Luckpenny Land (8 page)

Visitors to Ashlea were rare. Farmers, not having much time for socialising at home, tended to confine their gossiping, which they loved, to their gatherings, meets and markets. The womenfolk had their own list of busy chores which kept them at home just as firmly. So Meg was surprised to have a visitor one day in early summer. She was alone in the house, her father having gone to make arrangements with Lanky for the coming clipping. Dan and Charlie were out in the fields.

The day was sunny, ideal for a bit of gardening, washing curtains and baking a fresh batch of scones. Feeling well pleased with her efforts Meg quickly fed the new growing calves then awarded herself a well earned rest in the sun. She was sitting with her feet propped on an upturned bucket when Sally Ann Gilpin, the seventeen-year-old eldest daughter of the Gilpin family of Quarry Row came knocking at the farmhouse door.

She was a plump girl with a round smiling face. Meg remembered her from school as always wearing hand-me-down clothes a size too small, and she had changed little over the years, as untidy now as she had been at twelve. Kath, who of course had gone to a private girls’ school in Carlisle, had never been a particular friend of Sally Ann’s but Meg liked her. Sally Ann had a good warm heart.

‘Is your pa in?’ she asked now, hugging a buttonless cardigan about an ample bosom.

Meg explained that he was away and she wasn’t sure when he’d be back. ‘Dan’s in the top field. I could call him for you.’

‘No, it’s all right,’ said Sally Ann, too quickly. ‘I can call again.’

Meg smiled encouragingly at her. ‘He’ll be in shortly, for his tea. Stay and have a cuppa with me and a bit of a crack. It’s not often I get a chance for a gossip with another female. Surrounded by great clods of menfolk I am, and I haven’t been out for days.’ Meg laughed and Sally Ann, eyeing the scones on the kitchen table, quickly agreed.

‘That’d be grand, ta.’

They went inside while Meg brewed a fresh pot of tea and buttered several scones. She carried the tray out so they could sit in the sun, Sally Ann trailing silently behind her. But the small tea party proved to be a disappointing failure. Her one-time friend, perched uncomfortably on the edge of her chair, seemed lost in thoughts of her own and all Meg’s efforts at cheerful conversation fell flat. Finally she recalled how Jack had told her that Mr Gilpin had been unwell.

‘How’s your dad? I hope your ma’s managing all right.’

The girl swallowed a mouthful of tea, seemed to choke upon it and quickly set the mug down as she broke into a fit of coughing. Meg waited patiently for the spasm to pass.

‘Dad isn’t too good as a matter of fact. His leg was smashed by a boulder that ran loose in the blasting and he’s had to give up quarrying. He gets a bit of labouring here and there. Doctor doesn’t think it’ll ever properly mend, not that we’ve had him up recently. Doctors cost money.’

Meg looked shocked. ‘But surely your dad was insured, with the quarry?’

‘Oh, aye, at least he paid his penny a week for a while, only it don’t last for ever.’ Again she swallowed a mouthful of scalding tea as if wanting to soothe away unpleasant memories. ‘And there’s not been much spare cash about with Dad off sick for so long.’

‘No, there wouldn’t be.’

‘That’s why I’m here, if I’m honest,’ Sally Ann admitted, her voice so low Meg could scarcely hear her.

‘You’re wanting to borrow some money off my father, is that it?’

Sally Ann looked up at her with haunted eyes. ‘Well, your pa’s already helped us out a time or two. I was wondering if he’d give us more time to pay.’

Meg regarded the girl for a moment in compassionate silence. Unable either to read or write, Joe Turner was nevertheless frugal and adept at saving money. And if he could make that money work for him by lending it out at a good rate of interest, nothing pleased him more. He kept track of every penny owed him on tally sticks which he kept in a sacking bag hung behind the pantry door. One for every client. He never made a mistake and Meg had seen grown women weep as they begged for more time to pay, and him just turn and walk away. It sickened her sometimes but it was infinitely worse to see it happen to a friend.

‘He never likes extending the loan period. I do know that. Is there no other way you can get the money?’

