The Wingless Bird

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘I’m…I’m sorry. It’s…it’s only that I’ve been so lost, so lonely, and now you’re here and saying you’ll come back. It…it was too much at the moment. But…but don’t worry; you won’t see me cry again.’

  He turned towards her now, saying, ‘You don’t understand what I meant. It wasn’t your crying, it was…Oh, God Almighty! Let me have a drink.’ He flopped down onto the couch again and, lifting up the half glass of port, he threw it off in one go, and immediately poured himself out another measure from the decanter, then said, ‘Come on, let us sit down and talk business.’

  She sat down, then she smiled at him as he said, ‘I’m going to get drunk; what will you do about that?’

  ‘Put you to bed.’

  ‘You would at that, wouldn’t you? Which reminds me, I thought I should have to bring Flynn with me, but there’s always McCann and he saw to Charles, didn’t he? I can mostly see to myself, though. Gerry, here, I can manage,’ and he pointed to his false foot. ‘Most of the time, anyway. It’s amazing what you can do with one hand. You know, they want to fix me up with a false arm, one of those with a hook on the end, but I’ve refused up till now. Yet, Johnny Knowles, one of the fellows, uses it like a natural hand. What do you think?’

  ‘I think it would be a good thing.’

  ‘All right, we might see about it.’ Then lifting his glass again, he held it towards her, saying, ‘Here’s to the wingless bird.’

  She did not join in the toast. Friendship is love without its wings.

  Of a sudden she longed to be alone and in bed because there she could cry.

  So Mr Reginald was coming back to live here for three days a week. Now what would you think of that? said the conclave in the servants’ hall. McCann knew what he thought of it, but he kept it to himself.

  Three

  It was Christmas Eve, nineteen twenty-three. The Christmas tree in the hall was brightly decorated with glass baubles and tinsel. Around the foot there were heaped the presents for the staff; but no sugar mice were to be seen scattered among them, nor were any on the branches, although Alice had brought a boxful on her visit yesterday. During her visit she had pointed out yet again that it was a funny set-up, didn’t she think, having him living in the same house with her half the week? Of course, she herself knew everything was above board, but still people talked, you couldn’t stop them. Even the Miss Cardings said nothing with their tongues, but their eyes had spoken volumes when they first knew about it.

  And who had told them, she had asked her mother some months ago.

  ‘Well, these things get out,’ Alice had answered.

  Again the leopard and its spots…

  ‘Don’t you think it’s about time you stopped. Come and sit down, woman.’

  ‘I’ve got just one more parcel to do up. It’s for Williams’ granddaughter. I had forgotten she’ll be there tomorrow with them.’

  ‘Well, you can do it in the morning.’

  ‘There’ll be no time then.’

  ‘Leave it.’ He came towards her where she was standing at the library table putting some fancy paper round the box. And he tugged her away, saying, ‘Come on; my tongue’s hanging out for a drink. Look; it’s nearly eleven o’clock and I haven’t had one since dinner.’

  ‘Poor soul. Anyway, you’ve had more than your allowance already. We agreed, didn’t we? Two whiskies, or two ports, or three beers.’

  ‘Agreements are made to be broken. You read about it every day. Come on.’

  She was laughing as he led her out of the library and along the corridor to the hall, and from there down another short corridor and into what was known as the study, but which was actually a small sitting room. A two-seater couch was placed at right angles to the fireplace, and the rest of the room was taken up with two easy chairs, a writing desk, and some small tables. She sat down on the couch, but he went straight to the fireplace and, taking a pair of bellows from a hook, blew on the dying embers in the grate. And when it was aglow he said, ‘Now sit there till I get the tray, and don’t you move.’

  ‘Look at the moon through the window!’ She pointed down the room to where the double glass doors led into the conservatory. And when he said, ‘Leave the moon alone, it’s not touching you,’ she laughed outright, for she had once told him how she had heard that from an old customer in the shop.

  She laid her head against the wing of the couch. There was a feeling of excitement in her, and it wasn’t caused by the festive season; it had been mounting in her for a long time now. It could have come to a head three months ago. Why hadn’t it? She knew why it hadn’t and he knew why it hadn’t, but they hadn’t spoken about it. They had gone on seemingly as they had done since that night he had spoken of friendship. ‘Friendship is love without his wings.’ But it had grown wings. Rapidly it had grown wings. No, that was wrong, it hadn’t grown wings. The wings had always been there, but folded. Now they were flapping wildly through her whole body; and for how much longer could she stop them from enfolding him…?

  ‘Have you gone to sleep?’

  ‘No, no.’ She sat up straight.

  ‘Here, drink this.’

  ‘All that? I’ll never get up the stairs.’ She sipped at the glass of port, and he, sitting by her side now, said, ‘I don’t know why I drink whisky. I don’t like it.’ He took a drink from his glass and pushed it aside; then, turning and looking at her, he said bitterly, ‘It’s a damnable law, isn’t it?’

  She stared at him, her eyes wide. And when he said, ‘Why don’t you ask which law is damnable?’ she answered, ‘I have no need; I know a man can’t marry his brother’s widow.’

  ‘Agnes.’ Both arms came out to her now, the false arm with the hook on the end resting on her shoulder while his good hand touched her face, as he said, ‘Oh, my dear, I love you. I’ve always loved you. Do you know that? Right from the first time I saw you outside the Cathedral. Something hit me then. I laughed at it but I couldn’t laugh it away. I loved Charlie but I was jealous of him. Not envious of him, no. But oh God, how I was jealous of him! Even on the day before you married, when I came to see you, I wanted to say, don’t go through with it. Please don’t go through with it. And you knew this, didn’t you? You did.’

