12

A STRUGGLE BETWEEN
LIFE AND DEATH

Henry told me that his father was alive one day and dead the next. He said he wished he had known he was going to die so that he could say goodbye to him before he went.

Father seemed like to die for weeks, but he didn’t, not even when he seemed almost gone, when his eyes were open but he seemed to be seeing nothing, when he ate nothing, said nothing, did not move. Mother would lift his head and tip a little water in between his lips and he would swallow some but let most of it run out of his mouth and down his beard.

I thought about Henry and his father, taken from him with no warning. Was this my chance to say goodbye? It seemed to me that if I said goodbye, I should be excusing him and letting him go when we needed him to get better. So I did not say it. I held his hand, mopped his brow, showed him my finds and talked to him as if he was listening. I had even thought to share a letter from Henry with him, but none came.

Joseph and I shared Mother and Father’s bed so that we might all help to keep Father warm. Winter was upon us and nights were long and cold. Days were scarce different – short and cold. We were all exhausted but we got little sleep. Father moaned and cried out and passed water in the bed for he could not rise to use the pot, so we lay there awake, feeling the hot wetness of his piss turn cold beneath our bodies and listening to his wails and Mother’s sobs.

I was sickened to see him brought so low. He was once so strong. He could swing me up onto his shoulders with no effort at all. He could heave half a tree trunk onto a cart by himself. He could move a slab of mud and rock on the beach as easily as if it were a pebble. Now he could not lift his own head, with its mess of dirty, greying hair, all tangled and stiff with sweat and tears, and his arms were thin and wasted, the skin yellowed and slack. You could near enough count every bone in his hands and feet and sometimes I tried, tracing their whiteness beneath the skin.

I thought he might wake up enough to pay attention to the eel’s skull. Harry had tied the two parts of the skull together with a piece of string and I amused myself making the jaws snap together as if the eel were still alive. The teeth! Front ones long and sharp and curved towards its throat. I put one hand into its maw and pretended to be a fish, trying to wriggle free. Once behind those teeth, there was no escape, I could see – and feel. I had little cuts on my knuckles to prove their sharpness. Behind these daggers, a row of needles for chewing the flesh to a pulp ran all the way to the back of its throat, beyond the great holes where its eyes had been. I ran my finger over them and drew blood again.

I sat by Father, snapping and unsnapping those jaws, imagining if the eel were twice the size, three times the size. What a monster it would be! A dragon, fierce as any fought by St George!

I wished Henry was there with me. I would like to have shown him that eel. He could have made a drawing of it for me. I could have talked to him about Father. Maybe he would have known what to do for the best.

I would not have told him everything. I wouldn’t have told him about the pissing in the bed or the way Father dribbled or that he was getting very thin and nearly see-through or that he smelled disgusting, even though Mother washed him down on the days that were not freezing, and I was sure that he would not have asked about all that, but he would have helped me to believe that Father would get well again. I was sure of that. Perhaps, though, the plain truth was that I would never hear from him again. ‘Out of sight, out of mind’ went the saying. No doubt it was true.

The good news was that the people of Lyme Regis were, for the most part, kinder than they’d ever been when Father was well. We discovered who our true friends were. Some righteous folk helped out of a wish to turn us all from chapel back to church, going on about their Christian duty and making it very plain that they helped for no other reason. It was very hard to take their coin or bread when they felt obliged to add that ‘he brought it on himself’ and that ‘God punishes the wicked’, meaning we Dissenters, and that we were ‘the poor innocents suffering as a consequence of Father’s wilfulness’. Joseph ordered me to bite my lip and hold my tongue and I did, though my face told the truth... or so the horrid woman from St Michael’s said as she thrust a wizened turnip and two carrots in my hands.

‘I seen him!’ she crowed, her evil eyes sparkling like chips of quartz in a rock. ‘Up on Black Ven on the Sabbath! Dragging you poor souls with him and away from the Lord! Let this be a warning to him. He has been spared to show God’s mercy and that he might return to the one true church! The Lord be praised!’

Joseph stood by me and pinched my back as I took her miserable leavings. I wanted to say something. I wanted to say that I did not believe she would find herself in Heaven when her time came and that I could not help but hope that time would be soon, carrots or no. But I was good and stayed silent. She saw the black look of hatred which Joseph said passed over my face like a storm cloud over the sea and shook her bony finger at me. ‘I see that ingratitude, child. I see the Devil in your face. You are your father’s daughter and no mistake! Unnatural!’

I did not care. Let her see what was in my heart! I wanted to kick her down the steps.

‘She means well,’ said Joseph when she’d gone.

Hmmm. Indeed. I’d have liked to see her mean ill, then!

Mother had a strong dislike of charity for she was proud like me, but the baskets of food had been a blessing, she said, and, truth to tell, we were better fed some days than we ever were before, which was good for the unborn as well as the living. I don’t think she still believed the baby that grew in her belly was a blessing but it was, at least, another reason why Father must get well.

