A Woman Undefeated (12 page)

Briggs was rightly proud of the dwellings he provided for his workers. The other two, Ashlea and Thistledown were along the same lane. All three had been improved substantially since his father’s day, with a shallow pit privy and a spring water well. The roofs and thick stone walls were sound, no leaks or dampness would be found at any of his properties and he’d even put in a cooking range. The farmer frowned, as his new servant stood morosely, then turned to Jack who it seemed, was struck dumb. Jack couldn’t believe his eyes and began to thank his new master profusely, then gripping Maggie’s arm tightly, he explained that his wife was very tired.

“It’s been a long day for me new wife, Farmer and she’s not got over the sickness caused by travelling so far on the ocean waves. A good night’s sleep and she’ll be fit for anything. Isn’t that so me darlin’ bride? We can’t wait to serve yer and yer good wife, Master. Tis thankful we are, fer this fine place to live, and God bless yer fer giving us this start.”

Briggs looked gratified with Jack’s appreciative outpouring and opened the door of the cottage to show the couple around.

“Joe Parry and his wife lived here before,” he explained. “He got too old for working so I had to let him go. They’ve gone to live with a daughter the other side of Chester. Her place is too small for them to take their bits and pieces, so as you see they’ve left the table, chairs and sofa and there’s a bed left in the other room too. There’s some fruit still on the apple trees and you’ll see there’s a patch with cabbages and potatoes that your bride can use. Though you’ll mostly be having your meals at the farm. And down the lane are your nearest neighbours. Sam Evan’s lives at Ashlea and the Tibb’s live at Thistledown.”

Briggs, now mollified, left them to settle in. He liked to be thought as civilized, and as someone who tried to be kind to his men.

Jack opened the back door to let some air in, then went out to look around. He felt he was a fortunate man, as he gazed at the orchard with its old gnarled apple trees, the vegetable patch which
was sadly overrun with weeds, and the empty hen house which was rather tumble down. He knew it could be brought back to use again, with the loan of a hammer and some nails.

How he wished that Maggie was sharing his excitement, but she was sitting on the horsehair sofa, too tired to even listen, as he shouted happily to her. The view alone of the sea and the hills beyond, would have brought her a stir of excitement, if she had managed to drag herself to the door.

She was looking around the small living room, with weary red-rimmed eyes. She saw the stone flagged floor, the black iron cooking range, the spindle backed chairs, a round wooden table and an old rag rug that had seen better years. An enamel sink, a brass oil lamp, a battered looking pail, a tin tub and a besom, could be seen through the door that led to the lean to, but at that moment she didn’t care. Her stomach was giving her the gripes again and she needed to lie down.

Maggie lay in a dreamless sleep, having collapsed on the bed that had been left behind in the tiny front room. Jack had gone down to the shore to recover their few possessions. It was a chance to crow to his parents, over the good fortune he had been given by coming there.

It was a healing sleep, which gave Maggie’s body time to recover from the fatigue it had suffered over the last few days. Mercifully her mind had also gone into shut down, not showing the images of her mother and Molly, that assaulted her senses most of the time.

A sudden tapping on the window pane brought her to a wakened state. Though not quite aware of her surroundings, she knew that the noise had intruded on her mind.

She gave a cry of fear, as a large shape loomed outside the window. It was not quite dark outside, so she could see that the creature had long shaggy hair, framing a heavy looking face and what looked to be a man’s jacket on the upper part of its body. She sat up quickly, her heart pounding painfully inside her chest as she heard the front door opening.

“It’s only me, Ruthie Tibbs, yer neighbour,” her visitor said hastily, when she saw that Maggie had leapt from the bed and gone into the living room, her right hand balled into a fist in readiness, thinking that she was about to be attacked.

“Is this ’ow you greet all yer visitors?”

“Only ones who peek through me window while I’m
sleeping,” Maggie retorted, smiling weakly as she sat down on the sofa, her legs having turned to jelly as she spoke.

