‘What did she beat her for?’ asked the girl.
‘I think she was only looking for an excuse, but she said it was because Kitty made Bella’s nose bleed.’
Marie gasped. ‘Then it’s all my fault. Kitty hit Bella because of me. I’m so sorry.’
Tibbie consoled her. ‘It’s not your fault. What did Bella do to you?’
‘She said I was a navvy bastard and Kitty just ran into her and hit her on the nose. She was flaming mad,’ Marie said.
Tibbie sighed. ‘The poor wee soul must be sick of folk talking about navvy bastards. Don’t worry, Kitty’s going to be all right and your mother and father were decent people. Hold your head up and ignore Bella. She’s just a nasty wee gossip.’
It was still dark when Kitty was wakened next morning by the sounds of her mother and grandmother rising and dressing. She lay as still as a mouse and watched them through half-closed eyelids. Her grandmother was stooping over the ashes of the fire, breathing life into them by blowing gustily on the dull embers. Dust and ash flew everywhere but soon flames began to lick around the broken twigs she had placed on top of the pile.
Wee Lily was pulling on her clothes. Like her mother she was a big, handsome woman and from a distance looked imposing. It was only when you were close to her that you noticed the bland simplicity of her stare, the childishness of her smile. She sat on a wooden box and pulled on her boots, laboriously lacing them up and then giving the toes an extra polish with a bit of cloth. Kitty was filled with an immense love for her mother, and longed to rise from bed, throw her arms around the broad shoulders and kiss her cheek.
But the least movement hurt her as she silently tested out her body, luxuriating in the pain, flexing her muscles in turn but taking care to draw no attention to herself. Each movement made pain flood through her like a tide, building up to a climax and then gradually fading away as she lay still again. It throbbed inside her, taking its beat from the thudding of her heart. She must have given a sob or a sigh because she saw Wee Lily turn and stare in her direction, so she closed her eyes and pretended to be asleep.
Then Big Lily’s voice rang out in the silent room. ‘Dinna sit there staring. There’s fifteen heifers to be fed before daylight and I’ve the sheep to check before we do the milking. Hurry up.’
‘But what about the bairn?’ Wee Lily asked.
‘Leave her be. She’s asleep. She can get herself up when she wakens.’
‘But what if she’s hurt? What if you did some damage to her last night?’
‘She’s not hurt bad. That kind don’t get hurt.’
‘Aw, Ma, you’re ower hard on her. She’s only a bairn.’
‘Her kind’s born to hang. You mark my words. The quicker you cut her off the better,’ said Big Lily as she pushed her protesting daughter out of the bothy.
When their footsteps died away, Kitty crawled out from under her blanket – where had it come from, she wondered? – and, wrapping it around her shoulders, staggered over to the fire which was still burning cheerfully. Her bones ached, the welts on her arms and legs throbbed and when she put a hand up to her head, she felt throbbing lumps on her skull.
Usually she loved to be left alone in their little house but today she was too sore and too unhappy to really savour the experience. On the stone slab of the hearth, she sank down and let her tears flow, but not for long. Kitty despised tears. Angrily she wiped them away, furious at her own weakness.
When the door opened behind her, she thought it was her grandmother, so she sat upright and blurted out, ‘I’m no’ greetin’, I’m no’ greetin’.’
‘Then you should be. I’d be crying if I was you,’ said a soft voice and Kitty turned her head to see the new girl from the school groping her way in through the semi-darkness.
‘What do you want?’ she asked.
‘Tibbie told me what happened to you and I’m very sorry because I was the cause of it all. She sent me over with this dress because she said yours got torn last night. This one used to belong to her daughter Hannah.’
A dress of dark blue flannel was tentatively held out towards the huddled figure by the fireside. Kitty touched it. ‘It’s bonny,’ she said in a changed voice. Though she never owned anything nice, she loved pretty things and the material of the dress was soft in her fingers. ‘Is it really for me?’ she asked.
