A Dinner Of Herbs (76 page)

son of-’ Now she could not look him in the face and her head drooped before she

managed to mutter, “

Mary Bannaman. “

As they all steeled themselves for his great burst of anger and his voice roaring through the house, they

were amazed when he turned and, looking from one to the other, he nodded at them

before going to the

table and sitting down in the chair that Mary Ellen had vacated. Then putting out his

hand, he moved

aside a rolling-pin and a tin pastry shaper, and where they had been he laid his hand flat and his fingers

tapped the floured board before he said and in a quiet tone, “I knew it. Right from the beginning I knew

there was something, but I couldn’t put me finger on it. But I knew it.” He turned his head now and

looked up at Mary Ellen.

“Something about him.

Not his voice, no. It was the way he stood. And his eyes. Aye, his eyes, those big black-looking

eyes. “ Now he switched his gaze to Kate and lifted his hand from the board and moved it up and down

as if weighing something in the palm before he said, “ It was that that got your dad when he first saw her,

those eyes. “ His hand flat on the table again, he looked at it and, more to himself, he muttered, “ Twas

funny, but all along I knew, deep inside there was a warnin’. “

“Dad.” He turned his gaze back to Kate and, his voice changing now but still not harsh or loud, he

asked, “How long have you known this?”

“From the time he b... b... bought the house.”

“And you kept mum knowing how I felt?”

“Only because I... I didn’t want you to be hurt.”

“Didn’t want me to be hurt?” He was on his feet, and now his manner was recognizable

to all of them,

for his voice was deafening and his face ablaze with fury. It was as if the feeling had been injected into

him like a knife into the rump of a horse. And very like that animal now, he reared. His two arms going

above his head, his fist clenched, he cried, “Didn’t want me to be hurt? Knowing what he did to me and

mine and your grandfather an’ all.”

Although Kate had taken a step backwards, she now stood her ground and her voice was

loud as she

answered him, “He’s done nothing to you. If you want to know he went through as much

suffering at her

hands as you did. Aye, and more, because it was prolonged, it went on for years. If you’d only listened

to him as I have.”

“Listen to him? Listen, lass, if I as much as set eyes on him, I won’t be able to keep me hands off him.

He’s come in this house an’ sat at my table, he’s brought evil back into me life....”

“Don’t you dare say that!” She was crying at him now, her whole body trembling.

“If there is any evil, it isn’t in him, it’s what you’ve fostered all over the years.”

The effect of her words on Hal brought Mary Ellen in between them, and now turning her back on Kate,

she pleaded with him, saying, “She’s upset, she’s upset. Try to understand. Let’s go in the other room

and talk this....”

Without looking at her he thrust her aside, but not roughly. His gaze on Kate once more, he said,

“Fostered evil, have I? The feeling that I’ve borne you all these years is evil, is it? That one—’ He

thumbed towards the settle where Maggie sat, her sobs having subsided, her eyes wide

and in them a

fear of the consequences of her action, and he said, “ That one was right to be jealous.

They were all

right to be jealous. Everyone your mother has borne through me had a right to be jealous because you,

in a way, were me first-born. I brought you into the world. I saved both you and your

mother from

dying. I loved you as I’ve never loved any of me own. Why? I’ve asked me self that

hundreds of times,

why, when I didn’t sperm you. And now you stand there and tell me I’m full of evil. “

“I didn’t mean that.” Now the tears were running down her cheeks.

“Not like that, you know I didn’t. You’re twisting my words. I meant that you harboured the evil that

was done to you. I don’t deny that. Ben doesn’t deny that. He’s tried to erase it from his mind, that’s

why he came over here. He knew nothing about it until his grandmother told him.

“Twas the happiest day of his life when his mother died.

“Twas.

“Twas. If you’d only listen.”

“Shut up, Kate.”

