A Christmas Wish for the Land Girls

by Jenny Holmes

  ‘That’s putting it mildly,’ Brenda interrupted. ‘And who can blame him? In my opinion, the good reverend is a hard taskmaster and a first-class hypocrite to boot.’

  ‘Alan’s run off once already. He was eventually found hiding in the old cart shed at New Hall.’

  ‘Where I keep logs and gardening tools,’ Geoff added. ‘Are you both thinking what I’m thinking?’ he asked Brenda and Joyce.

  ‘That he’s scarpered again?’ Brenda nodded, aware that Emma had broken away from Fred and was about to join their little huddle. ‘When did you last see young Alan?’ she asked her.

  ‘Let’s see now.’ With all heads turned towards her, Emma strung out her few moments in the limelight. ‘He helped me with the cleaning on Friday. Alan likes to be given something to do – polishing the silver and such like. It seems to lift his spirits.’

  ‘And he came to the hall with Mr Rigg to help put up decorations,’ Joyce too thought back through the week. ‘Did anyone see him yesterday evening, though?’

  Everyone shook their heads.

  ‘We were all too busy getting ready for the do,’ Brenda muttered.

  ‘If we’re right and Alan has run away again, that would be a good enough reason for the vicar to miss the service.’ Geoff grew convinced that they were on the right track. ‘He would be out looking for him.’

  ‘What do you think, Emma?’ Joyce turned to her again for advice. ‘How did Alan seem on Friday?’

  ‘Quiet,’ came the foghorn reply. ‘I struggled to get a word out of him. As a matter of fact, I spoke to the vicar about it. I said that I thought something was up, that I’d caught Alan sobbing his heart out more than once.’

  ‘And what did Mr Rigg say?’

  ‘Not a lot. A little while later I did see him pinning Alan up against the wall and telling him not to be a cry-baby. That was a lesson for me – to be careful what I say to the vicar in future.’

  ‘Talking of whom …’ Geoff had caught sight of Rigg’s car coasting towards them after his fruitless morning of trying to locate the runaway. When he pulled up outside the vicarage, they all made a beeline for him.

  ‘Where’s the boy?’ Brenda demanded the second he stepped out of his car.

  Rigg tugged at the lapels of his black overcoat and gave a small, nervous cough. ‘I wish I knew. Unfortunately, Alan’s bed hasn’t been slept in. I can only assume that he’s absconded.’

  Absconded? The word infuriated Brenda. What’s up – have you swallowed a dictionary? She glared at Rigg and positioned herself between him and his garden path. Alan has run for his life, more like. ‘When? Why?’

  ‘I’d be obliged if you’d allow me to pass.’ Rigg coughed again as Brenda stood her ground.

  ‘“I’d be obliged!”’ she mimicked angrily.

  Geoff stepped in and spoke more calmly. ‘Tell us: have you any idea where Alan might have gone?’

  ‘And why!’ Brenda insisted.

  ‘Dear me.’ Rigg was visibly rattled but he managed to maintain his self-control as he stepped sideways. Brenda stepped with him. He was no taller than her, although twice the width. ‘Am I to be prevented from entering my own house?’

  ‘Yes, until you tell us everything you know.’

  Her adversary took his time to weigh things up. There was a slim chance that his usual bluster and a blast of righteous indignation would see him through but in the end he opted for a more direct response.

  ‘Very well. Not to mince words, Alan has run away. He was not in his room at seven o’clock this morning. I searched everywhere to make sure he wasn’t hiding inside the house – from the cellars up to the attics – then I went to the trouble of driving all the way to Attercliffe to see his sister.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘It was a wild-goose chase.’

  ‘So?’ Brenda stood, hands on hips, still refusing to budge.

  ‘Really, this is quite unacceptable.’ He turned to Emma for back-up. ‘Mrs Waterhouse, you know what this boy is like. He lacks backbone – tell them.’

  Emma frowned and shook her head. ‘I’m not sure about that. But I do know he wasn’t happy staying at the vicarage.’

  ‘Precisely.’ Rigg was ready to use his weight to push past Brenda. ‘If a boy is unable to appreciate his good fortune, what hope is there of him ever coming to anything in later life?’

