Heaven Knows Who (32 page)

Jess understood that. She muttered, ‘No,' and insisted, ‘Stay here with me.'

‘Yes, yes,' said Jessie, reassuringly. ‘I'll stay.' She raised her to a sitting position, still kneeling on the floor beside her, still holding the wet cloth to the wounds. The old man came back again.

He was carrying a large tin basin with water and soap and a cloth and he went down on his hands and knees and began to mop up the blood all about them, wringing the cloth out into the basin. But in getting up he slipped and fell on his elbow and the blood and water slopped over Jessie's feet as she knelt there. Her skirt and petticoats were soaked and her boots and stockings so wet that she had to take them off. She sent him to fetch another handkerchief and with it bandaged the forehead, and got Jess to her feet and helped her over to a chair beside the bed.

Jess was terribly weak. She murmured that she wanted to lie down and together they got her on to the bed just as she was and pulled up the covers over her. There was a crocheted nightcap hanging on the looking glass and Jessie fetched it and put it over the handkerchief-bandage to keep it in place. The wounds across the nose were still bleeding and while Mr Fleming went on cleaning up the room she sat by the bed still trying to staunch them. Jess lay still with her eyes closed. She seemed very weak and getting weaker. ‘We
must
get a doctor,' said Jessie.

The old man came over and stood by the bed looking down at the wounded face. But no, he said, there was nothing to be alarmed about. It would be time enough in the morning—he'd go for a doctor then, himself.

She would have insisted but Jess opened her eyes and again whispered, ‘No.' Torn with indecision, she sat on beside her and after a little while Jess fell asleep—so perhaps, after all, there was no immediate danger. Mr Fleming left the room again and she heard him moving about, upstairs and down. She went out to the kitchen a couple of times, once for fresh water, once to put her wet shoes and stockings by the fire to dry. On the second occasion she found him in there, making a pot of tea.

Jess woke, and now she seemed a little stronger and her mind was clear. Jessie sat on beside her and as the hours passed and the
dawn grew near, with the old man coming in now and then to look at the sick woman appraisingly and go away again—in murmurs and snatches, with long pauses of exhaustion, there emerged the story of that night.

The old man was afraid, whispered Jess. It was because she had made that remark about having a tongue that would frighten ‘somebody' if it were let loose. The fact was that three or four weeks ago a gentleman, a brewer, had come to stay and on the Friday afternoon, the family having left for Dunoon as usual, it fell to Grandpa to see him off at the station. He didn't get back till eleven and then he was ‘gie 'en tipsy'. Jess helped him off with his coat and went away downstairs to her bed; but an hour later he came down to the basement and tried to get into her bed and ‘use liberties with her'. She turned him out of her room in a fury and next morning she said she would tell his son about him, as soon as he got back from Dunoon. He begged her not to—not even to say that he had been drunk; if he hadn't been, this would never have happened. She'd had no intention of telling Mr Fleming really, she'd have been too much ashamed, but she thought she would make the old man pay for his sins; and when, in his terror he offered her money to keep quiet, she thought she might as well let him pay in that way too: she was set upon going to Australia now, and this would help to finance the expedition. They had been continually at war ever since, and already today they had had words about it. When Jessie left the house to go for the mutchkin of whisky, he had turned upon her—Jess—for hinting that there was something she could tell. She ‘gave him some word' and flounced out of the kitchen. Her stays were uncomfortable and she went into her bedroom and got out of her dress and put on a polka, and began to unlace them. He stood in the passage outside, shouting abuse at her and she, with her hands behind her unlacing her corsets, gave back as good as she got and, when she was ready to take them off, went over and shut the door in his face. She had slipped off the corsets and was standing tying her petticoats, when the door burst open and he rushed at her, struck her three times across the face and felled her to the ground.

Jessie was appalled by this story. ‘What will you do now?'

‘Am I badly cut?' asked Jess.

‘Yes, badly, very badly.'

‘Then I'll have to see a doctor; and I'll have to account to the doctor for the injuries.…'

The old man came back into the room. ‘How could you have done such a thing?' Jessie said to him. ‘How could you strike a girl like this?—and after the way you've behaved to her already.'