Harry May brought us a bit of salt fish two or three days every week for a month and that was most kind of him, for the weather did not allow sea fishing and he was sharing what must have been the last of his supplies, set aside for the winter. Even when winter was nearly done, spring storms could keep the boats ashore as much as any snow or ice. Folk had to survive on what they had kept from harvest – salted, pickled, preserved somehow.

Squire Stock, one of Father’s customers, sent us eggs, milk and cheese from time to time. At least the cold meant that the milk stayed fresh for many days, instead of curdling and going sour as it did in summer. Mother warmed a little for Father and tried not to mind when it spilled down his nightshirt. On good days, she managed to get him to swallow a morsel of coddled egg. He ate so little, grew so thin, but still he didn’t die.

When I wasn’t sitting with Father and Joseph was not at his apprenticeship, we carried on doing our best to make sure there were plenty of treasures to sell when the visitors arrived.

Joe and I were never much given to squabbles (except where Henry was concerned), but I knew it irked him that treasures seemed to leap out of the mud and into my hands whilst he dug and scraped for leaner pickings. It pleased me, of course. I cannot pretend it does not still, but I have never crowed or boasted about it. Even to this day, Joe complains sometimes that it wasn’t fair and I know he thought it wasn’t fair because I was younger than him and a girl! Mainly because I was a girl. Why that should have made any difference, I have never really understood. I suppose many would think it strange if Joseph could sew a frock or dress a baby, but why one thing should be for a boy to do and another only for a girl was beyond my understanding. It was quite ridiculous. I could thump any boy pretty much as hard as he could thump me, if I’d a mind to, as Henry found to his cost, but it wasn’t just about thumping. It was everything. Girls were just expected to stay at home and cook and clean for men, far as I could see. And have babies or lose them.

That baby of Mother’s, planted before the accident, gave up living before it was ready to be born. I found Mother one day, huddled in the corner of the bedchamber, clutching a little bundle of bloodstained rags and moaning to herself. I had seen this before but this time it seemed both cruel and a blessing at the same time. Mother had suffered enough. She loved babies. I did not. I was glad that there would be no crying babe, taking all her attention and laying her low, and I could not understand why they mattered to her so much but they did and that was that. She had had nothing but hardship these past months and I did not wish her any more.

‘Must we have a burial, again?’ I asked, as gently as I could. But she shook her head.

‘No, child. It was scarce there. Scarce formed. A scrap, poor mite.’

I did not ask her why she cried so hard for a scrap. I left her to her grief, and when the time came for bed there was no trace of blood or rags or the baby that never really was. I do not think Father even knew that it had been and gone so fast. It was a loss to her alone.

Having lost yet one more infant and with a husband ailing and still like to die, Mother was not best pleased about us going back onto the eastern beaches below Black Ven or Monmouth’s western shores. However, when we returned one day with thirty snakestones and the largest, most sparkling lump of what we called angel’s wings, we could see her doing sums in her head and reckoning the money that could be unlocked by selling those finds.

I took the angel’s wings up the stairs to show Father. The golden rock was as large as my two fists. It looked so curious, as if a mass of wood chips and shards of broken glass and nail heads and buttons had all been melted together and turned into gold. When I looked at it closely, I could see that it resembled coal too. Gold coal. What strange matter! If I were a true scientist, I would know exactly what it was.

I was going to lay it on Father’s chest, as if it were a gift, but it was so heavy that it might have crushed him, for his bones were like a bird’s. Instead, I drew back the curtain so that the sunlight struck it and sent beams of golden light around the room.

‘Father! Look! It is an angel, come to visit!’

He opened his eyes and then closed them again as a shaft of light dazzled him. I moved away from the window.

He opened his eyes again. He smiled. A very small smile.

I had not seen Father smile for what seemed like for ever.

He moved his lips to speak but they were cracked and dry so I set down my prize and gave him a sip of water. He swallowed it all without dribbling. He tried to sit up but he was too weak.

‘Mary!’ So faint, I could scarcely hear.

I climbed on the bed and put my ear near his lips.

‘My little Lightning Mary!’ he whispered and he lifted his scrawny arm and held out his hand. I rested my hand in his. It felt like a bundle of twigs. The palm was cool and damp. I did not like the touch of it but I was pleased to feel those twiggy fingers close around my own.

‘You aren’t going to die, after all!’ I said. ‘I thought you were, but you were taking a long time over it so I thought maybe you would get well after all. That is what I told Mother but she has been worrying so and it’s been horrible for us and did you know you piss the bed and dribble and groan all night long so we can get no sleep and you weren’t even interested in my eel skull and—’

He gave my hand a feeble squeeze. ‘Hush! Hush!’ he whispered.

He closed his eyes and for one moment I wondered if I that had been my chance to say goodbye and instead I had talked nothing but nonsense.

