Rosa's Island (29 page)

His father strode into the room. His face was livid. ‘Tell Mrs Jennings to shut 'window upstairs,' he commanded Rosa. ‘That girl is letting 'whole of Sunk Island know of her wicked sins and retribution.'

‘Best that they all know,' Jim muttered. ‘Better than letting a sin be hidden. Better that than a canker consuming you day by day.'

Matthew glanced from his brother to his father, and then to Rosa. She turned away and went upstairs carrying the bowl of water. ‘What you talking about?' Matthew asked, his voice raised. ‘She's having a babby and isn't wed! She was tempted and fell. She's not killed anybody, for God's sake!'

Jim's face drained of colour and his father stared at him, breathing heavily, his mouth working.

‘What's going on?' Matthew asked, but neither answered, and after a pause he pressed further. ‘Is there summat I should know?'

‘No.' Jim's voice was strained. ‘There isn't. Are you going to make that tea or not?'

Matthew brought out the cake tin and placed it in the middle of the table, but no-one took any cake. They sat at the table and drank the tea in
silence, Matthew staring in the direction of the stairs and Jim and his father towards the window. It was quiet now above them, until they heard the sound of footsteps on the stairs.

Mr Drew rose hurriedly from his chair and headed towards the door as Mrs Jennings came panting into the room. Her face was flushed and hot and her hairline beneath her cotton cap was wet. ‘Don't you want to know about your daughter, Mr Drew?' she asked, detaining him.

‘She's no daughter of mine,' he muttered, his hand on the doorknob. ‘I've said afore I want nothing to do with her or her child.'

‘Her son,' Mrs Jennings butted in. ‘She's had a son.'

Matthew and Jim both gave an audible sigh and their father stared at the old lady.

‘Will it live?' His question was terse and without emotion.

‘I don't know.' Mrs Jennings sat down in his vacated chair. ‘He looks sickly, he's not breathing properly. Will one of you fetch 'doctor back?' She turned to Jim and Matthew.

‘I'll go.' Jim got up, and Matthew asked, ‘What about Delia? Is she all right?'

‘Aye. Exhausted, but she'll recover. My,' she exclaimed, ‘but she's got an ill temper on her.'

Jim and his father left the room without speaking and Mrs Jennings reached for the teapot. ‘Is this fresh?'

Matthew said that it was. ‘Who made it?' She lifted the lid and peered into the teapot.

‘I did.'

‘And was 'water in kettle boiling when you poured it onto 'leaves?'

Matthew nodded. ‘I used it from the pan after Rosa had finished with it.'

‘You never made tea from warm water!' Mrs Jennings pulled herself up from the chair and swung the kettle back onto the fire. ‘Did nobody ever tell you that water has to be boiling!'

He shook his head. ‘I've never made it before. I thought I'd done well,' he grinned.

‘Useless,' Mrs Jennings grumbled. ‘Men can plough and sow and bring harvest home, but they're not much good at owt else; except mekking babbies,' she added. ‘Aye,' she gave a great sigh. ‘They can do that all right.'

Jim hadn't got back from Patrington, but at midday Rosa dished up the meal for Mr Drew and Matthew and urged her grandmother to sit down and eat also. ‘Delia's sleeping,' she said. ‘Take a rest now.' She didn't mention the child in front of Mr Drew, for he had a dark sullen expression about him.

‘We usually have turnip with pork,' James Drew muttered. ‘Not cabbage.'

‘Cabbage was quicker,' Rosa said sharply. ‘Turnip takes too long and I didn't want to keep you waiting. I knew how busy you were.'

‘We'll have it tomorrow with cold pork and stuffing,' Mrs Jennings attempted to pacify, ‘and a plum duff to follow.'

‘Why should we always have to humour him?' Rosa said after Mr Drew and Matthew had finished their meal and gone out again. ‘Why
should it matter so much whether he always has the same as before?'

‘It's his house,' her grandmother said patiently. ‘He makes the rules. It's not our place to change them. Well, not mine anyway.' She gave a little smile. ‘Your grandfer allus said I cooked just like his mother did. But I didn't, onny when we were first wed, then little by little I did things the way I wanted and he never noticed 'change.'

She nibbled on a piece of apple-pie crust as she cleared away. ‘But yon fellow is too set in his ways to change. He's got a rod of iron in his backbone and a stone for his heart.' She pondered for a moment. ‘But he must have a weakness somewhere. He wouldn't be human if he hadn't.'

