Chapter 10 The Folklorist's Notebook

Timea Spurrier came to the Saltwyke house on the eighth morning, at seven, before Nissa had lit the pans, and she did not come in. She stood on the shingle in front of the door with her grey trunk over one shoulder and her notebook under her arm, and she did not say good morning, and she did not say anything at all until Nissa came out to the door with her apron on and her hair in a net and her boots already wet. "I came to the marsh last night," Timea said. Nissa looked at her. "I walked out at dusk. I took the marshlight and I went to the first step. I stood on the first step." "Did you hear the bell?" Timea looked at her. She looked at the marsh. She did not answer for a moment. She put the notebook down on the shingle beside her. "No," she said. "I did not hear the bell. I heard something else. A man's voice, inland, carrying, and the voice said a name, and I do not know the name, and I wrote it down in the notebook, and the name is on the page in front of me." She opened the notebook. She held it out. Nissa took it. It was a small book, leather-bound, with a page of ink in Timea's hand, and on the page there was a name, in letters Nissa had seen before, in the Ledger, and on the slate, and in the third ledger in the schoolhouse, and the name was Barsham. "I heard the name Barsham," Timea said. "You heard the name Barsham." "I heard the name Barsham." "Where did you hear it from." "From the marsh. From the direction of the schoolhouse. Inland." "The schoolhouse is two miles inland." "Two miles." Timea put the notebook down. She put the trunk on the shingle. She looked at Nissa. "I am going to sit at your kitchen table," she said. "I am going to write down what I have heard, and what I have read, and what I have seen, and I am going to give you the notebook when I am done." "You have been here four days. You have not once asked me about the Ledger." Timea looked at her. "I have asked you about the Ledger," she said. "In the way you answer. In the way you say yes and no and nothing. In the way you do not bring the book out. In the way you do not sit at your kitchen table with me. In the way you have a slate on the table with words on it that I have not asked about. The Ledger has answered, and it has answered in the shape of a woman who is twenty-two, and a boy who does not have a name, and a parson who has not opened his door in seven days." Nissa looked at her. She put the notebook on the kitchen table. She sat down at the table. She did not open the Ledger. She did not touch the slate. Timea sat down beside her, and neither of them spoke for a while. "Who are you, really," Nissa said. Timea looked at her. She looked at the slate on the table. She looked at Nissa. "I am a woman who writes about places like this," she said. "I have been to places like this. I have written about the tides and the books and the bookkeepers. I have written about the villages and what the villages keep, and what the villages send." She picked up her pen. She began to write. Nissa sat beside her, and she did not write, and she did not read, and she did not open the Ledger, and she did not look at the slate, and Timea wrote, and by nine o'clock the page was full, and Timea put the pen down, and she did not give the notebook to Nissa. "I have until Friday," Nissa said. Timea looked at her. "Yes," she said. "You do." "What do you want me to do." Timea did not answer for a moment. She looked out the window at the marsh. The water was out. The first step stood in the mud. The second was wet at its top. The third was under the water. "I want you to keep the book," she said. "Not because it is the account. Not because it is the tradition. I want you to keep the book because if it is sent out and the sea takes what it takes, and the next Tidewarden comes along, and there is no book, and there is no account, and the next Tidewarden has to make it up again, and the next Tidewarden is twenty-two, and the next Tidewarden has not read the second column, and the next Tidewarden does not know what is on the second column, and the next Tidewarden will not send what should be sent, and the sea will keep its side of the trade in a way that no one in this village will understand." Nissa looked at her. "You want the next Tidewarden to have this," she said. "Yes." "And you are going to write it down." "Yes." "And you are going to give the book to the Folk Lore Society in the city." Timea looked at her. She put her pen down. "No," she said. "I am not going to give the book to anyone. I am going to give the notebook to you, and I am going to give the notebook to the parson, and I am going to give the notebook to Barsham, and I am going to give the notebook to Isaac Threave, and I am going to give the notebook to the boy, and I am going to give the notebook to the child, and I am going to give the notebook to the Folk Lore Society in the city, and I am going to give the notebook to every village on this coast, and I am going to give the notebook to every Tidewarden who will keep a book, and the book will be here, and the book will be here, and the book will be here." She did not say more. She looked at Nissa. She looked at the slate. She did not move. "I am not going to take the Ledger out of this village," she said. "I am not going to take the Ledger out of this room. I am going to write down what I have heard and seen and read, and I am going to leave the notebook on your kitchen table, and I am going to walk out of Harnsey Wick on Friday at noon, and I am going to leave the book on your shelf with its back to the wall, and I am going to leave the substitution on the marsh, and I am going to leave the child at her father's door, and I am going to leave the boy at Barsham's desk, and I am going to leave the slate on your table, and I am going to leave the Ledger on your shelf, and I am going to leave the account kept, and I am going to leave the village alive." Nissa did not speak. "Timea," she said at last. "You have not been in Harnsey Wick a week." "I have been here five days," Timea said. "I have been here five days and I have been to the marsh, and I have been to the schoolhouse, and I have been to the church, and I have been to the pans, and I have been to the boat, and I have been to the ninth step, and I have been to the child, and I have been to the slate, and I have been to the parson, and I have been to Barsham, and I have been to the boy, and I have been to the folklorist." She looked at her. "I have been to you," Timea said. "And you have been to me, and we have been here, and the marsh is here, and the marsh is waiting." ---