Chaff upon the Wind

by Margaret Dickinson

  Jack looked down into the barrel and then he tipped it over on to its side and the terrier trotted out carrying the dead rat in its jaws.

  ‘Well, I’ll be . . .’ Kitty began as the dog laid the rat at Jack’s feet and looked up at him, panting. There were patches of blood on the dog’s coat and one paw was oozing, but in the animal’s eyes there was triumph.

  From the team of threshermen, who, though taking no part, had been fully aware of what was happening, there came a cheer. Jack reached down and patted the dog’s head. ‘Good dog.’ Then, straightening, he raised his arm and gestured towards the stack. ‘Go on then, boy. Fetch.’

  To Kitty’s amazement the dog now raced towards the depleted stack and burrowed beneath the straw. He emerged a moment later shaking a rat in his mouth. A quick nip and the rodent was dead. The dog dropped it and was back beneath the straw again.

  ‘If I hadn’t seen that with my own eyes, I’d never have believed it,’ Kitty said.

  Jack only laughed and began to move back towards the engine. ‘It’s a tough life, Kitty. Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind. You can take the boy home now. We can manage.’ He glanced back at her just once. ‘You’ve done a good job today. Thanks.’

  Kitty raised her voice and said, ‘I thought for a minute you were going to pat me on the head and say “Good dog”. Come on, Johnnie. I’ve had enough for one day.’ She held out her hand to the boy. ‘Let’s go home.’

  Though the boy walked alongside her, he was craning round to watch the dog and the rats until the last possible moment.

  Thirty-Nine

  ‘I’m sorry, Mr Guy, I really can’t go to London again.’

  ‘I don’t like having to ask you, Kitty, but . . .’ Guy Harding’s deep voice, gentle smile and kind eyes melted Kitty’s heart and, with it, her determination to refuse what he was asking her to do yet again.

  ‘Please, Kitty,’ Edward said. They were both here this time, standing in the small living room of the cottage, filling it with their presence.

  ‘You see, it’s because she’s so involved with these women,’ Guy went on, twirling his hat round and round between agitated fingers. ‘She’s gone to London to join in a big rally and I’m afraid for her safety.’

  ‘They ban men from their meetings, you see,’ Edward put in. ‘Guy and I can’t get anywhere near them. We need a woman, Kitty. We need you. You’re the only one she might take notice of . . .’

  His voice died, but the pleading in his eyes made Kitty say, ‘Well, I would go, and gladly, but there’s not only little Johnnie to think of.’ She spread her hands in a helpless gesture. ‘My mother usually takes care of him, but she’s not well just now and I don’t like to ask her. And there’s something else too – Jack’s short-handed with the threshing team. He’s behind with the work now and I’m having to help out.’

  ‘I could send another couple of men, if that would help,’ Guy offered. ‘And your son could come to the Hall. I’d make sure he was well cared for and that Mrs Bembridge understands.’

  His mouth twitched and Kitty stared at him. It sounded almost as if Mr Guy was in awe of Mrs Bembridge too. Kitty shuddered. The Hall was the last place she wanted Johnnie to go and yet perhaps, because Miriam was away, it wouldn’t matter. But what if awkward questions were asked? What if someone should remark on a likeness to his mother? No, no, Kitty reassured herself silently. That wasn’t possible. The boy was the image of his father. There was no mistaking who the boy’s father was and because of that, it helped to hide the identity of the mother.

  But inwardly Kitty trembled. She didn’t like the involvement. What if Jack should take it into his head to tell? Stop being silly, she told herself sternly. Jack Thorndyke had as much to lose as anyone if he revealed the secret. He’d be hounded out of the county most likely and never be able to work again in these parts.

  She smiled a little uncertainly, and said, ‘Well, if we can make arrangements, sir, I will come.’

  ‘Thank you, Kitty,’ Guy said and Edward smiled and nodded his thanks.

  As she watched them walk away from the cottage, Kitty was overwhelmed with anger against Miriam. Why on earth can’t she settle down and behave herself now? she thought crossly. She’s got a lovely husband and a marvellous home and still she’s not satisfied. The wayward girl was still disrupting all their lives with her rebellious spirit – even Kitty Clegg’s.

