Sentence of Marriage (46 page)

She lay in bed trying to screw up the courage to get up and face them all. Her father would look at her as though she were a stranger. Susannah would call her those terrible names again. Perhaps her father and Susannah would have another dreadful fight. She wondered what John and Harry would say when they found out about her. Maybe they’d think she was those things Susannah had called her:
slut
and
whore
.

Amy knew she had to face them all soon; perhaps she should get it over with now. She pushed back the blankets and started to sit up, then scrambled right under the covers and hid in the warm darkness.
I can’t do it yet. I’m scared
.

She heard a door opening across the passage; it must be John going out to the kitchen. A few minutes later another door opened, and she recognised her father’s heavy tread in the passage. He went into the kitchen, but soon came out again. Amy held her breath as she heard him approach her door, but he walked past it towards his own bedroom. Amy heard him call from the passage.

‘Susannah. Get out here and make breakfast.’ There was a muffled response with a questioning note in it. ‘She hasn’t got up yet.’ Another muffled sentence. ‘No, I’m not going to get her up. You can do it for once.’

Susannah’s response obviously satisfied Jack, because Amy heard him go back into the kitchen. When Susannah had not emerged a few minutes later, she heard Jack open the kitchen door and shout down the passage. ‘Susannah! Hurry up!’

‘All right, all right,’ came Susannah’s voice. ‘I can’t get dressed in two minutes.’ She grumbled her way into the kitchen and out of Amy’s hearing.

When it became too stuffy under the covers, Amy emerged.
I’ve got to get up soon. Maybe I should now
. But that would mean walking into the kitchen when the others were already sitting at the table. They would all turn to look at her. No, that would be too hard.
Pa doesn’t want to see me, I know he doesn’t
.

Amy jumped when her door opened half an hour later to admit Susannah. ‘Here’s something for you to wear,’ Susannah said curtly. She flung two dresses onto the bed. Amy recognised them as the ones she had made for Susannah when she had been carrying Thomas. ‘They’ll be far too long for you, but you can cut off as much as you need to.’

‘I’ll… I’ll take a deep hem,’ Amy said, trying to match Susannah’s casual tone. ‘I don’t want to spoil them for you.’

Susannah shrugged. ‘It doesn’t worry me. I won’t need them again. Do whatever you like with them.’ She crossed to the window and drew the drapes, letting in daylight. ‘Are you going to get up this morning, or just lie in bed all day?’

‘I’ll get up now.’ Amy got out of bed and picked up the blue dress, then took up her sewing box and searched for the scissors to unpick the existing hem.

‘Your nightdress still fits, I see,’ said Susannah. ‘It’s not too tight over the bosom?’ She came closer to examine the gathered yoke.

‘No,’ Amy said, turning away from Susannah’s inquisitive fingers. ‘Leave me alone, please. I don’t want to be fiddled with.’

‘There’s no use taking that attitude with me. You’re going to learn, my girl, that there’s not much dignity involved in having a child. Let me look.’ Amy submitted, and Susannah twitched at the yoke. ‘No, that’s quite loose, really. That should do you until your time.’

Amy kept her eyes on her sewing, willing Susannah to go away, but her stepmother seemed in no hurry to leave. Instead she sat down on the bed.

‘When’s the child due?’ she asked.

‘I… I don’t know.’

‘You stupid girl. Well, when did it happen?’

‘When did what happen?’

‘It’s no use trying to pretend you don’t understand what I’m saying, sitting there with a great belly like that. When did you shame yourself?’

Shame myself
. A large tear dropped onto the blue dress, and Amy rubbed it into the fabric with her hand. ‘It happened lots of times,’ she said quietly.

‘You are a little whore, aren’t you? And you try to drag everyone around you down to the same level. I’m not going to talk about that filth any more than I have to. When did you last have your bleeding, then?’

‘It was at the end of January.’

Susannah counted on her fingers. ‘November then, I think. Early in the month. I was right, you’re nearly six months gone—five and a half, anyway.’ To Amy’s relief, Susannah stood up and made to leave the room. ‘So we’ve got three months to decide what to do about you,’ she said as she walked out.

