The Spuddy (2 page)

Back in her own kitchen Marie tried to make up her mind whether or not she was going to approach one of the skippers to dispose of the Spuddy. If she just left him and if what Effie had predicted were true then he would end up in the sea anyway. But at least, she told herself, when that happened she wouldn't be there and so have to feel guilty about getting rid of Joe's dog. In the end she decided to leave the Spuddy. She reckoned Effie was right about her being too soft-hearted.

The furniture van had left. The hire car that was to take her on the first stage of her journey had arrived. Marie settled herself in beside the driver, telling him she wished him to get away as quickly as possible and giving an explanatory nod towards the Spuddy who was hovering around as if awaiting the invitation to join her. As the car drew away from the kerb Marie turned to wave to the neighbours who had gathered to see her off. The car reached the end of the street and turned into the main road. The Spuddy stood watching it until it disappeared and sensing the finality of his rejection made no whimper of entreaty or protest. After a few minutes he climbed to the top step of the empty house and lay down, staring along the street, his mixed tobacco brown eyes shadowed with the fatalistic acceptance of his plight. The neighbours lingered gossiping for a while before returning to their own homes. The street became quiet save for the mocking echoes of gull cries carried in by a sea wind. With a sigh the Spuddy's head sank down on to his outstretched paws but his eyes stayed wide and reflective, like those of a man meditating over future plans.

When his son was six weeks old skipper Jake's wife announced that she must take the baby home to show him off to her family. ‘Home' to Jeannie was the home of her parents, a croft in the outer islands. The home Jake provided for her she always referred to as ‘the house'. Jake accepted her announcement impassively. Jeannie was forever making excuses to visit home. Either her father or her mother was ailing and needed her or there was to be a wedding in the family or a relative had just had a baby. In fact Jeannie's relatives made so many demands on her time that in the three years since she had married him Jake doubted if she had spent more than six months with him. It hurt him that she wanted to be away from him so much of the time and he had hoped that when the baby was born she would become more attached, if not to himself, then to the home he worked so hard to give her.

As he came through from the scullery into the kitchen where Jeannie was ironing he was pressing a towel against his newly shaven cheeks and only his eyes betrayed his unhappiness. There were times when Jake thought he ought to put his foot down about Jeannie's frequent absences but he knew in his heart he never would. She was so fair and young and slight and he was so big and swarthy and had such an intimidatingly gruff voice that he was fearful of appearing a bully in her eyes. So he erred on the side of over-indulgence, giving her everything she asked for and never complaining of her lack of interest in him.

‘Is the baby old enough to travel?' he asked, trying so hard to keep his voice gentle that it sounded almost meek.

‘Surely,' returned Jeannie as she guided the iron over the sleeves of a tiny jacket.

‘It's just that I've heard folks hereabouts sayin' a baby's not strong enough to take the fresh air until it's six months old,' he persisted, the gruffness edging back into his voice. ‘D'you not believe in that yourself?'

Jeannie tossed her head. ‘Indeed I believed that when I was younger because that's what the old folks say. Now the nurse says the baby's ready to take fresh air after about two weeks. After all,' she added, ‘it isn't as if it's the winter time yet.'

Jake went over to the cot in the corner of the kitchen and lifting the coverlet gazed down at his sleeping son. His sad, tight mouth relaxed into a tender smile. Was he going to see as little of his son as he did of his wife, he wondered bitterly and looked across at Jeannie who with her back to him was still ironing. She had once seemed so shy and desirable with her clear smooth skin and glossy hair but soon after they married he noticed her shyness had given way to an almost vixen-like quality and though her complexion and hair remained as attractive as ever he rarely saw her other than as she was now in carpet slippers and overall with her hair confined in a structure of steel curlers. He let himself wish that she would dress herself up for him when he came home at weekends. But she never did. When he went away to sea on Monday mornings her hair was in curlers and when he came home on Friday nights it was still in curlers. For only about two hours on a Sunday was her hair unconfined and then, because she was going to church, it was hidden under her hat. However, this was not all that disturbed him, for it seemed that she found an awful lot of housework to do at weekends when he was at home and while he admitted it was nice to know he had a clean shining home he would have preferred it to be a place where he could relax and rest his body from the constant swing of the sea: a place where he would be greeted by a neatly dressed wife prepared to share with him the comfort of their own fireside with perhaps later a few of the neighbours dropping in for a wee dram and a ‘wee crack' and a discussion of the week's fishing. Like most fishermen he had a strong streak of romanticism and when he was first married he had dreamed of the weekend respites from the discomfort of the boat: of returning and opening the door of his welcoming home to call ‘I'm back, Jeannie!'; of finding her in his arms; of lifting her up and carrying her to the kitchen. But even before he had touched her she had seen the eagerness in his eyes and had evaded him. ‘She didn't like that sort of thing,' she had rebuffed him. ‘It was soft.' Now at weekends he returned either to a listless greeting and the bustle of housework; the moving of furniture that she was unable to move by herself; the careful treading over newspapers that covered the constantly washed floors, or else too frequently he returned to a house that was clean and shining but was cold and empty and there would be a note on the table saying: ‘Have gone home – mother not keeping well'. At first she had stayed away only two or three weeks at a time but then her absences grew to months and he realised that except for financial support there was little else she wanted from him. He wondered if she wanted what any man could give her since island girls had a reputation for making their first duty the wellbeing of their parents. No matter what other commitments a woman might have she had from childhood been so indoctrinated with the belief that her loyalty was to her parents and to the homestead where she herself had been born and reared that she cleaved more naturally to them than to her husband.