Marie nodded. ‘Yes, Tibbie said you were to keep it. There’s a peeny that goes with it too…’
She held out a stiffly starched white pinafore with ruffles around the armholes, but Kitty shook her head. ‘I couldnae wear that. It’d get dirty too quick.’
The other girl nodded in agreement because the idea of hoyden Kitty in a frilled pinafore was incongruous.
‘When you’re dressed, Tibbie said I was to take you back to her cottage so’s she can have a look at you. She’ll wash your hair,’ Marie said next.
Kitty put a questing hand up to her head and found that the hair was matted with dried blood. It could obviously do with a wash. She rose painfully to her feet and started to pull the new dress over her head, refusing Marie’s offers of help. It smelled of dried lavender and fitted her well.
‘Isn’t it braw?’ she whispered.
Marie nodded in agreement. ‘You look very grown up. How old are you?’
‘Nine I think,’ said Kitty.
Marie was surprised because they were the same height. ‘You’re as tall as me and I’m eleven!’ Then she became brisk and hurried Kitty up with, ‘Come on, let’s go. Tibbie’s waiting.’
When she saw the transformation in the bondager’s child, Tibbie was glad that she had kept Hannah’s clothes. She took Kitty’s chin in a careful hand and examined her bruises. ‘Are you all right, lass?’ she asked gently.
‘I’m fine. I hurt a bit that’s all,’ was the stoical reply.
‘Good. Have something to eat and I’ll wash your hair for you. It’s got blood in it,’ said Tibbie sympathetically.
Kitty nodded. ‘I know. Thank you, Mrs Mather.’
She sat in a chair next to the parrot and watched the wonderful bird slowly and reflectively eat the seeds which had been scattered on the floor of its cage. A sigh escaped her. For years she had longed to be in Tibbie’s cottage, watching the parrot.
‘It can speak,’ said Tibbie, who could see how fascinated Kitty was with the bird.
‘What sort of things does it say?’ she asked, big brown eyes wide open.
Tibbie laughed. ‘He says my name, sometimes he talks about the weather, and says “Nice day” and things like that but sometimes he speaks in French… I don’t know what he’s saying then.’
Marie added, ‘And sometimes he swears, doesn’t he, Tibbie? He says, “God damn” and “blast me boots”.’
Tibbie nodded. ‘Tim must have taught the poor bird that. He was aye saying “blast me boots”.’
She was bustling about, bringing out a tin basin and a towel, and fiddling with the kettle that boiled gently on the hearth. ‘Come and sit down here,’ she said, indicating a place on the rug where another towel was spread. Kitty drew back slightly. She had little experience of having her hair washed, though once or twice attempts had been made to comb it and that had always been very painful.
Tibbie began pouring steaming water into the bowl. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll not hurt you,’ she said.
Not wanting to show cowardice Kitty walked forward and knelt on the towel with her head bent forward so that she looked and felt like someone at the scaffold. Very gently Tibbie poured a jug of warm water over the bent head and massaged the white nape of the child’s neck. As she worked she wondered how Big Lily could find it in her heart to be so brutal to her own flesh and blood.
Kitty sat submissive, luxuriating in the feel of Tibbie’s capable hands gently rubbing her head, kneading and smoothing, smoothing and kneading. A sense of pure bliss filled the child and she wished that this ritual would never end, but when she was satisfied that the rinsing water was at last running clean, Tibbie to
ld Marie to fetch another jugful of water from the well and mix it with the rest of the hot water from the kettle.
This last libation was poured over Kitty’s head, drops coursed down her cheeks like tears and ran into her ears. Tibbie wrapped her head in a soft, warm towel and told her, ‘That’s it. You’re clean as a whistle now. I’ll brush it soon.’
As she untangled the child’s hair, it seemed to spring into life and fill with colour glowing, gleaming and glittering like the leaping flames in a high fire on a winter’s night when there is snow and frost outside. Marie watched with open-mouthed admiration as the thick tendrils uncurled and shone glossily. The artist in her gloried in the beauty of the autumn shades of deep red, amber, orange and burning brown.
‘What wonderful hair, what a beautiful colour, it looks as if it’s on fire,’ she sighed.
