A Dinner Of Herbs (30 page)

then?”

His face blanched, and for a moment she became terrified by the look in his eyes as he took a step

around the table towards her, saying, “Do you you know what would happen then? Do

you? I’d come

over there an’ cut your throat. I would, I’d cut your throat.”

She had lifted up her bundle now and she moved backwards towards the door as she tried to answer

bravely, saying, “Well, you just might have to try that. But don’t forget she has lots of friends, has

Maggie, and I could get their protection, couldn’t I? Couldn’t I, Da?

I could get their protection. An’ you’re not fit to stand up to anybody in the valley now, are you?

“Get out! Get out! I don’t want to set eyes on you, not till me dying day, and not then.”

When she banged the door behind her all right left her and she felt so faint that she

thought she was going

to drop to the ground. She couldn’t believe this was happening to her. She had felt sure that Mrs.

Davison, after upbraiding her, would see her predicament as a way to getting her to marry Lennie. And

when that didn’t turn out, she had taken it for granted that her father, after the first shock, would look

upon her return home as a godsend for he’d have someone to see to him in his declining years which,

with the disease on his chest, wouldn’t be all that many.

At the spinney she put down the bundle and leant against a tree, thinking to herself. What if Kate . if

Kate turns against me? But she knew Kate: Kate would never do anything like that. But

hadn’t she

thought she knew her mistress? And hadn’t she thought she knew her father? Oh God!

Oh God! Don’t

let it be the poorhouse. She was running now. The bundle pulling her down sideways, she kept changing

it from one hand to the other. And then there she was in the field opposite Kate’s cottage.

She came to a stop when she saw Kate just within her gateway. She saw her straighten up and look

towards her, then turn away, and such was her reaction that she had to put her hand over her mouth to

stop herself from vomiting.

When she reached the gate, she called softly, “Kate. Kate.” And the old woman turned

and, coming

towards her, said, “It was you, then? I thought I was dreamin’, or it was somebody

passin’ by. What in

the name of God! Aw—’ She stopped, then said, “ Come away in. “

The relief almost bringing her to the verge of hysteria, she had the urge to laugh and cry at the same

time. She stumbled into the cottage, dropped the bundle and, rushing to the crack et she dropped on to

it and, bending herself double, she laid her head on her folded arms and gave way to a bout of

body-shaking emotion.

Kate did not go to her, or speak, but she went to the rack j where her potions were and took down

three bottles. From I each she took a small measure and put it into a tin mugs stirred the liquid around,

then went towards the fire,| saying, “Lift your head, girl. Lift your head and drink this.” |

Mary Ellen

lifted her head. Her face was awash, herj breath was coming in small gasps, but she

grabbed at theja

mug and went to swallow the draught in a gulp, only to|| choke and cough and spit half of it out.

“Careful. Careful.

“Tis too precious to be wasted. That lot| would cost one of the gentry sixpence.” Kate accompanied?

her last words with a tight smile; then she said, “Sip id slowly.”

“I

^ Mary Ellen sipped at the concoction. It had a bitter’| sweet taste and it seemed to dry up her tongue

as it passed over it, but when she had finished it she rose from the stool and sat on a chair and leant

back. Of a sudden she felt quiet inside and she looked at Kate and said, “D’you know

why I’m here?”

Kate herself sat on the crack et that Mary Ellen had just vacated, and folding her scraggy arms round

her equally scraggy body, she rocked herself as she looked at the young girl before her, and she said, “I

don’t have to guess, or when it happened. I only wondered at the beginning when you

would tumble to

it, or when you would arrive home, because you’ve come to stay, haven’t you?”

“Oh, Kate, Kate.” Mary Ellen brought her body forward now, and her head drooped, only

for it to be

brought up sharply again by Kate’s voice, always strong, always giving the lie to her old infirm body:

“Don’t bend your head, girl,” she said.

“Shame is a self-made thrashing stool. Have none of it. Look them straight in the eye, all who would

scorn you. Did she turn you out?”

