The Miner’s Girl (23 page)

‘How dare you come in here and say that!' Merry said angrily. She sat down on the settee suddenly for her head felt fit to burst and she saw flashing lights before her eyes. But this was nothing compared to the fury rising in her.

‘I'll say what I like – this is my lad's house, not yours. If it wasn't for him you'd be out on the street, and I doubt the workhouse would have you after your carrying on. Somebody has to tell you, Robbie's too soft hearted. He—'

‘Soft hearted?' Merry began to laugh. She put a hand up to the dressing on her head. ‘Do you see what he did to me?'

‘No more than you deserved, I'll warrant. It'll be nowt more than a scratch but you have to play it up, haven't you? You're a bloody actress an' what's more you have the morals of one.'

‘Mam? Mam?' The raised voices had awakened Benny in the room.

‘It's all right, pet, I'm coming,' Merry answered. She got to her feet, took hold of the older woman and forced her out of the door, her anger lending her strength. She
didn't even answer Doris's jibes but thrust her out and closed the door after her and shot the bolt. She could hear Doris shouting outside but she ignored her and went through to the boy. ‘It was nothing, just someone shouting in the back street,' she said.

‘I thought it was Granny Wright playing war with you.' Benny sighed and leaned against her as she put an arm around him.

‘It wasn't anything,' Merry insisted. Benny's eyes were closing again, his fair lashes fanning his cheeks. She could feel his bones through his nightshirt; he felt incredibly frail to her.

Dr Macready was right, she thought. She had to get away. If Annie would keep an eye on Benny tomorrow while Robbie was out of the way on shift, she would go and ask Jos Turner if he could give her her job back. It was the only way out she could think of. Then if she could get a place of her own with a little bit of land she could keep a nanny goat as she used to do at Old Pit. Goat's milk would build Benny up. Robbie wouldn't allow her to have one on the allotment as some did.

Merry went out to the kitchen and looked at her reflection in the looking glass over the mantelpiece. She didn't look too bad, she thought, though the bandage didn't help. Still, she could pull her hat down over that to hide it. Her headache was lessening as she tried to work out a plan. If Annie kept an eye on Benny she
could be in and out of Bishop Auckland in a couple of hours. Robbie often stayed down the allotments for that long then went down the Club for a pint before coming home.

Now she had made up her mind, Merry was afire to get on with it. Within twenty minutes she was on the horse bus going to the town and half an hour later she was hurrying down Newgate Street to the newsagent's on the corner.

‘Mind, you're a stranger,' Jos Turner commented by way of greeting. He gazed at her. She had her old brown hat pulled down over the bandage on her head; an equally old brown coat, which he seemed to remember from before her marriage, hung loosely on her shoulders. She was thinner and paler than she had been before and there were shadows under her eyes. ‘I cannot say that being wed seems to suits you; by the look of you it does not.'

Merry sighed. ‘No, Mr Turner, it does not. I'm going to have to start again on my own and I need a job and somewhere to stay.'

Jos was scandalised. ‘Leave your husband, you mean? Nay lass, you cannot do that! What about the bairns?'

‘My Alice got the diphtheria and died,' Merry said baldly. Saying it didn't make her emotional at all. She felt as though she was saying it about someone else's child. Just now she had to think about the living; fight for the survival of Benny.

‘Benny got it too but he's out of hospital now. He needs building up.'

‘I'm sorry to hear about the bit lass, but, well, it's best you stay with your man, isn't it?' Jos Turner shook his head. ‘Especially if the lad is still sickly, like.'

‘He's not the lad's father,' Merry cried desperately. ‘I have to get away; he hits my Benny and me and all. Look.' She took off her hat and showed him the bandage on her head.

Jos took a step back away from her. ‘Well, I mean, it looks like the man has good cause, doesn't it? I'm sorry, Merry, but I can't help you, you've made your own bed and now you'll have to lie on it.'

‘But Mr Turner, I'm a good worker, you know that, I never let you down, did I?' Merry appealed to him. She felt as if he was taking away her only chance to escape. ‘If you only knew—'

‘I think I know enough, lass. Now go on, get back to your man.' He turned back to the papers he was sorting, shaking his head. By, he'd never thought Merry was a lass like that.

