Tomas lived on a farm, a remote hillfarm at the end of a long valley underneath the big hill, where the weather was either damp or wet. Where nothing grew but coarse grass and bracken He was rather a lonely boy, having no brother or sisters, or indeed any friends, because the other farms were over the other side of the big hill. Well that was not quite true. He did have friends. His friends were the animals who lived on the farm, and he saw them everyday when he went to feed them. “Hello my friends the sheep” he would say, or “Hello my friends the chickens”. They rarely answered him. The problem was they were not very loyal friends. Every so often some would go missing never to return, but there always younger ones replacing them. It was odd that his father never asked him to look for those, but when a lamb was missing he’d be expected to search up and down the big hill till he found it caught in some bushes at the bottom or trapped on the rocks near the top.

In fact Tomas was kept rather busy one the farm being an only child. Apart from feeding the animals, he repaired the fences, built stone walls, cleaned the house, made the cheeses and baked the bread they ate. Then one day when Tomas was 12 his father said he should come to the market in town with him the next week. And Tomas found out what why his friends disappeared. His father sold them! I should point out that Tomas was not the brightest of boys. Anyway the journey into town, herding fifty sheep down the narrow lanes took two long days. Their dogs kept the sheep together on the road and at night, when Tomas and his dad slept under the hedgerows. They passed through villages that Tomas had never heard of, crossed bubbling brooks and rushing rivers, climbed up and down hills. Tomas was surprised when he saw the town. Nothing in his life had prepared him for this. He’d never believed there could be so many people - ever, and all in fancy clothes, talking to each other or busy going from place to place in the town. And he saw shops for the first time, and the market where the sheep were sold. There was even an old castle that was falling down in places. The flock of sheep was shooed into a pen, and Tomas saw his father had over two copper pennies to a man. They made their way to a big yard where a crowd of men of all ages and sizes leaned on sticks and smoked clay pipes had gathered. His father explained what happened. “That man up there” he said pointing to a man at a desk holding a little hammer, “will name a price for the sheep and one of the men watching will raise a hand or touch his cap, or even just wink, to say he wants to buy at that price. Then the man at the desk will name a higher price and someone else will give a signal. This will go on until only one man will want to pay the highest price. Then I get paid for the sheep, and he takes them away. I’m hoping to get ten pounds for this lot”. First some bulls were sold. Then some groups of cows. And then some pigs and piglets, in groups or on their own. Finally it was time for sheep to be sold.

“What happens next?” asks Tomos. “We buy some things with the money at the shops and go home till next year, and the man with the sheep will sell them to butchers for them to sell in their shops” replied his father. “And he will probably sell then for double what I get” he added. The auction of Tomas’s father’s sheep was over in a matter of minutes and Tomas never noticed who was bidding it was so quick, but his father was pleased to get twelve pounds for the flock. On the way home Tomas, for once in his life was rather thoughtful. For a whole year we raise sheep and sell them for twelve pounds to a man who will sell them the next day for twenty or even twenty four pounds. He thought about all the work he was expected to do in a year working hard on the farm, and how easy the buyer made his money.

Tomas brooded over this for a couple of weeks, while he sawed logs and repaired fences and dug ditches, and he made his big decision. Instead of working on the farm for the rest of his life, he would be one of the men who bought the sheep and sold them to the butchers. What an easy life he would have, He knew his father would not let him do that, with him already doing so much work on the farm, so he was going to run away from home and make his way to the town. One morning he got up early; even earlier than normal for a farmer always has be up and out of bed before dawn. He took some bread and cheese from the pantry, and put the two pennies he had saved in his pocket and slipped out of the house silently so as not to wake the dogs.