Mary Ellen leant against the back of the chair now before she said, “Yes, right off.” Then she added,

“No, not right off; she gave me to the end of the week, till she could find somebody else, but I told her

what she could do.”

“That’s a good sign, you stood up to her. Were they all against you?”

“Not all. Mr. Archie spoke for me.”

“Archie? Well, well. But then he would. A bright lad he was in his youth. His wife was a whining

whinney. He was glad when she died, and so became a regular visitor along at Maggie

Oates.”

“Our Mr. Archie?”

“Aye. Aye, your Mr. Archie.”

“He said ... if things had been different, he ... he would have married me.”

Kate let out a high hollow laugh.

“Did he be god she said.

“Did he?

Well, you could have done worse. Yes, you could have done worse. But you’ll do a damn

sight better

in the end, let me tell you. Now, your da? “

“That was quicker.”

“I’m not surprised. He’s turned into a right holy Joe, has your da.

I’m well acquainted with human nature and at one time I never thought I could read

wrong, but I did

with him, for there wasn’t a nicer or more straightforward lad in his youth, but now I know he was only

that way because he had your mother. He went to pieces after, or perhaps he just became his real self,

narrow, mean, because that’s your da, Mary Ellen. Say what you will, that’s your da.

Anyway, lass,

you’re here to stay, aren’t you?

“Please, Kate.”

“Aw, don’t put thank into your tone because you’ve come to me. You’ve come as a gift,

lass, as a gift.

Tell you something’, I’ve always wanted you. Oh, aye, I loved Roddy. I still do, but not with that

intensity. You see, again I’ve got to admit I was slightly wrong in reading human nature there. But with

you, from you were a nipper, I wished you were mine. And now you are.”

She pulled her twisted body up from the crack et and, going over to Mary Ellen, she bent forward and,

for the first time in their long acquaintance, she kissed her. It was a gentle kiss, yet the wrinkled lips

seemed firm on Mary Ellen’s cheek. But the kindness was too much and Mary Ellen

started to cry again,

only to have Kate bark at her now, “No more of that. That’s one thing we’re gona put a stopto’cryin’.”

After a moment, Mary Ellen, wiping her face, said, “How long have you known, Kate?”

“Oh, as I said, since the night he left. You were ripe for it.

him, Kate, ‘cos ... ‘cos I made| him.” I “Doubtless. Doubtless. The way you were that

night| you could

have stirred a dolly-tub from the mill to rise to^ you.”

Mary Ellen was about to hang her head again when Kate laughed and said, “There’s no

lass worth her

salt if she can’t get a man to do what she wants when she wants.”

Mary Ellen’s head didn’t droop now as she muttered, “But he didn’t want to, Kate.

And ... and he

went for me after. And that did something to me, it changed me somehow.”

Kate was staring at her. Her hands hanging by her sides, she said, “He went for you after it happened?”

“Yes, aye.”

“Blamed you?”

It was a moment before Mary Ellen admitted, “In a way, yes, yes.”

“God in heaven! I never thought I’d say I was ashamed of him.”

“Aw, please, please, Kate, he had a right to be.”

“He had no right to be.” The old woman’s voice was loud.

“I’d say this and I’d say it to his face if he was here. I’m disappointed in him right to the core. All right,

he’s given you a hairn, but he should have rejoiced in it. You untouched and offerin’

yourself to him. I

doubt if he’s ever had a virgin in his life afore. Doubt, did I say? I know fine well he hadn’t, the place he

went for his amusement.”

Mary Ellen’s eyes were round now, and her eyebrows were pushing upwards towards her

hair as she

said, ““ He . he had been with .

“Oh, aye, aye. Tell me of one who lives in the valley who hasn’t.”

“But who? Which lass?”

“Oh, no lass from here, the paid pieces from Hexham. He hadn’t the nerve to go along to Maggie,

because he would have his lugs pulled by the men. Oh, no. But there are plenty suppliers in the town.”

Again Mary Ellen felt she wanted to vomit. She was a fool, she was ignorant. She wished she was

dead.

