Corrag by Susan Fletcher Page B

for his life. So I said climb on. Quick! The mare waded through a river with us. It was fast-flowing with snowmelt, and loud, and her hooves clattered on the river’s rocks. But the boy was safe from the dogs, after that, and was gone.
    On a very wet evening, as we trudged through the mud, we heard a gasping sound which was not rain. I looked about, frowned. And there, in a hedgerow, was a hare—snared in wire. It was bleeding at the neck, and I dropped down from the horse to tend to it. I said poor you, poor you, prised the wire away, and it cut into my fingertips so my blood mixed with the hare’s, but at least it scrabbled free. Off it went, long-legged. And I wrapped my hands in dock leaves for a day or so.
     
     
    I still have scars from that snare. See?
    I have more scars than that—for a running life has its wounds. It has its wire and rope. It has the stones thrown out with witch, as I ran, and most stones were only fast air by my ear, or a thud on my mare’s behind—so that witch stung more. I have scars from a dog that tried for me.
    But a running life has its lonely times—such lonely, long ones—so that I think the soul’s wounds are the worst of all. I do. To pass homes, as we did. To hide in the woods as a family passes by on the road, laughing. A family! What one had I known? I’d been happy enough—Cora and me, and the pig before I killed it. Our scrag hens. That had been my family life—no father to speak of, and no family name. Just Cora , just Corrag. That red-skirted woman by the burn, and her child… And had I minded? I’d never minded. We were as we were, her and I. But I held the mare’s nose as I stood by her, and I watched. This was a true family passing by—parents, and brothers, and children, and wives.
    I scratched the mare’s neck, as they went on their way.
    Maybe she felt it, too. She would see fields of horses, or a stable-door, and put her ears forwards at them. She never called out. But she’d put up her tail and dance on her toes, and once I took her over to a bay filly in a barn. They pressed noses, and breathed. They rubbed their rumps on the wall, side by side. And I was sorry she had to leave her friend—but she did. We had north-and-west to do.
    It is being lonely—that night-time, running life.
    Like a twilight I came to. It was feather-grey, and red. I thought look at the beauty… But the mare was busy with the ground nuts, so I watched the sky alone, and I knew that that moment—seeing the shadows grow long on my own—was how Cora’s life had been, also. She’d lost her parents, and run. And she’d run and run. And I hoped that she’d had a twilight or two with a person beside her, hand in hand—not all of them on her own.
     
     
    S O YES , the heart has its scars. It has its spaces, so that I wondered if it whistled when the wind was strong. I wondered if it leaked, on rainy days. A heart with holes in it.
    In rough, open country, on a full-moon night, I was thinking of hearts, and witches. I was looking up at the moon, as I rode, and dreaming my dreams. When I heard voices.
    The mare heard it too—ears up. I slid down from her, and crept towards the sound. Through some hawthorn bushes and past a fallen log, I saw firelight. It was a warm, good glow. By it, I saw a rabbit roasting on a stick, and a group of men were sitting by the rabbit, drinking ale. They were not like usual men—for they were redcoated, with shiny boots on their feet. They had yellow breeches.
    Soldiers. I spoke this under my breath, into the leaves.
    Why here? I didn’t know, or cared to. If they had been sitting very soberly, and talking in a measured tone, I might have dared to venture forth, and ask for a taste of their rabbit in return for a herb or two. But sober was not the word—not at all. They were passing a bottle of some such about themselves, and they drooled, and one said shall I say why they have whisky, and drink it so much?
    Why?
    For the Devil drinks it. He