Three addresses were scribbled on the other side: Seatown, Cullen; Struieburn Farm, near Mintlaw; Marischal Street, Peterhead. Were they places where Katie Gunn had lived? Was it to one of them Angus had gone that Sunday he had said he had some business to attend to? He was in such a state when he came home that she had been afraid he was having a heart attack, and when he calmed down, he said that the deal he’d been trying to negotiate had fallen through. Was it possible that he had been trying to get his legitimate second wife to come back to him and she had wanted nothing to do with him? That would explain his agitation.
It crossed Betty’s mind that she could be thrown out if he ever succeeded in bringing Katie to Fenty, and in the worry of this, it was some time before she remembered the letter and was so on edge that she nearly put it back unread. Then, thinking that it might contain information about Katie – which would be why Angus had acted so strangely – she took the single page out of the envelope. It shed no light on Katie but was another great shock to Betty.
She read it a second time before she returned paper and envelope to the secret pocket and shut the lid of the trunk. Then, on an impulse, she went into the other attic, where a bed had also been left rumpled, with a chair at one side and a small table at the other. Instead of a trunk there was an old chest of drawers which drew her like a magnet. The top two drawers held only linings of yellowing newspapers, but in the lowest lay a pair of ripped stockings and a faded, torn petticoat. Were these Katie’s? But surely she would not have slept up here if she was married to Angus?
About to slide the drawer in, Betty saw that the lining paper was not lying flat at one corner and curiosity made her lift it to see what was underneath. To her astonishment, there was a small collection of coins and three ten shilling notes. In all, it could not amount to much more than two pounds, and the owner must have forgotten about them.
When Betty went down to the kitchen, she tried to put the pieces together in her mind. The letter, from Banff police station, had said that Samuel Gunn had been apprehended in the street for indecent behaviour, and also that he had been certified as insane and was now in Ladysbridge, the papers committing him having been signed by his recognized guardian and the police doctor. The writer had felt, however, that the young man’s father should be told, although he had been informed by his colleagues at Cullen that Mr Gunn had, some time earlier, refused to take his son back.
Betty felt a surge of anger. Angus had never told her that his son was still alive – she had assumed that the imbecile he had spoken of once had died at birth – but it explained the contents of the trunk. Then it occurred to her that Katie could be Samuel’s wife. She might have been a maid who had fallen in love and eloped with him, and left him when she found out that he was mad. Angus could be anxious about her, that was all, and was trying to find her to make sure that no ill had befallen her.
Yes, Betty decided, it all fitted in. Katie had slept in one of the attic rooms and Samuel in the other. The letter had shocked Angus at first – he would hate the idea of his son being in an asylum – then he’d been pleased that no harm had come to Katie, for, being Samuel’s wife, she must have been the other person who had signed the form to commit him.
Betty rose to make herself another cup of tea, but, while she waited for the kettle to boil, the doubts came flooding back, and she knew that she could never rest until she knew the truth. She would have to ask Angus … but not yet.
Mary Ann seemed to have recovered so quickly from the death of her husband that Katie wondered if she had ever mourned at all. After being married to him for so many years, she should have been lost, bewildered, but her tongue and her eyes were as sharp as ever. The only hint of advancing age was her occasional comment that her knees were as stiff as boards in the mornings with rheumatics.
Katie knew better than offer to share the housework, and so, to pass her time, she took bus trips to Buckie, not far along the coast, and once as far as Elgin; it was like being on a never-ending holiday. After three weeks, however, this began to pall, and she reflected, sourly, that holidays should come to an end some time, otherwise there was no pleasure in them.
It was worse having to sit through the long evenings with her grandmother, neither of them having anything to say to the other. Mary Ann, who had always kept her hands busy by knitting socks, drawers and ganzies for William John, did not have this to occupy her any longer and sat with her hands in her lap, staring into the fire. At last, Katie could bear it no longer. ‘Couldn’t you knit a cardigan for yourself, Grandma?’
