Feathers in the Fire

by Catherine Cookson

  She was deeply fond of Arnold, he was the best man in the world, and she reminded herself she was near thirty and this would be her last chance of marriage . . . and she wanted marriage, she wanted a child. Oh yes, once she had a child everything would fall into place; her body would no longer torment her once she had a child.

  She had entered the farm land and was within five minutes’ walk of the house when she saw Davie. He was at some distance, but she knew it was he and that he was attending an animal. She cut across the fields in his direction, and before she came up to him he heard her approach and turned towards her, but it was she who spoke first. ‘Is anything wrong?’ she asked.

  ‘Flo here, Miss Jane, if I’m not mistaken she’s going to drop her calf an’ all. If that happens it’ll be the fourth in three weeks. Something should be done.’ He stared at her, and she turned her eyes from his and looked sideways down on to the grass.

  ‘I’ve told him it’s the lack of something. It’s understandable one dropping now and again, but this’ll be the seventh this year. He should get advice. An’ you can you know, Miss; they’re looking into these things now. There’s a place where you can send. I’ve got the name and . . . ’

  He stopped talking when she looked up at him and said quietly, ‘You’ve tried it, Davie, and I’ve tried it; we know it’s no use.’ She turned away, and he turned with her, saying abruptly, ‘It’s a thankless job. I’m telling you, Miss Jane, if it wasn’t for me granda I’d be gone the morrow.’

  ‘No, no! Davie.’ She had stopped abruptly, and again they were looking at each other. ‘If you desert him, well . . . well the place’ – she shook her head, then slowly looked about her and, as if to herself, she finished, ‘Twenty years ago it was the most thriving farm in these parts, no other could touch it.’

  They were walking on again when Davie said quietly, ‘I hear he’s for selling the land beyond the Tor.’

  ‘That’s what he says, Davie.’

  It was noticeable that neither of them referred to Amos as Master, or Master Amos, he was HE, as he had at one time been IT.

  ‘I was worrying about losing Mickey but if this goes on it won’t matter, it’ll soon be a one-man plot. All that’ll remain will be a smallholding left us by the grace of Sir Alfred . . . God Almighty! it’s terrible when you think of it . . . Aw, I’m sorry, Miss.’

  ‘It’s all right, Davie. I say it too. God Almighty! it’s terrible when you think of it.’ She did not ask herself what Arnold would have said to her using such an expression, but added, ‘I didn’t know Mickey was thinking of going.’ And he answered, ‘Well, you can’t blame him.’ He didn’t look towards her as he added, ‘There’s one good thing, you’ll be finished with it all next week.’

  Slowly they turned their heads towards each other, but they kept walking. ‘The weight of it will still be on me wherever I go, Davie, and . . . and I feel as if I am deserting, like leaving a sinking ship.’

  ‘Don’t feel like that.’ His voice was quiet and deep. ‘If anybody in this world deserves a little peace it’s you . . . Miss.’

  She kept her head down as she said, ‘Thank you, Davie.’

  They walked in silence into the farmyard; then she went towards the kitchen where Molly was standing at the door, and he went towards the cow byres. But he passed them and let himself into the harness room.

  When he had closed the door behind him he stood looking about him from one article to another, from the table that held spoke, and water brushes, bit and dandy brushes and leathers all jumbled up together. He had ceased ordering Mickey to arrange everything neatly; there was no time for it, there was only time for keeping the gig spanking – for His Lordship. With the exception of one, the saddles on the walls had all gone dry, for the boiler was rarely put on now and the room was cold.

  He moved slowly to the wooden block near the bench and sat down and dropped his head into his hands for a moment. Supporting it with his thumbs, his fingers moved across his brow, and not for the first time he muttered aloud, ‘I must have been up the pole, bloody well up the pole to take this on.’ If he had gone when he should have he’d be free now on the seas, not working for a young snot whose head he wanted to bash every time he looked at him. Not that he wasn’t civil to him, himself; oh, butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth at times; but ask him to lay out a penny on the cattle or the place and what did you get? Just that blank closed look that you couldn’t get through.

