by Maggie Hope
‘It’s all right now, petal,’ she said. ‘Come on, go to sleep. I think Da just had a nightmare.’
The images faded from Elizabeth’s thoughts. She couldn’t remember what had happened after that, if anything had. A while later, it could have been weeks or months, she had no idea, Da had gone.
‘He’ll come back,’ Mam had said, ‘he will, I know he will.’
Well, thought Elizabeth, it’s been a long wait so far. She got out of bed and went to the window, drawing the curtain and looking out over the rooftops of Darlington. A pale, ghostly light lay on the town, silvering the slates, casting the chimneys into black shadow. It was something to do with Ben Hoddle, she decided. Yes, indeed. Had Ben pestered her mother the way he’d pestered her? Did Aunt Betty know? Was Christopher … but no, she wouldn’t allow herself to think any further than that.
Indeed, there was little time for her to think about anything other than the shop in the next few weeks. The order book was full and besides that there were new fashions coming into the shops. Elizabeth was kept busy travelling to Leeds and Newcastle, once even to London, to fashion shows and wholesale houses.
Anna, the girl she had taken on the week after she was made a partner, was becoming a great asset. In a very short while Elizabeth could safely leave the shop in her hands when she herself was out.
‘I’m thinking of getting extra help, Mrs Anderson,’ she said one day during her customary visit to West Auckland Road. She had to go there as often as she could because Mrs Anderson had given up saying she was coming back to the shop. She was lethargic, not getting out of bed until eleven o’clock sometimes, her face pale and her expressions lacklustre.
‘Melancholia,’ the doctor said, ‘it’s common in patients recovering from influenza. Try to take her out of herself, interest her in something.’
Elizabeth tried her best, taking her out to tea on the High Row, talking to her about what was happening in the shop, anything which might kindle her interest again. Jenny (bless her, thought Elizabeth) took to popping in to visit the old lady occasionally, making a detour to West Auckland Road on her way home from school. She had the most success. Mrs Anderson would sometimes play Ludo with her, though at other times she would simply shake her head.
‘Not today, Jenny,’ she would say. ‘I’m too tired today. But thank you for coming to see me.’
‘You do what you think, dear,’ she said now to Elizabeth. ‘I’m sure you know best.’ Elizabeth despaired of her ever regaining her former bright spirits.
‘I want to go to Weardale as soon as I can,’ she said to Laura one evening when Jenny was in bed and the two women were sitting round the fire supping cocoa. ‘I would like to see Peart, face him, ask him what he did with my letters.’ The letters from Jimmy, she thought sadly, I must make time to go up there and get the letters from him. ‘I can’t go on a Sunday, though, I don’t think I can take Jenny. It might just send her back into her shell when she’s doing so well at school, making friends and everything.’
‘She’s certainly a different girl,’ Laura agreed. ‘How on earth anyone responsible for children could have let that man foster her, I just don’t know. Criminal it was, they should be put up against a wall and shot.’
‘Well, I daresay I could have got her away a lot sooner if I hadn’t been so ignorant about what to do,’ said Elizabeth. She sipped her cocoa reflectively.
‘You were just a bairn yourself,’ Laura replied. Over the months she had learned all about Stand Alone Farm and Peart, and the Children’s Home at Bishop Auckland and Miss Rowland.
‘I suppose,’ said Elizabeth absently. She was busy in her mind, trying to arrange her schedule for the following week to include a visit to Bollihope Common. She wondered about taking on a seamstress to help her with the bespoke work. Goodness knows, she could do with the help and the shop was doing very well. The profits could surely stretch to one. But it was just a thought for now. It seemed no matter what she was thinking about lately, plans for the shop ran through her mind. And in any case, she couldn’t possibly get a seamstress and be able to leave her to work on her own within the next week or two. And after that came the school holiday; she couldn’t go to the farm without Jenny wondering where she was and worrying.
‘I tell you what,’ said Laura, ‘I was thinking of going to see my sister in York next Sunday. I could take Jenny, I’m sure she’d like to come. We could take the ten o’clock train from Banktop Station and come back on the five. What do you think?’