He gave her no direct answer—it was done he said, and couldna' be helped now, but he was sorry and of course he would ‘make everything right for Jess', and he would make up for it to Jess, as she very well knew. ‘And for you, Jessie,' he said, ‘if you'll haud your tongue and say nothing about it, never mention what you've seen—I'll not forget it to you, either.'

It was after two o'clock in the morning, she was worn out with the shock of what had happened, with anxiety and strain. She did not know what to reply, what Jess would want, what she ought to do. ‘I wish I had never got mixed up in it,' she said. She felt she could not leave Jess, and yet—‘What am I to do? I can't stay here all night, my baby's all alone at home with no one to look after him.…'

‘Mrs Campbell will look after him,' said Jess. ‘Stay with me till the doctor comes.' But when the doctor did come, she added, she'd have to explain to him; and when Mr Fleming got back from Dunoon, ‘I'm afraid I'll just have to tell him who did it—and why.'

‘No, no, Jess, ye'll no need to do that,' cried the old man, anxiously. ‘And you, Jessie, there's no need to tell, say nothing about it, tell nobody and I'll put all to rights.…'

‘Who should
I
tell?' she said. ‘It's no business of mine.'

‘You won't tell?'

‘No,' said Jessie. ‘I've got no occasion to tell—why should I? You and Jess can take your own way—it's no business of mine.'

‘You promise?'

It cost her nothing to promise: as she had said, who should she tell?—it was all no concern of hers. But he would not be satisfied, he went off upstairs and came back with the great family Bible, in its black cover, and there, in Jess M'Pherson's presence, made her swear. ‘Swear by the Almighty God that you'll never tell anyone man, woman or child what you've seen or heard this night between me and Jess. And I'll never forget it,' he also swore, ‘to either of you. I'll make Jess comfortable for the rest of her life.'

It meant nothing to her to tell or keep silent; and if there were
to be some little alleviation to be got out of it in her ever-pressing money troubles, she doubtless thought—well, all the better. She put her hand on the Bible and swore the oath. He calmed down again; and sat down beside the bed and remained there, quietly.

At about three o'clock, Jess told him to go away. He said he was all right where he was. ‘She told me she wanted to rise and make water and she got up in bed.' So Jessie sent the old man off and helped Jess out of bed. She was very stiff and cold and said couldn't she go by the fire? Jessie wrapped a blanket round her and called to the old man and together they helped her through to the kitchen—though she seemed pretty strong by now, she could have managed on her own—and she sat down on a small piece of carpet by the fire with the blanket hugged round her. Jessie sent the old man back to the bedroom for a pillow and bedclothes and made a sort of bed for her on the floor, and she dozed off again. But she woke and said she was now too hot, so they moved her, without raising her, away from the fire a little and turned her so that she lay with her feet towards the hearth and her head between the table and the corner cupboard, towards the sink, and there she lay, restlessly dozing. Mr Fleming went off again, upstairs and downstairs and once or twice into Jess's room.

Another hour passed. Jess grew more restless and at last woke and now she said she felt very ill. Jessie fetched water for her but she grew rapidly worse and at last admitted that she thought she ought to have a doctor. The old man was upstairs. Jessie pulled on her stockings and boots and went into the bedroom where she had thrown down her cloak and bonnet when she rushed to help Jess. The skirts of her dress were still damp and draggled with the spilt water and blood and she took down Jess's everyday brown merino from its hook and put it on over her own dress and got on the cloak and bonnet. As she hurried out again she met Mr Fleming coming down the stairs. ‘Jessie's worse,' she said. ‘I think she's very ill, I'd better get the doctor right away.'

He said he didn't know—to wait a minute and he'd see for himself how Jess was. But she'd wait no longer. She realised at last that he had no intention of calling a doctor if he could help it, he was afraid of what Jess would tell. But there was no more time to be lost. She knew of one doctor in the neighbourhood—she would go and get hold of him, without any more delay. She hurried off upstairs.

