Lavengro, George Borrow [i love reading books txt] 📗

“Frequently, brother; and I give them tolerably free answers.”

“Do people ever offer to make you presents? I mean presents of value, such as⁠—”

“Silk handkerchiefs, shawls and trinkets; very frequently, brother.”

“And what do you do, Ursula?”

“I takes what people offers me, brother, and stows it away as soon as I can.”

“Well, but don’t people expect something for their presents? I don’t mean dukkerin, dancing and the like; but such a moderate and innocent thing as a choomer, Ursula?”

“Innocent thing, do you call it, brother?”

“The world calls it so, Ursula. Well, do the people who give you the fine things never expect a choomer in return?”

“Very frequently, brother.”

“And do you ever grant it?”

“Never, brother.”

“How do you avoid it?”

“I gets away as soon as possible, brother. If they follows me, I tries to baffle them by means of jests and laughter; and if they persist, I uses bad and terrible language, of which I have plenty in store.”

“But if your terrible language has no effect?”

“Then I screams for the constable, and if he comes not, I uses my teeth and nails.”

“And are they always sufficient?”

“I have only had to use them twice, brother; but then I found them sufficient.”

“But suppose the person who followed you was highly agreeable, Ursula? A handsome young officer of local militia, for example, all dressed in Lincoln green, would you still refuse him the choomer?”

“We makes no difference, brother; the daughters of the gypsy father makes no difference; and what’s more, sees none.”

“Well, Ursula, the world will hardly give you credit for such indifference.”

“What cares we for the world, brother! we are not of the world.”

“But your fathers, brothers and uncles give you credit, I suppose, Ursula.”

“Ay, ay, brother, our fathers, brothers and cokos gives us all manner of credit; for example, I am telling lies and dukkerin in a public-house where my batu or coko⁠—perhaps both⁠—are playing on the fiddle; well, my batu and my coko beholds me amongst the public-house crew, talking nonsense and hearing nonsense; but they are under no apprehension; and presently they sees the good-looking officer of militia, in his greens and Lincolns, get up and give me a wink, and I go out with him abroad, into the dark night perhaps; well, my batu and my coko goes on fiddling just as if I were six miles off asleep in the tent, and not out in the dark street with the local officer, with his Lincolns and his greens.”

“They know they can trust you, Ursula?”

“Ay, ay, brother; and, what’s more, I knows I can trust myself.”

“So you would merely go out to make a fool of him, Ursula?”

“Merely go out to make a fool of him, brother, I assure you.”

“But such proceedings really have an odd look, Ursula.”

“Amongst gorgios, very so, brother.”

“Well, it must be rather unpleasant to lose one’s character even amongst gorgios, Ursula; and suppose the officer, out of revenge for being tricked and duped by you, were to say of you the thing that is not, were to meet you on the racecourse the next day, and boast of receiving favours which he never had, amidst a knot of jeering militiamen, how would you proceed, Ursula? would you not be abashed?”

“By no means, brother; I should bring my action of law against him.”

“Your action at law, Ursula?”

“Yes, brother, I should give a whistle, whereupon all one’s cokos and batus, and all my near and distant relations, would leave their fiddling, dukkerin and horse-dealing, and come flocking about me. ‘What’s the matter, Ursula?’ says my coko. ‘Nothing at all,’ I replies, ‘save and except that gorgio, in his greens and his Lincolns, says that I have played the ⸻ with him.’ ‘Oho, he does, Ursula,’ says my coko, ‘try your action of law against him, my lamb,’ and he puts something privily into my hands; whereupon I goes close up to the grinning gorgio, and staring him in the face, with my head pushed forward, I cries out: ‘You say I did what was wrong with you last night when I was out with you abroad?’ ‘Yes,’ said the local officer, ‘I says you did,’ looking down all the time. ‘You are a liar,’ says I, and forthwith I breaks his head with the stick which I holds behind me, and which my coko has conveyed privily into my hand.”

“And this is your action at law, Ursula?”

“Yes, brother, this is my action at club-law.”

“And would your breaking the fellow’s head quite clear you of all suspicion in the eyes of your batus, cokos, and whatnot?”

“They would never suspect me at all, brother, because they would know that I would never condescend to be over-intimate with a gorgio; the breaking the head would be merely intended to justify Ursula in the eyes of the gorgios.”

“And would it clear you in their eyes?”

“Would it not, brother? When they saw the blood running down from the fellow’s cracked poll on his greens and Lincolns, they would be quite satisfied; why, the fellow would not be able to show his face at fair or merrymaking for a year and three-quarters.”

“Did you ever try it, Ursula?”

“Can’t say I ever did, brother, but it would do.”

“And how did you ever learn such a method of proceeding?”

“Why, ’tis advised by gypsy liri, brother. It’s part of our way of settling difficulties amongst ourselves; for example, if a young Roman were to say the thing which is not respecting Ursula and himself, Ursula would call a great meeting of the people, who would all sit down in a ring, the young fellow amongst them; a coko would then put a stick in Ursula’s hand, who would then