Mary's Child Read online

  His grandfather came to the house, took the boy on his knee and told him, ‘You’re coming to live with me, Jack.’

  As he played on the nursery floor with the soldiers his grandfather had given him he was conscious of some whispering between Simpson, Jenkinson and the others. He overheard a muttered, ‘She’s run off with him,’ and, ‘Poor little lamb.’

  He was vaguely aware that he was being cuddled by Amy Jenkinson more than usual and he was glad of that. He felt no sense of loss. His mother had gone away just as his father did. Father returned now and again so presumably Mother would, too. Meanwhile he had Grandad and Jenkinson and he was content.

  He went to live in the big house with the tall tower.

  Chapter 3

  March 1900

  ‘Now, we’ve got to get ready in a minute but I have some ironing I want to do.’ Mary Carter set the smoothing iron on the glowing fire and went on, ‘And we need something for your dad’s tea. Put your coat on and run up to the shops and get him a kipper.’

  Chrissie was six years old now, brown eyes still large in the thin face. She had been at school over a year and all that time had helped Mary about the house, washing, cleaning and cooking. But she still had to stand on the stool to work on the table.

  She needed the coat in the street. A wind was blowing up from the sea, bitterly cold, nipping at nose and ears. It had driven the gulls inland and they swooped and soared above, their mewing rising high above the metallic clamour from the yards. The sun was down and the lamplighter doing his rounds with his long pole, switching on the gas for the lights. The yards would cease work soon and Harry Carter would come home for his tea. Mist and shadows together clothed the tombstones in the churchyard of St Peter’s at the end of the street.

  An old woman stood on the doorstep of the house next door, peering shortsightedly. She had only moved into the downstairs rooms of that house a few days ago. Mary had told Harry, Chrissie listening, that she was ‘Old Mrs Collins’, a widow. That was all Chrissie knew.

  Now the old woman called, ‘Will you go a message for me? Me rheumatism’s that bad wi’ this wind, Ah canna get out.’

  Chrissie knew about rheumatism, had heard Mary talk of other people in the street who suffered from it. Just as she knew about drunkenness and violence: she had seen Reuben Ward stagger by and crawl up the stairs, had heard his wife cry out and seen her battered face. Chrissie offered, ‘I’m just going up to the shops.’

  Ada Collins peered at the thin, serious little face, pink cheeked now from the wind. ‘There’s a bonny lass. I’ll give you something for going.’

  She held out a tin can with a lid and a wire carrying-handle, the same sort of can used by Harry Carter to carry his tea to work. ‘Look in the back door of the Pear Tree and get me a gill o’ beer. Can you do that?’

  ‘Yes, missus.’ Chrissie took the can and a penny from the old woman and started up the street.

  She bought the kipper then went into the Bottle and Jug, a narrow little bar at the back of the Pear Tree public house, and got a half-pint of beer pumped into the can. When she delivered it to Mrs Collins the old woman said, ‘There’s a good lass. Here’s a ha’penny for going.’

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Collins.’

  Chrissie told her mother, ‘Mrs Collins gave me a ha’penny for running a message for her.’

  Mary Carter gave the child an affectionate pat. ‘Put it in your box.’ But then she went on to order, ‘Next time you do something for her, tell her you don’t want anything for going, because she’s an old woman on her own, living off a little bit of a pension. Don’t tell her that, mind! Now I’ll cook that kipper for your dad then I’ll get you ready to go out. I don’t want to be late.’

  She had been given the chance to earn a few shillings that evening and had grabbed it. Harry had been on short time working since Christmas and Mary could only work while Chrissie was at school. So she picked up a few hours’ cleaning work here and there but it was poorly paid. She was a good manager of the household budget and they always had enough to eat, but some extra money was welcome.

  A half-hour later Mary had paid her three halfpence and she and Chrissie were aboard one of the new electric trams, grinding across the bridge from Monkwearmouth into the town on the south shore. They were on their way to the Ballantyne house in Ashbrooke. The war in South Africa was lurching on its disastrous way. The Boers had surrounded the town of Ladysmith for three months and news of its relief had arrived only a day or two ago. There had been scenes of wild celebration. Now George Ballantyne was giving a thanksgiving party for some friends, extra staff would be needed and Mary was one of the girls who had been recruited.

