The Mallen Litter

by Catherine Cookson

  ‘If you don’t let go of my nightgown, Mr Bensham, I shall…shift you onto the floor this instant.’

  At this he released his hold on her, lay back on the pillows again and laughed aloud, and as he watched her going towards the dressing room he said, ‘By, you can twist words about! Leave that door open, mind; I want to talk to you.’

  But he did not talk to her right away but lay listening to the sound of her washing. Then after a time he turned onto his side and called ‘What about going to 27 this weekend, eh? I wouldn’t mind seeing one of them concerts again by that Charles Hallé fellow.’

  Her voice came from the dressing room, saying, ‘I don’t think they will have begun yet, not until the autumn.’

  ‘Well, there’s bound to be something else going on. I remember years ago when I was a young fellow, Philip, that was me first wife’s brother, he died young, he used to go to what he called gentlemen’s concerts.’

  ‘I think the present concerts were derived from those.’

  ‘We could go to a theatre, something lively.’

  ‘If the weather keeps like this, it would be very hot.’

  ‘Well, it was only a suggestion. I’m content here if you are; I sometimes think you get a bit bored.’

  She appeared at the open door. She was adjusting her top petticoat. Her hands behind her, she tied the strings as she said, ‘Bored? You imagine I’m bored here?’

  ‘Aye, sometimes, with the look on your face.’

  Slowly she shook her head at him, then smiled softly. ‘I’m never bored, Harry, never, not here, and with you. Never imagine that.’

  He was sitting up now looking towards her. ‘Come here,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll do nothing of the sort, I’m going down to breakfast.’ The voice was prim, the manner was Miss Brigmore’s. She turned from him and disappeared into the dressing room as he shouted at her, ‘Remember I once said I could skelp you across the mouth. Eeh, an’ there’s times when you madden me so much I could do it now. You know what? You’re as aggravating as a young lass, you are, you are that. Sixty-four you are and as aggravating as a young lass.’

  She appeared at the door again. She was fastening the buckles of a belt between her skirt and bodice now and she nodded at him as she said, ‘When speaking of the conformity or non-conformity to age I would remind you that at sixty-six you should at least be showing signs of some senility, but being who you are you persist in acting as skittishly as an unbroken steer.’

  A final nod and she turned from him again, and he lay still, a self-satisfied smile spreading over his face. Besides all other things she knew how to pay a man a compliment. She did that, did his Brigie.

  When a few minutes later she came out of the dressing room and towards the bed she brought with her a fresh smell of eau de Cologne. With one deft swing of her arm she pulled the clothes from him and over the bottom of the bed. Taking not the slightest notice of his loud protests she now walked to the dressing table, picked up a gold watch, put it in the pocket of her bodice, then went towards the door, saying, ‘Yes, I think we’ll go to 27, but in the middle of next week. It is about time we had a bathroom, a proper bathroom, installed. I have seen an advertisement for one. Perhaps we could have two put in at the same time; one would be convenient for guests.’

  He was standing by the bed now groping for words, and he found them only as she closed the door. ‘Baths!’ he yelled. ‘Baths! Not on your life. You’ll not get me into a bath, not all over you won’t.’

  Baths! He stormed towards the dressing room. What would she think of next? Baths! Things had gone topsy-turvy. He was talking about wanting to hear music and she was talking about baths.

  Breakfast was over. Brigie had gone to her office, there to discuss with Mrs Kenley the meals and the other business of the day, such as the necessity for new uniforms for Armstrong, the butler, and Emerson, the footman. Also this particular morning she wished to discuss the employing of a permanent sewing maid in the household, for this, she believed, would be much less expensive than the present arrangement of having the maids’ uniforms made by a firm in Hexham. She had previously worked it out that she could cut this particular household cost by one third. It wasn’t that there was any need to cut down on household expenses, it was only that the habit of a lifetime prevailed with her.

  She had just bidden Mrs Kenley good morning and asked her to be seated at the opposite side of the desk when the door burst open and Harry entered, waving a letter. His face one great beam, he cried at her, ‘You’ll never guess, not in a lifetime. What do you think?’

