Outcast

by Josephine Cox

  ‘I won’t hurt you, Emma,’ murmured Gregory’s voice in her ear, ‘but you must help me . . . please.’ It was with a small shock that Emma realized that this was his first time also. Of a sudden, she was confused and more afraid than ever. The only thing she could do was to remember Mrs Manfred’s words, and to do as she was asked. She felt him lift his body over hers, and she lay passively as, with a gentle touch, he parted her legs and roved the tips of his fingers over her inner thighs, and she waited tremulously while he positioned himself above her. Then, as he began to lower his body, he murmured over and over how lovely she was, until, his voice breaking with excitement and the beads of sweat dropping from his face on to Emma, he thrust himself into her again and again with mounting frenzy. His heady cries were rapid and filled first with anguish, then with mounting rapture. Emma cried also – but not from joy, nor pleasure. Her tears were quiet, bitter tears, and her feelings were only of disappointment and pain.

  With a small, suffocated climactic scream, he gripped his arms so tightly about her that she could hardly breathe and, like a pent-up dam, he burst inside her, all the while whimpering and moaning and telling her he loved her. But there was no such response from Emma, for she felt no love for him in her heavy heart. She felt nothing but sharp, searing pain and disillusionment. Whatever warm feelings she had begun to have for this man who was her husband, had been driven away in terror, like a small, frightened creature who feared for its life and who nothing on God’s earth could ever persuade to come out into the open again. Emma would fulfil her wifely duties, as was her station, but beyond that, God help her, there was nothing more she could ever give.

  As the dawn broke, the clouds burst open, spilling out a deluge of rain to splatter the pavements and drive against the windows with a vengeance. For a long time, Emma lay awake listening to the rain’s patter as it fell on the roof, playing merry music on the tiles. One of her favourite feelings was lying in bed, cozy and warm, while outside the rain poured down and washed the windows, and then ran speeding into the overflowing gutters. She had always derived great comfort out of knowing that while outside the world became cold and drenched, she was warm and safe within. But that had been in the days when she had her papa and Manny close by, when there had been happiness in her heart and a sense of adventure in her soul. Now, there were only long, endless days stretching before her, when she must learn the ways and duties of a wife and, whatever illusions had been shattered on her wedding night, to please her husband and to bear his children.

  In the half-light, a smile crept across Emma’s mouth as she thought of the idea of children. No doubt carrying and giving birth to a child would be as degrading and painful as the conception of it. Oh, but at the end of it all there would be a reward in the form of a tiny and wonderful babe, warm and real, with a heart which would love her as its mama. That much at least she could look forward to; and she would, for it was a joyous and natural thing to want a child in your arms – a new-born child of your own flesh and blood whose life was so intimately bound up with your own. Emma wondered now whether that life was already starting deep inside her body. If it was, she would welcome it, but, she prayed to the Lord that if he saw fit to bless her with a child, he would never let her use it in the same way Gregory’s mother used him.

  Emma now turned her head to glance at Gregory, whose tousled hair touched her shoulder; and, looking at that boyish face, she thought how much kinder life might have been to him also. For, she could not be all he might have desired in a wife – any more than his domineering mother could be all he might have been blessed with for a parent. Still, she thought, there isn’t a single soul in this world who doesn’t have a cross of some sort to bear, and, as long as the good Lord sees fit to bless us with the strength to carry it, there’s little else we can ask for. With that small comfort in her heart, and warm thoughts of motherhood, Emma went gently back to sleep.

  If Emma was determined to rid herself of the memory of her first unhappy night under this roof, there was another who preferred to dwell on it, and to let the memory fester until it ate at her very reasoning. In that dark hour when Doreen Denton had lain in her bed listening to her son’s cries of ecstasy as he had taken his new virgin wife to himself, there had fused in her heart a wickedness and a deeper hatred of Emma than even she could have envisaged. Doreen Demon wanted her son’s wife out of this house now more than ever, so much so that in her fevered mind little else mattered. Emma Grady was an intruder. She would always be an intruder, and, like all intruders she must be routed at the first opportunity.

