A Child of Jarrow (28 page)

Kate stirred and the purplish light of the June night caught her face. Her cheeks were wet with tears. Rose's heart felt leaden. She sat down heavily and reached out a hand in the dark. Finding Kate's, she gently nestled the baby into her hold, ‘She needs you now, hinny.'

For a moment, she wanted to gather Kate into her arms and cradle her like a child, hush her fears. But at that moment Jack rushed in, followed by the doctor. She stood aside.

‘The milk's coming now,' she mumbled. ‘I'm sorry you were bothered.'

‘No bother at all,' Dr Dyer said kindly, and bent to examine Kate, speaking to her softly.

Rose turned away, heavy-hearted. ‘Go to bed,' she ordered Jack.

He hesitated. ‘Will she be all right?'

She nodded and he went without another word, though his look was perplexed. She watched while the doctor gave Kate a draught to ease the pain and help her sleep.

‘I'll call again tomorrow,' he promised.

‘There's no need,' Rose said firmly. ‘We can manage now.'

‘Still, I'd like to—'

‘Better if you didn't.' They exchanged looks and she knew the young doctor understood. He nodded and left. Rose sat on the end of the settle, watching Kate feed her baby, wanting to say something but not finding the words. Her feelings for her daughter were so confused now. She smothered her pity. No point showing her weakness when one of them had to stay strong. Rose heaved herself up and turned away before Kate could see the anguish that glittered in her eyes.

Chapter 34

Afterwards, Kate could not bring herself to look at her stepfather. She retreated to the bedroom with the baby whenever he came home. She was sapped by the fever and weak from suckling her demanding infant. For weeks she never left the house, imprisoning herself in its two musty rooms, unable to face the world.

She could not rid her mind of that terrible night, when John had bent over her with his rank breath and drunken lustful look. Sometimes she convinced herself it had only been a nightmare, a trick of her fevered brain. She had been shaking and delirious, hearing voices come and go, faces distorting and dissolving before her eyes.

She had thought young Dr Dyer had lifted her on to the settle, but the face that loomed over her had been Jack's. Later she had been roused by someone's touch and for a brief heady moment thought Alexander had come to claim her. Perhaps she had whimpered his name. Kate burnt with shame to think of it now, for the hands and lips on her skin had not been her lover's, but those of her hateful stepfather.

Her skin crawled to think of the way he had touched her. She could not wash herself enough to rid her of the shame. Now, every time her baby suckled, it reminded her of the brutal way John had bitten her breasts and squeezed hard until the milk came. Even after it poured from her, he did not stop sucking until he was sated.

Worse still, she had to endure his boasting about it.

‘I saved her life, you kna,' he told Dr Dyer in triumph when he called round to check on Kate and the baby a few days later. Kate blushed furiously to hear him describe his heroics and could hardly look at their visitor.

But when Father O'Neill got to hear of a birth in the house, he came round to demand when the infant would be christened. They had kept other visitors away with stories of sickness in the house, but Rose suspected the priest was not fooled. He eyed Kate with suspicion.

‘The lass's been ill,' Rose excused her.

‘The child must be christened,' the priest declared, ‘to save her mortal soul from everlasting hell.'

When he had gone, Rose turned to her and said, ‘He knows, I'm sure of it. You cannot hide away for ever. It just makes it look suspicious. I'm the one supposed to be keeping to the house.'

‘Aye,' John agreed, ‘I don't want that bugger on me doorstep every day.'

‘And the bairn needs a name,' Rose persisted. ‘We need to register the birth, else we'll have the coppers round here an' all.'

‘I'll gan,' John grunted, ‘if you fetch me suit from the in-and-out.'

Kate was shocked out of her silence. ‘No!' She looked at them both with a glint of defiance. ‘I'll go - she's my bairn.'

‘She should be called Rose Ann,' John continued as if she had not spoken, ‘after the mam who's ganin' to bring her up.'

