The Lonely Furrow by Norah Lofts

Author:Norah Lofts [Lofts, Norah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781905806881
Publisher: Tree of Life Publishing
Published: 2018-12-12T05:00:00+00:00

Into one of these miserable little groups Henry came. He was looking for a lame man. The other, the real culprit, the one who had jabbed Godfrey, might not be so easy to find but Henry was reasonably sure that a little pressure, or a little bribery, would persuade the lame man to give a name to his confederate. And he would be smashed into pulp.

There was a lame man, leaning on Nature’s own crutch, a forked bough. And there, too, was a man—recognisable Bert Edgar, who’d once worked at Knight’s Acre, with his left hand roughly bandaged.

‘You hit my boy,’ Henry said. Not quite a statement or quite a question.

‘What if I did? He lamed Ted. He’d hev lamed me. Bruk my thumb for me.’

‘All right,’ Henry said and began to loosen his belt.

His belt was the weapon that Bert Edgar used most often upon his wife and his unwanted children and he saw meaning in Henry’s action.

‘You hit me, and I’ll strike back. I still got one good hand.’

Henry pushed his own left hand behind him, into the back of the belt, loosened to admit it, then tightened to control it. He was being fair, chivalrous, though long ago he had turned his back on all that chivalry meant.

Ah. Then began a fight that was to be long remembered together with the witch-swimming, the baconless year.

Instinctively everybody moved back, even Ted Hodgson on his crutch, to form a ring, an amphitheatre with no seats.

There never had been; there never would be again, such a fight.

Actually Henry was doubly handicapped; he’d immobilised his left arm; Bert, while not wishing to engage his injured hand, had an elbow free; and Henry had never given or received a blow in anger since he and Richard had fought with the miniature spades which Walter had made for them; and Walter had said that the two of them were too much to control; one must go. Richard went and Henry had lived peaceably, whereas Bert Edgar had been in many fights, both as boy and man. Village squabbles easily erupted into blows and since he was usually the victor he was always ready to carry a quarrel to the limit. He was sturdier than many of his kind because, having only one brother, he’d fed better in his childhood than members of larger families. He had, indeed, the build of a bull and although Master Tallboys was superior in height, possibly in reach, too, Bert did not doubt his ability to floor him.

That was what made the fight so memorable. Most people, knocked flat by Bert Edgar, stayed down, either because they were knocked silly or thought it prudent not to get up. Master Tallboys went down no fewer than four times but he kept getting up and rushing in again. He was savage enough but quite unskilled. Bert had learned the art of dodging and some of Master Tallboys’ blows never found their mark at all or simply glanced off; almost all

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