The Gate

A short story, first published as a prize-winner in Northern Short Stories Vol 5. in 1994. This was when I published under my given name, before I discovered, via Google, that there were umpteen writers using that name. I created my pen name a little later.
But enough about that. Here’s the short story for your enjoyment.

THE GATE

‘Winter’s out.’ said Joe.
Greening hedgerows slipped slowly by, filling his view from the passenger seat.
George considered budding twigs, the damp verdant verges. ‘Ay. Mebbie.’ He agreed.
It was as much as the men had said all that afternoon. More than on some. Silence between them was understood, accepted, welcomed even. Their response to a shared situation; their imposed solitude. This silence held no hidden meanings for them. It was companionable and voluntary. And, like their habit of equality, marked their mutual dependence.
George turned the ancient Land Rover off the black surface of the lane and slowed to avoid the potholes and ridges that formed the farm track. The suspension was no longer able to reduce these shocks of the rural and he was sensitive to the older man’s painful limbs. He’d no wish to aggravate joints already inflamed. Concentrating on the road immediately before him, George missed what Joe could hardly avoid as they approached the house.
The car parked in front of the dilapidated farmhouse was shiny and new. Seemed fresh from the showroom.
‘Representatives.’ Muttered Joe, cynically.
Looking up, George was arrested by the bright gleam of red. He grinned at the sheen, incongruous against the dun, weather-worn bricks. ‘Fool’s errand.’ He predicted.
Joe relaxed again, confident George would keep the salesman waiting until they’d seen the cows in from the field across the road and milked. Afterwards he’d tell the lad – they were all so young these days – they wanted nowt. No sale. And the flash youngster would go, disconsolate. And George would get supper ready by the normal time whilst Joe saw the chickens gathered into the henhouse for the night.
George allowed the bumper of the battered old Land Rover to kiss the smooth red plastic of the saloon. Gentle as a cow’s tongue at its calf.
As they were getting out, the stranger approached through the side gate, mud and muck clinging to the suede of his shoes.
‘Townie!’ Joe’s tone was contemptuous, and loud enough to reach the young man’s ears.
But George said nowt. He halted in his tracks and stared at the newcomer in silent disbelief.
Smart, confident, the young man ignored Joe and stepped eagerly up to the farmer.
‘Michael!’ George welcomed the young man. Took him in a warm embrace that expressed deep affection.
‘Hiya, Dad.’ The young man said.
He glanced at Joe and only nodded.

