The Knowledge Stone Page 4

  ‘No,’ he replied. ‘We are betrothed and I will marry you.’

  There and then, he gave her a ring to wear to mark their betrothal. They continued to meet frequently but Young Malik never touched any part of her body; they touched only when they held hands or when they kissed briefly.

  In due course, the bride price was paid by Young Malik to the father of the poor serf family.

  This action caused quite a scandal in the region; many thought that the normal marriage arrangements should not apply to such an odd union.

  Following their betrothal, Young Malik provided new clothes for Maretta, the first new clothes she had ever possessed. He also gave her money so that she could buy all the things that a wife would need. He told her that he was building a new wooden shack for them at the farm and that this would be ready when they were married.

  Maretta was delighted and deeply in love with Young Malik. Now she could walk into the village with her head held high and buy from the merchants there. When she did so, no-one spoke to her or acknowledged her new status but Maretta did not care.

  Some weeks later, the reluctant village priest was persuaded (by the offer of a greatly increased marriage fee) to conduct their marriage ceremony in front of a handful of people. Unlike the usual village weddings, which were events that lasted for days and involved much singing, dancing, eating and drinking, the wedding of Young Malik and Maretta was a very muted affair, attended only by a few family members. There was no celebration, no music or dancing. Deeply in love, Young Malik and Maretta hardly noticed. They had eyes only for each other.

  After the wedding, the bridegroom took his new bride to the farm and installed her in the new shack he had built for them, a small one-roomed structure that smelled deliciously of sweet new wood. He was particularly delighted when Maretta told him that she had never before seen such a beautiful house, so clean, neat and new.

  Young Malik was also very pleased when his father came to welcome his wife as a new member of his family. He knew his mother was still tight-lipped about his marriage to Maretta but was convinced that in due course she would be charmed by his new wife’s beauty and wonderful personality.

  Thus began the married life of Young Malik and Maretta. They were ecstatically happy together. She looked after all his needs assiduously and he treated her with love and great kindness. They both looked forward to the long evenings after work, when they could snuggle up together! Like all young married couples, their love-making was joyful, energetic and frequent.

  At breakfast the arrival of their children would be discussed on many occasions. As Young Malik spoke humorously of a farmer’s need for many workers, Maretta’s answering smile was the timeless face of the “Creator Mother”, intensely beautiful and filled with the purest form of love.

  The months, then the years passed and Young Malik became deeply worried that new life did not form in Maretta’s body, despite their constant attempts to make this happen. He called upon many physicians and apothecaries for advice and, at considerable expense, these experts came to the farm and examined Maretta many times. Each consultation produced a remedy of some type and Young Malik took on the responsibility of administering these to his wife. Sometimes the remedies were unpleasant and Maretta was opposed to taking them.

  ‘No use complaining,’ her husband would say without pity, ‘you must follow orders. I have paid a great deal for these remedies.’ And so the pills would be swallowed and the ointments applied despite her protests.

  As more time passed, Young Malik began to blame his wife for her lack of fertility, at first secretly, then openly and with increasing acrimony. He became increasingly withdrawn and spent less and less time with her. Then one day, Young Malik decided that his wife should be examined by the village midwife. ‘She deals with these matters all the time, so she should be able to find out what the problem is,’ he thought.

  Of course he did not discuss this with his wife but went to see the midwife the very next day. Having explained the situation to her, he requested that she come to the farm and examine his wife. ‘I want many children and she is barren,’ he stated with his customary bluntness. Having agreed to pay the midwife’s fee for this service, he arranged to transport her to the farm on the following day.

  ‘The midwife is here to examine you,’ Young Malik said to his wife the following morning when he appeared at the farm with the old woman. ‘Make sure you do everything she wants and tell her the truth, you hear?’ Displeased and stony-faced, Maretta held the door of the shack open and the midwife entered.

  Young Malik waited outside and time crawled past.

  ‘This is taking a long time,’ he complained, ‘let’s hope it does some good.’ Like all men of these times, he was of course totally convinced that the infertility was Maretta’s fault.

  After a whole hour, the midwife appeared and they sat down and talked together.

  ‘I’ve asked her many questions and I’ve examined her very thoroughly,’ the midwife said, ‘and I cannot find anything wrong. Of course, that doesn’t mean that all is well, because there are many reasons for a woman to be barren.’ Then she added: ‘If you want to have many children, you gentlemen should be very careful who you marry. The women you marry need to be good breeding stock, you understand?’ The midwife looked at him significantly but Young Malik did not understand her words.

  ‘What do you mean?’ he asked in some bewilderment.

  ‘I mean that your wife is not good breeding stock,’ the midwife replied waspishly. ‘If you want many children, you need a woman from good breeding stock.’ Young Malik was dumbfounded and completely taken in by the midwife’s artful explanation. His face flushed deeply with embarrassment. He had never given any thought to this aspect of marriage.

  Now in his confusion he felt his fury rise – Young Malik reacted to most situations with anger: ‘How could she have duped me like this?’ This thought struck him like a physical blow, sending his mind reeling. In this moment, his love for Maretta was choked off by his fury. Sitting beside him, the midwife observed his reaction and her face became set in an ugly smirk of satisfaction.

