Union Belle

by Deborah Challinor

  ‘Come on, boys, let’s go,’ Pat said, reaching for his bag. He was hoping Canning might still be outside. The bastard had had it coming for a long time.

  But he wasn’t.

  ‘Must have scuttled off home,’ Lew said. ‘Bloody lucky he lives in town.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Pat said, ‘he’ll keep.’

  Tom sat in silence all the way home, brooding and massaging his bruised knuckles, thinking about Ellen’s strange moods over the last few months, her apparent need to go out more than she normally did, her evasive answers to his questions.

  The others glanced at him from time to time, but left him to it. They felt for him, but what could you say to a bloke who’s just been told his wife’s cuckolded him? They all knew Canning was a prize bullshit artist, and a prick to boot, and none of them had believed what he’d said, but still, it wasn’t a pleasant situation.

  None of them, that was, except for Pat, who had heard a little rumour from Rhea recently. Rhea was a good woman, but she was partial to a bit of gossip, and she’d mentioned a few weeks ago that there might be trouble in the McCabe household before too long. When he’d asked her what she meant, she’d told him very disapprovingly that Ellen McCabe had been seen getting off the train at Rotowaro and walking back up the main road towards the Junction, at about the same time that Jack Vaughan had been spotted sitting up the very same road in his truck. She didn’t want to put two and two together, Rhea had said, but you had to wonder. Pat hadn’t said anything to anyone about it because it was none of his business, and in particular he hadn’t said anything to Tom McCabe, whom he didn’t want distracted from his union work.

  They all got off when the train pulled into the station at Glen Afton, the end of the line. It was dark now and there was a fair bit of swearing and stumbling as they set off up the road to Pukemiro, a few miles further on. But they knew the road well, even after the sun was well down, and the walk was no hardship.

  Still Tom said nothing. Bert was getting worried about his thunderous silence, and looked to the others for inspiration, but all they could do was shrug helplessly, except for Pat, who was marching on ahead. It just wasn’t the sort of thing they could do anything about. Even if there was a problem, Tom and Ellen would have to sort it out between themselves; matters like this always were best kept between a man and his wife. But Bert suspected he wasn’t the only one relieved that Jack had gone down to Taranaki for the weekend. He wouldn’t tell Dot about this, though, when he went to see her on Sunday; she was very fond of Ellen and would be devastated to hear that something might have gone wrong between her and Tom.

  They reached the turn-off to Pukemiro and started trudging up the hill, Pat, Lew and Vic saying goodnight as they came to their front gates.

  Halfway up Joseph Street, Bert tried for a bit of conversation, just to break the tension. ‘Your lads playing football tomorrow?’

  Tom’s head jerked up. ‘What? Yeah, I think so.’

  ‘Who are they playing?’ Bert asked, although he already knew because his eldest boy was playing as well. It was a home game at the school.

  ‘Huntly Primary.’

  Bert considered this response to be a reasonably good sign. ‘You going along to watch?’

  ‘I expect so.’

  Silence again.

  Then Tom suddenly blurted, ‘Do you think what he said was true? What Canning said about Ellen?’

  ‘Hell, no,’ Bert said. ‘Red Canning’s full of shit and always has been, shit-stirring bastard. It’s either a load of rubbish or he’s got his wires crossed, that’s all.’

  Tom grunted, but didn’t say anything else.

  As they parted at Bert’s gate, Bert said, ‘I’ll see you tomorrow at the school then?’ but Tom didn’t reply.

  Bert stood and watched for a moment as the big, dark shape of his friend disappeared into the shadows on the other side of the hedge, then went inside himself. Ellen poked a knife into the meat, testing to see if the mutton was cooked properly yet. It was stewed chops, which no one really liked, with potatoes and cabbage. Fortunately for the boys, they wouldn’t have to eat it; Milly had been over earlier, and had decided to take Neil and Davey back to her house for tea. Her mother had given her a big pork roast, and she’d insisted that her lot wouldn’t be able to manage it all by themselves.

  ‘Save the leftovers for sandwiches for tomorrow, or for a shepherd’s pie tomorrow night. Don’t waste it on these two gannets,’ Ellen had said, laughing and inclining her head towards Neil and Davey, who were sitting at the table playing a very noisy game of Snap.

