The Good Provider (5 page)

‘Perhaps she went back to the Baird Home,’ said Craig.

‘Or if she felt she had a grievance against you, for some daft reason or another, perhaps she went to the constable,’ said Bob Nicholson.

‘The constable?’

‘At Dunnet.’

Clegg cocked his head, scowled. ‘I think you’ve got her hid.’

‘Are you callin’ me a liar, Mr Clegg?’

‘I think – well, she might be hidin’ at your place.’

‘Craig, walk back to Dalnavert wi’ Mr Clegg,’ said Bob. ‘Let him look through the barns an’ the sheds.’

Clegg’s mouth opened, closed.

Craig said, ‘Aye, come on wi’ me, Mr Clegg. You can ask my mam if we’re tellin’ lies.’

‘Your mam?’

‘Search the cottage too, if you feel you must.’

‘Nah, nah. That’ll not be necessary.’

Bob Nicholson nodded. ‘Very well, Mr Clegg. If I were you I’d bide at home for a day or two. If your lass has run off she’ll not get far on her own.’

‘Aye, perhaps you’re right.’

‘Did she steal from you?’ Bob asked.

‘Nah, nah.’

‘Did she take her belongin’s?’

‘Nah.’

‘When did she go missin’?’

‘Last night.’

‘Oh, so you saw her go, did you?’

‘I – I found her gone,’ said Clegg.

‘I see, so you found her bed empty this mornin’, is that it?’

‘It’s none o’ your damned business, Bob Nicholson.’

‘It was yourself made it my business, Mr Clegg.’

Clegg huffed and puffed again, then he capitulated. ‘I’ll wait a day or two, as you suggest, then I’ll consult the folk at the Baird Home.’

‘Wise,’ Bob Nicholson agreed.

Craig said, ‘Perhaps she’s down at Bankhead, Mr Clegg. She’s a favourite wi’ the Sandersons, after all.’

‘Aye, well, I’ll just wait.’ Obviously Duncan Clegg did not want to confront Mr Sanderson and have to explain why it was that Kirsty had run off. ‘I’ll away home now. I’ve got ploughin’ to do.’

‘Lassies can be flighty,’ said Bob Nicholson. ‘She’ll come back when she’s hungry, you’ll see.’

Clegg scowled. His outrage had been replaced by guilt, however, and undermined by Bob Nicholson’s questions. He turned and, without bidding his neighbours farewell, trudged off uphill towards the crown of the ridge.

Craig and his father watched his departure.

‘Nasty wee bugger,’ Bob murmured.

‘Will those papers really allow him to take Kirsty back?’

‘Who can say?’ Bob shrugged. ‘But I’d take no chances if I were you, son.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

Bob took the pipe from his mouth and cradled it in his palm. He rubbed the side of his nose with a knuckle. ‘Look, I’d best get down to Bankhead. Mr Sanderson’ll—’

‘Take no chances?’ Craig gripped his father’s arm. ‘What the hell d’you mean?’

‘I mean,’ Bob Nicholson said, ‘you should marry Kirsty Barnes just as soon as you bloody well can.’

She felt awkward at breakfast. It might have been different if Craig had been there but she had been so late asleep that she had not wakened at her usual early hour and was obliged to share the table with Lorna and Mrs Nicholson.

There was porridge, bacon and fried bread; bannocks too, fresh butter, even a pot of jam, a symbol of luxury as far as Kirsty was concerned. Whatever fate was in store for her she certainly would not starve while she was a ‘guest’ in Madge Nicholson’s house. She did not eat her fill, however, in case the woman thought her scrounging and greedy. She was quick to help clear the table and carry dishes into the little kitchenette where a stone sink and cold-water tap were and where Madge Nicholson, wrapped in a canvas apron, was busy scrubbing pots.

Mrs Nicholson said not a word and Kirsty returned to the kitchen to chat to Lorna about the happenings at the school she had left four years ago. She found it easier to relate to Craig’s sister than to his mother. She dreaded the moment when Lorna would leave for school and she would be alone with Madge Nicholson.

