Cotter's England

by Christina Stead

  "It's yourself, Mary, and no man else; what are you looking for?"

  "For the chocolate for Charlie."

  She found the chocolate presently and gave two pieces to the boy, to whom Uncle Simon had now given the grocery list. He impressed upon Charlie the name of his drops, not to forget them and to get them at Burns's, the corner papershop, not at the chemist's; and he carefully counted out the money.

  "Eh, give him the money, Simon, don't be an old miser," said Mrs. Cotter, rollicking: "he won't cheat you." She said to her son, "He's a real good boy to his mother; I give him the change for his mother. Now keep a bit of chocolate for your mother, hinny."

  She said to Tom, "My own boy Tom used to bring me chocolate when he came home from singing in the choir at Saint Aidan's. He had such a good voice, a real talent; and they always gave him a piece of chocolate and he came running home to his mother; and he used to bury his head in my lap. He was always a mother's boy."

  "Don't you know me, Mother?" said Tom. "It wasn't chocolate, Mother. The way it was, was this. We had to be on time and if we came late, we got bad marks, a mark a minute; and if the choirmaster came late, we got pennies, a penny a boy. With my pennies I bought you chitterlings of which you were very fond; that is what I brought you."

  She looked at him and laughed, "Chitterlings! They're very good. I like dumplings, too. Mother used to make very good dumplings."

  "Aye, she made them in broth and she made them in boiling water: Mother was a very good cook," said Simon.

  "I wish she was cooking for us now, I do," said Mrs. Cotter: "I'm hungry, I get really hungry these days, it's the weather coming on to spring."

  "It's a fine spring day in Bridgehead, Mother," said Tom laughing; "it is raining black diamonds. I was out; but came back fast."

  "Eh," said Mrs. Cotter looking at him, "well, I'm sorry you must go so soon. And look at us sitting in the kitchen!"

  "Now gather your wits together, Mary," said Simon indignantly, "ye complain he doesn't come and when he comes ye take him for the grocer's boy. It's ridiculous, that's what it is, A'm ashamed of ye. Ye always were a great one for play-actin' and now it's got the better of ye. Ye want to tell the plain truth all your life, woman, and speak straight and see straight; otherwise ye get to seein' double. Put on your glasses, Mary, don't be ashamed and look in front of you and stop wanderin' among shadows."

  "Oh, leave her alone," said Tom, revolted. "What does it matter? I came, didn't I? It doesn't matter if she doesn't know it."

  "No, I don't know it," said the old woman to Tom. "There are a lot of things going on in this house I don't know. They're here and they don't come downstairs. I don't know why. It's as if we were strangers. They don't tell me anything; always going and coming. They've got wild since they grew up and Nellie has got them into bad ways. I'm all alone in the house and I don't know what's going on. I don't ask, I don't interfere, but it makes me look funny. I say funny things when people call. People are very kind, very sociable, always visiting; but I'm worried that I'm going to make a fool of myself, put my foot in it. Then they laugh. You see, Mr.—excuse me, my head is so bad now, Mr.—?"

  "Cotter," said Tom.

  "Mr. Cotter," she said surprised, looking at him; "are you one of the family? You do look like the family."

  "Mother," said Tom.

  "Don't bother her now," said Uncle Simon; "it's surprisin' how fresh and clear she is often in the marnin' or late at night; but ye mustn't bother her. Peggy's been a very bad lass today and it's got her worried. She can't stand the shoutin' and the cruelty. She was always a timid woman; it's been too much trouble for her."

  Tom brought out the chicken and said they ought to have it for supper. The old people were delighted and excited; but Uncle Simon said he'd never cooked a chicken; though he once knew a French woman who cooked a wonderful chicken and he could still remember it. "Though it was thirty-five years ago," said Tom laughing.

  "It was thirty-eight," said Uncle Simon, with dignity. "Her husband was a German, a strange sort of man. He went away as a German soldier and he came back after the war. A never did trust him."

  "With a chicken cook like that, I'm not surprised he came back," said Tom.

  "Now, Simon," said Mary, rocking with laughter; "you're surely not going to try and tell us at this late date that you had a sweetheart who cooked you a chicken dinner?"

  "A had a friend who was a good cook," said Simon, straightening himself and looking at his sister. She kept on laughing and gently pinching the plump white flesh of the fowl.

