Brow of the Gallowgate

by Doris Davidson

  ‘Excuse me, Mrs Ogilvie, but I’ve somethin’ to tell you.’

  ‘I hope it’s something good, like a baby on the way,’ Bathie smiled. ‘You’ve fallen away behind me, you know. I’ve had Gracie since I had Flo, and you’ve still only got Will.’ She’d thought that her nursemaid had been too quiet over the past few weeks, but this would explain it.

  ‘No, it’s nothin’ like that, and afore I go ony further, I’m sorry about what happened this mornin’.’

  ‘It’s all right. I was angry at the time, but with Ellie and Bella, not with you. It was your duty to your husband . . . ’

  ‘That wasna why I went out, Mrs Ogilvie. I just tell’t Bella that to save her askin’ ony questions.’

  Her thin face bore such fear that Bathie was alarmed. ‘Why did you leave the children, then?’

  ‘It’s . . . I was . . . Oh, I’d better tell you the truth. Willie’s made up his mind to emigrate. It’s Jeannie’s letters, you see, aye speakin’ about the grand hoose they’ve got in Wanganui, and the fine job her Robbie has. That’s what’s made Willie want to go. He canna see us gettin’ out o’ the bit here, an’ he’s gettin’ ower-ambitious.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong in a man having ambition, Mary. It’s good that Willie wants to better himself.’

  ‘Aye, well, but he’s signed the papers, an’ we’d to go for an interview this mornin’, the two o’ us, to see if they’ll tak’ us in New Zealand. I should ha’e tell’t you about it afore, but I was worried in case you’d think we werena grateful for what you an’ Mr Ogilvie did for us.’

  ‘We didn’t think you’d stop in our attics for ever. I’m happy for you, although I’m sorry I’ll be losing you.’ Bathie knew what would be expected of her, and tried desperately to find an excuse to turn the suggestion down when Mary made it.

  ‘Bella would like my job, Mrs Ogilvie. She just needs a firm hand, an’ she’s good wi’ the bairns . . . honest.’

  Mary’s trusting eyes won her mistress over, against her better judgement. ‘All right, Mary, I’ll give Bella a try, but she’ll be out straight away if she doesn’t give satisfaction.’

  ‘Oh, thank you, I’ll tell her that, an’ if you let me show her how things have to be done afore I leave, I’ll mak’ sure she kens everything outside in.’

  ‘In that case, it’s a housemaid I’ll have to find.’

  The whole thing had obviously been well planned-out beforehand, presumably with Mrs Wyness’s help, because the girl burst out, ‘My cousin, Maggie, that’s Ma’s sister’s lassie, she’s lookin’ for a place, an’ she’d suit you fine.’

  So fourteen-year-old Maggie Lindsay started working for the Ogilvies on the following Monday morning, and Bella went upstairs to the middle floor with her sister to commence her training as nursemaid, although her mistress was anything but happy about the whole affair.

  ‘Remember, you’ll have to sleep here when Mary leaves,’ Bathie warned Bella, ‘so you can listen for Gracie and Flo, in case they waken up in the night.’

  ‘Aye, Mrs Ogilvie, I ken that, an’ I’m quite willin’.’ The girl’s smouldering eyes were serious for once.

  In just over four weeks, Mary was bidding her employers, and her charges, a tearful farewell.

  ‘Remember to let us know how you get on,’ Bathie told her. ‘We don’t want to lose touch with you.’ She regarded the girl as one of the family, she’d been with them so long, ever since they’d moved into the house in the Gallowgate.

  ‘I promise I’ll write.’ Mary wiped her streaming eyes.

  Willie Dunbar had been standing behind his wife, but now he stepped forward and cleared his throat. ‘I have to thank you very much for giving us a home for the past three years, Mr and Mrs Ogilvie. You gave me the chance to save enough to take this step, and I’ll always be grateful to you for it.’

  Albert, embarrassed, gave a short laugh. ‘Forget about it, lad. It was for my own benefit as much as yours, and you saved me a lot with all the jobs you did about the place. I’d have had to pay another tradesman, if you hadn’t been here, for I can’t even put a nail in straight.’

  Their slightly hysterical laughter faded away when Charlie came running in. ‘The cart’s here, Mary.’