Kate's heart hammered. She would be called Catherine after her! It was the only thing she could give; her name. But she kept quiet, knowing that to argue would only rile her stepfather. She could not rely on her mother to support her over this either. Since the incident of the milk fever, Rose had been more distant, as if she somehow blamed her for what John had done. But to her surprise her mother said, ‘Let Kate go. It's me that's pretending to be in confinement. She can make herself useful.'

It was August already. Kate knew she could not delay facing the world outside any longer. Dr Dyer had told her weeks ago that she must go to the registrar or else incur a fine for late registration. None of them could afford to pay that.

The next day, Kate squeezed into her best blue dress - the one she had worn during those carefree days at Ravensworth - and pulling on the lace gloves Alexander had given her, set out with the baby wrapped in a blanket for the registry office. Nodding at the people she passed in the lane, Kate hid her feeling of lack of self-worth beneath a cheery smile and a breezy, ‘Afternoon!'

By the time she reached the town hall, she was perspiring with the exertion of walking so far and nervousness at what she had to do. She wanted no one to be there to witness her shame at registering an illegitimate child. Kate hovered on the steps, regaining her breath. Her arms ached from holding the baby. Damn you, Alexander! Damn you for bringing me to this!

For a snatched moment, she contemplated dumping the infant on the steps and running away. No one would know it was hers. She was nameless, unregistered, unclaimed. In a few short minutes she could be out of the town and walking to Gateshead, or Newcastle - somewhere she could start a new life, unknown to anyone. Kate's heart hammered at the thought. Then the baby stirred in her arms and bleated, her tiny lips smacking in anticipation of the next feed.

What would become of her? Would Rose come looking for her? She would be given up to the workhouse orphanage, more likely. Kate felt a wave of guilt for even thinking it. She had brought this babe into the world; she could not abandon her as easily as Alexander had done. Then a thought struck her. A daring one, a reckless one. It would take all her courage to carry it out. Lifting her chin in defiance, Kate clutched the baby tighter and entered the office.

While she waited for her turn, she almost changed her mind. But when she was called through, she gave her answers boldly and without betraying the fear that pummelled her insides.

‘The child's name?'

‘Catherine Ann Davies.'

‘Father's name and occupation?'

‘Alexander Davies - he's a man of business.'

The clerk gave her a querying look. She thought quickly of the term used by visitors to the Ravensworth Arms.

‘Commission Agent,' she smiled.

‘And your name, please?'

‘Catherine Davies, born Fawcett,' Kate announced, her hands clammy inside the gloves that hid her lack of a wedding ring. She watched in amazement as he carefully wrote in her details. It had been so easy. But what would they do to her if they discovered the lie? Throw her in prison? Kate felt faint.

‘And date of birth?'

‘The twentieth of June.'

The clerk looked up at her and frowned. He had guessed. It must be obvious she was a woman in disgrace with a bastard child. Fear rose in her throat.

‘You must be mistaken,' he said quietly. ‘That is over seven weeks ago. And you wouldn't be registering late, would you?' He held her look.

‘No,' Kate gulped. ‘Daft of me. I've been poorly with the fever - I'm not thinkin' right.' She stared at him in panic. What should she say? She was going to be found out after all.

The clerk cleared his throat and studied the certificate. ‘Perhaps it was a week later,' he prompted, ‘the twenty-seventh?'

‘Aye,' Kate gasped, ‘that was it.' She held her breath while he wrote in the date.

‘Now, if you could sign here.'

Kate was careful to sign her imaginary married name. A moment later it was all over and he was handing her the certificate. She felt light-headed.

‘Thank you,' she said, smiling at him in gratitude. Then she was hurrying out of the office into the hot blustery street, before anyone should call her back.

She had done it! Given her little girl a father and herself a fictitious respectability. Not Pringle-Davies - such an unusual name would have drawn too much attention - but a name none the less. It would count for nothing round where she lived and God help her if the authorities discovered her deceit! But it was worth the risk to give Catherine a legitimate name. Some day in the future she might turn round and thank her for that. Deep down, Kate still kept alive a flicker of hope that Alexander might return some day, if not for her sake, then for their child's.

