Settling the Account (60 page)

‘What’s wrong, Charlie? Do you want me to do
something for you?’

‘No.’ But she sensed that he was not telling
the truth. He reminded her painfully of Malcolm as a little boy,
trying to keep some guilty secret and making a poor job of it.

‘Are you comfortable?’ she pressed. ‘Do you
want me to straighten the sheet? It looks as though you’ve got it
twisted under you.’

‘Leave me be,’ he growled, and made a feeble
grab at the covers with his one good hand. He tried to scowl at
Amy, but he seemed so astonishingly close to tears that his
expression looked more like a plea for help.

‘Let me.’ Amy disengaged the covers from his
feeble grip and pulled them down to reveal a large wet patch
centred around Charlie’s trouser buttons. The fabric of his
trousers looked sodden, and the sheet immediately beneath the wet
patch showed signs of dampness.

‘I’m sorry, Charlie,’ she said softly. ‘I
should have thought to ask if you needed a hand.’

‘A man should be able to sort himself out,’
Charlie said, his voice gruff with distress. ‘Shouldn’t need
looking after like a baby.’

‘Well, never mind all that,’ Amy said,
suddenly brisk. Overt sympathy would only distress him further;
best to get on with making him comfortable. ‘Let’s get your
nightshirt on, it’ll be easier for you to manage in that. Come on,
sit up first then I’ll help you stand up.’

She crouched beside the bed and put her arms
around him, helping him into a sitting position, then took hold of
his legs and guided his feet on to the floor. ‘That’s it, swing
your legs around. Now, put your arm around my neck and we’ll stand
you up. Oof! You’re heavy.’ She was filling the silence with
meaningless words, but it suited her purpose of distracting Charlie
from the indignity his helplessness forced on him.

She took off his jacket, then unbuttoned his
shirt and pulled it off. ‘Put your arms up,’ she said as she held
his nightshirt up, regretting her words a moment later as she
remembered that one of his arms could not obey. ‘No, don’t,’ she
corrected herself quickly. ‘I’d never reach up high enough if you
did, not without standing on a chair.’ She slipped the nightshirt
on him, the numb arm heavy and awkward in her grip, then under the
cover the long nightshirt afforded Charlie’s dignity she undid his
trouser buttons, slippery with urine, and pulled down the damp,
smelly trousers with the drawers sticking to them. Taking up the
towel from his washstand, she wiped him dry as well as she could
without looking, then helped him into the chair beside the bed,
slipping a pillow behind him to help him sit upright.

‘There, that’s better, isn’t it?’ He gave a
quick nod, but was clearly reluctant to meet her eyes. ‘Now I
really had better get breakfast on—it’s just about going to be time
for me to start lunch as soon as we’ve had our breakfast at this
rate. I’ll change your sheet later—I might put your mattress out
for an airing, too, it’s ages since I aired it.’

Amy left him slumped in his chair, feeling
his eyes on her as she went out of the room. She was tired from the
unfamiliar work of milking, and was tempted to sit down in the
kitchen for a few minutes before starting on the meal, but it would
be difficult enough to catch up on her day’s work without indulging
in a rest. She would have to start the afternoon milking much
earlier than Charlie usually did, since she was so much slower at
it.

I’ll get faster when I get back into the
way of it
.
Except Charlie’ll be better before long, so I
won’t have to worry. It’ll only be for a few days
.

*

It was a nuisance; there was no denying it.
So was having to see to the horses every day, and any of the other
farm work that could not be ignored. But she was careful to hide
any sign of irritation from Charlie; he was upset enough at his
forced inactivity without her adding to his distress.

The day after Charlie’s fall, Amy scrabbled
in the wood pile and found a length of wood suitable to be used as
a walking stick. She spent time every day propping him up as he
stumbled around the bedroom trying to get the knack of using the
stick, until four days after the fall he could manage to get about
without her help.

They both took his new-found facility with
the stick as an encouraging sign; it must mean he was on the road
to recovery. His excursions extended no further than the parlour or
the kitchen, but even that small range seemed a great advance after
having been confined to the bedroom for days.

‘I’ll be taking over that milking again
soon,’ Charlie said. ‘See what sort of a job you’ve been making of
it.’

‘Of course you will. Just another day or
two. Just till that leg gets strong again.’