  Gulping loudly, she said, ‘I’m sorry at ha’ein’ to leave a’ the bairns. Charlie, Donnie, Ellie – aye, even Ellie, though she had me runnin’ roon’ in circles sometimes – Flo an’ wee Gracie.’ She turned now to her sister. ‘Mind and work hard for Mrs Ogilvie, Bella, for she’ll write an’ tell me if you’ve been . . .’ Her tears choked her, and she grasped her son by the shoulder. ‘Come on, then, Will. We’ll ha’e to leave now, or we’ll be missin’ the train.’

  Little Will had been holding Flo’s hand – they’d been inseparable since the day they were born – but he let it go sadly and accompanied his mother out, while his father lifted their large trunk and swung it on to his shoulder.

  ‘Good luck!’ called Albert.

  Walking after the children, who were heading for the parlour window to watch the departure, Bathie said, somewhat shakily, ‘Mary’s been like a younger sister to me for eight years, I’m really going to miss her, Albert.’

  ‘You’ll have Bella.’

  His wife’s trembling lips tightened suddenly, but, as she glanced at the weeping girl standing behind the children, an unexpected pity surged up in her. This was a sad parting for her, too. Bathie stood up, in an attempt to take all their minds off what was happening. ‘It’s quite sunny today, Bella. I think you could take the children out for an hour or so.’

  Taking the two youngest girls by the hand, Bella led them upstairs to put on their coats, while the other three children trailed behind, strangely quiet.

  When the school opened the following Monday, after the long summer holidays, life returned to normal, and Bella was left with only two children to look after during the forenoons and afternoons, because five-year-old Ellie started in the infant class at Porthill School, just across the road.

  Bella’s youthful exuberance made her bored with being tied to the house for six evenings a week, so she tried to think of ways to cheer herself up. Aware that her large bosom excited men, and that Mrs Ogilvie watched her husband when they were all in the kitchen together, she set herself out to attract him. It would be a feather in her cap if he fell for her, and one in the eye for the stuck-up mistress.

  Unfortunately, he didn’t respond to the sly glances she bestowed on him, glances with the promise of delights to come. Once or twice he touched her breasts in passing, whether on purpose or accidentally, she wasn’t sure, but nothing more than that, and she grew frustrated because her own desires had been kindled and because her wiles weren’t working.

  When Bathie went to bed early one night with a very bad headache, Bella took full advantage of the golden opportunity. As soon as she heard Albert coming up from the shop, she crept down from the middle floor, and, knowing that her thin nightgown hid very little, she had deliberately left off her wrapper. If he saw her like this, she thought, he wouldn’t be able to resist her now.

  In her bare feet, she tiptoed across the kitchen floor to where he was standing at the sink, then pushed her arm past him to take the kettle out of his hands, brushing against him closely in the process.

  ‘Let me do that for you, Mr Ogilvie,’ she whispered, as seductively as she could, when he turned round in surprise.

  ‘You don’t need to bother.’

  His voice was slightly husky, and she was aware that he couldn’t keep his eyes off her erect nipples.

  ‘It’s nae bother, an’ I want to do something for you, Mr Ogilvie, for you’ve aye been awfu’ kind to me, an’ I like you an awfu’ lot.’ She fluttered her long lashes, and added, softly, ‘I’d do onything for you. Onything you wanted.’

  Relinquishing the kettle, he turned hastily away from her, muttering, ‘I’ll go through and ask if my wife wants some tea.’

  ‘I looked in, and she’s sleepin’,’ she lied.


  Thwarted of his means of escape, he moved towards the table to sit down, but the girl turned round after she’d set the kettle on the fire, and crossed to stand at his side.

  He didn’t look up into her face, but, when she leaned forward, he couldn’t avoid seeing down the front of her gown, and the swinging breasts with their hard pink tips made him lose his self control. But as soon as his fingers closed round them, he came to his senses and dropped his hands.

  ‘Get back upstairs, you shameless besom,’ he ordered. ‘For my wife’s sake I’ll not sack you this time, but if you try anything like this again, you will be out of a job.’

  ‘I didna mean ony harm,’ she muttered, but her eyes filled with hate as she straightened up and stalked out.