As Kate set off back to Leam Lane, with her newly named daughter cradled on her shoulder, she thought in defiance: at least she'll not be a common McMullen! She'll be better than that, much better!

Chapter 35

By autumn, both John and Rose were nagging Kate to go back to work. Their meagre funds were dwindling. Sarah had been quietly married to her pitman, Michael. John had cursed her for a fool, but Sarah moved thankfully to Birtley and beyond his control.

‘Your father's on short time,' her mother fretted, ‘and our Jack'll be next. We need the money.'

‘Aye,' John snarled, ‘it's time you paid for your sinning. We're slaving away all day to feed your brat - and what are you doing? Lying around the house like Lady Muck.'

‘I do more than me fair share around here!' Kate protested. ‘Don't I, Mam?'

But Rose said nothing. Kate could see by her worried look that money was more important than help around the house. Her time with Catherine was running out.

‘I'll gan into Shields the morrow and ask around,' Kate acquiesced.

‘Not Shields,' Rose said quickly. ‘Not round here. You can't sneeze but everyone knows about it.'

Kate looked at her in surprise.

‘You'll have to gan to place,' her mother said sternly. ‘We can't afford to keep you here. You can send your wages home.'

‘But, the bairn?' Kate stuttered. ‘I'm still feedin'—'

‘It's time she was weaned.'

‘Don't send me away, Mam!'

But Rose was adamant. ‘We'll ask our Mary if there's anything over Gateshead way.'

John barked. ‘She's not ganin' back to Ravensworth!' He seemed as taken aback by Rose's suggestion as Kate was.

‘Sarah, then,' Rose said stubbornly. ‘She'll find some'at for our Kate.'

‘I'll not trust her out me sight, woman!' John blustered.

Rose gave him a withering look as if his opinion did not matter, and it suddenly dawned on Kate why her mother was so set on sending her away. She wanted her gone from home, not only for the money but to stifle scandal. Only with her gone could they hope to carry out the pretence that Catherine was their child. Kate felt wretched at the thought. She was a constant source of shame under their roof. For the sake of saving face she had to go.

During the following two weeks, while word was put about the family that Kate was looking for a position, she began to wean Catherine. Rose helped her bind up her breasts tightly when they filled with milk. She had to watch her mother bottle-feed the baby on her knee while she got on with cooking and scrubbing.

‘She'll smell the milk on you and not take to the bottle,' Rose said bluntly, when Kate asked to feed her.

For several days she suffered agony with tender breasts, huge and bruised with undrunk milk. She could not lie comfortably at night, nor fit into her dress by day, having to wear a voluminous old-fashioned blouse of her mother's. Yet at night, Kate would rise from the settle and gaze into the cot that Jack had made for Catherine, that was squeezed into the corner behind John's large chair.

She would pick her up and cradle her, crooning softly in the flickering firelight. She was allowed to give her a bottle in the early hours, to save Rose getting up. But often in those final days before leaving, she would pick her up just for comfort. There was nothing in her life that matched the joy of seeing her daughter open her large solemn eyes and look trustingly up at her. Catherine responded to Kate's generous smiles and they made gentle gurgling sounds at each other. Softly, she sang the bitter-sweet song of a lost child in a winter world, and thought tearfully how this winter they would be parted.

Child of my dreams, love of my life,
Hope of my world to be ...

Then word came from Sarah. A general maid was needed at a bakery in Chester-le-Street, down the train line from Birtley. A cousin of Michael's worked in the shop. On a raw, windy day at the end of October, Kate packed a basket of clothes and a jam sandwich wrapped in newspaper for the journey. When her mother was not looking, she snipped a small auburn curl from Catherine's warm head and hid it in a screw of brown paper in her pocket.

Clasping the baby fiercely to her, she kissed her soft cheek.

