‘No, he didn’t.’ Betty sat down across from Mike and, leaning towards him, she said, ‘I’ve told you, Mike, exactly what he said. He was very brief. He had brought Martin back to Fellburn, he said, and David was taking him to see Elizabeth in the concert, and when I asked him if he himself was on his way home, he said he was going back to Newcastle.’
‘Did he sound drunk?’
‘Drunk? At four o’clock in the afternoon! Of course not, but…’
‘Aye, go on. “But”, you said.’
‘He didn’t sound himself; he was very abrupt.’
‘How do you mean abrupt? Offhand or short or…?’
‘Oh, Mike!’ She got to her feet. ‘Look, I’ve told you all I know. And for goodness’ sake stop worrying, or the next thing you know you’ll be in bed again. And let me tell you’—she wagged her finger at him now—‘if that happens I’m bringing you down to the first floor; our legs are worn off to the knees running up and down these stairs.’
‘Oh! Oh!’ His head began to bob as if it were on springs. ‘That’s it, that’s it, I’m a trouble and I’m to be treated like some doddery old bugger.’
‘Yes, exactly.’ She turned now and went hastily to the door, and as she went out he yelled after her, ‘Well, you take it from me, when you get me down to the first floor it’ll be in me box, and I don’t care if all the bloody legs in the house are worn down to the hips!’
Betty stood on the landing, her lips tight as she tried to stop herself from laughing. Mike was a stimulant. You could say that for him.
She went down the stairs, crossed the first landing but stopped at the head of the main staircase and looked down into the hall.
The telephone was on a table to the right of the door, and as she stood there she recalled Joe’s voice. There had been something about it that she couldn’t make out: offhand didn’t fit it, tense didn’t fit it. She had been about to ask him what had transpired at the doctor’s when he had rung off. Yet Martin must be all right, else he wouldn’t have allowed David to take him, and, as Mike had said, with understandable surprise, to the Egans’.
She now continued her way down the stairs, across the hall and into the kitchen. Mary was sitting by the table cleaning fruit, and she looked up and said, ‘You after your supper, miss?’
‘No, no.’ Betty shook her head. ‘And I’ll see to it myself. Can I help you with that?’
‘No.’ Mary emptied the currants into a large, brown, earthenware bowl, saying again, ‘No, thanks, miss. I’m just gettin’ them ready for the morrow. Eeh!’ She shook her head slowly. ‘Other years I’ve had the Christmas cakes and puddings made weeks afore this. But I’ve only one pair of hands.’
‘Yes, yes, I know you have, Mary. And don’t worry.’ Betty leaned across the table towards her. ‘Anyway, what does it matter when they’re made so long as they’re there for Christmas?’
‘’Tisn’t the same, miss; they should be made well in advance and tinned; it helps to richen them.’ She puckered up her lips now as she ended, ‘Duffy used to do all the fruit for me. Sit here he would, hour after hour, cleaning pound after pound. Since he died, I miss him, miss.’
‘Of course you do, Mary.’
‘The house isn’t the same; it’s not the same in any way, miss, like it used to be. Do you think it is?’
Betty didn’t give her a straight answer, but replied, ‘Well, I haven’t been here as long as you, Mary.’
‘No, that’s true, miss. You know, when the first mistress was alive we had seven in the house and four outside. Yes, we did. We had one maid alone for doing the washing, and now what have we? Meself and Ella…I mean, Jane. She’s a good girl, is Jane. Her tongue’s the worst part about her, but she’s a good worker. Yet she can’t make up for Duffy and Nellie. And them stairs up to that attic could kill a horse. They’re takin’ their toll on you.’ She nodded now at Betty, and Betty replied quietly, ‘We’ll never get him to come down to the first floor. It’s the view, and his workshop.’
‘Aye, I know, I know. And I wouldn’t do anything to disturb what peace is left for him. But…but I do think Mr Joe could engage another lass; a young ’un whose legs would take the stairs.’
