Black Pearls - Louise Hawes [55]
It was not to be. For when the uproar woke Jack's mother, she came into the great room in her shift, her hair undone, and begged them be quiet. Perhaps because she had just been torn from a dream and a piece of it was still in her head, I felt how much she yearned for the earlier, simpler times she and her son had shared. Her despair at her laggard boy and her own regrets brought my arms to my strings: "If I had a cow, a large brown cow, a jug of milk I'd bring thee."
Even in their cups, the two friends were stunned by my newfound voice. Jack's companion looked as if he thought black magic was afoot, and Jack himself rose from his seat, startled from his stupor.
"If I had seeds and a patch of earth, I'd grow a sweet pear tree." I felt a small, warm pride as a dappled day half dawned in the woman's heart. "And all the lords for miles around would beg me for to try ... One small bite of that sweet pear, one glance from your fair eye."
But I had no chance to sing the rest of her song, for Jack came toward me, anger blushing his cheeks, so that even in the light of a single candle, his face looked like a Turk's. "You sing for a beggar, do you?" he snarled. He hauled me from the hearth and lurched for the door.
"And now you think to sing all by yourself, do you?" He opened wide the door, howling into the night air. "Go sing to the moon about cows and seeds. We'll none of your country airs!" With that, he shoved me outside, slamming the door so that I heard no more of his bluster and lay cradled in the grass till his mother tiptoed out to rescue and polish me, then set me again by the hearth. Once in the night, I thought I heard the trace of a song in someone's dream. It might have been the pale shadow tune I'd felt earlier in Jack. It was not bold enough to rouse me, though, and I slipped back into dreams of my own.
Perhaps my song had emboldened her, or mayhap she intended to dispose her son more kindly toward me. In any case, it was Jack's mother who finally carried me to the musician's house. She hired a fellow to hoist me onto a wagon and then drove into town herself. While she visited the baker and milliner, the sweaty little man to whom she'd entrusted me worked for hours restringing and tuning, yanking and tightening until I thought my chest would burst. At last he was done, and she drove home to set me proudly before Jack. "Now ye shall hear this harp play proper at last," she promised, pleased with herself and the pleasure I was sure to bring the spoiled young man.
"Are ye certain that fellow's done the job?" Jack asked.
"As certain as certain," his mother assured him. "For I stopped on the way home and commanded it to play."
Indeed, she had. And when she'd pointed and ordered music, I had felt a whole flood of tunes dammed up in her heart. They were fair to drowning us both, and I'd had a hard time choosing which one she wanted most.
"And?"
"And it played as lovely as you please."
"And sang?"
"Like an angel in the house of the Lord."
"Well, then." Jack's greedy smile made his face almost handsome. "We shall invite the neighbors and have that musicale at last." He bade his mother draw up a guest list, making certain she included the maidens he admired most. "I will go to the butcher myself," he offered, "and fetch back some venison and lamb."
The party was held three nights later, when it appeared that half the town had assembled to hear me play. Or rather, to hear Jack order me to play. Dressed like a peacock, in apricot and turquoise silks, my owner moved from dame to damsel, offering his hand and honeyed words. He looked and acted very differently, indeed, from the fellow who spent most of his days lying about the house, gaming or drinking with his friends. Inside, though, he was no different at all, and soon he was to prove it.
When all were supped and seated, he bellowed, nearly as loudly as the giant, "Where is my magic hen?"
A servant lay a brocaded pillow before him, then set the hen upon it. She was now as plump and proud as any