It seemed they both had dreams, and she shouldn’t judge him too harshly.
Chapter Twenty-eight
1931
Before they set off for home, the skippers of many of the trawlers landing at Peterhead gravitated to a restaurant after settling with their crews, not only to have something decent to eat, but also to compare catches and have a good chinwag with others they knew. They generally ordered wine with their meal, had a glass of brandy or whisky afterwards and left generous tips for the waitresses, so Dennis McKay made a point of being friendly to those who came to Le Denis.
The latest arrivals seemed to be in high spirits, so he went over to talk to them – good humour meant good catches, good catches meant they had money to burn. ‘Good afternoon, gentlemen. I hope everything is satisfactory?’
The oldest, jolliest one looked up and laughed. ‘Aye, as always. I wish the wife could cook like this.’
Dennis let his eyes travel round the table, stopping when he saw an unfamiliar face. ‘I haven’t seen you in before, Mr … er … ?’
‘George Buchan. No, I couldn’t afford your prices before I got the Mary Ann.’
Dennis had a fund of questions to gain information which may, or may not, prove useful, and the boat in question was new and quite impressive. ‘The Mary Ann? Would that be your wife’s name, or your girlfriend’s?’
‘We called her after my wife’s grandmother. She left a lot of money to Katie.’
Not by one flicker of a facial muscle did Dennis show that the names meant anything to him, but his fertile brain was working at full speed. Katie? With a grandmother called Mary Ann? It couldn’t be coincidence, but he had to make sure. ‘Are you a … Lossiemouth man, Mr Buchan?’ He felt that it wouldn’t do to be accurate in his supposed guess.
‘No, I’m from Cullen.’
Hard pressed to contain his excitement, Dennis said, ‘I hope to see you again next time you’re in Peterhead.’
‘I’m sure you will,’ George smiled.
Dennis went into his small office mentally rubbing his hands with glee. Speak about landing on his feet! Katie Mair – no, Katie Buchan now – had money, a lot of money! And her husband had his own boat. A constant supply of money! The last time Beth had paid what he owed to the bookies, she had said it was definitely the last, though she’d been saying that from the first time he asked her. But he wouldn’t need to ask again, for he had just learned of a new, bottomless, source of supply, and what was more, it had been handed to him on a plate – one of his own plates.
The Mary Ann had been so successful that George and Katie now had a joint bank account – he had been adamant about that since buying the trawler had practically emptied the one her grandmother had taken out for her. They had only a few hundred pounds so far, but that would soon grow. George, of course, had suggested having running water put in, and a bathroom, but she had said, ‘Don’t waste money on this old place. Once we start a family, we’ll have to move.’
‘There’s brains inside that pretty head,’ he had laughed.
She was truly happy, Katie thought one morning, as she rubbed wax polish into the already gleaming old furniture. Letting George buy his own boat was the best thing she could have done. He’d had to study for his skipper’s ticket and learn all about navigation, but he had passed the tests the Board set in time to take over the Mary Ann when it was built. From the first, he had landed at Peterhead, where prices for fish were better, and he handed over everything he made to her, apart from what he spent when he went to some fancy restaurant for a meal with the other skippers. She didn’t mind him treating himself; he worked hard enough for it, and his crew respected him for mucking in at all the jobs, and for always being fair with them when it came to the settling up.
She went to answer the knock at her door with a smile on her face. ‘Mrs Buchan?’ Her hand flew to her mouth, which had dried up the second she saw who it was. ‘What do you want here?’ she mumbled.
Dennis grinned. ‘You’re not going to leave an old friend standing on the doorstep, are you?’
He pushed past her, and she had no option but to close the door behind her. ‘How did you know where I was?’
Sitting down, he studied his manicured nails with assumed nonchalance. ‘I know everything about you, my dear Katie.’
‘I’m not your dear, and how do you know?’
‘A restaurateur learns a lot.’
‘A restaur … oh, is it your place George speaks about, the place with the funny name … Leedinnie, isn’t it?’
