Diana Jones - Cart and Cwidder

“Leave those,” said Lenina. “We don’t need them.”

“Well, I don’t fancy them at the moment, either,” said Kialan. “But—”

“Leave them,” said Lenina. Kialan did as he was bid. Now Lenina seemed to be definitely in charge. It was she who took the reins when Olob was ready and drove out of the valley.

Brid and Moril looked back. It was a very beautiful valley. Probably, Moril thought, it was a good place to be buried, if one had to be. Brid cried. Dagner did not look back. He had sunk into a silence as profound as any of Lenina’s. He did not look at anything, and no one liked to speak to him.

Lenina drove northwards for a mile or so, until she came to a road that turned off to the left. Then, to Moril’s surprise, she swung the cart into it.

“Hey! Where are we going?” said Moril.

“Markind,” said Lenina.

“What? Not to Ganner!” demanded Brid, halting in the middle of a sob.

“Yes. To Ganner,” said Lenina. “He said he would have me and mine if ever I was free, and I know he meant it.”

“Oh, but no! You can’t!” said Moril. “Not just like that!”

“Why not?” Lenina asked. “How do you think we shall live, without a singer to earn us money?”

“We can manage,” said Moril. “I can sing. Dagner can – Dagner …” His voice tailed away as he thought of Dagner and himself trying to perform as Clennen did. He just could not see Dagner doing it. He did not know what to say, so he stopped, fearing he might be hurting Dagner’s feelings. But it looked as if Dagner was not listening. “Father wouldn’t like us to go to Markind,” Moril asserted. He was sure of that, at least.

“I can’t see that your father has much say in the matter now,” Lenina answered drily. “Get this clear, Moril. I know well enough that your father was a good man, and the best singer in Dalemark, and I’ve done my duty by him for seventeen years. That’s half my lifetime, Moril. I’ve gone barefoot and learnt to cook and make music. I’ve lived in a cart in all weathers, and never complained. I’ve mended and cleaned and looked after you all. There were things your father did that I didn’t agree with at all, but I never argued with him or crossed him. I did my duty exactly in every way, and I’ve nothing to reproach myself with. But Clennen’s dead now, so I’m free to do as I choose. What I’m choosing is my birthright and yours too. Do you understand?”

“I suppose so,” Moril mumbled. He had never heard Lenina say anything like this before. He was frightened and rather shocked to see that she must have been not saying it for longer than he had lived. He thought it was wrong of her, but he could not have said why. He thought she was altogether wrong, but he could not find any words to set against her. All he could do was to exchange a scared, helpless look with Brid. Brid said nothing either.

It was Kialan who spoke. He sounded rather embarrassed. “It’s not my place to object,” he said. “But I do have to get to Hannart, Lenina.”

“I know,” said Lenina. “I’ve thought of that. You can pose as my son for the moment, and I’ll find someone to take you North as soon as I can, I promise. Hestefan’s in the South, I know, and Fredlan may be too.”

Kialan looked exasperated as well as embarrassed. “But Ganner must know how many children you’ve got!”

“I shouldn’t think so,” Lenina said calmly. “People who haven’t got children themselves never bother to count other people’s. If he wonders, I’ll say you’ve been ill and we’d left you at Fledden.”

Kialan sighed. “Oh well. Thanks, anyway.”

“Remember that,” Lenina said to Moril, Brid and Dagner, and Moril felt very queer, because “Remember that” was such a favourite saying of Clennen’s. “Kialan’s your brother. If anyone asks, he’s been ill in Fledden.”

Olob plodded towards Markind. He did not look happy either, Moril thought, looking at the droop of Olob’s head. Moril was so miserable himself that he could almost hear it, like a droning in his ears, and he could not hide away in vagueness, much as he tried. He felt vividly and horribly attentive to everything, from the leaves in the hedge to the shape of Kialan’s nose. Kialan’s eagle nose was so different from Dagner’s, Brid’s, or Moril’s that surely anyone could tell at a glance he was no relation? Why did he have to be a relation, anyway? And had Clennen known he wanted to go to Hannart? Clennen would not have gone there because he never went to Hannart. And why had the six men killed Clennen? Who were they, and what were they looking for in the wood? And why, why, why above all, had Clennen given Moril a cwidder he did not want in the least?

I shall never play it , Moril thought. I’ll polish it and string it, and maybe tune it from time to time, but I don’t want to play it. I know I should be grateful, because it must be very valuable – though it can’t be old enough to have belonged to Osfameron; he’s long ago in a story – but I don’t like it and I don’t want it.

Markind came into view at the other end of a valley. Without meaning to, Moril looked at it as he always looked at a new town. Sleepy and respectable , he thought. Bad takings . Then he remembered he was supposed to be going here to live, not to sing, and tried very hard to look at the pile of yellowish-grey houses with interest. He found he was more interested in the villainously freckled cows which were grazing in the small green meadows outside the town.

Lenina looked at these cows with pleasure. “I remember I always liked those speckles,” she said. She encouraged Olob to trot, and the grey and yellow houses approached swiftly. Moril’s heart sank rather – and he had thought it was low enough before.

Soon they were winding up a gravelly street between quiet old houses. The houses were tall and cold and shuttered. There were very few people about. Even when they came to the main square and found a market going on under the high plane trees, there were still very few people, and these all sober citizens who looked at the gay cart with strong disapproval. Lenina drove past the stalls looking neither to right nor to left, and drew Olob up in front of a round-topped gateway in a massive yellow wall. Two men who seemed to be on guard at the gate peered round it at the cart in evident astonishment.

“Had you business here?” one of them asked Lenina.

“Certainly,” Lenina answered haughtily. “Go and tell Ganner Sagersson that Lenina Thornsdaughter is here.”

They looked at her in even more astonishment at that. But one of them went off into the spaces behind the thick yellow wall. The other stayed, frowning wonderingly at Lenina, the cart and her family, until Moril scarcely knew where to look.

“What’s the betting we get a message back to say, Not Today, Thank You?” whispered Brid.

“Be quiet, Brid!” said Lenina. “Behave properly, can’t you!”

Brid would have lost her bet. The man who had gone with the message came back at a run, and they could hear a number of people behind the gate, running too. The two halves of the gate were flung wide open.

“Please drive in,” said the man.

Lenina smiled graciously and shook the reins. Olob plodded forwards, disapproval in every line of his ears and back, into a small deep courtyard lined with interested faces. Ganner was standing in the middle of it, smiling delightedly.

“Welcome back, Lenina!” he said. “I never thought I’d see you so soon. What happened?”

“Some men killed Clennen this morning,” said Lenina. “They looked like the pick of somebody’s hearthmen to me.”

“Not really!” exclaimed Ganner. Then he looked a little worried and asked, “Does that mean it happened in my lordship then?”