Cold and Raw
by Terrance Aldon Shaw
England, circa 1640
Winter had come early to the north. Sharp winds
drove the snow across the ground in swirling motes like spreading tendrils of
smoke. Thus, all was grey in that cheerless chill an hour past the dawn, when a
traveler came riding upon a dappled mare.
The lone wanderer bore himself with an
untroubled air, his countenance confident, his gaze intent. He was a stranger
to that country, though clad in fur and leather, sporting a rakish capotain
over the white hood he wore against the cold. It was no roundhead’s hat, for
the red-gold tail feather of a game pheasant streamed bravely from the brim,
proud as a knight’s pennant. And draped around his shoulders, a voluminous
cope, which hung about his lean frame like a dowdy bell, hems fringed with the
softest sable above a pair of well-heeled boots, newly-blacked.
At the crossroads he dismounted. A tangled copse
of oak and ash stood hard by; the branches of the trees, forlorn of leaves, appeared
as flayed fingers, frozen in a skeletal rigor, stretching upward to indict the pallid
sky. Enshaded there beneath the trees, the tumble-down ruin of an ancient
hermitage could be seen, the tiny hut, long-abandoned by its monkish tenant,
o’erwhelmed by wind-piled heaps of errant thatch and desiccated moss.
Such bleak, desert country. How could ordinary
mortal souls eke out wage and rent in so forlorn a wilderness? Surely some grim
northern god had hollowed out these dales only to raise up mountains in
cheerier climes. The air seemed to grow even more chill at the thought. The
mare stamped her hooves, neighing brazenly as if to curse the cold, while,
drawing brim and cowl close to ward off the wind, her master paced a short way
here and there in pensive expectation.
Soon, upon the keening gale there came the sound
of grumbling cartwheels and straining bridle ropes, the merry jingle of harness
bells, and the trumpeting whinny of a dray horse, hooves falling heavily in the
snow as the great beast struggled with its load. Some crofter on his way to
market, the stranger guessed.
Or, mayhap,
more pleasant company.
He spied the girl from afar, as if through a lacy
scrim, a dark figure against the undulating whiteness. She came on foot,
leading the tall-shouldered workhorse through the deepening drifts. In another moment,
she was gone from view, disappeared behind the crest of a knough where the
track plunged down into a shallow vale.
“What sport shall we enjoy upon this chilly market
day,” the traveler jested with his mount. “What fools these farmers to send
their juicy daughters to town like stock to the block.”
He licked his lips. The lass had attained the
summit with her lumbering charge, and soon would be upon him.
What then, he wondered; how much parley need
there be between them? In every pious country lass, he knew, there dwelt a
wanton wench, longing to gambol and sport like a ewe in rut. And who better to
play the ram’s part in such a game than he? In the end the maid need only be
shown her heart’s delight.
A simple glimmer would suffice.
He stepped into the road, veiling his bonnet low
with a broad flourish, as small folk might imagine befits a man of breeding.
“Good morrow,” said he. “How come ye this way so
early?”
The girl returned a graceful bow. She was tall,
long-limbed and lithe as a willow, clad in a homely woolen habit beneath a
hooded cloak, her face, surpassing fair, framed like a high-born lady’s portrait
between the flaring fringes of the hood. A wayward strand of bonny wheat-gold
hair glinted upon her winsome brow, and her glistering eyes, bluer than the
deepest azure, shone brightly in that morning’s gloom. His mouth began to water
at the sight.
“A good day to you, sir.” Her voice like a
well-tuned fiddle comprised a dulcet, lilting melody above a droning northern brogue.
“I’m to the next market town, there to sell a load o’ barley for my father.”
“Truly? Your sire would send you forth
unescorted on such an errand—even on so wild and inclement a morn as this?”
“He trusts me well enough, sir,” she spoke with
no small hint of pride, “elsewise I should never have been away from the croft
so early. I’d’ve stayed safe at home with my sisters, gathered by the
ingle-side all snug and warm. But it’s like my jolly old pa says: this barley
won’t be sellin’ itself afore some poor fool takes it into his head to brew it
into beer, now will it? And I can get a good price in the town, what with the
snows come on so soon, and fodder bein’ scarce.”
“You seem a canny lass.” The stranger smiled
crookedly. “May I know your name?”
