The Other Cathy (19 page)

‘Seth needed me, lovey, to tend one of t’horses like.’

‘He needs me too, doesn’t he, Ursly? Seth and I belong
to each other.’

‘Aye, that he does, my little pet. Where would Seth be
wi’out his Cathy? And tha, wi’out him?’

‘He will hold me in his arms before I die, and speak of our
love for one another. Promise me that he will, Ursly!’

‘Aye, my lass ... aye, my little pet, to be sure he will. All
the things tha wants will come true, never fear.’

It was what the gypsy at the fair had said, and Emma felt
vexed. Ursly should know better than to pander to her cousin’s
sick fancies. But she was bound to admit that the immediate
effect was beneficial. Cathy seemed strangely at peace, as if a
burdensome weight had been lifted from her mind. All the
same ...

‘I think perhaps you had better go now, Ursly,’ she mur
mured, ‘Cathy is very tired.’

‘Aye, an’ so she is!’ The old woman, so short she scarcely
needed to stoop, leaned across and kissed Cathy’s cheek. Plac
ing her palm against the girl’s brow she began a gentle strok
ing motion. ‘There, my little bairn, my little lovey, go tha
to sleep. There, there, close thy eyes and let sleep come to thee.’

Cathy’s eyelids slowly drooped and in moments she was
breathing deeply, evidently in restful slumber. Emma beck
oned to Ursly and they tiptoed out. From her own room she
collected a cloak and bonnet, and they were halfway down the
stairs when the front door burst open and Uncle Randolph
strode into the hall. He was hatless and irate.

‘Emma! What is that woman doing in my house?’

A distortion of the truth sprang easily to Emma’s lips. ‘She
is here at my invitation, uncle. Kirstie was a trifle poorly, and
Ursly kindly agreed to look at her.’

‘I’ll have none of that old witch’s magic-mongering here.
What the devil do you think the veterinarian is for?’ He swung his rage upon Ursly. ‘Be off with you, you old hag, and don’t come round here again – unless you want to be thrown out
of the home I provide for you.’

In face of Randolph Hardaker’s wrath anyone else would
have trembled, even Emma herself. But Ursly remained un-
cowed. Tossing back her head she retorted, ‘Aye, and much
good ‘twould do thee, even if tha durst!’

‘Out!’ he shouted. ‘Out this minute, and don’t let me see
your face again.’

The old woman came slowly down the remaining stairs and
went right up to him; a midget beside him, hardly more than half his height. Yet she dared to raise her fist.

‘Tha’ll repent this, Mister Randolph Hardaker! On my
oath, tha’ll come to rue this day!’

Emma ran down and caught her arm. ‘Please Ursly, don’t.
It will only make things worse. Please come with me.’

Ursly nodded slowly and allowed herself to be led away.
Randolph had apparently not noticed that Emma was dressed
to go out, and as the two of them reached the front door his voice thundered, ‘Where the deuce d’you think you’re going,
my girl? I want a word with you!’

‘I’m taking Ursly home,’ Emma replied, attempting to
match the old woman’s fearlessness. I’m driving her home in the trap.’

‘You’re doing no such thing. Let her walk!’

‘No, it’s too far. She came on my account, and it’s the
least I can do to take her back.’ Seeing his face darken, the brows drawn together, she added defiantly, ‘How did you know Ursly was here, anyway? Did Hoad go running to the
mill telling tales?’

Emma was afraid she had gone too far. Then to her astonished relief Randolph turned on his heel abruptly and disappeared into his study, slamming the door behind him.
Beside her, Ursly gave a low-pitched chuckle.

‘Tha’s properly got t’measure of him, dearie, eh? I’ve heard tell afore that Miss Emma is the only one in t’family that can
stand up to him, and now I’ve seen proof on’t.’

But if she appeared calm to Ursly, inside Emma was
shaking all over.

‘I’m most dreadfully sorry, Ursly,’ she said. ‘I can’t under
stand why Uncle Randolph should have spoken to you so
harshly. You weren’t doing any harm.’

