Her voice came to him, soft and concerned, and he glanced up to see her watching him. ‘Never better.’ He reached out for a sandwich, bit into it and swallowed before he said, ‘Just thinking over some plans for the New Year, that’s all.’
Chapter 23
‘What do you mean, you was up at Jake’s place? What the dickens were you doing there?’ Wilbur stared at Adam.
‘Ssh. Keep your voice down.’ The two men were sitting in the bar of the Friendly Tavern in Southwick Road, Adam having invited his father out for a drink half an hour before. Wilbur liked nothing more than a drink on a Sunday evening, not so much for the drink itself but because of the camaraderie that was part of it. On the occasions Wilbur had the price of a gill on him he would make his way to the Colliery Tavern or the Friendly, but he wouldn’t do as some did and go in with his pockets empty and his tongue hanging out, waiting for someone to take pity on him. His pride wouldn’t let him. Of late he had taken to going round the greengrocers in the market and picking up their orange boxes for a farthing each, chopping them into sticks for firelighters, which he’d tie into bundles with string and sell round the doors in Bishopwearmouth or Hendon at tuppence a go. He always went over the river to sell his wares, he would rather have died than let his neighbours know what he was doing. But tonight his son had asked him out and he was like a dog with two tails.
‘Is that where you go sometimes? The farm?’Wilbur’s voice was low, and when Adam nodded, he added, ‘It’s the lass, isn’t it? Hannah. You’re meeting her on the quiet.’
‘What? No, no, nothing like that, I swear it. She doesn’t know I even go up there. I . . . I just like to see what’s going on, that’s all. It’s easy enough to make sure you’re not seen.’
Wilbur’s voice held a touch of pity when he said, ‘Lad, lad.That’s a mug’s game. One day you’ll be tumbled and what’ll you say then?’
Adam shrugged impatiently.‘Look, Da, I’ve not come to talk about that, just listen, will you?’
‘I’m listening, lad. I’m listening.’
‘The thing is, for a few weeks now I’ve noticed an old fella walking that way when I’ve been on my way back into town. I tried to pass the time of day with him once or twice but he weren’t having none of it. He wouldn’t even look at me. Kept his head down.’
‘It’s a free country, lad.’ Wilbur took a sip of his pint, smacking his lips.
His benign expression vanished when Adam leant closer, saying, ‘That’s as maybe, but it’s a bit funny when the dead walk, don’t you think?’
‘What you on about, the dead walking?’
Adam leant back in his chair, enjoying the moment. Then he said, ‘Well, what else do you call it when some bloke who’s supposed to have been six feet under for the last thirty-odd years turns up alive and well?’
Wilbur stared at his son. ‘You feeling all right, lad?’
‘Never better. Don’t you want to know who he is?’
‘Go on then.’
‘Silas Fletcher.’
The effect on his father was all Adam could have hoped for. Wilbur had just raised his glass to his lips and now he coughed and spluttered, swearing as beer split down his shirt. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he said, ‘What the hell makes you think it’s Silas Fletcher?’
‘I don’t think, I know. He looked a nasty bit of work and so today I thought I’d hang about out of sight and just see where he made for. I’d nowt else to do.’
Wilbur looked at his son. Adam and Lily had had a barney to end barnies before Adam had disappeared for the afternoon. He didn’t know what was going to happen there. He could see Adam doing for her one of these days, the mouth she’d got on her.
‘So I waited till it was twilight and, sure enough, along he comes. But he don’t pass the farm. Oh no. He stops and hangs about a little way off, furtive like. And then along comes the lord and master of all he surveys.’ This was Adam’s new title for his half-brother. ‘I could tell straightaway they’d arranged to meet. Anyway, I was in the hedgerow and I edged a bit nearer, keeping me head down. Something changed hands. I couldn’t see what. But then I realised it must have been money ’cos Jake says, “I can’t keep giving you ten, you must see that. All my money is tied up on the farm in bricks and mortar and the animals.” Then the old ’un half laughs, sneering, and tells him he’ll have to sell off a few beef steaks unless he wants to watch a touching reunion between his parents.’
Adam paused for breath.Wilbur was sitting as though poleaxed. ‘I still couldn’t work out what was what at that stage, but then Jake says, “You go anywhere near my mother and I’ll kill you, I promise you that,” all tough like. And the old ’un says something along the lines that whether he likes it or not he’s still his da and still Rose’s lawfully wedded husband.Then Jake tells him to sling his hook and the old ’un laughs again, saying he’ll be back next week. Same time, same place. And he’d better have what he wants and not a penny short. So,’ Adam leant back in his chair again, ‘what do you make of that?’
The expression on Wilbur’s face was answer enough.
‘He’s blackmailing him,’ Adam went on as though his father hadn’t realised. ‘Heaven knows where he’s been all this time but whoever that poor blighter is in the cemetery with Silas Fletcher on his headstone, it ain’t Silas. And that means you’re not a married man and the lot of us are bastards.’
‘
Don’t say that
.’
‘Keep your voice down, Da, for crying out loud.’
‘I won’t have you saying that, you hear me?’
‘Aye, aye, all right. I’m sorry, Da. Sit down, man. People are looking. I’m sorry.’
Once Wilbur had sunk back down on his chair, his face red, Adam said quietly, ‘I was only saying what folks’ll say if this gets out, that’s all. Do you think Mam knows it wasn’t him they pulled out of the dock?’
‘Course she don’t know, don’t talk such codswallop. Why do you think Jake’s paying him off? Your mam’s a good woman, a decent woman.’
‘All
right
, Da.’ Adam glanced round.