Sally Ann looked bleak. ‘I earn what I can at the Co-op shop and we’re very careful. But Mr Shaw says he has to cut me hours from next week so I won’t be able to pay so much back. And the little ones are needing boots for their feet, not new ones you understand, but teacher says they can’t go to school without. The house we’ve found, well, hovel more like since we had to leave Quarry Row...’Sally Ann rolled her eyes as if trying to make a joke of it . . . ‘needs a coat of distemper if only to kill the bugs. We can’t go on like this much longer.’ Her voice broke, betraying her resolution to remain calm.

Hearing her friend’s problems filled Meg with shame. She was in the depths of despair any day she missed seeing Jack, agonising over where he was and who he might be with. Only when she was with him was she truly happy. Jack was also growing more ardent, his hands seemed to be everywhere and she worried about how much longer she could control him. She loved him so much and she did want him, she did truly. Only she was afraid of what might go wrong if she gave in. Meg thrilled at the new excitement that had come into her dull life, delighted that at last someone cared, but it worried her all the same.

Yet really it shouldn’t, she told herself, not in comparison with Sally Ann’s lot.

‘I’ll call and see your ma. We’ve more vegetables here than we know what to do with. And I could spare a bit of milk and eggs now and then, for the little ones.’

‘Oh, she’d be made up.’

‘I wish it could be more.’

‘Just tell your pa that I. . .’ Footsteps sounded across the yard and Sally Ann stopped speaking, clamping her lips together as Dan swaggered towards them. Meg poured her brother a mug of tea, buttered a large scone and handed both to him without a word.

He settled himself with a sigh on a low stone wall and looked across at the two girls seated on kitchen chairs before him, brown eyes speculative while he consumed his tea.

They talked for a while of inconsequential matters, mutual friends they knew who had married or given birth recently and various members of Sally Ann’s large family. At last Meg turned to Dan with an enquiring smile.

‘Do you know what time Father will be home? Sal has come to see him on a matter of business.’

Dan gave a grunting laugh as if she’d said something amusing. ‘Women don’t know owt about business.’

‘That’s not true,’ Meg refuted stoutly. ‘Women aren’t given the chance, that’s all.’

Dan glowered at his sister, bristled brows twisted in scornful mockery. ‘You think you’re so smart.’

‘Maybe I am.
^’

‘Smarter than me, a humble farmer, I suppose?’

‘Most people are smarter than you. I certainly work as hard as you, great lazy lump that you are, and don’t pour money down me throat. What Father would say if he found out that’s what you do, I don’t know.’

‘You’re going to tell him, are you? Miss-Goody-Two-Shoes.’

‘No, I’m not the tell-tale round here. Stop trying to pick a fight, Dan, and just tell me what time Father’ll be home so Sally Ann knows whether it’s worth her while waiting.’

Clearing her throat, Sally Ann spoke up, perhaps thinking to stop this argument before it got quite out of hand. ‘It’s only about the loan.’

‘Well now, if it’s to do with money lending, I’m the one you want to see, not me father.’

‘Oh, but it was Mr Turner that I dealt with last time.’

Dan was setting down his mug as he got to his feet. He looked impressive at full stretch, a well-built man it was true, but handsome when he made the effort to adopt a more pleasant demeanour. And all too aware of his own power.

‘Well, you can deal with me now. Father leaves much of that side of the business in my hands these days.’

‘Since when?’ Meg asked, startled.

Dan ignored her. ‘He has enough to do with the farm, he says. These financial matters are often left to me.’ He smiled at Sally Ann.

A year or two younger than herself, Meg thought Sally Ann looked suddenly old and haggard, and she was filled with pity for her. Dan had never been known for his caring personality. Rather the reverse. He had been the kind of child who pulled wings off butterflies and hated anyone to best him. She reached out a hand instinctively to reassure the other girl.

‘What do you know about finance? You couldn’t even learn your multiplication tables.’

‘If you’re so clever I dare say you think you could run this whole farm better’n me?’

‘You don’t run it. Father does.’

Dan’s face went red. He hated the idea that he must wait till Joe died before he had any say in running Ashlea. ‘It’ll be mine one day. Then you’ll have to do what
I
say.’

