The Green Man and Other Stories

By Benjamin Parsons

Among these tales of human desire and supernatural design you will hear of a besotted man who unwittingly strikes a terrible bargain to secure the woman he adores; of a couple who find that their romance has already been foretold, long ago; and of a lonely girl who longs for love, but does not reckon on the dreadful consequences when love finds her first. Let me tell you a story that's true - or as true as you believe it to be - because although you may hear nothing new, you might hear something as old as the hills that surprises you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Benjamin Parsons
• Release date: Apr 8, 2023
• ISBN: 9798201672096

Benjamin Parsons

I am a writer and artist from the Westcountry of England now living in London. I write and illustrate stories about love, hate, ambition, revenge, beauty, and the supernatural.

Book preview

The Green Man and Other Stories

by Benjamin Parsons

Copyright 2023 Benjamin Parsons. First published in 2009.

Smashwords edition, license notes

Thank you for downloading this free ebook. You are welcome to share it with your friends. This book may be reproduced, copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes, provided the book remains in its complete original form. If you enjoyed this book, please return to Smashwords.com to discover other works by this author. Thank you for your support.

* * *

Contents

The Green Man

The Merlin

The Monument

The Tryst

The Reverse

The Green Man

Beauty without power must learn to be content with itself, as it has no uses. This girl Marianne had all the former, without doubt: nobody could find fault with her looks, even if they tried to; but as to power, she had none. Her beauty was a danger to no-one, she broke no hearts, nor fetched a single longing sigh from anybody —and the reason for this shocking neglect of her charms was, that she had passed her eighteen years in a remote rural community, surrounded on all sides by flat, empty fields, without so much as a hedge to break the view to the bland horizon. That part of Lincolnshire is the kind of place where, not only is there nothing to do, but you can see that there is nothing to do for miles around.

The patrons of her parents’ public house were all above her age, and had known Marianne so long that they looked on her as a sort of communal daughter, so that, though admired and celebrated by everyone, she was never revered in a romantic way by anyone.

So she had beauty, but could do nothing with it. This fact made her melancholy —quite understandably, as it is a cruel fate to be young and lovely and never have the chance to take advantage of these assets. Marianne longed for some wistful swain to be captured by her eyes, and made a slave to her very glances; she conjured him up in her imagination, with an attention to detail that was really quite impressive— she knew how he would look, how act, how speak, and what manoeuvres he would undertake in order to win her. She imagined her hoped-for lover so well, in fact, that she began to suppose, in idle moments, that he really did exist somewhere, out there beyond the stark, windswept horizon. But whether he was really waiting for her in the wilderness or not was to little purpose, because until he should decide to put in an appearance, she must make do with the punters of the Green Man for male society, and, as I say, this miserable court of knights errant fell far short of her expectations.

In case the hero of her romantic dream should ever appear, however, Marianne endeavoured to look suitably beguiling for him. She grew her hair long, and it curled into trailing auburn tendrils down her back; she wore lengthy, slim dresses that swirled about her legs, and draped herself with Celtic pendants on slender chains— the overall effect being as elegant and bohemian as any lonely, soulful girl could hope for. Indeed, I remember once seeing her, through a window at the Green Man, returning from one of her solitary walks across the fens; a light mist had risen over the fields, and she emerged slowly from it, her ringlets swaying gently, her skirts sweeping and her silver glinting in the dusk-light. It was an ethereal vision to be sure, and her face was pale and sad— which was an indulgent sadness, as it were.

Where did she walk, in that blank landscape, beneath the high and heavy gales? It seems there was one feature to break up the monotony, at some miles’ distance from the pub, which was a large and spreading oak tree— one of the biggest and oldest in the county. It stood in a shallow declivity, fairly sheltered, where three paths met. Marianne would often walk out there and linger under its branches, because it served as a landmark to aim for.

It was the evening before midsummer, I believe, when she made her way out to this oak tree, still more unhappy than usual. She had quarrelled with her mother, and had suffered the indignity of being told to take her head out of the clouds. To have her dreamworld of melancholy so rudely denounced, after cultivating it so carefully, Marianne felt not unduly forlorn. She fled to this great old tree, as I say, which was thick and full with foliage, and fell down at its roots, with tears standing in her eyes. The moths fluttered about her in the dusk, and the low-reaching branches cast a leafy pall over her retirement. Her sighs were heavy to be sure, and wracked her body through; though the slights and inconveniences inflicted by her parents did not upset her for long, as her common theme of loneliness and lovelessness was ever at hand to furnish her with materials for lament.

Why was there no-one to understand her, as she wished to be understood? Why was there no-one who she could understand, and appreciate, and admire? These questions brought the drops to her eyes anew, and, laying her head against the bark, she sobbed outright, so that her tears fell one and one upon the low-growing leaves. It was condemning enough to have nobody in the world to love her, but to have nobody to so much as pine for, or even cast her eye upon and wish for, was a harsh lot to bear, and she grew angry at her fate.

