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The Beggar's Curse
Ann Pilling
For Benjamin and Thomas
CONTENTS
The Ballad of Semmerwater
Deep asleep, deep asleep,
Deep asleep it lies,
The still lake of Semmerwater
Under the still skies.
And many a fathom, many a fathom,
Many a fathom below,
In a king’s tower and a queen’s bower
The fishes come and go.
Once there stood by Semmerwater
A mickle town and tall;
King’s tower and queen’s bower,
And the wakeman on the wall.
Came a beggar halt and sore:
“I faint for lack of bread.”
King’s tower and queen’s bower
Cast him forth unfed.
He knocked at the door of the eller’s cot,
The eller’s cot in the dale.
They gave him of their oatcake.
They gave him of their ale.
He has cursed aloud that city proud,
He has cursed it in its pride;
He has cursed it into Semmerwater
Down the brant hillside;
He has cursed it into Semmerwater,
There to bide.
King’s tower and queen’s bower,
And a mickle town and tall;
By glimmer of scale and gleam of fin,
Folks have seen them all.
King’s tower and queen’s bower,
And weed and reed in the gloom;
And a lost city in Semmerwater,
Deep asleep till Doom.
William Watson
Someone was hammering on the Blakemans’ front door. Prill ran to open it, and tripped over a half-filled suitcase in the middle of the hall carpet. Her best friend Angela Stringer stood outside in the pouring rain. Her bubbly black curls had turned into limp ringlets, her anorak steamed, and there was a dewdrop on the end of her nose.
“I’ve come for the address,” she announced, shaking herself all over the doormat, like a dog. “Can’t write if I’ve no address. And you’re off tomorrow, aren’t you?”
“Shut the front door!” Prill’s father bellowed from the top of the stairs. “It’s blowing a gale up here. Come on, Colin, give me a hand with this will you.” All that was visible of David Blakeman were two legs sticking out of the loft. Colin went up the stairs and grabbed one end of a battered trunk, and Prill steered Angela into the kitchen.
“Don’t tell me about the riding lessons,” she said, taking a pile of letters off the top of the fridge, “or I’ll be jealous.”
“Oh, I should think you’ll be able to ride up there, it sounds very rural.” Angela tried to sound encouraging. “Better than sticking to roads all the time – that’s what I’ll be doing. That’s the trouble with a place like this, it’s not the real country.”
But Prill was determined to be miserable. The one compensation for having to spend the entire Easter