Land of Milk & Honey

by William Taylor

  ‘I’m coming in, anyway, young man. Let’s be having you then!’ Molly opened the door. ‘Come on. Let’s be having you.’

  He held up a hand to hide a giggle. ‘That’s what my mum always used to say.’

  ‘Did she, dear?’ the woman smiled, and she saw quickly that he’d been examining himself. ‘Not quite a feast for sore eyes! Your mum say that, too?’

  ‘I think so,’ he said.

  ‘Don’t worry, young man. We’ll soon have you polished up and fit to put on a postcard, you mark my words. It’s mostly surface. And I’ll just bet your mum also used to tell you beauty is only skin deep.’

  ‘And ugliness goes right to the bone,’ said Jake. ‘I’d like to brush my hair.’

  ‘I’ll do it for you,’ Molly Henderson smiled. ‘Then it’s back to your bed and I’m poaching us a nice bit of fish for our dinners and I’m sure if you’re fit enough to be admiring yourself in a mirror, you’ll be up to tucking into that. Come on, now. That nice young policeman’s here to see you.’

  ‘No more questions, Jake. Reckon the old bloke asked you more’n enough for one day and it’s another day tomorrow,’ Constable Barry Jackson grinned down at Jake. ‘Didn’t trust me, did you?’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean, sir.’

  ‘Don’t need to call me sir. I’ve got something for you.’ He bent down, reached just out of the doorway behind him and held up a sugar sack.

  The sack squirmed and gave out a muffled, ‘Miaow.’

  ‘Reckon this chap is your Little Black Sambo,’ and he smiled again. ‘Not all of us around here knock off every little animal we come across, although, to be honest I must admit I felt a bit murderous about Little-Black-Devil-From-Hell. Claws sharp as needles.’ The constable smiled as Jake struggled to undo the cord knotted around the sack.

  ‘He’s still alive,’ he marvelled. ‘He survived!’

  ‘Surely did,’ said the cop, ruefully. ‘I’m carrying the proof of that!’

  Little Black Sambo lay in the bottom of the sack looking balefully up at his owner. He added a further scratch or two to Jake’s hand and wrist before curling up in the crook of his arm and going to sleep.

  ‘One helluva kitten,’ said Barry Jackson. ‘Now, I’ve got to go. Got to telephone my girlfriend. She’s going to murder me, stuck up here in the sticks for the next month.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Jake.

  ‘I didn’t know what you were thinking about this morning when you gave me that look, kid, but you’ve got no need to worry about me. Trust me?’

  ‘I do now,’ said Jake. ‘Sir,’ he added.

  ‘No, Robert. You can’t see him,’ said Mrs Henderson. ‘We’re about to eat.’

  ‘I’ll wait,’ said Robert. ‘Unless you’re thinking of asking me to eat, too?’

  ‘Nothing was further from my mind,’ she said.

  ‘What a pity,’ said Robert. ‘I still want proof he’s alive,’ he added.

  ‘He is,’ said Dr McGregor, coming to the door. ‘You’ve got our words for it.’

  ‘That’s what they all say. Sure he’s not dead? He looked half-dead yesterday.’

  ‘He’s very much alive.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘You sound disappointed, Robert,’ said Molly.

  ‘Don’t get me wrong, Mrs Henderson, I don’t really want him dead but if he is, that means they might hang Darcy Pearson, and I can’t wait for that!’

  The old doctor sighed. ‘Bad news always spreads quickly.’

  ‘Geez, Dr Mac, it wouldn’t be bad news if they hanged Pearson. When they do I’m going to apply to be a witness and cheer when they drop him.’

  ‘You bloodthirsty little devil,’ said the doctor.

  ‘All right for you, you’ve never been bashed up and tortured by him! Bet that bloke in there you won’t let me see would cheer the loudest.’

  ‘That’s as may be but, thank the good Lord, we don’t have capital punishment these days.’

  ‘My mum says that’s a pity,’ said Robert.

  ‘Your long-suffering mother is probably looking at you when she says it,’ said James McGregor. ‘Come on then, I’ll give you living proof that hanging isn’t on the cards, at least for the moment! Two minutes, and not a second more.’

  ‘Your generosity is succeeded only by your good looks, Dr Mac,’ said Robert.

