Family Drama 4 E-Book Bundle (154 page)

Oh no you won't, thought Ben. We'll all go together or not at all. He didn't trust that look in
her eyes. ‘Let's walk back down the Esplanade,' he offered.

‘Not with my corns,' protested Florrie. ‘You two go off and I'll take a trip round myself. I wish you'd make your minds up!' She was sensing the tension mounting. ‘We'll meet up outside the hotel,' she added, trying to be cheerful.

Ben marched Mirren back towards the sea and sand, hoping the breeze and fresh air would lift her mood. Perhaps it would have been better to have stayed in Cragside after all, but this outing was only for one day.

They walked side by side in silence. Mirren was building a wall around herself with no door he could bash open. It was not the time to push her but he couldn't help himself. He was worried now, but she spoke first.

‘When are you going to leave Cragside?' she said out of the blue.

‘Who said anything about me leaving?' he replied, taken aback.

‘I'm fine now. You've done your duty. It's time you were looking after yourself. If Lorna's dumped you, all the more reason to hit the trail,' she snapped. ‘I thought you wanted to do some training.'

‘I do but…' How could she be dismissing him out of her life?

‘No one's stopping you, Ben,' she sighed.

‘You are, if you must know. I just want to be
around a bit longer,' he said, not looking at her as they walked.

‘You want to be my gaoler in case I've sneaked a bottle or two upstairs? Well, I haven't, not yet, but if you hang around for much longer, I will, hovering over me like a mother hen. You did your job well at World's End. We can manage without you at Cragside now we've got three POWs. Trust me, I'm a big girl, I've learned my lesson and I can look after myself.'

‘I do trust you, but not in this mood. It's still early days. Doc Murray says—'

‘If Doc Murray wants to give me advice let him visit me himself instead of sending you as his messenger boy and his mouthpiece. I just want to be on my own. Can't you read my lips? Leave me be!'

‘I care about you, Mirren, I always have. We look out for each other and I want to see you on the road to—'

‘Oh, grow up, Ben. There is no yellow brick road to wonderland when you've lost your whole world, when every time you shut your eyes you see your child lying there. I don't want you around, reminding me of it all. Jack's gone and it's my fault. That's another thing I have to live with. Why don't you bugger off out of my life?' Her eyes pierced him like icy daggers. ‘Do I have to spell it out? I don't want you here!'

‘You don't mean that. I lost Sylvie too. She was like my own daughter and many was the day I pretended she was. I loved her as my own. Don't shut me out. I loved you both…' His voice was raised in desperation. How could this be happening?

‘Don't talk so soft. You get on my nerves. You should've married Lorna and been happy, not hanging round the farm being my gaoler. Go away and let me get on with my own life!' she shouted, pushing him away.

‘Don't say that!' He shoved her back, unable to help himself.

‘Is that lad bothering you?' said the man in a couple, hearing the argument as their voices rose.

‘Yes, he is,' Mirren snapped, and stormed off, leaving Ben flushed, furious and lost for words. What had he done to deserve all that?

She hadn't meant to say all those things to Ben. They were unfair and cruel, but he was getting on her nerves. Mirren stormed back towards the station, not wanting to spend another moment in the town. It wasn't Southport's fault. It was just the trip was a mistake and she could smell the beer coming out of the pub doors and alleys.

She wanted to get as far away as she could from shoppers and fish-and-chip stalls and hotels and cheerful people, back to the hills where she belonged and the silence of World's End.

How did they think she could ever survive the anniversary in a strange place? There would be a train going east to Preston and from there she'd get on the first one that went towards Leeds if there was one, and blow the consequences. Florrie and Ben could have their treat in the Scarisbrick Hotel. What she needed was to be left alone.

