The Branded Man Page 31

  ‘Yes; yes, of course.’

  Lifting his eyes from the blood-stained face to the bowl of water standing on the wash-hand stand, Don immediately went to it and took from the small top drawer a handkerchief that had been folded into a square but not ironed. This he dipped into the bowl of clean water, picked up a towel that was hanging over a rail attached to the wash-hand stand, and went back to the bed, where he gently sponged the blood from her face, muttering, ‘My dear. My dear.’

  He could now see that the blood was still oozing from a jagged cut between the top of her ear and her brow; and the arm lying across the mound of her belly looked in a bad state. It was covered with blood, like the rest of her; even her stockings showed red.

  When he lifted his eyes to her face he was amazed to see the tears running from beneath her lashes, and as his deep inner voice was crying, Oh, my dear one, my lovely, the words he actually spoke sounded cool: ‘Now Marie Anne, you’re going to be all right. Can you hear me? Yes, yes, I know you can. Now listen: the doctor’ll be here shortly.’ But his voice trailed away when through her blurred gaze she said, ‘I’m going to die, Don.’

  ‘What! Don’t be silly. Now listen!’

  But again she spoke: ‘Don, I knew it was coming. His hate has been with me all the time. I knew he would kill me in the end. I was drawn out of the house today for that purpose.’

  ‘Marie Anne, now listen to me: you are talking nonsense. You are not going to die. You are bruised, you are bleeding, you are shocked, but you’re not going to die. You are going to live and give birth to your baby.’

  Even as he spoke his eyes flickered to the cabinet on top of the low chest of drawers, and his mind took him down the ages. He could hear St Aloysius saying quietly, ‘I know on which day I am going to die,’ and die he did on that day.

  Oh God, get that out of his head; she can’t die, she can’t. I couldn’t suffer that. The voice was still with him, distant yet clear: There you go again. You couldn’t suffer the ache of her; you couldn’t suffer the sight of her because she created an ache in you; now you can’t suffer her dying. It’s how you feel, isn’t it? Always you, always the I, I, I.

  He was feeling the urge to scream abuse at the inner voice when Marie Anne spoke again. Not only did she speak, but she lifted her uninjured arm and caught at his hand, and her voice was low but firm as she said, ‘Don’t…don’t worry, Don. I…I’ve known for some time what would happen. I didn’t know how he would do it, I only knew he would, because he wanted to do it even when I was a child.’

  ‘Oh, Marie Anne.’

  ‘Listen. Listen, Don. I…I waited for you to come. When you didn’t, I felt I must see you once more. I…I don’t know why, but I just felt like that. I really wanted to talk about this.’ She now took her hand from his and laid it on the mask, but now her voice began to fade and her eyelids half closed as she muttered, ‘You know what I would want to say, but it doesn’t matter any longer.’

  He still had hold of her hand when the door opened, but now blindly he turned from the bed as Sally Harding took his place, saying, ‘Good gracious me, girl! But don’t worry, doctor will be here soon. In the meantime I’ll cover you up and keep you warm.’ Then turning to glance at Don, she said, ‘Now if you’ll just leave us, I’ll get on with it.’

  When the door had closed on him, Sally Harding, bending down to Marie Anne, asked softly, ‘Are you paining anywhere, dear?’

  When Marie Anne did not answer, Sally said, ‘Listen; you must tell me: have you got a pain anywhere?’

  With a slow movement Marie Anne put her hand across the mound of her belly, and Sally said, ‘You’ve got a pain there? Oh well; now we know where we are, or we think we do.’

  Standing in the living room, Farmer Harding said, ‘Has she any idea who it was?’

  ‘She’s got more than an idea, Fred; she knows who it was, as I do.’

  ‘You do?’

  ‘Yes. It was her brother.’

  ‘The older one? Vincent? I heard a rumour that he had gone for her before.’

  ‘You heard right.’

  ‘Is he mad?’

  ‘I wouldn’t say he’s mad, but just bad; full of hate and evil.’

  ‘But she’s just a lass and he’s…well, he’s kicking thirty.’