  She and Chrissie walked up from the tram stop in the darkness under the branches of the trees spread across the street, hurrying from one yellow gas lamp to the next. The wind had dropped now and the night was not so cold. They were further from the river and the sea, and more sheltered. They could see open fields through the wooded gaps between the big, widely spaced houses.

  Mary said, ‘You want to look out. You might see rabbits around here.’

  ‘Rabbits!’

  ‘Or maybe a fox.’

  Chrissie’s head turned continually after that. There wasn’t a rabbit or a fox within a mile of the shipyards and the street where she lived. The only grass near the street was in the churchyard.

  They came upon the house through the tradesmen’s gate, then followed the tracks cut through the gravel of the drive by the horses and carts of the butchers and grocers who had preceded them. Chrissie caught her first glimpse of the house through the trees, wide and high with tall, ranked rectangles of windows blazing with light. And there was the tower standing high and black against the sky with one lone light in a window at its top. She was never to forget that first sighting.

  But now they went on, around the side of the house, and entered the kitchen at the rear. They stepped into seeming bedlam. Most of one wall of the big room was taken up by the kitchen range, set into the chimney breast. The kitchen table, scrubbed white, covered half the floor area. It was a place of heat, steam, the smell of roasting meat and voices raised above the clatter of pans and plates. Mrs Tyndall, the cook, a queen in her profession and so earning more than thirty pounds a year, worked furiously. She was helped by three nimble-fingered maids, pressed into service as assistant cooks. There were to be a dozen courses to choose from, including duck, salmon and lamb, and accompanied by a half-dozen different wines. The evening would cost George Ballantyne a good seventy pounds.

  He did not mind. He was celebrating but not triumphant and said frankly, ‘I’ll just be damned glad when the war is over.’ But it would blunder on for another two years.

  Betty Simpson had been taken on by George Ballantyne when his son Richard closed down his own house after the flight of his wife Hilary. Now Betty stood in a corner of the kitchen by the door leading to the front of the house, from where she marshalled the extra girls hired to ‘wait on’ for the evening. There were already eight or nine and Mary crossed with a whisk of skirts to join them. She already wore her best high-necked black dress and now stripped off her coat and hung it on a hook by the door. She pulled a white apron, like that worn by the other girls, out of her bag and knotted it deftly in the small of her back.

  The single light at the top of the tower had come from the window of the crow’s nest. A ship’s captain had named the room thus after visiting George Ballantyne. From here he could look over the roofs of the town, down into the yards along the river and out to the sea beyond. He had built it for that reason. He lived by the sea. He was a builder of ships.

  For a man of his wealth the room was simply furnished. There was a desk close to the window and two leather armchairs before the fire. A thick rug covered most of the polished floor while bookshelves and glass-cased models of ships he had built crowded the walls. The room smelt of leather and polish.

  He was a little greyer now but still tall and straight, handsome in full eve
ning dress of tails and starched shirt front. The town below was a sprinkling of lights, the sea a black and dull silver blanket. In this room he found the solitude of standing on a mountain top. He had always been a solitary man, more so after the death of his wife, a loving companion for twenty years. She had died out there when the packet from Hamburg foundered in winter gales.

  He thought of her often and did so now, comparing her to Hilary Ballantyne. Richard had now divorced her and she was living in the South of France. Good riddance, he thought. But the affair had hurt his son. Little Jack, on the other hand, had not shed a tear. The old man thought shrewdly that the boy would certainly grieve if Jenkinson left him. The only good thing to come out of the whole unpleasant business was the boy coming to live with him.

  That reminded him and he turned and glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece, saw it was time to go. He walked down the wide, carpeted stairs that wound around the inside of the tower, and so came to the top floor of the house where his servants lived. Here, also, was the nursery. On the floor below, the first floor, were the rooms of Richard and himself, and those used by guests.

