The Solace of Sin

by Catherine Cookson

  There was a moment’s hesitation before Jim said, ‘I agree with you,’ after which he glanced in Constance’s direction and gave her a wry, shamefaced sort of smile that was meant to be reassuring.

  ‘Honestly?’ Ada chewed vigorously on a mouthful of food, swallowed it, then went on, ‘She’s so damned refeened is Miss Nesbit, the head of the department, you know. She talks like this—’ and, pursing her mouth, she mimicked, ‘Miss Stapleton, are you aware that you are on duty and a customer is waiting? Get along. Get along…Coo! She’s an old twit. She makes me want to spew—’

  ‘Ada! We’ll have none of that talk.’

  ‘Aw, Mam, what’s in that? It’s nothing. Anyway she does…she does, Uncle.’ She was bending forward and grinning, addressing herself solely to Jim. Then pulling herself upright again she looked from Jim to Constance, and then to Peter, and asked, ‘Any special reason for your visit? Not that I’m inhospitable; I’m just askin’.’

  ‘Well, there’re two reasons.’ Her father was nodding at her. ‘Your uncle’s got another book on the go. I mean, it’s coming out.’

  ‘Oh! Good for you, Uncle.’ Ada jumped up from the table and, throwing herself onto Jim’s knee, put her arms around his neck and kissed him. It could have been a childish action, but Ada was eighteen and none of her actions was childish.

  Constance’s expression did not change as she watched her husband’s arms encircle his niece and return her kiss.

  When Peter spoke, it was as if he were trying to drive a wedge between his father and his cousin. His voice high, he gave the second reason for their visit: ‘That’s not all. Mother’s bought the house out in the wilds, the one Aunt Millie and Uncle saw last weekend.’

  Ada was standing on the hearthrug now looking at him. ‘No kiddin’!’ she said. ‘For a weekend cottage?’ This last remark was addressed to Constance and Constance replied, ‘Well, not exactly; we might live there for most of the year.’

  ‘But I thought it was at the back of beyond.’

  ‘Yes, it is rather.’

  Ada looked at Constance in silence for a moment. Then shrugging her shoulders, she returned to the table and continued her meal. Her silence on the subject seemed to condemn the whole idea of the house as a permanent habitation. As a weekend cottage she could see it as bearable, but to her, anyone preferring to live outside the town was barmy.

  The conversation now became stiltedly general. Ada went on eating, and it wasn’t until she had finished and pushed the plate away from her that she turned to Peter and said, ‘I hear you’ve got a car.’

  ‘Yes; that’s right.’

  ‘I haven’t seen any invitations flying around.’

  As her mocking gaze stayed on him he swallowed and said, ‘I’ve hardly driven it myself yet.’

  Ada now rose from the table and dusted some crumbs from the sharp rise of her breasts, the while saying, ‘I’ve got some new records; want to hear them?’

  Peter did not answer; Ada kept her record player in her room and he certainly did not want to be in there alone with her. Once before he had gone in to hear her records, only to come out flushed to the ears. But his Uncle Harry was now saying, ‘Go on, man, and do a bit of twisting; it’ll do you good. You never go to dances, do you?’

  ‘No, Uncle.’

  ‘Well, it’s about time you started. Go on with you.’ And he jerked his head towards the door and his daughter, and there was nothing Peter could do but to follow Ada. As he passed his mother he did not look at her; he knew that she wasn’t looking at him but that his father was.

  In the room Ada said, ‘Shut the door, or you’ll have me mam yellin’ along the passage. She can’t stand the groups; they drive her barmy. Coo! What it is to be old.’

  After she had put on a record she turned and straight away walked towards Peter, who was standing by the window, and leaning close towards him, she thrust her face upwards until her nose was touching his chin, and above the din of the music she cried, ‘What’s the matter with you? Sit down. I won’t seduce you.’

  He closed his eyes as he said to himself, Oh God! She’s off again. Although she was only a few months older than he she seemed, and always had seemed, like someone of another generation. He had no way of combating her, or her quick-fire talk.

