Tears for a Tinker (29 page)

Dina didn’t want to go back home; she needed to explore, to show me her countryside. It was her countryside, because although the Hearnes were travellers, they never moved any further
north than this area. She pulled on her father’s jacket, tugged at his sleeve, and made signs with fingers touching his lips and her own. I didn’t understand, but her father
did—she wanted to go wandering over the hillside and down the next valley. ‘She has a favourite stream where she plays with otters. She must like you, lass, because not many folk get
taken there. Sometimes when she goes missing for hours we know where to find her.’

Daddy wasn’t keen to let me go far in a strange place. Like Mammy he knew how much I had the wander urge, so he told me to ‘be home when your shadow grows longer’—in
other words, by late afternoon. I’d had a bigger than usual plate of porridge that breakfast, so no doubt my belly would be happy enough missing lunch. Billy assured Daddy nothing would
happen to me, because Dina knew the ways of the countryside; she also knew when to be home. Deaf or not, her backside would still feel a sharp wallop, just like her siblings, if she disobeyed the
family rules. And as for roaming away from home, four hours was considered enough for any traveller bairn; after that whistles were blown and dogs were sent to search.

So, after waving goodbye to our fathers, we set off to explore Dina’s stomping ground. The sun shone bright in the early summer sky, and the air was filled with the scent of every wild
blossom one could hope to smell; and this sense to my mute companion was her finest. She held my hand as she stretched her neck upwards, then turned her tilted head in every direction. Like a hound
she sniffed the fragrant air; then letting go my hand ran and ran around until dizzy, whereupon she fell upon the grass laughing silently. I joined her and began pointing at a few fluffy clouds
that danced across the bright blue heavens; she in turn pointed to a lone buzzard. He must have thought we were tasty food, because in an instant he left his thermal to swoop down; once he
distinguished our human forms he flew back up to his resting-place on the wind and ignored us.

We lay there for some time, me laughing loudly and she doing the same in her silence. Suddenly my friend’s eyes narrowed; she sat up, then stood, stiffly turning her head from east to
west, then from south to north. I was puzzled: it looked as if she were listening. Then, without warning, she lay down hard upon the ground, pressing the front of her body into the earth. She
stared at me, and the look of terror on her face was indescribable. Quickly she jumped to her feet, gripped my hand and like a whippet tore across the braes, pulling me with her. My futile attempt
to slow her down only had her leaving me trailing behind, as she skipped and almost flew across the hillside. She plunged down a steep embankment, only stopping when she came to a wide stream.

Without pausing for breath she waded into the water, and pulled her soaked body onto a small island in the middle of the stream. She began frantically running her fingers amidst tree roots, and
then a smile spread across her wet face. She gestured that I should come over, and being the curious age I was, I didn’t need asking twice. Soon I was staring down at something my young eyes
had never seen before—two tiny baby otters snuggled together in a nest of thick river grasses and broken twigs, built with the skill and care only a loving parent could provide. Dina
didn’t touch the little ones, yet she would not leave them. Rather to my annoyance on account of my wet clothing, she pulled me up to sit at the other side of the sightless water babies.

Dina sat down, making no movement apart from folding her arms over her knees, and darting those fast-moving steely blue eyes up and down stream. I could see she was expecting company, as her
gaze moved from high ground to low, scanning every inch of the stream’s embankment. She knew we were not alone, yet at that time I heard no sound. Suddenly something moved among the long
grasses on the bank; she smiled and pointed. I looked in the direction of her finger, and was amazed to see two adult otters come swimming towards us. They swam past us, yet made no attempt to get
us away from their offspring. Dina lowered her hands and fanned the baby otters. I think she was calming the parents in doing this. I felt they knew her—don’t ask me why, because I have
no explanation, just a gut feeling that my new friend was more known to the animals than me. I had seldom taken an interest in these semi-aquatic creatures, believing them to be vicious in the
protection of their young, yet here we were sitting inches from them and no screeching or attack took place. One, which I thought must have been the father because of his size, nosed the air, then
like a grey streak he dipped his head, rolled his eyes and dived.

The smaller otter followed him. I could only think that we should not have been there: they couldn’t get to their young while we humans were holding them back. My face spoke what I
thought; but Dina shook her head as if she were telling me I was wrong.