‘Don’t tha fret, lass, ’twill soon blow over. I’ve never been
afeard of Mr Randolph Hardaker, and he knows it.’

In the stable yard Seth had the trap ready and waiting, and the two women clambered up. When they reached the end
of the laurel-edged drive, Emma turned right, away from the
village, taking the road that wound gently upwards to the head
of the valley. It was a long way round to Ursly’s cottage, but
she was afraid the trap wouldn’t manage the straight old pack-
horse track that led steeply on to the moor.

It was a warm afternoon and the sun shone down on a
tranquil scene, glinting on the polished steel ribbons of the
railway line and shimmering on the waters of the river as the
road climbed through a grove of ash and sycamore, their
branches casting dappled patterns of shadow. But Emma was
in no mood to enjoy the beauty that surrounded her.

‘I am afraid it was a mistake, Ursly, asking you to come into
the house,’ she said bleakly. ‘Even seeing Cathy didn’t work
out very well. Poor girl, these days her head is full of strange
fancies.’

‘Aye, the little lass is happy.’

Emma glanced at her sideways. ‘How can you say she’s
happy, when she is mortally ill?’

There was a moment’s hesitation, ‘Be thou happy, Miss
Emma?’

‘What’s that got to do with it?’

Ursly, her feet not reaching the floor boards of the trap,
was braced in the buttoned leather seat against the jolts from
the potholed road. Though incapable of seeing much, her nearsighted eyes darted quick glances from side to side.

‘Happen them is best happy who don’t go fretting over what can’t be changed, but just make t’best they can o’ things.’

‘You mean it’s kinder to let Cathy lose herself in the world
of her imagination?’ Emma sighed. ‘I suppose you’re right.
All these things she dreams about, they’re out of a book, you know. It’s become the real world to her.’

‘What’s
thy
real world, dearie?’

‘It – it’s obvious! Here – my family. Looking after
Cathy—’

Ursly made no comment, merely hunching deeper into the seat. For some reason Emma felt foolish, as though she had
given a stupidly evasive answer to a deeply penetrating question.

Presently they came to a point where the road was hardly
more than a ledge cut into the steepening slope of the valley’s
side. Rounding a sharp bend, Emma was confronted by a
curious two-wheeled cart pulled so carelessly to one side that
its rear end jutted out and caused an obstruction. The driver,
a dirty unkempt man in a ragged smock and gaiters, lay
back full stretch in the bracken, smoking a short clay pipe.
He grinned oafishly, revealing a flash of white teeth, as he
watched her efforts to get by.

‘This is a stupid place to stop,’ Emma called severely. ‘A few yards further on there’s much more room.’

‘Happen I likes it here,’ he shouted back. ‘Dost think tha owns t’whole blessed road?’

When they were safely past, Emma set the horse to a trot again. But Ursly twisted in the seat and was peering round.
‘Who were that?
’
she asked.

‘Oh, a travelling pedlar, I should think. I’ve never seen him before.’

‘What do’ee look like?’

Emma shrugged. ‘Hard to say, behind that mass of black
hair and beard.’

‘Johnny Gone-tomorrow!’ breathed Ursly. ‘I’d a’known that voice anywheres. What’s he come back to these parts for?’

‘You sound a bit bothered about it.’

‘For why should I be moithered?’ It was the sort of sidestepping reply typical of Ursly, but somehow Emma suspected she was on the defensive.

‘How did you come to know him?’

‘Never tha mind, dearie! But tha can take it from me he’s up
to no good, that one! Always the same, were Johnny Gone-tomorrow. I reckon ’twere the best day’s work he ever did,
clearing out.’

‘Tell me about him,’ said Emma, curious.

‘Twere all a long time ago, best forgot.’

‘But you’ve not forgotten.’

‘No, nor never will!’

Ursly lapsed into a surly silence and refused to answer any
more questions. Emma wondered why the old woman seemed
more disturbed about the pedlar than she’d been by the angry
exchange with Uncle Randolph. An old feud, she supposed;
probably the man had cheated Ursly of something, long ago.