Amy looked forward to his recovery as
eagerly as he did. She knew she was letting things slip in the
house; tasks like dusting had become luxuries, and scrubbing could
only be done in a cursory fashion.

Not that the floor had the chance to get as
dirty as usual. Unlike Charlie, Amy always took her dirty boots off
before coming inside. And Charlie did not bring any mud in, now
that he spent all day inside dressed in nightshirt and socks. It
was easier on both of them to keep him dressed like that; he could
manage to use the chamber pot unassisted if he had no buttons to
worry about.

The effort of fitting in all her extra work
meant Amy struggled on without a real awareness of how time was
passing. She was startled when she realised that over a month had
gone by since Charlie’s fall. His learning to use a stick had given
a brief boost to their confidence, but there had been no visible
progress since. He was still clearly incapable of any sort of work,
and Amy began to wonder just how long it was going to be before he
showed real signs of recovery.

She watched Charlie closely to try and gauge
his thoughts. He still spoke of taking up his usual work again
soon, but there seemed an increasing element of bluster in his
assertions. Sometimes she would see his face twisted in frustration
as he tried to perform some task that had been child’s play to him
before, but he kept his thoughts to himself and she did not press
him.

They were speaking to each other more than
they had in years, Amy realised. After the near silence that had
existed between them since Charlie had ordered David out, the two
of them would have appeared almost companionable to anyone who did
not know them. She had to check that he was comfortable, whether he
needed any help to get about, whether he could manage to eat his
food using only a fork or spoon. Charlie was constantly asking her
what she was doing with the animals, and telling her how she should
be doing it. He might grumble over what he saw as shortcomings in
how she did the work, but he no longer shouted or snarled.

Despite his forced inactivity, there seemed
a constant weariness hanging over Charlie since his strange fall. A
weariness and, Amy decided, a fear. There were times when she
sensed he was close to tears. She could not bring herself to upset
him further by suggesting that she tell her family just how
helpless he was and ask for their assistance around the farm. It
wouldn’t be for much longer, she told herself. She could
manage.

Most days Amy was too busy to be lonely,
even with only Charlie for company. She saw John or Harry, or
occasionally one of their sons, every day when they collected the
milk, and when she made her rushed trips into town each week she
sometimes bumped into Frank and Lizzie at the store. There was
never time to exchange more than a few words with Lizzie, but Amy
was careful to appear calm in front of her cousin.

‘Yes, Charlie’s all right. His leg’s still
giving him trouble, but he’s not too bad in himself,’ was the sort
of innocuous answer she always gave to questions about Charlie’s
health. The troublesome leg was a convincing enough explanation for
Charlie’s continued absence from the factory and the town, and Amy
was sure no one suspected how much of the farm work she was doing
herself.

‘You missed the last soyree,’ Lizzie scolded
during one brief meeting. ‘You haven’t been around for ages.’

‘I know, I seem to have had a lot on
lately,’ Amy said. ‘I’ll try and get down sometime.’

‘That cousin of Lily’s was quite put out
that you weren’t there. You’d better come to the next one or I
might have a bit of trouble with her. It’s Saturday week, so don’t
forget.’

‘Oh, Miss Millish! I was looking forward to
seeing her again. I just couldn’t, though, Lizzie, I’m sorry.’

‘Come around tomorrow, why don’t you? Even
the kids have been asking where you are.’

‘Tomorrow? I don’t think I can tomorrow,’
Amy said. ‘Maybe another day.’ She glanced at the clock above the
counter, wondering how to get away from Lizzie without appearing
rude.

‘I’ll have to come and see you, then.’

‘No, don’t do that!’ Amy said hurriedly. If
Lizzie found Charlie at home in his nightshirt in the middle of the
day, their whole pretence that he was still doing his normal work
would be uncovered in a moment. ‘No, it’s, um…’ She scrabbled for
an excuse that would not be a lie.

‘It’s not fair if you put yourself out
coming to visit me,’ she managed at last. ‘I mean, there’s only me
and Charlie to do for, and you’ve got such a crowd at your place.
And you’ve got Maudie to visit, too, now she’s not going out
much.’

Lizzie was not to be diverted. ‘That’s
another thing,’ she pounced. ‘Maudie says why don’t you come and
see her? She might even take a bit of notice of you, Lord knows she
takes precious little account of what I tell her.’

