Jack and the Devil's Purse (12 page)

She said, ‘Granny was right! There’s something strange about this place. And I cannot walk, my knee is so sore!’

Then the little tiny face came out and she saw that it had long, grey hair hanging down. The nose was long and pointed. She could see the face of an old woman.

‘Oh!’ Jenny says. ‘It’s the ghost, the ghost of the castle. She’s going to take me away.’

And she’s still hanging on to her little bunch of holly. The little door opened wider with a scree-eek. And the old woman came out. And Jenny could see that she had a long, dark dress trailing to her feet.

She came up and said in a shaky voice, ‘Don’t be afraid, little one. No one’s going to hurt you.’

But Jenny stood terrified, she couldn’t move. The old woman came closer and closer and Jenny said, ‘Keep away from me, old woman! You’re the ghost of the castle and Granny’s warned me. I should never have come here.’

‘Don’t be afraid, little one, I’m not going to hurt you.’ And the old woman stood before her. Then Jenny smelled a strange musky smell, a cold, damp smell. She said, ‘Let me mend your leg for you. I see you have hurt yourself.’

And she reached over and caught Jenny by the hand. Jenny saw that her fingers were curled; the nails were brown and grey. And the old woman’s hands Jenny felt were cold as clay.

‘Rise up, little one,’ she says, ‘come with me! I will fix you – you have nothing to fear.’

Jenny struggled up and the old woman pulled her gradually. She took her through the little door in the wall. There was a little room. And the old woman closed the door behind her.

Jenny smelled this strange musky smell of cold and damp. She looked and stared. There were coffins all around the
wall! And on the stone shelves were skulls sitting, staring. Jenny was terrified.

‘Please, old woman,’ she said, ‘l-let me go! Let me out of here. This is terrible.’

The old woman said, ‘Don’t be afraid! These are my family. You have a family, haven’t you?’

‘No, I live with my Grandmother. And she’s warned me not to come here.’

She says, ‘No one’s going to hurt you! Just you come over here.’ There was a stone chair. The old woman said, ‘Sit you down there!’

And Jenny sat down, trembling with fear. The blood was running from a large gash in her knee, running over her little sock.

The old woman said, ‘Don’t be afraid. These are my people. I am the guardian of my people.’

And the coffins were piled deep round the whole wall. Some were twisted, and Jenny could see bones sticking out from some of the coffins. All these heads were placed on stone slabs around the wall. Jenny was terrified and thought she saw the eyes watching her, the empty eyeholes.

And the old woman said again, ‘My dear, you have nothing to fear. I will fix your leg for you.’

Then she took an old cloth and with a piece of it she cleaned the blood away from the large gash on Jenny’s knee. She wrapped the rest of the cloth around Jenny’s leg as the blood ran over her stocking.

The old woman said, ‘Now that looks really well, my dear.’

And Jenny saw these big curled fingers, the little face and the long grey hair. But the old woman’s eyes were kindly. Jenny was still hanging on to her little bunch of holly.

She said, ‘I see you’ve taken something from my favourite tree – that is the tree of my father. Now, my dear, you must go home to your grandmother.’

And she led her through the little door. Jenny limped through terrified. And the little door closed with a scree-ee-k.

Jenny turned round . . . it was gone. Only the bare wall! And she looked at her leg. She saw the bandage, and she saw that she still had the holly in her hand. Her leg felt a little better.

‘Oh,’ she said, ‘whatever shall I tell my grandmother when I get home?’ So she walked home and her grandmother was waiting for her.

She says, ‘Jenny, where have you been? You’ve been gone a long time. School was out a while ago.’

‘Oh Grandmother,’ she said, ‘I am sorry, so sorry. I wanted to find a present for you and I climbed the castle wall to get some holly for you. And I fell. I gashed my leg.’

The old granny looked and saw there was a bandage around her leg. She said, ‘My dear, come in!’ And she brought little Jenny into the little kitchen of the house where they lived. ‘Sit you down there. Granny’s not going to argue with you. What happened to you?’

‘Oh Grandmother,’ she said, ‘I climbed the castle wall to get you a little holly. And then I fell and I slipped. A little door opened in the wall. And an old lady brought me in. Granny, it was horrible! Terrible – all those coffins and all those skulls that were staring at me, Grandmother. And that old woman. She looked horrible, but she was so nice.’