When she had finished hemming it, Amy put on the sack-like blue dress over half a dozen petticoats. At least she felt warm, for the first time in weeks. She caught a glimpse of her reflection in the mirror and turned away from the ugly sight, then went out to the kitchen. If she kept busy enough, perhaps she would not have time to think. ‘Decide what to do about you.’
What does that mean?

Susannah raised her eyebrows at the sight of Amy in the shapeless dress. ‘Well, you needed that, didn’t you? You wouldn’t have been able to squeeze into your old dresses much longer. How long did you think you could get away with not telling me?’

‘I was going to tell you soon.’ Amy picked up a duster and started on the dresser so that she would not have to look at Susannah.

‘Oh, yes,’ Susannah said. ‘You’d come out one morning with a brat in your arms and tell me then.’

Jack came in by himself at lunch-time. He sat down heavily, glanced at Amy in her baggy dress, then looked at the wall. ‘Now, listen to me, both of you. There were things said last night that shouldn’t have been. I’m going to forget they were ever said, and I want you to do the same. Susannah, I expect you to do what’s needful for Amy. You know about such things, and the girl’s your responsibility. Understand?’

‘Of course I do,’ Susannah said. ‘I’m already looking after her.’

‘Good. It’s about time you started—it would have been better if you’d started six months ago. You’ve dressed her properly, I see.’

Amy walked slowly up to her father, but her courage failed when she was still a table length away from him. ‘Pa, I wanted to tell you before, but it was never the right time. I wanted to try and explain it.’

‘Never mind all that now. It’s no use talking about it, what’s done is done.’

‘I’m sorry, Pa.’

‘It’s too late to be sorry,’ Susannah said.

Amy closed her eyes against the tears. ‘I know it is. But I’m still sorry. Pa, I never wanted to cause all this trouble. I didn’t think it would be like this. Please, Pa, can—’

‘That’s enough,’ Jack interrupted. ‘There’s no use dragging it all out. You just do as your ma says, she knows what you’ll need. Where’s my lunch?’

After being dismissed so abruptly, Amy did not dare try to ask her question out loud again. She looked at her father, repeating it silently.
Please, Pa, can you forgive me?
But he did not meet her eyes.

‘Where’s your brother?’ Jack asked when John came in by himself a few minutes later. John looked at Amy, then looked away quickly. She saw embarrassment in his face.
So he knows, too
.

‘I don’t know, Pa,’ John said, looking worried. ‘He… he got a bit wild, and he went off somewhere. He wouldn’t tell me where he was going, but I saw him heading off down the road.’

‘Silly young fool,’ Jack muttered. ‘Well, I’m not waiting my lunch for him. He can go hungry. What have you got such a long face on you for, John?’

‘Well, Harry was in a really bad mood, Pa. And he took his gun.’

Amy could see that gave her father a jolt, but he soon looked resigned. ‘He’s not likely to do anyone much harm. I’d be more worried if he was here in the house with it.’ He glanced at Susannah. She looked affronted, then alarmed. ‘He’ll come back when he’s cooled off,’ said Jack.

They ate their meal in a silence interrupted only by Amy’s occasional muffled coughs. ‘You want to do some of that fencing over the hill?’ John asked when they had finished.

‘You start on it,’ Jack said. ‘I’ll join you later. I’m going to Arthur’s for a bit.’ John nodded and went out.

‘Jack, do you need to tell them?’ Susannah asked. ‘You don’t want the whole town to know.’

‘I’m not telling the whole town, I’m telling my brother,’ Jack said. ‘I’m no keener than you are for anyone else to find out what’s going on.’

‘It reflects on us all, you know,’ Susannah said to Amy as soon as Jack had left the house. ‘You’ve brought shame on the whole family, not just yourself.’

‘I know,’ Amy said miserably.

