Luckpenny Land (9 page)

‘I wonder why.’

He gazed down at Kath’s nakedness and felt himself start to harden again. ‘Meg would certainly never lie here with me like this.’

Kath’s eyes sparkled with a taunting challenge as she watched his discomfiture worsen. She licked drops of water from her upper lip and saw him groan in fresh agony as his eyes followed the movement. ‘Well, there you are then. Nothing to worry about. She’s happy with her sheep and I’m happy with this. No plans. No ties. Come here. Let me make you a happy man.’

Trying to fetch the sheep down on her own was, Meg discovered, the craziest thing she had ever attempted in her life. And it was all Dan’s fault for stirring her up into anger.

Some of the greedy ones followed her, hoping for extra feed, but if she attempted to herd them in one direction they quickly panicked and set off at a gallop the opposite way.

She had run and stalked and circled wide, blocked up gateways, called, begged and even cried, but had known all along that it was useless. And all the time she was aware of Dan watching her from the
^,
house, laughing fit to bust, she shouldn’t wonder.

In the end she realised she was in danger of risking injury to the precious stock and sat on a boulder shaking with fatigue and anger, letting the tears of humiliation and ruined pride fall.

What a fool she was always to rise to Dan’s jibes. Why couldn’t they have an easy relationship, like she had with Charlie?

Just because she had helped one sheep bring a lamb into the world didn’t make her a farmer. Because she knew how to give a dose of treacle and egg white to cure its ills, didn’t mean she could catch the animal in order to issue it. Sheep were not half so stupid as they looked, she decided.

Meg gazed about her at the majesty of the mountains that rose above the lower slopes of the fells and felt humbled. Patches of shadow, like giant grey sheep, were being chased over the barren fell by brilliant swathes of light. And on the ridges beyond, the remains of last winter’s snow formed skeletal faces, warning people to tread with care. It put her in awe of the task of caring for heedless animals in such a setting. She was mad. She must be to let a little knowledge go to her head. Perhaps Dan was right when he said she was too sharp for her own good.

Alone, here, on the mountainside, she made a private vow that whatever she needed to know, she would learn. Deep inside her was an ache Meg knew must be satisfied. Nothing to do with love, or Jack, or even her family, though they made her more aware of it.

This was something to do with the search she had been engaged on all her life, with that night in April, and with the destiny that she had found on that night. She drew the sparkling air deep into her lungs and felt better for knowing nothing could touch that secret part of her.

In the end though, she was forced to swallow her pride and return to the farm. Dan crowed with pleasure at her embarrassment and her father mockingly reminded her he had said all along that shepherding was man’s work.

‘I could do it,’ she told them both, shame and humiliation adding unusual beauty to her rosy cheekbones. ‘If I had a dog to work with. Even you couldn’t do it without a good dog, you know you couldn’t.’ But neither would admit such a thing so Meg held her silence for the rest of the meal. Only Charlie seemed to be on her side.

‘I think Meg had guts to try. I couldn’t bring the sheep in on my own.’

‘We know that, you great clod,’ said Joe, masticating slowly. ‘Nor would you have thought to try. Shut your face and eat your food.’

It was when she was washing up and Joe was settling by the fire with his pipe that the subject of Sally Ann Gilpin came up.

‘What do y’mean, she came to see me? Why has no one thought to tell me.’

‘I’m telling you now.’ Meg took off her apron and hung it behind the door. ‘Dan sorted it out, ask him. I’m off for a walk.’

‘No, you’re not, madam. I want to know by what right thee put her on to our Dan without speaking to me first.’ Joe started to tamp down the tobacco with a yellow-stained finger as if trying to dampen his rising temper along with it.

For once Meg was surprised to see her elder brother wriggling with discomfort.

‘It was only a small matter,’ Dan muttered.’ Sal Gilpin needs to reduce the weekly payments for a little while, that’s all.’

