The Pesthouse (17 page)

So on her last trip into the final farmlands of America, in search of milk on the morning before she and the Boses expected to reach the salty, giant-pumped river, the man she found mending his harnesses outside his neat, wood cottage, with its pen of three fatly uddered cows, was easily — excessively — seduced. When Margaret had arrived with Bella and called out her greetings from the boundary fence, the man, like all the others before him, had taken hold of something with which to defend himself (in this instance, a weighted, leather strap) and ordered her to stay exactly where she was and state her business, unless she wanted to be driven out of the county with blood on her back.

Margaret was used to these immoderations. The man — as old as Margaret's father by the look of him, and not as tidy as his house — did not seem alarmed, just aggressively cautious. She gave her name. She smiled. She was polite. She introduced 'her' child. She said how hungry they both were. She asked if there were any chores, anything at all, that she could do in return for a little milk and some food, and then, before he could actually suggest any suitable work, she had pulled down her scarf and let the blue material puddle on her shoulders.

She'd seen the startled look on his face and expected him, like all the others had (at least once their wives had shown their faces), to order her to keep away from the house while he brought milk, and then to feed the child and leave their land immediately, or else. But this man stepped toward her, calling out to someone in the house as he did so. And then she realized, not from experience, but from base instinct, that the pulling down of her blue scarf, together with her smiling offer of doing 'anything at all' in return for milk and food, had been taken by this man to be an invitation to advance and put his hands on her. Her hair was not short enough to scare him off. 'You'll have the milk,' he said. 'You'll have it twice.' Another man appeared behind him at the door.

WHEN MARGARET and Bella had not returned to their rendezvous tree by late afternoon, Andrew Bose acted out of character. Anxious, fretful and exasperated by Melody's demands that he 'do something on his own account for a change', rather than just cussing their misfortune and feeling sorry for himself, he volunteered to do exactly what she suggested and risk 'a little scout' into the nearest fields.

He left his wife in charge of all their possessions. She would, she said, make as much smoke as she could if the missing couple were to return in his absence and as much noise as she could if a stranger approached and offered her 'any inconvenience'. She was pleased with herself for sounding so spirited in such worrying circumstances. In fact, she had discovered — and liked herself for it — that she could be tougher —
steelier
, to use the older word — than she had expected. Acton first. Now Bella. She still felt strong and calm and ready to be tested further, although she acknowledged in her heart that the prospect of Andrew being the third loss to the family was one that was mildly amusing to her imagination only so long as it didn't actually happen. He was thin water, though. No denying it.

Her husband set off across the strips of field toward the wood cottage that Margaret had identified, just before noon, as promising. Andrew, whose distance eyesight was still sharp despite his age, had clambered on to the same tree trunk as Margaret and agreed that, yes, her eyes were not deceiving her, that was a man outside the house and those were cattle, though he could not specify whether they were she's or he's.

'Take your knife,' Melody had instructed him, but he had thought it better to arrive at the dwelling empty-handed. He doubted that the inhabitants would want any nets mended — they hadn't passed a decent river for days — and knew for certain that he would not be able to use a knife effectively for any other purpose. He had no plan in mind, other than to take no great risks. He'd satisfy his wife's challenge and no more. He would walk as quietly as he could, keeping to the shade and to the low ground as much as possible, and see what he could see from a safe distance.

He did not approach the house directly by its path but followed a line of trees and then a highish loose stone wall that provided good cover. The only sound he could hear, apart from the entirely natural disharmony of birds and wind and branches, was the half-gate of an abandoned hut that was swinging noisily on the last of its leather hinges and repeatedly banging its jamb. But by the time Andrew had reached the end of the wall a dog had begun barking. You can't creep up on a dog. Andrew waited. There was no point in running away from a dog. He expected it to arrive with its inquiring nose any moment. He would do his best to charm it. Perhaps he should have brought that knife. Stabbing a dog would be no more difficult, surely, than gutting a good-sized fish. But not only did the dog not arrive, it also stopped barking after a while.

