The Triple Goddess (178 page)

Although the Aristotles’ language might therefore be said to be simple and natural enough...it’s not, and only the Wind and the Rain understand it.

To illustrate how difficult the Aristotles’ speech is, consider the words that they taught the shepherd, for him to use when counting, or “telling”, his own, ordinary, sheep to make sure none of them has strayed. These are the only words that the shepherd needs to know.

Up to ten, the numbers go: Yan, tan, tethera, pethera, pimp, sethera, lethera, hovera, covera, dik. Instead of fifteen the shepherd says “bumfit”; and at twenty, “figgit”, often followed by “Bother!”, because he can’t remember what comes next. And since ‘bother’ isn’t a number, he has to start again at the beginning.

On the North Downs, the shepherd has a brother who uses another version, because the dialect there is different. He still starts with ‘yan’ and ‘tan’; but then goes: “Tether, mether, pip, azer, sezer, akker, conter, dick, yanadick, tanadick, tetheradick, metheradick, bumfit”—fifteen, there it is again—“Yanabum, tanabum, tetherabum, metherabum”, and “jiggit” instead of “figgit”.

Having got to twenty, the shepherd picks up a pebble and repeats the same words; at thirty he bends over for another pebble, and at forty another; and so on until every sheep has been counted, and his pockets as well as his hands are full, because in days of yore flocks were much larger than in more recent times.

Occasionally the farmer passes by, and as a joke calls out, “Mathawoot!” and “Yahawoot!”. ‘Mathawoot’ and ‘Yahawoot’ are old words that are spoken to oxen when they are ploughing, meaning “Come hither” and “Go thither”, and they are the only two words an ox needs to know. Unfortunately the sheep don’t understand either of them, but take them as an instruction to disperse all over the downs and coombs, or “bottoms” as the hills and dales and hollows on the downs are called.

This means that the shepherd has to round them up again; which if it weren’t for his dog he wouldn’t be able to do. Though none of the sheep has ever gone missing, the farmer’s little joke at the shepherd’s expense is always lost upon him.

Down south, some of the shepherds tell their sheep in twos, as follows: “One-erum, two-erum, cockerum, shu-erum, shitherum, shatherum, wine-berry, wagtail, tarrydiddle, den.” “Den”, if you’ve been counting correctly, therefore equals twenty sheep.

It was from this system that people got the idea of “telling” sheep when they’re having difficulty falling asleep.

But
Retournons à nos moutons
, or “Let’s get back to our sheep”, as the French say when, in Pierre Pathelin’s words, they want to return to the subject.

The Aristotles built their village under the downs, because it was the nicest place in the world—so they say, though I don’t think they looked very far, if at all—and they gave it a name that even to the Wind’s ears, and he is tone deaf, sounded strange. So I just call it the Village. Everyone the Aristotles know gets lost on the way there, because the drovers’ track that leads to it goes round in circles, as if it is in no hurry to arrive; which, since the Aristotles never have cause to travel anywhere and come back, it isn’t.

The reason for the circumferential character of the road, though it barely deserves the title of thoroughfare, is that the Aristotles constructed it themselves, and very slowly. Rome wasn’t built in a day, as the expression is, admittedly; but if the Aristotles had been in charge of the project the emperors would have lived in tents instead of palaces.

The Aristotles didn’t make so many loops and bends in the road because they wish to discourage visitors, for they are a sociable and welcome company. But it is natural for them to move in circles, like the road…or as they call it, “in a peripheral manner”, when they are on the ground. Except, that is, when they are making a beeline to their breakfast-, lunch-, tea- or dinner-tables, of which each family has a separate one for each meal. All are round, and each person moves one place to the right each day, on the Aristotelian theory that this ensures even wear and tear—even though each seat is always filled.

When the road arrives at the Village, after coyly going around several bends, it becomes The Street. It is called the Street because there’s no other paved means of ingress and egress to confuse it with.

