‘Jenny. She say you’re wicked, Miss Regina, ma’am. It was Jenny. She was telling everyone you did somethin’ bad to Miss Kitty that was the death of her. But no one’s believin’ her. Everyone’s sayin’ how good you was to Miss Kitty. Old Abe, he says Jenny’s the wicked one and Callie Mae told Jenny ’tain’t right to say such wicked things.’
The blood left Regina’s face. She stared at the children without seeing them.
Mistress Kitty’s bell was ringing. She could hear it echoing along the corridor from Mistress Kitty’s room. Immediately she tossed aside the bedcovers, grabbed the candle-holder and without stopping to don a robe, hastened along the corridor to administer what help she could to the older woman.
The bell had fallen on to the floor and Mistress Kitty was gasping for breath. Regina lit the candle by the bed so that she would have plenty of light with which to see to prepare Mistress Kitty’s potion and give the suffering woman relief. It was while she was doing this that she noticed Mistress Kitty’s eyes, bulging with distress, fix on her abdomen. Then their eyes met before the older woman, still fighting desperately for breath, pulled her eyes away to seek the potion on the bedside table.
Regina continued to stare at her as if frozen. Then suddenly she lifted the candle and left the room, shutting the door behind her.
Jenny, Mistress Kitty’s body slave, who slept in the cupboard under the stairs, had just reached the landing when Regina said:
‘I have seen to Mistress Kitty. Go back to bed.’
She waited at the top of the stairs holding the candle high until the servant disappeared. Then she glided silently to her own room.
In the morning, Jenny had found Mistress Kitty dead. But Mistress Kitty had been suffering and dying for many months. Her eventual death had been a blessed release for everyone, including Mistress Kitty herself.
‘Everyone’s sayin’ how good you was to Miss Kitty,’ Lunesta repeated, near to tears. ‘We all knows it, Miss Regina.’
‘Come with me, both of you,’ Regina said, suddenly sweeping from the room, across the hall and into the drawing-room.
Harding and Gav were relaxing back in their chairs beside the fire enjoying their pipes. Abigail was leafing through a book.
‘What’s wrong?’ Harding asked when he saw Regina’s stiff face, and the two sobbing children at her back. Regina jerked them forward.
‘Repeat to the master what you’ve just said. Go on!’ She punched Lunesta’s back, making the words tumble out again.
Harding’s eyes flashed with anger.
‘Tell Callie Mae to come here,’ he snapped at the terrified child.
Both Lunesta and Little Sam ran from the room and Harding said to Gav:
‘I’ve never had any time for disloyal troublemaking niggers.’
Gav didn’t say anything and in a few minutes a wide-eyed Callie Mae appeared.
Harding said:
‘I’m going to ask you some questions, Callie Mae, and you’d better answer them truthfully. If you don’t, you’ll be punished. Do you understand?’
‘Yes, Master Harding.’
‘What was Jenny saying in the kitchen just now?’
Callie Mae lowered her eyes.
‘Come on, speak up. Was she saying things about your mistress?’
‘Yes, Master Harding.’ She spoke regretfully, sadly. She didn’t want to get Jenny into trouble but knew it was inevitable.
‘What did she say?’
Callie Mae hesitated, then with a trembling voice, murmured:
‘She said ’tain’t right you and Miss Regina gettin’ married so soon.’ She looked up anxiously. ‘Jenny was so fond o’ Miss Kitty and she was so upset at Miss Kitty dyin’. I don’t think she’s got over it, Master Harding. That’s why she’s sayin’ these things.’
‘Just answer my question.’
‘She … she said somethin’ happened that night.’
‘What did she mean?’
‘I don’ know and she don’ know either. She don’ know what she’s sayin’, Master Harding. She’s just upset. Somethin’ bad happened, she said. She thinks Miss Regina made poor Miss Kitty die. But we all knows poor Miss Kitty was dyin’ with her breathless turns. Only Jenny never would believe it. Just ’cause she didn’t want it to happen, I suppose.’
‘All right. Now tell Old Abe to come through.’
