Mud and Gold (37 page)

‘Frank, you mustn’t think that! She’s
asleep, that’s all.’

‘No,’ Frank said wistfully. ‘Lizzie’s not
like that when she’s asleep. She wriggles and makes little snuffly
noises, and she pushes against you till she’s lying in the middle
of the bed.’

‘I know,’ Amy said. ‘She used to push me
right out of bed sometimes when we were little.’

‘Did she?’ For the first time the ghost of a
smile passed over Frank’s face. ‘She hasn’t done that to me yet.
It’s a good thing I’m a bit bigger than her, eh?’ The ravaged look
came over his face once more as he stared at Lizzie. ‘I wish she’d
get better,’ he murmured. ‘She looks so awful. See how thin she’s
got? And Edie cut her hair off. All that pretty yellow hair. She
said it would drain Lizzie’s strength if she didn’t cut it
off.’

Amy stood beside him and looked down at
Lizzie’s pale face. Its usual soft covering of flesh had been honed
away so that Lizzie’s cheekbones, which had always been invisible,
were now prominent. ‘She’ll put on some weight when she’s well
again,’ she said, trying to sound far more confident than she felt.
‘It’s because it’s so hard to get any food into her. I’ll try and
give her some soup when I’ve finished washing her. Where can I put
Joey while I’m looking after Lizzie? He’s sound asleep, the good
little chap.’

Frank dragged his attention back to her.
‘The cradle’s just… where’s it gone?’

‘I’ve got it at home, Frank. Joey’s staying
with me, remember?’

‘Oh, yes, I forgot for a minute. It’s been
really quiet without him and Maudie around the place. I’ll put him
on my bed. I’m back in my old room now. It’s like before I had
Lizzie.’ He reached out for Joey, and Amy laid the sleeping child
in his arms.

As soon as Frank had gone out, she closed
the door behind him and got on with the task of washing Lizzie.
David, unaware of the tribulation around him, crawled about on the
floor of the unfamiliar room. Edie had wrapped lengths of cloth
around Lizzie’s middle like a loose napkin. Amy undid them, washed
the soiled flesh underneath, then replaced the cloths with clean
ones. She sponged Lizzie all over and dried her carefully with a
towel, and smoothed the short hair that framed her face. Through it
all Lizzie lay limp and unknowing, her shallow breathing only
slightly disturbed by Amy’s interference with her body.

When she had finished, Amy gathered David up
from the floor and went out to the kitchen. Frank was sitting at
the table with his gaze turned inwards. He did not look up at Amy’s
approach.

‘I’ll dish you up some of this lunch, shall
I?’ Amy said, lifting the lid off a pot of boiled potatoes.

‘What? Oh, no thanks. I’ve had lunch.’

‘No, you haven’t, Frank,’ Amy said gently.
‘I can see you haven’t eaten any of this.’ She loaded a plate with
chops and vegetables and put it in front of him. ‘Come on, now, eat
up.’

‘You sound like Lizzie,’ Frank said, taking
up his knife and fork.

‘You need to keep your strength up, you
know. Lizzie wouldn’t want you missing your meals.’ Amy put a
little soup into a bowl and took it to the bedroom, where she
managed to slip a few spoonfuls into Lizzie. It took her some time,
pausing between each mouthful to make sure Lizzie did not choke,
but when she went back out to the kitchen, leaving the bowl of soup
by the bed, Frank’s plate was still almost full.

‘Frank, you’ve hardly touched that
food.’

‘I’ve had a bit.’

Amy sighed and sat down beside him. ‘I’m
going to sit and watch you till you’ve eaten that,’ she said,
remembering her aunt’s words. Under her watchful gaze Frank began
eating more diligently, and it did not take him long to finish the
meal.

‘That’s better, isn’t it? I’ll wash these
few dishes, then I’ll give the floor a wash.’

‘I’ll go out and do some work in a minute,’
Frank said, but he made no move to rise. ‘I can’t understand how
she got sick so fast,’ he said, his brow furrowed. ‘The doctor said
she would have been having pains before she got really crook, but
she can’t have. She got those little cramps for a bit, but she
stopped saying anything about it, so they must have come right. How
did it happen so fast? Doctor Wallace was so sure it must have been
hurting her for ages. Maybe he’s wrong about what she’s got. Maybe
she’s got something worse.’ He looked dangerously close to tears
again.

