27th May; Campfires

Davy sat and thought for a little while; he hadn't ever heard that riddle before, and it took him a while to work through the clues. Fortunately, he didn't think he had any real competition from Braggins. It was some creature, he thought - or no, bone in the throat - he mulled it over a while longer, then hazarded his guess. "Is't cherry?"

"How'd - blimey," Braggins said, mystified.

Kerr smirked. "Takes brains, laddie," he told his mate. "Pity ye ain't gottem. Yon Davy's got a sharp auld mind, he does."

Davy puffed up with pride, grinning from ear to ear at the praise. "An' practice. Ah've got scads. Ye can get betta at it if ye try," he said generously to Braggins, with rather an air of superiority. "See if ye get this'n!"

"Sleekit as a shadow,
hidden in the neet
Thrums te see ye coming,
Then gives ye a bite
Cruel as Boneypart ,
when hor fancy turns
Clivvor as the tod
But hor keep she earns."

Kerr remained silent, while Braggins frowned thoughtfully at the fire. This one was for him to sort out on his own. Presently, however, the grenadier shook his head.

"I'unno," he said in disappointment.

Davy looked rather smug, though he tried to hide it. He'd made up that guessing-story himself, and he was proud of it. "Ye got owt, Jonny?" he asked Kerr, when Braggins gave up.

"Mebbe," he replied laconically. "It'd be a fox, sure."

A victorious grin made its way over Davy's features. Kerr had not got it either! He'd stumped both of them. "Ne, is not tod. That's ane guess, ye only gets ane. Is't moggie, see? Clivvor as tod, but ne tod itself." First blood went to him!

Ah.

"What wazzat you said 'bout brains, mate?" Braggins teased, stealing back his mug of brandy.

Kerr shrugged, nonplussed. "I hadda go, but ye dinnae. What's that fre brains?"

Davy scratched a score-mark in the ground. "Is't point for us," he said; he nearly crowed it triumphantly, but remembered himself just in time. He did, after all, want to keep his welcome. This time he'd give Braggins an old chestnut, out of compassion, and see how he did with that one.

"Alive wi'out breeth,
as caad as deeth,
Nivvor thirsty, elwis drinkin'
aa' in mail nivvor clinkin'," Davy recited.

Braggins repeated this one to himself, frowning in concentration. It was obvious he did not have the necessary cleverness to figure any of these out.

Davy sighed, giving up on Braggins. "Jonny?" he asked.

"Fish," Kerr said promptly. "Ain't ye never fished afore, Braggins?"

"No," the grenadier told him. "I didn't have nothin' to do with fishin' or farmin', never."

"Ah've nivvor fished nither," Davy pointed out, "but Ah knaas tha' ane. Aald chestnut, it. Fish ne breeth unda wata. An' caad to the touch, drinkin' aa the time, an' scales like mail, ye see noo?" He shook his head, Braggins just didn't seem to grasp the idea of any of the riddles.

"Yer go agyen, Jonny?"

Again, was it? Kerr thought for a moment. "A'reet," he said. "Here's a good'un:

"Down below the shinin' moon
Aroun' the trees, a sacred gloom
Runnin' wi' the midnight sky
Knowin' the thing that makes ye cry
Night's full wi' my essence
Eternal light betrays my presence
Soarin' through my endless task
Shadows're my faithful mask."

This one stumped Davy - sacred, and essence, and eternal, were all words he wasn't quite sure of the meaning of. And even without understanding those, he couldn't understand what it was talking about. He sat in silence for several seconds, chewing it over, and trying to see if he could guess, but came up with nothing.

"Tha's reet bonny," he said, admiringly. That Kerr could use words like that raised him up in Davy's estimation. "Aabut swanky. Divvent knaa what it is, but."

Kerr ignored the disgruntled expression on Braggins' face. "That'll be darkness, laddie," he supplied. "Learnt that'un from an' auld officer of mine, what reckoned he were a poet."

Davy thought of each of the clues, trying to think if it fit. "Whey aye," he said, "so it is. Reet clivvor, an' sounds like poetry, too." He'd not heard much poetry in his life before. "What de the waads mean? Sacred, an' essence, an eternal? Leik eternal hellfire?"

"Aye," Kerr agreed. " 'Sacred' is summat precious, sorta like gold. 'Essence'... now that'll be the heart of summat, like. An' 'eternal'. Well that's summat what'll never end, ye ken."

Davy tucked this information away, to trot out those words later on if he ever had the opportunity. Or maybe to use them in a riddle himself, sometime. "Ah'll hev te mind that ane," he observed. Kerr's riddle was a right corker.

They'd left Braggins in the dust, and Davy was starting to feel badly about it. Well, not so much that he was feeling guilty, but he wanted to be welcomed by all of them - especially if he was going to try to bring Lucy along. Thus, he gave up on guessing-stories for now, for Braggins' sake, unless Kerr chose to try another one - it was the Pioneer's turn, in any case, since the last point had been his. Davy was fine with leaving the score as one to one, anyway; neither he nor these lads lost any face by it. So he didn't prompt Kerr.

"Weor de ye hail frem, Nate?" he asked Braggins.

"Leicester," Braggins told him, with no small measure of pride. Kerr scratched at his chin to conceal a smirk.

"Wha' did ye de there?" Davy asked, his curiosity unsatisfied. "An' ye, Jonny? Afore ye were sowldgas?

Kerr's smirk broadened, such that there was no hope of concealing it.

"I did a lotta things," Braggins replied, red-faced.

"Aye," the Scotsman agreed cheerfully. "I was a sheep-herder, m'self."

"Leik wha'?" Davy prodded, still curious, especially to see what had Braggins so red-faced.

"He was a crossin' sweeper," Kerr answered, seeing that Braggins was in no hurry to respond. "An' a night soilman, too."

"Ye think-shyem aboot sich?" Davy inquired, perhaps incautiously, of Braggins. "Nowt wrong wi' it."