  Several years passed. The farm continued to be successful and fertile under the leadership of Young Malik’s father. The older man had now given up trying to teach his son the essentials of good farming and Young Malik’s farm work was that of a labourer rather than the trainee farmer he should have been. Every evening, Young Malik took himself off to the village tavern, where he drank noisily with his companions.

  One evening, not long after a violent storm had affected the area, a man entered the tavern and told him there was a woman outside who wanted to speak to him urgently.

  ‘Who is it?’ Young Malik asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ the man answered, ‘but she says she has come to solve your problems.’

  With the bad grace of a drunken man, Young Malik went outside, shouting:

  ‘Who wants Malik?’

  ‘I do. I’m here to solve your problems.’ Young Malik recognised the village midwife.

  ‘What do you want?’ He spoke testily.

  ‘I have worked very hard for you and your wife. I have found for you exactly what you want,’ she replied. ‘Look, a baby!’ She held out the small bundle she was carrying in her arms.

  ‘A baby?’ he queried, completely taken aback, a shadow of remembrance flitting across his face.

  ‘Yes,’ the midwife continued, ‘a very good baby, not long born, fit and healthy – and high-born, too (The midwife was a skilled and inventive liar). You won’t find a better baby than this one! Her parents are dead – uh, they died in the storm last week.’ She thought quickly. ‘A tree fell on them, that’s what happened.’ She paused: ‘A special baby for you and your wife and a special price for you, only ninety-five Ourtz.’ This said quickly.

  Young Malik wa
s silent, introspective. Suddenly he shook his head as if to clear it:

  ‘No,’ he said.

  The midwife was nonplussed: ‘But I have taken it into my care especially for you. And I’ve come here on this cold night just to see you about it,’ she protested.

  ‘No,’ he said again.

  ‘Look,’ the midwife spluttered in confusion ‘Because I know this baby is the right one for you, I will give you a very special price, only seventy-five Ourtz.’

  ‘No.’ The man turned his back on her and re-entered the tavern.

  That evening, Young Malik was unusually quiet when he returned to the shack. Maretta, dozing in a chair beside the fire, did not notice his return. For some minutes, he stood looking at her, seemingly poised to speak, then suddenly he turned on his heel and went out again.

  It was shortly after this that a tragedy befell the farm. Young Malik’s mother fell ill with a serious fever and within a very short time she had succumbed to this illness and died. Her eldest son, sunk in his own selfish misery, regarded the death of his mother as an unreasonable inconvenience and dealt with the burial arrangements in a callous and perfunctory manner.

  He was equally callous towards his father who was understandably devastated by the death of his wife of so many happy years. In the months that followed, the father became increasingly withdrawn and began to lose interest in the farm, which had always been the passion of his life. Within the year, despite knowing that his son lacked the skills to be a good farmer, both in agricultural knowledge and as an employer of people, he had passed over the running of the farm to his son and withdrew to pottering around the farm, doing odd jobs here or there, often ineffectually.

  It would not be long before tragedy returned to the farm once more. One cold and blustery day in the following year, one of the young farm labourers ran with considerable trepidation to inform Young Malik that his father had been found lying injured on the floor of the barn. On hearing this, Young Malik, who was working to mend a section of fencing, struck the young man with a violent punch and knocked him to the ground, not because of the news he had brought but because he had interrupted the work Young Malik was doing.

  Leaving the man bleeding on the ground, Young Malik stalked off to the barn, bellowing his anger. The other workers cringed in fear at his approach and fell completely silent as he stamped into the barn. His incandescent gaze, at once furious and contemptuous, rested briefly on each of the workers now pressed against the walls of the barn.

  ‘What’s happened? Where is he?’ The oldest labourer, a quiet and gentle grey-haired man, gestured timidly towards the centre of the barn.

  Young Malik’s father was lying in a twisted heap on the hard earth of the barn floor, with the hayloft ladder on top of his body. He had obviously been climbing the ladder for some reason when it had broken free from its fastenings. It was immediately obvious that he was dead. Having fallen from a considerable height, he had struck his head violently on the metal blade of a plough which had been brought into the barn for repair. This blow had shattered his skull.

  In complete silence, Young Malik took in all the details of the scene before erupting into absolute fury. He seized a stout stick and began to lash out at the totally blameless men and women who were present. Screaming, they ran from the barn in terror but not before some had been injured by the farmer’s murderous and totally unjustified attack.

  Somedays later, Young Malik attended his father’s funeral with the same truculent disinterest that he had exhibited when his mother died. He made no effort to respect the memory of his father and shocked many by wearing his normal dirty work clothes. Maretta did not attend the funeral; her husband had not mentioned it to her and, even if he had, it is unlikely she would have been there – it was too much trouble.

  His father had been a very well-respected and popular man in the region and many people attended the funeral, all wearing their best clothes. The village elders and many of the other leading local citizens came to offer their condolences to Young Malik but all were treated with casual rudeness. Even when the rich landowner, still smarting at the farmer’s rejection of his daughter, came forward to offer his condolences, Young Malik’s only response was: ‘Never mind that, just make sure I get the farm title passed to me as soon as possible.’ (As the King’s Justice, the rich landowner had some administrative responsibilities for the area.) These brutal words shocked many people who were present and most vowed to have nothing to do with the farmer from that moment on.