  "How do you cook a chicken, Mother? Do you boil it or roast it? Which is better?"

  The old woman laughed till she cried; but in the end she said, "I can't remember: it's so long since I cooked one."

  "Probably forty odd years," said Tom; "I don't remember ever getting one at home."

  "A roast with vegetables is best for the weekend," said Uncle Simon, who did the weekend cooking; "one good healthy man can eat a whole chicken at a meal and crack the bones too. A had a friend who did that, cleaned up like a dog, cracked everythin' with his teeth."

  Tom called upon Peggy, who at first screeched at the idea of cooking flesh, but eventually was persuaded, because it was good for her mother.

  "I'm hungry, too," said Tom.

  Grudgingly she hunted for a cookery book which had belonged to Aunt Lily who had died in their attic five years before and who had lain there for four years before that. Fortunately, the chicken had been cleaned by Connie and the giblets were inside it; but no one knew what to do with them; so Tom asked if he could give the chicken heart to the dog. "Chicken heart? What is that?" asked Peggy dubiously.

  "Chicken heart? Heart of a chicken."

  "Heart of a chicken? I never heard of that." She was very puzzled. She turned it over, with her rubber gloves on; and at length said that if it was cooked he could have it, she thought.

  "What would go with a roast fowl or boiled fowl?" Tom asked. Peggy said it would be better to have whatever was in the larder. They got out two halves of cabbage which Peggy had cut into for raw vegetable salads, and some potatoes. The mother declared a hankering for dumplings; they would boil the fowl and put the dumplings in the water. "And the cabbage?" They could do that in a separate pot, but they were not sure how. Peggy had given up cooking vegetables long ago, having read that cooking took the good out of them. They came to an agreement presently. Tom would try his hand at dumplings out of the cookery book; Uncle Simon would boil the fowl and cabbage; and they were forced to accept his view that all these things would do best on a very low gas; "then you won't lose the goodness." Gradually, the watchers departed, leaving the old man in charge. They could not go to the nearest aunt and ask advice, out of pride and because there would not be enough to invite her. Peggy foresaw that they would give a bone to the dog and kill him. Tom thought they might have potatoes too.

  Tom went out to get a beer when the beer shop reopened at six, found dinner was not ready, said he'd take a stroll. When he returned at seven thirty, Mrs. Cotter said she was hungry and they decided to dish up. The water, on Uncle Simon's low gas, had never come to the boil. Assuming command, Tom sent Peggy to lay the table, brought his mother to the kitchen to superintend the dishing up, agreed to divide the fowl himself. Simon said that he would eat by his own fire in the kitchen and remarked that it made a lot of dishes. The old mother wrapped all the necessary forks, knives and spoons in a brown paper parcel and put them with Aunt Lily's book in the sideboard in the front room, just after the potatoes were drained. During the hunt that followed she very slyly, with a pale little smirk, tipped the potatoes into Simon's fire, washed and polished the vegetable dish and put it back in its place. They were recalled to the kitchen by the smell. Tom had to finish the table while Peggy, scolding, stood guard and Simon tried to right his fire. The fine young hen which had been put on in cold water, with no salt, for Peggy thought it bad for the blood, was heavy, leathery; it did not seem cooked. The cabbage when dishe
d up was hard, almost crisp. "You should have turned the gas up a bit, Uncle Sime," said Tom pleasantly.

  "And lose all the good juices? A don't hold with the modern way of doin' everythin' fast and tasteless."

  "It's better for your stomach if the cabbage is raw," said Peggy.

  Mother said it smelled very good, it made her mouth water.

  "The dumplin's are very good," said Uncle Simon taking a hit of one. Some had fallen to the bottom, others had spread about in the water. "The taste is very good, ye are quite a hand," said Simon.

  "You must be very hungry, Uncle," said Tom, smiling sadly. He carried in the hen to divide up and after ten minutes called to the women to bring in the vegetables. "Surely we can do a simple thing like that without your powers of direction," shouted Peggy.

  "Very well," said Tom and sat down to wait.

