The Incomers Page 6

  ‘Aye but these things happen aw the time.’

  ‘No’ in his pit, he reckons.’

  ‘Aye well he’ll sin fund oot about that man-killer he’s landed wi’, won’t he?’

  ‘Aye. Ah suppose.’

  ‘Did the young fella’s wife no jist huv a wee bairn?’

  ‘Aye, it’ll no be lang afore that Nurse Lynn is roond there flingin’ her weight aboot, trying tae interfere.’

  ‘Sumbudy should dae sumthing aboot her, eh?’

  ‘Ah ken, she’s jist a twistit auld spinster that’ll cause sum serious harm wan o’ these days.’

  Chapter Eight

  Ellie is still hissing like a snake when she lifts Nat from his nap and swaddles him into his clothes and sling. The long tarmac lane James drove her along that first hopeful day is the quickest way to the big hoose, but Ellie wants to explore the woods on the way and give herself more time to calm down. She is in no mood for visiting but she has paced the lino until the floorboards creak, she has to get out of this house.

  Armed with her basket and wearing her red wellies, Ellie leaves through her back door. She hears a footfall and sees the back of Mr Winski disappearing into the woods further up the track. She is sure it is he; the thick heavy black jackets are common wear in Hollyburn but his cap is different from the cloth flats worn by the men she has encountered so far. She steps out through the garden gate and looks to the direction he went, in what she guesses is also the direction of the big hoose. There must surely be a gate further along the track that will lead her back into the estate grounds.

  New growth of stingy nettles curl through a thicket of bramble thorns and Ellie calculates tea and soup and wine. James had quipped, before his mood, that a mug of nettle soup would put colour in her cheeks. Very funny.

  The light dims as she walks deeper into the wood and she realises that the night will soon draw over the sky. Something called British Summer Time will happen at the end of this month when the clocks are moved forward an hour to fix the daylight saving given to the farmers in winter. Why this need to change time? In her land everyone rises when it is light and retires when it grows dark; the palm oil used for lighting is precious, so why waste it?

  She can smell damp earth, reminding her of the bush at home during the rainy season, when the ground springs from its knees and embraces the sky with lush green shoots and a promise more than it lives up to.

  She has read in the book now sitting permanently on her kitchen table, that many varieties of fungi grow on the forest floor and she plans to study them and examine the tree trunks for signs of growth. Her heart warms as she imagines her husband’s face when she presents him with something other than potatoes and carrots or turnip to eat.

  The baby is snuffling into her back now and she thinks he will be ill by nightfall. It was wrong of her to take him outside on this damp afternoon. She should return home and visit Mrs Watson another day.

  An animal cry shudders from the woods just ahead of where she stands.

  ‘What is that?’ she says to herself.

  ‘At?’ Nat says.

  ‘Shh.’ Ellie had forgotten her parrot son.

  Like an antelope caught by a wild dog, the cry is helpless. This is followed by a low moan. Ellie feels her heart tighten.

  She creeps forward to see if it is an animal in a trap. She knows there are few predators in these woods. Once off the path the trees thicken and her feet sink in moss and composting leaves. She stops and ducks behind a tree when she sees the figure of a man. The hand she places round her back and rests on the rump of Nat, she prays will hush his parrot chatter.

  Mr Winski sits on a fallen tree. His head hangs low between his legs with his arms covering his head as if protecting it from falling objects. He rocks forwards and backwards, moaning. When he stops rocking he lifts his head and hammers both his fists into the trunk beside him. Ellie can see blood oozing from his knuckles. She wants to go to him and stop this. The tortured cry screams from his mouth and he resumes his rocking and moaning. An intruder should not witness this amount of pain if they cannot help. One foot behind the other, she backs away.

  Nat sneezes, a baby sneeze but Mr Winski’s head snaps up and he turns his blotched, tear-stained eyes towards her. Before Ellie runs from this man she sees in his eyes the deep humiliation of defeat.

  The Pairty Line

  ‘They say the Pole wis tae blame.’

  ‘Whit fur?’

  ‘The accident at the pit.’

  ‘Are you still harpin’ oan aboot that? Onyweys, ah heard the young lad wis still drunk fae the nicht before. He should niver huv been allowed underground. The manager’ll swing fur this wan. But - whit aboot the latest – ah heard that the meenister’s a nancy boy.’

