She was really glaring down at him when he came back at her, saying, ‘Well, what’s the good, where’s it gona get me, eh? All the readin’ of books and discussin’, discussin’. Discussin’ writers and them what’s running the country, not forgetting religion. Where is it gona get me? I’ll end up in a box and the sooner the better.’ She did not now soften and say, ‘Oh, don’t talk like that, Barney,’ but what she said was, ‘Yes, if that’s how you feel, the sooner the better, for if you’re just going to lie there like a stuffed dummy waiting for my flying visits then I agree with you.’
She watched him turn his head to the side and mutter something, and when she said, almost demanded, ‘What was that you said?’ he moved his eyes in her direction and, his voice loud now, he cried, ‘You’re gettin’ hard. You never used to be like this.’
Her voice matched his now as she replied, ‘I never had a farm to run practically on my own; I never had another sick man upstairs; and I never had a daughter that is a…’
She had almost said the word. What was she coming to, going for Barney like this? She should be able to understand and sympathise with his frustration, but at the moment she was carrying more burdens than her back could or would bear and if something didn’t happen to relieve her then she would surely sink under them.
She turned and was at the door when his voice halted her, saying pathetically, ‘Emma.’ And now she looked at him and her voice quiet, even soothing, she said, ‘’Tis all right, Barney, ’tis all right. I’ll be back shortly.’
And her burdens seemed immediately to be lightened when, in the kitchen, she saw her daughter scrubbing the table with sand and she was quick to notice there were no dishes in the shallow sink, and when the girl smiled at her, her face so fresh, fair and innocent looking, she wanted to throw her arms about her and hug her tight into her breast for she felt she had been given a sign: her daughter could change, her daughter would change; she would grow up and marry and be like other girls. Please God. Please God.
Jimmy came earlier and stayed later. Emma rose earlier and went to bed later. Annie did not rise before seven but from then until three in the afternoon she worked in the house and without a word of grumbling. But after that time she would go upstairs, wash herself, put on a clean frock, tie a ribbon in her hair, then go out whatever the weather. If it was raining she put on Emma’s old cloak, if it was fine she went out as she was and with no covering on her head either of cap, bonnet or hat, which was a daring gesture in itself. But Emma did not reprimand her, for Annie had promised she would walk no farther than Openwood one way, to the coach road the other, and on the path that led to the river she would stop at the old turnpike. Sometimes she would be out for three or four hours. Out of curiosity, mixed with fear, Emma had one day followed her and for part of the time she saw that she sat on a knoll overlooking the coach road but some good distance from it, then she crossed the fields in the other direction and sat on the stile near the old turnpike.
Another time when Emma went out after her, if she hadn’t caught a glimpse of the wind blowing Annie’s loose fair hair above the grass she might have stepped on her had she walked on; but then she saw her rise from her elbow and place something round her neck, it was a daisy chain. The sight had caused Emma as much pain as if she had found her daughter out in another indiscretion …
And so the summer wore on. Once or twice Emma had experienced the old dread and fear when Annie did not return till dusk; but these times were few and far between.
