The Shadow of the Sycamores Read online

  Kitty was still single at eighteen. After working for a time in a draper’s shop in Aberdeen, she had found quite a good job in a hotel in Glasgow but was always too busy working – or so she made out – to come home.

  Taking his silver watch from his waistcoat pocket, Willie gave a start. He hadn’t realised it was that late and he had best get a move on. There would be hell to pay if his wife got home before him.

  Fourteen-year-old Abby Rae picked up another of her father’s socks and slid her left fist inside. She didn’t know how he did it but he always managed to get great holes where his big toes had poked through. It was just a matter of weeks since she finished knitting this pair and there was more darn than sock already. Giving a long sigh, she bit off another length of the wheeling wool and threaded the big eye of the darning needle.

  Henry’s twelfth birthday was less than a month away and he had taken to going to the mart as often as he could, looking for a job, and she was really worried that he might get a fee. None of her sisters cared what happened to her. Jeannie and Bella had their own families to worry about now, God knows when they were here last, and Kitty said she couldn’t afford the fare to come home more than once or twice a year.

  A lump of self-pity obstructed Abby’s throat for a moment. If Henry went away, she’d be left here on her own every day with Nessie! It would be worse than working for a mistress, not that she’d ever had that experience. She’d had little schooling since her father’s new wife moved in and she hadn’t been allowed to take a job when she was old enough. She’d been kept at home supposedly to look after her brother, though a hundred and one chores had fallen on her as time went by and she hadn’t had the courage to complain. Nessie wasn’t the kind of person you could complain to. She was big, both lengthways and roundways, with a chest on her that would knock you flat if she turned round on you quick, a backside that made her long black skirt wobble when she walked, hair that was a yellowing-white like her teeth and her eyes …

  Abby shivered. She couldn’t really describe the woman’s eyes. They were the darkest she had ever seen, almost jet black, and there was something in them that scared her, as if they held a threat. And yon big hands of hers always seemed to be ready to clout you round the lug if she wasn’t pleased, and it was difficult to know what it was that displeased her. Just the same, it was good to be able to sit quietly like this, knowing the woman had gone to visit her sick mother in Corrieben. Father had taken the chance to slip out for half an hour, for a breath of fresh air he said, but he’d likely be having a quick drink with his old cronies at The Doocot.

  Henry was out as well – she was sure he was up to something. Nessie didn’t seem to mind him going out, Abby thought resentfully, but, the minute she said she would like an hour off, there was an almighty row. As far as she could see, the only way she would ever escape Nessie’s clutches would be to get wed to some suitable man as soon as she was sixteen. But how could she meet any men, suitable or not, if she was tied to the fireside like this?

  Abby jumped nervously as the back door rattled but it was only her brother. ‘You’d best wash yourself and get up to your bed afore Nessie comes back,’ she warned him, noticing that his eyes were dancing with excitement.

  He lifted his shoulders and tapped his nose, grinning secretively. ‘No, I’ve got something to tell Father and I want her to be here and all. I canna wait till morning to see her face.’

  Abby’s stomach started to churn. She knew by his smug expression that, whatever he wanted Nessie to know, it was something she wouldn’t like and Nessie in a bad humour was … ‘D’you have to tell them tonight?’

  ‘Aye, I have.’ His smile broadened even further. ‘Ach, I’m bursting to tell somebody. Jim Legge wants me to start at Craigdownie on Monday.’

  It was worse than she thought. Telling Nessie that would be like throwing a lighted match into a barn full of hay – or worse, into a barrel of paraffin. ‘You’re not twelve yet, Henry, can you not just wait a while afore you …’

  ‘Craigdownie’s one o’ the best farms there is. If I say no this time, I’ll likely never get another chance.’

  ‘But it’s miles and miles – you’ll have to bide in.’

  ‘There’s a bothy for the single men.’

  ‘You’re not a man yet and, any road, she’ll not let you go.’

  ‘She canna stop me. She’s not my real mother.’

  ‘Father could stop you. He is your father.’

  ‘So he says.’

