The Cold Blast

by Mary Easson

  Sarah sat in a basket chair, bathed in a pool of yellow lamplight, beside the bed where Minn lay sleeping. She listened to her sister’s breathing, no longer shallow and rapid, but slow and steady since the shivering had subsided. She touched her hand – still perishing cold – and pulled the covers up around her shoulders, studied the soft sweep of Minn’s eyelashes over her closed eyes, and the way her thick black hair spread out across the bolster. She repositioned the hot water bottles up close to her and placed her own blanket on top of the quilt, an extra layer to make her warm. She placed her head gently against Minn’s chest, hugging the covers snug around her, then weeping because of what her lovely sister had borne on her own for so long.

  Rose appeared shortly, still dressed in her night attire, wearing the dark shadows of interrupted sleep. She put a thermometer under Minn’s arm then placed a hand on the sleeping girl’s brow; took her pulse, gently rubbing heat into the hand before returning it below the covers. She watched her breathing before putting the stethoscope in her ears.

  Rose studied the thermometer. ‘She’s still a little cold but she’s improving. Lucky she came to us when she did, very lucky. She needs rest. We’ll let her sleep for now and she can have a hot drink in an hour or two, perhaps a warm bath later in the day if she’s up to it. Try not to worry, she’s strong.’

  Sarah couldn’t speak.

  ‘The baby’s well advanced, fine for now though these things can change suddenly. Minn will stay here until she is well. No one need be told until she’s in a fit state to decide what she wants to do, who she wants to see.’

  ‘Do you think the father knows?’ I asked.

  Sarah shook her head, huge tears welling up in her eyes. ‘Oh, Minn,’ was all she could say.

  Minn

  The old mill was our meeting place that summer. We found a dry corner in a room where the roof was complete and gave shelter from the rain then made a bed with straw from the fields, carrying whole stooks under cover of darkness, trying not to laugh and bring attention to ourselves. He would light a small fire with kindling he collected, adding coals from a bag and we would lie together in the darkness watching the shadows dance across the walls while we listened to the rain spill from broken guttering and drip splattering from the trees. I placed an old china jug I’d found in the farm midden on a windowsill and filled it with flowers from the hedgerows. I could tell by the way his eyes lit up that he liked that and he would ask me the names of the flowers, covering my mouth with kisses as I tried to say each name in turn, making me laugh, telling him never to stop. Once, when the night was clear we lay together in a hay ruck out in the open, staring at the starry sky, wrapped in each other’s arms until the first glimmer of light woke us and tore us apart. I could not wait to see him again and thought of little else but his smile and his kisses and the way he made me feel when his hands caressed me. I was like a moth to a flame. I couldn’t get enough of him, nor him of me, in the beginning. We were like children wrapped up in a game of make-believe but we did not do childish things.

  Gradually, we spent more time talking. He would ask me about life on the farm and in the countryside and I would tell him about calves and heifers and cows in milk; about ewes at lambing time and how special it was for the farmer when twin lambs were born; how those lambs would be chosen to mate the following year to breed twin births into the line. I told him all about ploughing, sowing, and harvest, about singling neeps and about tattie howking, though he knew about that already and said he hated it when his mother had sent him to do it as a boy. A dark cloud passed over his face at the mention of his mother. When I asked him about what it was like working underground, he would go quiet, tell me a few facts about the lie of the coal and different jobs that had to be done but he wasn’t keen to elaborate. I didn’t like it when he clammed up so I didn’t prod or provoke and knew when to leave well alone. Rob was deep and mysterious and I loved him all the more for it. He didn’t like to talk about his family either so I didn’t ask him, waited for him to open up but he never did. One time, I told him about my sister in Canada and asked him if he ever thought of going to live in the colonies. I began to speak about the mountains and the harsh winters, and promised to bring along the photograph of Meg with the huskies next to the cabin Will had built, the next time I came to him.

  I remember how he looked at me, how cold his eyes were, his mouth suddenly cruel.

  ‘And what makes ye think there’ll be a next time?’ he asked.

  I was confused. Had I misunderstood what we were to each other? His voice was different. I studied his mouth trying to make sense of what he had said then gave a small nervous laugh when his smile didn’t come.

  ‘Do. Not. Presume. There. Will. Be. A. Next. Time,’ he snarled into my face, his teeth clenched.

  He wrapped his hand in my long black hair and drew me roughly towards him till our mouths were close. I told him he was hurting me, asked him to let go but he wouldn’t. Instead, he pushed me hard against the straw and threw away the blanket shielding my nakedness. I tried to reach for it but he laughed and told me to leave it be. I said I was cold and he told me to stop bleating, that I’d never complained of the cold before. There was no tenderness that time and I felt like a beast in a field when it was over and he’d slumped in a heap by my side. I was too shocked to cry, that would come later, so I lay quite still, too frightened to move for a while. Then I heard his breathing, deep and long and I knew he had fallen asleep. I dressed quickly, doing my best to be silent, felt around desperately for my shawl. I pulled it around my shoulders and picked my way out of the ruin, stumbling over broken masonry, my feet sliding on cracked slates. When I was out on the road, and was sure that he wasn’t following, I took to my heels, sobbing like my heart was broken.

