Redlegs (21 page)

“I forgot myself.”

He nodded. His grey eyes blank, as though he, too, had
forgotten
who he was. A man as grey as a loch at dusk, and as sad as the memory of it.

“Do you ever think of going home?” he asked.

Home. The word sounded different on his lips. Not the
nostalgia
of women riven from their hearths; no echo of soft spring and leafy dell. Something harder, more distant, but more real. She knew what he meant, and yes, every aching moment of her life, all she had ever wanted was home.

Elspeth prayed that no one knew of her infrequent lapses. Those few shameful liaisons that happened out of the blue over the next few years, and which were banished from her mind no sooner than they had occurred.

How could she possibly have explained – even to herself – that, at these junctures of her life, she simply could not think clearly; found herself in the midst of ill-advised actions, without ever having decided to embark upon them? The women around her could not know of her need for the touch of a man’s fingers, not just the brush of his eyes. None – certainly not Diana or Mary Miller, not even the intemperate Susan or the drunkard Margaret Lloyd – could have understood what happened between Elspeth and Shaw.

On that first of their meetings, they sat apart from each other all night until, with the first blur of dawn, he escorted her to the house. They exchanged not a word as she hurried ahead of him, the light bringing the gates and the outside world back into existence and chasing her back to the big house. They bid each other a hasty, formal farewell at the porch. In the days and months that followed, he acted as if nothing had changed between them, treating her in the same formal manner he always had.

When finally they fell together onto his pallet bunk – nigh on two years after that first encounter – she was, as before, in a fevered and detached state. George had made love with a joy and
inspiration
; even the farmboy of her youth tackled and worked at her with a greater doggedness than Shaw. Yet, despite his deficiencies in energy, she found an unexpected gentleness in his touch. His milky sugar-scent anaesthetised her. At first she had tried imagining she was with George, but the mental transition was too great. George’s skin had been soft, nearly hairless, and responded with a pulsing or goose-fleshing at her every touch; Shaw’s hide was taut and hirsute, his movements edgy. But his gradual entering of her – so tentative as though he feared he might break her – rendered her dazed and drowsy.

Three or four more times they fell together – exactly how many she couldn’t say, as each encounter was immediately obliterated from her memory. The drowsiness that overcame her when she was with the factor was only a magnification of the torpor she fell into
generally. She continued to organise the concerts, oversee the work of Mary Miller, Annie and Dainty, dance for Albert on the fewer and fewer occasions that he came home – but all of it she felt she was doing in a mild trance.

For her neighbours in Roseneythe these were exciting times, full of work, weddings, births. Dramas now happened only in other
people’s
lives: Diana losing her babe; Mary’s girl, Nan, growing faster and more noisily than the rest of her generation; Martha Glover’s death. The building of the Manufactory. Like the spectacles she now found she had to use to read the smaller text in books, the world was clear, but separated from her.

On the other hand, the dream of colours and shifting shapes that had seldom left her sleeping mind in all those years, seemed closer, intimate. She began to recognise the shapes as people,
crossing
to and fro, and the soft red glow as fire, or light. A memory of early childhood perhaps. Or a childhood promised but never lived. Elspeth, keeping the dream alive in her head when she woke,
letting
the colours drift and flow around her as she went about her mundane tasks, wondered if she had the power to remember events that had never actually happened.

In the same year as Elspeth’s first fall into the arms of Shaw, Diana Moore was accused of murder. Martha Glover publicly claimed the midwife had stolen her baby from her side, and killed it.

Martha had problems from the earliest stages of her pregnancy and Diana had nursed her, as she had always done with all the women, successfully bringing her to full term. The night of the
delivery
, however, had been excruciating for the mother-to-be, resulting in her passing out as Diana cut the umbilical cord of her little boy. When Martha awoke both Diana and her baby had vanished.

No one else was present at the time, so it was Diana’s word against Martha’s, and the two descriptions of the evening were in every respect dissimilar. Martha admitted she had fainted, but only for the briefest of moments, and claimed that she had heard the healthy cries of her infant boy. Diana maintained that
complications
had set in early; that Martha – an elderly first-time mother, at forty-two – had drifted in and out of consciousness for several
hours. She had woken briefly only when the child was being pulled from her, and was quite insensible again immediately after. The sad fact – and one which a woman who had waited so long for a child understandably could not endure – was that the boy was born
malformed
and lifeless.

Diana never said it directly, but everyone understood from the language she used that the child was also tarnished. Martha
vigorously
denied the rumour – but could not, or would not, name the father. She was an unlikely one, to be fair, to tumble with a darkie, but then, equally, she was desperate for a child, and perhaps her standards had dropped accordingly.