Meg was so infuriated by this high-handed bullying the words were out before she had checked them. ‘Maybe it’ll be mine and not yours, who can say?’

‘Huh, that’s a laugh. Father’d never leave it to you.’

‘He might, if I proved I could look after it better’n you,’ she protested, then quailed at the grimace of pleasure that came to his face.

‘You? Run this farm? A woman?’

‘Yes, me, a woman.’

‘I’d like to see you try.’ Dan jerked his head towards the empty field and the smooth green fells beyond, where could be seen moving flecks of sheep grazing. ‘If you’re so wonderful, let’s see you fetch some of the sheep down for the clipping. Go on, I dare you.’

She could tell him not to talk so daft. It took three men with dogs to walk the several hundred acres of open fell and bring down the hundreds of sheep that belonged to Ashlea.

Perhaps it was the mocking laughter on his face, or his heartless bullying of poor Sally Ann. Or the fact that he had ruined her one chance of earning a bit of extra money by getting her in trouble with her father. Or Meg remembering all too vividly that night in the snow. She had told no one, not even her family, of that night, and neither it seemed, had Lanky. Perhaps because of that experience Meg felt certain she was capable of so much more and had a sudden longing to prove it.

‘All right,’ she said. ‘You’re on.’

Dan turned away, a sneering laugh on his lips. ‘Don’t talk soft. There’s only two places where women should be. At kitchen sink, or in bed.’

That did it. Meg tossed her bright head, curls bouncing with boundless energy, grey eyes meeting her brother’s with a challenging glare. ‘Right. I’ll bring some of your damn sheep in. See if I don’t.’

And leaving them standing open mouthed, she recklessly set off alone, up the fells.

Drops of water sparkled in the sunshine on firm brown flesh. Two bodies, now entwined, now swimming and diving, ducking and leaping, girlish laughter mixed with the more gruff teasing tones of the man who pursued her carried upward on the still warm air.

Not for this girl any sense of shyness or undue modesty. Her body was carefully toasted to a coffee and milk colour and she held no inhibitions about showing it. She knew her breasts were firm and full, her waist narrow over the seductive swell of girlish hips. Her legs were long with slim ankles and highly arched, pretty feet. She buffed the skin at night till it was smooth as silk, nurtured with creams and lotions. Now she gasped with delight as the ice cold tarn water flowed upon it, swimming as briskly as she could to keep her blood flowing.

‘Come here, damn you!’ Jack was after her in a second. When he caught her she wrapped those long brown legs about his waist, shaking wet hair back from her face. He buried his face in it, capturing her breasts with his hands. ‘God, you’re beautiful. You’re like a drug I can’t leave alone.’

‘Why should you leave me alone?’ Slanting hazel eyes regarded him with open provocation. ‘When it’s so good.’

‘Oh, it’s good right enough.’ It was so easy to penetrate her here in the lake. He grasped her hips and pulled them down hard against him, making her scream and shiver with ecstasy as he plunged upwards into the soft warmth of her. The experience was intoxicating, addictive.

Later, when they lay spent on the cropped grass, gazing up at speckled sunshine glistening amongst the green leaves of an old oak, he swore softly through gritted teeth and she laughed. ‘Don’t tell me you want it again, so soon?’

‘No, witch, leave me alone. Why do I feel so damn guilty?’

Kath smoothed a languorous hand over the broad chest and down the length of his flat stomach. ‘I can’t imagine. It’s not as if you’re engaged or anything, is it? You’re still a free man.’

He pushed her hand away and sat up. When she was touching him like that he couldn’t think clearly. ‘Meg seems to be making plans.’ He couldn’t understand how it was that matters were moving so fast between them. She’d have him buying a ring soon if he didn’t watch out, and he hadn’t yet decided yet if that was what he wanted. Nor could he quite bring himself to give her up.

Kath sighed deeply, closing her eyes against the sun and enjoying the heat of it on her bare skin. ‘Nonsense. Tell her not to. Life is too short for plans.’

‘She spends hours at the farm with my dad. Keeps talking about farming. I think she’s more besotted with the sheep than me.’