by Katie Hutton
‘He shouldn’t see his father without his trousers on!’
‘And that parson didn’t teach me in his chemise! But you’re so much prettier than him—’
‘Stop it, Sam, and tell me what it says here.’
‘Sorry. You distract me, that’s all, when you look down with your head on one side like that, all serious. I do want to learn, Ellen. The reverend helped me more than he knows, and not just with the reading and writing. I want my boy to be proud of me – his little brother too. I want to read to him, not him read to his poor ignorant father. What tales does he like the most?’
‘Of these little books, there’s one where a badger gets the better of a fox – and another one where a kitten is rescued from a pie. I have to read them over and over, and never change a word or he’ll notice.’
‘I wonder what I can do for them. Something I can make with my own hands, and give to them.’
‘We must be careful.’
‘But for how long? How long mun I wait?’
CHAPTER 27
Why unbelieving? Why wilt thou spurn,
Love that so gently pleads thy return?
Primitive Methodist Hymnal no. 252, London, 1887.
Dipty Man
Canterbury
‘Why don’t you go up and say your prayers yourself, Ellen? I want to finish this article for the Review tonight but I don’t want to keep you up.’
‘All right, Harold. Goodnight, then, but don’t tire yourself out.’
Harold’s papers lay strewn across the table. His Bible lay open on top of them, but the cap of his fountain pen was firmly screwed on. The article was already written and sealed in its envelope. He thought of going out to post it but couldn’t summon up the energy. Always prudent, he stood up and dimmed the gas, then reached for the oil lamp and turned down the wick, and sat in silence and near darkness. That little train the boys had been playing with, hand-carved and cheerfully painted, was more beautiful than any toy he had ever possessed as a child.
‘Where did this come from, then?’ he’d heard himself asking. His own son, his David, had looked up smiling with his mother’s eyes and said, ‘The nice dipty man.’
‘Dipty?’ repeated Harold, as a cold hand reached round and squeezed his heart.
‘He means Gypsy, Father,’ said Tom. ‘Mother got it from a Gypsy that came up to her in the park. He said we were fine boys.’
‘And so you are,’ croaked Harold.
‘What’s the matter? You look all funny.’
‘Oh, I’m all right. Just tired. You go on with your game.’
*
In the back room of the Cricketers, Walter lifted Sam’s empty glass and said, ‘Another one?’
‘If you will too, Wattie, then thank you.’
They knew Walter in this pub. Sam watched the confident roll of Judith’s young man’s shoulders as he went to the hatch to refill their glasses, and felt his sense of adventure at being part of their subterfuge. Walter, in his own way as forthright as Judy, had wanted to know was Sam ‘all right’. Having decided pretty quickly that he was, he’d declared with clumsy frankness that: ‘You might be a gippo, but as far as I can see, you’re a pretty straight sort of fellow’, and the conversation had turned to horse-racing. Three pints later, and Walter had become more confiding, declaring his intention to marry Judith if he could.
‘Well, what does she say about it?’ asked Sam.
‘I can’t say as I’ve ezackly arst her yet. I need to find the right moment, you see. She’s a bit of a handful,’ he said, a proud smile breaking over his face. ‘You’d not be sure she wouldn’t cuff you or laugh at you if the idea didn’t please her. But I’ve never met anyone I liked even half as much.’
‘Just ask her. Be grateful you have that chance.’
Walter raised his eyebrows. ‘Gor, sorry, Sam. I’m forgetting . . . Truth is,’ and he leaned in and lowered his voice to give his story greater importance, ‘I did get mixed up with a married woman a couple of years ago – husband a commercial traveller. Thought I was on to a good deal there! Then I found she was just getting me to tag along of her to annoy some other fellow she had her eyes on. A bit different for you, though, with your kiddie and all.’
Sam flushed. But I want the world to know Tom’s mine!
‘I’m married too,’ he muttered into his glass.
‘Blimey! You’re quite the sheikh, ain’t you?’
