Half a Sixpence

by Evie Grace

  Frowning, she got up from the chair and looked out into the darkness. A figure moved into the light cast by the moon.

  ‘Matty?’ She opened the window. ‘What do you want?’ She pulled her shawl around her shoulders to protect herself from the icy draught.

  ‘To come up and see you, but your ma won’t let me in cos of me dirty boots.’

  ‘Can’t you take them off?’ Catherine called back.

  ‘She says my feet have the fago of a pigsty. I’ve got something for you.’ He pulled this something from his jacket pocket and held it out. ‘I didn’t steal it,’ he added quickly. ‘Here. Catch!’ He tossed it upwards. Catherine reached out through the window and caught it.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, examining his gift of a ripe apple. ‘That’s very kind.’

  ‘I thought it would help you feel better. I’m sorry about your brother. It’s a terrible thing that’s ’appened. I shouldn’t have put so much of that long straw through the machine in one go, but you know what your pa is like. He always wants things done by the day before yesterday.’

  ‘It wasn’t your fault. No one is blaming you.’

  ‘Is that you, lurking about in the bushes, Matty Carter?’

  He shrank back into the shadow at the sound of Ma’s voice, then turned and scarpered as fast as his legs could carry him.

  Catherine closed the window. She would have appreciated the comfort of another’s presence in the sickroom. The responsibility of caring for John was weighing her down and she could hear her parents arguing downstairs.

  ‘We should go and fetch Mary,’ Ma was saying. ‘Maybe she can wake him.’

  ‘I don’t want no more people coming round to take joy from the Rooks’ calamity,’ Pa said. ‘Mary would come of her own accord if she wanted to.’

  ‘She must come. She and John are engaged.’

  ‘She won’t want to marry him now. He kept her waiting, so why should she come here and be dragged in to looking after an invalid? Or be a widow by the time a year has passed?’

  ‘You are an insufferable husband. Why do you never take your loving wife’s side?’

  ‘Because you talk such nonsense.’ Pa raged against Ma, who raged against Pa and the machine.

  Catherine curled up on the mattress that she and Drusilla had dragged in from her bedroom, and placed her hands over her ears to block out the noise. Eventually she fell into a fitful sleep, waking twice to check on her brother and a third time to find Ma prodding at her with her foot.

  ‘Get up, lazybones. You’re supposed to be watching over John, not lying around doing nothing. You’ve let the fire go out,’ she snapped. ‘I shall blame your negligence if he should pass away. Go and fetch a comb for his hair. He must look respectable for the doctor.’

  Even if he’s dying, Catherine thought resentfully as she stood up. Not for the first time in her life, she wondered why Ma cared so much more for John than she did for her. She couldn’t understand how a mother could treat her own daughter so cruelly.

  ‘I’m sure Dr Whebley is used to seeing people at a disadvantage,’ she called after her mother who disappeared at the sound of a horse’s hooves, only to return shortly afterwards with the doctor. He’d had time to remove his coat on this occasion, revealing a red waistcoat and gold chain for a pocket watch.

  ‘What is your opinion?’ Ma asked in hushed tones while he gave the patient a cursory examination.

  ‘There is no change. He remains in a state of insensibility. Continue with the laudanum and I will come back tomorrow. Your young nurse here is doing a grand job.’ He smiled at Catherine. ‘Good day, Mrs and Miss Rook.’

  Catherine showed Doctor Whebley out and made her way back to the sickroom. Pa joined them, still wearing his boots which appeared to have half the farmyard stuck to them.

  ‘Well?’ he said, moving up to the bed. ‘Catherine, you speak more sense than anyone else around here. Did the doctor show any sign of optimism? Did he examine my son, or prescribe a different medicine, perhaps? Did he express a wish to bleed him or call the surgeon?’

  ‘No, Pa. He stood at the bedside and saw what I could see.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  She nodded. ‘He proclaimed that his condition is about the same.’

  ‘In a few days’ time, he’ll hand me his bill and expect me to pay for his opinion, which is no different from yours,’ Pa said scathingly. ‘I reckon he’s no more than a quack. In fact, I might just as well turn him away tomorrow.’