  ‘Gannet! Gannet!’ Fintan had squawked, and Milly had shrieked with laughter. She thought Fintan was the funniest thing she’d ever seen, especially when he swore.

  ‘It’s not a waste,’ she’d replied, ruffling the boys’ hair, making them giggle and squirm away from her. ‘You’ve got two growing boys here.’

  ‘And you’ve got two growing boys as well.’

  ‘But it’s a very big roast. I’ll send them back just before they’re too stuffed to walk, all right?’

  So off the boys had gone, delighted to be having roast pork for tea instead of stinky old mutton chops.

  To be honest, Ellen was glad of the peace and quiet. Tom would be home soon, and she wanted a few minutes to herself. The three hours she’d spent with Jack this morning had been wonderful, but what Gloria had said to her on Wednesday had given her an almighty fright. She’d almost decided to tell Jack about it, then changed her mind in case he’d thought she was fishing for some sort of promise or assurance. He was on his way to Taranaki now, anyway, so she wouldn’t see him for a couple of days.

  She heard Tom coming up the steps and gave the chops one last poke; another ten minutes should do it. She wiped her hands on her apron and turned to greet him, then felt her heart sink because it was obvious he’d had quite a few at the pub. There was something else, too, something dark and closed-off about him. Perhaps the meeting in Auckland hadn’t gone well.

  ‘Hello, love,’ she said, making an effort to make her voice sound bright. ‘Tea’s nearly ready. Mutton chops, unfortunately.’

  ‘Where are the boys?’ Tom asked as he pulled two bottles of beer out of his pockets and sat down heavily at the table.

  ‘Milly’s, they’re having their tea there.’ Ellen eyed the bottles, but didn’t comment. ‘Her mother gave her a big pork roast.’

  ‘Hip hip hooray.’

  Ellen frowned. What was wrong with him? He wasn’t usually sarcastic like this.

  ‘Did you have a bad day?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes and no,’ he said, flipping the lid off one of the beer bottles with a knife.

  ‘Well, tell me about it then.’

  He looked at her levelly. ‘No, why don’t you tell me about your day?’

  ‘My day?’ She was unpleasantly surprised; he hardly ever asked what she’d been up to. ‘Well, just the usual. After you went, I made the boys their lunches then saw them off to school. Then I did the breakfast dishes and made the beds and did a bit of ironing. Oh, and Milly came over later this afternoon for a cup of tea.’

  Tom took a long swig straight from the bottle.

  ‘Do you want a glass?’ she asked.

  ‘No,’ he said, and burped without excusing himself. ‘Did you do anything else?’

  ‘No, not really.’

  Ellen felt a bubble of dread begin to inflate in her chest, and turned away from him, moving the pots off the range and onto the bench. Then she stopped because she could feel him staring at her.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  She spun around, sudden fear making her shrill. ‘Of course I’m sure! Why would I not remember what I did today?’

  ‘No reason.’ His voice was ominously steady but she could hear something welling beneath it. ‘What about all the other Fridays I’ve been away?’

  Ellen looked at Tom’s narrowed eyes and the dark flush that was spreading across his face, and felt as if her legs might go from
under her. She put a steadying hand on the bench.

  ‘No, I can’t remember every minute of every Friday!’

  ‘I’ll jog your memory then. You weren’t, by chance, visiting someone who lives in Robert Street?’

  ‘Who?’ she asked, then immediately realised it was probably the worst thing she could have said, because now Tom would say his name and she wouldn’t be able to hide any of it from him.

  ‘Jack Vaughan,’ he said.

  And in that instant, in less than a heartbeat, Ellen saw that he knew.

  ‘Jack?’ she said, with as much surprise in her voice as she could muster.

  Then she panicked. Perhaps she could convince him that whatever he’d heard was wrong, just gossip or the wrong end of the stick, anything that would steer him away from the truth. Because it was too soon for this to be happening. She wasn’t ready, and she suddenly realised with a nauseating rush of dismay that she might never be.

  Then another voice said, ‘Jack!’