  She did not answer him. What she did was to put her arms around him and press her mouth on his misshapen lips.

  Time seemed to stand still until, easing himself from her, he bent and buried his face in her shoulder and the tremors in his body matched those in her own as she pressed his head to her.

  It was a matter of minutes before he looked at her again. His eyes were soft and moist and his voice thick and low as he said, ‘I don’t see how you can love me as I am; yet, I felt that you cared. Even before this happened I imagined, under other circumstances, you could have loved me.’

  ‘Oh, my dearest, dearest Reg. I cannot tell you when I started to love you, only from the time when I was afraid of loving you. It was before I married Charles. But I knew then, even if there hadn’t been Charles there would have been little hope for us, because we…we couldn’t have come together.’

  ‘Why not? Why not?’

  ‘Well, as you know, Charles’ taking me broke up the family; and I’m sure Charles didn’t mean as much to your parents as you did. You were carrying on the tradition. Charles, in a way, was already an outsider and I imagined once I was married to Charles I would be safe from you; my feelings for you would fade. And they did, somewhat; at least I managed to bury them. That was until the day I saw you in the hospital, and on that day I wanted to take you in my arms.’

  ‘Even as I looked then, much worse than now?’

  ‘It’s odd, but I only saw your eyes. They were as I’d always remembered them, talking eyes.’ She put her fingers on his temple and stroked his hair to behind his ear as she said, ‘All the time I see you as you were because, underneath all this’—she now cupped his cheek in the palm of her hand—‘there is still you. You are the same underneath the skin. I’ve never seen you
any other way.’

  ‘You mean that?’

  ‘I do, my dear, I do.’

  ‘You’ve never been repulsed by…?’

  ‘Don’t ever use that word to me. I love you. And you know something? I think Charles will be happy for us, because he loved you, too. He loved us both so dearly. But now I’m tired and…and I want to go to bed.’ Her last words were soft and her gaze, too, was soft on him.

  His response was to rise slowly from the couch and draw her up towards him. Then he looked at her for a long moment before he drew her slowly into his arms, muttering as he did so, ‘Oh, my Agnes. No matter how long we live you’ll never be able to realise what you mean to me.’

  And to this she answered simply, ‘Nor you to me. Nor you to me.’

  It was turned twelve when McCann finally locked up; and then he almost scampered into the kitchen, where Mrs Mitcham and the cook seemed to be awaiting his return.

  ‘Well?’ Mrs Mitcham rose from her chair and he, looking from one to the other with a broad grin on his face, said, ‘It’s clinched. I was at yon end of the gallery and I heard her door open and she didn’t come into view until she reached the bedroom, his bedroom. She was in a dressing gown, a light affair.’

  ‘She went to him?’

  He turned now to the cook and said, ‘Well, with his bits and pieces off it would have been difficult for him to go to her, now wouldn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, of course. Aye, you’re right.’

  McCann now squared his shoulders as he said, ‘Well, that’s settled, and not afore time. But when I saw them through the conservatory window earlier on, clinging together like clams, I knew what to expect. And certainly not afore time.’

  ‘What’ll happen if there’s any children?’ Mrs Mitcham now asked.

  ‘Well, she didn’t show any signs of it with Mr Charles, did she?’ said Cook. ‘And you know what they say about TB people: they’ve got the urge that way more than most. So likely she’s fertile…I mean the other way.’

  ‘Well, whatever transpires, we’ll have to wait and see. But one thing is sure, it’s going to cause talk.’

  ‘Aye, it might.’ McCann nodded at her. ‘But the main thing is the house’ll go on as it always has done, and there’ll be nothing for us to worry about. Anyway, get yourselves off to bed.’ He looked from one to the other. ‘And that’s where I’m going, too, because me legs are practically giving out. There’s tomorrow to see to and the whole tribe coming up from Shields. I don’t look forward to that very much. Now New Year’s different, because Miss Elaine will be here, or Mrs Stoddart as she is now, and the bairns, and perhaps him an’ all, if his boat’s in. Now wouldn’t it make the picture complete if Mr Henry could be here? But there’s no hope of that. Why had he to go and turn himself into a bloody monk?’

  Perhaps it was the fact that McCann rarely swore, or how he had said the last words, or perhaps it was that the cook and the housekeeper had imbibed rather freely during the last hour, but they fell against each other and laughed until the tears ran down their faces, and McCann joined them, until he spluttered, ‘Shut up, the both of you, else you’ll be heard up in the attic, and then you’ll have Mary down. Come on, get yourselves away. I’m going to put the lights out.’

  As they all went their different ways they knew that whatever had happened upstairs tonight had affected them, because not one of them could remember the time when they had let go in such a fashion as to laugh until they cried. It somehow spoke of another way of life, another era.

  Epilogue

  A wedding announcement appeared in the national papers. It may have been passed over by many, but some may have noticed it for its unusual wording:

  On Wednesday, June 1st, 1949, a marriage took place between Mrs Agnes Farrier, widow of the late Mr Charles Farrier, and Mr Reginald Farrier, eldest son of the late Colonel Hugh George Bellingham Farrier and the late Mrs Grace Farrier. It was attended by the couple’s two sons, Mr Charles Farrier and Mr Hugh Farrier, their daughters-in-law and their three grandchildren. The bridegroom’s brother, Henry Farrier, who recently left the precincts of a monastery for health reasons and has taken over a parish in Fellburn, officiated at the ceremony.

  The bride and bridegroom will be spending their honeymoon cruising among the Channel Islands.

  The End