All that hard work on the farm, the extra shifts and humble pie she'd eaten were taking their toll. If only she had the comfort of her nips. She knew that was dangerous but she needed something stronger than stewed tea to tide her along on the journey home. Not a nip, of course, but perhaps a glass of wine as a tonic. Just the one, though; she was not going down that road again…

Mirren sat in the buffet savouring the sweet taste of tonic wine. It was full of herbs and goodness and it slipped down easy, as did the next one and the next. It was only like pop, though. Three would have to be enough as she climbed on board the train with a smile on her face. What a relief to be heading back home. What a blessed relief to be away from their well-meant fussing.

She sat in the empty carriage watching the fields rush past. ‘Peter dum dick, peter dum dick,' clacked the wheels over the rails, and she nodded off.

She woke when a guard shook her awake. ‘Ticket, please?' he asked, and she rummaged in her bag for her return.

‘Where am I?'

‘You should've got off at Hellifield, love. You'll have to pay extra and next stop's Scarperton Junction. Better wait there for the up train.'

She staggered off the train, feeling silly and not a little fuzzy. The tonic wine must've been stronger than she thought. How stupid to have slept through her change. Then she stood and recognised just where she was: the other end of Scarperton, not far from Chapelside Cuttings. How strange to be only a few yards from where she was born. It was years since she'd been here.

Now she was hungry and feeling shaken. The wine had taken its toll. She'd have to wait for another connection, for a train going north from Leeds. It was like one of those eerie dreams when she couldn't find the way home and it was still 8 May. Oh hell!

Florrie would be furious that she'd sent Ben packing, let them down with breaking her pledge–but it was only tonic wine and only three glasses…In for a penny, in for a pound, perhaps some more would make no difference. She couldn't face them after this so she might as well make the most of the evening.

It was as if her feet knew the old paths by heart–through the side streets, on the cobblestones, past rows of terraces with corner shops, the sooty taste of chimney smoke up her nostrils, the smell
of the cotton mills and the clack of clogs on the pavements, neat doorsteps with whitened donkey-stoned steps and flags flying across the streets to celebrate the day.

In a daze of confusion and nostalgia she found her way back to the Cuttings and the line of carriages that had been her first home. The little allotments were still there but there was no sign of life at number five.

Granny Simms would've long gone. The faces peering at her through net valances were the faces of strangers, not neighbours, unfamiliar in turban headscarves. She was a country lady now, not a townie, in her summer frock and short jacket and sandals.

The child had come home one more time, she smiled, standing by the railway line, sniffing the soot and seeing weeds sprouting by the tracks.

There was Dad, picking docks to boil with nettles and oats, thickened with onions to make his special dock pudding when funds were tight. It tasted all green and slimy in her mouth but she swallowed it so as not to hurt his feelings. Why had she remembered that?

Mirren wandered past St Mary's school where she'd sat obelliently on the bench, looking up at the blackboard. It was still there, only smaller and shabbier than when she attended.

Then she saw the long low roof of the Green
Man. It looked now to her adult eyes like an old farmhouse converted into a public house, tucked away in what once must have been fields. How many times had she waited on that bench for Dad to come out with her heart in her mouth, waiting, waiting. She felt the tears rolling down her cheeks, tears for that little girl who waited for the man who never came, and she wept for the little girl who she'd never see again, who would never be eight or twenty or have children of her own.

In her throat rose up that familiar acid of bitterness for those lost years and all the broken dreams. Well, Mirren Sowerby, she decided, you're a big girl now; it's about time you saw for yourself what the inside of Dad's hiding place is like. What is so special about it that Dad preferred it to me?

Without a moment's hesitation she walked inside and shut the door.

Ben brought Florrie back to Cragside after their silent lunch. The pork was tough and stuck in his gullet. She was tired and tearful, and there was no point hanging about after Mirren's desertion. Over lunch he had tried to cover for her but Florrie was not fooled.

‘It were a mistake to shift her. She's a stubborn mare, is that one, but she'll come round given time. I hope she's not done something silly. It's about time you looked to yourself, young man…'

Ben smiled at her concern. ‘That's just what Mirren said. Time for me to move on then?'

‘Mirren talks through her behind sometimes but a change of sky might do you good. No good hankering after what's never going to happen, lad.'

He could see she meant well but it was not what he wanted to hear.

