The Mallen Litter

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by Catherine Cookson


  It had been common knowledge for years that Radlet kept a woman on the side, and those of the older generation said it was the very one who had taken his wife’s leg off. But the younger ones said they didn’t believe that; no man as nice as Michael Radlet had been would carry on with a woman who had maimed his wife; oh no. And besides, he came from a good family, his mother had been a lady. Even when she had taken over the farm and run it as good as any man she had remained a lady. No, she would never have put up with her son doing that.

  At least that’s what they had said before it all came out in the Sunday paper and named the woman as Mrs Bensham.

  Now Mrs Bensham had been the Mallen girl, daughter of that old scoundrel who had left more white streaks around the countryside than a seven-year-old buck rabbit.

  There was a tale that had gone round years ago about the Mallens and that streak; it was said that no real Mallen died in his bed, and it had been proved right with her, for it said in the paper she was lying on the floor and there was little question of who had turned the gas tap on for he had been found stark naked in bed while she had a dressing gown on. Knowing what they knew about the Mallens, the older ones said they weren’t surprised in the least. But what had her husband been thinking about to let it go on?

  Eeh, what some people got up to, especially the gentry! But then they weren’t really gentry, the Benshams. They had owned the Hall for years, but old Bensham himself had come up from dirt, so they said, and, keeping to pattern, what had he done at the end but marry his bairns’ governess? And she was no better than she should be, for wasn’t it known that she had been old Mallen’s fancy bit for years before that when he owned the Hall? And now she was mistress of it, and in her dotage. Lived upstairs in what was the nursery, because she had given the house over to the military. Again some said that that was because old Bensham’s grandson had gone wrong in the head after being blown up over there. And to cap it all, his other grandson by his daughter was in the Hall an’ all, and him an idiot.

  By, did you ever know such a set-up! It was a pity the war was on because this last event would have set the place on fire on market day.

  As it was it only supplied food for gossip in the public houses and the village inn for less than a fortnight before it was overtaken by the war again.

  Nine

  ‘Uncle Dan.’

  ‘Yes, Lawrence?’

  ‘Couldn’t you take me to see Petty?’

  ‘No. No, I’m sorry, Lawrence, I don’t think I could.’

  ‘You don’t think you could?’

  ‘No, Lawrence.’

  ‘No, Lawrence.’ Lawrence shook his head. Then looking straight up into Dan’s face, he asked simply, ‘Why?’

  ‘Oh, because. Well, because it’s a long way, it’s away over the hills. I mean the place where she lives.’ Dan’s voice held impatience.

  ‘On a farm with cows. Petty told me she lives on a farm with cows, I like cows. I made a cow today, Uncle Dan.’

  ‘Did you? That’s good.’

  ‘People like my cows.’

  ‘Yes, yes, they do.’

  ‘Yes, they like my cows. They pay money for my cows.’

  ‘Yes. It says on the board that you have totalled up to two hundred and seventy-five pounds. That’s a lot of money you’ve made for the Red Cross.’

  ‘I like making cows. When will Petty come back?’

  Dan drew in a sharp breath. ‘I’m…I’m not sure. Look, I tell you what to do. Take that cow, the one you’ve just made, and go down and show it to Cousin Ben.’

  ‘Cousin Ben’s away.’

  ‘Away?’ Dan turned his head quickly and looked to where Brigie was sitting in the big leather chair. Her body seemed to have shrunk during the past weeks and her voice was small and her eyes sad as she looked at him and said, ‘He means he doesn’t talk so much.’

  ‘Oh.’ Dan drew in another sharp breath. ‘I looked in his room as I came up. He…he wasn’t there. I thought he’d be in the grounds.’

  ‘Yes, that’s where he’ll be. I…I see him out and about quite a lot these days.’

  ‘But he hasn’t been to the cottage?’

  ‘Not yet, not yet. But give him time. It’s early days, it’s really early days yet. You should be thankful.’ She turned to Lawrence now and said, ‘Go down and see if your Cousin Ben has returned to his room.’

  Lawrence got up from the floor, where he had been sitting, but he did not move immediately towards the door; instead, he bent his tall thin body down towards Brigie and said softly, ‘I could go over the hills; I could walk to Petty and bring her back.’

