A Dinner of Herbs (The Bannaman Legacy)

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘Then why did he leave her across all that water?’

  ‘I don’t know. I only know this, Mr Roystan, that I feel there is good in him, and speaking for oneself, I must say the more one gets to know him the more one likes him.’

  ‘Aye, well’—Hal sat back in his chair—‘I’m no forrader. There’s only one thing I know, she’s not goin’ to live in that blasted place. Where is he the day?’

  ‘He…he went into Newcastle early this morning. He left a message with me for Kate. He’ll be returning by coach tomorrow I understand.’

  ‘Aye, well, the quicker the better, so I can get me tongue round him. We’ve got to know where we stand, him and me. By aye, we have that.’ He began to cough now and to press his chest with the hub of his hand, and when Charles said, ‘Can I get you something, sir?’ he gasped, then muttered, ‘No, just send the missis in. But thanks, lad, for being honest. Aye, thanks for being honest.’

  At this he sat back in his chair and closed his eyes while still pressing on his chest, and Charles left the room quickly to call Mary Ellen.

  Hal did not have a meeting with Ben on the Sunday evening as he had anticipated; he had another attack and his breathing became so difficult that Mary Ellen sent Gabriel post-haste for the doctor, who said that the patient must stay in bed for at least a week and be kept quiet: Hal’s chest was in a very bad state and the only way it would improve would be through rest, breathing air of a moderate temperature and the application of mustard poultices applied to the skin, and hot linctus taken inwardly.

  So it was a fortnight before Hal came downstairs again. The whole family had been concerned for him, Kate equally as much as Mary Ellen. But it was almost another week later before she said to him, ‘Dad, Ben would like to come over tomorrow to have a talk with you. It’s…it’s about the house.’

  ‘Oh, aye.’ He was in the sitting room now. He had a ledger on his knee and had been going through the week’s output of milk which had fallen for the obvious reason that two cows had gone dry. But the market prices of the meat and butter and potatoes had stabilised, and so last week there had been no goods brought back unsold.

  He continued to look at the ledger as he said, ‘Aye, well, he’ll be welcome.’

  ‘Dad.’

  ‘Yes, lass?’ Now he did look up. ‘We…we want to do what is right and what is going to be least hurtful to you.’

  ‘I…I thought you’d see it that way, lass. Aye, I thought you’d see it that way. Thank you.’

  ‘Oh, Dad.’ With a quick movement she came and sat down beside him and, taking his hand, she said, ‘I could never be really happy if I hurt you.’

  He looked at her lovingly as he said softly now, ‘And you’d never hurt me on your own, through your own will, lass, I know that. I also understand how you feel about him, and when all’s said and done, he’s a good match. But having said that, lass, you know so little about him. That’s…that’s what I’m afraid of.’

  ‘You needn’t be afraid, Dad. I…I know everything about him.’

  ‘You do?’ He drew back his head from her.

  ‘Yes, yes, everything.’

  ‘And you still think he’s somebody you should marry?’

  ‘Yes. Oh yes, definitely.’

  ‘Well, if you can say that, lass, with truth in your eyes as I see them now, then that’s good enough for me.’ He leant towards her and kissed her gently on the cheek, and she bowed her head, and as the tears squeezed from her closed lids he said, ‘Aw, lass, lass, come on now. Come on. It just wants your mother to see you cryin’ and I’ll get it again. My God! I’ve gone through it enough up in that room from her. Come on. Come on. Here, don’t use your pinny.’ He pulled out a handkerchief from the pocket of his soft housecoat and handed it to her, adding now on a light note, ‘I’ve never been so long in bed in all me life. At times I’ve thought to meself, this is what it must feel like to be dead.’

  ‘Oh, Dad.’ She was smiling at him, and he nodded at her, saying, ‘Aye, aye, I did. Your mother’s a tartar you know. She always was and always will be, and she’s got hands as gentle as muck shovels.’

  ‘Oh!’ Kate now got to her feet. ‘You’d better not let her hear you say that.’

  ‘What had I better not hear?’ Mary Ellen was coming up the room and she rounded the back of the tall chair and, facing Hal, she demanded, ‘What have you been saying about me now?’

  ‘I was just sayin’ to Kate how gentle your hands were, nearly as gentle as a couple of muck shovels, the long-handled ones, you know.’

