Old Sins Long Shadows (33 page)

Janey heard his voice first which brought her from her dreams to see him standing before her. The light was fading outside signifying evening was fast approaching. He looked tired from his night on the moor, followed by a full day of work on the farm. However, it was not the tiredness on his face that she saw in that instance of finding him looking down at her, it was the anger that she saw and a look of resentment or even hatred.

‘Edna says you’ve not eaten.’ Janey felt small next to his tall body that emulated strength. Feeling uneasy she repositioned herself in the chair to look up at him.

‘
I’m not hungry.’ It was true; she had no appetite and felt sick at the thought.

‘
I don’t care. You must eat.’

‘
I really don’t feel like any…’  He ignored her and pulled her to her feet.

‘
I don’t care what you feel like. You’ve got to eat.’ Taking her by the shoulders he roughly guided her to a chair at the table and sat her down.

‘
I’m not hungry, Daniel,’ she protested. He ignored her but with a flick of his fingers waved to Edna, who hobbled over and placed a plate before him. She roughly shoved a plate to Janey. They watched in silence as the old woman spooned out a portion of stew for each of them.

Janey t
ried to lighten the atmosphere in the hope he would not discover the full extent that her life was falling apart.

‘
Daniel,’ she smiled, ‘thank you for finding me and taking care of me but I really don’t feel like eating.’  He did not smile back.

‘
You don’t have a choice,’ he said picking up a fork and pinning her with a stare. ‘Now eat.’  Janey, with a controlled determination pushed the plate away. ‘Eat.’ Daniel said again, barely controlling his anger. Edna’s beady eyes darted from one to another.

‘
No!’ said Janey, anger beginning to build up in her at his rude behaviour. To her surprise Daniel casually dropped his fork.

‘
Well if you don’t eat, I won’t either,’ he retorted. The old woman gasped.

‘
You’ve got to eat, boy. You put in a full days work, seven days a week to keep this farm going.  You can’t do that on air and water alone.’  She turned angrily to Janey. Pointing a knurled finger at her she said accusingly, ‘See what you’ve done!  People depend on Daniel.  ’e’s a working man, ’e needs ’is food!’  In her anger she reverted back to her Cornish language, spewing forth a string of words some of which sounded like insults and curses. Daniel sat back with his arms folded; amusement glinted in his eyes as he watched Edna bombard Janey until she could stand it no more.

‘
Alright, I will eat something,’ she finally said, lifting a fork in annoyance and waving it at Daniel. ‘Go on, you eat something too.’

He picked up his fork again.

‘I’ll eat when you do,’ he said. They glared at one another, each holding a fork with two plates of stew steaming before them, an old woman standing like a referee at their side. Daniel took his fork and speared a cube of meat. He lifted it up between them and turned it in the light but instead of placing it in his own mouth he held it to her lips. Edna gave a toothless grin at the spectacle.

‘
Eat!’ he ordered. She kept her mouth closed so he touched her lips with the meat, its gravy marking her lips, inviting her to lick them clean. ‘Eat,’ he said more gently. She hesitated for a second then opened her mouth and took the food. He watched mesmerized as she slid it from the fork and chewed the tender mutton, her tongue darting out to lick the gravy from her lips. It had been a long time since she had eaten a hot meal and it surprised her to find its taste made her aware of the hunger growing in her belly. Since her attack she had had no appetite and the less she ate the less she wanted. Now, tasting the meaty gravy and feeling the tenderness of the braised mutton, it awakened a desire for more. Yet Daniel had not eaten for some time and she wanted him to now join her. A silence filled the room, even Edna had become quiet. Janey lifted her fork, stabbed a piece of meat and held it out to him.

‘
Now you.’ she challenged back. He grabbed her wrist and glared at her, annoyed she had taken to imitating him when he was only trying to help her, however he only saw sincerity in her eyes. He loosened his grip slightly and he brought the fork she held in her hand to his mouth. Opening his lips he took the mutton from the fork, as Janey watched him chew she could do nothing to stop the blushing of her cheeks. The old woman broke into their thoughts.

‘
That’s enough you two!’ she admonished them. ‘It’s unseemly behaviour!  Eat your own food and be done with it or I will give yea both a clout behind the ears. Never in me life ‘ave I seen a man an’ woman behave in such a way,’ she grumbled, ‘No better than childers!’ 

She hobbled back to her seat, p
icked up her mending and sat watching them eat their stew in silence, her beady eyes darting between them as she sewed. So Daniel had met his match, she thought, and not only that but he was soft on her. In all the years she had known him he had never brought a woman into the house. There had been several women but none were good enough for him to bring home to his house or to meet his family.  Yet this morning she had arrived at the farmhouse as usual to find a woman sleeping in his chair, being warmed by his fire and him watching over her, waiting for her to stir. Despite his protests, despite his anger and scowling expression, this fragile young woman was special to him. She wasn’t sure if he knew that or if the girl knew, but Edna did. She saw the spark in their eyes and felt the spark in the air.

The rape, and the months that followed, had left their mark on Janey, not only by the child growing in her womb but the night terrors she had endured which exhausted her. She had existed but not lived. It had become a life of contradictions, living on her nerves yet with her emotions frozen and her deep shame forever present in her mind. Yet for the first time since that awful afternoon, with her belly for once full of food, she slept soundly.

Daniel
’s voice, for once tender, woke her from her dreams and she listened to his voice as he spoke to Edna in the next room. It intrigued her to hear him as their conversation resembled that of an adult son taking care of his stubborn mother. She smiled as she listened, comfortable and warm by the now dying fire.

‘
You need a new coat, old woman,’ he said, the name he gave her was spoken with affection. Edna argued back.

‘
This coat is just fine.  Don’t you go bothering about me, boy.’