  Mrs Kenley had risen to her feet again, and Brigie only just prevented herself from following suit, so great was the excitement that Harry’s manner and the waving letter engendered.

  ‘Good news?’ she asked. ‘What is it?’

  He put his hands on the desk and leaned towards her and whispered now in an awe-filled tone, ‘Triplets.’

  Brigie blinked at him as she repeated, ‘Triplets?’

  ‘Aye, yes, woman’—his voice was loud now—‘triplets! Dan and Barbara, they’ve had triplets.’

  Now she did get to her feet. Her body jerked upwards, her hands went to her face. She looked from Harry to the housekeeper. Harry was also looking at the housekeeper and he shouted at her as if she were at the other side of the house, ‘What do you think of that, Mrs Kenley, eh? What do you think of that? Triplets! I’m a granda. Three times over I’m a granda. By, lad!’ He put out his hand and gripped Brigie’s shoulder. ‘Come on, come on out of here.’ He pulled her around the desk. ‘This needs a drink all round. You, Mrs Kenley’—he turned to the housekeeper again—‘tell Armstrong to put half a dozen bottles on the table for the staff for their dinner, an’ the same for them outdoors. They can pick what they like, whisky, brandy, what they like. Send Armstrong to me; I’d better tell him meself, eh?’

  ‘Yes, yes, sir, I’ll send him to you this minute. Oh, I am so pleased. Mr Dan and Miss Barbara, I mean Mrs Dan.’ She inclined her head while she beamed from one to the other. ‘Such good news. I’m…I’m so happy for you and…and them.’

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Kenley.’ Brigie’s voice was trembling, as was her whole body. Without protest she allowed Harry to escort her across the hall, his arm about her shoulders. Her mind was in a whirl. Barbara, her beloved Barbara had given birth at last. Two miscarriages, two great disappointments, and now triplets. Oh, if they had only been in England! Why couldn’t they come back to England?

  She said as much as soon as they entered the drawing room. Looking at Harry, she said sadly, ‘If only they were here and we could go to them.’

  ‘We could go to France.’

  ‘No, not to France.’

  ‘Why not? Why not?’

  ‘You know the reason. She…she has never invited us. Nor has Dan. We cannot go unless we are asked.’

  ‘Well now’—he stabbed his finger at her—‘this has put a different complexion on things. You needn’t think I’m goin’ to have three grandbairns an’ have them brought up as Frenchies without making an effort to stop it. It was all right when the two of them were over there on their own, but this changes things. My God!’ He put his head back and walked away from her down the long room to one of the tall windows at the end and, standing there, he raised his arms high above his head as he said, ‘I never thought to see it; I thought it was all too late. John’s Jenny has given no sign, not even a miscarriage. Then Barbara failing twice. Me only hope was Katie. I thought a year or so from now Katie might ’cos Katie’s like me; she’s fertile is Katie, she’ll fall in the flick of an eyelid.’

  Looking at the upstretched arms and listening to the words that were like an incantation to the gods, Brigie made no censorious protest. This, she realised, was a special moment in his life, as it was in hers. They were only reacting to it in their own particular ways.

  He turned from the window and looked at her now and said, ‘Katie…that reminds me. I’ve got a letter from her an’ all. Something
’s up; she should be here today.’

  ‘Oh, I’m glad she’s coming. But…but what do you mean, something’s—’ she did not repeat ‘up’ but substituted, ‘wrong? What is wrong?’ she asked.

  ‘I don’t rightly know.’ He was still smiling as he came to her side. ‘She just ended her letter by saying, “I’ve got news for you. I hope you won’t be too disappointed”.’

  ‘Perhaps she has changed her mind.’

  ‘What!’ he laughed. ‘Can you see him letting her change her mind? Not Willy! No boy, not our Willy. Apart from everything else, he stands to lose too much.’

  ‘You have changed your opinion somewhat about Willy of late, haven’t you?’

  The smile slid slowly from his face. He slanted his eyes at her and made a small nodding movement with his head as he said, ‘Aye, aye, you’re right, I have in some ways, but only in some ways. I still say he’s the best man at his job in all Manchester. He’s better than our John, oh aye. John’s all right, but he hasn’t got the ruthlessness of Willy.

