The Rag Nymph (aka The Forester Girl)

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘I hope so, too, Annie. Aye, I hope so, too.’

  ‘Is your arm very bad?’

  ‘He did a good job on it.’

  Annie now turned to Aggie, saying, ‘Mr Burton here looks after accidents in the factory, things that don’t need the doctor. Perhaps he could help. You would, wouldn’t you, Alfred?’

  Alfred nodded, saying, ‘Aye, only too pleased to.’

  ‘Well, we’ve bandaged it up now,’ said Aggie; ‘thanks all the same; but by the look of it I think it’ll have to be stitched.’

  ‘Well, if it’s a bad gash, missis, it should be done as soon as possible.’

  ‘Aye, perhaps; but I can’t see old Wheatley comin’ out tonight even for the Queen, ’cos as it’s said, and truthfully, he’s tight most of the day, but paralytic after six.’

  ‘He’s got a new assistant now,’ said Alfred Burton, ‘and he’s a good fella. He comes round The Courts and he doesn’t ask for his tanner before enterin’ a house. And ’tis said, if they can’t pay he’ll come back, not like old Wheatley. This one, he would come out all right.’

  Ben’s voice broke in on them now, saying. ‘Leave it. Leave it. Tomorrow will be soon enough. All I want to do now—’ he paused, then ended, ‘is sleep.’ Then as he closed his eyes he said, ‘Thanks, Annie. I’ll owe you till the day I die.’

  Annie turned quickly away, and as she passed Millie she stopped and said quietly, ‘I’m glad you’ve got back, lass.’ And Millie said softly, ‘I say with Ben, I’ll…I’ll owe you, too, till the day I die. Yes; yes, I will.’

  Without further words, Annie turned to go, and her companion nodded to Millie, saying, ‘Goodnight, lass,’ and she answered, ‘Goodnight, Mr Burton.’ Then they went out of the room, followed by Aggie.

  Left with Ben, Millie went and knelt by the couch again, and, gently touching the hand that was protruding from the rough bandages and lying across his waist, she said, ‘Oh, Ben; I daren’t think, I just daren’t think what would have happened if she hadn’t come to tell you.’

  Ben still had his eyes closed when he said, ‘Or what would have happened, lass, if Nell hadn’t gone to her first and given her the message to bring to me. We must never forget Nell. D’you hear?’ His voice trailed away; ‘Never forget Nell. Now go to bed. Be a good lass, go to bed.’

  On his last words Aggie came back into the room, and she repeated them, saying, ‘He’s right, lass, get yourself upstairs to bed and we’ll talk the morrow.’

  Millie walked over and stood before the old woman and asked softly, ‘Will you come up soon?’

  ‘Aye, lass; I’ll be up soon, but I’ll stay a while with—’ and she indicated Ben’s slumped figure, but the next moment she almost overbalanced as Millie threw herself once more into her arms, whimpering now, ‘I’m still afraid. Don’t ever let me leave you and Ben again. Will you promise me, promise you’ll not ever let me leave you? I…I don’t want to move out of this house, ever, ever.’

  ‘Stop it! Now stop it. It’s all over. You need fear no more. Go on, get yourself upstairs. Nobody can touch you up there. Nobody can get past me.’

  Millie reached up and kissed the flabby cheek, then went to the couch and looked down on Ben who lay with his eyes closed. She bent down and stroked his cheek gently with her fingers before going slowly from the room.

  The door had hardly closed on her before Ben said, ‘They’d get past you all right, Aggie, if they knew it was me who killed their boss, and that delicate lookin’ lass just gone and done for their rich client. It’s been a night. Odd, when you come to think of it, isn’t it? But we could both swing for killin’ two pieces of vermin, because that’s all they were, vermin. When I jumped on him I wasn’t seeing a man, not in either case, just a big sewer rat, a big sewer rat…’

  ‘Go to sleep, lad. Go to sleep. ’Tis over. Things’ll be different now.’

  Eleven

  Aggie was worried, Ben was feverish, and they were waiting for the doctor. When the gate bell rang Aggie went through the other room and glanced out of the window facing the yard before going out, because she was still taking no chances of seeing a stranger there. But when she glimpsed the uniform of Sergeant Fenwick she rushed as quickly as she could back into the kitchen, saying to Millie, ‘Cover his arm up. Tuck the blanket under his chin; it’s the sergeant. I can say he’s got a cold because there’s nobody quicker than him for putting two and two together, and, as good as he is, he’s still the law.’

