices shouting oaths and quarrelling on all sides. Crowd's churning like a monster, pushing and shoving, driving, beating, whooping and yelling. I have to clap my hands over my ears before I can start to hear.

  ‘Look, Annie – there's players – juggling!’ I bellow, for there's three men on a platform throwing balls about and as I watch, one of them leaps on to his hands and starts juggling the balls with his feet.

  That's a neat trick! I turn to see if Annie's looking, but she's pressed back against the wagon with her eyes shut and her hands clamped over her ears. I grab her elbow and feel her bones rattling through her skin. I start to shout at her to look around, but it's no use, so I let her go.

  Fat lot of good she'll be here.

  Well, I can't wait to look around.

  Barney pulls up the wagon into a space besides other wagons, gets down and starts unhitching the horse, Meg. Right away Annie leaps off and darts underneath it, out of reach of the crowd. Barney jerks his thumb towards her.

  ‘She all right?’

  ‘Right as she'll ever be,’ I bellow back. ‘Is this our pitch then?’

  Barney shouts back to watch over the wagon while he sees to Meg, and he starts leading her slowly, slowly through the crowd. I glance under the wagon at Annie, who's all hunched up with her hands still clamped over her ears, then I climb back up – master of my own wagon!

  The sun's flaring out in fits over the crowd. I can see littl'uns flitting about, nicking apples and anything else they can finger. All along the edges of the crowd and in a big space in the middle there are pens filled with sheep. Either side of us there's one wagon filled with carcasses and another with bales of cloth. There's a bloke selling meat puddings from a stall. Makes your mouth water just to look at them.

  Soon as Barney returns I leap down. I help him set up stall. Seems like the wagon is his stall, so we just drag some of the wheels and brackets out and stand them all round the sides. Annie's penned in underneath, which probably makes her feel better. She's weird like that.

  Barney drives a post into the ground and props up his sign beside it. Then he nods at me. ‘There'll be nothing doing here for a while,’ he shouts. ‘Go and have a look around, if you like.’

  ‘What about… Jill?’ I shout back.

  He shrugs. ‘She'll be all right there,’ he shouts. Then someone comes up to him, and he motions to me to be off.

  I don't need telling twice. Off I go, pushing into the arms and legs of the crowd. I can just about hear Barney yelling at me not to get lost, then, next minute, I already am, carried along in the press.

  There's a man selling a potion that'll cure backache, foot rot, fever, and even mend your roof. There's another selling dyes, and a woman with a sign round her, selling milk.

  What I want first is the stalls with food. I've seen them beggar children snatching apples quick as wink and I want a go. But I'm passing stalls with pitchforks, stalls with saddles, stalls with horseshoes, anything but food.

  I pass one stall piled high with books and papers, sheets with ballads on them pinned to the posts. The man's singing one of them as I pass.

  ‘Mother wept and father sighed,

  With delight aglow

  Cried the lad, “Tomorrow” cried,

  “To the pit I go.”’

  No time to stop. Past the pens I'm pushed and here at last there's stalls with rabbits hung from them, stalls with cabbages and turnips and great round cheeses hung from hooks.

  This is more like it. I find a stall piled high with apples: yellow, green and red. Makes my mouth water, though I've never tried one. Close by I can smell the sweetness of them. Just as I'm looking at those sweet heaps, shining like gold, I realize I'm not on my own. A little tow-haired young'un darts up while the woman's serving someone and nicks two of them quick as wink. He bolts off without anyone seeing, and luck must be on my side because he drops one of them as he's running. And I'm faster than him. Before he can dart back I leap forward and stuff it into my shirt. He stares at me and I think I may be in for a fight, but then he winks and says, ‘Finders keepers,’ –and disappears!

  I can't believe my luck. I look all around and no one's coming after me. Crowd's so thick they'd never see me anyway. I take out that apple, smell it and sink my teeth into it as far as they'll go. Tastes like a chunk of heaven – like the apple in the garden of Eden must've tasted. The juice runs over my hand and I lick it off. Then, after a bit, it tastes bitter. It's brown in the middle and there's the end of a maggot pointing out. I look at it twice then eat it anyway. No sense in waste.

  I'm milling around with the crowd, going nowhere much, and I can't see for all the people, but I want to catch a look at that hanged man. Seems like I'm not on my own, for there's a big press gathering that way. When I get near I can't see but I can hear. The group that's gathered near him are
ballad singers, singing his story to the eager crowd.

  ‘He's stopped her riding through the town

  With ribbons in her hair

  Her heart's blood stains her wedding gown

  And she has grown so fair.’