  ‘Dr Whebley is a polite and learned gentleman,’ Ma interrupted. ‘He’s been the only medical man in Boughton for many years.’

  ‘All he does is ride about the countryside making house calls and giving airy opinions.’

  ‘He’s renowned for his cures and bedside manner. Don’t you go sending him away for the sake of a few shillings.’

  ‘Guineas, more like.’

  ‘The money doesn’t matter. Our son must be well again.’ Ma’s face crumpled.

  ‘Don’t I know it. After all the work we’ve done to get this far. We’ve nearly broken our backs for it.’ To Catherine’s astonishment, Pa stepped towards his wife and took her in his arms. ‘I’m sorry, my dear,’ he said in a husky voice. ‘I wish I’d never clapped eyes on that damned machine. It’s cursed.’

  ‘Where are you going?’ Ma exclaimed as he turned and pushed roughly past her.

  ‘To make sure that nothing like this can happen again,’ he yelled, his feet thundering down the stairs.

  Ma, Catherine and Drusilla followed him out into the farmyard.

  ‘The Lord have mercy on us,’ Ma cried as he picked up an axe from the woodshed and carried it across to the threshing machine, the hens scattering feathers in front of him. ‘He has lost his mind.’

  He raised the axe and took a swing.

  ‘No, Pa,’ Catherine screamed.

  ‘Stop!’ Ma rushed towards him, but the axe came down onto the machine, splintering the timber with a terrible cracking sound that brought Matty running out of the granary with George limping along behind him, flail in hand. Jervis and another farmhand emerged after them.

  ‘No, Tom!’ George bellowed.

  ‘Stop him,’ Ma shouted. ‘Please! He’ll do himself an injury.’

  George threw down his flail and flung himself at Pa’s back, catching him by the arms, but Pa shook him off.

  ‘Leave me alone. This has to be done.’ He took another swing with the axe, smashing it down and raising sparks from the ironwork.

  ‘The madness has taken him,’ Jervis gasped as Pa took another swing, again and again, until all that was left of the machine was a heap of firewood and metal. He threw down the axe and sank to his knees on the wet ground, sobbing uncontrollably.

  As Catherine moved to comfort him, Ma stayed her with a hand on her arm.

  ‘Leave him be,’ she said quietly. ‘Go back to work, everyone. The grain won’t flail itself. Drusilla, stop gawping and get back indoors. Catherine, you’re neglecting your duties.’

  Feeling guilty for having abandoned her patient, Catherine returned to John’s bedside. Her heart missed a beat, for something had changed. His eyes were wide open, and his expression reminded her of a fox she’d once seen cornered by the squire’s pack of baying hounds.

  ‘Oh, my dearest brother,’ she reached for his hand, ‘you are returned to us. Ma, Pa,’ she shouted from the window. ‘John has woken! Come quickly.’

  Ma was in the sickroom in an instant, thanking God for a miracle. Pa arrived a few moments later, supported by George on one side and Matty on the other.

  ‘The breakin’ of the machine has brought him back to us,’ George marvelled. ‘The sound has roused him from his stupor. Well, I never. Well, I never did.’

  Pa stood at the end of the bed, unable to speak.

  ‘Who are you?’ John muttered, addressing Catherine.

  ‘I’m your loving sister. Don’t you recognise me?’

  He frowned and her joy quickly turned to sorrow. His
eyes turned to Ma.

  ‘Mama?’ he said.

  ‘My darling boy. You used to call me that when you were a baby,’ she said softly. ‘You gave us quite a scare. We thought we’d lost you.’

  ‘But I am here,’ John said.

  ‘I know.’ Ma turned to Pa. ‘Thomas, we must send for Mary straight away.’

  ‘It is too soon,’ Catherine interrupted. ‘If Doctor Whebley was here, he’d recommend peace and quiet for a while longer.’ There was more than one reason for keeping Mary away. She wasn’t sure what effect the sight of John’s future wife might have on him, and if he didn’t remember her, what effect this might have on Mary.

  Ma seemed to accept her opinion, clothed as Doctor Whebley’s. She kissed John’s forehead and ordered Pa, Matty and George to leave the room.

