Scottish Folk and Fairy Tales from Burns to Buchan (Penguin Classics) (12 page)

‘Look at me, Giant!’ it shouted when it re-emerged. ‘Where are your legs now? Can you swim like this?’

‘I’m afraid I’m not very much of a swimmer,’ replied Angus. ‘If I were I might swim across to the Island of Alva, for on it there lives a giantess.’

‘I know,’ said the whale.

‘Have you seen her?’ Angus asked.

‘I have seen her,’ the whale agreed. ‘And heard her too.’

‘I am going to ask her to marry me,’ Angus informed him.

‘Have
you
seen her?’ inquired the whale.

‘No,’ replied Angus. ‘Why do you ask?’

‘Never mind,’ the whale answered. ‘But I owe my life to you and if you truly wish to go there I will help you. Wade into the water and catch hold of my tail.’

‘It’s very kind of you,’ Angus told him. ‘But there’s one more snag. My mother told me just before she died never to go into the sea.’

‘And died, I suppose,’ asked the whale, ‘before she had time to say why?’ Angus nodded. ‘That’s the trouble with Death,’ the whale continued. ‘He always comes when you’re in the middle of something, even if it’s only drawing breath. Well, it’s up to you whether you want to take a chance or not. I’ll give you five minutes to make up your mind.’

The whale set off on a slow tour round the bay, or what was left of it. Angus pondered. What was the mysterious salt-water fate that lay in store for giants? Was it some monster of the deep? Something big enough to swallow even him? And whatever the fate was could it be any worse than loneliness?

The sea looked lovely. Surely nothing too terrible could happen to him if he ventured in? There was the Giantess, too, to think about, on her island just below the horizon. Very likely she was waiting impatiently for just such a one as he was. He decided to take the risk.

‘I’m going to the island!’ he shouted to the whale. ‘I’m ready now!’

They began their voyage, with Angus grasping the tail of his new friend and being towed through the water. Their progress, to be sure, was slow, for a giant is a considerable burden even for a whale. But the sun shone, the sea remained peaceful, no monsters appeared and one by one the miles slid past beneath them. Gradually they began to go a little faster.

Angus noticed this. ‘You’re getting used to me!’ he called.

‘I expect that’s it,’ the whale agreed.

On they went a mile or two farther and still the sea unrolled quietly before them like a great blue carpet. Their speed increased a little more.

Angus noticed this as well. ‘Wonderful!’ he shouted. ‘You’re going faster than ever!’

‘I’m not sure that I am,’ the whale said. ‘There’s something very strange going on. I don’t understand it at all.’ He sounded worried.

On they went again. Faster and still faster. Angus noticed that his hands didn’t grasp the whale’s tail as easily as they had when he started. ‘That’s because of the speed,’ he told himself. But almost as soon as he said it he knew it wasn’t true. His mother’s warning sounded again in his ears. ‘Don’t go into the salt water, Angus!’ And suddenly he realized what she had meant. He was slowly shrinking!

What could he do? He called out once more to his friend the whale, telling it what was happening.

‘Yes, I thought you must be getting smaller,’ the whale admitted. ‘But I was afraid to say anything in case you dropped off through shock.’

‘Should we turn back?’ asked Angus.

‘We’re there,’ replied the whale. Sure enough, the island loomed ahead, a large well-wooded one with the tallest tower that Angus had ever seen soaring above the tree-tops.

‘That’ll be the Giantess’s tower, I suppose,’ thought Angus. The island grew nearer and nearer and presently a great booming voice thundered out across the water.

‘Grammar never was her strong point,’ said the whale, ‘but she sounds in excellent form today.’

Angus had listened in trepidation to the great voice and to the awesome catalogue of attributes it had listed. He had tried to give himself courage by allowing ten per cent off the list for the usual giant’s exaggeration. But even if she were only half of what she claimed, the Giantess must be a formidable woman indeed. Somehow it was difficult to imagine her darning socks. And apart from that there was the worrying discovery he had made in the sea just now. How much had he shrunk?

The whale glided into the shallow water of the creek. Angus released his hold, waded ashore and turned to face his friend. ‘How much have I lost?’ he inquired anxiously.

‘A lot,’ replied the whale, surveying him. ‘An awful lot. You’ve dwindled by about half.’