“Margery,” she answered, “but there’s some as
call me Meg.”
“And how old are you, my sweet, pretty Meg?”
“Eight and ten this Lammas last.” A rosy bloom
was on her cheek. “And—” she hesitated.
“What is it, child?”
“If it please you, m’lord—if I may be so
bold—might I know your name as well? For I’ve never met a fine gentleman
before.”
“Men have known me by many names,” the stranger
said. “Can you not guess?”
“Oh sir, I could not—I’d never dare to try for
fear of gettin’ it wrong. Pray, tell it me?”
“Soon,” said he, “ere the time be full. But tell
me true, fair lass, have you a man of your own? Does a husband wait for you at
home, or, mayhap, some secret lover in the town?”
There was a wistful air in her voice as she
replied.
“I . . . I had a sweetheart once; the
blacksmith’s son, gone for a soldier these three years past, afightin’ in the wars.
And I only inquired of your name just now as I thought you might be him
returned. For, begging your pardon, sir, you look much as he did on the day he
left—though however that could be I’m sure I do not know.”
“Indeed,” said the stranger, “and were the two
of you to be wed?”
“Aye,” she answered bitterly, “but my folks had
nowt and less to put up for the bride’s portion, and his father refused—said
even a blacksmith’s boy could do better than some poor crofter’s whelp. We took
it hard, sir, me and him, it near to broke my heart. He begged me to run off
with him, and well I would’ve if only I’d been able. But in the end I could’na bring
myself to go; not with my ma feelin’ poorly, and them five silly sisters o’
mine needing some’un to look after ‘em, nor my dear old pa with the farm to
tend. So my handsome boy put his mark on the roll, claimed his thirty
shillings-worth o’ bounty and marched away with the regiment. Oh sir! I wept
for sorrow on that day.”
“And was he a comely one, this youth of yours?”
“Truly, m’lord! The most handsomest boy I ever did
see. Tall and straight as an oak, with dark eyes as could make me melt on a day
fair starved as this ‘un. His hair was black as a raven’s wing, and thick and
wild as heather—how I loved to stroke it whenever he’d let me—”
“And what of his cock?” said the traveler. “Was
that a pretty thing to stroke as well? Did it strike hard in that hot little
forge between your legs ere it softened in the fire?”
“Sir!” she cried, “I am a maiden still!” But the
stranger could see that her protest was half-hearted at best, for her blue eyes
shone far too blithely, belying the feigned piety of her words. Wantonness had
already cast its fleeting shadow upon her countenance, her cheeks flushed, less
from the sting of shame than from the rising heat of a secret fire.
“Mercy, sweet Meg,” said he, “I meant naught by it.
Yet so lovely a lass ought surely know something of the world.” Boldly then,
the stranger touched her gloved hand. “Will you not tarry with me for an hour,
that I might teach you?”
“Please sir! The day draws on and I must be
agate.” Her voice quavered, though she did not take away her hand. “Pardon,
m’lord, that is, I must needs be on my way ‘afore the storm come on so heavy
that Old Hector here’ll be hard-put to set one foot in front o’ t’other.”
“Nay, bonny one, bide with me awhile, for I’m of
a mind to help you in your troubles.”
“How do you mean, sir?”
“Here,” said he, tugging aside his cape to
display a leathern pout, gravid with coin. “Twenty pounds lie fairly in this
purse.”
The maiden gasped at the mention of the sum,
eyes growing wide, as if she had never beheld such a sight before in her life.
“Seek no buyer in the town,” said the traveler,
“for I’ll take all thy barley here and now.”
“Truly, sir?”
“Twenty pounds and a fairer bargain was never
struck.” He dandled the purse in his palm till the gold within began to sing,
“What say you, pretty Meg?”
He doffed a glove to offer her his hand.
Cautiously, the girl did the same. Yet ere the bargain had been clasped, the
stranger seized her tightly about the wrist and would not let her go.
“Twenty more shall purchase delight,” he
whispered, “for it’s thine own fair person I most dearly desire. Twenty pounds
for thy barley, and another score if thou would’st lie with me till daybreak on
the morrow.”
“This I cannot—I would not—do, sir!” she cried. “Not if twenty pound should buy the
globe! D’you think I’d so dishonor my kin, be they e’er so poor, for a doxy’s
wage?”
