The Other Side
“Harmless”
Taken from a Welsh newspaper report of 1872 A farmer fined ten shillings for breaking both arms of a boy working for him.
They stand in the dock, his head down, gripping his hat tight like a chicken he’s about to behead. She stares at the Beak, sullen. She says it was my own fault, punishment for the badness in me. I look up at the doctor, sitting beside me on the benches. He pats my shoulder. The Beak says a fine of ten shillings and asks what will become of me. The doctor stand up and approaches the bench. They speak in whispers and the Beak nods. The two in the dock skulk off, quick. The doctor puts his arm around me, leads me out to his carriage, carries me inside, as I cannot use my arms since she broke them both with the pitchfork. As we pass them on the road, I hear her berating him, but he does not speak. I think he is sorry. Sorry that he held me down whilst she hit me for whispering to the horse instead of forking hay. Sorry he has lost ten shillings. I spit at them through the open carriage window.