‘I'll be back for Christmas,' she promised. Her heart squeezed to see Catherine's answering smile. She was going away when her daughter was just beginning to smile!

‘Don't miss your train,' Rose warned.

Kate handed the baby to her, tears stinging her eyes.

‘Look after her for me, Mam,' she whispered.

‘I'll not spoil her,' Rose answered. ‘She'll be brought up right.'

Kate blushed, feeling rebuked. There was a hardness in her mother's look that made her shrivel inside. This time there would be no fond words and loving hugs at her going. She was being sent away - punished for her mistake - and no one was more bitterly disappointed in the way things had turned out than her mother.

Kate looked away, picking up her small basket of possessions.

‘Ta-ra, Mam,' she murmured.

‘See you keep your nose clean,' Rose said stiffly, not wanting to show the slightest weakness. It had done neither of them any good to show their feelings before. She pitied her daughter, but it was best for all that she left. Kate should be grateful that they were caring for her child. She should expect nothing more, for she had brought this all on herself, Rose thought bitterly.

Kate stepped out into the street alone. There was no one to see her off at the station, not even Jack. Since the time she had been ill after Catherine's birth, he had steered clear of her, avoiding her look, hardly speaking two words. He blushed when she came near him and flinched from her touch as if she was somehow contaminated. Maybe it was just a young lad's squeamishness about childbirth and feeding. Or maybe it was she who now revolted him. All Kate knew was that she seemed to have lost her former ally.

On the train, she managed to stem the tears of loneliness that welled in her throat, but when she passed through Lamesley station and the brown harvested fields around Ravensworth, she broke down and quietly wept. That place had been paradise, but how long ago it all seemed! Where was Alexander now? Happily married? Living nearby or far away? She tortured herself with such thoughts.

All she knew from Mary was that he had never been back to the inn. He had disappeared into thin air. If there had been any rumours about him, she knew her sister would have delighted in telling her. Since her disgrace, Mary had lorded it over her on her visits home, making out she was far the better daughter. But there had been no rumours and no news of the coal agent's son.

Staring, heartbroken, at the burnished woods around the castle, Kate felt a ridiculous flicker of hope. If he had married, surely news would have trickled through to the inn? And if he had not, then what was to stop him returning for her one day? Perhaps when his father was dead . . .

She stifled such thoughts. If he had loved her at all, he would have come for her by now. If he had been any sort of gentleman, he would at least have provided for his bastard child. Kate looked away. It was too painful to hope. All she could do was to make the best of her new position and provide for her child herself. Maybe some day she would find a man with a kind heart to take them both on. Unlikely as it seemed, Kate felt a twinge of optimism as she thought of starting anew in Chester-le-Street. She was still young and strong and willing to work.

By the time she stepped down from the train at the Durham market town, no one would know from her ready smile and brisk walk that she carried the weight of the world on her young shoulders, or guess that anything troubled her at all.

***

To her surprise, Kate found herself enjoying her new job. The baker, Slater, was a bluff, kindly man, and his wife and young family were friendly. The three children took quickly to Kate's warm personality and sense of fun, and the parents were happy with her capacity for hard work. She cooked, cleaned and for them, scrubbed down the shop in the evenings and got up in the icy mornings to light the fires.

Towards Christmas, when they were especially busy in the shop, Kate helped out behind the counter. She was cheerful to the customers and did not complain at the long hours. Only at night, in the attic room she shared with the youngest daughter, did she allow herself to think of Catherine and muffle her weeping under the blanket. She fingered her baby's soft lock of hair for comfort and clutched the worn paper package as she fell asleep.

As December came, she began to look forward to seeing her daughter again, although she could not talk about it to her employers.

‘I've a baby sister,' she explained to Mrs Slater, having let slip Catherine's name. ‘She's bonny - just starting to smile when I left. She'll be crawling by now, I wouldn't wonder - bright as a button.'

‘Bet she's a handful for your mother,' Mrs Slater said, with a side-long look. ‘Strange, calling her Catherine.'

