A Dinner Of Herbs (99 page)

teacups and mugs

in there.

She was pulling at the strings of her bonnet as she entered the hall, and she was brought to a stop by the

sound of laughter coming from the direction of the sitting-room, and she recognized her husband’s high

above the rest.

After pushing open the sitting-room door she was again brought to a standstill. The

laughter slid from

the faces turned towards her, and her eyes centred on the slim figure of the girl rising from the chair.

“Well, what d’you think?” Hal’s voice greeted her over heartily

“Here she is, out of the blue. Surprise like, eh?”

“How do you do, madame?” Yvonne, her face unsmiling now, was looking at the woman

who was

returning her look whilst John was helping his mother off with her cloak.

Being forced to say something, Mary Ellen said, “Why didn’t you let us know?”

“It was on the Yvonne paused ‘quick,” she said and glanced towards Maggie, and

Maggie, who was

also on her feet and about to make for the door, said, “Spur of the moment.”

“Yes, that is it.” Yvonne nodded her head several times in Mary Ellen’s direction, saying now, “I was

bragging that my English was good, but I have a long way yet to travel.”

Mary Ellen moved to the fire and, bending down, held out her hands to the blaze, and

from there she

asked, “Your house, how is it?”

“It is good. The painter men have finished. It is ... attractive ..

comfortable. I have had some offers to sell it. “

“Are you.. Mary Ellen had turned from the fire and was chaffing her hands together now as if

endeavouring to rub something off them.

“Oh, no, no.” Then Yvonne paused as if she was thinking, before adding, “At least, not yet. I do not

know.” Then she asked quietly, “May I stay for a while?”

There was a significant pause before Mary Ellen said, “Yes, I suppose so, now that

you’re here.” Then

abruptly she walked from them, saying, “I could do with a cup of tea. Everybody else

seems to have had

one.”

As she left the room John was on her heels, and he caught up with her in the middle of the hall and,

taking her arm, he pulled her round to face him, saying, “Mam, she’s travelled all the way from France on

her own. You could have given her a civil greeting.”

“What do you expect?”

“Well, what I expected was a little understanding. Mam, she’s here, and she’s here for a while, and

what I’m going to say to you now is, she could be here for a long while, or there’s an alternative.”

She snapped her arm away from his hold, saying, “My God! that I should have lived to

see this day.

With one and another of you, my brain’s going to be turned, and small wonder. You’re

mad, d’you

know that?

You’ll be a laughing stock, ridiculed. You won’t be able to hold your head up. Think on that afore you

let your old man’s fancy free. “

He stood where she had left him, his chin now sunk on his chest. Let your old man’s

fancy free. Well,

he wasn’t old. Forty wasn’t old, not for a man it wasn’t. But she was right about the

ridicule. Yes, she

was right about that. If only Yvonne didn’t look such a child, at first appearance at least.

It would be

hard for people to take in that she was nineteen, which meant in her twentieth year. But she was nineteen

and she loved him, and he . well, the feeling he had for her seemed to have no name, it went past love.

He adored her, not only the way she looked, but the sound of her voice, her every

movement, her

thoughts, the warmth of her. Yes, yes, the warmth of her, and he couldn’t do without that.

Now he had

felt it he couldn’t do without it. Nothing mattered here any more. Nothing mattered to him but her, and

he would have her. Mother, father, farm, ridicule, the lot, nothing would stop them from coming together.

It was turned ten o’clock when Mary Ellen and Hal went into their bedroom, and the door had hardly

closed on them before Hal, in what was to him a whisper, said, “What’s up with you,

woman? Acting

like a goat with its head down. You’re not going to alter things. He’s set on her, so you might as well

make up your mind to it.”

“Aw you! Make up my mind to what? My son and that chit of a girl? She can’t speak our

own

language.”

“She does pretty well, and better than most who’ve been brought up on it, I should say. If that’s all

you’ve got against her....”

