The Mallen Litter Read online

  She stood straight and stiff in the middle of the sitting room facing him. Her lips opened to speak, closed; and opened again before she ground out between her teeth, ‘He…he called them the…the…Mallen litter.’

  ‘What!’

  ‘You heard what I said, he called them the Mallen litter.’

  ‘The Mallen litter? Why, why would he call them that?’

  ‘Because…because he said Benjamin looked like a Mallen, like…like Thomas Mallen.’ She spat the name out as if it were alum. Dan glared at her, at this woman he loved, adored, worshipped in fact.

  In the years together he had never crossed her. At times he had been stubborn and showed her the side of himself that had strong connections with his father, but always he had come round and been the amenable Dan, the loving, comforting Dan, and above all the understanding Dan. But now there was no evidence of any of these sympathetic qualities in his face, and the tone of his voice was cutting and almost that of a stranger when he said, ‘Do you mean to say you spoilt this night for them just because of that, because he uttered a truth, because he said one of them looked like their grandfather? What you’ve got to face up to once and for all is that Thomas Mallen, dead or alive, is their grandfather and your father. Dear God!’ He thrust his fingers through his thick sandy hair ‘I thought you’d got all that out of your system during your silent period back in the cottage. But I was mistaken, you’re still harbouring it, and by heavens you’ve proved it tonight. All right’—he waved his hand at her—‘you were born of a tragedy, but I can’t see any sense in carrying it on after all these years. Anyway. I should think there’s enough harm and trouble come out of it as it is. I don’t know how it strikes you…’ He stopped as he saw the colour drain from her already pale skin and her eyes widen while her head moved sideways and she buried her chin in her shoulder as if seeking comfort.

  Yesterday, this attitude of hers would have brought his arms about her and his mouth showering reassuring kisses over her face, but now it apparently didn’t affect him, except in a reverse way, for what he did now was to cry, ‘Mallen! Mallen! Mallen! Go on, shout the name out, purge yourself of it, get it out of your system. For my part I don’t care if the three of them grow up carrying the white streak; I don’t care what they look like outside as long as they grow up men and have the character of my dad and John. And another thing I’ll say while I’m on.’ He drew in a deep breath and his tone was quieter now. ‘It’s Katie’s day tomorrow. She’s my sister, and I’m more than fond of her, so don’t spoil it. And lastly, you’d better know now, because it isn’t often I follow my own bent, we’re going home. I’m going to take the job Dad’s proposed. I’ve played about long enough. From now on I’ve got to earn my keep and yours, and that of the litter, Mallen or otherwise, until they can fend for themselves.’

  As he stalked from the room Barbara lowered herself slowly down into a chair. She was shocked, she couldn’t believe it, Dan to speak to her like that! Dan to act so. She had always known there was another side to him, there was bound to be, for he had his father in him, but he had never shown it to her, and she had thought he never would.

  As her hands gripped each other she became aware that she had lost something tonight, and that he had gained something; in the latter case, just what she couldn’t put a name to, but in the former, the fact that she hadn’t seen this side of his character before was proof of the extent of his loving her. She had been difficult over the years and she must have tried his patience to the limit, yet he had never retaliated. But now he had, and all through Pat Ferrier.

  It was odd how this man, whom she had met but a few times in her life, should be the means of pressing home the fact that she was a Mallen, for was it not he from whom she had first heard of her origin? Heard was the wrong word; being deaf at the time, she had read his lips. It was on the night she had danced in the farmyard with Michael, her cousin Michael, and he had almost kissed her, almost. His mother had been furious when she had come upon them, but Pat Ferrier, who was with her, had laughed and said, ‘She doesn’t carry the streak but she’s a Mallen all right.’ That was the first indication she’d had of being a Mallen.

  And now, in a foreign country, far away from the farm and the valley in the Northumberland hills, here he was again reminding her of her beginnings, and not only that, but calling her babies a litter, a Mallen litter.

