Molly Tanner smiled nastily. She knew he would never hurt her. He was too kind. And far too weak.
Unable to look on her a moment longer, John hurried Rosie away to bathe her wounds.
As her father carried her to the kitchen, Rosie looked back to see her mother smiling.
For a moment Rosie thought her mother was trying to say she was sorry, but then she realised the smile was neither reassuring nor warm, but cold and hateful, and the little girl held on all the tighter to her father.
John carefully settled his daughter at the kitchen table while he drew a bowl of warm water and found a flannel, which he rinsed under the cold tap.
Bringing the flannel to her face, he told her, ‘Put your head back a little, sweetheart. Keep this pressed to your nose, and the bleeding will soon stop.’ He then treated the bruises with saltwater and camomile, constantly assuring her that by the morning the bruises would be almost gone. Privately he thought it would be a long time, if ever, before Rosie would be able to forget how badly her mother had beaten her, and for what? He was determined to get to the bottom of it all.
When she was cleaned up he carried his small daughter upstairs and put her to bed.
‘I’ll be up again in a while to see if there’s anything you need,’ he promised.
Leaving the door slightly open in case she might call out, he paused on the landing, and when it seemed the ordeal had tired Rosie out, he leaned on the banister and softly cried, asking himself over and over how Molly could be so wicked as to hurt their child like that.
Somewhere along the way, deep in his heart, he had lost a huge measure of respect for this woman whom he felt he hardly knew any more. In fact, at some time during the past six years, since they were married, he had come to realise she was not the woman he had believed her to be.
If he had known at the outset what she was really like, he might have walked away, but even now, after what she had done, he still loved and needed her, and if that made him a weak man, then so he was. Above all else, John Tanner was a good and forgiving man. In spite of what he had witnessed this sorry day, he convinced himself that the woman he had taken as his wife must surely have a measure of compassion in her soul.
One way or another, he meant to find it.
THRUSTING THE UNHAPPY memories to the back of her mind, Rosie, peeping between the curtains, concentrated on keeping her vigil at the window. She now truly believed that tonight her mother would not come home. The troubling thought was tempered with an odd sense of relief.
She was startled by a gentle knock on her bedroom door and turned to see her father peeking round.
‘I didn’t mean to startle you, sweetheart,’ he said, coming into the room, patting the thick neck of his black Labrador, Barney, at his heels. ‘Is there any sight of your mother yet?’
‘No … not yet.’ Rosie knew how concerned he was.
When the dog came to sit beside her, Rosie ruffled his coat. ‘Hello, Barney. Come to see me, have you?’ She hugged him close, imploring her concerned father, ‘Daddy, please don’t worry about Mother. I’m sure she must be on her way home.’
John chuckled. ‘Hark at you, young lady. All grown up and reassuring me. It wasn’t all that long ago that it would be the other way round.’
He came over and placed his hands on her shoulders. ‘I’m so proud of you, Rosie,’ he told her. ‘We both know your mother can be hurtful at times, but you’ve learned to take it all in your stride. Fifteen going on forty-five, that’s what you are.’ He slid a comforting arm about her. ‘Hand on heart, Rosie, I do believe that she never purposely sets out to be spiteful. It’s as if she just can’t help herself.’
‘But she is spiteful, Daddy, to both of us, and to Harry, also. Sometimes she flies into a temper for no reason. She’s always been like that, and I don’t suppose she will ever change.’
‘I know, and you have every right to feel aggrieved,’ John said quietly, ‘although I think your mother has been more in control of her temper these past few years. You must have seen that for yourself, sweetheart.’
Rosie shrugged. ‘Maybe … but that’s probably because we all do what Harry does, and try to keep out of her way.’
Sitting on the edge of the bed, John momentarily lapsed into silence. Then, cautiously, he asked, ‘Can I tell you something, Rosie?’
She thought he had something weighing on his mind. ‘Of course.’
‘It’s just that I have good reason to believe that she was never really meant to be a mother.’
‘How do you mean, Daddy?’ He had Rosie’s full attention. ‘All I know is, she never wanted me. She’s always telling me that.’
‘Yes, and I’m sorry she has ever said such a terrible thing, but it only strengthens my belief that some women are truly not meant to have children. But to be honest, Rosie, I really don’t think she means half of what she says.’
Rosie looked him in the eye. ‘Well, I know she does, otherwise why would she say it?’
‘I don’t think it’s altogether her fault.’
‘Whose fault is it, then?’
John took a deep breath. ‘Some time back, I read an article in a medical magazine in the dentist’s surgery, when I had to have that back tooth out.’
Rosie was curious. ‘What kind of article? And what’s it got to do with Mother’s spiteful ways?’
John went on quietly, ‘It explained how some women, through no fault of their own, can never see themselves as mothers. They do not have a natural instinct with children, and they are unable to cope with the responsibility of raising them.’
‘I don’t understand.’
John admitted that he did not really understand either. ‘From what I can recall, it seems that some women – from every walk of life, and for many different reasons – are born without any maternal instinct whatsoever, and they don’t, and never will, possess the urge to bear a child or to love and take care of one.’
‘But that’s not natural … is it?’ Rosie was nonplussed, though she knew her own mother found it hard to love her, and there had been many occasions when she would rather hurt her than care for her.
‘If that article really is true, then there must be other women like Mother.’ Suddenly afraid her mother might appear at the door, Rosie lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘Sometimes, even when I haven’t done anything wrong, she screams at me and says hurtful things to make me cry. And she never, ever cuddles me. One time, I threatened to run away but she just laughed in my face and offered to pack a bag for me.’
‘You mean you actually meant to run away?’ John asked. ‘Why didn’t you come to me? Maybe by offering to pack your bag, your mother was trying you, thinking that if she pretended to go along with your threat you might give up the