‘Is it that obvious?' Ben blushed and spluttered on his crackling.

‘From the day you came with Pam and Wesley, all those years ago, to help out at the eclipse. She's allus been the one for you, cousin or not. You Yewell men are all the same, thank goodness, but lazy when it comes to doing something about it. Look at Tom. It took him years to pluck up courage to ask me to walk out with him,' she laughed. ‘I know when Wilf went west I thought the world had come to an end, and then up pops Tom and I've been twice blessed. Pity that Jack and her were never suited. We all knew that, but folk have to go their own gait, as they say.

‘There's some lovely young lass out there waiting for you so don't waste your time on what's not for you. Mirren's that twisted up inside, she's not to be trusted. Don't think we didn't know what was going on…It's in the blood. Ellie was a fool to follow Paddy Gilchrist. He was always a devil for his drink, so Tom says. Mirren's the same but no one can do owt about it…It's her show, not yours, so leave her be, Ben. You're putting good money after bad there.'

‘But I tried.'

‘You did your best but it's not enough with them as can't take it. Jack was finding his way through his problems with help. Going back to her undid it all. She'll have to do the same. I'm trying not to be bitter but it's hard. They were two of a kind and that didn't bring out the best in either of them.
Then with the war and Sylvia…It's in the Good Lord's hands now, not yours…I'll be praying she finds salvation one of these days. I wish we were rid of her but she's family. There, I've said my piece.'

Ben was stunned at this outburst.

They sat in silence in the carriage on the way home. Then, as they neared Hellifield, Florrie whispered again, ‘Mirren's said one good thing, though. It's time for pastures new for you. She's letting you off the hook by her way of it. We'll manage. You've been like a son to us and seen us through the worst. We'll be sorry to see you go but you've only got the one life, Ben. Look to it and to yourself for a change. No one will think the worst of you for that.'

Ben listened with a heavy heart to yet another dismissal. Perhaps it was time to leave Cragside after all, leave all that he loved about the place, leave the stock and the hills and find other experiences, see a bit of the world outside this dale. His heart was heavy at the thought of going. Why did it feel like exile and banishment?

The inside of the Green Man was little more than a smoky hovel with sawdust on the floor, a thin fire of sorts, and old men sitting around staring at her as if she was a creature from another planet, in her cotton frock and tweed jacket, not the usual
mill girl in clogs with curlers wrapped in a headscarf.

It took a while for her eyes to adjust to the gloom, to the fug of smoke and fumes and rough coughs from old men hugging the fire. The barman stood and stared.

‘Looking for someone, are you?' he said.

‘Now you come to mention it, yes, I'm looking for my dad. I just wanted to see what the attraction was in here,' she replied as they all stared.

‘Yer not from here, are you?' said one old man.

‘Oh, but I am, number five Chapelside Cuttings…Gilchrist, Paddy Gilchrist's daughter–you know, the one that got killed on the line a good few years back.' She saw their faces change.

‘Oh, aye, Paddy,' said one old man. ‘Scotch navvy on the railway. Sad do was that.' She was the object of interest now.

‘Poor man missed his footing, they said,' said another.

‘I heard that he lay on the line…'

‘Shut up, not in front of the lady. So where's you living now?' said the barman with the moustache and come-hither eyes, beckoning her to the bar. ‘On the house.'

‘Up the dale on a farm, my mother's side–and make it a double whisky,' she added. ‘And no water.'

‘So what brings you to this armpit of the world?' someone joked.

‘Just passing through.'

‘Nothing passes through this pub but piss and wind, pardon my French, or passes out on all fours or I've not done my business. Another?'

‘I know all about that, and thanks,' she said, swallowing it down quickly.

For the price of a pint they all had a tale to tell about roaring Paddy, the Scottish soldier who could spin a yarn. She didn't recognise her dad in any of their tall tales but she let them talk on while she supped.

Someone jangled the ivories and she forgot she was a lady and told some of the filthy jokes she'd heard in the Golden Lion, to their obvious enjoyment.