‘Get a lantern, Angus, and we’ll be on our way,’ she said and then turned as Milly came down the stairs with Jean.
Poor wee Jean. What agonies she must have endured to achieve those tortured plaits. She smiled tearfully at Mairi and got her coat from the pegs by the door.
Milly walked over to the fireplace and put the guard protectively in front of the damped-down coals. ‘A wee poke when we get home and we’ll have a nice wee blaze.’
‘A Christmas party should be fun, Milly. Everybody will be there.’
‘Everybody that’s left, lassie.’
‘Oh, Milly.’ Mairi had thought that Milly’s willingness to go to the party had signalled a new start. Perhaps it did.
‘It’ll get better.’
Milly looked at her and in her eyes Mairi saw the empty years stretching ahead. ‘I’ll endure it – for my bairns’ sake. Och, don’t fret, lassie. I’m tough, I’ll survive, but it’ll never get better. How can it?’
Mairi could say nothing. There were no words of comfort. She reached for her coat and followed the children out into the darkness.
They heard the sounds of revelry long before they reached the village. The piano, which even to Mairi’s untrained ear sounded badly out of tune, was being played as if loudness might make up for accuracy but the children did not seem to mind. They were running from one side of the hall to the other, from the top to the bottom, bumping into one another, into angry and overworked mothers who thumped, without discrimination, whichever child they could reach, and they were having a wonderful time.
The hall had been decorated with holly but there were no candles. Some of the smallest children could have no memory of socials and parties when the hall had been ablaze with red candles. They did not mind. It was decorated. A piano was being played and they did not have to go to school for a whole week. Could life get better?
It could. For one magic night the war was forgotten, at least by the children, and at nine thirty, just as the minister and the Dominie were beginning to whisper together about the lateness of the hour and the dangers involved in long walks home in the dark, someone heard the sound of a car and there was Sir Humphrey with his oranges – and his niece Arabella Huntingdon.
She was wearing silver grey furs and looked exotic and wonderful. Small children pressed close to her just to drink in her perfume or to touch the stuff of her coat. Jewels sparkled in her ears and on her soft white hands and Mairi, more than ever, was aware of her own reddened skin, her broken nails, her ugly, ugly, too-large dress. And then Arabella smiled and Mairi, together with everyone else, was captivated again.
Bella left her uncle deep in conversation with the minister and came over to Mairi who was watching the Dominie, flanked by his henchmen Angus and Bert, give out the precious oranges.
‘Miss McGloughlin,’ said Bella, ‘how very lovely to see you again.’
Ian loves her and she is a fairytale creature who has forgotten him.
‘It’s nice to see you, Miss Huntingdon,’ she said stiffly. She had to be polite, had to be. Arabella, after all, had persuaded Rupert to exert his influence on Ian’s behalf. ‘You have been away a long time.’
‘One has to do what one has to do,’ said Arabella. ‘My uncle and aunt want me to have the life they think a girl from my family ought to have. I have tried to play their game.’ Suddenly she looked directly at Mairi and her face was no longer smiling. ‘Have you heard from him lately? I’m so worried; there was such a ghastly battle at a place called Caporetto.’
‘Caporetto?’ Mairi’s mind seemed sluggish.
‘Italy. It went on for weeks and weeks and I tell myself that he was probably in quite a different part of Italy, probably sitting under an olive tree writing a poem . . . that’s how I make myself see him, to keep myself sane.’
‘You know where he is?’ Mairi could hardly believe what she was hearing. Ian had never mentioned Bella and Mairi had hardly dared remind him of the laird’s niece.
Bella laughed. What a lovely musical sound. Several of the children who were stroking her coat looked up at her lovely face to hear the laughter better. ‘He hasn’t told you,’ she said. ‘What a wicked boy. Is he ashamed of me, do you think?’
‘Perhaps you’re the only lovely thing in his life, Miss Huntingdon, and he wants nothing to touch you.’
‘Goodness, how lovely. You’re a poet too. And do call me Bella. If we are to be sisters in the eyes of the law . . .’