She bowed her head deeply on her chest, and now John went to her and put his arm

around her

shoulders, but when he attempted to lead her to a chair she remained stiff, and she almost sprang from his

hold when Hal, turning from her, sat down by the table again and said with finality,

“Well, that’s that.

You’ll not marry him.”

‘/ will. I will. Oh, yes, I will. “

He was on his feet again, growling from deep in his

chest, “By God! you won’t, unless you do it over my dead body.”

Well’—her head was up, her shoulders back—”I will say this to you, Dad, and I mean it

every word:

whether you are dead or alive, I will marry Ben.”

They all gaped at her as she went on, “He is for me and I for him. We have known it from the

beginning. If I don’t have him, then life won’t matter to me. For years I have been aware of my size and

my plainness.

You yourself brought it more to the fore than anyone else when you arranged my

marriage with Harry

Baker. But now I have found a man, a very, very presentable man, a highly intelligent

man, and a

gentleman to boot, who does not think I’m a big awkward lump, nor that I’m as plain as a pikestaff, as

has been said. And so he is my future, my life. Where he goes, I’ll be there too, even if it is to America.

“

They were all speechless, and for a moment there hung over the kitchen a silence in

which the only

sound was the fire crackling and an occasional piup from the kettle on the hob as it

spurted its boiling

water onto the hot ash.

It was Hal who made the first move. Turning to the table he leant his two hands on the edge of it and,

bending over, he said three words that caused Mary Ellen’s body to shake: “We shall

see,” sounded so

simple. But it wasn’t the words, it was the tone in which they were said that was so

ominous. She had

heard that tone before many years ago, but it sounded as if it had been yesterday. It was the tone that

preceded the fight. He could bawl and shout, or he could speak quietly, but when he used that tone, it

meant trouble. She went to him, saying, “Hal.” But again he pressed her aside, and now he went from

them all, up the kitchen and through the door at the far end.

But the door had hardly closed on him when once again she turned on Maggie, crying at

her now under

her breath, “You! you see what you’ve done? Do you see what you’ve done?”

“Let up, Mam.” Tom was at her side.

“She knows what she’s done, and she’s sorry, and she’ll be sorry for a long

time. Won’t you, Maggie? “ He looked down on his sister, and she bent her head and no

one could

see the reaction of his words on her face.

And now Kate spoke again. She had taken off her scarf and bonnet and they hung limply

from her hand

as she looked at Mary Ellen and said, “It would have come out in any case. Tis better in the open, no

matter what the consequences. I don’t think I could have lived with it, knowing we were deceiving him.”

As she made to walk away, Annie spoke for the first time, saying, “The past should be

allowed to bury

the past. What happened was a lifetime ago, yet at the same time I can say he has a side, for I can still

see his twisted body when they brought him home. A thing that is not easily pushed into the back of your

mind. You’ve got a trial afore you, lass, and although you say you’ve already made up

your mind, who

knows but time and thinking could change it.”

Kate had turned towards Annie, and she now said, “Don’t lay any stock on that, Annie.

Come

tomorrow, I’m going to him, married or not.”

“Oh my God!” The words were a mere murmur from Mary Ellen, but they all heard them.

Then their

attention was turned from Kate as she went from the kitchen, to Florrie who, of a sudden, let out a cry

then, turning to the wall, buried her face in the crook of her arm, and as her two brothers went to comfort

her, Mary Ellen stood with her hands tightly pressed against the nape of her neck and her eyes directed

onto the bowed head of Maggie. But she wasn’t at this moment thinking of Maggie alone, she was

thinking of them all for she knew in a way this was the end of the closeness of the family, a closeness she

had imagined would go on till the day she died.

Kate awoke to a white snow-muffled world. The room was icy cold. She lit the bedside

candle; then

pulling on a dressing-gown, she went to the window. There, to her dismay, she saw that the snow was

banked up on the window-sill against the bottom pane. And when rubbing an upper pane,

she could see

it was still coming down thick and heavy, she thought, anxiously, if I don’t get along there early the road

will be blocked, if it’s not already.

