Harvest A Novel by Jim Crace Read Free Book Online Page B

scrumped. I pick up smells that I can name. The master’s byres, of course. The sweating of his silage heaps. But other gentler odors too. The acrid smell—exaggerated by the rain—of elder trees. The bread-and-biscuit smell of rotting wood. The piss-and-honey tang of apple trees. I navigate my midnight village as a blind man would, by nose and ears and touch and by the vaguest, blackest forms.
    I see the men before they hear or notice me, or that’s to say I see the outline of their wide-winged cross and how bulked and heavy it’s become, draped as it is with sodden prisoners. I stand and watch, not daring for a while to make my presence known but still enjoying what must be a further penalty for them, the unrelenting rain. They cannot harm me, that is certain. Their arms are pinioned and their necks are caught. My only risk can be a backward kicking. I’ll have to treat them like a pair of tethered horses and not inspect their tails or rumps. I am holding my breath, not to be discovered. How silent it has become,beyond the pelting of the rain. I fear there’s no one living anywhere. The night is ponderous. No owl or fox is keen to interrupt the darkness. It seems that even the trees have stopped their stretching and their creaking, their making wishes in the wind, to hold their breaths and stare like me toward the pillory.
    If I could, if I had the powers of a wizard or a god, I’d build that church gate right away. I’d make it arch above the pillory. I’d build it with a canopy to keep these two men dry. Now that my eyes are more accustomed to the dark, I see them more clearly. This morning I persuaded myself that probably it’s wise for all of us to hold our tongues for the time being and let these newcomers soak up the blame. But now, beneath these weighty clouds, I recognize my foolishness; no, let us name it as it is, my lack of courage and of honesty. Soak up is not a happy phrase, I think. This rain is pleasurable only for those not fixed in it, those who can look forward to a square of drying cloth, a roof, a bed, sweet dreams. Tonight’s beneficiaries of Nature’s dowry do not include Mistress Beldam’s family.
    So I approach them, and I speak. “My name is Walter Thirsk … It’s Walt.” There’s no response. “I was not there, this morning, when you drew your bows,” I say. They need to understand at once, I should not be numbered among their accusers. I did not shake my stick at them. I did not help to shave their heads. I did not march them to the pillory. They cannot know I failed to speak on their behalf. Indeed, I am the only one among the villagers against whom they shouldn’t harbor any grudge. Still, they do not offer a response. They are like cattle feeding; their faces strain toward the ground. The rain drops unabated on their shoulders and their necks, channels down their spines. They each have a ropy tail of rain. The younger lifts his chin and looks at me, then drops his head again. He is exhausted by the weight of his own head, it seems. The shorter shuffles on his stretching toes.
    Of course, I cannot find a log for the father to stand on, not in this darkness or this weather. The nearest fallen timber is a walk away, beyond our fields. I don’t intend to go foraging so late at night. I should have planned this earlier. I could have sent a pair of boys out of the barn to fetch a log. I forgot. But I know there is a pile of large, roughly prepared stones intended for the church only a score of paces from the pillory. It isn’t hard to pull one loose and lift it that short distance—at least, it isn’t hard at first. Then my weeping hand, which for the moment I have not remembered, starts to hurt again. I’ve treated it too roughly, tested it too much tonight. Any crust that has been forming over it must now have torn again. I cannot see the damage, but I certainly can feel it. I drop the stone and try to roll it forward with my one good hand. The ground is far too rough