Pit Bank Wench (33 page)

Watching Emma push the hand cart out of the yard, Daisy waved after her but for the first time she did not smile.

The cart bucked and grumbled as it moved over the roughly cobbled road, jarring Emma’s shoulders. She had been to the abattoir several times and found none of those visits pleasant, but today the smell of blood and animal droppings caused her stomach to turn. Pausing, she leaned heavily on the handles of the cart, trying desperately not to breathe, not to take in any more of the odour that drifted over to her from the high windowless building.

‘You Sam Hollington’s wench?’

Sickness rising in her, Emma straightened to see a man in a long bloodstained apron that three parts covered trousers tied about his legs with string; a length of ragged cloth draped over one shoulder bore further stains of blood mixed with tiny pieces of flesh. Only his face was clean as he smiled at her.

‘I am Mr Hollington’s assistant.’

‘How be Sam?’ Pulling a rag from his pocket, the man wiped his hands. ‘That were a nasty accident he had.’

Emma leaned against the cart as another wave of nausea swept her. All she wanted was to make her purchase and leave, but she could not snub the man. Swallowing the bile in her throat, she answered, ‘Yes, it was terrible, but we hope he will soon be well enough to take up business again.’

‘That won’t be none too easy, not with one hand.’ He stuffed the rag back inside his pocket. ‘Meantime you be carrying on for him?’

Meeting his sympathetic smile, she recognised the honest friendliness behind his question and nodded. ‘I’m going to try, though to be honest I don’t know if I will be able to. I really know very little of this side of things; Mr Hollington was teaching me . . .’

‘Arr well, Sam Hollington knowed his trade, you couldn’t have no finer to teach you the meat. I’ve dealt with him here at the slaughter house since being a lad so I know the cuts he buys. If you like, I could deal the same way with you?’

Emma felt the weight that had rested on her all the way to the abattoir lift away and the fluttering fade from her insides. ‘I would very much appreciate that, Mr . . .’

‘Todd, my name be David Todd, but if you wants to find me then ask for Davey Porkchop.’ He grinned. ‘That be what I’m known as hereabouts, seeing as how every day I cut a chop from the choicest loin and takes it home for my supper.’

‘I am Emma Price, Mr Porkchop.’ Emma could not resist a smile. ‘But folk hereabouts call me Emma.’

‘Then, Emma me wench, let’s get that cart of yours loaded up.’

The man had obviously not been boasting. He knew Samuel’s requirements and had chosen her the very best. Now it remained for her to do the same for Sam’s customers.

Laying the knives alongside the chopping board, she felt trepidation flicker again in her stomach. This was where it had happened. One minute Samuel Hollington had both hands and the next . . . Leaving the cleaver in the wicker basket, she covered it with the chequered cloth. That she could not face using!

Almost numb with cold, every part of her aching from weariness, Emma wrapped a steak fillet, handing it to a woman who had spent an age prodding and sniffing at it before at last nodding her head.

‘It was fresh from the abattoir this morning.’ Emma took the ten-shilling note, sorting change from the tin box.

‘Arr, so you said!’ The woman grabbed the coins, meticulously counting each one. ‘And if it be a lie I’ll be back for my money afore you can blink, and wanting a free fillet in its place.’

‘Sure and am I not broken-hearted?’

Emma looked up from closing the cash box to see Liam Brogan glance at the meat the woman was packing away. ‘Hadn’t I hoped to see you refuse to buy.’

‘Why?’ The woman’s eyes snapped.

Raising one hand, Liam laid it over his heart. ‘Wasn’t it me own mother taught me always to be truthful? I hoped you would refuse it so I could have it for meself, for it’s the freshest meat I’ve seen in all the place.’

The woman’s hand closed over her purchase, her mouth tight. ‘How would you know?’ she demanded.

‘How would I know?’ Dropping his hand, he laughed lightly. ‘Am I not the son of Patrick Brogan, and him the finest butcher in all of Ireland! Did not himself teach me the skills? He did so, and I tell you that fillet be the very best steak I’ve seen since leaving the old country, and so I wanted it for meself!’

The woman rammed the package deep into her basket at the same time glaring at Liam. ‘Well, you ain’t getting it. Bloody cheek!’ Turning on her heel, she marched away.

About to thank him, Emma was diverted by yet another customer. ‘I’m sorry,’ she answered. ‘But the sausages sold out this morning.’