‘Whatever happened to you, my dear? Why have you got a bandage around your leg?’

‘Oh Grandmother, my leg is gashed. It’s a terrible cut.’ And the blood had dried on her little sock.

Grandmother said, ‘Let me have a look.’ And very carefully she wound the cloth off little Jenny’s leg. As she unwound the cloth it just melted in her hands, fell down piece by piece on the floor. She said, ‘Jenny, wherever did you get that piece of cloth?’

‘I told you, Granny, it was the old woman!’

And Granny looked: ‘Jenny, there’s no gash on your leg, my dear—’ and she pulled the last bit of cloth away. There was a scar, but no cut on Jenny’s leg. She said, ‘Jenny, you are a very lucky girl.’

‘But Grandmother, she never hurt me. She was just kind to me, really kind. But the room was so cold.’

‘Jenny,’ she said, ‘my dear, didn’t I warn you a long time ago not to go to the castle?’

‘But I had to go, Granny. I wanted to get you a present for Christmas.’

And Granny picked up the little bunch of holly. ‘Jenny, you’ve brought me the greatest present of all for my Christmas – you’ve brought me back your self!’

And Jenny lived with her granny for many, many years and she never was afraid anymore as she walked by that castle to school. Because she knew she had met the guardian of the castle, who guarded the family of all those people who were gone a long time before her.

And that is the end of my story.

Now many stories were laid towards many people’s doorways that never actually happened to them, but in folklore they had to find a character like Homer, like King Arthur, to lay some of these good stories towards. And among Traveller lore we have the same idea; we have a famous character called John MacDonald. And John MacDonald was a piper, there are even tunes called after him. And he was a good storyteller in his time, he was a good piper forbyes – whether he made stories up or not. But one I’d like to tell you this morning is about John MacDonald.

John MacDonald was a Travelling man, he was a wandering piper, a good piper. And he had a wife and two little boys. He never owned a horse in his life. He had no time for horses. But he had a little homemade handcart he built himself. And he and his wife would wander the countryside. He would play his pipes at the guest houses. He was always welcome wherever he would be.

But when he got together with the Traveller community, when some Travellers met together on a campsite way back in time, the most interesting character was a bit like myself; John MacDonald was a storyteller. And to get round John Mac -Donald’s fire was a treat! And listen to some of his stories. This is one that was supposed to happen to him. So, just you listen!
One day John and his wife had been travelling all day long. They didn’t have any girls, just two little boys, and they walked by their daddy’s side. And his wife Mary, she would hawk the doors along. He would make baskets for her, he would make scrubbers and besoms and he would pipe in his own time. But it was a late evening, the fall of the year, about October, and they came to a local camping site by the roadway, which was well used by Travelling folk.

And Travelling people in those days, the original Travellers, always cleaned up. The only thing they never cleaned up – they burned up all the sticks that was left – they never left a bit of stick. They left the stones in a little heap, for people would put them on their canvas to keep the canvas down. But they would never leave any firewood. They would make sure all the firewood was burned up.

So John and his wife Mary, they pulled into the little camping site. And the two little boys were tired, they sat down. He took off the campsticks they carried with them, always tied along his little handcart. And his Mary was clever, she was a real Traveller woman.

He says, ‘Mary, you put up the tent there in two minutes. And I’ll go and see if I can get some sticks to make a cup of tea for the weans!’

Now he looked up; there’s wall, a high wall, and he could see the tops of holly trees. But the tops of the holly trees were rotten.

And he says, ‘I’ll just climb that wall, stand on the wall and I’ll break some of the tops of thon sticks and we’ll have a fire in nae time.’

So Mary got the camp sticks, she was busy putting up the tent. And John climbed up the wall, which was about six foot high; he was a supple man. And he stood on the top of the wall. He was level with the rotten tops of the holly that
went round the wall. And he’s breaking them off, and he broke this big chunk of rotten stick, when he looked at the graveyard and it started –
REETLE RATTLE REETLE RATTLE REETLE RATTLE
– in the graveyard.

And he stared in amazement, for here were three skeletons, two big ones and a smaller one. The two big ones were laying into the little one. And they were beating and battering and kicking him and punching him.

‘Upon my soul,’ said John MacDonald, he says, ‘two to one is not my kind of thing.’