“It isn’t. It isn’t, and you know it. And one thing I’ll tell you: I can’t understand your attitude. You

know who she belongs to, and you know her relationship to Kate, and yet you ...”

“Aye, woman—’ He was bending towards her, thrusting his face into hers, still

whispering, “ You don’t

need to stress that part of it.

Aye, I know who she belongs to and I know who Kate belongs to. That’s been bored into

my mind

since the day I saw your stomach full of her.

But that’s got nothing to do with this lass. She can’t help it. And what I’m concerned about is our

John. Now I’m tellin’ you this, woman, you can come down too hard on a man where his

feelings are

concerned.

And he’s at the wrong age to be foiled. He’s gone over the hills for the lass, you can see that, and

you’ve got to accept it. The alternative is, he could up and go. Then where would we be?

‘cos you

can’t rely on paid hands, even a fellow like Willy, as good as he is. “

“Willy, as good as he is! Now I’ve got something to tell you, man.

You’re going to lose Willy afore you lose John. “

“Lose Willy? He’s goin’, he said?”

“No, he didn’t say, but your daughter said.”

He stepped back from her and sat on the edge of the bed, then asked quietly, “What are you getting’

at?”

“Just that. Our Maggie’s another one that’s gone mad in her middle years. She’s been

carrying on with

that fellow for weeks now.”

“Our Maggie?”

“Our Maggie.”

“And Willy?”

“And Willy.”

“You’re imagining things, woman.”

“All right. Then I’m imagining an’ all she’s got a hairn in her belly.”

He sprang up from the bed now, a purple hue spreading over his whiskered cheeks, and

she stood

nodding at him, saying, “She’s been visiting him at nights for God knows how long. I

caught her at it and

threatened to send him packing. And she threatened me an’ all. Our Maggie threatened

me.” She

pulled her lips tight inwards for a moment before adding, “And now she’s sick in the

morning and eating

cheese like an Irish navvy.”

“My God! Willy.” He dropped down on the bed again;

then caused her anger to flare and rise to almost a scream as he said, “I’ll never get another one like

him.”

“Is that all you can say? They’re leavin’, both of them. j And what am I left with?” i

“Woman, keep

your voice down, this is our bedroom. | Up till now it’s been private. Do you want the whole! house to

know what you’re thinkin’?” | Slowly she turned from him and when her head’ dropped

and her

shoulders began to shake, he rose and| put his arm about her, saying, “Well, let them go; there’s never

been a good but there’s a better.

But I can’t believe it of our Maggie. And, lass, what you’ve got to try to do is| to like Yvonne, because

it could be she’s going to be with;

us for a long time. “ As the tears rained from her eyes, her mind answered him. Never.

Never.

Over in the cottage Maggie was saying, “She brought me a 692

beautiful dress. I . I could be married in it. It’s lovely. It’s blue silk and all ruched’—she traced her

hand across her chest ‘and has a full skirt, and lovely wide sleeves. Oh, it is beautiful.

And she brought John a velvet waistcoat, very, very smart. And Dad a similar one. And

then’—she

paused ‘there was Mam’s dress. It was green velvet, plain but beautiful. And you know, she wouldn’t

put it on. She hardly thanked her for it. I felt so wild that I nearly went for her, but we haven’t opened

our mouths to each other. Poor John, he’s going to have a fight on his hands. But more so I’m sorry for

that lass, because if anything comes of it, and you can see how she feels about him, she’s going to have

one hell of a life with my mother. “

“Well, lass, we won’t be here to see it, because I think it’s nearly certain about that place.”

“No!”

“Aye,” he nodded, smiling widely at her, ‘and I think I could have it lock, stock, and barrel, together

with the hens, geese, and three pigs, and one of them in litter, for eight-five pounds. That would include

the odds and ends of bits of furniture. But mind, what I saw of them, they are odds and ends; they’ve

been battered by seven of a family for years. Well, the house is over two hundred years old, I think. “

“Oh, Willy.” She put her arms around him.