Then, as if from nowhere, a panting, snarling hound came bounding upstream, followed by several men. One had a long stick with which he was poking the water. He shouted to the other men that
there were wee lassies on the island, meaning us. ‘Wait back, lass,’ he called to the dog, who was already heading in our direction, slavers dripping from loose jaws. I grew stiff with
fear and grabbed Dina’s arm. She, unlike me, didn’t flinch, just gazed with a cold unmoving stare at the fierce animal which continued to ignore her master’s command. Only a few
feet from us, I could feel the hot breath of the beast’s nostrils on my face. ‘Lord help us, we’ll be shredded, because that gadgie canna control his bitch,’ I thought, as
shivers ran the length of my spine. All of a sudden, just as my eyes tightened with a fear that sent my heart into my throat and blocked my screams, the man with the stick lunged forward, hitting
the hound hard on the back. She yelped and drew back, shook her wet coat and bounded toward the bank to sit by her master’s side.

‘You bloody bairns had better no hing around this burn when the hounds hae a scent, awa hame with ye.’

I squeezed tight upon Dina’s arm, which felt like hardened steel. She had not heard him, but by her stern face there could be no mistake, she knew exactly what he had said. She shook her
head fast, then faster, flailing both arms in an erratic fashion that prompted one man to say, ‘she’s simple, better keep the dogs away. Anyway, if there’s young ’uns
we’ll chase the otter away, and sure as fate they’ll not come back.’

I wasn’t quite sure what these wet-trousered men with their rolled up shirt-sleeves were doing there with their sticks and hounds. I didn’t dare ask because I was so far away from my
secure bus home and Dina from her tunnel tent; fear had entered my young body. This pool in the stream looked deep in parts, and these men had hungry, lantern-deeking jaws onto themselves.

‘Yon otter is hiding up here in a holt. Come on, boys, the dogs will have him soon!’

‘Bloody hell fires, the bastards are hunting the poor wee otter!’ I shook with anger. I made to stand on my feet, but Dina yanked me down, pointing to the babies who were by now
moving uncomfortably, probably needing fed. Dina covered them over with more damp grasses and they quietened. I could see now what her plan was. Obviously, being from these parts, she knew of the
practice of otter-hunting. I didn’t, and there was nothing worse than an ignorant body screaming the odds at folks she neither knew or understood.

So while the hounds took off after the male otter, who had left his dangerous hiding place and was tearing towards a wooded area, we sat protecting the young. Every now and then I saw my silver
streak, with a big snarling hound inches from his low-lying tail, but each time he escaped. Further downstream I lost sight of him, and he disappeared from view in a patch of slimy thick stagnant
water. All the while the dogs barked and howled, the men brandished sticks, shouted orders to go here and come there, growing hoarse now. I prayed to every god I hoped there might be, but to no
avail. Suddenly, without seeing any evidence of a kill, I knew by the stillness that the brave water-coloured animal had lost his struggle for survival.

He had fought well, the little fellow, but when I saw his broken body held in the mouth of the very bitch who wanted to take a bite from us, I knew it was over. Poor otter, what a brave wee lad.
In minutes the hounds and their masters were gone over the knowe’s flank, whistling and chatting happily. Some women, who for their own reasons had held back, when the hunt was over joined
the troop of men to examine the dead beast. To them this was just another otter, just another out-of-doors incident. But to me, albeit briefly, it was one of the saddest of days I’d ever
witnessed.

I watched Dina’s face, and of course she too was sad, but already she was pulling and tugging for me to leave the island. Dripping wet and more than a bit stiff, we made our way onto the
mossy bank opposite, where thin willow branches were interspersed with silver birch. Dina tugged at my sleeve, pointing to the island from which we’d just come. I looked where she indicated,
and suddenly the still water rippled as the mother otter, without doubt now brokenhearted, curled onto her young.

If she could speak, I knew she’d say how proud she was of her man, and how strong a husband he was. He gave his life by drawing the pack away from his tiny family, knowing his partner
would continue to rear their young. And was it his last wish that when they, the hunters, came again next year, those fully grown otters would outrun their predators? Yes, I knew little of such
matters, but as is the way with most travelling children, I had seen life as it is—in the raw!

