A Pinch of Salt Read online

  Liam put a stop to that. He arrived at the cottage one morning just after Kate, who had been up for hours, had given Charlie his breakfast.

  ‘Da,’ Kate was surprised and then worried. ‘Is it Bridie? Is something wrong?’

  Liam looked around the tiny kitchen which was already full of the mouthwatering smell of baking and his eyes stopped at the blankets in the big chair by the fire. ‘Not in my house,’ he said.

  Kate blushed. She had meant to sleep in the chair for a few days only, to let Charlie rest and gain his strength. She folded the blankets and put them away in the wee press beside the fire.

  ‘Some tea and a bap, Da? Are you here to sit with Charlie a wee while?’

  Liam accepted the freshly baked morning roll and a mug of hot sweet tea. ‘I’m away to hire myself out as delivery boy for Kate Inglis Bakeries.’

  Kate was overwhelmed. Her proud father – a delivery boy. Then she remembered that Liam Kennedy had pushed prams and rocked babies when most of his peers thought such tasks were unmanly.

  Kate Inglis Bakeries. It had a grand ring to it.

  ‘Do you mean it, Da? You’ll deliver my pies?’

  ‘With pride. ‘’Tis better too for you to be at home with your baby. I’ll work for you till this strike is settled and then Charlie’ll take over. He’d best see the doctor about all the walking but, sure, I can’t see that being in the fresh air ever hurt a body. Pushing a pram at the same time will be Charlie’s worry, added to any other ills the poor man might have.’

  He got up and went off into the bedroom to see his son-in-law and came back less than fifteen minutes later with Charlie leaning on his strong arm.

  Kate rushed to her husband’s side. ‘Da, what are you daing? You’re no fit, Charlie. You should be in your bed.’

  Exhausted by the short walk from the bed, Charlie could say nothing but Liam answered for him.

  ‘A wee sit by the fire will do him the world of good, Kate. Sure he can even rock that precious wee boy of his while he watches the mammy working. When I get back from the village I’ll help him outside for a sit in the sun. Better medicine than lying in his bed.’

  ‘Your daddy’s right, Kate. I’m letting myself be an invalid. A proper man would get himself a job to look after you and the wean but this I can do; I can mind him while he’s awake and I can take him for a wee bit of fresh air.’

  Kate was not so sure that she would allow an invalid, for that was how she had become used to thinking of her husband, to hold her baby outside. What if he should drop him on the stony path? But she smiled and fetched her husband another cup of tea and then prepared a delivery for her new delivery man. Liam covered the distance to the village in no time at all but when he came back he found that Kate had taken the opportunity to air the cottage. The windows and doors were wide open and the coverings on the bed had been pulled back to let fresh air into the mattress.

  ‘Is it one of these compulsive workers you are, Katie?’ asked Liam gently. ‘Are you forgetting how to sit down and let God’s sunshine warm you?’

  Sit in the sun. Was it mad he was? Kate ignored the question. ‘I thought about washing the sheets but I’m frightened they wouldn’t be dry by the time Charlie would need to get back to bed. The first day you’re able to sit up all morning, Charlie . . . What in the name of heaven is that, Da?’ for Liam had certainly delivered his pies in the bairn’s pram but he had returned with a large empty grocery box.

  ‘This is going to be an outside cot for Patrick.’

  ‘A box for my bairn?’

  ‘Won’t I have the pram at the village? Fill up the bottom with papers so it’s not damp and the laddie can lie in the sun with his daddy and kick his wee legs.’

  Kate hated the idea but Patrick loved it. With less and less swaddling on as the summer progressed, his little limbs grew stronger and would have got browner if his mother had not interfered.

  ‘My son is not a tinker, Charlie Inglis. It’s indecent the way you have him lying there.’

  The baby had progressed with the summer from his box to an old rug and he now delighted his parents by suddenly turning from his back to his front, a feat which excited him so much that he proceeded to repeat the performance till he had mastered the technique.

  ‘Isn’t he the cleverest baby you’ve ever seen, Charlie?’ Kate said to her husband who was standing beside her in the garden. She turned to look at him and found Charlie looking at her and not, as she had thought, at his son.

  He put his arms around her.

  ‘Charlie, it’s no right. In the middle of the day and the bairn seeing us . . .’