Jake Yorkless had become worse, and now there was talk of him being taken to hospital. Over the past weeks a lump had emerged behind his ear which the doctor said would need medical attention. Emma had to face the fact that she wasn’t upset by this decision, for of all her tasks the nursing of the mister was the most trying, and the most thankless, for he never had a civil word for her and there was scarcely a time when she entered the room but he would upbraid her for being the cause of his trouble: if she hadn’t had a daughter like she had this wouldn’t have happened to him. He seemed to have forgotten that he had ever adored his granddaughter, and just as it seemed his son had, so he too had thrown off all responsibility for her; never once yet had Barney asked to see the girl, nor had she visited him or even mentioned his name; it was as if he didn’t exist for her. One task she’d had to let fall from her shoulders and that was the work down at the cottage. She still baked bread for Ralph, but she had got a woman from the village to do the cleaning and cooking for him. However, she made a point of slipping in to see him now and again. At such times as when she was tatie or turnip-picking in the bottom fields she’d fill a basket, hurry along the road with it and there have a few words with him. She had seen a difference in him these last few months and she thought it would be a miracle if he survived the coming winter; the disease was reaching its height and she knew that when he went she would miss him. He was someone she felt who had always been in her life, someone who had been kind to her and who had loved her. Yes, who had loved her, and still did …
It was the beginning of November when they took Jake Yorkless into hospital. The day was biting cold. They brought him downstairs wrapped in blankets and laid him on the flat farm cart. Jimmy drove it and Emma sat in the back and tried to make the journey as comfortable as possible for the irate man, and irate he was. But she could understand more now his irritation, for the doctor had explained to her that he suspected there was something touching the brain. This kind of thing often altered a man’s character, he said, but he would soon be himself again, they were very clever in the Newcastle Infirmary and the doctors there did all kinds of marvellous operations.
Last night she had tried to convey this to her father-in-law, but his response had been to tell her that she had always wanted him out of the way so she could run the place on her own, as if she hadn’t been doing that for months now.
She had always liked Newcastle, that was until that night she had made the journey in the dark; now, all she wanted was to get out of it.
The ward they carried him into was a bare place. It had beds along each side with men in them, some lying prone, some propped up, all looking ill. The place smelt strongly of carbolic combined with the smell of a dirty floorcloth that hadn’t been wrung out to dry: sour, arid.
A big woman dressed as a nurse told her to wait in the corridor for his things, and when they were later brought to her the big woman appeared again and said, ‘You can have a few minutes, that’s all.’
When she stood looking down on the man who had been her master since she was seven years old she did not chide herself because she could rouse no feelings of pity for him, for he had worked her hard all her life. She couldn’t remember him giving her one kind word, and lately she had wondered at times how she had suffered him while tending to his needs…all his needs, for he had been completely bedridden for the past month. Yet she managed to say, ‘You’ll soon be well; they’re very clever here, as I told you.’
‘Bloody liars, the lot of them, you an’ all. You want to see me finished, don’t you? And ’tis all through you I’m here, don’t forget that. If I die I’ll be on your conscience. Just remember that. Got me clothes there I can see, sell them likely.’
She turned away for she could stand no more and when she got outside the hospital gates and climbed up on to the seat where Jimmy was sitting patiently waiting, he looked at her and said, ‘Don’t cry, missis, he’ll be all right.’
And she turned to him and slowly she said, ‘Jimmy, I’m not crying for the mister, I’m crying because I’m sorry for meself.’
He smiled at her broadly now, saying, ‘Not you, missis, not you. Got too much gumption. Me ma said that an’ all just last night. She said you must have gumption to put up with what’s been shovelled on you.’
She dried her eyes and smiled at him, then said, ‘Let’s get back, Jimmy.’ …
But his repeating of what Mary Petty had said was literally made evident when they entered the yard, for the first thing she saw
was that the coalman had been and there on the ground near the coalhouse was a huge load of coal.
‘Crickey! that would have to come the day, wouldn’t it?’ Jimmy jerked his chin upwards. ‘And there’s the milkin’ and the horses.’
‘You see to the animals, Jimmy, and I’ll see to the coal.’
‘No, no, missis.’
‘Yes, yes; you’re better at the horses than I am, and they behave for you. Paddy made to bite me yesterday.’
‘He makes to bite me every day. He’s a devil is that one, but he can pull. He’s got his good points, and that’s what we need him for, isn’t it, missis, pullin’?’
‘Yes, yes, that’s what we need him for, Jimmy.’ She was making her way towards the kitchen door when it opened and Annie stood there bright-faced greeting her with, ‘You frozen, Ma?’
‘Yes. Yes, I am cold. I shouldn’t be surprised if we haven’t some snow shortly.’
