Arcadia

35

There are many ceremonies at Ossenfud, and Jay had taken part in a good proportion of them. For the dead time, the start of the year, the start and end of study each day, the arrival of food. Ceremonies for each season, and for the harvest. Each college had its own rituals and the town had still more.

But he had never witnessed anything quite as strange as the one he observed that day in Willdon. Shortly before noon Jay was summoned by a messenger and instructed to present himself at the entrance to the great courtyard. He took up his position just in time to see the huge doors leading into the grand chamber being thrown open. Henary was there already. A procession, gaudy and ostentatious, slowly emerged, consisting of all the people who lived and worked in the house, some of them carrying Lady Catherine on an elaborate gilt chair. Trumpets sounded, the watchers stamped their feet. It was, for Jay, a fascinating display of power and wealth, not least because Lady Catherine herself was dressed with all the magnificence of her position, covered in jewels from head to foot, wearing the richest garments imaginable and her finest wig.

They proceeded to the edge of the gardens, with Jay, Henary and many others following. Waiting for them was a small party, roughly dressed and looking decidedly uncomfortable and nervous. The jumpiest was a man carrying a large axe, who was dressed in brown working clothes, with heavy leather boots.

‘Who are you?’ he called out in a loud voice, once he had been elbowed in the ribs by a companion as a prompt.

The procession stopped and the golden chair was laid on the ground. Lady Catherine stood up and walked a few steps forward as her entourage fell back to make way for her.

‘I am Lady Catherine, Lord and Lady of the domain of Willdon by right, and I command your obedience.’ She spoke imperiously, disdainfully.

‘That is the wrong answer.’

Two of the other men with him stepped forward and began taking off the jewellery, starting with the huge tiara she wore on her head, then her necklaces, the encrusted belts, the rings on fingers and toes, until she wore no decoration at all. She stood there passively and allowed all this to happen. Each article was handed carefully to an attendant, who placed them carefully in a large wooden box.

‘Who are you?’ The question came again.

‘I am Lady Catherine of Willdon, and I demand your obedience.’

‘That is the wrong answer.’

Again the three men stepped forward, and this time started taking off the wig, the multi-coloured velvets and cloths which adorned her body, until she was standing in a simple dress.

‘Who are you?’ came the question for the third time.

‘I am Lady Catherine of Willdon.’

‘That is the wrong answer.’

For a third time the men stepped forward. They removed her dress, so that she was wearing only the least of undergarments. Then they pushed her down so she was kneeling on the bare ground, her head bowed.

‘No man or woman is above any man or woman. Three times you have denied this.’

The man with the axe, now trembling, stepped forward, carrying a length of leather. He walked up to her and, biting his lip, swung the strap down onto her back, so that the impact could be heard all over the glade. He did not do it so very hard, however. Jay noticed that he attempted to make the lash as light as possible. Still, he repeated the operation twice, and there were three distinct red lines across her back when he had finished. Lady Catherine did not flinch.

‘Who are you?’

‘I am Kate.’

‘That is the right answer. What do you have?’

‘Nothing.’

‘What do you want?’

‘I want to live.’

‘What will you give in return?’

‘What I am asked.’

‘Then you will be the least of people, until you have earned the right to be more. Do you accept this?’

‘I do.’

‘Then stand up, Kate, and follow me.’

She stood and dusted herself down, and Jay could see the broad man whispering anxiously into her ear. He didn’t hear it, but he thought he was asking — was that all right? She nodded briefly, and a second man came forward and dressed her in the rough clothes of a labourer, and gave her a pair of hard shoes with wooden soles.

‘Anyone who wishes to see that I obey the laws and customs of Willdon should step forward now,’ the man said.

There was a silence, apart from a rustling of clothes as the assembled multitude looked around expectantly. Then Jay realised Lady Catherine was looking at him. He stepped forward.

‘I wish to see,’ he said.

‘Then you will be my guest and companion.’

At which point the ceremony was at an end. Those who were gathered around burst into enthusiastic applause, and Jay could feel the tension seep away. Then the procession re-formed, the empty chair was lifted high and the members of the household withdrew.

The large man, Jay and Lady Catherine were now alone. ‘So, for the next two days I am your servant Kate. This is Jay, presently at Ossenfud, who has generously offered to see everything is done properly. That is to say, you will show me no favour or special treatment, nor will you be cruel or harsh undeservedly. Have you done anything like this before?’

‘No. I have not.’

‘Well, I have, but you will get no advice from me. What’s your name, by the way?’