  Half an hour later they were all eating what they could, while the dog constantly had to be threatened with the leash; and when the chicken was carried out, Peggy had to stay in the kitchen to see no one gave him a bone. Meantime, she lectured them on the evils of flesh-eating; but she had eaten a lot of cabbage, onion, cheese and was in a good mood. "You'll not want anything to eat for a couple of days," she said; "such guzzling and gobbling, you'd think it was Christmas." She cleaned up efficiently as usual, with the gloves to keep her hands white; and then sat contentedly by the back-room fire to knit. She let them hush the dog, without bursting into fury.

  The two men who looked so alike sat in the kitchen, while Simon Pike told Tom about trips he had made to Durham to install an iron fire-escape and to Consett to put in some boilers; and Tom described to his uncle new alloys he had been dealing with. When Tom, later on, took his bag out of the front room and went upstairs, to go to his father's room which he was to occupy, he was startled to see a woman's figure quite still on the dark mid-landing. It was all dark above; below, only the pale light from the street lamp beyond. He stopped. "Who is it?" he said as quietly as he could. No answer. His heart began an irregular beat. "Who is that?"

  His mother said in a very low voice, "It is his image standing there."

  He did not understand at first, he laughed low, "Yes, yes, it is."

  "He just stands there, it's so strange," she said almost in a whisper. Tom went on past her, up the stairs and said casually, "And who is it, Mother?"

  "It's Tom. He won't come in because he's waiting for the dog to go. He never could bear that dog. That's a bad dog, he said."

  "Yes."

  "He couldn't bear anyone to have his name. My son was called Tom and he made us call him Jack. Jack we always called him." She looked up rather brightly and said jokingly, "Hurraw, Jack!" Tom put on the bedroom light and then the stair light.

  "You oughtn't to be going upstairs in the dark, Mother."

  She looked at him quietly and said, "Jack, couldn't we sell him? We don't want him."

  "Who would buy him?"

  "Timmie was a good dog," she said; "but this is a bad dog; there never was a worse dog."

  When he came down, he sat in the back room with his cigarette and tried to talk to Peggy who had put on superior airs for some reason. Presently two of the aunts came round. Everyone began to talk of the dinners they had had; and Tom, lively, mentioned that Uncle Simon's sauce had been a combination of Friday's roast, juice from the boiling, touched up with a little bottled sauce and they never did get to the salad; perhaps it was for tomorrow. He burst out laughing hysterically.

  Peggy flew into a rage, supposing he was laughing at her. He said he was laughing because he was a hollow man. "Is it to be fed ye came home?" He'd sold his car, she cried out and had eaten it, when it would have been useful for taking them out of the house; and just when she expected a bit of a rest, they were going to have two Uncle Simons.

  The aunts took this seriously and spoke to him. When he eventually withdrew to the kitchen to make them all some tea, and to see why Tom the dog was making such a noise, Peggy came rushing out to say that they were two worthless lazy men taking out their sour crabbed natures on a young animal.

  The next day things were much worse. Tom came downstairs at one moment in time to see Uncle Simon shrink back and Peggy strike him on the temple with a greasy saucepan which she had put in the oven the day before "to keep it from the mice." Uncle Simon had reproached her for not washing it.

  "Ah, Peggy, how can you hit the poor old man," he shouted, running in.

  "I'd gladly strike him dead and never would be remorseful," said Peggy. "It would rid the earth of a great nuisance. What use is he? Are you such a weak thing, you're afraid to see someone hit? I often hit him. It's good for him. You'd better learn the facts of life. Life is not soft and easy, man. You don't suppose I can stay here with these daft old fools and keep my temper like a sister of charity? I suppose it would be better if I let him drive me back to the Home."

  It was a terrible scene and Tom, with a heart fallen as low as it could be, thought there was no help for it, he must get a job in Bridgehead and stay here to protect them. He had no doubt at all that Peggy would get rid of them in her own way if it suited her. But what was the use of increasing the misery by his own? There must be some way of organizing the home so that the old people would be taken care of and Peggy got out of it? He went for his evening walk and walked a long time, with his back bent, his hands clasped behind him, his nose down, with long strides, as was his habit in his lonely ambles. He looked bland, leather-skinned, old, glancing neither left nor right, along the streets he knew from childhood, stopping, walking on automatically with thoughtless precision, just as he drove, noticing old landmarks without comment. After some time, because of his meditations about the past, present and future, he reached a two-story building in an enclosure, with an isolation hospital and locked gates, some trees, a secret place he knew well, the Home where Peggy had been nursed from her twenty-second to her thirtieth year.