  Bathie had worried about Ellie behaving herself at school, but the girl settled in surprisingly quickly – it was Charlie who created the problem. At first, his mother assumed that he was outgrowing his strength – at eight, he was almost as tall as she was – but as the weeks passed, his eyes becoming dull and sunken, her alarm made her ask Bella about him.

  ‘Is Charlie sleeping all right? He always looks so tired and pale.’ She was dismayed to see Bella’s eyes sliding away.

  ‘He’s aye sleepin’ when I look in at him.’

  Bathie felt that Bella wasn’t telling the truth, so she tackled the boy himself when he came home. ‘Are you worried about something at school, Charlie?’

  ‘No, Mother. There’s nothing worrying me.’

  Bathie was horrified when he wouldn’t meet her eyes. It was so like the way Bella acted that it was frightening, but she didn’t pursue it. She’d try to find out from Donnie, who seemed normal enough, and often observed quite a lot in his own way. More than he was meant to, at times.

  At the first opportunity, she cornered her second son. ‘Do you know what’s wrong with Charlie?’

  Donnie looked at her candidly. ‘I didn’t know there was anything wrong with him, Mother, but you should ask Bella. She goes into his bed nearly every night, so maybe he’s told her what it is.’

  Bathie’s heart almost stopped beating at the implication of this. ‘Goes into his bed? Right into his bed?’

  ‘Yes, she comes in and takes off her nightgown and goes in beside Charlie. I’ve seen her lots of times, but she’s never there when I waken up in the morning.’

  ‘Thank you for telling me, Donnie.’ She kept her voice as steady as she could, to avoid transmitting her disgust to him.

  ‘Is that all, Mother? I want to finish reading a story.’

  ‘That’s all. No, tell Charlie I want to see him.’

  ‘Don’t tell him what I said about Bella, because he doesn’t know I’ve seen her.’

  ‘It’s all right, Donnie. Just do as I ask.’

  God in heaven, what should she do? How could she deal with this without leaving scars on her son’s mind? Looking up when Charlie came in, her heart went out to him, having to cope with emotions he knew nothing about.

  ‘Sit down beside me, dear. There’s something I have to ask you, and don’t be afraid to tell me the truth.’

  He hesitated for a moment, then sat down, his head bowed.

  ‘Charlie, you told me there was nothing worrying you, but that wasn’t true, was it?’ She prayed that he could tell her that Donnie was’ mistaken, or dreaming, or making it up.

  When Charlie didn’t answer, she braced herself to ask. ‘It’s . . . Bella, isn’t it?’

  His dark head jerked up. ‘What about Bella?’

  Bathie plunged in. ‘Does she come into your bed?’

  His face turned crimson. ‘Who told you?’

  ‘Never mind who told me. It’s true, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, it’s true, but I can’t speak about it.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘She said she’d kill me if I told anybody.’

  ‘She won’t kill you, because I’m going to send her away. You’d better tell me, Charlie.’ Bathie’s voice was urgent.

  ‘It wasn’t so bad the first time.’ He looked hopelessly at his mother, pleading with her not to interrupt. ‘She came into our room and I wasn’t sleeping because it was the day Mary went away and I was . . . crying.’

  That was months ago, Bathie thought. Had this been going on all that time without her being aware of it?

  ‘She came over to me, and knelt down on the floor and put her arms round me . . . like you used to do when I was little.’

  The pressure round his mother’s heart eased, fractionally. Was this all there was to it? Had Bella just been comforting him because he’d lost Mary, and easing her own sadness, too?

  But Charlie wasn’t finished. ‘She said she was cold, and she came under the blankets with me and cuddled me tight until I stopped crying. Then she went away.’

  Bathie held her breath. She sensed that there was more to come. Much more. She hated having to upset the boy by making him talk about it, but she had to know everything.

  ‘She didn’t come back until the night you went to bed early, remember? And she wakened me up, and came in beside me again. Then she gave me great big sloppy kisses, and asked me if I liked them. I didn’t, but I was scared, so I said I did, and she kept on and on at it nearly all night.’

  He paused, his distaste for what had happened showing plainly on his face. ‘I don’t think she came the next night, but when she came again, she said it was too hot with two of us under the blankets, and she took off her nightgown before she got in beside me, then she made me take off my nightshirt.’

  Bile was rising in Bathie’s mouth, but she had to ask. ‘Did she do anything to you, besides just kissing you?’