As if she had read Mary Ellen’s thoughts, Kate said, “Now don’t sit there looking like that and wishin’

your life away; he was a man, just like every other one. But by God! he should have

appreciated you.

If I hold nothin’ else against him, I’ll hold that. Now if it had been Hal.”

“What?

“I said, if it had been Hal.”

“Hal?”

“Aye, Hal. Like many another, you don’t see that fellow except from the outside.”

“Well, that’s been enough for me ... Oh Kate, what am I going to do?”

“What would you have done if that fat empty-headed little bitch hadn’t turfed you out?”

Mary Ellen sat and thought for a moment, then said, “Likely married Lennie.”

“And then what?”

“What d’you mean?

“What would your life have been like? Work from Monday mornin’ till Sunday night,

never a let up, and

never let you forget the reason why you were there. What I’m meanin’ is, you’d have had to work.

Well, we all have to work one way or another.”

“But where’ll I find work round here, except I do grubbin’ at the mine’ “ You’ll not go grubbin’ at the

mine; you’ll find work. But I’m tellin’ you this’—the gnarled finger wagged at her

‘you’ll have to learn.

You can read and write your own name, but that’s not goin’ to help you much, an’ what

I’ve got in mind

takes a good memory, a real good memory, or else you’ll be in the soup. “ She smiled

now and the flesh

came up round her small bright eyes and almost closed them as she added, laughingly, “

Oh aye, if you

put some of my concoctions into the soup you would be in it. They’d likely hang you for poisoning, and

they would have done not a hundred years gone in me grannie’s time.

Oh, the things she told me. “

Mary Ellen cut the old woman’s reminiscing short by saying, “What d’you mean, Kate,

about me

memory, havin’ to be good for a job?”

In answer, Kate twisted her body round and looked towards the end of the room to the

shelves holding

bottles, jars and boxes, and she said, “There, that could be your new Job.”

“Do what you do?” Mary Ellen’s voice was quiet but high.

“Make up potions?”

“Aye, just that. But it isn’t as easy as it sounds. As I told you, it all depends upon your memory. Now

listen here. I’ve been silly all me life with regard to that treasure.” She was now wagging her finger

towards the shelves.

“What I should have done many years ago was have a stall in the Hexham market on a

Saturday. That

would have kept me in clover. And when I saw what some of the fakers made out of

bottles of coloured

water, sugar, and salt, why, I knew I was a fool. But there, I was never one for bargainin’

or asking’

people for money, even if they were getting’ good value. So here I sat and let them come to me, and as

you know they’ve come from far and near over the years. But what have they given me?

D’you know

that nobody has ever paid me more than sixpence a potion in me long lifetime. But then, if I’d got

sixpence for every potion, I’d have been sittin’ pretty. In fact the hole in the wall there’

she nodded

towards the chimney piece ‘wouldn’t have held it, I would have had to take all the bricks out.”

She again gave her crinkled smile.

“Well, things are goin’ to change from now on. They have changed over the last weeks.

I’ve been

breakin’ them in, those of me customers.

“No, Bob,” I said, only yesterday. You know, Bob Alien the blacksmith. Well, over the

years he’s

come for a lotion for his back.

“Tis all right in the spring and summer but with the fall of the leaf he gets his twinges. So there he was

with a penny in his hand and I said, “ I’m sorry. Bob, but I’ve got a hard winter ahead of me, and your

special potion will be threepence from now on, and that’s cheap,” I said, “ because you go into Hexham

market or up to Allendale and what’ll you pay there to the apothecary for stuff that has no more in it than

plain pig’s fat? Ninepence you would pay. Well, not less than sixpence, nothing’s less than sixpence in

the apothecary’s when you’re asking’ for potions. So it’s threepence from now on. What d’you say,

Bob? “

“And you know, after a minute he laughed and said, “ You’re a marler, Kate. “ But he put his

threepence on the table there. And then there was Rosie Fowler. Carryin’ again she is, and her oldest

one twenty. She’s as good as any sow for turnin’ them out. Well, there she was last week complainin’

again of giddiness and swim my feelings and the panting of her heart, so could she have me lavender