For a Father's Pride

by Diane Allen

  ‘What are they?’ Tobias looked at the box.

  ‘It’s a box of tin soldiers. I thought you’d like to play with them.’ Jim smiled.

  ‘Tobias, could you get the towel? You can look at the soldiers when you come back down. Jim, take your coat off, before you catch your death; in fact take your trousers and jacket off, for you are soaked to the bone.’ Daisy pulled her airing rack down from over the fire. The pulley squeaked as she tugged on the ropes while lowering it to chest height. ‘Come on, you needn’t be shy. I’ll not look.’

  Jim peeled off his soaking coat and then, bashfully, his trousers and jacket, as Daisy turned the other way. He then placed them over the airing rack, before sitting down in the chair next to the fire, with the knitted throw from the sofa around him.

  ‘By, lass, tha’s a fast mover! Only just got into the house and you’ve got my breeches off me.’ Jim laughed as he dried his wet hair with the towel.

  ‘There will be none of that. I’m in enough bother, without you adding to it. But it is good to see you. I’ll put the kettle on.’ She reached for the kettle from the side of the fire.

  Jim dropped his towel and reached for her hand. ‘I’ve missed you so much, Daisy. I didn’t realize how I felt about you until you’d left. You always did have a way of making me smile. Not like Susie, who was only after one thing.’

  He looked into her eyes and held her wrist as Daisy stood there, not knowing what to say. Her heart was beating fast; the man she had always wanted was in her kitchen, in nothing more than his underwear, telling her that he had feelings for her.

  ‘Don’t be daft. I’m engaged to be married. You want nothing to do with me.’ Daisy pulled her arm away and filled the kettle, before putting it on the hearth to boil.

  ‘But in your letter you said you’d fallen out – that your fiancé didn’t want the lad?’ Jim watched Daisy as she put three cups and saucers on the table and sliced three pieces of sandwich cake.

  ‘Aye, well, he wanted some time to think about things. And you can’t blame him. It came as a shock to me to find that I was Tobias’s mother, so it must have been worse for Sam – God knows what he thinks of me. And he’ll be listening to the whole of Hawes talking, and his mother will be adding her four penn’orth. He’ll come back if, and when, he’s ready.’

  Daisy watched Tobias lining up his soldiers at the end of the table. She loved the lad; the truth was that she’d loved him from the first time she set eyes on him under the kitchen table. And no way was anyone going to hurt him again – not as long as she had breath in her body. She hoped Tobias hadn’t heard that he wasn’t wanted by Sam.

  ‘Anyway, how’s everyone in Leeds? And what happened between you and Susie?’

  ‘Don’t mention Susie to me. Once that witch Angelina cut me out of the new factory, her father and William bought back my shares in the firm, and then Susie wanted nothing to do with me. She’s living with the sales manager they took on, when they moved to Roundhay Park. He’s a swanky bastard who wears a sharply cut suit and charms the birds out of the trees.’ Jim stared into the fire. ‘The bastard!’

  ‘You never told me you’d been cut out of the firm. What are you doing now? Are you still living above the shop?’ Daisy couldn’t believe her ears. So much had changed since she had left Leeds; Jim had been the one with his sights set on one of the new houses in Roundhay then, not William.

  ‘Nope. I’ve no fixed abode, as they say. Daisy petal, I’m down on my luck: my family don’t want me; my fiancée has dumped me; and I spent my last few bob on them tin soldiers and a train ticket to see you. How the mighty have fallen, eh! Daisy, Susie took me for every penny. Not like you – you seem to have gone from strength to strength. Is it two properties you own now?’

  Daisy passed Jim his cup of tea and a slice of cake. What a fool she’d been, thinking that Jim cared for her. He was just escaping from his worries. And in her letter to him she had said how comfortable her new home was, and how much it was worth.

  ‘Well, I’m sorry to hear of your hard times – you never put any of that in your letters. How did you get the letters, if you aren’t living at the shop?’ Daisy decided she’d be cool with Jim. He still might make her heart flutter with his winning smile, but his love of money had always got him into bother. Now that she looked back on her life at Leeds, she could see that Jim had only ever thought about money – and Susie.

  ‘Freddie passed them on to me. But I shouldn’t bother you with my hard times, Daisy petal.’ Jim slurped his tea down and ate his slice of cake as if he’d never been fed before. ‘You still make a good cake, lass.’