Dina was smiling as we ran back home, because she’d thwarted the destruction of the two young otters. The sun’s light was lengthening our shadows, and for sure we’d both be
chastised for it, but hey, wasn’t it worth it?

I never told my family about the hunters—I’d have suffered for it if I had. Our survival in those days depended on maintaining a healthy country attitude: don’t interfere in
our culture and we won’t interfere in yours.

That night the old granny held us all spellbound with her ghost tales. To say I was frightened was an understatement. Rather than go for a pee I kept it in, resulting in a sore belly.

Dina’s family just popped round the side of the tunnel tent, and it’s as well the thunder and lightning storm that night that threw our imaginations into realms of terror was
followed by a deluge, or the smell of hot urine would have made pigs retch.

Next day Dina and I went gathering nettles for old Granny Hearne’s rheumatism. She needed new heads from fresh growing nettles to make a concoction which she swore blind made her lift her
old legs like a spring lamb; without it she stiffened with hard knotted joints.

It was very early, about seven a.m., when my pal Dina appeared at the side window of the bus where my bed was. I peered out to see her all dressed and ready for the day. I wouldn’t go
anywhere without my breakfast, not even if Jesus himself had called for me! So, after a quick swallow of porridge and toast, my feet once more began a journey with the silent but masterful Dina. I
can’t tell you what so excited me about this wayward lassie: perhaps it was they way she seemed to be so wise about nature, even the human kind. Life with this wean was neither dull nor
silent. I was becoming fond of her and knew that when the time came, our parting would be sore.

We’ll sort that scene out when it breaks, but in the meantime—those nettles.

Granny Hearne had told me the previous night, before I scooted home in the moonlight with my hair on end after her final story about a fiendish brown puddock with one eye, that her old recipes
were closely guarded secrets. If my mother wanted to know what the nettles were for, I had just to tell her, for soup. But of course my mother had her own carefully guarded recipes. The last thing
she whispered to me as I walked off that morning was, ‘there’s only one cure for stiff joints, and that’s to keep moving—walk plenty miles a day and you’ll live
supple. An auld auntie o’ mine from Kintyre jumped intae her widden box when she died!’ She added, ‘but try and find out how auld Hearne makes her stuff, just in case ma bones
should stiffen one day, Jessie.’

Travelling people set a great importance on every flower and herb growing wild, whether for eating, medicine or healing, and have gifted to each up and coming generation recipes that go back
centuries. My own mother had, as a lassie, acquired her mother’s herbal cures, but sad to say she used only a fraction of them, this being a result of the fifties wonder cure, Penicillin.

Dina knew exactly where nettles, with their young tasty heads, grew abundantly. As we trekked off, I hoped she didn’t feel the urge to revisit the mother otter, because I was afraid of the
huntsmen and their dogs, especially yon slavering bitch which I was later to see in a film about Sherlock Holmes called
Hound of the Baskervilles.
Well, it certainly seemed like the same
beast! But as Dina ran ahead of me with the stamina of someone twice her age, it soon became clear we were headed in another direction entirely. We kept the shore to our right, and on the sandy
ground to our left a bank of nettles and Michaelmas daisies, which had not yet come into flower, were growing tightly together like flowing green walls. If you don’t mind, I’ll skip
quickly through the gathering of those waspish plants, because my skin still cringes when I think of the dozens of stings I got: my arms and legs were red and swollen.

Dina stuffed a big bag with the nettles, as large as we could carry. We picked the nettle tops, because that’s the sweetest part of the weed. I grimaced and rubbed my hands over my itchy
and uncomfortable arms and legs. (A stupid idiot you’ll think me, lacking a spit of sense and heading off without covering my skin, but what wean thinks ahead?) Even Dina, who I thought would
be well used to this method of harvesting, didn’t escape the nips of nettles. She pointed over at the seashore, where there were some docken plants. I knew that if we rubbed them on our
stings this would alleviate some of the pain, and in a flash we were ripping up the green fans and covering ourselves in their juices. My companion started off then towards the water, and it
didn’t take words to tell me that a good dook in the salty Atlantic would further help our aching skin.