The Mallen Girl Read online

  THE MALLEN GIRL

  Catherine Cookson

  The Catherine Cookson Story

  In brief:

  Her books have sold over 130 million copies in 26 languages throughout the world and still counting…

  Catherine Cookson was born Katherine Ann McMullen on June 27th, 1906 in the bleak industrial heartland of Tyne Dock, South Shields (then part of County Durham) and later moved to East Jarrow, which is now in Tyne and Wear.

  She was the illegitimate daughter of Kate Fawcett, an alcoholic, whom she thought was her sister. She was raised by her grandparents, Rose and John McMullen. The poverty, exploitation, and bigotry she experienced in her early years aroused deep emotions that stayed with her throughout her life and which became part of her stories. Catherine left school at 13, and after a period of domestic service, she took a job in a laundry at Harton Workhouse in South Shields. In 1929, she moved south to run the laundry at Hastings Workhouse, working all hours and saving every penny to buy a large Victorian house. She took in gentleman and lady lodgers to supplement her income and took up fencing as one of her hobbies. One of her lodgers was Tom Cookson, a teacher at Hastings Grammar School, and in June 1940, they married. They were devoted to each other throughout their lives together. But the early years of her marriage were beset by the tragic miscarriage of four pregnancies and her subsequent mental breakdown. This took her over a decade to recover from, which she did, often by standing in front of a mirror and giving herself a damn good swearing at!

  Catherine took up writing as a form of therapy to deal with her depression and joined the Hastings Writers’ Group. Her first novel, Kate Hannigan, was published in 1950. In 1976, she returned to Northumberland with Tom and went on to write 104 books in all. She became one of the most successful novelists of all time and was one of the first authors to have three or four titles in the Bestseller Lists at the same time.

  She read widely: from Chaucer to the literature of the 1920s; to Plato’s Apologia on the trial and death of Socrates (she said that here was someone who stuck to his principles even unto death); to history of the nineteenth century and the Romantic poets; to Lord Chesterfield’s Letters To His Son and the books and booklets that abounded in her part of the country dealing with coal, iron, lead, glass, farming and the railways. She disliked it when her books were labeled as ‘romantic.’ To her, they were ‘readable social history of the North East interwoven into the lives of the people.’ For the millions of her readers, she brought ‘an understanding of themselves’ or perhaps of their dear ones. Her stories do not bring in a realism in which the worst is taken for granted, but a realism in which love, caring, and compassion appear, and most certainly, hope. ‘This type of realism does exist,’ Tom Cookson said of her writing. There is nothing sentimental about her writing; she is unrelenting in the strong images she invokes and the characters she portrays. They were born of her formative years and her personal struggles. Many of her novels have been transferred to stage, film, and radio with her television adaptations on ITV, lasting over a decade and achieving ratings of over 10 million viewers.

  Besides writing, she was an innovative painter, and she believed that her father’s genes fostered the strength to work hard, but also, in rare moments of freedom, to strive to better herself. Catherine was famed for her care of money but had given much to charities, hospitals, and medical research in areas close to her heart and to the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, who set up a lectureship in hematology. The Catherine Cookson Charitable Trust continues to donate generously to charitable causes. The University later conferred her the Honorary Degree of Master of Arts. She received the Freedom of the Borough of South Tyneside, today known as Catherine Cookson Country. The Variety Club of Great Britain named her Writer of the Year, and she was voted Personality of the North East. Other honours followed: an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1986, and she was created Dame of the British Empire in 1993. She was appointed an Honorary Fellow at St. Hilda’s College, Oxford in 1997.

  Throughout her life, but especially in the later years, she was plagued by a rare vascular disease, telangiectasia, which caused bleeding from the nose, fingers, and stomach, and resulted in anemia. As her health declined, she and her husband moved for a final time to Jesmond in Newcastle upon Tyne to be nearer medical facilities. For the last few years of her life, she was bedridden and Tom hardly ever left her bedside, looking after her needs, cooking for her, and taking her on her emergency trips, often in the middle of the night into Newcastle. Their lives were still made up of the seven-day week and twelve or more hours each day, going over the fan mail, attending to charities, and going over the latest dictated book, with Tom meticulously making corrections line by line, for Catherine’s eyesight had long faded in her 80s.

  This most remarkable woman passed away on June 11th, 1998 at the age of 91. Tom, six years her junior, had earlier suffered a heart attack but survived long enough to be with her at her end. He passed away on 28th June, just 17 days after his beloved Catherine.

