Tilly Trotter Widowed (The Tilly Trotter Trilogy)

by Cookson, Catherine

  ‘Say something.’

  She had not realised that he had turned from the window but she could not do as he asked, and now taking her hands, he pleaded, ‘Please, don’t be upset, nothing has changed between us. What has happened today doesn’t matter. I’m only sorry it has had to happen this way. If Josefina wasn’t such a spitfire none of this would have come about. I’m sorry I called her a bitch but I was so mad at her when she broke my violin, and all because I wouldn’t go to Uncle John’s with her.’

  Tilly bowed her head. It was strange how some men could be so inwardly blind. He had no idea of Josefina’s true feelings for him; and it was better that he should remain in ignorance.

  When he put his arms about her and kissed her she held him tightly for a moment before saying, ‘Go and make your peace with her, she’s very unhappy.’ She did not add, ‘She won’t be here much longer,’ enough was enough.

  When the door had closed on him she stood perfectly still in the middle of the room, then lifting her hand, she pressed it tightly over her mouth as if to prevent the words escaping from her lips, for her mind was crying, Oh Steve! Steve! He was the only rock in her life, the only being who had never changed. She wanted to fly to him, fling herself into his arms and cry, ‘I’ll marry you, Steve. I’ll marry you.’ At this moment the promise she had made to a dying man appeared foolish and futile, and her reason for not having broken it earlier was, she knew, because she’d had two children to bring up, then two young people to see to and guide; but now both of them were gone from her life, cut off as surely as if they had packed their bags and taken separate coaches to separate railways, they had gone.

  She must see Steve, she must. Perhaps he hadn’t gone to his cottage. Well, if he had she would stay and wait for him. Oh yes, she would wait. Whatever time he came back tonight she would be there waiting. Had he not waited for her for years?

  From the top of the stairs she called down to Biddle and gave him orders to have her horse saddled. Then going to her room, she swiftly changed her clothes. Fifteen minutes later she was galloping down the drive, through the main gates and onto the coach road. But she did not continue along it to the turnpike as she had done at odd times before, she jumped her horse over a ditch, then over a low field gate, rode him around the border by a drystone wall until they came to a part where the wall had broken down. Taking him gently over this, she set him into a gallop down a shallow valley and up the bordering hill. On the top she drew him to a stop for a moment, not only to give him a breather but to view the surrounding land. Away in the far, far distance to the right of her she could see a narrow silver streak that was the River Tyne. Away to the front was soft undulating farmland. Then her eye was drawn slightly to the left and below her where the land dropped again, and her gaze became rivetted on two riders. One was unmistakable, as was his mount. Steve’s horse was a fourteen-year-old mare which ten years ago she had helped to choose. She was broad in the back and made for weight, but the horse walking alongside her was a sleek animal, evidently a hunter, and its rider was sleek too. But she wasn’t a young girl. She had her face turned towards Steve and she was laughing, they were both laughing, he into her face and she into his. The sound of it came to her as if carried on a patch of wind, and now the mill grinding against her ribs worked faster as she saw Steve lean from his saddle, his hand outstretched. She could not see what he did with it, but its direction left little to the imagination – he was placing it on that of his companion.

  Oh God! God! She turned her horse slowly about and the seemingly unaffected part of her mind said, ‘Why do you always say, Oh God! God! when you’re upset? You never pray, so why do you appeal to Him now?’ But appeal to Him she did and, looking upwards, she asked, ‘What have I done this time?’ and the answer seemed to come to her from every corner of the wide expanse of sky, saying, ‘You left it too late. You left it too late.’

  Three

  Noreen was sitting by the burn gazing into the water. She had been sitting like this for almost an hour now and she told herself she would wait another five minutes and then she would go.

  She waited ten, fifteen, and she had risen to her feet when she heard the rustle of footsteps in the dry grass, and the snuffling of the dog, and quickly she put her hands to her bonnet, straightened it and dusted the grass from her coat, and then he came round the corner and towards her.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘I’m . . . I’m late.’