  She went out again, shambled across the frozen yard, opened the gate and said, ‘Well, well, you’re early! What have I done now?’

  ‘Nothing that I am aware of yet, Aggie. How are you?’

  ‘Oh, just gettin’ over a bout of cold, and I’ve passed it on to Ben, I think. He’s in a low state with it.’ She was slithering back over the yard now as she said, ‘What brings you here this mornin’?’

  ‘I have a bit of news for you. I don’t know whether you’ll think it’s sad or otherwise.’

  ‘Well, come on in and let me have it.’ She stood aside until he was in the room, then closed the door, while he waited for her to precede him into the kitchen; and there he looked from Ben, lying covered up to the chin, to Millie, at the fire poking it into a blaze, and it was to her he spoke first: ‘Ah, you’ve got back then?’ he said; then, turning to Ben, he apologised, ‘I’m sorry about your message. I didn’t get it until this morning. It was my day off yesterday and he should have told you. I had a word with him, a strong word. He should have put somebody else on it. Anyway, where did you get to?’

  Before Millie could answer Aggie said, ‘She got lost on the road after visiting a friend, but she happened to come across one of her teachers, you know, in the night schools. An’ she took her in an’ let her stay there for the night, but there was no way she could let us know. She got the length of me tongue when she came in, I can tell you, puttin’ everybody to so much trouble.’

  The sergeant was looking hard at Millie now and he said, ‘By! it looks as though she did go for you, Millie; you’re looking very peaked. You got a cold an’ all?’

  ‘I suppose so. It…It’s catching.’

  He kept his eyes hard on her for a moment before he said, ‘Well, I’ve come with some news. It concerns you mostly, I should say, and I don’t know how you’re going to receive it.’

  As she put her hand to her throat Ben stirred on the couch and made to turn on his side, but Aggie, tucking the clothes tight under his chin, said, ‘Now you lie quiet. Whatever it is, you lie quiet.’

  ‘Your father’s dead.’

  Millie’s hand moved slowly from her throat and now fell onto the edge of the table, which she gripped as if to steady herself, and the sergeant said, ‘Well, I didn’t think there was much love lost between you, but you never know in these cases; blood is thicker than water.’

  ‘How…how did he go?’ It was Aggie asking the question, and he answered her: ‘Not very nicely, I’m afraid. He was found in the canal. We think he must have been attacked; it didn’t seem to be robbery, because he still had a few shillings in his pocket and one or two other things that you might want to collect, such as a couple of brooches.’ He paused here, then said, ‘He hadn’t been long in the water…well I mean, not a matter of days; hours I would say. One of my men recognised him by the scar on his face, otherwise there was nothing on him in writing to prove who he was. And I went down and verified that he was the same man who had said he was your father.’

  Millie had dropped on to a chair, and Ben had turned slowly on to his back again: but then immediately stiffened slightly as the sergeant added, ‘And he wasn’t the only one that had to be identified. Slim Boswell was murdered last night, and that was a straightforward murder: he had his throat slit. Of course, a lot of people have been wishing that should have happened sooner. What d’you say, Ben? You never liked Boswell, did you?’

  Ben pulled a breath up from his chest before he muttered, ‘Tell me who did.’

  ‘Oh, you’re right t
here. Then there was another body found, not…not quite dead, but he’s in hospital. He is a well-known mill owner, the Mr Crane-Boulder, and no other. He’d had his head split open just when he must have been coming out of his club because he was found in the back alley next to it, and that appeared to be a plain, straightforward robbery because he was stripped of everything except his suit. They even took his boots. Strange how these things happen, and all about the same time. Three bodies found in a matter of as many hours, or nearly so. It was funny about Boswell, and Mr Crane-Boulder though, because between you and me and a number of other people in the town Mr Crane-Boulder was not unknown to visit Mr Slim Boswell and his establishment, and, too, that of another gentleman who goes under the name of Big Joe. But then if we were to run in all the well-known men of the town who take their amusement in diverse ways, our gaols would be full. What d’you say, Aggie?’