  His sister’s chin dropped with pained shock at such a statement, her serious brown eyes were in danger of popping out of their sockets. ‘God’ll strike you dumb for saying things like that, Henry,’ she managed to whisper. ‘Of course he’s our father.’

  ‘Yours, maybe, but …’

  ‘You’re surely not hinting that Mother was … that she had another man? You’re mad to even think it. She’d four of us to look after even before you were born. What time had she for other men?’

  Henry stopped, looking rather abashed. ‘I’m sorry, I was just teasing you – but it was a stupid thing to say.’ Little did he know that he had almost voiced a suspicion that was festering in the mind of Mary Jane Gow, whose husband had revealed his part in the secret of the boy’s real name when he was lying on his deathbed less than a month ago.

  The sound of the back door opening again stopped what was fast developing into a quarrel and Abby tried to calm her rattled nerves as her father tiptoed into the kitchen. ‘She’s nae back yet?’ At Abby’s head shake, he sat down on his usual chair by the fire, laid his tweed cap on the fender-stool and held his hands out to the heat. ‘It’s that cold outside it’d freeze the words afore they left your mouth.’

  Henry winked at a flustered Abby. ‘I’ve some good news, Father, but I want to wait till Nessie comes in.’

  Looking up at the wag-at-the wa’ clock Nessie had brought with her when she moved in, Willie said, ‘She shouldna be long. She aye comes in dead on nine.’

  No sooner had he said this than the clock gave a wheezy whirr and a little bird popped out to herald the passing of another hour. It had only given four hoarse ‘cuck … oos’ when they heard Nessie’s heavy feet approaching the front door.

  ‘My,’ she said breathlessly when she burst in, ‘you’re fine and cosy in here. Think yourselves lucky you didn’t have to go out. My hands and feet are like to drop off me.’

  ‘Abby’s got the kettle boiling for some tea,’ Willie prompted his daughter, who dutifully rinsed the teapot into the slop pail kept handy for such purposes.

  Sensibly waiting until his stepmother’s hands and feet had thawed a little, Henry took up his stance centrally to the fire and Abby cowered her brown head down into her knitted jumper in dread of what he was going to say – or, rather, of what would happen once he said it. Thankfully, he made it short and to the point.

  ‘I’m going to Craigdownie on Sunday, for Jim Legge wants me to start work first thing on Monday morning. Isn’t that good news?’

  He cast an apprehensive glance at Nessie now, waiting for her to erupt in anger, but was astonished to see her thin lips curved slightly upwards for a change. ‘Well, now, that is good news, isn’t it, Willie?’

  The wind taken out of his sails, the arguments he had prepared remaining unsaid, Henry was even more surprised by the look of shame on his father’s face. ‘Aye, Nessie, it is that,’ he mumbled.

  The boy couldn’t believe it. ‘You mean, you’re not saying I canna go?’

  Nessie pursed her mouth for a moment. ‘It’s time you learned how to look after yourself. You’ll be bothying, I take it?’

  ‘Aye, but we’ll get our food in the farm kitchen.’ He felt cheated. He had expected to put up a stand for the right to go and his stepmother was practically telling him she’d be glad to see the back of him. ‘Father?’ he asked, pleading for some show of affection, for a sign that he’d be missed – but the middle-aged man avoided his eyes.

  It was Abby who cried, �
��No, Henry, you’re not old enough to be …’

  ‘Not old enough?’ Nessie barked. ‘It’s time he was earning a living and not leaving it to me and his father to feed and clad him. Speaking of that, wouldn’t you say it’s time you took a job and all?’

  This did make Willie react. ‘No, no, Nessie. I agree with you that the lad should start learning how to fend for himself but let the lassie be.’

  His wife’s brows plunged down. ‘See here, Willie Rae, I’ve been wed on you for a good few year now and not one single night have we had by ourselves. We should be able to do what we like, without wondering if the bairns’ll hear us.’

  ‘But she’s just fourteen and never been away from …’

  ‘It’s time she was out in the world meeting folk. How d’you expect her to find a man? Or do you want to be keeping her for the rest o’ your life? If that’s what you want, it’ll be without me!’

  ‘No, Nessie!’ His ruddy face had paled. ‘You’d not leave me, would you?’