  ‘Yes, you are.’

  He laughed gently now. Any of the other young misses he had met he was sure would never have given such a forthright reply. They would have said, ‘Oh, are you? Well, I’ve just come’, or some such nonsense. He held out his hand to her and he knew it was trembling, and when her fingers lay within his palm he knew that she was trembling too. His head to the side, he bent down towards her and as he did so it seemed for a second someone had lit a lamp in front of her face.

  ‘You’ve got a new bonnet on,’ he said.

  ‘You can make that out?’

  ‘Yes, yes. I see it plainly in my mind. And you too. You’re . . . you’re very beautiful.’

  ‘No.’ Her voice sounded flat now. ‘I’m pretty but not beautiful.’

  ‘I think you’re beautiful.’

  ‘Well, I’ll not argue with you.’

  ‘No, you’d better not.’

  They both laughed; then he said, ‘Am I allowed to say that blue suits you? It is a new coat and bonnet, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, my mother bought them for my birthday . . . It’s my birthday on Tuesday, but it being Sunday she gave them to me today to wear.’

  ‘Yes, I know when your birthday is.’

  ‘I never mentioned it to you so how do you . . . ?’

  ‘You told me the day you were sixteen, and you had a new bonnet and coat on then.’

  ‘Did I?’

  ‘You did and you know you did. You pronounced it as if you had gained a century.’ Again they were laughing; and now he drew her cautiously towards the river bank and, as they had done so often before, they sat down side by side on it.

  She reached out now and drew a paper-covered parcel towards her, saying as she did so, ‘I’ve brought your books back. I like the Dickens stories, but they’re sad, aren’t they?’

  ‘Yes, they are; but they’re true to life.’

  ‘How do you know, because you’ve hardly been away from the big house?’

  ‘I’ve been to London.’

  ‘You have!’ There was awe in her tone now.

  ‘I have.’ His tone was deliberately pompous. ‘And what’s more, I have heard Mr Charles Dickens reading his own stories from the stage.’

  ‘You haven’t really.’

  ‘Yes, I have. My Uncle John and Aunt Anna, Mother, and Josefina, we all went to the St James’ Hall one night and listened to the great man. It was most enthralling. I felt so sorry when he died; ’twas as if I had known him personally.’

  ‘He is dead then?’

  ‘Yes, he died about three years ago.’

  ‘Aw, I’m sorry too. I hate to hear of people dying. I never want to die, I want to go on living and loving . . . ’ She stopped suddenly and her fingers jerked away from his.

  After a moment he leaned towards her and said softly, ‘You love someone, Noreen?’

  Her head was bent, her hands tightly clasped.

  ‘Yes.’ Her head was nodding now.

  ‘Do I know him?’

  There was a pause before her answer came. ‘Yes.’

  ‘What’s his name?’

  When she didn’t answer, he asked gently, ‘Can’t you tell me his name?’

  ‘No’ – she was shaking her head now – ‘he’s got to speak first.’

  ‘Perhaps he’s afraid to, this person you love. You see I know all about being afraid to speak my mind because I, too, love someone very, very dearly. But I’m . . . I’m handicapped. I couldn’t imagine her ever really loving me, being sorry for me yes, b
eing a companion to me, a friend, but I couldn’t ask her anything more until . . . well, I wouldn’t want to frighten her and lose her friendship.’

  ‘Willy.’ She was kneeling by his side now gazing at him, and he swung himself round so that he, too, was kneeling, and as he whispered her name she said again, ‘Willy. Aw Willy.’ And then their arms were about each other and his lips were on hers, hard, tight, and she was clinging to him as if she would never let him go.

  It was minutes later when, still clinging together, they sat once more on the edge of the bank; and Willy now brought from his pocket a small box and, handing it to her, he said, ‘A happy birthday, my dear, dearest Noreen.’

  Slowly she pressed the spring and when the lid opened there lay a brooch in the shape of a half-moon and lying in the crescent was a star. The moon was set with small diamonds, the star too, but at its central point there lay a ruby.

