Ann Pilling - The Beggar’s Curse

“Oliver,” she said. “You might like to read this. It’s not the text of the play, but it is quoted quite a lot.”

He took the small blue book, and read the title: The Stang Mumming Play, Origins and History . It was by Winifred B. Webster B.A. (Hons), Manchester. “ Thank you ,” he beamed, rather impressed. “I’ll read it, and bring it straight back.”

“No, that’s all right. But do look after it, Oliver. In fact, I’m not quite sure really. . .” and she put her hand out, almost as if she was going to snatch it back again.

“Why shouldn’t I read it?” Oliver said, hardening.

Winnie Webster said nothing for a minute, then she became cheerful and brisk again. But there was something forced in her manner now. “Well, quite . Why shouldn’t you? All this superstitious nonsense, all this secrecy. It’s ridiculous. Keep it at Molly’s though, dear, don’t take it round the village.” Don’t let the Edges see you with it was what she really meant.

Our Vi didn’t hear the conversation because the bungalow windows were all shut, but she certainly saw the book change hands, and as she sat waiting for her lesson an unpleasant smile was spreading slowly across her flat face.

Oliver tucked the book under his arm and followed Jessie along the lane. He was very thoughtful. Miss Webster’s crisp, no-nonsense manner hadn’t been at all convincing. It was as if, deep down, she was frightened of something. What on earth was it?

There had been no sign of a bonfire when they walked up to Winnie’s, but now the lanes were full of scurrying children lugging bits of dead tree up the hill, and rooting about in the hedges for branches and sticks. Rose Salt was there, helping some boys push an old pram full of rubbish. A loud argument was going on in the field next to George Massey’s new house; the Edges were building their fire there, and he said it was too close to his fence.

“You’ve got the whole field,” they heard. “Why build it here, for heaven’s sake?”

“Whole field’s no good,” Tony Edge said cheekily. “It’s all waterlogged, that’s what. This bit’s the only place we can build it. Any fool can see that.”

But George wouldn’t be shouted down, and, very grudgingly, they started to dismantle their fire. Sid turned up, with the Puddings in tow, and Our Vi appeared soon afterwards and helped to heave great branches about. The grumpy man who’d yelled at Colin from his bedroom window stood in the gateway and directed operations in a loud, harsh voice. This was Uncle Harold, brother of Uncle Frank. Together they ran the village stores, and they were also the stars of the play, according to Winnie.

“Seen enough?” Sid Edge bawled at Colin, who stood watching outside Molly’s. He turned, and walked up the garden path. The Edges weren’t doing anything constructive, they were just shifting their wood about six feet from the fence. That was no good. When darkness fell, and George Massey went indoors, he wouldn’t put it past them to creep out and move everything back to its original place. They were like that.

“How was Winnie?” Molly Bover asked them at tea. “Did she give you all a carrot juice cocktail?”

Colin and Prill exchanged embarrassed looks, but Oliver said, “Yes, it was awful. And the lunch was pretty awful, too. It tasted most peculiar.” He was totally unpredictable. In some moods he was maddeningly polite to grownups, at other times he said exactly what he thought. Aunt Phyllis wouldn’t approve, but Oliver was clearly enjoying a little taste of freedom.

Molly grinned. “Good old Winnie. I expect you’re all genned up now. I expect she gave you her lecture about Stang, and the play, and old Cheshire customs. Am I right?”

“Well, yes ,” Oliver said slowly. “But I’m still not sure about Blake’s Pit.”

“What about it, dear?”

“She said it was supposed to have a town at the bottom, and that there was a curse on it. She said you knew all about it too, but that it was a load of old rubbish,” he ended tactlessly.

“Ah yes,” Molly said quietly. “Winnie rather likes that word. She just means an old poem, I think, one I’m rather fond of:

“ He has cursed aloud that city proud ,

He has cursed it in its pride ;

He has cursed it into Semmerwater

Down the brant hillside ;

He has cursed it into Semmerwater ,

There to bide . . .”

Her voice was rich and deep, like a great river. What a pity women couldn’t be in this play, Prill thought. Molly would be marvellous.

Oliver had listened very carefully. “ Semmerwater ,” he said accusingly. “But what’s that got to do with it? It’s in Yorkshire. I’ve been. My father took me rowing on it.”

“Full marks, Oliver,” Molly said patiently, thinking that the persistent, pernickety Oliver was rather like a dentist’s drill. “But there are legends like that about lots of places, you know, with little variations. Didn’t your father tell you?”

“No. He’s not very keen on poetry.”

“Well, in the poem, a beggar is turned away from the gates of a great city, and he curses it. And the floods rise and drown everyone.”

“Yes, she told us that ,” he said impatiently.

“And did she tell you that people have actually seen the city, shimmering through the water?”

“No, no she didn’t. I don’t think she likes poetry much either.”

“Ah well,” said Molly.

“ King’s tower and queen’s bower ,

And a mickle town and tall ;

By glimmer of scale and gleam of fin

Folks have seen them all . . .”

The sheer music of it made Prill’s spine tingle. What a pity Molly Bover didn’t take them for poetry lessons. Their English teacher, old Mr Crockford, read things like that to them with all the feeling of an iron bar. “What about Stang, Molly?” she said.

“Well, nobody’s ever bothered to write a poem about Blake’s Pit, but it’s got the same kind of story attached to it, only in our version it was only the rich people who drowned. The beggar survived and prospered, and built another town by the lake. That’s one explanation of why Stang village is where it is. Old Stang’s under the water, and the oldest houses are just above it.”

“But I thought this house was the oldest in the village?” Oliver said.

“Oh no, dear, Pit Farm’s the oldest, and it’s the third house on that site, apparently. The Edges do go back a very long way, and I suppose when your name’s in the Doomsday Book you can afford to feel a bit superior.”

“They are awful though, Molly,” Colin said fiercely, thinking of Rose Salt weeping over her smashed eggs, and of Sid’s peals of laughter.

“Yes, they are. Sometimes, though, I get the feeling that wretched family just can’t help itself. They were born awkward, somehow.”

“Perhaps it was one of the Edges who cursed that palace into the pit,” Oliver said solemnly. “Perhaps they’re all descended from that old beggar.”

“They claim to be, as a matter of fact,” Molly murmured. “It’s a local tradition. No way of proving it, of course, but the Edges are quite proud of their ancestry. Most people would keep quiet about it, if someone way back had been responsible for a curse, but not that lot. . . Now ,” she said briskly. “If you’re going to this bonfire, wrap up well – and keep an eye on Rose for me. She gets rather excited on these occasions.”

What she meant was that Rose Salt had a crush on Tony Edge. They could see her, standing in the shadows, peering at Uncle Harold as he poured petrol on the bonfire. She was still wearing her woolly pixie-hood and the long brown mack, and clinging on to her old shopping bag. Tony was surrounded by a group of giggling admirers. They watched him fit a big harness on to his shoulders, then slot a long pole into it, down a leather pouch, rather like a boy scout carrying a flag. Then he began to sway about, laughing and chasing after all the girls. The bonfire had blazed up already, and in the orange glare Prill saw the outline of a horse’s skull.