  ‘I think you got a word wrong, Robert. Don’t they teach you anything at that dratted school these days?’

  ‘Not much, Dr Mac. Lead on, McDuff!’

  ‘Humph! Didn’t quite get that one right, either. Come on.’

  Robert took a good close look at Jake. ‘Hmm. Don’t look too good to me, Dr Mac. If you want my professional opinion…’

  ‘I don’t remember asking for it, Robert. Jake, this wretched specimen of humanity is Robert Te Huia. He helped us dig you out of my poor hydrangeas and feels some degree of ownership. If you don’t want him in here I’ll take great pleasure in booting him out. Robert, this is Jacob Neill. Two minutes,’ and the doctor left them.

  ‘Gidday,’ said Robert. ‘You OK now?’ And then he was tongue-tied.

  Jake looked at Robert without blinking. He took in the broad, brown face, the mop of jet-black hair that was more than black, almost purple, and the half-grin, now somewhat shy. ‘I think you came to see me yesterday,’ he said. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘You talk funny. Poms do, eh?’

  ‘No,’ said Jake. ‘But you do.’ He smiled. Each looked at the other, assessing. They relaxed.

  ‘They got that bugger and they reckon he nearly killed you. It’s all over town and it’s gonna be in the paper. Pity he didn’t kill you ‘cos then they might hang him…‘ He realised what he’d said. ‘Well, big pity he didn’t kill someone I didn’t like. What’s it feel like?’

  ‘What’s what feel like?’

  ‘Geez, you’re a bit hard to understand,’ and Robert spoke very slowly, loudly and deliberately. ‘Do…you…feel…all…right?’

  ‘I…am…not…deaf,’ said Jake. ‘I…speak…English!’

  ‘If you say so, mate,’ Robert grinned. ‘What’s gonna happen to you?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘I’ll come and see you again if the old bugger’ll let me in. OK? My mum reckons he’s the best doctor she’s ever known, for all he’s got a wicked temper.’

  ‘Your mother is right on both counts, Ropata. Now…out!’ Dr McGregor pointed.

  ‘Mum says you’re not to call me Ropata. It’s Robert.’

  ‘The day I do what your mother tells me, young man, will be the day I pop my clogs.’

  ‘See what I mean, mate,’ Robert grinned. He looked at Jake from the doorway. ‘You’ll be OK, even with Dr Mac as your doctor. See you tomorrow.’

  ‘Don’t count on the old bugger letting you in, Robert!’ said Dr Mac.

  IV

  It took time.

  There were nights when he couldn’t sleep. At first there was pain. After the pain came intense irritation as his skin fought to mend itself. No matter how effective the doctor’s treatments were, there were still times when Jake had to suffer. He endured without complaint to the extent that James McGregor, growling, said to him, ‘If you want to scream, boy, then bloody scream. I’ve seen grown men whimper and moan from much less! Sometimes a good howl helps us all.’

  After three or four nights, Molly Henderson returned to her own home. ‘If you insist on keeping him here, Jim, that’s fine and dandy. Just let me know if you need a break and he can come to me for a night or two. If you take my advice, you won’t let it go on too long.’ She looked at her old friend, but said nothing more.

  ‘I know what I’m doing,’ said James McGregor.

  ‘Do you?’ she smiled at him.

  The days accumulated. And Jake began to wonder more about what was to happen to him. Where would he go? Could he just go?

  He became increasingly friendly with Molly Henderson, indeed he spent more time with her than he did with the old doc
tor. He began pottering around, helping her in the kitchen, sharing cups of tea. He confided in her, telling the old woman the story of his family, the loss of his mother in what had been the worst air-raid to strike Coventry. Of how his father, a fireman and air-raid warden, had a lost a leg not long after. Of his grandmother who had died and of the agonies of decision and indecision about what would be best for him and for his sister, Janice, and of how his father had decided a new life for the two of them would be better than what he could hope to provide. A new life in a new world.

  Molly Henderson brought him pen and paper and he wrote to his father.

  Dear Father,

  I hope this finds you fit and well. I am having a good time and now stay in a town for a while. Well, it is not really a town, it is just a bit of a village. It has one street with a few shops and a post office and a bank and a library and other bibs and bobs. There is one school for the whole of the town. I do not know how long I am living here for. The farm where I was did not work out too good but I am fine. I think I might like to live in a town (or a village) but not on another farm but I suppose I will do what I am told because I have always done what I am told, ha ha. There is no need to worry.

