‘Oh, yes, I was dreading you being away for months.’
‘I wasn’t looking forward to it myself.’
Their lips had just met when the summons came. ‘Have you two forgot about me?’
‘Don’t heed her,’ Katie muttered.
George pulled her to her feet. ‘We’ve got all our lives to kiss, Katie lass.’
‘When am I getting my supper?’ Mary Ann demanded, when they went through.
‘When I’m good and ready,’ Katie retorted.
Turning to George, the old woman said, plaintively, ‘You see what I’ve to put up wi’? Like I said once afore, she needs a man to keep her in about, so the quicker you start, the better.’
Giving a laugh, George took Katie round the waist and bent her back to give her a long kiss, then he looked impishly at Mary Ann. ‘My wife has other things than cooking on her mind right now, so how about me getting some fish and chips?’
‘That would do fine.’
When he went out, the old woman said, ‘He’ll be a good man to you, Katie.’
‘I know, Grandma, so don’t spoil it for me.’
‘Me?’ Mary Ann looked hurt. ‘How could I spoil it?’
‘Give us some time to enjoy being married, that’s all I ask. If you keep interrupting us when we’re …’
‘I’ll not interrupt anything again. I’ll lie here starving to death and not say a word.’
Mrs Buchan’s odd remark coming back to her, Katie said, ‘George’s mother seemed to think I was illegitimate.’
‘She’s wrong, then, for your mother and father was married near a year afore you were born.’
‘Why did you never tell me anything about them, Grandma?’
Mary Ann sighed deeply. ‘Your grandfather was aye at me to tell you the truth, but I couldna hurt you. Now you’ve got a man to care for you, though, maybe I will, some day. Now, go through and get plates ready for the fish and chips.’
While she set the table and a tray, Katie puzzled over why her grandmother had said the truth about her parents would hurt her. Why was there such a mystery about them?
When she and George sat down to eat, he said, with a wry grin, ‘I’d have liked to give you a better wedding feast.’
‘It doesn’t matter. I love fish and chips.’
Mary Ann passed no sarcastic remarks when they told her they were going to bed, and Katie’s heart soared when they were in their own room and George said, ‘Maybe our wedding day wasn’t all we’d have liked, but we’ll not say that about our wedding night, eh, Katie lass?’
He had been almost sure that she wasn’t a virgin, but he couldn’t help feeling let down when it was proved to him.
Chapter Twenty-six
When Mary Ann suffered another seizure, Katie was thankful that George was at home. He could soothe the old woman much better than she could, agreeing with her even when she came out with outrageous accusations, for her brain had been left affected this time. Her eyes, if they weren’t vacant, had a baleful look when they fell on her grand-daughter, as though she resented her being there, and Katie was often reminded of how unloved she had felt as a child. She had hated her grandmother then, and hate – a far worse, adult hate – was building up inside her again. It was as if the old woman had made herself helpless deliberately, for spite.
‘She does it on purpose,’ she told George one night, after she had risen out of bed for the fifth time to give Mary Ann the bedpan.
‘She can’t help it, Katie.’
‘Yes, she can. She can’t need it as often as that. She knows we’re in bed, and she’s just trying to spoil it.’
He gave a rueful smile. ‘She is spoiling things, but she doesn’t know what she’s doing.’
‘She’s bound to know. She never cared how I felt.’
‘You’re over-tired, lass.’ George put his arms around her, and held her tightly. ‘Let me go to her next time.’
‘A man can’t do that kind of thing.’
‘I wouldn’t mind.’
‘She’d mind! Oh, George, we’ve been man and wife for two months and we’ve hardly had one night’s peace.’
His kiss was enough to set both their bodies on fire, but once again, the whining cry came before they could do more than caress each other. ‘Ka – ayt – ie!’
‘Bugger!’
Katie caught her breath at her husband’s exclamation. ‘You see, it’s getting to you, and all, George.’
She stamped through to the other room. ‘Grandma! You’ve just newly been, you can’t be needing again!’
