Heritage of Shame Page 17

  Reaching her bag and carrying it to the bed, she stared at it for several moments. The blackness of it was stark as the shadow of death against the bed cover. The shadow of death! Tracing a finger along the intricate braiding of the bag she smiled at the simile. It was an apt one.

  Taking the tiny bottle, still wrapped carefully within the folds of a handkerchief so no drop which might possibly have trailed from its lip that afternoon could have touched her skin, she held it to the lamp letting the light reflect in its glass body. Green and shiny as an emerald it glowed between her fingers. She had always had a fondness for the colour. Twisting it now she watched the deeper hue of the liquid move against its sides, sliding like the shadow of a serpent. The shadow of death! She smiled again. It was a shadow would play over any who posed a threat to Clara Mather or to the inheritance intended for her son!

  *

  He had wanted… what? What had he wanted? Abel Preston watched the girl turn along the narrow passage which gave entry to the row of houses, each joined like a Siamese twin to its neighbour. Anne Corby, the girl he had known all of his life yet hardly knew at all. She awakened feelings in him he had never experienced before. True, as a lad he had felt protective. Turning back along Church Street he smiled to himself. Had it been that he enjoyed playing Sir Lancelot or was it the fact that being in Anne Corby’s corner afforded him the satisfaction of giving that toad of a cousin of hers a hiding?

  That was certainly something he had never regretted and he definitely did not regret punching him in the mouth the night he had caught him manhandling the girl in the churchyard. Reaching the corner of Bilston Street he followed its course, crossing the Leys to Alma Street. Pausing at the one narrow entry which gave access to the rear of a string of tiny terraced houses he thought again of that evening he had heard a cry come from St Lawrence churchyard and a frown settled heavily between his brows. Quenton Mather had been no friend to his small cousin and he was no friend to her now she was grown. Quenton Mather was a coward and a bully but his was not the real threat to Anne Corby, that took the shape of a woman and that woman was his mother.

  Walking past the back of the houses, shared privies casting small islands of shadow onto the moonlit communal yard, the frown deepened.

  Clara Mather had played God in that metal works. Her word was not to be questioned, her way to be followed in the smelting of ore even though she knew precious little of the process. Clara was a woman determined her word should become law and to be sure it did, any attempt to change it resulted in even the most experienced of workmen being sacked.

  Lighting the candle kept on a saucer on the narrow ledge beneath the sash window of the scullery, Abel stood a moment watching the pale gleam stab defiant fingers at the encircling shadows.

  Her word… her way! Clara Mather ruled Glebe Metalworks. She would not relinquish that power… nor would she let her brother’s daughter stand in her way!

  Removing his jacket and hanging it on a peg set in the wall he poured water from an enamelled jug into a matching bowl, the coldness of it stinging his skin us he washed.

  Anne Corby might have rejected her father’s legacy, turned her back on it as Laban had confided, handed it lock, stock and barrel to her aunt, but that agreement had been simply a verbal one, one which, should she wish, Anne Corby could renounce at any time, deny any such agreement. Maybe at the time she had meant all she had said, perhaps she still did… but what of the child? What of Joshua?

  His face and arms dried and the water emptied into the one drain serving the yard, Abel settled before the fire kept burning in the tiny living room.

  The boy would grow and, given the tongues ever ready to wag in Darlaston, he would come to know his heritage, come to know what was rightfully his. Would he take the same attitude shown by his mother? The answer to that was a highly probable ‘no’. If the lad grew with any desire to take what had been denied him, to claim his own, then chances were he would fight for it. Clara Mather understood that only too well.

  Coals settling into the bed of the fire sent a flurry of sparks dancing, their vivid twinkling life snatched from them in the black void of the chimney.

  Snuffed out… destroyed! Abel stared at the dark emptiness which seconds ago had held dazzling pinpricks of vibrant light. Now they were gone, lost to the world for ever, their challenge to the blackness no longer existing.

  Clara Mather understood only too well!