  The house I am staying in is a very big mansion sort of a house with more rooms than I can count. It is a doctor’s house and his place of work. It is nearly as big as the orphanage run by the nuns where Janice and me lived after Gran had gone. But we don’t have no nuns, ha ha. None nuns, ha ha ha ha.

  I hope you get this letter. You can hop hop down to the pub and read it them down there, hop hop ha ha.

  Please write to me soon and tell me the news. Have you got a new leg yet? I hope it is a good one and better than the last one so that you hop even faster.

  Your son

  Jacob (Jake).

  ‘Did Dr Mac’s wife die?’ he asked Molly Henderson, as he looked at a silver-framed photograph. An old photo, brown with years.

  ‘Yes. That’s the two of them. Goodness me, back in the twenties, I would think. Off for a day at the races.’ Molly smiled. ‘She loved her horses. He did, too. Particularly if it was a winner!’

  ‘She died?’

  ‘Yes. Soon after the war began. Quite suddenly.’

  ‘Dr Mac doesn’t say anything about her.’

  ‘They were very happy,’ she picked up the photo. ‘Pauline, that was her name. She was lovely. My best friend. I guess that’s why I’m here today—slaving my fingers to the bone running two houses’ She laughed. ‘And at my age!’

  ‘Did they have children?’

  ‘No. Now you get out to the kitchen, stoke up the range and get that kettle boiling. Mac’ll be through for his morning tea at any moment. Scat! Off with you.’

  ‘It itches,’ he said to the doctor.

  ‘Of course it itches. Doesn’t mean to say you can scratch the hell out of it. God knows how you could have twisted yourself to scratch right up there. You a circus acrobat in an earlier life?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jake. ‘And a lion tamer.’

  ‘Hah! Tell that to your dratted cat! You’re not doing too good a job there, are you? Sure I can’t drown the bugger for you?’

  ‘You can drown him if you can catch him,’ Jake grinned. Little Black Sambo gave Dr James McGregor a very wide berth. ‘I think he’s quite safe.’

  ‘There’s an old girl lives down the road from here, out in the country. Mrs Sykes. Funny old soul. Had she been born a few hundred years ago around where you come from, your ancestors would have burnt her at the stake as a witch. Must admit she looks like one. Now, modern medical science says I should say that what she gets up to is a load of old rubbish, but, for all that, I’m going to have her take a look at your back.’

  ‘Why? Why would I want a witch looking at my back?’

  ‘Because I say so, boy, and because she makes these potions and ointments from herbs and roots and bark and whatnot, and for all it’s a load of old rubbish, it seems to work. We’ll take a drive out there tomorrow afternoon, after I’m through here. Don’t worry yourself if she never speaks a word to you. Least said soonest mended, is old Mrs Sykes’ motto. Either that or she thinks silence is insurance against being burnt at that stake by young hooligans like you!’ He smiled at Jake. ‘Pop your cat in a bag. I’m told she’s looking for a new fellow,’ and he grinned more broadly. ‘Last one fell off her broomstick. Was the tenth time it’d tumbled, so it didn’t get up again.’

  ‘So it’s not my back you’re interested in. You just want to get rid of my cat,’ said Jake.

  ‘Something like that. Now, then. You and me have to have a serious talk. Come on. We’ll walk and talk around the garden, and I can smoke my pipe. Molly doesn’t stop complaining if I smoke in the house. Smoke a pipe, lad?’

  ‘No,’ said Jake.

  ‘Pity. Hope you don’t smoke those other fool things.’

  ‘Sometimes I do.’

  ‘Oh, well. I guess you’re grown-up enough. God knows, after what you’ve gone through in the last few years…’ He looked the boy up and down. ‘Bad for the wind, though, if you want to be a runner. And you’ve the build of a runner. Come on. You can point out the hydrangeas. You should know them by now. The ones you carelessly destroyed!’

  They strolled the garden in silence before the doctor led the way back to the house and they sat together on the steps of the broad front veranda. ‘Would you like to live here, boy?’

  Jake looked at him. ‘You mean here with you?’

