Hannah Massey

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘Because what?’ Broderick was looking at Hannah steadily.

  ‘Never you mind. I’ll keep it to meself until I see which way the wind’s blowing. In the meantime, sit you all down and get your teas; it will be as cold as clarts in a minute if it isn’t already. Oh, lass’—she forced a stiff smile on her face—‘I’ve left yours in the oven. Would you be goin’ gettin’ it?’

  Rosie went into the kitchen, and as she opened the oven door the back door opened and Hughie entered. With a swift glance towards the other door she went towards him and muttered hastily under her breath, ‘They know, Hughie, about the money. Shane heard about the caravan and car.’

  Hughie had his cap in his hand and he turned and hung it on the hook on the door next to her coat before looking at her again. His smile was quiet; his whole attitude seemed serene to her, while she herself was feeling strung up and nervous; first from her encounter with Ronnie, and then from the feeling her mother’s attitude towards Hughie aroused in her. She went hastily back to the oven and was taking out the plate when again the back door opened, with a thrust this time, which almost knocked Hughie off his feet, and Karen exclaimed as she came in, ‘Well, you don’t expect me to see through it, do you?’ He straightened the sleeve of the coat he was hanging on the door as he said, ‘No, I don’t.’

  Karen was pulling her outdoor things off now, and, looking at Rosie’s retreating back, she said, ‘It’s not a night to linger on the doorstep; it’s all right for some people who can stay put all day.’

  Rosie hesitated; then glancing quickly over her shoulder said, ‘I’ve just come in.’

  ‘Poor soul! Have you had to battle against the elements an’ all? It isn’t fair, is it?’

  As Rosie went on into the living room without retorting to this, Karen turned to Hughie staring at her from across the table in a peculiar way, and she asked, ‘What you looking at me like that for? I don’t happen to be a man so I’m not in love with her. Men are fools…gormless idiots.’ She flounced her body around, but turned it back as swiftly again, saying, ‘As for you, you haven’t got the gumption you were born with.’

  ‘No, I haven’t, have I?’

  The admission was disconcerting, and all Karen could say to it was, ‘Oh my God.’

  When she entered the living room, Hannah spoke to her across the room, saying, ‘Who is that out there?’

  ‘Hughie, of course. Who else would it be? You’re all here.’ The sharp, round eyes swept the table, and the voice with which she had answered her grandmother bore no resentment for the blow she had received yesterday. She did not blame Hannah for that. She knew who was to blame.

  Hannah knew it was Hughie in the kitchen. She had asked a voiceless question of Rosie when she had come back into the room—she had done it with the jerk of her head—and Rosie had answered with a single nod, her eyes downcast.

  And when Hughie came in, he came in as he always did, quietly, his whole manner unassuming, not looking towards the table, not looking at anything really.

  They were all seated except Hannah. She stood to the side of her chair and she stopped him when he was opposite the fireplace—he was going, as he always did, to bring his chair from the corner to the table. She stopped him by saying, ‘Well?’

  ‘Well what?’ He was looking straight back at her.

  ‘What’s this I’m hearing?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know. You don’t often tell me any news.’

  ‘Have you or have you not bought a car and a caravan?’

  Rosie was looking at Hughie now. She had an odd feeling inside of her, a racing, excited, odd feeling. Whereas yesterday she felt that she wouldn’t be able to bear seeing her mother vanquished, now she knew that if Hughie were to come out on top her mother would have to be brought low, and, she wished, oh, she even prayed, that he would show her, show them all what he was really made of, and he could only do that by talking. Oh, if he would only talk as he had talked in the back room of the shop…Talk as he wrote.

  And he did. ‘Yes, I’ve bought a caravan and a car.’ Hughie looked from Hannah around the staring faces at the table: Jimmy’s, Arthur’s, Shane’s, Barny’s, Broderick’s, and lastly Karen’s. He looked longer at Karen than at the rest; he did not look at Rosie. And then he was staring at Hannah once more.

  ‘Where did you get the money?’

  ‘I came into it.’

  ‘You—came—into it?’

  ‘That’s what I said.’

  ‘Was it a win or something, Hughie?’ Broderick’s good-tempered tone tried to bring a lightness into the proceedings.

