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Chapter 1
1830
Belle’s teeth clamped down on the thick wad of cloth as the pain rippled through her. She could taste the mustiness of it, a dry, acrid staleness that caught in the back of her throat. Spitting it out as the pain receded, she wondered how many other women had bitten down on that same piece of cloth.
The sun, struggling to pierce the green glass of the small window, giving an unearthly greenish glow to everything within, suddenly burst through the opening door with an unwelcome warmth which merged with the sweat on Belle’s body. She turned her head and, narrowing her eyes against the glare, looked at the woman stooping to enter the small room. Their eyes met momentarily, and Belle knew that Annie was only there because it was her duty to be present at the birth of her first grandchild.
Belle turned her face to the wall, but no matter how much she tried she could not find a comfortable position on the straw filled mattress. Her dark curls tangled damply round her neck and she did not feel pretty, but no longer had the strength to care.
The pain started again. At first it had only been twinges but now the pain deepened and came in waves, closer and closer together. Tears coursed down Belle’s cheeks as she twisted her head from side to side, sobbing and moaning. ‘Damn! Damn! Damn!’ she muttered. ‘Damn you, Jimmie Watt!’ Clamping her teeth firmly on the rag, she thought angrily, if it hadn’t been for you I wouldn’t be lying here now, with only your sour faced mother and some damned witch of a midwife for company.
The pain ripped through her, a rending, splitting pain that threatened to disembowel her. She tried to scream but gagged on the cloth in her mouth. Struggling to dislodge it she finally shrieked and shrieked, while strong hands held her thrashing legs and caught the baby who had struggled so fiercely to be born. Belle, aware of a feeling of release now lay panting and sweating in the enclosed space of the box bed, barely aware of her mother-in-law’s silent disapproval.
‘It’s a fine wee lass,’ the midwife busied herself with a pair of scissors, manoeuvring adroitly in the confined space, her rubber apron crackling and smelling fishy in the heat. Belle felt sure it was the same apron she used to gut fish, and she recalled with a shudder the black under the woman’s finger nails.
‘A first bairn is always the worst,’ the midwife’s tone was kindly, ‘are you not going to look at her then?’ She thrust the baby at Belle who instinctively held out her arms. The baby, still covered with birth fluids, puckered her lips and made a mewling sound.
Belle had never actually held a baby before and she had never seen one with such a head of black hair, so long that it reached her tiny shoulders. ‘I’ll call her Sarah,’ she announced.
The tall, well-built woman sitting on the ingle stool at the fireside removed the clay pipe from her mouth and spat in the fire. As the droplets bubbled and sizzled on the coal, she turned slowly and deliberately to stare at Belle. ‘Sarah? What kind of daft name’s that?’ she demanded. ‘It’s not a fisher name, that’s for sure.’
Belle cringed. The feeling of worthlessness, instilled in her by her minister uncle, crept through her making her feel stupid. She looked at the baby and then at Annie. Meeting the contempt in Annie’s eyes she stiffened with defiance and said, ‘She’s my baby and I’ll call her what I like.’ Belle’s arms tightened round Sarah, the only real possession she’d ever had that was all her own.
‘Ach, Annie Watt, what does it matter what the lassie calls her bairn.’ The midwife thrust a parcel of bloody papers and straw on to the fire.
‘We’ll see about that when my Jimmie comes home,’ Annie muttered. ‘He’ll have something to say.’
‘He’s not your Jimmie any more, he’s mine,’ Belle muttered, scowling at her mother-in-law.
‘Hmph,’ Annie snorted as she turned back to the fire, ‘that’s what comes of marrying a townie. He should have stuck to his own kind,’ and with that final remark she clamped her teeth round her clay pipe, a sure indication that as far as she was concerned the discussion was over.
Belle flopped back on the bed exhausted, unsure whether the wetness on her cheeks was from sweat or tears. Jimmie should have been here with her, but he’d gone out with his father’s boat, chasing the herring shoals. The fish were more important to him than something so commonplace as the birth of a child.
Belle looked at the wrinkled, black haired baby, but her feeling of joy had been ruined by the attitude of her mother-in-law, and she suddenly felt too tired to care.
‘Don’t be such a misery Annie,’ the midwife said. She laid a basin in front of the fire and reached for the heavy black kettle that was simmering on the hob. ‘She’s just a wee lass, and I mind fine when you had Jeannie, you made a bit of a fuss too as I recall.’
‘I don’t recall that at all,’ Annie’s voice was dangerously quiet, ‘and I don’t see how you can remember. That was all of seven years ago.’
Turning her face to the wall, and grasping the baby close to her body, Belle covered her head with the rough grey blanket. She could not bear listening to the two older women because she knew that neither accepted her as one of their own. To them she would always be an outsider. The incomer that was not welcome in the fishing community of Craigden. She wished again that her Jimmie was with her to shield her from their contempt.
Belle never noticed the blanket being pulled back, nor was she aware of Sarah being lifted from her arms as she descended into a restless sleep.
