Feathers in the Fire (17 page)

‘Arnold shan’t be asked to countenance it, I shall be married in Hexham.’

They stood glaring at each other now. The wind had loosened her hair and a strand had fallen over her eyes. She pushed it to one side and with it the first tears, but so full was she of anger that they ran slow. But not so her legs when she turned from him and, picking up her skirts, raced through the fields.

When she entered the farmyard she looked like someone demented. Amos was coming out of the stables and he called to her, ‘What’s the matter, Jane? Jane! Stop a minute. What is it?’ But she took no heed. Nor of Molly in the kitchen who came from the sink, saying, ‘Good God, Miss, what’s happened to you?’ She ran past her and up the stairs to her room, and there she stood gasping for a minute before throwing herself on to the bed.

It was only seconds later when Molly entered the room and, putting her hands on her shoulders, said gently, ‘Tell us, Miss, what is it? What’s upset you?’

‘Nothing, nothing.’ She shook her head from side to side.

‘Aw, Miss! now come on, you don’t get in a state like this, not you for nothin’ you don’t.’

‘What is it?’ Amos came hobbling into the room and, thrusting Molly aside, he dropped his crutches on the floor and hoisted himself on to the side of the bed and, pulling Jane round to him, gazed tenderly down into her tear-swamped face, saying, ‘Tell me, tell me what’s happened. Someone done something?’

She gulped in her throat, then drew her fingers across her eyes, groped for a handkerchief, wiped it round her face, and looking at him, gulped quietly, ‘Father . . . Father’s going to marry again.’

The expression on Amos’ face remained as it had been a moment before, full of concern, kindly; then as the seconds passed it slowly took on a look of utter blankness.

She glanced from him to Molly, who was standing near the door now. Somehow she felt it was right that Molly should hear the news first hand. ‘But . . . but Amos’ – she moved her head from shoulder to shoulder – ‘I wouldn’t mind him . . . I wouldn’t mind him remarrying, but . . . but it’s who he’s going to marry.’

‘Who is he going to marry?’ Amos’ inquiry was quiet.

‘Agnes Reed.’

‘Reed? Agnes Reed, the twin girl?’

She nodded her head. ‘She’s two years younger than me, it’s indecent. And, and Amos, it’s not fair’ – the tears were still raining from her eyes as she gazed into his face – ‘is it? Is it?’

He did not answer her, nor did his expression give her any indication of what he was thinking, or if he was thinking at all. But he was thinking; his mind was galloping ahead into the future.

Sitting taut, his body straight, and in this position he could have been taken for a tall, hefty young man sitting on the side of a bed, his feet on the ground, and speaking figuratively his feet were on the ground, so much so that he knew exactly what to expect from life, but also what he meant to demand from it by way of compensation . . . Going by age his father was not really an old man, but in the jargon of the farmyard, which he used more often than the stilted form of speech taught him by the parson, he considered his father was not long for the top – frustration and drink had played havoc with him over the years – and it was not a thought brought up from his deep subconscious when he wished his father dead, but an ever present desire in the forefront of his mind.

The hate for his father had increased with the years. He had hated him before he learned, through eavesdropping on Will Curran talking to Johnnie Geary in the harness room, about his father giving orders to drown him, and how Molly Geary was said to have hesitated, and the question still remaining open whether she would have or not if Davie Armstrong hadn’t appeared on the scene. He had heard vague reference to the episode of his father whipping Molly Geary because she had fallen, and he knew that his mother had taken to her bed, not only because of his birth, but because his father had had a woman on the side. He hadn’t as yet learnt the name of the woman but it wasn’t of any interest to him anyway. He was also aware that there was sniggering in certain quarters with regards to his friendship with Biddy, but he put this down to her being Molly’s fly-blow and himself McBain’s son, which in one way was correct.

He gathered a great deal of information through his quiet approach. There were rubber cups on the ends of his crutches, and he wore hand-made soft leather shoes on the appendages referred to as his feet; he came upon people so suddenly that he startled them. He had discovered this trick early in life and had always used it to advantage, sometimes to scare an unsuspecting worker almost out of his wits, or to creep up on a conversation.