  ‘Try me. It’ll be just me and you or it’ll be you and your precious lassie.’ She turned round and stuck her face close to the girl’s. ‘Is that what you want, eh? Would you like me out o’ the road so your father can come to your bed and …’

  ‘That’s enough!’ Willie shouted his outrage at this insult. ‘She doesna understand what you mean and, if I was any kind o’ man, I’d throw you out for saying it.’

  Nessie smirked suddenly. ‘But you’re not any kind o’ man, are you? You’re a man that needs a woman like me, a woman that needs a man, isn’t that right? Eh?’

  It was the truth and he dropped his head, too shamed to look his children in the eyes.

  ‘Never mind them, Abby,’ the boy soothed as he led his sister up the stairs, ‘you can come to Craigdownie with me on Sunday if you want. I’m sure they’ll have a job for you an’ all.’

  But Abby was not to be comforted. ‘I canna bide here now,’ she moaned. ‘She wants rid o’ me. She’ll go on and on at me and punch me and …’

  Somewhat self-consciously, Henry sat down on the bed beside her and slipped his arms around her. ‘I’ll tell you what. We’ll pack some things and go to Gramma. How about that?’

  ‘They’ll hear us going out.’

  ‘We’ll wait till they’re sleeping.’

  Her face was miserably white but there was something she had to find out as they waited. ‘Henry, why did you say Father wasn’t your real father?’

  He gave an embarrassed grin. ‘I didna really think he wasn’t. It was just … you four were girls.’

  The doubt in her eyes clearing as an explanation struck her, Abby whispered, ‘But Gramma once said Father had been dying to get a son and he’d just got daughters.’

  ‘I thought he couldna make a son. That’s why I said he wasn’t my father.’

  ‘No, you’re wrong, Henry. He was that desperate for a boy, he’d no thought for anything else. No thought for Mother, really … not till after …’

  ‘I can’t remember what she looked like,’ he said, sadly.

  ‘You were only hours old when she died – I don’t remember much myself. I ken Gramma didn’t have much time for him but she said he really had loved Mother. He near went mad when she died, blaming himself and getting so drunk she thought he might do away wi’ himself. That’s why she was so hard on him.’

  ‘So Gramma never thought it was funny him getting a son after so long?’

  ‘No, she said it was just one of those things and it was, Henry.’

  ‘Aye, I suppose it was. Wheesht, here’s them coming up now.’

  He kept his arm round his sister as the feet went along the landing, having to hold his breath when his father said, ‘I’d maybe best look in to see they’re all right?’ and letting it out at Nessie’s hissed, ‘They’ll be sleeping, just leave them.’

  Not until the house was as silent as the grave did Henry make a move and, within ten minutes, brother and sister were creeping through the back door, each carrying a pillowcase stuffed with clothes.

  One knock on her street door was enough to have Isie McIntyre pulling back the heavy curtain at her bedroom window. At her age, she didn’t need as much sleep as she used to. ‘Abby! Henry!’ she exclaimed when she saw her unexpected callers. Forcing her stiff joints inside an old woollen cardigan to hide her well-worn wincey nightgown, she shuffled to the door to let them in, tutting when she saw their drawn faces properly.

  Henry took over as spokesman. ‘We’ve run away – so would you please let us bide here, Gramma?’

  Gathering that something was far wrong at Oak Cottage, Isie decided that now was not the time to ask questions. Her grandchildren were obviously far too upset to answer any and it was long past their bedtime. ‘It’s a good thing I aired out my spare bed yesterday,’ she smiled. ‘You can sleep there, Abby, and Henry can ha’e the couch in the parlour.’

  Recognising from their looks of despair that they needed the comfort of being together, their grandmother ignored any thought of the impropriety of boy and girl, one in her teens, sleeping in the same bed. They were still only bairns, after all; young innocents, what harm could they come to? It would be all right – for one night, at least. Then she would have a try at being peacemaker, in the hope that they’d go back to Oak Cottage.

