The Shadow of the Sycamores (6 page)

Their day off was the sole topic in the bothy that night and it was decided that those who were off on the first Saturday would go to the New Year Dance that was to be held in Corrieben.

‘You should come, Henry,’ Mick coaxed. ‘You’re bound to
meet a lass that’s mair than willing and, wi’ a few drinks inside you, you’ll nae care if she’s the right ane for you or no’.’

Accustomed now to being teased about his refusal to drink alcohol as much as for his oft-voiced intention of keeping himself for the girl he married, Henry gave a guffawing laugh. ‘I’d rather bide here and read. I’ll get peace wi’ you lot awa’.’

After a moment’s consideration, Mick put forward a more acceptable proposition. ‘Well, you can get a len’ o’ my bike if you want to go and see your sister.’

Henry jumped at the chance of seeing Abby again but, with little experience of bicycles, the almost ten-mile-journey was hard going for him. His welcome at the end of it, however, made up for every sweating minute, although his grandmother’s hugging made him hotter than ever.

‘Oh, laddie!’ Isie breathed when he broke away. ‘I’m that pleased to see you.’

‘Me and all,’ said Abby, keeping hold of his hand. ‘We’ve been wondering how you were getting on. Do you like it at Craigdownie?’

‘It’s not bad,’ Henry said, diplomatically, and gave them a brief description of the varied jobs he had to do. When his grandmother asked about the bothy, he didn’t tell her where he had slept for his first few months. And he only spoke briefly of the cramped quarters in the small stone building with the sod roof, the chaff mattress on the wooden board for a bed and the constant chatter that wouldn’t let him sleep for hours. ‘But Janet’s a good cook,’ he went on, not wanting them to feel sorry for him. ‘You should see the size of her porridge pot and the soup pot and all.’

‘How many does she feed?’ Isie wanted to know, thankful that she’d never had to cater for large numbers.

‘The married men go hame, of course, but there’s ten in the bothy, counting me and Harry the orra loon, Mr and Mrs Legge and Georgina, that’s their daughter, the cook, a kitchen-maid, a housemaid and … um … a dairymaid. That’s seventeen.’

The pink tinge that had flushed his cheeks at the mention of
the dairymaid made Isie say, ‘And have you got yoursel’ a lass yet?’

His colour deepened further. ‘No, I’ve hardly spoken to any of them.’

‘Early days,’ she smiled, ‘you’re nae fourteen yet.’

It seemed to him that the time was right to ask something that very occasionally bothered him. ‘Gramma, was it my fault my mother died?’

‘Na, na, bairn! It was your father’s fault. He was aye coming hame drunk, you see, and getting on top o’ her and putting another bairn inside her belly.’ She stopped, aghast at what she had said. ‘I’m sorry, lad, I shouldna speak like that in front o’ you but it’s the God’s honest truth.’

Apart from realising that this statement corroborated Janet Emslie’s lesson in human biology, something struck Henry as odd. ‘But there’s just five o’ us, Gramma – that’s not a lot.’

She shook her head mournfully. ‘Five living but there was a lot mair than that.’

‘How many were there altogether?’ Henry persisted.

‘There was thirteen. So you see, it was a lot.’

‘Thirteen?’ Both the young people gaped at that.

‘The rest died – some wi’ pneumonia when they was infants, some wi’ galloping consumption when they was toddlers and some died afore they was born, poor souls. They was a’ lassies and all.’

The boy glanced meaningfully at his sister who muttered apologetically, ‘Henry thinks Father’s not his real father.’

Isie bridled. ‘For ony sake, loon! What gave you that idea?’

‘I didna really believe it at first but now … Do you not think it’s queer that he had twelve lassies? It’s like he couldn’t make a son.’

Isie nearly choked laughing. ‘The Lord preserve us! You think your mother took up wi’ anither man?’ she gasped. ‘There was nae other man, Henry. Willie Rae was mair than enough for her. If she hadna died an’ you hadna been a laddie, he’d likely have made a lot mair.’

‘But, Gramma, that’s terrible. I ken it’s what the man does
to the woman that makes the babies but how could any man make a woman have thirteen?’

‘Not all men are like your father, mind that Henry. If you keep your breeches buttoned, you’ll nae get in trouble and, once you’re wed, think on your mother afore you tak’ your pleasure wi’ your wife.’

‘I’ll remember that, Gramma, but why d’you think he’d to make thirteen afore he got me? It’s an awful lot.’

‘It was God’s will.’