  After he had seated himself she sat on the bed and faced him. Supporting an elbow in one hand, she grasped her chin with the other and, moving the skin back and forth, she said, ‘You know what’s the matter with you, don’t you?’

  He made his expression superior and his voice careless sounding as he replied, ‘I know there’s lots of things wrong with me but time, I am sure, will erase them.’

  ‘Not if you don’t get out of your nappies an’ grow up.’

  He could do nothing to stop the flush covering his face, and it brought from her a high laugh. ‘You know—’ she placed her fist into her small waist now and, her expression changing to a sneer, she said, ‘you know you’re just like me Aunt Connie; all bottled up inside, frightened to let herself go. She’ll snap one of these days. I’m tellin’ you, she will.’

  ‘Don’t talk rot.’

  ‘I’m not talkin’ rot. I’ve been around; I know, I’ve seen people. An’ if you keep the kind of stuff bottled up in you that she keeps bottled up, the cork pops. It’s bound to some time or other.’ She dug her thumb into her black lacquered hair. ‘She’ll go barmy.’

  He now pointed his finger to the record player and said in a sarcastic, superior tone that only youth can use to youth, ‘Perhaps you haven’t noticed, but that record is running itself almost off the player, Miss Socrates.’

  ‘Miss who?’

  ‘Socrates. I thought you might be related to him. He, too, used to pretend to be ignorant, then come out with something devastatingly wise.’

  ‘Come off it.’ She flicked her hand at his face. ‘Just because you’re goin’ to college, don’t come that high stuff with me. An’ let me tell you something else: just ’cos I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, doesn’t make me feel awful; I’m not like me dad. If he doesn’t know something he gets a guilty feeling about it and has to dash to the library to find out all the whys and wherefores…But not me. That kind of clut doesn’t affect me. Me, I’m goin’ to live. Do you know what livin’ is, Peter boy?’

  When her face was thrust at him again he said, with studied calmness, ‘I thought I was going to hear some records, but if you would rather we discuss philosophy, it’s OK with me.’

  ‘Aw, chitterlings!’ she said as she pushed her hand flat against his face. Then she went to the little table and switched off the record player, indicating her irritation with him. She now changed the record, saying over her shoulder, ‘This is an old one of the Stones, but it’s me favourite.’

  As the raucous noise filled the room she turned about swiftly and, facing Peter, her body all movement now, she said, ‘Come on, let yourself go.’

  Peter shook his head. ‘I can’t do that.’

  She waggled herself up to him. ‘Anybody can do it, even a baby in a nappy can do it.’

  He glared at her. At this moment, above all else, he wanted to slap her across the face; not to utter a word but just slap her across the face. But when he felt her hands on his, pulling him up, he knew he would have to go along with her, because were he to walk out and back into the living room she would follow him and show him up in front of them all. He bent his arms at the elbows and slowly he moved his body.

  ‘Oh, shades of the Charleston!’ She covered her eyes for a moment. ‘Let yourself go, man…bend your knees!’ Her hand shot out and grabbed his tie and he was jerked towards her. His body touched hers and bounced off it again before he wrenched himself from her grasp, saying, ‘Don’t be a damn fool! You’re mad.’

  As he straightened his tie her cavorting increased, and she shouted above a sudden loud blare of the music, ‘Bet you ten to one I could have that off you in ten seconds.’

  ‘What! What did you say?’

&nbs
p; ‘Your tie.’ She pointed: ‘I could have it off you in ten seconds.’

  He was standing still now looking at her, and he said scathingly, ‘It’s you who wants to grow up. You’re like a dippy thirteen-year-old; you’re still wolf howling after the groups…Grow up! Huh!’

  ‘Dance!’ She waggled her small stomach in front of him. ‘Let your belly loose.’ Once again her hands flashed out and grabbed at his tie; but this time he resisted her, and strongly, and now in the struggle, managed to grip her hands, and the next minute they were sprawled across the bed, she underneath him with her body shaking convulsively as he struggled to free himself.

  He had one hand behind his head tearing at her hands, while with the other he was prising himself up from her chest when the door opened and a voice cried sternly, ‘Aye! Aye! What’s this? Come on now, enough of that! Come on.’