Sam looked up sharply, but faced with Walter’s open, somewhat befuddled face, it was impossible to be angry. If any other man had said this to him, Sam would have got up and left in order not to take a swing at him, but Walter was so artless in his manner, admiring, almost, that he could only smile back, feeling himself to be much older. Judy’s man was a well-meaning, not very perceptive gaujo, but Sam saw him with absolute clarity, in this same pub, surrounded by his work companions, waving his glass about and saying, ‘You say that about the gippos, but I’ll have you know that a good friend of mine is one and he’s as honest as they come – trust him with my last shilling, I would.’ Walter might not question any of the assumptions of his upbringing, but would be loyal in defending a friend, whoever he was.
Sam said, ‘No, for me there’s only Ellen now.’
*
Laying his papers down on the table, for he couldn’t concentrate, Harold dimmed the oil lamp and went at his problem again, as if picking a scab until it hurt. Maybe it wasn’t him. Wasn’t there a whole encampment of Gypsies out by Thanington? No doubt Ellen had bought the toy from a hawker and hadn’t wanted to say anything because she knew he thought the boys already had too many things. Heavens, she can buy them as many toys as she wants – she’s a careful enough housekeeper, after all – anything but accept gifts from that man! What if it was him? Anger bubbled up in Harold and displaced his fear. Surely she was not in danger from someone who had treated her so badly? But doubt crept back; Harold turned up the oil lamp again and pulled the heavy Bible towards him. Where was that terrible passage? Ah yes, here . . .
And a man lie with her carnally, and it be hid from the eyes of her husband . . . and the spirit of jealousy come upon him . . . then shall the man bring his wife unto the priest . . . and of the dust that is in the floor of the tabernacle the priest shall take, and put it into the water . . . the bitter water that causeth the curse . . . and say unto the woman . . . if some man have lain with thee beside thine husband . . . this water that causeth the curse shall go into thy bowels, to make thy belly to swell, and thy thigh to rot . . .
Harold wept. If only there was some bitter water that could ease my mind or tell me she makes a fool of me.
Ever since his conversion, as a seventeen-year-old at a camp meeting, he had found in scripture both comfort and guidance, and had marvelled at the way that there was always something in that book to guide him with any challenge or trial. He’d said so always to those who came to him for advice, and his knowledge of where to look had impressed in ways his preaching had sometimes failed to do. But there was no comfort in his agony now, only the confirmation that there had been husbands before him who had faced this terrible dilemma. If I denounce her, I must put her aside. If only there was something else that she could drink that would make her love me . . . He put his head in his hands and a distant memory swam up before him. He was a boy at a village fair, in love with the colour and noise. He preached against the dangers of such events now, though much of what he remembered was quite harmless: prizes for the biggest vegetable, or for guessing the number of stitches in an enormous knitted golly-wog . . . apple-bobbing, coconut shies, the vicar greeting people in the sunshine. Yet he had also found the Morris dancers sinister, the fool, the blackface, the raggy men. And whilst other children had laughed, he had covered his eyes when Punch beat Judy to death. A group of older girls had been clustered round a tent advertising fortunes, egging each other on to go inside. Harold had stood there fascinated when an old Gypsy woman had come out, fa
ntastically dressed in an old plaid skirt and a Paisley shawl, a wide-brimmed hat groaning with artificial flowers crowning her grey curly hair. She had spotted him staring and called out to him: ‘Want a love potion, dearie, to make one of them pretty ladies thine?’ He had run off with the laughter of those girls stinging his ears.
Harold groaned. He would say his prayers now rather than upstairs in the bedroom where Ellen was, and put the matter in God’s hands. He kneeled, and with the well-tried words, sought safe harbour from the storm. Eventually he rose to his feet and went reluctantly upstairs. From the regularity of her breathing, he knew that Ellen was already asleep. Her soft breath sounded so innocent. Perhaps, he thought, with a little joyous spurt of hope, perhaps she was completely blameless, and there was some harmless explanation for the presence of the wooden toy.
