A Safe Harbour (9 page)
Authors: Benita Brown
Tags: #Technology & Engineering, #Sagas, #Fisheries & Aquaculture, #Fiction
‘My brothers? What have they done? And why blame you?’
Her mother pushed herself away from the table and turned to face Kate. ‘I might as well tell you, he told them not to go to the funeral yesterday. He thinks it’s my fault they defied him.’
‘Why your fault? Doesn’t he think they’ve got minds of their own?’
‘Apparently not. He thinks I encouraged them because . . . because . . .’
‘What are you trying to say?’
‘Because of you. He thinks I’m too soft with you and that I let you get all your own way.’
‘I see.’ Kate reflected fleetingly that this was twice today that a member of her family had suggested that she got her own way. It made her uncomfortable to think that this caused problems for her mother. ‘Oh, Ma, will it ever change?’
Her mother managed a smile. ‘You or your father, do you mean?’ Then the smile faded when she heard Kate’s suppressed sob. ‘If you mean your father, no, Henry will never change.’
‘I thought it might be better for you once I was married. Once I’d left home. And now . . . now . . .’
‘Don’t torment yourself, pet. Once you’d gone he’d hev found something else to displease him. Look at today – he’s turning on William and Thomas.’
‘But only because he thinks they came to the funeral to please me.’ The two women stared at each other in despair. ‘Go and sit by the fire,’ Kate said. ‘I’ll make a cup of tea.’
‘Aye, pet. We’ll sit for a while.’
When her mother started to walk away from her Kate noticed something lying on the floor. It was her father’s tobacco pouch. She stooped to pick it up and place it on the table and that same feeling of dizziness overcame her. I need sleep, she thought.
The kettle was on the hob. Her mother used the poker to push it further towards the burning coals. It began to steam. ‘Leave it,’ Kate said. ‘Sit down. I’ll do everything. But first I’ll get you a wet rag to hold to that eye.’
Kate crossed to the sink and stooped to move aside the flowered curtain strung on a wire below the bench. She took one of the clean rags that her mother stored on the shelf there and then rose to turn on the tap. As the cold water gushed into the sink it splashed onto her face and she realized how hot she felt; not burning heat, just warm and clammy. The feeling of nausea returned and she put her hands on the cool edge of the stone sink and leaned forward, eyes closed, to steady herself. She was still clutching the rag and she had some idea of holding it under the tap and using it to cool her own brow when, without warning, she felt her stomach heave.
‘Kate, what’s the matter?’ she heard her mother ask, but she couldn’t answer as she found herself emptying the contents of her meagre breakfast into the sink. When the spasm was over she tried to right herself, but she felt her knees give way. Then, before she could sink to the floor, her mother’s arms came round her. Gratefully Kate leaned back against Nan.
‘Oh, Kate, me bairn,’ she heard her mother groan. ‘What hev you done?’
Her mother led her to a chair and made her sit down. Kate sat miserably clutching the damp rag and twisting it round and round while her mother made the tea. Nan placed the teapot and the cups on the table, but before she sat down herself she busied herself mixing something in a bowl. ‘Lard and vinegar,’ she said, although Kate hadn’t asked. ‘Smells nasty but if I smear it on me cheek it might stop the bruising.’
She put the bowl on the table and, avoiding Kate’s eyes, she began to dab the foul-smelling concoction on her face.
‘I’m sorry, Ma,’ Kate whispered.
‘Tell me what I suspect isn’t true,’ her mother said. ‘Tell me that you’re just upset and weary.’
‘I wish I could.’ And then, as her mother poured the tea and pushed a cup across the table towards her, she whispered, ‘I was supposed to be doing that.’
‘Aye, you were.’ Her mother’s voice seemed devoid of all tenderness and Kate felt a stab of anguish.
‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered again, and this time she wasn’t talking about Nan’s bruised face, ‘but I thought you would never have to know.’
‘Are you far gone?’
‘I’ve only just missed.’
