The Narrowboat Girl

by Annie Murray

  That night, after fourteen hours on the go, they tied up at Fenny Compton, where there was a small wharf and a pub. A couple of other boats were tied up there and the men went out to the pub as usual after they’d eaten. Maryann didn’t mind being left behind. She rather liked the novelty of having the cabin to herself.

  As it was so warm, she didn’t feel like slaving away cleaning the cabin. She was hot and tired and she went out and sat on the bank in the evening air. She could smell smoke and food cooking and she breathed in deeply, a great feeling of well-being coming over her.

  Glancing towards the pub, she suddenly noticed that Joel was on the bridge and there was a young woman with him. Maryann screwed up her eyes to see better. She was short and rounded looking, with a wide, healthy face and curly brown hair. She and Joel were standing quite close together, relaxed, each leaning on the bridge, and now and then their laughter floated over to her. Maryann was immediately curious. Was she someone Joel was very close to? She found herself full of mixed feelings. Joel had told her he had been courting a girl before the war changed everything. Of course he’d want to get married like other men, but she had had in her mind a future stretching ahead in which she could live on the Esther Jane and everything would stay the same.

  After a time, the two of them left the bridge and walked round the wall of the pub, out of sight. Maryann sat on, feeling suddenly desolate. She wasn’t really part of all this, however much she wanted to be.

  When Joel came back in she was already lying down. ‘Who was that lady you was talking to?’

  He frowned for a second.

  ‘On the bridge.’

  ‘Oh – that’s Rose.’ He laughed, then coughed to clear his chest. ‘Ent seen ’er in a good long while. We’ve been catching up.’

  ‘She’s pretty,’ Maryann said. She knew she sounded sulky.

  ‘S’pose she is. Known ’er all my life.’

  ‘Are you going to marry her?’

  To her surprise, both men started laughing.

  ‘Marry Rose? Bit late for that – she’s got a chap and three kiddies, Rose ’as!’

  Maryann went off to sleep feeling much happier. However much she told herself she was stupid to think she could have Joel all to herself, the thought of him being in love with that pretty Rose had made her feel jealous and left out.

  The next day was just as long, and in the evening they pulled into Thrupp where the canal was edged by little terraces of canal workers’ cottages. Joel told her they were now only about three hours away from Oxford.

  She helped to get the range going and cook the food. Joel had also made her responsible for unharnessing Bessie, feeding and stabling her. On these scorching days she also had to wipe out Bessie’s eyes with a rag dipped in paraffin, to keep them free from flies and parasites. Mostly, as they went about their evening chores, even Maryann was too tired to speak. Darius went off and kept himself separate, collecting water, or coal if they needed it, and at Thrupp he asked around for return loads to take back north after they had delivered the pipes in Oxford. She and Joel did their chores, often in silence, but always at ease. Sometimes he looked at her and smiled and she’d grin back.

  She was more than ready for bed every night after all the physical activity and fresh air of the daytime. As they drew further south away from Birmingham, home seemed more and more unreal, like a bad dream. In the daytime she was so caught up in all the details needed to keep the Esther Jane on the move that she barely had time to think, and that suited her very well. She wanted to forget all of it: Sal, Norman Griffin. When she did allow herself time to think, she was filled with anxiety. Where had Sal gone? Was she with Charlie Black and were they both all right? And what about Tony and Billy, left at home? Most of all she felt badly for Tony, about her going off and leaving him. But nothing would have made her give up these days on the cut. Nothing.

  By ten the next morning they were pulling into Juxon Street wharf in Oxford amid a collection of boats waiting to unload. The wharf was very busy. Maryann stabled Bessie, gave her a feed and cleaned her harness. She wound her way back to the Esther Jane through the stacks of cargo standing on the wharf waiting to be collected: coal and stone, barrels, packing cases, sacks. The hard work of loading and unloading was going on all round and she could have stood all morning watching, but instead she hurried back and got the stove going to make cups of tea. The Esther Jane was due a big clean-out while they were tied up. In the meantime she heated more water, got the tin tub and dolly from off the roof and did some washing, scrubbing at the men’s thick corduroy trousers, struggling to lift them when they were saturated with water.

