Tomato Cain : and Other Stories by Nigel Kneale

Author:Nigel Kneale [Kneale, Nigel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Comma Press
Published: 2022-09-26T04:00:00+00:00

Curphey’s Follower

It began one night in the gradual quietness that follows closing time.

Lot Curphey was on his way home from Ballaroddan village, not quite solid on his feet, and with little crumbs of song still coming out of his mouth; too cheerful to swear at the faintness of the starlight.

He was a small man, chiefly from shortness of the legs, with a tufty hairiness about the face. Warm, now, inside a huge old yellow coat given to him by John James Quilleash, his employer. Under its long skirts his left leg limped from an injury by a ploughshare years before; now and then the thick cloth dipped in the dust.

About half a mile from his cottage he was chilled by the night air and beginning to notice things.

He felt that he was being followed.

He stopped and turned. There was no sound but a sheep’s cough far away on his right. He scraped his foot sharply in the loose surface.

A few yards away something slithered. Curphey could see a black patch against the lighter darkness of the road. Too small for a dog.

‘Shoo, cat!’ he said loudly. For a second his back tingled at the odd stillness of it. Possible horrors bobbed in his mind.

He stamped towards it with a hollow-feeling foot. The thing moved; and as it moved, it flapped. And spoke unmistakably.

‘Quaa!’

That was how Lot Curphey met the duck.

It followed him along the road, stopped when he did, shuffling along behind at a respectful number of small paces. Twice he tried to chase it home, taking it to be a stray from the yard of old Skillicorn, who was unpleasantly litigious. Each time it scuttled close again as soon as he turned his back.

He came to the cottage where he lived alone, and went straight in and lit the oil lamp.

An eye glittered in the flare, low down on the threshold. He stooped, lamp in hand, and the duck grew clear.

The creature was amazingly ugly.

It stood on the rough slate step boldly, but with its right leg oddly twisted, like a bored corner boy. One eye looked in his face; the other was closed and hollow. Its feathers lay many ways; in patches there were none. Those that remained were a shiny black.

After a moment he picked it up, careful about where he touched it, and it was quiet in his hands. Thin, with skin loose in his fingers. A glance by the lamp showed the damage to its leg was old, and no treatment needed. And it was too skinny to eat.

He tossed it outside and clapped his hands loudly. A little later the door was opened once more, for a green crust to follow it.

In the half-light of the next morning, Curphey found the black duck among the seedlings in his front garden patch. He shouted and flung his hat at it. Having to clamber sleepily after his hat, he trod on three brussels sprouts. He swore, loud in the clammy air, tried to restore them, and

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