  ‘Aye, he’ll die of shock seeing his parents kissing. It’s all he’d see, isn’t it, Kate? I’ve forgotten how to do anything else.’

  ‘I never meant . . .’ began Kate but, luckily for her, for she had no idea how to explain what she had never meant, Liam called to them from the road.

  ‘Is this not the best day and you two out in the garden. I’ve got the post. Did Jock Thomson not say he loved coming up here for his tea with you? But there’s nothing for the farms and so he’s off home to get his garden in.’

  ‘He’s over late,’ said Kate with relief as she took the letters. ‘There’s one from Mr McDonald,’ she said in some puzzlement. ‘It’s a wee thing early but it’ll be a grand cheque this month. Da, can you bank it for me when you’re back in the village. Bring the bairn, Charlie. I’ll get you two your dinners and feed him in the back room.’

  They heard no more of the daily post till they were well in to their mince and tatties. Kate came through from the bedroom looking dishevelled and to her father utterly charming; to her husband completely desirable, and totally oblivious of the effect she created.

  ‘Da, Charlie, you’ll never guess. Mr McDonald wants to see me . . . in Glasgow.’ She said Glasgow as if it was as far as the moon instead of a bus journey, albeit a long one, away. ‘Our business plans,’ he says. ‘I didn’t know we had any business plans. Well, I’m no going to Glasgow. Gracious, I have a baby to feed, and a bakery to run.’

  ‘And a husband forbye,’ added Charlie sotto voce.

  Kate heard but paid no attention to Charlie’s wee joke. It was a joke, wasn’t it? Of course she knew she had a husband and didn’t she show he was important by working hard to feed him? She was rereading her letter. ‘He says it’s time we was on a more businesslike footing. Oh, Daddy, what if he’ll no sell my pies?’

  If Liam did not think it strange that Kate should voice her fears to her father, Charlie certainly did.

  ‘Glasgow is the business capital of Scotland, Kate,’ he said, ‘not Siberia. We’ll all go. You come too, Liam, and me Aunty Molly. It’ll be a grand day out.’

  ‘It’ll be like a tinker’s flitting,’ laughed Liam. ‘No, you two go. You know Glasgow, Charlie, and you can mind wee Patrick when his mammy’s at her meeting. You can afford a new frock. Molly says the Co-operative has nice ones.’

  Kate listened to them planning her life and wondered at them. If she had come into the room demanding new clothes for a business meeting in Glasgow they would have thrown up their hands in horror and found a million reasons why she should not go. Now they were discussing the probabilities of trains running, the times of buses, and the logistics of breast feeding (although the word breast was never mentioned) on the said buses, as if they had been wholeheartedly behind her business ventures in the first place. Contrarily, for the first time, she would have welcomed their interference. The thought of a long bus journey to someone who had only once been as far as Dumfries, with a business meeting at the end of it (whether or not she was bolstered up by the wearing of a brand-new, shop-bought dress) was making her feel more than slightly sick. If only Charlie would rage and storm, ‘No wife of mine is having a business meeting in Glasgow or anywhere else.’ It would then be easier to acquiesce quietly and go on as she was. Here she was at the turning point, wife and mother or businesswoman. The thought was terrifying but strangely
exciting.

  ‘You’ll need to get a writing tablet at the post office, Kate,’ Liam went on as if he had been arranging meetings every day of his life. ‘They’ll have what’s suitable for business letters and then,’ almost as an afterthought he turned to Charlie, ‘she should go and buy a frock . . . maybe a coat too, and a hat.’

  He smiled at them both, well pleased with his organizational skills and Kate and Charlie looked at one another in the confusion engendered by the word hat. To Kate, and she felt sure to Charlie too, it brought back memories of their appalling wedding night. She remembered her beautiful wedding hat, shop bought too, and the only one she had ever owned.

  ‘A hat would be too much. Wouldn’t they think it was the queen herself coming, Charlie, but I’ll get gloves,’ – a smile lit up her face – ‘and some for Bridie.’

  She would not listen to their surprised reaction to the thought of Bridie with gloves. It was a promise, a promise from long ago and for the first time ever Kate felt as if she was beginning to make good her promises. She had money in the bank, for none of the profits from the pies had been spent, and they owed money to no man.

