The Road to Rowanbrae (4 page)

‘I'm thinkin' your man's some like your father. Your face is pickit, though you're nae showin', so I might be wrang, but are you to be ha'ein' another bairn yoursel'?'

‘Aye.' Mysie had been sick the past two mornings, but was surprised that her mother could tell so soon. ‘Jeems's nae like Father, though, for he says he just wants twa loons.'

‘That's maybe a' he's wantin', lass, but he'll likely mak' a lot mair if he's onything like Eddie.'

‘But I'm nae goin' to let him touch me after I've gi'en him the twa loons, so …'

‘He'll maybe nae tak' no for an answer.' Jean shook her head sympathetically then changed the subject. ‘Mistress Gunn o' Tinterty has asked me to tak' on the cook's job, an' I'm to get the hoose her son had afore him an' his wife went to Canada. It's a lot bigger than this – three rooms forbyes the kitchen, an' a inside w.c. It's one good thing your father's daen for me, ony road, for Mistress Gunn said she was sorry for me wi' him meetin' his end like he did. If only she ken't. It's a blessed release I feel, after the purgatory he put me through. It's a awfu' thing to say, but I canna help it.'

Mysie had known that her mother had no high opinion of her father, but she was taken aback by Jean's forthright remarks. Fancy having to live with a man for … it must be seventeen or eighteen years, when she felt like that about him. But had it always been like that? ‘Did you never … love him?' she asked, timidly.

Jean didn't answer for some time, having to delve deeply into her memory, then she gave a shuddering sigh. ‘Eddie was the maist handsomest man I'd ever met. He was tall and straight an' his eyes looked into mine like they was turnin' me inside oot. When we was coortin', he tell't me I was the bonniest lassie he'd ever saw, an' there wasna a happier lassie than me the day he wed me …' Her voice broke. ‘Oh, God, Mysie, I wonder what went wrang atween us? What was it made him tak' to the drink? Was it my blame?'

While her mother wept for a love which had foundered and sunk without trace, Mysie stood helplessly. Her father's back had been bowed for as long as she could remember, his face blotchy, his eyes bleary, his hair lank, but a vague picture was surfacing in her mind of a tall, laughing man, with bright eyes and thick fair hair, tossing her up in the air when she was a very small girl. She had forgotten about it until now, but how could a man change like that?

She would never be disillusioned about Jeems, that was one thing, for his looks couldn't get much worse. She hadn't liked him the first time she saw him and she didn't like him any better now, but he provided for her and wanted no more than two sons, so her life would surely never be as bad as her mother's. Instead of resenting her husband, she supposed she should be grateful for what he was. A little niggling voice inside her, however, told her that she had a right to be resentful. What of the dreams she had had, when she was younger, of a man who would sweep her off her feet, who would kiss her and make her love him as he would love her? And all she'd got was Jeems.

She looked round when her husband returned, and couldn't help hating his pudding face and big nose, and the way his thick dark eyebrows straddled across his forehead as if trying to reach each other. She hadn't even the doubtful consolation that he loved her, for, as he'd told her himself, he had just picked her to be the mother of his bairns.

The funeral was not well attended – some of Eddie's drinking cronies and a sprinkling of farm servants and their wives, there because convention demanded it – and the Duncans left soon afterwards. Mysie hugged her mother before she climbed up on the cart, but made no promise to return. How could she, when she would have two bairns in a few months?

On the way home, Jeems said, ‘You're awfu' quiet, Mysie, but I suppose you'll be mournin' for your father noo?'

‘I'll never mourn for him. It's my mother I'm mournin' for. She loved him once, for he was a real handsome man when he was young, an' it's terrible to think he let himsel' sink so low. What could ha'e drove him to the drink?'

‘There's some men dinna need to be drove to the drink,' Jeems observed, quietly, ‘it just comes natural, like.'

‘Maybe. Em … Jeems … I'm goin' to ha'e another bairn.'

His head whipped round. ‘Oh, quine, you should ha'e tell't me, an' I'd never ha'e let you come a' this distance. I hope you havena daen him ony harm.'

Angry that he thought more of the coming child than he did of her, Mysie said, huffily, ‘It's me that might come to harm, wi' the soakin' I got.'

