She bent her back as the ceiling sloped, and then she was kneeling in front of the dormer window and, as Dan Flynn had said, she now seemed to be in heaven, looking down on the world, the world of the house. She gave a high laugh and turned her face swiftly to him as she pointed. ‘I…I can see me window, there on the corner. The mistress’s window faces the front, mine, the little one, it’s on the corner. But it isn’t so little, it only looks little from here.’
‘That’s your room?’ he asked.
‘Aye. Yes.’
‘Is it nice?’
She didn’t answer immediately. She was looking into his eyes now; their faces were close, not six inches apart, and she wanted for some strange and not understandable reason to please him by saying, ‘No, I hate it, as much as I did the cart.’ But she couldn’t, because she didn’t hate it. She said simply, ‘It’s quite nice, plain but nice.’
Plain? she thought. There was nothing in that place plain. If he could see the mistress’s bedroom he in his turn would think he had landed in heaven; even the mantelshelf was draped in velvet with tassels four inches long.
As she looked at the house again she realised that she had been away long enough and so she screwed round on her knees, saying, ‘I’ll have to be gettin’ back, me time’s bound to be up.’
He made no comment on this but led the way down the ladder and to where they were all waiting, some in the bedroom, the others on the landing, and it seemed strange to her that they should all wait for her like this.
‘Isn’t it a grand sight?’ said Dorry, and Kirsten replied, ‘Indeed yes, wonderful.’
Stretching her arm out to the partly open door opposite the ladder. Dorry said, ‘That’s me own private abode but I won’t take you in, it’s always like a padden-can.’ Only the children laughed at this.
Elizabeth now led the way down the stairs, through the storeroom and out along the rock-paved terrace and so into the first of the last two cottages. Here Kirsten saw the children’s bedrooms, one for the girls, one for the boys, a double bed in each, with a rough-hewn headboard and covered in patchwork quilts. There were rope mats on the floors and roped-framed pictures on the walls, the pictures themselves being of wild flowers worked on brown hessian. And it was Colum who pointed out the pictures, saying with quiet pride, ‘Ma’s work; she’s a dab hand with her needle.’
Kirsten looked at the two tallest people in the crowded room and she noticed that the mother and son smiled warmly at each other, and she thought again he was a strange fella, changeable, full of moods.
Outside on the terrace again, Elizabeth was for turning towards the main door when Dan said in a jocular tone, ‘Now don’t let her miss the last one.’ But Colum said, ‘She doesn’t want to go in there.’
‘Why not for?’ And Dan leant his face towards Kirsten as he asked, ‘You afraid of coffins?’
‘Coffins?’ Kirsten considered; then with a little movement of her head she said, ‘No.’ But she didn’t know whether she was afraid or not, coffins were linked with death and the fever.
‘Well, come on then and see some works of art.’ Dan thrust open the door and led the way into a room which, as in the other cottages, had been made larger by stripping the in-between walls, and there in a row almost filling the room stood eight coffins, and at the far end a long work bench, which was clean of sawdust and with tools that were arranged in wooden slots on the wall above it.
‘This one here’—Dan was patting an oak coffin that had darkened to almost black, with a sheen on it as if it had been newly polished—‘you’ll never guess, but that’s all of ninety years old. It’s the last of me great-granda’s lot. Those three in the middle’—he pointed up the row—‘Peter, Paul and Moses we call them.’ His laugh was high and merry now. ‘Those were me granda’s effort, an’ the farther two me own father made. It’s a custom in the family, but me, I haven’t done me share yet. I’ll get down to it though, never fear.’ He was jerking his head now at Colum, and then he said to him, you’ll soon have to be makin’ a start.’ But as he finished speaking his eyes turned towards Kirsten, and, as if in explanation he ended, ‘For when you marry you have to prepare to bury.’
‘Come away, come away out of it.’ It was Dorry’s voice now, shouting from outside the door. ‘On me birthday an’ all! I’ll have the collywobbles in the night thinkin’ I’ll not see another.’