  ‘They’re filthy,’ she said to Joel, pummelling them wearily with the dolly. Her shoulders were aching like mad.

  ‘You should see ’em after a hold full of coal.’ Joel grinned. ‘That’s filthy!’

  The afternoon passed loading the Esther Jane, the long iron pipes swinging high in the air above her head before being deposited with a loud clanking on the bank. Joel and Darius were preoccupied with securing a return load to take north again. The country wharves sometimes wanted loads of grain taken up for grinding in the Birmingham mills, but it was close to a new harvest now and the stores were low. They needed to find something in Oxford. Joel went off to some of the other wharves, and by late afternoon he had secured a load of timber to be taken to Birmingham. In the meantime, Maryann strung the washing along the boat and helped Darius to swill her out with water. She was ill at ease being left to work with him, but she did everything he said to the letter and by the end of the afternoon she felt that even if she did not have his approval in great measure, at least he had accepted the help she was offering and she had not let herself down.

  Eighteen

  That evening though, for the first time, she felt lonely. With the work done and the cargo to be loaded in the morning, Joel and his father went to see Joel’s auntie, Darius’s sister, and then for a few pints at the pubs round Jericho, the area near the wharf. Maryann, as ever, was left alone.

  She cleared up the tea things, put everything away. The men brought food in daily if they could, as nothing would keep in the heat, so there was only a bit of bread and bacon on board for next morning. The place was tidy, and as she had been washing and cleaning most of the day she could think of nothing she needed to busy herself with. Now they had achieved the journey down to Oxford the urgency had gone out of things. Before, she hadn’t minded being left here, had rather relished having the cabin to herself, but tonight, with nothing to do, she felt suddenly bereft. She sat by the table for a time, biting her nails, and unwelcome thoughts of home and Norman Griffin began to crowd into her mind. She knew if she started on that it would just keep on going round in her head. No – she must think about anything but him.

  She got up and folded back the table so she could make up her bed on the side bench with the little flock mattress and the blanket she slept under. She lay down and concentrated on the rosy light of the lamp reflected in the brass fittings. It was such a snug place and it felt like home now. Maryann found herself smiling, snuggling down cosily and growing more sleepy. Every so often she heard the sound of the water lapping gently against the wharf. She was coming to love the sounds of the cut at night. If only she could stay here! There were a few lonely moments, but nothing like the isolation she felt at home where there was no one she could turn to. There was no threat here, not with these big, quiet men. She felt safe with Joel, safe and reassured, as if he was a strong, fairytale brother who’d come to rescue her.

  The thought of home filled her with dread. She would have to go back – for Tony if no one else. But why did she have to stay at home? Why could she not just live on the cut with the Bartholomews? Joel had said it was hard enough working the Esther Jane three-handed, let alone two, and Darius wasn’t a young man any more. But what would Joel say if she asked him? And Darius? Had she proved her worth enough during these last few days?

  By the time the men came in she
was dozing. She woke again as the cabin door squeaked open, letting in the night air. Darius, walking unsteadily, immediately went and let down the bed at the back, gave out a loud, beery belch, then readied himself for the night. Joel, however, seemed restless. Seeing Maryann looking sleepily up at him he came and sat on the end of the bench. She slid her legs out of the way for him. For a time he just sat there holding his cap while she watched him. His wiry beard and wavy hair were a lovely bronze colour in the pink, subdued light. She looked at his gentle face and huge, worn hands and felt she couldn’t imagine a time when she had not known him. Why was he just sitting there instead of going to bed, she wondered. But she liked it, didn’t want him to move, wanting instead to ask him if she could stay with them, but Darius was there and she didn’t have the courage.

  He looked across at his father now and then, and when Darius was obviously asleep he turned to her and said, half whispering, ‘Well – it’s been a soft day for us today. I don’t know about you, but I ent ready to settle yet. I fancy a walk. How about you, young nipper?’

  ‘Ooh, yes!’ She sat up, immediately cheerful. Anything Joel suggested seemed good. An adventure!

