Alchemist's Apprentice (7 page)

Perhaps it was because there really was gold. Jack took the pot out of the sack and laid it with great care on a level piece of ground. Then he searched around among the roots until he found a stone heavy enough to break it. The surrounding countryside was quite silent. Jack raised the stone above his head, imagining the pot cracking like an eggshell and a smooth, shining yolk of gold rolling out. But before he could make the crucial blow, Gregory's words came back to him.

‘What if nothing came out except a mess of noxious chemicals?'

Jack froze where he stood as a dreadful image came into his mind. He had been at home, years ago, watching his mother kneeling beside the hearth. Behind her, hunched in the chimney corner, his brother Matty was dying of consumption.

‘I have an egg for you, Matty,' his mother said. ‘This will build up your strength again now, won't it?'

Matty looked out with hollow, hopeless eyes. His mother held the egg out for him to see, then cracked it on the edge of the hot pan. But instead of white and yellow, a thin, green sludge came out. As it hit the pan a foul stench rose up and made Jack retch until his ribs hurt.

That night, Matty died. Jack had been too young to realise that he would have died anyway, and he believed that if the egg had not been rotten, his brother would have lived. The incident convinced him that some sort of celestial cruelty existed; some dreadful corruption at the heart of things. The image remained with him for years, creeping into his mind in the minutes before sleep and invading his dreams. At the bleakest times of his life it returned to torment him, sticking in his mind with a terrible tenacity that he could not defeat. At his mother's graveside he could not tell whether the smell that surrounded him had risen from the dark earth or from the memory of that rotten egg. He looked down at the pot, and knew that he couldn't break it. As long as it was still intact then hope was, too. He drew back his arm and flung the stone as high as he could into the branches above him, filling the air with frightened birds and swirling leaves. Then he wrapped the pot back up in its sack and rejoined the road.

It was market day and the small town was teeming with life. Jack was tempted to stay and watch, just for the familiarity of being surrounded by people, but Gregory's warnings had made him aware of the danger of discovery and he passed on through. As he left the town, the sky clouded over again and the air cooled down. There would soon be more rain.

The alchemist lived half a mile outside the town, at the end of a narrow, green track which looked as though it were rarely used. Any doubts that Jack might have had were dispelled when he saw the garden. It was, as Master Gregory had told him, the finest garden that Jack was ever likely to see. On one side of the flagged path which led up to the front door a forest of vegetables was growing. Carrot tops crowded each other for space like rows of bracken beside huge, perfectly formed cabbages. Enormous marrows, ripe to bursting, lay beneath the shade of their bushes. Red beetroot tops grew between rows of spinach and parsnips and the whole area was fenced in by ranks of tall onions.

Jack was just about to open the little wicket gate when something caused him to stop. On the other side of the path was the orchard, where a dozen or so chickens and a cock wandered and scratched. Beneath one of the trees the figure of a man was stooping down, as though picking something up from the ground. Jack waited for him to straighten up, but he didn't move, not an inch. As he watched, Jack noticed another figure; a woman in a sackcloth dress, stretching up towards a cherry tree laden with ripe fruit. She wasn't moving, either, though her skirts swayed in the light breeze. Suddenly Jack realised that there were people everywhere, merging in among the shadows of the orchard. A chill tingled his spine. They were all frozen, locked into one position or another beneath the ripening apples and plums. Perhaps they had been caught stealing fruit? Jack had heard of such things in fairy tales. If the alchemist could make gold, he could surely turn people into stone as well.

Jack was about to take to his heels when he noticed a cat in the branches of the cherry tree above the woman's head. As the tree shifted in the breeze, he could see quite clearly that the cat wasn't made of stone at all, but of straw. He let out a long-held breath. They were all scarecrows. Weird and wonderful scarecrows. And it appeared as if they worked. A few wasps buzzed in and out of the shadows, but there were no birds to be seen among the trees at all. The lush crop of cherries was the proof. Jack lifted the latch of the gate and walked through it on to the onion-scented path.