  The thought returned, chilling in its implication. Would she act in the same way, strike at Anne Corby and her son thereby removing the challenge for ever?

  His fingers tightening about the arms of his chair, Abel watched colourful flames twine together, seeking each other’s comfort before entering the black void.

  It was not any probable ‘no’ which answered the question in his mind, it was a very definite ‘yes’.

  17

  He was such an ordinary man! Anne stared at the figure standing in the centre of Unity’s living room, his shoulders stooped, his grey hair yellowed by the light of an oil lamp placed on the table beside him. He wore no flowing white robe, no great feathered wings spread from his back and no glittering circle of light played about his head as she had always been taught. Had her father not instilled into her the appearance of those heavenly beings, those great Messengers of the Lord; had he not said they were glorious in their holiness, transcendent in their majesty, that even the least of God’s angels was sublime in his beauty; how much more then the Archangels, the greatest of those beings?

  But he showed none of that glory, the one come to take her child, none of the infinite grace and splendour afforded him by custom of the church, yet was he not of the highest, one bidden from the Throne of God, the great Angel of Death?

  But he was so ordinary!

  Anne met the faded eyes behind heavy owl like spectacles, watched the thin lips move, a long, clean fingered hand dip into a black Gladstone bag.

  So ordinary!

  The hand emerged from the bag, the lips moving again as the head turned towards Unity. Such an unremarkable head, so grey, so plain! Where was the shimmering aura which blinded in its brilliance? Where the countenance whose beauty was such that man could not comprehend? Was it that this was a lesser being… was the sin of her child’s begetting so black the great Archangel would not himself come for the tiny soul? But that sin was not Joshua’s!

  The last of her thoughts cried aloud, Laban stepped quickly to her side. ‘Come, wench,’ he whispered, ‘let me tek you upstairs.’

  The softly spoken words hovering on the edge of her mind Anne turned her gaze towards the sound. ‘Why?’ It was a question dredged from a vacuum, an emptiness of heart and soul. ‘Why could he not come himself… why blame an innocent child?’

  ‘Let me take her.’ Unity reached both arms to the girl held by her husband, but lost in her bewildered world Anne felt nothing as she was taken gently and led from the living room.

  How could heaven be so cruel, how could the God her father had loved, had sacrificed everything to follow, turn His wrath upon a tiny child?

  ‘C’mon, wench, drink this down.’ Uncomprehending of the liquid spooned into her mouth, of the tear marked face bent above her own, Anne swallowed.

  She would speak to the lesser being. She swallowed a second spoonful, no taste of the potion registering on her senses. She would speak to that so ordinary looking spirit, explain Joshua’s innocence, tell him it was she, she who had sinned.

  In the dim light of a candle Unity watched the eyelids flicker, heard the faint words.

  ‘I’ll tell him he is mistaken. I am the one he came for. I am the one guilty of sin. I am the one the Great Angel of Death has sent him to take…’

  The spoon held in her hand, tears running unchecked down her lined cheeks, Unity listened to the words trailing off into drugged sleep, words addressed to a higher power.

  ‘Lord forgive mine offences…’

  Turned into the pillow the lips moved, the almost silent words
coming now on a last wakeful breath.

  ‘… take me, please… take me in place of my child.’

  *

  ‘But how – how did it happen?’ Abel Preston looked up from the girth strap whose one end he had skived, shaving the thick leather to half its thickness.

  ‘That be the selfsame question I asked o’ that doctor.’ Laban Hurley’s head moved slowly, its side to side motion that of a man still bewildered by what had so suddenly happened to his world. He had been given the message by a neighbour’s lad, a boy breathless with the urgency laid upon him.

  ‘You be having to go home, Mister ’Urley,’ the youngster had gasped, holding a spot beneath his ribs which ached with the effort of running. ‘Missis ’Urley, her said to tell you that you have to come now, right away.’