‘I am called Callan, my La—’

‘What do you have planned?’

‘Wood cutting and collecting. It’ll be hard work, and tiring. We will go into the forest and chop logs. Or at least, I will. Your job will be to collect and stack them. If we have time, I want to make a fire for charcoal. You will cook and clean the pots, make my bed and sleep on the leaves.’

‘What am I meant to do?’ Jay asked.

‘Nothing. You just watch.’

‘Oh, must I?’ Jay said. ‘I used to burn charcoal with my uncle when I was little. I loved it. Do let me do something useful.’

Callan looked at his earnest young face and laughed. ‘A lady and a scholar,’ he said. ‘What more could any forester need? Lord, but this is going to be hard work!’

Callan followed the rules very carefully, showing neither of them any favour. He marched off and took them deep into the forest, walking for nearly three hours without stopping for food or rest, keeping up a swift pace. Even Jay, who got a great deal of exercise in the college’s fields around Ossenfud, was tired, and he was concerned that Lady Catherine — Kate, he reminded himself — was quite unused to such exertion. Already her bare legs were scratched from the brambles, her short hair was tangled, her hands were dirty. She didn’t seem to mind, and bore it all with good heart.

‘You thought I had forgotten you, didn’t you, Callan Perelson?’ Jay said after a while.

Callan smiled. ‘I did.’

‘I remember you very well. You were kind to me.’

‘No more than a frightened little boy deserved.’

‘I thought you were a soldier.’

‘Me? No. I was just doing my service. Three years I spent marching around, standing guard, doing nothing of importance. That was enough. I missed my forest. Being in towns made me ill. All those people...’

‘So now you’re happy again?’

‘Not today I’m not.’ He jerked his head in the direction of Kate, who was walking dutifully behind them. ‘I could do without this.’

‘So why are you doing it?’

‘Chosen by lot. It’s not as if anyone in their right mind would volunteer.’

‘What are the rules?’

‘She does as I say. She works. If she refuses, she gets beaten.’

‘You are going to beat the Lady of Willdon?’

‘I hope not. If I do, then no one will ever know. She cannot say what happens to her. Nor can I, and you can only speak if one or other of us breaks the rules. You know that, don’t you?’

Jay shook his head. ‘No. I don’t know anything.’

‘You’ve not changed, then.’

They walked on some more, then Callan dropped his backpack on the ground. ‘Time for a rest,’ he said, ‘and some food. Kate! In the bag you’ll find some bread and cheese. Set it out for us.’

Kate came, and bowed, and set to work.

Jay had forgotten how hard it was to lift and carry logs, stacking them in a neat pile for collection. They didn’t even begin until their long march through the forest had come to its end. By then they must have been twelve miles away from Willdon, and had been passing through never-ending trees, crossing brooks and rivers and occasionally little meadows cleared for sheep and goats. Once they spent a few minutes up a broad oak tree; Callan thought he had heard a wild boar. He stood guard at the bottom while Jay and Kate — neither much good in a fight, he reckoned — scuttled up the tree and hung on to the branches.

‘Think ahead,’ Jay whispered to Kate. ‘The boar comes, kills Callan and eats him. It then settles down for a sleep. Its family comes and joins in. We’re stuck up here. What do we do then?’

‘Are you always so cheerful?’

No such disaster occurred. Jay reckoned this was down to him, on the grounds that a disaster anticipated never happens. It is only the things you don’t think of which come to pass. Kate declined to give him much credit, but was at least grateful for the ten minutes’ rest they had lying on the branches before Callan told them they could come down.

‘Wouldn’t have minded some meat for dinner,’ he said. ‘Next time, Jay, you go ahead and make a noise to attract it.’

‘As long as you tell Henary how his student died.’

‘I could do that,’ Kate said. ‘He would understand and bear his loss. Henary is not a man to do without food.’

It was a good-natured march. Callan treated Kate rather as a kind master treats a servant and she, in turn, played her part well. Jay, whose respect had previously clouded his vision, found himself considering things he would never have dared allow himself to think about the Lady of Willdon. Stripped of authority and of finery, she remained a lovely woman, much younger-looking now that her body was not bound and cosseted. Her face, perhaps, showed a few lines around the eyes, but her skin was clear and fresh, her eyes bright. Nor did her luxurious life mean she was unfit; she walked strongly and, when it came to work, lifted and stacked logs with steady effort.

It was dark by the time Callan called a halt for the day. He and Jay settled down on a blanket while Kate built a fire, which Callan, as master, lit. Then she began to prepare their food.