  As a rule, Sunday in the Denton household followed a hard and fast routine which had not varied for nigh on thirty-five years – since Gregory Denton’s father had brought his new bride to the house on Montague Street. On the stroke of eight a.m., when the sound of church bells resounded over the length and breadth of Blackburn town, the worshippers would tumble from their houses, answering the summons of the Lord with the same automatic response with which they answered the summons of the mill whistle. One of the first doors to open was always that of the Denton house, when, looking respectably sober and devout, the family would follow the well-trod path up the hill and into the church. In earlier years, there had been only Doreen Denton and her husband; then along came Gregory, making the number up to three. After Mr Denton’s demise, the number had reverted back to two. Doreen Denton had never once trod that particular path alone, and she had grown used to having a man by her side. Now the number had become three again, but it gave her no comfort, and she would have no part of it. So, for the first time in many years, the church bells rang out and the door of the Denton household remained firmly shut.

  ‘Fetch me my rosary, and I shall talk to the Lord in my own way,’ came the command from the bedroom, whereupon Gregory hurried about, fussing until she was left to ‘talk to the Lord’ in privacy, with the door firmly shut and both Gregory and Emma left in no doubt as to how dreadfully ill she felt.

  For Emma, the day began as a long and tedious ordeal, with old Mrs Denton constantly banging the floor with her walking-stick, and Gregory fetching and carrying until Emma thought he would fall down from sheer exhaustion. Emma also kept herself busy. She took up the coconut matting and the big rag-peg carpet from the hearth, taking them out into the backyard where she beat the dust from them. Then, after cleaning the oilcloth floors, she polished the furniture, washed the breakfast things brought down from Mrs Denton’s room, and cleaned and tidied the upstairs room which was hers and Gregory’s. With that done, she then collected the kindling wood from the cellar, and watched most carefully as Gregory stuffed newspaper and wood into the fire-grate before lighting it with a match and quickly forming a pyramid over it with the smaller pieces of coke taken from the scuttle. As he worked, he took great care to explain the procedure in meticulous detail to the attendant Emma. For her part, she was surprised to find herself somewhat ignorant of such matters; she had seen the scullery maid make a fire often enough, and thought it an easy thing to do. Certainly, she would make it her own foremost task from now on.

  ‘There’ll be little need for you ever to make the fire, Emma,’ Gregory told her as he held a sheet of newspaper over the open fire-grate to create a pulling draught up the chimney. When the small brown scorch which appeared in the centre began to spread right over the page, he swiftly drew it away and crumpled it into the coal-scuttle.

  ‘But I won’t mind at all,’ replied Emma, who would be thankful for any little job that might keep her from under Doreen Denton’s feet.

  But before Gregory could comment any further, another voice interrupted, ‘The fire is Gregory’s job! I’ll thank you not to interfere with the smooth running of this household, Emma Grady. With a little help from Tilly Watson next door, we’ve managed admirably these many years, and I see no call to bring about a change now.’

  Emma bit her tongue though she was sorely tempted to make a scathing comment as Doreen Denton made her way slowly across the room, her white fr
illy cap pulled low on her wrinkled brow, her full dark skirt squeaking and swishing as she went, and her brass-capped walking-stick making a soft thudding sound against the floor.

  Quietly incensed by what he suspected was a deliberate mistake on his mother’s part in addressing Emma with the surname of Grady and not with the name he had given her, Gregory said in an unusually firm voice, ‘There has been a change brought about in this house recently though, Mother. You referred to Emma just now as Emma Grady. You remember . . . she is Emma Denton now, Mrs Denton, like yourself.’ His words pierced the air like daggers, and each one seemed to make the uneasy silence beneath that much more intense.