The voice Angus had heard on approaching the island rolled out again, sounding louder and nearer all the time. He found himself thinking with longing of his home territory and of the clear eyes of Goldentop and the fringed ones of Morag Matheson.

‘You know, I think perhaps I’ll come back some other time,’ he said to the whale. ‘I don’t feel in the right frame of mind for courting.’

‘It’s too late to back out now,’ the whale told him. ‘Here she comes!’ He nodded with his head in the direction of Angus’s right shoulder. ‘Good luck!’ he added and with a flick of his tail he was gone. Angus turned. The ‘tower’ he had seen above the tree-tops was advancing down the beach towards him. It was the Giantess!

‘Good afternoon,’ said Angus politely, the occasion obviously being one that called for politeness. The Giantess said nothing but she stooped suddenly and her huge hand shot out. Before he realized what she was about she had grasped him by the waist and swung him up to face level.

‘Angus Macaskill is my name,’ said Angus hurriedly. ‘I’m a giant. At least, I was this morning. I’m from the mainland. I have quite a good little territory over there. Lots of butter and eggs and vegetables and that sort of thing. More than enough for two. I’m looking for a wife, I think. Will you marry me?’

The Giantess listened to this recital in complete silence. When it was finished she spoke just one word. ‘Cheek!’ she said. The hand that grasped Angus drew back quickly and then shot forward. He found himself flying out over the sea in a huge tumbling curve that arched slowly down towards the waves.

Goodbye, world!
he thought.
Goodbye!
And splash! He hit the water. But before he could sink, there beside him was the whale.

‘You landed just about where I thought you would,’ he said to Angus. ‘Hang on and I’ll have you back at the Blue Bay in no time.’

Angus spat out a mouthful of salt water. ‘If I shrink as much
on the way back as I did when I came here,’ he said, ‘there’ll be nothing left of me.’

‘I’ll go extra specially fast,’ the whale promised. And so he did. He tore through the water at such a rate that Angus had to hold on with all his strength. Even so, he felt himself shrinking so much smaller that his clothes began to fall off. He had to clutch them desperately.

When they landed in the Blue Bay they went through the same routine as at the island. ‘How much have I lost this time?’ Angus asked, after he had waded ashore.

The whale looked him over carefully. ‘Well, not as much as last time,’ he answered. ‘But still quite a lot. You’re about ordinary-sized now. I shouldn’t try it again.’

‘Don’t worry,’ Angus told him. ‘It’s dry land for me from now on. Dry land and a bit more reverence for the wisdom of mothers. Thanks for rescuing me.’

‘At least you can say one thing,’ said the whale.

‘What’s that?’ asked Angus.

‘You’re not the first man to shrink from courtship,’ the whale answered. He dived under the water and vanished.

Angus made his way home as quickly as he could and the first person he went to see was Morag. He found her spinning and singing as before but more slowly and sadly than she used to.

‘It’s me!’ he shouted when he reached her. ‘I’m back!’

‘Angus?’ cried Morag. ‘I recognize your voice but where are you?’ She was so busy craning her neck skyward that she failed to notice him standing beside her.

‘I’m down here,’ he told her. ‘The salt water shrank me. I’m just about your size now.’

‘So you are,’ she agreed. Her eyes dropped down from the clouds, rested on him briefly and kept on dropping till her gaze was fixed on the ground.

‘Will you marry me, Morag?’ he asked.

‘Yes, I will,’ she replied. So they got married and lived as happily as two people in love might reasonably expect to live. They had three ordinary-sized children, two girls and a boy, none of whom could ever be persuaded to go near the sea. Angus stopped being lonely.

This story is aboot a laird awa in the Heilands… and he had the
Black Art
… but every year he used to gie a big
ceilidh
for aa the workers on his estate, an aa the fairm folk an aa the fairm hands, an he used tae had the ceilidh in a big barn. There wis a fire in this barn, and they’d put on a big pot of sowens. (Ye ken whit sowens are? No? Well, Scotland, it’s always been a very poor country, and no that very long ago, jist aboot a hundred years ago, they used to soak… the husks o the grain… until they were soor, and then they strained it, and boiled up the liquid an this made a sort of porridge, and a lot o them had to exist on that.) So this big pot o sowens wis boilin away anywey, and everybody wis doin their thing: ye hed tae

They hed other things as well as singin an tellin stories an that: they hed sort of games, they’d games of strength an guesses an that sort o thing, an one o the things wis to see who could tell the biggest lie. So everybody wis gaun their roond an gaun their

roond, but every time it cam roond tae this cattleman he would aye say, ‘Ye ken fine A cannae dae nothing, ye shouldnae ask me! Ye ken A cannae dae it.’