They were about to take a few minutes' rest by the fire when they heard the sound of horses in the yard. ‘That'll be Jim with the doctor.' Rosa got up from her chair. ‘Will you go up with him, Gran, and I'll give Jim his dinner? He won't want to waste any more time, they're repairing 'dairy roof and cow byre, and want to finish before dark.'

‘Aye.' Mrs Jennings nodded and, as the doctor came in, she asked, ‘Will you tek a look at babby, Doctor? He's small and not a good colour and his breathing isn't regular.'

‘And the young mother?' the doctor asked. ‘Has she recovered? Her brother refers to her labour as sounding like a wildcats' concert!'

‘It's true she didn't suffer silently.' Mrs Jennings glared disapprovingly at Jim, who had
the grace to look abashed. ‘But population would soon die out if roles were reversed and men had to give birth! But she's well enough now, or will be when she's rested.'

She led the doctor upstairs and Rosa raised her eyebrows at Jim as she served him his meal. ‘Didn't mean owt,' he started to say, when they heard a muted cry from Delia's room.

Rosa went to the bottom of the stairs and listened, then slowly climbed the steps and opened the bedroom door. Delia was standing by the window with her back to the room, whilst the doctor had his ear over the baby's chest, listening intently. Then he straightened up and shook his head. ‘I'm sorry, my dear,' he said. ‘I'm afraid he's gone.'

Delia didn't move, but Mrs Jennings, who was sitting on the side of the bed, put her hand to her mouth and stifled a sob. ‘But he was all right,' she gasped. ‘He was wheezy as if his tubes were blocked, but—'

She stopped as Delia turned towards them. Her face was white and her eyes glittered. ‘It wasn't meant to be, then, was it?' she breathed. ‘He wasn't meant to have a life. I'll dig a little grave for him at 'bottom of 'garden.'

‘No, no,' the doctor said soothingly. ‘That will be taken care of. Come back to bed, my dear. You really shouldn't be on your feet yet.'

‘He'll have to have a proper burial in 'churchyard,' Mrs Jennings told her. ‘With a service and everything.'

‘No,' Delia said. ‘Da won't allow that. If we bury him here on 'farm, nobody will know.' Her
words were whispered as if she was confiding a secret. ‘Matthew will make him a little box.' She glanced towards Rosa as she spoke and Rosa had the distinct impression that Delia was goading her, but then she immediately dismissed the notion. Why would Delia do that? She was upset, bound to be, having lost her baby, perhaps her mind was distracted.

‘Let me help you back into bed, Delia,' she said, as Mrs Jennings took the still form of the child and wrapped a sheet around him.

‘I can manage on my own,' Delia snapped. ‘I don't need you to help me.'

Rosa exchanged a look with her grandmother, who indicated with a slight movement of her head that she should go. ‘See 'doctor out, Rosa, and then put 'kettle on 'fire.' She sighed. ‘And is there any brandy? I reckon a drop in hot water wouldn't do any of us any harm.'

As Rosa took the brandy bottle from the cupboard downstairs she suddenly thought of Henry, who had imbibed too much brandy and drowned in the ditch. She leant her head against the cupboard door and blinked away hot tears. A picture of her mother came into her mind and she wondered how she had felt when giving birth to her, not knowing where Rosa's father had gone, or if she would ever see him again. Did her mind turn? Was that why she eventually went down to Spurn and didn't come back? She thought of Delia and how her eyes had glittered with a kind of madness.

‘Rosa?'

She hadn't heard the door open and when she
turned, she saw Matthew standing there. ‘What is it? What's wrong?' He came towards her. ‘Who's having brandy?'

She put out her hand to him. ‘It's for Delia, I think – or for Gran – I don't know. Oh, Matthew!' She stifled a sob. ‘It's the baby. He was such a sweet little mite. And he's gone! He's dead.'

Matthew put his arms around her and held her. ‘I don't understand,' he mumbled into her hair. ‘I thought everything was all right.'

‘It was,' she whispered, and thought how steady and strong he was. ‘Or seemed to be. But he stopped breathing.' She drew away reluctantly and lowered her eyes as he gazed down at her. ‘Delia wants you to make a casket for him.'

‘Me?' he said. ‘Jim's the carpenter! He'll do it better.'