She had spent most of last evening packing her belongings. She had not gone down to the evening meal,

and when Mary Ellen had brought her some food up on a tray, she thanked her but said

she wasn’t

hungry.

And Mary Ellen, sitting down on the edge of the bed, had looked sadly at her and said,

“Aw, lass, for

this to happen.” And she had answered simply, “I can’t help it, Mam.”

“No, no. I understand that.” Mary Ellen had said.

“Your head’s not much good when your heart is touched. Yes, yes, I understand that,

lass. But for you

to pick on someone like him. Why, if you had taken up with a savage Red Indian, he

would have put up

with it. But a Bannaman, never! Never! Never in this world, because it’s still with him.

He still has

nightmares about it. He wakes up struggling and gasping and muttering as if the gag was still in his

mouth. Many’s the night I’ve had to get up and wipe the sweat from his body. I’ve even had to change

the sheets, so damp were they. No, lass, he would have stomached you havin’ anybody

but a

Bannaman.”

Even when she tried to tell her how Ben had suffered at the hands of his own mother, it had seemed to

make little impression. And even when they had held each other closely before Mary

Ellen left the room,

Kate knew that her mother was as hurt by her action as was Hal, though her hurt lacked his furious anger

and bitterness.

She looked at the clock. It was half-past seven. She had overslept.

Her time for rising was six o’clock and no one had come to waken her, which bore a

significance all its

own: already she was outside the family. She looked around the room which had been her own for

years.

She would miss this. Even if she slept in a finer one in the future, she would still miss this room.

At the foot of the bed were now piled four cloth bags on top of three boxes. She had

brought them from

the attic last night, and she had packed the contents of her wedding chest and the clothes from her

wardrobe into them.

She washed herself in the ice-cold water from the ewer on the wash hand stand, then

dressed, and lastly

did her hair. She did not hurry. All her actions were measured as if she was stretching each one out to

hold in her memory. Breakfast, she knew, would be over now, and just as she was

thinking, with a touch

of sadness, that no one had come to bid her to it there came a tap on the door, and when she called, “All

right,” Florrie entered, balancing a tray.

“I brought you a little breakfast, Kate.”

Thanks, Florrie” but I’m not hungry.”

“Well ... well, have a drink then.” Florrie’s voice was low and she did not look at Kate, but, placing the

tray on a small table, she began to pour out the tea from a small china pot. Then, after a moment, she

picked up the cup and, turning to Kate where she was sitting on the bottom of the bed, she held it out to

her in a shaking hand, and when it wobbled Kate took it quickly from her, and, getting to her feet, she

placed it back on the tray. And then they stood tightly enfolded. Florrie’s head resting on Kate’s

shoulder, she cried as she muttered, “Oh, Kate. Kate. I can’t bear it. I’ll never be happy when you’re

gone.”

“You will, you will, dear. Charles will see to that. And ... and I may not be so far away.”

“America.”

“No, no. Not for some time anyway.”

“I like him, he’s nice. If only Dad....”

“Yes, if only Dad, but it’sno use. Nothingwill alter Dad in that way.

I’ve always known it. “

“Dad loves you, Kate.”

“Yes, I ... I know that, and I love him, but I love Ben more. There now, come on, dry

your eyes.” She

pressed Florrie upwards and they stared at each other. Both their faces were wet, and

when Florrie

turned and looked at the packages on the floor she shook her head, saying, “You’re really going then?”

Kate answered nothing to this but said, “It’s a bad morning,” and Florrie answered, “Yes, it has been at

it all night. It’s nearly knee-high in the yard. And there’s a wind, it’s drifting.”

It was after a short pause that Florrie asked quietly, “Are you going straight along to that house?”

And there was another pause before Kate, nodding, said, “Yes, Florrie, I’m going along to that house.”