Feathers in the Fire

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘No, Master, no.’ She was whimpering like a hurt animal.‘Molly, you love me?’

  ‘Aye, Master.’

  ‘Then do as I bid you. Look.’ He got to his feet, still holding her. ‘Take it to the copse and drop it into the pool, the bog part.’

  Her head was back on her shoulders wagging in desperation. ‘But what’ll you say, Master, what’ll you tell them? Dead or alive, Winnie and Miss Jane, they’ll expect to see it.’

  He shook her impatiently now, then whispered, ‘It came away in bits. Tell them that, it came away in bits and you put it in the muck cart. When you come back you can take the afterbirth and dump it there. Go now, go on.’

  He thrust her towards the bedroom door, and like someone drunk she staggered into the room again. Stopping for a moment she looked over the foot of the bed at the inert, distorted, unsightly figure of her mistress; then she grabbed the small bundle in the shawl and crept out of the room.

  When she reached the bottom of the stairs and heard a door above her open with a squeak, she knew that Miss Jane had woken up, and at this she took to her heels and flew through the kitchen, out into the yard, and along the road towards the copse.

  Davie sat on the side of his bed looking out of the low attic window. The rain had stopped, the moon was shining and seeming to be wafted from one scud of clouds to another by the high wind that was blowing. There were only the clouds and the noise in the chimney breast behind him to indicate the strength of the wind; as far as he could see the land was treeless and fell, to rise again sharply to the hills beyond. His vision did not take in the copse that lay to the right of him, for his head was resting against the wooden shutter that barred the window from the inside and kept out the weather in the winter.

  This was to be the last night he would sleep in this room for a long time to come. He didn’t know how long, years perhaps, or never again. He felt sad, depressed, yet at the same time he was experiencing an odd kind of elation, for whatever lay before him he knew would be strange and exciting. He gave no thought to a hungry belly, or hardship, he was young and strong, and, as he told himself, he had his wits about him; what was more, he had advantage over the majority of his kind for he could read and write and, if it was required of him, talk with the best of them, at least so he told himself. But nevertheless, he was sad, deeply sad. He was going to miss his mother, and he would even miss his father; but most of all, aye, most of all, he’d miss his granda.

  It was odd, he thought, but if the events of yesterday had not taken place he might in the end, in fact he knew he would, have married Molly Geary and remained for the rest of his life on this farm, in this hollow in the hills, and might never have got even as far as Alnwick. He had promised himself for the last two or three years that one day he would go to Alnwick and see the castle, the stronghold of the Percys. Parson Hedley had told him quite a bit about the Percys, great fighting men the Percys, men it was an honour to serve. He wished now he could go back down the centuries and ride by young Hotspur’s side, even if he was but a lad of twelve, and with him retake Berwick and kill every damn Scot in it, his master included, for it was McBain’s boast that his forebears went back to the fourteenth century. He had a sword hanging in the hall that he was forever pointing out was used at Duns when the Scots routed the English, but he said nought about the defeat of 50,000 of the hairy-legged galoots being beaten by half their number at Neville’s Cross. Why, when he came to think of it, what was McBain compared with men like the Percys? Midden muck, that’s all, midden muck.

  Two days ago he wouldn’t have thought of the comparison, but now it seemed apt, not because he had found out about the master whoring, nor that he hid his escapades under a cloak of piety. No, his animosity was derived from the personal insult McBain had directed towards his manhood. ‘Marry Molly,’ he said, ‘and cover up for my fly-blow.’ Like hell he would. If he was to father a child he would know the beginnings of it as well as the end. Oh aye . . . By, she was a rampant cow, that Molly. You found them here and there among the stock; not for them, waiting for their turn, right at the front they were, almost putting the bull to shame . . .

  As if his thoughts had conjured up their substance into form he saw her. She came running into a patch of moonlight opposite Curran’s back gate. She was on the grass bank raised above the lane and was carrying something in her arms. He bent forward, his face close to a small pane. What was she up to at this time of night, or mornin’ as it was? Where could she be making for running along the bank? It was a dead end, the railing shut off the copse.