She shook her head. ‘She said you. You'd better go up and see her, she was talking nonsense – about burying him in the garden, so that no-one would know about him.'

‘I'll not have that.' There was anger on his face and in his voice. ‘That's because of Da! But he's an innocent child, he'll have a decent burial.'

James Drew made no comment when told of the child's death, but simply left the room and sat alone in the parlour for an hour. Then he came out, went up the stairs and, after rapping sharply on Delia's door, opened it. Standing in the doorway, he announced that the parson wouldn't bury the child in the churchyard as he had been conceived in sin, hadn't been baptized and had no father's name.

‘Nay, Mr Drew,' Mrs Jennings, who was in the room with Delia, objected. ‘That wouldn't be Christian! He's a good parson. He'd not deny an innocent bairn.'

Mr Drew didn't answer but turned around and went down the stairs again.

Delia lay awake until the early hours, her eyes wide open. It was not yet dawn, the skies dark and grey. She ran her hands over her breasts, which were tender and swollen, and then down to her navel. Nobody else need know, she pondered, only those of us here at home. She forgot about Harry and the farm lad, she forgot about John Byrne: they had all known. She forgot too about her sisters, who had also known and who might have spread the news. Except that she hadn't actually forgotten, she simply pushed them to the back of her mind as being irrelevant to the present situation.

She rose from her bed and, taking a shawl from the back of the chair, wrapped it around her. Her child, whom she hadn't named, was in the wooden casket which Matthew had hastily made for him, beneath the window. She averted her eyes from it and stole out of the room and along the landing to her father's room.

Gently she turned the brass knob. It yielded and she slid in through the door. She saw, by the light from the small fire which still burned in the grate, that her father was fast asleep in the bed which he had once shared with her mother. She took in a deep shuddering breath as she thought of what she was about to do, but even
though in a confused and muddled state, she was determined.

She leant over her father's sleeping form and put a hand on his flannel-clad shoulder. ‘Da,' she whispered. ‘Da, wake up!'

‘Huh!' He gasped and opened his eyes with a start. ‘Ellen? No! Who is it?'

‘It's Delia. I need to talk to you, Da.'

He sat up in bed and peered at her in the gloom. ‘Get out!' he said in a guttural voice. ‘How dare you come in my room? You're a wanton woman bringing shame on our name.'

‘I know.' Tears thickened her voice. ‘And I'm sorry, Da. But I've thought of something, and the others and 'doctor and Mrs Jennings said I couldn't do it, but I know that you'll say I can.'

He leaned on one elbow and stared at her. ‘What are you talking about? I want you out of this house. You're not stopping!'

She started to weep. ‘I've nowhere to go, Da, but babby's dead! If we bury him quietly, nobody else need know, onny 'family and Mrs Jennings and her – Rosa, and they won't say anything if you tell them not to.'

He frowned. ‘What are you trying to say?'

She sniffled. ‘If you'll help me, Da, we can bury him in 'garden. I can't dig, I'm not strong enough yet, but we have to do it soon – afore parson comes. Tonight even! And then, and then, if nobody else on Sunk Island knows, perhaps I can stop at home?'

He kept his eyes on her face. ‘You'd not have to tell anybody where he was, and I shall deny it if I'm questioned.'

‘Yes. Yes! And then I can stop at home? I'll not go wrong again, Da!' As she made the vow, the words of the Irishman came into her head, that someone would care for her. If it was him, she thought, I would make him wait until we were wed. I'd not be tempted again.

‘Fetch him then,' her father said abruptly. ‘We'll do it now. Onny be quiet. Don't waken anybody.'

The wooden box was surprisingly heavy, but Delia carried it as her father refused to. She trod carefully in her bare feet down the stairs and into the middle kitchen, and waited for her father to unbolt the rear door. When she heard the bolt slide back she tiptoed into the back kitchen and her toes curled as they touched the stone flags.

The wind whistled around her as she stepped outside and it pulled on her shawl, sliding it down her back. She shivered, she should have put some outer clothes on, but there hadn't been time, although her father had put on a pair of breeches over his nightshirt and even now was pulling on his boots which he always left inside the back door.

He collected a heavy spade from the lean-to where the tools were kept and led the way to the bottom of the garden, past the small orchard and towards the kitchen garden, but then he stopped. ‘This is no good,' he said in a low voice. ‘Somebody'll turn it over, ready for winter frost. They'll find him once they start digging.'