  ‘No, it wasn’t a win, Broderick.’ Hughie was smiling gently down on the elderly man, who alone in this house had ever gone out of his way to show him a kindness. ‘It was a legacy, Broderick.’

  ‘A legacy!’ Hannah had grabbed at the lead again. Her eyes screwed up, her brows beetling, her chin pulled in to the deep flesh of her neck, she repeated, ‘A legacy! Who, in the name of God, have you got to leave you a legacy, I ask you that?’

  ‘I happen to have had a sister. Perhaps you’ve forgotten about her.’

  ‘Your sister! But she was no better than…’ Hannah prevented herself from adding, ‘meself’; instead she turned it into ‘the rest of us. She went to America as a servant if I remember rightly.’

  ‘She went as a nurse-companion if you remember rightly,’ corrected Hughie. ‘And she was left some money. But unfortunately she didn’t live long enough to enjoy it, and before she died she remembered me.’

  Hannah, her eyes still on Hughie, groped at the back of her chair. She wanted very much to sit down but she remained standing.

  ‘When did this happen, Hughie?’ It was Arthur on his feet now, coming round the table.

  ‘Oh, some weeks ago, around Christmas time. It takes a while for these things to get settled.’

  ‘By, you’re a deep ’un!’ Shane, too, had risen to his feet. ‘An’ keepin’ this to yourself all the time,’ he said.

  ‘How much did she leave you?’ It was the first time Barny had spoken.

  ‘A bit over twenty thousand. Round about twenty-four I should say when everything’s settled up.’ His tone was quiet but self-assured. He spoke of twenty-four thousand as if he was quite used to thinking in thousands.

  For a full minute no-one in the room moved or spoke a word. Each of them was digesting this news, and most of them were wondering what was in it for them, if anything. Strangely it was the two girls who were the exceptions. Karen knew she would get nothing out of Hughie’s legacy, for there had always been a mutual dislike between them. She had become aware of it as a small child and reciprocated the feeling in full, but, thinking along the lines of her grandmother, she was saying to herself, God, it would be someone like him who would come into money, a mutt who won’t know how to enjoy it.

  If Rosie was thinking of the money, it was to the effect that it had put power and courage into Hughie. It had also endowed him with a dignity. His back was straighter, his look even bold, he was no longer afraid of her mother, that’s if he had ever been afraid of her. But he must have been, because for some reason or other he had always knuckled down to her.

  Rosie saw that her mother was utterly flabbergasted, but she also saw that she was determined not to show it.

  Sitting herself slowly down, Hannah again took charge of the situation. She jerked her head up towards Hughie and said, ‘Well, sit down, and tell us what you’re going to do.’

  Hughie sat down, after going and picking up his chair and bringing it to the table. No-one had said, ‘Stay where you are, I’ll get it for you.’ As much as they would have liked to they hadn’t the face to do that, it would look too much like sucking up.

  Hughie sat down opposite to Jimmy and Karen. Jimmy’s expression was eager, bright. He looked as if he wanted to say something but was withholding it with difficulty. Karen still looked surly. She had the intelligence to know when it was fruitless to beat a dead horse. Shane and Arthur had sat down again,
and now they were all around the table like a family. Again Hannah said, ‘Well?’

  Hughie moved his knife and fork to one side and surveyed them for a moment before looking along the table towards Hannah. ‘You want to know what I’m going to do, is that it?’ He stared at her while waiting some response from her; but receiving none, he went on, ‘As soon as the caravan’s ready—I’m having it all rebuilt inside. Jim Cullen’s doing it for me.’ He turned his head now and addressed himself to Broderick. ‘He’s a good craftsman, as you know.’

  ‘Oh, you’ll get a good job out of old Jim,’ said Broderick, nodding his head quickly. ‘He’s a grand fellow when dealing with wood; you’ll get a good job out of him.’

  ‘I know that, Broderick.’ Hughie turned his gaze slowly back to Hannah again and unhurriedly went on, ‘Well, when it’s ready, and it should be towards Monday of next week, I’m starting on my travels; that’s if the weather allows. Anyway, I’m going to make for the Continent and just jog along where the fancy takes me…That’s all.’