  Contents

  Cover

  Titlepage

  The Catherine Cookson Story

  Books by Catherine Cookson

  Description

  Copyright

  BOOK ONE Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  BOOK TWO Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  BOOK THREE Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Catherine Cookson’s Books

  NOVELS

  Colour Blind

  Maggie Rowan

  Rooney

  The Menagerie

  Fanny McBride

  Fenwick Houses

  The Garment

  The Blind Miller

  The Wingless Bird

  Hannah Massey

  The Long Corridor

  The Unbaited Trap

  Slinky Jane

  Katie Mulholland

  The Round Tower

  The Nice Bloke

  The Glass Virgin

  The Invitation

  The Dwelling Place

  Feathers in the Fire

  Pure as the Lily

  The Invisible Cord

  The Gambling Man

  The Tide of Life

  The Girl

  The Cinder Path

  The Man Who Cried

  The Whip

  The Black Velvet Gown

  A Dinner of Herbs

  The Moth

  The Parson’s Daughter

  The Harrogate Secret

  The Cultured Handmaiden

  The Black Candle

  The Gillyvors

  My Beloved Son

  The Rag Nymph

  The House of Women

  The Maltese Angel

  The Golden Straw

  The Year of the Virgins

  The Tinker’s Girl

  Justice is a Woman

  A Ruthless Need

  The Bonny Dawn

  The Branded Man

  The Lady on my Left

  The Obsession

  The Upstart

  The Blind Years

  Riley

  The Solace of Sin

  The Desert Crop

  The Thursday Friend

  A House Divided

  Rosie of the River

  The Silent Lady

  FEATURING KATE HANNIGAN

  Kate Hannigan (her first published novel)

  Kate Hannigan’s Girl (her hundredth published novel)

  T
HE MARY ANN NOVELS

  A Grand Man

  The Lord and Mary Ann

  The Devil and Mary Ann

  Love and Mary Ann

  Life and Mary Ann

  Marriage and Mary Ann

  Mary Ann’s Angels

  Mary Ann and Bill

  FEATURING BILL BAILEY

  Bill Bailey

  Bill Bailey’s Lot

  Bill Bailey’s Daughter

  The Bondage of Love

  THE TILLY TROTTER TRILOGY

  Tilly Trotter

  Tilly Trotter Wed

  Tilly Trotter Widowed

  THE MALLEN TRILOGY

  The Mallen Streak

  The Mallen Girl

  The Mallen Litter

  FEATURING HAMILTON

  Hamilton

  Goodbye Hamilton

  Harold

  AS CATHERINE MARCHANT

  Heritage of Folly

  The Fen Tiger

  House of Men

  The Iron Façade

  Miss Martha Mary Crawford

  The Slow Awakening

  CHILDREN’S

  Matty Doolin

  Joe and the Gladiator

  The Nipper

  Rory’s Fortune

  Our John Willie

  Mrs. Flannagan’s Trumpet

  Go tell It To Mrs Golightly

  Lanky Jones

  Bill and The Mary Ann Shaughnessy

  AUTOBIOGRAPHY

  Our Kate

  Let Me Make Myself Plain

  Plainer Still

  The Mallen Girl

  Even as a child Barbara was beautiful. But as her beauty grew, so did the affliction which shadowed it. She was becoming more and more deaf. Yet, living in an almost silent world, Barbara was protected from the knowledge which might otherwise have destroyed her—the secret of her own parentage.

  But there was one who knew the secret—her governess, Anna Brigmore, who was haunted by this knowledge, and by the thought that it must one day be revealed to the girl she cherished as her own daughter.

  The Mallen Girl is the sequel to The Mallen Streak and the second novel in the compelling trilogy which follows the fate of the Mallens through succeeding generations.

  Copyright © The Catherine Cookson Charitable Trust 1973

  The right of Catherine Cookson to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998

  This book is sold subject to the condition it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form.

  ISBN 978-1-78036-102-4

  Sketch by Harriet Anstruther

  Except where actual historical events and characters are being described, all situations in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to living persons is purely coincidental.

  Published by Peach Publishing

  BOOK ONE

  YOUNG BARBARA

  One

  The trap had hardly stopped opposite the cottage gate before the lithe figure of the young girl sprang down from it, ran up the back path, across the small courtyard, thrust open the door of the kitchen, and slammed her beaded handbag and the book she was carrying down on the table, which action caused Mary Peel, who was standing at the far end of the table, to space her lips widely apart and mouth her words in a loud voice crying, ‘Now Miss Barbara you! Now don’t you start the minute you’re in; keep your tantrums for those who caused them.’

  The young girl’s hand went to the book again and as she grabbed it up and threw it, the door leading from the hall opened and Miss Anne Brigmore entered. The book had missed its target, skimming by Mary Peel’s face, but it hit Miss Brigmore’s shoulder, bounced off and on to the dresser, knocking a jug onto the stone floor.

  After the resounding crash of the jug splintering there was quiet in the kitchen for a moment. Miss Brigmore, staring in pained silence at the young girl who was known as her ward, but whom she thought of as her daughter, cried from her heart, ‘Oh Barbara! Barbara, my dear.’ But Mary Peel, looking at the girl, thought, By! If I had me way I’d skelp your backside for you, I would that. Your neck’s been broken, that’s your trouble, miss.

  And apparently her thinking was endorsed by Jim Waite as he held the door open when Miss Brigmore took hold of Barbara’s hand and led her out of the room, for as soon as he closed it he said, ‘That one wants her ears scudded.’ ‘Aw, don’t say that, Jim,’ said Mary Peel now; ‘I know she deserves her hammers, but it’s her ears an’ not being able to hear right that makes her as she is. Sit yourself down, the kettle’s on the boil. How’s things been?’

