A Dinner of Herbs (The Bannaman Legacy)

by Catherine Cookson

  She ground her teeth together before she said, ‘What if I don’t go to Kate’s, eh? What if I don’t go to Kate’s, but I go along to Maggie Oates’? She’ll give me a bed an’ gladly, and I can earn me keep in more ways than one. What about that, Da? Eh? What’ll happen to your respectability then?’

  His face blanched, and for a moment she became terrified by the look in his eyes as he took a step around the table towards her, saying, ‘Do you know what would happen then? Do you? I’d come over there an’ cut your throat. I would, I’d cut your throat.’

  She had lifted up her bundle now and she moved backwards towards the door as she tried to answer bravely, saying, ‘Well, you just might have to try that. But don’t forget she has lots of friends, has Maggie, and I could get their protection, couldn’t I? Couldn’t I, Da? I could get their protection. An’ you’re not fit to stand up to anybody in the valley now, are you?’

  ‘Get out! Get out! I don’t want to set eyes on you, not till me dying day, and not then.’

  When she banged the door behind her all fight left her and she felt so faint that she thought she was going to drop to the ground. She couldn’t believe this was happening to her. She had felt sure that Mrs Davison, after upbraiding her, would see her predicament as a way to getting her to marry Lennie. And when that didn’t turn out, she had taken it for granted that her father, after the first shock, would look upon her return home as a godsend for he’d have someone to see to him in his declining years which, with the disease on his chest, wouldn’t be all that many.

  At the spinney she put down the bundle and leant against a tree, thinking to herself, What if Kate…if Kate turns against me? But she knew Kate: Kate would never do anything like that. But hadn’t she thought she knew her mistress? And hadn’t she thought she knew her father? Oh God! Oh God! Don’t let it be the poorhouse. She was running now. The bundle pulling her down sideways, she kept changing it from one hand to the other. And then there she was in the field opposite Kate’s cottage.

  She came to a stop when she saw Kate just within her gateway. She saw her straighten up and look towards her, then turn away, and such was her reaction that she had to put her hand over her mouth to stop herself from vomiting.

  When she reached the gate, she called softly, ‘Kate. Kate.’ And the old woman turned and, coming towards her, said, ‘It was you, then? I thought I was dreamin’, or it was somebody passin’ by. What in the name of God…! Aw—’ She stopped, then said, ‘Come away in.’

  The relief almost bringing her to the verge of hysteria, she had the urge to laugh and cry at the same time. She stumbled into the cottage, dropped the bundle, and rushing to the cracket, she dropped onto it and, bending herself double, she laid her head on her folded arms and gave way to a bout of body-shaking emotion.

  Kate did not go to her, or speak, but she went to the rack where her potions were and took down three bottles. From each she took a small measure and put it into a tin mug, stirred the liquid around, then went towards the fire, saying, ‘Lift your head, girl. Lift your head and drink this.’

  Mary Ellen lifted her head. Her face was awash, her breath was coming in small gasps, but she grabbed at the mug and went to swallow the draught in a gulp, only to choke and cough and spit half of it out.

  ‘Careful. Careful. ’Tis too precious to be wasted. That lot would cost one of the gentry sixpence.’ Kate accompanied her last words with a tight smile; then she said, ‘Sip it slowly.’

  Mary Ellen sipped at the concoction. It had a bitter-sweet taste and it seemed to dry up her tongue as it passed over it, but when she had finished it she rose from the stool and sat on a chair and leant back. Of a sudden she felt quiet inside and she looked at Kate and said, ‘D’you know why I’m here?’

  Kate herself sat on the cracket that Mary Ellen had just vacated, and folding her scraggy arms round her equally scraggy body, she rocked herself as she looked at the young girl before her, and she said, ‘I don’t have to guess, or when it happened. I only wondered at the beginning when you would tumble to it, or when you would arrive home, because you’ve come to stay, haven’t you?’

  ‘Oh, Kate, Kate.’ Mary Ellen brought her body forward now, and her head drooped, only for it to be brought up sharply again by Kate’s voice, always strong, always giving the lie to her old infirm body: ‘Don’t bend your head, girl,’ she said. ‘Shame is a self-made thrashing stool. Have none of it. Look them straight in the eye, all who would scorn you. Did she turn you out?’

