THE GREAT WAR SAGAS: Box set of 2 passionate and inspiring stories: A Crimson Dawn and No Greater Love

by Janet MacLeod Trotter

  Emmie rapped on the door with the gleaming knocker. After a long moment of waiting, Louise answered. They stood staring at each other.

  ‘What you here for?’ her sister-in-law asked in hostility.

  ‘You know what.’ Emmie kept calm.

  ‘Tom doesn’t want to see you.’

  ‘That suits me,’ Emmie replied. ‘It’s me bairns I want to see.’

  ‘You can’t,’ Louise said dismissively. ‘Our Tom won’t allow it.’

  ‘Let me in, Louise, please,’ Emmie said urgently. When Louise hesitated, Emmie pushed past her.

  ‘Mam! Tom!’ Louise shouted in panic. ‘Emmie’s here. I couldn’t stop her.’

  Emmie burst into the parlour, searching for her children. ‘Barny?’ she called out. The room was empty. She rushed into the kitchen, Louise trying to grab her by the arm.

  Mrs Curran rose startled from her chair, her mending falling to the floor.

  ‘Emmie. . .’

  ‘Where are they?’ Emmie demanded. ‘I want to see my children.’

  ‘Hush, you’ll wake them,’ Mrs Curran said in a fluster. ‘They’re having a nap.’

  Emmie turned to rush from the room and make for the stairs. But just as she reached the door, a tousled-haired figure loomed over her. Tom pushed her back in the kitchen, his face creased from sleep, his look belligerent.

  ‘Wondered how long it would take you to come,’ he sneered. ‘On your own, are you? Lover boy too scared to face me, eh?’

  His face was fuller, a boozer’s face with a purplish nose, his once handsome eyes bleary and faded. Like Rab he had aged, but not with malnutrition and hard labour. He looked as physically strong as ever, but his face was scored with bitterness and disappointment.

  ‘Tom, let me see the bairns,’ she pleaded.

  He opened wide his arms. ‘No kiss hello for your husband first?’ he mocked. ‘Show a bit respect, eh?’

  ‘For a man who beats his wife?’ Emmie said in disdain.

  ‘Don’t speak to our Tom like that.’ Louise was indignant.

  ‘But it’s true, isn’t it, Tom?’ Emmie challenged.

  ‘You got above yourself,’ Tom snapped. ‘But that’s all in the past. I’m willing to forgive you - seeing as you’ve come back like a dutiful missus.’

  ‘You’re never going to take her back, are you?’ Louise cried in dismay. ‘She’s shamed us all.’

  ‘I’ll do what I want!’ Tom shouted suddenly.

  ‘Tom, dear—’ his mother began.

  ‘I haven’t come back,’ Emmie interrupted. ‘I’ve just come for my children,’ She appealed to Tom. ‘They need their mam, surely you see that? They’re too young to be without me. If you love Barny you’ll let him come to me.’

  For a moment she thought he was wavering, then the hard look returned. ‘You’re not fit to be their mam,’ he hissed. ‘I’ve seen the way you live - like savages in that dirty little cottage - and with those men. Do you whore for them an’ all, Emmie, or just for MacRae?’

  Emmie flinched at his invective. ‘Stop it, Tom.’

  ‘I’m taking care of the bairns now. They don’t want to see you and I don’t want you coming anywhere near them again. Not unless you repent of your sins and come back to me like an obedient wife should,’ he challenged.

  Emmie stared at him in horror. In that moment she knew she could never go back to him under any conditions. She despised the person he had become. She would wither under his harsh rule. And with a wave of despair, she realised that she could not subject her children to such a loveless home. Emmie remembered suddenly how terrified Barny had been at the violence in Berlin Terrace. Barny and Mary must not be brought up in such a climate of fear.

  ‘I’ll never come back to you, Tom,’ Emmie declared.

  Just at that instant, a muffled wail came from the room above. Emmie’s heart jerked.

  ‘Mary!’ she cried. ‘Let me go to her.’

  ‘No.’ Tom gave her a savage look of triumph. ‘You take one step and I’ll take me belt to yer.’

  ‘Please, Tom.’ Emmie was on the verge of tears as her baby’s crying grew more insistent. ‘She needs her mam - I’m still feedin’ her myself.’

  Louise said, ‘She’s taken fine to the bottle.’