  They had all been looking at him; now they were all looking at Hannah, their eyes brought to her by the sound of her strong short teeth grinding over each other. They watched the invective rise in her and fill her mouth, and they watched her check it and select words which had to be pressed through her lips to ask him, ‘How much are you going to leave behind you?’

  ‘How much? Nothing, not a penny.’

  ‘Ma…Ma, go easy, go easy; give the fellow a chance.’ Barny had put his hand across the table towards Hughie, and he brought Hughie’s attention away from his mother, saying quickly, ‘I’m not asking you for anything, Hughie, but I could do with a loan. Is there any chance? I want to start a shop.’

  Hughie’s eyes held a kindly expression as they looked back at Barny, but he shook his head twice before he spoke. ‘No, Barny, not a chance. But you could still start your shop. Your mother has around four hundred and seventy-five pounds of yours upstairs.’

  Barny’s hand lifted from the table; his face jerked towards his mother as she jumped to her feet. Then he looked again at Hughie; and Hughie finished evenly, ‘I’ve had nothing much to do these last few years when I was in the house but count up. About four hundred and seventy-five I should say, Barny, would be your share.’

  ‘You dirty sod!’ Hannah picked up a knife from the table, and as her arm swung up Jimmy gripped it, crying, ‘Here! Steady on. Steady on, Ma.’

  ‘Put the knife down, woman!’ Broderick was standing before her. ‘Have you gone out of your senses?’

  ‘I’ll kill him! I’ll kill him! The ungrateful sod that he is. And what money he’s got belongs here, for haven’t I looked after his offspring for years? He owes me a share of that money; he killed me daughter.’

  ‘Stop it, woman! An’ don’t talk wild. Stop it! Do you hear me?’

  With a jerk of her elbow, Hannah thrust Broderick aside, and because Jimmy was still holding one arm she leant crookedly over the table towards Hughie, crying. ‘Do you want me to tell ’em? They’ll murder you.’

  ‘Yes, tell them.’ Hughie slowly rose from the table; his face had lost its taunting expression. ‘You tell them your side of the story and I’ll tell them mine, and let them judge. If I hadn’t been such a blasted fool that’s what I’d have done years ago, and you would have had one less to suck dry then. Go on, tell them. Or will I do it without the hysterics?’

  ‘You rat, you! You bloody mealy-mouthed rat, you!’ There was froth gathering at the corner of Hannah’s mouth. She turned her furious face now towards Broderick, then flashed her eyes towards her sons, and with her free arm she pointed dramatically at Hughie and cried, ‘He raped me daughter, Moira, and she died with his child…her there!’ She was pointing at Karen.

  Again a silence came upon the room, and it would have been broken long before it was if the contortion of features had made any sound, for the faces of the men were twisting with amazement. They looked from their mother to Hughie, then to Karen, and then back to their mother. And it was Jimmy—big, thoughtless Jimmy—who spoke first. ‘But, Ma,’ he said, his face a mass of bewilderment, ‘Moira was eleven years older than me; she was a woman when Hughie was a lad.’

  ‘There you have spoken my defence, Jimmy.’ Hughie motioned his head towards the big, puzzled man. ‘I was fourteen, not quite fifteen, when I, as your mother put it, raped her eldest daughter. And into the bargain I was a thin, puny lad, as was pointed out to me practically every day, and was always ailing. Moira was twelve stone if an ounce. She came up into the room one night and ate me alive. Granted there was a raping, but I had very little share in it; yet there were results.’ He dropped his eyes now to where Karen was staring at him, her full-lipped mouth agape. ‘We’ve never liked each other, Karen,’ he said sadly. ‘It’s a pity. I suppose it was my fault because I blamed you. I was held like any prisoner because of you, and also because’—he smiled wryly now—‘I hadn’t, as you said a few minutes ago, any gumption. But whatever gumption I was born with and retained until I was fourteen, she kicked out of me.’ He lifted his eyes again to Hannah; then they flicked to Broderick, where the old man stood, his hand to his brow, exclaiming over and over, ‘God Almighty! God Almighty!’

  ‘I’m sorry, Broderick, I’m sorry. I wouldn’t have had you hurt for the world.’