  Mary Ellen turned her head to the side while still keeping her eyes on him and, matching his jocular tone, she said, ‘Very well, very well. Wait till that next mustard plaster goes on, I’ll know what to do with the muck shovels. By lad, I will!’

  ‘Oh, away with you, woman, and get in the kitchen and do some cookin’!’ But then, jerking his head towards Kate, he added, ‘She tells me that Ben’s comin’ over the morrow.’ And looking down at the ledger again, he finished on a mutter, ‘He’s comin’ to talk about the house.’

  Mary Ellen and Kate exchanged glances, and Mary Ellen let out a deep sigh, and, in an even more jovial tone now said, ‘Well, he won’t be the only one comin’ the morrow. There’s Florrie’s Charles. And what d’you think? Our Maggie’s just told me she met Andrew Boston in the market and he asked her if he could call the morrow an’ all.’

  Hal looked up at her, laughing now and saying, ‘Well, now she’s doing something sensible at last that one. Andrew Boston. He’s in for law like our Hugh, but I wonder who really did the askin’. Well, well. Has our John or Tom said they’re bringin’ anybody?’

  ‘No, not yet anyway; but May Turner has been trotting her horse along this road quite a bit of late, and our Tom always seems to know the time she’ll be passin’. I’ve noted that.’

  ‘May Turner?’ He pulled a face. ‘Oh, well, he could do worse, couldn’t he?’ Her dad, so I understand, tried to get his foot in the Coultas Dodsworth Company when they opened at Haydon Bridge Iron Works in forty-three. And his brother’s got one of those nice little villas up on the hill above the village. He’s in good company there with Mr Bewick, who’s now got a lease on the Langley Barony Lead Mines. Oh my, yes, our Tom’s goin’ to be in good company if he captures May or May captures him. Well, whichever way it goes he could get his saddles free an’ all, because hasn’t one of her uncles got that fine saddler’s place in Hexham? And he’s got neither kith nor kin as I understand it, and she being the only child an’ all.’

  ‘By! you know your history, Hal Roystan.’ Mary Ellen stood looking down at him, her arms folded across her waist. ‘You wouldn’t care who any of them married as long as there was money in it, would you?’

  ‘Oh, no.’ He nodded at her. ‘You’re right there: I don’t care a damn for any of them, it’s the dowries I’m after an’ the discount I could get off wares if me son marries into families that make saddles an’ the like.’

  ‘Aw! You.’ Mary Ellen turned away, and Hal, laughing now, said, ‘What about our John? Isn’t he set?’

  ‘Yes, he’s thinking of joining the ministry; they’re looking for lay preachers for the Nonconformists’ Chapel. He could rise to be a circuit minister. You never know.’

  At this, both Kate and Hal burst out laughing, for not one of them, nothing, could get John to church or chapel under any pretext. But as Mary Ellen walked down the room, Hal called after her, between short coughs, ‘Stranger things have happened. Conversion…fear of hell…or seeing the light.’ And Mary Ellen’s voice came back at him saying, ‘True, true.’

  When the door closed on her, he looked at Kate and said, quietly now, ‘We said all that in a joke, but as I see it, anything could happen in this life. Like your miracle you spoke of a few weeks ago.’

  ‘Yes.’ She nodded at him. ‘Yes, like my miracle. Well, when he comes tomorrow, listen to him, will you, Dad?’

  ‘Aye, I will. As long as what he says tends to your happiness, I�
�ll listen to him. Aye, I’ll listen to him.’

  Twelve

  The weather had changed: there had been high winds and rain squalls all night and for most of the morning; the rain had now ceased, but the wind was still high. And Kate, walking along the road to meet Ben, had to hold down her skirt with one hand, while holding her bonnet on with the other.

  No-one had passed any remark when she dressed for outdoors and stated her intention of meeting Ben on the road, however much her riding across the moors to meet a man was hitting convention with a hammer. Had either Maggie or Florrie suggested doing something similar, Mary Ellen would have said, ‘Oh, no you don’t. And a day like this! Let them come to you. Men don’t appreciate such eagerness.’ With Kate it had been different from the beginning. And yet she would have agreed with her mother’s view that nothing about this courtship was conventional.