  She put her shoes back on and her cardigan and they climbed back out into the starry night. The moon was almost full and the wharf buildings were sharp edged, the colour of pewter under its light.

  They set out along Juxon Street. Maryann found it strange to be back on a road, with buildings hemming you in on either side, after the cut. She tried to imagine how it would feel never to have lived on the bank.

  ‘D’yer think you’ll ever live in a house?’ she asked, looking up at Joel.

  ‘Oh – you can never tell, can you? There are folks moving off the cut all the time. It ent easy, with the moty boats and lorries taking over the cargoes. We’ll hang on as long as we can though. It’s what we know.’

  ‘But you wouldn’t give up the Esther Jane, would yer?’

  Joel shrugged. ‘I hope not. But we had to sell the butty – we had a pair before, but we had to part with one of ’em. That’s how it goes these days.’

  Maryann felt sobered by this. The thought of the Bartholomews living like other people was inconceivable. They turned into another street, then another, in silence, except for the sound of their feet on the road. Silence was easy with Joel. It never felt uncomfortable.

  ‘But—’ she said eventually. ‘You were born on the cut, weren’t you?’

  ‘I was s’posed to be born ’ere at h’Oxford. My mother was coming to town to ’ave me and I was in too much of a hurry – arrived just south of Banbury!’

  ‘On the Esther Jane?’

  ‘She weren’t called the Esther Jane then.’

  ‘No, I know. Joel – will you tell me about your brothers and sisters?’

  They turned on to a wider road where there were a few more people about, coming out of the pubs.

  ‘You’re a proper chatterchops, ent you?’

  ‘I ain’t!’

  She liked Joel calling her a chatterchops, but in fact it was hardly justified. There’d been very little time to talk much on the way down. They were always busy, or the men were in the pub or too tired.

  ‘When’ll you see Ada again?’

  ‘Well, if we don’t run into ’er on the cut, it’ll be Christmas. We all try and ’ave a rally at Christmas time, tie up at Braunston or Hawkesbury for a couple of days. See young Darius and Ada.’

  ‘Won’t she miss you?’

  ‘She will. But a lot of young ’uns work away from their families. It’s the only way to do it – someone always needs a pair o’ hands.’

  ‘What about the others?’

  ‘Darius is the oldest. There was Daniel who fell sick and passed on as a little ’un. I never knew ’im. Then there was Esther – she drownded when she was not more than fifteen. Then Ezra – ’e died in the war, and so did Sam, then there was me, then Sarah and we lost ’er to the h’influenza and our mother lost a pair of babies in between – she was very poorly after them – and then there was Ada and through her we lost our mother.’

  ‘Oh Joel, your poor mom!’

  ‘Yep—’ he said gruffly. ‘She were a good’un, our mother.’

  ‘Did Darius go away to the war?’

  ‘No. Someone ’ad to stay. We younger ones went and I was the one come back. Anyhow – that’s how it went. How many’s in your family?’

  She told Joel all about Tony and Billy, and Sal running off and her dad dying and Mom marrying Mr Griffin, but she didn’t want to say much about him. She could feel Joel listening beside her.

  ‘Is your stepfather good to you?’

  ‘No,’ she said abruptly. ‘Well – I mean, we eat enough and that. But . . . I don’t want to talk about ’im, Joel. Don’t let’s spoil it – it’s lovely out ’ere.’

  As she began to take an interest in the town unfolding round her, she saw that it was indeed beautiful. There were a few lamps, but mainly the buildings were lit by the moon. Maryann looked up at the spires and towers, the grand, dark fronts of the colleges all around them.

  ‘This is h’Oxford University,’ Joel told her. ‘They do a lot of book learning ’ere, that’s what.’

  To Maryann it seemed like fairy land, like nowhere else she’d ever been before.

  ‘I’ll show you summat lovely,’ Joel said. ‘Come along ’ere.’

  He led her down a side street, then another, and into a square. All along the sides were castellated buildings, no factories or houses at all. There was a huge, rounded building in the middle. It was covered in little stone arches and columns and stone balustrades, and its roof was domed. Its windows reflected back the moonlight.

