The Miner’s Girl (6 page)

‘Now then, lass,' he said in her dreams. ‘No use sitting there like you can't help yourself. Get theesel' bestirred.'

‘I'm sorry, I don't know why I did that,' said Miles. ‘You made me mad.'

Peggy stared at him, a bitter, level stare. ‘Get out of my house,' she said. He sounded as though he was apologising for standing on her toe or something like that. She was pulling her dress together with shaking fingers. A button had been pulled off in the struggle and she held the gaping place together with tight fingers.

‘You're nowt!' she said. ‘You're not a man, no man would do that. Force a woman.'

The baby, who was sitting inside the makeshift pen, was watching them, tears rolling down her cheeks, her bottom lip jutting out. She had been screaming the whole time of the assault – loud, terrified screams – but her grandma had not come to comfort her and now she simply sobbed quietly. She pulled herself up by the back of a chair and hiccuped softly.

Peggy pulled her hair behind her head and twisted it deftly into a tight bun, tucking the ends in and sticking in a hairpin. Miles watched her. He was unsure what to do having never raped a woman in his life before, and he couldn't believe he had done so now. And a miner's widow, for God's sake?

He cleared his throat. ‘You can stay here if you like,' he said. ‘I won't put you out.'

‘Very good of you, I'm sure,' said Peggy. ‘Being as the place is derelict any road.'

She went over to Merry and took her out of the pen, holding her close, kissing her and wiping her wet cheeks with the corner of her apron. Outside, the snow had stopped falling and the sky was lightening.

‘You won't tell—'

‘Of course I bloody won't! Do you think I want to be shamed in Winton and Eden Hope?'

‘Can I get you anything? I can help.'

‘I reckon you've done enough helping for one day. Coming in here and eating my food and then …'

She couldn't go on. She buried her face in the nape of little Merry's neck.

‘I'll go then.'

‘What are you waiting for?'

Standing with her back to the room she felt the cold draught as he opened the back door and went out. She sat and rocked the baby.

‘Whisht babby, whisht,' she crooned and Merry, worn out with crying, dropped off to sleep. Peggy laid her on the old sofa and covered her with a piece of worn blanket. Then she drew the curtains tight shut; something she had not done for a long while. Once again she brought in the tin bath and boiled water, and added clean snow to cool it. Taking the bar of lye soap she scrubbed at herself in an effort to be clean again. But she didn't feel really satisfied when she was finished, even though the skin of her thighs and belly looked red and angry and stung like fire.

Next day there was a thaw. Water dripped from the broken guttering on the roof and the pump at the end of the street dripped both from the tap and the split in the pipe caused by the ice. A tiny river began to form in the middle of the street, black with coal dust against the white snow.

Peggy decided to try to get to Winton along the old line to bring in some oatmeal and condensed milk. She was wrapping the baby in her old shawl, tying it over her head and across her chest on top of the coat she had bought for her from the second-hand clothes stall on the market in the autumn, when there was a knock at the door.

Peggy stiffened. No one came to Old Pit these days. Indeed hardly anyone realised she was still there. Surely he hadn't had the cheek to come back?

‘Hey, missus, are you all right?'

It was Bob, the colliery joiner. Though what he was doing there was a mystery. Peggy went to the door still carrying Merry.

‘The gaffer told us to come and fix the pump,' he said. ‘An' I brought a few bits of things an' all.'

‘I don't want them if they've come from—' Peggy stopped herself in time before mentioning the agent. Bob was not noted for his close mouth and he would wonder aloud why she was talking about the man who even told the manager gaffer what to do. Folk would draw their own conclusions.

‘Eeh, thanks, Bob,' she said. ‘I was just going into Winton to the store.' She looked into the brown paper bag. There was a quarter of tea and a pound of oatmeal and two tins of milk. ‘Come on in,' she said. ‘I'll soon boil a drop of water and make a cup of tea. I'll give you the money for the groceries.'

‘A cup will be welcome, missus,' said Bob. ‘But I don't want anything for the bits from the store, I didn't buy them meself, like.'