She felt lost in Dalnavert’s unfamiliar routines. She did not know what would become of her if Duncan Clegg should come rapping at the door and demand her return. She had signed articles which bound her to him for a given period of time. She had not read the crabbed script carefully and could not remember any of the official jargon. She was determined, however, not to return to Hawkhead farm. Intuitively she knew that his desire for her had not been a weak and impulsive thing but a slow smouldering hunger which her resistance had not extinguished.

The thought of Duncan Clegg upon her, touching her, filled her with loathing. If Lorna and Madge Nicholson had not been there she might have wept at memory of the incident, from fear that she would be callously handed back to Clegg and spoiled for other men, for Craig. Kirsty had learned control, however. It kept her stable during the twenty minutes of breakfast-time. While Lorna went off to pack her dinner into her schoolbag, she occupied herself by sweeping the hearth and filling the brass coal-hod from the pile in the shed by the yard door.

It was a fine dry sort of morning and she wondered if Clegg had, perhaps, decided to plough and to let her take her own time in returning to him. Another kind of man, another kind of farmer, would have done so, for dry spring days were precious and Mr Clegg was far behind in his planting, so far behind that he might again miss the feed crop completely.

When she returned to the kitchen, lugging the upright hod, she found to her surprise that Lorna was not the only one dressed for outdoors. Madge Nicholson too had put on her coat and hat. They were not the sort of garments that Kirsty would have imagined for Bob Nicholson’s wife. They were expensive and fashionable, with a hint of practicality in the choice of material. The tailor-made, windproof garment with its tight-fitting back and pouched front made Madge look years younger. The hat sported a bow of brown velvet and two small artificial roses, one of which was spiked through by the long pin that held it fast to Madge’s hair. She was tugging on a pair of brown kidskin gloves, and seemed to have performed a miracle of transformation in no time at all, as if shedding the worn apron had brought her out like a butterfly from its chrysalis.

‘Are – are you going out, Mrs Nicholson?’ Kirsty, rather stupidly, asked.

‘Shoppin’.’

‘Oh!’

‘Aye, shoppin’.’

It was on the tip of Kirsty’s tongue to enquire what sort of shopping required such elegant attire but she said nothing. She put down the coal-hod by the grate and, for something to do, blew gently along the brass bevels to remove the thin layers of dust that had accumulated there.

‘Will you be here when I get back?’ said Madge Nicholson.

‘If – if that’s all right, aye,’ said Kirsty.

‘I take it you’ll not be goin’ back to Hawkhead?’

‘No, Mrs Nicholson.’

‘Well, there are potatoes in the sack below the kitchen board. They’ll need scrubbed and washed. Enough for six. Can you manage that?’

‘Aye. Is there anything else I can do?’

‘I’ll be back in time to see to the rest. Nobody’s home much before six, except Lorna.’

‘Does Craig not come in for his dinner?’

‘No, he does not.’

‘Will I take him out somethin’?’

‘No, you will not.’ Madge Nicholson held out a hand to her daughter who had been waiting by the door. ‘Keep the fire up, though, if you can be bothered.’

‘I will, Mrs Nicholson,’ Kirsty said.

‘Cheerio, Kirsty.’

‘Cheerio, Lorna.’

And they were gone. And she was alone in the Nicholsons’ house with virtually nothing to do and all day to do it, nothing, that is, except worry about Madge Nicholson’s destination and what tricks the woman intended to employ to be rid of her.

Kirsty had not been deceived. Madge Nicholson had not dressed herself to the nines to visit the provision merchant in Dunnet. She had gone, Kirsty suspected, to the Baird Home to report the situation and lay blame for the occurrence where, in Mrs Nicholson’s opinion, it properly belonged, with the servant and not the master. Kirsty went down the corridor, opened the back door and looked out into the yard. It was tidy enough, not like the dirty pen at Hawkhead with its slops and weeds and dung-spatters. Hens clucked and pecked contentedly about the barn and a dog, locked in one of the long sheds, barked at the unfamiliar smell of her.