  A cloud distorted her shape for a moment. The wind was lifting her skirt into a half circle behind her legs, and she looked as if she were flying.

  He stood up but still stooped and moved his head to the other side of the window. He saw that she had reached the railings, and he watched her drop the bundle on to the ground, climb over; and then she was lost in the low scrub, all except her hands that came out and pulled the bundle under the bottom rail.

  He stepped three paces back from the window to where the ceiling allowed him to stand straight and he looked from one corner of the little room to the other as if he would find the answer to his thoughts. What was she taking into the copse at this time of night? It was dangerous in there in the daytime; there was bog all round the waterhole. Whatever she had with her was meant for the waterhole. But what?

  He did not wait any longer for an answer but pulled open the door and ran down the stairs; and as he rushed out of the back door he heard his mother’s voice crying, ‘Is that you, Davie, you awake?’ Within seconds he had reached the railing and was over it and into the copse. He paused for a moment and listened; but the wind covered all sound but its own thrashing. There were two narrow paths not more than twenty feet apart and both leading to the waterhole. They had been made many years ago before the springs had started to divert and make the place a danger to man and cattle.

  Before he reached the end of the path he had taken he saw her. She was standing on the edge of the bog looking down at the thing she was holding in her hands. The moon was full on her and she was rigid, but she was evidently going to throw whatever she was carrying into the pool, and once in there it would be lost forever – it was said to be bottomless. He had never tried to prove this; even his adventurous boyish spirit hadn’t been brave enough to test the depth of this awesome place, not after he had seen a cow sink like a stone in the mud at its edge.

  ‘What you up to?’ He thought for a moment she was going to fall backwards into the bog and he rushed forward and gripped her arms, that were in turn gripping the bundle to her.

  ‘What you up to? What’s this?’ He had to hold on to her to keep her steady for her whole body was now shaking like a cart going over a rutted road. He took one hand from her arm and touched the top of the bundle; then he pulled the blanket back and gazed downwards.

  ‘Aw, my God! YOU! YOU! YOU WICKED HUSSY YOU!’

  ‘No, no, Davie, no, no, I wouldn’t, I couldn’t have.’

  ‘What did you come in here for then?’

  ‘The master. But . . . but I couldn’t.’

  ‘You would if I hadn’t stopped you, an’ it breathing an’ all.’

  He pulled the shawl farther away from the face; then he said in a deep tone that might have been used by Pastor Wainwright, ‘If there’s a hell you’ll go to it for this.’

  ‘Davie! Davie!’ She was crying now and loudly. ‘I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t.’

  ‘Shut up! an’ get back.’ He gripped her by the shoulders and pushed her forward, and she tried to turn to him as she spluttered, ‘You don’t know, you don’t know, Davie.’

  ‘Go on, out of it.’ He thrust her along the path until they reached the railings, and there he let go of her and she pushed the bundle under the bottom rail, and when she tried to climb over she almost fell on to the other side. She did not
stoop immediately and pick up the bundle, but stood leaning against the rails gasping as she looked up at him. The tears were raining from her eyes, her mouth was wide; she tried to speak but the words were choked in her throat.

  He bent down to her.

  ‘Get!’ He pointed, and at this she stooped and picked up the child again. And once more he was pushing her forward and towards the figure that was standing in the road outside the front door.

  Winnie, a coat over her calico nightgown, came towards them, saying under her breath, ‘What in the name of God is it? What’s happened?’

  ‘Get inside.’

  Her eyes flashed from him to Molly; then she hurried back into the cottage and he followed her, still thrusting Molly before him.

  Although there was a candle burning on the kitchen table the light in the cottage was dim compared with that outside. Davie peered towards the stairs, where his father was descending with his granda behind him. His granda was saying, ‘What’s up? What’s up, lad?’

  For answer he turned to Molly saying, ‘You tell them.’

  Molly now placed the bundle on the table and leaned over it, her shoulders shaking, her sobbing uncontrolled, and Winnie, going to her, said, ‘What is it, girl, what is it?’

  But all Molly could say was, ‘I wouldn’t have, I couldn’t, I couldn’t.’

