“I must look ridiculous.” She tutted. “A widow with–”
“You look divine, Hebe,” he assured. “And there are no rules here – noTonto denounce your attire or matrons to withdraw your invitations. A country life can be arduous so the good times are celebrated without censure.” He plucked a sprig of flower from her crown and brought it to her nose. “’Tis meadowsweet from the water pasture. In King Henry VIII’s time, they planted and gathered it to strew the banquet hall floor, hence its abundance.”
With her deep-blue frock and flowery garland, Hebe would win Queen of the Woodland with ease, a sylvatic goddess walking amongst the mortals of Wychmere.
An odd timbrous pattern of chirps intruded on his reverie and he glanced up to a modest dumpy bird with speckled chest, preening amongst the branches above. Then the timbre altered to flute-like tones.
“A song thrush,” he murmured, admiring the velvet cadence of its repetition. “It sings mostly at dusk and sunrise.”
“To greet the day and night.” Hebe’s lips parted in wonder, and so together they lingered awhile at the edge of this forest ignited by the red dipping sun, just listening.
Ernest had never felt so bloody content, watching as the earth gradually lost the day’s heat and twilight embraced them. The birds quietened, the woodland darkened and the land appeared to almost sigh in rest.
Full of mead and venison, a few villagers commenced retiring to their cottages, and the younger children were rounded up for bed, but with the onset of dusk, a new ambience was created.
Cripps began to shove metal-hooked stakes into the flattened grass, Garvey following with lit lanterns to hang upon them, and Lydia hauled a cart through the meadow before halting at the edge of the forest, castle lads scurrying behind.
“What are they doing?” Hebe enquired as the lads began unloading bundles of twigs, stacking them to a pyramid six foot high.
“Now we light Saint Roch’s bonfire. To keep the evil spirits at bay and to cleanse the land. It’s kept burning all night.”
Thos strode through the meadow with a flaming torch and thrust it to the dried twigs.
Smoke curled.
A flash of yellow.
And then it caught with a sudden crackle, flames licking and finding purchase.
Lydia was unhitched and led away, the cart still laden with kindling, branches and trunks, enough to last till dawn.
The gilded sparks danced and drew the rest of the villagers to this most romantic spot, families and friends, spouses and sweethearts who congregated upon blankets with jugs of mead and soft laughter. A few meandered to the cart and gathered a branch to throw upon the fire, their faces, for an instant, lit by the capricious flames, mesmerised and pensive.
Then a band of six brawny young shepherds in loose white smocks and breeches rose from their blankets, thick hazel sticks held within tanned palms. With stout muscles from hefting lost sheep and hauling wool sacks, they stretched, voices a rumble, their faces lit to an ethereal glow.
“The Morris men are to dance. Shall we place a blanket nearer, Hebe? Or stay here to watch?”
“I think here, if you do not mind? ’Tis a little cooler.”
Ernest nodded, content to just stand at Hebe’s side, and even more content not to get walloped by an inflated pig’s bladder when the Morris fool arrived.
He wondered how he’d ever preferred London to here.
Of course, soirees and balls held their attractions, and he missed the clatter of Tattersalls and the amusement of the theatre, but this was unembellished merriment. Modest and sincere.
Thos threw a silver birch trunk to the fire, and flames shot heavenward, abruptly lighting Hebe’s face to golden – no longer shadowed beneath her eyes but alive and incandescent.
At length, a fiddler took up his stance amongst the lanterns, placed bow to string and commenced a rapid, lilting tune, the six shepherds separating to stand opposite one another, three abreast.
Hebe appeared rapt, as though viewing a beloved painting. And perhaps it was – a scene to be preserved and honoured, a moment in time.
“Where does the tradition come from?” she whispered.
Ernest shrugged. He’d always just…known them.
“It’s been danced for centuries, to celebrate summer or the coming of spring, to ensure crop fertility and to ward off malevolent souls – hence the bells attached to their shins. I’ve no idea where their name comes from, but ’tis a tradition within families, an honour for sons to learn.”
The encircling locals quietened, faces lit and radiant as the fire consumed and began to rage, sparks frolicking against the blackening dusk and heralding the night.