‘He would like to, Mary.’ Betty’s voice was low now. ‘I know he would like to very much, but things are not going well at the works; he’s having to cut down all round.’
‘All round, did you say, miss?’ Mary now slanted her gaze up at Betty, and Betty looked down towards the table. She would have liked to reply to the implication in Mary’s tone by saying, ‘I know, Mary. I feel the same about it as you do.’ But you just didn’t say things like that to a servant about the mistress of the house who was also your sister.
There had been times of late when she found it difficult not to tell Elaine that the money she spent on cosmetics alone would pay for another housemaid; and that for just half the money she spent on clothes she could have a kitchen maid and an outside boy to help David. But on consideration she knew she wouldn’t have mentioned David’s name, for Elaine’s hate of him seemed to increase with the years.
‘I’ll have a talk with Mr Joe, Mary,’ she said, ‘and see what we can do about getting you some help in the kitchen. By the way, how is Jane going to get back tonight?’
‘Oh, she’ll get back all right, miss; she’s used to snow. And, anyway, Bill Laidler will be only too glad of the chance to carry her over his shoulder.’ She laughed now, a deep chuckling laugh; and Betty laughed with her; then she asked, ‘When do you think they’ll be married?’
‘Oh, God only knows that, miss. Things were looking up this time last year, but since this Hitler business they’ve stopped building; they can’t get the stuff. He’s been on the dole again now for five weeks. As Ella said, come the war there’ll be work for everybody, and the sooner the better. She’s got a tongue, has that Ella, but she’s right, come a war men will become men then, not just corner-end props.’
‘Yes, I’m afraid you’re right, Mary. But I wouldn’t want to see a…’
Her voice was cut off by the distant sound of Mike’s bell ringing furiously, and they looked at each other across the table as Betty said, ‘I’ve just come down.’
‘I’d let him ring. He takes advantage of you, miss, he does. We all say that. He does. You know what Duffy used to say? He used to say that if miss was his wife himself couldn’t expect more from her. And he said, an’ it’s true, that with one an’ another of them they’d make you old afore your time.’
Dear God, people rubbed it in, even the kindest of them. She turned from the table, saying, ‘Well, I’d better see what the trouble is; he doesn’t usually ring for nothing,’ which elicited a grunt from Mary.
The bell was still ringing furiously as she mounted the main staircase, but she didn’t hurry. Old before her time. Did she look that old at forty? Her mirror showed her no change in her face: her features looked the same as they always had, large and plain. What had altered over the years was her figure; she was slim now, as slim as her frame would allow.
At the foot of the attic stairs she paused and looked up and was amazed to see Mike standing on the landing; and when he cried at her, ‘Where’ve you been, lass? Come on!’ she began to run up the stairs, but on her reaching the landing he had already turned and was shuffling towards his sitting-room door.
‘What is it? What’s wrong?’
‘Our Joe.’
‘Joe?’
‘Aye, Joe, in the car.’
He was now leaning on the window sill. ‘I saw his car coming along there a few minutes ago,’ he said, nodding his head as though indicating the road that passed by the gate. ‘It went over, head over heels down the gully into Robson’s field.’
Betty now peered at him through narrowed lids and said slowly, ‘Mike! Mike! you could never have seen his car…‘
‘Look, lass’—he turned on her furiously—‘I’ve sat at this window for years; I know every turn of the wheel of that car. What’s more, there’s no othe
r cars come along this way unless it’s the doctor’s or tradesmen’s vans and such, and nobody would be taking that road the night with the snow up to the axles. Our Joe’s car’s down there in the gully, I tell you, lass.’ His voice ended in a yell, and hers was almost on the same key as she cried back at him and pointing to the window, ‘But you can’t see a thing out there, Mike.’
‘Look.’ He brought his body full round to face her and he gritted his teeth for a moment. ‘I was sitting here in the dark. I was on the look out for him comin’, and if you look into the dark long enough you’re able to see. And I saw its shape in the distance against the snow. Anyway, I know those headlights. I should.’ And now there was an imploring note in his voice as he ended, ‘Believe me, Betty, I haven’t gone round the bend; I tell you the car’s gone down the little gully. Put out the light and look for yourself. You won’t see the car, but after a minute or so you’ll be able to see into the distance.’