  ‘I’m not planning on moving out, lad, so you can have the whole darn place to yourself.’

  ‘I didn’t mean that.’

  ‘Although it is hard for me to admit it, I am getting a bit long in the tooth. Seventy next birthday, dammit! Can’t always do those things that need to be done. You’d work for your keep, mark my words. Mow the lawns, garden. Drive the car.’

  ‘But I can’t drive a car,’ said Jake.

  ‘I’ll teach you,’ said Dr Mac. ‘You see, lad, the spirit’s willing but the flesh is getting a bit weak. The old arthritis is taking its toll.’ He held out a gnarled, knotted hand.

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘Yes. You’re not too short in the old brain-box department. And that’s another thing…you’d go to school.’

  Jake breathed a sigh of contentment, closed his eyes, felt warm all over. Then chill struck. ‘They wouldn’t let me.’

  ‘Who’s they?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ He took a stab. ‘The police?’

  James McGregor laughed. ‘Don’t worry about the authorities, laddie. Good God, boy! What are you, man or mouse?’ He looked thoughtfully at Jake. ‘I know what you mean, though. I haven’t bothered you with all the ins and outs—but I’ve settled with the authorities already. You’ve been living here with me, quite legally, since a day or two after you plonked yourself in my hydrangeas and killed ‘em. My legal wallahs saw to that. I guess it’s a bit of a help when your best friend is also a judge. As we sit here talking, I am your legal guardian. For the time being, anyway.’

  ‘You…you mean I’ve got no worries?’

  ‘Didn’t say that, did I? You’ve got me as a worry. What is it your best mate calls me—a bad-tempered old bugger? Don’t promise you a bed of roses, young man.’

  Jake wasn’t listening. He had bent over, head almost between his knees, body shaking. When he finally raised his tear-soaked face, he stared directly at the old doctor. ‘You’re not a bad-tempered old bugger.’

  ‘I take it that means your answer is yes. Come on, boy. It’s not as bad as all that. Come here,’ and he reached out a hand and pulled Jake towards him. ‘Not too good at this. Here,’ and he gave Jake a rough and ready hug. ‘Dry those eyes. Come on inside and we’ll drink to it. I’ll have a whisky and you can have…dammit, you can have a whisky, too!’

  He hadn’t told Jake about the endless hours of argument with nurse and housekeeper. ‘You don’t know him! He doesn’t know you!’

  ‘He’s fourteen and you’re s
enile!’

  ‘You’d have to be at least something of a parent! Really, Mac, it’s not as if you’ve ever had any training.’

  ‘Poor little kiddy like that and a doddering old fool! God knows, Pauline’ll be turning in her grave! What on earth d’you think you’re playing at?’

  ‘You know nothing of his background. Nothing at all!’

  Then, finally, capitulation.

  ‘He’s a nice enough little chap. Sure he doesn’t deserve better? I’ll do what I can.’

  And, ‘Even this old pile of a place, and you besides, must be better than what he’s had so far! He needs clothes. I’ll make a list. No, I won’t. You’ll give me the money and I shall take him down to the city and fit him out! Oh, yes, I knew that’d make you blink!’ A smile. ‘We’ll take young Robert as well. Make a day of it. Christmas is well nigh on us and I’ve still not got those curtain samples. Might even stay overnight.’ And then a sly smile. ‘You’d better start thinking of a Christmas tree, Mac. Can’t have a kiddie in the house and no tree!’

  From the far corners of his mind where he had hidden them away for safe keeping, Jake took out and brushed off his memories of his mother. It was safer, now, to let them surface, let them out. What surprised the boy was that while they still had the power to sadden him, the hurt and the pain they had once the generated had, somehow, lessened in intensity. At first this puzzled Jake until one day the realisation hit him that his mother had been gone from him for so long, and so much had happened to him in the years since that had changed his life and existence, for ill and then good. He knew that while he would never forget her, and that his memories of her would live within him forever, edges had started to blur. Memories were there in plenty, but, well, just sometimes it was getting a little hard to actually see her and hear her voice.

  When he thought about his little sister, Janice, he knew that whatever memory she may still have of their mother would be fainter by far than his. Jake hoped with all his might that he would somehow get to see Janny before whatever memory she might still have of him was lost in the mists of time.