Authors: Yelena Kopylova
surprise, even John who was very fond of her would undoubtedly have been amused by
such a term
being applied to his big sister.
Moreover, Kate had a fine speaking voice, and she could relate a story. When anyone
heard Kate talk,
really talk, they forgot what she looked like. And this must have happened to Harry
Baker, for he had
seen Kate for years and had taken no notice of her. That was until he had called to see Hal to ask for
help: he and his folks among many had been hit by the poor crop; his farm, being not
much bigger than a
small holding and on hilly land where the grazing was poor, had yielded not even enough to pay his debts,
let alone survive another year. And it was when she herself had invited him to a meal that he had first
heard Kate talking. She was relating an incident she had heard in Hexham market that
brought them all
to laughter, and his the loudest:
she was adopting the tones of various voices engaged in argument.
She herself hadn’t taken to him very much at first, having thought he was only after a free meal, but from
the beginning she had realized that he was impressed by their way of living, for they
always ate their main
meal in the dining-room.
She didn’t know what kind of a cook his mother was, but on that first visit he had eaten twice as much
as any of hers.
As it was quite a ride to his place, yon side of Haydon Bridge, which was a good six
miles away, she
had been to his place only the once, to meet his mother and father. But that didn’t seem to prevent him
from visiting weekly, when he didn’t come on horseback but always brought his flat cart.
One day,
seeing Hal once again loading it up with hay and corn, she had said to him, “He’s not
daft, that one.”
And Hal had answered, “I know that. I know that, but me generosity isn’t stretching to him so much as
to Kate. She’s going to need quite a bit of help in that direction. And he’s no fool, he knows it’ll come
through her.”
That night in bed she had said to him, the worry deep in her voice, “Hal, you ... you don’t think that’s the
reason he’s taking her?”
And she had become more worried by his reply: “Hard to say. He’s handicapped because
his father’s a
bit shiftless and his mother not much better. I should say, by the inside of the house, Kate’s going to
have her work cut out there. But the fellow himself, well, he seems he wants to get on.
And let’s face up
to it, lass, he’s about the only chance Kate’ll have. There’s been no one in the running afore, has there?
They must all be bloody well blind, because she’s a fine lass, is Kate. None better.”
“Do you think she cares for him?”
And to this he had answered, “I was going to ask you the same question because she talks to you.”
Yes, she did talk to her, but not on the subject of her feelings for Harry Baker. Perhaps later tonight,
when she was saying good-night to her for the last time in this house, she would open up.
She looked down the table towards her daughter. She was seated to Hal’s left. Even the two sons she
had given him at one and the same time, when they had become old enough to sit at the
kitchen table in
his first little farmhouse, he hadn’t had one on each side of him, Kate had always sat next to him, and to
his left hand, for it was easier, she saw, for him to pass tit bits to her with his right. And that’s how it had
been through all the years. None of the children she had given him had supplanted Kate.
And Kate loved him in return. She couldn’t have loved her own father dearer.
There were times when she thought of Roddy Green—bank, as he was when he worked
in the smelting
mill and roamed the hills in his spare time with his slate and pencil. And her thoughts would be soft on
him then.
However, when she thought of the man that both Newcastle and London town had
produced, she
would be rilled with a bitterness, but mostly against herself for being a besotted fat-headed girl, she who
was supposed by everyone to be full of common sense, but as dear old Kate Makepeace,
her friend and
benefactor, that wise old woman had said, “Sense came from the head, trouble from the
heart.”
Was it the head or the heart that was leading Kate to the altar tomorrow? She hoped it was the heart.
Oh yes, she did, she did, because sense, although it. might make you count your chickens after they
were hatched, did little to help you while sitting on the eggs, and so, as she saw it, if the heart hadn’t led
you to the altar it was a sure thing you wouldn’t look forward to going to bed that night.
She was recalled from her twisted metaphors by a great burst of laughter and seeing Tom thumping John
on the back, causing him to splutter into his pudding, and she leant towards Gabriel who was sitting to
her left and, smiling, she asked, “What was that?” And Gabriel, wiping his eyes, said,
“They were talking
about what happened on Windy Monday, the day they were burying Maggie Oates,
remember? And
the one woman who had braved the walk to the cemetery, and the wind blew her skirts
and petticoats
over her head, and she nearly fell in the grave. And there were only two men there
besides the parson,
and he only buried her because she confessed her sins before she went. And those two
fellows had
some nerve an’ all, and brave, ‘cos if all her customers had followed her, half the county would have
been empty of men, so it was said.”
“Oh, be quiet.” Laughing, she thrust her hand out towards Gabriel, saying, “What d’you know about
it?”
“Enough, Mam, enough. I saw her once. I was only about eleven, and she smiled at me.
Didn’t she,
Hugh?” He looked up the table to his brother.
“And she patted your head, didn’t she?”
“Shut up! Shut up!”
Again there were gales of laughter.
Mary Ellen recalled Maggie Oates vividly, and the day she was buried too, because that was the day of
the hurricane in January, thirty-nine. It tore up half of the countryside and played havoc in Allendale.
And after it was all over people remembered that Maggie Oates had been buried on that
day. And some
wit in a bar had said she had gone out on a blast and not only with one devil and a gale of wind, but with
all of them she had served over the years. So the story went around, and whenever Windy Monday was
remembered so also was Maggie Oates’s funeral.
