Mud and Gold (34 page)

‘Shut up!’ Charlie turned on her and swung
the stick, catching her just below the shoulder. Amy cried out in
pain and shock, clutching at her arm, and Malcolm took advantage of
Charlie’s distraction to make a rush for her. He cowered behind his
mother, trying to burrow under her skirts, but Charlie’s long arms
defeated him. He reached behind Amy and hauled Malcolm out, looking
angrier than ever. ‘I’ll not have my son hiding behind a woman’s
skirts! Don’t you try that again, boy.’

‘He’s only a baby, Charlie,’ Amy sobbed
helplessly. ‘You’ll half kill him. Please, Charlie, please.’

Charlie ignored her. He flicked Malcolm’s
nightshirt up and held the little boy by one arm while he swung the
stick. Amy hid her face in her hands as Malcolm’s screams pierced
the air and she began to count the strokes.

When the whack of the stick against bare
flesh stopped, she had only reached six. Charlie must have taken
some notice of her pleadings after all.
Thank goodness
.
Poor little Mal, at least Charlie didn’t give him
twelve
.

‘I’m taking this stick back with me. It’ll
be in the house from now on. You’ll get more of the same if you
ever do anything like that again. You remember that, boy,’ Charlie
said over Malcolm’s yells. ‘Get to bed.’

The moment he was released Malcolm ran
wailing back towards the house. Amy made to follow him. ‘Leave him
be,’ Charlie said sharply. ‘He can find his own way back.’

‘He didn’t mean to do wrong, Charlie. He’s
just a baby.’

‘He’s
not
a baby, and I’ll not have
you treating him like one. He’s got to learn. Spare the rod and
spoil the child. And who’s been spoiling him?’

‘I have. I’m sorry, Charlie.’

‘So you should be. Stop snivelling,
woman.’

Amy walked slowly, hoping Charlie would get
ahead of her and let her cry over Malcolm’s punishment in peace,
but he stopped and looked back, flicking the top off a thistle with
his stick while he waited for her to catch up. She blinked away her
tears and walked back to the house with him, wondering why there
seemed such a brooding threat in his silence.

‘Shall I dish your dinner up now?’ she asked
as she walked through the back door behind Charlie.

‘Not yet. I’ve something to settle with you
first. Get into the bedroom.’

A shiver went through Amy at his grim
expression. Surely he didn’t want to do
that
before he had
even had his dinner? It wasn’t even properly dark yet. But there
was nothing to be done but obey him. She gave silent thanks that
little David was such a sound sleeper; his father’s grunts were
unlikely to wake him. She trailed after Charlie into the bedroom.
He closed the door behind her, still clutching the length of
supple-jack in one hand, then turned to face her.

‘You defied me, woman. You argued with me in
front of the boy. I’ll not put up with that from you.’

‘I’m sorry, Charlie. I didn’t mean to argue.
I was just worried about Mal—he’s so little to get the stick. I was
wrong to contradict you, I know that. I won’t do it again.’

‘I’ll see that you don’t. Are you with
child?’

The unexpected question startled her.
‘Wh-what? No, I don’t think so. Davie’s so little, and I’m still…’
She trailed off, anxious not to remind Charlie that she was still
breastfeeding David even though he was now twelve months old, the
age at which Malcolm had been declared too old for such babying.
‘No, I’m sure I’m not.’

‘That’s as well.’ He pointed to the chair
that stood close to the bed. ‘Bend down over that and lift your
skirts.’

Amy stared at him blankly, then realisation
dawned. ‘You’re not going to… please don’t, Charlie. Please don’t
hit me with that thing. I’m sorry I argued, I won’t do it
again.’

He gave her a shove that sent her to her
knees, and Amy grasped at the chair to steady herself. ‘I have to
teach you a lesson. You’ve got to learn how to behave. Hurry up,
woman, or it’ll be the worse for you.’

As if I was a child
.
As if I was a
naughty little child
. Amy leaned against the chair and fumbled
at her skirts, bundling the layers of cloth up over her shoulders.
The draught in the room felt chill on her legs and on her buttocks
where her drawers gaped open.

‘I said bend over,’ Charlie growled.

‘I don’t bend in the middle very well,’ Amy
said through a muffling of cloth. ‘It’s my stays. This is as far as
I can bend.’
I’m not a child. I’m a woman, and I wear women’s
clothes
.

‘That’ll have to do, then. Keep still.’