  Winnie put her hand out tentatively towards the bundle, asking now, ‘What have you in there?’ and before Molly could answer Davie cried, ‘Go on, tell her. Tell her what you’ve got in there, an’ what you were aimin’ to do with it.’

  They were all surprised at Molly’s next reaction for, turning from the table and gulping on each word, she bawled at him, ‘You! You! God you are, aren’t you! God. Well, I wouldn’t have, no matter what you think, I wouldn’t have. I couldn’t, I was just wonderin’ what to do. Even though the master bade me.’

  Taken aback for a moment Davie remained silent, as they all were, and then he said, ‘He told you to drown a bairn? the missis’ bairn . . . couldn’t be anybody else’s.’

  ‘Aye, aye, he did. An’ ’cos why, cleversides. Look, look.’ She swung round to the table and tore the blanket first one way and then the other from the tiny form.

  They all stared down at the little creature. It had a head and two arms and a body, but no legs. There were two fleshy protrusions where the legs should have been and from these hung two pieces of distorted flesh, what might have been termed, with a stretch of imagination, a pair of feet.

  ‘God save us this night.’ It was a faint whisper from Winnie, but it was echoed in the eyes of the three men.

  There followed a long silence, which wasn’t broken until Winnie went to a table in a corner of the room on which stood a bucket and bowl, and took from its drawer a square of rough linen, and having dipped it into the bucket of water she came back to the table and gently wiped the slime from around the child’s eyes; then she passed the cloth over its face, and as she did so it cried out loud for the first time in its life.

  It was Ned who spoke first. Quietly he said, ‘I can understand why he wanted to get rid of it, it’s natural.’

  ‘Natural! God! Da! You say it’s natural, a child livin’ and breathin’. And then he hadn’t the guts to do his dirty work himself. Natural!’

  ‘It hasn’t happened to you, lad. You’re born but you’re not buried yet.’ His father’s voice was harsh, and Davie cried back at him, ‘Well, if it did happen to me, I’d put up with the consequences. Any road, I’d do me own murderin’.’

  Sep put in quietly now, ‘There’s bairns been born without legs afore the day and lived to be old men, good old men at that. You remember the Millburns over near Newbiggin, well they had a lad who hadn’t a leg to stand on so to speak, and he was a potter, one of the finest in the country, and died worth a bit. An’ he married at that.’

  ‘Aye, well, when you’re on remembering’ – Ned nodded his head vigorously at his father-in-law now – ‘also reckon on Harry Watt’s daughter, one stump of an arm and no legs and her head the size of two . . . And then not five years since there was a child they tell us born over near Beltingham not an arm to him, everything got to be done for him. There’s somethin’ to be said after all for makin’ a quick end to such.’

  As Davie turned away from the table, Winnie said, ‘What’s to be done?’

  ‘He’ll have to be taken back, lass,’ her father answered, and at this Molly cried, ‘No, no. Eeh! no. The master wouldn’t have it, he wants a son, a real son.’

  ‘Then you’ll have to give him one, won’t you?’ There was a deep bitterness in Davie’s voice, and Molly again faced him, but all she could say this time was, ‘You! You!’

  ‘Look, lass.’ Sep touched her arm gently. ‘He’s got a son, a bit short in the limbs perhaps, but you never know. God works in strange ways, he might turn out to be a comfort to him.’

  Molly’s head swung from side to side as she muttered, ‘I can’t, I can’t take him back.’

  ‘All right, lass, I’ll take him.’

  The girl looked up into Winnie’s face and whimpered, ‘He won’t have him, Winnie, he won’t.’

  ‘We’ll see about that. Come on, Ma.’ They all looked at Davie now. He was standing with the open door in his hand and when his father said, ‘You stay out of this, it’s none of your business,’ he jerked his head towards him. ‘No, none of my business. I’ve saved its life, haven’t I? Another minute and it would have been at the bottom of the waterhole. She can say what she likes but that’s what would have happened to it, so I take it, it is me business . . . Anyway, in a few hours I’ll be left this place an’ I want to do him one last service. Come on, Ma.’