  ‘Oh!’ She looked round in wonder. ‘What is it?’

  ‘They say it’s full of books,’ Joel said, with a slight air of disbelief. ‘Let’s go down by the river, shall we?’

  Maryann could tell that, while awed, he was not comfortable between all these walls. He led her out the other side of the square and across another road hemmed in by buildings that seemed like palaces to Maryann.

  ‘D’you wish you could read?’ she asked him. ‘If you wanted to learn I could ’elp yer.’

  She heard Joel’s wheezy laugh come to her through the darkness. ‘Reckon I’ve got this far without. There ent much call for it on the cut.’

  She walked with him, down to where the river flowed past the backs of the colleges. For a moment they stood looking back. It was a beautiful sight, the old stone lit by soft moonlight.

  ‘S’funny how many different ways there are for folk to live, ent it?’ Joel said. She felt him reach down and take her hand in his, and she nuzzled against his arm, happy. ‘Bet you’ve never seen nothing like this before.’

  Maryann shook her head. ‘Joel?’ Her heart began thumping fast.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘I don’t want to go home. I want to stay with you and your dad and work the cut.’

  There was silence as Joel stared down into the water, that flowed past quite briskly, not like the still, sluggish canal water.

  ‘I don’t know about that. You’ve been a good’un, learning how to work the boat, no doubt about it. And I can’t says I won’t miss you, specially with Ada gone. But you can’t just stay on without your family giving their by-your-leave. That ent right.’

  ‘Oh please, Joel. I can’t go home. It’s not . . . I can’t say why. But it’s horrible at home and they won’t care if I’m there or not . . .’

  ‘Now, now—’ He turned to face her. ‘That can’t be true now, can it? You got family – people who need you.’

  ‘But Ada just went off to live with someone else, daint she? Why shouldn’t I do it too?’ She knew she sounded desperate, almost tearful.

  ‘That’s what life is on the cut. We boat people do that. But it ent the same where you come from, is it? I ent saying we don’t need you – a pair of hands is like gold to us. But you should go back and make things right with your family first. I ca
n’t feel right about you just running off and them not knowing where you are, Maryann. You can see that, can’t you?’

  ‘I know.’ Her voice sounded high and young. ‘But I just want to stay with you, Joel.’

  ‘Oh – now—’ He pulled her towards his big, burly body and she felt herself pressed against his scratchy weskit, her little budding breasts tender against him, his strong arms tight round her. She put her arms as far round him as she could reach, laughing. She hadn’t felt so warmed or happy since she was a little girl, held in her dad’s arms after he came home and she nestled against him, loving the feel and smell of him. Joel could save her, he could take her away from that life at home that she so dreaded, she knew he could. He could do anything.

  ‘Don’t you get all upset,’ Joel was saying, tenderly stroking her hair. His hand felt enormous on her head. ‘We’ll see what can be done.’

  She looked up into his face and saw his eyes twinkling down at her affectionately in the moonlight.

  Nineteen

  During the small hours of the next morning, the weather broke. Maryann woke in the night to hear thunder and, soon after, the sound of rain drumming on the cabin roof. The next morning it was still raining. She went out with her coat on and the water was soon running off her hair and down her cheeks.

  They moved the Esther Jane down to Isis Lock – Joel and Darius called it ‘Louse Lock’. To load up, Joel explained, they had to move from the narrow Oxford Canal on to the wider Thames, the adjacent ‘Mill Stream’, to where the imported timber was brought from London on lighters, towed by tugs, which were too wide for the Oxford Cut.

  ‘When they come up ’ere’ – Joel pointed after they had come through Isis Lock – ‘they got to get past the railway, see? There’s a bridge there, cranks up by ’and, lets ’em through.’

  ‘But what if there’s a train coming?’ she said.

  Joel laughed at her foolishness. ‘You don’t do it when there’s a train coming!’

  Maryann did not see any of the lighters coming through, but on the wharf waiting for them was a stack of timber sawed into all sorts of different lengths and thicknesses.