  ‘Oh! . . . Oh! . . . Oh, Willy! I’ve never seen anything so beautiful. Oh, thank you! Thank you.’ Her arms were about him again. Once more their lips held; and then he said in a tone full of emotion, ‘You’ll marry me, Noreen?’

  ‘Oh aye, yes, Willy.’ Each word seemed to be balanced on wonder, and again she said, ‘Oh yes, yes.’

  ‘When?’

  Slowly now she sank away from him while still retaining hold of his hand, and she looked across the water as she said one word. ‘Father . . . ’

  From the thicket behind them a prone figure slowly edged itself backwards and if the couple on the bank heard the rustle of the grass they put it down to a rabbit, but the dog heard it and when he made towards it, Willy commanded him to stay.

  Randy Simmons was more of the weasel type than a rabbit, and he grinned and nodded his old head as he muttered to himself, ‘Aye, aye, Father.’ News of this would mend his back for him. Aye, by heck, it would. He could see his master skitting up to that Manor and tearing it apart. Just let her say it to him once again, ‘You’re as lazy as you’re long, Randy Simmons,’ and he’d put the shackles on her all right. He’d split on her; her father’d hear about it in any case, sooner or later.

  Father. She had a good right to say it like that, the little trollop.

  By! It’d make a story in the pub, the witch’s blind bastard and Bentwood’s lass. ’Twas about time there was a bit of excitement round here, things had been too quiet of late. Aye, much too quiet.

  ‘Girl! Look at your coat. It’s all grass stains, you’d think you had been kneeling in it.’

  ‘Mam! Mam!’ Noreen pushed her mother’s hands away. ‘Stop fussing and listen, I’ve got something to tell you . . . listen . . . listen . . . Willy has asked me to marry him.’

  ‘Willy?’ Lucy screwed up her eyes as if she had never heard the name Willy before, and one thing was sure, she had never heard it from her daughter’s lips.

  ‘Willy Sopwith.’

  ‘Willy Sopwith?’

  ‘Mam, don’t act on as if you didn’t know.’

  ‘Well, I didn’t know it had gone this far.’ Lucy’s voice was now a harsh whisper and she glanced about her as if afraid of being overheard. Then grabbing her daughter by the shoulder just in case this fear should be realised, she thrust her forward, saying, ‘Get upstairs.’

  When they were standing in the back bedroom Lucy peered at her daughter as if she were finding difficulty in seeing her. The light in the room was dim, it being the original upstairs room of the once two-roomed cottage that had first stood on this site, and on the brightest day the light merely filtered into the room through the two narrow windows that were set like armoury slits in a castle wall; and the walls, all of two foot thick, did resemble those built as a fortification. Noreen could have had any of the other three vacant bedrooms in the house but she preferred to stay in the one which had acted as her nursery when a child.

  ‘You’re mad, girl. You know that, you’re mad.’

  ‘All right, I’m mad, but we’re going to be married.’

  ‘When, in the name of God?’

  ‘I . . . I don’t know exactly, but we are. He . . . he wanted to take me to see his mother today, and when I wouldn’t go he wanted to come here . . . ’

  ‘Come here! Oh!’ Lucy held her head between her two hands and she rocked herself from side to side as she said, ‘He’d go for him. You know that, he’d go for him.’

  ‘Well, he might find his match if he did, Willy’s no weakling.’

  ‘He’s almost blind, girl, at least from what I hear . . . is he?’

  ‘Yes.’ The answer had come firm and clear, and as Lucy looked at her daughter she recognised that she wasn’t arguing with or trying to persuade a young girl, because Noreen neither looked nor sounded a young girl, she was a woman. She had always been older than her years and much wiser than one would expect from someone of her age, but the revelation did not deter her in her pleading, in fact it seemed to make it imperative that her daughter should see sense before it was too late. ‘Look,’ she said now; ‘give yourself time. Tell him you must think it over, have time . . . ’

  ‘I have thought it over, and for a long time now, and I’ve given him my word. Anyway, I want to marry him. If I don’t . . . ’

  ‘Oh no! No! Oh girl, no!’ Lucy had put her hand up as if to ward off something fearful, and now she cried almost in anguish, ‘Not that, girl. Don’t tell me that you must marry him. How could you!’

