Churn Milk Peg

 

One fine morning, up in the Yorkshire Dales, where sheep graze peacefully on the rolling hills, Tom and his sister Katie set out to explore.

'Stay close to the path,' said their Grandma, 'and keep well away from the hazelnuts, or you'll upset Churn Milk Peg.'

'Who's Churn Milk Peg?' asked Tom, intrigued by such a strange name.

'Churn Milk Peg owns all the unripe hazelnuts,' said Grandma, ' and she doesn't like children picking them before they're ready to eat.'

The two children looked at each other and grinned, thinking that this was just one of Grandma's many stories, before setting off across the field and down towards the stream by the crumbling stone wall.

The sun shone warmly, and the stream burbled softly over smooth grey stones, as Tom and Katie followed its path along the Dale. Rooks argued up in the trees and lambs called for their mothers in the fields as high above them all, buzzards circled silently on the thermals, calling to each other, just because they could.

Tom found a few nearly ripe blackberries growing by the wall and gobbled them greedily, staining his fingers purple, as Katie picked small meadow flowers to take back to Grandma in a posy: purple gentians, devil's-bit scabious, knapweed and harebell.

Presently, they came across a copse of trees in a hollow between the old stone wall and the stream, and they sat on the bank in the shade as Tom threw pebbles into the water. Katie was busy binding her posy, when she suddenly noticed a small cluster of hazelnuts lying in the grass beside her which must have been blown down in the recent heavy rainstorm.

'Look Tom,' she cried with excitement. 'Hazelnuts, your favourite.'

Tom looked up and quickly realised that they were sitting directly beneath an old hazelnut tree heavily laden with fruit; the pale green nuts peeking out from beneath little bonnets of spiky leaves. He jumped up and plucked a handful from the lowest branch.

'You know what Grandma said, Tom. Keep away from the hazelnuts, or we'll upset Churn Milk Peg.'

But Tom just grinned, picked up two suitable stones from the ground and began breaking open the nuts. He bit into one and started chewing, handing one to Katie as he did so.

'Yuck,' Katie grimaced. 'That's bitter.'

'They're not too bad once you get used to them,' said Tom. Here, try another.'

For several minutes the two children ate green hazelnuts and pretended that they didn't taste too bad. They did really, but neither of them wanted to be the first to admit it. Tom even stood up to take more from the tree, but just as he'd pulled another handful from a low branch, something horrible stepped out from behind it and he gasped.

An old woman with white hair curled around her face and dressed in a long brown shawl stood before him. She carried a small churn under one arm and had a long clay pipe hanging from the corner of her mouth. She rocked slowly from side to side and the milk in her churn sloshed gently as she did so.

Katie jumped up beside Tom and stared at the old lady.

'Are you Churn Milk Peg?' she asked.

The old woman didn't reply, but instead lowered her rheumy eyes to the broken shells scattered beneath her tree and frowned. She reached up and touched a leaf above her and it immediately turned black and fell to the ground. The two children stared in disbelief.

'Green nuts are not ready to eat,' she told them. 'They must stay on the tree until they are ripe.' Her voice was low and dry, like leaves in the wind

Just at that very moment, both Tom and Katie's tummies began to rumble and they both began to feel unwell. The old lady smiled.

'That is the price you pay for impatience,' she told them sternly. 'Give me back the nuts you have just taken from my tree.'

Tom dropped the cluster of green nuts into the old woman's wizened hand and she glared at him.

'Good things come to those who wait,' she told them. 'Learning patience is often bitter, but your reward will be sweet.'

With that she turned and disappeared behind the tree and the two children, now both feeling decidedly unwell, rushed back to Grandma's house.

Grandma took one look at them and knew exactly what had happened.

'Did you eat green hazelnuts?' she asked.

They both nodded.

'Did you meet Churn Milk Peg?' she asked with a smile.

They nodded again.

That night, when the sky was dark and the owls were hooting, Tom was awoken from a fitful sleep by a strange sloshing noise. He jumped out of bed and went to his window and there, by Grandma's front gate stood Churn Milk Peg.

Moonlight shone on her white hair and the small churn beneath her arm. She looked up and waved to him and he waved back. She then turned slowly and disappeared into the darkness.

Only then did Tom realise that his tummy ache had completely gone and he climbed back into bed, pulled the covers up around his ears and fell into a deep sleep.

The next morning Tom woke bright and early and crept downstairs before Grandma and Katie had woken. When he went into the kitchen, he found the table already laid for breakfast, and three steaming bowls of porridge stood waiting. Beside each bowl lay a cluster of hazelnuts, their shiny brown faces smiling out from beneath bonnets of spiky green leaves.

Tom smiled. He knew they were ripe, and he was quite happy to wait.