‘Oh, Laura, that would be grand, I’d be so grateful.’
‘Aye. Well, I can say we want Jenny to see York Minster. It’ll be good for her education.’ Laura smiled triumphantly. ‘That’s a good idea, isn’t it? I do have some, you know.’
And so it was arranged.
Alighting once more at Stanhope Station, Elizabeth shivered though it had nothing to do with the cold. Memories came crowding back of the other times she had been here, especially that first time in the snowstorm when she despaired of finding anywhere to stay. Best forget such things, she told herself firmly. Memories didn’t help.
There was a bus standing with Middleton-in-Teesdale showing on its destination board. The service must have started up since the war ended, she thought. On impulse she approached the driver who was leaning against the side of the bus, smoking a pipe.
‘Do you go by way of Bollihope Common?’ Elizabeth asked him.
He took the pipe out of his mouth and spat into the gutter. ‘Aye.’
‘Will you stop by Stand Alone Farm path?’
‘If you tell us where it is.’
Elizabeth climbed on to the twenty-four-seater bus, hardly believing her luck, and took a seat by the window. At the stroke of eleven the driver got in and they set off.
‘Threepence.’
Elizabeth jumped. She had been staring out of the window, thinking of what she was going to say to Peart when she saw him. Oh, she was a very different girl now from the one he had used and bullied, she told herself.
‘What?’
‘I said threepence. You didn’t think the ride was for free, did you?’
It was a man who had been sitting on the front seat. She noticed now he had a dun-coloured shop coat on and a money bag over his shoulder. In his hand was a roll of tickets.
‘I’m only going to Stand Alone Farm,’ she objected. ‘Isn’t threepence a bit too much? Or is that a return?’
‘No. It’s threepence anywhere along that road. Now if you don’t want to pay we can stop the bus and you can get off. A return is fivepence.’
Tuppence was an amount to look at twice before spending, and she might not be able to catch the bus back. Elizabeth sighed. ‘All right, I’ll pay.’ She handed over her threepence and resumed looking out of the window. There were roadmen working on the track, a cart loaded with small stones and men raking them over the surface. A steamroller and vat of tar stood off to the side. The council was making up the road, she thought, a sure sign that the war was over.
It was only a few minutes to the place where the path led off to the right; the same sign, looking only slightly more weathered, was still hanging on the rotten wooden post. Elizabeth jumped to her feet; she couldn’t believe they were there already.
‘Here – let me off here,’ she called to the driver. He overshot but not by much. ‘What time do you come back?’ she asked.
‘Two o’clock from Middleton,’ the conductor replied and the bus trundled off. Elizabeth set off down the path which widened in places to a track. Perhaps, once, all of it had been wider, but heather and bracken had grown in on it. She glanced anxiously upwards. Clouds were lowering, threatening rain. She hurried on until she came to the broken-down fence and the gate which led into the farmyard. As she gazed at the back of the house, still looking as derelict as it ever had, she couldn’t help a feeling of apprehension which made her heart beat faster.
‘Come on, he can do nothing to you now,’ she said aloud. Jenny was safe from Peart’
s clutches and she herself had enough resources to fight him if need be, something which had always stopped her before. Money counted for everything if you hadn’t any, she thought grimly as she went through the gate and up to the back door of the farm. Lifting a resolute fist, she knocked hard on the door.
Under the eaves birds twittered. At her second knock a couple rose into the air and flew off to the rowan tree. She could hear nothing else. Although, yes, she could. There was a soft whining and a snuffling from behind the broken boards of the dilapidated door.
‘Snuff?’ she called. ‘Snuff, is that you?’ The whining became louder. There was even a weak bark. Elizabeth pushed at the door; it wasn’t locked, but something was stopping it from opening easily. She pushed harder and found she was pushing the dog who lay just inside, emaciated to the point of being almost unrecognisable and only just alive. As she stepped inside Snuff managed to raise his head and give a little whimper.