‘I suppose it was to be expected.’ Lifting a corner of her shawl, the tired-looking young woman wiped the nose of the child she carried on her hip. ‘You wouldn’t have three pennorth of scrag would you?’

Emma glanced at the few pieces of meat left on the stall. There was no scrag end of mutton. That, she knew, had sold out shortly after she’d set out the stall. About to shake her head, she looked at Liam.

‘’Tis fortunate the last bit of scrag was taken an hour since.’ He played his charming smile upon the young woman. ‘For that leaves you as tasty a couple of pork kidneys as ever was.’

‘Tasty they might be mister,’ she hitched the child higher, ‘but there ain’t enough there to feed a man and four kids. What I’d pay for them would buy a dozen sausages. I’ll just ’ave to try a bit further along, could be one of the other stalls will ’ave some.’

‘To be sure they will, seeing as theirs be having nowhere near the taste of Hollington’s, nor will they be cheaper. Now add to those kidneys these pieces of underbelly and you’ll have a meal the little people themselves would cross the sea for, and all for no more than threepence.’

Reaching across the stall, he took a piece of paper, wrapping the meat in it and handing it to the woman who took it gratefully.

‘Sure and Samuel Hollington don’t be needing your thanks.’ Liam brushed aside her gratitude. ‘But he will welcome your custom, and if you come tomorrow I guarantee there’ll be sausages.’

‘You shouldn’t have told her there’d be sausages tomorrow,’ Emma said as the woman turned away, trailed by her three small children. ‘Samuel can’t make them and I don’t know how.’

‘Since when was that a problem?’ He gathered the knives, slipping them into the large wicker basket.

‘Since now. You told that woman a lie.’

‘Did I now, or was it yourself told the lie? I did not say the sausages sold out this morning.’

Emma turned to gather up the chopping board, feeling a flush rise to her face. ‘Yes, I said that, and it seems tomorrow I’ll have to say the same.’

‘No, you won’t.’ He lifted the basket on to the hand cart then turned back to her. ‘
I
will make them.’

Chopping block in hand, Emma stared at him. ‘You!’

‘Me!’ He grinned.

‘But you’re not the son of a butcher.’

‘Ah, now
there
I lied.’

‘You lied?’ Despite her weariness, Emma responded to the infectious grin. ‘And wasn’t it your very own mother taught you always to be truthful?’ Running a hand through his hair, he looked at her with laughing eyes. ‘Me mother now, God bless her, was a good teacher but her son didn’t always learn the lessons he should. But the making of sausages and the butchering of animals I
did
learn. A lad learns many things living in a small village where every family does for itself.’

‘So was your father a carpenter as you told Daisy and me?’

‘Wouldn’t I swear as much before the Holy Father himself! Now stop your blethering, woman, and blow out them candles and let’s get you home. We have sausages to make!’

The moon was high and silver when at last Emma and Daisy climbed into bed.

‘Liam Brogan’s a good friend, Emma,’ Daisy said softly. ‘But he would be more than a friend if you let him.’

‘That’s ridiculous. He hardly knows me.’ Emma turned down the paraffin lamp until it was barely a glow.

‘Know you or not, he’s in love with you.’ Daisy turned on to her side, pulling the covers up to her chin. ‘Given half a chance he’d marry you . . . and you could do worse than accept him.’

‘
You could do worse than accept him.
’

The words rang in Emma’s mind long after Daisy’s rhythmic breathing told she was asleep.

But how could she do that, even should he ask? How could she ask any man to take on the child of another?

‘
. . . he’s in love with you . . .
’

It seemed Daisy’s words came back to her for answer. But that was not enough, surely? A man needed to be loved in return.

Beyond the narrow window the sky turned from black to grey.

But a child needed love too, the love of a father as well as a mother. Liam was kind and thoughtful, and what was more he was honest. Once he knew the circumstances of the child’s conception, that Emma was not married, he would tell her honestly whether or not he could become that father.

But would she come to love him?

In the shadows shrouding the room it seemed the face of Liam Brogan with its tiny Z-shaped scar smiled at her, but as she watched a darker, more brooding face appeared at his shoulder; one whose pitch dark eyes haunted her every night. The face of Carver Felton.

It had been more than a month since Samuel’s accident. Emma packed away the last of the knives. A month in which she had looked after the business alone.