Along the bottom of the downs on either side of the Aristotles’ village are dense beech woods. Above these woods is a steep escarpment, covered in springy turf, which rises to the top of a line of high but soft and rolling hills. The short grass is emerald green in colour, like baize, interspersed with dashes of colour from violets, cowslips, and harebells; field poppy, red clover, wind eyebright, and sapphire-blue round-headed rampion—known as “the Pride of Sussex”; knapweed, yellow rattle, campion, and vetch; scabious, wild thyme, and bird’s foot trefoil; and Spotted, Pyramid, Fragrant, and Early Purple orchids.

Because common or field sheep aren’t as nimble as Aristotles over rough ground, and as fleet of foot, there’s a track called a bostal cut in the escarpment, for the shepherd to drive his flock up to the grazing during the day, and down in the evenings to the folds.

“Downs” is the meaning of the Aristotle word for hills. It might seem like an inappropriate name for a geological formation that goes upwards. But the Aristotles think of the Downs as downs because their word for Up, when it entails moving in that direction on foot as opposed to floating like a cloud, is the same as that for Exercise...which is a word signifying anything that is to be avoided, owing to the importance of not missing the next meal at home.

When a young Aristotle is told to tidy up his room, he may stamp his foot and say, “I won’t! That’s exercise, and it’s nearly time for lunch!” But his parents tell him to do it anyway, or there will be no lunch; which there always is.

The Aristotles find that single syllable, Up, fatiguing to utter in its connotation of effort; as tiring as its opposite, Down, is pleasant and refreshing. So, because they are as drawn to the sky as a cloud is, when the Aristotles want to go up the downs they think “Up!” as hard as possible, whilst reminding themselves that Up is followed by Down: down to where their cottages are, and their cheerful kitchens, and well-stocked larders; and breakfast, lunch, tea, and supper.

At least when they get to the top, there’s the reward of a breeze to cool them off, and a view of the Village, and the great flat plain of the Weald beyond; and a sight to the south of the blue sea against the whitest of sheer chalk cliffs, where the downs come to an abrupt end as if they’d stopped in the middle of a sentence; and to the north of the North Downs on the other side of the Weald.

Then, when they’re ready, the Aristotles shout “Down!” and hurry down the hill, happy that they’re soon going to be home for tea, and hot buttered crumpets, and scones, and jam.

The other Aristotles, those who’d “exercised”, or perhaps it should be called “unexercised”, their option to stay home and take a nap after lunch, would by now be looking out of the lattice windows in their living rooms, and wondering where the others are. For though there are no clocks in the Village, because Time has never visited it, no Aristotle is ever late for tea.

At last the stay-at-homers would see them tumbling down the hill, yelling “Bags I cream cake!”, and “Toffee banana for me!”, to let those below know that they are on their way...as if there could have been any doubt of it.

The Aristotles, therefore, do have a body clock of sorts, which, instead of telling them the time, registers, rather than reminds them—for how could they forget?—when it is time to eat.

The day is divided into twelve sections to accommodate the various meals that an Aristotle needs to keep body and soul together. There are even a few sticklers who observe the minutes, too, when one progresses from course to course during a meal; and who regulate their mouthfuls to ensure that everything can be “fitted in” before commencement of the interval that separates one meal from another, during which one fasts.

The gustatory day is as follows:

One: Early Breakfast. Early Breakfast is a scaled-down version of what is to follow, as Main Breakfast. It is taken as soon as one gets up, for no purpose other than to prepare the mind and body for Main Breakfast. The only difference between Early Breakfast and Main Breakfast, other than that Early Breakfast is a bit smaller in quantity, and shorter in duration, than Main Breakfast—or as the Aristotles would say “less large and not as long”, is that tea is drunk instead of coffee.

Two: Main Breakfast. Fruit juice, followed by orange or grapefruit segments, or prunes; cereal or porridge, or both, with cream; bacon, grilled tomatoes, sausages, mushrooms, kidneys, eggs
à la
however you fancy them—meaning boiled or coddled or fried or poached or scrambled; fried bread and black pudding; toast and butter, and a dollop of marmalade or jelly or jam or honey…or half as much each of two of them, or a third as much each of three, or a quarter as much each of four, or as much of all of them as one can eat or has time for, whichever is the greater.