Tibbie, gently brushing, replied, ‘Aye, it’s bonny hair right enough. My Hannah had red hair but it was more corn-coloured than this.’
Kitty, whose head was bent so that she could not look up, was genuinely surprised at their enthusiasm because her hair had always been a cause of shame to her.
‘They call me Carroty Kate at school,’ she offered.
‘That’s because they’re jealous. Your hair’s the most beautiful colour I’ve ever seen,’ Marie told her.
Kitty, surprised, put up a hand and felt the new softness of her hair; took a curl in her hand and held it up so that she could see it. To her disappointment it still looked the same colour as the carrots that her mother and grandmother grew in the field behind Craigie’s farmhouse.
‘Take care of it,’ Tibbie was saying. ‘When you need it washed, come over here and I’ll do it for you. It’s a pleasure to work with hair like yours.’
For the first time in her life, Kitty felt she had something of which she could be proud. Her red-headed father had left her one good legacy after all.
The two girls were sitting side by side in the sun when David arrived back, dusty and tired after the walk from Maddiston. He was full of the news that he had been offered a place in the mill counting-house and was to start the following Monday. His face fell, however, when he saw a girl with his sister in the garden and he turned to Tibbie to whisper, ‘Who’s that?’ Kitty’s refurbished state had confused him.
She said, ‘It’s Wee Lily’s bairn from over the road.’
His eyebrows shot up. ‘The bondager’s bairn? The one who stole from the shop? I thought you said Marie was to stay away from her? Why did you let her in here?’
Tibbie was surprised at his reaction. ‘It’s all right. I’ve washed her hair so she’s no lice now. She’s no’ a bad lassie and they’re getting on well together,’ she told him.
He frowned. ‘But she’s the one that was fathered by the navvy called Bullhead, isn’t she? My sister should find a better friend than that.’
Tibbie shot him a sharp glance and was about to make a sharp retort but bit it back. ‘Let them be. Marie’s enjoying looking after Kitty and the poor wee lass could do with a bit of that. It’s good for both of them,’ she told him.
‘I’ll speak to her about it,’ said David sullenly and climbed the narrow stairs to the attic where she heard him throw himself heavily on the bed. He stayed there till Kitty went away.
That night, when they went to bed, and after David had broken his good news to Tibbie and his sister, Marie heard his voice coming through the curtain that divided their attic in half. ‘Don’t get involved with that Kitty Scott,’ he warned her.
‘Why not? She’s a nice girl. She said she’d take me for a walk and show me where the rabbits play and where you can see lots of bonny birds,’ she protested.
‘She’s from a bad family. We’ve got to aim for better friends than that. When I’m up in business, we’ll have to know the right people,’ he said heavily.
She turned on her side in bed and sighed. ‘Oh don’t be silly. It’s a long time before we’ve got to worry about things like that.’
His voice rose angrily. ‘Listen to what I tell you. You’re judged by your friends. We’re going to find it hard enough to make our way without being seen with the wrong people.’
She was used to deferring to him in everything and his vehemence frightened her. ‘All right,’ she said in a mollifying voice. ‘Don’t worry.’
When she woke next morning, however, for once she decided that she was not going to do what her brother told her. At school she took Kitty’s arm, ignoring the jeers of Bella and her friends and after lessons were over, they walked along the riverbank while her new friend pointed out wonderful things – trailing waterweed with tiny white flowers like stars dotting its surface; still pools where fat brown trout lurked and allowed their bellies to be tickled by Kitty’s poaching fingers; beds of yellow flag irises where little black moorhens paddled to and fro in the shallows; secret places in the riverbank where ducks made their nests; warrens of rabbit holes like little towns and badger holes with platforms of earth beaten down in front of them; swooping swifts, kingfishers and herons. Marie felt like Kitty’s pupil because she realised the other girl was able to show her a wonderful new world, a world that had been hidden from her before. When she was living with Nanny, she had rarely ventured outside the streets and gardens of Rosewell.