‘Forgive me for asking, but can you cook?’ Jay enquired.

‘Of course I can cook,’ she said crossly. ‘I used to enjoy it. I can do fresh perch in a cream and sorrel sauce. Calf’s head in honey and vinegar. Jams and preserves of all sorts. What do we have?’

‘Bread, cheese, beer, some pickled meats as a treat and porridge for breakfast,’ Callan said with an amused snort.

‘What about tomorrow?’

‘Bread, cheese, beer, some pickled meats as a treat and porridge for breakfast,’ Callan said again.

‘That’s easy enough, then.’

She could drink as well, and felt she deserved to, as she had been the one who had carried the two heavy jars of strong beer. Once the food was ready, Callan made the blessing over it and poured the beer into three earthenware pots. ‘It may be against the rules,’ he said, ‘but in my village, servants eat with the family. So sit you down, servant Kate, and join our meal.’

He raised his glass when they were all around the fire. ‘To the health and lasting life of two of the worst woodsmen I have ever encountered.’

They cheered this and drank; Jay watched as the beer spilled down Kate’s chin, her neck and her body. He forced himself to think of other things.

‘Your turn, Master Scholar!’ Callan said when they had eaten part of their meal.

‘I would like a toast to the weather,’ Jay said. ‘Neither too hot, which would be bad for working, nor cold and wet, which would be miserable. May it be as generous tomorrow and ever after.’

Another cheer, and another drink.

‘Now you, servant Kate. You are one of us this evening, and you must make a toast as well,’ Callan said.

Kate, who was lying propped up on one arm, chewing an apple, straightened herself and picked up her mug. She peered into it with one eye closed to make sure there was still some beer in it.

‘I,’ she began, then stopped, and thought. ‘I,’ she resumed after a while, ‘would like to toast those who take the good in the Story and shun the bad. Who stray never from kindness, and who know where lies true contentment. I would like to toast kind masters and good friends.’ She saluted the other two and drank deeply. They followed her lead, then clapped enthusiastically.

‘Bravo, servant!’ said Callan. ‘As a reward you may clear the plates and prepare the beds. After you are done, it seems a pity to waste the opportunity of having a Storyteller with us.’

‘But I am not a Storyteller,’ Jay said. ‘I’ve never told one in public.’

‘Nonsense,’ Kate said, momentarily reverting to her true self before remembering. ‘Sorry. Slipped.’

‘She is right,’ Callan added. ‘You may not have told a story, but what better start could there be, under the warm night sky, with an appreciative and’ — here he glanced at Kate — ‘slightly drunk audience? What better place and time could you have? Besides, no word of this interlude must ever be spoken, so if you make an idiot of yourself then no one will ever know.’

‘Except us,’ Kate pointed out happily.

‘Come along, Jay,’ Callan said. ‘Please do. Remember, you owe me a kindness. While you prepare, this excellent servant will clean up, and I will stack some more logs on the fire, and when you are done, we will sleep.’

While they worked, Jay calmed himself down with the breathing exercises he had been taught, sitting still and loosening his muscles, gaining control of his diaphragm, then putting his hands together and bowing his head to empty it of extraneous thought.

When he was prepared as he could be, he began.

There was once a Storyteller who was known as the wisest man of his generation. He was kind to his students, careful in his judgements. His reasoning was so powerful, his use of argument so great that all naturally accepted his word. For twenty years he had gone on the regular circle of visits, listening, considering and deciding. In that time there was not one appeal against his verdicts, and his relations with those who went with him were perfect.

Often, when travelling through the countryside, he would stop on a hilltop at evening and stare at the beauty of the valley below. Or he would pause as he passed a ruin of great antiquity and wonder aloud what its history was. Later, one remembered him in a library, running his fingers over the leather of an old manuscript, looking at it in a way that was not easy to interpret.

One day he went to a town where there was a difficult dispute to resolve. The mayor had married his daughter to a lord ten miles away. The marriage had been settled, the dowry agreement signed, but then an argument had erupted. The lord said the girl was bad-tempered, lazy and offensive. He would not repudiate her, but demanded more money to keep her. The mayor refused, saying the agreement had been freely made. So the lord sent her back, but kept the dowry, as she was still his wife.

The dispute caused ill-feeling between the town, which was angry at the insult, and the lands around. Blows were exchanged, local farmers assaulted as they came into market. So it was the scholar’s first duty to resolve the matter when he arrived. He listened (as was his habit) to those involved, and many who were not. He asked penetrating questions and decided that all were equally at fault. Such was his reputation and his secret pride that he did not listen to his fellow who was with him, but reached his decisions alone.