Gently Jake replaced the coverlet over his son. He cleared his throat. ‘I'd like to see a fair bit of the boy, Jeannie' he said.

‘And when would you see him anyway?' Jeannie taunted. ‘With you away at the fishing all week it's precious little you see of your own house let alone your son.'

‘But Jeannie!' he expostulated. ‘I've to earn money for us, haven't I? An' how else would I do it except for the fishin'?' He knew just how much money he had to earn to keep up with Jeannie's whims. She tired of things so quickly, forever demanding change and he reckoned they had bought enough to furnish three homes in the time they had been married. Only he knew how he hated to have to call out his crew in weather that made other skippers comment: ‘It's only greed or need that would make a man go out to sea on a day like this.'

Jeannie shrugged. ‘Well, what sort of a life d'you think it is for me here all by myself with a man only coming home at weekends and him only wanting his bed then.'

‘But the other wives are the same,' he pointed out. ‘A fisherman's wife knows what to expect before she marries him.'

‘Well, I can't help it if I like company,' she retorted. ‘It's what I'm used to.'

‘Can you not make friends with the other women?' he asked. ‘They'd be company for you.'

‘Ach, they're that proud,' she said defensively. ‘They're not my own folk.'

‘Aye, right enough they're not,' said Jake resignedly. ‘But all the same I'm sayin' I'd like to see my son growin' up and there'll not be much chance for me to do that if you have him away at your parents as much as you have been yourself. I'm askin' you not to stay away so long.'

‘That'll depend on how my father's keeping.' Jeannie's voice sparked at him like sticks on a newly lit fire. ‘He wasn't keeping so well in my mother's last letter,' she added. She thumped the iron down and started to gather up the pile of clothes.

Jake looked at her, dismayed as always by her apparent renunciation of him but he was too proud and thought of himself as being too inarticulate to plead with her further. He opened a cupboard and took out some tools.

‘Which is the shelf you say you want fixin'?' he asked her in a tired voice.

While Marie Glenn was speeding away from Gaymal another car was speeding towards the village. In this car there were again only two occupants, the driver himself and sitting beside him a boy of about eight years old who stared out at the passing landscape with wide inscrutable eyes. The boy's name was Andy but he could not have told anyone that for though he was a good looking boy, well grown and sturdy with curly fair hair and large eyes the colour of fresh cut peat, he was completely dumb. When people first saw Andy they tended to exclaim admiringly: ‘That's a grand looking boy!' but when they realised he could not speak they would add: ‘Ach, the poor thing's a dummy!' And Andy, whose hearing was at least as good as theirs, winced at their pity as if it had been abuse. From the time he had been able to understand the speech of adults and had thus become aware of his own affliction he had begun to feel excluded even from his own parents. His father was in the merchant navy and was away for long periods leaving Andy and his mother on their own. But their being together had not resulted in togetherness for once Andy had outgrown the toddler stage, ceasing for her to be an absorbing interest, she had become withdrawn. Not that she displayed any lack of affection towards the boy. On the contrary she was at times demonstrative. She had even spared the time to teach him to write his name and had encouraged his love of drawing, buying vast quantities of paper and crayons to keep him occupied. But when she was not being demonstrative she appeared indifferent, even a little resentful towards him and as he grew older Andy sensed that his muteness embarrassed her. He thought he understood. She was a vivacious woman liking the company of the many friends who called while leaving Andy to sit quietly in a corner of the room drawing the boats he loved. As he listened to the lively chatter and banter and thought how much prettier his mother was than all the other women he wondered if like him she was wishing, deep down, that his father's leave would soon be due and they could all three be together. But there came a time when, Andy noticed, the number of friends being entertained dwindled until there were only two or three and finally one, a man, and when he came his mother insisted on Andy going to bed.

When the telegram arrived announcing his father's imminent arrival, instead of grabbing Andy's arms and exuberantly dancing him around the room his mother rushed upstairs and began packing suitcases. Coming down again she said in reply to Andy's look of bewilderment: ‘I'm going away for a bit.' Her voice was strained. She gave him no further explanation but told him not to go out until his father arrived, and added that there was a cold lunch prepared for them both in the larder. Then she put an envelope beside the clock on the mantelpiece. ‘See your father reads that when he comes,' she told him. She was frowning in an abstracted way and her eyes were bright. As she moved past him Andy put a hand on her arm and looked at her imploringly. ‘I can't stay, Andy,' she said in a tight voice. ‘It's no good. I just can't stay.' His hand slid down to his side. ‘Be a good boy,' she said, giving him a quick hug. The door closed behind her and she was running down the garden path and out to the car where a man was waiting. She did not glance back or wave at her son who stood forlornly holding aside the curtain watching his mother go.