by Valerie Wood
‘There’s folk watching us, Fayther,’ whispered Tom.
‘Well, what of it?’ his father replied. ‘Wouldn’t tha do ’same if tha saw strangers coming?’ He too had seen the shadows of faces looking out from some of the doors and windows as they passed by.
As they drew up by the gates, hesitating as to which way to enter, a man came down the road from the sea leading a cow on a long rope.
He stopped and looked at them. ‘Tha’ll be new folk for Garston?’
‘That’s right,’ said Will. ‘Is this ’road we should take?’
‘Aye, it is, but tha’s not expected yet. Ma Scryven said tha was due tomorrow.’
‘Who’s Ma Scryven?’ Will was perplexed. ‘We were told to come today.’
‘She’s looking after ’house for ’time being. She’d find thee somewhere to stay, only she’s over at Tillington, tending to somebody what’s sick.’
‘Is there somewhere to rest now? ’Bairns are weary,’ Maria interrupted. ‘They’ve walked from Hull.’
The man stared at the children. ‘That’s a good walk,’ he said. ‘Tha needs a pair o’ strong legs for that. I went to Hull once.’ He leant on the back of the cow. ‘Didn’t like it, though. It were full of villains and drunkards, and somebody stole what bit o’ money I had.’ He stood silently shaking his head. ‘I nivver went back. Nor shall I.’
He stared at them thoughtfully as if assessing which category they fell into. ‘Tha could stay in ’old barn that’s on Garston land – just for tonight. It’s dry and warm, then Ma Scryven will fix thee up tomorrow.’
The stone barn was set in a sheltered corner of a field and was warm and welcoming, with a rich smell of ripe apples and hay. Maria flopped down in exhaustion, her body aching from the jarring and shaking of the cart.
‘I couldn’t go another step, Will. My legs wouldn’t carry me.’ She made herself a hollow in a pile of hay and stretched out. ‘I’m sorry, but tha’ll all have to fend for tha selves. There’s bread in a basket and there must be water nearby.’
Lizzie came up with a blanket and covered her over. ‘I’ll see to things, Maria. Don’t worry. Try to get some rest now.’
Maria smiled at the earnest child as she gazed at her. She was a good girl, shy and nervous except when she was doing something for someone else.
‘We must all try and get some rest, Lizzie, so that we’re ready for what the morning brings.’
Will came and sat by her. The children forgot their aching feet and tiredness, and were soon exploring the far corners of the barn, rolling in the mound of straw that was stacked almost up to the beams at the back of it.
‘Well, we’re here, Maria.’ He looked down at her, elation growing inside him.
‘Aye.’ She turned her head away.
‘What’s up, lass?’
She shook her head. ‘I’m that scared, Will.’ She stared up at him anxiously. ‘It’s that bleak and desolate. I’m not used to so much space.’ She shivered. ‘It’s all that much bigger than me.’
‘Tha’ll soon get used to it.’ He smiled down and bent to kiss her. ‘Tomorrow it’ll all seem better. ’Bairns will grow strong here. We’ll maybe never have much, but we’ll have good clean air which’ll cost us nowt – we’ll not get diseased!’ He could see that she was still unconvinced, but her eyes were beginning to close with sleep. ‘And maybe one day, ‘I’ll take thee back.’
Gently he stroked her cheek, and then turned away with a sigh. He had wanted her to share the passion which he felt, the excitement growing inside him as he had watched the vastness of the landscape unroll before him on his journey here, and ending at the foot of the waters of the sea.
Telling the children that he wouldn’t be long, he went outside and, carefully manoeuvring his crutch in the short tufted grass, walked in the gathering darkness across the field towards the sea. The salt smell gripped his nostrils, and he laughed aloud at the sound of the surf as it crashed against the cliffs.
He felt the untamed wildness wrap round him, challenging him, and he responded. He wanted to run headlong into the wind; to defy nature; to spurn danger. He wanted to make passionate love to Maria, as he always used to when he came home from the sea, when their joy and desire overwhelmed them. And he felt that, cripple though he was, out here was a challenge he could face. He turned to the sea in defiance, his shock of red hair blowing wildly in the wind, gazing past the mass of grey water which thundered and broke beneath the clay cliffs, throwing up frothy white spume, out to the boundless horizon, and raising his arms up to the sky, his fists clenched in triumph, with a mighty primitive cry answered the call.