  ‘It’s too far away, Lawrence.’

  ‘Too far away. I can walk a long way.’

  ‘I know you can, dear. But go down now and see if Cousin Ben has come back.’

  Obediently now, Lawrence went out of the room, and Dan, looking at Brigie, asked, ‘Have you talked with him lately?’

  ‘Yes; he came up yesterday.’

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I don’t think he has regressed, it’s just that he hasn’t gone forward.’

  ‘Is she coming back?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know that, Dan. But speaking personally, I hope she does.’

  ‘You were hoping something would come of it, weren’t you?’

  ‘Since you ask, yes. Yes I was, Dan. She’s a very fine young woman. Nothing to look at, grant you, but she’s got something, spirit, something, something that he needs.’

  ‘I can’t see eye to eye with you about this, Brigie. It didn’t seem right to me then, it seems less right now. You know I’ve had the idea lately that Barbara got wind of it in some way and if she had, she…she would have done exactly what she did in order to put a final spoke in their wheel.’

  ‘You’re too hard on her.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Brigie, but don’t misjudge me on this, I’m holding no animosity against her.’

  ‘No? Exactly how do you feel about her, Dan?’ She laid stress on the ‘do’.

  ‘Well.’ He sighed deeply. ‘It’s odd but at first I felt lonely, so lonely it was unbearable. I’d been without her for years yet her going left me desolate. I was back in my youth longing for her, craving for her…But gradually the feeling left me, and now…well, I feel free. It’s strange when you think I could have been free of her years and years ago, but I wouldn’t let her go. If she had gone off on her own bat that would have put a different light on things, but I couldn’t release her. Now I feel like a gaoler would feel when an unruly prisoner has finished his time. And you know, Brigie, she was a prisoner, like a bird in a cage. No, more like a tiger in a backyard. I made the mistake of trying to tame her by kindness when I should have used the whip.’ He took out his handkerchief and wiped his face with it.

  ‘What are you going to do now?’

  ‘Oh, something, something. One thing I’m not going to do, I’m not going to rot. I’m fifty-six but I still feel sort of young inside, and I haven’t done anything with my life. Once the war is over I’m going to pick up where I left off all those years ago; you remember when I wanted to roam the world? Well, I feel I’d like to have a shot at it before it’s too late. I may only cover a little bit of it, but enough to satisfy me.’ He paused a moment, then said, ‘May I ask how you feel about her?’

  ‘So sad, Dan, so hopelessly sad. She’s with me constantly, she never leaves me. It’s as if I could put my hand out and touch her. She had a wasted life and I must take a big share of the blame for that.’

  ‘No. No. I don’t see it, Brigie. Even if she had got him in the first place there would have been trouble of some kind. She was born to create trouble; as sure as the sparks fly upwards. Some people are made like that. Barbara was poison to everyone she touched.’

  ‘Oh, don’t say that. Poor Barbara. Poor dear Barbara. She was the only child I ever had.’ The tears rolled quietly down her wrinkled cheeks and she dabbed at them in the refined way that had ever been part of her. Then after a momen
t she looked at him and said, ‘Will you marry Ruth now that you’re free?’

  ‘No! No! Never, Brigie.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Why?’ He jerked his head to the side as if throwing off something unpleasant. ‘There’s never been any question of it. Ruthie has always understood this.’

  Brigie’s pale watery gaze was fixed on him. Men, they were all alike, at the core of them they were all alike. God must have set in the heart of the first man an unthinking selfishness and his sperm had passed it down through the ages. Thomas Mallen could have married her, but he didn’t, he wouldn’t. Not that she thought that Ruth would make Dan a fit wife. The common girl had grown into the common woman. A kindly woman granted, a cheerful one too, but not the wife for Dan. No, it was merely on the matter of principle that she had put the question.

  She said now, ‘You know best.’ Then, a tired smile spreading over her wrinkled features, she said, ‘The question of what I’m going to do doesn’t arise, does it? It’s quite settled for me, isn’t it? There’s only one thing I can do now, sit and wait. But’—she moved her head slightly—‘after all that’s what I’ve done all my life, at least for more than sixty-six years of it, sit and wait for one or the other of you to see what you’re going to do…’

  ‘Oh no, you haven’t, Brigie; you’ve never sat and waited for anything.’ He wagged his head at her. ‘You’ve willed it to happen. Now haven’t you?’