  Jack was surprisingly sanguine about Kitty going to London again, but it seemed that Mr Guy had ‘made it worth his while’ to agree. ‘He’s sending two of his own men over to help out and he says I can go up to the Hall for me tea while you’re away and I can collect the boy and bring him home then.’

  ‘Oh, I thought Johnnie was to stay there, I mean, sleep there. I don’t think . . .’

  Jack’s face darkened. ‘Think I can’t look after me own son, Kitty?’

  ‘No, no, Jack, I wasn’t meaning that. Only that – only that it’d be a bother to you.’

  The man shrugged his broad shoulders. ‘No, he’s growing into a real lad now. It’s babies I can’t abide.’ He grinned and arched an eyebrow at her. ‘And I’ve got to make sure he grows up into a real chip of the old block, now, ain’t I?’

  ‘Perish the thought,’ Kitty retorted, but she was smiling as she said it.

  ‘Where is this rally then?’

  The three of them were hurrying along the platform towards the exit from the railway station.

  ‘Trafalgar Square.’ Guy glanced at Kitty. ‘We’ll go straight there, Kitty, if you’re not too tired?’

  Kitty smiled. ‘Me, Mr Guy? No, I’m fine, thank you.’ She was touched by his thoughtfulness, but was inwardly amused to think that he knew so little about the daily life of a servant, who scrubbed and washed and cooked from early morning until late at night without a moment’s respite, that he thought a mere journey could exhaust her. To her, sitting on a train watching the countryside flashing past the window was like a holiday.

  Guy hailed a cab and, as he gave their destination, the driver said, ‘I don’t think I’ll be able to get close to the square today, sir. There’s a big rally. These suffragette women, you know. Hundreds of ’em, there’s going to be, but I’ll do my best . . .’

  ‘We’ll never find her, will we?’ Kitty whispered as the cab jolted round corners and weaved among the other traffic.

  ‘We must,’ was all Guy said, grimly determined.

  Edward was silent.

  They alighted a street away from the square.

  ‘Sorry, sir, that’s as near as I can get.’

  Around them as they walked were groups of women, all moving in the same direction. Some were smartly dressed, with white frilled blouses and trim, fitted jackets and broad-brimmed hats perched upon their heads. Others pulled shawls around their shoulders and their heads were bare, the shoes on their feet worn. There were young girls, linking arms and chanting the war cry of the suffragette movement, ‘Votes for Women, Votes for Women’, looking for all the world as if they had come to the city on a charabanc outing.

  Perhaps they had at that, Kitty thought.

  There were older women too, but all marched along side by side, united in their cause.

  Kitty felt their fervour, recognized that if she had not been here on a mission of her own, she could very well have found herself swept along by their enthusiasm. She could understand how Miss Miriam could be caught up in it, especially, she thought sadly, if there was something lacking in her marriage and she was not entirely happy.

  ‘I think Kitty’s right,’ Edward’s voice broke into her thoughts. ‘We’ll never find her in this lot.’

  She glanced at Guy’s face. It was strained with anxiety. ‘Edward, keep Kitty between us. I don’t want her getting separated from us.’

  ‘Right.’ Kitty felt Edward take her arm and tuck it firmly through his own. She glanced at him and he was looking down into her face, his expression serious. ‘Ready for the fray?’ he asked softly and she nodded. Women were
arriving in the square from every road that converged on it. Ranks of police began to form lines across the roads as if to contain the gathering within Trafalgar Square and prevent more from joining in. But determined women still pushed their way through to join their colleagues. Now young girls climbed on to the lions at the four corners of the fountain and festooned the stone animals with banners. ‘Votes for Women, Votes for Women.’

  There was a murmur among a group of women near them, then voices were raised. ‘Sylvia. Sylvia’s been arrested . . . on her way here . . . they’ve arrested Sylvia Pankhurst . . . Sylvia . . . Sylvia . . . Sylvia . . .’ The news spread and the murmuring grew to a crescendo until they were shouting and chanting with a burning anger. Banners and placards were held aloft and the women formed ranks and surged forward in a swelling wave of furious indignation.

  ‘There she is,’ Guy cried. ‘There’s Miriam. I saw her. Oh damn – I’ve lost her again.’