‘Then you’d probably have got away with it. Did Jos know?’
‘No. Oh, poor Jos . . .’
‘
Poor
Jos? What do you mean,
poor
Jos? He should hev behaved himself till you were wed.’
Poor
Jos? What do you mean,
poor
Jos? He should hev behaved himself till you were wed.’
‘I know. But I’m to blame as well, aren’t I? He didn’t force me’.
‘Kate . . .’ Her mother glanced across at the old woman but Sarah had closed her eyes and seemed to be sleeping.
‘No, listen, Mother. I knew the risk we were taking. But I loved Jos so and the nearer it got to the wedding the more persuasive he became. He made me feel I was being cruel to deny him. Oh, please don’t look at me like that. I know it was wrong.’
‘I divven’t know about wrong – although the minister would say so. No, what you did was plain daft. Now look at the trouble you’re in.’
‘But we didn’t know this was going to happen, did we? And Jos said that we loved each other, so what we did wasn’t a sin.’
‘There you are! And you’re trying to tell me he wasn’t to blame!’
‘Ma, please stop. It’s done. I can’t change things, and I said poor Jos because I wasn’t sure, so I didn’t tell him, but if I had told him he’d have been happy.’
‘Happy!’
‘Yes, of course he would. That’s what we get married for, isn’t it? To have children? And now my poor Jos is drowned and he never knew that he was going to be a father. Oh, Ma, I can’t bear it!’
For a moment neither of them spoke. In the hearth the wet coal hissed and spat. Her mother spoke without looking at her. ‘I love you, Kate,’ she said. ‘I love all me bairns but, God forgive me, you’ve been special, with your bonny looks and your bold ways.’
‘I know you’ve always stood up for me,’ Kate said, ‘and I’m grateful.’
Her mother sighed. ‘But I don’t know how I can help you this time.’ She was silent for a moment and then she said, ‘I suppose you’re sure of it?’
‘I’ve never missed before. It’s always come on to the day.’
Her mother sighed resignedly. ‘How are we going to tell your father?’
The two women stared at each other. ‘Does he have to know?’ Kate’s voice was hardly more than a whisper.
Her mother didn’t answer at once and Kate frowned as she saw the older woman’s expression change and suddenly become more guarded. Nan Lawson was shaking her head very slightly, her lips drawn together in a thin line and her eyes staring at a point behind Kate and above her head. Kate realized what this meant at the same moment that a hand came forward to take up the tobacco pouch from the table. Her father had returned.
She sensed rather than saw her father’s meticulous movements as he filled his pipe. She could hear his breathing and smell the ale on his breath. Her mother remained sitting bolt upright and staring at Henry like a trapped animal.
‘Well then,’ he said eventually, and he strolled over to the fire. He took a spill from the container on the mantelpiece and leaned over to light it. Then he took his time lighting his pipe. Kate realized how much she hated the sucking noises he made. While he was occupied Kate’s mother left her seat and came to stand beside her daughter. Once the pipe was drawing to his satisfaction Henry turned to stare at them.
‘Well, then,’ he continued as if there’d been no interruption. ‘What is it Kate doesn’t want to tell me?’
‘It’s nothing, Henry,’ Nan said.
‘Let the lass speak for herself.’
Kate felt her mother’s hands on her shoulders. She reached up and pressed them before rising to face her father. ‘I’m with child, Father.’
The words seemed to paralyse him. He removed the pipe from his mouth and clasped the bowl in his right hand. His left hand still held the spill. The end was smoking, Kate noticed. Henry stared at it as if it had offended him and then turned and hurled it into the fire. He turned back to face Kate and she blanched at the barely restrained anger of his expression.
‘Jos Linton’s bairn, is it?’ He almost spat the words at her.
Kate felt her own fury flare. ‘Of course! Whose else would it be?’
Taken aback by her defiant attitude, it seemed, Henry turned his anger on his wife. ‘And you think that’s of no consequence, do you?’
‘What do you mean?’ Nan asked.