But then he opened his eyes and smiled again. ‘Oh, Mary! May you never change!’

‘I never will!’ I said.

‘That’s my girl.’

He closed his eyes and let go of my hand. I wiped it on my skirt because it was all clammy from his touch.

‘Do you want to see my eel skull now?’ I asked, but he shook his head very slightly.

‘Tired. Tomorrow.’ And with that he fell back to sleep.

I went down to tell Mother.

‘He’s talking. He wants to see my eel skull tomorrow. We must give him an egg tonight to build up his strength.’

‘Must we, indeed,’ said Mother. ‘There are but two remaining and I had thought to give them to you and Joseph, now you are both shooting up like bean poles.’

‘Father needs it more than me. Besides, I don’t want to grow more. My clothes are too tight as it is. I can scarce breathe and you can nearly see my knees in this dress.’ It was true that my few clothes were becoming very tight and I did not like the feel of them at all.

Mother looked at me long and hard. I thought she might be about to cry. ‘You’re becoming a woman, Mary! You’ll be all growed up soon. With babbies of your own and a man by your side to look after you.’

At that moment, Joseph came in and it was just as well for I think I would have screamed with fury. Mother knows I do not like talk of babies or husbands.

‘Mary’ll never be wed!’ said Joseph. ‘She can’t abide anyone in her company except we three and that fancy boy of hers.’

My face grew hot with anger, but I bit my tongue and said nothing for, in truth, I did not know what to say. I had been riled by his rude description of Henry but I was also befuddled for a moment by a strange feeling that I might cry.

‘Don’t tease her, Joe, there’s a good lad. She will come around to a husband and babies soon enough.’

‘I will not,’ I muttered under my breath, my hands balled in tight fists ready to thump Joseph or Mother if they continued in this vein. ‘I will never, ever. I will not be a man’s skivvy. I will not let myself grow fat with child or spend my days cleaning and cooking and waiting on a man like a slave with no life but what some, some man, says I must have!’ I spat out the words and a big gobbet of spittle landed on the floor. Joseph saw and started to laugh which enraged me. ‘Some stupid man, like you are becoming, Joseph Anning!’ and I pushed past him to go outside.

‘Wait here, missy!’ shouted Mother. ‘That’s no way to speak to me or your brother!’

I stopped and turned round. ‘Why? Because you be so superior? Because you be so old?’

‘Mary, Mary!’ sighed Mother. ‘We have had difficult times and we are all weary and that makes us say things we do not mean.’

‘But I do mean it!’ I said. ‘I never say things I do not mean. Never. Ever.’

And with that I went out and slammed the door behind me.

What was happening to me? Hadn’t my father just showed signs that he might get better after all? Wasn’t my mother fair worn out with looking after him? Hadn’t she lost yet another of her precious babies? Wasn’t Joseph working hard, learning a trade so that he might put food on the table? And wasn’t Father a man and the best man I ever did know?

I ran down to the Cobb. Harry and three other fishermen were working on their boats ready for the spring, painting on the sticky black pitch that would stop the water getting in.

‘Well, if it isn’t little Miss Anning come to pay us a visit!’ said Harry, his blue eyes twinkling. ‘How’s Father Anning this fine day?’

‘He spoke. He spoke to me!’ I burst out, and then suddenly I was crying and crying and crying as if I would never stop.

Harry put down his brush and wiped his hands on his overalls. I thought he might try to hug me but he knew me better than that, it seemed. He ruffled my hair just as my father used to before he had his accident.

‘Tis the way of it,’ he said kindly. ‘While tis all gloom and doom and sorrow, we show a brave face to the world and go about our business as if all is well. Then, when it is all well at long last, all the sorrow we have kept at bay... just as the Cobb keeps back the storms... all that sorrow comes flooding over us, all of a sudden. You, young Mary, you can scarce believe your grief is over and that is why you cry. Tis the way of it,’ he said again, giving my hair one last ruffle.

I dried my eyes and my runny nose on my sleeve and stood up as straight-backed as I could, which made my bodice feel very tight indeed, I must say. He was right. It made no sense at all, but he was right. We had all been hiding our sorrow, trying to pretend all would be well. Now it would be!

‘Thank you. And thank you for all the salt fish. It helped. And my eel skull. It is my favourite possession, apart from my necklace and my hammer, and I am showing it to Father tomorrow.’

‘Good girl!’ Harry smiled approvingly before taking up his brush again and returning to his task. ‘You’re a good little maid, for all you are a strange one.’

Harry was a good man. And so too was Henry. Maybe I would get a letter from him after all. The thought of it warmed me a bit and I headed back for home a little lighter in my step and in my heart until I reminded myself that, if a letter were to come, it would be I who must pay for it. Let no letter come, then, for there was no money for such fripperies. Was there no end to the deprivations of we poor?