  She was about a third of a mile along the road when she espied Ben, and, so it seemed, he her, for at that moment from a trot he put his horse into a gallop. But as he drew his horse to a skidding stop she moved quickly across the road and jumped the ditch on the far side, and laughing, she cried, ‘I’ll send a complaint to the justice about your riding; ’tis a danger to man and beast.’

  He dismounted, then held out his hands to help her back across the ditch, and having done so, he put his arms about her, and she hers about him, and they kissed passionately. Then, his arm still about her shoulder, he took the horse’s bridle, saying, ‘Courtroom all ready?’

  ‘Yes; and judge in the chair.’ Then looking up into his face she said, ‘Thank you, Ben.’

  ‘Oh, my dear.’ He lowered his head towards her again and, pushing his face under the rim of her bonnet, he kissed her temple, saying now, ‘Never thank me for anything, my dear. Leave that to me, because I shall never cease to thank you for just being you.’

  She remained silent. What could she say? Because at times she could hardly believe him when he talked like this. And more often than not he talked like this, telling her how wonderful she was, when all the while inside herself she still felt inadequate, plain, and ungainly. But perhaps not quite so much now. In order to come up to what she imagined was his idea, and ideal of her, she had of late practised the spinet a little every day, and had read more, even to the extent of taking less sleep in order to do so. And now she could discuss with him not only her hearsay knowledge of the authors of books, but the substance of what they were writing. The conversation she held with him would, she knew, sound as foreign to her family as he himself already did to them: not one of them accepted him as one of themselves, not even John, and John liked him, and this fact pained her. Charles was the only person who seemed to understand him and the whole situation. But then, Charles had been brought up in an atmosphere different from that surrounding the members of her family. Not that they hadn’t all been brought up well: they all had their wits about them, and they could read and write, which wasn’t usual with all farmers’ families. Yet still, their outlook was limited, as hers had been, too, until she met up with this man.

  They were nearing the gate when Ben, looking ahead, said quietly, ‘I never enter this place but I feel I’m here under false pretences, and every time your father looks me straight in the eye I want to tell him the truth and damn the consequences because, whatever the consequences, you are with me.’ He pressed her arm hard against his side, saying reassuringly now, ‘Yes, I know, I know, we’ve agreed. And this new plan…well, if it is at all possible, will put some distance between us and him. And we’ve agreed on that too, haven’t we?’

  She nodded, murmuring, ‘Yes, yes.’

  ‘Well, into battle!’

  They were now walking across the farmyard, and Hugh was coming to meet them. ‘Hello there,’ he said. ‘Weather’s changing. How are you?’ And he held out his hand to Ben who, taking it, answered, ‘Fine, thank you. And you?’

  ‘Never better.’

  Hugh had met Kate’s intended only once before, but Kate felt she could leave them together and make her way towards the kitchen.

  Taking the reins from Ben, Hugh said, ‘Give him here, I’ll see to him,’ then leaned towards Ben and muttered, ‘I hear you are to go before the judge, the court’s in session.’ And Ben burst out laughing saying, ‘That’s funny. I was saying something similar to Kate as we came along.’

  ‘Hope you’ve got your case all worked out. Don’t worry; his bark’s worse than his bite, only…you know.’ His face lost its smile and became serious. ‘We all love Kate, but he most of all. And…and he’s only thinking of her. ’Twas unfortunate you picked on that neck of the woods as a habitation to set up in. Still, you weren’t to know. Anyway, I’ll be with you in a minute, I’ll just take him along to Terry.’

  Consciously now, Ben squared his shoulders as he too walked towards the door that was now being held open for him by Maggie.

  Before crossing the threshold he took off his hat and he was stroking his hair back from his forehead as he passed her. Unsmiling, she looked up into his face as he said, ‘Good day, Maggie.’

  He hardly heard her response but he heard her close the door with a bang. Maggie didn’t like him, and being a man he knew the reason: to use an expression he had heard used in the inn, she would have set her cap at him without any encouragement, and with just a little of it she would have fallen into his arms. He had summed up Maggie’s nature from the first: she was vain and could be spiteful, but being very pretty, as she undoubtedly was, she imagined that covered all her defects. She could be a hussy, could Maggie.