Peggy's pleasure at the gift diminished. It must have come from bloody Gallagher. By, she wished she could take them and throw them through the bloody window. But there was the bairn – she had to be fed and kept out of the workhouse. Still, why not take it? To Gallagher it didn't amount to more than a few coppers, any road. Not
that she wanted more from him. She wanted nowt. But beggars couldn't be choosers.

Miles Gallagher was at Winton Colliery, in the office with the manager. Production was down this month and he wanted to be prepared with answers when they asked why. After all, the snow didn't affect the working conditions underground, did it? It didn't cool down the temperature one iota.

‘There's been more men taken badly, chest problems mostly,' said Jack Mackay, who had taken over Winton after Jane Pit closed. The previous manager had been getting on a bit.

‘If they're not fit enough for the work there is no place for them here,' said Miles.

‘It
is
an exceptionally bad winter,' said Jack. Some of the men had the miners' disease from the dust, their lungs easily becoming congested in the sudden changes of temperature going on and off shift. And the pit was a wet one, which meant they were often wet when they came to bank. But he didn't say any of this. If the weather were taking a turn for the better the men would soon be back at work.

Miles seemed a bit absent-minded this morning, though, and went to the door without commenting further. He went out to his horse and mounted, turning the animal for home. Tom was going back to school
tomorrow; he would go home and have dinner with him. After all, the boy must still miss his mother.

He'd told the joiner to fix the water pump at Jane Old Pit and take some food over for the woman while he was about it. Not a lot but as much as she was probably used to – it wouldn't do to let her think she was being paid off. His conscience was, if not exactly clear, eased.

Tom was building a snowman in the garden. At eight years old he was tall for his age but thin as a lathe. The old jacket he was wearing was short in the sleeve revealing knobbly wrists, red and angry looking above the wet wool of his gloves. His fair hair flopped over his brow from beneath his cap and the tip of his nose was as red as his wrists. When he saw his father he stopped, dropped the carrot he had been about to stick in the snowman's face for a nose and stood still, watching as Miles dismounted and called to him.

‘Come and help me with Marcus, Tom,' he called and Tom trotted over obediently. They led the horse into the stable and Miles unsaddled him while Tom filled the manger with sweet-smelling hay. They worked in silence except for the odd word about the job in hand, for Miles didn't know what to say to his son these days. He rarely came into Barnard Castle to the school and took Tom out. In fact he hadn't done that at all last term.

‘Have you everything ready to go back to school, Tom?' Miles asked at last.

‘Yes, Father.'

‘Has Edna packed your clean linen? There's nothing extra you need this term, is there?'

Tom agreed that there was nothing. He looked down at the slice of roast leg of mutton on his plate, cut a piece off and put it in his mouth, chewing slowly. He wasn't expected to talk while he was chewing.

Miles added mint sauce to the mutton on his plate. The slice was a little pink in the middle as befitted roast lamb rather than mutton. Suddenly it reminded him of the goat he had eaten the day before so he put down his knife and fork and took a drink of water.

‘I don't know why I bother cooking for those two,' grumbled Cook when Polly brought back the plates with the half-eaten food. ‘The master usually likes mutton.'

‘Never mind, we'll enjoy it later on,' said Polly. She had a very healthy appetite and since she had been working here had changed from a thin, pale little girl to a plump, rosy woman.

Back in the dining room, Miles cleared his throat. ‘I'll take some time off tomorrow morning and go to the station with you,' he said. ‘If the weather were more clement I might have driven you up to school, but perhaps that wouldn't be wise in the snow.' He had to find a way to get closer to the boy, and was suddenly aware of it.

Merry woke in the early dawn of the October morning as she usually did. She had chores to do before she went to the hospital to work. She turned her head on the pillow and felt a twinge of alarm as Peggy wasn't there. Merry had shared a bed with Peggy ever since she could remember, whereas Ben had a mattress that was newly filled with straw every harvest time. Shivering, for there was a chill in the air, she sat up, pulled on her shoes over her bare feet and ran downstairs.

‘Thank God!' she said aloud. Peggy was there, asleep in the rocking chair by the dead fire, her feet propped on the fender. ‘Granma!' cried Merry. ‘Wake up, you should be in bed. You'll be as stiff as a crutch sitting there. Have you been there all night?'