  Singing's fine but I can't see, even when I jump up. All I can catch sight of is the man's feet swinging to and fro. So after a bit I pass on, munching my apple.

  ‘Gather round, ladies, gather round, men,’ a voice booms. ‘Cloth'll fade, food comes and goes, but a good story'll last forever!’ There's a barrel-chested man with a red beard ringing a bell and housewives with children gathering round, so I gather round with them. It's the story of Tom Tit Tot, and he tells it grand, doing all the voices and gurning like a goblin, and when he finishes there's much laughter and clapping and he grins round in a good-humoured way. ‘Come on, ladies,’ he shouts. ‘You've heard the tale – now you can have it for your very own, a penny a time. Come on, now, it'll keep your childer happy through a long wet night!’ And he brandishes a little book with a picture on the front of the little black imp and the maiden, and so many people cluster round that I can't see. He's selling them all a copy of that story! And I wish, not for the first time, that I'd learned how to read. But this time the wishing turns into a longing that's like a pain. I wait till the crowd's thinned a bit and push my way through.

  There's hundreds of them on the stall, little books, each with a picture on the front. I try and work out what they are from the pictures, but most of them I don't know. I pick them up and feel the rough paper with my fingers. I turn the pages but the lines are like black twigs on winter trees and I can't make head or tail of them, though I turn the book about.

  Then suddenly the stallholder's voice booms out. ‘Eh, lad, don't go fingering if you're not buying.’

  He comes over and I shrink back, because he's big. ‘I were only looking,’ I mutter.

  ‘Then look, don't touch,’ he says, and starts shuffling the books into lines, so that all the ones with the same picture are lined up. I can't help myself, I have to say something. ‘Eh, mister,’ I say. ‘That were a grand tale.’

  He grunts. Not friendly now.

  ‘I can tell a tale,’ I say.

  ‘Can you now?’

  ‘I can,’ I say, warming to my theme. ‘About Jinny Green-teeth and the miller's wife.’

  He shakes his head. ‘Never heard of it.’

  ‘Or Jack the Giant-killer. You must've heard of that one.’

  But he's turned away again, selling another copy to an ancient woman like a crone, with a babby tucked under her arm.

  I should give up and go away. But I want one of them books for my very own. So much, it's killing me. I pick one up with a picture of a dragon on the front, but he plucks it from my hands and cuffs me smartly round the head.

  ‘Ow!’ I say.

  ‘Get on with you,’ says he. Then, as more people mill round, he starts telling them the story of the dragon. Everyone's laughing and cheering by the end and, once again, Red-beard's selling all the copies.

  That's the life for me! I'm thinking. I'd love to live like that – selling little books, telling stories. I'm clapping and cheering with the rest of them, and when the crowd disappears I'm still there. Red-beard's back's turned, and I hang back a bit, but then I step forward.

  ‘Eh, mister,’ I say. ‘If I tell you a tale, will you give me a book?’

  ‘Clear off,’ says he over his shoulder.

  ‘Well – what will you give me one for?’

  He turns round then, hands on hips. ‘Have you got a penny?’

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘But –’ and I fumble at the rope that holds my trousers up, ‘I've got a tinderbox.’

  Red-beard puts back his head and laughs. I can see all the holes in his teeth. ‘I'm not wanting a tinderbox, lad,’ he says. I feel foolish and my face is bright red. But he's looking at me in a considering way. ‘What do they call you?’

  ‘Tom,’ I say, remembering.

  ‘Tom,’ he says. ‘What tales do you know?’

  ‘Hundreds of 'em,’ I say. ‘Jack the Giant-killer, Jinny Green-teeth, the Giants of Boulder Hill, the… the angels who came to earth,’ I say, thinking of Travis's story and racking my brains for more.

  Red-beard shakes his head. ‘How about the Black Dog of the Wild Forest?’

  I shake my head.

  ‘Well, read it then,’ he says, handing it to me, and I feel more foolish than ever.

  ‘I can't read,’ I say.

  That stops him in his tracks. ‘You can't read, but you want a book?’ he says. I stare at my feet.

  ‘I've heard everything now,’ he says. ‘Well, look. Seeing as you're a red-haired chap like myself, I'm thinking I'll give you a chance.’

  I flick the hair from my eyes. I suppose you could call it red.

  ‘If you can tell me any of the tales on this stall,’ he says, ‘I'll give you a copy of the book. Now then, I can't say fairer than that. Tell it and sell it, and you can have one of your very own.’