  ‘I’ll see what the Co-op’s prices are,’ said Kate bringing herself back to reality. Meeting or no meeting she was not about to put her hard-earned money on her back. Was it not for Patrick? But she and Bridie could have gloves surely and she could wear her wedding dress and her shabby old coat. Mr McDonald need not see the coat for she could take it off and have Charlie mind it for her while she was talking to Mr McDonald.

  ‘Talk to your daughter, Liam. Every penny profit goes into that bank to make more.’

  Charlie was the man for the grand gesture, champagne and photographers at his wedding when he had not a shilling to fall back on. Kate, more practical, smiled at him. A new frock, just this once. She was sorely tempted.

  ‘Kate’s a grown woman. It’s for you to tell her what to do,’ said Liam.

  This was dangerous ground. Kate knew fine what Charlie wanted her to do and what that moment in the garden had made her realize that she would have to do.

  ‘Aren’t we wasting time here?’ she said. ‘If I’m coming into the village, Da, we’ll need to get the pram ready.’

  ‘Stop fussing over that bairn. He’ll no die with me here to mind him and he’ll probably sleep till yer back,’ Charlie said angrily some time later as Kate tried to get herself ready.

  ‘You’ll no let him lie wet and these are all aired nice. Charlie, I’ve not left him afore.’

  ‘I’m his father, Kate. Look for a blue frock . . . to match yer eyes.’ He smiled at her; it was almost the brilliant-blue smile of the cocky wee bantam she had known before the war.

  Oh, God, what’s wrong with me that I can’t respond to him? thought Kate almost wistfully, aware deep down that something was missing, something that could make life so much fuller. But I can’t, I can’t; if he touches me I’ll scream. Breathe deep, Kate; it’s Charlie and it’s not that awful.

  Kate and Liam walked off down the road, Liam wheeling the pram and Kate looking back to wave again to Charlie still standing in the doorway.

  ‘Will I not wheel the pram, Da?’

  ‘It’s heavier with pies than with the bairn, lassie. My goodness, Kate Kennedy. What would yer mam say if she could see us walking together to the bank and maybe a blue frock. Changed days. Don’t let Mr McDonald talk you into working harder. Have you not a nice little business and all your own work? Maybe it’s time I retired and let your man have my job. A man needs to feel he’s doing his share.’

  ‘That’s daft, Da. Charlie will never work again. What’s wrong with me working for the both of us and the bairn? Look, is that not the doctor’s sister in her pony and trap. What’s she doing out this way?’

  The little blue cart drew up to them and Miss Hyslop looked down at Kate and her father. Her eyes, so like her brother’s, had none of the friendliness that always lighted up the doctor’s homely face.

  ‘Good afternoon, Kennedy,’ she nodded to Liam. ‘Dr Hyslop asked me to give you this, Kate,’ she almost sniffed with the appalling realization that she was playing messenger to the ragged miner’s child who had once knocked fiercely at her door demanding the doctor. She handed down a letter and Kate had to stop herself bobbing a curtsey. Instead, Kate Kennedy Inglis, businesswoman, smiled her dazzling smile and thanked Miss Hyslop for her kindness.

  ‘I’ll get blue, Da,’ said Kate watching the retreating trap, ‘and maybe even a blue coat.’

  ‘Her brother would have taken us and the pies up beside him,’ said Liam. ‘Open your letter. Two letters in one day. Don’t I think I’m in the presence of somebody special.’

  Kate did as asked and read the letter from Dr Hyslop in quietly growing pleasure. ‘Oh, read this, Da. He’ll send me in his trap to Ayr and then I can get a direct bus to Glasgow. That’ll save hours and he’ll pick us up – he says he knows fine I won’t leave wee Patrick for the day – if we get the last bus home. Why is he so kind to me?’

  ‘Isn’t he kindness itself to everyone, Kate? I think he sees something he can do to help you get on. You know when your mammy died he was dead against you leaving the school. “She’s bright, Kennedy,” was what he said, “and deserves her chance.” He was silent for a long moment. ‘Wasn’t he right but there was nothing else I could do.’

  Kate said nothing for her heart was too full. To walk beside Liam like this, on her way to that grand building on the main street that she never entered without a thrill of pride, and to have him talk to her not as a father but as an equal was absolute joy.