She had once likened herself to Maggie Oates, that was after she had forced Roddy
Greenbank into
giving her the child, and she admitted, even now, that it was she who had done the
running, and because
of it she had been turned out of her postal Davison’s farm, her father’s door had been locked against her,
and the only friend she had in the world had been Kate Makepeace. It was then that
certain men had
come to old Kate’s door presumably for potions and herbs for their ailments, but really to look her over
to see if she was a younger up-and-coming Maggie Oates. And, too, they had coupled her name with
Hal when there was nothing between them but their own secret thoughts, which had risen to the surface
the day he had fought through the great drifts of snow and found her in the agony of
labour and with his
own hands had then
delivered the child, and afterwards saved her life by bringing away the afterbirth.
It was on the night they were married that she thanked him for being so good to Kate.
And he had said
to her, “She was mine afore you were, for I brought her into the world, and I feel that I’m her father as
he never was.” And that feeling had continued between her daughter and her stepfather, for strangely she
was closer to him than were his own.
Hal was speaking now, and she smiled at him down the length of the table from where he was looking at
her, for he was saying, “Come on, let’s drink to our Kate and her happiness, and I wish that with all me
heart, as I know you all do. And Kate Hal looked into the brown eyes of the big young
woman sitting to
his side, and he said softly, “ Your chair may be empty the morrow but you’ll still be in all our hearts. “
“Oh! Dad.” She leant forward and kissed him on the lips, and his hand trembled and the wine spilled
from his glass, and Maggie cried, “Look out! Dad. I’ve got to get that stain out the
morrow.”
“There’s no washing the morrow.” This came from Florrie, her voice quiet, a soft smile on her face.
Then Tuesday or whatever. “
“Be quiet, tousle-head.” Hal looked down the table towards his eldest daughter; then
shifting his gaze
on to Mary Ellen, he said, “To Kate, lass, to Kate.”
They all stood up and raised their glasses and they drank while Kate’s head lowered and her lids closed
and the tears pressed from beneath them, and Maggie cried, “Oh, our Kate, don’t start to bubble. It’s
unlucky if you bubble.”
“No, no, it isn’t; it’s only unlucky if you don’t.”
They all looked towards Mary Ellen now, and she went on, “Have you ever known of a
bride who
doesn’t cry? It would be like an Irish wake without a pig on the spit and whisky in the teapot.”
“Oh! Mam.” They were all laughing again.
“The things that you come out with.”
“Well, let’s go into the sitting-room and have a singsong.” Hal was already on his feet, and he walked
down the length of the table, but before he reached Mary Ellen, his hands came to rest gently, one on the
back of each tilted chair. Then taking Mary Ellen’s arm, he led her from the room; and the family
followed, but only after each of them had made his way to the two chairs and laid his or her hands gently
on the backs. It was a ceremony that had been enacted ever since they had lost their
brother and sister,
and it was one that had caused not a little talk in those who had been guests and had
witnessed it.
It was said round about that it was a strange and unhealthy thing to do to keep the dead alive in a
dining-room. But then Hal Roystan was a very strange man, a man who had spent his
earlier working
years since he was a young lad in the smelting mill, and then, starting with the few
pounds the owners had
given him in compensation following the murder of his father while in their employ, he had built up the
most thriving farming business for miles around. Moor Vale was his fourth place in
twenty-five years,
and it was said he now lived like a lord, and had educated his children as if they were class. But be that
as it may, he was still not accepted by the real people of the county and never would be, for his wife had
had a bastard before he married her;
and she was odd, too, in her own way, for she could make up potions and pills for man
and beast that
benefited both better than any doctor’s medicine. Yet she only did it when she thought fit and for those
whom she liked; others got short shrift should they go to her door.
No, the Roystans might live like lords and copy the gentry inside the house in the way they ate and
outside in the way they rode for their horses were all good breeds, and they ran a trap, a dog cart and a
brake, besides all the farm carts, but people had long memories and, given the chance, didn’t let them
forget from where they had come.
And many prophesied that the Roystans had gone up as far as they could, and that now
the road would
be downhill. And who would be to blame but themselves for getting too big for their
boots. However, it
had to be admitted he paid more than a fair wage to his one hired man, although he
expected him to
sweat for it, as he did three of his sons who worked on the farm. The latest news was that the second
youngest one, Hugh, was going in for law. Now would you believe that? If it had been
one of the twins,
people might have understood it, because they, if you could put the word to them,
appeared more
refined, whereas the last two of the brood, Hugh and Gabriel, had been known to be
tough since they
were lads, and they were already in and out of scrapes.
They were likeable enough, but rough. Yet, here was one of them going in for law.
Hal Roystan had seen to it that each one of his family had been given the chance of an education. The
girls had gone to a dame school in Hexham, and the twins had gone to school until they were fifteen. But
the last two, they had been sent into Newcastle. It had been expected that Gabriel would go into
shipping, but no, he brings his fine education back and says he wants to work on the
farm, at least for a
time. And so Roystan had bought more land;
and it had prospered.
But it was also said around that Hal Roystan’s interest didn’t lie only in farming, he had his fingers in
other pies, and when Langley Smelting Mills were rented by the Greenwich Hospital to
Messrs.
Wilson, Lee and Company in eighteen and thirty-three, it was rumoured he had tried to
get a share in
there. Some said that tale was but a joke because his wife’s name had been Lee before he married her.
But it was no rumour that he had been after a brick works which was close to the farm he had at the
time, but had been outbidded there.
Oh, he was a deep one was Roystan. Everyone knew. But wouldn’t you have thought he