Chapter 2
The mud slithered through Jeannie’s toes. She tentatively dug deeper and wriggled them in an effort to detect stones and the precious mussels that clung to their surface. Ma always managed to fill her creel with mussels, so Jeannie knew she wouldn’t be pleased with today’s harvest that barely covered the bottom of her murlin basket.
‘There’ll be no mussels today,’ Jeannie had heard her ma say that morning. Jeannie knew she should not have come to the back-sands on her own. But she also knew that Da couldn’t fish tomorrow if there were no mussels to bait the lines, and Ma had been so busy she had not even noticed Jeannie leave.
Solemnly she studied the bottom of the basket hoping the mussels would magically increase, but nothing magic ever happened to Jeannie, and the weight of her responsibilities pressed down on her young shoulders. The other bairns didn’t seem to be worrying, but it did not matter so much to them, because they knew there would be mussels in plenty to bait their father’s lines. There would be few mussels for her da’s lines because her ma was at home waiting for the birthing of Belle’s bairn.
Jeannie knew that if she could get further out on to the back-sands where the mussel beds were thick, she would have filled her basket. She looked with envy at the women already turning to wade back to the shore, and knew by the angle of their shoulders that they had managed to fill their creels.
The first of the women passed her singing out as she went, ‘Back to the shore you, young uns. Tide’s coming in.’
Jeannie dug her toes stubbornly into the mud. There must be some more mussels somewhere. But if there were, the women would not have had to wade so far out into the tidal waters of the basin. Her eyes stung but she refused to cry. Jeannie had not cried since she was five, and now she was a grown up seven it wouldn’t do to let anyone see tears.
Davie appeared at her side with a splash, ‘Come on, Jeannie, tide’s coming in fast, and Ma would give me what for if I took you home drowned.’
‘You might have helped me with the mussels,’ Jeannie glared at her older brother.
‘Menfolk don’t gather mussels,’ Davie stretched his twelve years old body as tall as it would go. He smirked down at his sister. ‘That’s women’s work.’
The two children glared at each other, Jeannie, small and thin for her age, and Davie, already showing signs of becoming a tall man. Jeannie was the first to turn her eyes away. She did not like to fight with her brother and did not like it when Davie’s eyes lost their usual laughter.
‘Anyways, you could have helped, just this once,’ she muttered, turning to wade to the shore. Staggering slightly she held her skirts higher to avoid the gathering waves.
Davie grasped her thin arm. ‘Come on, before you sail down the river,’ and making sure she did not stumble, led her to the shore.
The women, already walking towards the village, strode out with manly steps despite their wet skirts. Jeannie was not sure how they managed it because the sogginess of her skirt kept catching her legs and slowing her down.
‘Cheer up,’ Davie tramped along at her side. ‘Ma’ll be too busy helping Belle birth the bairn she won’t notice there’s hardly any mussels, and by the time she does I’ll make sure your murlin’s full.’
Jeannie did not bother to ask him how he would manage that, but she reckoned some of the other baskets might be slightly less full. It wasn’t right some of the things Davie got up to, but she would not refuse the extra mussels, for Ma’s displeasure was dreaded by all her children.
‘D’you think the bairn’s born yet, Davie?’
‘How should I know? That’s women’s business.’ Davie lengthened his stride. ‘Anyway I expect it is,’ he added.
Jeannie giggled. Davie often imitated his older brothers in his efforts to appear a man. ‘D’you like Belle?’ she asked, and watched with interest as a blush stained Davie’s neck and spread to his face.
‘She’s all right,’ he mumbled.
‘Ma doesn’t like her.’ Jeannie hesitated, not sure whether she should or shouldn’t like Belle, just because Ma didn’t like her.
‘Ma wouldn’t like anybody who’d taken her Jimmie away from her.’
‘That’s not true, she wanted Jimmie to marry Ellen Bruce,’ Jeannie nodded in the direction of the group of younger women just in front of them. ‘I heard her say so.’
‘She only wanted that so Jimmie could get a share in the Bruce boat, anyways Belle’s a lot prettier than Ellen.’
‘See, I knew you liked Belle,’ Jeannie skipped out of the way of the hand that Davie aimed at her head. Hoisting her damp skirt up to her knees, she ran to the top of the grassy bank where she could see straight down the river and out to sea.
The mud flats were now completely under water as the tide raced in. Jeannie shivered to think that only minutes before she had been gathering mussels where now there was only water. The village lay before her, small and constrained by the cliff that rose behind it, the sun dappling the faces of the cottages that sat in its lap. She tried to pick out her ma’s house, but they all looked the same at this distance. Shading her eyes with her hand, for the sun was high in the sky, she looked beyond the small huddle of whitewashed cottages to the river mouth.
‘The boats should be coming back now the tide’s on the turn,’ Jeannie lowered her hand and turned to look at her brother. ‘Jimmie’ll be anxious to know if he’s a da yet.’
‘They’ll not come back until they’re full of fish, no bairn’s worth an empty boat. Besides Ma would give them what for if they came back without a catch.’
‘You’re right, Davie, I suppose I just wished they’d come home.’ Jeannie started to walk down the path towards the cottages, ‘At least we can see if Belle’s had her bairn yet.’
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