In her frustration, she clenched her teeth and snapped off a branchling nearby her, to swipe at the moths with; and no sooner did she break the branch than it bled, and the sap ran down onto her hand.

Just then, the wind stirring up heavily, the leaves swayed and surged above her; the acorns rattled and the branches creaked; and in a sudden moment the Green Man himself appeared before her, and she was much astonished, as you may well imagine. He was taller by a head than any man she had ever seen, and broad, and twisted together out of sinew; his chest and legs were all over green, and covered and intermingled with hair and leaves, flecked through with moss and lichens, and sprigs of brown dry leaves here and there. His hair and beard, too, were full of various leaves, some yellowing and some sapping and fresh; and his eyes were clear and bright, and his teeth were sharpened flints of wood.

‘Now you’ll atone for taking off this branch,’ he said in a dreadful voice, like sawing cellos. ‘How dare you do it, when I’ve harboured you here so often, and listened to your miseries?’

Marianne, in a panic without doubt, and gaping at this green man frowning over her, was seized with the emergency of the situation sufficiently to stutter out: ‘I’m sorry— I didn’t know— I didn’t mean to break the branch!’

But the Green Man was in full sway, and snatched the branch from her quivering hand. ‘Do you think I don’t have miseries of my own to endure? Do you think I enjoy abuse, and torture? Do you think I like to have my kindness and compassion thrown back in my face? Would you spare one moment from your despairs to give to me, when I’ve set aside worlds of trouble to listen to you?’

‘I’m sorry,’ gasped Marianne again. ‘I didn’t know you were listening to me!’

‘You didn’t care!’ he thundered. ‘And this proves it!’ — he wielded the broken branch. ‘But I tell you I did care for you; it was a kind of comfort to be near you and listen to your little sad ways, the little tunes you’d hum, the little rhythms your feet would make walking along— it soothed my weary day to hear you; but now I see you’re cruel and careless, and think more of your own unhappiness than anything else!’

‘I tell you I didn’t know you were listening!’ Marianne protested. ‘But you can’t call me cruel for being careless, for being ignorant— how was I to know you were there all along?’

‘I will call you into the earth, if I wish it!’ he bellowed in reply. ‘I’ll seal you into the roots here, and you’ll feed my oak till you’re rotted to nothing! Do you hear me? I’ll put you under the ground alive, and we’ll see if you go mad before you suffocate— you’ll have miseries enough down there!’

Marianne, in distress and confusion, looked about her to run off, but the Green Man, seeing the intention in her face, bore down on her so that she shrank back against the old tree trunk. On her knees there, she implored him not to hurt her.

‘Why shouldn’t I take off your hand in return for this branch?’ he demanded.

‘No, no, please!’ she cried. ‘I’ll do anything, but don’t hurt me!’ —and she argued that the losing of her hand would not in reality prove an eye for an eye, or a tooth for a tooth, for the broken branch, as the tree could very easily grow another branch, whereas a pruned hand was altogether a more serious matter. And in short she begged him to tell her how else she might atone.

The Green Man replied: ‘I will have your hand, but I won’t take it; you will give it to me.’ —and looking sly, he plucked a hair from his great beard, which was as barbed and briared as a bramble, and fashioned it into a ring, binding and weaving it round and round. Then, taking the sap that had bled from the oak tree, he sealed the ring so that it shone like amber; but still the thorns of the bramble stuck from it, so that it must be a painful enough ring to wear.

‘Here is your wedding ring,’ said the Green Man to the frightened girl. ‘Midsummer’s day will be your wedding day; you will come here to me and place the ring upon your wedding finger yourself, and you’ll be my bride henceforth.’

Of course Marianne was astonished more and more at this, and wondered at it, but the Green Man seemed very pleased with his stratagem, and carefully hung the ring from a twig high in the oak tree. While he was about this, however, she saw her chance to escape him, and, stumbling to her feet, she darted off on the path home as fast as she could, pulling her skirts up around her knees and fairly flying along, for she was in a terror that the spectre would be hard on her heels in pursuit. Well, it happened that she tripped on her way, and, falling down, struck her head on a stone and was knocked out.

There was a great clamour and anxiety about her disappearance for sure, and at home her mother was in despair as the hour grew later and later, and there was no sign of her wandering daughter. The regulars in the pub got themselves together and drove slowly through the lanes, looking out for her, while others took torches to search the fields. But the night was very dark, and it was not until near dawn that a farmer discovered the poor girl, still unconscious, by the lane-side. He concluded she was concussed, which I suppose she was, and when, after a day