The little Botallack man and Eli Penhale shook hands, tucked the slack of their wrestling jackets under their left armpits and, crouching, approached each other, right hands extended. The three judges, ancient wrestlers, leaned on their ash-plants and looked extremely knowing; they went by the title of “sticklers.”
The wrestling ring was in a grass field almost under the shadow of St. Gwithian church tower. To the north the ridge of tors rolled along the skyline, autumnal brown. Southward was the azure of the English Channel; west, over the end of land, the glint of the Atlantic with the Scilly Isles showing on the horizon, very faint, like small irregularities on a ruled blue line.
All Gwithian was present, men and women, girls and boys, with a good sprinkling of visitors from the parishes round about. They formed a big ring of black and pink, dark clothes and healthy countenances. A good-natured crowd, bandying inter-parochial chaff from side to side, rippling with laughter when some accepted wit brought off a sally, yelling encouragement to their district champions.
“Beware of en’s feet, Jan, boy. The old toad is brear foxy.”
“Scat en, Ephraim, my pretty old beauty! Grip to an’ scandalize en!”
“Move round, sticklers! Think us can see through ’e? Think you’m made of glass?”
“Up, Gwithian!”
“Up, St. Levan!”
At the feet of the crowd lay the disengaged wrestlers, chewing blades of grass and watching the play. They were naked except for short drawers, and on their white skins grip marks flared red, bruises and long scratches where fingers had slipped or the rough jacket edges cut in. Amiable young stalwarts, smiling at each other, grunting approvingly at smart pieces of work. One had a snapped collar-bone, another a fractured forearm wrapped up in a handkerchief, but they kept their pains to themselves; it was all in the game.
Now Eli and the little Botallack man were out for the final.
Polwhele was not five feet six and tipped the beam at eleven stone, whereas Eli was five ten and weighed two stone the heavier. It looked as though he had only to fall on the miner to finish him, but such was far from the case. The sad-faced little tinner had already disposed of four bulky opponents in workmanlike fashion that afternoon—the collar bone was his doing.
“Watch his eyes,” Bohenna had warned.
That was all very well, but it was next to impossible to see his eyes for the thick bang of hair that dangled over them like the forelock of a Shetland pony.
Polwhele clumsily sidled a few steps to the right. Eli followed him. Polwhele walked a few steps to the left. Again Eli followed. Polwhele darted back to the right, Eli after him, stopped, slapped his right knee loudly, and, twisting left-handed, grabbed the farmer round the waist and hove him into the air.
It was cleverly done—the flick of speed after the clumsy walk, the slap on the knee drawing the opponent’s eye away—cleverly done, but not quite quick enough. Eli got the miner’s head in chancery as he was hoisted up and hooked his toes behind the other’s knees.
Polwhele could launch himself and his burden neither forwards nor backwards, as the balance lay with Eli. The miner hugged at Eli’s stomach with all his might, jerking cruelly. Eli wedged his free arm down and eased the pressure somewhat. It was painful, but bearable.
“Lave en carry ’e so long as thou canst, son,” came the voice of Bohenna. “Tire en out.”
Polwhele strained for a forwards throw, tried a backwards twist, but the pull behind the knees embarrassed him. He began to pant. Thirteen stone hanging like a millstone about one’s neck at the end of the day was intolerable. He tried to work his head out of chancery, concluded it would only be at the price of his ears and gave that up.
“Stay where ’e are,” shouted Bohenna to his protégé. “T’eddn costin’ you nawthin’.”
Eli stayed where he was. Polwhele’s breathing became more labored, sweat bubbled from every pore, a sinew in his left leg cracked under the strain. Once more he tried the forwards pitch, reeled, rocked and came down sideways. He risked a dislocated shoulder in so doing with the farmer’s added weight, but got nothing worse than a heavy jar. It was no fall; the two men rolled apart and lay panting on their backs.
After a pause the sticklers intimated to them to go on. Once more they faced each other. The miner was plainly tired; the bang hung over his eyes, a sweat-soaked rag; his movements were sluggish. In response to the exhortations of his friends he shook his head, made gestures with his hands—finished.
Slowly he gave way before Eli, warding off grips with sweeps of his right forearm, refusing to come to a hold. St. Gwithian jeered at him. Botallack implored one more flash. He shook his head; he was incapable of flashing. Four heavy men he had put away to come upon this great block of brawn at the day’s end; it was too much.
Eli could not bring him to grips, grew impatient and made the pace hotter, forcing the miner backwards right round the ring. It became a boxing match between the two right hands, the one clutching, the other parrying. Almost he had Polwhele; his fingers slipped on a fold of the canvas jacket. The spectators rose to a man, roaring.
Polwhele ran backwards out of a grip and stumbled. Eli launched out, saw the sad eyes glitter behind the draggles of hair and went headlong, flying.
The next thing he knew he was lying full length, the breath jarred out of him and the miner on top, fixed like a stoat. The little man had dived under him, tipped his thigh with a shoulder and turned him as he fell. It was a fair “back,” two shoulders and a hip down; he had lost the championship.
Polwhele, melancholy as ever, helped him to his feet.
“Nawthin’ broke, Squire? That’s fitly. You’ll beat me next year—could of this, if you’d waited.” He put a blade of grass between his teeth and staggered off to join his vociferous friends, the least jubilant of any.
Bohenna came up with his master’s clothes. “?’Nother time you’m out against a quick man go slow—make en come to you. Eddn no sense in playin’ tig with forked lightnin’. I shouted to ’e, but you was too furious to hear. Oh, well, ’tis done now, s’pose.”
He walked away to hob-nob with the sticklers in the “Lamb and Flag,” to drink ale and wag their heads and lament on the decay of wrestling and manhood since they were young.
Eli pulled on his clothes. One or two Monks Covers shouted “Stout tussle, Squire,” but did not stop to talk, nor did he expect them to; he was respected in the parish, but had none of the graceful qualities that make for popularity.
His mother went by, immensely fat, yet sitting her cart-horse firm as a rock.
“The little dog had ’e by the nose proper that time, my great soft bullock,” she jeered, and rode on, laughing. She hated Eli; as master of Bosula he kept her short of money, even going to the length of publicly crying down her credit. Had he not done so, they would have been ruined long since instead of in a fair state of prosperity, but Teresa took no count of that. She was never tired of informing audiences—preferably in Eli’s presence—that if her other son had been spared, her own precious boy Ortho, things would have been very different. He would not have seen her going in rags, without a penny piece to bless herself, not he. Time, in her memory, had washed away all the elder’s faults, leaving only virtues exposed, and those grossly exaggerated. She would dilate for hours on his good looks, his wit, his courage, his loving consideration for herself, breaking into hot tears of rage when she related the fancied indignities she suffered at the hands of the paragon’s unworthy brother.
She was delighted that Polwhele had bested Eli, and rode home jingling her winnings on the event. Eli went on dressing, unmoved by his mother’s jibes. As a boy he had learnt to close his ears to the taunts of Rusty Rufus, and he found the accomplishment most useful. When Teresa became abusive he either walked out of the house or closed up like an oyster and her tirades beat ha............