And a great deal of freshly ground coffee.

Three: Late Breakfast, which is an expurgated, meaning slightly less large, version of the aforementioned. The only difference, therefore between Late Breakfast and Early Breakfast is that it comes later. Or “less early” as the Aristotles prefer to say, the word “later” to them being a little depressing—or rather, less happy, because Aristotles don’t get depressed—in that it means there are fewer meals ahead of them to look forward to that day.

Four: Mid-Morning Snack, usually consisting of a Cornish pasty, Scotch egg, and a large Melton Mowbray pork, or veal and ham, pie.

Five: Brunch. A cold collation of what was not left over from breakfast, because it was eaten earlier, which means going to the larder again to assemble it. Brunch is an introductory lunch.

Six: First Luncheon. The lunch part of Brunch, only more of it.

Seven: Second Luncheon. The same as First Lunch, only larger still.

Eight: Third Luncheon. A somewhat pared-down, or rather, less sizeable, Second Lunch.

Nine: Teatime. Sandwiches, cakes, and more cakes…a subject that shall be gone into in greater detail, considerably greater detail, presently.

Ten: High Tea. An edited breakfast, with the eggs done a different way to how one had them at breakfast.

Eleven: Supper. An unrestricted menu, except as may be dictated by personal preference and seasonal availability. The only thing missing from Supper, or rather, not included in it, are Savouries. Savouries are, or would be if there were such things, dishes that are served at the beginning or end of a meal as a stimulant or digestive. The Aristotles’ appetites do not need stimulating, and their digestions are just fine, thank you.

Twelve: Snack. Milk and cookies, most of them chocolate.

Now, lest you should think that the Aristotles’ meal schedule—or “itinerary” as they call it in their language, because each category of meal is eaten at a different table, requiring movement—is, though evenly distributed throughout the day, more heavily “weighted” towards the beginning, Attend! The next chapter shall describe in more detail what the Aristotles mean by Tea.

’

‘

On certain afternoons the Aristotles, instead of having tea at their homes, meet at the Tea Shoppe in the Village.

The Tea Shoppe is run by Mrs Crampton-Bunne, in the gabled cottage where she lives with her two daughters. It has an uneven stone floor and a low-beamed ceiling, and the windows have lace curtains drawn in a sweep to either side. It is dark in a cosy way, lit by firelight and reflections from five great copper kettles on iron stands on the hearth.

On a table are ten brown double-handled earthenware teapots, waiting to be warmed with hot water from the kettles, with their spouts pointing in the same direction.

Owing to their circumnavigatory nature, the Aristotles never take the quickest way anywhere; so, though the Tea Shoppe is in the middle of the Street, after Third Lunch there is no time for dilly-dallying, let alone shilly-shallying, if one is to arrive promptly. The preference is to get there a little early, in order to secure a seat closest to the kitchen door; then, when the Misses Bunne come out with new plates of things to put on the half-dozen tables, one can ask to take a piece “before it disappears”—which it will as surely as chocolate cake has a short life, of about fifteen minutes from the time that it is introduced into society.

The Aristotles’ route takes them along the track into the beech wood, out the other side and up the downs, along the top for half a mile, down again, and through the wood and a gate into a field, over a stile, through another field and gate, and down a path back to the Street where the Tea Shoppe is.

There Mrs Crampton-Bunne and her daughters are waiting, hoping that the cucumber sandwiches won’t curl at the edges before they arrive, which they don’t because the Crampton-Bunnes have timed the preparation to a T.

When they get to the Tea Shoppe, the Aristotles use the hoof-scraper at the front door and wipe their feet on a mat. They are in such a hurry to get indoors that they don’t do a very good job of it; but Mrs Crampton-Bunne doesn’t say anything—not because she doesn’t mind her rugs getting dirty, but because an Aristotle tea is as good an afternoon’s business as it is possible to have, and one does not offend such custom; not that anyone has ever offended an Aristotle.

Then Mrs C.-B. ushers the Aristotles in to warm themselves in front of the fire, if they want to before sitting down, which they do not.