Merry found herself walking back along Newgate Street, despair gripping her so that she could hardly see in front of her. Where could she get work that would pay enough to keep her and Benny? There was nowhere. Always there were lots of girls looking for work; she had been lucky to get the job with Mr Turner the first time.

In the mining villages around the town there were no jobs for women, or very few apart from housework in the officials' households. So Auckland was always saturated with girls out of work and chasing after every vacancy – most girls had to go into service miles away. But even if she tried that, no one was going to take on a woman with a young and sickly boy.

Merry thought she had some time to spare so she decided to walk through the woods and save the tuppenny bus fare. Besides, she wasn't ready for what faced her at home in Eden Hope. Her head had started to ache again, clouding her thoughts as she tried to find a way out.

Maybe she could go back to Old Pit, get a goat from Mr Hawthorne, do farm work for Farmer Parkin. She remembered the days when she had lived there with Ben and her gran with a yearning nostalgia. The houses hadn't been completely destroyed, she knew, though they were more and more dilapidated as the years went by. But she didn't know if it was possible.

Merry emerged from the wood near Winton and began to hurry along the waggon way to Eden Hope. The walk had taken longer than she had thought it would and she began to worry that Robbie would be home. If so he was sure to have upset Benny. Oh Lord, what had she been doing, taking so long? She ran along the end of the rows and down the back street to the house, her head thumping at every step.

Robbie was home, standing in the window looking blackly down the yard; behind him she could see his mother smiling maliciously at her. The door was locked against her. She couldn't believe it.

‘Robbie! Let me in!' she shouted.

‘Go to hell,' he replied.

‘Robbie, Benny will be frantic, let me in.'

Robbie pushed open the bottom sash of the window. ‘You're not getting in here again so you might as well take yourself off. An' your by-blow isn't here, I put him out an' all. I've kept the bastard long enough.'

‘Where is he?' she screamed. ‘If you've hurt him I'll swing for you, I will, I'm telling you.'

Doris poked her head out by the side of her son's. ‘If you're that worried about him why did you leave him?' she taunted. ‘Well, I'll tell you, we put him out with the rubbish when the muck cart came round.' She laughed, a hard sneering sound. ‘I've packed your box an' all – if you don't take it away it'll go the same way.'

‘Where is he?' Merry shouted. ‘Robbie, if you've hurt him I'll—'

‘I never touched him,' said Robbie. ‘Not but what the little bastard didn't deserve it.'

‘Merry? Merry, we've got him round here.' Merry turned to the high wall between the yards. It was Annie's voice. She turned and ran down the yard and up her neighbour's. Annie had gone back in the kitchen to
where Benny was lying on the settee, his blue eyes the only colour in his pale face. She gathered him up in her arms and held him to her.

‘He didn't hurt you?' she whispered.

‘No, Mam,' he replied. ‘I didn't see him. Where've you been, Mam?'

‘Never mind that, I'm here now.' Merry breathed a long sigh before turning to Annie.

‘I saw the pair of them turning the corner into the rows,' said Annie. ‘I lifted the bairn and brought him round here.' Anyone can see the lad's not well yet. He's best out of the road.'

‘Eeh thanks Annie,' said Merry.

‘I'll put the kettle on. It'll be a while before Jack comes in. Mind, I don't know what you're going to do. You can't stay here, pet. I haven't the room and any road Jack wouldn't have it.'

‘No, no, Annie, I wouldn't think of it,' Merry said hastily but her mind was racing round in circles, as she tried to think of what to do, where she could stay.

Dr Macready ate his dried-out meal stolidly as he sat at the dining table and stared out of the window
at his small front lawn. He wasn't tasting his food nor seeing the lawn; in his mind's eye he was seeing the young woman whose head he had bandaged that morning and her young son, just recovering from diphtheria.

Miranda Wright was an intelligent woman trapped in an impossible situation. Perhaps the situation had been of her own making, for anyone could see that the boy was not her husband's, but still, as a doctor he was not here to judge. All he knew was that Merry needed to get away from her brute of a husband before he killed her or the child, or even both of them. The child reminded him of someone he knew but no, that was impossible. In any case, that wasn't the issue.