  ‘Willy’s the right man in the right place. It would have been different if Dan had stayed on. You know I’ve always thought that funny about our Dan, hating the mill, hating the muck and the squalor, yet in the short time he worked there he got more work out of them and he was better liked than me or any of the rest. He was, he was. Aw, our Dan.’ He now beat his fist into the palm of his hand. ‘He might have disappointed me in some ways but, by lad, he’s made up for it now! Triplets, eh? Triplets!’

  As the door opened and Armstrong came in carrying a tray with a decanter and glasses on it he called to him, ‘Heard the news, Armstrong?’

  ‘Yes, indeed, sir. And may I offer my congratulations? And will you please convey them to Mr Dan and…his good lady? And that is the wish of the servants’ hall too, sir. We…we are all very delighted. We…we have only one regret, sir.’

  ‘Aye, what is that, Armstrong?’

  ‘That…that they weren’t born in this house, sir.’

  ‘Aye, aye, that’s my regret an’ all.’ Harry turned away as he spoke. ‘And it’s your mistress’.’ He put his hand on Brigie’s arm as she sat to the side of the flower-banked hearth. ‘But never you fear, we’ll have them here yet, won’t we, eh? Won’t we, lass?’

  ‘I…I hope so.’ Brigie was looking at Armstrong now. ‘And please thank the staff for their kind wishes, Armstrong. I shall convey them to Mr and Mrs Bensham when I next write.’

  ‘Thank you, ma’am.’ Armstrong bowed and withdrew. A moment later, with glasses of wine in their hands, they looked at each other, and as Harry touched his glass to hers he said, ‘Three lads. By! What you could have done for them if, as Armstrong said, they’d been born in this house.’

  Brigie did not answer, because had she done so and truthfully, she would have said, ‘I’m glad they weren’t born in this house because never again do I want to take a child under my care. For over forty years I looked after other people’s children, I infused into them my principles, I shaped their lives, and with what result? First, Barbara dead, through shame; then her sister, Constance, only seven miles away but alienated from me forever; the second Barbara, a substitute for my empty womb, prefers a foreign land and loveless marriage rather than tolerate my company.’ No, she wanted no more truck with children of any kind. That was Mary’s term, truck, which reminded her she must go along to the cottage and tell Mary. She said so.

  ‘I must go along to the cottage and tell Mary. Will you walk with me?’

  ‘No, I won’t.’ His head bobbed on his shoulders. ‘Why that woman wants to stay in the cottage by herself when she could be comfortable here, I’ll never know. You made a mistake in saying she could have it for life.’

  ‘No, I made no mistake.’ Brigie’s voice was firm now. ‘She wanted a place of her own; everyone wants a place of their own, Harry. She has served me and all those connected with me all her life. I understood her needs, she is happy there.’

  ‘Happy when she’s snowed up for weeks on end, like she was last winter, an’ her with a cough on her like a barking fox!’

  ‘She’s promised to come here for the bad weather this year, so let it be. Are you coming or are you not?’

  ‘I’m not and that’s flat.’

  ‘You’ll put on weight if you don’t walk more.’

  ‘I’ll put on no weight’—he thumped his flat stomach—‘I’ll never be fat, I’m the greyhound breed. Aw’—he flapped his hand at her—‘all right, don’t look like that, I’ll come along of you. You’re a bully, that’s what you are. Do you know that? You’re a bully, a refined, educated, polished bully and them kind…’

  ‘Those kind.’

  He thrust out his hand and playfully slapped her on the ear, growling, ‘Those…them. By! One of these days I will, I will, I’ll skelp your face for you…Come on, get up off your backside and let’s get goin’.’

  She got up from her backside and followed him out of the room, and she did not wonder that such a remark, had it been made to her four years ago, would then have caused her to bridle with indignation. She was mistress of High Banks Hall, and she was loved by this man, and because she had learned to love him nothing that he could say offended her any more. But what did offend her, or rather what was hurting her at this moment, because it was bursting upwards like pus from an old sore, was the fact that Barbara had not taken the trouble to inform her personally that she had given birth to triplets. She hadn’t even known that she was pregnant.