  He entered the nursery. It was a middle-sized, square room, looking out on the front of the house. Two other doors opened out of it, one leading to Jack’s bedroom, the other to Amy Jenkinson’s. She had come to the house with Jack, along with Betty Simpson and his rocking-horse, which stood, splashed with colour, in a corner. A coal fire burned in the grate and the brass fire-irons and fender reflected its glow. Linoleum covered the floor but a rug lay before the fire. A flowered paper on the walls formed a backdrop for two pictures: The Charge of the Light Brigade and Victory at Trafalgar. A round table by the window had been set for supper and Jack had just finished eating.

  He called, ‘Grandad!’ then jumped down from his chair, ran to meet his grandfather and clutched his leg. George stooped to ruffle his hair. Jack had grown several inches but that black hair was still rebellious, the blue eyes clear and sharp. He was ready for bed, dressing-gown wrapped over his nightshirt. Amy Jenkinson was folding the clothes he had discarded.

  George picked up the boy, carried him to the armchair by the fire and sat down with Jack in his lap. ‘Now, what have you been doing today?’

  They talked for a while, Jack trying to think back to recall the events in his childhood world, George nodding and looking appropriately serious or impressed, until he set the boy on his feet again and stood up. ‘I have to meet our guests.’ He cocked an eye at Amy Jenkinson, patiently standing by, and asked, ‘Has he been a good boy?’

  Amy pursed her lips, then said, ‘I think so, sir.’

  ‘Then he may stay up for a little while and watch. Goodnight, Jack.’

  ‘Goodnight, Grandad.’

  And George left him to the nurse.

  Down in the kitchen the door leading to the front of the house swung wide and Parsons the butler, in tailcoat, entered with a swift, gliding stride. He took in the apparent chaos in the kitchen, ignored the din of a dozen women talking at once and saw that Mrs Tyndall had all working like clockwork. He snapped at Betty Simpson, ‘The first guests are arriving. Two girls to serve sherry in the hall. Follow me, please.’ And he was gone through the door again.

  Betty called, ‘Dora! Mary!’

  A high stool stood in the corner. Mary lifted Chrissie up on to it and told her, ‘Now, you watch what’s going on but don’t get in the way!’ She kissed Chrissie then followed the other girl in pursuit of Parsons.

  Amy Jenkinson had said, ‘Just for half an hour, mind, and no further than the top o’ the stairs.’ So Jack Ballantyne knelt on the landing in his nightshirt and dressing-gown, peeping through the banister rails as he had done many a time before. He watched the guests arrive, to be welcomed in the hall by his grandfather. All the men were in full evening dress or uniform of scarlet or blue, the women in silks and satins and ablaze with jewellery. Two maids were moving among them with trays of small glasses. He did not recognise the girls but knew some had been brought in for the evening because he had heard Amy Jenkinson discussing the dinner with Betty Simpson.

  The half-hour passed quickly and then Parsons was in the hall, clearing his throat and announcing, ‘Dinner is served!’ The hall emptied as the crowd moved through to the long dining-room, and Amy Jenkinson came to take Jack by the hand. ‘Time for bed now.’

  He rose reluctantly. Increasingly he was questioning her authority. Wasn’t he – just – eight years old now? Hadn’t he been given lessons by a local curate coming to the house for the past three years? And he would be going to boarding school after the summer! He protested, ‘I’m not tired. I don’t want to go to bed yet.’

  But he had tried that one before and Amy had heard it from a score of infants over the years. ‘I am, and it’s another day tomorrow.’ And she led him away.

  He asked, ‘Are you going to bed?’

  ‘That I am,’ she lied. ‘I’m dead tired.’

  In truth she was weary, feeling her age now, finding that an energetic eight-year-old took too much out of her. But she was not going to bed. She stood behind Jack as he knelt and said his prayers, finishing: ‘. . . God Bless Daddy and Grandad and Jenkinson. Amen.’ She tucked him in and waited a half-hour in her own room, the door to his open, until she was sure he was asleep. Then she headed for the back stairs. The servants’ supper tonight would consist of the leftovers from dinner and her mouth watered at the thought of it.