‘That’s all?’ The voice was ominously soft. Joe Turner had learned that a quiet tone injected far more menace into simple words. He stared unblinkingly at his son. ‘Under what conditions did you agree to her reducing the weekly sum?’

‘Conditions?’ This from Meg who was anxious to provide Sally Ann with a defence at least. ‘What more can you ask for? If she pays less each week it’ll just take longer to be paid off, but you’ll get your money in the end, and no doubt extra interest.’

Dan nodded eagerly. ‘She’ll call here regular to pay it, every Friday.’

Joe stood up to face his son, his body quivering with unspent anger. ‘Didn’t she tell you that I called at her house each week along with my other regular clients? Thee has no right to change the arrangements behind my back.’

Meg looked from one to the other, dazed by the tension that had sprung up so quickly in the small kitchen. ‘For goodness sake, what does it matter how you get your money? She’ll do her best. Calm down, Father.’

‘Don’t thee tell me to calm down, madam. This is my farm, and I’m in charge of it.’

‘You’re in charge of everything, it seems,’ Dan said in a rare show of rebellion. ‘When do I get some rights? And some wages?’

‘Why would you need wages? I don’t charge thee any keep.’

‘I’m not your whipping boy. You keep saying you’ll retire. But you won’t, I know you won’t, and how can I ever think of taking a wife with no money coming in to keep her?’

Such an unusually long speech from
Dan silenced Joe for a whole half minute. He chewed on his pipe and considered. ‘It’s come to a pretty pass when a man’s own son is after stepping into his shoes before he’s taken them off. Thee could allus go and work for someone else if tha’s dissatisfied.’

Dan subsided into his chair, his rebellion spent.

‘I’m the moneylender in these parts, not you, you daft ha’porth. I’m the one that feckless women come running to when they find themselves out of money by Tuesday morning and need my coin to get them through the week.’

Meg found she couldn’t let that pass without defending her sex. ‘Women run out of money because their husbands don’t give them enough. They drink it.’

‘Very likely, but where would those poor women and bairns be without me, I ask you?’

‘It’s not their gratitude you enjoy, it’s the profit you make out of them. Where would you be without those same poor women paying interest through the nose every Friday when you collect your coin back at the quarry face?’

‘I’m not a charity, miss,’ Joe roared, losing his calm again. ‘Is it my fault if some chaps can’t hold on to what they earn?’ He pushed his face close to his daughter. At fifty-nine the years of toil, of being out in all weathers, had left their mark, worsened by lines of bitterness set there by a sanctimonious determination to make life as difficult for himself as possible. As if by doing so he could be brought closer to his elusive God. What he suffered, he felt duty bound to make his family suffer likewise.

‘Times are hard, don’t you forget that. A bit more gratitude wouldn’t come amiss. Sally Ann Gilpin at least never complains about her lot - she does summat about it. You don’t know what it is to be without food to put on the table. When have you ever gone hungry, tell me that?’

How could she dispute such logic? Meg knew she was fortunate. They may be short of cash, and not keep so fine a table as Kath’s family, but they never went hungry like the Gilpins. She felt diminished, as she always did when her father turned the attack upon her. ‘I was only meaning to speak up for Sally Ann,’ she said.

‘Aye, well, happen she can speak up for herself.’

On top of her foolishness of the afternoon Meg felt she had failed to defend her friend. Perhaps her father was right and she was selfish, ungrateful and greedy, with, as Dan said, too high an opinion of herself.

But if that were so then why did she feel deep inside that the name of the emotion she experienced so strongly was not greed but ambition? Not selfishness but self-esteem. She wished with all her heart that she could work it out.

Chapter Five

On the last day of September 1938 Chamberlain was boasting of ‘Peace for our time’. Czechoslovakia and later Britain herself would have cause to doubt this statement but for now appeasement was all. It seemed to Meg that similar political efforts were being made in the Turner household.