  His glance raked the crowd and stretching up on tiptoe, Kitty too stared about her. ‘There. There she is.’ She pointed excitedly and pulled away from Edward’s hold, thrusting her way through the throng, using her strength to forge a path.

  ‘We’re right behind you, Kitty,’ she heard Guy’s voice but did not look back. She just kept her eyes on the direction in which she’d seen Miriam and pushed ahead.

  Now there were police among the crowd, trying to break up the gathering, trying to calm the growing agitation.

  ‘Free Sylvia Pankhurst,’ the chant began somewhere at the edge of the square, spreading like wildfire. ‘Free Sylvia Pankhurst.’

  Kitty was about two yards away from Miriam, already reaching out to her, when she saw a policeman grasp Miriam’s shoulders from behind. She saw her young mistress turn her head to look back and upwards to see who it was who held her and then, to Kitty’s horror, she saw Miriam purse her lips and spit into the officer’s face.

  ‘Miss Miriam . . .’ But Kitty’s shocked cry came too late and the policeman with an expression of disgust tightened his hold upon the girl’s shoulders and began to haul her, none too gently, through the crowd. As she screamed in protest, the women around her turned on the officer and began to claw at him and try to pluck Miriam from his grasp. The chaos spread and Kitty felt strong arms about her waist, but, turning, was thankful to see that it was Edward who held her fast. ‘Keep out of it, Kitty,’ he shouted, close to her ear. ‘Let Guy deal with Miriam now. Look, he’s almost there.’

  Kitty gave up striving to reach her mistress and leaned back against Edward, thankful to leave everything to Mr Guy. They saw him reach his wife and stretch out his hand towards her, but the crowd, obviously thinking that he, a man, had come to the aid of the police constable, grabbed Guy and wrenched him backwards. Briefly, Kitty and Edward saw his arms flail helplessly. For a moment he seemed to rise in the air, as if he had been lifted off his feet, and then he plunged from their sight beneath the seething mass.

  ‘Oh no,’ Kitty cried out. ‘Edward, we must reach him. He’ll be trampled.’

  Again she pushed her way forward, all the time aware of Edward holding fast to the back of her jacket, determined with all the strength of his being that she should not be torn from his grasp.

  The shouting had lessened and the crowd were pulling back from the place where they had seen Guy fall to the ground. Even the policeman had stopped trying to effect the arrest on Miriam, and she, with a loud shriek of anguish, pulled herself from his hold and lunged forward, elbowing her way through the women to reach the man on the ground.

  They reached him at the same moment, and Miriam fell to her knees. ‘Oh Guy, Guy, no.’ He was lying in the roadway, his body twisted and his head at an unnatural angle. There was a gash on his forehead oozing with blood. His eyes were wide open and staring and Kitty, as she looked down at him, knew with awful certainty that Mr Guy was dead.

  She stood and watched as a weeping Miriam cradled her husband in her arms and rocked him. ‘Oh Guy, I’m sorry. Forgive me. Oh God – Oh God – forgive me.’

  Forty

  ‘You know, Sir Ralph’s a wonderful man, to forgive Miss Miriam like he has done. To think, through her thoughtlessness, he’s lost his only son and heir and yet he’s forgiven her and wants her to stay as mistress at the Hall.’ Mrs Grundy shook her grey head and said again, ‘He’s a wonderful, Christian man.’

  Kitty, sitting in the Manor House kitchen, leaned her arms on the table and sighed wearily. The previous two weeks had been the worst in Kitty’s young life. After the inquest, Guy’s body had been brought home for burial and it seemed as if the whole of the community of Tresford and the surrounding district had attended the funeral in the tiny church on the estate of Nunsthorpe Hall.

  Miriam could not have been unaware of the whisper that ran through the congregation like a breeze as she entered the church following the coffin and leaning on her father-in-law’s arm. The gossip would run riot through the county in the weeks that followed and though in time other events would push it from the forefront of people’s minds, Kitty knew it would never be forgotten by the locals. It would become part of the Harding family’s history, and an incident that had no pride, only shame, attached to it.

  Even Mrs Grundy was giving vent to her feelings, she who usually would not hear a word against the family for whom she worked.

  ‘It’s changed her, Mrs G.,’ Kitty said quietly in Miriam’s defence. ‘If you could have seen her when it happened, and after. She looked like a ghost.’