  She hated him, she would never forgive him, not until the day she died. She didn’t wish Katie any unhappiness, but him! She ground her teeth together. What did she wish him?…That he’d never produce a litter. No! Nor even one child to bear his name.

  MICHAEL 1888

  One

  Wolfbur Farm lay in a valley near the border of Northumberland and Cumberland.

  When the people in Allendale, and those even as far away as Hexham and Haltwhistle, spoke of the farmer they always referred to him as she, for Constance Radlet had run the farm for more than twenty years, and although her son, Michael, was now virtually in charge he was not looked upon as the first man in the place. In fact, it was Jim Waite who, since old Waite’s death, was deferred to more than was the young master.

  Michael Radlet was aware of this situation, as was his mother, but neither of them voiced their opinion on it. He could not say to her, ‘You are not giving me my due any more than Jim is,’ for in a way his mother, and Jim Waite, and the whole Waite family blamed him for what had happened to Sarah. That he had married her did not in their eyes lift the guilt from him, for in different ways they made it clear to him that if he had stood up to ‘the other one’ and told her where his real intentions lay, the climax that had led to the maiming of Sarah would never have come about.

  They all took it for granted now that it had always been his intention to marry Sarah, for had he not been brought up with her, played with her as a child, protected her, danced with her at the harvest suppers? He was continually being reminded that at one time she had been able to dance. It had now reached the point that if she mentioned dancing just once again he would turn on her, really turn on her; not just growl at her under his breath as he did when they were in bed, or turn his back on her whining voice when in the kitchen, but come into the open with a yell, and bawl, not only at her but at his mother, oh yes, at his mother, ‘You got what you wanted, the both of you. You got rid of Barbara; once and for all you got rid of her.’

  Who but his mother could have made him feel it was nothing less than his duty to marry Sarah?

  ‘You are fond of her, aren’t you?’ she had said.

  ‘Yes,’ he had answered.

  ‘Well then.’ She had stared fixedly into his distressed face before adding, ‘She’s a sweet thing.’

  Yes, she had been a sweet thing up till then, and he had been very fond of her, but when she lost her leg it wasn’t only her body that became maimed but seemingly her mind. If she had been someone who had made a name on the stage through her dancing she could not have reacted more tragically at being deprived of what was after all but a twice-yearly recreation, the harvest supper in the barn and the Christmas jollification in the kitchen.

  And up till that time too he and his mother had been all in all to each other, but on that fateful day the bond of affection between them was broken. Barbara in her attack on Sarah had not only crippled her but she had severed the umbilical cord that had tied him to his mother.

  What was more, his horror and disgust at Barbara’s action and his open rejection of her had elicited in her a frenzied rage and she had spat at him his own true beginnings and the reason why his hair was fair instead of black like his father’s. All the offspring of the male Mallens were black-haired, and he had thought that his father had been the fly-blow of a Mallen. But she had made it plain to him that it was no Mallen who had bred him, it was his supposed father’s half-brother, Matthew Radlet, the legitimate son of the owner of the farm, the fair-haired young fellow who had died early of consumption. He had been begotten, so she had screamed at him, on the floor o
f the derelict house way up on the hills, the house that was used as a mean shelter for the scum of the roads.

  In the hurry and anxiety of getting Sarah to the hospital that day the shock of the revelation had become a secondary thing in his mind, but a secondary thing that held shame, bewilderment and a rising resentment.

  Every day in the week that followed he told himself he would bring it out in the open, yet he didn’t, for he couldn’t look the tall, stately woman in the face and ask her to deny or confirm this thing. Yet in a way he did confront her with his knowledge, for he had gone up into the attic in search of the photographs that used to hang in his granny’s room. It was as he looked at the photos of the two half-brothers and saw the truth staring at him from the fair-headed man that he became aware that he wasn’t alone and, turning, he saw his mother standing in the doorway. She had looked from the pictures in his hand into his face, and their gaze had held for a long painful moment before she turned abruptly away. But the truth was out, even if unspoken, and it was from then that she went over, as it were, to the other side, to the side of Sarah, Jim Waite and his people. And it was from then that she too changed, and he saw her no longer as his charming mother, but as an authority, cool, distant, and ever watchful.