  Mary Ellen leant against the back of the chair now before she said, ‘Yes, right off.’ Then she added, ‘No, not right off; she gave me to the end of the week, till she could find somebody else, but I told her what she could do.’

  ‘That’s a good sign, you stood up to her. Were they all against you?’

  ‘Not all. Mr Archie spoke for me.’

  ‘Archie? Well, well. But then he would. A bright lad he was in his youth. His wife was a whining whinney. He was glad when she died, and so became a regular visitor along at Maggie Oates.’

  ‘Our Mr Archie?’

  ‘Aye. Aye, your Mr Archie.’

  ‘He said…if things had been different, he…he would have married me.’

  Kate let out a high hollow laugh. ‘Did he begod?’ she said. ‘Did he? Well, you could have done worse. Yes, you could have done worse. But you’ll do a damn sight better in the end, let me tell you. Now, your da?’

  ‘That was quicker.’

  ‘I’m not surprised. He’s turned into a right holy Joe, has your da. I’m well acquainted with human nature and at one time I never thought I could read wrong, but I did with him, for there wasn’t a nicer or more straightforward lad in his youth, but now I know he was only that way because he had your mother. He went to pieces after, or perhaps he just became his real self, narrow, mean, because that’s your da, Mary Ellen. Say what you will, that’s your da. Anyway, lass, you’re here to stay, aren’t you?’

  ‘Please, Kate.’

  ‘Aw, don’t put thank into your tone because you’ve come to me. You’ve come as a gift, lass, as a gift. Tell you somethin’, I’ve always wanted you. Oh, aye, I loved Roddy. I still do, but not with that intensity. You see, again I’ve got to admit I was slightly wrong in reading human nature there. But with you, from you were a nipper, I wished you were mine. And now you are.’

  She pulled her twisted body up from the cracket and, going over to Mary Ellen, she bent forward and, for the first time in their long acquaintance, she kissed her. It was a gentle kiss, yet the wrinkled lips seemed firm on Mary Ellen’s cheek. But the kindness was too much and Mary Ellen started to cry again, only to have Kate bark at her now, ‘No more of that. That’s one thing we’re gona put a stop to, cryin’.’

  After a moment, Mary Ellen, wiping her face, said, ‘How long have you known, Kate?’

  ‘Oh, as I said, since the night he left. You were ripe for it. It had to be.’

  ‘You must never blame him, Kate, ’cos…’cos I made him.’

  ‘Doubtless. Doubtless. The way you were that night you could have stirred a dolly-tub from the mill to rise to you.’

  Mary Ellen was about to hang her head again, when Kate laughed and said, ‘There’s no lass worth her salt if she can’t get a man to do what she wants when she wants.’

  Mary Ellen’s head didn’t droop now as she muttered, ‘But he didn’t want to, Kate. And…and he went for me after. And that did something to me, it changed me somehow.’

  Kate was staring at her. Her hands hanging by her sides, she said, ‘He went for you after it happened?’

  ‘Yes, aye.’

  ‘Blamed you?’

  It was a moment before Mary Ellen admitted, ‘In a way, yes, yes.’

  ‘God in heaven! I never thought I’d say I was ashamed of him.’

  ‘Aw, please, please, Kate, he had a right to be.’

  ‘He had no right to be.’ The old woman’s voice was loud. ‘I’d say this and I’d say it to his face if he was he
re. I’m disappointed in him right to the core. All right, he’s given you a bairn, but he should have rejoiced in it. You untouched and offerin’ yourself to him. I doubt if he’s ever had a virgin in his life afore. Doubt, did I say? I know fine well he hadn’t, the place he went for his amusement.’

  Mary Ellen’s eyes were round now, and her eyebrows were pushing upwards towards her hair as she said, ‘He…he had been with…?’

  ‘Oh, aye, aye. Tell me of one who lives in the valley who hasn’t.’

  ‘But who? Which lass?’

  ‘Oh, no lass from here, the paid pieces from Hexham. He hadn’t the nerve to go along to Maggie, because he would have his lugs pulled by the men. Oh, no. But there are plenty suppliers in the town.’

  Again Mary Ellen felt she wanted to vomit. She was a fool, she was ignorant. She wished she was dead.