He stood there for a while, looking ahead at the old house. The walls were of rough stone, smoothed and softened by successive coats of lime. Ivy and honeysuckle climbed with the same luxuriant growth as the vegetables and made their own frames for the door and windows, so that there seemed to be no corners or angles anywhere. The roof-line dipped and swayed where the green timbers that had been used to build it had warped and made themselves comfortable, and the thatch which covered them was shaggy as Dobbs' winter coat. Indeed, the house seemed more like a living creature than a building, but it was a friendly one, and Jack felt quite comfortable as he began to walk forward again. He examined the scarecrows as he passed. None of them had faces, and now that he knew what they were, they did not seem forbidding at all. But when one of them detached itself from the shadows and began to walk towards him, Jack nearly lost his grip on the pot.

‘Good afternoon to you.'

The man was wearing a collarless shirt like Jack's with leather braces, moleskin trousers and a pair of large, dusty boots. Although his hair was almost white he looked as strong as a horse, his square hands roughened by work, his face and arms darkened by long hours in the sun.

‘Lost your tongue, lad?'

He was one of the tallest men that Jack had ever seen, but it was not his height that struck Jack speechless. It was the bright blue eyes, which shone with a youthful, almost child-like light.

‘I see you have.'

Jack craned his neck to look up into the man's face. ‘Are you here working?' he said.

The blue eyes took on a mischievous glint. ‘As you can see,' he said.

‘For Mr Barnstable, I meant.'

‘I would work for no one else,' said the man, ‘since I am Mr Barnstable.'

‘Oh.' Jack was disappointed. He wasn't sure what he had expected, but it hadn't been someone who looked like a labourer. If a man could make gold, surely there would be some evidence of it? Fine clothes at least, and servants. He didn't know what to say so he said nothing. Barnstable said nothing either, but retreated into the shadows of the orchard. Jack watched a thrush hopping among the radishes and tried to remember why he had come.

‘Oh!' he called. ‘I have something here belonging to you.'

Barnstable re-emerged, his hands full of cherries. ‘Have you?' he said.

‘Yes.' Jack held up the piece of sacking. ‘Or at least, Master Gregory thinks so.'

‘Does he indeed. Well, perhaps he's right.' He smiled at Jack. ‘Will you swop it for these?'

Without a second thought, Jack held out the sack and accepted the rich, red cherries. There were more than he could fit in his cupped hands, and they spilled out on to the path at his feet. He sat down and began to eat them. Nothing had ever tasted sweeter.

Barnstable untied the sack and gave a surprised laugh. ‘So you came back to me,' he said.

Jack looked at him quizzically.

‘Not you,' said the alchemist. ‘This. My sacred vessel.'

‘It is yours, then?'

‘Yes, it is, Billy. It is. I never expected to see it again.'

‘Who's Billy?' said Jack.

‘Why, you are, aren't you?'

‘No. I'm Jack.'

Barnstable looked at him closely. ‘Are you sure?'

‘Yes. I'm quite sure.'

The mischievous glint had returned to Barnstable's eyes. ‘How strange,' he said.

At that moment the clouds burst and rain began to pour out of the skies. The thrush hopped up from among the radishes and soared away over Jack's head to some tall poplars beyond the orchard. The chickens began to make for the shelter of a lean-to at the side of the house. Barnstable ran up the path and sprang on to the doorstep with surprising agility.

‘Come on,' he called.

Jack gathered up the remaining cherries and raced up to the house. As he followed the alchemist through the low doorway he had a brief sensation of walking into a cluster of undergrowth: the inside of the house was as much alive as the outside. Plants grew everywhere, out of buckets and pots and crocks and cut-down barrels. Ivy wandered up the walls and wound around the ladder which led to the loft. In a crack in the front windowsill, a sycamore seedling had taken root. The alchemist watched Jack's reaction and smiled. Then he led the way on through a muddle of tools and boxes to the back of the house.

Jack followed slowly, gazing around him. His eyes were becoming accustomed to the interior gloom and there were things everywhere that he wanted to see. There were shelves lined with books, their spines turned towards him, their secret hearts hidden. There was a pile of stones which glinted with different colours; reds and silvers and iridescent greens. The walls were hung with pictures; not grand portraits like the ones in Master Gregory's house but delicate drawings of kings and queens, of snakes which ate their own tails, of vessels like the one he had just handed back to the alchemist. The house was saturated in mystery, but it didn't make Jack afraid. It thrilled him to the marrow.