“Why? Think of it, my pretty Meg. Consider all that
twenty pounds could purchase. Surely, t’would suffice for dowr’; enough to see thee
well-betrothed to some worthy freeholder’s son, a fine wedding with meat and
ale for all thy kin, and bread to see ‘em o’er the winter, too. ‘Tis yours, I
swear, every last crown and farthing, if only thou would’st stay with me tonight,
lie with me with a right good will, and gang home in the morning, a wealthy
woman. What say you, lovely lass?”
“You’ve not taken my meaning, sir,” said Meg. “Aye,
the price you’ve named for the barley’s more than fair, better’n any bargain I
might strike at market this morning, and if you truly be in earnest, I’d be a
fool to turn up my nose at such an askin’.”
“Well then—”
“‘Tis my company you mean to have for cheap.”
“I would not offend thee, Meg.”
“Gold might ease offense,” she said. “Yet would
you leave me rich and ruined?”
“Nay—” he began to protest.
“I mean,
sir, that twenty pound seems hardly fair cosiderin’ all the risk you’d have
me take.”
“You are a shrewd and wily siren, I’ll be bound,”
the stranger sighed impatiently. “Forty pounds, then.”
“One hundred pound,” the maid spoke up boldly
now, “and not a double-Guinea less.”
“I ken now why your father sent you out to sell
that barley in his stead. Are your sisters half so clever altogether? How like
you fifty Guineas?”
“What am I then,” she sniffed, “some galty sow?”
Ninety pound!”
“You have the advantage of me,” said the
stranger, “and well you know it. Sixty Guineas!”
“Do you think to slight me, sir? Or do you take
me for a fool? Eighty pound and five Guineas beside!”
“For that I ought to have a taste,” said he,
“or, leastwise, a look at what I would purchase so dearly. Come! Lift your
skirts for me, wench! Seventy pounds!”
“And now you take me for a common bawd? Eighty
Guineas!”
“You are anything but common, fair nymph. Yet,
still...seventy Guineas and no more!”
“Mayhap some other lad shall have my barley.” She
tossed her head proudly. “Eighty Guineas, and no less!”
“Suppose we divide the difference?” The traveler
shook his purse again. “What say you to five and seventy?”
Meg made no reply at once.
“Very well then,” he said, “five and seventy
Guineas it is, and let there be an end to it.” The stranger stepped forward and
kissed the maiden full upon her blushing lips, quickly, before she could name
some other sum. “Perhaps another ten if you truly please me. What say you,
Meg?”
“Done,” she replied, “though the Devil take me
for an ass.”
“‘Tisn’t the devil’ll be taking that lovely arse
o’ yours,” the stranger said, goosing her there with a playful swat. “Come,
Meg, let’s tether the horses, for I’m impatient to see what my gold has bought
me.”
* * *
They found a place to the lee of the gale among the
barren trees within the circle of the copse, and there the horses were hobbled in
amiable companionship close beside one another. The tiny hermitage, though long
bereft of habitation, was stoutly built of good gray fieldstone, mortared once
with mud and wattle, now petrified in winter’s deathly grasp. The eremite’s
cell within was dry enough, though hardly wider than the span of a youngling’s
outstretched arms. Meg set about building a fire in the tiny hearth—scarce more
than a shallow niche set into the side of the wall—kindling a meager blaze of
old thatch and ash twig, as the traveler spread his fur-lined cope upon the
earthen floor. The robe was broad enough to stretch from one wall to the other,
making a cozy bed on which the two of them might lie.
“Anon, sweet Meg!” He whispered low, and laid
his hands upon her shoulders. “Show me all thy treasures!”
She turned from the fire to face him, whence it
was she whose mouth began to water, for there before her stood a dashing youth
with dark, flowing locks, strong and straight of limb, though seeming to grow
taller still within that little room. An unruly whorl of coarse black hair
peeked from beneath the linen tunic he wore for an undershirt, his chest
rugged, broad, and tautly muscled. A ruddy brownish beard, well trimmed after
the fashion of some gallant outlaw, grew thickly on his chin, the color setting
off his twinkling nut-brown eyes—a pleasingly handsome visage withal.