  ‘Dinnae haver, who telt ye that?’

  ‘Ma man brought it back fae the club.’

  ‘Aye well, he wid love that.’

  ‘Whit dae ye mean?’

  ‘Nithin’. So tell me, how dae the brains o’ the village work it oot?’

  ‘Well, he, the meenister, like, he’s stertit up this youth club. Aw the young yins go tae his hoose on a Sunday nicht an’ ur supposed tae speak aboot Christ an’ stuff.’

  ‘Well whit’s wrang wi that?’

  ‘It jist disnae seem richt, that’s aw.’

  ‘Ah tell ye, it’s hellish. Onybody that tries tae dae guid in this village is shot doon in flames.’

  ‘Ah’m jist saying, like.’

  ‘Well dinnae, ah’ll no hear anither word aboot it. It’s jist idle gossip eh?’

  Chapter Nine

  The garden at the back of the big hoose is surrounded by a stone wall as tall and as wide as a shea tree. A small iron gate closes under an arched doorway and seems to be the only way in. Ellie peers through the gate and gasps at the green that is abundant in there.

  A man in a flat cap and wearing a black jacket with leather across the shoulders is bent over a twiggy bush snapping pieces off with hooked scissors. She is tempted to speak, but she clips her tongue back behind her teeth. The gold dog that lies by the shed lifts its head, thumps its tail twice and lies down again.

  James tried to dig her vegetable patch but his Estate Factor hands are soft, and as he dug blisters appeared on the soft ridges where the fingers sprouted from his palms. So Ellie had taken the spade against his loud but tapered protests and dug a trench fifteen feet long and ten feet wide, turning the hard black clay earth over two feet deep. As she dug she could feel the sweat run down her back and on her brow and between her legs, and she felt warm for the first time since she left her red dirt land.

  James had bought her some packets of seeds from the shop called Wool Worths, explaining that the stock in the village store was so old it was a wonder it hadn’t taken root on the display stand. He promised to take her to this Wool Worths one day, and Ellie was sure she would not let him forget that promise.

  His mood is still cool, but like a stone in the constant stream of the river, his resolve to remain silent to her is smoothing in the trickle of their everyday routine.

  A noise in a tree brings her back to the garden: the sound of two planks being drilled and rattled together alerts her to the presence of a woodpecker. She scans the trees but cannot find him.

  ‘Listen,’ she says to Nat.

  ‘At?’ he whispers as he pops his head out of the shawl and looks round.

  ‘Shsh.’

  ‘Shsh,’ he mimics, breathing angels wings on her neck.

  They stand like statues and listen to the sound grow louder. Out the corner of her eye Ellie sees a flash of red, the only bright colour she has seen in the estate apart from her own skirts and scarves.

  ‘Shsh,’ she breathes in.

  She can feel Nat hold his breath and the reward comes to them from heaven. The red flash attaches itself to a tree. The bird sparks them a wicked grin before its long black beak drills into the bark with a rapid-fire ratatattat; it stops, looks round at them with a satisfied smile and d
ashes off into the forest.

  Nat lets the breath go with a big huff and a cough. ‘At,’ he whispers.

  ‘A bird.’

  ‘At.’

  ‘A very pretty birdie. In the forests of your motherland there are many pretty birds. My mother, your grandmother, tells of a time when the forests sang so loudly with bird song the earth rumbled with joy.’

  Ellie did not add that now the earth rumbles to the sound of construction trucks and mine detonation or that the birds had fled, their song replaced by industrial saws cutting timber to be carried underground.

  The high wall of the garden obscures the house and when it does finally come into view, Ellie is startled that she has forgotten how large it is. The square windows on all floors are shuttered, like the eyelids of the dead. Or are they just indifferent?

  The birdsong which has followed her here remains in the forest as she steps onto gravel. A dog barks in the distance, perhaps from the village, certainly too far away to be the gold dog. Then there is silence, at least she thinks of it as silence until her ears tune into the sound of music, a murmur of a radio drifting from the direction of a low building attached to the side of the house. Ellie picks her way, tiptoeing on the gravel; then she stops.