Alone, Joe finished the milking. He patted Betsy on the hocks, urging her from the stall and recalling the day when he and George had spent four hours rescuing her as she lay stranded on her back in a ditch. They’d saved her newborn calf that day as well.
George, his favourite briar trailing fragrant blue smoke and signalling an end to his day’s labour, trod too carefully into the cow shed. He looked at the soft eyed cows and avoided Joe’s stare.
‘Haven’t seen Michael for years. Ten years. Mebbie more.’ George was well aware that Joe knew this. ‘He’ll likely be stoppin’. For a while.’
Joe nodded. He refused to return George’s unfamiliar parting smile.
Alone, he hushed and heyed the slow cows from the shed. They wandered unguided along the track and spilled into the lane until Joe urged them into the field opposite with calls of encouragement and much arm waving.
The gate was still bad. George, had he been there, would’ve lifted it, closed it with one hand. Joe’s rheumatic limbs hauled it heavily over cloying, hoof-churned mud until it was a few feet from the post. From there it was more a question of stopping it from swinging back open before it was secured. The loop of faded baling twine, once bright orange nylon, was split and threatening to give again. Joe tied yet another knot until it looked as if it might hold the barrier shut for one more night.
In the kitchen the food smells were unfamiliar. Joe looked forward to the fry-up that always followed their visit to the market. But the lad had the stove, his back to Joe, talking to George.
Joe took a step from the worn doormat.
‘Boots off, Joe.’
He raised eyes and eyebrows at the unfamiliar demand and saw the familiar face colour with embarrassment. He crouched uncomfortably and worked at the string, covered in cow muck, that formed the laces.
‘Michael, say hello to Joe, son. You’ve known him long enough.’
The outstretched hand was clean, manicured but open enough. Joe stood, free of one of the boots, and wiped his hand on the seat of his green corduroys before he clasped the other. Both tested the strength of grip. Joe’s, in spite of age and rheumatism, the stronger. Michael washed his hands before returning to the food.
‘Used to bounce you on me lap when you was a lad.’ Joe recalled for all of them, bending with difficulty to his other boot.
George nodded his fond memories.
‘Used to.’ Michael reminded them.
‘Michael’s fetched his own ‘erbs and things to meck us a fine supper, Joe.’
Joe nodded and tried not to let his disappointment show.
For ten years they’d eaten together in silence. Never a need for words. With Michael, George was all talk. Joe half listened. His other half sought something. Finally he knew it was simply the customary silence of companionship he was seeking.
Neither father nor son made mention of letters never written. Each understood the other would not write. And the farm managed to remain unconnected to the world by wires. Michael lived a hundred miles or more away with wife and child and work.
Until the previous day.
‘And now?’
‘Divorce is absolute now, Dad. I stayed with her until then. Promised her I would. She’s got Carol so she’d best have the house as well. It never had a hold on me anyway. I’m free now. No ties.’
‘Stay with us as long as you like, Michael. The place’ll be yours when I’m gone anyroad. Might as well get used to it.’
‘I disappointed you by going out of agriculture, Dad. I know I did. It’s not too late. I can learn.’
‘Not that easy. For a townie.’ Joe gave voice to the thoughts George’s love wouldn’t allow him to express.
‘Give the lad a chance, Joe. He were born to the land. Likely he’ll pick it up quick enough.’
Father and son talked into the night. Through hours George and Joe had shared at chess and brag and gin. Their shared words droned into Joe until the sound of his exclusion drove him to his early bed with little more than a mumble. They barley paused to acknowledge or reply.

Later, out of pitch black, and through siling rain, a knock came unfamiliar at the front door. Local callers, friends, used the back door. A stranger, drenched and savage, cursed the cows that had him off the road and almost in the ditch. George nodded an apology and smiled the driver off. He yelled at Joe to help him get the herd back into the field.
Michael lit the gateway with the static car but refused the comfort of its dry interior. He bore the soaking with the men as they hushed and shushed the herded cows from the lane and back through the open gateway. To Joe’s surprise and George’s admiration, Michael played a useful part.
‘You should’ve made the gate secure, Joe. The times I’ve told you.’
Joe allowed the unjust rebuke to pass in silence. Said nothing of the untold times he’d badgered George to fix the gate.
Michael fiddled with broken twine to no avail. ‘This should’ve been fixed ages ago.’
The look of accusation he shot at Joe, under the harsh glare of the headlights, didn’t go unnoticed by his father.
George walked back to the cowshed and found a better piece of twine. The gate was fast secured to the leaning post.