  It was some half an hour later that they walked the mile along the road that separated the Hall from the cottage. It was one of the rare days when the fells, and the hills, and the mountains beyond were merged in gentleness; their green, purple and brown coats, splashed here and there with buttons of yellow, denied all knowledge of their treachery. Impossible to imagine now that in a twinkling of an eye you could be enveloped in shrouds of mist that would seep into your skin and press terror into you; or a wild wind would blow up and wrap your skirts round your head and lift you bodily from the ground. But today there was neither mist nor wild wind, the air was still, the sun was hot on their faces, the sky was so high that a soaring lark seemed unable to reach it. The light all about them was pale and clear like water that had been slightly tinted with a blue bag.

  It was as the cottage came into sight that Harry stopped suddenly and, looking at her, said, ‘Do you know what’s just struck me?…I’m asking you, do you know what’s just struck me? It’s the first we’ve heard of it. He never said she was pregnant; did she say anything to you?’

  ‘No, no, she did not mention it. Perhaps because of the last two disappointments.’

  ‘Aye, aye, you’re likely right. It would have been just too much if she’d had a miss the third time.’ He put out his hand and took hers, and like country lovers they walked on to the cottage.

  Three

  They had kept back the meal until the coach should arrive. Harry himself helped Katie down, restraining himself, for once, in not speaking his thoughts aloud, for he was troubled by the sight of her white face and her apparent loss of weight. The whiteness, he thought, could be put down to the heat and the travelling, but not her loss of weight. Her bust had gone and there was no hump to her hips any more, and it was only a month since he’d last seen her. She’d had a fine figure had their Katie…but now!

  On the terrace, Brigie came towards her with outstretched hands.

  ‘Hello, my dear. I’m so pleased to see you; it seems so long. Did you have a good journey?’

  ‘Awful. I know now what it feels like to be slowly grilled…You’re looking well.’

  ‘It’s nice of you to say so, Katie. I’m feeling extremely well at the moment in spite of the heat.’

  And she was looking extremely well, Katie thought, younger than ever she remembered seeing her before. And her attire was surprising in that her dress was of pale mauve muslin with a neckline that showed the top of her breastbone. Wonders would never cease; marriage certainly s
uited Brigie! Marriage. Marriage. How would they take it? She had a good idea how Brigie would receive her news, but what would her father’s reactions be? ‘You’ve made a bloody monkey out of the fellow,’ would likely be his first retort, and this would be followed by, ‘I won’t thank you, our Katie, if you’ve lost me the man with the best mill know-how in Manchester.’

  Well, whatever her father’s reactions, it was done and although it was done, and finally, she could put no name to her own feelings on the matter. She told herself almost every hour of the day that she was relieved—to use the local jargon concerning such matters, she had escaped a lifetime of misery—yet at the same time she asked herself, whilst scorning her weakness, would it not have been better to suffer such a marriage than never to know marriage? For maidenhood, she had discovered long ago, had its own particular tortures. When you were young, below twenty, you termed such feelings facets of love; having reached twenty-four you named them correctly as bodily needs…

  After she had washed herself in cold water and changed her outer garments she came down to supper which, as was usual with meals at the Hall, contrasted in all ways to those served at 27. Bella Brackett did her best, but it was a rough and working woman’s best in comparison with Mrs Lovett’s creations.

  ‘You’re not eating, lass?’

  ‘I’m not very hungry, Dad.’

  ‘Brigie here thought up all your favourite bits and pieces.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Brigie.’

  Brigie, looking across the table into the white drawn face and the eyes that seemed too large for it, said gently, ‘That’s all right, dear. After a few days’ rest you’ll regain your appetite, I’m sure.’

  Harry broke in now on a laugh, saying, ‘Rest, she said, she’s promised you rest. That’s when she hasn’t got you walkin’. Believe me, if she gets her own way with you she’ll pump you so full of fresh air you’ll be eating like a horse. I’m speaking from experience.’ He nodded at her and she smiled at him.