‘There once was a drunken potter,’ Spackleface said loudly, ‘who got home one night very much the worse for wear. He stumbled around in the dark until he tripped over some broken terracotta jugs and cut his head on a shard.’
‘Oh, how terrible!’ said the croc.
‘QUIET!’ shouted the monkey, glaring. The crocodile shrank back into the mud, apologizing profusely. ‘This potted potter,’ Spackleface continued calmly, ‘cursed his pain and passed out flat on his back. He had slashed his forehead. Blood streamed over his face, clogging his eyes, entering his mouth and sloshing into his right ear. He was a gruesome mess, and when he came around, gagging, a few minutes later, he rose and staggered to a trough of filthy water normally used by the goat. He splashed his face with this vile water, bumbled into his shack, fumbled in the dark for a grubby rag to staunch his wound and crashed down on his bed.
In a short time, without proper treatment, the wound developed into a vicious scar running diagonally from his right hairline across the brow of his left eye nearly to the top of the ear. From then on he looked a frightful brute, but he wasn’t really – he was just a large, amiable potter with a drink problem.
Life continued as it does for big ugly potters everywhere, with its usual litter of triumphs and defeats. One of these defeats was that Scarface – for such he was soon nicknamed in his village – began to lose sales. For reasons totally unconnected to his drunken accident, the bottom dropped
Scarface the Potter 29
out of the clay-pot market, and soon he hadn’t enough money for food, or even ale.
Fortunately some of his pub mates were soldiers on local duty, and they still had enough cash to buy him a drink or two when they met up. The question inevitably arose: “Why don’t you join up, mate? Come with us next week! We’re leaving for the capital, the big city, and you could come along. You never know where you’ll end up but at least you’ll get food, bed, grog, and – sometimes – pay and booty.”
Scarface took his friends’ advice; he quit potting and joined the army. He underwent brief training, and the next thing anyone knew, he and his mates were stationed together in the capital’s barracks. It wasn’t glamorous duty but it was a lot more exciting than village life. One day, however, he seemed to hit the jackpot when the king noticed his fearsome face during a routine troop review.
“Good heavens!” the king thought to himself. “Now there’s a brave fellow to terrify the enemy. I rather like the cut of his brow.” Soon enough the monarch himself drafted Scarface into his palace guard. Not only that, but it was soon clear that he had become a royal favourite, to the annoyance of his mates. They were too frightened of the king to do anything about it except to tease Captain Ugly Mugly, as they called him, after his undeserved promotion. To put it another way, he was the wrong guy at the right time in the right place, but he didn’t know that yet of course.
Yes, here was Scarface, the silly fraud. Working, to be sure but, by military standards, as pampered as a lapdog. His comrades attached enormous weight to the most trivial of events. For example, when the king passed him a pair of his old socks (and dirty ones at that) the royal discard was to Scarface and his mates like precious coin. “The king gave him a pair of socks!” Gossip traveled around the palace and far beyond as tongues wagged. “What is it about this brute that so intrigues
the king?” courtiers asked. Nobody could fathom it. “He isn’t even a real soldier!” they complained. Words flew helter skelter, denigrating or defending Scarface. “The king spoke to Scarface!” some exclaimed. “Who is this soldier and what kind of spell has he cast over our noble leader?” Rumour reached fever pitch when the royal hand casually passed Scarface a peach from a nearby bowl of fruit. “Good God!” the Vizier thought, “he’s FEEDING him now!”
Quite soon Scarface had many would-be friends who gave him small presents, including a few gold coins, asking after his health and such like, and “By the way have you ever heard His Majesty speak out about this or that, diamond mining in the south, for example, or a disputed track of land near Orissa, or that vacancy for a new provincial governor?” Although not the brightest spark, Scarface, it must be said, soon learned to refuse all such entreaties to exploit his position, saying to himself: “I didn’t earn this honour, so it’s not mine to turn to commercial advantage.” Nevertheless, it didn’t occur to him to wonder: “Why is the king attracted to me? What have I done?” He may have had a moral streak but his curiosity was limited. He knew he was one of the king’s minor favorites, and that was good enough for him. His unthinking motto, if it could have been plumbed, ran something like this:
“Ours not to question why, Ours but to satisfy!”
Captain Ugly Mugly wasn’t exactly smug, but he was in danger of taking a tumble. Easy come, easy go. What
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happened to trip him up was Veterans’ Day, the annual extravaganza when all the country’s warriors gathered at the capital for a massive ritual celebrating their glorious military history.
Over countless decades, thousands had fallen in terrible battles in defense of the realm. Every veteran had a duty to remember dead comrades and former heroes. Their pitiful stories of privation and bravery under unimaginable conditions inspired in all citizens a sense of worth and valour. This was the land of the brave, of honourable men and chaste women, of the brightest children, and where all grandchildren were geniuses. Its citizens must be always alert to the dreaded enemy, lurking in darkness, ready to spring upon the innocent.
On Veterans’ Day, elephants would be arrayed in armour and battle colours, horses caparisoned and the bravest men lined up in full dress uniform for royal inspection. There would be long speeches, endless parades, banquets, music, dance, chants, amazing costumes and a blaze of pageantry to gladden the heart of any patriot. It was during the preparation for this celebration that the king decided to find out more about his favourite guard, “Tell me, my good man, how came you by your magnificent scar?”
“Well it was like this, Your Royal Highness. I used to be a potter, and one night when I came home drunk, and …” Scarface soon poured forth his grubby tale.
The king was enraged. “A potter! A worker in common clay! Trickster!” he shouted. “I’ll show you battle. Seize the imposter,” he instructed the guards. “Thrash him!”
This royal command was music to the ears of his comrades who now gave vent to their resentment. They threw him to the floor to give him the drubbing of his life.
“Pity, Sire! Mercy!” Scarface cried out, trying to defend himself as blows rained down all over his body. “At least you
could give me a chance to prove myself. You could test me.” “Desist, men,” the king said to the other guards. “Test YOU, Scarface? Test you HOW, you miserable worm?”
“Test me in battle, Your Majesty! See whether I’m soldier material or not.”
“Ha! Test you in battle? Don’t be ridiculous! You’ll slay no elephants, my boy, as the wise have said.”
All the guards, as well as the bashed and bleeding Scarface, stared back uncomprehendingly at the king. “You … you know what I’m talking about, don’t you?” the king spluttered. “The story about the lions and the … the … er … jackal cub?”
The guards stood in abashed ignorance as if they’d been turned into stone, hardly daring to breathe. “No, Sire,” the bravest one among them ventured just above a whisper, “I don’t think we do.”
“Oh, for heavens sake!” said the monarch. “What’s the matter with you lot? Don’t you know anything?” He snatched a halberd from one of the guards and banged its butt loudly on the marble floor. “Scarface, sit up!” he said. “The rest of you,” he said banging the halberd again, “onto the floor. Settle down and listen or I’ll pin your ears back.”
Thus it was that this king, attended by one of the most captive audiences in recent history, began his rendition of the traditional tale. Understandably any court functionary, servant, waiter, petitioner, dignitary, foreign personage and idler present or passing by during the narration felt it prudent to gather around and sit awkwardly on the floor to listen. Scarface, bloodied but thankful to be alive, was the most attentive of all.