  ‘She made me touch her . . .’ He pointed shyly to his mother’s bosom. ‘She got all excited and her breath was hot and coming fast, especially when she started rubbing my . . .’ Embarrassment made him stop.

  ‘What else did she do? You must tell me everything, or else I can’t send her away.’

  ‘That was all for a start, but the next time she came, she made me put my hand between her legs, at the same time as she was rubbing me, and . . . Mother, my . . . you know . . . grew big.’ He sounded astonished, remembering about it.

  Bathie didn’t want to hear any more, and what Charlie had told her already would enable her to get rid of Bella Wyness. It was her duty to soothe her son now.

  He was still agitated. ‘Why did it grow big when she rubbed it, Mother? I felt I was doing something wrong and I was ashamed, but I didn’t know why it was wrong.’

  ‘You didn’t do anything wrong, my pet. Any boy, or man, will grow big if a woman rubs him there. It’s how you’re made, but you won’t understand about it properly till you’re older. What Bella did was very bad, but it wasn’t your fault, and you must never breathe a word about it to anybody else. I’m sorry I had to make you tell me, but now I can make her go away for good, and she can’t touch you ever again.’

  His eyes still regarded her anxiously. ‘I grow big now when I rub it myself. You see, I liked how it felt.’

  His honesty disconcerted her. ‘Charlie, it was wrong when she did it, and it’s not very nice to do it yourself.’

  ‘I’ll try not to do it again. I was worried when I thought I was doing something wrong with Bella, and I’m glad you say I wasn’t.’

  ‘Off you go, Charlie, and we’ll never speak about this again, I promise.’

  Bathie started to shake with fury when he left. She’d been sure, all along, that Bella meant trouble, but it had been Albert she’d worried about, not Charlie. The filthy, perverted trollop! How could she do that to an eight-year-old boy? Not much wonder the child looked ill, having that on his conscience and being terrified to tell anybody about it.

  Waiting until she felt more composed, she went through to the kitchen. ‘Maggie, go upstairs and tell Bella I want to see her in the parlour.’ She trusted that her voice sounded fairly normal. I want you to stay with the children until I come up.’

  Bella presented herself
to Bathie only a minute later, giving her mistress little time to plan what she would say.

  ‘You wanted to see me, Mrs Ogilvie?’

  The girl’s swagger, and her old insolent manner, almost made Bathie lose her self control, but she swallowed several times and said quietly, ‘Bella, as from this very moment, I am terminating your employment.’

  ‘Terminatin’ . . . ? You mean, you’re gi’ein’ me the sack?’

  ‘I’m sure you know why. I am absolutely disgusted, and I only wish I’d known sooner what was going on.’

  A sneer crossed the sensual face. ‘Charlie’s been tellin’ tales, has he? He’s a little devil, that ane.’

  ‘You’re the devil, Bella. I want you to pack your things and go, and I mean to tell your mother why I’ve put you out.’

  ‘You canna tell Ma! She’d knock the livin’ daylights out o’ me. What was the harm in lettin’ the laddie feel my tits? He’s nae so innocent as you think, ony road, for you shoulda seen the size his cock grew when I . . .’

  ‘That’s enough! Go, right now!’ Bathie’s insides were churning so much it was an effort to speak. ‘And if you ever mention this to anyone, I’ll . . . I’ll strangle you with my own hands.’

  The girl sidled towards the door. ‘He’s goin’ to be a right ane in six or seven year. The lassies’ll ha’e to watch theirsel’s wi’ Charlie Ogilvie.’ She fired a parting shot. ‘An’ he kens where to put it, for I showed him.’

  She flounced out, but the last glimpse of her face, filled with hatred and vindictiveness, galvanized her mistress into action. The filthy slut might just go to the nursery and take her spite out on Charlie for telling the truth about her.

  Bathie hurried up the stairs and heaved a great sigh of relief when she saw Maggie Lindsay reading a story to Flo and Gracie, who were both sitting in her lap with their eyes fixed intently on the page. Ellie was on the floor, colouring some pictures in a picture book, and Charlie and Donnie were beside her, playing with their train set.

  Maggie looked up, smiling. ‘Will I go down now and see to the supper, Mrs Ogilvie?’