In the night, a prickling sensation started at the back of her nose, then she felt beads of perspiration running down between her shoulder blades. She had caught a cold, but it was no good telling Jeems, for he wouldn't care. Trying to cool herself, she let her feet rest against his, rough but icy, and it did help – she wasn't quite so bad in the morning. It was Jamie who was breathing heavily, his brow hot and clammy when she felt it. ‘Oh,' she wailed, ‘the bairn's got a fever.'

‘You'll need to keep him in the hoose the day,' Jeems ordered, ‘an' gi'e him some thin gruel to help his hirstly chest.'

When she picked up her son, his little body was so hot that she wished she had someone to advise her what to do for him. Jess wouldn't know, never having had any bairns, but Pattie White – their nearest neighbour on the other side from Downies – had Nessie and Drew, and although they were both in their teens now, she must have had to deal with something like this when they were younger, and she was a real motherly woman. A longing for her own mother filled Mysie's heart, for Jean had tended one sick child after another. What had she done for feverish colds like this?

Relief flooded through her when she remembered. Laying her infant in his cradle, she took an old flannel linder of her husband's out of a drawer and tore it into strips. Then she filled her yellow baking bowl with cold water and got a towel out of the press. Stripping the baby, she took him on her knee and laved the cold water over him, as she'd watched her mother do, and his grizzling stopped abruptly with the shock. After drying him thoroughly, she wound a strip of the flannel round his body and secured it with a safety pin. She could still hear the phlegm in his chest, though he felt cooler, but she dressed him and laid him down to make some gruel. He wouldn't feed from the spoon when she tried, so she bared her breast and drew her nipple across the tiny mouth, which fastened on like a leech, drawing steadily and strongly. By the time Jeems came in at dinnertime, Jamie was sound asleep in the wooden cradle, breathing more peacefully. The drastic cure had worked, though his nose ran for a few days. So did her own, but her pregnancy continued without a hiccough.

In January 1907, only ten months after her first son's birth, Mysie produced a second, and Jeems was so pleased that he let her call the baby Alexander, after her mother's brother who had been lost in the Boer War. In contrast to the placid Jamie, Sandy disrupted the house from his very first day by crying constantly, except when he was sleeping or being fed.

‘I'm that tired I can hardly keep my een open,' Mysie told Jess when he was about two weeks old. ‘An' Jeems is that ill-tempered at nae getting slept, I feel like tellin' him I get nae mair sleep than him an' I've twa bairns to contend wi' day an' nicht, as weel as the other things I've to dae.'

Jess smiled sympathetically. ‘If you like, I'll tak' Jamie wi' me to the shop to gi'e you some peace.'

‘You can tak' him, but he's nae bother except for his chest whiles. He plays awa' on the rug wi' pot lids an' spoons and never a cheep oot o' him, but hardly a minute's peace dae I get fae Sandy, though to look at him sleepin' the noo, you'd think he was a angel.' A loud wail issuing from the cradle, she added, in some disgust, ‘Ach! I spoke ower quick.'

Jess chuckled. ‘You'll nae ha'e your sorrows to seek wi' that ane, I'm thinkin'. Weel, come on then, Jamie, I'll put my shawl roon' aboot us, an' we'll awa' to see Dougal an' Rosie.'

The new baby's face was scarlet from screaming by the time Mysie picked him up, his arms flailing about, his legs kicking wildly. Jess was right, she thought, ruefully – Sandy Duncan had a mind of his own, and he would be a problem when he was older, there was no doubt about that.

Chapter Three

1910

‘Is there a clean sark in the hoose?'

‘If you'd look instead o' just openin' your mooth an' lettin' your belly rummel,' Mysie began, then stopped, for Jeems lost his temper at the least little thing nowadays. ‘You'll find ane in the top drawer o' the kist,' she finished, although she still felt impatient with him. Listening to him opening the drawer, she stirred the porridge fiercely, the spurtle cleaving through the grey mass like a plough through clogged earth. How had the man got on before she came here? He was a great useless lump, worse than a bairn. Young Jamie had far more sense at four years old, even wee Sandy at three.

