A Dinner of Herbs (The Bannaman Legacy)

by Catherine Cookson

  It was on that day too, and for the first time, that she heard an amicable exchange between Maggie and her father, because when Hal had come in saying, ‘Jimmy Broadbent passed me on the road galloping as if the devil was after him. He didn’t stop for a word. What’s afoot?’ she had told him, and at that he had sat down on the settle where Maggie had been sitting stiff and tight staring into the fire, and he had put his hand on her shoulder, saying, ‘My, lass, it was a pity you didn’t swipe him! The insulting bugger, I’ll spit in his eye the next time I see him. I was about to buy a couple of shires off him, now he can go to hell. You could have had your pick of the countryside, I know that.’

  Her father’s unusual kindness towards her had resulted in her bursting into tears and rushing from the room. Anyway, it was after that that she did her hair in a different style, and started wearing pretty prints again, and would now often go into the market on a Saturday. Yet the change brought forth no more suitors. This apparently didn’t seem to bother her. Yet at times Mary Ellen felt there must be something bothering her daughter for she would become edgy and go a whole day without opening her mouth.

  Mary Ellen told herself again and again that Maggie was no company, and yet at the same time she didn’t know what she would do without her for she worked from early till late both inside the house and in the byres and the dairy where she did a great deal of the milking. She seemed to like the milking more than any other work on the farm, whereas at one time she had hated all outside work. She knew while she was there she talked to Willy. And it was this knowledge that made her say now, ‘Has he said anything about leaving?’

  ‘No’—Maggie pulled her starched apron tight around her hips—’but with the windfall he got last week, he could start up on his own, couldn’t he?’ She turned and looked fully at her mother, and Mary Ellen said, ‘A hundred pounds won’t go very far.’

  ‘I understand Dad started on very little more and ill-got at that.’

  ‘Maggie!’ The name was a growl. ‘I’ve told you before never to mention that. It’s gone, forgotten. You came on that knowledge because you’ve got ears like cuddy’s lugs. What is it, girl? At times you seem bent on upsetting me.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry.’ Maggie wagged her head, and Mary Ellen looked away towards the window again—she had heard the sound of a horse’s hoofs from the stone yard—and she said stiffly. ‘That must be your dad back. Let’s have no more of it.’ And she lifted up the great wad of dough and flopped it onto a floured board.

  Her face tight, obliterating the good looks it normally still bore, Maggie now made towards the kitchen door, but it opened before she reached it and both she and her mother exclaimed simultaneously ‘Kate!’ Then Mary Ellen added, ‘What’s wrong?’

  Kate, now a woman turned forty who seemed to have grown even taller and broader, looked first at her mother then at Maggie. And it was to Maggie she said, ‘Fraser—our young Frag. He’s run off again.’

  ‘No! Not again. I thought…well, he had promised.’

  Kate nodded at Maggie now, saying as she moved past her, ‘As Mam is always quoting, promises are like piecrusts, made to be broken.’

  Maggie had turned back into the kitchen and, quietly, she said, ‘But he’s been good for a year now.’

  ‘Ten months to be exact. This’ll put the finish to Ben.’

  ‘How is Ben?’ Mary Ellen was pouring some boiling water into a large brown teapot, and Kate answered briefly, ‘The same,’ as she sat down in the rocking chair to the side of the fireplace. Then looking from one to the other, she demanded, ‘Why does he do it? That’s what I’d like to know.’ And it was Maggie who answered her, saying harshly now, ‘He hates to be cooped up. He was born to roam.’

  ‘Born to roam!’ Mary Ellen’s voice broke in high now, crying, ‘He wants a horsewhip taken to him. He knows how he upsets everybody. How did you find out?’ She looked at Kate.

  ‘By a special delivery letter from the headmaster. He must have got out last night. His bed hadn’t been slept in.’