  Emmie ignored her. ‘Let me take the baby,’ she begged, ‘please, Tom.’

  But Tom’s expression did not alter.

  ‘How come you never bothered to tell Tom he had a lass?’ Louise needled. ‘Didn’t bother to tell any of us.’

  Mary was bawling now. Emmie turned to her mother-in-law in distress. ‘Please go to her,’ she pleaded. ‘She needs a cuddle.’

  Mrs Curran looked anxious but said, ‘She’s fed and changed; there’s nothing she needs. Best let her cry. Too much fussing spoils a child. And I’ll not have a grandbaim of mine brought up spoiled.’

  Emmie’s nerves snapped. ‘She’s not your grandbairn!’

  They all stared at her. Tom prodded her with a finger. ‘Meaning?’ he glowered.

  Emmie faced up to him. ‘Meaning Mary is Rab’s daughter, not yours.’

  Louise and her mother gasped in shock. Tom glared at her in disbelief. In an instant he raised his hand and struck her across the face.

  ‘Whore!’he bellowed.

  Emmie staggered then righted herself. She dug her nails in her palms to stop herself crying.

  ‘So you’ll let me take her?’ she demanded. ‘You can’t want Rab’s bairn, can you?’

  ‘Get out!’ Tom roared, seizing her by the arm and dragging her forward. ‘Get out of this house and never come back!’

  He yanked her into the corridor. Emmie cried out at the pain as he wrenched her arm. Suddenly there was a noise on the stair behind.

  ‘Mammy?’

  She swivelled to see Barny at the top of the stair in his underclothes.

  ‘Barny!’ she yelled.

  ‘Mammy!’ her son cried. ‘Don’t go, Mammy!’

  ‘Get back upstairs,’ Tom shouted, ‘or I’ll skin yer backside.’

  Emmie struggled to throw Tom off as the boy screamed for her not to leave him. But Tom was too strong and in a moment was throwing her out of the door and down the steps. He slammed the door in her face and bolted it shut. Emmie hammered on it.

  ‘Give me back my baims!’ she screamed.

  A crowd of onlookers began to gather in the street, but Emmie did not care. She banged her fists and bawled like a madwoman, but to no avail. Inside she could hear Barny crying and Tom shouting, but no one came to let her in again.

  People began to call at her to keep the noise down, to go away. Someone threatened to fetch the police. But Emmie clung to the doorstep, unable to leave, quite hysterical. Finally someone pushed their way through the baiting crowd.

  ‘Out the way - let me pass!’

  Suddenly Helen was reaching out and snatching her with protective arms.

  ‘Emmie! Come away, pet.’

  Emmie grabbed on to Rab’s mother, babbling incoherently about her children.

  ‘There’s nothing you can do about it now,’ Helen said firmly. ‘Don’t let Barny hear you - you’ll just upset him more. Come with me, pet.’

  Emmie responded to Helen’s calm voice, allowing herself to be led away. They were jostled as Helen hurried her down the street, people calling out their disapproval.

  Back at Mannie’s, Helen made her drink tea and calm down. Peter eyed her nervously from the doorway. The sight of Rab’s brother made Emmie more composed.

  ‘Peter,’ she said, holding out her hands to him, ‘it’s grand to see you.’

  But he stayed where he was, silent and watching.

  ‘Doesn’t speak much,’ Helen said quietly, ‘doesn’t play his tin whistle - doesn’t do much of anything, poor lad.’

  Peter slipped away. Emmie and Helen looked at each other, quite at a loss.

  ‘I’d hoped to take you and Peter back with me,’ Emmie whispered, ‘as well as the bairns.’

  Helen sig
hed. ‘At least here I have a job of sorts. And maybe one day, Peter’s nerves will get better and he can work again.’

  ‘What should I do, Auntie Helen?’ Emmie asked forlornly. ‘I can’t bear the thought of leaving and not being near the bairns. If I stayed here with you a bit, I’d have the chance of seeing them, wouldn’t I?’

  Helen gave her a pitying look. ‘Currans will never let you near them, you know that. And feelings are running too high in the village - best to stay away.’ She took Emmie’s empty cup. ‘You and Rab - you’ve still got each other. He needs you now more than ever. Do you still want him?’

  Emmie held her look and nodded.