‘Goodness, Miss . . . Bella. No, I’m sorry, I can’t. I can’t take this in. I didn’t think you and Ian . . .’
‘I haven’t seen him since the picnic. Those picnics were, well, you won’t believe me if I say they were the highlights of my year. I saw Ian first when I was fourteen. He’s so beautiful, isn’t he?’
‘Would you like a cup of tea, Miss . . . Bella? I need to sit down.’
‘Me too. Let some of these little acolytes fetch tea for us. We can sit over here.’
She walked across the hall, children trailing in her wake like seagulls after a trawler, and sat down against the wall and Mairi had no choice but to follow her. Milly brought them tea and slices of the latest attempts at eggless cake. Arabella smiled up at her. ‘You must be Mrs Baxter. We were so sorry to hear about your loss.’
Milly smiled but said nothing and Mairi drank some of her tea and wondered what on earth to say. Ian beautiful? Ian was a farmer’s son who had almost been shot for desertion. What would Sir Humphrey have to say about that?
‘It won’t be easy, Mairi, but what is easy? My aunt will have a fit and Ian isn’t terribly easy to convince either. He spouts all this stuff and nonsense about my being too good for him and miles above me and all that rot.’
‘It isn’t rot at all, Miss Huntingdon.’
Bella turned in her chair to look at Mairi. ‘But I thought you would have been on my side.’
‘I’m on my brother’s side. Has he asked you to marry him?’
‘Good gracious no. I have to do all the running. He has such fearfully outmoded ideas. I keep telling him that the war has changed everything. I was going to try with “love changes everything” but Ian would give me up out of love. Now I’m working on, “when you’re acknowledged as an absolutely brilliant war poet, everyone will say you’re marrying beneath you” but he hasn’t replied to that one and so I’m frightened.’
Mairi was having trouble in taking in all that she was hearing. Ian and Sir Humphrey’s niece, a debutante, a girl who had been presented to their majesties at court: they were writing to one another, had been for some time. ‘I haven’t heard in weeks,’ she said at last. ‘I’ve been so involved with poor Milly Baxter and her children, but quite often there’s a huge gap and then three letters arrive at once . . .’
Arabella stood up. ‘That’s what I’m hoping. Uncle’s leaving. I must go. When you hear from Ian, you may tell him that I’ve told you of my feelings. Perhaps then he’ll write to you about his. Funny, isn’t it, but he’s actually more of a snob than Rupert and that’s saying something.’
She walked to the door, chatting to all the little acolytes who followed her, and when it closed behind her the room seemed cold and empty and dark.
A few days later another visitor, Mr Sutherland the minister, brought Mairi more bad news. Ian was missing, assumed captured by enemy soldiers.
She could not bear it; she could not. It was too much. Robin in hospital, Dad out but sent back to his unit, and now this.
‘Do you know what day it is, Milly?’ she asked as they sat side by side before the fire that Angus kept stoked for them. ‘It’s the first day of 1918. We should have the whisky out and black bun and a fiddler playing all the old tunes.’
‘It’ll get better, lassie.’
Who had said that last?
‘He’s been in prison, Milly. It nearly drove him insane. He’d rather be dead. Oh, God, I have to tell Bella.’
Milly lifted a spoon of the hot broth she was trying to m
ake Mairi drink. ‘Come on, lass.’
Mairi took the spoon from her and tried to smile. ‘You think you’re dealing with Jean, Milly.’
‘Ach, we’re all children when we’re in pain. Who’s Bella?’
And Mairi looked at her honest face and told her everything. ‘But how can I tell her on New Year’s Day? They’re bound to be having a wonderful party.’
‘It won’t hurt to keep it till tomorrow. Let her have her fancy party.’
‘He’s a prisoner of war. He’s alive and he’ll come home. Right?’
‘Right. And then your dad’ll be back and your Robin because this war has to end, Mairi. They won’t go on until there’s no one left to fire the guns.’
Mairi stood up. ‘We’d best away to bed. There’s more than enough work for the two of us tomorrow.’
‘Give Angus some chores. He’ll need to do some of your work or you’ll not have time to visit the lassie.’