‘He does come in to Le Denis for meals.’
‘How did you know he was married to me?’
‘That would be telling, but don’t worry, I haven’t said a word to him about our previous … entanglement.’
‘Thank God.’
‘So you didn’t tell him yourself? That’s good news.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘You will, Katie. Why don’t we sit down and have a chat?’
She knew that he was up to something, and perched uneasily on the edge of a chair. ‘We’ve nothing to chat about.’
‘Oh, but we have. Let me bring you up to date. I married money, which is why I now run my own restaurant, and I’ve been living the good life, but, unfortunately, my wife is clamping down on me. She disapproves of my gambling.’
‘And your women, I suppose?’ Katie interrupted, bitterly.
‘That, too. Anyway, she’s refusing to pay my debts, and to be frank, Katie, I’m desperate for cash.’
The penny dropped. ‘If you think you’ll get money out of me, you’ve another think coming.’
‘I don’t think, Mrs Buchan, I know I will.’
‘You won’t, for I’ve none to give you.’
‘Come, come, Katie. I believe your grandmother left you very well provided for.’
‘She left me quite a lot, but I paid her funeral out of it, and I gave George the rest to buy his boat.’
‘Oh.’ This had not occurred to him. ‘But he’s a prosperous skipper, so there must always be plenty coming in.’
‘We’re saving to buy a better house.’ Katie bit her lip in anger at herself for letting him know they had any savings.
‘We … ? A joint account, I hope?’
‘Yes, but …’
‘There’s no problem, then, is there? I’m not greedy. Fifty pounds, that’s all I want.’
‘Fifty pounds? You must be mad!’
‘Never been saner, my dear Katie. Fifty pounds, or I’ll tell your darling hubby all about us.’
Recalling how jealous George had been about Sammy, Katie was afraid to take any chances. She could put £50 back bit by bit from the house-keeping money and he would never know. ‘I’ll have to take it out of the bank.’
Beaming with satisfaction, Dennis leaned back and watched her taking the passbook out of the dresser drawer. ‘No need to hurry, Katie, I can wait.’
Sweat dripping from his brow, Angus Gunn let the whip fall to the floor, his brain clearer than it had been for many months. There was no one there! He had been lashing an empty bed and the screams had only been inside his head. But why on earth had he been doing it? Was he going insane?
He sat down on the chair and took great gulps of air into his lungs, waiting until his overstrained heart stilled and his stomach muscles untensed. He must stop this nonsense. It was nonsense. Catching sight of the sticks ranged against the wall and the ropes lying on the floor, he had a moment’s panic. What would Betty think if she saw them? He would have to hide them somewhere.
Two hours later, sitting sedately in the kitchen, he turned to smile at his wife when she came in. ‘Have you been busy today, my dear?’
She thumped down on a seat. ‘Rushed off our feet.’
‘Your assistant is coping, I hope?’
‘Henry’s very good, a natural salesman.’
Angus was surprised at the little thread of jealousy that looped round his heart at the softness of her eyes when she spoke of th
is other man. ‘You think a lot of him?’
‘I couldn’t think any more of him.’ Having been caught off guard, Betty added quickly, ‘As an employee, not a person.’
The afterthought was obviously to put him off the scent, Angus guessed, and wondered if he ought to go back to the shop himself to get rid of his rival. But he couldn’t bear to stand all day again, and besides, he was not sure if he was mentally capable of coping with the pressures. ‘Have you noticed anything odd about me recently, Betty?’
‘What do you mean, odd?’
‘Unnatural behaviour. I sometimes wonder if my mind is …’
‘If you’ve been speaking to yourself again, it’s nothing. It’s because you’re on your own so much.’
‘I found myself actually doing something today – I cannot tell you what, it was so foolish – and I was not conscious of doing it until I caught myself with the …’ He halted, confused.
‘I haven’t noticed anything,’ she soothed. ‘Your memory maybe slipped a bit. It happens when we grow older. I often can’t remember why I’ve opened a cupboard, or why I’ve gone upstairs.’