He lay some minutes, bathed briefly in relief, sending silent thanks heavenward. Then he turned on his side, and gently patted her sleeping shoulder. Ellen made a low, indistinct sound, and rolling towards him, embraced him, fitting her body to his. She slept on whilst Harold lay stiff with despair. Never had she held him in that way. He eased her sleeping arm away and turned his back, mouthing silently into the darkness, ‘Let the day perish wherein I was born, and the night in which it was said, There is a man child conceived,’ but like Job, he refused to curse his God.
CHAPTER 28
What makes you leave your house and land?
What makes you leave your money, O?
What makes you leave your new wedded lord,
To go with the wraggle taggle Gypsies, O?
Traditional
Hosea
In the narrow scullery Ellen clinked the crockery onto the tray with as little noise as possible. She could see Harold through the doorway, staring at the open Bible. He was preparing for preaching that coming Sunday. There would likely be no more than the usual congregation, she thought sadly, for though Harold’s sermons were diligently prepared, perceptive and thoughtful, he couldn’t compete with the fire of the famed circuit preachers. The fare would be plain, ungarnished, but she would do her best to listen attentively.
Why was he so still? Normally he attacked his sermons briskly, with much lifting of pages, running his finger down concordances, muttering the quotes he would use under his breath. Now he seemed transfixed by what he saw on the page. She was not close enough to see whether his eyes moved. The boys played quietly on the rag-rug with the wooden train. They would have preferred to run it smoothly across the linoleum where it could get up speed, as they did when Harold was out, but were obedient to the command to be respectful of their father’s work. She lifted the tea-tray. He looked up at her, stricken, but asked her an apparently harmless question.
‘Um . . . is Judith at the temperance meeting still?’
‘So far as I know.’
Harold stared at her.
‘She isn’t, is she? You both deceive me. Do you think I don’t know, Ellen?’
The tray shook in her hands, the willow-pattern crockery shivering. She put it down, but could not look at him. He went on quietly.
‘I am an unimaginative man. I don’t know how to show what I feel, but do not assume that I do not feel. Do not assume that I cannot be hurt, humiliated. And never think that I do not love you.’
This was the worst of all. Had he raged at her, thrown the tea-tray against the wall, struck her, even that might have been better.
‘I should ask your forgiveness, Ellen.’
‘You? ’
‘Keep your voice down. Next door has ears.’
‘Let us eat something if we can, Harold. Then let me put the boys to bed.’
‘Did you think your children didn’t know? Were you bribing them to secrecy? Their understanding isn’t perfect, but I found out because of them. I said I should ask your forgiveness, and it’s true. Nobody like me should have aspired to one such as you, Ellen. I took advantage of your situation. I took advantage of you in my own way as much as that Gypsy did . . . knowing that you really didn’t have much of a choice. You thought I was proud of what I’d done, for looking saintly in the eyes of our brethren – don’t deny it, I’ve always known it, always seen your resentment, and yes, I was proud. Walking out of the chapel with you on my arm was the happiest moment of my life – more than when I married poor Millie. And you were honest with me. You told me you didn’t love me, but you were grateful to me. I thought we could start from there, and make something of it all, if I watched over you, and that we would do good work for the Lord together, that in time all His gifts would be granted to us. Then David came, and I thought we might both be content at last. I did believe that, Ellen. You took me for a hypocrite. You told me as much, and I was guilty of that, I admit, in that business with Ellis, but the reality is much simpler than that. I love you, Ellen. I’d always admired you from afar, but the seed of love was planted when your grandfather came to me weeping—’
‘He never wept!’
‘He did then, believe me. I saw my chance – I thought – and I took it. I don’t know as I should do any different, even now, knowing that you have loved that man all this time and you see him again whenever you can. I’m sure you don’t manage your meetings without the help or the connivance of my own daughter – I am betrayed and made a fool of on all sides. I don’t know which way to turn. I even ask myself was it the workings of Providence that brought him and you together.’