  ‘Mama!’ The word was almost a bellow. ‘You’re barking up the wrong tree.’

  Lucy closed her eyes and her body seemed to slump; then looking at her daughter again, she said, ‘I’m sorry, lass, I’m sorry, but I could stand anything except that. The disgrace of that, at least for you. Aw no! No! Aye’ – she managed to smile now as if in relief – ‘things will work out, at least I hope to God they will. But do this for me, lass, don’t mention anything yet. And don’t go running off because that might be all right for you and him but your dad will go up to that house and there would be murder done. I tell you you don’t know how he feels about . . . about that woman.’ Her head was down now and her lips were trembling and it was Noreen’s turn to feel concern. Putting her arm around her mother’s shoulder, she said, ‘I . . . I do know and . . . and I think he’s mad, mad in so many ways, mainly for not appreciating what he’s got in you, for what I’ve seen of her . . . she’s got no figure, nothing, she’s as flat as Willy himself.’

  They stood in silence for a moment, Lucy with her head still bent, Noreen looking towards her bed. When she spoke she asked a question: ‘Do you think, Mam,’ she said, ‘that Dad’s not right in the head? Because nobody sane could act like he does about something that happened years and years ago, and be normal.’

  Lucy now moved from her daughter’s hold and towards the door and she had the knob in her hand as she said, ‘He’s sane enough in one way but mad in another, because some women have the power to turn men’s brains.’

  ‘I don’t like her.’

  Looking sadly at her daughter, Lucy said, ‘Well, if you’re hoping for her to be your mother-in-law it’s a sad lookout for the future, because there’s an old adage that says a wife is but the second woman in a man’s life.’ And on this she went out.

  Four

  For the past two months Tilly had avoided meeting Steve except when she visited the mine, and even there she managed to arrange for a third party to be present.

  She knew she was afraid to be alone with him, in case she might upbraid him for enjoying another woman’s company and in doing so reveal her own feelings towards him. And this she knew would be most unfair, for the situation between them was of her own making. She could have married him any time within the last sixteen years but now it was too late.

  A meeting had just taken place in the office with regard to the building of new repair sheds, also the renovation of the stables. There had been present John, the under-manager Alec Manning, Steve and herself. Some of the under-manager’s remarks had been disturbing. He was a modern young man, not afraid to open his mouth,
and he said openly that it was very little use spending money on new buildings when the roads inside were almost worked out. Better, he thought, to open new seams.

  She had been surprised that Steve had not downed him. His silence on the point seemed to suggest he was of a similar way of thinking. Then why, she thought, hadn’t he spoken up? Her own thoughts became agitated as she realised that his mind was not wholly on the business in hand.

  John had been emphatic against spending more money on exploring new drifts until he was absolutely sure there was nothing more to be had out of the present ones.

  The meeting had ended with nothing settled because no two of them seemed to be in agreement on any point.

  She came out of the office and stood talking to John, aware at the same time that Steve and his under-man had gone into the lamp house. Steve hadn’t spoken to her privately except to wish her a good morning.

  John brought her attention to him swiftly by saying, ‘Mc . . . McGrath is not . . . not himself these days. I fear there m . . . m . . . might be some . . . something in the rumour after all.’

  ‘What rumour?’ Her voice was sharp.

  ‘Oh, just that I heard he was th . . . thinking of leaving the pit and taking up f . . . f . . . farming. I understand he’s got some kind of a f . . . f . . . farm.’

  ‘It’s merely a cottage.’

  ‘Oh yes, yes’ – he looked closely at her – ’I f . . . f . . . forgot you’ve b . . . been there. And it isn’t a f . . . farm of any k . . . k . . . kind?’

  ‘No. The land’s useless for farming. A few sheep perhaps but that’s all. When did you hear this?’