  I am an imbecile, she thinks; I am not a thief, I have come to visit. I have come to pay my respects, to pass the time of day and thank the cook for her gift. She places her feet firmly on the gravel and clump, clump, clumps her wellies hard, scattering stone chips in her wake

  As she rounds the corner of the house she sees the woman she remembers from the President’s reception tipping rubbish from a plastic bucket into a larger tin bin. When the woman turns and sees Ellie her mouth makes an ‘O’ shape.

  Her hair is so tightly curled it is almost as curly as Ellie’s, but Ellie suspects this lady’s hair is the result of a practice called a Permanent Wave.

  The woman puts the plastic bucket down on the ground, wipes her hands on her apron and holds out her hand for Ellie to shake. Ellie thinks this is strange after the Nurse’s reaction to her offer, but she takes it anyway.

  ‘Ah’m Maggie Watson,’ she says, ‘and you are Mrs Mason.’ She stands back and looks at Ellie with honest eyes. ‘Ah’m cook, housekeeper and general dogsbody around here.’ Her voice is soft but strong in the local dialect, like the woman in the shop.

  ‘Hello, Mrs Watson, my name is Ellie.’ Ellie turns round to show her back. ‘And this is Nat. Say hello to Mrs Watson, Nat.’

  ‘Hiya, wee man,’ Mrs Watson says.

  ‘ ’ya,’ Nat responds.

  ‘Och, isn’t he lovely?’

  ‘Yes, he is.’ Ellie clears her throat. ‘Thank you for the book.’

  The older lady purses her wrinkled lips and bats Ellie’s words away.

  ‘Och, it’s nothing.’

  ‘It is very generous. Too new to give away to me.’

  ‘It wis ma sister Minnie’s. Ah gave it tae her for Christmas, just before she passed over. Ah don’t know why, ah knew she hadn’t long tae go. Ah thought it might spark some new life intae her.’

  ‘I am sorry for your loss.’

  ‘Not at all, girl. We all have tae go sometime. As long as you can get a use of the book, there’ll be no waste; ah hate waste, so ah do. Ah know how your people love tae live off the land, not that ah mean that in a bad way, you understand, it’s just, you know, oh dear, ah just meant …’

  Ellie laughs and realises that she has not heard her own laugh for a long time, it feels good.

  ‘Ah had meant tae come tae visit down at the lodge, but felt ah should let you settle in first.’ Mrs Watson continues. ‘The folk round here aren’t intae each others houses all the time. Mind you, they still like to ken your business.’

  Ellie feels her blood warm with the guilt of her attack on the inhospitality of the villagers.

  ‘’S’ok,’ she says, but does not know what to say next. Should she mention the President’s residence? It is obvious that Mrs Watson does not recognise her and she does not want to embarrass the woman who has been kind to her by reminding her of the earlier meeting.

  ‘My husband tells me you like my country’s food.’

  ‘Aye, it’s great tae use different stuff tae cook with. Mind you, ah suppose ah’m luckier than most, the walled garden can throw out some exotic stuff. And it wasn’t that long ago when the food rationing stopped here, you know. Ah remember it wis years before we saw bananas again after the war.’ She stops and turns red. ‘Sorry ah didn’t mean …’

  Ellie laughs, ‘It is alright, I quite like bananas, but I prefer mangoes and papaya.’

  ‘Aye, well, the Fairbairns have a grand contact in India who sends over spices and stuff, and of course when they go back to Africa they send back all manner of stuff fae the bazaars. Just you let me know when you get homesick, hen, and ah’ll see if ah can find you some of your home spices.’

  Mrs Watson taps her nose and says, ‘Don’t you be letting on tae the village mind or they’ll be calling us a witches’ coven. That auld bugger in the garden thinks the spinach is the only exotic thing he should be growing.’ She crosses her arms and looks pleased with herself then she jumps and uncrosses them again.

  ‘Sorry, hen, much as ah’d love tae stand here gabbing with you, ah must get on. Next time pop round about two-ish, that’s my quiet time. Toodle ’oo.’ She lifts her plastic bucket and returns into the back door, shouting, ‘Toodle ’oo, Nat,’ over her shoulder.