  I didn’t go back the following Sabbath, nor the next, or the next but I couldn’t stop thinking about him. I wanted him at the queerest of times, day and night, and soon convinced myself that whatever had happened between us – to change him – had been my fault. Maybe I had been wrong to mention my sister and her husband, and their life in Canada. Maybe we hadn’t known each other for long enough when I had begun hinting about marriage and emigration though that hadn’t been my intention right then. It was just a thing that was in my head so I’d said it. Rob was the main breadwinner in his family, he had responsibilities. It was too much to expect him to think about such things. But I knew by then I was having his bairn. The signs were there and had been for a while. All the time we were courting I’d assumed he was mine and he would be there for me. We both knew the consequences of our actions. I remembered when I’d first gone to him, how sweet and gentle and tender he had been, telling me how long he had wished for me, how much he needed me. I longed for that Rob to come back; prayed he’d come back once I told him I was having his bairn.

  As autumn wore on, the weather worsened. Sarah came to see me one bleak day when the first snow arrived. It saddened me to hear about Uncle Peter but I could offer no words of comfort. She couldn’t hide her shock at the sight of me, dirty and unkempt. I could see she was worried and she said how much I was missed by the family but I didn’t want to see her or anybody just then. I had to sort out my predicament before I could go home.

  A few weeks went by before Rob came looking for me. Annie was first to hear him tapping on the small window that lit our sleeping space under the stairs. She gave a yowl loud enough to waken the dead but I told her to calm down when I saw it was him, recognising the dark shape of him in the moonlight. As soon as I opened the window, his fingers sought out my hand and I was his once again. I agreed to meet him along at the mill and he slipped off in the night to wait for me.

  As soon as I got to the mill we were in each other’s arms, seeking our pleasure like there was no tomorrow. He told me he was sorry and asked my forgiveness. He couldn’t explain why he had acted so mean to me, his beautiful special Minn whom he’d wanted for so long. Everything was
fine when he was with me, he said. I didn’t tell him about the bairn, not then nor the next time we met. First, I had to be sure the old Rob was back, the one who would welcome the news.

  It was late in the year when I decided I could not put off what had to be said any longer. Our lovemaking was as ardent and passionate as ever, and though even a blind man would have recognised how my body was changing, Rob didn’t seem to notice.

  He wasn’t there when I approached the mill in the dark of that December night when I knew I would have to tell him. There was no warm fire waiting for me, no candle lighting up the corner where we lay together. I edged my way in through the undergrowth and sat in the straw listening, watching for shadows. The minutes passed, then the hours. I don’t know how long I lay there in the cold, the blanket damp with the winter’s chill wrapped around me. I must have fallen asleep. The noise of his feet scrambling through the ruin woke me up with a start but I smiled sleepily that he’d come at last, just as he’d promised.

  He made his way towards me on all fours, breathing heavily like a dog on the prowl. I caught the whiff of whisky on his breath straight away, sour and hot. He said he’d attested and couldn’t wait to be called up. Then he would be able to get away from this piss-rotten place and sluts like me and his mother. We were all the same, he said, and he used words that I had never heard before, that made me try to cover my ears so I wouldn’t have to hear them again. He pulled me out of the corner and tore at my clothing. I tried to get up but I was much less agile than before. I rolled over, got onto my feet and he pulled me back, slapped me hard on the face and warned me that if I cried it would be worse and all my own fault. I wanted to get away because of the bairn but he was too strong for me. He told me to stop pretending, knew I wanted it. Only a bitch like me would want to do it in a hovel like this. Did I think he was stupid? Of course, he knew about the bairn, he said, but there was no guarantee it was his.

  He was too drunk even to unbuckle his belt so he staggered to his feet and threw the blanket at me. He said he was leaving and wouldn’t be back. Nobody walked out on Rob Duncan but he was walking out on me, for good. He spat on the ground, wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and disappeared like a ghost in the night.

  After he’d gone, I shivered in a black pit of desolation. Loud in my ears, the sounds of the burn awakened me to my predicament, heightened my despair. The bairn was the only part of me that was warm, that seemed in any way alive and I drew my trembling hands over the round curve of the small body growing inside mine. Had it not been for the bairn, I think I would have lain there all night, let the frost take its grip on my heart and given myself up forever to the cold.

  Annie comforted me that night when I got back to Netherside but I was inconsolable. She said she had known about my condition for a while but wanted me to be the first to say. She urged me to go home to my family. My father would be raging, she said, but Jean would stick up for me and help bring him round. After all, I wasn’t the first and I wouldn’t be the last lassie to get myself in the family way outside marriage. Besides, there were worse things in this life than a bairn.