‘
But it’s so old. Let me buy you a new one.’  Edna would have none of it,

‘
Pah!  This ‘ere coat will see me out, and you too, no doubt. Stop your fussing, boy and take me home.’

‘
I’m going to buy you a new one anyway.’

‘
Don’t waste your money. I won’t wear it.’  Janey could hear Daniel’s soft laughter as he left the house and suddenly the old woman appeared at the door. She was dressed in a black man’s coat and a scarf wrapped around her head and she looked even more like a witch than she had appeared in Janey’s dreams.

‘
There’s a bed made up for ’e in the room at the top of the stairs.’  She flicked her eyes upwards indicating its location. ‘Best sleep in a bed tonight or you’ll be stiff as my knees in the morning.’

The realisation that she was going to be alone in the house wit
h Daniel suddenly frightened Janey.

‘
You are not coming back?’  Edna turned to leave and for a moment took pity on her.

‘
You’ve nothing to fear from Daniel. He’s already put a lock on your door so you will feel safe.’  Suddenly she was gone and the wheels of the trap could be heard rattling down the lane. For a few moments Janey did not move. Since she was thirteen she had spent her life in service and from that day she had never been on her own in a house. She had often felt lonely but there was always a servant somewhere within the walls. In this homely farmhouse she felt like an outsider and was alone, yet strangely not lonely. Apart from the room she sat in and the time when the old woman had shown her the water closet, Janey had not seen the rest of the house. She had spent so much of the day sleeping that she didn’t even know where to fetch water for a drink. She had never felt so helpless or without a routine of chores to mark her day.

The fire still glowed but the flames were much lower now
. As she watched the fire she realised she didn’t even know whether to feed the fire or let it go out. Daniel’s routine was unknown to her, as was his life here. She stretched out her stiff legs from underneath her and moved her ankles, testing their flexibility and finding them satisfactory she stood up. The room she had spent her time in was typical for a worker’s cottage. At one end stood the granite fireplace with its clone oven for baking built into the side of the chimney, chairs positioned around it, at the other end a large table for cooking and eating. The curtains were dull and in need of a wash to freshen them and their wooden frames were dusty. The windows were set deep in the two foot thick granite walls, providing slated covered sills to sit upon. Despite the fading light Janey could see the garden outside. A neat path lead up to the front door but the garden itself was neglected and in need of flowers and shrubs to bring it to life. Janey could see it transform in her mind, bursting with colour of flowers that she would plant if the garden was hers. She turned away and left the room to explore further. There was no point in her imagining such things, tomorrow she would leave for the workhouse.

To her surprise the second room she entered was a large kitchen making her initial assumption that the farmhouse was like any other traditional worker’s cottage
quite wrong. At the far end was a black Cornish range, new and untouched, it provided a focal point in the room. Janey couldn’t help running her fingers across the front, its coldness evidence that Edna preferred to use the method of trivet and cooking pot than a wood burning range. It seemed such a waste that the beautiful range was not brought to life with heat and the smells of pies and casseroles cooking in its belly while a kettle boiled on its top. In fact, the whole kitchen looked newly built and equipped, waiting for the woman of the house to make use of it and it seemed all the more sad that the old woman did not seem to appreciate its qualities. It had a large pantry but the shelves were bare of preserves that should have been made in the autumn to last the winter. It seemed that Edna came to make a meal and mend but the planning and running of the home fell to Daniel who was too busy working the land.

Janey found the stairs which led to the first and only landing
. The walls of the farmhouse were bare of pictures and lacked the knick knacks that make a house a home. She easily found the room assigned to her as it had her carpet bag placed at the foot of the bed and was the only room with a bolt. However she did not enter it but passed it by to look at the other rooms on the landing while she was alone to do so.

Th
ere was another bedroom similar in size to hers and then, at the far end, was Daniel’s. The door was ajar, she stood at the threshold with no plans to enter it but only observe. His bed was unmade and boots lay untidily on the floor. It lacked any feminine presence, was basic and needed airing. The curtains were half drawn and a shirt had slipped onto the floor from a chair. Without thinking she entered the room and picked it up, folding it and laying it back over the chair it had fallen from. She opened the curtains and looked down, seeing the overgrown garden beneath her and noticing for the first time a vegetable garden to the side. Neatly dug, the garden lay waiting for spring and a selection of seeds to be sown in its rich soil. It did not surprise her to learn that Daniel grew his own vegetables, most people did in the village and he was a farmer after all. She dragged her eyes away and saw the view from the bedroom window for the first time. Beyond the hedge that shielded the house from the moorland weather was the moor itself. It spread out like a wild carpet for miles ahead and as the sun set in the west it cast a red fiery glow across the sky. The silhouette of a flock of birds flew across the dramatic red backdrop and Janey marvelled at the sight. The scene was beautiful and breathtaking all at the same time and Janey felt she could happily sit on the sill for the remainder of the day and watch until the sun disappeared below the horizon. She abruptly stood up from the sill she had unconsciously sat down on. She could not linger in this room, she thought, Daniel would soon be home.

She smelt the familiar smell that she had come to associate with him and turned to see his wash stand and the familiar sandalwood soap in the dish that she had seen in the apothecary shop in the village
. She was about to reach for it when a white figure caught her eye as it passed the doorway. It made her jump with surprise and set her heart racing as she listened to light footsteps running along the corridor and down the stairs. Gathering her courage Janey followed to see who had been watching her but despite her best efforts the ghostly figure had disappeared and the house was empty. Her heart still beating loudly in her chest, she returned to her room and was relieved when she finally heard Daniel’s trap rattling up the lane and his heavy booted foot steps on the slate floor below. She sat and waited, listening to his foot tread enter each room until he finally climbed the stairs.