When they finally emerged Elizabeth was standing near the far wall looking down into the valley and to the river, and Kathie and Sharon were with her. Elizabeth turned at their approach, and Kirsten, adjusting her shawl about her and fingering the ends, said shyly, ‘I’d like to thank you, mam…Eliz-a—’
They were roaring now, all of them. The girls were hanging onto each other’s necks, the boys were leaning against the wall. Dan was thumping his breeches with his fist, and Colum was looking at her, his mouth wide. Her inability to speak Elizabeth’s name was convulsing them.
Elizabeth now took Kirsten’s plucking fingers from the shawl and, bending over her, said kindly, ‘I hope you come often enough to get used to calling me by me own name.’
‘Thank you, I’d like…I’d like to. You’ve…You’ve been so kind.’ She cast her glance swiftly around the whole family. ‘It’s been a…’ She searched for a word. She thought of surprise, but that didn’t fit; the word she wanted was revelation, but she wasn’t acquainted with it, and so she ended, ‘It’s been a happy day, the happiest time out I’ve ever had in me whole life.’
‘And it’s been a happy day for us an’ all.’ Dorry was again chatting. ‘I’ve never had a caller on me birthday; in fact, we’ve never had a caller for a year or more, have we now?’ She looked about her, and the children gave her the answer by shaking their heads. ‘It’s been a grand birthday. But as you say, you’ll have to be away now for the child will be gettin’ hungry. Does he yell when he wants his feed? All this lot did.’ She waved her hand to indicate the family, and Kirsten said, ‘Yes, he does that, he lets you know when he’s hungry.’
‘Then he’s a lusty youngster. An’ I hope you don’t truss him up with binders like a chicken; I’ve always believed in lettin’ them kick, givin’ their limbs their fling, Flynn’s fling.’ She was laughing again.
‘You must be on your way.’ Elizabeth’s voice, little more than a whisper, cut through Dorry’s laughter and the fat woman became quiet and stepped aside, and Kirsten walked across the yard with Colum. The others followed them to the gap in the wall, but they came no farther. She had the idea that the children wanted to come down with her but that Elizabeth’s hand stayed them.
Halfway down the hill she turned and looked up, and she saw they had come to the top of the hill. She waved, and they all waved back to her.
Strangely now, away from the family the feeling of ease left her, just as it seemed to have left him, for they didn’t exchange a word all the way down the hill; there was an embarrassment on them that hadn’t been there before. Even as they were crossing the stones they still did not exchange a word.
On the far bank, near the end of the wall, they stood for a moment and looked at each other, and the embarrassment seemed to deepen, until he said, ‘The invite from me ma holds for any day when you’re off.’ And she answered politely. ‘Oh, ta. Thanks. Thank you very much.’
‘Will you make use of it?’
‘I’d like to.’
‘When will you be off again then?’
‘Next week perhaps; or maybe not till the week after; I just have to take it as it comes.’
‘But then you might want to go into the town and see the shops?’
‘I’m not particular for shops.’ She shook her head.
‘Well, then, in that case we’ll be seein’ you.’
‘Yes.’ She paused. ‘Goodbye to you then.’
‘And goodbye to you.’
The stepping stones finished almost where the wall began, there was only about a yard of clear bank on which to walk between them. And he did not put a foot pas
t the wall, but handed her around it, and she stepped from his land onto the master’s land and after glancing up at him she hurried across the meadow, up the slight incline and into the park. And as she went there grew inside her a strange elation as she experienced joy for the first time.
The sun was casting long shadows. It must, she thought, be about five o’clock. What if the child were crying and Miss Cartwright went for her! Well, it wouldn’t matter if she did, it would be worth a scolding for she’d had a wonderful time. She had been in the house on the hill not much more than an hour, but it had seemed like a full day. She had never known a time like it. Never had she seen people so happy; and yet they were poor; well, not exactly poor, look at that sugar basin; but not rich, not rich like the master. There was pride in them though. She hadn’t imagined that poor people could be proud; but then the family went back, they had ancestry—the coffins spoke of that—you could be proud when you knew where you came from. She wished she knew where she came from; she also wished she knew where she was going an’ all, and what was going to happen to her.