“Bring me the boy’s body and I’ll show you he was not only fair, but strong and healthy, too!” cried Martha to anyone who would listen. Elspeth, Mary and Nan Miller, as well as the less powerful women, all felt for her. But they trusted Diana’s expertise – not to mention her piety. Mistress Moore was of a kind that shuddered at even the hint of a little white lie. And the idea of digging a child’s body up was distasteful. When Diana refused to reveal the
whereabouts
of the child’s remains, many took it as proof that she sent them out on the water in the direction of Scotland – another little Moses in a sailing crib.

Martha persevered for months, demanding that Captain Shaw take some action. Along with Susan Millar and Bessy Riddoch, Martha was one of the few women who had managed to strike up relations with the distant factor. She was friendly, too, with his deputy, Nathanial Wycombe, so alone amongst the women she had some purchase to pursue her case. For a week or two, all Roseneythe held its breath, waiting for Shaw’s reaction.

“The mannie’s in a swither,” Bessy Riddoch said. “On the one haun’ he has to bide by his complouter Moore, whae does hauf his work for him but whose sermonising he cannae thole. On the ither, Martha’s a proper freen’, and a freen’ o’ his Billie Wycombe.”

At last, and to the relief of most, the factor came out quickly and strongly on Diana’s side. She was, he proclaimed, the most decent, pious and dependable of ladies. She had worked loyally and
steadfastly
for over a decade, and her propriety and righteousness were not to be questioned. He defended her right – a right granted by his own
authority – to inform mothers of the disposal of remains as she saw fit in each circumstance. Given Martha Glover’s evident anguish at the loss of her child, Diana had acted properly, and out of a humane desire not to cause the lady any further upset. He reminded them all of the difficulty of producing and nurturing a successful species, made in their own image, under inhospitable and peculiar climactic conditions. Those who wanted the best for themselves and their families must bide by the rules he and Diana set.

In between the cheerless transgressions with Shaw were rich years for Roseneythe, but silent ones for Elspeth. She looked into herself, trying to pull the fading memories back from a void inside her. The shape and motion of the Alba; the dressing-rooms of The Lyric; the countenance of her darling George Lisle. She could no longer imagine the face of the daughter she was meant to have, and began to lose faith in the hope that that child would ever emerge even from another woman’s belly.

Recommencement of Captain R. Shaw’s Disclosure

I left off my journal some years ago overtaken by the sudden & momentous work at the Coak Estate at Northpoint. The record of my Project here is fully reported & available for those who wish to study my method. Were it not for my successes – & some inevitable setbacks – I might have found time to elaborate on these rough notes of my more Personal life. As it is I have only a few hours to bring up to date the story that I began nearly two decades ago.

I found myself paying-work for a while on the estate of the admirable Mister Barclay. This planter had interests beside those of sugar & crop. He had made a deal of money from trading in slaves when such a profession was still permitted. He had invested in the island of Barbuda in the management of stud farms for the breeding of slaves. He knew how much of Whydah could be mixed with Congolese to produce a tall strong worker who yet was not rebellious & did not eat too much.

Through study & practice I now know all there is to know about the African. I know that the Wolof & Mandingo are to be avoided – that they have knowledge that is not Natural & should not spring from behind dead eyes. The Congolese – despite a bearing blacker than all other Africans – are strong – indifferent to fatigue – tranquil & born to serve. They take no heed of our world so that all is balanced in theirs. Their distaff are full-breasted & breed readily. The best produce will be the offspring of a Whydah bitch & Cormantine bull. The other way around & you result a strong & healthy cub – but prone to be sullen.

I say again – I do not despise the Negro. The meek shall inherit the Earth. I take the words of the Good Book as they are written undiluted. By mixing his blood we have robbed the African of his innate weakness which looks to us like idiocy. It only does so because the Negro’s time has not yet come – nor will it for many a generation & perhaps never now that we have toyed & interfered with him. Kinmont saw in the passivity of the darkie no less than our Saviour’s own mildness & the least of His creations who shall be suffered unto Him. The Negro’s ascension will undoubtedly take place in the Last
Age – some time off yet I trust. Least until I have terminated with this damned Disclosure.

I heard that a young man in the northern Parish of St. Lucy was struggling to maintain his plantation. I had long since relinquished ambitions to own a plantation or business of my own – dedicating myself now to a greater cause. An Estate under the management of an unapprised young newcomer – he was reported to be no more than a lad – was the perfect place for me to practice my art & recent profession. I journeyed to the Parish to meet this man – or, in actual fact, boy. My life has been tarnished since squeezing out of my mothers thighs, by runts & shrunken striplings. I do not believe that I have ever encountered such a confused & lost Soul. It was clear that my very presence frightened the girlish little milksop – a pederast I took him of – a fucker of pups’ arses – a pintle-licker – & an English pouffe. He was introduced to me by his father – who on the contrare was a manly gentleman – as Mister Albert Cox. Once the father had agreed my conditions & secured my services I built a house for myself on the Plantation. Only in one particular did the older man veer from the path of Truth – though he was still frank.