Gathering Winter Fuel
Page 53
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0 UTSIDE the front door, a group of little boys were alternately singing one line of a carol and ringing the bell. Maggie's brother Cromwell took out his cigarette lighter, hesitated, and then struck a match.
"The lighters are going out all over Europe," he misquoted.
"And the blighters are bawling out all over my clean step," said Maggie. "I can hardly bear to listen to any more of that carol. If they start to sing it again, they had better look out, as good King Wenceslas did."
"What a pity," I said, "the king did not ask the poor man into the royal kitchen for a good square meal, instead of tramping a good league hence loaded to the gunwale, and with a companion who obviously did not have his heart in the business."
"There was a very good reason," said Cromwell, "why the king acted as he did."
"it might make us more patient," I said, "ii we could know it."
" Yonder peasant is the interesting character," Cromwell began. "Although he does not say a word, the whole action revolves round him. If you can identify him, you make a good start. My close and enforced study of the ballad during the last few minutes has convinced me that he is no other than my friend Bloggs of Bloggs Transport."
"And what,said Maggie, " would your friend Bloggs be doing in Boliernia on the feast of Stephen?"
"What they keep telling us outside," said Cromwell, "collecting his supplementary ration."
"It would never have occurred to rile to associate yonder peasant with Bloggs," I said. "Even the address does not seem to be correct."
Where to Find Bloggs
"You mean, I suppose," said Cromwell, "the bit about the mountain, the forest fence, and St. Agnes' fountain."
"Precisely," I said. " A more correct description of where to find Bloggs would have to include that stretch of road past the Corporation salvage disposal plant."
"in addition to which," said Cromwell, "the Regional Transport Commissioner's office is the other side of town."
'Who is the Regional Transport Commissioner and how does he get into this?" asked Maggie.
"He has the job of doling out fuel tickets to road operators," said Cromwell. "So he is their Santa Claus, or in this instance good King Wenceslas."
I have seen several of the R.T.C.s in court," I said, "but never wearing a crown or driving a sleigh."
"And I refuse to accept that good King Wenccslas is a civil servant in disguise," said Maggie. "What evidence have you for it?"
" It is all in the poem, as I said before," said Cromwell. "If for no other reason, you can tell it from the way he speaks."
"Give me just one example," said Maggie.
"You merely need to take the words that our young friends outside have just given us for the fourth time," said Cromwell. " Yonder peasant, who is he? Where and what his dwelling?' Imagine the questions set out one below the other, and what have you got?"
" It certainly sounds like one of those Government forms," admitted Maggie.
• "Exactly," said Cromwell. "It might as well be the first stanza of Z/F/58."
"And what is that?" asked Maggie.
"It is the form of application for supplementary rations of fuel for goods vehicles," I said.
"And that is what you understand by 'winter fuel '? " asked Maggie. "You are beginning to get the idea," said Cromwell.
"But it really means firewood, twigs and branches and so on," said Maggie. "There is nothing in the song about fuel for lorries."
"And there is nothing in the song about the king laying his car up as a good example while petrol is scarce," said Cromwell, "but it is just as much a fact. Half the charm of a ballad is in what is missed out and has to be understood."
"Tell me about the car first," said Maggie.
Psychological Touches
"You must, of course, look out for the subtle psychological touches," said Cromwell. "It is clear that the king makes a habit of going out of his way to bless the poor. There must be some special circumstance to justify the choice of this particular incident for a poem. The unusual feature is that on this occasion page and monarch went forth on foot. The king himself is not above underlining the fact that he is walking in the interests of fuel economy."
"Perhaps he was just a good walker," said Maggie.
"The same can hardly be claimed by the page," said Cromwell. "They have hardly been walking for five minutes before he says he has had enough. 'I can go no longer,' he gasps. He is Transport Man to the life. I should be prepared to swear he has not walked a quarter of a mile at a stretch since he passed his driving test."
Very well, then," said Maggie. "Let us agree that the king has laid his car up in the royal garage. I still maintain that the poor man was merely picking up sticks."
"There are several points that make it unlikely," said Cromwell. "Why should the king be bothering to lake him pine logs if he already had some? And why should the poor man come a good league hence to collect firewood when he lived right against the forest fence?"
"Perhaps it was that kind of behaviour that kept him a poor man," I said.
Note also," said Cromwell, "the reference to ' winter ' fuel. What do you suppose that means?"
" Fuel for the winter, of course," said Maggie.
"A little belated when there is already several inches of snow," said Cromwell. "You lay in your winter fuel in the autumn. But if, as is of course the case, the reference is to the supplementary rations intended to last the winter, or about four months, the word makes sense."
"But the story makes no sense at all," said Maggie. "Why should good King Wenceslas walk all that way with flesh and wine and pine logs to visit Bloggs, who I bet has all these things in plenty."
"The answer is really quite simple,said Cromwell. "The old king was on the same lark as me. He wanted to cadge a spoonful of petrol for his fighter."