‘I am needing again, but you’ve nae time for me now you’ve got a man.’
Hoisting her up, Katie rammed the bedpan under her. ‘If you don’t do anything, you can shout till you’re blue in the face next time, and I’ll not bother.’
‘Did she do it?’ George asked, when his wife rejoined him.
‘Aye, she did. I don’t know where it all comes from … I’ll have to stop giving her so many cups of tea.’
They had gone much further than petting when the next cry came, and he exclaimed, ‘Oh, God, I can’t stop now.’
The call was repeated three times before being answered, and Mary Ann looked up at Katie angrily. ‘I’ve wet the bed and it’s your fault! I ken why you didna come, for I heard what you and him were doing.’
Thoroughly embarrassed, Katie had to ask George to help her change the sheets, then she said, ‘I’d better stay with her. This is getting beyond a joke.’
Unwittingly, Katie had made a stick to break her own back, as George told her before he went to join the trawler again. ‘I’m sick fed up having a wife that never sleeps with me,’ were his last words as he slammed out.
Katie was not left long to cry in the kitchen, and when she answered the summons which came, she said, ‘I just hope you’re satisfied now! You’ve made George fight with me!’
All that day, Mary Ann was even more demanding than she had been before, hardly letting Katie out of her sight, and when the young woman sat down in the chair at the side of the bed in the early evening, she was so exhausted that she dozed off almost immediately. When the hand touched her arm about five minutes later, she had to drag herself out of a deep sleep. ‘What is it?’ she asked, petulantly.
‘I just minded I promised to tell you about …’
Dropping with fatigue and lack of sleep, Katie snapped, ‘I’m too tired to listen. Tell me in the morning.’
‘I’d like some cocoa,’ Mary Ann wailed.
Furious, Katie stamped into the kitchen and put a pan of milk on to heat, then after she had taken a cup through to her grandmother, she sat down by the fire to drink her own. Once she got the old besom settled, she thought, she would sit here for a while. Surely she’d get peace for half an hour or so?
Feeling quite relaxed, Katie stretched out her legs, and realized that she was cold. She opened her eyes and was astonished to see that the fire was out. Surely she couldn’t have slept … ? But it was daylight … She glanced up at the clock and was dismayed to see that it was almost eight. More than twelve hours without a single call? Bounding out of the chair, she ran through to her grandmother’s room.
When she saw Mary Ann lying with her eyes shut, her first reaction was one of relief that the old woman had managed to get one whole night’s sleep at last, then something made her bend down to touch the brow, and when her fingers came in contact with the icy skin, she jerked them back in alarm. This was not slumber. This was death!
A terrible horror gripped Katie then. She had left Grandma – like she had left Sammy – to die with no one near to care, and she would be haunted by that for the rest of her life. Still looking down at the bed, she saw now that the face was waxen, but it was more peaceful than it had been for a long time. This kind of death couldn’t be so very terrible, she thought. Neither of them would have felt anything, or known anything. They had fallen asleep and some time later, they had slipped away. She shouldn’t reproach herself. Even if she had been s
itting by the bed, there was nothing she could have done. She wouldn’t even have been aware of the exact time of death.
Going into the kitchen, Katie raked out the fire and set it with paper, sticks and cinders, then put a match to it, and when it was burning properly, she put on the kettle. She didn’t feel guilty any longer, but she needed a cup of tea before she went to tell the doctor.
On first watch, George was thinking about his wife. He shouldn’t have taken his frustration out on her, she wasn’t responsible for Mary Ann’s condition. No one was. If he could afford it, he would willingly pay for a woman to sit with the old woman all night, but it was impossible on what he would make from small fishing trips like this. If he was a skipper, things would be different, but he’d never be able to buy his own boat, so there would be no chance of sleeping with his wife until her grandmother died, and for all her tantrums, he didn’t wish the old woman dead.