He was relieved that his wife did not consider that his brain was disintegrating. She would tell him if she thought it was. But who had he thought he was whipping?
***
Each time Dennis returned, his demands grew, and with having to buy new oilskins for George, sea-boot stockings and thin underclothes for the summer, Katie had watched their bank balance sink lower and lower. The Mary Ann had hit a bad patch, never finding the best shoals of fish, and after George had paid his crew – he didn’t make them suffer for his ill fortune – he hadn’t much left to hand over to her.
‘You’ll have to take something out of the bank to keep you going,’ he had told her after the first poor trip. ‘It’s a good thing we’d something at our back, and we can make it up when my luck turns.’
When he was at sea, she lived on bread and margarine, and burned sticks from the shore to save coal, even going whole days without a fire, she was so determined not to take more out of their account, and always at the back of her mind was the fear that he would find out how low their bank balance was. But over-riding that was the fear of what Dennis would do when she told him she had nothing left.
She knew when to expect him – he always turned up the day after George sailed, so he must watch for the Mary Ann going out – and when he arrived, she took out the bankbook and showed it to him. ‘That’s all there is.’
‘Only ten pounds? That’s a fleabite, but I’ll take it for now. I expect you to get some from somewhere before I come back, though. It shouldn’t be hard for a lovely young woman with a body like yours to earn some – there’s always plenty of men ready to pay for a quick thrill.’
‘Damn you, Dennis!’ she cried. ‘You needn’t bother coming back, for I’ll have no money – not even to buy food!’
His sneering eyes hardened. ‘I warn you, Katie, if you don’t give me something, I’ll put your husband off his food next time he comes in for a meal, though he hasn’t been in for a while. I’ll tell him what we used to get up to, and I won’t water it down.’
Katie ran to the bank, and after he charged out with two five-pound notes in his hand she wondered, hopelessly, what she should do. Blackmail was a criminal offence, but if she reported him to the police, she would have to tell them why he was blackmailing her, and George would find out anyway. The sensible thing would be to tell him herself, but how could she, when she knew how he would react?
When George came home that weekend, his face was grim. ‘It never rains but it pours. Another poor catch, poor prices for what we did get, and to crown all, my mind wasn’t on what I was doing, and I rammed the boat against the harbour wall when I was taking her in. The Mary Ann’s got a bloody big hole in her, and I’d better take a hundred out of the bank in case the shipyard asks for something in advance. I only hope the repair doesn’t clear us right out.’
Without a word, she opened the drawer and handed him the passbook, bracing herself for the explanation she would have to give.
He turned the pages with satisfaction. ‘It soon mounts up when you’re putting in regularly. It’s a shame we’ll have to use it, but we can start saving again once …’ He broke off as he turned the next page. ‘What the hell – balance nil? And why have you made all these withdrawals? You couldn’t have needed all that for housekeeping. What’s been going on, Katie?’
‘You’d better sit down,’ she whispered, tearfully, ‘but I wish I’d told you months ago.’
When she came to a trembling halt, George roared, ‘So your fancy man was blackmailing you? You must have been laughing up your sleeve when I was jealous of that half-wit, when it was another man you’d been carrying on with.’
Her heart battering against her ribs, her insides heaving, she cried, ‘I was frightened to tell you. You left me when I told you about Sammy, remember?’
‘I should never have come back to you, but I’ll not be so stupid this time.’
‘Oh, George,’ she sobbed, ‘it was years ago, before I was in love with you. Please, please, don’t leave me.’
‘You’ll not get round me again, you and your lies! You swore you’d never been with a man, but you weren’t a virgin. I thought it was Sammy, but why didn’t you tell me about this one? Who is he? I’ll knock the truth out of him.’
Thankful that she hadn’t named Dennis, or said that he ran George’s favourite restaurant in Peterhead, Katie told a further lie. ‘I don’t know where he lives now, or where he works. He just turns up.’
