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Of Lions and Unicorns: A Lifetime of Tales from the Master Storyteller
I can mind it was the year that Father caught him that it happened. I were maybe seven or eight perhaps. He flew at Fathers face and Father had him and hung on spite of all the flapping and squawking.
We would have a good supper out of that and we were pleased as punch I can tell you. Father and me stayed up in the village and Mother went off home with the fowl. There were a whole crowd of folk in the Duke of York and as usual there was some that had too much of the beer or cider. It were rowdy in there and I was sat outside with the horses waiting for Father. It was the drink that started the whole thing. Mother always said so after.
Harry Medlicott he had West Park in them days. Biggest farm in the parish it was. Harry Medlicott comes out of the Duke drunk as a lord, he was knowed for it. He was a puffed up sort of chap a bit full of himself. Had the first car in the parish the first tractor too. Anyway Father and me we were mounting up to leave. Father was on Joey and I was up on Zoey and this Harry Medlicott comes up and says. Look here Corporal he says you got to get yourself up to date you have.
What do you mean says Father.
Those two old nags of yours. You should go and get yourself a proper new-fangled modern tractor like me.
What for says Father.
What for. What for. I’ll tell you what for corporal says he. My Fordson can plough a field five times as fast as your two old bag of boneses. Thats what for.
Bag of bones is it says Father. Now everyone knows what Father thinks of his Joey how he won’t hear a word against him. Common knowledge it was at the time. Well for a moment or two Father just looks down at Harry Medlicott from on top of Joey. Then he leans forward and talks into Joeys ear.
Do you hear that Joey says he. Joey whips his tail and paws the ground like he wants to be off. A bit of a crowd was gathering now most of them as drunk as Harry Medlicott and laughing at us just like he was. He dont much like what youre saying Mr Medlicott says Father. And whats more neither do I.
Like it or not Corporal, Harry Medlicott is still swigging down his cider. Like it or not the days of horses is over. Look at them two. Fit for nothing but the knackers yard if you ask me.
Tis true that Father had drunk a beer or two. I am not saying he hadn’t else I am certain sure he would have just rode away. I don’t think he was ever angry in all his life but he was as upset then as I ever saw him. I could see that in his eyes. Any rate he pats Joeys neck and tries to smile it off. I reckon theyre good enough for a few years yet Mr Medlicott says he.
Good for nothing I say Corporal. And Harry Medlicott is laughing like a drain all the while. I say a man without a tractor these days can’t call himself a proper farmer. Thats what I say.
Father straightens himself up in his saddle and everyones waiting to hear what hes got to say just like I was. All right Mr Medlicott says he. We will see shall us. We will see if your tractor is all you say it is. Come ploughing time in November. I will put my two horses against your tractor and we will just see who comes off best shall us.
Well of course by now Harry Medlicott was splitting himself laughing, and so were half the crowd. Whats that Corporal he says. They two old nags against my new Fordson. I got a two furrow plough reversible. You got an old single furrow. You wouldn’t stand a dogs chance. I told you I can do five acres a day easy. More maybe. You havent got a hope Corporal.
Havent I now says Father and theres a steely look in his eye now. You sure of that are you.
Course I am says Harry Medlicott.
Right then. And Father says it out loud so everyone can hear. Heres what we’ll do then. We’ll plough as many furrows as we can from half past six in the morning to half past three in the afternoon. Hour off for lunch. We’ll have Farmer Northley to do the judging at the end of the day. Furrows got to be good and straight like they should be. And another thing Mr Medlicott since youre so sure youll win we’ll have a little bet on it shall us. If I win I drive away the tractor. If you win theres a hundred bales of my best meadow hay for you. What do you say.
But my Fordsons worth a lot more than that says Harry Medlicott.
Course it is says Father. But then your not going to lose are you so it don’t matter do it. And he holds out his hand. Harry Medlicott thinks for a while but then he shakes Fathers hand and that was that. We rode off home and Father hardly spoke a single word the whole way. We was unsaddling by the stables when he sighs deep and he says. Your mothers going to be awful vexed at me. I shouldnt have done it. I know I shouldnt. Dont know what came over me.
He was right. Mother was as angry as I ever saw her. She told him just what she thought of him and how could we afford to go giving away a hundred good bales and how he was bound to lose and how no horse in the world could plough as fast as a tractor. Everyone with any sense knew that she says. Father kept his peace and never argued with her. He just said he couldnt go back on it now. What was done was done and he would have to make the best of it. But I tell you something Maisie he says to her. That Harry Medlicott with his fancy car and his fancy waistcoat and his fancy tractor hes going to be worrying himself silly from now on till November you see if he wont.
But you’ll be the silly one when you lose wont you says Mother.