‘No, Frank, I’m sure that’s not it,’ Amy
said. ‘The doctor’s right, she’s got something infected inside
her.’

‘Then why didn’t it hurt her before that
day?’

Amy thought for a moment before speaking.
Lizzie had said she wasn’t to tell Frank about those stomach aches,
but Lizzie’s illness was no secret now. Frank was so worried, it
seemed the kindest thing to tell him the whole truth.

‘Lizzie knew she was sick weeks and weeks
ago. She didn’t know how bad it was, though. She kept getting awful
stomach aches, but she thought it’d get better by itself.’

Frank turned to her in shock. ‘She knew?’ he
echoed. ‘But… but why didn’t she tell me? Why did she keep quiet
about it? I would have taken her to the doctor.’

‘She didn’t want to upset you. She knew you
were worried about… about things.’ She had said too much, she
realised when Frank gave a start.

‘What do you mean, worried about “things”?’
he demanded. ‘What things?’

‘I…’ It was no use pretending, and against
Amy’s nature to try. ‘Lizzie knew about the money. She found the
letter from the bank. She didn’t want to ask for any money while
you were so worried, so she just kept quiet about those stomach
aches and hoped they’d go away.’

Frank was staring at her, open-mouthed with
shock. ‘You mean she was in pain for ages, but she kept quiet
because of me? Because I’m such a useless bastard that I can’t even
provide for my wife? Lizzie!’ he cried. He slammed his fists onto
the table so hard that his plate fell to the floor, breaking in two
where it landed.

‘Frank, stop it,’ Amy said in alarm. ‘I’m
sorry, I shouldn’t have told you.’

‘When I asked for her Arthur wanted to know
if I could provide for her,’ Frank railed against himself. ‘Oh,
yes, I was so sure I could! Provide for her? I bet she’s been half
starving herself to save money. I didn’t even have the brains to
see she was sick. Arthur never should have let me have her. He
should have kept her at home where she was safe. Now she’s going to
die, and it’s my fault! It’s all because I’ve been such a lazy,
good-for-nothing bastard!’

‘She’s not! You mustn’t say such things.
Lizzie’s going to get better, you’ll see. Frank, you mustn’t blame
yourself like that. You’ve made Lizzie so happy. She’s wanted to
marry you since she was fourteen, it’s all she’s ever really
wanted. She’s not going to die, Frank!’ Amy took hold of his hands
in hers and held them tightly. ‘We won’t let her. We’re going to
look after her, and she’s going to get better.’ She held Frank’s
hands until she felt him relax a little.

‘Let’s start now,’ she said. ‘I hardly got
any soup into her before, she might take it better from you. Come
on.’ She led Frank by the hand up to the bedroom and sat him beside
the bed. Frank propped Lizzie’s pillow a little higher, and Amy
showed him how to spoon the soup carefully into Lizzie’s mouth.
‘There, you see?’ she said triumphantly. ‘She
is
taking it
better from you. You can tell Aunt Edie you want to feed her from
now on.’

‘Yes, I will,’ Frank said quietly. He
stroked Lizzie’s face. ‘I’m going to look after her. I’m going to
look after Lizzie properly from now on.’

She left him in the bedroom and finished
doing the cleaning, then gathered up a still-sleeping Joey and
slipped him back into the sling, picked up David, and left the
house without disturbing Frank to say goodbye.

Frank loves Lizzie so much
, she
thought as she began the long, weary trudge.
She mustn’t die! It
would be such a waste. It would just about kill Frank if he lost
her. I never knew anyone could love another person as much as he
does
. Amy could not help but wonder how Charlie would react if
it was her lying ill instead of Lizzie. He would be worried about
how he would manage the house and the children, and about his loss
of home comforts, but she could not imagine he would feel any
grief. The tears that began to trickle down her face were only
partly for Lizzie and Frank.

David grew sleepy, and both babies dragged
more heavily against her arms as she walked. Amy grew clumsy with
tiredness, her feet stumbling against rocks on the road. Her right
foot twisted on a large stone, almost making her lose her balance.
She forced herself to pick out her way with more care. The day was
bright although cold, and the glare soon made her head ache. Joey
began to squirm, making her more uncomfortable than ever. She saw
his mouth working, and knew he would soon demand to be fed.