Tears suddenly welled up in Callie Mae’s eyes.
‘Yes, Master Harding.’
When Old Abe arrived he was questioned too, and then Joseph and Westminster and Melie Anne, who had also been in the kitchen at the time. Eventually Harding sent for Jenny so that he could speak to her. Joseph came back, however, and said that Jenny must have run off as she was nowhere to be found.
‘Oh, has she?’ Harding said grimly. ‘Well, get the dogs out and saddle up my horse.’ Rising, he turned to Gav. ‘Do you want to come along for a bit of sport, Gav?’
Gav, who was still puffing at his pipe, shook his head.
Harding shrugged.
‘Suit yourself.’
Regina said:
‘What are you going to do with her when you find her? String her up?’
‘No, but she’ll wish I had before I’m finished with her. I’ll have her tongue pulled out.’
Then before leaving the room he said to Gav: ‘We’ll have a game of billiards when I get back. I shouldn’t be long.’
A silence held the room after he left. Regina went over to the window and stood looking out. Eventually she said:
‘I wonder what way she went? Unless the dogs can smell her out, it won’t be easy to find her in the forest.’
Abigail put aside the book she had been holding.
‘Regina, I hope you mean to speak to your husband and persuade him from the harsh punishment he spoke of.’
‘Why should I?’ Regina said without turning round.
‘Well, if you don’t know, there’s no use me telling you.’
Regina felt needled by Abigail’s quiet, self-righteous voice. Easy for her, she thought bitterly. Sitting there safe and sure of her doting husband. Everything went right for Abigail. Nothing terrible or frightening happened to spoil Abigail’s wedding day.
‘Regina!’ Gav said in a sharper tone. ‘It’s you I’m thinking about. What sort of person are you allowing yourself to become?’
‘Allowing myself to become?’ Regina echoed derisively, coming over to sit opposite Gav and stare at him. ‘Allowing myself? My God!’
‘You weren’t like this when you were younger and we were together.’
Yet, even as he said it, a frightening doubt was taking shape at the back of his mind. Had there not always been something terrible about Regina? She had caused Mistress Annabella’s French lover to be horribly killed. She had caused the first mate of the ship The Glasgow Lass to fall overboard and drown. What was she not capable of? He felt nauseated with horror. Could it be that the slave, Jenny, was telling the truth and Regina had caused Mistress Kitty’s death?
He fixed his sister with an agonised gaze. She looked so beautiful, a defiant blaze of colour with her fiery hair, emerald eyes, golden jewellery and shimmering gown.
‘Remember how it used to be at home?’
‘Oh, I remember all right, Gav. In fact, I remember Glasgow a lot better than you. You say remember how it used to be at home, as if everything was happy and good then. Well, it wasn’t. It wasn’t good when we lived with our mother in that hovel in Tannery Row …’
‘Regina, you don’t mean that …’
She gave an incredulous laugh.
‘Don’t mean it? Why shouldn’t I mean it?’
‘Mother was good to us.’
‘She fed us slops and kept us in a filthy hovel with harlots debauching upstairs and a blind fiend and his vicious dog next door who continually terrified us.’
‘It wasn’t Mother’s fault that we were poor any more than it was her fault that she got caught up with the Highland army, or wrongfully hanged for st
ealing.’
‘And I suppose it wasn’t the beggar Quin’s fault for kidnapping us and making us beg for him each day and sleep in filthy cold closes every night.’
‘It wasn’t really, Regina …’
Her mouth twisted.
‘No? Well, it’s not my fault that Jenny is going to be punished by having her tongue pulled out.’
‘If you’d just try and have some compassion and understanding for other people.’
‘Why should I? No one’s ever had any compassion or understanding for me.’
‘That’s not true and you know it.’
‘What the hell do you mean by that?’
Abigail rose.
‘Gav, you and your sister can fight for as long as you like but I have a headache and I’m going upstairs to lie down.’
‘I’m sorry, Abby.’ Gav rose too. ‘Perhaps a walk in the air would do you good. I’ll come too.’