  At this moment the door was thrust open and Pat came in, gasping as he said, ‘What’s he done to her now? Where is she?’

  ‘It’s all right. It’s all right,’ said Don, putting a hand out towards him.

  ‘Sarah…Sarah said he battered her…her head, everywhere.’

  ‘She’s all right. Well, what I mean is, we’ll know what damage is done when the doctor comes. Have you sent for him?’

  ‘Yes; Barney’s gone post-haste. Took the trap. I told him to bring it to your place, Mr Harding.’

  ‘And rightly, sir. Yes, you did right; he’ll get here in half the time.’

  ‘Who’s with her?’

  ‘My wife, sir. She knows about such things; she was a midwife once. She’ll…well, she’ll know soon if there’s any damage been done; I mean, to the child.’ Turning now to Don, Pat said, ‘Sarah said it was Vincent. And of course it would be; who else? Yet it’s hard to believe that he would go this far.’

  ‘Where is Sarah?’ asked Don now.

  ‘She’s with Father; they’re coming along. She herself nearly collapsed when she got inside; we couldn’t get any sense out of her. She was yelling so much that we had to push her into the kitchen quarters in case Grandfather heard her, for we didn’t want to upset him until we knew exactly what had happened.’

  They all now turned towards the bedroom door as Mrs Harding came into the room, saying in a low voice, ‘You’ve brought the doctor?’

  ‘No, no. We’ve just sent for him,’ said Pat.

  ‘Well the quicker he gets here the better.’ And now addressing her husband, she said, ‘There’s a cut in the back of her head an’ all. Her hair’s all matted.’

  ‘Is she conscious? May I see her?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Pat. I suppose so, but I wouldn’t let her talk much.’

  When he stood by the bedside, almost as a child would, Pat’s hand went sideways to his mouth and his teeth bit into the soft flesh of his index finger as he looked down on his young sister.

  Marie Anne’s eyes were closed. The cut and grazed skin on her brow were still oozing blood, her eye and cheek were swollen and slowly discolouring, and there was blood soaking into the towel on which the arm was resting. The pillow behind her head, too, was showing blood.

  After a moment he bent over her and his voice was thick and breaking as he spoke her name, ‘Oh, Marie Anne. Marie Anne.’

  Slowly she opened her eyes and her voice stammered his name, ‘P-at.’

  ‘Yes, dear, it’s Pat.’

  ‘Pat.’

  ‘Yes, dear.’

  ‘He meant to kill me some…time. But not the baby. Save the baby, Pat.’

  ‘Be quiet, dear; don’t talk. You’ll be all right. You’ll be all right; and the baby too. The doctor will be here soon. And here’s Sarah and Father.’ He turned with relief as the door opened, and his lids were blinking rapidly as he looked at his father, and all he could find to say as he pointed to the bed, was, ‘She’s…she’s very tired,’ and straight away pushed past Sarah and went from the room.

  Now it was James Lawson who stood looking down on his daughter, and the only words his mind offered him were those used by all men of whatever class when confronted with emotions they could not express: ‘My God! My God!’

  When her eyes opened and she slowly lifted her good hand to his, he took it and held it between his own for a moment, but found it impossible even to speak her name; it was she who spoke to him: ‘Don’t worry, Father,’ she said.

  James had to close his eyes for a moment before he could look at her again, and when she added, ‘Please don’t tell Grandpa…not yet.’

  For the life of him he could not speak, not even her name, but what he did was
to bring her thin fingers up to his lips and kiss them; and when her hand dropped from his he turned blindly to look at Sarah, but she spoke no word either …

  It was nearly an hour later when Doctor Ridley arrived at the Hardings’ farm. Mr Harding had just finished milking and he gave him a rough idea of what he would find at the cottage. Being a naturally jovial man, he had also to narrate how, when he heard the screams, he had left his ploughing, only to find, on his return, that the horse had eaten so much grass from the side verges of the field, he wouldn’t get any more work out of him that day. Then he had gone on to say that his wife had taken charge of the matter up in Mr McAlister’s cottage and was awaiting his arrival.