There was a smell in the room such as Elizabeth had never smelled before in her whole life. It made her retch and gag so that she turned abruptly and went back outside into the blessed fresh air. She stood and took deep, gulping breaths of it, until her stomach settled down and her head cleared.
There was something dead in the room, there had to be. And she was filled with the dread of what it was, what it could only be. How else could the dog have got into such an appalling condition? She felt like fleeing up the path, running to the nearest human being, begging for help. Even if it meant going as far as the farm where she and Jenny had worked the turnip field, or to Stanhope if need be. But she knew she couldn’t leave Snuff now she had given him hope, she had to see to him. And she had to find out what horror was in the room.
Steeling herself, holding her handkerchief over her mouth, she forced herself to go back in. In front of the chair by the fire there was what looked like a huddle of old clothes and there was no doubt that this was where the smell came from. Walking closer with slow, hesitant footsteps until she was near enough to peer at him she saw the face of the man, unrecognisable almost in its advanced state of decay. But it was Peart. By his hand was an empty whisky bottle; the shirt he had on was one she had patched herself. She stared, paralysed with shock, her mind unable to think. Then the dog whimpered again, breaking into the silence and her sense returned.
In her mind she was screaming; in reality there was no sound except her ragged breathing and that of the dog. Walking over to the door, she bent and half carried, half pulled Snuff out into the open then closed the door on the horror in the house. She looked at him thoughtfully then went to the water butt on the end of the barn, found the old ladle which she had used so often in the past and brought the dog a drink. It lapped, slowly at first, then frantically, licking every last drop from the battered tin. She went back to the butt and refilled the ladle.
‘Slowly, this time,’ she said. ‘Steady, Snuff. You’ll be fine now, lad.’ When the dog was finished she put down the ladle and rose to her feet.
‘I’m going for help, Snuff,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry, I won’t abandon you.’
Walking up the path, Elizabeth tried to remember the name of the farmer and his wife, the ones who had been so kind to her when … no, she couldn’t think of that, not at this minute. Doris, she thought, no, that wasn’t right. Albert was the farmer, she thought doubtfully. She was ashamed that she couldn’t remember when they had been so kind. But her mind had frozen, she reckoned. Head down, thinking hard, she came to the road. Oh, if only the bus was coming. She looked to the left and to the right but there was no sign of anything or anyone. She began to walk to the bend in the road, head down, scouring her brain for the names. And suddenly there was a car, almost running into her as it came round the bend. And in the driving seat was Jack Benson.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
JACK CAME OUT of the colliery office on Friday evening and stood on the step, breathing in the particular smell surrounding a coal mine: coal and engine oil, a faint taint of sulphur from the coke ovens. He had been going over the books, over and over to make sure he made no mistakes. The fact was output from the mine was up. The men, including those returned from soldiering in France and Belgium, were cheerful and optimistic. Their rates of pay, though modest in Jack’s opinion, were the best they had ever had in peacetime.
There was trouble brewing, though, he mused. The Association of Mine Owners wanted to reduce the rates now the war was over. They couldn’t be sustained, demand was falling and stocks were rising, was the argument. He had wanted to spend the weekend preparing a paper to read at the owners’ meeting next week, but he was blowed if he knew how to start. Oh, yes, the owners had made good profits during the war and they couldn’t have done so without the workers, but they didn’t see it like that, not at all. They had the upper hand now. In their opinion the miners needed to be sat on, they were getting too big for their boots.
Jack sighed, thinking of Jimmy, his talented protégé, the son of a miner. Given-education boys like him did well. The two he had sponsored since Jimmy were doing well in the grammar school, though the parents of one were threatening to take him out and put him to work.
‘He can work in the pit, bring in some money. A great lad like him, idling his time away at school,’ his mother had said when Jack visited her. But she had half a dozen other children around her and was obviously close to having another. She would need the lad’s money all right if the wages were reduced to pre-war levels.