Without a word, he took her in hand, and so pushed
back her hood to uncover the crowning glory of her tresses—done up loosely in
a shimmering rope of rich spun gold,
which seemed to illumine the narrow chamber like a hundred lambent candles. His
curious fingers brushed her burning cheek, her strong-set mouth, the tender
place beneath her ear, and soon, the knotted cowhide thong that held her cloak in
place. She unclasped it for him with a simple flourish, giggling at his
clumsiness even as she opened the breach. The homely roughspun beneath was
warm, yet ne’er so warm nor half so inviting as that which lay within.
He caressed her bonny bosom—her breasts
uncleaved and covered still within their woolen prison—not a little impatient
to loosen the garment so that he might warm his hands against the fire of her untried
flesh.
“Nay! Hold, good sir,” she chided playfully.
“Would you taste the beer ‘afore it’s brewed?”
Boldly she grasped his stiffening cod, and
gently did she squeeze, until the trunk sprang from the root to flower, adamant
against her trembling hand. “Ah me!” she sighed as she fell to her knees, and
so the clever lass unlaced his leathern breeches, eager to cherish the
new-found toy within. Yet, bringing it forth, the girl at first seemed but to
feign and feint, drawing it coyly towards her lips, only to bob her head away again,
still coming closer with each teasing motion, till, weilding it like a pen, she
traced a cunning map in the charmed space just beyond her pouted lips.
The stranger braced his hands against the narrow
walls to either side, threw back his head, and mouthed a silent orison to gods
unknown. And then, with soft endearing sighs, as if in answer to his prayer,
Meg lightly kissed the crown; kissed it thrice ere drawing her lolling tongue
along his length, laving it as kye their calflings in the spring. And thus her
ardor, so long restrained, grew with each lingering stroke, till she was of a
mind to swallow him whole, post and stones together.
“You are a wonder, Meg,” he sighed, “a pearl of
great price, in truth!”
Still intent upon her task, the girl raised her
eyes to fix him with a gaze of fulsome desire—and so the sight caused the youth
to spend with a groaning shudder. Ahhhh!” he cried, pouring forth so copious a
flood as soon o’erflowed his lover’s lips. Yet his pleasure was no greater than
her own, for she gamely swallowed his salty porridge in a single greedy gulp, as
e’re there played a catlike smile upon her milk-stained mouth.
“And now,” said he, his composure recovered, “unveil
thyself to me! Be rid of all this tiresome attire. I’d see thee naked as Eve
before Shame came into the world.”
Soon enough the habit fell about her feet, and
soon enough she stood before him clad only in a humble shift of bride-white
cambric, falling loose about her shapely shoulders, with naught but a simple
drawstring to uphold her waning modesty. She stared back at him, as if in proud
defiance to the last, slowly, slowly, letting the shift slip down across her blushing
bosom. Her breasts were firm and fair, round and plump with swelling teats as
straight and stiff as joiner’s pegs. He longed to take them between his teeth,
yet not before he had beheld the curve of her waist, graceful as an hourglass,
her haughty rump, so fine and pert, with nary a wen to cloud her creamy skin. And
then, at last, the young man gazed upon the blooming swell of honey-hued thatch
between her thighs, ripe for the harvest, glistening with the dew of wakening
ardor.
His mouth agape in fervid wonder, the youth
marveled at the miraculous perfection of her nakedness. Still he stood and
silently he gazed, as if in meditation, till, so it seemed, eternity itself
might hold its breath.
“Sir?” said Meg, breaking the spell at last.
“Upon thy back,” his voice was husky ere he bid
the girl lie down. Then, reaching to the floor, he drew the feather from the brim
of his capotain, so carelessly tossed aside in his earlier haste. “Behold!” he
knelt before her, brushing her nipples ever so lightly, drawing the feather’s
soft tip across her flesh. Down, he traced the ghostly roseline twixt her
rolling breasts; down o’er the plain of her belly, and further still, thence to
the verdent hummock below, there to seek the petals of her lovely maiden-flower,
the juicy furrow of her lips.
“Oh sir!” Meg panted out her passion in a
shallow gasp, caught between an awful dread and rapt anticipation. “Oh!” she
moaned, arching her middle to meet the feather’s fleeting kiss. More slowly and
more lightly still, the stranger turned it in his hand to draw it gently up
again, until she wept in amorous agony, sighing with the all-consuming need of
it.
