Will Slater's Crock of Gold, by Terry H Jones

WILL SLATER'S CROCK OF GOLD
by Terry H Jones

Will Slater turned off the worn dirt path to wander into the field of wild flowers that grew in the late spring sun. The sun and air were warm, he had carried bricks at the job all morning, and a nap in the tall grass seemed the proper way to spend an afternoon. He had to be ready for a bit of dancing in the evening, not tired out from a full day's work as so many others might.

He pushed through the waist-high grass and flowers to a pair of branching snowball bushes that stood like islands of dark green and white amid the nodding stems and blossoms. The bushes would shade his eyes from the sun, he thought, and shade the rest of him from people on the road. The few coins jingling in his pocket were his. There was no telling, he thought, what a person on this road might do to some one they found sleeping in the bushes.

Rolling his jacket into a pillow for his tousled blond head, Will settled into the shade between the two bushes, stretched his legs into the grass, closed his eyes. And that's when he heard the sound. It was a small sound, a rough and raspy one, and it rose and fell. It might have been the growl of a small animal, but no animal Will knew, and it didn't sound angry. He sat up and held his breath to listen. The sound came again, then silence, then the sound. It came from under the bush at his right.

With his right hand, Will picked up a stick lying in the grass, and with his left he held up the jacket. Afraid to look, but afraid to leave, he pushed the stick gently into the noisy bush and lifted a branch.

There on the ground, in the flower-scented shade of the bush, lay a small person sleeping. And snoring. That was the noise Will heard, the snoring of this - leprechaun? Leprechaun! That's what this must be - there hung the long, knobby nose (snoring heavily), there lay the pointed red hat, the dusty green waistcoat and leggings, the shiny, perfectly made black leather shoes with their great silver buckles. All the leprechaun parts were there - it was one of the little people Will had heard of all his life but never expected to see. And it was asleep.

Forgetting he did not believe in the faerie, Will remembered that a captured leprechaun could be forced to surrender its riches. And never could one be captured easier than when it was asleep.

Will dived into the bush with his jacket spread out before him. Like a giant spider, he dropped onto the sleeping leprechaun and bundled him up in the worn, dusty coat. The little man kicked and grunted some, but put up no great fight. When he had settled back down, Will got a firm grasp on him with his calloused hands and headed home. He stayed off the roads, cutting through fields and woods so he would meet no one. You just can't trust people you met on these roads, he thought.

An hour later saw the man and his catch back in the rough sod and thatch one-room hut Will called home. Afraid to let go of his prize, Will used his foot to pull a trunk from under the bed, open it, turn it over to empty its contents, and then push it upright again. Leaving the little man wrapped in the jacket, Will dumped him into the trunk, then slammed and locked the lid. He'd done it! An imprisoned leprechaun, and all Will's! Soon the little man would wake and Will would be rich. Oh, maybe not immediately, but Will was sure he could make the little man see the sense of trading gold for freedom. Dreaming of how he would spend his new gold, Will settled on the trunk to wait.

When Sean Og woke, he had a headache that felt much too large for his leprechaun head. The Shoemaker's Ball had lasted for days, lapped into the May Day celebration and generally turned into one of the most memorable celebrations ever. Well, as much as he could remember. There had been faeries everywhere, faeries from everywhere. 'The fields will bloom thick this season,' he thought. 'I'll be wanting to see it, if this headache doesn't kill me.' He sat up, rubbed his eyes, and then tried to stand up.

*Thump!* "Ouch!" squeaked a small voice from inside the trunk, followed by some grumbling noises. The noises got a little louder, then a little louder and then became angry, frightened squeals. "Leave me out of here! Leave me out!"

"Hush, you," ordered Will. He bounced up and down on the trunk a couple of times to shake up his prisoner. "You hush, now, and listen. You're my prisoner, see. I caught you fair and I kept you fair. You're my prisoner, and you have to give me a crock of gold. Understand?"

There was a cold silence from the trunk. Will bounced up and down on it a few times. "Hey! I asked you if you understand."

"Quit jumpin' about," yelled Sean from his prison. "Open this here box and leave me out!"

"I want a crock of gold."

"I've got no crock of gold. Ye're tormentin' the wrong leprechaun, big 'un. Open this box and leave a peaceful faerie go about his business."

Will bounced on the box a few times. Sean wished his head would explode and be done.

"I told you," said Will. "I want gold. None of your heathen faerie lies will get you out. Nothing but lovely, warm gold. Now let's have it and no more of your lies." More bouncing. "You're my prisoner. You must give it to me."