  Sensing that there was more fire to Gregory’s character than she’d previously thought, Emma watched as the older woman sat stiff and stooped in the chair, her eyes staring hard into the crackling flames of the fire, her mouth a tight, thin gash in the angry redness of her face, and her jaw muscles working in a fury. She straightened herself up, the thin gnarled fingers of her right hand gripping the handle of her walking-stick so tightly that the blood had completely drained from them, and the other fist resting on her lap, clenching and unclenching like the muscles of her jaw bone.

  Despite her pretence at making Emma welcome here, Gregory’s words had unleashed her acute dislike of what she considered to be the cuckoo in her nest. When she spoke, it was with a viciousness which shocked Emma to her roots. If she had any hopes at all about this woman coming to accept her in this house, they were utterly dashed with these words, which were spoken to Gregory, but so obviously intended for Emma. ‘Don’t you dare speak to me of our good name! The good and respectable name of Denton . . . a name which I have been proud to carry these many years. A name given to me by a man of upright and faultless character, and who I prayed you might one day live up to!’ Not for a moment did she remove her cold, condemning stare from Gregory’s face, and, because of the desolate look which was wrought on it by the onslaught of her words, all of Emma’s sympathy rose towards that poor, cowardly fellow who was her husband. But it was not finished yet, as old Mrs Denton poured scorn upon scorn – belittling his efforts as a son, and condemning his new status as a husband. Finally, exhausted by her own tirade, she gave out a cry, let her cane fall to the floor, and, dropping her head between her hands, she began sobbing as though her heart would break, muttering through her crocodile tears, ‘You don’t want me any more, do you? I’m old and weary . . . and you’re tired of me. She’ll be the same, I know. She’ll want rid of me soon . . . out of my own house.’

  Never having come across such a situation before, Emma was at a loss as to what to do. Gregory came to her and, putting his arms around her shoulders, murmured, ‘Emma, will you busy yourself in the front parlour while I talk to her. Don’t worry.’

  At that same moment, old Mrs Denton looked up to see why her doting son had not come to put his arms about her like he’d always done before. When she saw that instead his arms were wrapped around Emma and the two of them appeared to be about to depart the room, she was incensed. Getting to her feet, she shouted, ‘I heard you! Last night, I heard the pair of you . . . like animals! Filthy animals!’

  The outburst shocked and shamed Emma. But it was the last straw for Gregory, who almost flung Emma to one side as he burst from her to confront his mother. ‘That’s enough!’ he told her. ‘You’ve gone too far!’

  ‘Too far, eh? It’s you that’s gone too far. Fool that you are, you don’t know what you’ve taken on.’ Now her tone became less severe as she cajoled. ‘Oh, son . . . think what you’ve done. We’re not moneyed folk, and while you might keep two of us on a manager’s wage, you’ll never keep three. And what if she gets with child?’

  To her astonishment, Gregory was not fooled by her change of manner, nor was he placated. ‘If Emma gets with child, we’ll manage well enough, for she didn’t come to this house a beggar!’ Here, he thrust his hand inside the jacket pocket of his best Sunday suit, and drawing out the long bulky package given to him by Caleb Crowther, he brandished it under her nose. ‘Emma brought a handsome sum to this household . . . more money than you or I have ever seen! I thought you might accept Emma with more grace, but I see you never will! But, thanks to Emma’s money, we can make our own plans . . . for we’re neither of us welcome under this roof, that’s clear enough!’

  For a long time afterwards, Emma thought that something in Doreen Denton’s face should have warned her and Gregory of what was to follow. But, when it happened, it came so quickly that they were both taken completely unaware.

  On her son’s defiant words, Doreen Denton reached herself up to meet his face and, fixing him steadily beneath a terrifying look, she said, ‘So! Your trollop came here with her fancy money, did she? Well, we can do without her, and we can bloody well do without her money!’ In a swift movement which belied the stiffness of her bones, she thrust out her arm and grasping the package from Gregory’s fingers, she flung it into the farthest reaches of the fire where, in a matter of seconds, it was engulfed by the flames.