  ‘I won’t be frightened to get lost in Glasgow with Charlie with me. A big place like you could confuse a body, do you no think, Da?’

  ‘Aye, especially if her mind’s taken up with a new dress,’ Liam interrupted and they laughed. They had reached the village and while Liam strode off with his pramful of pies, and surely with even more pride in those strong shoulders, Kate went to the bank. She was always amazed to see the totals growing larger and larger every week but, as Charlie had pointed out, nothing had ever been taken out and she almost hated to do it now. She made a quick calculation, added two whole pounds in case of emergency, and the money was counted out to her.

  ‘Always a pleasure to serve you, Mrs Inglis,’ said the bank clerk and she nodded to him politely as if bank staff were always saying such things to her. And one day they will be, she determined, when I’m Kate Inglis Bakeries.

  According to Mr McDonald, sole proprietor of McDonald the Grocer, that day was on the very horizon.

  ‘I’ve ordered lunch, Mrs Inglis,’ he said after she had been shown into his beautifully appointed office. ‘You must be starved after that journey. You’re staying overnight in Glasgow, I take it?’

  Kate shook her head and heard the words, ‘I have a bakery to run, Mr McDonald.’ She must have said them for he was laughing.

  ‘A holiday never hurt anyone and if your bakery was on the right footing you could have had a few days; nice shops, restaurants, art galleries, a wonderful city, Glasgow.’

  They talked, at least he talked and she murmured something now and then, of Glasgow and Charlie and wee Patrick as they walked along thickly carpeted corridors to a private dining room. Kate had never imagined that he would invite her to lunch and at the bottom of her stomach was lying a bacon sandwich that Charlie had insisted she eat at the bus station. Even without it she doubted if she could have eaten in this lovely place. All she wanted to do was look around and dare to touch the fine linen on the table when her host turned his head to address the hovering waiter. Behind his head on the wall was a painting and Kate admired it with rising excitement. It was of little boys and boats and the sea looked as if any minute it might splash out of the canvas and soak the floor.

  ‘It’s a McTaggart, Mrs Inglis. Incredible, isn’t it? Do you know, I used to wrap that picture in brown paper and carry it home with me at night so that I could look at it there too. I ordered a meal to
save time so I hope you like what I’ve chosen . . .’ Kate nodded dumbly while part of her mind wondered why he no longer carried the glorious painting home to admire at night – was he so rich that there was another one just like it in his house? ‘We need to talk, Mrs Inglis.’

  And for the next hour, while fish followed soup and beef followed fish and the lightest most delicious pudding followed the beef, he talked and Kate listened and tried to remember what he said and what the food looked like. She could not eat a bite. She did try but the bacon butty seemed to have moved and to have become lodged somewhere between her throat and her stomach.

  ‘You don’t care for white wine, Mrs Inglis. Try this claret,’ and she sipped from a glass that she would have thought too fine even to sustain the weight of the liquid and wondered that he could pick them up so nonchalantly in his great hands.

  The bacon sandwich slipped down and the second gulp spread a warm glow across Kate’s stomach and down her legs to her toes and she wiggled them inside her brand-new shoes. The only alcohol she had ever tasted had been the champagne at her wedding.

  She gulped again. ‘This is very nice,’ she heard a voice say and it must have been hers. ‘Much, much nicer than champagne.’

  He refilled the glass. ‘I knew you were a woman of impeccable taste, Mrs Inglis. All the ladies of my acquaintance swear by champagne, a highly overrated beverage in my opinion and obviously in yours too. It’s almost time for your bus though.’ He signalled the waiter who poured coffee. ‘I’m not asking for your decision today. It’s a lot to take in and quite an undertaking with a new baby, but the business plan is carefully set out for you here.’ He patted the fat folder beside him. ‘You should have brought Mr Inglis and the baby with you. It was remiss of me not to think of them, but next time. If you’ll excuse me a moment . . .’ and while he was gone a neatly dressed maid showed her into a bathroom and asked if there was anything at all madame needed.

  Madame looked at herself in the grand mirror. I was so scared but now I’m not. She felt distinctly unlike herself and experienced a rush of nausea that made her hold onto the marble basin for support. What am I doing here, and then her heavy breasts reminded her of her son and she came back to reality in terror that she might be leaking over her new dress.