Why the Whales Came. Michael Morpurgo
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ourselves over the fish, so I had the whole meal to work out how best to ask them about the initials in the sand, without incriminating myself.
‘Saw the Birdman today,’ I said at last, as casually as I could.
‘Hope you kept your distance,’ said Father, pushing his plate away. ‘With young Daniel Pender again were you? Always with him aren’t you?’ And it was true I suppose. Daniel Pender and Gracie Jenkins were a pair, inseparable. We always had been. He lived just across the way from our front gate at Veronica Farm. Whatever we did, we did together. Father went on. ‘Proper young scallywag his father says he is and I can believe it. You be sure he doesn’t lead you into any trouble, my girl. Always looks like a big puppy that one with his arms and legs too long for the rest of him. Hair’s always stood up on his head like he’s just got out of bed. Proper scallywag he looks.’
‘Looks aren’t everything,’ said mother quietly; and then she smiled and added, ‘they can’t be, can they, else how would I ever have come to pick you?’
‘My beard, perhaps, Clemmie,’ father laughed, and he stroked his beard and smoothed his moustache. He always called her ‘Clemmie’ when he was happy. It was ‘Clem’ when he was angry.
‘You leave Daniel be,’ said Mother. ‘He’s a clever boy, clever with his hands. You seen those boats he makes?’
‘I help him,’ I insisted. ‘I paint them and I make the sails.’
‘Been sailing them all day, I suppose,’ said father. ‘Out by the pool were you? That where you saw the Birdman?’
‘Yes, Father,’ I said; and then, ‘About the Birdman, Father; everyone just calls him “The Birdman”, but he must have a real name like other people, mustn’t he?’
‘Woodcock,’ said father, sitting back in his chair and undoing a notch in his belt as he always did after a meal. ‘Woodcock, that’s what his mother was called anyway. You can see for yourself if you like – she’s buried down in the churchyard somewhere. Last one to leave Samson they say she was, her and the boy. Starving they were by all accounts. Anyway, they came over to Bryher and built that cottage up there on Heathy Hill away from everyone else. The old woman died a few years after I was born. Must have been dead, oh thirty years or more now. The Birdman’s lived on his own up there ever since. But you hear all sorts of things about his old mother. There’s some will tell you she was a witch, and some say she was just plain mad. P’raps she was both, I don’t know. Same with the Birdman; I don’t know whether he’s just mad or evil with it. Either way it’s best to keep away from him. There’s things I could tell you . . .’
‘Don’t go frightening her now with your stories,’ said Mother. ‘Anyway it’s only rumours and tittle-tattle. I don’t believe half of it. If anything goes wrong on this island they blame it on the Birdman. Lobsters aren’t there to be caught – it’s his fault. Blight in the potatoes – it’s his fault. Anyone catches the fever – it’s his fault. Dog goes missing – they say he’s eaten it. Lot of old nonsense. He’s just a bit simple, bit mad perhaps, that’s all.’
‘Simple my aunt,’ Father said, getting up and going over to his chair by the stove. ‘And what’s more, it’s not all tittle-tattle, Clemmie, not all of it. You know it’s not.’
‘There’s no need to tell her any more,’ said Mother. ‘Long as she doesn’t go anywhere near him, long as she keeps off Samson, that’s all that matters. Don’t you go filling her head with all those stories.’
‘But they’re not all stories, are they, Clemmie? Remember what happened to Charlie Webber?’
‘Charlie Webber? Who’s he?’ I asked.
‘Never you mind about Charlie Webber,’ said Mother; and she spoke firmly to Father.
‘That’s enough – you’ll only frighten her.’
But Father ignored her. He leaned forward towards me in his chair, stuffing his pipe with tobacco. ‘Charlie Webber was my best friend when I was a boy, Gracie. Got into all sorts of scrapes and capers together, Charlie and me. Nothing we wouldn’t tell each other; and Charlie wouldn’t ever have lied to me, not in a million years. He wasn’t like that, was he, Clemmie?’ But Mother wouldn’t answer him. She walked away and busied herself at the sink. His voice dropped to a whisper now, almost as if he was afraid of being overheard. ‘There’s always been strange stories about Samson, Gracie. Course, people only half-believed them, but they’ve always steered clear of Samson all the same, just in case. But it was all on account of the Birdman and his mother that Samson became a place no one dared go near. They were the ones who put it about that there was a curse on the place. They were always warning everyone to keep off, so we did. They told everyone it was an island of ghosts, that whoever set foot on the place would bring the terrible curse of Samson down on his family. No one quite believed all that about ghosts and curses; but just the same everyone kept well clear of the place, everyone except Charlie.’
Father lit up his pipe and sat back in his chair which creaked underneath him as it always did whenever he moved. ‘I never went over there, but Charlie did. It was a day I’ll never forget, never, never – low tide, no water to speak of between Bryher and Samson. You could walk across. It was my idea, and not one I’m proud of, Gracie, I can tell you. It was me that dared Charlie Webber. I dared him to walk over to Samson. We were always daring each other to do silly things, that’s just how we were; and Charlie Webber never could resist a dare. I stood on top of Samson Hill, and watched him running over the sands towards Samson, leaping the pools. It took him about ten minutes I suppose and there he was jumping up and down on the beach waving and shouting to me, when suddenly this man in a black sou’wester appeared out of the dunes behind him, came from nowhere. He began screaming at Charlie like some mad fiend and Charlie ran and ran and ran. He ran like a hare all the way back across the sand, stumbling and splashing through the shallows. By the time he reached me he was white with fear, Gracie, white with it I tell you. But that’s not all of it. That very same night Charlie Webber’s house was burnt to the ground. It’s true, Gracie. Everyone managed to get out alive, but they never did find out what caused the fire; but Charlie knew all right, and I knew. Next day Charlie went down with the scarlet fever. I caught it after him and then near enough every child on the island got it. Aunty Mildred – you know Daniel’s Aunty Mildred – she was just a baby at the time and she nearly died of it.’
‘Did Charlie Webber die of it?’ I asked.
‘Now that’s enough,’ said Mother sharply. ‘You’ve said enough.’
‘Clem,’ said Father, ‘she’s ten years old and she’s not a baby any more. She’s old enough to hear the rest of it.’ He lit his pipe again, drawing on it deeply several times before he shook out the match. ‘No, Gracie, Charlie didn’t die, but he had to leave the island. His family was ruined, couldn’t afford to rebuild the house. But before Charlie left for good he told me something I’ll never forget. The day after the fire, Charlie was sitting on the quay when he felt someone behind him. He looked around and there was the Birdman. There was nowhere for Charlie to run to. He’d come, he said, to say sorry to Charlie, to explain to him that it wasn’t his fault. There was nothing he could do once Charlie had set foot on Samson. He told Charlie that there was a curse on the island, that the ghosts of the dead haunted the place and could not rest, not until the guilt of Samson had been redeemed, whatever that meant. And when Charlie asked him why there was a curse on Samson, why the ghosts could not rest – this is what he told him. He was a little boy when it happened, younger than Charlie, he said. The people of Samson woke up one morning to find a ship run aground on a sandbank off Samson. Like a ghost ship it was on a flat calm sea. No fog, no wind, no reason for it to be there. They rowed out and hailed it, but no one answered; so they clambered on board. There was no one there. The ship was deserted. Well you don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, do you? Every man on Samson, sixteen of them there were in all he said – every one of them was on that ship when it refloated at high tide. They sailed it off to Penzance to claim the salvage money, but they never got there. The ship foundered on the Wolf Rock, off Land’s End, went down in broad