  Geoff had heard enough. ‘Come on, Giles; there’s a chance that Alan went to ground at New Hall like last time.’ He led the way down the pathway leading to the river, breaking into a run as he reached the bridge.

  ‘Good idea.’ Joyce went after the two men. ‘Let’s start in your cart shed,’ she suggested to Geoff.

  ‘He wasn’t happy and I don’t blame him,’ Emma insisted as Brenda continued to block Rigg’s path. For once she lowered her voice and she poked her sharp features to within six inches of her employer’s face. ‘I’m sorry to have to say this, Vicar, but I did warn you. I said you can’t expect a little lad of Alan’s age to put up with what he had to—’

  ‘Why, what did he do?’ Emma’s backing strengthened Brenda’s resolve and she stood her ground as Rigg attempted to push her to one side. ‘Did he beat him to within an inch of his life?’ She resisted Rigg’s attempt to thrust her to one side by grabbing his arm and pushing him off balance.

  ‘I don’t know for sure. But Alan was often in tears and I noticed red marks on his legs and who knows where else on his little body.’

  ‘For heaven’s sake!’ Brenda’s loathing for Rigg boiled over. ‘Look at the size of you, compared with him, poor mite! What did you hit him with? Did you use a ruler or was it with your cane?’

  Rigg had tottered backwards against the railing. Unable to get past Brenda, he was forced to endure more of Emma’s unexpected betrayal.

  The village stalwart went on. ‘He was scared of his own shadow, that one. I asked you once why he was so nervy and you brushed me off. I went home that afternoon and wondered why you went on taking in evacuees if they were such a nuisance to you. Is it their food coupons, or what?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ Rigg rallied. ‘I do it because it’s my Christian duty.’ He pulled himself upright then straightened his hat.

  ‘And is it your religion that makes you such a bully?’ Brenda swore to herself that the hypocrite would be made to pay for what he’d done. ‘It gives you the right to throw your weight around and scare that poor little boy out of his wits? I expect you even took it out on him when I brought him back from visiting his sister that time. I’m right, aren’t I?’

  ‘As his guardian, it is my right to discipline him …’ Rigg’s voice faltered. ‘… as I see fit.’

  ‘As you see fit!’ Brenda’s voice dripped with scorn. ‘We’ll see what your superiors have to say about that.’ At that moment she had no idea who his superiors might be, but she vowed that she would not let the matter rest.

  ‘Brenda!’ Joyce called from the bridge but Brenda was so incensed that she failed to hear her.

  It was only when Emma tugged at her arm that Brenda turned and saw Joyce. She stepped back reluctantly from the confrontation with Rigg. ‘You haven’t heard the last of this,’ she muttered as she hurried off.

  If being left alone to think things through was what Evelyn wanted, that was what she would get.

  Cliff strode away from the castle determined to see how she really liked it. He reckoned she wouldn’t last long. One or two nights of her own company out there in the mouldering pile should do it then she would come running. Meanwhile, he would keep his head down at Garthside and hope that Gladys would stay out of his hair. On the other hand, if the lying bitch did come back to squeeze some money out of him he would be ready for her. She won’t get a penny, he said to himself as he reached his car parked at the far side of the wood then drove fast and furiously along the twisting lane. Sorting out this divorce will cost me a packet as it is. Anyway, I hate the sight of her and that sidekick who put her up to it.

  His mind flew back to
Evelyn. Part of him could see why she was annoyed – who wouldn’t be? But she’d overdone it last night and again this morning, pushing all the blame on to him and sending him away. It would serve her right if he stayed away for good. After all, though there’d been no word from the Weatherall relatives, the job at Acklam was as good as gone. Perhaps it was time for him to move on – not to Northgate, but to Millwood or another of the mill towns further west, where he could always find light work as a joiner or doing odd jobs that would get him back on his feet.

  Let’s see if Evelyn comes to her senses, he thought as he reached Shawcross and turned up the lane to his father’s farm. If she does, fair enough. If not, she’ll be the loser, not me.

  There was no sign of his dad’s tractor in the yard when Cliff arrived. What does Bradley want? he wondered, expecting that it would be to do with a lost sheep or a broken boundary wall; definitely not a social visit from their notoriously unfriendly neighbour. So he went inside already on the defensive and was taken aback to see Alma Bradley sitting in the kitchen with Dorothy.