‘No, I’d rather go upstairs. Anyway, if we’re leaving tomorrow I’d be the better for resting today.’
‘You don’t need to leave tomorrow,’ Regina said. ‘You can stay the week if you wish.’
‘Thank you, but we really do need to go. We’ve chores that need attending to at home.’
‘Yes, the work soon piles up at the store too,’ Gav added. ‘I can’t afford to stay away.’
‘Very well.’ Regina picked up her embroidery and began calmly stitching.
Gav’s and Abigail’s eyes met before she left the room.
‘Regina.’ Gav tried again once they were alone but his sister cut him short with an unexpectedly savage voice.
‘Why don’t you just mind your own business?’
With a sigh he picked up his pipe. Outside he could hear the barking and baying of the dogs. Sometimes the sounds were loud and clamorous, sometimes they were muffled and faint as if from a far distance. Then for a long time there was silence except for the cheeping and twittering of the birds and the rustling of the trees. Eventually Abigail came back downstairs and Regina ordered the evening meal to be served, although Harding had still not returned. When he did arrive he announced triumphantly:
‘It took me longer than I expected, but I got her all right. I’ve locked her up until tomorrow. I’ll have all the slaves gathered to watch the punishment. It’ll be a warning to them.’
‘Abby and I will be setting off for home first thing in the morning,’ Gav said. ‘We’ve a lot of work waiting to be done.’
Harding poured himself a glass of whisky.
‘You must come again.’
‘Well, I don’t know about Abby and the children. It’s a long tiring journey for them, but no doubt I’ll be back on store business.’
‘I’ll get one of the slaves to pack some food supplies in your wagon. Come on, let’s have that game of billiards.’
Gav followed him from the room but his mind was still troubled. It was as if nightmares like creeping mice were hiding in his head. By the time morning came and he and his family were taking their leave of Forest Hall he was ashamed at the relief he felt to be free of the place and its occupants. Just before the wagon rumbled away his eyes met those of his sister and he imagined he caught a glimpse of the timid, vulnerable Regina he had once known.
But before he had gone far into the forest he could hear the plantation bell ringing to summon all the slaves to the clearance and he knew that that was where Harding and Regina had gone too.
The plantation bell hung from a wooden erection in the clearance in front of the barns and stables on one side and the office and overseer’s house on the other. The remaining sides of the square were wooded areas. The trees that faced the barns and backed onto the big house had been cut down and thinned out until most of them were like giant stools squatting in the shade of those trees that were left. On the other side of the clearance, opposite the office and overseer’s house, rose the forest like a huge wall.
The bell had been donging out for some time before Harding and Regina walked round to the back of the house and along the path until they came to the office. There they mounted the steps and turned to face the gathered throng of Negroes.
‘Move back all of you. Leave a space in from here,’ Harding shouted. ‘Where’s the smith?’
‘Here, Master Harding.’ A big Negro, stripped to the waist and showing bulging muscles, stepped forward.
‘Have you your pliers and knife ready?’
‘Yes, Master Harding.’
Harding puffed leisurely at his pipe as he looked at the silent crowd. By his side Regina stood like a tropical flower in her green dress and vivid hair. Eventually Harding spoke to the waiting crowd:
‘If there’s one thing I won’t have it’s a disloyal, troublemaking liar of a nigger. I’ve never wasted any time with no-good niggers and I’m not going to waste any time now. Especially a no-good, troublemaking nigger who tells lies about her mistress. Let what’s going to happen to her be a lesson to you all.’
The overseer and the driver and the smith had taken up positions at the foot of the stairs and Harding now addressed the overseer and the driver.
‘Mr Blakely and Minos, fetch Jenny the house servant.’
Soon part of the crowd erupted in terrified screams as the overseer and driver dragged a hysterical Jenny to the front of the stairs.
‘I’m sorry, Miss Regina, ma’am. I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Master Harding. I didn’t mean what I said, I swear I didn’t mean it. Please don’t hurt me. Oh, please.’ Sobbing wildly she flung herself on her knees at the foot of the steps, only to be dragged up again by the two men.