Amy was too absorbed in the necessity of
putting one foot in front of the other even to think about what
might be in store for her until she turned off the main valley road
and up the track towards Charlie’s house. Then the memory of what
she had done rushed in on her: she had left the property without
permission. He had told her within two days of their marriage that
she was never to do such a thing, and now she had broken the
rule.

For a few moments she let herself hope that
perhaps Charlie might not yet be home; sometimes his visits to town
lasted till late in the day. But that idea was dashed when she came
near the horse paddock and saw Smokey grazing. So Charlie was home.
Home and aware of her absence.

He was standing in the doorway as Amy walked
up to the porch. She stood at the foot of the steps and waited for
him to speak.

‘So, you’re back,’ he said grimly. ‘You went
out by yourself. You went out without asking me.’

Weariness dragged at Amy. ‘Yes, I did. Can I
come inside and settle the babies, please?’

Charlie took a step back from the door to
let her pass, then followed her through the kitchen and into their
bedroom. His stick rested against one wall; Amy shuddered as she
saw it. Joey was now whimpering with hunger; Amy was about to feed
him when she remembered the rule about feeding David first. There
was no sense getting in even more trouble, even though she could
see that David was not at all hungry.

She untied the sling and laid Joey on the
bed, then undid her bodice and tried to coax David to take a nipple
into his mouth. ‘I had to go,’ she said, too weary to feel more
than a vague fear of what was to come. ‘Someone had to look after
Lizzie, and Aunt Edie was just about ready to drop. I couldn’t ask
you because you weren’t here.’ David took a few desultory sucks,
then let the nipple fall out of his mouth as his eyelids
drooped.

‘I had to, you see,’ Amy went on. If she
didn’t look at him she would not become too frightened to speak.
She undressed David and put him in his cradle, careful to lay him
on his side facing away from them so that he would not see her
punishment if he woke too soon, then she took up an increasingly
irate Joey and put him to the breast. ‘Lizzie needed me. We’re
family, and we have to help one another. Lizzie would do the same
for me if I was sick. So would Aunt Edie, and Jane. Even
Susannah—Pa might have to make her, but she’d help me. That’s what
being a family means. It’s so that—’

‘All right, that’s enough,’ Charlie
interrupted. ‘Don’t you lecture me, woman. You disobeyed me—you
willfully defied me. You know what that means, don’t you? You know
what’s going to happen?’

‘Yes, I know. But I can’t help it. I had to
do it.’ Amy sat in silence while Joey suckled, shifting him to her
other breast after a few minutes. ‘I’m sorry it meant disobeying
you. I’m very sorry.’ She raised her eyes to his for a moment, then
dropped them as she disengaged Joey from her breast and fastened
her bodice. Her eyes flicked to the stick then away before she put
a clean napkin on Joey and tucked him into his cradle.

Amy stood up from the cradle and looked
straight at Charlie.
Better get it over with
. She dropped to
her knees in front of the chair, lifted her skirts to her
shoulders, and waited for the first blow to fall.

She waited and waited, wondering why Charlie
did not move. At last she twisted around to look at him, and saw
his hand reach out towards the stick then drop to his side again.
His brow was furrowed in thought.

‘There’s something in that,’ he said at
last. ‘I suppose you thought you were doing the right thing, going
down there. You can’t have got up to much mischief with two bairns
to lug about, either. We’ll say no more about it this time.’

Amy raised herself slowly upright and sank
onto the bed, shaking in reaction to the unexpected relief.

‘That doesn’t mean you can wander off by
yourself whenever the fancy takes you, mind. I’ll let you off
today, but you’re to ask if you want to go again. Understand?’

‘Yes, I understand. Thank you, Charlie.’

*

Frank sat at Lizzie’s bedside holding her
hand, but there were no tears on his face now. He looked grim and
determined as he stroked her cheek.

‘
I’ve let you down,’ he
whispered. ‘But I’m going to make it up to you. I’m never going to
let anything hurt you again. When you’re well again you’re going to
have whatever you want. I’m going to make things right for you.’ He
raised her hand to his mouth and kissed it. ‘I love you,
Lizzie.’

October 1888 – August 1889

On a mild spring day late in October, Lizzie
opened her eyes and looked at Frank with recognition as he sat by
her bedside.

When his rush of elation had settled into a
calmer happiness, Frank spent the afternoon mending the stretch of
fence whose collapse had, in his eyes, marked the beginning of
their troubles, and to which he had done no more than rig a
temporary repair up till now. There would be no more falling down
fences on his farm, he pledged to himself.