Barnstable was in a cosy little room beside the scullery, looking out through the window. Jack went over and stood beside him. Behind the house the bank of the river sloped steeply down to the water's edge. With a hook and line, Jack could have tried for a fish without moving from where he stood. The surface of the water was pitted by the heavy rain.

‘Good for my garden,' said the alchemist. There was a gentle smile on his face as he looked across the river, as though the rain had come as a special favour to him and he appreciated it. Suddenly, and with a painful intensity, Jack wanted Barnstable to look that way at him. He couldn't explain it, not even to himself, but there was somehow more to the alchemist than to anyone he had ever met. There was more gentleness, more humour, more kindness, more life. He wanted to stay there and be with him, to learn the secrets of the garden and the books and the pictures, to eat cherries and stand in simple silence at the window, looking out at the rain.

When the alchemist finally spoke, it was as if a spell had been broken.

‘Where did you find the vessel, Billy?'

‘In the river. And I'm not Billy, I'm Jack.'

‘Yes, so you said. I find that very strange.'

‘Why?'

Barnstable turned away from the window and leant against the sill. ‘Because I thought all boys were called Billy. They are around here, anyway.' He began to count along his fingers. ‘There's Billy Hobbs and Billy Miller and Billy Grace, then there's the three Billy Bakers, Billy Fisher. Oh, who else? Little Billy, One-eyed Billy, Billy the Boots, and Pig Billy. I could go on and on. The town is full of Billys. But I never heard of a Jack.'

‘Well, you have now,' said Jack. ‘Where I come from all the boys have different names. There's Thomas and John and Robert and Oliver and …' he faltered, trying to remember.

‘You're not going to tell me the girls have different names as well, are you?'

‘Of course they do!' Jack moved round to face the alchemist and looked up into the brilliant blue eyes. ‘There's Polly and Lizzie and Alice and Jenny. And lots more, too.'

Barnstable shook his head in puzzlement. ‘If you weren't so earnest, Jack, I would have trouble believing you. The world is a strange place, isn't it?'

The way he said it reminded Jack of the mystery which surrounded him. The sense of excitement returned. ‘Yes,' he said. ‘It is.'

Barnstable moved away from the window and sat down in a chair beside the unlit hearth. He gestured towards a second chair and said, ‘But you were telling me about finding the vessel. Do go on.'

Jack sat down on the edge of the chair. ‘It was in the river, beside the old monastery. It was just in the water.'

‘And what were you doing there?'

‘I was just walking along.'

There was a silence. Jack looked at his feet and then, reluctantly, up into the calm gaze of the alchemist. There were no lies there, nor even the possibility of them. With a sense of shame, Jack began again.

‘I was an apprentice to a blacksmith.'

He told the whole story, leaving nothing out, not even the way he felt about Dobbs. It was strange to be saying it, as though it were a tale belonging to someone else, but the alchemist listened intently and gave gentle encouragement when Jack stumbled over a word or lost track of his thoughts. When he arrived at finding the pot he would have stopped, but Barnstable asked him to go on and tell everything, right up to his arrival at the gate. So Jack told him about the beggar and about Nancy and the journey to Master Gregory's house. He made a joke about the cases full of rubbish that Gregory kept, and was delighted when the alchemist laughed. What he didn't tell, because he didn't dare, was how close both he and Gregory had come to breaking open the precious vessel.

When he had said all he could think of to say, Jack waited expectantly. Barnstable stared at the hearth for a while, as though pondering on something, then sighed deeply.

‘That Gregory is a strange one all right,' he said. ‘I think we are safe enough, though. If he wished me harm he could have given me away a long time ago.'

‘Given you away?'

‘To those who govern the land, Jack. Alchemy has been outlawed for a long time now.'

‘But why?'

Barnstable sighed again. ‘Did Master Gregory tell you what an alchemist is?' he said.