by Leah Fleming
He looked down, poking among the seaweed. ‘Have you got a golden necklace?’
‘No, but my mother had a lovely one made from polished pebbles all the colours of the rainbow: amethyst, amber, quartz, turquoise, all linked together with a golden chain. Father bought it for her on their wedding day.’
‘Do you wear it?’
‘No, Peg has it.’
‘Why? I’ve never seen it but I’ll ask her to show it to us,’ said Gus, burying the helmet in the sand.
‘No, Gus, I’d rather you didn’t.’ He could tell by her pursed lips that he was not going to be told why but it was worth another question.
‘Jamie Paterson telt me that you’re no my real auntie. Are you ma big sister then?’
Netta shrugged her shoulders. ‘Something like that but I like being called Auntie
Sometimes it was hard to understand who anyone was. This auntie kept coming back to Galloway, taking him on trips, telling him all about people in the brown photographs until he fell asleep with her chunnering. Mam sniffed a lot when she arrived and plumped up the cushions just as she did when the Minister called after church and she had to hide the Sunday Post out of sight quickly. But Carrick Shore was their special picnic spot and Gus liked his auntie’s company sometimes. No one else would play French cricket with a piece of driftwood or spot oyster catchers, rock pipits, seagulls and bobbing sand birds for his I Spy Club.
As the afternoon wore on the sky darkened and an anvil of heavy cloud over the bay threatened an outburst. It was time to turn back eastwards again to Brigg Farm, home for evening milking. He wished he had a proper bicycle not a trike. Trikes were for babies and the wheels kept sticking in the gritty tracks, making his legs tired.
*
This picnic outing marked the turning point of each visit. The days would run quickly downhill after that. Netta watched Gus bending over his collection of shells and thought of herself at that age on the same shoreline, watching her mother painting, her wispy red hair fading outwards at the sides, hunched over her sketching or looking up to capture the brightness of the beautiful scene.
Griseley seemed so far away, with its dark stone dykes and tall chimneys, sooty mills amongst grey fells where time dragged. While in Yorkshire she yearned for this place. Now, her time here was ebbing fast, this rationed time. Netta remembered that she was here for a purpose.
It was time to make demands again. She must not go back to Yorkshire empty-handed this time. Don’t forget your New Year’s resolution. You can do it! was the vow she had made to herself a week ago. Now there were only a few days left to execute the mission but courage was failing her as it always did.
*
The next day it poured down, heavy driving rain blown in from the sea lashing the grey walls of the farmhouse. Netta made herself useful mending Gus’s torn trews and fixing buttons to his shirts. She could relax if there was a thimble on her finger and a needle in her hand. Peg was baking in the kitchen, listening to the wireless, not in a talking mood. Counting the days, no doubt, until this visit ended. Gus had gone to play at his friend’s farm, out of their hair.
Netta took the mending basket into the cool parlour with its dark treacle-coloured paintwork, black oak furniture and heavy moss green velvet drapes at the window. The china cabinet gleamed with china cups and saucers, souvenirs from Musselburgh and Largo Bay. On the walls were sepia portraits of the Nichols family in suits and black bombazine dresses with white mutches – stern, forbidding ancestors who had frightened her as a child. There was the smell of old soot and damp and disapproval in this room. She spotted two of Grandpa John Kirkpatrick’s watercolours of Kirkcudbright harbour and the Toll Booth. The two fishing boat sketches that had always hung close by were gone but she could see faint marks on the distemper where they’d left their mark. His paintings were becoming sought after. He’d been a colleague of Hornel and Jessie King and the other famous Kirkcudbright painters.
Stepping back into the parlour was like stepping back a hundred years. Nothing much had changed but the drawers of the cupboard were neatly tidied out, lined with fresh copies of the Galloway News. As she rooted round to find the old photograph albums she fished out sepia postcard scenes, rosette prizes from cattle shows, Sunday school attendance tokens. Nothing of interest to her here. Her world had turned and left this Stratharvar way of life far behind many years ago.