  Soon after his daughter was born in 1883 he realised that his mother and Sarah combined were, in a subtle way, going to cut him off from his child, perhaps the only one he would ever have, legitimately, for he was finding it increasingly difficult to take Sarah. It was then he showed them that they could go so far and no further.

  He would pick up the child when they said it should be lying in its cot; he would dance it up and down in his arms after it had been fed, which they prophesied would make it sick. When it was only three months old he carried it along with him on his round of the farm, and it not yet shortened and without a bonnet. It would die, they both cried, and he’d be to blame, he’d have it on his conscience, among other things, for the rest of his life.

  He took it outdoors the next day, and the next, and when he saw them become fearful, he knew, in a way, that he had achieved a victory.

  Against strong opposition he had called the child Hannah. There wasn’t a Hannah on either side of the family. Why Hannah? Because he liked the name Hannah, and Hannah she would be.

  Sensing, from the beginning, they were going to have trouble in the bringing up of the child, Constance and Sarah became even closer, and as time went on they joined in battle to subdue young Hannah’s spirits and to erase in some part her foolish adoration for her father, for from the time the child could crawl, she crawled towards him, and when she could walk, she walked towards him, and as soon as she could run, she ran after him.

  Two

  It was on a spring day, the Wednesday after Easter Monday in 1888 when, for Michael, life jumped back seven years and the longings of a boy were formulated into the desires of a man and he knew, as he had always known in that closed pocket of his mind, that his love for Barbara Mallen had not been quenched, but had been thriving in the darkness.

  The day started early, at five in the morning. Hitching himself up in the bed, he lit the candle, then rose quietly from Sarah’s side, thinking that she was asleep, but her voice came at him before he had put his second foot to the floor.

  ‘Are you going to take me or not?’

  There was a long pause before he answered under his breath, ‘We’ve had it out; I told you last night.’

  ‘I’ve never seen Newcastle in me life. Mam says you should take me.’

  ‘I’ve told you both,’ he said dully.

  ‘You would take Hannah.’

  ‘Yes, I would take Hannah.’ The last word ended on a sigh.

  ‘Because she can walk, I suppose, she’s got two legs.’ Now his tall well-built body twisted like a snake about to strike, and he was bending over her, hissing down at her, ‘All right! You want the truth. Yes, because she’s got two legs, and because she can smile, and because she hasn’t got a nagging tongue. Now you’ve got it. Are you satisfied?’

  They were staring at each other in the candlelight. Sarah, whose face at sixteen had been soft and pretty if somewhat pert, now at twenty-four had the hard lines of a woman twice her age. Her eyes were dry but her lips trembled as she said, ‘I’ll get Uncle Jim to speak to you, I will, I will.’

  For a moment she cowered down deep into the feather tick away from him. His fair skin looked almost black in the flickering light. His full lips were stretched wide, his big square teeth clenched and the grinding of them was audible until they opened and he said, slowly, ‘Listen to me, Sarah, and get this into your head. This farm is mine, not my mother’s, mine, and one word from me and your Uncle Jim, his mother, and his sister…the lot of them over there will be looking for work. Now I’m telling you, you’re driving me too far, you’re asking for it; but I warn you, be careful, remember what I said, this is my farm, legally mine, and I’m going into Newcastle the day to sign an agreement for that strip of land, because only I can sign it. Me…me, not my mother. And from now on it’ll pay you to remember that, and you can pass it on to your Uncle Jim an’ all. You can also tell him, if I hear any more of his big talk in the market about who runs this place I’ll make it impossible for anybody to have any more doubts about it. Just you tell him that.’