She was determined to have no more arguments with either her brother or her father. Life was otherwise too perfect to let them spoil it. Sally Ann called regularly at the farm every Friday to pay what she could and there seemed to be no further trouble there. Meg wished with a deep longing sometimes that Jack could be as easily welcomed. If only she could pluck up the courage to tell her father about him, but she never managed to.

Though Jack sometimes complained she spent too much time away from him, she loved him all the more for that little show of jealousy. Meg too preferred it when they were together but she also enjoyed helping Lanky.

She wanted Jack to come with them all to the Merry Neet which was a favourite social event. It took place in the backend of the year so that any sheep that had strayed in bad weather, or through a gate left carelessly open, could be checked against the Shepherd’s Guide and their rightful owners take them safely home. Meg loved these traditional get-togethers.

In the old days horse racing would often follow the serious business. Nowadays it might be hound trailing or Cumberland and Westmorland wrestling, both of which were favourite pastimes of her brother Dan.
 

There was a great fire at the inn to toast toes and cheerful faces. It burned so fiercely that after a while caps were removed, brows mopped and chairs eased back. The trestle tables were as packed with plates of hot pot and tankards of ale as the floor was with dogs. And everyone was expected to do a ‘turn’ as they sat and smoked and drank and chatted into the small hours.

The chairman in charge tonight was Lanky, and he volunteered to ‘get the ball rolling’ with a rendition of ‘The Bonnie Sheep’ on his fiddle.

Several other people sang songs while the shepherds beat time with their sticks, the dogs with their tails, and Meg and Charlie sat laughing together on the wooden settle in the corner, not taking part but feeling privileged to be allowed to join in with the merriment. Oh, but how she wished Jack were here. He’d sulked when she’d insisted on coming tonight, wanting her to go with him into town.

‘You’d love it,’ she’d urged, kissing him softly on the mouth. ‘Why won’t you come with me?’

‘You’ll be the only woman there.’

‘No, I won’t.’

‘What would your father say?’

‘We don’t have to tell Father about us. You’re entitled to come with Lanky.’

But he refused, so she’d come with Charlie instead, and was glad.

There were no women shepherds, of course. How she would love to be the first. But several of the wives had come.

And then cries went up for the gurning to start. A popular local sport it might be, nonetheless she was astonished to hear Joe volunteer. She watched him stick his round head through the horse collar, known as a braffin, and start to pull and stretch his lips and cheeks into the most horrendous face. All the farmers stamped their feet and roared with laughter. Meg couldn’t believe this was her own, stern-faced father who was performing so outrageously. How could he be so unfeeling towards her, yet the life and soul of the party with his friends?

‘Nay, Joe,’ cried one, as he let his face relax into a grin. ‘Give over, that’s worse.’

He was declared champion gurner of the night and was so well pleased with himself he told them a lively tale of losing two sheep from the back of his van and chasing them all round town, which had the farmers almost falling off their seats with delight.

‘Why isn’t he like this at home with us?’ Meg asked Charlie, but her brother only shook his head, equally bewildered.

‘Because he isn’t happy there,’ came Lanky’s voice from behind her. ‘Not since your mam died. Come up and see me tomorrow. I’ve got summat to show you.’

She stared thoughtfully at her father and wondered if she knew him at all.

Meg finished her chores and walked up to Broombank as promised. She took her time, enjoying the softness of the autumn breeze which failed to shift the phosphorous cloud that clung to the mountain tops. Dundale Knott rose up at her left as she walked, looking like a lop-sided cottage loaf with a knob on top and a large slice of it cut away, leaving a sheer drop to a bubbling beck below. She found Lanky mending broken walls.

‘You look busy,’ she said.

‘Thee’ll not catch me laikin,’ he said, meaning lazing about doing nothing. ‘I’ve summat to show you. Hold on a minute while I finish this bit.’

He laid all the stones out on the grass and then it was like watching him put a very complicated jigsaw puzzle together. He never picked up the same stone twice, just slotted each one together perfectly. Meg did what she could to help, learning all the while.