Pushing away his plate, which was edged with dried-up gravy and curled-up scraps of meat, he dabbed at his mouth with a napkin and took a drink of water before sitting back in his chair. He was tired, very tired. Before he came to County Durham he knew nothing about it or the people there. Now he was deeply involved with them and didn't want to work anywhere else. It was just as well Kirsty, his wife, didn't care where she lived. She was a painter and spent her days sketching in the surrounding countryside when the weather was clement, and when it was not she practically lived in her studio in the attic.

It had been a hard summer and it wasn't over yet but at least the diphtheria epidemic seemed to be waning. In its place measles and mumps were on the go. He needed help – Dr Moody who had replaced Gallagher in Winton shared emergency cover with him now but that wasn't enough. Maisie just wasn't good or reliable enough to take messages properly, though the poor girl tried. Kirsty wandered into the dining room and dropped an absent-minded kiss on his sparse grey hair. ‘Did you enjoy your meal?' she asked, not noticing the dried-up remains on his plate.

‘Very nice, dear,' he replied. She wandered over to the window and gazed out.

‘I think I'll walk up Canney Hill this afternoon,' she murmured, almost to herself. ‘There is such a view of the valley and the town there and I want to catch the effect of the afternoon shadows along the bottoms. The
light is so . . . golden almost in the late afternoon, don't you think so, dear?'

Dr Macready grunted in reply. He looked up at his wife; though her thoughts were so often wrapped up in her art, she had a good mind and surprised him often with her common sense and straightforward approach to his problems. Now was a good time to talk to her.

‘Come and sit down, dear,' he said. ‘I want to talk to you; it won't take long.'

‘Yes of course, what is it?' Kirsty was immediately alert. ‘I know you've been busy with the diphtheria epidemic and there are all the other infectious diseases that come with the warmer weather.' She sat down opposite him. ‘You look tired, dear. Perhaps you need some extra help.' As usual, she surprised him by her perception. She gazed at him steadily, waiting for him to speak.

‘I have been busy, but no more than I would expect in a mining village with no proper sanitation. Dear Lord, the powers that be here think they have modernised when they changed from open middens to ash closets. I dread to think what would happen should the cholera sweep down this valley as it has done over Sunderland way. ‘I've tried talking to the Board of Health but to no purpose.' Dr Macready paused and looked at his wife thoughtfully.

‘You have a plan?' she asked.

‘Not for the big problem, no, I'm afraid I haven't,' he said. ‘But I do have a plan to get some help for myself
and at the same time help a young woman I know. She has a young boy just recovering from diphtheria and a husband she is desperate to escape from. He is violent, both to her and the boy.'

The doctor sat back and waited for Kirsty's reaction.

‘Go on,' was all she said.

‘There are the two rooms above the surgery. We don't use them and they wouldn't take much doing up. Being attached to the main house her lout of a husband won't bother her, I don't think. I have long been dissatisfied with Maisie answering the telephone, you know that. And Mrs Wright has some limited experience of nursing. She could be a great help to me.'

Dr Macready paused to take a breath. In the end his ideas had come out in a rush. After all, he was asking a lot. Aiding a woman with an ailing child to leave her lawful husband was unheard of even if they were entering more enlightened times with the coming of the new century.

‘It might cause you problems with the locals if you take her on,' Kirsty said thoughtfully.

‘Yes. But I'm sure they would blow over.'

‘I think you should do it, Ian,' She said. ‘Ask her at least, anyway.'

Dr Macready smiled and got to his feet. He had known what she would say really – he just needed to hear her say it. He had to go into the rows to see a baby who had
been suffering from measles; the measles had gone but the disease had left him with severe bronchitis. He had left instructions for nursing the child and with luck he would be beginning to improve by now. Then it would be almost time for surgery. At least the surgery was by the house and wasn't far to come home. The house was apart from the miners' rows on a small rise but it was still close for his patients. And the pithead, should there be an accident, which God forbid.