  Thomas Cotter Senior had never gone in those gates. "It is not my daughter Margaret Cotter that is in the Home, but a girl belonging to the other Cotters across the river" and so for eight years. The nurses had liked her. She was a good-looking, softly charming, and foolishly excited girl, rather clever at that time, going with them everywhere. Then she had lost hold of things, like her old mother now. Bridgehead is a gray town: the women are sensible and salty. Peggy's early blossoming was an event: the men all looked at her and she threw herself to them. They both stood out like scarlet patches on the gray tatters of those years; Nellie too, with her gawky Bohemian toughness, putting out cock's feathers of charm on demand: "Chief Chickenhawk," he had called her to her delight.

  He had had ambitions too, running on the muddy winter fields against the sooty sky, with the team in blue and yellow against some team in gold and black or scarlet and sky: noticeable, with his red cheeks and glittering fair hair. He had hopes that though he was a little man and a Pike, he'd play national football because he was tough and relentless: he never gave up. Women had begun to have the strangest effect on him, not as with other boys as far as he could see. Women began to love him. It was a surprise and a release from the back-kitchen world and the aunts. They never thought well of men in the Pike family; and men, in Bridgehead, were just regarded as work horses. He did not know, in his heart, quite why it was that women's eyes followed him. "I do nothing," he said to himself; "and I give them very little." He often wondered about it with a faint sinking of the heart. Suppose this mysterious charm were to desert him? Of course, it would some day and probably very soon. He must get himself fixed with a woman he could live with for the rest of his life. It had startled him to hear that Uncle Simon had once had a French friend. On the empty day which would bring him nearer to Uncle Simon, make him like him, he was afraid he would not be able to see his way any more.

  They had had too many privations as children and adolescents. He was skinny, feebler than he showed now; and he had never done anything he had meant to do. For one thing, as a boy, he had admired Carlyle, they
all had; and he had thought of writing something in that vein. But now at night, when he came from the works, he could often hardly keep his head up. And the food the landladies provided for the men! He laughed at the idea his sisters had of him. They were Bridgehead women in that. Nellie imagining him always in the lap of some woman; a roué, a cheat. What else would a man do? Not think and meditate of course! He chuckled out loud. And Peggy seeing him as a sort of unemployable. At his last job he had had three hundred men under him. He gave it up to nurse Marion, to be with her every minute of the last days of her life. How could he explain that to the women at home? Besides, they didn't care. Their only idea was to see his pay envelope on Friday.

  Well, poor Peggy. She had gone earnestly with them to the miners' cottages when they were young, to learn socialism there from one or two; she had stood in the freezing cold and sold newspapers with them. And when she grew a bit, she had laughed with men and fallen in love with a man who couldn't or wouldn't divorce his wife; and she had lost touch through sorrow and they had shut her up. She thought she was imprisoned for something she had done. At one time, she fancied it was a political crime and the police had got her. Pop Cotter had really sent one of his pals in the police to bring them home. At another time, it was a contagious disease she had she thought —that came from talk among the aunts of the consequences of Pop Cotter's endless gallantries. And then, that when she opened her mouth filthy creatures dropped out of it; and that was Nellie, the way she made us confess, even things we hadn't done at all, but that sounded good and rich to her. "Confession, pets, is good for the soul: it purges; introspection is what distinguishes us from the animals." Sometimes Peggy thought she had threatened someone's life. Perhaps she had. "Poor Peggy! But I have to have all my humanity back of me to make me say it."

  And he thought of Nellie, guilty, guilty as she said; and really guilty towards Peggy and himself as he knew her to be, seducing children to love; out of her great vanity wanting to be the only one to show them love; so that no one again could take them from her; but not calling it perversion, calling it knowledge, the true way. "I can lead, I know," she said. He knew she meant no real harm. She did not understand; and his love forgave her: "the softest tough girlie I ever met," as he said to her; and a most unscrupulous woman, as Pop Cotter was a most unscrupulous man; anything to be the center of everything and hog the limelight. Nellie, though, being a woman, and being so loving, was forgivable.