Though that was not altogether true. She glanced up as the clock of St Bartholomew’s chimed a quarter to nine. She had not been entirely alone. Davey Porkchop had helped her choose her meat every morning, and Liam Brogan had taught her how to make sausages. He had come to the stall regularly for the first few nights and then . . .

She lifted the basket on to the cart, gasping as a pain streaked across her back.

Why did he not come any more? She glanced the length of the Shambles. Hers was the only stall with the candle jars still lit. Mrs Hollington had often said there was no need to stay at market so late, but Samuel had always stayed; not because he wanted to garner the last penny, Emma had long realised that, but to almost give away the last of his meat to those so poor they came looking for scraps left at the end of the day. And to leave earlier would seem like breaking faith with the man to whom Emma owed so much.

The cart loaded and the stall brushed down with a screwed up sheet of paper, she glanced again along the narrow street. Why did she have this feeling, this wish almost, that Liam would come?

Blowing out the last of the candles, she collected the burned out stubs, putting them in the little wooden tray that Samuel had fixed to the side of the cart.

Weary from the day, her body clumsy with the burden it carried, she took up the handles of the cart, clamping her teeth as a fresh pain darted across her back. How much longer would she be able to keep this up? Half-bent, she shoved the reluctant cart over the uneven cobbles, the bitter wind that had blown the whole day tearing at her shawl.

Samuel had sickened, that was to be expected after such a terrible accident, but there had been virtually no recovery since and each morning Sarah Hollington’s eyes grew a little bleaker.

Catching her breath against the sharp stabbing in her back Emma blinked against the strands of hair whipping across her face. What if he did not get well? And what of when her baby was born?

‘One day at a time,’ she whispered into the wind. ‘One day at a time.’

‘I guessed you’d be the last to leave . . .’

The words mingled with a sound like rushing wind and a thousand pin-points of light dancing in the blackness as a blow to the back of her head sent Emma stumbling to the ground.

‘Emma! Oh, thank God!’ Daisy rushed into the yard. ‘You’re so late, I couldn’t think what . . .’

Then, as Emma-half fell into her arms, she gasped, ‘Oh, Lord, what happened?’

Leaving cart and basket in the yard, she helped Emma into their little house. Sitting her close to the stove Daisy knelt down, taking cold hands into her own.

‘Someone struck me.’ The nagging throb in her head added its own pain to that which winced across her back. ‘They took the cash box. Daisy, what will Samuel say?’

Pushing herself to her feet, the girl took down a dish from the dresser, filling it with broth from a pot on the stove.

‘Don’t think about that now. Drink that broth and then let me get a look at your head. We can talk about the cash box later.’

‘No, Daisy.’ Emma pushed the dish away. ‘I must tell him now.’

‘But somebody hit you, Emma, you can’t go ignoring a bump on the head. Let me at least . . .’

‘I’m all right, Daisy, really I am!’ Emma stood up on legs still quivering from the effort of pushing the cart. ‘I’m going to see Samuel, to tell him what’s happened.’

‘Won’t do no good.’ Daisy returned the broth to the pot. Holding the empty dish in her hands, she stared down at it. ‘He won’t be bothered about no cash box.’

‘Of course he’ll be bothered. It was robbery, it has to be reported to the police. Mrs Hollington must send for a constable.’

‘Mrs Hollington ain’t here.’ Daisy’s voice faltered. ‘She’s gone to her sister’s house.’

Already at the door, Emma turned. ‘But Samuel . . . she wouldn’t leave him alone!’

‘There was no choice given her.’ Daisy continued to stare at the dish. ‘Samuel died early this morning.’

Samuel was dead! Emma clutched at the table for support. Samuel was dead!

‘Happened soon after you left. I ran to get the doctor but it were too late. I heard him as he came out of the bedroom, I heard him tell Mrs Hollington he’d been expecting it. A poisoning of the blood so he said. Poor Mrs Hollington! She never said a word, not even after her sister come. A sharp one she was, a right bossy bitch! Sent me straight along to Webb’s Funeral Parlour. Ordered that the body was to be moved straight away. I told her it weren’t right, it weren’t the way things is done round here, but she said it would be done the way she wanted it and so would a good many other things now she were in charge. But I still don’t think it’s right. A man should lie in his own house and Mrs Hollington would have wanted that an’ all.’