She didn’t follow his command, for now she believed him and she put her hand to her lips as she said, ‘There’s nobody in The Cottage, and even Jane’s out for the night.’
‘You go, lass; go down and see. If I’ve been wrong, well, you’ve had your journey for nowt, but if I haven’t…’ His head drooped. ‘Go on. Go on, lass, for my sake. Ease me.’
She turned now and ran from the room, down the attic stairs and across the landing to her room. There she pulled on a pair of ankle-length boots, then snatched a hooded coat from the wardrobe and struggled into it as she ran across the landing and down the main staircase. In the hall she grabbed up a large torch from the drawer of the side table; then she paused a moment and looked towards the kitchen, wondering if she should tell Mary, but decided against it.
The journey to the gates was comparatively easy, for David had cleared a path earlier in the day, but once on the main road the going was difficult, and the snow came over her boot tops. It was still snowing, but it was thin and was being blown about like curtains of mist.
Within a matter of minutes she had reached the part of the road where the ground sloped quite steeply away down to a field. It was the boundary field of farmland, and the drop from the road to it, always referred to as Robson’s Gully, was about fifteen feet deep, and towards the bottom and seeming to separate it from the field fence was a border of trees.
As she left the road and turned towards the top of the bank her feet gave way beneath her and she found herself part-way down the slope and up to her waist in snow. Gasping, she pulled herself up the bank again, and all her bemused mind could think of at the moment was that she still had her grip on the torch. Flashing it now along the ditch, her petrified gaze took in the car, lying with its rear wedged cornerwise between two trees and its bonnet facing diagonally up the bank.
‘Oh my God!’ Mike had been right. ‘Oh Joe! Joe!’ Yet even as she cried out aloud she cautioned herself against her rising panic.
Again she flashed the torch. The only immediate impression she could gather from the tracks was that the car, having gone into a spin and its back wheels having slithered first over the bank, was thankfully brought to a stop and prevented from overturning by the trees.
She slid down the bank now towards the car, and as she slithered with a bump into the front wheel she shouted, ‘Joe! Joe!’
She couldn’t see into the car because of the snow on the windscreen and so edged her way to the door and directed the flashlight through the dropped weather curtain. And then she saw him. He was lying slumped in the seat behind the wheel; his head hanging to the right. He looked as if he were asleep.
‘Joe! Joe!’ As she yelled his name a swirl of drifting snow almost choked and blinded her, and she leaned against the car, gasping. After a moment she gazed about her frantically. What was she to do? She needed help; she could never get him out of there alone. Or could she? Not from this side maybe, but if she could open the door from the other side, she might.
As if obeying a sharp order she suddenly reached over and grabbed the figurehead on top of the radiator cap, and slowly dragged herself up and over the still-warm engine casing. Then she was standing on the sloping running board and clinging with one hand to the side of the windscreen.
She loosened the side curtain and then opened the door with remarkable ease; but before she could get at Joe she had to close the door again and move further along the running board beyond the door. This time when she opened the door, Joe almost fell on top of her, and his dead weight made it difficult for her to maintain her position. When she heard the groan she thought it was from herself, until it came again. Now she was shaking him gently, crying in an agonised tone, ‘Joe! Joe! Are you hurt? Say something. Oh, Joe! Wake up! Wake up!’
Her face was hanging over his. She sniffed loudly and shook her head; he stank of whisky. ‘Oh Joe! Joe!’
‘Wh…where? Wha…t?’
Thank God! He was alive…‘Are you hurt?’
He groaned; then very slowly he said, ‘Oooh! My…Go…od!’
‘Joe! Joe! Listen to me. Are you hurt?’
‘Betty.’ He opened his eyes and blinked in the light of the torch, then said again, ‘Betty.’
‘Can you sit up?’