  When her hold slackened, he pulled himself up from the bed, then ran one hand through his hair, at the same time trying to straighten his jacket with the other. He could not look at his Uncle Harry. His whole body was glowing with a painful heat, and he kept his head down as Ada pulled herself up, saying, ‘It’s all right, Dad, man; we were going round and we fell, that’s all.’

  ‘They’re going.’ Harry’s voice had a flat sound. He motioned his nephew towards the door, and Peter went past him…still with his head lowered.

  Harry now looked at his daughter and he closed the door quickly before he asked her softly and urgently, ‘What happened? Was he up to any tricks?’

  ‘Oh, Dad!’ She put her hand across her mouth. Then going to him and looking up into his face with wide-eyed innocence, she whispered, ‘It was as I said; we were dancin’ around, an old-fashioned one, you know; they’re doin’ it now like you used to do, and we slipped on the mat there—’ she pointed backwards.

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘Of course I’m sure. Anyway, can you imagine Peter attempting anything naughty?’ She took her fist and punched it gently against her father’s jaw.

  He seemed to ignore the fact that her words and the act that accompanied them were in any way insinuating. To him, everything she did had a touch of naive innocence about it. If he had come into the room and found her stark naked he would have believed her if she had said that the situation had been forced on her. He said now, quietly, ‘You be careful. Still waters run deep, you know. Even if your Uncle Jim is my brother, I know he’s a rake at heart, and Peter’s his son. So I’m warning you. Don’t tease him or give him an inch. Now mind what I say.’

  ‘All right, Dad.’ Her face was serious and when he turned and left her, pulling the door behind him, she stood with her shoulders pressed against it, her belly thrust out, and after a moment her mouth slowly dropped into a wide gape and she became convulsed in a spasm of soundless laughter. God! Men were barmy, all of them.

  After her mouth had closed her expression altered. The laughter left her face and she looked down at her belly. Then, her mouth opening wide again, she murmured, Why not? God! Why not? Her dad coming in like that. Why, yes. What more evidence did she need?

  She went and stood near the bed and looked down at the rumpled coverlet, and her lips made a spitting movement, and on it she brought out two words laden with derision: ‘Cousin Peter!’ she said.

  Six

  On Wednesday of the second week in August Constance moved into the house. Legally she should not have taken possession until all the paperwork had been completed, but it was Sean O’Connor who said, ‘Get your bits and pieces in any time you like, otherwise you’ll miss the fine weather.’

  Florence O’Connor had endorsed this; and Hannah had said, ‘I’ll scrub down for you, and I’ll put the gang in with a wire brush or two over the stones of the fireplace, for they’re smoked black in parts.’

  Yesterday she had driven out and told them that the furniture would be arriving today. She had come to Wheatley’s Wall, as the O’Connors’ home was called, by the lower road, and in the kitchen she had found Sean O’Connor and Florence. Sean was sitting reading, because, he explained, his toe was giving him gyp. Florence O’Connor had been baking and she pressed Constance into taking tea with new bread, and explained that the children and Hannah were all up at the Hall getting it tidy, as they had promised.

  Over the past four weeks Constance had been the recipient of kindness such as she had never before experienced. All the O’Connors seemed pleased that she had taken the house; all, that is, except for the big fellow. Vincent O’Connor had spoken to her only twice since he had made the deal with her on the terrace. First, when he and his mother had called at the flat; the second time when Jim had come to see the house and she had taken him down to the farm, as she had come to think of the huddle of cottages inside the stone wall. She had occasionally caught sight of him at a distance, but he hadn’t gone out of his way to acknowledge her or to give her the time of day. But against the combined warmth of the rest of the family she could ignore his churlishness.

  And now here they were, but again with the exception of Vincent, all helping to carry the seemingly thousand and one articles up to the house. Sean helped the three removal men with the heavy pieces of furniture, while Hannah, at one end of drawers full of linen and bedding with Michael and Davie at the other, went crabwise up the grassy hillside, yelling at each other as if poles apart.