The first album was in the bottom cupboard: a heavy leather-bound book with a stiff gold clasp, full of yet more ancient Nichols posed in their finery, sturdy Galloway farmers with handsome faces. A smaller album was full of Peg’s old family photos: Peg MacBain, her stepmother, as a young girl in uniform, stiff and starchy even then. She was after all one of Mother’s distant cousins who’d come to nurse the invalid and stayed on to wed the widower. There was one unframed photograph of Peg and Angus on their wedding day outside the parish kirk porch, looking awkward in the sunlight. The photo was pristine, still in its cream folder with tissue paper lining. There was a blue leather album of Gus in his toddler days and Netta closed that quickly. Where was her picture taken with Mother at Ayr? Where were her own baby days kept? There was only one picture of her, grinning in pigtails; a line-up on the bench outside Stratharvar School when she was nine before Peg came and her world changed forever.
All that sixth day indignation rankled in Netta’s mind. Eventually she sought out Angus with a mug of tea as he was tidying up in the byre.
‘I was looking for a snapshot of myself when I was a bairn to show Gus and yon one of Mother to take back to Griseley with me. Where would I be finding them?’ Angus paused, looking at her square on with his blue eyes.
‘Don’t be asking me then, it’s Mother’s stuff. What’s brought this on, Netta?’ he replied.
‘Nothing, only it’s about time I took some more snaps back with me to put on my own mantelpiece. Tell me where to look?’
‘That’s Peg’s department, she had a clear out a while back. She did say the drawers needed sifting through. She’s awful sensitive on that score. Best not to bother her with it. I’m sure they’re put away safe somewhere.’ Angus slurped his tea quickly and returned to his job, not looking at his daughter.
Why did she always have to tiptoe around her own home on eggshells in case she cracked the fragile veneer of welcome? Why did she have to behave like a visitor or a prisoner on parole? All she was asking for was some blessed snapshots, but Netta could feel her heart thudding at the thought of facing Peg with the real demands of her mission. It felt like asking for the Crown Jewels. Why did her courage always fail her at the last? Was it because all her past was shut away in some press, out of sight in a neat box labelled: DO NOT OPEN?
Early on Friday Morning
Netta woke with a start from a dream. Mother was still drifting away from her, far out to sea on a boat, bobbing on the waves while she was left alone on the shore, trying to keep the misty figure in sight. Netta stumbled out of bed half asleep, fumbling for the light, crying out as she stubbed her toe. Why were there always these same dreams, yearnings for the sound of beloved voices and shapes? This dawn half-light promised only shadows and echoes, silhouettes on the wall made by lamplight. She felt as small as in that school snapshot, a child again in a Fair Isle jumper and tartan kilt.
One morning Netta had gone to school in sunshine, rushed out of the door to catch the school charabanc which stopped for her at the end of the track and returned home to only tears, silence and darkness. Mother was asleep on the bed, cold and different. ‘Say goodbye to your mammy, hen,’ urged Peg MacBain gently, but Netta turned away in disgust. ‘That’s no my mammy!’ she cried, rushing down the stairs and into the darkness. The sky was flushed with autumn constellations and she had searched in vain for a shooting star to wish her mother back home again.
The world was painted in such different colours then, when Mother was alive, Netta thought as she sat on the bed. Mother was the smell of treacle scones and honeycomb, warm butter and currant spices; the smel
l of all the colours of the rainbow in her artist’s palette. Yet how quickly all those familiar colours and smells had faded when she’d passed away. Mother had been one of the only good and certain things in Netta’s life. It was she who’d first said that the rainbow in the Galloway sky was really the handle of God’s basket, carrying the whole world safely through storms and tempests. Mother had said it was made of silken threads. Father had roared in disbelief: ‘Come, Jeanie, don’t fill the bairn’s head with the jewels of untruth. It’s stuffed with enough nonsense as it is.’ Mother just looked up from her sewing and smiled so sweetly.
‘What’s the world without colour, Angus Nichol? Why, the very ark of the rainbow is in the child – the sunset in her hair, the sea-shifts blue and green in her eyes, the sand and pebbles dust her cheeks. Is she not a very rainbow of God’s mercy?’ Her loving words made Netta’s red hair and freckles just about bearable.