The woman continued to stand in the doorway, staring down at Maggie in an accusing fashion, her arms folded over her pendulous breasts, tree trunk legs standing wide apart. She was dressed like a labourer, wearing a large black fustian jacket over a man’s white collar-less shirt, brown corduroy trousers a little short in the leg and black down at heel boots, with the leather all cracked and worn.

“Honest, yer put the heart across me, so yer did,” Maggie said, now that her pulse had returned to normal. “So yer me nearest neighbour. Ruthie Tibbs, did yer say?”

“You’re not from round here though,” said Ruthie, her voice suddenly taking on an accusing tone.

“Are yer one of them immigrants then from the settlement, come to take our jobs and our homes? They say they’re a load of left footers that’s come over, brought their popeish ways with them as well.”

“What do yer mean, a left footer?” Maggie inquired, not sure she liked this name that she was being landed with.

“I don’t know,” admitted Ruthie, a little warily, seeing that the new tenant looked annoyed and about to rise up from the sofa she was sitting on.

“Just something our Solly, me husband, said. “They’re all left footers, them immigrants down on the shore.”

Ruthie looked around her and Maggie smiled inwardly. She had suddenly realised that the woman was perhaps not a full shilling, as the eyes that were staring ahead had a blank expression. Though, to be kind, maybe she was just a country girl who was not used to choosing her words carefully, nor used to knocking first on a new neighbour’s door.

Maggie decided that all she could do was try to be friendly, better that way than making an enemy of the poor soul.

“I’ve lived in Neston all me life,” continued Ruthie proudly.“Me dad was the blacksmith before ’e was taken with the
fever two years ago. They said it was the ale ‘e’d bin drinking. ‘E drank gallons of the stuff and water too. I’d bin wed a while by then and Solly wouldn’t let me go to help ‘im. Said me mam could manage, but she died as well. I never even went to his funeral, ‘cos Solly said I had to stay down here, where the bugs are blown away by the estuary winds and our water comes from the fast runnin’ streams.”

Ruthie paused for a moment, then looked at Maggie inquisitively. “You got any youngsters then?”

Maggie shook her head and was about to confide in her about Molly, but Ruthie settled her bulk at the side of her and continued to ramble on.

“Me house is bigger, but the same rooms as yourn, but with ‘aving all the kids now we’ve had to make a bedroom in the loft. The little ones sleep in that bedroom.” She pointed to the room, where Maggie had been sleeping. “And we have a ladder going upwards, back there.”

She pointed beyond the fire range.

“That’s where the older ones sleep. Our living room’s bigger, so me and Solly sleep near the warmth of the fire.” Looking around curiously, she asked.

“Have yer got nothing fer cookin’ in?”

Maggie explained that Jack, her husband, had gone down to the settlement to collect her kettle and cooking pots.

“So, yer are one of them immigrants then?” Ruthie’s eyes gleamed with triumph.“I thought yer was, yer don’t speak like the folk from round ’ere. So, have yer come to pinch our jobs and our ’ouses? ‘Cos if yer ’ave I’ll get our Solly to ye. ’E’ll sort yer out if I tell ’im yer not from round ’ere.”

She stood up and towered over Maggie menacingly, but although she felt a bit intimidated, Maggie didn’t show it. She was grateful to be removed from a bad and cloying smell. Ruthie gave off a mixed odour of sour milk, urine and sweat which was offensive to the nose. Maggie knew her own smell was bad enough, but these smells coming from Ruthie brought on a wave of nausea.

She bent her head to touch her knees, which Ruthie probably took as a sign that Maggie was frightened. There was a silence for a moment, as Ruthie stood glowering, then a little tousled head peered around the front door which was still ajar.

“Mam,” said the small boy, who came walking into the room uncertainly, seeing a stranger sitting on the sofa, instead of Hilda Parry who used to sit on the sofa before.

“What do yer want, our Ernie?” Ruthie shouted, her attention taken away from her victim, as the nervous child came into view.“I thought I told yer to stay and look after our Katie, while Annie’s away gettin’ messages up at the Cross!”