‘This can’t get out.’ Wilbur was becoming more agitated by the moment. ‘I’ll never be able to hold me head up again. Think how some of them jumped-up toadies at the pit would laugh if they found out.’ He swore again, softly but vehemently, drops of frothy saliva gathering at the corners of his mouth. ‘I can just see a couple of them deputies, Longhurst and Ferry, they’d love this. And the neighbours . . .’ He shook his head desperately. ‘This can’t get out.’
‘Don’t take on like this, man. Look, drink your beer and I’ll get another pint in while we decide what we’re going to do.’
‘How serious was Jake about not paying him what he wanted?’
‘I don’t know. How the hell would I know that? I’ve told you what I heard.’
‘It’s no skin off his nose if word gets out,’ said Wilbur bitterly. ‘He don’t live round about no more, he’s got the farm and he won’t be labelled a—’ He couldn’t bring himself to voice it. ‘Not like the rest of you. I won’t have our name dragged through the mire, Adam. I don’t care what it takes but I won’t have that.’
‘Aye, we’re agreed on that, Da.’
‘I might not have much but I have got me reputation. I’m not like some I could name who have never done an honest day’s work in their lives. Hard graft all me life, I’ve done, and I won’t have me self-respect taken away by any man, least of all Silas Fletcher. Your mam let drop the odd thing about him when we was first wed and he was a wrong ’un, all right. All the Fletchers are the same, scum of the earth.’
‘He’s a skinny little nowt of a man now.’
‘That’s as maybe, but if he opens his gob too wide we’re done for.’
‘Then we’ll have to make sure he doesn’t.’
Wilbur nodded. The angry colour had drained from his face and it was pasty with shock. ‘You don’t know where he lives, do you?’ he asked hopefully.
‘No. By the time I’d come out of hiding, he’d scarpered. Jake stood looking after him for I don’t know how long and I couldn’t risk being seen so I had to wait. Anyway, that’s not important. We know where he will be next Sunday, don’t we?’
‘What if he don’t turn up?’
‘He’ll turn up.’
‘There’s no reasoning with a man like that, lad. He won’t be content until he’s bled Jake dry.’
‘He could do that and welcome if it wasn’t for the danger he is to us. Anyway, I wasn’t planning on reasoning with him. What I’ve got in mind is a sight more physical. You game, Da?’
Wilbur nodded. ‘To my mind he deserves everything he’s got coming.’
‘And more. We’re agreed then. Next Sunday you an’ I will disappear for a while. We can tell Mam there’s a meeting about getting some of the old-timers reinstated at the pit, something like that. There’s so many meetings these days about something or other she won’t think twice.’
‘What about Naomi? She’s been to the farm the last two weeks since her an’ Stuart packed up.’
‘Don’t worry about Naomi. I haven’t bumped into her yet and I don’t intend to start now. She always leaves long before twilight and that’s when Fletcher comes. I make sure I watch her go and only come out when it’s clear. Sometimes I’ve been at the end of the North Hylton Road when I’ve seen Fletcher.’
Wilbur stared at his son. How long had he been spying on the folk at the farm? Months probably. And all the time hoping to catch Hannah with this Daniel bloke. And what good would it do if he did see them together? The lass could take up with whoever she wanted, after all. Rose was right, it was an obsession with Adam; the lass, Jake having the farm, Joe’s death and now Stephen working for their half-brother. And if he went to the farm on a Sunday afternoon, where did he go most evenings? Not to the farm, it would take too long to walk there and back. But he was seldom at home these days, that was for sure. Mind, if it wasn’t for his fixation on the lass, they wouldn’t have caught wind of this other business. Keeping his thoughts to himself, he said, ‘How about we let Naomi leave home after we’ve had our Sunday dinner and give her plenty of time to get to the farm before we start.Then we’ll make sure we’re in position hidden out of the way when she starts for home again.What if we lose Fletcher like you did today though? What if Jake hangs about again? What if—?’
‘Enough, Da.’ Adam silenced his father with an upraised hand. ‘Let’s just see how it goes, eh? Play it by ear. All right?’
‘Aye, all right, lad.’ Wilbur nodded and drained his glass. ‘Now, what did you say about another pint? If ever I needed a drink, it’s tonight.’
Chapter 24
‘What’s bothering you these days, lad? And don’t say nowt because you haven’t been yourself for a while. It’s not just me who’s noticed it either. Hannah was saying the other day she’s worried about you.’ Rose stared anxiously at her son over the kitchen table where the two of them were sitting drinking a cup of tea. ‘You can tell me, Jake. You know that.’
His mother was the last person he could tell. Staring at her, Jake tried to control the growing resentment and bitterness he felt these days towards the woman who had borne him. He didn’t understand how someone like his mam, a good, decent person, could have got mixed up with the type of man he now knew his father to be. She’d lied to him. About everything.
‘What was my father really like?’ he asked suddenly. They were alone in the house for the first time since Christmas. Lily and Sadie were at her mother’s and Wilbur had gone to visit an old friend who recently had had a stroke and was residing in the Sunderland infirmary. The children were due home from school soon and Jake knew if he didn’t ask now, the chance would vanish.
‘What?’ Rose’s tea slopped into her saucer.
‘My father. I heard someone talking the other day.’
‘Someone? Who? What did you hear?’
‘That he was something of a wrong ’un. Look, Mam,’ Jake leant forward, his eyes angry, ‘I’m not a bairn and I’ve got a right to know what he was like. I know what you’ve said in the past but I want the truth, all right? Whatever you say won’t go beyond these four walls but I want to know.’
Rose’s hand had gone to her throat, her fingers plucking at the loose skin. ‘It was such a long time ago.’