It was just as well he wasn’t with the herring fleet now. Feeling the way he did, he’d be looking for a tart in the first port they stopped at. No, he corrected himself. He’d never do that again, not now he was married to Katie. It had been bad enough with Lizann, and he couldn’t explain that, not even to himself. Was it possible to love two women at once? It must be, for his gut still twisted when he thought of Lizann with another man. He hadn’t seen her wedding in the papers, though, so maybe she hadn’t married her Peter. Maybe, if he went to Buckie when he got back next week … ? God, what was he thinking?
‘Hey, George, you’re away in a dream, man.’
He looked up at the skipper with a smile. ‘I was thinking about my wife.’ And so he had been originally, he assured himself somewhat guiltily.
‘Oh, aye, I forgot. It’ll still be new to you, but wait till you’ve been wed for twenty year like me, and you’ll be glad to get away from her for a wee while.’
‘We’d a bit of a row before I left.’
‘You’re surely not fighting with her already?’
‘It’s her grandmother. It’s too complicated to explain.’
‘Ach, it’ll all come out right in the end, I’m sure.’
Watching the other man walking away, George felt better. Mary Ann couldn’t carry on like that for long, and likely, by the time he went home, her mind would be back to normal.
‘You couldn’t let me have fifty pounds, could you?’
Beth frowned. ‘I gave you thirty last week. If you’ve been gambling again, Dennis, I’ve a good mind to let you stew in your own juice.’
‘Once I’ve squared up the bookies, I’ll not go near them again, and that’s a promise.’
‘You’ve said that dozens of times before.’
‘I mean it this time, Beth, honest! I kept thinking I’d hit a lucky streak, but …’ Shrugging, he added, ‘You know what they say – unlucky at cards, lucky in love, and the same goes for the gee-gees.’ He slid his hand up her arm, smiling appealingly.
Heaving a resigned sigh, she picked up her handbag, took a wad of notes out of the inside zipped pocket and counted some into his hand. ‘Ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty.’ Noticing that his eyes had lit up greedily, she warned, ‘And that’s the last. You needn’t bother asking for any more.’
‘Thanks, Beth, you’re an angel.’
‘I’m a sucker.’ She knew he was watching her put the other notes back in her bag, and guessed what he was thinking, but he wouldn’t get away with it if he tried to get his sticky fingers on them, for she knew exactly how many were left.
‘I feel like going to bed for an hour or so, how about you?’ Dennis winked at her suggestively.
‘On a Sunday afternoon?’ She tried to sound shocked.
‘The better the day, the better the deed. Come on, my dearest one, let Dennis give you a proper thank you.’
‘I was going to look over your accounts.’
‘Oh, come on, Beth,’ he coaxed. ‘I’ll be cut to the quick if you prefer doing that to coming to bed with me.’
She gave in. She didn’t have to check the books to know he’d been fiddling. The profits had decreased steadily for months though the restaurant was busier than ever, but she wasn’t going to confront him just yet. What was more, she was almost sure he was taking up with other women, and she’d have to get proof before she accused him of that. Besides – she still loved the thieving blighter, God help her.
The stir of the preparations and the funeral itself were over now, and Katie was sitting forlornly in the kitchen. It didn’t feel right to have time to sit down when she kept imagining a voice calling for her. The house was like a morgue – no, she thought, sadly, not that, but it was cold despite the fire crackling up the chimney. If George had been at home, he would have got her out of this depression which had nothing to do with her bereavement – it was better that her grandmother was at peace – it was more a sense of foreboding. But he should be home for Christmas within a couple of days and everything would be all right.
Maybe she should clear out Mary Ann’s things? That would be something to occupy her hands, and she might find the money she suspected the old woman had stashed away. When she had opened the tin to get money to provide the funeral tea, there had only been three pounds left, though Mary Ann had always said there was plenty more.
