He stopped dead, gazing at the four of them. ‘My God! Then what you all blaring for? Crikey! Did you ever see such a lot of bloody fools! I suppose if it was bad news you’d have a damn good laugh, eh?…And you’ - he pointed to his daughter, the daughter who, he prided himself, was a chip off the old block, the male block - ‘don’t tell me you’re piping too!’
‘I ain’t,’ protested Rosie, endeavouring to straighten out her face, ‘I ain’t…it’s me nose, it’s stopped up.’
She managed to grin at her father, who grinned back. Then, turning to his wife, Mr Mullen said, ‘I’m off for a wet, and I hope I get happy enough to have a damn good cry!’
After he had gone, they looked at each other in silence for a moment, then, one after the other, they began to laugh; Rosie, her face all wet and her mouth wide open, was saying to herself in relief, ‘By, lad, this is better! Me da’s a one, ain’t he? I wish Annie had a da like him, she’d laugh more then.’
Kate lay and listened to the carol singers; the card was on the pillow, half under her cheek; Annie lay curled into her back, fast asleep.
‘While shepherds watched their flocks by night…’ the voices rose to her from the street.
‘Oh, God, watch over him,’ she prayed. ‘Make the war soon end; bring him back safely…And, oh, thank You, thank You, that he is alive.’
‘“Fear not,” said he, for mighty dread had seized their troubled mind…’
‘No…I will not fear. He will come back. I will fear nothing,’ she said to herself, ‘not now; not even “him”.’
She had lain awake, waiting for Tim to come in, dreading his footsteps on the stairs. She had dragged the big box that had for years acted as a cupboard and placed it across the door, for she felt now that not even Annie was a protection. But he had not come. She wondered if he had gone to Jarrow…Had the priest said anything to him?
Long after the carol singers had gone from the street she lay awake, waiting. Everywhere was silent; there was no more shouting, no more drunken singing, not even the echo of the carollers from the distance, just that uncanny quiet that seemed full of sound. So, when the footsteps came up the street, she heard them, slithering over the ice. And when they stopped beneath the window she sat up, and, as the knocker banged, she was out of bed and had her coat on in a flash.
It couldn’t be him; he always came in the back way. She opened the window and looked down on a shadowy figure. A white blur was turned up to her, and a voice asked, ‘This Hannigans’?’
‘Yes,’ she answered.
‘Well, I’ve news for you. You’d better come down.’ Sarah called out, as Kate passed her door, ‘What is it?’
‘I don’t know, ma. I’ll be back in a minute,’ she answered.
She opened the door, to find a policeman standing there…
When she returned upstairs and went into Sarah’s room, she noticed that her mother looked strangely alert.
‘What is it?’ Sarah asked. ‘What’s the matter, hinny?’
‘It’s him,’ said Kate; ‘he’s had an accident…he’s in Harton.’
Sarah hitched herself up on her pillows, an effort she had stopped making months ago. ‘Bad?’ she asked.
‘It’s his arm and head…I don’t know how bad; the policeman says I have to go down.’
‘Yes, hinny. Go down. You needn’t see him, only find out how bad it is.’
They did not look at each other, and Kate hurried out to dress. She felt light headed with relief; it would appear that good news attracted good news as bad bad.
From the moment Kate left the house Sarah began to pray. Not mumbled prayers…not the prayers that were for ever being repeated at the back of her mind, a jumble of entreaties and requests, but verbal prayers, said aloud into the room, each word distinctly spoken, rising into the air, filling the room with power. The faculties which had been slowly fading during the months past seemed to regain new life. Each word she uttered vibrated with terrible purpose. She went on and on, speaking words and framing sentences that were new to her. Nor did she stop until she was exhausted. Then she lay, wideeyed waiting…
When she heard Kate’s step on the stairs her bloated body stiffened against the bed and her eyes fixed themselves on the door.
Kate came in panting; she had been gone only an hour and a half.
Sarah brought herself on to her elbow: ‘Yes?’ she asked.
‘He’s gone!’ said Kate, unable to keep the joy and relief from her voice.