  That Doctor Ridley was surprised at the situation he found in the cottage was not evident in either his speech or his manner, as he was shown into the bedroom and to the young girl bruised and bleeding from several parts of her body and lying, as he saw immediately, on a plank bed.

  He stood looking down on the heaving bedclothes that covered the mound of her belly while he slowly took off his coat; then handing it to Mrs Harding, who was standing at the foot of the bed, he said, ‘Hello, Mrs Harding,’ and she answered, ‘Good afternoon, doctor.’

  Then looking at the person who seemed to be impeding him, because she had hold of the limp hand of the patient, he said, ‘Would you mind?’

  Sarah could always recognise sarcasm; on this occasion, however, she did not rise to it, but said under her breath, ‘I’m not holding her hand, doctor, she’s gripping mine.’

  ‘Oh. Oh, I see. Well, then’—his voice was as low as hers—‘would you mind trying to disengage your hand? It would be a help, so that I could begin my examination.’ And these words were now accompanied by a smile, but she did not respond to it. What she did was to take her other hand and, one by one, lift Marie Anne’s fingers and embedded nails from her flesh.

  When at last her hand was free and she went to move it from the bed, the doctor picked it up and examined it. There was a row of small blood spots on the hand where the nails had pierced the flesh and, his tone changing completely, he said, ‘I see. I see. I’m sorry.’

  ‘That’s all right with me.’

  Her Irish brogue and the way she had delivered the last words caused him to turn and look to where she was now moving towards the window. Then he found that Mrs Harding was standing close to him and, her voice scarcely a whisper, she was saying, ‘They’re great friends, Doctor.’

  ‘Oh. Oh.’

  This news surprised him further, for the Irish woman was certainly no lady, whereas the girl lying on the bed there, he recalled seeing some years ago when she had a broken ankle.

  Gently now, he began his examination …

  It was twenty minutes later when he went into the other room, and without any preamble said to the three men waiting for him, ‘I shall need quite a lot of linen. Sheets, pillowcases, proper blankets, bedcovers, towels and such;’ then he turned and looked at Don, and there might have been a quirk to his lips as he said, ‘and soap. You don’t go in for refinements, Mr McAlister, do you?’

  ‘I have never found the need, Doctor.’

  ‘No, no; of course not. Well, now, that is the beginning.’

  ‘What d’you mean, sir’—it was James speaking—‘the beginning?’

  ‘Just what I say, Mr Lawson. There will be lots of things, many more, required if your daughter is to stay here for any length of time.’

  ‘But she can’t stay here!’ James’s voice expressed his indignation. ‘How can she stay here? We must find something to get her across to Mr Harding’s farm, and I’ll have the carriage there. One thing is certain, though, she can’t remain here.’

  The young doctor stared at the portly figure before him. He had never heard any good about this man, yet he had never heard any bad either. He seemed to be an indifferent figure, not worthy to be included in any of the gossip that went round about that house.

  Sensing the feeling of antagonism between his father and this very good doctor, Pat said in a placating tone, ‘You see, doctor, my father’s very worried about my sister, and as she is soon to have…a baby…’

  ‘Yes, yes; I understand that,’ said the young doctor impatiently. ‘So I would advise you to advise your father to go ahead, as long as he has an undertaker and a hearse waiting at the house; in her present condition she could not survive the journey.’ He now turned back to James as he added, ‘She has not only been beaten severely, arms and stomach, yes, and stomach,’ he emphasised, ‘she is expecting the baby soon, as your son says, and let me tell you it might be sooner than you think. I understand from Mrs Harding that she has twice shown signs of labour pains, and I myself have just witnessed another, yet she is in so much shock and so weak that I doubt but there is to be a long battle for her, and for us too, I might add, before she can thrust her child into the world, whether alive or dead.’

  This last statement seemed to stun the three men, and the doctor remained silent in order to allow the import of his words to sink in. When he went on it was to address Don: ‘Your sleeping arrangements are crude, to say the least, Mr McAlister,’ he said, ‘but your board bed might come in handy after all if I have to use it. But we’ll wait and see; another twenty-four hours should give us the answer; in the meantime I’m sure one of you’—he now looked from father to son—‘will want to stay the night and you’ll need a place to sleep, because that’—he pointed to the couch—‘doesn’t offer much comfort.’