8
Mrs Scryven assessed the situation immediately she put her head round the barn door the next morning. Her bright birdlike eyes picked out Maria lying motionless on the hay, with Lizzie anxiously watching her. Tom, covered in dust, had made himself a burrow in the straw, whilst Alice was sitting in a corner, her eyes and nose streaming, coughing and crying quietly to herself.
‘This won’t do,’ she said. ‘This won’t do at all.’ She opened wide the barn door and the bright morning sunlight streamed in, making them blink.
‘I’m sorry—’ began Maria. ‘I don’t feel too good. My legs—’ She broke off and tried to sit up.
‘Stay right there, my lovely, don’t thee dare move. Ma Scryven will put thee right.’
She beckoned to Tom. ‘Come here, young scallibrat.’
Tom, recognizing the voice of authority when he heard it, obeyed immediately, brushing himself down perfunctorily as he did so.
‘First thing tha learns in ’country, is that tha doesn’t play games with winter fodder. In ’summer tha can have a grand time sliding down ’stacks, but come rain and snow, when neither we nor beasts have owt to eat, then we’re glad of a well kept harvest.’
She picked Alice up from the floor. ‘Now, take ’young ’un outside away from ’dust, and go find thy fayther and fetch him to me.’
‘He’s gone for water,’ volunteered Lizzie, afraid that they were all going to get a sound ticking off from this small round body who was enveloped in a crisp white apron with not a hair showing from underneath her bonnet.
Mrs Scryven came across to where Maria was lying. Gently she placed a hand on her forehead, then with care she put her other hand beneath the blanket and softly pressed Maria’s abdomen. She stood for a moment, her eyes closed, breathing deeply, then she opened her eyes and smiled, her wizened brown face warm and sunny, as if deep inside a light was glowing.
‘She’ll do fine,’ she breathed. ‘Just rest today and tomorrow, and ’babby will be all right.’
Maria prayed that she was right, for all night she had been racked with pain and cramps in her legs. She’d told Will, when she was unable to sleep, that now she knew something of what he had suffered during his ordeal. He spoke then of the fact that not once had she turned away from him, never ever showing by look or word that his disfigurement repulsed her.
‘Tha’s still ’same man I married, Will,’ she’d whispered in the darkness. ‘Still ’same one as I yearned for when I was just a young wench, and thee a grown man and never noticing me.’
‘Will tha be all right for a bit, if I tek ’bairns with me?’ Mrs Scryven looked down at her. ‘Then I’ll bring thee some gruel.’
She gathered up Alice and Lizzie, one on each hand, and marched them off across the fields towards Garston Hall, where a short while later Will and Tom found them seated at a long scrubbed table in the kitchen, tucking into a dish of steaming gruel.
The previous owners of Garston Hall had not been mean when they had fitted out the kitchen. A brick-built fireplace with a large iron cooking range with fire bars and spit racks within it, dominated one end of the room, with a complement of fire irons, pans and kettles hanging within easy reach. The heat from the fire burning there and the mouth-watering aroma of game and herbs reached Will and Tom as they hesitated by the door.
‘Sit thee down.’ Mrs Scryven poi
nted to the bench. ‘Tha can’t work on an empty belly.’ She poured the thick, glutinous liquid into two bowls and slid them across the table towards them.
‘Now I’ll go and see to thy missus.’ She stared sternly at Will. ‘If she’s to keep ’babby, she’s to stay where she is for ’next few days.’
She sat down on a stool facing him. ‘Tha’s been given farmstead in East Field – Field House. It’s not very grand, but ’roof is sound and ’rent is cheap, leastways that’s what I’m told, and I’m only passing ’message on from ’agent. So tha can get moved in and made comfortable afore thy missus is up and about.’
With that pronouncement she heaved herself off the stool and proceeded to heat a pan of milk on the fire, which she poured into the gruel, stirring it until the viscous mass was smooth and creamy. They watched her, the motion of spoon to mouth never wavering as they ate hungrily, as she added some white grains from a jar, mixing them patiently until they were absorbed. She picked up her basket and carefully placed the dish of gruel into it, covering it over with a clean cloth.