  As if she had read Mary Ellen’s thoughts, Kate said, ‘Now don’t sit there looking like that and wishin’ your life away; he was a man, just like every other one. But by God! He should have appreciated you. If I hold nothin’ else against him, I’ll hold that. Now if it had been Hal.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I said, if it had been Hal.’

  ‘Hal?’

  ‘Aye, Hal. Like many another, you don’t see that fellow except from the outside.’

  ‘Well, that’s been enough for me…Oh Kate, what am I going to do?’

  ‘What would you have done if that fat, empty-headed, little bitch hadn’t turfed you out?’

  Mary Ellen sat and thought for a moment, then said, ‘Likely married Lennie.’

  ‘And then what?’

  ‘What d’you mean?’

  ‘What would your life have been like? Work from Monday mornin’ till Sunday night, never a let up, and never let you forget the reason why you were there. What I’m meanin’ is, you’d have had to work. Well, we all have to work one way or another.’

  ‘But where’ll I find work round here, except I do grubbin’ at the mine?’

  ‘You’ll not go grubbin’ at the mine; you’ll find work. But I’m tellin’ you this’—the gnarled finger wagged at her—‘you’ll have to learn. You can read and write your own name, but that’s not goin’ to help you much, an’ what I’ve got in mind takes a good memory, a real good memory, or else you’ll be in the soup.’ She smiled now and the flesh came up round her small bright eyes and almost closed them as she added, laughingly, ‘Oh aye, if you put some of my concoctions into the soup you would be in it. They’d likely hang you for poisoning, and they would have done not a hundred years gone in me granny’s time. Oh, the things she told me.’

  Mary Ellen cut the old woman’s reminiscing short by saying, ‘What d’you mean, Kate, about me memory havin’ to be good for a job?’

  In answer, Kate twisted her body round and looked towards the end of the room to the shelves holding bottles, jars and boxes, and she said, ‘There, that could be your new job.’

  ‘Do what you do?’ Mary Ellen’s voice was quiet but high. ‘Make up potions?’

  ‘Aye, just that. But it isn’t as easy as it sounds. As I told you, it all depends upon your memory. Now listen here. I’ve been silly all me life with regard to that treasure.’ She was now wagging her fingers towards the shelves. ‘What I should have done many years ago was have a stall in the Hexham market on a Saturday. That would have kept me in clover. And when I saw what some of the fakers made out of bottles of coloured water, sugar and salt, why, I knew I was a fool. But there, I was never one for bargainin’ or askin’ people for money, even if they were gettin’ good value. So here I sat and let them come to me, and as you know they’ve come from far and near over the years. But what have they given me? D’you know that nobody has ever paid me more than sixpence a potion in me long lifetime. But then, if I’d got sixpence for every potion, I’d have been sittin’ pretty. In fact the hole in the wall there’—she nodded towards the chimney piece—‘wouldn’t have held it, I would have had to take all the bricks out.’ She again gave her crinkled smile. ‘Well, things are goin’ to change from now on. They have changed over the last weeks. I’ve been breakin’ them in, those of me customers. “No, Bob,” I said, only yesterday. You know, Bob Allen the blacksmith. Well, over the years he’s come for a lotion for his back. ’Tis all right in the spring and summer, but with the fall of the leaf he gets his twinges. So there he was with a penny in his hand and I said, “I’m sorry, Bob, but I’ve got a hard winter ahead of me, and your special potion will be threepence from now on, and that’s cheap,” I said, “because you go into Hexham market or up to Allendale and what’ll you pay there to the apothecary for stuff that has no more in it than plain pig’s fat? Ninepence you would pay. Well, not less than sixpence, nothing’s less than sixpence in the apothecary’s when you’re askin’ for potions. So it’s threepence from now on. What d’you say, Bob?” And you know, after a minute he laughed and said, “You’re a marler, Kate.” But he put his threepence on the table there. And then there was Rosie Fowler. Carryin’ again she is, and her oldest one twenty. She’s as good as any sow for turnin’ them out. Well, there she was last week complainin’ again of giddiness and swimmy feelings and the panting of her heart, so could she have me lavender spike potion, and not only the potion but the conserve, and the water for dabbin’ on her head. Now for years she’s had the three at a penny a time, a penny mind for the three lots. You know, when I told her that in future she’d have to pay a penny for each lot, she got on her hind legs and said, “You can pick lavender anywhere.” So I said, “You can go and pick it, Rosie. You go and pick it.” And there she stood wavering. But in the end I got me threepence, for as you will learn, Mary Ellen, there’s more to the lavender potion than lavender. There’s cinnamon powder, crushed nutmegs an’ cloves, and they’ve all got to be worked at, whereas the conserve, as you know, is mainly sugar. But look at the price of sugar. And then there’s the time that it takes if you want to make some oil from the flowers. Oil of roses, why they’re nothin’ to it.’

