Wild Heritage

by Wild Heritage (retail) (epub)

  Bill gave her a whole guinea in front of a cheering ecstatic crowd. ‘No one’s ever knocked out Grandma Kennedy before,’ he bawled.

  At this the tent exploded with loud cheers and a bemused Kitty saw May and Emily jumping up and down, embracing each other and shouting like lunatics.

  She grasped her money and was about to leave when Bill took her arm and whispered, ‘Go out the back way. My mother wants to speak to you.’

  Grandma Kennedy was sitting on an upturned box by the door with an open bottle by her feet, apparently none the worse for her fight. She proffered the bottle to Kitty and asked, ‘Want some?’

  The girl shook her head. ‘No thanks. Are you all right? I was afraid I’d hurt you but you made me so angry.’

  ‘I had to make you angry. You were fighting Joe as if it was a put-up job. The crowd would’ve lynched us if they guessed. I told him to lie down and I’d take over. It worked, didn’t it? They loved it.’ She was obviously highly pleased with herself and with Kitty. Taking another swig from the bottle she said, ‘We could build up a good piece of business between us, you know. People would think you were just one of the crowd like tonight. Sometimes I could win, sometimes you could. We’d share it.’

  Kitty shook her head. ‘I don’t think so. I don’t want to be a boxer.’ The old woman said, ‘It’s good money. We rake in twenty or thirty pounds a night at a big fair and we all take a share. If you were on the bill we’d make even more. That hair’s a big draw. They’d come to see it flying about all over the place. Think about it. I’d take you with us and I’d look after you well. Ask your mother what she thinks.’

  Kitty stiffened. ‘I dinna need to ask my mother. I make my own decisions. I’m on a farm at the moment and I think I’ll stay there.’ She wanted to travel, that was true, but not with a boxing show.

  ‘Your choice,’ said Grandma philosophically, ‘but it’s a good offer. Life on the road’s grand. You never get stale. I’d be good to you. My old man’s dead but my sister and I travel together and we wouldn’t let any of those bucks get at you if that’s what worries you.’

  She waved a hand at her listening entourage, who all shuffled their feet. She obviously had them under strict control. Kitty would not change her mind, however.

  May and Emily were waiting at the tent door when she emerged and they threw their arms round her neck and kissed her, crying out, ‘Well done, Kitty, well done. That man gave us two shillings each because of you. He promised us a shilling but he doubled it!’

  At that moment the clock struck the half-hour and Emily screeched, ‘The cart, the cart, it leaves at half-past seven.’

  People were converging on Kitty, wanting to shake her hand and congratulate her, but she pushed them away so that she and the girls could take to their heels and run across the emptying square as if they were being pursued by the Devil. They caught up with the cart as it was negotiating the corner out of Maddiston’s main street and heading down the open road for home. There were only five people on board, all quiet-living people off the farm. The rowdy boys were still at the fair and would make their own way home. MacPhee pulled the girls aboard and started to scold them. ‘You nearly missed us and then where would you have been? I told you it was leaving at half-past seven.’

  ‘It was Kitty’s fault,’ gabbled May. ‘She knocked out two people in the boxing booth. It was marvellous.’

  MacPhee thought they were joking and laughed. ‘Don’t be daft, May,’ she said.

  Kitty gave her friend a sharp jab in the ribs as she said sharply, ‘That’s rubbish, May. Be quiet.’ She didn’t want to talk about her triumph, or about her bounty of a guinea, and it was unlikely that anyone on the cart would have been in the boxing tent. The boys might have been there and seen it but they wouldn’t be able to spread the news till tomorrow and that was early enough as far as she was concerned.

  The cart dropped Kitty beneath the big railway viaduct and she walked up the hill to Camptounfoot, led on by its lights twinkling in the distance.

  Unfortunately, the bothy was in darkness and she knew better than to rouse her grandmother from her first sleep, but Tibbie Mather’s lamps were lit and she was sitting knitting in a glowing circle. Yearningly Kitty stared through the window from the dark garden. The scene was like an idealised painting of old age.