  ‘Why aren’t you in bed?’ he said to his sister when he flung his cap down on the table.

  ‘Because I’m feeling better. Look – Alma’s brought us a hotpot for our dinner.’

  ‘It’s mutton stew,’ Alma corrected her. After her long conversation with Dorothy, Cliff’s arrival had plunged her back into the familiar knotted self-consciousness that twisted up her stomach and made it hard to breathe properly. ‘Look at the time! I’d better be off,’ she said as the telephone rang and Dorothy answered it.

  Dorothy listened to the operator’s voice telling her that she had an Attercliffe number on the line and a Mr Donald White wishing to speak to a Miss Brenda Appleby.

  ‘Brenda’s not in,’ Dorothy replied, waving at Alma as she picked up her keys then rushed away. ‘This is Miss Dorothy Huby. Tell Mr White that I’m happy to pass on a message.’

  The operator obliged and Dorothy listened attentively.

  ‘Very well, I’ll tell her,’ she said and put down the phone. ‘You have to go down to the village,’ she told Cliff in a no-nonsense voice. ‘Find Brenda and tell her that Hettie White’s funeral is on Wednesday this week at eleven o’clock.’

  ‘How am I supposed to track her down?’

  ‘She went to church.’

  ‘And can’t it wait until she gets back?’

  ‘No, Cliff; it can’t. Brenda needs to know now. And tell her that her fiancé has applied for leave to come to the funeral. Can you remember that, or do I need to write it down?’

  ‘Give over, Dorothy.’ Opting for the line of least resistance, Cliff took his cap from the table and glanced at his watch. ‘Where will she be if the service has finished?’

  ‘How should I know? I’m not a mind reader.’ Why did he always have to make a song and dance? Dorothy lost interest and turned the pages of her latest magazine. ‘Just find her, Cliff, and pass on the message. Funeral. On Wednesday. Les White hopes to come. Over and out.’

  Once Brenda had learned from Joyce that she, Geoff and Giles had looked in all the outhouses at New Hall but found no trace of the missing boy, they decided to widen their search.

  ‘Put yourself in Alan’s shoes,’ Brenda said as she stared down into the brown rushing water beneath the bridge. Melting snow had swelled the river until it was almost bursting its banks. ‘From what we can make out, it must have been dark when he ran away. I wonder if he had a torch.’

  ‘Let’s hope so. Anyway, he’d hear music coming from the church hall and he’d want to avoid that in case someone spotted him.’

  ‘So he’d probably cut across the graveyard then head down towards the river.’

  ‘Or else across the green in the direction of Thwaite.’

  ‘Not so likely,’ Brenda pointed out. ‘There’d be lots of coming and going on the green: people arriving for the dance or nipping across to the pub for a quick drink. I know Alan would dread going near the stone angel but I don’t think he would have had any choice.’

  ‘So let’s try to retrace his footsteps.’ Without waiting for Brenda’s agreement, Joyce headed back to the church and started to search the graveyard. ‘If I were Alan and I was running away in the pitch dark, I’d stick to the path and follow it around the back of the church to the vestry door. I might turn the handle to see if it was locked.’ Acting this out, she looked over her shoulder to find that she was alone. ‘Come on, Brenda, what’s keeping you?’

  ‘Hello there, Miss Appleby!’ Cliff had spotted the two women as they entered the deserted churchyard. He had to lean out of his Morris and yell at the top of his voice to attract Brenda’s attention.

  What now? She waited while he parked then strolled towards her, preparing to tell Cliff Huby exactly what she thought of him. Last night’s episode didn’t seem to have had a lasting effect, to judge by the cocksure expression on his face.

  ‘Dotty asked me to pass on a message.’ A quick glance told him that he was still in Brenda’s bad books. ‘What?’ he cajoled. ‘So it turns out I’m not squeaky clean. Who is these days?’

  ‘I never thought you were squeaky clean, Cliff.’ She cut him off before he’d finished. ‘What’s the message?’

  ‘From a fellow in Attercliffe – a Donald something or other.’

  Brenda drew a sharp breath and waited for him to go on.

  ‘About a funeral.’ Cliff stretched out to the maximum the sudden power his news seemed to have bestowed. ‘I take it someone you know has died?’

  ‘Yes. Carry on.’