  Amy Jenkinson was not the only one to have learnt over the years. Jack Ballantyne waited, breathing regularly and quietly so he could hear her moving. Twice he almost nodded off but caught himself in time, remembered what he intended to do and was wide awake again. When her soft footfalls faded down the stairs he rolled out of bed. In the light from the glowing embers of the nursery fire, smouldering inside its guard, he dressed quickly in the white sailor suit that she had set out for the morning. Then he slipped out on to the landing.

  The brightly lit hall beckoned below but maids scurried back and forth, carrying trays laden with plates and dishes. So he turned away from it and instead made his way down the narrow back stairs that the servants used to climb from the kitchen to their rooms on the top floor. On the ground floor he avoided the busy kitchen and went to a door used by the gardener. He had to struggle with the stiff bolt but he finally drew it clear and passed through. He was free.

  He had done it several times before, of course. This was no lucky, fumbling first attempt. He knew his route to the outdoors.

  And now? He might not go to the party but he would get as close to it as he could. He passed the kitchen, ducking below the window so he would not be seen, and went on to the big french windows that opened out from the long dining-room inside. The curtains were drawn but there was a gap an inch or two wide near the top and a tree near by. An adventurous eight-year-old could climb to a branch where he could sit and see through the gap. Soon he was straddling the bough.

  There was little to see after the first triumphant, intent minutes; he had seen it all before. A table set with silver and candelabra stretched the length of the room from front to back of the house. There were ladies and gentlemen eating and talking, maids swarming, serving or clearing away. A great, glass chandelier hung from the ceiling and picked up the glow from the fire and the colours from the dresses and uniforms.

  After a while Jack became bored, cold and hungry, climbed down from the tree and went back to peer in at the kitchen window. Its warmth was out of bounds to him and its food out of his reach. The kitchen table was loaded with it. There was a constant traffic of maids entering with half-empty dishes or piles of used plates, leaving with hot, clean ones and full dishes. He saw his nurse, Jenkinson, sitting on a straight-backed chair by the kitchen range, but set to one side so she would not be in the way of the cook while waiting for her supper. And in one corner a small girl, dark haired and dark eyed, perched on a high stool. She seemed to droop, the corners of her mouth down.

  Chrissie was bored. She had bee
n ignored ever since Mary Carter lifted her on to the stool, everyone in the kitchen being too busy to stop and talk to her. The evening had faded into monotony after starting so excitingly, with a promised visit to the big house, the chance of seeing rabbits – and a fox. Now she wondered . . .

  She would not be missed, not for just a few minutes. She got down from the stool and sidled through the bustle around the table, remembering Mary Carter’s warning and being careful not to get in anyone’s way. She eased open the door a few inches and slid sideways through the narrow gap, closed the door behind her and took a step or two. After the light in the kitchen, and because of that spilling out from the window now, the garden in contrast lay in pitchy blackness. There might be rabbits, or a fox out there, or . . . Her imagination took hold as branches waved overhead on a gust of wind and some creature squeaked among the trees. Then . . .

  ‘Hello!’

  Chrissie squeaked in fright. The voice came from only inches behind her. As she yelped she jumped forward and turned, then hesitated before running when she saw the owner of the voice, silhouetted and half-lit by the glow from the kitchen window. The boy wore a white sailor suit and was a head taller than she. Her yell had caused him to recoil so there was a yard between them. His chin was on his shoulder as he peered back at the kitchen window, but now he faced her again and said, ‘It’s all right. They didn’t hear you. Why did you shout like that?’

  ‘Because you scared me! That was a daft thing to do!’ Shame at him seeing her frightened stoked Chrissie’s anger.

  It did not impress Jack, who asked, ‘What are you doing here?’

  Chrissie answered, ‘My mam’s in there, waiting on. I came out to see the rabbits.’ Then she countered, ‘What are you doing here?’

  Jack answered with the confidence of ownership, ‘I live here.’ Then he asked, ‘What rabbits?’