The first bit of the journey was easy. The sun shined, the birds sang and he passed through the first of the villages. But he soon came to a crossroads. He wished he had taken more notice of which way they had gone to the town. He decide it must have been the left turn, but the lane twisted and turned, and had high banks topped with a tall hedge. He looked through gates when he passed them, but there were just a field beyond, bordered by more tall hedges.  After a stop for some bread and cheese it was mid morning and he found himself at a another crossroads. It looked rather like the one he had come to before, so this time he turned right. Again the lane twisted and turned and again the it was bordered by high banks and tall hedges. After a stop for the rest of the bread and cheese it was mid afternoon and he came to yet another crossroads,; and it looked just like the other two. So this time he went straight on and again the lane twisted and turned. And now he was getting hungry but had nothing left to eat. It was also getting dark and beginning to rain. There were some woods ahead. Perhaps I can shelter there and get some sleep he thought. But the lane became a track with high hedges, and the track became a path with even higher hedges, and still the woods looked a long way off. It was now quite dark and the rain was heavy, when he saw an old cottage lit up by a flash of lightning just a hundred yards away nestling inside a copse of trees. It was built of stone and had a thatched roof with two gabled windows. There was a wooden door and two square windows either side. The curtains were drawn and no light came out, but someone was at home, because he could see smoke coming from the chimney. Smoke must mean a fire and warmth, and could even mean hot cooked food He crossed a field, had to jump over a stream, tread carefully through a patch of nettles before he reached the cottage. So feeling too cold, too wet, too miserable and too hungry to worry about appearing rude he walked up to the cottage and knocked on the door.

The door opened almost immediately and there, frame in the light, was an old lady. She was a bit shorter than Tomas, and had her grey hair in a bun on top of her head. She was wearing a pink cardigan, with a clean blue apron. She looked at Tomas, with a smile and a twinkle in her eyes through the glasses perched on the end of her nose, and said “Come in, come in dear boy. You look lost and all alone, and you must be cold and wet outside on a night like this.” Tomas stepped over the threshold, and she put he arm around his shoulders and led him to a chair in front of a blazing log fire. “You sit yourself there, and dry yourself and warm yourself,” she said. “You are lucky, I have a stew nearly ready in the kitchen and there’s more than enough for two”, and she disappeared into the kitchen. Tomas could hear her humming to herself as he sat in front of the fire, and by the time she brought out two dishes of stew and set them on the table he was quite warm and just a bit damp.

The two sat down to each, and the old lady asked him what he was doing out at night. Tomas started telling her his story and how he was going to the town to make his fortune. It was a long story and they had both finished their stews before he had finished, so the old lady went and refilled his dish for him. The stew was delicious and meaty. Tomas didn’t have meat to eat at home very often. Lots of onions and potatoes and carrots too. And big chunks of bread to dip into it. When he had finally finished eating and was as full as he had ever been, the old lady said he needed a good night’s sleep and led him upstairs to her spare bedroom. It was a nice room. It even had a carpet, and the bed was a proper bed, with a proper mattress and a quilt made of all different coloured cloths. Back home his bed was sacks stuffed with old straw, and his blanket was a smelly old sheep fleece. Tomas fell asleep almost straight away.

When he awoke in the morning the sun was already high in the sky. Tomas couldn’t remember when had been allowed to sleep in so late. There was a tap on the bedroom door and the kindly old lady pushed open and came in carrying a tray. “No, no” she said as Tomas swung a leg over the edge of his bed. “You have your breakfast in bed”. On the tray was a plate of sizzling bacon, a two fried eggs and juicy mushrooms. There was two slices of bread fresh from the oven, and a large glass of creamy milk. “You tuck into that”, she said. “I’ll be out in the garden in my vegetable patch” she said as she left the room. Tomas had never had a breakfast as good as this, not even on his birthday. He finished it all off and even licked the plate clean. He met the old lady in her vegetable garden where she had lifted some onions and dug up some potatoes. And she had picked some nice red juicy strawberries too.