‘It doesn’t matter. I know enough to see you’re not the kind of girl I should have taken as a wife.’
She followed him into the bedroom, tears still streaming down her cheeks. ‘What are you going to do?’
‘It’s a good thing I didn’t empty out my things. I’m going to my mother, then I’ll likely go to Buckie, to Lizann. At least I know I was first with her. One of my crew happened to mention that he came from the Yardie the same as her, and when I asked him how she was liking married life he said she didn’t marry her lad after all.’ Swinging his seabag over his shoulder, he stared at Katie coldly. ‘The next time you hear from me’ll be through a solicitor!’
‘George!’ she pleaded. ‘You can’t end our marriage because of something I did years ago.’
‘God Almighty, woman! You can’t expect me to forget about this? You’ve cut the feet from under me, you’re depriving me of my livelihood …’
‘No, George, the Mary Ann’s yours! I gave her to you as a present.’
‘I can’t afford to have her repaired, and I want nothing to remind me what a bloody fool I was.’ He lifted his reefer jacket and cap and charged out.
Left standing in the middle of the floor, Katie turned her eyes slowly to the slippers she had laid out to heat for him at the fireside. The intimacy of it raised a small glimmer of hope in her frozen heart. He had come back once before after they quarrelled, and he would come back this time, and all, once he cooled down. She would just have to be patient, and she had nothing to fear from Dennis, now George knew all about him. Everything would work out come time – it must!
Chapter Twenty-nine
Looking at Henry Ferguson as he was serving, Betty Gunn knew that she had never loved Angus. She had been drawn to him originally – had been mesmerized by him – because he was so different from any man she had ever met, like a brooding Rochester to her Jane Eyre, with the promise of great depths of passion in his mysterious dark eyes. The reality had not matched her expectations. The passion had been there for only a short time, slowly deteriorating to a desire for self-fulfilment, and she had long been aware that she was just a substitute in his twisted mind for the girl Katie, and sometimes even for his first wife. It was inevitable, really, that she would fall in love with Henry … and, miraculously, he had admitted to loving her.
He was everything that Angus was not, a gentleman in the true sense of the word. In direct
contrast to her husband’s overpowering darkness, Henry was freshcomplexioned, fair-haired and only a little taller than herself. His soft blue eyes could hold her spellbound, and she sometimes felt like rushing up to him and kissing him in front of anyone who happened to be in the shop. He had nothing to lose if their love was uncovered, yet it was he who was careful. He had only agreed reluctantly when she suggested that they steal an hour once a week to be alone together.
So now, every Monday – the day they were never busy – they locked the shop at five and pulled down the blinds to save anyone seeing in. ‘To safeguard your reputation,’ Henry had said. He made her feel special, like a delicate flower that needed nurturing to bloom properly.
When his customer went out, Henry regarded her earnestly. ‘We can’t go on the way we’ve been doing, Betty. I thought my life was over when I lost Edna, but you’ve given me …’ He paused briefly, and then said, sounding a little defiant about it, ‘We must stop all the secrecy, I don’t want to degrade our love by having a sordid little affair. I want to marry you, and you had better tell your husband about us soon.’
She ought to have expected this, but it came as a complete surprise, although she could see that it was the right thing, the decent thing, to do. ‘I’ll have to choose the right time.’
‘That doesn’t sound as if you want to tell him.’
‘You don’t know Angus, Henry. He’s so unbalanced …’
‘If you’re afraid he’ll get violent, why don’t we tell him together? I can’t bear the thought of you sleeping with him again, so I’ll come home with you tonight, and you …’
Her mouth went dry. ‘Tonight?’
‘We may as well. You can pack what you need while I tell him, and then I’ll take you away with me.’
Henry had to shift his attention to a man who walked in at that moment, which gave Betty time to think. Why shouldn’t she grab at happiness when it was offered? Angus would likely make them leave the shop, but after the scandal broke there would be no customers, anyway. They’d be better going somewhere else to start their life together.
The Three Kings Page 32