They parted at sunset and Marie said, ‘I hope we’ll be friends from now on but my brother’s funny about me going out with other people. He’s working in Maddiston now and he’ll only be coming home on Sundays though, so don’t come for me then.’
Kitty understood what she was being told and nodded. ‘I’ll no’ come on Sundays,’ she promised.
That was how their alliance began; that was how Marie began leading a double life, hiding her friendship with Kitty from her brother. And it was a real friendship despite the difference in their ages, for while Marie was shy, withdrawn and romantic, Kitty was ebullient, realistic and worldly-wise. They complemented each other very well.
Chapter Four
Languid would be the best word to describe the attitude of the tall, fair-haired man who was surveying passers-by from the first-floor window of an elegant house overlooking the trees of London’s Berkeley Square. Long, heavy-lidded, hooded eyes made his face look impassive as he watched the labours of the crossing sweeper, a purple-faced man in a threadbare jacket and a red neckerchief. It did not take long before the unremitting stare made the workman look up and grimace in discomfort, wondering why the toff in the green velvet dressing-gown was staring so hard at him.
Pleased with the success of this aimless way of passing the time, Sydney turned back to the breakfast-room behind him where Norris, his valet, was pouring golden China tea from a famille rose teapot. His mind leaped back a decade to the time when his morning libation had been Major Bob’s strong black tea from a rusty tin pot. Major Bob! – the strangely impressive ruin of a woman who had taken to drink and kept herself in brandy by taking care of ten men in a navvy bivouac.
He remembered the taste of her brew… black as tar and flavoured by peat from the brackish water of a stream that ran through the navvy camp where they were all living. His face darkened. Major Bob had died there, a horrible death from cholera but she’d endured her agonies with dignity and without complaint. What would she think if she saw the navvy she’d known as Gentleman Sydney wasting his time watching passers-by from a window, wondering how he was going to pass the rest of the day?
He drank his tea and then walked across the hall to his dressing-room where his clothes were laid out. A pair of brightly polished boots stood side by side on the carpet. Again his memory took a leap back to the dusty clothes he’d worn as a railway navvy. He still owned his old boots, all walked-down and split at the seams. He’d never allow them to be thrown out, in spite of his wife Bethya’s horror of them, because they were part of his memories, part of the time when he’d run away from his family and background and tried to be someone else.
Sydney was bored and only too well aware of his own shortcoming
s not to recognise that when he was in such a frame of mind, he had an unfortunate tendency to get into trouble.
‘What’s the programme for today?’ he asked Norris, who had been with the household for several years and was totally devoted to the beautiful Lady Bethya. As a result he harboured a barely hidden animosity towards his employer, who not only had the luck to be married to her, but did not seem to appreciate his good fortune.
‘Her ladyship is holding a luncheon party,’ said Norris solemnly.
‘Who’s coming? The usual bores… the Parliamentary crowd?’ Sydney asked.
‘As far as I was told there are only two guests… your lordship’s friend, Sir Timothy Maquire and his wife, Lady Emma Jane.
‘Goddamn, of course, I’d forgotten Black Ace was coming today. That’s something to look forward to. I haven’t seen him in three years!’ Sydney’s boredom flew away, changing the expression on his face, making him seem younger and happier.
‘Can I inform her ladyship that you will be attending the luncheon?’ asked Norris. On more occasions than not, he had the task of telling Bethya that Sydney would not be present at her entertainments, but now his employer regarded him with astonishment. ‘Of couse I’m going, I wouldn’t miss the Maquires, would I?’
‘Of course not, sir,’ said Norris, wondering how he was expected to guess whom his unpredictable employer found suitable and whom not.
It was a fine day so Sydney decided to drive away boredom by taking a stroll in the sunshine, but before he went out he looked in on his wife.
Bethya was in their huge bed with her pair of pet pug dogs sprawled on the cover and the pages of a letter strewn over her lap. She looked up at him through a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles perched on her pretty nose. He loved to see her wearing her spectacles because they made her look like a small and surprised mole peeping out of a hole. She was vain about them; never wore them in public and always snatched them off hurriedly when he caught her unawares.
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