‘I asked you what it was Kate didn’t want to tell me and you said it was nothing. You lying bitch.’ Henry hadn’t raised his voice but that made it all the more frightening. ‘The lass is carrying Jos Linton’s bastard and you think that’s nothing, do you?’
Kate felt her mother begin to shiver and she risked a swift glance. Nan was terrified and clearly wished that she could be anywhere but here in her own cottage, facing her husband across the table.
‘It’s not my mother’s fault,’ Kate burst out and her father jabbed the hand holding his pipe towards her. Kate saw the smoke swirl and a few small fragments of burning tobacco fly into the air.
‘Hold your tongue,’ he said, still in that quiet menacing tone. ‘Your words count for nothing here.’ Kate was glad of the table that lay between them when her father moved forward. ‘And furthermore, there’s no room for you in this house.’
It must have taken all her mother’s courage to say, ‘But Henry, Kate is our daughter.’
‘Mebbe so,’ he said, ‘but I’ll not raise a bastard in this house. Especially not when Jos Linton is responsible. The Lintons have no place in this village. James Linton is a thief—’
‘No,’ Kate cried. ‘How can you say that!’
‘Because it’s true. There’s no other way to describe a man who steals other folk’s livings from them. James Linton should get himself back to Burnmoor where he belongs and take that wife of his, a poacher’s daughter—’
‘You don’t know that!’
‘Kate!’ her mother hissed. ‘Be quiet. Let him speak.’
‘As I said, a poacher’s daughter who can’t bait a hook to save her life.’
‘And Matthew?’ Kate asked, ignoring her mother who was tugging on her sleeve. ‘Matthew and Jos were born here.’
‘Makes no difference. Interlopers all. No real fisherman would hev behaved the way Jos did. Risking his life for a few green apples. And what’s more he took Barty with him. You can’t tell me the lad would hev acted so daft it he hadn’t been egged on by Jos Linton.’
Kate would have liked to say that Barty was old enough to make his own decisions but she knew that what her father said was probably true. Often when they’d been bairns Jos had led them into pranks that even high-spirited Kate had balked at. The remembrance made her feel even more wretched.
‘I see you’ve got nothing to say for yourself,’ Henry Lawson continued. ‘You know that what I say is true.’
Kate shook her head. Not all of it was true but she knew her father would never change his mind about the Linton family.
‘Henry,’ Nan said. ‘Go easy on her. Kate’s our bairn and she’s in trouble. We hev to decide what to do.’
‘
We
hev to decide?’ her husband said. ‘There’s no we about it.
I’ve
already made me mind up. I’ve told you I’m not raising one of Linton’s brats under my roof. She’s got to go.’
We
hev to decide?’ her husband said. ‘There’s no we about it.
I’ve
already made me mind up. I’ve told you I’m not raising one of Linton’s brats under my roof. She’s got to go.’
‘Where would she go?’
‘Where? To the workhouse in Shields. That’s where the likes of her go with their brats, isn’t it? In any case, I divven’t want to set eyes on her again.’
‘For God’s sake, Henry, you can’t mean that.’
‘Oh yes I can. And as for you, hold your tongue, woman, or you’ll go out the door along with the slut. Now I’ll give her until tomorrow morning but when me and the lads come back into harbour, I want her gone. And I forbid you to let her in this house ever again, as long as I live. Do you understand?’
Kate’s father turned his back on them and spat into the fire. The phlegm sizzled and congealed on the bars of the grate. As far as he was concerned the matter was closed.
Sleep was impossible. Her mother had sobbed into her pillow and the old lady had muttered and tutted as if she knew what was going on – and maybe she did. But eventually they had both drifted off into an uneasy sleep marked by their tossing and turning, leaving Kate on her truckle bed near the fire to lie and listen to the constant sound of the sea breaking on the shore.
Kate was ready to leave well before her father would return from the fishing. She sat with her mother and drank hot, sweet tea while they talked, trying to comfort each other and discussing what Kate would do in the months that lay ahead.
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