‘She pleases the eye, as well you ken, but it’s the colour of her heart which will be the making of her. Rainbows are nothing but tricks o’ light on water and there’s no ark without tears, Jeanie.’
So the heavens darkened and the light went out of her world when Mother was taken away in that wooden casket and put in the cold earth. It was hard even now to think of that sad time, all dressed in black and grey.
There was so little left to remind her once Peg got her thick ankles under the table at Brigg Farm. Father looked sad and his moustache drooped above a clown’s downcurved mouth. He worked all day in the fields with his men and came home silent. Netta knew that he never looked at his daughter again without wincing for she was the image of his loss.
How quickly Mother’s things were cleared away from Netta’s loving touch: her tortoiseshell hairbrushes and combs, the silver-topped bottles, the bangles and beadwork purse and that special necklace. Her clothes were packed away and the cupboard rattled with empty hangers on the rod. Each time Netta came home from school there were further changes. Peg MacBain did not go back to Kilmarnock but stood at the range dishing out meals and clean laundry, feeding the hens and polishing the dark oak. Soon the smells of home became Peg’s own peculiar sour smells, of meat pie and scouring powder. Her smalls hung over the pulley to dry. Netta wished she would disappear. Peg loomed over her childhood like a dark shadow, black hair peppered with oatmeal, pinafore floury and greasy over her heavy bust and rounded belly. Netta always thought of her as a plain clothes and porridge sort of woman.
Angus Nichol changed with her staying. Netta saw that he could look at Peg now without wincing and they shared little jokes. Netta was too young then to recognise the signals but she sensed a strange dark smell of a different spice in the air.
All these thoughts raced through her head again as she dressed quickly and made for the narrow staircase up to the loft with her lamp. She must not leave empty-handed again, without her photographs and everything else that belonged to her.
*
‘Who is that up in the loft?’ Peg stirred from her sleep. Angus chuntered and snuffled but did not move. Until that buzzer in his head woke him for the milking he was dead to the world. Peg could hear footsteps above. Surely Gus was not awake at this hour? It must be Netta rooting through the cases. Angus had said she was on about photographs. Let her search, there was nothing up there of interest. The sooner that young woman was on her way back south to England the better. Her visits had to be endured, but her coming brought Peg out in itchy bumps. Like the proverbial bad penny she rolled up each summer with her fancy presents and now swanking a borrowed motor car. They were not fooled for one minute by all her dainty clothes and eagerness to please. Netta was only a jumped up seamstress for all her big ideas, making fancy gowns for women with more money than sense. It was about time the girl faced the truth and settled down to her life in England.
Netta was far too like Jeanie Kirkpatrick for Peg’s comfort: the same red-gold hair and tall graceful figure. ‘A race horse out of a stable of nags,’ Angus had laughed, describing Peg’s second cousin. He was proud of his beautiful wife and pretty daughter which made Peg all too aware of her own dumpy figure, the dark brows which almost met over the bridge of her nose and double chin. Peg had learned early that plainness was her lot but that didn’t make her useless and fragile like poor Jeanie who, for all her beauty, was weak in her chest. Peg had proved to be the sturdier of the two, a reliable workhorse. She had been glad enough to escape the drudgery of life in Kilmarnock even if it was only exchanging one kitchen sink for another, and that isolated down a track two miles from Stratharvar, the nearest village.
No one could ever fault Peg’s housekeeping. You could see your face in her polished surfaces and her thrift in the darned heels of Angus’s stockings. She kept hens and ducks, helped with the cheese making, scoured the dairy and kept bees. Each Sunday she warmed the pew in the parish kirk and was a stalwart of the Ladies’ Guild. Had she not answered the call of war duty by taking in evacuees from Glasgow? What she had been called to do in the name of mercy was above the call of Christian duty. And was it not she who kept all those toerags up to scratch with moral lectures, meals and motions? Peg firmly believed in regular bowel movements as the key to health and happiness: Beecham’s Pills, Syrup of Figs, Sennacot tablets… she was a martyr to them all.