  Gently she tapped on the glass, not wanting to frighten the woman inside but Tibbie did not scare easily and without looking up she called out, ‘Go away Jo. I’m too old to be feared for you.’

  ‘It’s not Jo. It’s Kitty,’ came the voice from outside and when Tibbie let her in she was smiling.

  ‘Come in lass. You’re out late. Marie’s not here. She’s gone to Perthshire with her Edinbury friends.’ Marie had obviously not told Tibbie about the trouble between herself and Kitty.

  ‘I just came to tell you that I’ve got a new place, on a farm near Duns,’ Kitty explained.

  Tibbie nodded. ‘That’s good. Does your mother know?’

  ‘I wanted to tell her but they’re asleep and I didn’t want to wake them up.’

  ‘I’ll tell them if you like,’ offered Tibbie. ‘I think it’s good that you’re going away. You need a new start.’

  Kitty nodded. ‘I know. I love this village and the orchard and all the places I know but I want to see the rest of the world as well. I’ll give you the address of the place at Duns I’m going to and if anything goes wrong with my mother, will you please let me know?’

  ‘Of course I will, lass,’ said Tibbie kindly. ‘And I’ll tell Marie that you came to say goodbye to her.’

  The walk across the fields to Falconwood was a pleasure for the frosted stubble crunched beneath her boots as she hurried along. White owls swept over her head like ghosts; little animals bustled about in her path; beneath the trees that surrounded Falconwood from the back, drifts of frosted dry leaves rustled as she kicked her way through them like a child. The moon was up and it gilded everything with an eery light but she was not afraid, for she enjoyed being alone with only the birds and animals for company.

  As she walked over the back field she heard the geese cackling under the apple trees. In the excitement of returning from the fair, they had been forgotten and if they were not shut up, a fox would almost certainly get them for this was a perfect night for hunting. She broke a stick off the hedge and went towards the sound, intending to drive them to their little house. The stick was for protection because the gander was fierce.

  ‘Come on, come on,’ cried Kitty as she walked towards him. ‘Come in. You don’t want to be eaten by the fox tonight, do you?’ She was quite unaware that she was being watched by human eyes.

  Tom Liddle had not gone to the fair because of his wife’s religious convictions against drink and pleasure-taking, which he pretended to share. Now he stood in the lee of the cart shed with Walter and Tommy, the toughest of the young lads who’d come home very drunk from the jollifications and were telling him about Kitty’s exploits in the boxing tent.

  He listened sourly, fingering his chin, which was still sore from the thump she’d given it.

  ‘She packs a punch that little bitch,’ he agreed. ‘She needs teaching a lesson but nane o’ you lads are up to doing it. You’re a’ feared o’ her.’

  The biggest of the two, Walter, straightened his shoulders. He’d had enough drink that day to make him very brave indeed. ‘I’m no feared o’ her,’ he said. ‘She’s just a woman, isn’t she?’

  ‘You’re feared o’ her tongue, that’s what you’re feared at,’ sneered Liddle.

  ‘I’m no’,’ protested Walter weakly.

  They were about to go to bed when they heard her calling to the geese. Liddle put his fingers to his lips telling them to keep silent. ‘Now’s your chance,’ he said.

  ‘I’m awa tae ma bed, man,’ said Walter.

  Liddle sneered. ‘I kent you were feared for her. But she’s just like any woman, lie on top o’ her and you’ve got her. You’d be feared to do that though, woul
dn’t you? You’re no’ man enough for her.’

  Walter was a lady’s man, and a coarse one at that, who’d had his way with most of the girls on the farm, especially with Effie.

  ‘There’s no’ a woman alive I’d be feared to fuck,’ he snapped, nettled by Liddle.

  ‘Go on, show me. Catch the carrot top. There she is out in the field now. Away and grab her. Tommy here’ll help you if you need any help, won’t you, Tommy?’ Liddle’s voice was like poisoned syrup.

  Tommy, staggering drunk and not really aware of what was going on, slurred, ‘Aye, I’ll help you, Walter. Whit’s it ye need doin’?’

  Liddle was pushing Walter on, saying, ‘She’s a hard wee bitch. She needs a lesson. Will you be the yin to teach her?’