  But Mrs Grundy was not convinced. ‘It’s all show if you ask me, to get sympathy. She’s lucky not to have landed ’ersen in prison. The court was very lenient with her, dropping all charges in the circumstances. It’s more than she deserves.’

  Kitty stared at the cook in surprise. ‘That’s not like you, Mrs G., to be so hard.’

  The woman wriggled her shoulders. ‘Well, she’s been a very silly girl and through her a lovely young man’s lost his life.’

  ‘But if you could see her,’ Kitty persisted. ‘She’s going about in a dream.’

  ‘A nightmare, more like,’ Mrs Grundy muttered.

  ‘Well, I think it serves her right,’ Milly put in, banging a pile of plates on the table so hard that they rattled.

  ‘Who asked you . . .? Kitty began.

  Mrs Grundy twisted round with surprising agility. ‘You mind your business, Milly, and watch what you’re doing with them plates. Break just one and I’ll have it stopped out of your wages.’

  ‘Oh pardon me for breathing.’ Milly tossed her head and flounced out of the kitchen.

  Mrs Grundy shook her head. ‘Eh dear, that girl. ’Ow she comes to be your sister, Kitty, beats me. She’s a spiteful tongue in her head, that one.’ She paused, deep in thought for a moment, and then, as if Milly’s malicious tongue had made her think again, she sighed and said, ‘Ah well, I suppose if Sir Ralph, of all people, can forgive her, then we should too.’

  ‘I think so, Mrs G.,’ Kitty said softly.

  ‘Mebbe it isn’t all her fault, at that.’ Already the kind-hearted cook was beginning to make excuses. ‘She’s been that indulged as a child, always had her own way . . .’ she glanced up again and nodded at Kitty, ‘until she came up against you, that is.’

  Kitty gave a small, sad smile, but was thankful that it wouldn’t be long before Mrs Grundy was once more defending Miriam fiercely.

  ‘I must get back outside,’ Kitty said. ‘No peace for the wicked, eh?’

  ‘There’s going to be a war.’

  Kitty paused in pounding clothes in the tub of soapy water and leaned on the long handle of the posser, smoothing the damp hair back from her forehead. ‘So, all the rumours were true then?’

  ‘Seems like it. All the young fellers are falling over themselves to join up.’ Jack’s mouth tightened. ‘Even Ben’s got caught up in the fever. And if he goes . . .’

  Kitty made no answer. She knew Jack relied heavily on Ben Holden. They had worked together as a team for years, knew each
other’s ways. If Ben went, it would be very difficult for Jack to find anyone to replace him. She resumed her work, splashing the posser up and down. Above the noise, Jack said with a sly note creeping into his voice, ‘I hear Master Edward was first in the queue to volunteer.’

  The shock was so sudden and unexpected that, for once, Kitty could not hide her feelings. She paused again in her work and stared at him.

  ‘Aye, I thought that’d mek you stare. Your precious Master Edward off to play the hero.’

  Kitty said nothing and lowered her eyes. Poor Edward. Her heart twisted at the thought of him being maimed or even killed. She knew why he was doing it, of course. He was trying to prove to his father that he was not the weakling, the disappointment that Mr Franklin had always believed him to be. Edward meant to prove himself.

  Keeping her voice calm, Kitty said, ‘And what about you, Jack? Are you going to be a hero?’

  His laugh was loud. ‘Not me. I’ve a job to do here. Agricultural workers won’t have to go. Not unless they want to, I reckon. Ben and all the rest of ’em are fools.’

  But the day Edward came to say goodbye, Kitty thought her heart would break. He came upon her suddenly, so quietly that she did not hear him approach.

  It was a Sunday afternoon and Kitty had taken Johnnie into the garden to play, keeping the boisterous little boy away from his father who was sleeping off his dinner and several pints of beer.

  The child was laughing as Kitty chased him round the thick trunk of a tree. He darted first one way and then the other, avoiding capture and laughing louder each time he evaded her. ‘Can’t catch me. Can’t catch me.’

  ‘That’s a pretty picture for me to remember, Kitty,’ Edward said softly, unable to hide the catch in his voice and the longing. ‘A happy picture of you and your son.’