  He had given the lad a penny and watched the simple gift breathe fresh life into winded limbs, hurtling him towards the nearest sweetshop. Matthew and Luke had raced like that when given a penny to spend on bull’s eyes or treacle toffee.

  ‘I mean if the child had been poorly then Unity would have known.’

  ‘Ar, Abel lad, her would have known.’ Laban let go the memories. ‘Her would have had that little ’un to the doctor afore you could bat your eyes, but there weren’t nothing wrong with him, not when her took him to the town.’

  But when she got home…! What illness could strike so quickly and with such dire results? Taking up a number four pricking iron Abel marked the end of the bridle to be stitched.

  His own work lying idle in his hands Laban watched the younger man cut a length of six cord, hand made waxed thread, inserting it into a single needle before knotting one end.

  ‘Unity were beside herself when I got home.’ He talked on quietly, even now unbelievingly. ‘I couldn’t get no sense out of her, then the woman from next door took me to that carriage…’

  Laban had told him of the perambulator, of how he had spotted it outside Thomas Cooper’s pawnshop in King Street and paid half a crown for it, then wheeled it all the way to Blockall despite the jokes of men he met on the way.

  ‘At first I thought the child asleep…’ Laban’s eyes followed the movement of the needle back-stitching the straps on to the webs at the places Abel had marked, but his inner eyes looked at something else, at a small child lying motionless, his tiny face showing the first hint of marble. ‘I couldn’t tell what the fuss were about, then I touched a little hand… it were cold, cold as ice. I wanted to pick him up, to warm him with my own body, to hold him ’til he woke up, but the woman stopped me, her said it were best the doctor see him first. That were when I went to sit with Unity, and while we waited together for the neighbour to bring the doctor her told me of what her knew.’

  Working in silence Abel listened, hearing the heartbreak in the old man’s voice, hearing the pain that had struck once before, that agony of having beloved sons ripped from his life.

  ‘The little ’un had cooed and gurgled when her set him in that carriage, seeming to answer as her talked to him, kicking at the covers when her tried to tuck him in but by the time her got to Cock Street he were asleep, the same as when her come out of Tom Cooper’s shop; he were fast asleep but her couldn’t resist touching a finger to that little face. My Unity loved that babby—’ his breath catching in his throat Laban blinked at the tears filling his tired eyes ‘—her loved that babby as her had loved her own.’

  And now the child was dead! Abel kept his glance on the strap he was stitching to the saddle, allowing the other man to keep his dignity; Laban Hurley was not one for public displays, he would not want his tears witnessed by another.

  ‘I asked the doctor the same question you yourself asked.’ Laban cleared his throat but his hands remained unaccustomedly idle. ‘I asked him how could it have happened, what could have took a child’s life when he had no sickness, when he smiled and cooed? He answered me that no doctor knowed the cause, that many a babe were laid to sleep in perfect health yet never woke again. Unity must not blame herself, it was no fault on her part, it had happened many times afore this and no cause or reason to say why, seemed the poor little mite just died in his sleep.’

  ‘And Anne?’ Abel asked when it seemed the other man had done speaking. ‘How is she taking it?’

  Glancing down at the leather in his own hands Laban appeared to weigh the question, to search in his mind for the appropriate answer.

  ‘Like somebody in a dream,’ he said after a moment, ‘her hears naught of what be said to her and sees only what no other eyes see. We thought the sleeping draught that doctor took from his bag would help, that when the girl woke her would be in a proper sense o’ mind but it’s like Anne don’t want to wake.’

  She did not want to wake! Abel sent the needle expertly through the holes he had pricked with the iron, stitching the leather strap grain side down. Did she blame herself, hold herself responsible for something the cause of which not even doctors understood?

  ‘When her does speak it be something or someone neither me nor Unity can see, her begs to be taken in place of the child, saying over and over hers be the sin, hers be the offence, it be her life should be forfeit; but that wench be innocent as her own child be innocent, so why should the Lord take one simply to punish the other, why make her suffer what Unity and me suffered all them years ago?’