Although Katie emptied every drawer and shelf in Mary Ann’s room, and laid everything on the bed ready to put in boxes to be thrown out, she found no secret cache, only another old tin with some papers in it. She took it through to the kitchen and sat down, tired and dejected. Why had she let the undertaker talk her into ordering an oak casket with brass handles and a brass plaque? Of course, she hadn’t been thinking clearly at the time, and he had said it was what her grandfather had, but it was far too expensive. George had paid for everything since they were married, food, coal, paraffin, and had left her a few pounds to keep her going until he came back from sea. She couldn’t expect him to pay for her grandmother’s funeral as well, even if he did have enough money, which was unlikely.
She would have to sell the house, it was the only thing to do. George’s mother would probably take them in until they could afford a place of their own, though she would tell everybody her daughter-in-law was feckless and couldn’t face up to her responsibilities.
Remembering the old tin in her hand, she took off the lid to go through the papers. There was likely nothing important but she may as well look. On top, she found two blue birth certificates almost worn through at the folds, one for Mary Ann Bruce and the other for William John Mair. Under them was their marriage lines, and another birth certificate in the name of William John Mair, white this time and dated 1888, which must be her father’s. Slipped inside this was a scribbled note in her grandmother’s writing. ‘William John wed Elizabeth Baxter in Portknockie on 20th December 1905’, it read. So that had been her mother’s name, Katie thought, pleased that she now knew at least that much about her.
But there was something else at the bottom of the tin – a piece of paper with a rusting safety pin stuck through it. She thought at first that it was blank, but when she looked closely, she could just make out the faded writing. ‘This is your grand-daughter. Her name is June.’ Uncomprehending – the name meant nothing to her – she returned everything to the tin and went to bed.
The cost of the funeral niggled at her again as soon as her head touched the pillow, but a far greater worry hit her some minutes later. The note in the tin had obviously been pinned to some infant’s clothing … but whose infant … and why? When the answer struck her, Katie was left gasping like a fish out of water, and a great sickness surged up inside her. Almost paralysed with shock, she was certain that the baby had been the grandchild Mary Ann had taken in after its mother died … June, not Katie!
Her thoughts jumped around wildly, trying to make some sense of it, until, at last, shivering with cold, she rose and went through to the kitchen. It was only half past two, and the embers in the fire were still glowing, so she piled on some sticks to make it burn up. Waitin
g for the kettle to boil, she took out the little note again. June? It was this girl who was the rightful owner of the house … unless … had she died as a baby? Had Mary Ann been so upset about it she got another infant from some poor unmarried girl to replace her? Was that why there had been so much secrecy about her birth? Was Katie Mair not Katie Mair at all? Was she Katie something else? George’s mother had been right. She was illegitimate!
With a shuddering sigh, she stood up to put a spoonful of tea in the pot, then poured in enough water to fill one cup. By the time she sat down to drink it, she was beginning to feel angry. She shouldn’t have been left to discover a thing like this at such a time. She should have been told when she was old enough to understand, and not been allowed to think that the house would belong to her. Just the same, who would know she wasn’t the rightful heir? She had been raised as a Mair, everybody thought she was a Mair – damn it all! She was a Mair, no matter what!
Going back to bed, she slept like a log, and it was almost eight o’clock before she got up, refreshed and determined to clear out the whole house so that it could be sold. She went up to the grocer first to get some tea-chests then set about her task. She weeded out all the items she thought should be thrown out and put them in a big pile in the backyard. Then she packed the rest in the boxes. If George’s mother didn’t have room to store the things until they got a house, the Salvation Army would be glad of them, or she could give them to the Seamen’s Mission.
She was so engrossed that it was half past three in the afternoon before she felt hungry and made herself a slice of toast and a pot of tea, then, anxious to be finished before she lost her nerve, she set to again. Only once did she falter, when she came across William John’s sail-making tools tucked away in a corner of the press. Her grandfather – she would always think of him as that whether or not he’d been any relation to her – would be horrified if he knew she was planning to usurp someone else’s birthright. The moment passed, however, and, squaring her shoulders, she carried on. If Granda hadn’t been able to make his wife tell her the truth, he should have told her himself … but maybe they had become accustomed to thinking of her as their grandchild.
The Three Kings Page 30