Lanky Jones Read online

  LANKY JONES

  Catherine Cookson

  Contents

  The Catherine Cookson Story

  Lanky Jones

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  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.

  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)

  THE 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 Bi
ll

  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

  Lanky Jones

  Daniel Jones wanted no more trouble—he already had plenty. Living alone with his father was far from easy, and the weekend visits with his now-attentive mother and her new husband were almost more than the fifteen-year-old could bear.

  But then, one night, he and his father are stranded during a snowstorm and are offered refuge by a kind family at the Everton farm. Daniel is mystified by the strange goings-on there and, though reluctant at first, becomes deeply involved in the Evertons’ problems and discovers that their long kept secret was more disturbing than his own.

  In this suspenseful adventure, a young boy realises that there are few simple rights and wrongs in love and family ties.

  Copyright © The Catherine Cookson Charitable Trust 1980

  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 1988

  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 978-1-78036-090-4

  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

  To Karen and Alan

  in the cottage on the hill

  Chapter One

  ‘Dad.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘May I ask you a question?’

  ‘You don’t often ask if you can ask a question. What is it?’

  ‘Do you still love Mam?’

  The car swerved slightly; the driver turned the wheel sharply before answering briefly, ‘No.’

  ‘Did…did you love her at the time she left you?’

  There was a longer pause now before Peter Jones answered, ‘No.’

  ‘Is…is that why she went off and left you…us?’

  Mr Jones pressed his back tight against the leather seat and let out a long breath before he said, ‘And the answer for the third time is no. But now I’m going to ask you a question. Why were you in such a devil of a rush to come back home? You haven’t been like that during your other visits to her.’

  There was no pause before Daniel the fifteen-year-old fair-haired boy jerked his head towards his father and exclaimed in bitter tones, ‘He wasn’t there at other times.’

  ‘But you had met him before, and as far as I can gather you didn’t think he was such a bad type.’

  ‘He wasn’t married to her then and acting as if he owned her, and the house and me an’ all.’

  ‘Oh’—the word was long-drawn-out—‘played the father figure, did he?’

  ‘Yes, and overdid it.’

  There was silence in the car now except for the noise from the engine which was indeed a noise. Being a nineteen sixty-eight Morris it had seen its better days and every now and again the rhythm of the engine was broken by a sound that could be taken as the protest which might come from an old body being driven beyond its limits. Both the father and the son seemed oblivious to all but their own thoughts; yet the thoughts of both were dwelling on the same person.

  Daniel’s memory was taking him back to when he was eight years old, when he first became aware that his mother was very smart, very vivacious. It was at the school play and Jimmy Osborn had said to him, ‘By, your mam’s a smasher!’

  He did not know at what age he became aware that his mam was a person who easily became bored. Perhaps it was that time when she jigged him around the room saying in a sing-song voice, ‘Your dad doesn’t realise your mam’s a song and dance girl.’ He could see his father sitting in the armchair smoking his pipe. He had just said he wasn’t going out to the club, or anywhere else that night.

  Looking back, Daniel thought perhaps that was the first time his mother had gone out on her own. He had considered his dad to be silly and selfish not to take her out; but then, his dad being a gardener was outside all day and so what he looked forward to, at least for one or two nights a week, was a quiet evening at home.

  When was it he realised he was on his dad’s side? Soon after his mother started to go out every night, he supposed; that was after she went back full-time to office work. Previous to this she was always home when he came back from school and would be preparing a meal. But after she started work again he had let himself into the house and set the table for the tea which usually meant beans or fish fingers.

  Then just over two years ago she had walked out. He hadn’t heard any big row or anything like that, she had merely left a letter to say that she wasn’t coming back.

  Although his dad had just said he hadn’t loved her when she left him, he now recalled that his dad had hardly spoken for a week afterwards except in monosyllables. But when he did get round to talking, the first thing he said to him was, ‘You didn’t want to go with her, did you?’ and when he answered, ‘No,’ his father had said, ‘That’s all right then.’

  Although he liked being with his dad, there were times when he felt very lonely as if he were missing something. His mind wouldn’t allow him to put the word loving to his need because his mam had never been loving towards him; she had never put her arms around him and hugged him. He knew it was soppy to expect a mother to do that, yet some mothers did, he had seen them, even with fellows as tall and as lanky as he was. He wished he wasn’t so lanky, he wished he could stop growing. He was sprouting so quickly that at times he didn’t know where to put his arms or legs.

  His mam’s new man joked about his height, all the time pretending he was angry that he was taller than him. There was an arrangement whereby he had to visit his mother once a month; well, when the time came round for his next excursion to Carlisle he’d be sick in some way, perhaps break one of his gangly limbs.

  ‘I wonder if that cottage has been sold. You remember the cottage?’

  He looked at his father. Yes, he remembered the cottage, or what was left of it; it was a wreck standing in the middle of a field. One day in the summer when they were up here his father had walked round it as if he were viewing a palace. All his father seemed to want was a cottage in the country and a piece of land. But he himself hoped his dad never realised his dream, not out here anyway in this wild, sparsely populated part of the country where all you saw were little stone farmhouses dotted here and there.

  ‘I said, do you remember the cottage?’

  ‘Yes, I remember the…the ruin.’

  Mr Jones laughed now, saying, ‘Ruin or not, I bet somebody’s had the same idea as I had and snipped it,’ and he leant forward and
peered out of the windscreen onto the narrow snow-bordered road as he said, ‘We’re nearing the turn off, what do you say we go and have a look at it?’

  It was Daniel’s turn to laugh now as he asked, ‘Are you looking for trouble, Dad? The side roads will likely be blocked, and Jinny’s been grunting more than usual. Perhaps you haven’t heard her.’

  Daniel shook his head as he watched his father take his hand from the wheel and pat the fascia board, saying with real affection, ‘She’s been grunting for years, and if I know anything she’ll go on grunting when some of this year’s products are on the scrapheap. Well, what do you say?’

  Mr Jones glanced at his son and Daniel answered brightly, ‘Yes, I don’t mind. If we go into a snowdrift there’s half a flask of tea and two sandwiches left; they should see us over the next week or until they come and dig us out.’

  They laughed together now and both sat up straighter in their seats, peering along the road looking for the turning; and when they came to it, Mr Jones swung the wheel, saying, ‘Here goes!’ and Daniel, his tone high and light, shouted, ‘You know what you sounded like there, Dad? Like a canoeist approaching the rapids, knowing he would be lucky if he ever got through.’

  ‘Well, these are no rapids; look ahead, there’s been farm tractors up here. It’s clearer than the main road in parts.’

  After about half a mile there was a sharp bend in the road, and this at the top of a steep gradient, and the expression on both their faces changed somewhat when they saw the road at the bottom was covered with thick snow.

  Before they actually reached the level ground Mr Jones drew the car to a stop and, looking to the right of him, pointed, saying, ‘There it is!’

  ‘Yes’—Daniel nodded—‘and by all appearances nobody’s jumped at the chance of taking it. What on earth can you see in it, Dad?’

  ‘Oh, a home, a smallholding, a way of life.’

  ‘You’re not going to get out and have another dander round it, are you, not in these conditions?’

  ‘No.’ Mr Jones smiled as he shook his head. Then he started the car again, saying, ‘I’ll run down to that field gate, there’s more room for turning.’