9 June 2012
1/2
Gloomy. The boy could only think of one word to describe the day, and it fitted perfectly. The sky above shone a dark silver, clouds encompassing every corner of the horizon. It was that point before rain where the atmosphere seemed to hum with anticipation, the air damp and biting cold. Spires of pointed building tops stretched up high. The faint glow of gas lanterns left warm flickering circles of light in the entranceways to the shops, just about illuminating the creaking wooden signs dangling above. The street was desolate. No soul in sight.
The boy tiptoed past murky puddles and treaded cautiously on the path, glancing over his shoulder every so often. He seemed uncertain, almost afraid. In one hand he held a lantern up tall. Cradled in the other, and hidden under his oversized coat, he appeared to be holding something else. His movements were frantic and uneasy. Past every quaint house and shop he would slow down, lift his lantern up to the sign then move on.
Barbers
Blacksmiths
Jewellers
Butchers
He continued his paranoid prowl until finally he stopped in front of a dark building at the very end of the street. This one didn’t have any lanterns of its own. It stood apart from the other shops, looming in its own shadows. The boy edged towards the door and lifted his lantern up close to the battered sign. The darkness shied away and revealed the spindly words carved into the dark wood.
Knotwerkers
For a while the boy didn’t move, he was frozen in place as though the word he had read was some incantation that had turned his blood to stone. Eventually he stepped forwards. On one side of the door hung a tangled and filthy length of rope. It seemed to have no other end. Even as the boy lifted the lantern up as high as he could, there was no origin to be seen. The boy placed down his lantern, grabbed the rope and gulped. He tugged.
A muffled chink clattered from behind the door, like the sound of a hammer against a plain of iron. For a moment there was silence, and then a flurry of mechanical noises erupted. Clicks and winding seemed to be coming from every part of the door. Mechanisms whirred, cogs spun and the sound of rope against wood panned from all sides until finally everything stopped. The boy stared, wide-eyed and wary. A final solitary click and the door slowly opened inwards, as though pulled by clockwork.
He stepped inside.
Hung from almost every patch of ceiling were hundreds of pieces of string, ropes, wires, chains hanging like vines. They were stretched out, dangling, knotted. Some would reach from one corner of the room to another. Others would be short and frayed. On the walls were tea-stained posters, demonstrating hundreds of different types of knots, more than anyone would ever have imagined there to be. The boy glanced over his shoulder as the door closed behind him and he saw the cause of all the noise he had heard. Fixed to the back of the door were long threads of rope and wires, giant wheels and cogs, all spinning as the door locked back into place. Just above it the boy noticed that the cause of the hammer-on-iron sound he had heard was exactly that; hammer striking iron. It was set above the door and he watched as a thin piece of string slowly pulled the hammer back into its place, awaiting the next person to pull the rope outside and release it again.
The boy pushed through the forest of strings, lantern shaking with unease. He could barely see anything through them. The shop was much deeper than it had looked from the outside. He brushed away a long chain in front of him and could just about see the counter up ahead. He continued onwards and finally reached it. From underneath his coat he produced a small velvet green box with a faint gold symbol on the front. He held it tight in his hand whilst placing the gas lantern on the counter. Tentatively he peered around for the shop owner.
“Hello?” he asked in a frail voice, looking towards the door behind the counter. The hanging ropes seemed to absorb his voice, leaving no trace of an echo. A cold skeletal hand suddenly grasped the boy’s arm and another grabbed the box out of his hand, extinguishing the gaslight in the process. The boy let out a yell and his eyes fixed on the towering figure before him, trying to make out his features in the dark.
He was old and grotesque to look at, a long dirty beard with tangled and knotted strands hung from his protruding chin like the ropes and strings from the ceiling. The boy could faintly make out the patchwork of various materials sewed together that made up the man’s clothing. His expression was cold and terrifying as he looked down at the boy through tiny eyes.
“What do we have here?” he wheezed in the boy’s ear, “Jewellery I presume?”
He plucked open the little green box and his eyes seemed to enlighten as the tangled clump of necklace rose from within. The boy’s hand lashed out in reaction trying to grab it back, but the man held it out of reach. He released his tight grip on the boy’s arm and as he did so the boy noticed the long curved nails protruding from each finger. He seemed mesmerised by the necklace, staring intently with squinted eyes.
“Figure of Eight,” he muttered in his rasping voice.
“Sorr...” but before the boy could finish the man interrupted again.
“tangled amongst one... no two diamond knots, moving into what looks like the beginnings of a slip knot.”
At the mention of this he quickly pulled one of the ends with the tips of his fingernails, releasing a clump of the chaos. His mouth moved silently as he continued to list off the different knots that built up the tangled mess of jewellery.
“You’ve given me a tricky case of knotwerk here, boy.”
He smiled a sickly smile, still entranced by the jewellery.
“Please be careful with it, Mr. Lariat, it’s my mother’s. She needs it for her ball. She would kill me if...”
He silenced the boy with a simple glance then continued to marvel at the intricacy of the tangled necklace.
“Given the complexity of this particular contortion,” he moved the necklace around, caressing it with the tips of his long fingernails, “and the haste with which it needs to be untwined - not to mention the value of the item in question, both monetarily and sentimentally - I would price this job at...” he paused to calculate in his head, “let’s make it five pounds.”
The boy seemed disappointed with Mr. Lariat’s calculation. He knew that his charges weren’t exactly cheap, but four pounds was all his mother had given him. He reached into his pocket and retrieved the money. Mr. Lariat looked at it with mild disapproval, then snatched it up and delicately placed the coins into his money pouch.
“I suppose that will have to do. For now.”
The boy sighed in relief and Mr. Lariat made his way towards the backdoor.
“I will be nine minutes. Please remain here for that time. I shall increase the fee should you delay me further.”
‘Nine minutes?’ the boy thought, incredulously. He supposed the man was an expert knotwerker after all, unmatched by anyone in the town. It was no wonder he could do it in such little time. The man disappeared behind the door, leaving it open just a crack. There was no light coming from behind it, leaving the boy questioning whether Mr. Lariat was untying the knots in the dark. The boy felt a sense of admiration for the man and his expertise, overshadowed by the unease he experienced in his presence.
He used the time to have a proper look around the shop; although as there were no items for sale this didn’t make for a very interesting adventure. He headed towards the door and studied the intricacy of the mechanism. He hadn’t noticed before that the ropes and wires all disappeared into tiny holes in the walls and ceiling. Perhaps they led to the back room?
Within minutes he had exhausted all entertainment possible from the room and had returned to the counter to wait. As he arrived, he noticed something on a shelf behind that he hadn’t before; a dusty grey-white cloth covering some misshapen object. He looked at his watch and spent a couple of seconds working out the time. He still had 6 minutes left. With a burst of mischief he leapt over the counter and gently pulled off the handkerchief.
Knotwerk • Opuss № I