“Take me!” she begged him. “Oh, take me, sir! Now,
elsewise I’ll surely burn for the wanting!”
He made no reply; only bowed his head between her
thighs, the better to devour. His tongue was a ravenous serpent, delving the
moisty crevice of her cunny.
“Saints and angels!” she cried. “Is this
heaven?”
“Bide awhile and see,” he murmured, drawing his
nose up along the tight cranny of her folds until it came to rest against the
pearled nub of flesh at the summit. He pressed it firmly, as if to try its
readiness before he began to hum. The low rumble of the note sent gentle shivers
through her loins at first, yet soon it echoed through the whole of her body
like a choir of pealing bells.
And then, more wonderful than all that had come
before, he forged a tune upon her cunt, a melody so eloquent and strange as
might warm the heart and break it all at once. The tune rose along a graceful
gamut, long and short notes ascending the string from re to re before it
dropped down again, below whence it began. It was that falling note that moved
her most mightily, as if the ground had given out beneath her feet. And so she
trembled as he sang:
Cold and raw the north did blow
Bleak in the morning early . . .
She held her breath as, bravely, the tune rose up
again:
All the fields lay covered in snow
Damned by winter, yearly . . .
The music entered her through the selfsame wards
her lover might soon unlock. And when she thought she could bear the bliss of it
no longer, the tune abruptly ceased, not on the expected note, but on the open
string above, as if the spirit of a question had been left to float upon the
air. The handsome stranger pulled himself up, beard sodden with the nectar of
her sex, yet ever gazing warmly upon her. Bereft of his kisses, like that
strange unfullfiled melody, abandoned to a sweet despair, the maiden moaned,
and begged him presently to take her.
And most ready was she ere he did. thrusting his
stout prod deep into her cunny with such eager force as took her breath away. Easily
he moved within her, for, in truth, her joy was like unto a flood, her bartered
virtue given without complaint, nor pain, nor blood, nor aught but bliss. And
when it was done, she beamed. a new-made woman, well-pleased, swearing it was
she who’d had the best of their bargain.
Thus happily they rolled together all that day
and long into the night, swiving with right lusty cheer. Sometimes Meg would
crouch on hands and knees before him, so he might play the stallion to her mare.
Other times, the youth might pantomime a jockey, bestriding her back, her
golden hair spread out like a silken saddle cloth as he made sport upon it, harrowing
her tresses with the horn of his cock, his ticklish cod, well satisfied, in tow.
And more than once, the lass took on the man’s part, mounting him most wantonly
to churn his adamant prod until he groaned and roared, his roving hands
reaching about to fondle her bouncing rump, or up again to palm her jostling
orbs.
Later, as the dark of night came on, they lay snugly
together, their naked bodies swaddled tightly in the languorous warmth of his
cape. He gathered her easily to himself, his brawny chest against her smooth back,
his prowess buried deep within the labyrinth of her folds. Yet a little while
before the dawn, she turned about to face him, rousing him from slumber with a
lingering kiss, full as much of questioning as unspoken ardor.
“‘Tis time I be on my way, sir,” she whispered.
“Yet ‘afore I go, mayhap we might...once more again...if only for remembrance’
sake?”
“Who’s had their will with whom tonight?” he
laughed, rolling the girl onto her back.
“One thing, only m’lord?” She looked up at him
plaintively. “Since now you’ve had your sport with me, mayhap we’ve gotten a
young kid together. I thank ye most kindly for the gold, though I’ve little
doubt you’ll be gone ere nine month end.”
“What would you have of me, Meg?” He spoke not
unkindly.
“Please, m’lord, yester morn you said you’d
answer my question ere the time be ripe. So now I’m askin’, for the sake of the
bairn, will you not tell to me your name? Else, what’ll the poor thing do for a
father?”
“Very well, then, if you would truly know, my
comely Meg.” He kissed her up and down as he spoke, first upon one ear and then
the other, her jaw, her neck, the bewitching roundel of flesh where throat
meets collarbone, slowly moving from breast to breast, and the soft lips below
and above, by which time the girl had begun to moan like a storied princess under
some dark enchanter’s spell.