‘Why?'

‘Well, with you being named Kate as well.'

Kate went red. ‘Me mam likes the name. And the bairn's called Catherine Ann.' She turned away and busied herself with the ironing. She must stop herself prattling on about Catherine, else the woman might guess the truth. She was fairly certain no gossip about what had gone on at Ravensworth had reached down here, but it was as well to be cautious. Kate did not mention Catherine again, but as Christmas drew nearer, her excitement mounted at seeing her once more. She could not wait to see what her daughter looked like after the two long months of separation.

On Boxing Day, the Slaters filled up a large box of bread, cake, pies and groceries for her to take home. They had told her to take two days off for working so hard.

‘You've been a grand help,' Mr Slater told her. ‘Enjoy yourself.'

‘Hope the baby's well,' Mrs Slater said with an encouraging smile. ‘But come back to us, won't you? The girls won't forgive us if you don't.'

‘Of course I will,' Kate replied, ‘you're that good to me.'

She caught the train to Gateshead, meeting up with Mary on the way. Kate steeled herself for the stop at Lamesley, but the thought of seeing Catherine again eased her discomfort at the familiar landmarks of church and inn and distant castle towers.

‘I've bought her a rattle and her own spoon,' Kate told Mary in excitement. ‘And a blanket for her cot.'

‘Thought Mam was to get your wages?' Mary said pointedly.

‘I'm just providing for the bairn like they want me to,' Kate defended.

‘Well, so you should. I'm glad I don't have to hand over all my wages.' She gave a superior look. ‘What you got in there?'

‘Cake and that from the bakery,' Kate said proudly, ‘for all me hard work. That should please them at home.'

Mary sniffed. ‘It'll take more than that for you to please them after what you did.'

Kate felt dashed. Mary was probably right. A mountain of bakery wouldn't let her parents forget the disgrace she had brought under their roof. Well, at least her own bairn would be pleased to see her, Kate thought with spirit.

She was out of her seat before the train pulled into Tyne Dock station and throwing open the carriage door as it squealed to a stop.

‘Haway, Mary,' she cried with impatience as they made their way through the town. ‘Do you have to look in every shop window?'

‘I've been stuck in Lamesley, remember?' Mary retorted. ‘Not a proper shop for miles.'

Kate bustled ahead, her parcel from the Slaters weighing heavy in her arms. Some of the windows they passed were strung with colourful decorations and her excitement increased. She loved Christmas. Even when they had been small and there were hardly two pennies to rub together, Rose had always tried to find some treat to put in their stockings. She wondered what her mother had bought for Catherine for her first Christmas.

Reaching Learn Lane at last, they clattered breathlessly through the front door.

‘We're back, Mam!' Kate called, rushing into the kitchen.

John was sitting in his chair by the fire, smoking. Rose was setting the table.

‘Where's Catherine?' she asked at once. ‘Where's me little lass?'

She followed her mother's look and saw her daughter sitting on the hearth rug waving a wooden spoon. She was neatly dressed in a blue serge smock, her auburn baby hair glinting in the firelight. Kate dumped down her parcels and hurried towards her, arms outstretched.

‘What a picture!' she cried. ‘Come to Mammy and give me a big love!'

She bent down and seized the child, swinging her up into her arms.

‘Mind you don't crease her dress,' Rose warned.

‘Let me look at you, bonny Catherine.' Kate ignored the plea. ‘Eeh, how I've missed you!' She squeezed Catherine to her and smothered her in kisses. Her cheeks felt so soft and warm, her skin smelling of soap and milk. She buried her nose into the baby's neck.

‘Stop fussin' over her,' John complained, banging his pipe on the hearth beside them.

Catherine flinched at the noise and let out a wail of protest.

‘There, there,' Kate soothed her, kissing her again. But her daughter screamed louder as she eyed Kate in alarm. Kate bounced her in her arms. ‘Now, now, Catherine, don't fret, Mammy's got you.'