The happy feeling was seeping from her. Unconsciously she had taken the path that ran by the two trees with the little grave lying between them, and she stopped and looked towards it, and there came to her the strange desire in this moment to gather up the living child, her child, and run with it. She wanted to run now as she had wanted to run the night Ma Bradley told her she was going into the House. She saw a picture of herself running across the park here holding her child by the hand, crossing the stepping stones and going up the hill to that family, that happy family.
She was hurrying on again when she remembered what the jolly fat woman, Dorry, had said: ‘I hope you don’t truss him up with binders like a chicken. I’ve always believed in letting them kick, give their limbs their fling.’ And there was forced to the front of her mind something that had been niggling at her over the past days, in fact the past weeks. She herself undressed the child and bathed him, and wrapped him up either for night or day. Miss Cartwright would have nothing to do with that, and it had been too much like tedious work for the nurse, and so nobody had looked on the child’s bare body except the master, and that was but twice or thrice during his first days.
‘Let him kick,’ the laughing woman had said. Her child didn’t kick, that was the thing that had been niggling at her. It didn’t use its legs, it used its arms and its upper body. Its upper body was strong and fattening but its legs were slow in thickening out. To her knowledge it had never kicked its legs since it was born. She stood dead still among the towering trees. Florrie, Annie, Mary, Bob and Ada, their legs couldn’t move much; they all had the rickets. No! No! Blessed God, the child hadn’t rickets. Had she brought it over from Ma Bradley? She had been with rickety children since she was six. Perhaps rickets was like the fever, catching.
She picked up her skirts now and ran wildly through the remainder of the park. She skirted the ornamental garden with its pool and fountain; then she cut through to the vegetable garden. Although she could use the main staircase, she knew better than go in the front way, but instead of going round by the stables she took a short cut through the laundry—there was no-one in there today, it being a holiday. She thrust open the back door where the poss-tubs were, ran through into the ironing room and almost tripped over two figures on the floor. She let out a squeal, as did Florrie Stewart, the second laundress, at the same time trying to cover her bare limbs with her skirt, while Mr Hay, the second coachman made wild efforts to pull his trousers up.
Then Florrie Stewart, leaning on the big box mangle and hugging her waist as if in pain, was calling to Kirsten where she was now darting between the ironing tables towards the other exit: ‘A word about this an’ I’ll brain you, mind. Anyway you’ve got no room to talk, you cockeyed tinker!’
Kirsten had her head down now as she ran across the yard. She did not go through the kitchen, but took the side door which led along a passage to the green-baized door, which in turn led into a small hall and stairway, and as she hurried up the stairs, through another door and onto the first floor landing the lusty wail of the child came to her.
Outside the nursery Miss Cartwright was waiting. When Kirsten, walking now, came up to her, her mind in a whirl after the last encounter and an apology spluttering on her lips, Miss Cartwright allowed her to pass into the nursery and she closed the door behind her before she said, ‘You’re taking advantage aren’t you? Two hours and a half you’ve been gone, and where? Where have you been?’
‘I…I went for a walk by the river, an’ I met—’ she did not say ‘a young man’ but ‘the…the family that live in the house on the far side on top of the hill and they asked me in for…’
‘You’ve-been-over-the-river! You mean, you’ve been in the Flynns’ house?’
Kirsten was some time in answering—the look on Miss Cartwright’s face prevented her—and then she gave no verbal reply only a hesitant movement with her head.
‘Well! Well!’ Bella stood back from the creature, as in her mind she thought of Kirsten, and she smiled at her grimly now as she said under her breath, ‘If ever I needed a handle to get rid of you, you’ve given it to me yourself. Do you know that the Flynns and the master are sworn enemies? Of course they’re low scum, and far beneath the master’s notice, but through treachery they have annexed some of his land. That is the contention between them, and anyone who speaks to the Flynns would not have a moment’s breathing space in this house.’ She drew her chin into her neck and let a moment or two elapse before she said. ‘But visit the Flynns by all means, for you may need their championship sooner than you think; and they may set you on the road once more, for they are tinkers of a kind themselves…But now…get about your business and feed the child, and quickly! And after you have washed him see that he is tightly bound for his clothes are hanging on him like a sack…And…don’t forget, wash your hands first.’