He had worked out for some time past what he was going to do with the farm when it became his. He would sell all the lower land lying towards the river, Sir Alfred had been after it for years, not only in order to extend his own land but with the idea of building a house for his son, for from the rye field there was one of the finest views in the county. The Manor had nothing to compare with it; all the manor lands lay too low, whereas this particular part of the farm took in the source of the burn; it sprang from high up in a rock wall as out of a gorgon’s mouth; it was a silver spray in the summer and a roaring cascade in the winter. But who saw it unless they made the rough journey to it. No, that part could easily be done without, and it would bring in a pretty penny. He would enclose the farm, bringing it down to workable size so that they needn’t employ outside labour. What had to be done would be done by Will Curran and the two Gearys. What the farm wanted was reorganisation; less land would need less scattered labour on walls and ditches and hedges. And he’d get rid of the hunters; they ate money, hunters. Look at what was spent on them and look at what was doled out to himself. On the first of every month Jane gave him a pound . . . the allowance his father made him – a pound! He wanted to spit at the thought. At one time it had been only five shillings and he had been forced to supplement it with his winnings from the marbles and chucks. Even as a child he could beat the men at their own game. A ha’penny a game he would play. They had thought it funny at first, until, losing as much as threepence a week, they called a halt to his monetary gains.

Lately he’d had a craving for money. He had designed a new trap, a spanking affair, something different from the makeshift he used now. It was to have a removable hood and a soft leather seat shaped like a tub armchair from which he could drive. He imagined himself galloping into Hexham or even as far as Newcastle in the rig-out. In it he would feel the eyes on him, women’s eyes, in fascinated admiration. God, what he would have done to them if he’d had legs! But he wanted to rivet their attention on to what he had become without legs, a smart dashing figure in a spanking rig-out.

With money he’d have a tailor who’d make clothes to suit his bulk. And trousers. He had even designed a pair of false legs made of light wood strapped to his waist by leather. And the picture these last presented to the forefront of his mind was of him walking up the aisle of the church with Biddy on his arm.

Apart from her being the only one who was likely to have him, he loved her, craved for her. He hadn’t seen her bare body since she was ten. She’d got shy and proper after that, but every time he looked at her he stripped the clothes off her. It made not an atom of difference that she was old Geary’s granddaughter and that she didn’t know who her father was. What the hell did that matter?

And the idea of marrying Biddy had an added attraction, for it would cause a stink round about. One thing he was sorry for, his father wouldn’t be here to see it because all this could not happen until he died.

. . . Now Jane was saying he was going to marry again, and to Agnes Reed, which would mean he would start a family, for the woman was a frustrated breeder by all accounts. Goodbye to the farm; goodbye to dreams; goodbye to compensation; where would he end his days? up in the attic? The bogeyman to the litter that would fill the house. As if he had asked the question aloud Jane said, ‘He’s . . . he’s having the malt house renovated for us.’

‘The malt house?’ He gaped at her, then brought his head down towards her and repeated, ‘The malt house?’ She nodded silently. ‘Well, well, that is kind of him. It’s quite a way to the malt house from the farm, we’ll be nicely tucked out of his sight.’ He now put his hand on to her shoulder and, gripping it, said, ‘Don’t worry; he hasn’t done it yet . . . he could have a stroke.’

For a moment she looked horrified; then hastily wiping her face she muttered, ‘Oh, Amos, don’t say things like that.’

‘I was just hoping.’

‘Oh Amos!’

He brought his joined hands together and pressed them down into the coverlet between the stumps of his legs. Then he turned his head and looked at Molly, who was still standing by the door, and as if he too considered her one of the family he asked, ‘And what do you make of it?’

‘I’m not all that surprised,’ Molly answered, then turned and walked out, down the stairs and through the kitchen and into the dairy where Winnie was scouring milk pans, and without any lead-up she said, ‘He’s gona marry again.’

Winnie turned her head, her face wrinkled in perplexity, then she repeated, ‘He?’

‘Aye, the master.’

‘No!’

‘Aye, it’s true. An’ who do you think it is? That Miss Reed, the horsey one, the one that got her name up two or three years back and went away for a long holiday abroad they said, you remember?’

‘No, never! She’s younger than Miss Jane.’