  ‘My head hurts,’ John groaned, touching the bruise on his temple with his fingertips. His lips were dry and cracked.

  ‘Don’t move,’ Catherine said gently as he tried to sit up.

  ‘I’m hungry,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll arrange for Drusilla to bring something,’ Ma said, ‘and then I’m going out to let everyone know that the Rooks are back stronger than ever and the tenancy of Wanstall Farm is secure.’

  ‘No, Ma. Don’t say anything, not just yet,’ said Catherine.

  ‘Why not? This will put an end to all the gossip I’ve had to endure.’

  ‘Wait a few days until he is up and about again. Without proof, people are bound to speculate about his condition. I would have thought that the last thing you’d want is for Mary to find out that he isn’t as well as you’re making out, and break off the engagement for that reason.’

  ‘Perhaps it is better to delay in case he has a relapse,’ said her mother begrudgingly.

  ‘Thank you,’ Catherine said, feeling much older than her years.

  Ma left the sickroom and Drusilla turned up with a bowl of light gruel some time later.

  ‘I want bread and jam,’ John said.

  ‘Sup this first,’ Catherine said, smiling. He hadn’t lost his appetite.

  He tried to reach out for the bowl with both hands, but his right arm flopped uselessly from his shoulder.

  ‘Let me help you.’ Catherine tucked a cloth beneath his chin, spoon-fed him then wiped his mouth while Drusilla stared. She took her aside on the landing.

  ‘I shouldn’t need to remind you where your loyalties lie,’ she began.

  ‘With the Rooks, a’course,’ the maid said.

  ‘That’s right,’ Catherine confirmed. ‘If you value your position here, you’ll choose your words wisely when it comes to talking about my brother.’ Catherine didn’t want idle gossip spreading through Overshill, ruining her brother’s reputation before he was back on his feet. If people thought that John wasn’t fully recovered, it would damage him, their whole family and their position as trusted tenant farmers. Would Squire Temple be so keen to continue having the Rooks run his land if John was no longer capable?

  ‘Are you threatenin’ me, miss?’

  Catherine stiffened at the tone of her voice. She glanced from her small pale blue eyes to her roughened red hands, and wondered what she was capable of.

  ‘I’m doing what anyone would do, protecting my family.’

  ‘You’ll soon learn that it isn’t that easy. Don’t worry, I won’t say anythin’ out of turn. Is there anythin’ else?’

  ‘No, that will be all for now.’

  Over the next two days, the colour began to return to John’s face. The swelling on his head diminished and the bruise at his temple started to retreat. Doctor Whebley expressed the opinion that the accident had caused congestion of the head with consequent softening of the brain which could result in a variety of symptoms, including slow thought, poor speech and a privation of voluntary movement with paralysis and a lack of sensation in the limbs. He couldn’t confirm that John would regain all his faculties. On the contrary, he doubted that he would make a full recovery. Once he saw the patient on his feet, however, unsteady but able to move around, he did say that John was much improved, and Pa dispensed with his services.

  Catherine dispensed with the laudanum as well, locking it in the top drawer of the bureau in the hall for safety. She didn’t see the point in it. It sent John to sleep when her instinct was to keep him awake so he had time to learn how to move again and recall lost memories. She didn’t believe Pa’s theory that the doctor was a quack. She thought it more likely that he had made a mistake. She decided not to mention withholding John’s medication.

  All she wanted was for John to go back to his old self so she could have her brother back, then his marriage to Mary could go ahead, she could go back to school and Pa could return to normal. A week later, though, Pa was hardly speaking still, except to berate himself over the machine, and John couldn’t recall a single detail of the accident. He could scarcely remember his own name.

  Chapter Four

  The Watch

  Catherine didn’t go back to school after John’s accident. She continued to nurse him through the ever-shortening days of October and into November, when the easterly wind blew across the vale with a nasty bite, nipping at her fingers and toes and tearing deep into her bones. No matter how many clothes she wore, and how close she got to the fire in the parlour where John spent most of his waking hours, she couldn’t get warm.