‘I wonder if I should just send her a note – I went to the front door there once – I’ll not make that mistake again. I don’t know what excuse I’d make for wanting to see her.’
‘It’s still better than letting her read it, lass.’
Milly was right, of course, but Mairi did not relish the embarrassment of being asked by a servant to state her business and she knew that would happen. She lay awake for most of the night worrying about Ian and trying to think of a reason for a farm girl to call on the daughter of the ‘Big House’ before eventually falling into an uneasy doze.
Milly was already awake and the porridge was plopping softly over the heat when she went downstairs the next morning.
‘I’ll do what has to be done here and then I’ll walk over, Milly. Will you have a look at the logs, Angus? Maybe Bert could give you a wee hand and, Jean, you’ll do the hens this morning for me, won’t you?’
By one thirty she had no excuses left. She combed her hair, tied it back neatly, put on her coat and her boots and set off for Sir Humphrey’s home. She rehearsed what she would say when a maid came to the back door to see who was knocking.
Arabella was walking in the garden, throwing sticks for her spaniel to retrieve. She saw Mairi on the driveway and, abandoning her puppy, hurried to meet her.
The cold air had made Arabella’s cheeks pink and her eyes bright and she looked ethereally lovely. As usual she made Mairi feel plain and dowdy but she could not care about that today because she was going to extinguish the light in Bella’s sparkling eyes.
‘A prisoner? But he’ll hate that.’
‘He’s alive . . . Bella.’
Arabella smiled. ‘He hated prison. It wasn’t so awful when they sent him up to the highlands to build roads but the prison cells were terrible, frightening. He couldn’t write; they wouldn’t give him paper and so he kept sane by memorizing his poetry. He’s a genius, but you know that.’
Mairi hung her head. They had never taken Ian’s poetry seriously. ‘Men like Rupert wrote poetry.’ She was startled to realise that she had spoken.
‘Then what about Burns, Mairi? Men like Ian write poetry. You have no more news?’
‘No, I’m sorry. The telegram came yesterday . . .’
‘And while I was dancing in the ballroom, getting squiffy on champagne and toasting the end of the war that is bound to come, you were alone.’
Mairi felt exasperation rising. How melodramatic. Two poets together. Ian and Bella were perfect for one another. ‘With Milly, Angus, Bert, and Jean, and a farm to run so that Ian will have a home to come back to. I’d best get back.’
‘Yes, of course, and you’ll let me know when you hear something. Oh, blast, I’m going to town later this week. You must ring me on Auntie’s new telephone; I’ll give you her number.’
‘I’ve never seen a telephone machine, Miss Huntingdon. There isn’t one in the village.’
Bella looked at her and impulsively grasped Mairi’s hand. ‘You’re angry, calling me Miss Huntingdon. I’m sorry. You will write to me though, just as soon as you hear something definite?’
‘I’ll write.’
Bella called the spaniel who was having a wonderful time rolling in the soft snow and Mairi stood and watched them make their way back to the luxury of the Big House. Ian would not be at ease there. There could be no future for him and Arabella Huntingdon, no matter how romantically they looked at their situation. And it was obvious that the young aristocrat was keeping her letter writing from her family or perhaps she tossed off her interest in Ian with a . . . writing to one of the tenants, you know. One’s got to do one’s bit for our fighting men.
Mairi remembered how Rupert had reminded Arabella pointedly that the young farmer was one of her uncle’s tenants. And he was not even that. Colin was the tenant; Ian no more than a hired hand. A match between the two young people would never be allowed and, even if it were, how could Ian support a girl who wore furs and diamonds to a school party?
The only thing to do now was to write to Ian with love and support. And after that letter was written there was one to Colin who also needed support and then Robin . . . How wonderful to be able to pour her heart out to Robin but she would have to write him a friendly letter, telling him about the children’s party and the oranges and Arabella Huntingdon’s beautiful clothes, and then she would tell him that Ian was a prisoner of war and she would be so positive that everything was going to be well.