  ‘It’ll be the drovers again. They’re down from Scotland. Hal was saying they’re camped in a field just beyond Corbridge, fattening the stock up afore taking them into market. But how would he know where they were? Still, he’s got the devil in him. Always had. He’s the spawn of Satan. He should be…’

  ‘No, Mam! No, don’t say that. He’s not got the devil in him. He’s…’

  ‘Aye, well, you tell me what he is. He’s caused you heartache from the time he could walk. He thinks of nobody but himself.’

  ‘That isn’t true.’

  ‘Oh, you’ll defend him with your last breath. ’Tis natural I suppose. But he’s been at this game since he was five. He was five, wasn’t he’—she turned her head towards Maggie, bobbing it now—‘when he first went after the drovers? And that old Scot who stunk to high heaven brought him back. Then a year after he did the same. And how many times after that has he joined one or other of them? He’s a byword, he’s become notorious. If I had my way, I’d let him go his way and join the roadsters and live like the animals they’re drovin’. It might have been funny at first, prankish, but now here he is coming up sixteen and looking all the world eighteen or over. Well, something must be done finally with him. It’s up to you, ’cos Ben’s in no fit state to deal with him…Aw, here’s your dad.’

  As the sound of Hal’s voice came from the yard, Kate rose to her feet, saying, ‘I’ll be off.’

  ‘Now look.’ Her mother turned to her, muttering under her breath now, ‘Don’t walk out the minute he comes in.’

  ‘Well, I won’t be able to stand his rampaging. Anyway, you needn’t tell him until I’m gone.’

  ‘Did you tell John?’ Mary Ellen was looking towards the window again. And when Kate answered, ‘Yes,’ her mother said, ‘Well, your dad’s talking to him now.’

  ‘Oh, my God!’ Kate leaned against the side of the table and Maggie, looking at her with concern, said, ‘Don’t worry. John will go after him. He usually does.’

  ‘John’s got enough on his plate; he can hardly get through the work now.’ Mary Ellen bit on her lip, then turned her head away, saying, ‘Aw, lass, I’m sorry, but that lad’s forever upsettin’ me.’

  ‘Goodbye, Mam.’ Kate made for the door, and she had reached the yard before Hal turned from John and saw her. Coming swiftly towards her, he said, ‘That bugger at it again, I hear?’

  And she retorted in a similar fashion, ‘Yes, you’re right, you’ve heard, the bugger’s at it again.’

  ‘Kate!’ Whether it was the tone of her voice or the repeating of his words that brought his sharp reaction didn’t matter. But he went on more quietly, ‘I was only saying.’

  ‘Yes, Dad, I know you were only saying. But he’s my responsibility and Ben’s, and we’ll deal with him.’

  At this his manner reverted to natural and he cried at her departing back, ‘Aye, like hell you will. He’ll make you sup sorrow, that one, afore he’s finished.’ And he continued to stare after her until the sound of Mary Ellen’s voice calling from the kitchen door, ‘Enough! Enough! Come away in,’ made him turn about.

  Pushing past his wife, he threw his tall hat onto the settle and dragged off his coat and now threw this towards Maggie, crying, ‘The buckle end of a belt, that’s what he wants. That’s what he should have been given from he could walk. The money that’s been wasted on his schoolin’. I said all along, put him to work. Aye, even at the pit or the mill. That would have cured him. But no, no.’ He turned now on Mary Ellen, his finger stabbing towards her as he cried, ‘But one of these days, mark me, she’ll remember my words, because there’s a Bannaman in that ’un if I ever saw an inherited streak of rottenness in anybody…’

  ‘Hal, stop that! Now don’t start that again. The lad’s a rover and that’s all there is about it.’

  ‘Rover be damned!’ He now went to where Maggie had placed his coat on the back of a chair and, thrusting his hand into a side pocket, he brought out
four letters, saying as he did so, ‘I met the postie at the end of the road. There’s one for you.’ He took the top letter and threw it on to the table, saying, ‘It must be from the lads, but they’re altering the handwriting I would say.’

  As Mary Ellen picked up the letter, Maggie, looking at her father, said, ‘Is John riding out?’ and when he answered briefly, ‘Aye,’ she said, ‘In that case I’d better get over to the milking; Willy can’t do it all himself.’