  ‘Ah well, yes, yes, I suppose you’re right, too much so, and to my sorrow. But now at ninety-six, I haven’t any choice, have I? I’m obliged now to wait for the inevitable. I suppose I could force the pace and make that happen too, but I won’t. This time I will sit and wait, at least until I’ve seen Ben and Lawrence settled in the cottage…You must do your best in that quarter, Dan. Try and persuade him; he’s been in that room much too long. He will never get rid of his fear of space there, he’s got to move out into it.’

  ‘I’m afraid it doesn’t rest with me, Brigie. When I mention it all he’ll say is, “Time enough, time enough.” He’s in God’s hands and…’

  ‘Don’t talk rubbish, I’m surprised at you.’ It was as if the years had dropped from her. She pulled herself well back into the chair and her old head bobbed on her shoulders as she cried at him, ‘God helps those who help themselves, and He helps those who try to help others to help themselves.’

  Dan stared at her open-mouthed for a moment, then on a gentle laugh he said, ‘I seem to remember someone saying they were going to sit and wait for the inevitable.’

  ‘I did, but it doesn’t mean that I’m going to waste time while I’m doing it.’

  ‘Oh, Brigie, you’ll never die, not you. They’ll have to shoot you.’

  ‘Quite possibly.’ She did not smile but went on, ‘Yet, I won’t put them to that trouble for a little while. Being a woman, or the shrivelled remnants of one, I still claim the privilege of changing my mind. And’—her voice dropped back into thinness again—‘it will pass the time.’

  Yes, it would pass the time, fill in the loneliness. There was only one thing to feel grateful for, this would be the very last time in her life when loneliness would assail her. Her darling Barbara had left her devastated once again and nothing could alleviate it until they met as they surely would in the great beyond. Until that time she would, as usual, put a face on things.

  Training told. Oh yes, training told.

  Ten

  It was a warm day. Nurse Byng had got her charge as far as the lake, which was the longest distance he had walked yet, and she felt triumphant, but was wise enough not to show it, for the Captain was of uncertain temper these days, not that she’d ever found his temper good. She wasn’t very fond of the Captain, so without reluctance she left him seated by the water’s side while she went to attend her other duties.

  Strangely, the rim of the lake held no fear for Ben, although there was a drop of almost three feet down the bank to the level of the water. He bent forward and sat gazing down at the water, his thoughts on his problem. If he could pass through those gates, just once…that’s all it would need, just the once. He could have done it by now if she’d been here, he was sure of it. She would have pushed him through, for she had reached that stage of irritation with him where she was substituting action for persuasion. That very last morning they had fought nearly all the time. ‘You have learnt to talk properly, so you can learn to walk properly.’ If any of the others had spoken to him in that fashion he would have put them in their place; he was sufficiently recovered not to stand any nonsense, or rudeness.

  Why hadn’t she come back? Was the scandal too much for her and she couldn’t face it? Here it was forgotten; old patients going, new ones coming; every day new ones coming. As for the staff, they were too concerned with the shattered young lives about them to keep talking about a couple, well past middle age, who had committed suicide together…

  ‘Hello, Cousin Ben.’

  ‘Hello, Lawrence.’

  Lawrence lowered his gangling length onto the seat beside him and, holding out the wooden object in his hand, he said, ‘Look, Cousin Ben, a cow.’

  ‘Oh, that’s a fine cow.’

  ‘It’s a fine cow. Brig said, make cows ’cos there are cows on the farm…Petty’s farm.’

  ‘Yes, Lawrence, there’ll be cows on the farm.’

  ‘Lovely day, Cousin Ben.’

  ‘Yes, it’s a lovely day, Lawrence.’

  ‘Petty won’t come from the farm, Cousin Ben.’

  He turned his head sharply towards the flat smiling face and said abruptly, ‘Who said she won’t?’