Molly now folded her arms and patted her bare flesh as she said, ‘Well, here’s one who won’t stay and welcome the bride.’

‘Where will you go, lass?’

‘I don’t rightly know as yet, Winnie, but I think it’s time I was making a move, for more reasons than one, don’t you?’

They looked at each other in silence now. The reason was speaking from both their eyes and Winnie, turning to her work again, said, ‘Well, perhaps you’re right, lass; in fact I know you are. Pity you didn’t tell her years ago.’

‘Aye, it is. But then there are some things that are hard to get out.’

Two

The dawn was breaking when Amos slipped out of the house the following morning. Molly was not yet in the kitchen, or Biddy in the dairy. Their time for arriving was half-past five, half an hour earlier than in the winter, but winter and summer now, Winnie did not begin work until half-past six, it was a concession to her age.

There was a ground mist over the land and his head just came above it; as he bobbed along on his crutches, he appeared to be swimming in it. He was careful when going along the Tor path for there was a drop on the off side, not over steep, but enough to keep you rolling until you reached the valley bottom should you step off the road at certain points.

He left the ground mist behind when he took the Tor path, and when he reached the top the sky had a warm glow to it, although as yet he couldn’t see the sun.

It wasn’t the first time he had been on the Tor at dawn; since his first visit the Tor had held a fascination for him. But when up here he liked to be alone, even Jane’s company irked him. He seldom dreamt when in bed but he always dreamt up here. The Tor soothed him, brought him peace, and gave him a sense of power. He knew it had a power all its own. And this seemed proved to him one day when, the rain pouring down on the hills around, the sun still shone on to the top of the Tor and it remained dry. And there were days when it matched his black moods, when the rest of the surrounding country was bathed in light, but dark clouds remained stationary shadowing the Tor rocks, tinting their hue to the despair in his mind.

He knew the history of the hills: the mud-rocks, beaten by time into slate; these would take grass and wear it like a cloak, whereas the slates born of volcanic lava were as cold and hard to the buttocks as steel. But his Tor, like a human being, was a mixture. The north side above the path was made up in part of loose scree; yellow or grey or black according to the light; put a wrong foot on it and away you went tumbling down into the road. But on the top, like a soft mantle studded here and there with rock gems, were great stretches of turf, moss and lichen, which sloped down south-west to a wooded area.

But he wasn’t interested this morning in the softer aspects of the Tor. What took his attention was a cluster of boulders, eight in all, situated about twelve feet from where the land dropped at its steepest to the road below. As a child he had played in and out of these boulders, chasing Jane and being chased by her. There was one he could rock back and forward. When he was seven years he stood as high as it; now he could support himself by leaning his arm on it, and he often did while rocking it gently.

There had, in the past three years, been two rockfalls from the Tor, both occurring after prolonged periods of rain. The last fall had blocked the road to a height of ten feet and some of the fall had spilled down into the valley below. A good job, everyone said, it had happened during the night, for someone might have been coming round the bend, and then it would have been a bad lookout for them.

He walked on his crutches to within two feet of the edge of the rock and above the point at which the road below began its curve around the base of the Tor. The rock, shale here, was slack in parts. There was a deep split, a two-inch crevasse, not more than a foot from the edge. A few boulders placed on the outer part could bring it down . . . but perhaps at the wrong time. They would have to be placed just this side of the crevasse. But how to get them this far.

He went back to the boulders and rocked his favourite stone, but try as he might he couldn’t budge it. Yet when he tried the same manoeuvre on the one to the side he was greatly surprised when he found he could move it with comparative ease.

Within a short space of time he had moved four boulders to within four feet of the edge of the rock, and then he sat back and surveyed his handiwork. If the combined weight of them didn’t cause a slide, one of them alone, toppled at the right moment, could send a pony and trap, or a horse and rider, skiting down into the valley below.

Now on all fours, he scrambled to the very edge and peered over, and as he stared down he had a vivid picture of his father looking up at him that split second before the boulder hit him, and he anticipated the feeling the picture would give him when it took on reality.

The feeling that he had for his father, which was bred of hate, would at times take on a raging feeling of lust for revenge. Apparently small things could awaken this feeling, such as the sight of Winnie carrying in the cover dishes to the dining room, or his father throwing a leg over a horse.