"I don't have to do nothin'. Sit still."

"But if a human captures a leprechaun, the leprechaun has to give up his gold. That's what I've always heard."

Sean giggled, moaned and held his head. "Ye heard wrong. I must only give ye the gold to buy my freedom. And I'm not buyin'." Sean curled up and pulled his pointed cap over his head. "Ye'll get nothin' from me today," he said. "Even if I had some gold, and I don't, and even if I wanted to give ye gold, and I don't, I feel too bad to do anything. My head hurts. I'm going to sleep. Go away." The rasping, snoring sound the Will had heard in the bush began again. Sean was taking a nap.

Will sat on the trunk and listened to the little man snore. When he was convinced the leprechaun was indeed asleep, he decided it was safe to stand up. He paced around his hut a while, trying to think of a way to convince (that is, force) the faerie to cooperate. He failed. He did, however, work himself into a good appetite. He spent a couple of minutes looking for his jacket, then remembered he had stuffed it into the trunk with the leprechaun. 'One more reason to convince the creature to cooperate,' he thought. After a quick check of the lock on the trunk, Will stuffed his hands in his pockets and strode down the dirt path toward the village, his shoulders bunched up tight against the sunset chill. With the coins he carried he would buy some bread and cheese and beer and wait out the stubborn faerie. At least, that's what he planned.

When he returned an hour or so later, Will saw a tiny, wrinkled hand reaching through a small crack in the wooden side of the trunk. Miniature fingers busily worked on the trunk's lock, and just as Will walked in the door the lock sprang open. Will dived across the room and landed on the top of the trunk lid before Sean could push it open.

"Get off!" Sean cried, beating on the trunk lid and calling Will foul names. Will wriggled around so all his weight was on the lid. Then he closed the lock again and twisted it away from the hole in the trunk's side.

"You'll be free when you tell where to find your gold. You'll not get out before!" Will rummaged around the hut, found a hammer and a couple of nails, and tacked a scrap of wood over the hole Sean had made. Then he sat on his bed, ate the bread and cheese and watched the trunk. Minutes crept by, then hours. There was no movement from the trunk, no sound. Will watched and waited and drank his beer and eventually drifted off to sleep.

The moon was riding high hours later when Will woke. He had gone to sleep sitting up and his back was stiff. He stood and stretched and scratched and was about to lie down on the bed when he noticed a small movement on the ground near the trunk. In the silver-white moonlight pouring in his only window, Will saw that tiny, wrinkled hand again. This time Sean had worried a hole in the side of the trunk near the floor and was trying to remove one of the nails that held it together.

'Sneaky,' Will thought. 'And stubborn.' He bent over and smacked the tiny hand. Sean yelped from inside his prison, and the hand disappeared back inside. Will hammered the nails back in place and tacked another piece of wood over the new hole.

This began a pattern between the two new roommates. Any time Will left the trunk alone, Sean tried to escape. It generally took him about a couple of hours to dig a hole in the side, or work a nail loose, or damage the lock, or loosen a hinge or - Will had not known there were so many parts to a trunk! Every few hours, day and night, Sean found something new to meddle with. He didn't do it all the time or every day, but he did it enough that Will never felt safe leaving the trunk alone.

Weeks passed in this fashion - Sean silent but meddling with the trunk, Will demanding gold and putting the trunk back together. In a few months you could hardly see the original trunk; it was too heavily covered in cloth patches, wood scraps, extra nails, pieces of rope and anything else Will could find to keep his little prisoner inside.

At the same time, you could hardly see anything of the original Will Slater. As he could never get far away from the trunk, Will could not hold a normal job. He had to take what errands and labor he could get from local farmers, and he started scavenging along the beach and roadways for junk to sell. The work was hard and paid little, so Will never had enough to eat, and few farmers would hire him when they learned he left every couple of hours. The flesh fell off Will and his face hollowed out to show his skull. He never slept through the night any more; he woke every couple of hours to check the trunk.

Fewer and fewer people stopped by his hut for a visit. Will developed a reputation for being odd. Some heard him speaking aloud when there was no one else in his hut. Some had gone by his hut only to find him sitting outside and the hut full of thick, foul smoke. Will offered no explanation. He did not think it a good idea to tell them his captive leprechaun was enjoying a pipe.