Here was the judgement: the girl was indeed rude and offensive to her husband, but this was because he was a dolt, well-meaning but stupid. The girl’s father had filled her with vanity at her beauty and importance, so had made her unwilling to see the good in others. And the lord was incapable of seeing what a lovely creature he had, although unworthily, been allotted as his wife.

All should apologise. The father should pay the extra dowry, but give it to the poor of the lands around, and the husband should give an equal amount.

The mayor of the town was a cunning fellow. He pretended to accept the judgement, with fine words of praise for the scholar’s wisdom, but secretly he was furious. He invited the scholar to his house and gave him food and wine. Then he brought out a great treasure, a small picture of ageless antiquity. It was his, and had been in his family for longer than anyone could remember, he said.

The scholar wondered at the object, which was more beautiful than anything made by the hand of man that he had ever seen, and the mayor knew that the scholar coveted the beautiful thing for himself.

‘It is yours, as thanks for your wisdom,’ said the mayor. ‘Or rather, it would have been. For now I have to pay the extra dowry for my daughter I will be a poor man, and will have to sell it to the highest bidder for whatever I can get for it.’

The next day the scholar gave his judgement. He found in favour of the mayor and condemned the lord for his actions. He took the little picture, wrapped it in his baggage and left the town.

But it was not the mayor’s to give. It was the most precious possession of the town, and as soon as its loss was discovered there was much unhappiness. The townspeople searched the baggage of the scholar’s clerk, found the picture and arrested him.

The scholar immediately returned and confessed what had happened. He said his clerk had been innocent, and that he had taken the picture as a gift.

Then he left the town and went wandering, no longer a scholar, but a beggar until his dying day.

Jay had chosen well; at the end, it took some time before his audience — small but appreciative — came out of the reverie the words had induced in them. Rather than showing off, he had taken a simple tale, one which had been translated into the spoken language so that Callan could understand it. This was not the place for a virtuoso display. It was not a first-level telling, nor a second, nor even a third; indeed, it fitted no proper category that he knew of.

It was not as he had imagined his first telling. He had thought it would be in a formal setting, after weeks of preparation and coaching and rehearsal, to make sure every vowel, every weighting, every intonation was correct, that the movements of his hands and body fitted the words he spoke, emphasising but not distracting. It was to have been in a grand hall, advertised in advance, witnessed by his friends, his teachers — and those who were there to sit in judgement. On it his future reputation would have depended. Many failed through nerves, many more were sick beforehand and collapsed afterwards. It was said to be the single most terrifying event any man could endure.

It could not have been more different. He sat, rather than stood; his audience was two people, rather than two hundred. They wanted to hear the story, not to spot his mistakes. At the end, they didn’t even need to applaud. He loved it, once the nervousness passed. He adopted a tone that was conversational rather than declamatory, only rarely raising his voice, sometimes almost whispering the words. Occasionally he did drop in a few sentences of the old language, for emphasis, but only when the meaning was obvious. They loved the words, loved the story, loved him. For the first time in his life, Jay felt what it was to be respected, to use his skill to obliterate the loneliness of life. He became the story, and through it he merged with his audience, by instinctively responding to them.

Neither spoke for a long time after he finished, but just stared dreamily at the fire, smiling occasionally as they recalled passages. Then, roughly, Callan pulled himself together.

‘Sleep, my friends,’ he said. ‘We have a hard day’s work tomorrow, and I intend to make you remember just what hard work is.’

‘I will sit awhile, if you don’t mind,’ Jay said. ‘I will sleep soon enough.’

Kate had pitched Callan’s little tent some way off; he didn’t like sleeping by fires, he had said, and never felt the cold. He went, leaving the warmth to the soft house dwellers. Jay scarcely noticed him going. Nor did he pay much attention when he felt her settle down beside him and gently knead his shoulders. She said nothing, but laid her head on his shoulder so he could feel her hair against his neck.

‘Now I understand what Henary sees in you.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘It doesn’t matter tonight. Now you must rest. We are all transformed by the forest, no? I the servant, you the Storyteller, Callan the master. Soon enough I will again be the great lady, and you will be a simple student, and he will be but a forester once more. The magic will fade. Then we must talk. But not now. Now your servant Kate will soothe you to sleep. So lie down, my master Jay, and rest.’

He lay down, and Kate folded him in her arms and held him close, stroking his hair and kissing his forehead until the oblivion of sleep took him over.