And he jumps down into the graveyard with a piece of stick in his hand. Within minutes he took the little one’s part and he scattered the bones of the two big ones. He scattered their skulls, and he scattered the bones. He says, ‘Two to one is no my kind of thing!’

And the little one stood by and watched this. And then an amazing thing happened. Lo and behold he began to change . . . he turned into a young farmer dressed in tweeds.

And he said, ‘Thank you! Now I can rest in peace.’

John MacDonald was amazed. He said ‘A-a-ar-are you a ghost?’

‘Well,’ he said, ‘you could say I’m a ghost.’ He said, ‘These were . . .’ but then the skeletons vanished, the remains of the skeletons vanished! When he took human form they vanished. ‘These,’ he said, ‘were my two brothers. And they killed me for my father’s money. And I could never rest in peace. But you,’ he said, ‘came to my part. If you had hae been there when they were beating me up to kill me, it would never have happened. And you have been honest and true! And for that I’m going to give my money to you, because they never got it. Both were hanged with my murder.’

Now he said, ‘Tonight when it gets dark I want you to backtrack the way you came today. And you’ll see a large
pine tree in a farm road-end. Follow that road-end up till you come to another pine tree, and by the side of that pine tree you’ll see a well, a dry well. Go down the dry well – it’s easy access – and there at the very bottom stone pull it out. See what you find.’ And the skeleton faded away, and was gone.

John MacDonald was amazed, he didn’t know what to do. Never mentioned it to his wife. But he came over with some sticks, and they kindled a fire, they had a cup of tea.

She asked him, something to eat; ‘No,’ he says, ‘I’m no needing something to eat.’ He was so excited he didna ken what was wrong with him. He never mentioned it to his wife.

So that night when it got gloaming dark, he says, ‘Mary, I have to go back the road a wee bit.’

She says, ‘What are you going back for? I’m eerie to sit here by myself.’ (Eerie means ‘feart’ or afraid.)

He said, ‘I’ll no be long.’

She said, ‘What is it you’re going for?’

‘Well,’ he said, ‘I saw a field of potatoes, a pit of potatoes away back the road, I’m going to go back and get a few tatties for the weans, for the morning.’

‘Well,’ she says, ‘dinna be long!’

‘Well,’ he said, ‘sit in the tent where nobody’ll see you.’

So Mary took the wee weans, the two wee laddies, inside the tent and she began to tell them a story. She just lighted a candle and she begint to tell the weans a story.

And he made his way back till he came to the big pine tree. He saw an old rough farm road and he followed it up for a little way. He saw another pine tree and some buildings. And as the ghost had told him, he went over and there was an old, dry, draw-well with a lid.

He pulled the lid off and he climbed down. The well was dry. He pulled out the watering stone as the skeleton had
said, and he pulled out a wee little iron box. It was full of gold sovereigns, packed full of gold sovereigns! More money than he’d ever seen in his life.

Of course he carried it back with him to his tent and he told Mary the story, with the two wee laddies sitting playing with the gold sovereigns. So he didn’t know what to do.

He said, ‘We’ll no shift today.’

So he went and dug a hole and buried the box. And tied all the gold sovereigns into a pack with Mary’s shawl.

And the next day he went down to the village. He says, ‘Mary, I’m sick fed up travelling!’ He bought himself a wee house, sent the two laddies to school.

Nobody ever knew where John MacDonald’s money came from. And it was on his dying bed that he told some of his family where he actually got the money.

And that was the story of Johnny MacDonald.

And there were many, many wonderful stories laid at Johnny’s door; he was a kind of a Donald Angie MacDougal MacLean in Traveller folklore.

A long time ago in the West Highlands of Scotland Jack lived with his old mother on a little croft. His father had died when he was very young and Jack barely remembered him. He spent most of his time with his mother. They had a few goats and a couple of sheep on their small croft. His mother kept a few hens and she sold a few eggs in the village. She took in washing and knitting and doing everything else just to keep her and her son alive. But Jack grew up. He loved and respected his mother. And he tried to make the croft work, but things got very hard. The ground was too hard and stony, little crops could he grow. He always depended on the few shillings that his mother could bring in because he couldn’t get very much off the land. And where they stayed was about two miles from the small village. There was a post office and a local store and a little inn. Jack used to walk there every week to get his mother’s few groceries, or messages. And Jack had grown up to be a young man by this time.