‘Was it God’s will my mother died and all? He can’t be a very good God.’

His grandmother heaved a long, shivery sigh. ‘Maybe God just took pity on my poor Bella …’

Her abrupt stop, her hand on her chest, made both young people jump up in alarm.

‘Gramma!’ Henry cried, taking her free hand and massaging it. ‘What’s wrong? What is it? Tell me.’

But Isie was past telling anybody anything.

Henry slept with Abby that night again – or to be more precise, he shared her bed because sleep did not come to him. Even knowing that he might lose his job, he simply could not leave her on her own at such a time and he was plagued by the worry of what the future would hold for them. Doctor Michie had offered to let his father know what had happened but he had pleaded with the man not to tell anybody.

‘You need a man here, Henry, lad. The burden of arranging a funeral and all the other things that have to be done after someone passes on is too great for a boy your age to carry. Whatever went wrong between you should be forgotten and I’m sure Willie would want to attend to what has to be done. She was his mother-in-law, wasn’t she? And she looked after the family for some years after your mother died.’

The boy couldn’t deny this. ‘But he threw her out when he took another wife.’

‘Threw her out? Surely not. Asked her to leave, perhaps?’

‘It was Nessie Munro’s fault but my father didn’t stop her.’

‘Ah, well, my boy, a man does not argue with his bride.’

Recalling the doctor’s expression when he left, Henry knew what would happen and he wasn’t in the least surprised when his father walked straight into the spare bedroom without knocking at seven the next morning, with Nessie following in behind him – her obvious reluctance becoming outrage when she saw the boy with his arms round his sister.

‘Would you credit that, Willie?’ she shouted. ‘They’ve been … you know, with their grandmother lying lifeless in the next room!’

‘Haud your wheesht, wumman!’ Willie snapped. ‘They’re only bairns, for God’s sake!’ Striding over to the bed, he took his bewildered children into his arms, soothing them as they burst into tears.

Before that day was out, all arrangements had been made for the funeral, most of Isie’s neighbours volunteering to bake or cook something for after the burial. Willie had registered the death with John Gow’s replacement utterly sober and without a thought to the last shambolic time he had been there. (Willie’s second marriage had been conducted and registered at Nessie’s own kirk in Corrieben, five miles away.)

A steady stream of Isie’s friends and acquaintances and the keepers of the shops she had used called over the next few days, each with only complimentary things to say about her, each stressing how much they would miss her. Abby and Henry were overwhelmed by it all and it was not until after the funeral, after all the mourners had left, that they were alone with their father and stepmother. Nessie was so quiet, so receptive to all that was suggested, that it was glaringly apparent that Willie had given her a good talking-to but Henry was not in a forgiving mood towards either of them.

‘You’ll have to come home now, the two of you,’ Willie said, not as an order, more of a tentative question.

Before Henry could say a word, Abby astonished them all. ‘No, Father, I’m not going home with you. Gramma let me do what I wanted, within reason, and I’ve discovered I can make a living with my sewing – not a great living but all I need. I’ll
soon be sixteen and I’m able to look after myself. And Henry’s welcome to come back and bide wi’ me if he’s lost his job.’

Clearly rattled, Willie got noisily to his feet. ‘I could take you both back, you ken,’ he ground out. ‘You’re still minors till you’re twenty-one.’

Ignoring him, Abby turned to her brother. ‘What about it, Henry? Will you come and live here with me? You could get a job somewhere near and, if you wanted to get married sometime, there’s plenty room.’

He was torn between compassion for her and his own need to be independent. He wanted to make something of himself – he wanted to have a wife and bairns … but not in a house he would be sharing with his sister. He didn’t, however, want to upset her tonight and especially not in front of the other two. ‘I’ll have to think about it, Abby,’ he said, softly, and then turned to his father. ‘But I’ll definitely not be going back to your house. Never! Like Abby, I’ve had a taste of freedom and I’m not going to put myself in that position again.’

After a curt ‘Suit yoursel’s, then!’ Willie pushed his now simpering wife towards the door and Abby turned tearfully to her brother, who held her until all the emotions she’d had to hold back that day had flooded out, then he made her sit down until he explained how he felt. ‘I don’t like leaving you here on your own, though,’ he added after he made it clear that he wouldn’t take up her offer of a home.

‘I’ll be all right,’ she told him. ‘I’ve made plenty friends at this end of the town – boys as well as girls. She smiled shyly.

‘Oh, is there somebody special?’