  Despite having assured herself that nothing untoward would happen between them, Isie took a quick peep into her spare room after she had cleared up in the kitchen and was relieved to see Henry with his hand protectively on his sister’s shoulder, both sound asleep. Poor wee lambs, she thought, as she went through to her own bed.

  A big pan was hottering on the range when the two youngsters made their appearance in the morning, looking, Isie was pleased to see, rather better than they had the night before. ‘Now then,’ she said, briskly, as she poured the breakfast into three deep bowls, ‘you can tell me your story once we’ve supped this porridge.’

  Nothing was said until the bowls and the enamel mugs of milk were empty, then she raised her eyebrows encouragingly to the boy. ‘Come on then, Henry.’

  Some moments later, as he came to a gulping halt, Isie was having to bite her tongue to stop her from voicing her opinion of their father for not standing up for them. It was terrible to think that Willie Rae had sided with that uncorseted mantrap against his own flesh and blood. But what was inside his breeks had aye been more important to him than what was inside his head, even when he was wed on her poor Bella – the filthy pig.

  But it was these two hapless creatures she had to consider now. If she could afford it, she would gladly keep them for good but what she made from the washing and ironing she took in wouldn’t stretch to feeding two extra mouths.

  ‘The thing is, Gramma,’ Henry went on suddenly, ‘I’ll have to go to Craigdownie today, for Jim Legge said I’d to start first thing Monday morning.’

  Isie had almost forgotten what had led to the row at Oak Cottage and couldn’t help being pleased that there was one less for her to worry about, although she was instantly ashamed of herself. They were of her flesh and blood and all, poor things. ‘Well now, Henry, if you dinna like it there or if things dinna turn oot the way you want, you’re welcome to come back here. We’ll manage somehow or other.’

  Old enough to be aware of his grandmother’s poverty, the boy hurried on. ‘I’m going to ask Mr Legge if there’s a place for Abby and all. She’s done near all the housework for a few years now and she can sew and knit and darn and patch …’

  ‘Oh, Henry, stop!’ The girl was red with embarrassment.

  ‘Aye, laddie,’ Isie nodded, ‘you’ll not need to lay it on ower thick. That would put them right aff. Besides, there’s nae hurry. She’ll be fine here wi’ me for a few …’ She broke off as a perfect solution struck her. ‘I’m nae getting any younger, I’ll be sixty-five in June so I’ll be glad of her company – and her help. Eh, lass, what d’you say? You could take in some sewing or mending and we’d manage fine.’

  Shy Abby, havin
g secretly dreaded the day when she would have to go out to work amongst strangers, sat back thankfully. ‘Oh, Gramma, I’ll work as hard as I can for you.’

  Henry felt free to smile now. He had been worrying about Abby, about what would become of her if he couldn’t find employment for her, but this was something he had never expected. Jumping up, he bounded over to his grandmother and flung his arms round her. ‘Oh, Gramma! I’ve aye loved you best – better than anybody else – except Abby,’ he added, bringing his sister into his embrace.

  Even knowing that he had an extremely long walk ahead of him, his heart was singing as he set out for Craigdownie and, as the saying goes, fortune favours the brave. He had been on the road for hardly twenty minutes when the carrier caught up with him, drawing the hefty Clydesdale to a halt.

  ‘Aye, Henry.’ Geordie Mavor was an old friend of the boy’s father, although neither frequented The Doocot as often as they had once done. ‘Where might you be heading for on a Sunday in sic’ a hurry?’

  ‘I’m starting at Craigdownie the morrow morning,’ Henry said proudly.

  Geordie was suitably impressed. ‘Craigdownie, eh? Jim Legge’s a good boss, I’ve heard, a fair man, as long as you keep to his rules. Orra loon, I suppose?’

  ‘Aye and I’m prepared to work hard for him. He’ll not find any fault wi’ me.’

  ‘I’m pleased to hear that. Now, you’ve a good bit to go yet, so how about coming up beside me? I’m nae going as far as Craigdownie – just to Meikle Birtle to gi’e my brother a hand wi’ his flitting – but I’ll drop you aff as near as I can.’

  ‘Oh, thanks, Geordie,’ Henry said as he happily scrambled up on to the big cart.