He had known before he left Jane last night what he intended to do; the only question now was when – it was all a matter of time. There was only one snag that he could see. His father didn’t always take the Tor road; but if he was going to the Reeds he’d surely come this way for it was the nearest road to the village, and the Reeds lived beyond the village.

He shambled back, picked up his crutches and stood looking at the boulders. If Jane should come up here before he could carry out his intentions, then he would suggest that it was the work of some of the village lads, they had been up to their pranks. It was well known that they came poaching. But he wasn’t worried about Jane, he could always convince Jane of anything he wished.

It was Thursday night, his father had been out twice and had not used the Tor road, neither going nor coming. He had waited through the long twilight last night, even until it was dark. Jane had questioned him as to where he had been, and he had snapped at her, ‘Let go my halter,’ and had felt little contrition when he saw the tears coming into her eyes.

His father had returned at nine o’clock this evening from wherever he had been, and was now in the sitting room drinking; and he would be there until midnight. Or perhaps not. He recollected that over the past few nights he had come upstairs to bed a little earlier; perhaps, he thought, he didn’t need so much drink now he had comfort in anticipating the pleasures of a young wife. What a pity he didn’t get drunk enough to fall downstairs and break his neck . . .

The thought brought his body slowly upright where he sat in the leather chair before the low toilet table that held a standing mirror. In the candlelight he looked at his reflection. His eyes were slowly widening, his lower jaw drooping. He leaned forward and stared at his face. It was a habit with him. He had spent a great deal of time over the years looking at his face. He knew it was an extraordinary face, very uncommon, beautiful in a way. His mouth was full-lipped and looked tender, his nose was straight, his cheekbones flat, and his eyes, his eyes were really extraordinary. He knew he resembled neither of his parents, nor yet any of his forebears. Jane had introduced him to the two albums of forebears when he was very young. ‘That is your grandmother McBain; and that is your grandfather McBain. That is your great-grandfather McBain and that is your great-grandmother McBain. And that is your grandmother Lawson and that is your grandfather Lawson.’ On and on. She had always stressed his claim to his forebears to make up to him for the lack of his parents, who had been as dead to him from the day he was born.

He had, over the years, worked out for himself the comforting thought that perhaps he was a changeling, a being from some other existence, another world where no-one had legs, just short appendages thrusting out from the hips. The feeling of difference from those around him was emphasised when he was visited by strange and weird ideas, ideas more fearsome than those in the stories of Mr Edgar Allan Poe, ideas that would have horrified Parson Hedley had he voiced them, for Mr Poe had never thought up ideas so macabre as the ones his mind prescribed for his father.

And now his thinking had offered him a solution, not a very original one he admitted, but it could, like the landslide from the Tor, be set down as an accident. He wondered why he hadn’t thought of it in the first place.

He slid down from the chair and, going to the door, opened it slightly and listened. He did not expect to hear any sounds. Jane had gone to bed early with toothache; Winnie had given her some herb tea and a dose of laudanum, she would be fast asleep by now.

He turned and peered through the candlelight at the clock on the mantelpiece. It said ten to eleven. Swiftly now he sat down and pulled off his soft leather shapeless boots. He was about to take off his coat when he changed his mind, thinking, no, he might have to lie there for some time and it would act as a pad against the wood.

As silently as a cat, and not unlike some huge animal, he went along the passage and down the stairs, across the landing and down the other four steps on to the main landing. When he reached Jane’s door he stood for a moment and listened; then he went on to the top of the stairhead.

There was a table to the left-hand side on which stood a lamp. Its wick, only half turned up, gave a dim glow to the head of the stairs. He turned it down lower still. At the right-hand side against the open balustrade, that gave to part of the landing the effect of a miniature gallery, stood a heavy wooden monk’s chair. Gently, he eased it a foot further until the stout back was within a few inches from the square upright post that ran from the ground floor up past the head of the stairs to the ceiling above and acted as a support for the lintel beam placed about two feet from the ceiling.

