I was six, and didn't everybody know it. I was the most mischievous
little bugger (according to my
Dad) in Lincolnshire (Robin Hood country).
"Watch 'im" was the catch word of the day. "Iff'n it ain' nailed doon that little bugger will pinch it (steal it)."
But my Mother used to stick up for me.
"You'll get the lad a bad name," she would say, then look at
me with a wistful smile as if she already
knew what life had in store for
me. I'm glad she didn't have a crystal ball or I think I might have made
for the nearest very deep body of water with a heavy weight round my neck.
At this point in the yarn we are now at a fork in the road so to speak.
If we take the left fork we
get the miseries, so we will turn hard t' starb'rd
and take the right and happy road, okay?
"What are you up to, Thomas?" cried my Mother out the back door.
"Oh, there you are, what
are you doing with my best meat cover?"
I had borrowed the blue cover which always covered the Sunday joint of
roast beef, which was
always stashed on the coolest shelf in the pantry.
"I'm going to catch some black birds," I replied.
My Mother looked up to heaven and said something about "God give me
patience" so I looked
up too, expecting to see a pack of cards come
tumbling out of the clouds. Since I was now getting an ache in my neck
I shouted "I don't think 'e 'eerd you Mum!"
Mother came back to the door with " what's up now?"
I repeated
"I don't think 'e 'eerd yu Mum."
"Who?" queried my
Mother, looking puzzled.
"God," I answered.
Mum came over (looking at the trap I was making out of the cover), and
said "It won't work
like that. You have to make sure this stick sits
on this one and the cover rests on this one."
As soon as she let go it fell down, so with a snort she said, "Oh
I don't know, ask your Dad when
he gets home, he knows how it works,"
and with a swirl of skirt and apron my Mother walked back through the back
door and shut it with a bang.
With my Mother out of the way, I thought I would try some thing else, so
discarding my attempt
at a figure four trap, I got a bobbin of very fine
twine (string), propped the blue meat cover up with a bit of stick with
the twine tied to it and poked the other end of the twine through the back
kitchen window. Then I put bits of bread under the meat cover and retired
to the back kitchen window, where I watched.
After a few minutes a sparrow flew down and had a go at one of the bits
of bread, but then a big
blackbird scared it away. Soon it was joined by
others and there were two under the cover. I was tingling with excitement.
I pulled the string and the cover fell down and I had caught two black
birds!
"Mum, Mum!" I shouted. My Mother came rushing through from the
living room.
"What ever is the matter?" she panted.
"Look, look, I got one, I got one!" I shouted.
Suddenly my Mother calmed down. Opening the back door, she got the two
birds, wrung their
necks and hung them on a nail. She said, "Put the
rest there if you get any more."
I did, and we had blackbird pie.
Next day was Sunday, so I wandered down to the farm yard, about half a
mile down the lane,
and meandered round this hay stack.
There was the farmer, John Davey, with a six foot long bow and he had it
fully drawn. On seeing
me he relaxed the bow and said "get your lad
away from there Barker, the arrow may glance and we don't want an accident."
So Dad came over and I got a clout over the head. "Wot yu doin 'ere
then?"
The farmer said "He's all right Barker, let him watch if he wants
to."
So Dad reached into his waistcoat pocket and dragging out a plug of tobacco,
cut a bit off with
his pocket knife and put it into his mouth. I thought,
I wonder if cows chew tobacco? Well it did look the same, but then I thought,
I've never seen cows spit like me Dad, splat, a bit like a .22 rifle going
off.
The farmer had a target pinned up on the cut side of the hay stack, and
with me now out of the way,
he put an arrow to the bow and drew it way
back. ZIP, the arrow went into the bullseye and only the goose feathers
of the arrow could be seen. The rest of the arrow was in the tightly packed
hay stack.
"Here Tommy, have a try" said the farmer, but I could not pull
the bow very far. Because it was
six feet long I also had to hold it sideways.
The arrows had no metal war head on them, they were wood ends and sharpened
like a pencil. With a metal end the arrows were heavier and would do more
damage.
I discovered the English long bow that day. This bow is famous, it can
put an arrow through a
plank of wood when a bullet from a pistol will not
go through the same plank.
As soon as I got home I had to find my book with Robin Hood in it. Then
I went across the road
to the pond and selected a branch that would make
me a bow and it wasn't long before I had my own bow and arrow. Then I got
a good hiding for putting an arrow through the front room window.
I got another hiding because when the bloke came to put the new pane of
glass in, he complained
to Dad that he couldn't find his putty, and would
have to go all the way back to the village to get some more. Meanwhile,
I was in the barn making all kinds of shapes with this new found plasticine.
I fell in the pond on another occasion and guess what? As much as I wailed
that it was an
accident, I still got whacked.
In those days my Dad used to read his paper and if I walked past him, I
got whacked. My
Mum would look up and ask "What was that for? He hasn't
done anything."
A voice from behind the newspaper would respond with " Ah naw, that's
just in case 'e does."
My Dad was always one jump ahead so to speak. I began to ponder, would
I reach seven?
