Great Britain -- History -- 19th century -- Fiction; Peddlers -- Fiction; Riots -- England -- Fens, The -- Fiction
Then Zita exclaimed, 'What, Wolf! Don't you know me? Haven't you been
cheap-jacking with us for a couple of months, since father took you off
the knife-swallowing man? We'd have kept you, old boy, but didn't want
to have to pay tax for you, so sold you, Wolf.'
The dog had not at first recognised Zita in her black frock; now, at
the sound of her voice, it bounded to her and fawned on her.
A girl now came out from the habitation, called, 'What is it, Wolf?'
and stood at the head of the steps that led to her habitation, awaiting
Zita.
'Who are you?' asked the girl on the platform She was a sturdy,
handsome young woman, with fair hair, that blew about her forehead in
the strong east wind. Over the back of her head was a blue kerchief
tied under her chin, restraining the bulk of her hair, but leaving the
front strands to be tossed and played with by the breeze. She was, in
fact, that Kainie whose acquaintance we have already made.
'I believe that I know who you are,' she said.
She had folded her arms, and was contemplating her visitor from the
vantage-ground of the brick pedestal that sustained mill and cot. 'You
are the Cheap Jack girl, I suppose?'
'Yes. I am Cheap Jack Zita. And who are you?'
'I—I was christened Kerenhappuch, but some folks call me Kainie and
Kenappuch. I answer to all three names. It's no odds to me which is
used. What do you want here?'
'I have come to look at the mill. What is its purpose? You do not grind
corn?'
'Grind corn? You're a zany. No; we drive the water up out of the dykes
into the drains. Come and see. Why, heart alive! where have you been?
What a fool you must be not to know what a mill is for! Step up. Wolf
won't bite now he has recognised you. If you'd been some one else,
and tried to step up here, and me not given the word to lie still,
he'd have made ribbons of you.' She waved her arms towards the low
wooden habitation. 'I lives there, I does, and so did my mother afore
me. Some one must mind the mill, and a woman comes cheaper than a
man. Besides, it ain't enough work for a man, and when a man hasn't
got enough work, why, he takes to smoking and drinking. We women is
different; we does knitting and washing. We's superior animals in that
way, we is. Here I am a stick-at-home. I go nowhere. I have to mind
the mill. You are a rambler and a roll-about—never in one place. It's
curious our coming to know one another. What is your name, did you say?'
'Zita—Cheap Jack Zita.'
'Zita? That's short enough. No wonder with such a name you're blowed
about light as a feather. It'd take a thundering gale to send
Kerenhappuch flying along over the face of the land. Her name is enough
to weight her. Now, what do you want to see? Where does your ignorance
begin?'
'It begins in plain blank. I know nothing about mills.'
'My mill is Red Wings. If you look along the line to Mildenhall and
count ten, then you'll see Black Wings. Count eight more, and you have
White Wings.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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