‘I’ve plenty cardigans.’
‘Aye, but it’s just the darns that holds them together,’ Katie retorted.
Even having suggested it, she was still surprised the next morning when Mary Ann said, ‘If you’re going to Buckie, I’ll gi’e you money to buy some black wool and a pattern for me. You’ll get a better selection there.’
Katie bought wool for herself, too, and from then on, the evening silence was broken by the click of knitting needles. She sometimes went out for a short walk before she went to bed, along the harbour wall or across the golf course, but not to the Three Kings. There was nothing to tell them any more. She still felt guilty about putting Sammy away and often wondered how he was. She even dreamt of him one night, reliving her brief visit to Ladysbridge, feeling again the deep pain she had felt when he had looked blankly at her and shouted for his mother. She couldn’t understand that, for he had never mentioned his mother after they left Fenty. Maybe she should go back to see him? He could be better now. The shock of being accosted by the police and locked in a cell was enough to make even the most balanced of men lose their reason.
When Katie told her what she meant to do, Mary Ann was very much against it, but the young woman stuck to her guns. ‘Sammy could be wondering why I’ve never been back to see him, so I’m going, whatever you say, Grandma.’
‘And if he’s got back what little sense he had? You surely wouldna think on taking him out o’ there?’
‘If he recognizes me, I’ll ask how I should go about …’
‘You’re nae taking him here! Have you lost your wits, and all? He might have clear spells, but they wouldna last and then he could be worse than ever. He’s best where he is, for they ken how to deal wi’ the likes o’ him, and seeing you could easy upset him.’
‘I have to go, Grandma!’
Mary Ann sagged back in her seat. ‘So be it, then.’ In her displeasure, her compressed lips vanished inside her gummy mouth, leaving the impression that there was only a puckered hole in the middle of her face.
As it turned out, the two women need not have bothered to argue, because there was no change in Sammy’s condition, and when, after ten minutes of trying to jog his memory, Katie turned to go, he shouted for his mother. The attendant came running up to quieten him. ‘He hasn’t done that since the last time you were here,’ he said, accusingly.
Bitterly disappointed, she walked away, presuming that she must remind Sammy of Fenty and Mrs Gunn.
When she went home, Mary Ann did not need to ask what had happened, and uncharacteristically, she made no reference to the girl’s long face and melancholy eyes.
***
The days passed so slowly for Katie that she eventually had to say, ‘I can’t go on like this, Grandma. I’ve got nothing to do all day and I’ve used nearly all the money I’d saved. I know you give me all my food, but I’ve been paying a lot of bus fares, and I’ve had to buy stockings and other things I needed. I’ll have to get a job.’
Mary Ann bridled. ‘You should have said and I’d have paid for the things. Besides, there’s precious little jobs to be had round here, and I’m not having you going away again. I kept you till you were fourteen, and I can still manage.’
‘But Granda was working when I was younger, and you’ve only your old age pension coming in now. Ten shillings a week’s not enough to keep us both.’
‘Your grandfather didna leave me penniless. I got what his father
left him, and I …’ Mary Ann broke off, then ended, a crafty smile flitting across her face, ‘Nothing’ll come ower you when I go. You’ll be well provided for.’
‘But I could provide for myself if I had a job,’ Katie objected. Her grandmother had no idea how quickly money went down when there was less coming in than going out.
‘You’ll get the house, and all, when I pass on.’
‘You won’t be passing on for a long time yet.’
‘I hope no’, but you never ken.’
Mary Ann’s pessimism worried Katie, and she wasn’t sure if she would want to stop on in Cullen if her grandmother died. There was nothing for her here. She would be better to go to a city, Aberdeen, or Edinburgh, or even London. She might get the chance of working for a lady with a title there.
