Wild Heritage

by Wild Heritage (retail) (epub)

  He wished that he could stop but some devil inside pushed him on, making him sound more and more cocky and assured. He knew the villagers well enough to realise that they would not be over-impressed. They may not have travelled far but they were shrewd observers of human nature and they’d known him for a long time.

  ‘That Robbie’s got awfy fu’ o’ gas,’ was what they’d say when he turned his back. It was what he’d say if one of them tried it on with him. The thought made him laugh.

  On his way home from paying a call on the family who lived in the corn mill at the western end of the village, he saw a tall, slim girl walking ahead of him. Her back was very straight and she strode along like a soldier, very upright, head high and feet planted firmly on the ground with each step she took. She carried a black hat in her hand and a mass of tousled bright red hair cascaded down her back in a waterfall of colour.

  Robbie knew that this was Bullhead’s daughter. Nobody else could have hair like that, a shade of red that was rarely seen; not the beautiful auburn beloved of painters, but a burning, vibrant red as if the person from whose head it sprang was either tremendously passionate or furiously angry – perhaps both.

  ‘Are you looking for your mother?’ he asked when he was close to her. She spun round and he saw a guarded look come into her brown eyes.

  ‘Who are you?’ she asked abruptly.

  ‘Robbie Rutherford. That’s my family’s house over there.’ He pointed at their garden wall.

  She nodded. She could place him now, though she did not at first recognise the dandified fellow who stood beside her.

  ‘Oh that’s who you are. Yes, I’m looking for Wee Lily. My granny’s in the big field ploughing and I thought she might be on her own just now.’

  ‘I’ve not seen her today but last night Jake was hitting her and I told her to go home and lock the door,’ said Robbie.

  ‘Did he hurt her?’ she asked angrily.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ he said.

  ‘One of those days I’m going to kill that bastard if he doesn’t stop knocking my mam about,’ said the girl. Though her tone was almost conversational, Robbie could tell that she was completely serious.

  ‘I don’t think that’s a very good idea,’ he told her.

  ‘What does it matter to you?’ she asked.

  ‘Nothing really. I just think that if you killed him, they’d hang you and that must be an unpleasant way of dying.’

  ‘They didn’t hang Craigie,’ she said.

  ‘Craigie was insane. Besides he had a good reason for killing Bullhead. He had it coming to him.’ For a moment Robbie forgot who the girl was.

  She glared at him. ‘Did you know him?’ she asked.

  ‘Know who?’ He was defensive now, having recognised his slip.

  ‘The man they called Bullhead.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What was he like?’

  He stared at her. She looked intelligent and resourceful. There wasn’t any point in telling her lies. ‘He was a pig, I’m afraid.’

  She said nothing, just kept on staring into his face.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said slowly.

  ‘Don’t be sorry. Why should you be sorry? Nobody else is,’ she said and strode into the steading just at the moment that Wee Lily appeared in the dairy door. It was plain from her expression of delight and the way she threw out her arms how much she loved her child.

  ‘Aw, Kitty,’ she cried as they embraced.

  Robbie watched the girl put a hand on her mother’s face. ‘Has Jake been hitting you again, Mam?’ she asked.

  ‘No’ much. Robbie over there stopped him. He’s a grand lad is Robbie.’

  Kitty did not turn her head towards Robbie but went on looking at her mother. ‘Where is he?’ she asked.

  ‘He’s over there by the byre.’

  ‘No, I mean Jake. Where’s Jake?’

  ‘I dinna ken. He’s never come out to work this mornin’ and my mother cannae find him. She’s hopping mad.’

  ‘You tell him when he does come out that if I get my hands on him, I’ll mark him like he’s marked you,’ said Kitty in a voice of menace. Robbie could guess that she was well capable of it.

  When Robbie went off shaking his head, Kitty and her mother fell into their usual kind of childish conversation which Kitty had long ago grown out of but which was all that Wee Lily could sustain.

  ‘What are you doing here, lass? Won’t they miss you at the ferm?’ she asked.

  ‘MacPhee sent me into Rosewell to give an order to the haberdasher for her. She’s no’ expecting me back for a bit yet. I thought I told you to hit Jake if he tried anything on wi’ you, Mam.’ Kitty’s voice was angry.