Spring turned to full summer and that turned to early autumn. Sean stayed stubborn and Will waited and dreamed of gold and checked the trunk a dozen times a day. Sean never spoke. Sometimes Will heard sounds of knocking or tools being used in the trunk, but what the leprechaun was doing or where he got his supper was more than Will could guess.

One September afternoon Slater walked along the beach, shivering in the ocean breeze, wishing he had his jacket or a little more weight to keep him warm. He was looking for junk to sell, or (much better) coins lost from some one's pockets. Just as he was about to give up, he spied a pile of driftwood washed up in a gap between two large stones. The wood was bright tan and polished glassy smooth by the sand. Will knew it would sell to a tourist, so he scooped it up and started to town. The wood felt strangely heavy, but Will was weak from the lack of food and sleep; everything felt heavy, so he thought little of it. He sold his find to the first tourist he met, not even bothering to argue over the handful of coppers they offered him. He feared he had been away from his hut too long, and he could waste no time bargaining. Snatching the coins, he ran (well, hobbled) to his shack.

Sean had made no attempt to break out while Will was gone. Instead, the leprechaun was smoking his pipe (filling the hut with thick, gray clouds) and laughing. Will had never heard the faerie laughing from his prison, and had never anyone laugh so loud and strong about anything. He kicked the trunk a few times and demanded to know what was so funny, but Sean just laughed and smoked and explained nothing.

Early fall became late fall and then winter settled in on the village with it's first frost and ice. Will's older brother, Robert, had heard rumors throughout the summer that his brother was becoming a recluse, that his health appeared poor. Close friends hinted at some of the more notable behavior they'd seen or heard of - talking to furniture, sitting outside while the house filled with smoke - the sort of behavior that causes snoopy neighbors to talk about you. Robert decided it was time to ride down from the farm to see his younger brother.

Will was not happy to see Robert. He did not like people in the house as there was no telling when Sean would try another escape or have another pipe or start laughing or singing or something else embarrassing or dangerous. 'Dangerous,' Will thought. 'Anyone who learns what's in the old trunk will try to take it sure.' To make matters worse, Robert tried to get Will to leave the house, to go into the village or come to Robert's farm for a visit. 'It's like Robert knows of the leprechaun,' Will thought. 'He's trying to get me to leave the trunk unguarded. Well, we'll have none of that!'

But the two were not brothers by accident. The more stubborn Will became about staying at home, the more stubborn Robert became about getting him to leave. The talk grew louder, then louder still. There came a moment of silence when each inhaled so he could make his next arguments very forceful (well, loud anyway) - and Will heard a giggle from the trunk.

Whether Robert heard the giggle, no one knows. Robert had no time to analyze such matters before Will jumped across the room, grabbed him by the shirt and drug him to the door. With one motion, Will kicked the door open and flung Robert out into the icy darkness of the winter evening. The older brother spun and slid across the ice of the hard packed earth around the hut, tried to get his feet under him, failed - and fell, breaking his knee on one of the many large stones in the yard that Will had never bothered to clear away.

It was a slow, painful night for Robert, dragging his crippled self across the ice to his horse, then a painful ride through the frosty evening to the village. It was painful for Will, as well, sitting in the hut, choking from pipe smoke, listening to Robert's cries and Sean's loud laughter. But if the leprechaun had tried to let Robert know he was in the trunk - well, there was no telling what the stubborn faerie would try next! Will couldn't leave him alone.

The doctor set Robert's leg and by spring planting it worked as nearly new. His affection for his brother, however, did not heal so quickly.

That winter was a hard one. The cold came and it stayed. The first snow lingered, rivers and streams iced over early, and the ground became iron-hard. Will's meager stock of provisions dwindled quickly, his little bit of money ran out, and there were no odd jobs or tourists to be had. He shook the trunk several times a day and yelled at Sean to give him a crock of gold. Sean never said a word, but smoked pipe after foul-smelling pipe because he knew Will was stuck in the house.

Now, Will had a secret, one he thought would see him through the hard winter and let him outlast the stubborn leprechaun. He was not wholly out of money. He had a stash, a bag of coins buried at the roots of a willow on the banks of a nearby creek. For years, every time he had hit a run of luck (that is, not often) he put a few coins in the bag. Now seemed time to dip into it. One frigid November evening, just at dark, he gave the trunk a sullen kick, slung a shovel over his shoulder and stomped into the night to dig up some grocery money.

