Perhaps

Once there lived a miller with his wife and two sons Gustave and Wilhelm. Gustave the elder son excelled in wrestling and other village sports and was his father’s favourite. The pair travelled widely to find challengers and purses while Will was left at home to run the mill.

A year came with poor harvests when the mill could no longer support the travel and hospitality that went with these sporting endeavours and at the same time feed four mouths. So the miller decided that the time had come for Will to leave home and seek his fortune elsewhere.

So it was that one morning, Will, who had never been beyond the nearest village, set out into the world. His few possessions were in a grain sack along with a small loaf that his mother had baked. She had no coin to give him.

Not long on the road, He came upon an old man, a pilgrim in travel-worn clothing, resting under a hedge. “Good morrow father,” said Will touching his forelock respectfully. “Have you travelled far?” “To the Holy Land,” said the pilgrim. “And, if it be granted me, I shall reach my home before I die. But I am weary.” “Let me share with you,”said Will bringing out his loaf and running to a nearby stream to fill his cup.

The old man ate ravenously but, when Will tried to pass over some of his own share, he would have none of it. “This is all the food you have my son. Yet you give it to me a stranger. Here! I must give you something in return.”

The gift was a walnut shell from a sacred tree in that distant land. A tiny hinge held the two shell halves together and inside on a scrap of silk was a single word in an unknown language. “It means ‘perhaps’,” said the old man seeing Will’s puzzlement. Will thanked him and placed it in his sack assuming it to be some sort of talisman. Although not mentioned, Will would always find in his sack thereafter a small loaf fresh and warm as though not long from the oven. As Will left, he turned to wave farewell. There was nobody there.

Some days later, Will’s way led into a large forest and for a whole day he met no-one but then toward evening, tired, he smelled smoke and glimpsed a small cottage away among the trees. A side path appeared to lead to it. “Perhaps I can gain some benefit there,” Will murmured to himself and turned aside.

He had hardly entered the path when his way was blocked by a large horned ram determined that he should not pass. Which ever way he dodged, it matched him with lowered head. Suddenly, an old crone was standing beside it. Will had not noticed her come up. She tapped the ram with her gnarled staff and, to Will’s surprise, it fell down stunned. “Don’t worry my dear,” she said. “He doesn’t like strangers. He thinks he’s protecting me. Come and share my evening meal.”

Will felt that he would be taking advantage. The old woman apparently lived alone and appeared to be very poor. But there was no polite way that he could refuse. He followed her to the cottage.

A pot of stew bubbled on the fire and the old woman filled two wooden bowls and placed them on the table. Will did not see the magic potion that was slipped into one of them. “Eat up,” she said but as they were about to start there was a thunderous bang on the door and the cottage shook. The ram had recovered and had charged the door. Will offered to catch the animal and tie it up but the old woman was insistent that only she could handle it.

While she was gone, Will compared the two bowls and could see that his portion contained a little more meat and, feeling that she should rightly have this, changed bowls. “Eat up.” she said on her return and took a spoonful to set the example. She shrieked in horror when she realised the switch. But too late! She was already changing. In a matter of seconds, Will was sharing the cottage with a sheep.

Will was fortunate that he had not eaten. Over the years, the old crone’s stewpot had been constantly repleneshed with solitary travellers turned into sheep any excess being sold to the butcher in a nearby village. It was against this that the ram, a former traveller, had tried to warn Will. It now lay outside with its throat cut.

Will left with all haste and took the old crone’s staff to help him on his way. She would not need it now. He hurried far on into the night until he fell from exhaustion.

When the butcher called at the cottage several days later, he found the old crone to be absent and the now useless dead ram. There was no other livestock there apart from a stringy old ewe which his wife made into mutton pies.

The country that Will entered as he left the forest the next morning had trouble in the form of a dragon. It ate farm animals and farmers without discrimination. It ate the bands of knights sent out to kill it. Merchant caravans now gave the land a wide berth.

The king was in despair. His tax collection had dropped alarmingly. He made the standard offer, his daughter and half his kingdom to any prince who could slay the dragon. The princess was widely famed for her beauty and many princes sought the dragon most of them younger sons whose only means this was to gain a kingdom.

Will knew nothing of this: nothing about the dragon. His first awareness came with a metallic flapping of wings and the bright glint of sunlight from copper green scales. By that time there was no hope of escape. It had seen him. Perhaps he could stun it long enough to make his retreat. A rather vain hope it seemed. He looked around frantically for a weapon, a club a some sort. But there was none. There was only the old crone’s staff.

The dragon was almost upon him when Will threw the staff. It flew unerringly into the dragon’s flaming maw. The flame immediately snuffed out and the dragon fell stunned its momentum gouging a deep furrow in the ground. Will was knocked aside but unhurt. He took to his heels not knowing when it might revive. But it would not revive. Not with a witch’s staff in its throat.