Driving on, Emma dismissed the incident, having much
besides to occupy her thoughts. But she was reminded of it on her way home an hour later when she came within sight
of the bend in the road. Not far from the spot where she had
seen Johnny Gone-tomorrow, she glimpsed the tail of his curious, tent-like cart, half concealed in a clump of rowans.
She fixed her eyes on the road and set the horse to a brisk trot,
hoping to avoid another encounter with the wild-looking
pedlar, especially now she was alone. Safely past the bend,
she relaxed with relief. But a moment later she spotted him
lower down in the valley, standing under an old elm tree in
one of the river meadows, deep in conversation with another man. Even at this distance the smocked figure with the shaggy
growth of black hair was unmistakable, and with a sense of
shock Emma recognised his companion. What was Matthew
doing talking to the disreputable itinerant pedlar? Arguing, it
seemed, from their gesticulating hands. Emma had an intuitive
feeling that the meeting was furtive, that both men were
anxious not to be seen together.

She drove on, deeply thoughtful, her glance straying back from time to time to watch the two men down by the river.

They remained there, still talking, still arguing, until finally
they were lost to her sight.

The next morning the Brackle Valley buzzed with the news
that a ragged pedlar, unnamed, had been found battered to
death on the road leading up to the moor.

It was the gardener who brought the news to Bracklegarth
Hall. It had run quickly through the village, and Tom Brigg
learned it walking up from his dwelling in Providence Row.
He came importantly to the back door and was rewarded with
a mug of tea and a hot bacon buttie while the Hoads extracted the grisly details. Nelly and the kitchen maid, Ada, listened in
horrified fascination in the background.

Hoad passed on the information to Chloe, who brought it to the breakfast table. Randolph said he had heard it already
at the mill, and they talked it over between them.

Emma listened in shocked silence, her heart clenched with fear. It seemed that a shepherd had stumbled over the body
of the pedlar in the dark of early morning, the head smashed
to a bloody pulp. Nearby he had found a tethered horse and a
ramshackle two-wheeled cart. The evening before, apparently,
the pedlar had patronised the alehouse down by Hebble End.
Heartily and noisily drunk, he had boasted merrily and in
articulately of his own cleverness. The mystery of his death
seemed half solved; the murderer must have been a fellow vagrant who lay in wait on the moor and attacked him during
a jealous quarrel; another of the disreputable army that
roamed the byways of England, begging, pilfering, threaten
ing and stealing.

‘It’s an abomination!’ Chloe declared. ‘Almost on our very
doorstep. Such people shouldn’t be allowed to wander the
country free. If it were up to me, they’d be locked away
where they couldn’t terrify decent people.’

‘Happen it would suit us,’ her brother agreed ironically, ‘but there’s a lot of them, Chloe, gypsies, mouchers, diddiki and the like. They’re not all of them rogues.’

He glanced at Emma. The girl was very quiet this morn
ing, and looked pale and concerned. Still brooding over that
Ursly business of yesterday, no doubt. He had almost for
gotten it himself, but he’d best put things right with her. He didn’t like being at loggerheads with Emma.

‘Now then, lass, don’t bear a grudge,’ he said coaxingly. ‘We both of us spoke our minds plain, and I’ll not take back a single word. But now let’s forget it, eh? Just keep away from
that old witch, it’s all I ask.’

‘I can’t imagine what you were thinking of, Emma,’ added
Chloe. ‘You had no right to bring that woman into the house, knowing your uncle’s opinion of her. I don’t wonder he was
angry about it.’

Randolph cursed under his breath. He might have known
his sister wouldn’t lose the chance to poke in her long inter
fering nose.

‘That’s enough of that, Chloe,’ he commanded. But it was
too late, for without answering Emma had risen to her feet
and was already leaving the room. ‘Now come back and eat your breakfast, lass. There’ll be nowt more said.’

For all the notice Emma took of him, he might not have spoken. She went out and shut the door behind her.