The ground was like stone, and Will was cold and weak from hunger. He was still afraid to open the trunk to recover his coat, so he worked in his shirt sleeves and he worked fast to keep from freezing. The frozen earth slowly gave away, exposing the burlap bag of money. It opened stiffly, and the coins Will grabbed from it were so cold they burned his hand. He took a few shillings, enough for a week's supplies, and stuffed it in his pocket. Then he folded the bag (which still held many shillings and silver pennies), threw it into the hole and shoveled dirt on it. The frozen clods of earth did not fit neatly back into the hole, and the dark brown soil looked like an old scab on the snow covered ground, but it was all he could do. Nearly frozen, and facing a long hike into the village for supplies, Will gave his hiding hole a final slap with the shovel, then shivered back to his hut.

Sean was chuckling softly when Will walked in the door. By the time Will had warmed up a little, Sean was giggling. While Will was planning what to buy, Sean began laughing, and a few minutes later the leprechaun was roaring with glee, bumping against the sides of his little prison, and puffing his foul pipe.

Will could stand no more.

He dived at the trunk, shook it, beat it, wrestled around the floor of the hut with it. He screamed at the faerie to stop laughing, to give him the gold, to stop smoking the pipe. Sean rolled and banged around inside the trunk, sometimes right side up, sometimes not. He wrapped himself in Will's coat to soften the blows, but he was badly beaten and could barely keep up the tormenting laughter. When a particularly vicious shake slammed him face first against the wooden side of the trunk and shattered his clay pipe, Sean spoke.

"Enough! Enough!" he cried. "Ye'll never get anything from me if ye beat me to death."

"I'll do it!" Will screamed. He was nearly exhausted from the cold, the shoveling, the lack of food, the anger. "I'll see you smashed like a bug! What are you laughing at? Eh?" He slapped the trunk against the leg of his bed. "What are you laughing at?"

"Stop! I'll tell ye. I'll tell ye if ye set the trunk down."

Will was worn out and glad to lay down the trunk. He curled up on the floor beside it. "What were you laughing about?" he panted.

From a waistcoat pocket, Sean produced a small wooden pipe, his spare. He packed it as he spoke.

"Do ye recall," he began, "that since our discussion the day ye cruelly locked me in this dungeon, I have not spoken except to laugh three times?"

"Yes," Will answered tiredly. "I remember. You're supposed to be telling me why."

Sean lit his pipe. "Well, I laughed those times because each time I found something funny. The first was when ye found the driftwood and sold it too the tourists. Do ye remember?"

Will began to feel cold from the inside. "Yes."

"One piece felt 'special heavy, didn't it? Probably made ye tired carrying it, didn't it. Tsk tsk." Will kicked the trunk. Sean continued. "Well, that piece felt heavy because it weren't real driftwood. It were gold. A little scuffed up, true, a little sandy, but a sculpture from King Orin's drawing room nonetheless. Ye do know Orin, King of Faeries? Many unusual gold sculptures in Orin's drawing room. Oh, yes, I've been there to see. And ye sold it for a handful of coppers." Sean giggled and puffed on the pipe. "All because ye had to get back and check on me. I felt so safe."

Will kicked the trunk again, as hard as he could manage. It barely shifted. "What about the rest, curse ye? You said you'd tell about the rest."

"Well, there was that time yer brother was here. Oh, that were a lovely visit, that were." Giggle. "To see ye two big bumblers fight, and then for him to break his leg of all things. Well, I guess ye'd have to be one of the Little People to see the true humor and irony of it. Especially since he felt so sorry for ye living all alone here, sickly and starving, and he only wanted help ye. But ye did it all to keep me from him. I felt so loved and wanted!" Snicker.

Will didn't bother to kick the trunk. He just curled into a tighter ball on the floor. "And tonight," he said quietly. "Tell me about tonight."

"Tonight! Oh, tonight. For ye to have put back that croker sack of coins the way ye had for so long, and then to have it stolen from ye that way - "

"Stolen!" Will shrieked.

"Oh, yes!" Sean howled with renewed laughter. "That piddlin' job ye did of coverin' it back up, did ye think that would hide it from anyone? Especially the types that wander the roads and follow people who have business in the fields? A man out without a coat makes folks wonder, ye see. Why, ye hadn't got inside the door of this shack before some of yer neighbors were countin' out yer treasure 'tween 'em. Right now I bet -"

The top of the trunk flew open and Sean saw dim fire light for the first time in months. He also saw Will standing over him like a scrawny avenging harpy.