‘I’d love to see Maudie. I just can’t,
though. She’s keeping well, is she?’

‘Seems to be,’ Lizzie said, assuming an
offhand manner. ‘Of course, my opinion isn’t—’

‘Maudie’s really well, Amy,’ Frank cut in,
giving Amy a conspiratorial wink. ‘Blooming, you women call it,
don’t you? We’re going around there after we finish this lot, why
don’t you come, too?’

‘I… I’ve got to get home,’ Amy said. ‘But I
will come and see you soon, Lizzie, honestly I will.’

She fretted for days over the idea of
Lizzie’s catching her out with a surprise visit, until at last she
decided that she would have to find time to visit Lizzie
herself.

‘Lizzie’s having a soyree tomorrow,’ she
told Charlie as she held a match to his pipe. They had become quite
dexterous at getting the pipe going as a joint effort, since
Charlie found it impossible to manage the task with one hand. ‘May
I go?’

Charlie puffed several times until he was
satisfied the pipe was going properly. ‘All right. See you’re back
in time to get dinner on, mind.’

Getting back in time for milking was the
main issue, but Amy did not point that out.

The next afternoon she installed Charlie in
the parlour with a rug over his knees and a tray with tea things
beside him.

‘Don’t leave that tea too long or it’ll get
cold,’ she said. ‘Here’s your paper, if you feel like reading. I’ve
put extra milk in the jug, and here’s a glass, in case you want a
drink of milk later. Are you comfortable? Do you want anything
else?’

‘I’m all right,’ Charlie muttered. ‘Stop
your fussing.’

‘I’ll be as quick as I can down there, but
it’ll take me a bit longer than going into town does. I mean, I’ve
got to stay long enough to be polite. Are you sure you’ll be all
right by yourself?’

‘Of course I will. I don’t need a bloody
nursemaid! You go off with your gabbling women.’

Amy’s doubts over whether or not it was a
good idea to go were banished by the delighted greeting she got
from Sarah Millish when she entered the parlour.

‘Oh, Mrs Stewart, you’ve come!’ Miss Millish
exclaimed. ‘I was so hoping you would!’ She rose from her chair and
clasped Amy’s hand. ‘You must sit beside me—see, I’ve saved you a
chair—I was trying to will you to come, you see. And it
worked!’

Amy returned her smile, and willingly let
herself be led to the chair next to Miss Millish’s.

‘I’ve brought some books I thought you might
like,’ Miss Millish said, reaching into a capacious bag by her
chair. ‘Here’s Carlyle’s
Past and Present
. It’s dreadfully
heavy going, but there’s the odd gem buried among the obscurity.
And this John Stuart Mill, you said you hadn’t read this one, I
think? Then I thought you might like a change from all that
philosophy, so I brought some poetry, too. I’m sure you love
poetry, don’t you?’

‘Oh, yes!’ Amy said, taking the books
eagerly.

‘I
knew
you would. Mother never quite
approved of Byron, so I used to keep this one hidden away, but
there’s no real harm in him. Such wonderful images! You must tell
me what you think of it.’

‘Honestly, Amy, I used to think you were bad
enough about books, but the two of you together!’ Lizzie said,
smiling indulgently. ‘Of course, it’s no wonder you two get
on—you’ve got something in common, what with Amy being a teacher
too.’

‘Lizzie!’ Amy protested.

‘Did you teach, Mrs Stewart?’ Miss Millish
asked in surprise.

‘For goodness sake, Lizzie, every time a new
teacher comes you tell her that,’ Amy said. ‘No, Miss Millish, I
wasn’t ever a proper teacher. I wanted to be one, and I helped at
the school for a while, but it didn’t work out. They needed me at
home.’

‘I see,’ Miss Millish said, studying Amy
thoughtfully. ‘That must have been very disappointing.’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Amy said, trying to make
her voice light. ‘It was a long time ago.’ She met Miss Millish’s
eyes and saw the real sympathy there, and felt a sudden urge to be
truly honest. ‘Yes, it was. It was really disappointing.’

Amy shrugged. ‘But it couldn’t be helped.
Thank you for bringing out these lovely books,’ she said, eager to
change the subject. ‘I’m so looking forward to reading them. It’s
very kind of you, Miss Millish.’