  ‘Then go back to him. Get your strength back, the pair of you,’ Helen encouraged. ‘Maybe Tom will get tired of the bairns and hand them back.’ She put a hand on Emmie’s head and stroked back her hair as if she were a young girl again.

  ‘I’ll keep an eye out for Barny and Mary.’ she promised. ‘And Mrs Curran and Louise are not bad people - they won’t neglect your bairns.’

  That night, Emmie shared the bed with Helen. Emmie had suggested to Peter that she take him back to The Grove for a visit, thinking the place would do him good.

  ‘You could help with Cobbles, Mr Runcie’s old pony - and it would lift Rab’s spirits to see you.’

  But Peter had shaken his head and turned his back on her. Emmie had hidden her disappointment; somehow this silent rejection by the once-affectionate Peter hurt her more than Tom’s cruel words.

  The next morning, the women rose early, breakfasted and prepared for Emmie’s journey. Helen packed her a hard-boiled egg, bread and a bottle of cold tea. They hugged each other tight.

  ‘Look after that son of mine,’ Helen smiled tearfully, ‘and I’ll look out for yours.’

  Emmie nodded, too choked to speak. She left the village with a heavy heart and the intolerable thought of her children waking at the Currans’ without her. At the road junction with Blackton, she stopped and glanced back for a final view of Crawdene.

  The pit was wreathed in smoke from dozens of coal fires; Oliphant’s Wood shimmered with the fresh green of early summer. Perhaps Louise would take Barny there later in the day. Envy gnawed inside and the view blurred in sudden tears. Far away, the school bell beckoned the children to lessons. Emmie wiped her tears impatiently. She would not be beaten by this attempt to reclaim her children. As long as she lived, she would go on fighting for the right to see them, the right to bring them up.

  As her vision cleared, she saw two figures hurrying down the dirt road towards her. They were shouting something. Was it at her? Emmie turned away, not wanting to be confronted by more hostile villagers. Then she heard her name clearly.

  ‘Emmie! Wait!’

  Turning back, she recognised the familiar figures. Helen and Peter. She began to walk towards them, quickening her pace.

  Reaching her, Helen panted, ‘The lad wants to come with you after all.’

  Emmie looked at Peter in surprise. He nodded and gave a half-smile directly at her. It was his first sign of friendliness, a glimmer of the old Peter.

  ‘That’s grand!’ Emmie exclaimed.

  Helen nodded at her in encouragement. ‘Aye, it is.’ She kissed her son’s cheek swiftly. ‘You do as Emmie says and be a help to her,’ she ordered. ‘And here,’ she pressed his tin whistle into his jacket pocket, ‘you might want this.’

  The women smiled at each other in understanding. Peter would be a comfort to Emmie and Rab, and in return they would try to heal his wounded mind.

  Emmie set off, her sore heart eased a fraction by Peter’s mute companionship.

  Chapter 39

  1920

  Peter’s short stay drifted into the following year. Gradually, he regained confidence in handling horses, helping the Kennedys with theirs when they returned to the woods. Eventually he spent all day with the tinkers and they accepted him as one of their own, taking him off to local fairs and to help them picking in the fields when the harvest came. It gave Emmie bitter-sweet pleasure to see Peter’s friendship develop with Ned, how they splashed in the river and explored together the way that Barny had done.

  To see Peter flourish once more was her one consolation. As soon as she had returned to The Grove, word had come that Tom wanted a divorce, citing her adultery with Rab. Knowing how appalled the Currans would be at the scandal, Emmie realised just how much Tom must hate her to go through with it. But Tom knew how to hurt her most. Emmie cared little for the public humiliation, but the repercussions for the children were devastating. The courts upheld Tom’s right to take both her children from her for good, convinced by his insistence that Mary was his too.

  It was like bereavement, yet worse. She could never see them again, yet they carried on living beyond her reach. Did they think of her? Did Mary even remember her now? What were they told - that she was dead, or that her sinfulness meant they must never come into contact? Daily, she tortured herself with thoughts of them. Helen’s infrequent notes told her little, save that her children were still alive and healthy. Rab’s mother was not allowed to visit them either.