When he made the attempt she helped with one hand while steadying herself against the back of the seat with the other. Then as the car rocked slightly she cried, ‘Careful! Oh, be careful, Joe.’
‘Where?…What happened?’
‘The car. You ran off the road.’
He blinked his eyes slowly, then stretched them, and in a voice that was almost a croak he asked, ‘Where is it?’
‘Robson’s Gully. You’ve dropped down into Robson’s Gully.’
‘God in heaven!’ He groaned and lifted his hand to his head, and she asked, ‘Are you hurt anywhere?’
‘I…I don’t know. My head’s spinning.’
‘Your legs? Your arms?’
Slowly one after the other he moved his limbs, then shook his head; and she did not say, ‘Thank God!’ but, ‘Do you think you can get out? The car’s tilted; you’ll…you’ll have to be careful in case it slips further. Look—’ She shook him gently by the arm now. ‘Open your eyes, Joe.’
‘What? Oh yes, yes, Betty. Yes, I’ll…I’ll get out.’
He pulled himself upwards.
‘Careful!’ The word erupted on a yell as the front of the car moved a little.
‘Look.’ She was gulping her words now. ‘You’ll have to move over and get out of the other door, in case your weight makes the car tip if you get out this way. I’ll get back the way I came.’
‘Right. Right, Betty.’ He made an effort to open his eyes wide. He followed the direction of the torch as Betty pulled herself upwards and on to the running board, and then back over the bonnet. And then he edged himself slowly across the seat to the door, which she had already opened. But when, getting out, he went to stand on the running board he almost toppled backwards into the snow. Only her cry made him instinctively grab at the panel by the side of the door, and then gingerly he let himself down into the snow.
Now half supporting and half dragging him, she tried to get him up the slope; but he fell onto his face into the deep snow and lay there inert.
Grabbing at him, she cried harshly, ‘Joe! Joe! For God’s sake, make an effort. Come on! Now, come on!’
She managed to turn him on to his back and he lay gasping. His eyes were closed but he spoke to her, quite plainly now, saying, ‘I’m tired. I’m tired, Betty, very tired.’
‘Joe! listen to me. We must get out of this.’ And, taking hold of his shoulders, she dragged him into a sitting position and tried to shake him whilst crying at him, ‘You can’t stay here! You’ll freeze. Look, hang on to me. Grip my arm.’
‘No; you…you go on, Betty. Go on. I’m…I’m all right.’ As he went to lie down again, she took his wet, snow-covered head in her hands and she yelled into his face, ‘I can’t go on. If you don’t make a move we’ll both freeze to death; so come on! Damn it! yo
u’ve got to try.’
She never recalled the effort of the next ten minutes, during which she hauled him to the top of the bank, without wondering from where she had got the strength. Physically she wasn’t weak, by any means, but Joe was a big man and he was almost insensible now with shock and drink. When she finally pulled him over the edge of the bank and on to the road she lay by his side, her face in the crook of his arm, her own arms outstretched as if on a rack, and the sweat of her body melted the snow that had gathered on her head and neck. Unaware that she was soaked up to the waist, all she could think about at that moment was that once she got her breath back she must get him home as quickly as possible.
Within a few minutes she was shaking him again, and when she had managed to get him to his feet she pulled his arm around her shoulders and hung onto it with one hand while with the other she gripped him around the waist. Half dragging him, she talked to him constantly to keep him awake, and they both stumbled their way towards the gates, and from there it seemed a comparatively easy walk up the drive to the house.
Before she kicked at the front door she was yelling at the top of her voice, ‘Mary! Mary!’ She made no attempt to ring the bell, for she knew that once she let go of him he would drop to the ground, and she knew that she wouldn’t have enough strength to lift him yet again.
‘Oh my God above! What is it? What is it?’ Mary was on the other side of him now. Her support, however, was more moral than practical, and as they dragged him into the hall Betty gasped, ‘The drawing room.’
Going at a wobbling run towards the double doors, Mary thrust them open, then rushed towards the couch and pushed it towards the fire.
Justice is a Woman Page 21