  As Biddy, the fifteen-year-old daughter, twin to Michael, dashed past Constance down the hill, followed by the youngest boy, Barney, their faces broad with laughter, their voices high, their legs leaping from one mound to another, she thought, with not a little amusement, that they were all enjoying the arrival of the van as if it were a fair rather than a pantechnicon full of second-hand furniture.

  She had spent the last month exploring antique and second-hand shops, because she knew that Shekinah would reject anything new within its walls; the furniture that was to go into it must be weathered and mellow, or it would not fit.

  Barney ran past her now carrying a frying pan in one hand and a steamer in the other, the shaggy-haired dog bounding by his side. It would have been easier, she felt, for the men to have shouldered the tea chests full of kitchen utensils, but the children had taken it upon themselves to empty them on the rough road below and she hadn’t the heart to stop them. For this seemed indeed a fête day for them …

  It was two hours later when one of the men said, with a grin, ‘Well, that’s the lot. You’re all set now, ma’am; and do I understand we’ve been invited down below for a cuppa?’

  ‘Yes; Mrs O’Connor has been kind enough to make you some tea.’

  ‘Well, it’ll be very acceptable; so we’ll be away then.’

  ‘I’ll see you before you go.’

  ‘Sure. Sure,’ said the man and, followed by the other members of his gang, which now included Barney, Joseph, Davie and Michael O’Connor, they went out of the house, leaving behind only Moira and Biddy. The two girls suddenly became quiet and a little shy; at least, Biddy did. Moira’s silence, Constance assumed, was merely respectful awe of the furniture, for she was walking from one piece to another, fingering it in an appreciative loving way, as if she liked furniture. She turned from the tall black-oak dresser standing against the wall to the right of the fireplace and said, ‘What did you call this again, Mrs Stapleton?’

  ‘A Welsh dresser.’

  ‘It’s nice. It’ll look lovely when you get your plates on. It’s a bit like our dresser, but nicer.’

  ‘Mother will be expecting you down there,’ said Biddy suddenly.

  ‘Oh yes…Yes, of course. But I’m an awful sight, and so dirty.’ Constance flicked at the specks on her plain blue print dress, then clapped her hands against each other, and as she did so Moira walked slowly towards her, saying casually, ‘Oh, you’re all right; it doesn’t matter what you look like up here. That’s the beauty of it. That’s what Hannah says. Hannah says you could look as dirty as a fiddler’s pack and nobody would notice, but you look all right.’ She smiled disarmingly at Cons
tance, then added, ‘Dad always says you can’t mistake gentry; they can go about in sackcloth, but it doesn’t cover them up.’

  It was a covert compliment, an Irish compliment. They had likely been talking about her…Gentry indeed. It was nice to be taken for gentry. Or was it? She guessed that Sean O’Connor’s idea of gentry wouldn’t be the same as his wife’s; he would stick the label on anyone with money, and she knew that he was under the impression that she herself was well endowed with the latter.

  Going down the hill, Biddy remarked, ‘Your husband will find it all done when he comes back,’ and Constance replied, ‘Yes; yes, he will.’

  ‘Hannah always says that the best way to get rid of a man is to show him some work; they’re all a lot of lazy—’

  ‘Our Moira!’ Biddy’s voice came as a high reprimand, and Moira answered quickly, ‘Oh, don’t sweat yourself, I wasn’t goin’ to say anything I shouldn’t. I was just going to say lazy beggars.’ She now glanced sideways up at Constance, and Constance was forced to smile down at her.

  ‘Is your son still in Switzerland, Mrs Stapleton?’

  Biddy had put the question tentatively, and Constance answered her without smiling, saying, ‘No, Biddy; he…he should be in Germany now. I should imagine they’ll be walking in the Black Forest this week.’

  The fifteen-year-old Biddy had shown a marked liking for Peter during his visits to the house, and now she wouldn’t see him again before she left for Hexham, where she was to stay with a distant cousin of her mother’s and start work in a local draper’s shop. She was suffering the pangs of first love and Constance didn’t laugh at her, even inwardly.

  As they passed through the gap in the wall, it was to see Hannah waddling across the yard carrying a tray, on which was a small teapot and a cup and saucer. She was on her way to Vin’s workshop.