She picked up her baskets and said “Come into the cottage, and you can tell me all about yourself”. So Tomas followed her inside and told her all about himself and his life on the farm, and told her his plans to get rich in the town. “Well its too late in the day now for you to go off and seek your fortune” said the old lady. “I was going to have liver and onions with roast potatoes for dinner this evening, and there’s more than enough for two”. So Tomas and the old lady sat down and had another tasty meal, better than any Tomas could remember, and again there was a refill for his plate. He still had room for a bowl of strawberries with some deliciously creamy cream. That evening he sat in front of the fire, and the old lady’s tabby cat jumped onto his lap and purred and purred and purred.

Next morning Tomas woke late again and had another breakfast in bed brought to him. If anything the bacon was even better this time. When he finally went downstairs the old lady said she was going for a walk across the fields as there were some things she needed, and Tomas went with her. She showed Tomas where the blackberries would be good for picking, and where the chestnut trees in the woods grew. But today she was picking other plants. “tonight we are having nettle soup”. Tomas was surprised to find out you could eat stinging nettles. And the old lady pointed to a plant and asked if he knew what it was. Tomas only knew it as a weed, but the old lady told him it was called Good King Henry and was a better green than cabbage. That night they had the nettle soup, which Tomas couldn’t get enough of, and a cottage pie with more potatoes and the Good King Henry. Tomas went to bed with a full tummy yet again.

As you can expect, the next day started off in a similar pattern. Although Tomas never suggested he should continue his journey, the old lady suggested he stay another day or two because she was knitting him a nice new warm jumper because he seemed to have left home without any proper warm clothing. That night they dined on toad in the hole with succulent browned all over sausages, and the next they had trout, which Tomas had never eaten before. The old lady spent the afternoon showing Tomas how to catch them but lying on the river bank hardly moving, and tickling their bellies till they could be grabbed and pulled from the water. By now Tomas was beginning to enjoy his lazy wed fed life and wasn’t even thinking of when he should move on and seek his fortune in the town. The days became a week or more, and Tomas was now putting on a little weight. Breakfast in bed everyday and seconds of delicious dinner every evening.

But as he went to bed one night he remembered his quest, and why he had run away from home. He decided that next morning he should ask the old lady which way he should go and set off for the big town. When he woke in the morning though, things were not right. It was cold and dark, his bed seemed hard and flat, and he couldn’t move. He realised that he wasn’t in bed, but stretched out and tied down to a table in what must be a cellar below the cottage. Then he heard the old lady coming down some stairs behind him, and she was carrying a candle. Quite afraid he managed to say “Please untie me, I should be getting on to make my fortune in the big town”.

“Oh is that what you intend to do is it”, replied the old lady. “And leave me here all alone again, like you did to your poor, hard-working father on the farm. You really are quite a selfish little boy. You never think of anybody except yourself, do you? You have had breakfast brought to you each morning and never offered to wash the dishes. You came out to the vegetable garden, but never offered to do any digging. We have been out collecting food, but you never carried anything for an old lady. You have happily feasted here every evening, but never offered to help prepare anything. You were going to seek your fortune, but never even asked me my name”.

Tomas was now crying, tears were welling up in his eyes. “Please ubtie tie me he” he managed to burble between his sobs. “I promise to help you for a few days Mrs Old Lady”, he added without realising that would not help him at all.

The old lady now stood where Tomas could see her in the candlelight, and he could see that she no longer looked like a kindly old lady. Her face, once round and smiling, was sharp and stern; and in her hand was what looked like a rather sharp butcher’s chapping knife. “You won’t be helping me, or going anywhere now, young Tomas”, she declared. “There are always boys running away from home, looking to seek their fortune. Selfish, self-centred boys who think they know it all, who will take advantage of a kindly old lady. And they always get lost and find their way to my little cottage here in the middle of nowhere. Why there is another one right now, lost in the winding lanes, with nothing to eat, and it looks like a storm coming. No I cannot let you go, for you have eaten so much of my food, and soon he will be knocking on my door and I would like to give him some grilled chops for his dinner. Oh no, young Tomas, you are going nowhere.”