After the journey, we arrived at the water separating us from the other side.
I could see the ferryman on his boat, moored against the jetty on the far bank.
Waving my arms to signal him, finally he looked our way and I beckoned him to come to us.
He pointed further along from where our group was standing.
“What?” I called, seeing nothing of note.
He stabbed his finger in the air, as if prodding at a tricky button.
Glancing again along the path, I saw a sign. After indicating to our group to stay where they were, I strolled over to it.
To signal the ferryman, you must wave an article of clothing
I shrugged to the ferryman, holding my arms out to my sides – We’re here. You can see us right here – but he nodded, insisting.
Fine.
While the ferryman continued to watch, I took off my belt and waved it above my head.
“That’s an accessory,” he called across the water. “It must be clothing.”
Jeez, man.
I pulled up my trousers, which had dropped while I was waving my belt, relooped it, and removed my shirt. I swung it around above me like a cowboy’s lasso.
I saw the ferryman nod, this time affirming, and he unhitched his rope.
Once he started heading over the water, I made my way back to the group, pulling my shirt back on.
Even before he pulled up at the jetty, I could see that he was clearly puzzled, looking at us each in turn and scratching his chin.
“Now, then,” he said, holding his chin, “what’s the best way to do this? Here’s an idea: I’ll take the fox and leave you with the chicken and grain. I can drop the fox on the other bank, and then come back and pick up the chicken—
“Nay, that won’t work, leaving the chicken with the grain for all that time.”
He stared away over the water, back to scratching his chin. “I’ll take the grain—
“Nay, that won’t work either, the fox left with the chicken . . . Hmm . . .”
So deep in thought was he that I could almost see his brain twisting in knots.
The chicken and the fox were both looking up at me, all of us thinking the same thing.
I nodded in agreement with them.
“Why don’t you just take us all, mate?” I said, interrupting the ferryman’s internal and external gibbering. “There’s enough room in your boat.”
Taking a moment to calculate the effects of the permutations as they sank in, he finally agreed.
“Aye, all get in, why don’t you. That’ll be two bilberries per passenger,” he said, pointing to a sign sellotaped to a post in the middle of the boat.
“Bilberries? What if I don’t have bilberries?” I asked the ferryman. “Would you take an egg?” I reached into my satchel, retrieving an egg, which I showed to him.
“Nay,” the ferryman said, frowning at my egg like he’d never seen one before. “If ye wish to cross, bilberries the fee must be.”
“Fine.” I put the egg back into my satchel and looked down at the fox and the chicken.
What to do?
They had no answer for me.
So, the question remained: What to do?
“’Pon consideration,” said the ferryman, “I’d be willing to make an exception. I’ll take ye for a song.”
“A song? No trouble, my friend,” I said, before breaking into a quite impassioned version of Survivor by Destiny’s Child. There was no way I needed asking twice; I’d had it stuck in my head all the journey here. I knew some of the moves too, so I threw those into my recital.
Frankly, I nailed it.
Once finished, I stood there slightly out of breath, a grin trying to find its way through my panting.
“Aye, that was a fine rendition,” said the ferryman. “Very fine. But I meant a song. A small monetary fee; an arbitrary token.”
“Oh.” I patted my pockets, hoping I had some money left. Deep at the bottom of one pocket, I found a 50p, so I proffered it to the ferryman.
“Aye.” He accepted and inspected the coin. “A song. Hop in,” he said, moving aside to allow entry onto his boat, pocketing the coin.
While I picked up the chicken and grain, the fox skipped from the jetty onto the boat.
It felt good when were finally on our way.
The ferryman gestured to a bag between the seats. “Help yourself to bilberries.”
“What’s your name?” I asked the ferryman, reaching into the bag. “You, so kind to help us on our journey.”
“Sharon,” I thought I heard him say.
As we travelled over the water, a stretch of about 20 metres – the ferryman whistling Survivor, as he was now likely to all day – I gazed further down the river at the bridge there. The juice from the bilberries was dribbling down my chin.
vss #65
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