“William, men most oft’ have called me,” said he,
“be it one way or another. A few would brand me outlaw and dub me Willan the
Wanderer, Billy the Rover Boy or Dark-Eyed Bill the Pirate, for in truth, I
have no home. In my journeys, I’ve known many women, and they, too, have their
names for me. There’s some as call me Charming Billy and pine for my return;
others Sweet William, or sometimes Handsome Will. And there are learned men in
the king’s high court who’ve known me as Erwilian. I’ve traveled far and wide
throughout this land and many lands beyond the sea beside, and everywhere I’m
called by a different name, each one as soon forgotten as the last when e’er I
take my leave. Yet know, darling Meg, that I would choose thee for my queen, but
for the curse that follows me wheresoever I go.”
“And what of me?” A tear fell from her lovely
eye. “Shall I forget thee, too? Oh my heart! ‘Tis too cruel a thing to bear!”
“Nay, sweet love.” He dried her bonny cheek. “Methinks
you’ll remember me well like as not, so long as you recall the song I’ve left
with you tonight.”
“That I can surely do, m’lord!” Meg smiled
brightly as she took him to herself, guiding him in with an easy grace. And as
he moved within her ever so gently, the two of them began to sing.
# # #
NOTES ON COLD AND RAW
The text of
the Scottish ballad The Famer’s Daughter
(or Cold and Raw as it is most
commonly known from its opening line) first appeared in print in the 1651
edition of Tom D’Urfey’s Pills to Purge
Melancholy, set to the popular fiddle tune known as Stingo—or later, simply Barley
Oil (due, no doubt, to its inextricable association with the words of the
ballad). The great English composer Henry Purcell used this melody in the sixth
movement of his 1692 birthday ode for Queen Mary, Love’s Goddess Sure Was Blind
(May her bless’d example chase...)
as the ballad was a particular favorite of the queen’s (reportedly much to
Purcell’s great chagrin). The tune was later employed with a new set of words
by John Gay in The Beggar’s Opera
(1726) (Act I, scene IV: If any wench
Venus’ girdle wear . . . (Air III)) The original ballad is also sometimes
known as The Girl Who Sold Her Barley. [To hear the song, click here, and, for an instrumental version, here.]
In D’Urfey’s
1651 telling of the tale, a traveler comes upon a lovely farmer’s daughter on
her way to the next market town in order to sell a load of barley. The
stranger, who also narrates the tale, wastes no time in propositioning the
young maiden:
In this purse, sweet soul, says I
Twenty pounds lie fairly.
Seek no further one to buy
For I’ll take all thy barley.
Twenty more shall purchase delight,
Thy person I love so dearly
If thou would’st stay with me all night
And gang home in the morning early.
The girl
protests, scandalized less by the stranger’s forwardness than his treating her
like a common bawd:
If twenty pounds should buy the globe
This I would not do, sir;
Nor were my kin as poor as Job
I’d never raise ‘em so, sir . . .
At this
point her argument assumes a more practical tone:
For if tonight I prove your friend
We’d get a young kid together,
And you’d be gone ere nine-month end,
And what should I do for a father?
The
stranger—a clumsy seducer at best—is forced to admit that he is a married man
of “fifteen years and longer”:
Or else I’d choose thee for my queen
And tie the knot much stronger.
The girl
admonishes him to return home to his wife, and goes on her way.
So far, so
dull. The ballad is less rustic sex romp than roundhead morality play. The traveler
is portrayed as a faithless degenerate, while the upright farmer’s daughter is
a high-horse-riding scold. What little real titilation there is derives from
the stranger’s propositioning of the supposedly sheltered, innocent country
lass, though, in the end, propriety is maintained, and Commonwealth-era
sensibility bruised but mostly unoffended. Thus, the story’s prurient potential
is left almost completely unmined, though clearly ripe with all sorts of juicy
openings for 21st-century eroticists to explore.
The ballad
provides the basic outline for the beginning of my story. I have freely
embellished and expanded the narrative, inventing details such as the abandoned
hermitage and the pheasant feather, as well as new plot points including the
scene where the girl haggles with the traveler over the price of her virtue,
all adding up to what I hope will be a sufficiently steamy denouement. I have
also slipped in a few references and added the odd detail, borrowed from other
folk songs of the broader period including Seventeen
Come Sunday, Charming Billy, The Dark-Eyed Sailor, Just As the Sun Was Rising, Early in the Springtime, and Erwilian The Royal Forester.