  ‘It doesnae matter. I’m having a bairn soon and Big Lily says if it’s a laddie we can get shot o’Jake yince and for a’.’

  Kitty stared at her mother. ‘You’re having a bairn? When? Is it Jake’s?’

  ‘Of course it’s Jake’s. And I dinna ken when but I’m having it. I’ll no’ need to let him in my bed again and that’s why he was mad yesterday.’

  Wee Lily sounded very happy at this turn of events, but the feelings that rose up in Kitty almost overwhelmed her. First of all there was disgust that her mother had slept with Jake at all in spite of hating him.

  ‘How could you let him into your bed, Mam?’ she asked angrily.

  Wee Lily only shrugged. ‘Big Lily told me to. She said I had to get another bairn. If it’s a laddie, we can get rid o’Jake.’

  ‘I know, you said that already,’ snapped Kitty. What she was feeling now was terrible jealousy because she realised that any child born to her mother would be loved with unquestioning affection, the same love as Wee Lily had always given to her.

  She wanted to cry, to howl and scream and was furious to realise that Big Lily was right, she did not want her nose put out of joint with her mother. Already, though the next child was not even a noticeable swelling in Wee Lily’s belly, she felt displaced.

  She turned away and walked towards the door. Wee Lily watched her going and asked sadly, ‘Where are you going? Do you no’ want a cup o’ milk?’

  ‘No, I don’t. I’m going to see if I can meet Marie off the train. It’s about this time she comes home,’ said Kitty shortly. She could not bear to listen to her mother telling her again that if the child she was carrying turned out to be a boy, all her hopes would be vested in him.

  There was a fine mist drifting up the river and trailing its ghostly fingers among the leafless trees of the Prior’s Walk. Kitty strode over the rutted track without noticing the stones.

  She was furious and hurt. If Wee Lily had not been so childish, Kitty would have rounded on her and accused her of lack of love but there was no use saying anything like that to her mother. It would not be understood.

  Halfway along the path she saw a figure coming through the mist towards her. Marie was not as tall as Kitty but she had filled out and lost her girlish look. As she drew nearer, Kitty saw that her friend had become a woman of some style dressed in smart city clothes, a long grey jacket that buttoned up neatly to her chin, a matching skirt that swept the top of her good-quality boots and a little grey hat with a green feather sticking up from the ribbon. On her hands she wore black leather gloves and she carried a shallow leather case containing her pictures.

  Kitty felt ill-dressed and slovenly as she walked towards this vision. She was conscious that all the clothes she wore were hand-me-downs from other women on Falconwood. Even her bondager’s hat was an old one thrown out by MacPhee. She had never in her whole life chosen something she wanted to wear.

  She was unstinting in her praise of the transformed Marie, however. ‘My word you look grand, like a duchess. Edinburgh’s made a difference to you,’ she exclaimed as they came near to each other. Marie smiled, pleased to see her friend, for in recent months their meetings had been rare. During the summer months Kitty was kept working late on the farm and since the painting classes began again, Marie had been
spending more and more time with the Roxburgh family. She knew she was drifting away from the old life in Camptounfoot and only came back reluctantly. She did not want Kitty to realise this, however, and anxiety to cover up made her very effusive in her greeting.

  ‘Kitty, how wonderful to see you! What a lovely surprise,’ she exclaimed. Even her voice had changed, Kitty noticed.

  They linked arms and walked back along the path. Having Marie with her again cheered Kitty up and she was able to thrust the pain of Wee Lily’s news to the back of her mind at least for a short while. Marie was telling her about the work she was doing and about the other girls in her class, carefully glossing over Amy for she did not want to wax too enthusiastic about her new friend to her old one.

  Kitty listened and when it was her turn, talked about Falconwood and especially about Effie, the bondager who most often shared her work.

  ‘Effie’s getting married soon. She’s got a man at last and it’s no’ without trying. I think the only men in Falconwood she’s not slept with are Laidlaw and Liddle,’ she said baldly.

  Marie, who had become used to the gentility of Edinburgh girls, was shocked. ‘That’s awful. Does the man she’s marrying know?’