  The afternoon went quickly as Jim told Daisy of his woes, along with his lack of money. ‘What time’s your train back?’ Daisy looked at the clock ticking on the mantel. She knew the last train was around eight o’clock and the night was pulling in, as it was nearly four in the afternoon and darkness was soon going to fall, because of the weather.

  ‘Back? I thought you’d ask me to stay a while, once you knew my plight.’ Jim nearly choked over his second slice of cake.

  ‘Jim, I’ve too much hanging in the balance in my life at the moment. I don’t need the hassle of you living here, and having to explain to Sam and confuse poor Tobias. You are a dear friend – and always will be – and I’m sorry you’ve landed on hard times, but you’ll bounce back, I know you will.’ As soon as Daisy had said the words she felt a pang of guilt. They’d been so close, or so she’d thought, but when she looked back, she’d been like a puppy in love, hanging on Jim’s every word. It had been William who had always been the gentleman in her life. ‘As you are down on your luck, and because you were always good to me, I’ll give you your train fare home, and some more besides. I don’t want you sleeping on the streets, but I can’t have you living here.’

  Daisy stood up from her chair and looked at the crestfallen Jim, who stared into the fire, not saying a word. She walked through to the kitchen and climbed the stairs. Reaching under her bed, she stretched out for her cash tin and took twenty pounds out of it. It had taken her a long time to earn it, but she could do without it, for the sake of a friend. A pang of guilt overcame her: should she let him stay? She closed the tin and held the twenty pounds tightly as she walked down the stairs and into the kitchen.

  Jim was already climbing back into his damp clothes.

  ‘I’m sorry, Daisy, I shouldn’t have presumed you would let me stay here. I was desperate – I’ll go now.’ For once he was reserved and quiet. He pulled his sodden coat back on him and tussled Tobias’s hair. ‘You look after your mother, she’s a good woman.’

  ‘Jim, take this.’ Daisy held the three months’ savings out to him. ‘I want you to have it. Go back to Leeds, rent yourself a room and make a new start. I can’t send you out into this night with nothing.’ She forced the notes into his hand and smiled. ‘Call it an investment; you owe me, just for a change.’ She bit her lip and fought back the tears.

  ‘Daisy petal, I can’t take all this. I didn’t come for your money.’ Jim’s eyes belied his lips, and he knew it.

  ‘I know, but you look after yourself. You’ll bounce back; you can’t keep a good man down.’ Daisy opened the door on the gathering dusk outside. ‘Now get back over the fellside and onto the road while it’s light, or else you’ll lose your way.’

  Jim stopped and wrapped his arms tightly round Daisy. His wet coat rubbed against her warm clothes and he kissed her on the cheek. ‘Thank you, Daisy. I’m sorry I disappointed you. I disappoint everyone.’ He looked into her eyes and, in that moment, she realized just how much she loved him.

  ‘You take care. And you are no disappointment.’ She squeezed his hand and wiped a tear away from her eye as she saw Jim walking away from her. She watched him for as long as she could, before the mist and the darkness enfolded him. ‘God bless you, Jim Mattinson. Perhaps next time around things will be different.’

  27

  ‘Well, are you satisfied now?’ Luke Allen stood in fron
t of Mary and Sam Allen. ‘We had to know, so I thought I’d get it from the horse’s mouth.’

  Henry Winterskill stood in the front room of Luke’s family house. He’d broken every rule in the book, but Luke had convinced him that it was in Daisy’s best interests that his family knew the truth, and that the situation needed clearing up.

  ‘She really had a hard life with her family. Her father regretted treating her like he did and, what with her rape by her brother-in-law, can you blame Daisy for papering over the truth?’ Henry stood his ground for Daisy. She had always been true to her word with him, and she was always polite.

  ‘Aye, but she’s got a lad! Our Sam will have to raise him,’ cried Mary.

  ‘Your Sam will be the owner of Mill Race, if he marries Daisy. And while young Tobias is growing up, he will be able to put aside the rent from Grouse Hall. I think Daisy will come off worse financially than Sam. After all, on her marriage everything automatically becomes her husband’s, and I presume you’ll want her to work for your business without pay?’

  Henry watched Mary’s hard face. She’d listened too much to the gossip of Hawes, instead of taking as she found.