  They both turned and stared at Fintan in his cage.

  ‘Jack!’ the parrot trumpeted again. ‘I miss you, Ellen!’

  The blood drained from Ellen’s face. ‘Oh, God,’ she whispered. ‘Tom, it’s not what you think.’

  He banged his bottle down so hard that the beer frothed up and spewed out all over the table. ‘I bet it fucking well is,’ he hissed, ‘I bet it’s exactly what I think.’

  ‘He’s a parrot, he doesn’t…’

  ‘Fuck the parrot. Why, Ellen? Why?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I don’t know! I’m so sorry.’

  ‘You will be,’ Tom said, and stood up.

  He crossed the room, raised his hand and hit her a solid blow across the side of the head that knocked her sprawling. A grunt was forced out of her as her face scraped along the floor, but she didn’t scream—if it was the last thing she did, she would not scream. And then, with stoic resignation, she covered her head with her arms.

  THIRTEEN

  But he didn’t hit her again, and neither did he say anything else before he slammed out. She lay there for nearly ten minutes, weeping, before deciding she should move, just in case Neil and Davey came back early. There was the tea to sort out, too; it was unlikely to be eaten tonight but there was no point in wasting good food. She sat up, wiped her tear-stained face on her cardigan, then got to her feet.

  She transferred the chops and the vegetables into bowls and put them in the refrigerator, washed and dried the cooking pots, then went down the street to Milly’s house and asked her if the boys could stay with her for the weekend.

  Milly knew straight away that something was wrong.

  ‘You’ve been crying,’ she said. ‘What’s the matter?’

  Frank, who was reading the paper at the table, took one look at Ellen, then got up and went out, leaving the women alone.

  ‘What are the boys doing?’ Ellen asked.

  ‘Barricading themselves into Billy’s bedroom. It’s a fort, apparently. Did you need to see them?’

  ‘No, I just wanted to know they’re all right.’

  ‘They’re fine. Ellen, what’s wrong?’

  Ellen bit her lip. Then she took a deep breath and said in a wobbly voice, ‘Tom and I are having a bit of trouble. We…we’ve had an argument and he’s gone off somewhere.’

  ‘Obviously that was after he took a swing at you,’ Milly said, nodding at Ellen’s reddened cheek.

  ‘So I was wondering if Neil and Davey could stay here for the weekend. There might be…well, I’d rather they were here, if that’s all right with you. I’ll bring their things over in the morning.’

  ‘Of course it’s all right, love.’

  Ellen knew her friend wouldn’t pry, but she felt she deserved some sort of explanation. An honest one.

  ‘It’s, well, it’s Jack. Jack Vaughan.’

  Understanding began to cross Milly’s face.

  ‘I’ve been seeing him. And Tom has found out.’

  Milly sighed. ‘Why am I not surprised?’

  ‘What, that Tom found out?’ Ellen felt a stab of alarm. Did the whole town know about it?

  ‘No, that you’ve been seeing Jack. It’s been coming for a while, hasn’t it?’

  ‘I never thought so, Milly, I really didn’t, until it actually happened. I never thought I’d cheat on Tom, but I have.’ She looked at her friend with infinite sadness. ‘I’ve hurt him so badly, Milly.’

  Milly nodded, but said nothing.

  ‘You’re not angry at me?’ Ellen asked.

  ‘Come here,’ Milly said, and held out her arms.

  Ellen stepped into them for a comforting moment, absurdly grateful, then pulled back and started to cry. She dug in her pocket for a handkerchief.

  Milly waited patiently until Ellen had herself under control. ‘What will you do? Does Jack know what’s happened?’

  ‘He’s away until Sunday.’

  ‘What do you think he’ll say?’

  ‘When he finds out that Tom knows?’

  ‘No, love, when you tell him it’s over.’

  Ellen stared at Milly, then her eyes brimmed with tears again. ‘I don’t think I can tell him that,’ she said.

  ‘I know, love, it’ll be hard, but you can do it. You’ll have to.’

  ‘No, you don’t understand, Milly. I don’t want to tell him, I don’t want it to be over.’