The front door was locked and the key was not in it.

She went down to the kitchen again. He was standing bending over Jess, his hands on his knees, looking down at her. She went forward to ask him for the key and now she saw that Jess was already far worse than when she had left her only a few minutes ago—and for the first time it came to her that she might die. She was still alive, for though she seemed to be unconscious she was moving; but unless help came very soon it might well be too late. She asked for the key.

He would not let her go, he would arrange it all in his own time, he said. She did not stay to argue but went off upstairs again—it was dawn by now and growing light, perhaps some of the neighbours would be stirring. She threw open the shutters in the ground floor parlour looking over the back gardens, and flung up the window. But there was no one. She was hurrying through to the dining-room to try the front of the house when, at the head of the basement stairs, she suddenly stopped. A moment later she was running down them as fast as she could go.

She saw the upraised cleaver, dripping blood, and the poor blood-streaming, mutilated head, tumbled off the pillow to the stone of the kitchen floor; and even as she stood in a paralysis of horror, again and again the terrible weapon crashed down.

She gave one wild scream and ran forward into the kitchen; but the old man turned and looked at her and at that look she took to her heels and started to run back up the stairs again. He came after her and halfway up the stairs her terror-stricken heart betrayed her and she stood, violently palpitating, spread-eagled against the wall, powerless to move another step; and began to scream for help.

He came to the foot of the stairs. ‘Come down,' he called. ‘I'm not going to meddle with you.' But she saw the blood-dripping cleaver still in his hand and could only stand trembling and weeping, pressed against the wall, imploring, ‘Oh, let me away, let me go; for the love of God let me away.'

‘Come down,' he insisted. ‘I'll do you no harm.'

‘She's dead,' sobbed Jessie. ‘She's killed. Oh, what shall I do?' And she prayed again, ‘Let me away, let me away.'

He came up the stairs and caught her by the cloak. ‘I kent frae the first she cou'dna' live; and if any doctor had come in I would ha' had to have answered for her death, for she'd ha' told.' But
she only sobbed and cried, ‘Oh, what shall I do?—out of my house all night, and Jessie killed!'

‘Aye,' he said. ‘If you tell what you know, you'll be taken for her death as well as I. But there's no need to be feart. Come down; it need never be found out.'

Cowed and terrified, she crept back down the stairs. It was true—out of her house all night, and now here lay the murdered body of her friend. She looked at it and shuddered. He must have seen the look, for he said eagerly: ‘You see—my life's in your power; and so is your life in my power.' If she informed upon him, he said, he would deny the whole thing and charge
her
with the murder. But the fact was, it was as much as both their lives were worth that either should ever say a word about it. Let them both keep it secret, and it could never be found out who had done it. ‘Help me now,' he said. ‘We must get her out of here and wash up the blood from the floor.…'

‘I couldn't,' she said. ‘I couldn't. Not if I were never to move from here again.…' And she besought him, ‘Let me go away, let me go.'

But he ignored her. He tore away the sheet and blankets and tossed them on to the kitchen table and took hold of the poor, terrible body by the shoulders and dragged it out through the passage and into the bedroom, and came back and took the sheet off the table and began to clean up the floor with it. But in disturbing the heap of bedclothes he revealed the bloody cleaver which he must have put down on the table; and at sight of it, her terrors redoubled and she began again to implore him to let her go. She would never reveal a word of it, never, never; even if she were charged with the murder as well as he, she would never say a word. Only, for God's sake let her go!

‘We must pretend there was a burglary,' he said. ‘I'll leave the pantry window open and tell them I found the house robbed in the morning.' And he went back into the dead woman's room and came back with an armful of dresses. ‘Take these away. We can say her box was robbed.'

‘Take them away? What could I do with them?'

‘Buy a box somewhere, pack them up and take a train to some out-of-the-way place and get rid of them. Or send to box to some railway station or other, to lie till called for. Then it can never be found out what happened to the things.'

She
looked at poor Jess's treasured ‘best clothes' and, her own terror a little abated, gave way to a purer grief. ‘How could you do such a thing?'