  Jim Waite lowered his long length on to the wooden kitchen chair and stretched out his hands toward the fire before saying, ‘Oh, much as usual. I suppose I’m sayin’ it as shouldn’t, but I tell you everybody on the farm breathes a sigh of relief when that young monkey steps up into the trap. They do, they do.’ He nodded at her. ‘She makes the young master’s life hell. She never lets him out of her sight; he can’t go to the netty for her, an’ that’s a fact. And I’m not just usin’ that as a sayin’, ’cos only this mornin’ he was in the closet and there she was standin’ in the middle of the yard looking at the doorway waitin’ for him coming out. It isn’t decent. You’d think Miss Brigmore would be able to do something about it, now wouldn’t you? If anybody could you’d think she could. And yet on the other hand, as me da was sayin’ just the other night, it’s her who’s partly to blame for the way Miss Barbara is now. Oh, not her ears, no but the way she carries on, ’cos she’s given in to her all along the line.’

  ‘Here, drink this.’ Mary handed him a mug of tea and asked, ‘Would you like a bit of new fadge, it’s just out of the oven?’

  ‘Aye, ta; it’ll fill a corner.’

  ‘An’ you’ve got some corners to fill.’ Mary pushed him in the shoulder with the flat of her hand. ‘You would’ve thought you’d stopped growin’ years ago…How’s your ma and da?’

  ‘Oh fine, fine.’

  ‘And Lily?’

  ‘Oh Lily. You’ll never believe it but I think she’s got Bill Twigg up to scratch at last.’

  Mary sat down abruptly now and, clasping her hands, she bounced them on her lap as she leaned toward him and said, ‘No! What’s brought it on?’

  ‘Well, Harry Brown’s wife died over Allendale way. He’s got a bit of a farm, not much to brag about but enough to keep the wolf from the door. Well, he’s been over three times in the last three months, an’ each time stood chattin’ and laughing with our Lily. It’s made Bill think.’ He jerked his head as he ended, ‘An’ so he should, he’s been courtin’ her for seven years. But it was his mother to blame there, at least up till three years ago when she died, ’cos she always used to tell him that it was unlucky to marry a woman older than himself. Two years, I ask you! Eeh! the things people say an’ believe in…This is a nice bit of fadge, Mary.’

  He took another huge bite out of the buttered bread, then ended, ‘Folks in the main are ignorant, you know, ignorant…’

  In the sitting room Miss Brigmore was using the same words. ‘It is ignorance, my dear,’ she was saying, ‘just ignorance.’ Miss Brigmore did not speak as loudly as Mary Peel, but her voice was a pitch above normal, and she moved her lips in a slightly exaggerated fashion.

  ‘She is horrible, and I hate her.’

  ‘You mustn’t say that, Barbara. Sarah is only a little girl, she is but ten years old.’

  Miss Brigmore did not think that the girl standing before her at this moment was but twelve years old, for she considered Barbara older than her years. Knowledge, she thought had made her so, the knowledge that she herself had imparted to her. The child, although having the terrible disadvantage of being almost completely deaf, nevertheless had the balancing advantage of being as well informed on a great many subjects as any young lady of twenty.

  She gazed at the child, who was over-thin and ov
er-tall for her age…and over-beautiful too. Her straight black hair was shining with the sheen of a wet seal. The skin that covered her long face was creamy and thick of texture and without tint. Her eyes were dark brown and the look in them now, as at other times, made Miss Brigmore uneasy, for it reminded her of the look in Donald Radlet’s eyes, Donald Radlet who had been the husband of Barbara’s aunt, Constance, but who was much closer to her than an uncle, did she but know it. This fact often kept Miss Brigmore awake at nights as she searched for a way to break to her beloved child the truth of her beginnings. She was fully aware that but for the girl’s deafness her origin would have been made clear to her long before now, and, if by no-one else, by one of the Waite family over at Wolfbur farm, for she had aroused the dislike not only of Harry and Daisy Waite, but also of Jim and Lily, their son and daughter, and all because she had taken a dislike to Harry Waite’s niece, Sarah.

  Harry Waite had brought Sarah to the farm when she was two years old, when her parents had both died of the fever. Sarah had grown into a pretty and lively little girl and she was popular not only with the Waite family, but with the mistress, Constance Radlet, and her mother-in-law Jane Radlet too.

  All this would have been quite in order and accepted by Barbara had the attention to Sarah stopped there, but her cousin Michael had championed the little girl from the day she arrived on the farm, for Sarah, although so much younger than himself, was someone with whom he could play and at the same time protect. Previous to Sarah’s coming the only time Michael had anyone of his own age to play with was when Barbara visited the farm. In the summer the visits could be frequent, but during the winter months the children were lucky if they saw each other twice.

  The first time the rift between the children came into the open was one exceptionally mild Christmas. Miss Brigmore herself had driven Mary and the child over expecting to be able to return home within the week, but their stay on the farm had lengthened into almost three weeks, and although Michael, then eight years old, had played with Barbara and tolerated her domination, he had continued to take notice of young Sarah.