‘Hold her good,’ Harding said, ‘so as the smith can pull her tongue and make a nice clean job of it.’
Jenny’s screams changed to mindless, high-pitched, staccato bursts of terror. But she managed one other cry of:
‘Miss Regina!’
It was the last thing she ever said.
8
THE four streets leading from the Cross in Glasgow had a most elegant appearance with their arched and pillared piazzas and covered arcades. The Trongate especially boasted splendid edifices like the Tolbooth with its tall crown-shaped steeple and musical chiming clock. Next to the Tolbooth, the Exchange had long attracted much attention because of the faces carved in stone above the arches of its piazzas. There were spacious coffee houses and comfortable taverns. There was the Tron Church with its two large bells that rang out at six, eight and ten of the clock at night, and at six in the morning all the year round.
But the streets that met at the Cross in such silvery-grey stone splendour all dwindled away into humble thatched cottages and mean hovels of overhanging wood and outside wooden stairs. Trongate Street had the Shawfield Mansion at its western extremity, but after that, it too was a straggle of bushes and trees and cottages. To most of them was attached a malt barn and other outhouses. These houses were occupied by maltmen who prepared ale one day and delivered it on the next to the citizens. Other cottages had orchard gardens.
It was in this area that the Western Port or Gate of the city had once stood and the narrow road still bore the name Westergate as a reminder. In the Westergate aristocratic mansions had begun to be erected side by side with the cottages, making a curious contrast which strangers and travellers never tired of remarking on.
The Ramsay mansion rose up from the ground on which two cottages and their rambling orchard gardens and outbuildings had stood. When it was completed there would be very little garden left; only a small patch at the back and none at all at the front. At either side maltmen’s cottages hugged close to the mansion walls, leaving no space in between. But no space in between was needed. Tradespeople had plenty of open countryside at the back of the property through which to bring their goods and a door had been provided as a rear access to the house. This was as much a novelty and a delight as anything to Annabella. To think that tradespeople would not need to drag filthy coal and water and other necessities all through the place! It meant an enormous improvement to t
he quality of life. For a start, the house could be kept so much cleaner.
The Ramsay mansion was one of the last dwellings before the row of elm trees and the wild countryside of heather and broom. But opposite the house was the dwelling and yard of a keeper of sedan chairs, and his cottage was often flanked by elaborate, painted chairs, some with curtained windows. Annabella thought it was a stroke of great good fortune to have such a place so near. She realised that it would not be easy to walk the distance from there to the Trongate or elsewhere to visit friends or go to the market or attend an assembly.
Trongate Street in winter, indeed in summer too, was potholed and difficult enough to manage on foot. But by the time it dwindled into the narrow Westergate, it had the extra hazard of slithering dung from the farm animals as well.
Mungo House, for that is what they had decided to call it, was going to be a very grand place and Annabella felt proud and happy as she showed Phemy around it. At the front, a short double outside stair with an iron railing led up to a tall oak door with iron studs. It opened in halves into a square hall.
Phemy clapped her hands in appreciation.
‘Oh, Annabella, how lucky you are. Everything is absolutely splendid. When will you be moving in?’
‘There’s still the furnishings to organise and of course the workmen aren’t quite finished yet despite my prodigious urgings.’
‘Shame on you, you’ve been driving them like slaves right from the start. I wonder that the poor men have managed any sleep.’
‘You like the hall, then, Phemy?’
‘It is so bright and airy. Oh, I do think it’s a great advantage having such a high ceiling and I love the cupola with the little windows round it.’
‘Isn’t the staircase marvellously elegant? Isn’t it a difference from our monstrously filthy tower stairs in the Saltmarket?’
Phemy’s sharp-nosed, birdlike face tweaked this way and that.
‘It’s a pretty colour scheme. Oh, I do like it, Annabella.’
Walls and ceilings were a delicate apple green separated by a frieze of white and gold and all the doors were gleaming white. Annabella skipped over to the first door on the right and Phemy hurried after her. It led into a fair-sized square room with a single window looking out onto the Westergate.
The Tobacco Lords Trilogy Page 70