  It poisoned Emmie’s relationship with Rab, each riddled with guilt at what had happened. The divorce proceedings had come at a time when Rab needed her most, when she was still nursing him back to health. Should she have left him and fought harder for Barny and Mary? But the courts frightened Emmie. All she knew was that the law gave her no rights over her precious children. The only way she could have kept them would have been to beg Tom to take her back and submit to his rule. Perhaps that was what he really wanted, but Emmie knew she could not do it - not even for her children. It was this realisation that crippled her with guilt. Unable to admit this to anyone, least of all Rab, Emmie found herself incapable of loving him.

  Rab recovered some of his old strength, but his spirit was blighted. He blamed himself for Emmie’s grief, yet he resented her in some obscure way for not taking care of his daughter. If only she had stayed with the children and not come to meet him. But he knew this was destructive thinking. Tom would have taken them anyway, and maybe harmed Emmie, for she would have struggled like a vixen to keep them.

  Yet sometimes Rab caught Emmie looking at him and he knew by her bleak expression that she regretted choosing him. It turned his heart cold. Without Emmie he was nothing, would not be living if she had not nurtured him back to life after his long imprisonment. But he could not tell her this, for they no longer spoke their feelings, fearful of spilling into angry recriminations. So Rab kept himself busy in the garden and spent time with the men. He and Emmie lived under the same roof, shared the same bed, but were like strangers to each other.

  After the divorce, Emmie could hardly bear to be touched by Rab. She was consumed by guilt at abandoning her children. The haven at The Grove was turning into a bucolic prison from which there seemed no escape. She yearned once more to be campaigning for women’s rights, among like-minded women. Yet Rab seemed to have lost his old passion for justice and social revolution. All that interested him was gardening and sharing cigarettes with Laurie.

  Then in the autumn, things came to a head. Philip received a solicitor’s letter informing him that Mr Calvert, their benefactor, had died. As he was childless, his estate passed to a distant cousin, who wished it to be sold. They all knew that sooner or later they would have to leave. One chilly October evening, they sat around the fire talking about what to do. The Kennedys were preparing to leave, uncertain as to whether they could use the woods again the following spring.

  ‘I want to gan with them,’ Peter declared.

  The others exchanged looks.

  ‘But your mam, Peter,’ Emmie began, ‘she’ll want you home, won’t she?’

  ‘I’m happy with the horses,’ Peter said stubbornly. ‘Ned said I could gan when they do.’

  ‘It’s up to the Kennedys,’ Rab shrugged. ‘I don’t see why he can’t.’

  ‘But what if he changes his mind?’ Emmie worried. ‘He won’t kn
ow how to find us.’

  ‘I’ll find me way to Crawdene,’ Peter answered. ‘Mam’ll tell me where you are.’

  Emmie felt panic rise. She did not want Peter to go; he was someone for her to look after, a buffer between her and Rab.

  ‘We’ll have to ask your mam first,’ she cautioned.

  ‘He’s a grown man,’ Rab said in irritation.

  Emmie glared at him. ‘Aye, but he still needs someone to look out for him.’

  ‘The Kennedys will look out for me,’ Peter answered simply. ‘Don’t you worry, Emmie.’

  Emmie bit her tongue and the others continued to discuss the future. Laurie suggested they might be able to find a smallholding down the valley and grow enough food to have a surplus to sell. They could hire themselves out at harvest. Emmie remained silent, until Philip asked for her opinion.

  ‘I want to gan back to the town,’ Emmie announced abruptly. ‘We’re not country people and I’m tired of living hand to mouth like this.’ They stared at her in surprise. She tried to explain her restlessness. ‘We’re radicals - we should be doing more. I used to think this place was the Utopia we were looking for but it’s not; it was just a temporary refuge from the war. We should be getting stuck into our old campaigns,’ she said with an impatient wave of the hand. ‘Lasses my age still don’t have the vote. Pitmen are having their wages cut. Schoolboys are being made to drill like soldiers ready for the next war. And what are we doing about it? Nowt!’

  She swept them with a challenging look. ‘Well, you can carry on playing at being peasants, but I’m ganin’ back to Tyneside.’

  That night as she lay sleepless, Rab asked, ‘Do you want me to come with you, Emmie, or not?’

  ‘Make up your own mind,’ she said impatiently. ‘You’ve always said we can come and go as we please. Free love - isn’t that what you call it? Don’t feel tied to me.’

  ‘Is that how you feel - tied down?’ Rab asked, his voice hardening. ‘Cos it was never meant to be like that.’