  ‘Just you wait and see, wait there and see,’ hissed Walter, and Liddle and Tommy watched as he slunk round the wall heading for the field gate.

  Kitty did not hear him approach because her normally sharp reactions were dulled by weariness. The geese were safely in their hut and she was yawning as she bent over the gate to slip its chain into the hook when, suddenly, two hands went round her waist and threw her forward over the gate’s top bar. Her arm was twisted beneath her and she could feel the weight of a man’s body pressing her down.

  ‘Got ye, got ye. Stay there till I show you what’s what,’ came a voice that she recognised as Walter’s. He was a man that she particularly disliked because of his treatment of Effie and she knew that by the way he was handling her this was no mild piece of horseplay. This was serious.

  With a superhuman effort she arched her back and threw him off her. Then she turned to face him and screamed, ‘Get away from me, get away from me!’ But there was nobody round about to hear her. Everyone except Liddle and Tommy had gone to bed.

  Walter put his hands on her shoulders and shook her to and fro till she thought that her neck would snap.

  ‘You do what I want and you’ll be all right. If you don’t, I’ll damned well kill you,’ he told her.

  She smelt the beer on his breath. Somehow she managed to get upright with her back against the spars of the gate and grappled behind herself in the hope of finding the stick she’d thrown down, but it was too far away. In the shadows beneath the overhanging roof of the cart shed she saw two people and shouted to them, ‘Help me, help me! Get him off me.’

  When she heard Liddle’s mean laugh, she realised that there would be no assistance coming from that direction. If she was to be saved from Walter, it would be by her own efforts.

  My knife, my knife, I’ve got to find my knife, was her chief thought as she fought against him, biting and scratching like a wildcat, kicking with her booted feet. She must have hurt him for he yelled and hit her across the face with the back of his hand, dazing her.

  ‘Stand still, stand still,’ he gasped while he struggled with one hand to undo the button of his fly. Though her head was swimming she knew that this was her chance and kneed him hard in the groin. When he bent over gasping, she reached into her pocket and grasped her knife. Miraculously her fingers found the blade catch as Walter threw himself onto her with his erect penis jabbing at her belly.

  Though it had lain in the tin box for such a long time, the knife blade was very sharp and it slid into his chest as if it was cutting butter. He went limp, stood stock-still for what seemed like a hundred years, then put a hand on his shoulder and gasped, ‘You bitch, you’ve stabbed me.’

  ‘The bitch has stabbed me!’ he yelled out to the watching men.

  Kitty was in shock. She edged away sideways holding the knife up in front of herself like a talisman to ward off evil and told the men running towards her, ‘Don’t come near me or I’ll stab you as well.’ They stopped short at the sight of the blade gleaming in the moonlight, staring from her to Walter, who was leaning his arms on the top bar of the gate with his head laid on them.

  Kitty was near enough to see a red stain spreading over the breast of his white shirt. She backed away further and ran to the other side of the yard while Liddle went up to the wounded man and saw the stab wound.

  ‘You’ve killed him. You’ve killed him. They’ll hang you for this!’ he yelled at Kitty as Walter slid down the gate and lay groaning on the ground. Still holding out her knife, she turned and ran towards the wood that marked the boundary between Falconwood and Townhead.

  She was in a complete panic and had no idea of where she was going. Instinctively, like a hunted animal, she headed for the ancient orchard at Townhead. She almost didn’t get through the stream tunnel but made it after a tight squeeze and found herself among the ghostly, silver-branched trees where she huddled, shaking and gulping in hysteria.

  She stayed there for what seemed like a long time with both arms wrapped round her body as if in an embrace, her right hand still holding the open knife. When her first outburst of terror passed she tried to think coherently.

  It was impossible to stay in Camptounfoot, for anyone looking for her would go straight there. And they would be looking for her if Walter was dead… She didn’t doubt that she’d killed him. Liddle’s words, ‘They’ll hang you for this…’ echoed in her brain. What chance would she have in any trial with two witnesses against her? Liddle would stand up in the witness box and give damning evidence.