She turned round to see her husband struggling with his huge hands to fasten his top button. ‘Come an' dae it for me,' he ordered, ‘instead o' screwin' up your face like that.'

As she closed the neck of his shirt, he growled, ‘I'm scythin' the corn the day, an' you'll ha'e to bind the sheaves. An' muck oot the byre sometime, for it's sair needin' it.'

‘Aye.' Mysie said nothing as she returned to the range. Her husband had changed since she had given him the two sons he wanted. Sandy had hardly been three months old when Jeems made her start working in the fields, yelling at her when she tried to protest one day, ‘Nane o' your backchat, wumman. You didna dae very muckle afore, just the hens an' the milkin' – I've had a bloody poor thirty pound' worth oot o' you.'

‘I didna ask you to buy me,' she had retorted, and he hit the side of her head with such force that she reeled back against the wall. Now she knew to keep quiet.

Until Sandy learned to walk, she'd had to strap him to her back as she hoed, pulled turnips, gathered potatoes, and all the other things Jeems found for her to do. She hadn't that burden to carry round now, thank goodness, but her hands were calloused and her legs often buckled before she had done what was expected of her, so she had come off worse than he had in the stupid bargain. He even left her working outside on her own some evenings, telling her that he had to see Andra White about something, or Rab Duff, but she suspected that it was another woman he went to see, one of the maids at Fingask or Waterton, most likely. Not that she cared, for it meant that he didn't bother her so much. She had refused him as often as she dared, but, as her mother had once warned her, there were times – especially the times he came home drunk from Aberdeen – when he would not take no for an answer.

At that moment, the two boys burst in from the other room, Mysie and Jeems having had to sleep in his parents' box bed in the kitchen since Jamie was out of the cradle. ‘We're awa' to the wee hoosie,' Jamie announced, as he went out through the back porch on his skinny legs followed by the chubby toddler.

‘The wee hoosie' was how Mysie delicately referred to the structure in the backyard, where a wooden plank with a large circle cut out of it rested over the pail which Jeems emptied every night into the midden. The hole was meant for an adult backside, and she was always afraid that one of her sons would slip through, but it hadn't happened … yet.

Putting two large ladlefuls of porridge into the deep bowl, Mysie set it in front of her husband, who helped himself to a home-baked oatcake and some of the still-warm milk in the jug.

Sandy was back first, saying, as he clambered up on a chair, ‘The futtret's got oot.'

‘Losh be here!' Mysie was alarmed. A loose ferret could put her hens off laying again, and they had not long started after Sandy chasing them a week ago. ‘You must ha'e left the cage open, my mannie, an' me aye tellin' you to mak' sure you put the sneck doon.'

‘It wasna me.' The boy's eyes were round and innocent, but his mother wasn't fooled, and it was lucky for him that Jamie came in. ‘I catched him, Sandy. He was coorin' doon ahin' the cage, near frozen stiff.' He produced the poor creature from under his nightshirt. ‘We'll ha'e to put him in front o' the fire till he comes to himsel'.'

‘You're nae putting nae futtret in front o' my fire,' Mysie exclaimed. ‘You ken what futtrets are like, he'd ha'e the feet eaten aff me when I was makin' the dinner.'

Jeems let out a snort. ‘Losh, wumman, what ideas you get. The beastie'll nae bite you unless it's feared. But put it back in the cage, Jamie. It's used wi' the cauld.'

‘It wasna my blame it got oot, Mam,' Sandy insisted.

‘Haud your wheesht an' sup your porridge.' She wanted peace to remember what she had to buy from the packman, for he only came one Wednesday in every three months. She had run out of little buttons for their shirts, her white thread was nearly done and she'd lost about half her hair-pins. Sure that there was something else, she didn't look round when Jamie returned, nor when Jeems poked his head back round the door. ‘You'll nae forget aboot the sheaves?'

‘I'll be oot when I'm ready,' Mysie said, sharply, and added, hastily, ‘I've to tidy up in here and feed the hens first, an' I'll need to wait till the packman's been.' As the door closed behind her husband, she turned to her sons. ‘Get your claes on when you're finished and get ootside, but nane o' your tricks, Sandy. If you dinna ken what to dae, you can feed the hens for me, an' shift some o' the peat ower to the porch door.'