Annie stood back, the door held wide, and Emma saw why: the table was set for tea; there was a plate of cut bread-and-butter, a dish of apple jelly preserve; there was the remains of the boiled bacon they’d had for their dinner yesterday; there were two cups and saucers set beside the plates; but best of all there was a tray with a single cup on it and a plate holding two bacon sandwiches. She turned and looked at her daughter. Annie’s face was bright, like that of a child who had presented her mother with a surprise present. Again she wanted to put out her arms and draw her tight, but something held her back; yet she said with deep feeling, ‘Oh, that is nice. What a welcome! And is the tea mashed?’
‘Yes, Ma. I poured the water on as soon as I heard the cart come in. It should be drawn in a minute.’
‘Oh, I could do with a cup of tea.’
‘I’ll pour it out for you, Ma.’
As she took her hat and cloak off she watched her daughter scurrying backward and forward between the fire hob and the table, and again she wanted to cry. Things would come right, there were all the signs of it. She didn’t know how long they would keep the mister in hospital. Likely when he returned he would no longer be bedridden and perhaps his temper would be improved too. But that was in the future. Here she was drinking a cup of tea and eating bread-and-butter that her daughter had made ready for her. The load of coal that she had to move would appear light after this …
Half an hour later she had changed into her working clothes, seen to Barney, and now she was about to tackle the coal, but because it was growing rapidly dark she lit a lantern, and as she did so Annie, coming to her side, said, ‘I’m going out for a little, Ma.’
‘But it’s on dark, lass.’
‘I know, but I want a breath of air and I won’t stay out long. I promise you. I’ll just walk down to the road and along by the field. I won’t be long. But I’ve been in the house all day and…’
‘All right, all right; but come back before it’s real dark, won’t you?’
‘Oh aye, Ma.’
‘Wrap up well, it’s enough to cut you in two now.’
‘Yes, Ma. I’ll put a shawl over my head.’
‘Do that. Do that.’
Emma went outside, and Annie now ran down the room and, taking a coat from a wooden rack that was nailed to the back door, she hurriedly dragged it on. The sleeves were much too short and the hem of it hardly came to below her knees. From another peg she took down a shawl which she threw over her head, crossed the ends over her breast and tied them in a knot at the back. Then she ran back to the kitchen door, but after opening it her walk was slow and it even turned into a saunter as she passed her mother who was shovelling the coal into wooden buckets at either side of her prior to carrying them into the coalhouse and she said, ‘Won’t be long, Ma.’
‘All right, all right, Annie.’ Emma had paused for a moment, and she shook her head, wondering again at her daughter’s craze for wandering. Perhaps it was because she had been shut up in that place so long. Yet, in her own words, she hadn’t considered herself as having been shut up; in fact, even before that business started she had wandered. Was that something she had inherited from her own line, from her grandfather who had wandered from one town to another, and from herself who had loved to wander when she was a child? Oh, enough that her daughter was changing for the good now.
When Annie was through the narrow alleyway between the stables and the barn her sauntering ceased and she began to run, then skip, and the path she skipped along was not that towards the coach road but one that went off at right angles in the direction of the river and Openwood. Openwood was now wired off but the wire was obliterated by a dense growth of scrub that had been left uncut over the years. There were openings here and there where someone had forced their way through, likely poachers, and it was to one of these that Annie made her way, even though it was almost dark now.
She did not go through the opening but stood to the side, her head cocked as if listening, and when the sound of crushed undergrowth came to her she smiled and her smile broadened into a grin when a voice said, ‘You there, Annie?’
‘Aye, Uncle.’
‘How’s tricks?’
‘Fine. They took me granda into hospital the day.’
‘Did they now? Did they now?’
‘He’s gona have an operation.’
‘Is he now? Is he now?’
The voice being thrown forward through the hedge appeared bodyless.
‘Did you find them, Uncle?’
‘I did, Annie. I did that.’
‘Did you tell her what I said?’
‘I did that an’ all, Annie. Yes, I did that an’ all.’