  Winnie heaved a deep sigh, lifted the child from the table and followed her son out, and Molly, after glancing from Ned to Sep in a desperate fashion, went after them.

  No-one spoke until they were crossing the farmyard; then Winnie turned and whispered to Molly, ‘The mistress, how did she take it?’ And Molly muttered through her crying, ‘Bad, she passed away in a faint.’

  ‘Why didn’t you come for me earlier?’ They were nearing the kitchen door now and Molly, hanging back, said, ‘I didn’t know, I dozed; an’ then I heard her cry out, an’ there it was on the bed.’ She stood still before she added, ‘I’m not comin’ in, I’m . . . I’m afeared.’

  ‘Don’t be silly, girl!’ Winnie’s voice was low and harsh. Somebody’s got to see to the child, I’ll have to attend the mistress. Here, take him.’

  Backing from Winnie, Molly shook her head and muttered, ‘I daresn’t, I daresn’t, Winnie, I daresn’t.’

  ‘Give him here.’ Davie’s voice was quiet, even calm sounding, so much so that his mother looked at him in inquiry; then after a moment’s hesitation she handed him the child, saying, ‘He’ll have to be kept on the side for a time, away from both of them.’

  ‘You mean you’re not goin’ to tell him it’s back?’

  His tone was as it had been before, and she answered with equal sharpness, ‘Of course he’ll have to be told; but let him get his breath . . . Molly’ – she turned to where Molly had been standing, but Molly was no longer there. There was no sight of her in the yard, and again Winnie heaved a deep sigh, then said, ‘Keep it warm; I’ll rouse Miss Jane.’

  The sound of a loud wail coming from up above startled them both. When it rose to a scream Winnie rushed out of the room. After a moment Davie went towards the fire, pulling a cracket after him. Seated on it, he looked down at the baby on his lap. The face was wrinkled, the eyes in the lowered light from the oil lamp looked dark, black; the hair on the head was fair. He never considered babies to be as attractive as young calves, at least not until they started to gurgle and move about a bit, but there was something about this one’s face that kept his eyes riveted on it. Somehow it didn’t look like a baby’s face at a
ll; not that it was marred, it wasn’t. He supposed many would consider it bonny for a newborn babe, but there was a look of age about it that wasn’t suggested by the wrinkles.

  He started again as he heard another high scream from the room above. The missis was taking it badly. There came the sound of a door banging loudly, and then the screaming died away.

  He never heard McBain enter the room; the door from the passage was open. McBain was wearing slippers, but he had no sooner stepped over the threshold than Davie became aware of his presence, and he turned slowly and looked at him. But his master did not return his glance for his gaze was concentrated on the bundle Davie was holding on his knee.

  As McBain came towards the middle of the room Davie rose from the cracket and went towards the table, and there they stood, one on each side.

  McBain’s face was ashen. He no longer looked at the child but straight into Davie’s eyes, and if it had been possible to strike him dead at this moment he would have done so; if there had been a knife in his hand he would have used it; the rage in him was like molten steel, white hot, fusing all his emotions into a bar of hate.

  ‘You mustn’t blame Molly, Master,’ Davie’s voice was low and cool sounding. ‘She did her best to carry out your instructions, I just managed to stop her in time.’

  ‘Get out! Get out of my sight, off my land.’ McBain’s voice was choked with his passion, and Davie, dropping his quiet pose now, cried back at him, ‘Aye, I’ll get out of your sight an’ off your land. I’ll leave at dawn and not afore, because I don’t want to wake up Parson Wainwright and Parson Hedley afore the sun is up, because I’m going to give them a message. I’m goin’ to tell them that your son’s been born and you want either one of them to come over and christen him proper like, because you don’t know what might happen to him. I’ll make it me business to tell them both ’cos if I was only givin’ me message to old Wainwright it’s my belief it wouldn’t take much for him to finish off what Molly started so you’ll keep his hand greased. But not Parson Hedley, no. So I’ll see that they both know that your son has been born. I’ll tell them he’s without legs, but, as me granda says, he’s likely been given something else to make up for them. They say God’s ways are strange.’