What was that stampeding above her head, enough to wake the dead? She would have to rise and give that girl a piece of her mind, disturbing them at this hour! There was no making any sense of Netta. What a disappointment to her father she had proved; a thorn in their flesh right from the start. After all they had done for her, still she kept wanting more.
Peg spied her photograph in its silver frame on the windowsill. The child had spoiled that portrait with her scowl. Resentment still festered like a pimple on the chin. Netta had even spoiled their wedding day, the minx, with all that business with they beads! How would Peg ever forget the scene?
September 1937
Peg ordered the party dress from Wee Alec Kerr, the travelling outfitter, from their Children: From Cradle to Young Miss Galloway catalogue. It was to be Peg’s own special surprise for Netta to soften the blow when she told her the news. Peg had even collected the outfit from the store herself, packaged it in brown paper and left it on the table for the girl to find after school.
‘What’s this? It’s no my birthday…’
‘It’s for you, a braw new frock for the wedding.’ Peg straightened herself, waiting for the blast.
‘What wedding is this then?’ Netta fixed her piercing blue-green eyes on Peg in disbelief. ‘You’re no marrying my pa, are you?’ She rummaged through the packaging and took out the turquoise taffeta frock with its puff sleeves and stiffened underskirt, flinging it across the floor. ‘I’m not wearing that!’
‘You’ll do as you’re told, you ungrateful lassie! I declare tae God I’m no having you turn up at ma wedding in black mourning. Pick it up at once! It’s been ordered especially. Think yourself lucky. Many a wee lassie would think herself Princess Elizabeth in yon bonny goon. Try it on, I chose the shade to go with yer hair.’
‘You’re no my mammy and you cannae make me!’ Netta picked the frock off the floor as if it was a duster and flung it on the kitchen table. ‘I’m no going to yer rotten wedding! Who said you could marry my pa? He’s married already.’
‘Aye, but your mammy’s away to live with Jesus, God rest her soul, in a far better place out of all her earthly suffering. Yer faither needs a woman about the house and since I’ve been doing this job for months, we decided it was aboot time we settled things properly afore the tongues of all the Stewartry start to wag. ’
‘You’re never going to be my mammy, I don’t like you,’ answered Netta, mouth pursed tightly in defiance.
‘And I don’t like you much so that’s the truth telt and the devil shamed! We’ll both have to make the best of it.’ Peg stood firm with her arms folded over her bosom.
‘Nobody asked you to come here,’ snapped Netta, trying to fix her gaze out of t
he window and in the yard.
‘As a matter of record, young lady, as I recall my second cousin Jeanie Nichol herself begged me to help yous all out when she took to her bed…’
‘We’d’ve managed!’ came the fierce reply.
‘Och, aye! I didna see you soiling yer fingers in the byre or at the sink.’
‘I do the hens.’
‘And the hen money has brought you this fine dress to be my flower girl. You ought to be grateful I’m asking you. Look, this has real smocking on the bodice. I’ll treat you to some sandals with straps and long white socks…’ Peg could see the child wavering. Wee Alec had chosen well for her but Netta didn’t want to give Peg the satisfaction of acknowledging it. ‘It’ll have to do,’ she said grudgingly.
‘It’ll have to do! A good skelping is what you need, not a new dress.’ This argument was going nowhere.
‘My pa loves my mammy, not you.’
‘Well, she’s no here to get his meals on the table or warm his bed. I may be no good with the painting or much to make a portrait of, but he knows this plain woman’s grateful. I’m strong, built to last… more than yer poor ma was, being sae delicate. Besotted though he was by her fair looks and artistic fingers, she was a town incomer not an in-born country bred like me.’
‘Are you going to give him a bull calf then?’ Country girls knew all about birthing and offspring and Netta was no exception.
‘Wash your mouth out!’ Peg’s arm swung out to clip the cheek out of the child. Netta ducked and darted to the door.
‘Just you wait till I tell Faither about yer lip.’
‘I don’t care, I hate you! I shall tell my mammy what you’ve done. It’s no fair!’ The girl raced across the yard up the track towards the top of the hill.