  He had spoken only half the truth the day he’d found Biddy gone, when he had cried and said he’d make somebody pay for it, because he’d made everybody pay for it. But her most of all.

  His fingers now stopped moving on his brow and pressed tight against his temple bones. She didn’t want to go through with it, he was sure of it . . . Well, say she didn’t, where did that leave him? Aw, why in the name of God hadn’t he gone when the going was good? Why? because he had gone barmy. You couldn’t want two women at once; or could you? What was he on about? He didn’t want two women; never in his life would he take Molly Geary, although she was hanging like a ripe plum just waiting to fall into his hand. Throwing herself at him she was. Never by a word, no, no, but he could tell, he could read the hungry look in her eyes. Well, she could throw herself from now until she was toothless and she would still bounce off him. But the other, Jane – he did not add the prefix Miss in his mind – how did she affect him? He was puzzled with regards to his feelings towards her. All he knew was that they had grown out of pity; he had been sorry for Miss Jane, a young woman who had been used by her people since she was a child, until she was left with only one refuge, to marry the parson. He had nothing against Parson Hedley, oh no; if he respected anybody it was the parson, but not as a husband for her, a man to love her. No, he couldn’t see the parson filling those roles. And Jane needed both, for she was warm and loving. But she was lost. For months past now every time he had looked at her he had wanted to take her into his arms. Just to comfort her, nothing more, just to comfort her. At least it had been nothing more at the beginning.

  It was, he told himself, a hell of a situation, for there were the nights when, lying in his bed, he was as conscious of that one beyond the wall as if she was tucked in to his side. At times he felt she was willing herself into his bed. There had been one night not long ago when he’d had the urge to get up and hammer on the wall and yell, ‘Stop it! Stop it! You’re wasting your time. Once bitten, twice shy.’ He fought with her ceaselessly during the night yet in the daytime he was civil to her. He called her by her name, and spoke the time of day, and at times talked of this and that. He also thanked her frequently for what she did for the old ’un; but then in this case there was likely more method in her madness than generosity. Aw, no! he had to give her her due there, she was kind. By nature she was kind, and it was in her favour too that she’d always been kind and loyal to Jane. But she’d been kind to Jane’s father an’ all, hadn’t she?

  He rose abruptly from the log and went outside. He had better see what Will Curran was up to. If he wasn’t an old man he’d send him packin’, lazy beggar that he was.

  ‘Jane.’ Amos stretched his hand along the dining-room table towards her. The gesture and his voice both held supplication, and his large fair face was soft with it.

  It was a long time since she had seen him like this, but she remained untouched by it. Sitting straight in her chair, she looked at him as he said, ‘I’m speaking for your own good as well as mine. Oh, I know I’m pleading for myself but . . . but on the other hand I know your heart isn’t in this. Look, it’s not too late to call it off. And I promise you, I swear on it, Jane, I’ll take a pull at myself. I won’t sell the bottom land, I’ll get another hand in. I’ll see to things myself, I’ll take over . . . ’

  ‘You couldn’t do better than Davie does.’

  He drew his hand a few inches backwards and stared at her before he said, ‘No
, I know I couldn’t. I’m not saying I could, I’ll always need Davie. But . . . but there’s things I could do to . . . Oh! Oh!’ He now waved his hand in front of his face. ‘I know I should have done them before, but Jan’ - he used his old pet name for her – ‘don’t marry old Hedley, don’t leave me, please.’ On the last words his voice had dropped to a thin whisper.

  Two years ago, even a year ago, if he had made such a plea she would have flown down the table and put her arms about him and held his head to her and said, ‘As long as you need me, Amos, I’ll never leave you.’ But she knew now, and with a deep certainty that were she to comply with his selfish demand, he would, in a very short while, forget his promise to reform and argue and defend his right to do so. Oh, she knew Amos; to her cost she knew Amos. Never had she imagined that there would come a time when she would look at him coolly and see him as he really was, a bitter, totally selfish man; for, only eighteen years old, he was already a man in looks and mind . . . and in one particular, which was certainly not affected by his handicap.