Sarah dropped back on to her pillows, a slow smile spreading over her face.
‘Sit down, hinny,’ she said: ‘you’re puffed.’
Kate sat on the side of the bed and took her mother’s hand.
‘How was it?’ asked Sarah.
‘They don’t know, really. He was knocked down by a tram in Eldon Street. His arm was broken and he received a blow on the head which made him unconscious. But it wasn’t serious, they said, and they could not understand him dying. When he came round and asked where he was, and they told him Harton, the nurse said he had a kind of fit, and died in it.’
‘Ah!’ exclaimed Sarah. ‘Harton!…That’s what he was always feared of, having to end his days in the workhouse…it’s the only thing that ever worried him; he was mortally afraid of the workhouse…He died of fright, Kate.’
She lay silent for some time, her eyes roving gently round the room, a wondrous peace filling her, like that of carrying a child. It would vanish later, she knew, and there would be the throes of dying, but at present it was here and she hugged it to herself. She smiled at Kate: ‘Do you think we might have a cup of tea, hinny, it’s Christmas Day?’
10
Always Flight
John Swinburn and Stella faced each other in the drawing-room. Swinburn’s face was white and drawn, and his thin nostrils moved in and out in little jerks.
‘Do you mean to say, Stella, you don’t want to get a divorce…ever?’ His voice was harsh, and deep in his throat.
‘Must we have it all over again, John?’ Stella made an impatient movement with her shoulders. ‘I have told you already I have no desire to be a divorced woman…Anyway, if I were divorced, I shouldn’t marry you.’
‘You’re a fiend, Stella, a heartless fiend!’
‘Then why do you bother with me?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said despairingly.
‘John, don’t act like a boy. I have told you things can go on just as they are…We can be together now and again. He’ll live his life and I’ll live mine.’
‘I couldn’t do it,’ said Swinburn, turning away and beating a fist in the palm of his hand. ‘I know how many different kinds of a swine I am, nobody better, and I have no love for Rodney. I think him a prig, but I couldn’t work with him and have you at the same time…not the way I want you. I couldn’t do it. He’s coming home smashed up, and, after a year as a prisoner, he’s not going to feel very bright…I tell you, I couldn’t play that underhand game…I could go to him and lay my cards on the table and ask him to divorce you, but not the other way.’
‘You’ll do nothing of the kind,’ rapped out Stella. ‘Should you attempt it I wouldn’t even look at you again.’
‘But what about him?’ Swinburn turned on her. ‘What about the Hannigan girl? Have you thought about her? He may want a divorce.’
‘He won’t get it…And please don’t shout,’ she added coldly.
‘How are you going to stop him living with her then, if he wants to?…Tell me that.’
‘He won’t live with her, I’ll see to that,’ said Stella, her lips folding into a thin line.
‘What do you mean to do? What are you up to?’ he asked.
‘Never mind…He won’t live with her! He will live here, and things will go on just as they did before he left.’
‘You’re a cold-blooded devil.’ ‘Really?’ she raised her eyebrows, tauntingly, at him.
‘Oh, you’d drive a fellow mad!’ He made a grab at her.
‘Please, John
,’ she commanded; ‘not here…I have told you…not here!’
‘Hell!’ He turned from her and flung out of the room.
Stella listened to him stamping across the hall. The front door banged, and she went to the window and watched him stride away down the garden. She stood, biting her lip with vexation.
Something must be done, and at once…things seemed to be getting swiftly out of hand. Why had she gone so far with him, anyway? she wondered. Why had she started it? She had never intended it to reach this stage. In the beginning she had used him to play off Herbert, who was demanding too much. But she had found John wasn’t like Herbert, she couldn’t keep him in line at all. The week-ends they spent together were nerve racking and exhausting; she had been made aware that Rodney, even in his passion, had been tender; and now John was proposing divorce, and marriage to him…a struggling doctor, with not a penny behind him; it was ridiculous.
Stella admitted to herself that she had been foolish, very foolish, but whatever happened there must be no divorce. The Hannigan girl would have to be dealt with; she should have done it months ago, when that old hag had brought her those letters.
