The Inheritance and Other Stories

She wasn’t sure where the thought came from, but something not a sound made her glance up into the dimness under the rafters. A cat’s eyes glowed at her from the shadows. Don’t come down! she mentally begged him. She made a pretense of gathering garbage from around the cottage, added a handful of bones from around the chicken carcass, and carried them outside. She walked to the edge of the farmyard near the trash heap and set them down. In a heartbeat, Marmalade was there. He wound twice around her ankles, purring like a storm and then settled down to crunching the bones. She crouched down beside the cat in the gathering darkness. “I have to go away, Marmy. So do you. I wish I could tell you to run to Hilia’s house and live there. She’d take you in.”

He stopped his crunching and looked up at her, his eyes boring into hers. I live here, his gaze seemed to say.

“So did I,” she said, and sudden tears choked her. “But I can’t stay here any longer. He’s going to change too many things. He’s going to kill my chickens. And make Gillam into someone named Will, someone like him. And make me into . . . something.” She didn’t have a word for what she would become. Something he ordered about, something that cleaned up after him and gave her body over for his use, and never spoke about the things that had used to belong to her, never spoke of the ways he had hurt her and wronged her. “I can’t become that. So I can’t stay here.”

Marmalade rumbled a growl.

“I can’t defend my territory like you do. Not without risking that he’d hurt me. And if he hurt me badly enough, or killed me, then who would protect Gillam from him? Even if I stay here and battle him every day, he will change Gillam in ways I don’t want him to change. I have no choice, cat. I have to run.”

“Rosie! Rosie, where are you?” Pell sounded more annoyed than concerned at her absence. She hissed at the cat, startling him so that he dashed off into the darkness. She wiped her face on her apron and walked around the end of the byre.

“I was checking the cow,” she lied. “Truly, I’d best take her to Ben’s tomorrow.”

“Yes, I know, you told me.” He was impatient. “Come back to the house. I can’t find the money.”

Her heart lurched. The money? What did he mean by that? Then she knew. Her money. When he’d left, they’d already spent the last of his on the fish and potatoes. Every copper pence in the small cloth bag behind the kindling box was hers, earned by hard work, a shard at a time. Not that there was much. But he’d take it all. She knew it. She thought of the silver bit she’d earned today. That at least was still tied in her apron pocket. He had no way to know about it. She walked slowly back to the cottage, debating with herself. He would know she had at least some money. And once she’d shown him any of it, he’d take it all. Which was worth more, the silver in her pocket or the coppers in the pot?

“Rosemary!” His shout was angry, and she suddenly heard Gillam wail.

“No, no, no! You bweak it!” She broke into a run and burst through the door.

“What? What is it?”

Gillam sprawled in the corner, sobbing. He clutched the broken pieces of his three-legged stool to his chest. The bedding was in a heap on the floor. An angry Pell spun to face her. “Where have you hidden the money? It’s not in the pot on the rafter.”

“What did you do to him?” she demanded. Gillam was gasping as if he could not get his breath.

He gave his son a disdainful glance. “Nothing. I tried to use the stool to look for the money and it collapsed under me. Then he burst into tears about it.” He shook his head. “The boy wants toughening.”

“No.” Gillam wailed indignantly. “No, you bweak it and you push me down! You pushed me down! Pushing is wude! You bweak my stool.”

“It was badly built. It’s not my fault. And you are too big to cry about every little thing. None of this would have happened if the money pot were where it is supposed to be. Rosemary, what did you do with the money?”

She was shocked at how swiftly he descended to the level of a two-year-old, trying to shift blame for his idiocy onto someone else. A cold deadly calm suddenly flowed through her, as chilling as if her blood had turned to seawater as she realized what he had been about. The pot on the rafter. He’d stood on Gillam’s little stool to reach for the rafter.

“That’s where you used to keep the money. Out of my reach. Remember? So I couldn’t be ‘foolish’ with it.” She crossed the room and picked up Gillam. He clung to her tightly, bundling the pieces of his beloved stool between them, and she found herself returning that grip. “Don’t you cry, son. We’ll build another stool.”

Gillam took a shuddering breath and emboldened by his mother’s embrace, he peered around her neck and cried out, “I don’t wike you! You bweak my stool!”

“Oh, shut up. Rosie. I’m asking you something important. Ignore that brat for a moment. Where did you move the money? I need to go to town, and I can’t go without a penny to my name.”

A sudden vivid memory flooded her. She’d stood here and with a long stick had poked the money pot out of the rafters. Heavy with pregnancy, she’d not trusted the chair she’d stacked on the table to take her weight. And when the small pot fell and shattered, it had confirmed what she’d already known. Not even a copper shard was left in it. He’d left her penniless. She’d been hungry that night.

Gillam still in her arms, she strode across the room and snatched up the small bag from behind the kindling box. She opened the neck of it and dashed the contents to the floor. The scatter of small coins rang and rolled against the stones. She tossed the emptied bag onto the bedding. “Take it,” she said. “Take every penny that you never earned. Take every bit of it. And go away and never come back.”

“Stupid bitch,” he said with great feeling. “I am taking it.” Without shame, he dropped to his knees and went grubbing after the coins. He grunted as he crawled under the table and spoke as if short of breath. “I’m going to town. I have to meet someone there, to talk business. And I may have a beer or two with old friends. But I will be back. Because this is my house. My grandfather may have willed it to the boy, but everyone in town knows it should have come to me. That’s how it should be. And that’s how it’s going to be. Accept that, and things might be easier for you. Or get out. I don’t care which.”

With a louder grunt, he heaved himself to his feet. His face was red, and his fine shirt was so wrinkled it looked crumpled. He pulled his own empty purse from his belt and funneled her small collection of coins into it. His telling her to get out suddenly changed everything. “This is Gillam’s house and land, given him by his grandfather when you would do nothing for your son. I won’t let you take them from him.”

“Don’t talk to me like that!” he warned her. He tied the purse at his belt and glared at her. She stood where she was, her foot firmly planted to cover two of the errant coins that had rolled toward her. She needed them, and so she stood her ground as he advanced on her. She met his gaze. She wasn’t quite brave enough to say anything more to the angry man, but her need to keep the money made her stand defiantly before his sudden charge.

As he lifted his hand, disbelief froze her. She turned her body, shifting Gillam away from the blow. He wouldn’t! her mind shrieked.

He will. He’ll kill you if he dares. It’s in his mind right now.

He can’t! Her argument with herself took less than a second. His hand was in motion and she still hadn’t moved, still covered the bits of money she hoped to keep for herself. Faster than his falling hand, the cat leaped down from the rafters. Claws out, he lit on Pell’s head and shoulder, raking his face and yowling. The blow Pell dealt Rosemary was a glancing one as he spun to confront the snarling, spitting cat. It still sent her to one knee as she sought to keep Gillam from hitting the floor. Pain shot through her leg, but she didn’t drop her child.

Pell seized Marmalade in both hands, and the cat sank his fangs into the soft meat between Pell’s thumb and fingers. Pell shouted wordlessly and flung the hapless cat. He struck the wall, fell to the floor, and then impossibly swift, shot out of the open door.

“MARMY!” Gillam shrieked.

Pell clutched his scored face with his bleeding hands and glared at them. “No howling,” he warned the boy. He pointed a shaking finger at Rosemary. “You clean this mess up before I get back.” A nasty smile showed his teeth as he glared at the white-faced child. “Kitty likes to fly,” he said and laughed.

Rosemary struggled to her feet, her child still in her arms. “No. My cat, my Marmy!” Gillam’s little body, she realized, was tight with anger, not fear. “You bad! Bad, bad, bad!”