  As she walked from the table she said, ‘I am marrying Arnold next week, Amos, and nothing you can say will change my mind. It’s too late.’ She was, she imagined, passing beyond arm’s length of him when, with the agility that always surprised her, he leaned sideways, stretched out one arm, while hanging on to the table with the other hand and, grabbing hold of her skirt tugged her fiercely towards him.

  When her hip hit the table she cried out, ‘Amos! stop it. Have you gone mad?’

  ‘No, I haven’t gone mad . . . I am. Remember? You have told me on several occasions over the past two years that I am mad; everything I do comes under the heading of madness to you. Now, before I show you how really mad I can get, I ask you again not to leave me.’ There was no plea in his voice now, and although he had said, ‘I ask you,’ it was more in the nature of a command.

  ‘Leave go of my skirt.’

  ‘I will when I’m ready. You’re going to listen to me. What do you expect to get out of a marriage with old Hedley . . . now don’t tell me he’s only forty. I know his age. But add twenty years on to that and you’ve got the real man. Why, you’d get more out of Will Curran than you would out of him. He’s never seen a bare backside in his life, not even a child’s. Do you think he’d want to look at yours . . . ?’

  The force of her blow sent his head bumping against the back of the chair. If she had attacked him like a dog and bitten him he couldn’t have been more surprised by her reaction. She stood back from him. Her face was not flushed with indignation but drained like a piece of bleached calico. The pumping of her heart was heaving her small breasts and pulsing in her neck. Her words, when she spoke, spurted out in jerks as if each one had to surmount an obstacle. ‘F . . . Father was right. He . . . he was right all along with regards to you. I’ve . . . I’ve heard said you were a devil, and . . . and you are, a . . . a wicked-minded devil.’

  She ran out of the room, while he remained seated at the table, his hands spread out before him as if taking his weight. Her attack had surprised him in more ways than one. What had he said to make her so mad? That old Hedley wouldn’t want to see her backside? He had said worse things than that in her presence. He had never seen her so wild, not even on the day he aimed at smashing up the whole house and she had literally fought with him, braving flying vases and bric-a-brac. Did she care for old Hedley all that much? No, she couldn’t; she was just keeping to an agreement made years ago.

  He lifted one hand now and felt his cheek. She had struck him, and no light blow; but he wouldn’t hold that against her. It was a wonder she hadn’t done it years ago; he knew he had tried her patience beyond endurance at times. But didn’t she understand that you always tried the patience of those you loved? Didn’t she understand that he loved her, in spite of everything he had done to her, he loved her? Anyway, she was all he’d had to love since they took Biddy away. And now Biddy was going to be married. Her mother had made a point of telling Will Curran within his own hearing. By God! he’d like to slit that one’s throat. If there was anyone on this earth he hated it was Molly Geary, and he would have given her short shrift before now if it wasn’t for the fact that she had him nobbled. It was true he had only her word for it, but he had to take it just in case. And now it looked as if he was going to be left with her. She would order things pretty much her own way once Jane was gone . . .

  There were so many reasons why Jane shouldn’t go, so many.

  What would it be like at night in the winter when the snow was on the ground for weeks on end and he couldn’t get into the town to ease his body’s needs? He had been like a caged lion last winter, but a lion with a gentle keeper, a keeper he knew he could devour, metaphorically speaking, any time he chose. Now this keeper was leaving him, and there was the winter ahead.

  But there wasn’t only the winter to worry about, there were the nights in the near future when, because his bank balance was almost nil, he would be unable to enjoy the one thing that gave him real pleasure.

  He had over the past eighteen months become a respected patron in Rafferty’s Rooms; a seat was kept especially for him, he was a man among men. There, no-one treated him as a youth; he knew that some of them were afraid of him. For the first six months his luck had been just average, then there was a time when everything he touched came up for him. During this period he had never gone to the tables more than twice in the same coat and waistcoat; what was more, Rafferty’s niece had been very attentive to him. She was a bit long in the tooth, but after all, he had to face it, his choice outside the brothels was limited.