She was unwilling to waste money on bus trips now, and when she returned from one of the long walks she had started to take – strolling through the grounds of Cullen House or visiting her grandfather’s grave in Seafield Cemetery, or, as today, going up the Bin – Mary Ann observed, ‘When I was up at the baker’s in the Square this forenoon, young Alice Burnett was telling me she’s getting wed next Saturday.’
Katie knew that there was something behind this apparently innocuous remark, but it took her a minute or two to realize that her grandmother was telling her to apply for Alice’s job. There was no point in trying to thank her, for her head was bent over a pot at the fire.
‘I thought I’d never be happy again after Tom died, but I’m happier than I’ve ever been.’ Beth McKay gave her husband a loving smile.
‘I’m pretty happy myself,’ Dennis smirked, ‘though I was a bit embarrassed about you paying for everything – the ring, my clothes, the honeymoon.’
‘I wanted it to be perfect, and it was. I was proud of you in Strathpeffer, you looked so distinguished. Some of the old dears in the Hydro looked at you like you were royalty.’
‘King Dennis, that’s me,’ he grinned. ‘I never thought I’d be in a place as swanky as that, but being a waiter, I knew the right knives and forks to use.’ His face straightened. ‘I’ll be back to serving other people tomorrow, though.’
‘I’ve been thinking about that, Dennis. What would you say to running your own restaurant?’
After the initial soaring of his spirits, he decided to go carefully. ‘How do you mean?’
‘I could buy a place for you, and you could hire your own staff, and do anything else you wanted.’
‘Just a minute, Beth.’ He had meant to wait a while before hinting that he’d like to have his own hotel, but she had only said a restaurant, and he didn’t know what she had in mind. ‘What kind of place were you thinking of? A poky wee café, a tearoom?’
She gave a tinkling laugh. ‘Much better than that, Dennis. A proper restaurant, with good food reasonably priced, but not cheap. The kind of place a businessman could take his wife, or a solicitor might take his clients. You know what hotels serve … that’s what you could aim at to start with, then once you saw how it was going, you could engage a chef to specialize in a certain kind of cuisine.’
He smiled derisively. ‘In Peterhead?’
‘Why not? There’s a lot of moneyed people here, skippers and fish-curers as well as the businessmen and solicitors, and so forth. I’m sure you could make a go of it.’
Dennis felt his interest stirring. A restaurant would be easier to run than a hotel. As long as he found a decent chef, he could do the rest standing on his head. ‘So how do we go about it? I mean, getting premises and that?’
‘Leave that side of it to me. After I’ve found the right spot, it’ll be up to you and I promise I won’t interfere.’
He heaved a sigh of satisfaction. ‘I can’t believe you’d do this for me, Beth.’
‘Can’t you? You should know how much I love you.’
‘Not half as much as I love you.’ As he said it, he felt a slight prickle of conscience, because he didn’t love her at all. He liked her, but he had married her purely for her money, though he had never thought she would cough up so quickly. He would make a go of this restaurant, which would lull any doubts she might harbour about him, make her think he was a reformed man, but once he had it running smoothly, he meant to have a good time amongst the girls again.
Betty Gunn had been waiting to catch Angus in a good humour. She had not been able to get Katie, whoever’s wife she was, out of her mind, and when Angus came home one night looking pleased with himself, she made up her mind to tackle him.
‘I sold three skirts to one woman today,’ he crowed.
Betty smiled admiringly. ‘You’re a good salesman.’
‘Yes, I think I have a good way with the women.’ Full of bonhomie, he asked, ‘What have you been doing today?’
It was the perfect opening and she took it. What did it matter that what she was about to tell him had taken place nearly a month ago? ‘Well, I’d finished all the housework early, and I was stuck for something to do in the afternoon, so I tidied up one of the attics.’
A frown appeared on his forehead. ‘I told you not to go up there. Which one did you do?’
‘The nearest one.’ She waited for the eruption and when it didn’t come, she added, ‘There’s a lot of stuff in the trunk that could be thrown out.’