Washing the dishes, she tried to recall the elusive item she required – Auld Jockie was such a fine old body she liked to give him trade – but hadn't remembered when Jess came in, on her way home from the shop. ‘I've had right sair guts since I was here last,' Jess said.

‘Are you ony better noo?' Mysie asked, solicitously.

‘Aye, I took a dose o' castor oil an' that shifted me,' Jess grinned. ‘An' how's things been wi' you?'

‘Just the same. Jeems thinks I've naething to dae except help him, an' Sandy's still up to his tricks.'

‘Aye.' Jess was of the opinion that Sandy did these things to get attention because Mysie always made more of Jamie, but she said nothing. Their mother should realise that herself.

‘Auld Jockie should be here the day,' Mysie observed, suddenly.

‘I'll swear Jockie kens a'body's business, but he never passes on nae gossip. I wish there was mair like him. Some o' the biddies roon' here spread stories whether they're true or no'.'

‘Jean Petrie was sayin' Mrs Mutch o' Fingask was takin' up wi' young Gavin Leslie, an' her near twice his age. I just said I didna believe it, an' she wasna pleased.'

Jess looked thoughtful. ‘I've heard that aboot Freda Mutch mysel', though, an' nae fae Jean Petrie. Do you think there's onything in it?'

‘I wouldna think so, for she's got a' their men to pick fae – she surely wouldna bother wi' Gavin Leslie.'

‘As my Jake sometimes says, weemen are kittle cattle, and you can never tell what they'll dae.'

‘Weel, I wouldna ha'e Gavin mysel', an' that's sayin' something when you think on what Jeems is like.'

Jess gave a roar of laughter. ‘Aye, Gavin Leslie's a soor bugger at times, but he's a fine strappin' loon, an' maybe it's what he's got under his breeks that tickles Freda's fancy, eh? Mind, her ain man's nae that bad lookin' – I'd nae say no to Frankie Mutch if she offered him to me.'

‘Oh, Jess, what blethers you come oot wi'.'

‘It's nae blethers, I'd fair like a change o' man. Jake's a' right, but … ach, weel, you ken. Changes are lightsome.'

‘You shouldna say things like that.' Mysie was quite upset. She had always thought that the Findlaters were ideally suited.

‘I suppose no',' Jess admitted. ‘If we'd had ony bairns, it wouldna be so bad, but we're that used to each other there's nae excitement in it noo.'

‘You canna expect to ha'e excitement a' the time – an' look at me, I've never had nae excitement.'

Jess looked sympathetic. ‘No, your Jeems wouldna exactly set the heather on fire, but you've had twa loons by him, so you must ha'e had a bittie excitement sometime?'

‘If that was excitement, you can keep it,' Mysie said, dryly. ‘I've had mair excitement shellin' peas.'

Jess went out chuckling, and Mysie lifted the hearthrug and took it outside. She was still banging it against the gable wall when she noticed Andra White's daughter cycling along the road. ‘Aye, aye, Nessie,' she called, and was rather dismayed when the girl stopped and wheeled her bicycle over, because she had wasted enough time already.

‘You're Jeems's wife, are you nae?' Nessie simpered. ‘I like Jeems, he comes walks wi' me some nichts.'

‘Jeems?' So it had been Nessie he had been seeing.

‘Aye, we go ower the peat moss, an' roon' the auld quarry, an' there's a fine place at the far side that naebody can see us.'

Uncomfortably aware of what Nessie was working round to tell her, Mysie said, ‘Are you awa' for a run on your bike?'

Nessie was not to be diverted. ‘Me an' Jeems dae things. He lets me open his spaver an' tak' oot his … he says I havena to tell naebody, but I like what we dae.'

Mysie didn't care enough for Jeems to be jealous, but she was afraid that others might get to hear of it – this poor simple creature hadn't the sense to keep it to herself. ‘I thought Jeems said you hadna to tell naebody.'

‘I havena said a word to naebody else, nae even my ain Ma an' Da, but you're Jeems's wife, an' I thought he'd ha'e tell't you himsel'.'