‘And what did she say?’
‘Well, what do you think, Annie?’
‘She wants me back?’
‘That’t just it, Annie. She’d welcome you back, she thinks you’re a fine girl. Oh, yes indeed.’
‘Where are they then, Uncle?’
‘Well now, ’tis a bit difficult to describe and it’s farther out than the last place, but I’ll take you there, Annie, any time you’re ready. But I’d leave it until the nights get a bit darker, say the first week in December and you’ll be all set in afore Christmas. They have some high times at Christmas, don’t they, Annie?’
‘Oh aye, Uncle. Oh aye.’
‘Listen to me, Annie.’
‘Yes, Uncle?’
‘We mustn’t be seen together, not at all, you understand?’
‘Oh yes, I understand that. She’d go mad, Ma would.’
‘She would indeed, Annie. She would indeed.’ The words came deep and soft and borne on laughter. ‘So caution’s the watchword, eh?’
‘Yes, Uncle.’
‘Well now, you come out for your jaunts mostly in the daylight, don’t you?’
‘Yes, Uncle.’
‘Well, one day I’ll tie a bit of blue ribbon on the post just to your left, it holds the wire, it’ll just be a tiny scrap so it won’t be noticed. Now when you see that, get yourself ready for the next day. Rain, hail or snow, just walk out as if for a saunter and take the road to the river. And you know where the path leads to the top of the bank, it’s the first place from where you can see the water and the jetties, you know that?’
‘Yes, Uncle, I know the place.’
‘Then make for there, an’ I’ll be waiting. Now you’ve got that?’
She now repeated slowly, ‘The day after I see a bit of ribbon on the post here, I’m to make me way to the top of the bank overlooking the river.’
‘That’s the girl. No grass will grow on you, Annie, you’re sharp and you’ll get somewhere. Oh aye, you’ll get somewhere, Annie. Now I’ve got to be off, you get back.’
‘Ta, Uncle. Thanks.’
‘You’re welcome, Annie, you’re very, very welcome. Goodnight to you.’
‘Goodnight, Uncle.’
She turned and ran all the way back to the farm. Emma was still shovelling the coal and when her daughter said, ‘I’ll give you a hand, Ma,’ Emma straightened her back and said, ‘No, lass, y
ou’ll get all dirty. But I’ll tell you what you can do, you can go into the dairy and do a bit of churning for me. You know what to do, don’t you?’
‘Aye, Ma.’
‘And then peel some taties for the dinner. There’s those fresh herring the fishwife brought yesterday, I’ll fry them when I come in; they’ll be tasty.’
‘Aye, Ma.’
Her hand tight against her thigh, Emma stood for a moment tensing her back muscles. Her daughter had offered to shovel coal with her. She closed her eyes and smiled to herself: God seemed to be at last paying attention to her prayers.
She attacked the coal with renewed vigour.
Three days later a man came from the hospital, knocked on the front door, then was directed by Jimmy to the farmyard and into the byres. There, facing Emma, he doffed his hat and said, ‘I’m very sorry to inform you, missis, that Mr Yorkless died this morning at half past eight. The operation was successful but apparently his constitution couldn’t stand up to it.’
Nine
Soft flakes of snow were falling when they buried Jake Yorkless, and there was a good turnout at the funeral for he was of an old farming family and, as one of those present said later when seated round the kitchen table, one of the few freeholders hereabouts.
Not more than twenty people had returned for the meal; these included the pallbearers of whom Luke was one.
They had brought the farmer’s body from the hospital already boxed and he had lain in the hall on trestles for three days, his head bandaged like a mummy, only his eyes, mouth and nose evident. He was a weird sight and Emma had had to force herself not to look at him as she passed back and forth to the sitting room to attend to Barney. As for Annie, once she was downstairs in the morning she wouldn’t go back into the hall until she made for bed at night.
The Whip (The Spaniard's Gift) Page 39