  Nevertheless, the farm now belonged officially to Malik, notably no longer “Young”. On returning from the funeral, he told Maretta that they were moving into the now empty farmhouse. He would turn their shack into a store. Maretta objected. She told him that she did not wish to move; that she was perfectly settled where she was. Characteristically, Malik ignored her wishes. When all their belongings were moved to the farmhouse, he placed her bed into the smaller room and set up a truckle bed for himself in the main room, underlining their complete separation.

  Under Malik’s management, the farm continued to go downhill. Over the years, incorrect management of the soil reduced its fertility markedly and crop output decreased considerably; sometimes, the crops failed completely. Simultaneously, poor husbandry of the farm animals meant that many of them became sick and died.

  Inevitably, Malik blamed his workers for all these problems and became even more unpleasant and abusive towards them. When he resorted to striking them on a regular basis, one by one they started to leave; they were free men and women and could do so. The oldest workers stayed on for a time, loyal to the memory of Malik’s father, but eventually even they could not tolerate Malik’s increasing violence.

  Left without help on the farm, it was then that the aging Malik bought Joachim to work as a farm boy: ‘I’ll soon whip him into shape,’ he thought, smirking unpleasantly at the prospect.

  “Old Malik” had arrived.

  The farmer narrowed his eyes and squinted towards the top of the field where he could see the boy ploughing.

  ‘Good thing for him,’ he grunted, rather disappointed. He was also disappointed to find that his bullock had been watered and fed. Soon the animal was hitched up to the plough again and the work restarted. Hours passed; the shadows moved and lengthened and all was quiet apart from the muted noises generated by the ploughs, the panting of the straining bullocks and the occasional shouted commands of their drivers.

  Suddenly, there was a great commotion from the top of the field. A large bird had flown up from a ground nest in front of Joachim’s bullock and the startled animal had reared and plunged in sudden panic. The heavy plough was knocked over, pinning the boy’s leg to the ground. He struggled to free himself but could not.

  A few minutes later, Old Malik approached the scene, shouting angrily and brandishing his heavy bullock whip. This sight filled the boy with absolute terror. Old Malik had only once before struck him with a whip; not only was it the most agonising punishment he had ever experienced but the wounds were so severe that his flesh took many weeks to heal. He struggled to free himself with redoubled efforts so that he could flee.

  ‘If he whips me while I’m trapped here he might kill me!’ The boy burst into terrified tears.

  Old Malik seized the bullock and calmed it. Then, cracking the heavy rawhide whip, he turned his attention to the trapped boy:

  ‘You stupid useless little fool,’ he snarled, ‘this is all your fault and now you’re going to pay.’ The boy whimpered as the man stepped towards him, raising the heavy whip.

  Suddenly, still several metres from the prostrate boy, the man stopped. He stood stock still. His fury disappeared, as quickly as a candle flame is extinguished by a sudden gust of wind, to be replaced by a powerful feeling of peace and calmness which pervaded his whole being. He had not experienced such a feeling for decades. Unnoticed, the bul
lock whip slipped from his thick, powerful fingers to fall on the ground. He looked away from the boy pinned below the plough and let his gaze run along the neat furrows that the boy and his plough had produced, finding his thoughts turning unexpectedly to the beauty and precision of that work.

  After some moments, Old Malik’s gaze returned to the trapped boy. Stepping forward, he lifted the heavy plough and set it aside, revealing that the boy’s leg was deeply embedded into the soft ploughed earth below. Released from the dead weight of the plough, the boy scrambled free, carefully lifting his leg from the earth while keeping a very wary eye on his master. The leg came free with ease and the boy rose slowly to his feet, testing his weight upon the limb, rather gingerly at first, then with increasing confidence, finding he could move it without pain or tenderness: ‘I’m really lucky,’ he thought gratefully, ‘that heavy plough could easily have broken my leg.’

  Now, he was in a quandary. Should he run away to avoid Old Malik’s fury or should he just stand still and pray to the spirits that he would not to be killed? Should he try to explain what happened – how it was not his fault but the fault of the bird suddenly frightening the bullock? Or should he restart his ploughing work again to try to please his master with his dedication?

  Meanwhile, the man was still and silent, looking at the standing boy with a strange neutral expression that Joachim had never seen before.

  In fact, Old Malik was looking at the boy with almost sightless eyes, his mind in bewildering turmoil. Strangely, part of his mind was calm and serene, a long-forgotten condition for him, and part was a racing tumult of almost totally-forgotten memories. Finally, Old Malik looked around him, a look of appraisal, a careful scan of the farm as if seeing it for the first time. Then he smiled, a rather bewildered but genuine smile quite unlike his usual cruel leer. Bending down abstractedly, he scooped up the bullock whip and tucked it neatly under his arm. Then, without a word, he turned around and walked back down the hill, striding purposefully towards the distant farmhouse.