  ‘Well, you seem to know best, sergeant, you seem to know best—it’s your business—but I’m no hypocrite an’ all I can say is, Boswell’s got his due at last. As for the other one, well, strikes me that those that visit them places are all tarred with the same brush.’

  ‘Yes, you’re right, you’re right. But if he manages to come round, he’ll be able to give us some explanation, at least, as to how he was brained. That’s if, of course, he saw his assailant.’

  ‘Oh, my goodness!’ The exclamation came from Millie, who had lowered her head on to her outstretched arms on the table, and as the sergeant watched Aggie put an arm around the girl’s shoulder, urging her: ‘Come on, love, go on upstairs for a while and lie down,’ he said, ‘I’m sorry, it’s all my talk about murders and such, and young people have weak stomachs. And she wasn’t looking very well to begin with. Anyway, I’ll be on my way before I cause any more damage, but I’ll be looking in again. I’ll likely want her’—he was nodding to Millie now—‘to receive his belongings, at least’—he paused—‘what we think might belong to him.’ He now glanced towards Ben, saying, ‘I hope you’ll soon be on your feet, Ben. Colds are nasty things. I’ll let myself out, Aggie. Don’t worry.’

  As he made for the door they all heard the gate bell ring again and he, smiling at her, remarked, ‘It’s visitors’ morning.’

  ‘It’ll be the doctor.’

  ‘The doctor?’ He widened his eyes at her.

  ‘Aye, for Ben.’

  ‘For a cold? My, my! You do look after your stray lambs, Aggie. Well, I hope he soon gets over it. If it’s old Partridge he’ll have him out of there in no time.’

  When she opened the door and looked across the yard, she said, ‘Well, ’tisn’t old Partridge; this must be the new one. Stevens they call him. They say he’s good.’

  ‘Yes. Yes, I’ve heard something about him, the new type they’re breeding now. Works for nothin’ at times, so I hear. Well, he won’t get fat on that. He’ll learn. Like us all, Aggie, eh? He’ll learn.’

  ‘You’ve taken a long time.’

  He said nothing, only smiled at her, and when they reached the gate, it was he who greeted the doctor, saying, ‘Good mornin’, doctor.’ Then laughing, he added, ‘You’ve got a very sick man awaiting you in there; he’s got a cold.’

  ‘Is that so, sergeant? Well, then I’ll have to see what I can do for him.’

  ‘And while you’re there I would have a look at the youngster, too, because I think she’s sickenin’ for something; probably picked it up when she went missing. Goodbye, Aggie. As I said, I’ll be callin’ in in a day or two to see Millie. I hope she’s a lot better by then. You’ll have to stop her getting lost.’

  Aggie said nothing, but her mind was galloping: he’s got wind of something, he has, he has. She closed the gate on him, then turned to Doctor Stevens, saying, ‘I’m sorry to have had to trouble you, doctor, but it isn’t just a cold. Anyway, step inside ’cos it’ll freeze you out here.’

  As she was leading him through the first room, he said, ‘Well, if my coming patient hasn’t got a cold I think you have, and you really shouldn’t be outside in this weather.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve never died of winter yet, doctor,’ she countered, at the same time gently patting his arm and indicating he should stop; then, lowering her voice, she explained, ‘The young man in there hasn’t got much of a cold, but I think he’s got a fever, and it’s from a wound he’s received. You know what the pollis is’—she thumbed now towards the yard and the now-departed sergeant—‘the least they know the less trouble they can cause. Although he’s a good one, they’re few and far between. Now, about Ben, that’s the young man you’re goin’ to see, Ben Smith. I’ve looked after him since he was a lad. Now he’s got into a little trouble, but it’s the kind of trouble that has to be kept under your hat, so I hope, doctor, I can trust you not to say anythin’ about what’s happened to him. I know it’s a large order, because we’ve never met before, but what I hear of you is all to the good. So, that’s why I feel I can ask you to keep your mouth shut.’

  ‘Well, Mrs…’

  ‘Winkowski’s the name. It’s a mouthful.’