  Hannah gazed around her family in nothing less than blazing amazement. Their reactions were maddening her still further, and she cried at them, ‘Well, what are you goin’ to do? Standin’ there like stuffed dummies!’ She tried to pull herself from Jimmy’s hold, but he held her fast and shook his head at her. ‘Leave go, will you!’ She was lifting her other hand, the fist doubled at him, when Broderick spoke to her, calmly, deadly. ‘Enough woman, enough,’ he said. ‘I think whatever Hughie did he’s had to pay for.’

  ‘My God!’ The words were deep and guttural, as if they were issuing from the throat of a bass singer. At the moment she was seeing no-one but her husband. ‘You would turn against me in this. I’ve carried the load for years, on me own shoulders I’ve carried this load and you would—’

  ‘I’ve said be quiet. For your own good, be quiet!’ Broderick now turned to Hughie, and his voice still low, he said, ‘We want none of your money, Hughie…’

  ‘I know that, Broderick, at least I know you don’t. And I wouldn’t see you short, only I know you’d never keep it for yourself.’

  ‘What about her? He owes her something.’ Hannah was spitting the words out like grit as she pointed to Karen, and Karen snapped her fascinated gaze from Hughie’s face, the man who had become her father, and looked at her granny. A moment ago she had wanted nothing from Hughie because then she thought she stood no chance, but now things were different, she had a claim on him. And when she looked back at him her expression showed this claim and he read it. And he answered it, but looking again at Hannah. ‘Not a farthing, not a brass farthing,’ he said. ‘I paid you for her keep from the day she was born until she started to work. Many’s the time I could only meet me board, but you wanted that two pounds for her or else…Yes’—he nodded towards the staring faces that surrounded him—‘two pounds a week I had to pay. Do you wonder now that she had me brought back twice? My wage was four pounds five.’ He glanced at Broderick. ‘And as the years went on, many a time you had a job to find that, hadn’t you, Broderick? But it all went back into the kitty, two pounds for me keep and two pounds for Karen…And you took it, didn’t you, Hannah?’ His eyes were on her furious face again. ‘And let me go around with hardly a rag on me back; and this too’—he nodded at her—‘whilst these last few years the lads were being decked out like lords. Nor did you spare me when Karen started work either. No, I had to pay for the goodwill of the shop then, if I wanted to keep it on, you said. So you had four pounds a week from me.’

  ‘Then why the hell did you put up with it? It’s your own fault and it’s no use yarping on now.’ It was Arthur speaking, and Hughie turned towards him and nodded at him before he said, ‘I�
�m not yarping, Arthur, I’m opening me mouth for the first time in me life in this house. And why did I put up with it? Well, as I said, I hadn’t any guts. Time and time again she threatened to tell you all and set you on to me. And’—his lips went into a twisted smile—‘you were all big lads, the lot of you, and somehow I didn’t fancy seeing meself battered to death. But there was another reason, a reason none of you would understand because you had what I wanted, what I needed, a family, somebody belonging to you…Well now, I think everything’s been said that need be said, so I’ll be leaving you…I’ll…I’ll just get me things and then…’

  ‘Begod, you won’t! You won’t take a stick out of this house; that’s somethin’ I can stop you doin’.’

  ‘Oh, very well.’ He smiled at her. ‘You’re welcome to what there is.’

  Except for Rosie and Karen, they were all on their feet. Rosie had her hands joined together on the table. The knuckles were showing white and she had her eyes fixed on them.

  But now Karen rose from her chair and her movement stopped Hughie from turning about. She was going to speak to him, and he waited, looking at her quietly, even gently, waiting to hear what she had to say. And what she said was, ‘I never liked you afore, and I like you less now, and you can keep your money and stick it. I hope it does you some good. You said you had no gumption and you’re right, you’re gutless. I’ve often wondered who me father was. But you! You’d be the last man in the world I’d pick for a father. So now you have it.’

  ‘Thank you.’ He moved his head as he spoke. ‘Over the years I’ve been glad there was little of me in you, but on the other hand, I was sorry there was so much of your granny in you.’

  On this last shaft, Hughie turned, and amid a moment’s silence walked across the room towards the kitchen door, but as he opened it a glass dish, accompanied by the concerted cries of protest from behind him, caught him on the back of the head and sent him flying, covering him at the same time with sliced peaches.