Mysie sighed with relief. ‘Dinna tell naebody else, though, Nessie, or Jeems'll stop goin' walks wi' you.'

She had hit the right note and Nessie's eyes clouded. ‘You'll nae let on I tell't you, will you?'

‘No, I'll nae let on. Noo, aff you go, for I'm busy.' Mysie went inside, quite sure that nobody else would hear of it from Nessie now, but praying that no one would ever see her husband with ‘the daftie', as the older children called her. Suddenly realising the incongruity of her thoughts, she laughed out loud. If it kept her from having to suffer his crude pawings, long may Jeems continue to ‘do things' with the miller's daughter.

About ten minutes later, the packman knocked. ‘Good day to you, Mistress. Here I am again like the bad penny.'

‘Aye, I was mindin' aboot you.' Smiling, Mysie held open the door. ‘Come awa' in, Jockie.'

As she put the kettle on again, the old man put his pack on the table and opened it up. ‘Razor blades, shavin' brushes, tie pins, collar studs …'

He rummaged through his goods until he found the three times she requested. ‘Onything else? Ribbon, tape, safety preens?'

‘I ken't there was something else. Safety preens, that's what it was. They aye come in handy.'

‘Aye, that they dae. An' I've got some bonnie wheeling wool for knittin' socks or drawers for your goodman – lovat green or maybe a dark grey. I'm sure he's needin' …'

‘Maybe next time.' Mysie was ashamed to tell him that she couldn't afford anything else, but Jockie likely knew, for most of the crofters' wives were in the same position.

Over a cup of tea, the packman said, ‘The loons'll be ootside this bonnie day? Has Jamie's chest been botherin' him again?'

‘A wee turnie noo an' then, but naething muckle.'

‘Your littlest ane – I canna mind his name – but I hope he's weel enough?'

‘Sandy never tak's onything, but he's a little de'il. He's aye in trouble, an' I whiles wonder what he'll dae next. I'll be fine pleased when he starts the school, but it's twa year yet.'

‘He keeps you on your taes,' Jockie smiled, ‘an' that's what keeps you lookin' so young.'

‘Och, you an' your havers.'

‘I'm nae haverin'. If I'd been a young man I'd ha'e hung up my hat to you.' He laughed to show that he
was
joking, then said, ‘Your goodman's keepin' weel, I hope?'

‘Oh aye, I dinna think Jeems has ever had a day's illness in his life, though I some think he'd be a poor patient if he had.'

Swallowing the last piece of his buttered scone, the old man laid his empty cup on the table and stood up. ‘Thank you for the tea, Mistress, but it's time I took the road again.' He waited until she paid for her purchases, then buckled up his pack and swung it over his shoulder. ‘I'll see you in three month as usual, Mistress.'

He was a kindly old soul, Mysie thought, as she stood at the door watching him tramping along the road towards Downies. It must be a dreary life, walking round the countryside carrying that pack on his back, but he never grumbled and always had a cheery word for the bairns if they were in. She wondered if he'd ever had bairns of his own, but he never spoke about a family. Poor Jockie. Even if her own life was drudgery from morn to night she wouldn't change places with him or anybody else, for she had Jamie, with his dark curly head and his big blue eyes looking up at her full of love when she tucked him into bed. She hadn't the same feeling for Sandy, always up to things he shouldn't, no matter how much she scolded him.

When she went out to help Jeems, Sandy was balanced on top of the peat stack throwing lumps of peat at his brother, who was howling loudly. ‘Stop that!' she shouted.

Sandy let his hand drop. ‘Ach, I was only playin', Mam.'

‘That's nae playin'! Did he hurt you, my lambie?'

‘He got me on the lug.' Jamie clutching his injured ear, squeezed out a tear.

‘Come, my dearie, an' I'll put a tickie butter on it.'

‘Why is it aye me you pick on?' Sandy complained, as he slid down. ‘Why dae you never rage Jamie?'

Her voice hardened. ‘Nane o' your lip. If you was as good as Jamie, I wouldna need to rage you, an' if you havena cleaned up this yard afore I come back, you'll feel the weight o' my hand on
your
lug.'