Her face stiffened at the thought of them, and jealousy rose in her like a corroding acid…To think Rodney would write letters like that to a maid! Of course, she admitted, she had herself to blame, she had played him too tightly.
She wondered if she could regain her lost ground…He would be sick, and would doubtless respond to sweetness. She would devote herself to him; it wouldn’t be her fault if she failed to establish at least a friendly footing. She still hated him, and desired nothing but to humiliate him for his spurning of her that memorable Christmas Eve. Well, the opportunity might yet come. But, in the meantime, if she didn’t want a terrific scandal and wished to keep her head above the social waters, then Rodney was her only hope. But the Hannigan girl must be dealt with at once, she must be placed out of his reach.
She went to her desk and unlocked a drawer, and took out a bundle of letters. She fingered them as though they scorched her flesh.
Why, she wondered, did that old hag hate Rodney so? She evidently did, to go to the lengths she had in stealing these letters; her tale that she had found them in the street was paltry.
Stella felt that she had made a mistake in paying for them. Yet the old witch had played her nicely, leaving her no other way of getting them. And, although she had dismissed her some time ago, she wondered whether she had seen the last of her. Still, she had provided the means of putting the Hannigan girl where she wanted her; and she must lose no further time in doing it.
Annie was playing at the corner of the street; she stood in a circle with other children, all hopping from one foot to the other to keep warm. A child in the centre stabbed a finger at each in turn, shouting:
‘Iccle occle, black bottle,
Fishes in the sea,
If you want a pretty girl,
Please choose…me!’
Annie knew that the first stab could be regulated to choose whichever one you liked. The unfairness of the system did not trouble her; she felt gloriously happy…the sun was shining, the frost was sparkling, it was Christmas Eve and she was going to hang up her stocking, she had a secret present for Kate…and oh! oh! oh! the doctor was coming home, the doctor was coming home, the doctor was coming home…she beat out each word with her hopping feet. Everything was lovely and bright and shiny, Kate was lovely and bright and shiny. She sang all day. They both sang together in the kitchen at night, and Mrs Mullen knocked on the wall at them, and they laughed because they knew it was only in fun. Oh, they were so happy! They missed grandma at times, but she had been so happy before she died that you did not feel sorry for her now…it made you feel she had gone straight to Heaven like that…nice and happy. Oh, wasn’t everything lovely! No granda, no more carrying washing for Kate went out to work now, most days, and the doctor, doctor, doctor was coming, coming back! She was still hopping when the circle broke up.
‘Count a hundred before you look, mind, Jinnie Taylor!’ a little girl was admonished. Jinnie turned her face to the wall and started to count quickly in a loud voice.
Annie dashed into the main road, she knew a lovely place to hide…It was then she saw the car. It was gliding slowly forward and the chauffeur was looking up at the names of the streets. A woman in the back leaned forward and spoke to him; and Annie stopped running for a second. Turning, she dashed back the way she had come.
Running up the street, she knew that the car had turned the corner and was behind her. It was almost upon her when she reached the door. As she thrust open the door the car stopped. She ran into the kitchen, whispering hoarsely, ‘Kate! Kate!’
Kate was not there, so she dashed into the backyard and found her in the wash-house.
‘Oh, there you are,’ she said. ‘I’m getting the steps to put the chains up, you can come and help me.’
‘There’s…there’s a lady outside, Kate,’ Annie panted. ‘I think she’s coming here.’
‘A lady?’ Kate asked, knowing that any of their usual visitors would have had the term ‘woman’ affixed to them. ‘Do you know who it is?’ she went on, straightening her dress, one of the faded and washed out Quaker-grey dresses she had worn at the Tolmaches, and smoothing her burnished hair up the back of her head with a sweep of her hand.
‘It’s…I think it’s…’ But Kate was already in the kitchen, and Annie let her go through the front-room without adding, ‘the doctor’s wife.’