Andrew counted to a hundred before he dared to stand a little and look over the wall toward the house. There was a dog, its head between its paws, and safely leashed at the side wall, but there was no one looking out across the land to discover why their guard had been making such a din. The only movement Andrew could spot was from the back of the house, where there were at least three cows in a deeply slurried pasture. For a moment he was tempted just to stand up and call out Margaret's name. If he shouted loud enough and then ducked behind his wall, he would be able to hear any reply, but no one would be able to see who'd done the shouting or where from. But they might untie the dog. And, as he had seen, the dog was a large one. Even if they did not release the dog (and a clear sense of
they
had already formed in his imagination —
they
were the same group who had already taken Acton), if it was decided to chase after him, what chance would an old, tired man like him stand? No, he would stick to his current policy and stay both quiet and hidden. He skirted the front of the house, still pressing close to walls and fences until he reached the boundary of the cow paddock, on the opposite side of the house from the dog. There he could hope that his odor might be masked by stronger ones.

He waited for another count of a hundred, watching for any movement. There was nothing. He felt reasonably satisfied that, unless the rooms were occupied by drunks or men without legs or hostages, tied up, the only living creatures within the grounds of this house were the cattle and the dog. So, thinking not only of the heroic tale he would be able to tell Melody later that day but also that he would never forgive himself if this first chance of finding his granddaughter was refused, he walked across the pasture, using the cows as shields as much as possible, and pressed himself up against the rear of the cottage. Again he waited and listened. Nothing, other than the sounds that empty houses make. So, with his heart racing and his mouth dry, he peered between the shutter-boards in the larger of the two windows into the long, single room, half expecting to find Franklin, Acton and Margaret trussed in ropes, with little Bella crawling in the dust. But all he could see was a table with pair of leather boots on it, and two bed boards covered in a tangle of blankets. Otherwise the house was unfurnished and certainly not permanently inhabited. Now he was confident, though disappointed. He walked around to the front of the house, by way of a side gate, and — this surely was courageous for an aging net-maker — went inside. Other than a damaged harness and a leather strap that somebody had dropped on the doorstep, there was nothing more to see than he had noticed from the rear window. Just leather boots and bedding. But fresh hoof marks in the earth outside suggested that horsemen — only two or three, so far as he could tell — had recently departed, probably only that afternoon. There was nothing to suggest that Bella and Margaret had even reached the house or that there was anything there to be feared, other than a tethered dog that now, for reasons of its own, began to bark again. Andrew thought he heard shuffling and a voice, a baby's cry, perhaps. A bird? It was time for him to flee.

It was dark by the time Andrew found his wife again. She was shaking and hardly able to breathe. Her period of mild amusement on her husband's departure had been short-lived. As soon as he was out of sight, she could no longer admire herself as tough and
steely
or ready for greater tests. Without her husband's timidity to measure herself against, she soon felt unprotected and exposed. Even though there had been no strangers to offer any 'inconvenience', every bird and every cracking branch terrified her. Every shifting shadow made her jump. She'd never known such fear and anxiety before. What if neither her husband nor her granddaughter came back to her? That would be worse than losing Bella's mother. That would be worse than losing Acton. It was not that she loved Andrew better than her son (indeed, she did not) or was so deeply attached to her granddaughter that the thought of life without her was impossible. It was rather that she was alone.

Melody was relieved to see her husband fit and well, despite the dreadful fates that she had imagined for him, and to know that she herself would not be left entirely on her own in the middle of a hostile land, a widow and a destitute, with not a hope in the world. But she was still distraught when he returned, and she saw that he was unaccompanied. She listened to his account of finding only an empty house and no sign of their granddaughter or Margaret. She kissed him and embraced him, glad of his warmth, but she was annoyed with him again. 'Did you call for her? Did you shout her name?'

'I did everything. There's not a sound. There's no one there.'

'A woman and a baby just don't disappear without a trace. Something bad's happened, I'm sure of it now—'

'There were horsemen there.'

'There were horsemen? Andrew, you never mentioned horsemen. Did you speak to them?'

'I didn't see them. Just fresh marks.'