  ‘He doesn’t care. She’ll work along with him and they’ll take a herd’s place on some farm. Poor Effie, it’ll be bairns and hard work, and hard work and bairns for the rest of her life, but she’s daft, she’s as pleased as a dog wi’ two tails,’ said Kitty.

  ‘Well if that’s what she wants, it isn’t so bad,’ suggested Marie.

  The memory of Wee Lily kindled a spark in Kitty. ‘Of course it’s bad, it’s terrible. She’ll be an old woman before she’s twenty-five. You won’t catch me getting married. I’d rather go to jail like Craigie,’ was her stout reply.

  Marie thought she was joking and laughed. ‘I’m sure you’ll get married one day and I certainly hope you don’t go to jail. Some man’ll come along and sweep you off your feet.’

  Kitty noticed there was a yearning note in Marie’s voice when she said this. She looked sharply at her, wondering if she was about to lose her friend in the same way as she was losing her mother, to someone else.

  ‘Thae daft lassies in Edinburgh are filling your head wi’ rubbish,’ she snorted.

  ‘Oh no, Kitty, I believe in love. I really do,’ said Marie fervently, thinking of Murray. She wished she could tell Kitty about him, about his wonderful dark hair and soft brown eyes… about the lovely way he spoke and how he looked soulfully at her when he sang to Amy’s accompaniment on the Murrayhill piano.

  But Kitty was obviously not in the mood for that sort of confidence. She stopped in the middle of the path and said scornfully, ‘Love… It’s a lot o’ shit. It’s a swindle put oot by men to convince women they should do as they’re told. The boots are a’ on the men’s feet. Look at my mam and Jake. He sits doon and gets fed. He never lifts a hand to help. He does as little work as possible but they keep him because he’s a man and they need a man to keep their place. Now he’s got her in the family way and she’s as pleased as a dog wi’ two tails.

  ‘And look at Craigie, come to that, up there in the prison. He writes letters to his sisters telling them what to do and they do it. If he told them to go down and jump off the big bridge, they’d do it, I’ll be bound. So would my daft granny come to that.’

  There was a note of fury in her voice that startled Marie. ‘Oh Kitty,’ she said, patting her friend’s arm. ‘Has Jake been giving your mother trouble again?’

  ‘Not just him. Every man means trouble as far as I can see. Liddle keeps trying to creep up into the attic when I’m asleep. It’s getting to the stage I’m scared to close my eyes. He’s put some o’ the farm lads up to bothering me too. Two of them are aye jumping out on me and trying to feel me up. I’m sick of it.’

  Marie had been guarded from troubles like those. ‘That’s awful. You should speak to the steward about it,’ she said.

  Kitty turned on her. ‘What good would that do? Laidlaw’s no’ going to give them their marching orders because they bother a lassie and say dirty things to her. Besides, he looks at me in a funny way now. I think he’d be the same as them if he got the chance.’

  Marie stared at the tall figure walking by her side and realised that the tousled tomboy Kitty had grown into a statuesque Amazon. Her head of glorious hair meant that she would stand out in any crowd. No wonder men took an interest in her. She knew better than to say this, for Kitty would not have been flattered by such a comment.

  ‘Come into Tibbie’s with me,’ she suggested instead. ‘She’ll have tea ready. You’ve not been in for a long time. She’ll be pleased to see you.’

  The cottage was warmly lit by paraffin lamps with big glass shades in warm colours of pink and ruby-red. The fire was blazing and the whole place had an atmosphere of comfort and ease that was not usual for such a humble home.

  Tibbie wisely spent the money that Tim sent her and it was she who’d paid for Marie’s fine clothes because she wanted the girl to hold her own in Edinburgh society. Even then there was still plenty left over for bags of coal and the best of food.

  When Kitty stepped inside the cottage door she paused as she always did and cast an admiring look all around. Everything sparkled and shone, from the gleaming table to the brass fire irons and there was a mouthwatering smell from golden pancakes cooking on a black griddle over the fire. This must be how the gentry live, she thought, for she did not know any better and Tibbie’s way of life was so vastly superior to anything else she’d ever seen.