Then Harold’s poor jowly face worked, creased and gave up the battle. He put his head in his hands and wept. The two little boys looked up, puzzled. Ellen tentatively patted his shoulder. It was like trying to comfort a stranger, someone she barely knew.
‘Ellen!’ He spoke into the cup of his hands. ‘I must speak to him. Arrange it, will you?’
The fork in the road was reached at last.
CHAPTER 29
Rejoice for a brother deceased,
Our loss is his infinite gain;
A soul out of prison released,
And freed from its bodily chain.
Primitive Methodist Hymnal no. 973.
Denne’s Mill
‘Judy! Wake up!’
‘What’s the matter, Ellen?’
‘Harold hasn’t come home.’
‘What time is it?’
‘Gone midnight.’
Judith sat up in bed. ‘So he has been out three hours. They could still be talking. Or maybe he’s gone for a walk.’
‘In that rain? I want to go and look for him. I’m frightened.’
‘I’ll come with you then. Just let me get dressed.’
‘We can’t leave the children alone, Judy.’
‘I’ll get next door in.’
‘At this hour? I don’t want to make a fuss—’
‘Oh Ellen, you never have, and look where it’s got you! There’ll be no fuss. Mrs Clerk hasn’t a job to go to in the morning and she’ll get a bit of excitement from it. Maybe Pa has got into trouble at last – breach of the peace by night-time preaching or something.’
‘Oh please don’t joke now, Judy! He went to see Sam!’
‘Oh, Gor! Look, Ellen, I’m getting my clothes on. I’ll get old Clerk organised. Go out the front door meanwhile and see if you can’t see him coming along the road. Take the gamp. Did you never get ready for bed then?’
‘How could I?’
*
‘So where are we going, Ellen?’
‘The bridge at Denne’s Mill.’
‘It’s a funny thing being out at this hour.’
‘I don’t care for it, Judy! I wish there were more constables about.’
‘Well, you’re in luck. Who do you think that is coming along there with the torch? I don’t like the way he’s shining it right at us, though, up and down like that – what’s the matter with him?’
‘Ssh! Judy, he’ll hear you!’
‘In this downpour? He’s got a river running off that cape of his.’
‘Right, you two – stop there!’
called the policeman. ‘You look like you’re new round here. A bit wet for business, isn’t it?’
‘Will you stop shining that into my eyes!’
‘Judy! ’
‘What, no paint? No geegaws?’ the man exclaimed.
‘Constable, could you help us please . . .’
The policeman shone his torch briefly under Ellen’s umbrella, dazzling her. Then his manner changed abruptly.
‘I do beg pardon, ladies – it is rather late. I’d see you home myself only there’s been an incident back there. Don’t suppose you’ve seen anyone acting suspiciously, running but not trying to get out of the rain, for instance?’
Ellen caught Judy’s arm.
‘I’m looking for my husband – this is my stepdaughter – he went to meet someone by Denne’s Mill, and he’s not come home.’
‘There’s no easy way for me to say this, ladies, but they’ve just pulled a man from the mill race. I think you’d best come with me. We’ll need to get a description of your husband – no point putting you through an unpleasant experience unless it’s absolutely necessary.’
He looked directly into Ellen’s ashen face.
‘Identifying the deceased, I mean. If it’s not him, nor the man he went to meet, then we’ll at least have the description of your husband if we’re to look for him.’
‘Deceased?’ whispered Ellen. She’d been clinging to the idea that a drowning man had been saved. But which of them was dead?
*
Half an hour later, having refused the small brandy the kindly desk sergeant offered her, Ellen tried to give a description of Harold Chown.
‘It’s hard to say what he looks like, really. He’s quite . . . ordinary.’
‘Start with his age, then.’
‘Fifty-six.’
‘How tall?’
‘Oh, about middling.’
‘Well, if Ernest and I stand up here, who is he closer in height to?’
‘Maybe a little less than Ernest, sir.’
‘Hair colour?’
‘Grey.’