Why, she wondered, had she sought refuge here? Why had she not gone straight to Bankhead? In all likelihood Mr Sanderson would have taken her part against Duncan Clegg. It was not too late. She could walk to the Mains in half an hour, tell Mr Sanderson what had happened, throw herself on his mercy and thus spike Mrs Nicholson’s guns. But she could not bring herself to quit Dalnavert, even if it was unsafe. She was bound by the fragile hope that had brought her here, the hope that Craig would protect her, would take her in his arms and keep her safe from harm. She saw now, all too clearly, that a marriage between them would be difficult if not impossible, that Madge Nicholson would fight to keep her son.

Uncertainty and self-pity took hold of Kirsty again. Tears welled in her eyes at the realisation that she might lose him. He was, after all, all that she had in life.

The breaking up of Dalnavert’s old grassland had been undertaken at Mr Sanderson’s suggestion and with his support.

Craig was not shy when it came to hard field work. He had enjoyed the days stolen from the late autumn season and from the winter months when he had harnessed the two big plough horses from Bankhead and made a high cut that had opened up the matted sward to air and weathering. He was no expert with the plough, but he had been guided by his father’s advice as well as Mr Sanderson’s and had assiduously prepared a fine tilth for the seed-bed. But Craig’s mind was not on grassland husbandry or cereal production that morning, or even on the job of fencing that he had set himself to do until the earth warmed enough to begin sowing.

An old dry-stone wall marked the northern boundary of the field. Over the years cattle had rubbed it down in places and the hedges that had been planted in the gaps had been bruised and battered too. Craig’s task was to stretch new wire to make the boundary secure. He had fetched up posts and wire by cart and dug out the post holes one cold day last week. Now he stood the posts into the holes and with a heavy hammer drove them in deep and firm.

The long swinging blows relaxed him. The shaft vibrated in his fists and his muscles stretched and sweat started down his spine. It was beneficial work for a day like today. Being with Kirsty last night had frustrated him and brought out a strain of discontent that had been in him all this year and most of last. He whanged away with the hammer on the stobs, grunting, releasing his sullen anger at the realisation that Clegg, that evil wee tyke from Hawkhead, might have spoiled Kirsty, his Kirsty, and nobody would have been any the wiser.

She was not, strictly speaking, his Kirsty at all. But when he thought of other girls – May Sanderson from the Mains or Helen Mackenzie from the mill at Dunnet, he found that the visions became unpleasant and did not give him the sort of feelings that thinking of Kirsty Barnes engendered. He did not know why every girl he met, even casually, should be instantly compared with her. Being a man was not easy, Craig had come to realise, and he often wished that he might be a young boy again, untroubled by confusions of the blood. Whanging away on a fence post with an iron-headed hammer was one way to cast out devils and Craig worked rapidly from section to section, setting the posts and leaving the stringing of wire until he ran out of stobs or of energy.

By dinner-time, when the sun had grown almost hot, Craig felt better. He had worked up a thirst for the cold tea in his bottle and hunger for the bread and cheese that Mam had packed into his sack. He had come a long way, though, from his jacket. He had skirted full half the field, lugging and planting and hammering, and he walked slowly back around the perimeter with the hammer over his shoulder, thinking, calmly and pleasantly, how good it would be to go home tonight and find Kirsty there, to have her at the supper-table along with folk he cared about and who cared for him.

It surprised him to discover his father seated against the dry-stone wall, tea-bottle uncorked and pipe smoking like a little lum. Bob Nicholson offered the bottle to his son.

‘You could do with a swig o’ this, I fancy.’

The bottle had been in the shadow of the wall all morning and was cold to the fingers, the weak astringent liquid cold on the tongue.

Craig drank, wiped his mouth on the back of his hand. He reached for his jacket and draped it over his shoulders for, now that he had stopped, he realised that the day might be bright but was not warm after all. He studied his father curiously.

‘What might you be doin’ here?’ he asked.

Bob Nicholson shrugged. ‘Visitin’. See how you’re gettin’ on with the fence.’

‘I’m gettin’ on fine with the fence.’

‘Sit yourself down, son.’

Craig did not obey. ‘Have you been at the pub?’

‘Been at the pub? Me!’ Bob said in an injured tone. ‘Hell, I’ve been puttin’ in my hours at Bankhead, tendin’ spring calves.’