  ‘She’s a grand lass, Mary, give her a chance.’ Luke looked at his son. ‘And you – you big lummox – get yourself up Grisedale and get a date set. She’s waited long enough. I’m sick of seeing your sulking face around the shop. The lad’s young enough to know only you as his father. He’ll soon forget Clifford Middleton; he can’t call him his father anyway.’ Luke liked the lass, and that was all that mattered.

  ‘I don’t know, Father. Folk will talk.’ Sam thought of all the sniggers and whispers he’d put up with over the last few weeks – he hadn’t liked it.

  ‘So what? Your mother was six months pregnant with you when we got married, and folk talked about us then, but they soon get over it. Something else comes along, and they forget.’ Luke looked at his son.

  ‘Father, you didn’t have to tell him that!’ Mary blushed in front of Henry Winterskill.

  ‘If he loves her, he’ll put up with the gossip and enjoy his life with her. It’s no good if he’s ashamed of her. He thought nowt of having his way with her on Moorcock Show day. Aye, you didn’t think I knew. I wasn’t born yesterday, lad. I know that twinkle in a young man’s eye. It’s what got me into bother.’

  ‘If you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll go now. This is for your family to sort out.’ Henry Winterskill had heard enough of the Allen family secrets. It was time to leave.

  ‘Well, thank you, Henry, I appreciate your time. I’ll see you right. Would your good lady wife like a box of groceries? Sam will deliver them in the morning – no charge, of course. Let’s say for services rendered?’ Luke showed Henry out of the door.

  ‘Well, why are you still sitting here? Get gone!’ Luke flicked his apron at Sam and grinned.

  Sam needed no further excuse. He’d missed Daisy so much. He knew he loved her – he loved her with every beat of his heart – and he was fed up with his mother making his ears burn every day with her constant nagging. He shot out of his chair like a rabbit out of a trap, with his mother shouting warnings behind him.

  ‘Leave him be, Mother. You’ve a wedding to plan. We’ll have to make the best wedding cake ever seen, because it’s going to be a wedding of substance.’

  Daisy watched Sam pacing back and forward in front of the lit fire. She had been surprised to see him standing on her doorstep, and now he seemed to be struggling with his words.

  ‘Daisy . . .’ He looked serious, and kept giving fleeting looks at young Tobias. ‘You know that you are the centre of gossip in Hawes, but I won’t listen to it. In fact none of my family will give the gossips the time of day, and we will stand your corner – we know you’ve been wronged.’ Sam took a deep breath. ‘You know how I feel about you, and that we are engaged to be married. Well, I was stupid when I said I needed time to think about it, especially when it comes to young Tobias there. I would be proud to make you my wife, and for Tobias to be brought up as our son.’ He exhaled deeply, relieved that he’d said it as planned. ‘Damn it, Daisy, I love every inch of you. Let’s get married as soon as we can – and to hell with the rest of the world.’ He grabbed her by the waist and kissed her, and kissed her again and again.

  ‘Sam! There’s Tobias.’ Daisy smiled and struggled for breath.

  ‘Come here, Tobias. I’m your new father, and I promise I will look after you for ever.’

  Tobias ran to their side. ‘Can I help myself to the toffees in your shop?’ He grinned up at Sam.

  ‘You can help yourself to a toffee every day, and have cake every day. And we’ll make sure you have shoes and clothes when you want them. And that dog your mother was promising? Well, just go and have a look at what is tied up in the back of my cart.’

  Tobias sprinted out of the door.

  ‘Sam, you haven’t?’ Daisy watched from the doorway as Tobias got licked to death by an over-eager sheepdog puppy.

  ‘I have. But what about you, Mrs Allen? When are we to be wed?’ Sam held her tightly and kissed her neck. ‘I know: how about Valentine’s Day – the perfect date for perfect lovers?’

  ‘That’s lovely, Mr Allen. Time to read the banns, and for your mother to settle down to the thought of me entering your family.’ Daisy had tears in her eyes as she kissed her man. All was perfect. She had her home, her man and her son. Please God, she thought, let everything go to plan this time.

  The cold wind blew as Sam and Daisy entered the small chapel at Lunds at the head of Garsdale. It was a cold February day, but inside the chapel the love of the couple and their family warmed the very bones of everyone gathered there. Even Joshua Oversby and his fiancée, Kitty, beamed as Daisy and Sam kissed after the vicar’s blessing.