  For the first time since Ellen had arrived, Milly finally looked doubtful. ‘You can’t just up and leave Tom, Ellen. It wouldn’t be right. Shouldn’t you try and patch things up? It might not be too late.’

  ‘I don’t know if I can, not after this.’

  Milly gave Ellen a long, searching look. She reached out and touched her hand. ‘Look, I know Tom isn’t normally a violent man, but if you need to, you come down here, all right?’

  Ellen nodded.

  ‘And the boys can stay here as long as they need to, don’t worry about that.’

  Overcome by Milly’s kindness, Ellen could only nod again. Then she left.

  As she walked back home the night was sharp and cold even though a layer of cloud obscured the moon. She thought rain might be on the way and pulled her cardigan across her front. She felt numb and detached, as though she were trudging through a soundless dream in which everything was motionless except for her, and wondered abstractly if she was in shock. Her ear still buzzed from Tom’s blow and when a cat yowled from behind a fence it seemed to take ages for her to register what the sound was, and when she finally did it nearly gave her a heart attack. She half expected Tom to appear, but he didn’t. She had no idea where he’d gone.

  She was on the back steps to her house when someone called out, ‘Ellen?’

  ‘Bert?’ She stopped and peered into the darkness, just able to make him out standing on the other side of the hedge.

  ‘Is everything all right? I thought I heard…’ He trailed off.

  Ellen’s heart swelled with affection for him. ‘No, things aren’t all right, Bert, but thanks for asking.’

  She watched as he nodded hesitantly, then he merged back into the shadows shrouding his back lawn. He climbed the steps and a moment later his porch light went off.

  She went inside, changed into her nightie, then got into the empty bed where she curled up on her side and began to cry again.

  She woke early the next morning. Her neck was very stiff, and there was a graze on her cheek where she’d connected with the kitchen lino. When she moved her fingers tentatively over the side of her head, she found a painful lump there.

  The house was silent, but she went in to every room to see if Tom had come home during the night. He was asleep on the couch in the sitting room, a blanket from one of the boys’ beds thrown over him. Ellen watched him for several minutes then crept away, thinking it would be best to leave him to sleep for as long as possible. Anything to put off what she knew would be coming.

  She got dressed, went outside and began to work in her garden, systematically wee
ding from one end of a row to another, pulling out the odd vegetable plant that wasn’t doing so well and tamping down the soil around the ones that were. The cabbages were coming along, and so was the silverbeet. The cool, damp dirt felt good on her hands, soothing and reassuring. She worked mindlessly and repetitively until it occurred to her that she should take the boys’ football gear along to Milly’s.

  She washed the dirt off her hands under the outside tap, then went inside. Tom was sitting at the table, still in yesterday’s clothes, unshaven and bleary-eyed. He regarded her in silence.

  She stoked the range, filled the kettle and set it on the heat.

  ‘I asked Milly if she would take the boys for the weekend,’ she said eventually. ‘I thought it would be better if they weren’t here at the moment.’

  ‘I’m surprised you thought about them at all.’

  Stung, Ellen turned away and busied herself getting the frying pan out of the cupboard.

  Tom said, ‘I don’t want anything to eat.’

  Ellen put the pan back; neither did she. She sat down, and waited.

  Tom rubbed his face wearily. ‘How long has it been going on?’

  She knew he would ask that, just as she also knew she couldn’t lie to him any more. ‘Nearly two months,’ she said, aware that there was no way she could answer the question honestly without hurting him.

  Tom winced as though he’d been punched in the stomach, and Ellen had to look away.

  He was quiet for a long time, and she could see that he was thinking back over all the Fridays he’d been away, the dances at which he’d left her to entertain herself, the times that Jack had been around to the house—any occasions when the pair of them might have been together.

  He seemed almost paralysed by the awful finality of her admission, and she saw that they wouldn’t be able to talk, not yet. And what was there to say anyway? Sorry, it won’t happen again? Because she knew that it would. She felt as lost and as hopeless as Tom looked, although in a way he was lucky that he had his rage and his self-righteousness to buffer him from his pain. All she had was the cold, selfish reality of what she’d done, and Jack wasn’t even here to tell her it would be all right.