  ‘Well, Mrs Winkowski, like priests, we’re used to keeping our mouths shut unless we’re offending the law, and even then we do stretch the limit at times. And if you’ve heard about me, I’ve also heard about you, and not only about the boy you mothered but also the girl, who, you say, or I mean…er, the sergeant says, went missing.’

  ‘Aye. Aye, she did. It’s a complicated story and some day, when we know each other better, I’ll tell you the ins and outs of it. But at the moment, I’d like you to have a look at his arm. I’m not happy about it. So, will you come this way?’

  In the kitchen, the young doctor looked first at the man on the couch, then at the girl sitting at the table, and his eyes remained on her for a time before he looked again at his new patient. Then, putting his black bag on the table, he went to the couch and said, ‘Hello, there. Now what’s the trouble?’

  Ben was sweating and his face was flushed and his return greeting was brief: ‘Hello,’ he said.

  Aggie pushed a chair forward, and the doctor sat down; then, pulling the cover from under Ben’s chin to disclose the bloodstained bandaged arm, he said, ‘Oh, I see. Well, now, we’ll have to have that off, won’t we; I mean, the bandage.’ He gave a short laugh now and Ben answered, ‘I hope you’re right.’

  When the arm was bared, the young doctor looked at the long jagged gash, then muttered, ‘My, my!’ before turning to Aggie and saying, ‘Could I have some boiled water, please? I want it boiled.’

  ‘In a jiffy, doctor, in a jiffy; the kettle’s on.’

  Turning to Millie, he said, ‘Have we any more clean sheeting?’

  Without answering, she went straight to the sideboard drawer and brought out a number of strips. Taking one from her, the young man folded it into a pad, lifted out a bottle from his bag and, again addressing Millie, said, ‘A clean basin, please.’

  When she returned from the scullery Aggie was already standing by him with the kettle of boiling water. After pouring some liquid from the bottle into the basin, he half-filled it with the boiling water and put in the pad of linen. Then, his fingers moving quickly against the heat, he squeezed this and, looking down on Ben, said, ‘This might sting a bit here and there, but we’ve got to have this wound cleaned. And don’t worry if it starts to bleed again. When did it happen?’

  ‘Last night.’

  ‘Oh, last night. Then you should have sent for me sooner. Why didn’t you?’

  Before Ben could answer Aggie put in, ‘Well, it bein’ Sunday, doctor, and I knew old Doctor Wheatley wouldn’t thank me for rousin’ him on a Sunday night.’

  When the doctor again muttered something which Aggie interpreted as ‘or at any other time’, she made no comment, for she might have been mistaken.

  ‘I’ll have to sew this, you know.’

  ‘I expected that.’

  ‘It’s some length and it’s not goin’ to be pleasant.’

  ‘I didn’t think it would.�
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  ‘You should really have gone to the hospital.’

  Ben said nothing.

  The cleaning of the wound over, the doctor went to his bag again and, taking out a small case, he extracted from it a needle and a length of what looked like thickish thread. Then, addressing Aggie, he said, ‘Have you any spirits about?’

  ‘I’ve only got gin, but I mean to get some whisky in. I do, ’cos he’s not partial to gin.’

  ‘Well, gin will have to do.’

  After Ben had drunk half a mug of gin, the business of sewing up his wound began. It was a long process; but he made no sound during it. And when the doctor at last cut off the thread from the end of the wound, he said, ‘Well, you’ve stood that all right, and it certainly wasn’t a straightforward business. Doubtless the gin helped. Now I’m going to bandage it, but lightly. Don’t worry if some blood oozes through; that will be caused by the cleansing. But this business certainly hasn’t done you any good; you’ve got a fever on you, so what I want you to do until I pop in again, which could be later this evening, is to lie as still as you can in order to rest that arm. And I can see you’ve got two good nurses here. Now don’t baulk at being spoon-fed for the next day or two, because I don’t want you to exert yourself. You understand?’

  He smiled down on Ben, but received no comment on his statement, for Ben was feeling as he had never done in his life before: there was a weakness on him as if he had been trying to shift a heavy load, and an excruciating pain was spreading from his arm through his whole body. At this present moment he wouldn’t have minded if he died.

  On his way out, the doctor said to Aggie, ‘You’re going to have a sick man on your hands for the next few days…Was he in a fight?’