  ‘Kitty, it’s grand to see you. Sit down and I’ll mask the tea,’ cried Tibbie, lifting the cat off its nest on the chair to make way for the guest. Then she looked at Kitty again and asked, ‘Aren’t you grown up? How old are you now, lass?’ It seemed as if Kitty had matured in only a few days.

  ‘I’m nearly fifteen,’ said Kitty shortly. She was tired of people making comments about her transformation from child to woman. She wished she could go back to being the barefoot urchin who hid under hedges. At least no one bothered about her then, no men gave her evil looks or made lewd suggestions to her.

  She looked across at the ladylike Marie and thought that men would be more polite to her. They wouldn’t grab for her in the hayshed because she was only a bondager’s bastard and ripe for the taking.

  It was very important to her, however, that she and Marie remained friends. That bond must not be broken because it was a bond made when they were children and it mattered a lot to Kitty, who had no other real friend.

  ‘I was wondering if you’d like to go to the Rosewell dance on Saturday night with me’, she said suddenly.

  Effie had been telling her about how all the other young women went on Saturdays. Kitty had never been to a dance and now she thought it might be some place that she and Marie could go together.

  As soon as the words were out of her mouth, however, she knew she’d made a terrible mistake. Marie’s eyes showed total shock but she covered it up almost at once. Not quickly enough though, because Kitty saw it.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said hurriedly. ‘It doesn’t matter. I don’t really want to go.’

  There was nothing that Marie wanted to do less than dance in Roseweil’s public hall, because her experiences in Edinburgh had introduced her to a very different world. But she thought Kitty had set her heart on it and did not want to hurt her, especially after the peculiar way she was behaving and the terrible description she had given of her life on Falcon wood.

  ‘What a good idea,’ she enthused. ‘I’d love to go. I’ve never been to a dance.’

  ‘There’s always grand music,’ said Tibbie wistfully, thinking of the times she and Nanny used to go dancing together. In her kindly way she smiled on the girls, imagining that they would be following in her footsteps. So it was arranged. Kitty and Marie were to go dancing on the following Saturday.

  There was no one in the farmyard or in Liddle’s cottage when Kitty arrived back at Fal
conwood. Mrs Liddle, she knew, was in the habit of attending prayer meetings held in other cottages in the evenings and Liddle took advantage of her absence by drinking with the unmarried men who lived in a communal bothy at the back of the hayshed.

  Relieved to have the place to herself, Kitty set about bringing life to the fire and preparing a meal. She ate and, barefooted, was about to mount the stairs to her comfortless bed, when the door creaked open and Liddle staggered in. He was drunk, drunker than she had ever seen him, and when he saw her standing by the hearth, he slammed the door shut, turned the key and shoved it in his pocket.

  ‘Now I’ve got ye. Now you canna get oot. Now I’ll show ye, cheeky little besom that ye are!’ He hissed and swayed towards her, hauling at the neck of her blouse with both hands and ripping it down the front.

  Kitty shoved frantically at his chest and cried out, ‘Get away from me, you pig.’

  ‘I’m a pig, am I? Let’s see about that,’ muttered Liddle, roughly ripping the girl’s clothes. She hated the touch of his hands on her skin; she loathed the sour smell of his breath on her face.

  As she fought against him, a strange red tide was rising within her. It was a tide of fury swollen to terrible force by all her pent-up resentments and angers. Her struggles increased.

  Liddle was angry too, violent and dangerous in drink. He put both hands round Kitty’s neck and pulled her head down towards him, half-throttling her.

  ‘Come on, ye’ve no’ had a man yet. It’s about time ye started. I’ll show ye,’ he was muttering as he fought with her. She pummelled him with her fists, kicking at his legs with her bare feet, regretting the fact that she’d taken off her heavy boots. The grip that he had on her neck threatened to immobilise her and she knew if she did not get away from him soon, she would pass out.

  The situation was desperate. She was being pushed back against the wall and Liddle was groping under her skirt with one hand while he held her head back with the other. The only weapons she had were her strength and desperation. With a superhuman effort she turned her face towards his hand and bit viciously into it. Bone crunched beneath her strong teeth and he gave a horrible yell as he let go.