“Katie’s crying for yer, Mam, and our Danny’s wet his breeches and I want to go and play with our Tommy.”

“Get out of ‘ere now and do as I told yer,” bellowed Ruthie, aiming a blow at the cowering child’s head. “I’ll be after yer and give yer a clip round yer ear!”

Her voice came down a few octaves, as the ragged boy quickly fled, and she lowered her head to speak to Maggie in a confidential tone.“Can’t ’ave a minute to meself with that lot, though I suppose I should be going now. It’s getting dark and Annie, that’s me eldest, will be coming ’ome. That little swine that’s just been here is a bugger fer going missin’. Three days he was gone once and it was my Solly who found ’im. ’E were hiding out in a den the older lads had made, feedin’ ’imself on scrumpin’ apples. ’E had a terrible belly ache and was in the privy for hours. You’ll see what it’s like ‘avin’ kids once you get started,” she said, nodding her shaggy mane and smiling in a knowledgeable way.

Maggie got up hastily as her neighbour ambled to the door, then stood outside the cottage while she listened to Ruthie’s heavy footsteps disappear. She began to wonder where Jack had got to? He must have got lost with no lantern to guide him, not knowing the way from the shore. She trembled from the coolness of the air and the freezing bareness of her unshod feet . Remembering the shoes that Peggy had handed over, she went inside to find them, returning to stand at the door. There was no point sitting in the
darkness or in front of an empty grate. She could wait instead for Jack and look at the stars overhead twinkling so vividly, in the clear night sky.

As usual her thoughts turned to Molly and her mother. Was it true that when you died, your soul would fly up to Heaven? Was her mother looking down on her daughters, as they lived their separate lives? Was Molly safe under the same clear sky? She sent a hope filled prayer, up to Him who is supposed to listen, that one day soon she would see her sister.

As Maggie stood there, wrapped up in her dreaming, she began to hear a sort of shuffling, clanking and heavy panting, coming from beyond the bushes that gave Lilac Cottage its name.

Jack appeared, weighed down by the mattress, the kettle and the cooking pot, holding a lantern in one hand, a dead fish in the other and wearing a look of exasperation. He couldn’t see the funny side, when Maggie burst out laughing at the sight of him.

“You wouldn’t be laughing if you ‘ad to drag this damn mattress up that rotten ‘ill,” he chided breathlessly.“‘Tis full of lumps and bumps and smellin’ like a midden. Don’t know why you want it, I saw there was a good enough mattress here on the bed. All right, all right, I know you got it fer a comfort for yer mother.......”

Jack had the sense to stop mid sentence, as he saw his wife’s grinning face turn quickly into a scowl. He was tired and ravenously hungry and was looking forward to eating the fish that his Dad had caught, after warming his feet in front of the fire.

His time with Alice had not been easy. She had nagged him into giving her his last few shillings, to help her rent a small house along the shore. She had said Jack had no need of the money now, with his meals and cosy cottage included in his job. Did he want his parents and younger brother to spend the winter on the shore at the mercy of the elements? With the O’ Hara’s and the Tierney’s gone, there would be no safety in numbers anymore. Did he want to hear about their frozen bodies, or find that their throats had been cut by marauding thieves? It was too bad of him to abandon his
mother, when it was for his future that they had left their homeland.

Jack smiled to himself as he thought of Alice. She never changed, just took her advantages, when other people couldn’t even see one.

He followed Maggie into the cottage, expecting to be met with a welcoming glow from within. Well, at least a fire, or some preparation of the vegetables he had seen in the garden.

He looked around in disbelief and asked her what she had been doing since he’d gone? Jack’s face looked grim when she replied that she had been sleeping, but as usual she answered him in a confrontational way.

“So what am I supposed to use to get a fire going? And how can I see to cook a meal, seeing there’s no candles? And why can’t you cook that fish yourself, instead of expecting me to see to it? You may have dragged me away from Killala, but that doesn’t make me yer damned slave.”