To say that Kate was surprised at the sight of her visitor was to say the least. She looked at this beautiful, magnificently-dressed woman, with the background of the car behind her, and found herself incapable of uttering a word.
‘Miss Hannigan?’ Stella asked.
Kate inclined her head slowly.
‘May I come in? I should like to talk with you.’
Stella, poised and calm, felt she already had this woman at a disadvantage. She took in, at a glance, the poverty of Kate’s attire, shutting her mind to the beauty that it clothed.
At the second motion of Kate’s head she stepped into the front-room, and barely suppressed a shudder as she looked around at the horse-hair suite and the bamboo table standing on the bare wood floor.
Kate found her voice: ‘Will you come into the kitchen, it’s warmer there?’ She led the way, and indicated Tim’s chair to the visitor. To Annie, who was standing wide-eyed, she said, ‘Go into the front-room, dear, and close the door.’
Stella experienced a sense of irritation at the sound of Kate’s voice; she must, she conceded, be suffering a shock, yet her voice was strangely controlled and well modulated; there was none of the raucousness that, to her mind, accompanied the Tyneside speech. She remembered vaguely having heard that one of the old Tolmaches had educated the girl, which increased her irritation. But her voice was cool and level when she spoke: ‘You wonder why I am here, Miss Hannigan?’
‘No,’ answered Kate surprisingly.
‘Oh!’ said Stella, slightly nonplussed. ‘Then that does away with the need of an introductory opening…Sit down,’ she spoke as if commanding a servant; ‘you’ll be tired before we finish, no doubt.’
‘Thank you; I don’t wish to sit down,’ said Kate. She stood with one hand resting on the kitchen table and holding the middle button of her dress with the other.
‘Very well!’ Stella suppressed her annoyance with difficulty, for this attitude was unexpected. ‘I shall come to the reason for my visit right away,’ she said. ‘My husband is, as I suppose you know, expected home any day now. I understand he is a very sick man and will need careful nursing for some time, as I expect the surgery was rough in a prison camp, especially with amputations.’
She was allowed a pause, while they stared at each other.
‘He will,’ she went on, ‘need peace, and rest from worry…Whether or not he gets it will depend on you, Miss Hannigan.’
Kate did not answer, but her eyes widened slightly and became dark
.
‘I want you, Miss Hannigan,’ Stella continued coolly, ‘to leave the district, and promise in no way to get in touch with my husband. If you do this he will have a chance to get well and strong again, and to resume his career, which means so much to him.’
‘And if I don’t?’ put in Kate quietly.
‘Then, if you don’t, he will not have a career to resume…for I will sue for a divorce.’
‘There are no grounds for a divorce,’ Kate said evenly. ‘And anyway, divorce does not end a man’s career.’
‘To the first…I can prove there are grounds for divorce.’
Stella opened her bag and took out the bundle of letters.
‘These are six of my husband’s letters to you. In one of them, he speaks of “our beautiful Annie”, and that he has loved her since the day he brought her into the world; in another, that to him you are more than a wife, and he makes reference to a week you are to spend together, which he refers to as “heaven”.’
The button Kate was holding snapped across, making a loud twang in the silence…Her letters!…How?…Where?…Mrs Mullen?…No. Who, then?…Dorrie Clarke! Last Christmas Eve…Yes, sending Annie out so that she could search…Annie hadn’t told her of that until after Christmas, knowing she was so worried and it would only have annoyed her to know.
Kate’s voice trembled as she said, ‘He’s not Annie’s father…you know he’s not.’
‘Whether I know it or not everything points to it. I can do my best to prove it. But I am not going on that alone…Rodney made no secret of his attachment to you; he never does when he has these strong attachments for women. You start, Miss Hannigan,’ said Stella, with a smile. ‘Surely you didn’t think you were the only one. Dear, dear! I’ve had to straighten out these affairs all my married life. But that’s beside the point.
‘The Christmas Eve before last he spent the night here, and most of the following week. You don’t deny that?’
Kate did not answer.
‘Also, previous to that, you were seen in a field…’
‘In a field!’ Kate exclaimed in amazement.
Kate Hannigan Page 20