Will grabbed the little man out of the trunk and shook him at arm's length. "You're lyin'!" He shook Sean again. "You're lyin'! That sack is all I have to see me through the winter."

"Put me down! Leave me go! I can't help it if ye humans are all thieves."

"You're lyin' and I'll show you!" The leprechaun still wore Will's much-too-big jacket, and Will held him at arm's length, kicking and scratching and cursing around the pipe he held clamped in his teeth. The human kicked open the door of the hut and charged clumsily across the frozen turf to the willow where his treasure was buried.

The sun had set, the temperature was falling, and Will met no one on the way. Just as well, him with his fighting, foul-mouthed burden. The cold, the struggle of holding Sean (and watching him all the time; remember, a leprechaun in the open can disappear if a human doesn't watch him), the walk through the ice covered snow - Will had nothing but stubbornness left to keep him moving. He would prove the faerie lied.

But the faerie told true as faeries sometimes do. The frozen snow beside the willow was scarred worse than when Will had left. Dirt was scattered, and on top of the snow beside the hole lay the burlap bag, bare to the winter winds. The bag rested dead on the frozen turf, one corner flapping feebly in the frigid breeze. It gripped Will's attention; it seemed the beckoning hand of starvation. Will dropped to his knees in the filthy snow, picked up the sack and shook it. Empty.

"Yer neighbors are probably having a hot toddy in the public house right now. Wonder if they'll thank ye for buying a round?"

Will no longer cared that he had let go of the leprechaun and had let the faerie out of his sight. He had nothing else left. Why should he hang on to a stubborn, skin-flint leprechaun?

"Go on with you," he mumbled. "Just go on."

"What? Ye don't want yer crock of gold? Nor even yer coat? And here's me thinkin' it were just a loan to keep me warm on these long winters evenings, a pillow fer me head on all those summer nights. A bit ragged fer me to be seen in back home, don' ye think?"

Will looked up from the bag at the little man. The leprechaun stood on the ice of the frozen creek, holding the jacket at arm's length, eyeing it sourly. "No," he said, "I don' think I'll wear it. Me image, ye know." He giggled. "But still, I'll take it if you insist. Quite the memento."

Will roared with a strength he no longer thought he possessed. Still clutching the burlap bag, he dived at the little man, so angry he would have stuffed the leprechaun in the sack and then beat it against a tree. He never got the chance. With a rifle-shot crack, the ice of the creek broke beneath Will's feet. Solid enough beneath the faerie, a human's weight and hobnailed boots broke through to the freezing waters. In Will went, up to his knees and then fell face forward onto the wet ice. Sean danced just out of his reach.

"Well," the faerie giggled. "If ye feel that strongly about the old rag, ye can have it." He threw the coat at Will, and it quickly soaked up the frigid waters. "I think most of a year in a box, watching ye throw away what little ye had, that'll be enough of a memento for me."

Will foundered to his feet and stood knee deep in the water, clutching the sopping bag and coat. "Be seein' ye again, I think, Will Slater." Sean nodded, waved his pipe, and was gone, back to wherever such creatures go when they vanish from the sight of men.

Plodding across the frozen turf, dirty burlap bag and ragged dripping coat in his arms, soaked to the skin in freezing waters, Will went slowly numb from the feet up during his long, stumbling walk home. He did not remember collapsing in the road, nor the men who found him and took him to the pub where his few shillings bought him a bed until his brother came, nor anything else until he woke in Robert's farm house days later.

Thin, weak and silent, Will Slater was never after that but a shell of what he had been. Some said it was that strange summer and winter spent by himself, talking to his furniture and smoking a stinking pipe. Others said it was just the family oddness, and the more charitable thought it was the fever he caught after his dunk in the creek. His brother never offered an opinion. But a few people from near the village, not from in it mind you, but from near it, they said Will had come afoul of the gentry, the good folk as they were known. Didn't he talk of little people? Wasn't he afraid of the sight of gold? Madness, they said, madness sure brought on by the touch of the Sidhe.

Some time later Will was called home to God. He went quietly, as befit a man who spent his last years in near silence, and the stone his brother set up was a quiet one in a quiet spot in the chapel yard. Robert stopped from time to time to say a prayer and once a year to say a rosary, but he never knew how many local children visited Will's stone. Will had been a local 'character' and that draws a crowd, but what brought them back again and again were the faint sounds of a tiny tapping hammer, the occasional thin, wild laugh when the winds blew, the light odor of foul pipe smoke when they were still. You just don't see that around grave stones often enough.

Fin