“I can’t wait. I just can’t wait. It’ll be like walking into heaven.”

“Well, you’ll have to go through a lot of muck afore you get to the gates ‘cos I was up to me ankles in it

in the yard.”

They held each other, laughing, and rocked together. Then putting his arm around her

waist, he led her

towards the bedroom, saying, “There’s no rush any more then, is there?” And for answer, she smiled at

him and pressed her head against his shoulder.

A fortnight had passed and everyone of the household felt that they couldn’t bear the

tension enveloping

them much longer. Mary Ellen pointedly never addressed Maggie, nor Maggie her. And

when Mary

Ellen had to answer a question put to her by Yvonne, she did so in an abrupt fashion, and nearly always

avoided looking at her.

Outside, Hal shouted most of his orders and spaced them more thickly with curses. A

week previous,

Willy had given him notice, saying, “My bond is up at Midsummer I’ll stay on till then to see you fixed

up.”

And Hal’s answer to this was, “I should bloody well kick your backside out of the yard at this minute,

because you’re a sly, underhand snipe.” But he was silenced when Willy came back at

him, saying

firmly, “I am neither sly, underhand, nor a snipe, Mr. Roystan. I care for Maggie and she cares for me,

and it’s been that way for both of us since shortly after I came onto your farm. But we did nothing about

it until recently. And all I’ll say to you, Mr. Roystan, is, we’re both adult people and entitled to pass the

rest of our lives together, just the same as you did with the missis.” And when Hal,

searching in his

agitated mind for something to say, cried, “You know you’ll be my bloody son-in-law?”

Willy answered

him, “These things happen. And they can be unfortunate for both sides.” And with that he had left Hal

fuming yet wishing at bottom that the fellow’s status had been other than that of a

cowman, because he

had his head screwed on the right way. S This being Saturday, Willy and Maggie were

accompanying

him into the market. They were taking the cart in and he was going in on horseback.

After they had gone Mary Ellen went into the dairy. She couldn’t stay in the kitchen with that lass doing

her fancy cooking. Twice this week she had asked if she could bake some French dishes.

The last stuff

she made was a kind of stew, and the rest of them ‘oohed and aahed’ about it. But for

herself, it tasted

of nothing but bay leaves. And the pudding that she made, fluffy stuff, nothing in it, a French name she

gave it, sufflay or something. And then this morning she asked if she could make some

pastry. So what

could she say? But the one thing she needn’t do was to watch her. The girl was getting on her nerves.

She felt she couldn’t stand much more.

She had been in the dairy over an hour. She had made up some butter and had turned the little cheeses

on the slab, but now she wanted to start up a fresh cheese, and she went towards the two dishes standing

on the stone bench against the far wall, and finding one empty she bit hard down on her lip. There were

always two or three bowls of cream left on a Saturday to start another batch of cheese.

That was

Maggie’s job. She mustn’t have skimmed yesterday’s milk, likely thrpwn the lot to the

pigs as it was.

Him and her must be getting their heads together to slack off because she had noticed

patches of mud

lying on the bottom of the yard when she came out a while ago. Another time Willy

wouldn’t have

dreamed of going to the market without seeing that the yard was scrubbed clean. They’d had heavy rain

for the past four days and the mud from the road was often swept in, but up till now it had never lain.

She opened the door and stood looking out. The sky was high and a deep blue with white scudding

clouds racing across it. There was a fresh wind blowing, but the sun was warmish. Spring was in the air,

but this was the first time she could remember that she had never welcomed it.

As she stood she saw John coming out of a loose-box accompanied by the girl. She was

like his

shadow, she never left him alone for a minute. What had happened to her pastry-making?

Her face

tightened as she saw John open the door of the tack-room and allow her to pass in.

My God! How was she to put up with this? She knew what would be happening in there

besides their

making plans. And making plans they were, she was sure of that.