A Sharp Knife Is Safer 7: 19th Century and Possibly British
"Looking in the papers, I happened upon a notice by a certain purveyor of fine cutlery."
Welcome back to the series where I tell the same story 100 ways. Today’s is long, and from the past.
19th Century and Possibly British
In my youth, having completed my studies at the preparatory academy, and anticipating four years of higher scholastic pursuits, I yet possessed an interim of some months in which to seek my fortune.
In summers previous, I had found employment in the various public houses, serving victuals and disposing of waste. But following my matriculation, I felt myself graduated also from such plebeian work. Looking in the papers, I happened upon a notice by a certain purveyor of fine cutlery. In short order, having purchased a sample of said purveyor’s wares, I became the company’s licensed representative. I was now tasked with demonstrating the capability of these wares to prospective buyers.
These buyers were, according to custom, drawn from the ranks of the seller’s own relations, familial and social. Said relations would then provide letters of recommendation to relations further removed, such that in time (and in theory) the seller could practice his trade with the whole of the nation, one estate at a time.
This seemed a fit plan for my colleagues, whose relations counted among them doctors, solicitors, architects, and diverse other professionals of a comfortable estate, with the means to spend a day’s wages on a butcher’s cleaver. Some might make the purchase not even for want of such an implement, but merely to support a young family friend making his way in the world. These young friends, my colleagues, had little need for the income in the first place, as their fathers ensured their hands never must touch the bottom of a bare pocket.
As you may have surmised, dear reader, such was not the case for me. My relations were sober church-goers who held thrift next to godliness. Nor was I any charming Mephistopheles, in my musty borrowed suit and my shirt stained beneath the arms, my nose running, my arrival invariably late. My reluctant congregation spurned my false gospel of the blade and cast me from their presence with nary a calling card. Thus, beyond failing to unburden my employer of its wares, I could not win even a chance at future custom. I was the prophet unaccepted in my country.
The end of summer drew near. I was shortly to venture south to New Spain, to assist the local clergy in their ministrations. And here I had taken my own unwilling vow of poverty.
Ah, but what mother ewe can but hearken to her lamb’s piteous bleating? In truth I know nothing of the ways of sheep. But I know the ways of my own mother. It was she who had raised greatest objection to my summer’s endeavor, she who warned against chasing gold with steel. But mother she was, and so, though it was yet some months away, she purchased through me one pocketknife for the name day of my father, who was a craftsman by trade and hobby. With this sale I procured my first and only commission. It was a gift, then, to husband and to son.
Apart from my samples, I did not carry merchandise on my person; it was delivered directly to customers by post. As luck would have it, my father’s gift arrived on the very day I was to leave on my desert sojourn. I carried it with me on the carriage. My mother planned to deposit me at port, then convey the gift home. In the meantime, I decided I would make a closer examination of it.
I had taken some liking to the line of goods I represented. This had made the sting all the sharper when my enthusiasm and knife-lust proved in no way contagious to my fellow man. In the carriage, I turned the closed knife this way and that. My father was handy with any tool; he had taught me to whittle a stick to a point, though I had since forgotten the lesson. When I opened the knife, the blade locked in place with a click. My mother objected to my “playing,” but I assured her that all was safe, and demanded she take note of the locking mechanism. And it is then that I traced a crimson line across my palm.
Through some wonder, even after diverting the carriage to a local stable and applying amateur medical attention, we arrived at port in time to board. My mother took home the knife without further incident, and cleaned it. The next winter, I came home from university to witness her bestow the gift to my father. With great mirth we revealed that his new tool had already tasted blood. And the following summer, I chose a humbler trade, selling pastries as apprentice at a bakery, where I dared not slice a loaf.
I just read Rivka Galchen’s short story collection American Innovations, which is fun like a Crayola 96-box. Each story is inspired by an existing “canonical” story, but there’s no prerequisite for enjoying the collection. The book itself only mentions this in the jacket copy.
I also recommend Galchen’s novel Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch, a touching dark comedy about that time Johannes Kepler’s mother was tried for witchcraft while he was the imperial astrologer for the Holy Roman Emperor’s court.
There’s a similar novel, The Manningtree Witches by first-time novelist A.K. Blakemore, about another historical witch hunt in England just two years after Mother Kepler’s. Blakemore is also a poet, and it’s obvious in the opening pages. Read them aloud, even to yourself, and feel the bite of the words.