Kirsten scurried to the wash-hand stand, washed her hands, then scurried to the cradle, picked up the child and bared her breast to it.
After the door had closed on Miss Cartwright she stared at it for a long time; then her right hand moved under the bundle of petticoats and frills and into the napkin, and gently she gripped the child’s leg. When it did not stir under her touch she bit tightly on her lip and her head moved in pendulum fashion, backwards and forwards.
PART FIVE
THE CHILD
One
February 21st, 1852, was the child’s first birthday. It was a day very like the day on which it had been born, high wind, driving rain and icy cold. The only difference was, the river hadn’t flooded and the turmoil was not raging outside the house, as it had done a year ago, but inside now, for the master had returned from London by way of coach and railway, bringing with him a doctor of high degree, and the great man was examining the child in the new nursery that three months ago had been set up in the east wing of the house.
The child was lying naked on a table with just a shawl beneath it, and the doctor, a short man with a bullet head and a pointed vandyke beard, moved his hands over the distended stomach and up over the well-developed chest and arms before turning it over and running his fingers down the dipping spine until they came to rest on the bones between the narrow buttocks; lastly he touched the legs. Standing back, he looked at the child as a whole before bending above it again, turning it onto its back once more and patting its face; then, walking slowly towards the fire, he lifted the tails of his coat and warmed his own still freezing buttocks.
‘Well?’ Konrad was standing in front of him.
The doctor turned his head slowly to the side and looked upwards at the embossed ceiling, saying in a high cool voice, ‘It could be liver’—he nodded as if to himself—‘or it could be a defect in the spine. Or then again it could be just rickets.’
‘Just rickets! What do you mean, man?’ There was no touch of deference in either Konrad’s voice or his manner. But then there was no need, for he had known J
ohn Howard Bolton since his schooldays, at least during the two years he had spent in school in England. ‘Rickets!’ he repeated. ‘With the milk he’s been brought up on, as thick as cream? With the food that’s been packed into that girl? Rickets!’ The word conveyed scorn.
‘She may not have been having the right food previous to the birth of her own child. You told me she had come off the road.’
‘I also told you she was from good stock. I told you her father was a doctor like yourself.’
‘Yes, yes you did, Konrad. And now don’t get agitated. Remember you also said she had been undernourished in that baby farm, so she in turn may have been taking all the nourishment out of the food you packed into her, and therefore depriving the child.’
‘But look at him, man! Look at him. He’s got a chest on him like a young bull. It’ll be like mine in a few years’ time.’
He thumped his own breast. ‘Look at his arms and his head; he’s as strong as a bullock up above. It isn’t rickets.’ His voice sank. ‘No it isn’t rickets, John. I won’t have that.’
‘When was he weaned?’
‘About three months ago.’
‘And what has been his food since then?’
‘Soups, they tell me, gruels, pap.’
‘No milk?’
‘Not much. He was finished with milk; he’d had enough. I agreed with Bella about that. She is, as I told you, my wife’s second cousin, a sensible woman.’
The doctor now began to walk up and down on the hearthrug, every now and again putting his hand out towards the blaze; and then he asked, ‘Did your wife have a fall of any kind, a tripping? Did she twist her body in any way, I mean when she was carrying the child?’
‘Not that I know of. No, no; she would have told me.’ Konrad paused and looked towards the table where the child was thrashing the air with its arms. But would she? She was riding like mad with Gerald for the first three months. That was before he knew she was carrying his son. Then Gerald had been down here twice, thrice, when he himself had been away, and they acted like two irresponsible children whenever they were together. This was something he must go into. He asked now, ‘When will you be able to find out with certainty what the trouble is?’
The Slow Awakening Page 14