‘You’ve driven your brother away already. And look at the state your father’s in,’ Susannah went on relentlessly. ‘At his age, too, to get a shock like this. Especially when he’s always doted on you so ridiculously. He can’t bear to look at you now.’

‘I
know
,’ Amy sobbed.

*

Lizzie thought nothing of it when she saw her uncle talking with her father out in the paddocks; he often popped over for a chat. But when her father strode back to the house looking grim, she knew something was up.

‘Go outside,’ he ordered Lizzie. ‘I want to talk to your ma.’

Lizzie pressed her ear to the door, but her parents were speaking so quietly that she caught nothing except an exclamation of shock from her mother. When her father finally opened the door again, her mother was dabbing at her eyes with her apron and her father looked grimmer than ever. Lizzie looked from one to the other, and her mouth set in a firm line. So they had found out at last. She bent to put her boots on.

‘Where do you think you’re going?’ Arthur said.

‘Next door to see Amy. I’m bringing her back here to stay the night.’

‘No you’re not.’

‘Why not?’ Lizzie demanded.

‘Don’t take that tone with me, girl.’ He stared closely at her, his eyes narrowed in anger. ‘You already knew about this, didn’t you? Why didn’t you tell anyone?’

‘It wasn’t my secret to tell. I’m going to get Amy.’ She looked mutinously at her father.

‘I say you’re not leaving this house!’ Arthur shouted. ‘Are you defying me, girl?’ The red tint of rage slowly mounted in his face. ‘You’d better not be.’

Lizzie stared back at him, coolly weighing her options. If she did defy him he would make her mother give her a beating, something that hadn’t happened to Lizzie for many years. He would probably stand in the bedroom doorway and make sure her mother made a proper job of it, too. If she got him angry enough he might even do it himself.

What mattered far more was that she would not stand a chance of getting off the farm against her father’s will. Even if she took to her heels, trousers could beat skirts without even trying.

‘All right,’ she said, glowering at her father. ‘I’ll do as you say.’ She slumped down in a chair and watched him regain his calm.

‘Good,’ he said. ‘I’m only thinking of you, girl.’

‘What do you mean?’

Arthur made a noise of exasperation. ‘Isn’t it obvious? You’re not going to that house, and you’re not going to talk to that girl.’

‘Arthur,’ Edie protested feebly.

‘Don’t argue. Either of you. She’s shamed herself, and I’m not having my daughter mixing with her. That’s that, I won’t listen to any arguments. And
you
,’ he stabbed a finger at Lizzie, ‘you don’t leave this farm again till I say you can. Understand?’

‘Yes,’ Lizzie muttered, looking at the floor.

‘Just you remember it. You watch yourself with that Frank Kelly, too.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Lizzie asked indignantly.

‘I don’t want the same thing happening to you.’

Lizzie glared at him. ‘Do you think Frank is the sort of man who’d do
that
and then run away?’

‘Frank’d have a bit more trouble running away, wouldn’t he? Anyway, he knows I’d kill him if he tried. You just watch yourself.’

‘I don’t need to be told that.’

‘I’m telling you anyway,’ Arthur shouted. For a moment Lizzie thought he was going to hit her. She braced herself for the blow. But instead he turned away. ‘Get to your room. You can stay there till you’ve remembered your manners.’

Lizzie went without a word. She stared out her window for a long time in the direction of Amy’s house, pounding her hands on the sill in frustration at her own powerlessness.

July – August 1884

John again came into the house alone and some time after his father that evening, but this time he looked calmer.

‘I saw Harry,’ he said.

‘Where is he?’ Jack asked, looking over John’s shoulder as if he expected to see Harry there.

‘He’s gone next door. He said he wanted to be away from…’ John glanced at Susannah, ‘people for a while. He went up in the bush—he said he felt like killing something, so he shot a few pheasants.’

‘When’s he coming back?’ Jack demanded.

‘I don’t know, he didn’t say.’

‘He’d better be back here tomorrow morning or I’ll go and get him,’ Jack growled. ‘He needn’t think he’s sloping off like that.’