Merry shook her grandmother's shoulder, just a little, enough to wake her up. Peggy's hand fell down by the side of her chair. Merry's heart beat fast, almost
jumping into her throat. Suddenly filled with dread, she forced herself to look properly at Peggy. Her pallor was unmistakable. In her short time at the workhouse hospital Merry had seen too many dead people not to recognise that fact.

‘What's the matter with me granma?' Ben came up behind her. She let out a small scream before she took control of herself, turned to him and put an arm around him.

‘Gran's dead, Ben,' she said. ‘Run and see if Mr Hawthorne is off shift, will you.'

‘Aw . . . Merry! No she's not! You're just saying that!'

But Ben knew she was not. He started to cry, tears running down his face as he stared at his granma. ‘What did she want to die for?' he panted out at last, and Merry, who was holding him close now, shook her head.

‘She was tired, Ben. She was an old woman.' How old was she? Merry wondered. Not that old. Not as old as some of the women in the workhouse, any road.

‘It's not fair,' said Ben. He wiped his nose with the back of his hand and made to wipe his hand on the old shirt he slept in. Merry found a rag in her own sleeve and thrust it at him.

‘Howay now, Ben! Don't be such a babby. Get away to Winton and tell Mr Hawthorne, will you? He'll know what to do.'

There was no one else. Merry didn't know why Peggy shunned her old neighbours; those that had straggled back to the pit villages around. ‘We'll manage on our own,' Peggy used to say. There was only Mr Hawthorne who had sold them the goat and Merry had only met him once or twice. But they had managed on their own. Most of the gardens of the houses at Old Pit had been cultivated at one time, and Peggy had used the others to graze the goat. (They did not name the goat now as Granma wouldn't have it, though Merry vaguely remembered that one goat had been called Nannie and one called Betsy.)

Ben pulled on the trousers which came down to just below his knees. They hung from his shoulders by an old pair of galluses that had belonged to Grandda, the one that was buried in the pit.

‘I'll go then,' he said.

‘Put your boots on, Ben.'

‘Aw man, they hurt me feet,' he protested, but pulled on the boots anyway.

Peggy Trent was buried in a pauper's grave in the far corner of the churchyard at Old Winton village. There was a wooden marker that soon rotted away. Merry, Ben and Mr and Mrs Hawthorne were the only mourners. Afterwards the man came from the Board of Guardians and said arrangements would be made for them to go to the workhouse.

‘Me brother and me, we're not going,' said Merry. The man looked at them as they stood shoulder to shoulder. ‘I've got a job, any road. I'm going to be a nurse.'

‘An' I'm going down the pit,' said Ben as Merry gave him a sharp glance.

‘No you're not,' she hissed. ‘Granma would turn in her grave.'

The man from the Guardians shrugged. ‘Well,' he said, ‘you're both of an age to work for a living, it's true. Lads younger than you work down the mines, Benjamin. You're twelve, going on thirteen, aren't you? And I understand you work in our infirmary anyway, Miss Trent. I cannot force you to enter the workhouse. How old are you?'

‘Fourteen. I'm fourteen and me brother's nearly thirteen. We're old enough to manage now. I'll look after him, any road.'

The man shook his head and got to his feet. He looked around the kitchen. It was reasonably comfortable, in the way of the miners' houses, a table, wooden chairs, a rocking chair and ancient sofa and a press. All shabby but clean. It was the deserted village around it that was strange. Outside the two rows of houses, all empty but for this one, were eerie somehow. But the boy and girl didn't seem to mind. Of course they had been brought up here, he understood.

‘We don't pay out relief,' he warned. ‘If you stay out you get no help from the Guardians.'

‘We don't need it,' said Merry, drawing herself up. ‘We have the gardens and like I said, I have a job.'

‘The boy is old enough to work,' said the man.

‘He has a name, Benjamin, and he is still at school. He's clever,' Merry asserted.

The man snorted. ‘Lads in his position cannot afford to be clever,' he said. ‘He has his daily bread to earn.'