  She stood up in the moonlight and looked around. Trails of silver smoke rose to the midnight-blue sky from fires that had been left banked up to burn overnight; the oil lamp on the corner of Jo’s wynd guttered feebly as it had always done; the bulk of the farmhouse loomed in front of her. She crept over to the orchard gate and gently eased it open. Down the street feeble lights showed in a couple of windows where candles were burning within – perhaps because an old person was sick or a child was frightened of the dark. Across the road she could see the roof of the bothy where she had been born and where her mother lay asleep.

  She knew she had to go away, as far and as fast as she could, but it gave her terrible pain not to be able to tell her mother what had happened. Tears poured down her cheeks as she took her farewell of Camptounfoot and the people in it. Sobbing heartbrokenly she ran down the street, dodged into a narrow lane and headed for Bella Vista where the thick woods around the house would provide a temporary hiding-place.

  Where will I go? What will I do? she was asking herself as she ran. There was no chance that she could remain in the district, no chance of taking up a new place even as far away as Duns because her red hair made her too easily recognisable. She would have to put as many miles between herself and Falconwood as possible. She’d have to hide in a city.

  London, that’s where I ought to go, she decided.

  A train left Rosewell station for London early every morning. She’d often watched the smoke puffing out of its chimney as it negotiated the bridge over the Tweed. But how to get on it without being stopped by the authorities who would almost certainly be looking for her.

  Not owning a watch she had no idea of the time. It could be five o’clock in the morning for all she knew. As she hid beneath the trees in Bella Vista woods, however, she heard the tolling of the abbey bell… the midnight bell. The people of the town allowed it to be rung for the last time then but, after that, it was silent till six o’clock in the morning when it summoned them from sleep.

  If it was midnight there were another five and a half hours to spend before the London train left. She wondered if it was possible to hide in the station without being seen and jump aboard the train when the postmen were loading the mailbags? She couldn’t take the risk of buying a ticket because the booking-office clerk knew her. In fact, most of the people in Rosewell knew her.

  From her hiding-place she could see the dark swell of rising ground that cut Rosewell off from Maddiston. That was where her salvation lay, she realised. She’d go over the hills to Maddiston in the hope that Grandma Kennedy and her crew had not left yet. Speed was essential if she was going to catch them.

  The way over the hill was a rutted track used by drovers herding cat
tle from farther north in Scotland to London’s Smithfield Market. Though the drovers’ road was heavy going, it had the advantage that there was little chance of meeting anyone else on it at this time of night.

  She forded the river at a place Jo had shown her long ago and ran up the hill to where the drove road began. In places it was so boggy and overgrown that it almost disappeared and there were deep ruts that took her unawares in the darkness, but other parts were paved with huge stone slabs that showed the road had been laid originally by the Romans. Gates cut across it where farm boundaries ended but Kitty did not wait to open them, for she was in such a hurry that it was quicker to shin over and keep on running, stumbling in her heavy boots, panting and gasping and holding her hand against a stitch in her side. Sometimes she fell over a stone not seen in the dark but always picked herself up immediately and started running again. The palms of her hands and her knees were scratched and raw with abrasions from her falls but she did not notice the pain.

  It was ten minutes to two o’clock in the morning when she reached Maddiston Square. Most of the pedlars had gone, though some of them lay sleeping in darkened corners, using their packs as pillows. The stalls were disassembled and lay in piles on the cobbles waiting to be loaded onto carts when dawn came. The boxing booth had disappeared too and all that remained of it were spars of wood wrapped up in a roll of canvas. It was amazing that so big a structure could shrink to such small size.

  There was no sign of any of the boxing booth people and Kitty groaned aloud in disappointment. Grandma Kennedy had represented an escape for her. If the old woman had already taken the road, where could she go? The police would catch her; she’d be sent to prison like Craigie – that is if she was lucky. If she wasn’t, she’d hang for the murder of Walter.

  Who would believe that she was only trying to defend herself? People would think she should have lain down and let him rape her… She could just hear them saying, ‘After all, being taken by force isn’t such an unusual thing in the bondager community. She probably led him on and, anyway, look at her mother and her grandmother…’