Maybe I will maybe I wont Father says back. And he gives her a little smile. Be something if I win though wont it.
The silver swan, who living had no note,
When death approached, unlocked her silent throat:
Leaning her breast against the reedy shore
Thus sung her first and last, and sung no more.
Orlando Gibbons
I stood and watched her as she arranged her wings behind her and sailed out over the loch, making it entirely her own. I stayed as late as I could, quite unable to leave her.
I went down to the loch every day after that, but not to fish for trout, simply to watch my silver swan.
In those early days I took great care not to frighten her away, keeping myself still and hidden in the shadow of the alders. But even so, she knew I was there – I was sure of it.
Within a week I would find her cruising along the lochside, waiting for me when I arrived in the early mornings. I took to bringing some bread crusts with me. She would look sideways at them at first, rather disdainfully. Then, after a while, she reached out her neck, snatched them out of the water, and made off with them in triumph.
One day I dared to dunk the bread crusts for her, dared to try to feed her by hand. She took all I offered her and came back for more. She was coming close enough now for me to be able to touch her neck. I would talk to her as I stroked her. She really listened, I know she did.
I never saw the cob arrive. He was just there swimming beside her one morning out on the loch. You could see the love between them even then. The princess of the loch had found her prince. When they drank they dipped their necks together, as one. When they flew, their wings beat together, as one.
She knew I was there, I think, still watching. But she did not come to see me again, nor to have her bread crusts. I tried to be more glad for her than sad for me, but it was hard.
As winter tried, and failed, to turn to spring, they began to make a home on the small island, way out in the middle of the loch. I could watch them now only through my binoculars. I was there every day I could be – no matter what the weather.
Things were happening. They were no longer busy just preening themselves, or feeding, or simply gliding out over the loch taking their reflections with them. Between them they were building a nest – a clumsy messy excuse for a nest it seemed to me – set on a reedy knoll near the shore of their island.
It took them several days to construct. Neither ever seemed quite satisfied with the other’s work. A twig was too big, or too small, or perhaps just not in the right place. There were no arguments as such, as far as I could see. But my silver swan would rearrange things, tactfully, when her cob wasn’t there. And he would do the same when she wasn’t there.
Then, one bright cold morning with the ground beneath my feet hard with a late and unexpected frost, I arrived to see my silver swan enthroned at last on her nest, her cob proudly patrolling the loch close by.
I knew there were foxes about even then. I had heard their cries often enough echoing through the night. I had seen their footprints in the snow. But I had never seen one out and about, until now.
It was dusk. I was on my way back home from the loch, coming up through the woods, when I spotted a family of five cubs, their mother sitting on guard near by. Unseen and unsmelt, I crouched down where I was and watched.
I could see at once that they were starving, some of them already too weak even to pester their mother for food. But I could see too that she had none to give – she was thin and rangy herself. I remember thinking then: That’s one family of foxes that’s not likely to make it, not if the spring doesn’t come soon, not if this winter goes on much longer.
But the winter did go on that year, on and on.
I thought little more of the foxes. My mind was on other things, more important things. My silver swan and her cob shared the sitting duties and the guarding duties, never leaving the precious nest long enough for me even to catch sight of the eggs, let alone count them. But I could count the days, and I did.
As the day approached I made up my mind I would go down to the loch, no matter what, and stay there until it happened – however long that might take. But the great day dawned foggy. Out of my bedroom window, I could barely see across the farmyard.
I ran all the way down to the loch. From the lochside I could see nothing of the island, nothing of the loch, only a few feet of limpid grey water lapping at the muddy shore. I could hear the muffled aarking of a heron out in the fog, and the distant piping of a moorhen. But I stayed to keep watch, all that day, all the next.
I was there in the morning two days later when the fog began at last to lift and the pale sun to come through. The island was there again. I turned my binoculars at once on the nest. It was deserted. They were gone. I scanned the loch, still mist-covered in places. Not a ripple. Nothing.
Then out of nothing they appeared, my silver swan, her cob and four cygnets, coming straight towards me. As they came towards the shore they turned and sailed right past me. I swear she was showing them to me, parading them. They both swam with such easy power, the cygnets bobbing along in their wake. But I had counted wrong. There was another one, hitching a ride in amongst his mother’s folded wings. A snug little swan, I thought, littler than the others perhaps. A lucky little swan.
That night the wind came in from the north and the loch froze over. It stayed frozen. I wondered how they would manage. But I need not have worried. They swam about, keeping a pool of water near the island clear of ice. They had enough to eat, enough to drink. They would be fine. And every day the cygnets were growing. It was clear now that one of them was indeed much smaller, much weaker. But he was keeping up. He was coping. All was well.
