The Keys of the Kingdom Read Free

his father in the stern. Back on the butt, their tackets rasping the wet stones, the men huddled themselves low against the wind, some squatting with a yellowed sailcloth across their shoulders; others sucking warmth from a blackened inch-long clay. He stood with his father, apart. Alex Chisholm was the head man, the watcher of Tweed Fisheries station No 3. Together, not speaking, cut by the wind, they stood watching, the far circle of corks dancing in the choppy back-lash where the river met the sea. Often the glare of sun upon the ripples made his head swim. But he would not, he could not blink. Missing even a single second might mean the missing of a dozen fish – so hard to come by, these days, that in distant Billingsgate they brought the Fisheries Company a good half-crown a pound. His father’s tall figure, the head sunk a little on the shoulders, the profile keen beneath the old peaked cap, a fine blood whipped into the high cheekbones, had the same still unswerving tensity. At times, mingled exquisitely in his consciousness with the smell of wrack, the distant strike of the Burgess Clock, the cawing of the Derham rocks, the sense of this unspeaking comradeship drew moisture to the boy’s already smarting eyes.
    Suddenly his father shouted. Try as he might Francis could never win first sight of the dipping cork: not that tidal bobbing which sometimes caused him foolishly to start, but the slow downward tug which to long experience denoted the thrusting of a fish. At the quick high shout there was an instant clatter as the crew jumped to the windlass which hauled the net. Usage never staled that moment: though the men drew a poundage bonus on their catch, the thought of money did not stir them; this deep excitement sprang from far primeval roots. In came the net, slowly, dripping, flaked with kelp, the guide ropes squeaking on the wooden drum. A final heave, then, in the purse of the billowing seine, a molten flash, powerful, exquisite – salmon.
    One memorable Saturday they had taken forty at a cast. The great shining things arched and fought, bursting through the net, slithering back to the river from the slippery butt. Francis flung himself forward with the others, desperately clutching at the precious escaping fish. They had picked him up, sequined with scales and soaked to the bone, a perfect monster locked in his embrace. Going home that evening, his hand inside his father’s, their footfalls echoing in the smoky twilight, they had stoppped, without comment, at Burley’s in the High Street, to buy a pennyworth of cockles, the peppermint ones that were his special choice.
    Their fellowship went further still. On Sundays, after mass, they took their rods and slipped secretly – lest they shock finer sensibilities – through the back ways of the Sabbath-stricken town, out into the verdant valley of the Whitadder. In his tin, packed with sawdust, were luscious maggots, picked the night before from Mealey’s boneyard. Thereafter the day was heady with the sound of the stream, the scent of meadowsweet, – his father showing him the likely eddies, – the crimson-speckled trout wriggling on bleached shingle – his father bent over a twig fire, – the crisp sweet goodness of the frizzled fish …
    At other seasons they would go to gather blueberries, wood strawberries, or the wild yellow rasps which made good jam. It was a gala day when his mother accompanied them. His father knew all the best places and would take them deep into devious woods, to untouched cane-breaks of the juicy fruit.
    When snow came and the ground was clamped by winter, they stalked between the frozen trees of Derham ‘policies’, his breath a rime before him, his skin pricking for the keeper’s whistle. He could hear his own heart beating as they cleared their snares, under the windows almost, of the great house itself – then home, home with the heavy gamebag, his eyes smiling, his marrow melting to the thought of rabbit pie. His