  Pa grew impatient at his son’s failure to recover fully. He was determined that John would return to normal despite Doctor Whebley’s gloomy prognosis, and decided it was time that he carried on his usual business just as he had before the accident. Getting him back to work on the farm and out into the community, he reasoned, would hasten his convalescence. To that end, Pa asked Catherine to help John dress in his outdoor clothes. He took him by the arm and led him out to the farmyard where he placed a stick in John’s right hand. It fell to the ground.

  ‘Wake up, lad,’ Pa exclaimed.

  ‘You have to remind him to use his left hand. His right side is weak,’ Catherine said protectively.

  ‘Thank you, sister,’ John said as Catherine picked it up and handed it back to him. Did he recognise her now? She wasn’t sure if he remembered her from before the accident, or he’d created fresh memories since. Doctor Whebley seemed to have been correct in surmising that the accident had softened John’s brain.

  He pointed at the hens and the cat, and grinned with delight.

  ‘I told you you’d feel better for a bit of fresh air,’ Pa said. ‘Let’s go to Faversham and have a look round the market.’

  George brought the horse over and helped John into the cart. There was a time when John would have taken up the reins, but it was Pa who had to do the honours because John didn’t seem to know what to do.

  Catherine fetched a blanket to put around his shoulders, afraid that he would catch a chill.

  ‘Stop pampering him,’ Pa complained. ‘He needs to do things for himself.’

  ‘He can’t. He’s like a baby.’

  ‘He’s a grown man,’ Pa said sharply.

  She watched them pass through the gate onto the track at a plod. The piebald mare didn’t like leaving home without one of her companions, and Pa had to crack the whip across her rump to keep her moving. Pa was burying his head in the sand, Catherine thought, because she hadn’t seen any change in John’s condition in the past two or three weeks. John was a half-wit, or maybe not even as much as that. Awash with sadness, she went to feed Margaret and the piglets they were keeping to fatten over the winter.

  When Pa and John returned after their long day’s expedition, they sat down to supper with Catherine and Ma.

  ‘John and I have been thinking about how to move forward and we reckon it would be a good idea to rent a cottage and a few acres on the marshes where he can run a flock of sheep. There were some Kent sheep, long-wools, at the market – I fancy they could make a fair profit,’ Pa said.

  ‘John can’t live alone,’ Ma said. ‘I won’t have it.’

 
; ‘Mary’s a good woman. She won’t let him down.’

  ‘What’s she got to do with it? She hasn’t paid us a single visit since John’s accident, and Mr Nobbs has been avoiding us. He almost ran out of church the other Sunday so he didn’t have to speak to you.’

  ‘I’m sure Mary will hold fast, but anyway, it doesn’t matter. Our boy will be perfectly capable of looking after himself and a wife by then,’ Pa insisted. ‘That’s right, isn’t it, John?’

  ‘I’d like some more,’ he said, looking down at his empty bowl. Ma nodded towards Catherine who fetched him a second ladleful of stew.

  ‘What do you say of our plan, son? We talked about it this afternoon.’

  John continued to eat, scraping the bowl with his spoon.

  ‘Stop!’ Pa seemed to snap. He grabbed at his hand and held it still. ‘Look at me and listen. What did you think of the sheep?’

  John nodded and smiled. Slowly, he formed the words, ‘I can look after myself.’

  ‘There you go,’ Pa said. ‘Case proven.’

  Catherine frowned, silently questioning her father’s sanity. John’s accident had turned his hair completely white and there was no telling what effect it had had on the inside of his head.

  ‘What about the farm?’ Ma asked. ‘Who will do John’s work here? Thomas, this will tear our family apart.’

  Catherine knew why Pa didn’t want him here any longer. John’s bumbling presence was a constant reminder that he had a simpleton for a son and it was his own fault.

  ‘I won’t discuss this further. The decision is made.’

  Ma scowled and tutted, and cleared the plates. Catherine served up plum pie and custard. Pa didn’t touch his portion. John took it from under his nose and finished it off.

  Catherine hoped that the trip to Faversham would be the last attempt that Pa made to return John to his former self, but it wasn’t to be. On the following Sunday, he decided to take him to church.

  ‘I reckon he will shine when he’s in the presence of people he’s known all his life,’ he said.