Dawn, damp with early mist, saw Joe milking morning cows alone for the first time since he’d nursed George through a fever seven years before.
In the kitchen, eggs that George invariably fried were scrambled healthily by Michael. Seasoned not with salt and pepper but with dried herbs from his own collection. Joe declined the speckled pale concoction and broke three fresh eggs into aromatic fat. Ate them with thickly buttered slabs of crusty white bread to soak the golden yolk, the clear beef dripping, from the plate.
‘Scrambled eggs contain less cholesterol, you know, Joe.’
George nodded, his son’s up to the minute knowledge wanting his agreement, and watched Joe’s feast with envy well hidden. ‘What’s so wrong with Michael’s cooking you’re forced to do your own?’
‘Piss pale mush! Y’know how I like my eggs.’ He stabbed one harshly, pointing at the yellow, bleeding, dripping from the bread. ‘Like that. The way you do ‘em.’
‘He’s stoppin’, so you’d best get used to it.’
‘Ay. So it seems.’
Michael, sensitive more to his exclusion than to the tension, tried to intervene. ‘It’s not important, Dad. I’ve no wish to impose my own ideas on either of…’
‘Impose is right.’ And Joe stalked out into the growing sunshine to make good the repair on the gate before he said too much.
‘Teck no notice, Michael. It’s just the change. He feels threatened, I reckon. Give ‘im time and ‘e’ll get used to you as a man. He were fond enough on you as a lad. He’s bound to come to terms with you in time.’
‘Is he? It’s my experience that men who don’t like change are generally stubborn and narrow-minded. Bigots. It might be worth considering how efficient he is. Does he make a contribution worth having?’
‘Joe’s experienced, lad. He’s utterly dependable, you know….’
‘Really, Dad? That why we were chasing cattle in the pouring rain at midnight?’
George wanted him to know that the gate was his responsibility, that Joe had tried to get him to repair it. But this proud young man admired him and the father welcomed the respect of the son. Joe was broad backed enough to take a little blame. It would do no harm.
‘Just one of those things, Michael. Could’ve happened to anyone. It’s not important.’
‘And if the driver had been killed?’
‘Look, Michael, me and Joe have worked this place together for most of our lives. We’ve done it on our own ever since you left and your mother…passed away. I’d be lost without him.’
‘Will the farm support three of us?’
‘It supported your mother and you for long enough. It supported a family.’
‘I’m talking personal income, Dad. Not pocket money and housekeeping.’
Michael really wanted him to choose from what he saw as the alternatives. But he’d no wish to put these into words for his father. He’d sacrificed his home and left behind his family in expectation of finding something new and lasting on the farm. Now it was beginning to look as if he’d be left with nothing but the car, his few personal belongings still in his suitcases and a bit of personal capital. Little enough to show for the years of marriage.
‘There are no wages here, Michael. Never were. We each have what we need. The rest goes back into the land.’
‘Subsistence farming, Dad? I always imagined the place was a little gold mine.’
‘Never was. Never will be, Michael. Land’s too poor. I’m sorry, lad.’
Michael knew enough to recognise the truth. It was truth, after all, that had ended his marriage after his undiscovered affair. He trusted his father. Understood there was no subterfuge in what he’d told him.
The father saw the son’s dilemma. Realised the gulf between their respective needs and dreams and hopes was unbridgeable. Gave his lad the means to leave.
‘When will you move on, Son?’
‘It’s not just money, Dad. It’s…well, I need something a little more…, you know.’
‘Up to you, Michael. There’s room enough. There’s food. A bed. And work. Always plenty of work.’
‘No. I don’t think so. Not for me.’
‘Ay. Mebbie.’
There seemed no reason for him to prolong his stay. He was intruding, and there was nothing for him on the farm. He might as well be on his way, wherever that might be.
‘No time like the present, eh?’
‘So they say.’

Joe came back up the track. He’d fixed the gate with timber borrowed from the hayloft, a bolt found in the workshop. The barrier was secure and firm. The herd would stray no more.
The red car approached him, slowing as it did so. Michael wound down the window. ‘I never intended to cause any ill-feeling between Dad and you, Joe.’
Joe nodded and touched his cap. He turned as he followed the car out of sight.
In the kitchen George was wiping tears from his eyes.
‘You and your bloody eggs!’
Joe nodded. Put the kettle on.
‘You can cook your own damn breakfast in future, Joe.’
Joe pondered. Wondered if the change was permanent.
‘Gate’s fixed.’
George scowled at him, recalling how he’d let Joe take the blame. It’d be hard to forgive him the reason for the lie.
‘About bloody time.’
Joe nodded and poured water on the tea in the pot.
‘Touch of Spring about this mornin’.’ He said as he recalled the feel of the soft morning air, hoping things might now return to normal.
But George just stared at him in hostile silence and Joe recognised that things would never be quite the same again.