The Shattered Plough
by
Michael
Graeme
It had lain in a corner of
the old barn since the day my grandfather brought it in
from the field, its once bright edge shattered beyond
repair by a sunken granite boulder. And as I ran my
fingers over decades of rust, the memories came back -
misty recollections of childhood, the warmth of friends,
family and of course the bitter-sweet taste of my first
true love.
Mr Clough, the estate
agent, gave a discreet little cough. He knew this was to
be my last look about the old place and yet he'd been
shadowing me all afternoon - not once thinking to give me
some time alone. "That's about it then, Mr
Macreedy," he said. "The auction went well, I
believe. Everything gone but for this piece of scrap -
they might've got something for it if you'd let them try,
you know."
"They might," I said. "Except the plough
isn't mine to sell."
"Ah.... I didn't realise. Will the owner be coming
to collect it d'you think?"
"No," I told him. "I'm pretty sure he
won't be coming, now."
Mr Clough was not a local man, or I'm sure he would have
heard the tale already. I mean - you could ask anyone
around here and they'd tell you it was was the Mackinnons
who loaned my grandfather the plough back in 1925.......
"But it was a useless old thing even then," I
could hear my father say. "And when it broke, as
they knew it would, they said we must pay ten shillings
to replace it....."
But my grandfather was not one to be made a fool of so he
dumped it in the barn, swearing he wouldn't pay and he
told the Mackinnons if they wanted it back, they must
come and fetch it!
I laughed, "Ten shillings, Mr Clough! It wouldn't
even buy a hair cut these days - eh?"
"A bane!" my mother called it and she was right
for I could barely have been six years old before the
plough had cut a great swathe through my innocence.....
It was at school, noticing
Tom Mackinnon and his little sister ignoring me all the
time, that set me thinking. In my young mind, you see, it
didn't seem right - us not speaking and yet being
neighbours and all, so I asked my father.....
"They'll have been told not to," he said.
"And you must do the same, my lad....."
"But why?"
"They're Mackinnons, that's why....."
Then I'd see my mother pounding angrily at the washing.
"Isn't it time we forgot?" she'd say. "The
old man's been gone ten years. We should let it
lie!"
But my father said it wasn't so simple. There was a
principle at stake and feelings ran deep, as I learned
when
Tom Mackinnon set about me on the way home from school,
one evening.
Tom was a big lad - a real farmers boy with hands like
shovels and his sister, Katherina, with the proud head
and the laughing eyes, looked on while he blooded my nose
and sent me running - the pair of them calling after me
all the while about the ten shillings.
I shook my head at the
memory. Then I brought to mind the picture of Katherina's
back, upright and proud as she sat before me, day in, day
out all those long school years and knowing she hated me
for no better reason than a broken old plough.
"See these marks, Mr Clough? That's where I took a
hammer to it. I wanted to break the thing into dust, you
see."
For by now, I was nearly fourteen and so in love with
Katherina there was barely an hour went by when my heart
didn't ache from thinking about her.
Mr Clough ran his fingers over the hammer marks. He was a
man of gentle manners but his businessman's head gave him
little room for sympathy. Anxiously he followed me out
into the yard.
"Ah yes, the trials of youth, eh Mr Macreedy? -
Still, we must clear the barn. It's a condition of the
sale, you know."
The sun beat down on the white of the old farmhouse and
swallows screeched and dived as they had every summer
since my earliest memories of the place. It was
impossible to think of anyone else living here, but now,
with both parents gone and me settled in the city,...
"I recall it was an afternoon like this when I first
came home from university," I told him. "I was
walking down the lane after the bus had dropped me off
and there was Katherina strolling towards me.
"I can still see the
summer dress and her hair flowing out from beneath a big
straw hat as she stepped along with an easy grace. She
looked up as if to smile . But when she recognised me,
she shot me that old scornful look and walked by without
a word.
"It might've been
easier to bear if she'd matured into a plain sort of
girl, but anyone will tell you she was the queen of the
county in her day - and my heart, so carefully pieced
together during my time away, fell apart once more in her
wake.
"I swear, Mr. Clough, I'd thought the whole stupid
business of the plough was long forgotten. Yet here I
was,
barely home five minutes and already it was causing me
fresh misery....."
My mother was running the place alone now, with just a
few hired men. One morning, at breakfast, I remember
taking her hand and squeezing it gently."Why don't
we pay the ten shillings Mam?"
But she shook her head and smiled. "Must we drag all
that up again," she coaxed and then she told me how
she'd heard Tom was to quit the farm when he got married
next year. Katherina was working in the city, leaving
just the old fella and he was harmless enough these days.
"So you see, lad, soon it'll make no difference to
anyone."