He took a moment to answer. ‘Yes, I have not been in there since my son left.’
‘Oh,’ she said, feigning great surprise, ‘I thought your son died when he was born.’
‘It would have been better if he had.’
‘It was his bedroom, then?’
‘For a time.’
‘Who slept in the other one?’
His face registered deep annoyance now. ‘So you went in there, too, did you?’
His anger made her regret broaching the subject, but she had started and was determined to get to the bottom of it. ‘I just had a look. There’s some ripped stockings and an old petticoat in one of the drawers.’
‘Er – yes. They were left by a young maid we had.’
‘Katie?’
His eyes flashing, he shouted, ‘Damn you to Hell! You had no business up there! You were interfering with things which do not concern you.’
Her legs trembling, Betty still persisted. ‘Anything about you concerns me. I told you I was tidying up, and I saw the pocket in the trunk, so I put my hand in to see if there was anything inside. Why did you write that name so many times? What’s Katie to you?’
Not answering her question, Angus said, in a voice as cold as steel, ‘I suppose you found the letter from the police, too? You knew my son was in a mental institution.’
‘I can’t understand why you didn’t tell me yourself, it’s nothing to be ashamed of. And you still haven’t told me what Katie is to you.’
‘She is nothing to me! It was she who … turned my son’s brain altogether. She interfered with him, and when I caught them one night and ordered her to leave next morning, she ran off and took Sammy with her.’
He was shaking so violently that Betty was sure there was much more to it than he was saying. ‘Did you fancy her, and all? Was that why you … ?’
He grabbed her arms roughly above the elbows. ‘Oh, Great God, woman! Yes, I fancied her, as you so crudely put it, and she spurned me! Are you happy now that you have wormed it out of me?’ He paused, his fingers digging into her flesh, then sneered, ‘Since you seem to be so interested, I may as well tell you that Marguerite’s death was a direct result of Katie taking Sammy away. If I ever get my hands on her, I’ll …’
Betty was relieved when he stopped and let his arms fall. ‘I warn you,’ he muttered, ‘do not goad me again.’ Then he turned and went out.
She sat down, rubbing her arms. What kind of man had she married? She had never seen him so angry; he had been on the verge of striking her. After giving it a little more thought, however, she realized that she had asked for it, reminding him of things he would rather forget. She just wished she had found out why he had written M
rs Katie Gunn, but she would be wise never to mention that name again. Enough was enough.
When Angus came back from wherever he had gone to cool off, it was he who brought up the subject again. ‘Katie was a trustworthy maid, and I would like to bring her back here. I have learned that she now lives in Peterhead, and I have been meaning to go to see her, to show her that I bear her no malice. Perhaps, if you came with me, she would be more willing to return.’
Betty contemplated refusing, then she remembered that he had said he would like to get his hands on Katie for what she had done to his son. If he was out for vengeance, she could warn the girl if she went to Peterhead. Besides, she wanted to find out what she looked like. ‘All right,’ she smiled, ‘I’ll go with you.’
‘Shall we make it this coming Sunday?’
Never having been told of the wartime injury to his head, nor of the fall which had further damaged his brain, Betty was blissfully unaware that her husband was teetering on the borderline between sanity and insanity.
Too wound up to sleep on Saturday night, Angus was recalling his first visit to Peterhead. The indignity of being thrown out had mortified him, and the excruciating headache and the intense pains in his chest had made him sure that he was in the throes of a fatal heart attack. It had been more than an hour before he felt fit to drive home, and he had decided to put Katie and what she had done out of his mind for good.
The arrival of the letter from Banff, however, had put a different perspective on things. With Sammy out of the way, his long-nourished dream of putting his mark on Katie could soon be fulfilled, but first he meant to force himself on her, give her a taste of what a red-blooded man could do. Betty would suspect nothing as long as he could contain his feelings in front of her, but he would have to guard his tongue tomorrow. If he let slip that he had bought a whip …
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