‘I wouldn’t mind if there was but he hasn’t …’

‘Well, I hope it goes well for you, Abby.’

‘I hope you’ll find the right girl for you and all when you’re a few years older.’

‘Aye. I’ll have to go back to Craigdownie in the morning to return Mick’s bike. If John Legge doesna keep me on, I’ll look for some place else but, wherever I am, I’ll come and see you as often as I can. Now, I think we need to get some sleep.’ His stepmother’s disgust coming back to him, he went
on, ‘But not in the same bed. Nessie was right – we really shouldn’t have.’

Unfortunately for Henry, the couch in the parlour was so uncomfortably lumpy and noisy that he couldn’t sleep but the only alternative was his grandmother’s bed, where her body had lain until it was transferred to the coffin, and he certainly wouldn’t have been able to sleep there.

Going over what had happened three days before, he wondered if it had been his fault that his grandmother had died. He had more or less accused his mother – her daughter – of adultery. But Gramma had been tough. She had known why he said it and she hadn’t seemed angry with him.

She also had a long experience of life. She knew what she spoke about and he was definitely not going to turn his wife – if he ever took a wife, which he didn’t feel too sure about at the moment – into a machine for producing babies. He would ask her, just after putting the ring on her finger, how many children she wanted and he would abide by her decision. No woman would die because he couldn’t control his passions.

His mind made up on that, he turned over with a lighter heart and, just before falling asleep, he made another vow. According to Gramma, it was the strong drink that fuelled lust and he would never, ever, touch liquor of any kind. It was true what the Band of Hope taught. Drink was the downfall of all men.

Jim Legge was furious. ‘Are you sure he knew he’d to come back last night?’

Mick Tyler shrugged. ‘I didna tell him, Mr Legge. I thought he’d ken.’

The farmer looked round the breakfast table. ‘Did he tell any of you where he was going?’ He bared his teeth for a moment at the blank stares that were the only responses. ‘He didn’t definitely say he was going to see his sister so he could be anywhere?’ A new thought struck him. ‘Has he left any of his things?’

Mick looked at Frankie Ross who mumbled, ‘We never looked, Mr Legge.’

‘He’ll turn up.’ Mrs Legge was something of an optimist. ‘He could have had a puncture.’

Her husband had spent enough time on the missing second horseman. ‘Harry,’ he snapped, turning to the lad at the corner table, ‘you can give Davey a hand today and, if Henry doesn’t turn up by tonight, you can have his job for good.’

The orra loon’s eyes lit up at the prospect of this unexpected promotion. ‘Right you are, Mr Legge. ‘You can trust me. I’ll not let you down.’

This was too much for Janet Emslie. ‘The poor laddie could be lying in a ditch for all you folk care. Somebody should be out looking for him.’

It was a busy time on the farm with fields to be ploughed for the spring planting as well as seeing to the new lambs and all the other on-going jobs and Jim Legge did not relish the prospect of another of his men taking time off. His conscience, however, gave enough of a twinge to make him say, ‘I suppose
I could let you take the trap, Mick, and see if he
did
go to his sister’s. Is she married or is she still at home with their mother and father?’

Mick shook his head. ‘He’s never said nothing about a mother and father. He just said he’d a sister but he never said where she bade.’

‘He once said something to me about his grandmother,’ Charlie Simpson offered, ‘but he didna say where she bade either.’

‘That’s it, then!’ The farmer obviously considered that they had wasted too much time already. ‘You go with Charlie, Harry, and the rest of you get on with what you were supposed to be doing. Mick, just a quick scout around, remember. I want you back here in an hour.’

When the men had left, the farmer’s wife turned to the cook. ‘I can see you’re not happy about this, Janet, but there’s nothing we can do. Henry might have had too much drink yesterday and wasn’t fit to cycle back but no doubt he’ll turn up today.’

‘I suppose so.’ Janet watched the mistress and her daughter as they went out, then she turned to her young assistant. ‘What do you think, Maidie? Henry wouldna have been drinking, I’m near sure o’ that.’

‘He was dead against the drink,’ the girl agreed.

The absentee was the main topic again the following morning, the discussion ending by Jim Legge officially giving the second horseman’s job to Harry. By the next day, everyone had got back to normal and forgotten about him – except Janet Emslie. She had taken to Henry Rae the first day she saw him. He was different from all the uncouth orra loons they’d had before – quieter, more serious, innocent. A smile played at the corner of her mouth at the memory of his childlike confusion over the ‘pencil’ he didn’t have.