Episode 18: Another Mother’s Son
Neil had made the tea too strong and his aunt drank it without noticing. He watched as she sat motionless, facing the window, lifting her head whenever something stirred outside. At last, hooves sounded on the road. Her mind, which was always far away from her body these days suddenly jumped into action and she lifted her head to stare at Neil. He could see the anguish in her eyes.
Robert rode into the yard alone. He climbed down from the horse, saw them waiting at the door and spoke before either could ask.
“It’s not Thomas.”
Agnes caught the doorframe. Neil put a hand beneath her elbow.
“You saw him yourself?”
“Aye. It’s not our boy.”
She moved forward, pressed her face against Robert’s coat. He stood with his arms hanging awkwardly, then slowly put them around her. Neil looked away, knowing they were never good with showing physical emotion even at the best of times. It wasn’t embarrassment -it was their culture and Neil knew it well.
He had imagined those words would change everything but Thomas was still missing and his chair was still empty. Nothing had changed but there seemed to be some kind of understanding that maybe he wasn’t coming back but he might be alive.
The man from the river was German. “He worked at the mill,” Robert said when they were seated.
“They fetched someone who knew him.”
“What was his name?” Neil asked.
“They told me.” Robert rubbed his eyes. “I can’t remember.”
“Do they know how he died?”
“Not yet.”
Agnes stood beside the stove, holding the kettle.
“That poor man,” she said. “And here was I thanking God.”
“You were thankful it wasn’t Thomas,” Robert answered.
She nodded, but did not move – her eyes fixed on the wall, looking lost.
By the time Thomas had been missing for three weeks, people had begun offering explanations instead of help. Perhaps he had caught a train, gone looking for work or was hiding until the trouble at the inn was forgotten. Everyone had a story but yet nobody had Thomas.
Robert always followed up on whatever news reached him. He came home tired, sometimes angry but yet always alone. There had been no further signs.
Neil had told the constable what he remembered about one night, which was painfully little. A horse, a hat and face hidden in darkness riding up to the house.
One afternoon, he found Robert mending a gate Thomas had promised to repair. Neil held the timber while his uncle positioned a nail.
“Do you think he left because he was frightened to come home?”
Robert stopped.
“Who said that?”
“People in town.”
His uncle looked towards the kitchen window.
“I told him to stay away if he was stealing again.”
“You were angry.”
“Aye.”
“You didn’t mean it like that.”
Robert pressed the nail into the wood.
“I knew what I meant.” He struck it once.
“I don’t know what he heard.”
Neil kept the timber steady. He could think of nothing useful to say. When they finished, the gate swung cleanly and Thomas would have found something wrong with it. He would have laughed and told Neil he had been holding the wrong end. Neil almost smiled.
That evening, Agnes sent him upstairs for Thomas’s blue shirt. “There’s a cuff needs mending.” A boot lay beside the bed. Neil straightened it, then stood wondering why he had bothered. He noticed paper inside the boot, first he thought it might be just to dry the boot off but he lifted it out and took it downstairs. It was a handwritten letter alright.
He hesitated about handing it over, slipped it into his pocket but didn’t understand why. He did know though that kids, even young adults never trusted their parents with secrets. Hiding in a boot, it clearly wasn’t something for the world to see.
His aunt opened her sewing basket. “He’ll want this,” she said. Neil sat opposite her, watching the needle pass through the cloth. After a while, she looked up.
“Do you think he knows he can come home?”
Neil said nothing.
“Whatever’s happened,” she added.
He wanted to promise that Thomas knew. Instead, he reached across and held the cuff while she pulled the thread through. Outside, Robert fastened the yard gate. They listened together until his footsteps reached the door. For a moment, neither moved; then Agnes bent over her sewing again.
Later that night he tried to read the letter but found himself struggling. He was due to meet Esther the next day and she, if anyone knew how to keep a secret.