‘I’m much obliged to thee,’ said Will as she turned towards the door. ‘If there’s owt I can do for thee, tha only has to say.’
‘I dare say there’ll be plenty of jobs that I’ll think on,’ she answered. ‘I’ve no man around, and though I can fend for missen, there’s time’s when a bit of brute strength is needed.’
She left them with instructions not to dally around all the morning, but then poked her head back round the door, her shrewd eyes gleaming, to say to Lizzie to make sure that all the gruel was eaten up as she couldn’t abide waste.
It took them two days to sweep out and prepare the farmhouse before Mrs Scryven deemed it fit to live in. The last tenants, she said, had had to move away to seek work in the town, leaving the building empty since last Martinmas.
‘It’s funny tha’s brought thy family here, when most folks are moving out of ’country.’ Mrs Scryven watched Will as he carefully jointed some discarded pieces of elm which he had found leaning up against a wall.
‘I’ll work wherever work is,’ he answered her. ‘I can’t sail any more and though I’m no farmer I like it here. ’Sea’s in my blood so I’m happy to be within sight and sound of it.’
Tom and Lizzie ran to them. ‘Can I go down to ’sea, Fayther? I want to catch a fish.’
Will laughed. ‘Aye, tha can try.’
‘Can I go too?’ Lizzie was still shy and nervous with Will even though he did his best to put her at her ease. ‘Everything’s done inside.’
‘Go on then, but make sure tha watches for ’tide!’
‘Me too, me too,’ said Alice. ‘I want to catch a fish.’
‘No, tha’ll fall down ’cliff,’ said Mrs Scryven. ‘Stay with me and we’ll bake some bramble tart.’
Alice took Mrs Scryven’s hand and they watched as Tom and Lizzie ran swift as young hares across the field towards the cliffs, and heard their shrieks as they clambered down.
‘She’s a good bairn, that one. A real worker,’ Mrs Scryven acknowledged, having watched the way Lizzie had set to with broom and pail to clear away a year’s dust and grime.
Mrs Scryven had been busily occupied plying Maria with nourishment three times a day, her small dumpy figure scurrying across the fields, armed with bowls of soup and tender pieces of meat, to the barn where Maria was propped up on pillows and blankets on her mound of hay.
‘I shall be that fat, tha’ll be able to render me down,’ she protested as Mrs Scryven appeared again through the barn door, holding yet another jug of liquid.
‘This isn’t broth.’ Mrs Scryven poured the pale pink liquid into a cup and handed it to Maria. ‘This is to help thee when thy time comes.’
Maria sipped the warm pungent liquid with the faint smell of ripe summer fruit and was instantly reminded of the time she was expecting Tom, when her mother, like Mrs Scryven, would appear with strange potions and liquids for her to consume to ensure a trouble-free labour.
‘My mother had all this lore,’ she began.
‘Aye, and now it’s lost!’ The old lady nodded her head, her thoughts astray. ‘But we’ll tell ’bairn, she’ll know what to do.’
Maria stared at her. ‘Dost tha mean our Alice – or Lizzie?’
Mrs Scryven looked flustered, ‘Ah, don’t listen to me. I’m just a silly old gawk sometimes, my tongue prattles on afore I’m ready.’ She leaned forward. ‘Wilt tha be satisfied wi’ four bairns?’
‘Three,’ corrected Maria. ‘Lizzie isn’t one of ours.’
‘Aye, I guessed as much.’
Tom’s and Alice’s thick dark hair and olive skin, like their mother’s, was in sharp contrast to Lizzie’s fine fair hair and pale complexion.
Will came in through the door and swept off the old hat he was wearing. ‘Would Madam care to inspect ’palace?’
‘Oh – at last. Can I get up? Mrs Scryven – tha’s been so kind, but I’m not used to this life of idleness. It’s all right for grand folk like Mrs Masterson, but I’ve never spent so much time in bed before.’
‘And I doubt that tha ever will again, so it’s as well tha hasn’t a liking for it. But ’babby’s safe enough now. Tha’ll go thy full time.’
Will walked Maria slowly across the Masterson land, or Garston land as the locals called it, skirting the prickly hawthorn hedges and clumps of bramble which already were bright with berries proclaiming the end of summer.
‘Is it all for us, Will? We don’t have to share with anybody else?’