  Pain they both suffered still. The stitching finished, Abel laid the work aside, going to that corner of the room set aside for brewing tea. A mug would probably be of some benefit to Laban. Should he ask to see Anne, would it help or would his presence at the house be an imposition? Spooning tea into the enamelled creamware teapot pock marked with chips which attested to its age and use he covered it with water from the kettle always kept boiling on the iron stove. He wanted to see her, to comfort her, to hold her in his arms and whisper it wasn’t her fault. One hand clenched about the teapot handle, the fingers of the other gripping the small rounded knob of the lid, Abel felt the rush of feeling which attacked his chest each time he thought of Anne Corby. Yes, he wanted to hold her… Lord, how he wanted to hold her! To tell her she was not to blame; but that was not all he wanted to say, he wanted to tell of his love, the feelings which had always been there deep in his heart, tell of a friendship with a little girl which had awakened into love for a woman; he wanted to tell Anne Corby all of this, but those were words which must never leave his tongue.

  *

  ‘I heard it twice, once in King Street and again in Pinfold Street.’ Clara Mather hid the triumph that had sat warmly inside her all day.

  ‘Women’s talk!’ Quenton studied his third brandy, holding the Stuart crystal goblet at eye level, watching the facets of light dance through it.

  It’s more than that!’ Clara snapped, irritation swamping triumph. ‘One woman said the doctor was along of Blockall in the early evening.’

  Quenton lowered the glass but did not look at his mother. She got on his nerves with her constant harping about Anne and the brat she’d given birth to; if there had been the least chance of Jacob’s daughter claiming anything at all she would have done it by now, instead she was lodging in some poky house, what sense did that make?

  ‘There’s no surprise in the doctor being in Blockall,’ he answered, disinterest plain in every syllable, ‘the place is a warren; there is always some outbreak there, if it’s not measles then it’s chicken pox and it’s not that then it’s something else, so where is the strangeness in a doctor visiting?’

  What he meant was he had no interest. Clara’s irritation grew. No interest when his every comfort, his very future depended upon what she had heard gossiped over in the town being fact. With that child gone half of the battle was won and the other half would be won as easily.

  ‘There is no chicken pox in Blockall nor any other childhood ailment.’ She forced a calmness she did not feel.

  ‘Yet the doctor was called,’ Quenton yawned rudely, ‘and to where… let me guess… ah yes, to the Hurley house, now who is living there who c
ould be sick?’ Why did she put up with this, why tolerate indifference bordering on insolence, why not turn him out of the house, let him fend for himself for a month or two? That would bring reality home sharp enough; her son had led too pampered a life to exchange it for work… any kind of work. But then prevention often worked effectively as any cure!

  ‘It seems that, like your father, words and warnings have no effect upon you.’ Clara watched the brandy goblet rise, the golden amber liquid significantly reducing as he swallowed. Wait for him to lower the glass because her next words might very well – no, definitely would – cause him to choke. ‘That having been so often proved, I have arranged for you to take a lesson of a different kind, in fact several lessons. You are to start at Glebe Metalworks at five o’clock tomorrow morning as a labourer. Depending upon how you succeed at that you will move on to other work, let us say feeding the furnaces, they tell me that is very good for burning starch out of a man.’

  ‘The Glebe!’ The glass banged onto a side table and Quenton shot upright in his chair. ‘Me work in a bloody metalworks, that’ll be the day!’

  As she rose slowly, taking time in smoothing her skirts, Clara’s thin mouth etched her returning triumph, but her eyes were hard and cold as she looked at him. ‘Yes, that day will be tomorrow, and just in case you should think of not turning up then think a little more carefully on this. The doors of this house will be closed to you, every account you so liberally use will be closed and not so much as a halfpenny will you get from me.’ Lifting her hand as his mouth opened, she went on. ‘This is no idle talk, Quenton, if you doubt my word then do not go to the works in the morning; but I warn you, it can be harder for some to make a living than by shovelling coke!’