  But it was those long winter nights ahead of him that were really worrying him, when with Jane gone he’d be deprived both mentally and physically. No-one to talk with; he no longer found even slight amusement talking to those about the farm. What had he in common with Will Curran, Mickey, or even Davie Armstrong for that matter? It was strange about Davie. He would have been more than willing to listen to his yarns of the sea if they had been forthcoming, but the man was reticent. There was an aloofness about him that did not fit his position. True, he would discuss any point concerning the farm, but beyond that it was as if he had drawn a line. At one time he had wondered if it was he who was Molly’s confidant, but had discarded the suggestion, going on what Will Curran had said that she was as much cow splatter to Davie, and he treated her as such, stepping out of her way whenever possible.

  But in spite of Davie’s manner, which irritated him at times because of its entire lack of subservience, he still retained for him the feeling the man had engendered years ago – he liked the sailor, in fact when he came to consider it, he liked the sailor better than anyone else he knew, except, of course, Jane.

  Jane . . . Jane. He touched his cheek again. Next week, and for the rest of her life she’d be in the Vicarage with old Hedley. Apart from everything else it wasn’t right; she might be thirty, and past the marrying age, but in a strange way she still remained a girl, a very young girl. It didn’t seem right that she should be broken in by old Hedley.

  He sat quite still for almost fifteen minutes; his face had taken on a look of deep concentration. When at last he slid off the chair and got on to his crutches he hobbled slowly from the room, went out through the front door, across the farmyard, and over the fell towards Shale Tor.

  Two

  ‘Is that you, Davie lad?’

  ‘Aye, Granda, I’ll be up in a minute.’ Davie took the brown teapot to the hob and mashed the tea from the black spurting kettle. Then putting out his hand he went to pull a chair up to the fire to sit for a few minutes while the tea brewed, and to give himself a breathing space before going upstairs to talk and listen to the old ’un, but his action was halted by old Sep’s voice, high now, calling, ‘Davie! Davie! come up a minute. Here, quick!’

  Thinking there was something wrong, he bounded up the stairs and burst into the small low-ceilinged b
edroom to see his grandfather leaning towards the window, peering out into the deepening twilight.

  ‘Come here a tick.’

  ‘What’s up with you, old ’un?’

  ‘Nowt, nowt. Just get on your hunkers and follow me finger.’ Leaning over the bed, Davie looked in the direction in which the horny finger was pointing, and after screwing up his eyes he studied the far landscape for a moment. ‘What you hoping to see?’ he asked. ‘There’s nothin’ out there.’

  ‘Hold your horses, an’ keep your eyes on this side of the Tor, above the road. Now, what do you see?’

  Again Davie paused, then said, ‘It could be a sheep going up the path. No, too big for that. Well, a wild pony strayed in.’

  ‘It’s no sheep an’ no wild pony.’ The old man’s voice was low.

  ‘Four nights running he’s gone up there and around, on dark . . . yon’s Master Amos.’

  ‘Master Amos! Don’t be silly, old ’un; you can’t make out what that is from this distance, man or beast, not in this light you can’t.’

  ‘Can’t I, lad? Well, there’s one thing I’ve kept, an’ that’s me keen sight, together with me mind; I’m neither blind nor in me dotage. No matter what’s gone wrong with me limbs, those two faculties are much as they always were, an’ that thing you see movin’ over yonder is Master Amos. I tell you he’s skitted across those fields like a devil in a gale of wind these past few nights, an’ always on dark . . . now why, I ask you, why?’

  ‘Perhaps he’s got some piece from the village he meets up there. Some of them’s not particular.’

  Sep shook his head. ‘Why should he go up there for his sport when he can get it in Rafferty’s back room? Anyway, it would be a bit uncomfortable. Blow the hairs off your chin up there. No, you know what, lad? I smell a rat.’