'They're lost. I know it in my heart. They're lost.' We all of us are lost, she thought, unless we make it to the boats.

MARGARET HADN'T had to run like this for years, not since she'd been a girl and dodging boys in games of Free 'n' Freeze or taking part in races to and from the lake. She'd never had to run with a baby in her arms, taking care not to let the child's head bang against branches or walls but still not slowing down to pay attention to her distress. But she was younger than the two giving chase and marginally more desperate.

Before the first man at the front of the building had managed to grab hold of her arm, she had instinctively run forward and to the side of him. If she had turned and run away, he would have caught her at the gate and hauled her back onto his land. Then what? But he was not expecting her to rush toward him and then take off just out of reach. Now he had to waste a few moments of advantage to turn himself around and take stock.

Margaret headed for the cottage door. The second man, a little younger than the first and simple-minded to all appearances or maybe half asleep, just stood and watched. He hadn't any idea who she was or why his elder was now calling out, 'Bring her down!'

Margaret veered again and took the path that led around the east side of the house and into a horse paddock. A dog, which had been sleeping, shot out at her on its leash and missed her calf with its teeth by the thickness of a reed. She felt its breath. A moment later the first man cleared the corner, too, but snagged his ankles in the leash and hit the earth. The simpleton followed after, just sauntering, in time to see his buddy rolling on the ground, the dog beside itself with fury, and the fur-haired woman climbing the back fence, already too far gone to hear him say, 'Blue devils, Charlie, what's goin' on?'

Charlie soon explained. 'You'd better wake up, boy. We missed our chance there. We'll get her, though. She owes us now.'

'She's got a kid.'

'So it won't be nothing new for her.' Any woman was a rare commodity for squatters like them. A beauty was too good to lose. They wanted her.

It did not take them long to saddle up their horses, equip themselves with cattle prods and rope, and ride around behind the house in search of Margaret. The men spread out, riding fifty paces or so apart, close enough to shout out to each other and to control a wide stretch of the land. Margaret, with Bella wailing, more frightened by the dog than by anything else, had scrambled through a choke of rocks and ended up above the house, looking down on the roof timbers. She was breathless, and angry, mostly with the men but partly with herself for having been so dangerously and laughably ambiguous. 'Anything at all.' Not the wisest of remarks. She'd cracked her knee during the climb and caught the back of her hand on a thorn. She sucked the blood away, quieted Bella with a little finger in her mouth, and tried to think what she should do.

It was tempting, actually, to pick up several rocks and see if she could put some holes in their thin roof, or even damage their milk cows. She thought that probably her dangers would prove to be brief and somewhat comical. Perhaps her only problem now would be getting back to the Boses by a circuitous route, though the thought of trying to amuse them with an account of her adventures was not promising.

It was only then that Margaret saw that the two men had mounted up and armed themselves. They had not spotted her yet, but there is a golden rule of hunting that says that nothing from a bee to a buffalo can evade two mounted men for long, except three mounted men. Her first thought was to try to reach one of the other habitations in the neighborhood and beg for help. A young woman with a child, escaping from two likely rapists, could surely expect the offer of help and safety from any normal home, if there were other women, anyway. She could see the roofs of two small steads within easy reach, though no sign of people. If she could see another woman or a child, then she would head that way. But there was no one. There wasn't even any smoke. For all she knew, all these places might be abandoned. Most places were abandoned nowadays. Perhaps these two men were simply passing through. Their high-tacked horses seemed to suggest so. Maybe they had rustled their three cows and moved into the empty cottage for a day or so of butchery. Salt beef would see them and their dog safely and fatly through the winter. Perhaps the other buildings were harboring similar men, from the same band of riders possibly. Margaret did not need reminding how cruel and murderous such groups could be. She'd seen them take her Pigeon away. She'd seen the woman on the Highway, raped and stoned to death. No, Margaret dare not take her chances at another house. The best thing she could do was get away from humankind and horses altogether. She had her breath back now. She made a sling out of her blue scarf, wrapped it round Bella, and tied the child to her back. She'd carry the baby how Franklin had carried her down Butter Hill.