  ‘Willy!’ Hal turned to Mary Ellen now, saying, ‘What’s the latest, do you think, I heard in town the day? Old Picker Robson has been at Willy to go in with him. It’s got round about his windfall. The cartin’ business isn’t as bright as it was since the railways came on the scene. Moreover, he’s likely got his eye on Willy for his lass, her kicking thirty an’ hope gone. Anyway, I squashed that one flat. I…’

  ‘What did you say? You’re going to raise his wages to keep him here?’

  He swung round on Maggie now, crying, ‘Don’t you be saucy. He’s well paid to begin with, and he’s got a cottage on his own.’

  ‘They give dogs kennels.’

  Hal’s mouth opened wide, and his eyebrows seemed to rush up to the deeply grizzled hair sprouting from the top of his brow.

  ‘Your tongue, miss, will get you a slap across the mouth one of these days. You’re not too old for that.’

  ‘I wouldn’t try it.’ Maggie walked calmly to the back of the door and lifted from it a head shawl which she put on and tied in a knot under her chin before turning once again and looking at her father, saying, ‘There’s one thing certain in this life: you go out of it the way you came in; you can’t even take your bank book with you.’

  As the door opened, Mary Ellen sprang round the table and caught Hal’s arm, saying, ‘Leave over. Leave over.’ And when the door closed on her daughter she added, ‘She’s in one of her moods the day.’

  ‘But did you hear what she said?’

  ‘Yes, I heard what she said and she’s right in a way; and another way an’ all, ’cos I think you should raise Willy’s wages. A shilling a week won’t hurt you and it might save you pounds in the end, for you’ll never get another like him. And, as I told you last week, Terry won’t last much longer.’

  He pulled away from her and walked to the window, saying, ‘All this, because that one puts me in me place. Be damned if I will!’

  ‘Well, you might be damned if you won’t. Anyway, sit yourself down. I’ll pour you out a cup of tea an’ then see to the bread, it’s rising beyond itself.’

  ‘See what the lads say first.’ He pointed to the letter on the corner of the table, and she picked it up and looked at the envelope, saying, ‘It isn’t from the lads this. It isn’t their writing.’

  ‘No, I thought it wasn’t. Well, open it up, woman, and see who it is from.’

  She picked up a knife from the table and split the envelope and took out the single sheet of notepaper. Then, after scanning a few lines, she raised her eyes and looked at him, and something in her expression made him cry, ‘What is it, woman? What is it?’

  At this she resumed her reading; then, the letter held slightly away from her, she went and sat on the settle, and from there she gazed up at him as she said softly, ‘It’s from Roddy.’

  ‘Roddy? Roddy Greenbank?’

  ‘Which other Roddy do we know?’

  ‘What does he want?’

  ‘He wants to come and see me…us.’

  ‘Why? He’s been a long time thinkin’ about it, hasn’t he? Must be all of sixteen or seventeen years gone since he was here. He never came to his own daughter’s weddin’. And what did he send her? A picture. And what was it about? The flamin’ smelt mills. He had painted her a picture of the smelt mills.’

  ‘He sent her fifty pounds an’ all. Remember that.’

  ‘Fifty pounds. Aye, and what was that an’ all? Poor return for her being kept for years.’

  ‘Hal!’ She sprang to her feet, and he wagged his hand at her, saying, ‘You know what I mean. You know what I mean. Don’t twist me words. But tell us what he wants to come here for?’

  ‘He’—she looked at the letter again—‘he says he’s got something to ask of me. He’s…he’s not well. Well, read it yourself.’ She thrust the letter towards him. But he hesitated before taking it from her and when he did he held the end of it between his finger and thumb as if in some way it might infect him. After a moment he handed it back to her, saying, ‘He could be here the morrow by that.’

  ‘Aye, yes.’ She nodded at him.

  His chin thrust out, he said, ‘Aye well, aren’t you gona fly round the house gettin’ it spruced up? If I remember, the last time his majesty proposed to visit us you had the place turned upside down; non-stop work for twenty-four hours.’