Pulling himself on to the chair, he stood peering up at the lintel. It was a replica, or more correctly the mother and father of the one in Winnie’s cottage. Since the sailor had first introduced him to it, it had become a practice that whenever he was in the cottage one or the other of them would lift him up and he would swing from the beam. Often, as he had on that first day, refusing to come down, he would lie, his head hanging over the side, laughing at them. But he had stopped swinging from the beam when he was nine or ten because he had become too heavy for them to lift.

This beam was more than twice the width of the one in Winnie’s cottage and he had no doubt that once up he would rest comfortably on it. But it was the getting up; he had only his arms to rely on.

The back of the monk’s chair was about six inches higher than the top of the balustrade. It was made of black bog oak and the top horizontal rail was flat, but he knew that even if this supported him there would be more than four feet to go before he could reach the beam. He himself stood exactly four feet from the end of his stumps to the top of his head. His arms extended, measuring from the top of his head to his wrist, would give him another foot or so. But the point was he wouldn’t be able to extend his arms, his arms would have to act as legs and grip the post while supporting his weight, and his body would then be concertinaed. He could grip tight with his stumps if he could get the object between them, but this post was too wide for that. Once he left the support of the chair he’d have a perilous foot to traverse, he could hang and swing from a bough like a monkey and slide down a tree, but he had never attempted to climb up one, fearing that the feat would end in defeat, and he couldn’t countenance defeat.

He heard a movement somewhere in the distance below him, and it acted like a starting pistol. He flung his arms upwards and to the side, and as he gripped the post his body swung into mid-air. When he felt himself beginning to slide he spread his stumps as wide as it was possible for them to go, and when each one pressed tight against a corner of the wood the pressure was like a hot iron searing his flesh, but it checked his descent. Drawing in a deep gulp of air, he moved his arms upwards once, twice; and then he thrust out a hand and clutched the top of the lintel. He had made it, he was safe. Letting go the other hand, he encircled the beam with his arms, then slowly drew himself up on to the top of it, and there he lay breathing heavily, one cheek pressed tight against the wood.

After a moment he moved cautiously, easing his body into a more comfortable position for the wait, however long it be . . .

It was longer than he anticipated, long enough to make him realise that he wouldn’t be able to swing forward from this beam, for it was too wide for him to grip with a single hand; he’d have to join his hands over the top of it if he wanted to put force into his body. He also realised that his movements must be swift; he must not expose himself until his father reached at least the fourth step from the top. Then he would swing sideways and catch him on the third or the second step.

By the time the clock in the hall struck half-past eleven his body was becoming cramped, and he knew that he could not lie like this much longer. Nor could he ease his position on the beam, for his previous movements had brought him in contact with nails. The lintel, he discovered, was a fake as to its width. Below it appeared like one massive piece of wood but he had found it was made up of two beams nailed and bolted together in parts. Moreover it was thick with dust; twice he had to pinch his nose to stop himself from sneezing.

As the clock struck a quarter to twelve he heard a door open, then close, and footsteps coming across the hall. He did not see his father until he was actually mounting the stairs, for McBain had stopped to turn out the lamp in the hall. His body stiffened; he raised it slightly upwards and watched the oncoming figure.

McBain had his head down, looking at each stair as if deep in thought. His step was steady, for his drinking had been moderate. He left the sixth step and it was on the fifth that something caused him to raise his head and look up, and the cry escaped him when he lifted his foot and put it on the fourth stair. But it was throttled in his throat as the stumps of his son’s legs caught him under the chin and lifted him into the air and sent him tumbling to the foot of the stairs.

Jane was awakened by a scream and someone shouting. Or had she been dreaming? She’d had a nightmare. The pain from her toothache was gone but her head was very fuzzy. What was it? She lifted her legs slowly out of the bed and sat on the side of it. She was sure she’d heard someone call out. Had something happened to Amos? But what could happen to Amos?

She stumbled across the room, not bothering to put on her dressing gown, and opened the door and looked out on to the landing. The light was still burning but it was dim and she couldn’t see very far. She glanced towards the stairs that led from the landing to the next floor; then she turned her head slowly and looked towards the head of the main staircase. Could it have been her father calling?

At the top of the stairhead she stood peering down. Then she was crying aloud as she raced down the stairs. ‘Oh Father! Father!’ She had her joined hands tight against her mouth as she stared down at the contorted figure at the foot.