Amy looked at her hands lying on the seat of
the chair and saw they were shaking. She knotted them tightly to
try and steady them, closed her eyes and waited for the pain.

The stick bit into her flesh, and Amy barely
stifled a scream. She was determined not to frighten David by
making a noise, but the pain was hard to bear in silence. She
stuffed a fold of cloth into her mouth to muffle the cries she
could not hold back.

Each stroke left a burning sensation worse
than the one before. Amy could count the stripes without needing to
see them.
One. Two. Three
. The fourth missed its mark and
fell on her thighs, hurting even more against the thinner flesh
there.
Will I get more than Mal because I’m grown up? Or less
because I’m a woman? Five. Ohh, it hurts. Six.
The seventh
stroke gave her the answer.
More
.

Charlie had either lost count or decided
that even a dozen strokes were not a severe enough punishment. When
Amy realised after the thirteenth blow that he had stopped at last
she spat out the gag she had made for herself, now soaked with
saliva, and staggered on her knees over to the bed. She crawled
onto it and sprawled face down, shuddering with the pain that
racked her and heedless of the fact that her skirts were still high
above her waist.

‘I had to do that, you know. You’ve got to
learn. Straighten yourself up and get out to the kitchen,’ Charlie
ordered. ‘I’ll have my dinner now.’ Amy heard the door close.

It took several minutes before she was able
to get up and put her clothes in order. Her flesh still burned when
she walked into the kitchen and dished up Charlie’s meal in
silence.

‘Where’s yours?’ he asked through a mouthful
of stew.

‘I’m not hungry.’ The pain was too strong
for hunger, and in any case she did not want to eat standing up and
remind them both of her punishment.

‘Don’t you go sulking, woman. You deserved
that.’

‘I know I did. I’m not sulking, I’m just not
hungry. Can I go and settle Mal, please? He’s not used to putting
himself to bed.’

‘He’ll be all right. He’s not a baby.’

‘No, he’s not a baby,’ Amy agreed wearily.
‘But he’s still a very little boy. Please, Charlie. I just want to
see if he’s tucked in properly—you know how cold it gets at night,
and he’s been getting a chesty cough lately. I won’t baby him.’

‘Be quick about it, then,’ Charlie said.
‘Just cover him up and get back out here.’

Amy slipped quietly into the half-darkness
of Malcolm’s room, where muffled sobbing from the bed told her he
was still awake. She lit the lamp to see better. Malcolm cowered
under the covers and peeped his tear-streaked face out, obviously
expecting to see his father returning for fresh vengeance.

‘It’s only me, Mal, don’t be scared,’ Amy
said, pulling back the covers. ‘You’ve got between the top sheet
and the blankets, silly. Hop out and let me get it tidied up.’

Malcolm twined his arms around her neck and
let her lift him from the bed. He stood beside her, shivering in
the chilly room while she smoothed out the sheets, then he climbed
back onto the mattress and lay face-down.

‘No!’ he complained when Amy tried to lift
his nightshirt. ‘Don’t, Mama.’

‘Let Mama look,’ Amy said gently. ‘I won’t
touch, I promise I won’t.’ She drew in her breath at the lurid red
marks on Malcolm’s thin little buttocks, though she knew her own
must look far worse. ‘You’re going to have some good bruises,
Mal.’

‘I didn’t mean to let them out.’

‘Of course you didn’t. Shh, now, go to
sleep. Papa won’t be wild with you any more as long as you’re
good.’ She patted the covers down over him and tucked them in,
careful not to brush against Malcolm’s tender flesh.

‘It hurts, Mama.’

‘I know it does. Try to keep still, then
you’ll go off to sleep faster. It won’t be as sore in the morning.
Don’t, Mal,’ she said, pushing him down flat when he tried to roll
over. ‘Lie on your tummy, it won’t hurt as much like that.’

I wish I could
, she thought as she
kissed Malcolm and straightened her aching body.
I had to bend
over and get beaten like a child, but I’ll have to lie on my back
like a woman tonight
. She shuddered at the thought, and pushed
down the bitterness she felt rising.
I suppose I must deserve
it
.

September – October 1888

Frank slapped the cheque down on the bank
manager’s desk, relief and resentment warring over which was his
dominant emotion.

‘That’s my September milk cheque,’ he
announced. ‘I talked the factory into giving it to me a couple of
days early. And
that
makes fifty pounds I’ve paid you, and
it’s not the end of the month till the day after tomorrow.’