Then, silently, as I slept one night, it snowed outside. It snowed on the farm, on the trees, on the frozen loch. I took bread crusts with me the next morning, just in case, and hurried down to the loch. As I came out of the woods I saw the fox’s paw prints in the snow. They were leading down towards the loch.
I was running, stumbling through the drifts, dreading all along what I might find.
The fox was stalking around the nest. My silver swan was standing her ground over her young, neck lowered in attack, her wings beating the air frantically, furiously. I shouted. I screamed. But I was too late and too far away to help.
Quick as a flash the fox darted in, had her by the wing and was dragging her away. I ran out on to the ice. I felt it crack and give suddenly beneath me. I was knee-deep in the loch then, still screaming; but the fox would not be put off. I could see the blood, red, bright red, on the snow. The five cygnets were scattering in their terror. My silver swan was still fighting. But she was losing, and there was nothing I could do.
I heard the sudden singing of wings above me. The cob! The cob flying in, diving to attack. The fox took one look upwards, released her victim, and scampered off over the ice, chased all the way by the cob.
For some moments I thought my silver swan was dead. She lay so still on the snow. But then she was on her feet and limping back to her island, one wing flapping feebly, the other trailing, covered in blood and useless. She was gathering her cygnets about her. They were all there. She was enfolding them, loving them, when the cob came flying back to her, landing awkwardly on the ice.
He stood over her all that day and would not leave her side. He knew she was dying. So, by then, did I. I had nothing but revenge and murder in my heart. Time and again, as I sat there at the lochside, I thought of taking my father’s gun and going into the woods to hunt down the killer fox. But then I would think of her cubs and would know that she was only doing what a mother fox had to do.
For days I kept my cold sad vigil by the loch. The cob was sheltering the cygnets now, my silver swan sleeping near by, her head tucked under her wing. She scarcely ever moved.
I wasn’t there, but I knew the precise moment she died. I knew it because she sang it. It’s quite true what they say about swans singing only when they die. I was at home. I had been sent out to fetch logs for the fire before I went up to bed. The world about me was crisp and bright under the moon. The song was clearer and sweeter than any human voice, than any birdsong, I had ever heard before. So sang my silver swan and died.
I expected to see her lying dead on the island the next morning. But she was not there. The cob was sitting still as a statue on his nest, his five cygnets around him.
I went looking for her. I picked up the trail of feathers and blood at the lochside, and followed where I knew it must lead, up through the woods. I approached silently. The fox cubs were frolicking fat and furry in the sunshine, their mother close by intent on her grooming. There was a terrible wreath of white feathers near by, and telltale feathers too on her snout. She was trying to shake them off. How I hated her.
I ran at her. I picked up stones. I hurled them. I screamed at her. The foxes vanished into the undergrowth and left me alone in the woods. I picked up a silver feather, and cried tears of such raw grief, such fierce anger.
Spring came at long last the next day, and melted the ice. The cob and his five cygnets were safe. After that I came less and less to the loch. It wasn’t quite the same without my silver swan. I went there only now and again, just to see how he was doing, how they were all doing.
At first, to my great relief, it seemed as if he was managing well enough on his own. Then one day I noticed there were only four cygnets swimming alongside him, the four bigger ones. I don’t know what happened to the smaller one. He just wasn’t there. Not so lucky, after all.
The cob would sometimes bring his cygnets to the lochside to see me. I would feed them when he came, but then after a while he just stopped coming.
The weeks passed and the months passed, and the cygnets grew and flew. The cob scarcely left his island now. He stayed on the very spot I had last seen my silver swan. He did not swim; he did not feed; he did not preen himself. Day by day it became clearer that he was pining for her, dying for her.
Now my vigil at the lochside was almost constant again. I had to be with him; I had to see him through. It was what my silver swan would have wanted, I thought.
So I was there when it happened. A swan flew in from nowhere one day, down on to the glassy stillness of the loch. She landed right in front of him. He walked down into the loch, settled into the water and swam out to meet her. I watched them look each other over for just a few minutes. When they drank, they dipped their necks together, as one. When they flew, their wings beat together, as one.
Five years on and they’re still together. Five years on and I still have the feather from my silver swan. I take it with me wherever I go. I always will.
Open one eye.
Same old basket, same old kitchen.
Another day.
Ear’s itching.
Have a good scratch.
Lovely.
Have a good stretch.
Here comes Lula.
“Morning, Russ,” she says.
“Do you know what day it is today?”
Silly question! Course I do!
It’s the day after yesterday
and the day before tomorrow.
Out I go. Smarty’s barking his ‘good morning’ at me from across the valley.