But it made a difference to me, for I knew until it was
settled I didn't stand a chance with Katherina. All
summer I thought about it and a thousand times I must
have leaned on the farm gate, gazing over the valley at
the Mackinnon place, just willing myself to go across.
Each morning Katherina would walk the mile to catch the
early bus, so I took to racing up the lane, so I might
walk back and maybe meet her. Then I'd steel myself to
speak but she'd just hold her head high and walk past as
if I were invisible - until finally one fateful morning,
I stood my ground and stammered out her name.
"Katherina, can't we call a truce? Can't we settle
this thing?"
"And what thing might that be?" she said,
evasively.
"The plough! What else?"
She seemed impatient.
"I'm in a hurry,' she said. "I'll be missing
the bus. Anyway, it's Tom you should be speaking to - not
me." Then she tossed her head and went on her way.
By now I was almost shaking with frustration. "Then
tell him I'll be round this evening," I
called."And tell him I'll be bringing the ten
shillings with me!"
Ten shillings! Except it wasn't ten shillings any more,
was it? It was fifty pence, which sounded ridiculous. And
ridiculous was how I felt when I approached the
Mackinnon's farm yard.
The summer was almost over and I could feel the first
September chill as I marched in with a poker face and not
a clue what to say. Tom was standing high on a cart,
hands on hips, waiting for me. His father, pitifully
frail and bent, looked on from the farmhouse door with
all the hands gathered round. Then, from an upstairs
window, a curtain twitched and Katherina looked down.
The yard fell quiet as Tom spoke, his voice low and
scornful. "Go home Macreedy. You've no business
here."
"I think I have, Tom." I told him. "And
it's long overdue. You'll take ten shillings for the
plough or you'll come to collect it - either way we shake
hands and put an end to this stupid squabble here and
now."
"Oh will we?,"
he laughed. "Well we'll have to see about that. It
wasn't us who started this, you know."
"What does it matter who started it?" I told
him. "Isn't it more important we finish it?"
But he didn't seem to care. "Go home," he
jeered, "before I give you another bloody
nose."
He didn't mean it of course, but the hands lapped it up
just the same and a great snigger went around like they
were a bunch of school-boys. It was hopeless - all he
wanted was to make fun of me.
I looked up briefly at Katherina's face and for a moment,
before she let the curtain fall, I saw there was not a
spark of warmth in it and as I turned away, I sensed that
was how it would always be.
Climbing the lane, I felt the weight of the old plough
like a curse upon my shoulders, while the ten shillings
jingled in my pocket as if even they were mocking me.
Suddenly my anger boiled over. I took them out and flung
them as hard as I could over the hedge, watching as they
spun wildly - the sun kissing them with fire and my hopes
finally vanishing as they sank for ever into the waist
high weeds of the fallow land, beyond.
It might have been a premonition, for when I finally
arrived home, my mother was bursting with the news. It
was all over the valley. Only that morning, Katherina had
announced she was to marry some hot-shot businessman from
the city....
Mr Clough stole a glance at his watch and then I saw him
fiddling with the key - a key worn smooth and shiny over
a lifetime, by my mother's hand. Ah... so much was
changing! Even the old Mackinnon place was empty, now,
soon to be bulldozed, they said, to make way for houses.
I turned my back and tried to think of Katherina. The
last I'd heard she was in England somewhere with children
of her own and a big house in the country. Folk tell me
she's happy enough. But they also tell me she was a vain
woman - that she threw herself at her man because he was
rich and powerful and anyone who could bear me a grudge
for so long and over so little was hardly my ideal
soul-mate. I pay them no heed of course, but then young
love was never a repecter of common sense.
"So there's just the question of the plough then, Mr
Macreedy. Is there nowhere else it can go?"
I sighed. "Maybe there is, Mr Clough."
As I sent the Landrover bouncing down the lane, I watched
him in the rear-view mirror - his image jiggling about as
he closed the gate on my past and locked it away for
ever. Meanwhile the old plough groaned in the back like a
slowly awakening dinosaur.
In town, the scrapman gave it a contemptuous kick and
offered me a few pounds before dragging it away to the
crusher. I might have haggled but there seemed little
point, so I took the cash and walked straight into
Donnels Bar. There I blew the lot on a cool drink and a
long cigar.Sitting at a corner table, I gazed through the
window at the bustle of the street and thought long and
hard on the lesson of plough. I was beginning to realise
how time has a funny way of covering its tracks. You see
it's not always possible to settle a thing begun so long
ago. Sometimes, like my mother said, the best we can do
is let things lie......and forget.
And with that one thought I raised a final glass to the
memory of Katherina Mackinnon. I wished her well and then
walked out into the world a free man.....at last.
____________
~ First
Published October 1995 ~
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Index
Copyright
© M Graeme 1995
m_graeme@yahoo.co.uk
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