  Ellie watches the door close and wishes she could follow, wishes she could sit down and talk more with Mrs Watson about the spices of India and the markets of home where the exotics are sent from. Ellie lifts her head and walks away from the house. She has made a friend who is too busy to talk to her. She will need to find some excuse to come back and talk to Mrs Watson again. And perhaps next time she will have the opportunity to speak to the man in the garden about his plants.

  The Pairty Line

  ‘Ah got lovely pieces o’ cod roe and finnin haddie fae Davie the day.’

  ‘Lucky you, he niver hus ony finnin haddie left by the time he gets roond tae ma street.’

  ‘Aye well, ye ken how that is, eh?’

  ‘No, how like?’

  ‘He gies it aw tae that Nora Wilson. And that’s no aw he gies her by the sound o’ things.’

  ‘Whit dae ye mean?’

  ‘Dinnae be sae naive. He delivers her fish tae the door. She’ll no’ staun’ oot in the street like the rest o’ us huv tae. Sometimes he’s in there mair than five meenits. Ye ken whit that means?’

  ‘No! No wi’ Davie, he stinks o’ fish.’

  ‘Aye well, she niver hus ony problems gettin’ her finnin haddie that’s fur sure, eh?’

  ‘Bit whit aboot her man?’

  ‘He’s constant back shift and unlike some, he niver misses a shift.’

  ‘Dinnae stert.’

  ‘Ah’m only sayin.’

  ‘Aye well, ma man’s on the wagon noo. We’re hoping tae go on holiday this year.’

  ‘That’ll be a first.’

  ‘Did ye no hear me, dinnae stert.’

  ‘Aye, richt enough, ye hae enough sorrows without me gien ye ony mair. At least your man kin go tae work kenning ye widnae cheat on him, eh?’

  ‘Aye, if you say so.’

  Chapter Ten

  The Wednesday after Ellie’s visit to the big hoose, James leaves the house without eating his breakfast.

  ‘Can you go up to the village and buy fish from the fish van?’ he says as he pulls on his coat and hands her extra housekeeping money. ‘It stops in front of the Post Office about half past four,’ are his parting words.

  They always have fish on a Friday, which James brings home with him. The fish van that honks its horn round the streets in the village also delivers to the big hoose. James arranges his order with Mrs Watson without ever consulting Ellie. In the days after her arrival at the witch’s hat house James presents her with packets of assorted butchered meat on the Saturd
ay and the Wednesday, and on the Friday she receives limp grey fish along with a bag of orange grains.

  ‘What is this?’

  ‘It’s coating for the fish,’ James says as he dumps the parcels on the table and leaves her to her woman’s work.

  That first time Ellie fries the fish in butter and sprinkles the orange grain over the top. She presents it to James with mashed potatoes and diced turnip.

  ‘What the hell is this?’

  ‘Your tea.’ But it did not take many glances at her husband’s horrified face to tell her she has it all wrong.

  James scrapes the food into the bin.

  ‘Wait there,’ he says and slams out of the house.

  As she hears the Landrover rev up and skid away she places her hands to her forehead to try to calm her throbbing head. She picks up her fork and breaks off a piece of the fish. The fish disintegrates into tiny flakes. It is hot on her tongue and the cold dried orange tastes like evening desert sand. A knot twists in her stomach and churns the empty juices until they bring water to her mouth. Her dinner also finds itself in the bin and she spits in the sink to rid her mouth of the bile there.

  Ellie sets her mind to blank as she washes the plates and the frying pan and stores them in the back of the cupboard. She opens a jar of Heinz baby food and begins to spoon the cold gloop into Nat’s mouth. He bubbles it out and begins to cry. The jar is full but as she looks at it she realises that it too is shit, and sends it to join the rest of their meal in the bin. What is wrong with her? A woman who cannot feed her family; she would be outcast if she were in her fatherland.

  She grabs the tin of oats from the counter and begins to work it together with the top of the morning’s milk which she has saved in a stone jar and hid in the pantry for her baby. This she simmers on the range until it is thick and smooth. Then soothing him with her breast, she lets the meal cool a little and is soon ladling spoonfuls into the eager mouth of the chubby boy. Ellie places a little on her lips and takes pleasure in the hunger it quells in her belly. She deserves to go hungry; she is such a lazy wife. Nat slurps and smacks his lips with delight. At least he does not complain about her food.