Farewell to Lancashire (3 page)

It might have been different if they’d been able to have children. When they were first married, Isabel had carried one for seven months, seeming to soften and grow kinder with each month. But then she’d lost the baby, nearly dying herself in the process. She’d been too narrow and the birth had torn her inside, the doctor said. He’d added that she’d not be able to carry any more children to term so should avoid getting with child again.

She’d been ill for so long they’d moved in here with her parents, where her mother could look after her. And they’d not shared a bed from that day onwards. Which was a relief.

He’d soon learned to spend as much time as he could in the shop, had quickly understood why his father-in-law also did this. You could always find something to do there, checking the shelves, making sure the boy took out the deliveries promptly, seeing the salesmen from the various firms from whom they bought stock, or just sitting quietly after the shop closed, ostensibly checking the account books but in reality reading a newspaper or book.

When his parents-in-law died, he changed the shop’s name to Blake’s Emporium, which angered his wife but for once he’d stood up to her. He’d carried on running it in much the same way as before, however, because his father-in-law had been a good businessman.

Since the war in America things had changed. There was no need to order as much stock these days, because the Cotton Famine had affected people at every social level. The more affluent folk were unlikely to stop buying the basic necessities and wouldn’t starve like their poorer neighbours, which meant he would continue to make a living. But nearly everyone in the town had had to cut back their expenses, so his profits had gone down.

No putting it off any longer. He made sure the flaring gas lights were all safely extinguished and climbed the stairs to their living quarters.

Isabel was sitting waiting for him in her armchair near the fire, back stiffly upright, mouth tightly pursed, hands clasped in her lap. ‘How did business go today?’

‘Takings are down, but we’re still making a decent enough living.’

‘You should dismiss the youngest lad to keep the profits up.’

‘There are no other jobs in town and he’s the sole support of his family, so I’ll keep him on for as long as I’m able.’

‘My father would have dismissed him long before this.’

‘I’m not your father.’

She made an angry growling sound in her throat, but he didn’t care because she had no power to change anything. The shop had been left to him not her, thank goodness, because Mr Horton hadn’t believed women were able to understand business.

‘I’ll ring for our cocoa and biscuits,’ she said abruptly.

It wasn’t till they were sitting in front of the fire that she revealed the cause of her bad mood. ‘I saw
those girls
today. Three of them, anyway, I don’t know where the other one was. They came to the soup kitchen.’ Her narrow chest heaved with indignation as she added, ‘
Like beggars!
I was so mortified I didn’t know where to look. I didn’t acknowledge them, of course.’

He was surprised. ‘Are they that short of money? I’d have thought Edwin would still be earning something.’

‘They must be out of work or they’d not have been given tickets. I dread to think what people will be saying behind our backs, knowing we have relatives seeking charity like that.’

‘A lot of folk in the town need help now. It’s not my nieces’ fault there’s no work for them.’

‘Trust you to take their side. I’m sure those lazy young trollops don’t want to work.’

He didn’t argue, just sipped his cocoa and kept his expression calm as she went on and on. There was no doing anything but endure when Isabel got into this sort of mood, imagining insults where there were none and maligning his nieces, who were decent lasses.

He’d known she wouldn’t be an easy wife, but he hadn’t realised how bad living with her would be. He’d wanted the shop that came with her, the shop where he’d worked hard for ten years, so when it was clear that no other man was likely to marry her, he’d risked asking his employer’s permission to court his thirty-year-old spinster daughter.

His brother Edwin had hungered for learning but Joseph had hungered for money and comfort. Most of all, for a shop of his own.

He’d thought having children would soften Isabel. Now he knew nothing would ever soften her. Her mind was so warped with spite and temper, he sometimes questioned her very sanity.

But he would keep his promise to her father: he would always look after her, however difficult she was, in return for being given the shop.

I
n late November the whole country was outraged by the Trent Incident, when a US Navy vessel from the Northern States stopped and boarded a Royal Mail steamer which had just started its voyage from Cuba to England. At gunpoint they removed two passengers, who were Confederate diplomats on a mission to London.

The nation erupted into rage, and even those hungering from lack of cotton forgot their woes for a time as they expressed their outrage. Britain wasn’t at war with America, either North or South, but had declared its neutrality. The Americans had no
right
to do this! Many people clamoured for war to be declared on the North.

Edwin shook his head over this. ‘War’s a shameful way to settle a quarrel and I’m sure our dear Queen won’t allow it.

‘The Northern Captain was wrong, though,’ Cassandra protested. ‘He had no right to stop a British ship.’

‘No right at all.’ He smiled at her. He loved the way she understood what was happening in the world, though some folk said it wasn’t women’s business.

The Blake sisters, fretting over their lack of work, were more upset by the news their father brought home in early December about the local cotton industry. His employer had told him that twenty-nine mills in Lancashire had now stopped production and over a hundred others were on half-time.

‘So many people out of work, so many going hungry,’ said Maia. ‘Why does no one set up proper relief schemes to help us, instead of these soup kitchens?’

‘They’re talking about setting up a work camp for men just outside town,’ Edwin said. ‘Breaking stones.’

‘But that’s work for convicts!’ Pandora exclaimed.

‘It’s the Vicar’s idea. He’s a hard man, Saunders is, says people should be grateful for any work and at least the town can use the stones to mend the old roads and make new ones. They’re going to pay the men a shilling a ton for the stones they break.’

There was silence, then Cassandra asked, ‘How long will it take to break up a ton of stones?’

‘A day, they tell me, perhaps a little less if a man is strong.’

‘Six shillings a week isn’t enough to feed a family properly!’