  ‘It is sufficient for what I need,’ put in Don stiffly, and the doctor replied, ‘No doubt. No doubt.’ But then, his voice softening and even taking on a jocular tone, he said, ‘We’re not all as strong and hardy as you. Anyway, here’s one that isn’t, and if I need a rest between times, I should like a mattress to lie on. So, would it be possible—’ he was now addressing James as he went on, ‘to let us have three single mattresses? Two for out here and one inside the bedroom, because your housekeeper seems determined to live in there as long as your daughter is there. She says she can keep going for twenty-four hours or more. Maybe she can, but if her will is to give way to her body I would like to think she’ll have somewhere to place it.’

  ‘You’ll have everything you need, doctor,’ said James. ‘And now I’m going to ask you one straight question, and I would like a straight answer: What is the exact condition of my daughter?’

  Doctor Ridley stared at the man. Then, in an unusually quiet voice, he said, ‘This is one time, sir, when I must tell you I find it impossible to give a straight answer. I can only say that at the present moment she is in shock; her temperature is rising; she must be in a great deal of pain, which I could alleviate. But this would only sap her energy, all of which she will need if she intends to bring the child naturally. That’s all I can tell you at the present.’

  ‘But what, sir, do you mean by naturally?’

  This was Pat asking the question, and the doctor turned to him and said, ‘Well, to put it bluntly, if she won’t give birth to the child in the ordinary way it will have to be taken from her.’

  ‘Even if it is alive?’

  ‘Yes, yes, of course if it is alive. But let us all hope for the best. She is young and, as I recall, has a strong spirit, both good assets at a time like this. And now down to very mundane and practical matters: food. For the moment she will need only drinks. But having said that, there is the rank and file to be thought of. I don’t suppose’—he was looking at Don now—‘you have a supply of tea, sugar, butter, bread, milk and such like to meet the occasion that has arisen?’

  ‘No, sir; I’m sorry I haven’t, but I can always see it is provided.’

  ‘Oh, that is good and kind of you. Well, now,’—again he was looking at James—‘if I could ask you, sir, to see to the requirements we will be needing to get us over tonight and tomorrow. We will talk again about what will be needed during the further weeks.’

  ‘Further weeks?’ James’s face was screwed up as if in enquiry, and the doctor a
nswered, ‘Yes, of course; further weeks. After she has had the baby she will be in need of a fortnight’s rest at the least in her state.’

  ‘But, sir…’

  ‘Yes, Mr Lawson?’

  James could find nothing more to say to this man. He wasn’t used to dealing with doctors, at least not of this ilk. At the house, whenever there had been need of one, they had been attended by Dr Angus Sutton-Moore…but of course, he recalled that this young man—and, to him, he still seemed very young—was the one who had attended Marie Anne when she broke her foot and who laid down certain rules as to how she was to be treated. Well! He suddenly turned away and, picking up his hat and without speaking, he went to the door.

  Looking from the doctor to Don, Pat said, ‘No-one has asked your opinion about using your house; we’ve taken everything for granted.’

  ‘Well, go on doing just that. Please.’

  After a long pause and an exchange of glances, Pat said, ‘Thank you, Don;’ then he turned and followed his father.

  As they hurried towards The Little Manor, Pat thought that he had never heard his father talk as he was doing now. Granted he had given him some surprises over the past few weeks, the main one being his frequent visits, not only to see his own father but to spend hours at the house, which Pat knew would have inflamed his mother’s anger still further, but now here he was saying that he was going to take all that was necessary for the doctor’s needs and the comfort of others from The Manor. He also said it was a night some people would not forget in a hurry.

  Before they parted at The Little Manor, he said to Pat, ‘Father will likely have got wind of something now because I understand Foggerty usually takes him a cup of tea in the middle of the afternoon. You must impress upon him that he cannot go along there tonight because there’s no place for him to sit, never mind sleep, but tell him you’ll take him first thing in the morning.’ And with this his father had left him at The Little Manor and continued to march on to the house, for marching he was.