  After he had greeted Annie, whose manner as always was welcoming, she said, ‘Go on through, they’re all in the sitting room. Kate’s taking off her things. Why she wanted to go out in a wind like this I don’t know. Blow the hairs off a pig’s back, it would.’

  He smiled at her, then went up the kitchen and into the hall, where he was met by Mary Ellen.

  Holding out her hand, she said, ‘Glad to see you again, Ben,’ and he, taking her hand, said, ‘And I you, Mrs Roystan. Definitely I you.’

  That was one thing, Mary Ellen told herself, she couldn’t get used to about him: when he paid a compliment, he nearly always stressed it by repeating it. Fanciful, she termed it. ‘The others are in the sitting room,’ she said, ‘but Hal is in the office. Would you like to go and have a natter with him?’

  ‘Yes, yes, of course.’

  She led the way across the hall, along the passage towards the study door, which she opened, saying loudly, ‘Here’s Ben, Hal. Thought he would just have a natter afore tea. All right?’

  ‘Yes, all right, all right. Come in. Come along in.’ Although still croaky, Hal’s voice was hearty, and Ben went in and, extending his hand towards Hal who was sitting to the side of the fireplace, said, ‘How do I find you today, sir?’

  ‘Better. Oh, much better. Back in the yard the morrow, even if I’ve got to shoot me way out.’

  He laughed, and Ben laughed with him.

  ‘Sit yourself down, lad. Sit yourself down.’

  Ben sat down in the chair Hal indicated, which was directly opposite to his own, and Hal began by saying, ‘Weather’s changing. Blowin’ a gale all night. How’s it up your way?’

  ‘It was pretty bad during the night, brought a slate off. And’—he smiled—‘that’s the first one that’s moved since I’ve been here.’

  Hal turned his head away and sighed as he now said, ‘Can’t understand you, lad, can’t understand you. But then…Well now’—he looked at Ben again—‘since we’re on about houses, I might as well tell you, it was a mighty shock to me when I heard you had bought that place.’

  ‘So I understand, sir.’

  ‘You know what happened to me there. Kate has told you all about it—so you can guess within a little how I feel about letting her go to live there. All right, all right’—he put up his hand as if Ben had made some protest—‘it’s a fine enough place, none better for miles, for it wasn’t built as a farmhouse but as a gentleman’
s residence. And that’s what it was for years until the devil took a hand in picking who should go in. Anyway, you understand my feelings?’

  ‘I do, indeed. I do, indeed. And therefore, Kate and I have decided to look for another house, but as I’m committed to this with the builders, I shall see it renovated and the land around cleaned up so it will be more attractive for a sale.’

  ‘Aye, well, I can see your point there, but you’ll get no-one to stay there long, lad. There’s a curse on the place, and it will never be lifted, for those that wrought it were evil.’ He leant towards Ben now, saying, ‘You look peaky the day, a bit white about the gills, and winter’ll soon be on us; you want to get yourself down from there afore the frosts come. Have you seen any place you fancy?’

  ‘No, not yet. Well, not quite. But I have seen a little house to rent beyond Langley, in the direction of Bardon Mill. Although it, too, is somewhat isolated, it is in a sheltered spot.’

  ‘On the way to Bardon Mill, you say, sheltered? I know the very place. Butterfield Cottage is the name of it, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, yes, that’s it.’

  ‘Well now, you’re being sensible, ’tis a nice little place. I know who owned it at one time, ’twas sister of Mr Ellison, and he was undersheriff of the county just a year gone. Oh, you can’t go wrong there. Anyway, I’m glad that’s settled.’ He rose to his feet now, as, too, did Ben, and extending his arm, Hal placed his hand on Ben’s shoulder, saying, ‘You’ve eased me mind, lad, because it was Kate I was thinkin’ about. She’s very dear to me, is that lass, and I couldn’t bear to think of her startin’ life in a place so tainted with badness. Why, I wouldn’t be able to sleep, man. It would be as if the Bannamans themselves had come back. But come on now, they’ll be waitin’, and you look as if you could do with something inside you. ’

  It was later remarked among the family that Kate’s man had had little to say all evening, not like the first time he had sat at the table, and the change was put down to the fact that likely their father had lathered into him, and, as they all too well knew, that could be a numbing experience.