  ‘It’s on Wednesday, apparently.’ Should he or shouldn’t he tell her the bit about the fiancé? No, leave her in the dark and let her stew for a bit. She would find out soon enough. ‘Eleven o’clock, Dotty said. There, I’ve done my duty. Now I’ll head back home for my dinner, if that’s all right with you.’

  Alan lay under the heavy jute sacks, stiff with cold. He heard voices calling his name and footsteps growing louder and going away again. Then there was only the sound of the river and a chink of daylight creeping under the door.

  He tried to pull the sacks further over his head but his fingers wouldn’t work. His whole body shook. The air inside the coal house was damp and lumps of coal shifted under him as he tried to ease his position. The grating noise made him hold his breath and close his eyes tight shut. Don’t let them find me. I won’t go back. I won’t.

  The river roared in his ears.

  ‘Alan!’ a woman’s voice called.

  ‘Alan!’ A man this time.

  He shrank further under the sacks. They would find him and drag him out into the open. Mr Rigg would be there with his cane. It hurt when he hit him with it; the swish as he brought it down hard, the sting on his skin before the throbbing ache set in. Even worse, Mr Rigg would snitch on him this time. He’d said he would tell his mum and dad that he’d been naughty and a cry-baby. Oh, Alan! He heard his mother’s voice, saw the sad look on her face. He wouldn’t be her best son any more. He would have let her down.

  ‘Alan?’ The voice was close by; a woman’s again.

  He wished for the darkness to cover him and keep him hidden.

  The latch lifted, daylight flooded in.

  Emma opened the door to the coal house at the bottom of her small garden. No stone must be left unturned. Brenda had taken charge and knocked at each door in the row of cottages. ‘The vicar’s boy has gone missing overnight. Please look for him and let us know if you find him.’ It hadn’t taken long for Emma’s neighbours to search their houses and sheds.

  Nothing. No sign.

  Missing overnight? Freezing cold.

  Whose boy? The vicar’s.

  You don’t say.

  Emma opened her coal-house door. At first she saw nothing unusual; just a heap of coal, a shovel resting against the wall and a pile of sacks. Then her eyes grew used to the dim light. The sacks had been moved. A living creature breathed underneath them. Gingerly she lifted the corner of the nearest sack and discov
ered the boy.

  Alan covered his face with his hands.

  ‘Oh, lad!’ Emma let out a long, heartfelt sigh. Small and black like a little chimney sweep, curled up on his side, shaking, hiding his face. She stepped back out of the stone shed and ran up the path to call across the green with her loud voice. ‘Brenda, Joyce; he’s here – come as quick as you can!’

  ‘Where’s Joyce?’ Laurence had spent the morning in the farmhouse, catching up on odd jobs while Alma was out. He was at the sink replacing the washer that had been leaking for a long time when he heard the latch click and he looked round to see her taking off her scarf and coat.

  ‘She’s still in the village. I decided to walk back.’

  He worked on for a while, finding the right size of spanner to tighten the new washer. She looked different – her head was up and there was colour in her cheeks.

  ‘Did you know that Dorothy Huby was taken ill at the Christmas dance?’ Alma asked.

  ‘No, that’s news to me.’ The job was done so he packed away his tools.

  ‘Well, she was. There was a big panic – she had to be rushed home to take her pills. Cliff gave her a tremendous shock. It turns out he got married without telling anyone.’

  Laurence gave a dismissive shrug. What was he to make of this new, talkative Alma?

  ‘That’s not all. He tricked a girl into getting engaged even though he was still married.’ She watched him wash his hands then offered him a towel. ‘Don’t you want to know who the girl is and how he was found out?’

  ‘No. It’s none of my business.’

  Alma snatched the towel back. ‘Well, I’ll tell you anyway. His new fiancée is Evelyn Newbold, the forestry girl, and it was Aunty Muriel who gave the game away. Yes, now you’ve pricked up your ears!’

  ‘What had that old witch got to do with it?’ Laurence watched Alma keenly.

  ‘The last time Aunty Muriel was here to give me the present, she ran into Cliff outside the church hall and recognized him. She dashed straight back to Northgate and told the wife where to find him.’ Lifting the hat box from the window sill she took off the lid then thrust it under his nose. ‘Remember; she gave me this hideous thing.’