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Authors: Karen Cushman
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man turned and looked at Alyce. “Forget this Edward, curly top. My name is Mat and I am six times the man he is. Climb up here on this hay bale and give me a warm, sticky kiss.”
“My hair may be frizzled but my wits are not,” Alyce responded. “Save your sticky kisses for your wife or your cow.”
Alyce left the barn and went next to the smithy, where the manor blacksmith and his apprentices were hammering lumps of iron into shoes for horses. “The boy Edward?” she asked again. Her answer was rude remarks, laughter, and kissing sounds from men too ill-tempered or too busy or too tired to care about the questions of a strange girl.
“The boy Edward?” Alyce asked the kitchen maid skinning a pig in the manor yard, the laundress boiling great kettles of goose fat for soap, the carpenters fashioning a coffin for Old Ned, who had died that morning. None answered. “Corpus bones!” said Alyce. “I might as well be asking the fence.”
Finally she found her way to the shed that served as the manor kitchen and there found a cook who, judging from the words pouring forth from her mouth with none to listen, would not be reluctant to talk to Alyce.
“Please, ma’am,” said Alyce, who had learned that ma’ams and sirs served her well even with cooks and stableboys when asking favors. “Please, ma’am, the boy Edward who came after harvest to help with the threshing, is he still here? Have you seen aught of him?”
“Ah, the lamb,” the cook cooed, waving her ladle at Alyce, “the little lamb. He be here. But too small he is to be swinging that great heavy flail about or wrestling with the oxen and ploughs and the taunting of the men, so I try to watch over him, the wee duckling, and find him simple tasks to do, suited for a small boy.” The cook sat down, her face red from the heat and emotion and the boiling and stewing going on about her, took off one great leather shoe, and used it to fan her face. She peered closely at Alyce. “Surely then you be the sister he talks about, for you look just like him and could pass for twins.” The cook muttered and crossed herself. “You not be twins?” she asked Alyce, peering closer. “I cannot abide twins.”
“No, ma’am. We be not even brother and sister.”
“Ah, never say that, sweet pudding, for you are as alike as two peas. Just so you are not twins.”
“No, ma’am, not twins,” answered Alyce again, wondering why twin cows such as Baldred and Billfrith should be such a joy and a boon while twin babies were ill-starred and unlucky.
“Well, then, my little turnip. Go find your brother in the hen house behind the barn, where I sent him to gather eggs for a parsley omelet. And bring yourselves back here for a dinner of bread and bacon.” The cook wiped her wet red face on her skirt, picked a struggling fly from the great pot of soup she was stirring, and began a new conversation with herself, for she found such talk interesting and hardly ever disagreed with what was said.
----
15. Edward
« ^ »
T he manor was growing quiet, preparing for evening and supper and bed. Alyce passed men coming back from the fields, weed hooks and hoes and rakes on their tired shoulders; dairymaids washing out the churns, stopping every now and then to lick the sweet butter off their fingers; shepherds bringing in the sheep for tomorrow’s washing and shearing, the music of their pipes rising to the wide blue sky and disappearing into the silence.
Around the barn in the hen house she found Edward, egg basket still empty, kneeling before the chickens. “So then,” he said to the largest and most bad-tempered, “you be the king and you”—he pointed to a small hen with speckled feathers—“be the queen, for you look motherly and kind, and the rest of us will be knights and we will pretend we are about to have a great battle with the Scots but we don’t mind for we are sure to be victorious.”
At that, Edward looked up and saw Alyce watching him.
“My hair may be frizzled but my wits are not,” Alyce responded. “Save your sticky kisses for your wife or your cow.”
Alyce left the barn and went next to the smithy, where the manor blacksmith and his apprentices were hammering lumps of iron into shoes for horses. “The boy Edward?” she asked again. Her answer was rude remarks, laughter, and kissing sounds from men too ill-tempered or too busy or too tired to care about the questions of a strange girl.
“The boy Edward?” Alyce asked the kitchen maid skinning a pig in the manor yard, the laundress boiling great kettles of goose fat for soap, the carpenters fashioning a coffin for Old Ned, who had died that morning. None answered. “Corpus bones!” said Alyce. “I might as well be asking the fence.”
Finally she found her way to the shed that served as the manor kitchen and there found a cook who, judging from the words pouring forth from her mouth with none to listen, would not be reluctant to talk to Alyce.
“Please, ma’am,” said Alyce, who had learned that ma’ams and sirs served her well even with cooks and stableboys when asking favors. “Please, ma’am, the boy Edward who came after harvest to help with the threshing, is he still here? Have you seen aught of him?”
“Ah, the lamb,” the cook cooed, waving her ladle at Alyce, “the little lamb. He be here. But too small he is to be swinging that great heavy flail about or wrestling with the oxen and ploughs and the taunting of the men, so I try to watch over him, the wee duckling, and find him simple tasks to do, suited for a small boy.” The cook sat down, her face red from the heat and emotion and the boiling and stewing going on about her, took off one great leather shoe, and used it to fan her face. She peered closely at Alyce. “Surely then you be the sister he talks about, for you look just like him and could pass for twins.” The cook muttered and crossed herself. “You not be twins?” she asked Alyce, peering closer. “I cannot abide twins.”
“No, ma’am. We be not even brother and sister.”
“Ah, never say that, sweet pudding, for you are as alike as two peas. Just so you are not twins.”
“No, ma’am, not twins,” answered Alyce again, wondering why twin cows such as Baldred and Billfrith should be such a joy and a boon while twin babies were ill-starred and unlucky.
“Well, then, my little turnip. Go find your brother in the hen house behind the barn, where I sent him to gather eggs for a parsley omelet. And bring yourselves back here for a dinner of bread and bacon.” The cook wiped her wet red face on her skirt, picked a struggling fly from the great pot of soup she was stirring, and began a new conversation with herself, for she found such talk interesting and hardly ever disagreed with what was said.
----
15. Edward
« ^ »
T he manor was growing quiet, preparing for evening and supper and bed. Alyce passed men coming back from the fields, weed hooks and hoes and rakes on their tired shoulders; dairymaids washing out the churns, stopping every now and then to lick the sweet butter off their fingers; shepherds bringing in the sheep for tomorrow’s washing and shearing, the music of their pipes rising to the wide blue sky and disappearing into the silence.
Around the barn in the hen house she found Edward, egg basket still empty, kneeling before the chickens. “So then,” he said to the largest and most bad-tempered, “you be the king and you”—he pointed to a small hen with speckled feathers—“be the queen, for you look motherly and kind, and the rest of us will be knights and we will pretend we are about to have a great battle with the Scots but we don’t mind for we are sure to be victorious.”
At that, Edward looked up and saw Alyce watching him.
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