descended from a witch.
So maybe being hideously judgemental about
anyone even slightly different from ‘the norm’ wasn’t just a historical thing. Maybe
it was just part of our nature. A nasty part; but a part. Human nature. Instinct.
It was an uncomfortable thought. But it
only got worse when the man finally shushed the crowd and continued: “According
to these sources, this place got its name when a young girl, described as ‘slow
of wit’, was drowned in the well by her family. But even though the act was
deliberate, the culprits were never brought to justice as they swore that they
had believed her to be not a human being, but a changeling. And thus this
became the Changeling Well.”
I sat there on the bench, horrified. A
child drowned by her own family? My mind filled with disturbing images which I
struggled hard to suppress. But had they really thought that she was a
changeling? Really ? Or had they just
used that as an excuse to get rid of her? Was she, as ‘slow of wit’, a burden
to them? An extra mouth to feed? And so they’d simply murdered her and used an
old superstition to get away with the crime.
And then a sudden memory hit me of a poem
we’d studied at school about a boy on a farm watching some unwanted kittens
being drowned in a bucket of water. And in the poem he’d finally accepted that
this was the way it had to be.
The class had been in an uproar at that,
finding it all disgusting. But then the teacher had basically told us to get
real, giving us various examples of animals themselves who killed their
unwanted young, for example in rejecting the runt of the litter - the small,
weak, or injured one - the mother refusing to feed it, just letting it starve
to death. Like it or not, as the poem said, it was just a hard fact of life. Nature
could be cruel.
I looked back at the well. The voodoo-like
items hanging there seemed even more disturbing now. Especially those with a
vaguely human shape like dolls and puppets. And other, less-obviously-recognisable
objects seemed to me now like a frightening array of body parts: small bones,
shrunken heads, broken carcases. A line of unwanted children.
As the pensioners moved off, I took a big
swig of Coke, letting the liquid swill around my mouth to wash away the bitter taste
which had risen up from my throat.
What was wrong with me? I was being
ridiculous. It was just an old story. And probably only a myth anyway.
But now the wind picked up, crashing
through the trees above and sending odd gusts to the well below, making the
washing line jiggle, the stone-like objects swinging and swaying in a strange,
ritual dance.
I looked away, screwing the lid onto my bottle.
I had to get a grip on myself. But as I was shoving the bottle into my rucksack,
I heard it again. A sound on the wind. A distant cry. A voice calling out as it
had done at the Falls.
I looked up, but no one was there. I was
alone.
I busied myself again, fastening the buckle
on my bag, zipping up my jacket, trying to tell myself not to be so stupid. There
had been no cry. Of course not. How could there have been?
And yet I had heard it.
“Help me…!”
I shivered. It was the story of the changeling
that had done this. It must have been. The gushing of the well and the talk of
the girl’s drowning had brought my mother’s death back to me. The memories
rushing in, unbidden - like the cold, black water.
And I heard it again, a high-pitched cry on
the wind as it wailed above me, reaching down to pluck at the line so that the
objects rattled and danced. I stood up, moving closer to the well, my eyes drawn
back again to the performance. Pulled there, as if by some kind of hypnotic
force. Unable to look away, they swept over the line now, scanning the objects
in turn. A lobster, a boot, a handbag, a spade-
And then something stopped them in their
tracks.
A teddy bear.
And I knew it.
I knew what it looked like beneath the thick layer of stony deposits. I knew it was pink. I was
So maybe being hideously judgemental about
anyone even slightly different from ‘the norm’ wasn’t just a historical thing. Maybe
it was just part of our nature. A nasty part; but a part. Human nature. Instinct.
It was an uncomfortable thought. But it
only got worse when the man finally shushed the crowd and continued: “According
to these sources, this place got its name when a young girl, described as ‘slow
of wit’, was drowned in the well by her family. But even though the act was
deliberate, the culprits were never brought to justice as they swore that they
had believed her to be not a human being, but a changeling. And thus this
became the Changeling Well.”
I sat there on the bench, horrified. A
child drowned by her own family? My mind filled with disturbing images which I
struggled hard to suppress. But had they really thought that she was a
changeling? Really ? Or had they just
used that as an excuse to get rid of her? Was she, as ‘slow of wit’, a burden
to them? An extra mouth to feed? And so they’d simply murdered her and used an
old superstition to get away with the crime.
And then a sudden memory hit me of a poem
we’d studied at school about a boy on a farm watching some unwanted kittens
being drowned in a bucket of water. And in the poem he’d finally accepted that
this was the way it had to be.
The class had been in an uproar at that,
finding it all disgusting. But then the teacher had basically told us to get
real, giving us various examples of animals themselves who killed their
unwanted young, for example in rejecting the runt of the litter - the small,
weak, or injured one - the mother refusing to feed it, just letting it starve
to death. Like it or not, as the poem said, it was just a hard fact of life. Nature
could be cruel.
I looked back at the well. The voodoo-like
items hanging there seemed even more disturbing now. Especially those with a
vaguely human shape like dolls and puppets. And other, less-obviously-recognisable
objects seemed to me now like a frightening array of body parts: small bones,
shrunken heads, broken carcases. A line of unwanted children.
As the pensioners moved off, I took a big
swig of Coke, letting the liquid swill around my mouth to wash away the bitter taste
which had risen up from my throat.
What was wrong with me? I was being
ridiculous. It was just an old story. And probably only a myth anyway.
But now the wind picked up, crashing
through the trees above and sending odd gusts to the well below, making the
washing line jiggle, the stone-like objects swinging and swaying in a strange,
ritual dance.
I looked away, screwing the lid onto my bottle.
I had to get a grip on myself. But as I was shoving the bottle into my rucksack,
I heard it again. A sound on the wind. A distant cry. A voice calling out as it
had done at the Falls.
I looked up, but no one was there. I was
alone.
I busied myself again, fastening the buckle
on my bag, zipping up my jacket, trying to tell myself not to be so stupid. There
had been no cry. Of course not. How could there have been?
And yet I had heard it.
“Help me…!”
I shivered. It was the story of the changeling
that had done this. It must have been. The gushing of the well and the talk of
the girl’s drowning had brought my mother’s death back to me. The memories
rushing in, unbidden - like the cold, black water.
And I heard it again, a high-pitched cry on
the wind as it wailed above me, reaching down to pluck at the line so that the
objects rattled and danced. I stood up, moving closer to the well, my eyes drawn
back again to the performance. Pulled there, as if by some kind of hypnotic
force. Unable to look away, they swept over the line now, scanning the objects
in turn. A lobster, a boot, a handbag, a spade-
And then something stopped them in their
tracks.
A teddy bear.
And I knew it.
I knew what it looked like beneath the thick layer of stony deposits. I knew it was pink. I was
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