So this laird says, ‘Look, ye can surely tell a lie.’

He says, ‘No, A cannae.’ Sandy wis a bit simple, ye ken, and he wisnae very good at nothin but lookin efter the coos.

So the laird says, ‘Sandy, look, try an tell a story, or tell us a lie o some kind.’

He says, ‘A cannae, A dinnae ken how tae.’

‘Well,’ the laird says, ‘if ye dinnae ken how tae ye’re no gaunnae be here. Awa ye go an mak yirsel useful some other place.’

He says, ‘What am A gaunnae dae?’

An the laird says, ‘A’ll tell ye what tae dae. Awa ye go doon tae the water an clean ma boat, because A’ll be usin it shortly. Awa ye go.’ So Sandy’s away, tramp, tramp, tramp, doon through the gutters tae this river, this big river. And he scraped aa the moss an dirt aff the boat, scrapin it oot, and there wis a baler lyin in the boat, an he wis balin oot the water, an balin oot the water, an he steps inside the boat so that he could finish balin it oot, ye see?

But didn’t this boat take off wi him, an there’s no wey he could stop it! An before he could get time to think, even, they’re away in the middle o the water, an he couldnae swim. So he says, ‘Ach, A’ll jist sit an let it go wherever it wants tae go.’ So he jist sat like this lookin up at the birds an things.

But he glanced doon again, an there he saw the loveliest wee green satin slippers; pure silk stockins; taffeta dress. He says, ‘Whit’s this? Whit’s this?’ An he felt his sel ower – oh!
pappies
an everything! ‘Oh!’ he says. ‘Whit’s happenin?’ Curls an everything. An he looked… ower the side o the boat, an there wis the bonniest lassie that he ever saw lookin back at him. ‘What’s happened?’ he says. ‘What’s happened? (higher voice)
What’s happened?’
His voice changed all of a sudden. Oh! So he says, ‘Oh, my God!’ – he was so stunned he jist sat there, an this boat, it got tae the other side, an he felt… it was the boat scrapin the

bottom that brought him back tae himsel, ye see – but he was a she now!

So she stands up in this lovely green
claes
, an she looked – she wondered how she was gonnae get oot o the boat withoot makin a mess o her shoes an everything. Now there was a young man walkin alang the bank o the river, and when he looked doon an sa this lassie in the boat, ’course he would run doon an help her oot. So he ran doon an cairried her oot o the boat till he got her on dry land, an he says, ‘Where are ye going?’

‘A don’t know,’ she says. ‘A don’t really know where A’m goin.’

He says, ‘Well, where did ye come from?’

‘Oh, A came from the other side o the water.’

‘Are ye goin tae anybody?’

‘A don’t know.’

He says, ‘Lassie, I think ye must have fell an bumped yir heid. I think ye’ve lost yir memory wi aa this “Don’t knows, don’t knows”.’

She says, ‘Well, mebbe something like that happened.’ She says, ‘A jist don’t know where A’m goin here. Ye see, A know where A’m goin when A’m at the other side o the water, but A don’t know where A’m goin here.’

‘Well,’ he says, ‘A think A’ll take ye home tae ma mother, an get her tae look after ye, see if ye get yir memory back.’ So he took her home tae his mother, and she helped his mother in the hoose, an did this an that. But in time he got aafae fond o her, in fact he fell in love wi her, and the two of them got married. And within a couple o year they had two o the bonniest wee bairns ye ever saw, a wee toddler an one in the pram.

So one day, when they were oot walkin wi the bairns, an he was pushin his pram, quite proud o this wee laddie he’s got, ye see… she says, ‘Ye know, I think we’ll go a walk down the river today.’ She says, ‘A haven’t been back down that way since the day A came here.’