Will kept watching his back track anxiously for the rest of that day and toward evening he saw a dust cloud coming up rapidly behind. Not a dragon but obviously horses. He waited for them to come up hoping to get directions. As they approached, he found them to be a farmer’s wain and driven by a prince at breakneck speed. Behind this came the prince’s squire leading an extra saddle horse. It became clear that the prince was quite prepared to run Will down if he did not quit the road. He leapt into the bushes and so missed seeing the contents of the wain.

This high-handed treatment made the normally placid Will angry. There was nothing that he could do about it, a prince is a prince and above common courtesy, but he muttered to himself, “Perhaps someone will ride roughshod over him one day. Then see how he likes it.” Although angry, he would not have said this if he had realised that his ‘perhaps’ had unusual force. He would never deliberately wish ill on anyone.

As it turned out, He did not need their help. Cresting the next rise, he found a city stretched out before him. To Will, it seemed immense. ‘Surely there will be work for me here,’ he thought. ‘Perhaps there’ll even be someone with a mill wanting a good hand.’ He slept under a bush that night and entered the city early the next morning.

There was great excitement on the streets. Several people grabbed Will’s arm to tell him the news. The day before, one of the visiting princes, Rupert of Craiberg, had killed the dragon after a fierce hours-long battle. He had brought its head into the city to present it to the king as proof. Hearing the details of this battle made Will thankful that he had escaped before the dragon regained conciousness.

Actually, the dragon was dead although still warm when Prince Rupert found it. The staff in its gullet had done for it. Rupert could hardly believe his luck. The beautiful princess and a kingdom were his. He was going to enjoy the chagrin of the other contenders. After a cautious approach, he had driven his sword into the beast’s heart and carved other wounds to simulate a fierce battle. His clothes he tore and singed over a wood fire to add an extra touch of authenticity. The witch’s staff helped to fuel that fire.

Rupert had finally cut off the dragon’s head and sent his squire to commandeer the farmer’s wain after which he had driven into town with all haste. With what he considered fitting modesty, he had paraded the head down the main thoroughfare for the benefit of an admiring populace. His personal account of the battle already lurid and imaginative had grown more so as it spread abroad.

But Will’s urgent need was work. He was directed to the palace. There would be celebrations: a wedding. Almost certainly they would need temporary help.

There was a great deal of coming and going at the palace and he was directed to the kitchen door. His timid knock was answered by a kitchen maid of about his own age. Her name was Greta. She had reddish hair, freckles, and a snub nose and Will, who was quite unused to girls, thought that she was the most beautiful creature that he had ever seen. He stood there tongue tied. “Well, come on,” she said and dragged him into the kitchen. “You can help me wash these vegetables. We’re running late.”

After that he was kept permanently occupied. With all the celebrations being put in hand, the wedding preparations, and the imminent deluge of foreign royalty, the palace was in turmoil. There were so many extra staff that no-one thought to ask Will who had hired him.

A vacant corner was found for him to sleep. Not that any of the palace staff found much time to sleep just then. Although things appeared to run smoothly in public, life was hectic in the lower regions of the palace. There seemed to be one crisis after another, particularly in the kitchens.

As Will gained confidence, he would suggest, “Perhaps if we did it this way.” His suggestions had a way of working out. One area where he did not gain confidence though was with the kitchen maids who delighted in playing up to him to make him blush. Greta, assuming the role of mentor, was always quick to come to his aid at such times.

The wedding of the beautiful princess and the handsome prince came and went. Supposedly a marriage made in heaven, the palace servants knew otherwise. They had suffered from the princess’s hauteur and petulance: her acid tongue. “Poor Rupert,” they said. And they were in agreement that the king had played a mean trick in saddling Rupert with a crumbling castle and territory that he was only too pleased to quit.

With the guests gone, it was time to pay off the temporary staff. Will, though found now not to be on the roster, was paid off as was Greta. He was asked to stay on but no. An earlier ‘perhaps’ advanced a further step. It was not fate that took Greta to the kitchen door that day. Her father was a miller without sons and needed honest help. That was Will.

He gave his sack to needy widow who called at the mill seeking charity. He produced for her the amazing loaf, fresh and warm, and told her of his meeting with the holy man. Will had always felt the blessing undeserved, by him at any rate, but hoped that it would remain with the sack when it left his possession. And it did. But now, miracle of miracles, it produced a large loaf exactly suited to her family’s size.

He kept the walnut shell and its contents. He had no idea what, if anything, they were supposed to do but they had been given to him by a man for whom they had special value. One treasured and kept such gifts.

Will served his new master well and time made him to all intents the miller’s son. The mill’s reputation grew and its business prospered as never before. Being in close contact with Greta made it natural that Will should hope, ‘Perhaps someday the two of us…..’ Which made their marriage inevitable in spite of his reticence. And when the nut shell with the blessing became their common property, Greta’s dreams—her ‘perhaps’—- like their shared dreams– also had a tendency to happen.