  ‘Brig. Brig says she won’t come back, Cousin Ben. I said I could go an’ fetch her; I’m quite big, aren’t I? Aren’t I, Cousin Ben?’

  ‘Yes, yes, you’re very big, Lawrence. When did Brigie say that Petty wasn’t coming back?’

  ‘Oh.’ Lawrence’s attention was caught by a moorhen on the lake and he pointed to it scurrying across the surface leaving an ever-widening arrow behind it, and he cried excitedly, ‘Look! Cousin Ben. Look, it’s swimming. I can swim, I can swim, Cousin Ben, like this.’ He made excited flapping movements with his arms.

  ‘Yes, yes, I know you can, Lawrence.’

  ‘Brig says it’s a long way over the hills. But I can walk over the hills ’cos…’cos I want Petty, Cousin Ben. Petty’s nice. My mama was nice.’

  Ben stared into the blue eyes that lay level with the cheeks, the flat face now drooped with sadness that brought an added ache into his chest, and he said softly, ‘Yes, your mama was very nice, Lawrence. I called her Auntie Katie. I…I liked your mama, Lawrence.’

  ‘I like Petty, Cousin Ben. I could go over the hills because they won’t let her come.’

  ‘Who won’t?’

  ‘Them.’

  ‘Them?’

  Lawrence nodded. ‘Brig said them. Them are over there on the farm with the cows, and they won’t let her come. But I could go and…’

  ‘All right, all right, Lawrence.’ He put his hand on the boy’s to silence him. Then after a moment he turned and looked towards the lake again.

  If he could only get through that gate. He…he would try tomorrow.

  No. No. This afternoon.

  What about now?

  No! He couldn’t go now, he…he felt tired.

  The endless death of enforced ease.

  Where had he heard that? Another of Murphy’s? No, no; he remembered. It was a line he had written himself years ago, after he had seen a group of workless men standing on Newcastle quay. He had thought it good, ‘Work, the only resistance against the endless death of enforced ease.’

  He was experiencing an endless death sitting in these grounds, in that room back there, the room which a relief nurse had tactlessly suggested could hold three beds. It was his house, he was entitled to a room to himself. He’d always had a room to himself back home, no, not back home, in the house in which he was brought up. She had given him a room to himself when he was quite young
, but she had let Jonathan and Harry share.

  But this was his house; he could have a room to himself, all the rooms to himself if he wished.

  The endless death of enforced ease. Oh for God’s sake, shut up! Shut up!

  ‘What did you say, Cousin Ben?’

  ‘Nothing, Lawrence.’ He was standing on his feet looking back towards the house. He wouldn’t go in there again, he wouldn’t go in there again until he had been through those gates. But going through the gates wouldn’t get him over the hills.

  ‘Where are you going, Cousin Ben?’

  He turned to Lawrence, ‘Just for a little walk. You stay there. No.’ He came back to him again and, bending over him, said, ‘You go up to Brigie and tell her your Cousin Ben has gone for a walk up the road. Can you remember to say that…up the road?’

  ‘Cousin Ben has gone for a walk up the road. Yes, Cousin Ben.’

  ‘That’s a good fellow. Go on now.’ He patted his shoulder and pushed him forward, then watched him going off at a shambling trot.

  Get going. You said you were going, so get going.

  He looked down at his feet; they were clinging to the earth, held there as if by a magnet from its centre. ‘Damn you! Blast you!’ He addressed each foot in turn, then looked up towards the house again as there came to him the sound of a car being revved up.

  That was it. That was it. He could ride through the gates. Once through the gates he’d be on the road; there’d be nothing for it, he’d have to either walk back or go forward. His feet moved, his knees bent, his hips swung and he almost went into a trotting run.

  When he came to the courtyard the beads of perspiration were running down his face. There was an army transport truck in the yard. Two men were unloading stores from it. He went up to it.

  ‘Who’s driving?’

  ‘Oh, the driver’s in the kitchen, sir, having a cuppa.’

  He went to the kitchen door. It was open and laughter greeted him, until he said, ‘Excuse me,’ and then a khaki-clad man rose quickly from a chair by the table, put down a mug of tea, paused a moment, then said, ‘Yes, sir?’

 

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