  As both Emma and Gregory surged forward with the intention of grabbing the poker with which to salvage the blackened package, Doreen Denton pushed herself in front of the fire, grappling with Gregory as he fought desperately to remove her. When, with a triumphant look, she shouted, ‘You’re too late!’ Emma saw that it was true, and her heart sank within her.

  In that same moment, Doreen Denton’s cry of victory became a cry of terror as the fringe of her shawl was caught by the flames and the back of her hair began smouldering. In a panic, she began screaming and thrashing at herself, and the more she panicked, the harder it was for Gregory and Emma to snatch the burning shawl from her and to stamp it out on the floor. Quickly, Emma threw off her own shawl and smothered it over Doreen Denton’s hair and shoulders, and though she had been saved from serious burns by the swift action of her son and Emma, it was plain that the old lady was badly shocked and in a state of hysteria.

  Outside, Thomas was about to knock on the door when he heard the dreadful commotion. Finding the door unlocked, as it always was during the day, he rushed inside to find Gregory stooping over the chair in which sat his mother, her face a ghastly colour and every inch of her trembling. ‘It’s all right, Mother,’ he was telling her, one arm holding her tight and the other raised to his forehead as he wiped his hand backwards and forwards across it in a state of great agitation. Emma meanwhile had rushed to the scullery, where she was hurriedly filling the saucepan with water – her first thought being that a hot, strong brew of tea might help to calm Doreen Denton’s shattered nerves.

  No sooner had Thomas poked his head round the parlour door to ask Emma, ‘Is everything all right, Mrs Denton? . . . I’ve fetched your belongings,’ than Gregory had pounced on him, saying, ‘Stay with my wife and mother. There’s been an accident . . . I’m going for the doctor!’

  As Gregory sped away up the passage towards the front door, Thomas returned to the room, where his eyes were immediately drawn to the bent, shivering figure hunched in the chair; he was terrified by her low, whimpering cries and the wide stare which wandered round the room looking at nothing in particular. ‘Lord above!’ he exclaimed in a quiet voice, ‘What’s happened, Mrs Denton?’

  Having neither the time nor the inclination to stop and explain, Emma swiftly recruited Thomas to watch over the pan of water while she gave whatever comfort she could to Doreen Denton.

  In no time at all, Gregory returned with Doctor Harrison, whose home was situated just over the Preston New Road in one of the big houses. Within a matter of minutes, he had examined old Mrs Denton; pronouncing, ‘She’s a very fortunate woman indeed. And it’s due to your quick action that she’s not badly hurt.’ Sweeping his small, bright eyes from one to the other, he added for Emma’s benefit, ‘Take heart, Mrs Denton. All I can say is that your mother-in-law can thank her lucky stars that she was not alone in the house when it happened.’ This led Emma to suspect that Gregory had not told the full tale, for had
she been alone in the house, there would have been no argument, and consequently no accident! Pride and shame kept her from mentioning the money. As Gregory’s wife, it was not for her to draw attention to such private and domestic matters, and she instinctively felt he would not thank her for doing so.

  As Emma watched the doctor and Gregory assist the badly shocked patient up the stairs, she found herself trembling also. What had taken place in this house today was something she wouldn’t forget in a hurry. But, in spite of the awful things that had been said, and regardless of how spiteful old Mrs Denton had proved to be, Emma couldn’t help but feel some compassion towards her, for her son was all she’d got and she felt herself being replaced by someone else in his affections. But the money! Oh, what a tragic thing to have happened, because, without that, she and Gregory were really trapped here. Still, Emma wouldn’t lose hope; they’d have to stay until the old lady had recovered, she knew that, but perhaps later they could find a house to rent.

  Before he left, Thomas cheered Emma up with the news that Mrs Manfred intended calling on her Monday week. ‘After you’ve had time to find your feet, so to speak,’ he added with a forlorn look, thinking that, as far as he could see, she had been knocked right off her feet.