Jack was sick of thinking about it. He walked to his car, cranked the handle, and when the engine burst into life climbed in. Thinking of Jimmy made him think of Elizabeth and the usual ache in the pit of his stomach started up, spreading melancholy like a malignant growth. Elizabeth … what was she doing now? And how could he face her after Jimmy’s death, even if he found her? He had been responsible for it, it had been he who had enabled the lad to go to Dartmouth.
‘You see,’ Olivia had said to him, ‘no good comes of interfering in other people’s lives.’ She had sounded smug, as though she was somehow vindicated in her opinions by Jimmy’s death.
On impulse, Jack drove to the miners’ rows, to West Row in fact. His longing for Elizabeth was so great, his sorrow at Jimmy’s death combining with it into a heavy load. He had to try to shake himself out of it, he had to. But he would have a word with Jimmy’s landlady first, try to lay a few ghosts.
Parking his car on the end of the row, he walked up the street to Mrs Wearmouth’s cottage. It was the first time he had been here since the boy’s death. He knew he should have called weeks ago but he had put it off, so shocked by Jimmy’s dying like that of such a random thing as influenza.
He didn’t allow himself to hesitate now though, as he opened Mrs Wearmouth’s back gate and walked up the yard to knock on her door. It was answered immediately. She must have seen him coming and been on her way to the door even before he knocked.
‘Captain Benson!’ she cried. ‘How good of you to call. Come away in, do, I’ll make a nice cup of tea.’
‘Thank you, Mrs Wearmouth, but—’ Jack had been about to refuse the tea but seeing her expression, changed his mind quickly. ‘Of course, Mrs Wearmouth, I’d love a cup of tea.’ He followed her in and sat down, watching as she bustled about, bringing out a treasured china cup and saucer, brewing tea. He remembered how good she had been to Jimmy, how the boy talked so much about her and with such affection, and warmed to her himself.
‘I was devastated to hear the news about Jimmy,’ he said, and she paused, teapot in hand.
‘Aye, it was awful.’ She took a hanky out of her apron pocket and wiped away a sudden tear. ‘I was just saying to his sister – you know, Elizabeth – how good you’d been to him …’
‘Elizabeth? She was here?’
In his surprise, Jack jumped to his feet and stepped towards her urgently.
‘Well, aye, yes, she was. We went to the service in the chapel and the Minister spoke that nicely about Jimmy. It was such a comfort, for Elizabeth
and Jenny especially. Oh, yes, very nice.’ She paused and looked at him strangely. ‘Is there something wrong?’
‘No, no. Just that Jimmy and I were trying to get in touch with Elizabeth before he died. Didn’t you know?’ Remembering his manners, Jack sat back in his chair.
Mrs Wearmouth shook her head. ‘No one said anything to me,’ she replied. ‘I could have told you where she was – where she’s been for this last year anyroad.’
‘Where? I thought she was married and living in Weardale. But her husband is an awkward sort of chap. Oh, I’m sorry, Mrs Wearmouth, you see I need to get in touch with her.’ Jack took the cup she was offering him, waiting while she spooned sugar into it.
‘Huh! Well, she left him, a cruel beggar by all accounts, treated little Jenny something shameful, he did. Elizabeth’s well out of that!’
‘But where is she now?’
‘Living in Darlington with my niece. Doing well for herself an’ all. Working in a dress shop, she is. Would you like one of my Shrewsbury biscuits? New made yesterday, they are, an’ though I says it meself—’
‘No, thank you, Mrs Wearmouth.’ Jack’s mind was in a whirl. Elizabeth in Darlington? And she hadn’t got in touch with him? Not even when Jimmy died. Oh, she must not want to see him, that was it. He must have done something to upset her so badly, she didn’t want to know him. But he would go to see her, he would go now, waste not a moment more. It was just a pity it was too late to go tonight. Oh, what a fool he’d been. Of course Mrs Wearmouth was the obvious person to ask and it had taken him all this time to do it. He stood up, anxious to be off.
‘I’ll go to Darlington to find her,’ he said. ‘Thank you very much, Mrs Wearmouth, for your help.’
‘Do you not think it would help more if I was to give you the address?’