The Moon of Gomrath. Alan Garner

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СКАЧАТЬ the rock, there were some bubbles: the quarry was silent under the heavy sky.

      “I’m not waiting any longer,” said Bess. “Susan mun get her own tea when she comes in.”

      “Ay, let’s be doing,” said Gowther. “Theer’s one or two things to be seen to before it rains, and it conner be far off now: summat’s got to bust soon.”

      “I’ll be glad when it does,” said Bess. “I conner get my breath today. Did Susan say she’d be late?”

      “No,” said Colin, “but you know what she is. And she hadn’t a watch with her.”

      They sat down at the table, and ate without talking. The only sounds were the breathing of Bess and Gowther, the ticking of the clock, the idiot buzz of two winter-drugged flies that circled endlessly under the beams. The sky bore down on the farm-house, squeezing the people in it like apples in a press.

      “We’re for it, reet enough,” said Gowther. “And Susan had best hurry if she dunner want a soaking. She ought to be here by now. Wheer was she for, Colin? Eh up! What’s getten into him?” Scamp, the Mossocks’ lurcher, had begun to bark wildly somewhere close. Gowther put his head out of the window. “That’ll do! Hey!

      “Now then, what was I saying? Oh ay; Susan. Do you know wheer she’s gone?”

      “She said she was going to the quarry for some peace and quiet – I’ve been getting on her nerves, she said.”

      “What? Hayman’s quarry? You should have said earlier, Colin. It’s dangerous – oh, drat the dog! Hey! Scamp! That’s enough! Do you hear?”

      “Oh!” said Bess. “Whatever’s to do with you? Wheer’ve you been?”

      Susan was standing in the doorway, looking pale and dazed. Her hair was thick with mud, and a pool of water was gathering at her feet.

      “The quarry!” said Gowther. “She mun have fallen in! What were you thinking of, Susan, to go and do that?”

      “Bath and bed,” said Bess, “and then we’ll see what’s what. Eh dear!”

      She took Susan by the arm, and bustled her out of sight.

      “Goodness knows what happened,” said Bess when she came downstairs half on hour later. “Her hair was full of sand and weed. But I couldner get a word out of her: she seems mazed, or summat. Happen she’ll be better for a sleep: I’ve put a couple of hot-water bottles in her bed, and she looked as though she’d drop off any minute when I left her.”

      The storm battered the house, and filled the rooms with currents of air, making the lamps roar. It had come soon after nightfall, and with it a release of tension. The house was now a refuge, and not a prison. Colin, once the immediate anxiety for Susan had been allayed, settled down to spend the evening with his favourite book.

      This was a musty, old ledger, covered with brown suede. Over a hundred years ago, one of the rectors of Alderley had copied into it a varied series of documents relating to the parish. The book had been in Gowther’s family longer than he could say, and although he had never found the patience to decipher the crabbed handwriting, he treasured the book as a link with a time that had passed. But Colin was fascinated by the anecdotes, details of court leets, surveys of the parish, manorial grants, and family histories that filled the book. There was always something absurd to be found, if you had Colin’s sense of humour.

      The page that held him now was headed:

       EXTRACTS: CH: WARDENS’ ACCS. 1617

       A true and perfect account of all such Sumes of Money as I, John Henshaw of ye Butts, Churchwarden of Neither Alderley and for ye parish of Alderley have received and likewise disburst since my first entrance into Office untill this present day being ye 28 May Anno Di. 1618.

	£	s.	d.
Imprimis Payed for Ale for ye Ringers and oure Selves	0	3	2
Item to John Wych his bill for a new Sally Poll	0	2	0
Item to a man yt had his tongue cut out by ye Turks	0	0	2
Item to Philip Lea half his bill for walking	0	1	6
Item to a pretended Irish gentleman	0	1	3
Item spent for cluckin to make nets	0	1	8
Item to a woman yt was dumpe	0	0	6
Item spent when I did goe throw ye town to warne those to bring in ye wrishes yt had neglected on ye wrish burying day	0	0	4
Item given to a Majer yt had been taken by ye French and was runeated by them	0	1	0
Item payed to Mr. Hollinsheadfor warrants to punish ye boys’ Immoralities	0	0	8

      But the next entry took all the laughter from Colin’s face. He read it through twice.

      “Gowther!”

      “Ay?”

      “Listen to this: it’s part of the churchwardens’ accounts for 1617.

       ‘Item spent at Street Lane Ends when Mr. Hollinshead and Mr. Wright were at Paynes to confine ye devil yt was fownde at ye Ale house when ye new pipe was being put down and it did break into ye Pitt.’

      “Do you think it’s the hole at the Trafford?”

      Gowther frowned. “Ay, I’d say it is, what with the pipe, and all. That side of Alderley near the Trafford used to be called Street Lane Ends, and I’ve heard tell of a pub theer before the Trafford was built. Sixteen-seventeen, is it? It conner be part of the mines, then. They didner come that way until about two hundred years back, when West Mine was started. So it looks as though it was the well of the owd pub, dunner it?”

      “But it couldn’t be,” said Colin. “It was called ‘ye Pitt’, and by the sound of it, they didn’t know it was there. So what СКАЧАТЬ