‘No.’

‘Well, I’d do anything to earn money again,’ Xanthe said, ‘even break stones. But they won’t let women do that.
We
always have to depend on our menfolk.’

‘And you’ve only got me,’ Edwin said. ‘I wish you’d married, my dear girls, at least one or two of you, so that you could have strong young men to depend on, not an old fellow like me.’

‘I’ll not marry till I meet a man I can love and admire,’ Xanthe said, ‘and who will recognise that I’m able to think just as well as him.’

‘I sometimes wonder if there are men like that for women of our class,’ Maia said sadly.

Cassandra was more concerned about the way her father had spoken of himself as ‘old’. He’d talked like that a few times lately. Was he feeling his age?

And he was right. What would they do if anything happened to him, especially now?

December was a very mild month, which was a godsend for people unable to afford fuel to heat their homes. But the end of the month was heavy with sorrow for the whole nation, because on the 14th the Prince Consort died. Everyone prayed for their Queen in the various churches and chapels. They’d all experienced loss of a loved one, after all, and knew how painful it was.

But the newspapers said the Queen was inconsolable, her grief going beyond the normal measure.

‘That poor lady bears a heavy burden as monarch,’ Edwin said. ‘She needed Prince Albert’s support even more than other women need their husbands. And she lost her mother last March as well, so it’s been a sad year for her. But at least she has her children to comfort her. Children are a wonderful consolation, a sign that life will continue.’

He looked round, smiling at his own lasses. ‘I don’t know what I’d have done without you after your mother died.’ Then he turned to Cassandra and proved his eyesight was as sharp as ever. ‘Take back that piece of potato you just slipped on to my plate. We’ll share what there is. I don’t want you going hungry for me.’

‘You’ve looked so tired lately.’ And had hardly touched his Greek books.

‘I’m growing old. I’m sixty now, after all.’

She didn’t say it but her uncle was two years older and yet he looked rosy and vigorous. Perhaps good food would make a difference to their father? Only she didn’t know how to get it for him. ‘You’d tell us if anything was wrong with you, wouldn’t you?’

‘I’m just tired, that’s all, my dear lass. No need to worry about me. And Mr Darston says he’ll keep me in work, at least half-time. He’s a good man, my employer is.’

Since Sunday was fine, Reece Gregory walked the five miles into Outham from the farm where he’d found work and a place to sleep. The Dobsons, who were cousins of his, couldn’t pay him much but they fed him decently, gave him a shilling or two when they were able, and in times like this, that was worth a lot. Better by far than going on relief.

He made his way to the churchyard, intending to sit on the stone bench near the grave of his wife and child. It had been two years now since they died and the sharpest grief had faded, but still he found it comforting to sit there with them from time to time. Heaven knew, he wasn’t the only one to lose a wife in the aftermath of a difficult childbirth, or to have a child who only lived a few days.

This peaceful place was where he thought about his life, tried to make plans and having made them, abandoned them and made others. He’d been drifting for a while now, he knew that, must take himself in hand.

Today, to his disappointment, someone was already occupying the bench, a young woman with a book in her hand, though she seemed to be doing more staring into the distance and sighing than reading.

He took a step backwards, intending to find somewhere else to sit, but his feet made a crunching sound on the gravel and she looked round.

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to disturb you,’ he said.

The Town Hall clock began to chime the hour and she got to her feet. ‘It’s a good thing you did. It’s time I went home.’

She dropped her book and he bent to pick it up, glancing at its title instinctively:
A Journey to Egypt.
It was a heavy tome for a young woman to read, but he’d have read anything he could lay his hands on. He’d always loved reading, but there were no books at the farm, except for the few he’d brought with him, and he’d read those till he nearly knew them by heart.

He smiled as he recognised the title. ‘I’ve been a member of the library since it opened. I read this book a few years ago. It made me long to see Egypt.’

She smiled as she took it from him. ‘Me, too. I’ve never been anywhere but Outham, and I don’t suppose I ever shall. But if we can’t travel, at least we can see these places through the eyes of those more fortunate than ourselves.’

It popped out before he could think what he was saying. ‘Most women have no desire to travel.’

She put up her chin. ‘Well, I’m not most women. I had the good fortune to be brought up by a father who taught his daughters to learn about the world. Have you read the same author’s book about Greece?’

‘No. And I doubt I shall. I’m working on my cousin’s farm now the mill’s closed down and I can’t get into town at any time the library is open. I just come in on Sundays sometimes to visit my wife’s grave.’

‘She must have died young.’

‘Twenty-four. Childbirth.’

‘I’m sorry for your loss.’

‘It happened two years ago. The worst pain has faded now.’ He smiled, finding her face very attractive, lit up as it was by intelligence.

She nodded and started to walk away, then turned round and came back. ‘Look – I could get books out of the library for you, if you like, and give them to you on Sundays. I hate to think of anyone starved for something to read.’

He was surprised by her offer, which she’d made as one equal to another. ‘Would you trust me to bring the books back?’

‘You don’t look like a villain. I’ll need to know your name and address, though, for the librarian, and perhaps you could sign a piece of paper asking for me to borrow books in your name. Why don’t you come to my house now and do that, then I can have a book ready for you next week.’ She offered him her hand, as a man would have done. ‘I’m Cassandra Blake.’

He took her hand and shook it. ‘Reece Gregory. I think you must be related to Edwin Blake.’

‘Yes, he’s my father.’

That explained her open ways. Everyone knew that Blake had raised his daughters to read and think freely. There were those who said too freely, but thoughts should fly free, in Reece’s opinion.