  Is he having me on? I can't tell, but there's a crowd gathering again. I look at all the pictures on the front covers, trying to make them out. There's one with a picture of a fox and a goose, and another with a blacksmith, shoeing the devil. ‘What's this one?’ I say, pointing to a picture of a man with a bow and arrow, and a big tree spreading behind.

  ‘That's the True Tale of Robin Hood,’ says Red-beard. ‘Have you heard it?’

  I shake my head. This was a daft idea, I'm thinking. There's cries of ‘Tell us a tale’ and ‘Get on with it’ and ‘Give the lad a chance’ from the crowd, and I'm thinking it'll be difficult to slink off, when suddenly I see it – a picture of a giant man with a little old lady tucked into his arm.

  ‘Is that Tom Hickathrift?’ I say, grabbing it.

  ‘It is,’ says Red-beard.

  ‘I know this one!’ I say, and Red-beard bows mockingly.

  ‘Well then,’ he says, and he turns to the crowd. ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ he says. ‘Today we have a special treat. My young… apprentice here is going to tell you a tale for the first time himself. The good tale of Tom Hickathrift!’

  There's scattered clapping. I look round at the faces of the crowd, which is always a bad idea. Some look curious and others sour. I stare at my feet, willing myself to remember.

  ‘Come on, then,’ someone says. I clear my throat.

  But I can't do it. Something's wrong. I can't tell the tale – not like I did in the pub. I'm stuttering and losing my way, and it feels like all the eyes are boring me full of holes like a colander. Someone shouts, ‘Spit it out, lad,’ and I'm blushing like a girl. The crowd start moaning and drifting off and Red-beard bats me across the head with one of the books.

  ‘Learn to read,’ he says. ‘Then you'll tell the story as it should be told.’

  I back off, shamed. Why couldn't I tell that story? I can remember it all now. Why could I hold a crowd in the pub and not here? Was it only the ale?

  I'm still going through in my head how I couldn't tell that tale, when I pass the meat-pudding man again, and I'm starving. No way of nicking one of these, though, because there's two lads older than me looking on.

  All I need's a penny. My hand brushes Travis's tinderbox. I look around. Everywhere there's buying and selling – all kinds of things. A few stalls away there's a man selling iron goods and hardware. I walk up to him, brave as I can.

  ‘Eh, mister – how much'll you give me for this?’ And it works! He turns it over in his long yellow hands and offers me halfpence.

  ‘Sixpence,’ I say, and he laughs in my face.

  ‘That's a good'un,’ he says, but I stare at him, not backing down.

  ‘Tell you what,’ he says. ‘I'll give you a ha'pence for t'box, and ha'pence for t'joke.’

  A penny, then. I can't help staring as he drops it into my palm. Bright copper, with the king's head on. The first I've ever owned – the very first. I've lost the tinderbox, and the shovel
, but the coin's brighter, winking in the sun. I turn it this way and that, making it glint. Then I think someone might snatch it off me, so I close my fingers round it tight.

  I walk away with a swagger as though I've been doing this all my life. Man of trade. And I go up to the pudding stall and buy a steaming great pudding and sink my teeth into it, and it's the best thing I've ever tasted.

  It's a magic place, this, I see that now. A place where a tinderbox turns into a coin, and a coin to a pudding. Anything's possible here. Don't matter if you're a king or a pot-boy – all that matters is your money.

  I pass the jugglers again, and this time they're doing tricks. One of them's eating a huge, knotted rope. Down and down his throat it goes, further than you'd ever think, and all the crowd gasp. Then he turns round and you can see it, coming out of his back end, under his coat. A right laugh. I wish I could do tricks.

  But mainly what's going on is buying and selling, buying and selling. I walk around for ages, watching them all at it.

  Sun's gone now and there's a grey soaking mizzle. All this time I've forgotten Annie, but it finally comes to me that I should get back. I walk all over without seeing Barney's cart. Annie'll be hungry, I'm thinking and, just as I'm thinking that, I have a stroke of luck.

  I'm watching two kids – a dark-haired, scraggy boy, and an older girl. I'm wondering where they've come from and if they've got homes to go to. They're standing near a woman who's selling vegetables; then, while I'm watching, the older girl starts begging for some of the veg that's not quite whole – a carrot end or half a turnip. She's begging but not getting anywhere. The woman's trying to shoo her off.

  I could have told her that, of course, that begging'll get you nowhere. But while she's begging round the front of the stall, the lad's round the back stuffing his jerkin with whatever he can get his hands on.

  Then a man nearby shouts, ‘EH!’ and they're both off, quick as wink. The man runs after them, and the woman takes two or three steps forward shouting, ‘Stop, thief!’ and while they're not looking I grab some turnips and stuff them into my shirt, before making off myself.