A Country Girl. Nancy Carson
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was passed. ‘Algie, do us all a favour and clear off, and in future don’t be such a damn fool. Next time mind your own business.’
‘But he—’
‘Yes, I know …’
‘But you—’
‘But me what?’
‘He was hurting you.’
‘Clear off, Algie,’ she repeated impatiently. ‘And go and wipe your mouth. Your lip’s bleeding, by the looks of it.’
‘My lip?’ He put his fingers gingerly to his mouth, then inspected the ends in the moonlight for signs of blood. ‘You’ve split my lip, you swine,’ he complained to Reggie, his indignation surfacing again.
‘Serves you right. Come near me again and I’ll knock seven bells out o’ yer.’
It was all about to flare up again. Kate placed herself between her brother and her clandestine lover once more.
‘Go, Algie … clear off. I’ll see you inside.’
Algie turned to go, his shoulders hunched in humiliation at having perceived the situation between Kate and Reggie so wrongly. ‘If I catch you here again, Reggie bloody Hodgetts, I’ll do the same,’ he said as a parting shot, trying to salvage some credibility.
‘Balls!’ rasped Reggie, determined to have the last, meaningful word.
Once inside, Algie stood on the hearth looking into the mirror by the light of an oil lamp at his bleeding lip. He didn’t like the look of the cut and tried to stem the bleeding by dabbing it with a rag moistened with cold water. If it hadn’t healed sufficiently by tomorrow night his ability to engage Marigold in some earnest spooning would be seriously impaired.
Kate eventually returned, shutting the door behind her grumpily.
‘You article!’ she scoffed in an angry, grating whisper, trying to keep her voice down so as not to arouse her mother and father. ‘In future, if you ever see me with a man, whoever it is, just don’t poke your nose.’
‘I thought he was hurting you,’ Algie muttered defensively. ‘I thought you didn’t want his … his … attentions. I thought he was raping you.’
‘Raping me!’ she gibed. ‘You idiot.’
‘I was trying to protect you.’
‘I don’t need your damned protection. A fat lot you know about women …’
Algie turned round to face her. ‘I always had the feeling you might be a bit loose, our Kate, but I never reckoned you were that much of a slut. Couldn’t you find somebody with a bit more about him than Reggie Hodgetts? He’s the scum of the earth. He stinks. I swear I could smell him.’
‘Oh, shut up,’ Kate replied sulkily.
‘Can’t you see it? What if he’s put you in the family way and you have to marry him? Would you like to spend the rest of your days living on his filthy narrowboat with no room to swing a cat?’
‘Don’t be stupid, Algie,’ she protested, but calming down. ‘I’d never marry him. I ain’t in love with him, am I?’
‘Then what’s the big attraction?’
She turned away, reluctant to answer that it was sexual pleasure, for fear of debasing herself further in her brother’s estimation. Instead, she lifted the kettle off the hob, checked to see if there was water in it, and then lifted it onto a gale hook over the dying fire so it could boil.
‘Tell me, our Kate, what’s the big attraction?’
‘Does it matter?’
‘Yes. It does matter. He’s a nothing. He’s lower than slime in a duck pond.’
‘It doesn’t matter, Algie, ’cause I shan’t be seeing him no more.’
He welcomed this unexpected nugget of information. ‘That’s a bit sudden, eh? Are you sure?’
‘I ought to know.’
‘So it’s done some good, my parting you? Was it your decision or his?’
Kate made no reply.
‘At first I thought I’d have to fetch a crowbar and prise you apart,’ Algie continued derisively. ‘Aren’t there no decent chaps at the Amateur Dramatics Society you could take up with, if you’re that desperate? Don’t nobody decent ever come into the bakery shop?’
Kate didn’t answer and they remained silent for some minutes. She went to the brewhouse to swill out the teapot.
‘D’you want a cup of tea?’ she asked, a little more civilly, when she came back inside.
‘I might as well. Is my mouth still bleeding?’ He dabbed his lip again and inspected the rag for blood.
‘No, but it’s swelling up … And it serves you right.’
‘I can’t believe you’re such a trollop, Kate,’ he commented, still preoccupied with what had occurred. ‘My own little sister.’ He shook his head to emphasise his disdain. ‘I’d never have thought it of you.’
‘Leave it be, Algie.’
‘Why should I?’
‘Because you’re being stupid. What about if the boot was on the other foot?’
‘Well it ain’t, is it?’
‘How should I know? Haven’t you ever tried your luck with Harriet Meese?’
‘Oh, I’ve tried,’ he admitted. Then he saw an opportunity to belittle his sister further. ‘But she wouldn’t let me. And you know why? ’Cause she’s a lady, not a trollop. She’s got something about her. She deserves respect for it.’
‘She’s a stuck-up cat. Anyroad, I can’t see young Marigold Bingham being as stuck-up, I’ll say that for her. So when you get your way with her, just consider whether she’s a trollop, eh?’
‘Leave Marigold out of this.’
‘How can I, when you’ve been with her most of the day? Have you had your way with her already?’
‘What’s it got to do with you?’
‘Exactly my point, our Algie.’
‘For your information, Marigold ain’t a trollop,’ he added in the girl’s defence. ‘And like I say, it’s nothing to do with you what me and Marigold do.’
‘Likewise, what me and Reggie were doing had got nothing to do with you,’ Kate riposted. ‘But it didn’t stop you interfering.’
‘I’m going to bed,’ Algie announced grumpily. ‘I don’t see the sense in stopping up and arguing with you … trollop!’
Algie had eaten and gone to work by the time Kate went down for breakfast. She was employed as an assistant in the shop at Mills’s Bakery in Brierley Hill High Street, and didn’t have to be there until eight. She had not slept well, preoccupied all night at being discovered with Reggie Hodgetts, and her sudden plunge in Algie’s already low esteem. Maybe she was a trollop. She’d never looked at it like that before; she’d never had to because she’d never been found out before. But if it was all done in private then what did it matter to anybody else? It was simply that she enjoyed the physical contact of men; the exhilaration, and all those sweet sensations. When Algie had pondered it all a little longer, when he was more familiar with the ways of women and the world, he might work it out for himself. It pained her to admit it to herself, but yes, she must be a trollop in his estimation and, if he thought it, so might the rest of the world. The encounter tonight must not become common knowledge for fear of her losing her reputation.
A significant thought struck her: polite society, on the brink of which she was now poised – by virtue of