Maria was overwhelmed. The stone- and boulder-built house with the overhanging thatch looked big enough for three families. The door opened into a room much larger than the one in Wyke Entry, and their few sticks of furniture looked sparse, but she didn’t mind that if there was room to move.
‘But tha’s forgotten to bring in ’bedding, Will. It’ll look well in that corner, over there by ’fire.’
Will smiled mysteriously and opened a door across the room. To her delight she saw another room, smaller than the first, but taking up most of the space was a rough hewn bed which Will had made, with their own feather mattress already on it.
‘And we’ve got our own water pump out in ’yard. There’s a deep well, fed from a spring, so we shan’t have to go traipsing around looking for good water.’ He put his arms around her. ‘We’ll do well here, Maria. ’Bairns will grow strong.’ He laughed. ‘And that old witch Mrs Scryven says she’ll get rid of Alice’s cough with some of her potions.’
They stood by the door. The wind was blowing strongly now and intermingled with its howling they could hear the plaintive shrieking of gulls as they wheeled overhead.
Maria shuddered as the sound assailed her ears. ‘Tom and ’girls—’ she said. ‘Where are they?’
‘What? Oh, Alice is up at ’house baking tarts.’ His face suddenly changed colour. ‘Oh God – Tom and Lizzie!’
Maria turned to him. ‘What is it? Will, what’s wrong?’
He reached for his crutch and hurried past her. ‘They wanted to go fishing. But ’tide—!’
He started across the field, stumbling in his haste but miraculously not falling, as Maria watched horrorstruck from the doorway.
As he ran he realized that above the sound of the gulls and the wind was another thin cry.
He had been surprised when they had arrived at Monkston at the nearness of the farmhouse and the village houses to the cliff edge, but as he stumbled now over the last few yards and flung himself down at the edge, he was thankful for it.
He peered down over the brink. The sea was already licking the base of the cliff and although the water was not yet deep the tide was coming in fast. There was no sign of Tom or Lizzie and he hollered Tom’s name, the wind catching the sound and tossing it away landwards. He got up awkwardly and hurried further along the top of the cliff. So anxious was he to move quickly that he didn’t watch where he was going and his crutch caught in one of the deep fissures which ran along the cliff edge and
he fell heavily.
As he lay there winded, he heard again a shrill cry, only this time he knew it wasn’t the gulls and it was coming from slightly down to the right of him. He leaned over again and below a jutting outcrop he saw the frightened face of Tom, trying desperately not to cry, and below him a pale and terrified Lizzie, clinging frantically to the crumbling cliff surface.
‘Come on then, Tom, let’s be having thee up here,’ he called out in a tone more cheerful than he felt, but nevertheless tinged with relief at having found them in one piece.
‘We couldn’t find ’steps where we came down.’ Tom’s voice cracked tearfully. ‘And ’sea was coming up that fast.’
‘Never mind that now,’ said his father. ‘Just try to get another foothold further up – but don’t let go with thy hands,’ he added hurriedly as Tom scrabbled around with his feet. ‘Just take it nice and slowly.’
He saw Lizzie shake her head as a flurry of sand and bits of debris fell on top of her as Tom searched for another foothold.
‘Lizzie!’ he called. ‘Try to move over to thy left, there’s a bit of a ledge where tha can stand easier.’
Lizzie didn’t move but gazed up at him, her blue eyes wide and abstracted.
‘Lizzie, can tha hear me? Try to move over.’
She remained motionless, her fingers white where she clutched a clump of marram grass growing out of the cliff.
Tom eased himself slowly up, his confidence returning now that his father was near.
‘Now then, Tom, I’m going to put my crutch over, and I want thee to take hold of it, first with one hand and then with t’other,’ said Will, still keeping a watchful eye on Lizzie. ‘Then I’ll take ’weight and tha can walk up.’
Slowly, step by step, Tom came up the side, Will’s shoulders and arms taking the strain until he finally reached the top, his face showing signs of jubilation as fear receded.
‘Run now as fast as tha can, and fetch help from ’village.’
Will knew that getting Lizzie to the top of the cliff was going to prove more difficult. He had seen that look of terror before, when men he had known, confronted by sudden danger, had seen death facing them and became petrified by fear, unable to move a muscle.