  He walked from her and went behind the screen that stood in the corner of the room and, having torn his nightshirt over his head, he pulled on his long pants and vest.

  Since shortly after they were married, he had undressed and dressed behind the screen because the sight of his bare legs seemed to upset her. She didn’t mind them in bed; no, she had been surprisingly free in her love-making, too free. The loss of a limb had not impaired her desires; it was her hunger in this direction that showed up his own loss of appetite. First of all he had thought it was because he had been afraid to hurt her, but now he knew it was because there was no passion in him for her. His bodily needs lacked the impetus of love. They were fulfilled on his part through a requirement of nature, that was all, and she, being a woman and a woman coached in such things by her aunt, whom she called mother, and her cousin Lily, whom she called aunt, not forgetting his own mother who had educated her, recognised the missing element in his lovemaking, and this, no doubt, was the cause of her bitterness as much as was the loss of her leg.

  Dressed, he picked up the candle and went out of the room without speaking further.

  Down in the kitchen the table was set as usual for breakfast. The fire glowed through the humped slack that had been heaped on it last night. The copper pans hanging above the mantelpiece gave out a soft warm sheen like dulled gold. The house cat, with its privileged bed near the black oven, uncoiled itself, looked up at him, stretched, moved into a new position and went to sleep again. From outside in the yard came the low murmur of the cattle, a cock crowed, then another, then another.

  He brewed himself some strong tea, drank it black and sweet, then went out into the yard. The light was lifting rapidly. It was a beautiful morning; the air tickled his throat like a sharp wine. He stood for a moment and drew in a slow long breath that widened the space between his open waistcoat to three inches. Then he went past the dairy, looked in the barn where two sheepdogs were sleeping on the straw until he whistled softly, when they roused themselves and slowly followed him past the stables and into the byres.

  Although it was only twenty past five Jim Waite was already there. He always felt that if he were to get up at three Jim Waite would be there before him.

  Jim Waite had come to this farm when a boy. He had come with his father seeking work and a roof to shelter his mother and sister, and they had been given a shelter by Donald Radlet. That Radlet’s generosity had been a form of spiting his wife, because in the early days Harry Waite had once been a footman in the home of Thomas Mallen where Constance Radlet had been brought up, made no matter; he had given them shelter, and they had repaid him well. When he died they had continued to repay his wife with hard work and l
ong hours, until, with the passing years and the death of his own father, Jim Waite had come to look upon himself, not only as Constance Radlet’s head man but as the man who really ran the farm.

  Michael had, up till the last year or so, remained a boy in his eyes, but of late, to use his own expression, Mr Michael had begun to throw his weight about. Slowly but surely he was taking the authority from him and reducing him to shepherd-handyman again, and he didn’t like it, he didn’t like it at all. But he knew which side his bread was buttered, and he was wise enough to realise that he would never again in his life get a place such as he had here, a house and a free supply of milk, butter, eggs and pork, vegetables and mutton. The only thing they bought were the grains. And if young Michael were to turn nasty the fact that they were now, in a way, related by marriage would, he knew, carry no weight, and he had nothing in writing, he wasn’t bonded in any way. No, he knew which side his bread was buttered, and it didn’t do him any harm to put on a mealy mouth. But he saw to it he got his little digs in; Master Michael didn’t have it all his own way.

  ‘A fine morning, grand, isn’t it?’ He had dropped the title Mr Michael a long time ago.

  ‘Yes, it’s a grand one. The winter’s well past now, thank God.’

  After looking around Michael came out of the byres and went into what was called the harness room, where a boiler was always bubbling with pig feed. In a few minutes Jim Waite followed him and, putting his head in the door, he said, ‘I think I’d better go along the low bottoms this mornin’ an’ see how many have come in the night.’

  Michael turned from his harness rack; he was pulling a leather strap through his hand as he said, ‘It mightn’t be how many have been born but how many have been pinched.’