  Her face took on a quiet, even sad expression, and her voice was low as she answered, ‘A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then, Hal. Then, I had wanted him to see how well you had done, and what a fine family we had. Well, now he knows. There will be no trumpets blown for him this time, I can assure you. If you keep your temper and show a little dignity, that’ll be all that is required to impress him, and prove to him he’s not the only one who’s got on in the world.’

  She had expected him to come back at her, likely about the word dignity, but he must have thought better of it for when she rose to pour out his tea, he sat down, saying half to himself, ‘I wonder what he’s after now? He wants something or else he wouldn’t be comin’ here.’

  ‘Yes, I think you’re right.’ She handed him the cup of tea, adding, ‘But we’ll only have to wait and see, won’t we?’

  ‘Aye, yes we will.’ He looked up at her. ‘He’ll see his grandchildren for the first time and the boyo. I wonder what he’ll make of him? Will he recognise him as a copy of the man who killed his father, do you think?’

  ‘Hal! Hal! Don’t rake that up, for God’s sake. Whatever happens the morrow, don’t rake that up. There’s enough trouble, and right here an’ all, because I’ll tell you what’s worrying me more than anything at this moment, and that is that Willy ups and goes.’

  Over in the cow byres Maggie was putting that very question to Willy himself and not in a very roundabout way. She had just come in from the dairy with the two empty pails, and as she took the yoke from her shoulders, Willy Harding turned his head from one side to the other on the cow’s belly and, glancing at her, said, ‘There’ll only be two more, leave them, I’ll see to them. And you know, I never see what good those wooden monstrosities do. Besides tearing the skin off your shoulders, they hump the spine through time an’ all. I think it’s just as easy to carry the buckets by hand.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t mind them. I’m used to them, and I’ll have to go on getting used to them if all rumours are true.’

  He lifted his face from the cow while his hands still kept working on its teats as he said, ‘What rumour is that?’

  ‘That you’ve been given an offer to go in with Picker Robson.’

  ‘Huh! Oh, that.’ He was laughing now. She liked to hear him laugh. It started as a rumble in his chest and rose like the notes of a scale. It was like his voice, pleasing. He shook his head, saying, ‘It’s funny what a few coppers will do.’

  ‘I don’t call a hundred pounds a few coppers.’

  ‘No, perhaps not, but he never approached me afore the money was heard of.’

  ‘But others have, haven’t they, without the money?’

  ‘Oh aye, aye.’ He now stood up, pushed the stool back with one foot and, bending, drew out the pail from under the cow. Then patting its rump, he said, ‘You’ve done well today, girl. Look at that!’ And he pointed down to the full pail. ‘As creamy and as thick as whitewash. You’ll get some good butter there.’

  They were standing facing each other now. He was just a shade taller than her. His hair was fair to brown and had a wave on the top. His face was squarish: his eyes deep blue, round, and set in wide sockets; his nose was straight, in
clining to largeness; his mouth too was large, the lips slightly shaped; but there was no jut to the chin, it lay flat and would have dismissed all aggressiveness and determination from the character except for the squareness of the jaw. His eyes narrowed and he peered at her in the dim light of the byres as she said, ‘Why do you stay then? You’re not overpaid.’

  It was a moment before he spoke. ‘Why do you ask?’ he said.

  ‘Just that…well’—she jerked her chin up—‘you could get a better job than this with more money any day in the week.’

  ‘Perhaps I like it here, and…and I’m not one for change.’ He smiled again. ‘This is only the second job I’ve had in me life, you know. I was about twenty-six years with Sir Reginald. It was a long time.’

  ‘Did you really start work when you were six? You once said you did.’

  ‘Oh yes, aye, anyway they said I did, because I howled me eyes out when me mother died. So her ladyship said the best cure was to give me something to do, so they put me to work with a miniature brush. I swept the yard and kept the hen crees clean, and her ladyship saw I went to half-day schooling too. That was up till I was eleven, by which time I had tried me hand at most things on the farm. Then her ladyship died and everything altered.’