‘Well done, Frank.’ Mr Callaghan beamed at
him. ‘I knew you’d come through.’

‘I wasn’t so sure about it myself for a
while there. It’s not easy, you know, finding fifty pounds just
like that. Not for someone like me, anyway.’

‘I’d be a bit hard pressed to find fifty
pounds myself. I know what you mean—especially with a wife, eh?
Those women can spend money as if there’s no tomorrow.’

‘Not my Lizzie,’ Frank said gruffly. ‘She’s
as careful as anything. I don’t know what she’s been feeding us on
this last couple of months, she’s hardly run up any money at the
store. I didn’t let on to her about this,’ he waved vaguely around
the bank, ‘but I’ve sort of wondered once or twice if she knew
something was up. I’ve been a bit short with her a few times—with
Maudie too, poor little mite.’

‘Well, it’s all sorted out now. But we don’t
want things getting in that state again, do we? We’d better make
sure you make regular payments on that loan from now on, eh?’

‘How much?’ Frank asked anxiously.

‘Say five pounds a quarter? Do you think you
could manage that?’

‘I suppose so. I managed to scrape up fifty
pounds in the last couple of months—I wouldn’t want to go through
that
again, though. Yes, five pounds a quarter should be all
right.’

‘Good lad.’ Mr Callaghan examined the milk
cheque then quickly jotted down some figures on a scrap of paper.
‘Actually, this brings what you’ve paid up to fifty pounds, seven
shillings and sixpence. Would you like the seven and sixpence in
cash?’

‘All right,’ Frank said. Relief won out as
he realised that the nightmare of the last two months really was
over. He grinned at the bank manager. ‘I might buy Lizzie a
present, sort of make it up to her a bit for being such a rotten
sod lately. Maybe something for Maudie, too.’

He left the bank feeling a great weight
lifted from his shoulders. Now that the money was paid, everything
was going to be all right. He would be able to tell Lizzie what had
been going on, too; keeping it all secret from her had been one of
the worst things about the whole wretched business.

A present for Maudie was easy enough: a bag
of sweets would have her crowing with delight. Now he came to think
of it, Lizzie hadn’t let Maudie have any sweets for weeks and
weeks. Well, she was going to have a whole twopence worth today.
Some of those sticky toffees, too. She could make all the mess she
wanted.

The sweets safely stowed in his pocket, he
marched into Mrs Nichol’s shop.

‘I want a present for my wife,’ he
announced. ‘Something pretty.’

Mrs Nichol beamed across the counter at him.
‘I’m sure we can find something nice. What did you have in mind? A
bonnet? Gloves? Perhaps a scarf?’

Frank looked around the unfamiliar items
that filled the shop in growing bewilderment. ‘I don’t know—what do
you think she’d like?’

‘Hmm, let’s see,’ Mrs Nichol muttered,
rummaging under the counter. ‘I’ve got a nice lot of winter gloves
in here somewhere.’

‘Hey, this is pretty,’ Frank said, fingering
a fan that lay open on one end of the counter.

‘Isn’t it lovely?’ said Mrs Nichol. ‘I just
got those last week, they’re the latest thing from Auckland. I’ll
open up the others to show you.’ She spread out five more fans.
Frank glanced at them all, then returned to the one that had first
caught his attention. ‘You’ve got your eye on that one, haven’t
you, Mr Kelly? Dusky pink satin, that is, with ivory point lace.
See the rose pattern on it? It’s a beautiful fan, that.’

‘It’s not a very sensible thing, is it?’

‘Well, I suppose not. It’s very pretty,
though. Just the thing for weddings and suchlike.’

‘But it’s not
sensible
.’

‘No, it isn’t,’ Mrs Nichol agreed
reluctantly. ‘I can show you some good, warm scarves, they’re
sensible enough.’

‘How much is this?’ Frank asked, pointing to
the fan.

‘Three and sixpence.’

‘I’ll take it. Lizzie can have a rest from
being sensible.’

Frank nudged Belle into a faster trot as he
drew close to the house, eager to see Lizzie and tell her all about
what had been happening. He could hardly wait to see how she would
like the fan, carefully wrapped in tissue paper and stowed in his
jacket pocket.

He had barely dismounted when he heard a
high-pitched cry. He turned to see Maudie running towards him from
the house as fast as her little legs would carry her, her face
contorted with fright.