  In spite of her advice, I couldn’t bring myself to admit what was happening far less do something about it. Annie helped to cover for me, helped to bind up my belly so I didn’t look so much like a heifer in calf but my condition was not going to be hidden forever.

  Mrs Davidson noticed how heavy I looked and she confronted Annie. Knowing the truth would have to come out, Annie told her I was having a bairn but she didn’t know who the father was because I wasn’t saying. We sat in fear and trembling in our space under the stairs that fateful night, knowing that Mr Davidson was being told. As it turned out, his rage knew no boundaries and he shouted to high heavens that he was a God-fearing man and no hure would have refuge under his roof. He sent his wife to order me off the farm – she came to see me with tears in her eyes. Annie looked out at the freezing night and asked if I could at least be allowed to stay until morning but she said no, she could not be responsible for Mr Davidson’s actions if I was still in the house longer than was necessary. Annie put on her coat to help me over the hill road but he came down the stairs right at that moment. He told her if she so much as put a foot over the door, she was not to come back. I understood that Annie could not come with me. She was alone in the world since her mother had died. Her employment at Netherside gave her a roof over her head as well as her daily bread. Her face was wet with tears and her shoulders shook with her sobbing as I went out alone into the darkness of that bitter night.

  And that is how I came to find myself in the minister’s bed with a warm fire crackling in the grate and my dear sister fussing about me with beef tea and hot water bottles. The terrible journey through the snow played out in my head like a bad dream but I learned to let it go and be thankful I had come through it. Miss Fraser was kindness itself and she brought Jean to see me a week later. It made me sad to think of how my father would take the news when she told him but I had made my bed and I had to lie in it. Try as I might, I could not reconcile the two Robs I had encountered but I saw him in the eyes of the son I bore him in the early spring of 1916 and was glad.

  In a confusion of fear and longing, I have wondered if Rob will ever come home. I am sure that his heart would melt with joy at the sight of his beautiful son and he would fall in love with me again for my part in giving the boy life. Whenever a whistle is heard on the line, whatever I am doing, my eyes are drawn to the station road and a smile appears for a moment on my lips as I picture Rob stepping off the train and coming home to where he belongs.

  As the months and the years pass, I know that this will never be and that, after all, it is for the best.

  Chapter 23

  Elizabeth

  It was almost nine months before Richard returned from the mission. He didn’t say so in as many words but he was overwhelmed by what he had seen though he was nowhere near the Front, and had volunteered to stay on for a longer stint. Eventually, overworked and emotionally drained, he was forced to retreat across the channel to recuperate. It was several weeks before he felt well enough to make the journey home. I was quite taken aback by how thin he’d become. The haunted look in his eyes suggested a profound change had come over him. He was a much quieter, more subdued individual initially, but he soon became fractious, irritated at the slightest thing but, thankfully, less interested in the day-to-day goings on in my life than before.

  Of course, his return meant that Rose had to move out of the manse, but the renovations at Spittal Cottage had been completed giving her a pleasant living space above a surgery and dispensary. I visited her often when my own business allowed and we talked endlessly about all manner of things but more and more about what we might do and where we might go when the war was over. One day, she handed me a letter she had received from Phee.

  Scottish Women’s Hospital

  France

  May 1917

  Dear Rose,

  Spring has come at last! I have been able to cast off my rubber boots which were such a God-send this winter past, and can feel the cool grass between my toes as I write to you from a pretty meadow by a river near the Abbey. The sunshine on the water and the flowers that dance around me in the soft wind lift my spirits after many months of frost and rain. A boy is fishing for perch in a large pool upstream whilst his female companion sits on the riverbank with her book. It is such a happy scene, yet only a few miles away, the mayhem continues. The youthful innocence of the sweethearts gives me hope that one day soon all of this will be over. Being here has been my salvation. I spend nearly every waking hour with my mind on the present so I have little time to dwell on the past and what might have been. In odd moments – like this one – when I am allowed some respite, my thoughts turn to the future and the many possibilities life holds. I have seen death at such close quarters for so long that I feel immense gratitude for my own life and know that I will live it to the full whe
n the time comes, when the war is over, should I be spared.

  Although they have little time for the likes of me, I have great admiration for the work that is done in the hospital by the medical staff – all strong women like you, dear Rose. They strive ceaselessly for the sake of their patients who arrive, day and night, from the clearing station. I cannot give details, as you will understand, but there is never enough equipment or time. They make do, improvising with what they have, and go without sleep until the job is done. I can see that they have the same spirit that you have. That same determination and resolve, that same self belief and, dare I say it, bloody-mindedness. I am proud to be your friend!

  I have heard from Isabelle that David is well. He has been promoted to major, and mentioned in dispatches. Clive and little Kate are thriving by all accounts. I am homesick at times for Parkgate and the horses – I remember the days when the stables were full of horses. I do love Rashiepark at this time of year. There is something so uplifting about the springtime, don’t you think? The drab colours of winter sloughed off for the bright green hues of new growth.