Good old Smarty. Best friend I’ve got, except Lula of course.
I bark mine back.
I can’t hang about. Got to get the cows in.
There they are.
Lula’s dad likes me to
have them ready for milking
by the time he gets there.
Better watch that one with the new calf.
She’s a bit skippy.
Lie down, nose in the grass.
Give her the hard eye.
There she goes, in amongst the rest.
And here comes Lula’s dad singing his way down to the dairy.
“Good dog,” he says.
I wag my tail. He likes that.
He gives me another ‘good dog’.
I get my milk. Lovely.
Off back up to the house.
Well, I don’t want to miss my breakfast, do I?
Lula’s already scoffing her bacon and eggs.
I sit down next to her
and give her my
very best begging look.
It always works.
Two bacon rinds in secret under the table,
and all her toast crusts too. Lovely.
There’s good pickings
under the baby’s chair this morning.
I hoover it all up. Lovely.
Lula always likes me to go with her
to the end of the lane.
She loves a bit of a cuddle, and
a lick or two before the school bus comes.
“Oh, Russ,” she whispers. “A horse.
It’s all I want for my birthday.”
And I’m thinking, ’Scuse me, what’s so great about a horse?
Isn’t a dog good enough?
Then along comes the bus and on she gets.
“See you,” she says.
Lula’s dad is whistling for me.
“Where are you, you old rascal you?”
I’m coming.
I’m coming.
Back up the lane,
through the hedge,
over the gate.
“Don’t just sit there, Russ.
I want those sheep in for shearing.”
And all the while he keeps on
with his whistling and whooping.
I mean, does he think
I haven’t done this before?
Doesn’t he know
this is what I’m made for?
Hare down the hill.
Leap the stream.
Get right around behind them.
Keep low. Don’t rush them. That’s good.
They’re all going now. The whole flock of them are trotting along nicely.
And I’m slinking along behind, my eye on every one of them,
my bark and my bite deep inside their heads.
“Good dog,” I get. Third one today. Not bad.
I watch the shearing
from the top of the haybarn.
Good place to sleep, this.
Tigger’s somewhere here.
I can smell her.
There she is, up on the rafter,
waving her tail at me.
She’s teasing me. I’ll show her.
Later, I’ll do it later.
Sleep now. Lovely.
“Russ! Where are you, Russ?
I want these sheep out.
Now! Move yourself.”
All right, all right.
Down I go, and out they go,
all in a great muddle
bleating at each other,
bopping one another.
They don’t recognise each other without their clothes on.
Not very bright, that’s the trouble with sheep.
Will you look at that!
There’s hundreds of crows out in my corn field.
Well, I’m not having that, am I?
After them! Show them who’s boss!
Thirsty work, this.
What’s this? Fox!
I can smell him.
I follow him down
through the bluebell wood to his den.
He’s down there, deep down.
Can’t get at him. Pity.
Need a drink.
Shake myself dry in the sun.
Time for another sleep.
Lovely.
Smarty wakes me.
I know what he’s thinking.
How about
a Tigger hunt?
We find her soon enough.
We’re after her.
We’re catching her up.
Closer. Closer.
Right on her tail.
That’s not fair.
She’s found a tree.
Up she goes.
We can’t climb trees, so we bark our heads off.
Ah well, you can’t win them all.
“Russ, where were you, Russ?”
Lula’s dad. Shouting for me again.
“Get those calves out in the field.
What’s the point in keeping a dog
and barking myself?”
Nothing worse than trying to move young calves.
They’re all tippy-toed and skippy.
Pretty things.
Pity they get so big and lumpy when they get older.
There, done it. Well done, me!
Back to the end of the lane to meet Lula.
I’m a bit late. She’s there already,
swinging her bag and singing.
“Happy birthday to me,
happy birthday to me.
Happy birthday, dear Lula,
happy birthday to me!”
For tea there’s a big cake with candles on it,
and they’re singing that song again.
Will you look at them
tucking into that cake!
And never a thought for me.
Lula’s so busy unwrapping her presents
that she doesn’t even notice I’m there,
not even when I put my head on her knee.
Car! Car coming up my lane, and not one I know.
I’m out of the house in a flash.
I’m not just a farm dog, you know, I’m a guard dog too.
“Russ! Stop that barking, will you?”
That’s all the thanks I get.
I’m telling you, it’s a dog’s life.
Looks like a horse to me.
Give him a sniff.
Yes, definitely a horse.
Lula goes mad.
She’s hugging the horse
just like she hugs me, only for longer.
A lot longer.
“He’s beautiful,” she’s saying.
“Just what I wanted.”
Well, I’m not staying where I’m not wanted.
I haven’t had any of that cake,
and they’re not watching.