  ‘And…and you’ve kept all these things in your head all these years?’

  ‘Aye…aye, I have. But I started early, much earlier than you. I was picking from I was five years old and I could tell every plant and weed for miles. And I’ll tell you somethin’, I wasn’t half as good as me mother, for as a girl she had been away in the Midlands, and then in the south of the country in service, and like the different types of people you get in the different counties, so do you get the different growths of weeds and herbs.’

  Now she was laughing widely, her tongue flicking in and out of her mouth past the stumps of her front teeth as she said, ‘I laughed a bit gone. Doctor Cranwell, the head vicar you know who scatters his curates like dockheads flying in the wind, well, one of them came to the door there knocking and politely asked, “Are you Mrs Makepeace?” “I am,” I said. “I was told to come to you, because I was bitten by a dog last week and the salve I applied hasn’t seemed to heal the wound.” Did I think I could do anything? I could but try, I said, if he would sit down, and let me see his offended part. It was on the calf of his leg and it was nasty. So I bathed it with a solution made from wild thyme and gave him the same to drink in little quantities first thing in the morning. Then, who sent him? I asked. Oh, he was a bit chary in telling me until I laughingly said, “’Twouldn’t be the vicar?” Then his face colourin’, he said, “No, no, it wasn’t the vicar.” And he laughed with me. A nice young fellow he was. And he came back the next week for another supply because the wound had almost healed. And he said he felt much better in himself and after a little more conversation we agreed that the vicar must never hear of his visits.’

  Mary Ellen was actually smiling now, a weak and watery smile, but nevertheless she was looking relaxed and she asked, ‘How much did you charge him?’

  ‘Oh’—Kate turned her head away—‘what could I charge him? The church mice could feed any curate with their left-overs. But not so the parsons and them they call the doctors of
the church. Live like lords they do, in mansions. This one’ll likely come to that later on and he’ll forget he was ever hungry. Do you feel better, lass?’ Kate’s tone and manner changed now as she looked gently towards Mary Ellen, and Mary Ellen’s response to the kindness emanating from her friend brought her to her knees and, with her arms about the thin, but clothes-padded body, she laid her head on Kate’s lap and murmured, ‘Oh, Kate. Kate. What would I do without you?’

  ‘I don’t know. I just don’t know.’ The answer was intended to bring a smile again to Mary Ellen’s face but instead it brought another flood of tears. And now, the old woman’s hands cupped the bright head and pressed it to her as she muttered, ‘There, there. Now this is the last burst of cryin’ you’re goin’ to indulge in. Do you hear me? There’s to be no more of it, ’cos it’ll only harm what’s inside you. Lift up your chin now.’ She pressed the head gently from her and, looking down into Mary Ellen’s face, she wiped the tears from each cheek with her fingers, saying, ‘We’re both sick at heart over one person, so we can comfort each other, but there’s good days ahead. We’ll make them so. You know’—she continued to stroke each cheek—‘I’ve had a feelin’ on me of late that something good was goin’ to happen. I felt strongly that my Pat would walk in the door. Sometimes I imagined he was in the room. I began to be a bit uneasy at those times’—she nodded at Mary Ellen—‘because I’ve always told meself me body’s old, ancient, but me mind is still young and active, but when you start thinking things like that, well…But he seemed very close, so I thought, perhaps he’s on his way. And he could be. Aye, he could be. But the other good thing that happened to me is you, lass. I’ve never been one for constant company except a selected few: my Davey, then Pat, then you from you were a baby in your mother’s arms; then of course, Roddy. Only four people. Oh no, five. I’m forgettin’ Hal. And recalling him, there’s somethin’ in the wind in that quarter, for there he was first thing this mornin’ in his Sunday best. He said he was goin’ into Hexham.’