She did not have to write the letter, for when she got home Angus rushed out to tell her that the Dominie had walked to the farm to tell them that the war was over for Robin, who was being invalided out to recover at home.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
‘Hey, farmer, can you not see my sheets?’
The cheery cry rang out from the drying green and Mairi straightened up from the fire she was lighting to wave to her housekeeper.
‘The wind will change, Milly, honestly.’
‘I’ll believe you,’ shouted Milly, leaving the end of the quotation, thousands wouldn’t, left unsaid.
Mairi laughed and went on with burning the stubble. She was months behind with the work on the farm; things just did not work so smoothly with Colin and Ian away. This had to be done and it was a shame that Milly had chosen to change the beds on the day she had elected to light fires so near the farmhouse. The wind would change – eventually.
Just as the war would end – eventually, and Ian and Colin would come home. And Robin? Mairi sighed. Robin would talk to her – eventually.
Oh, he did talk. He was painfully polite when a meeting could not be avoided but it was obvious that communicating with anyone at all was an almost unbearable burden.
‘He’s no the man he was, lassie,’ said Milly. ‘Your Robin is still there somewhere, but there’s layers of experiences on that laddie and he has to learn to live with them afore he can think on living with anyone else.’
‘But I don’t want him to marry me – I mean, of course I do, but I know he’s not ready. I’m terrified that he doesn’t love me any more, that maybe he never loved me at all. He kissed me, Milly; he never said he loved me. Oh, damn, why is being an adult so difficult? Can’t he see that I want to help him. If he’d talk to me, really talk, not just mutter things about it being a good spring for planting, I know I could help him.’
‘Give him time. Give him space. My Jim used to jump up in the bed at night screaming bloody murder; used to frighten the life out of me – and the bairns. It’s what they’ve seen, what they’ve had to do.’
‘I seem to have wasted so much time, Milly. I took years to realise how I felt about him and now, just when I thought that perhaps he cared for me too . . .’ Suddenly Mairi looked up and saw Milly’s kind, sympathetic face and she remembered that Milly had lost her husband and here was she, blubbering like a school girl.
‘I’m sorry, Milly. I feel so ashamed.’
Milly wiped Mairi’s face with her dishcloth, just as she did with Jean and occasionally Bert. ‘Come on, let’s have a cup of tea a
nd a scone. There is nothing to be ashamed about, lass. Jim’s dead, and I’ll carry that grief for the rest of my life but surely that should make me better able to comfort. You helped me when Jim got killed, I help you when Robin gets hurt. Women always pick up the bits after their men, lass. The way of the world.’
Mairi looked at the older woman and again felt ashamed. Milly had loved her husband dearly, yet after allowing herself hardly any time to grieve, she was back at work, looking after the house, caring for her children and their grief, keeping a worried eye on her elder son who, of course, felt the loss of his father so much more than the younger children who had hardly known him, and being constantly, unfailingly cheerful.
‘Milly, did you never think of joining any of the clubs . . . I don’t know, knitting socks for servicemen or something like that?’
‘My God, lassie, have you ever seen my knitting? Jim didn’t marry me for my knitting skills. I’m perfectly content here with you and the bairns.’
They both looked quickly out of the window as they heard a furious cry from Bert but it was no more than high spirits. It was good to see the three children running around happily, as if they had not a care in the world.
‘This is a lovely place you’ve given us,’ said Milly. ‘Jim died knowing his family were safe. I’ll never be able to thank you enough for that.’
Mairi followed her into the kitchen. One more worry that would not go away. What would become of Milly and the children when the war ended and the men came home?
*
Robin knew that he was hurting Mairi but he had no idea what to do about it. The wounds on his body were healing and the doctor at the hospital had assured him that the scars on his mind would heal too, given time.
But days passed and he felt worse, not better. He was home, alive. A girl was waiting for him to make some move; he just knew it. She was so tense when they met and he was taking every chance to ensure that they did not meet. He refused to accompany his father to church and he refused to stay in the room when the minister came preaching forgiveness. He could never forgive. But the person he could not forgive was himself. He was alive and his friends were dead. But worse than that – other men were dead at his hand.
The Crofter's Daughter Page 17
