A Hat Full Of Sky

direction,” he complained to anyone who would listen. “And they marched off wi’ my old hat, too. And I’d got he just as I wanted he, all soft and floppy!”
    A pair of trousers and a long coat vanished from a hook belonging to Abiding Swindell, the ferret keeper, and the coat still had ferrets living in the inside pockets. And who, who climbed through the bedroom window of Clem Doins and shaved off his beard, which had been so long that he could tuck it into his belt? Not a hair was left. He had to go around with a scarf over his face, in case the sight of his poor pink chin frightened the ladies.
    It was probably witches, people agreed, and made a few more curse nets to hang in their windows.
    However…
    On the far side of the Chalk, where the long green slopes came down to the flat fields of the plain, there were big thickets of bramble and hawthorn. Usually, these were alive with birdsong, but this particular one, the one just here, was alive with cussing.
    “Ach, crivens! Will ye no’ mind where ye’re puttin’ yer foot, ye spavie!”
    “I canna help it! It’s nae easy, bein’ a knee!”
    “Ye think ye got troubles? Ye wanna be doon here in the boots! That old man Swindell couldnae ha’ washed his feet in years! It’s fair reekin’ doon here!”
    “Reekin’, izzit? Well, you try bein’ in this pocket! Them ferrets ne’er got oot to gae to the lavie, if you get my meanin’!”
    “Crivens! Will ye dafties no’ shut up?”
    “Oh, aye? Hark at him! Just ’cuz ye’re up in the heid, you think you know everythin’? Fra’ doon here ye’re nothing but deid weight, pal!”
    “Aye, right! I’m wi’the elbows on this one! Where’d you be if it wuzn’t for us carryin’ ye aroound? Who’s ye think ye are?”
    “I’m Rob Anybody Feegle, as you ken well enough, an’ I’ve had enough o’ the lot o’ yez!”
    “Okay, Rob, but it’s real stuffy in here!”
    “Ach, an’ I’m fed up wi’ the stomach complainin’, too!”
    “Gentlemen.” This was the voice of the toad; no one else would dream of calling the Nac Mac Feegle gentlemen. “Gentlemen, time is of the essence. The cart will be here soon! You must not miss it!”
    “We need more time to practice, Toad! We’re walkin’ like a feller wi’ nae bones and a serious case o’ the trots!” said a voice a little higher up than the rest.
    “At least you are walking. That’s good enough. I wish you luck, gentlemen.”
    There was a cry from farther along the thickets, where a lookout had been watching the road.
    “The cart’s comin’ doon the hill!”
    “Okay, lads!” shouted Rob Anybody. “Toad, you look after Jeannie, y’hear? She’ll need a thinkin’ laddie to rely on while I’m no’ here! Right, ye scunners! It’s do or die! Ye ken what to do! Ye lads on the ropes, pull us up noo!” The bushes shook. “Right! Pelvis, are ye ready?”
    “Aye, Rob!”
    “Knees? Knees? I said, knees ?”
    “Aye, Rob, but—”
    “Feets?”
    “Aye, Rob!”
    The bushes shook again.
    “Right! Remember: right, left, right, left! Pelvis, knee, foot on the groound! Keep a spring in the step, feets! Are you ready? All together, boys…walk!”
    It was a big surprise for Mr. Crabber, the carter. He’d been staring vaguely at nothing, thinking only of going home, when something stepped out of the bushes and into the road. It looked human or, rather, it looked slightly more human than it looked like anything else. But it seemed to be having trouble with its knees, and walked as though they’d been tied together.
    However, the carter didn’t spend too much time thinking about that because, clutched in one gloved hand that was waving vaguely in the air, was something gold.
    This immediately identified the stranger, as far as the carter was concerned. He was not, as first sight might suggest, some old tramp to be left by the roadside, but an obvious gentleman down on his luck, and it was practically the carter’s duty to help him. He slowed the horse to a standstill.
    The stranger didn’t really have a face. There was nothing much to see between the droopy hat brim and the turned-up collar of the coat except a lot of beard. But from somewhere within the beard a voice said:
    “…Shudupshudup…will ye all shudup while I’m talkin’….

    Ahem. Good day ta’ ye, carter fellow my ol’ fellowy fellow! If ye’ll gie us—me a lift as far as yer are goin’, we—I’ll gie ye this fine shiny golden coin!”
    The figure lurched