  ‘Excuse me, everyone. And behave yourself for a minute, my lad. Sorry, Vicar – you’ve said your bit, now I’ll say mine.’ Luke Allen stood in front of the congregation. ‘I know some of you perhaps think these two shouldn’t be married. But I knew from the minute I set eyes on Daisy that she was a grand lass. Now I just want her to know how much she means to me.’ Luke fumbled in his pocket and pulled a full jam jar out of his pocket. ‘In honour of my new daughter-in-law, here is “Daisy Allen’s Lemon Cheese”. I got the labels printed last week, as a surprise.’ Luke grinned from ear to ear.

  ‘Sit down, you silly old fool. There’s more to life than lemon cheese.’ Mary pulled at his jacket.

  ‘Aye, lass, but she’s going to make me a fortune.’

  Luke winked as he watched his son and Daisy walk down the aisle, and whispered, ‘Now that’s what I call a good investment!’

  Daisy’s Little Book of Everyday Recipes

  Lemon Cheese

  4 eggs

  450g / 1lb caster sugar

  100g / 4oz butter

  Grated rind and juice of 4 lemons

  Break the eggs into a basin. Beat slightly, then add the other ingredients and stir over a gentle heat in the basin, over a pan of simmering water, for about 20 minutes or until thick.

  Pour into dry jam jars. When cold, cover securely and store in a cool, dry place.

  Variation: Orange Cheese

  Substitute 2 oranges for the 4 lemons, and add the juice of 1 lemon. Use just 50g / 2oz butter, melting it in a double saucepan or bowl, before adding it to the eggs, sugar, rind and juice.

  Kiss-Me Cake

  225g / 8oz self-raising flour

  pinch of salt

  50g / 2oz margarine

  50g / 2oz lard

  50g / 2oz sugar

  1 medium egg, beaten

  3 tbsp of milk, if required

  raspberry jam

  caster sugar for sprinkling

  Preheat the oven to 180°C / 350°F / Gas Mark 4. Grease a baking tray.

  Mix the flour and salt together. Rub in the margarine and lard and stir in the sugar. Mix to a stiff dough with the beaten egg, adding a little milk if necessary to get a good consistency.

  Div
ide the mixture in half, then roll out both halves into thin rectangles. Place one rectangle on a baking tray and spread with the raspberry jam. Place the other rectangle on top and pinch the edges together.

  Bake for 15–20 minutes until golden brown. When cool, cut into squares or triangles and sprinkle with caster sugar.

  Onion Chutney

  2 tbsp salt

  1.4kg / 3lb coarse brown sugar

  3.3 litres / 6 pints malt vinegar

  3 dozen cooking apples, peeled and thinly sliced

  5 medium Spanish onions, thinly sliced

  100g / 4oz green ginger, thinly sliced

  900g / 2lb sultanas

  100g / 4oz bird’s-eye chillies

  40g / 1½ oz mustard seed

  6 shallots, thinly sliced

  Dissolve the salt and sugar in the vinegar, then strain and add to a preserving pan.

  Add the apples, onions and ginger and the other ingredients, and cook gently until the apples and onions are quite tender.

  Pour into small jars or wide-necked bottles. When cold, cover securely and store in a cool, dry place.

  Christmas Mincemeat

  3 large cooking apples, cored

  3 large lemons

  450g /1lb raisins

  450g / 1lb currants

  450g / 1lb suet

  900g / 2lb soft light-brown sugar

  50g / 2oz candied orange peel

  30ml / 2 tbsp orange marmalade

  250ml / 8fl oz brandy

  Preheat the oven to 200°C / 400°F / Gas Mark 6.

  Place the cored cooking apples in an ovenproof dish, cover tightly and bake for 50–60 minutes, until thoroughly tender. Leave to cool.

  Grate and squeeze the lemons. Roughly chop the lemon shells, place in a saucepan and add cold water to cover. Bring to the boil, cover the pan and simmer for about 1 hour, until the shells are soft enough to chop very finely.

  Scoop the apple flesh from the skins. Place in a large bowl. Stir in the lemon rind, juice and shell with all the remaining ingredients. Cover the bowl and leave for 2 days, stirring occasionally.