Mulled Vine

The old man sat hunched over an empty glass in the corner of the pub. It seemed as if he had been there forever, amidst the dust motes, for he did not move. I noticed that every now and then he would sigh and shift his gaze to the window where through the grime I could make out the object of his focus: a rocky outcrop overlooking the sea. I wondered at his story, whether perhaps he had lost a child or loved one, or perhaps something more sinister, a regret at some deed long committed. So I sauntered over, with all the unthinking assurance of a local tourist taking in the sights, and stood by his table. He looked up, slightly puzzled.

“Do you mind if I sit down?” I asked.

He shrugged and waved vaguely at the seat opposite. I sat down and smiled but he just looked away.
“I hope you don’t mind my being forward,” I hesitated, “but I saw you sitting here and wondered why you sighed.”

The old man did not speak, at least not for a while, but then turned to me. “Eh? Now why would you be wondering that?”

It was a good question, one that I couldn’t really answer, and I was beginning to regret my venture, yet I felt a strange empathy for this man, a sense that our meeting was fated in some way. “I’m sorry, no reason really. I should go.”

He looked at me quizzically, a hint of a smile on his lips. “How strange,” he smirked, “but who better to unburden to than a stranger with excessive curiosity and a spare pint.”

I grinned, took the hint and soon returned with two pints. He took a long deep draft and sighed with obvious pleasure, “Aah, that is good. Many thanks.”

I watched him as he wiped the froth from his lip with a great, big gnarled hand, rough and worn with hard work, so different from my milky, white hands. His face was lined with deep crevices surrounding two strikingly intelligent, dark eyes. He took in a deep breath. “My story is long, so make yourself comfortable.”

“It were long ago, he began, when I were nowt but a young lad, many years before the likes of you was born. I grew up just half a mile from here and used to come down to the shore whenever I could. I didna ha any siblings, and not many a friend; I preferred me own company and many was the day when night would come and me da would have to come looking for me. At first he thrashed me black and blue with his belt, but then gradually he came to see that it were nowt but the harmless dreaming of a young fool and he let me be. My favourite place was yonder rock, what they call Cairn Kenidjack (he pointed through the window at the outcrop I’d seen earlier.) From the top of it you could see across the whole bay, and underneath an old smuggler’s cove where if the tide were out one could spend many an hour exploring the nooks and crannies.
It must have been my 16th year when I happened to be down by the rocks looking through the pools for crabs when I noticed nearby a girl around my age swimming in the water near me. I were surprised as heck because the currents in that cove is treacherous. I called out to her and told her she were mad to be in the water, but she just laughed. I tell thee I were bedazzled by her beauty, her long golden locks, her pale, sun-freckled skin with the faintest tinge of red on her soft cheeks. I never saw such like in me life and I reckon I were in love, for I wanted to dive then and there into the water after her. But I were afraid.

She looked at me. Are you coming in, she asked me, but I shook me head, never before so disconsolate.

Why not, she asks me, insistent like, don’t you want to?

I says I do but that it were dangerous, however she just laughs again. Her laugh made my heart do somersaults for it were like the tinkle of bells in a spring breeze. I felt a fool, and no man, young or old, likes to feel a fool, particularly in front of a woman, so I cast caution and clothing to the wind, keeping me johns on for modesty sake, and dove in after her. The currents were strong but she swam effortlessly towards me, and I noticed for the first time that she were starky naked. I blushed and did not know where to look for I’d not seen a woman’s form in such plain splendour before, but she were so natural about it I soon forgot about it and we frolicked and talked like old friends amidst the rocks. I asked her name and she told me, but for the life of me I couldn’t get it – it sounded like the rushing of a brook, not like any name I’d heard before. I asked her where she was from and where her clothes were but again she just laughed – oh, that laugh, I cannot describe how it made me feel, fool that I was.

Soon however, the day was done and the sun began to settle on the horizon. She said she had to leave but I grabbed hold of her hand and would not let her go. Don’t, says I, but she says she must and pulls her hand away. I asked her when I’d see her again, but for the first time she looked sad and replied, it cannot be. My heart wrenched. What do you mean, I asked, I must see you again! We are not the same, says she, and when the sun is down I must return to my kind, forever. I did not understand and told her so, and in my anguish again tried to take her hand, but she would not have it. Instead she glided away, looking at me all the time with deep sorrowful eyes, and then with a twist and a splash she was gone as suddenly as she had come. I were heart broken I tell thee, and returned the next day, and the next, and many more after that, hoping to see her, but I never did.”

He stopped talking and looked wistfully out the window, his old eyes full of tears. I prompted him to continue but he would not, so eventually I rose, thanked him for his time, bought him another pint and left. As I walked up the hill to my hotel it occurred to me how mythical his tale sounded and wondered if the old fool had not imagined the whole thing, or even worse was having me on – the locals do like nothing more than to rag on a visitor.

It was many years later that I returned to that little sea port, and I went into the same pub, hoping perhaps to see the old man again. He was however not there, and when I enquired after him it turned out he had passed away, drowned, they said, in the cove below Cairn Kenidjack.

They curious thing is that they never found his body, just his clothes folded in a tidy heap next to the water.