Black Beauty's Family

by Josephine Pullein-Thompson

  I know that it is better for an old horse to be shot or poleaxed rather than left out in a cold field to die slowly of disease, but it seemed so very sad that Tammy and The Giant had had so little pleasure in their lives.

  6

  TROUBLE AT THE PIT

  I HAD BELONGED to Mr Arkwright for almost two years and he was growing so much stronger that he was talking of hunting again, but Mrs Arkwright was said to be very much against it and there was a lot of talk in the stable about who would win.

  Then we heard that there was unrest among the miners. It seemed that the price of coals had fallen suddenly and the owners were refusing to pay the men a wage that had been promised, so they had come out on strike. Mr Arkwright often rode me over to Blackmarsh but there was no longer a busy, bustling scene. The great wheel was still, the engine silent and the railway trucks empty. The men and boys stood at the street corners without work or pleasure.

  Some of the women would run after us as we trotted by calling on Mr Arkwright to save their children from starving.

  Some children died, it was said, and Mrs Arkwright took to sending soup over to them in the wagonette. The men grew leaner and leaner and took their skin-and-bone dogs poaching for rabbits and other game in the woods and all the keepers stayed at home, rather than come to blows with starving miners.

  It must have been after seven or eight weeks that things came to a head. Early one cold, foggy afternoon a message reached the house that there was trouble at the pit. One of the lads was immediately sent off to Bruddersford with a letter and told not to waste a minute on the way. I was saddled and taken round to the front door. Mrs Arkwright was there begging her husband not to go but he said he must and was quickly in the saddle. ‘Now Ebony’, he said, ‘put your best foot forward. The men are planning to mob the manager’s house and break up the pit head equipment and I must see if I can do any good by talking to them.’

  I enjoyed the exhilaration of an unexpected gallop over the moors though I had to keep a sharp watch out for rocks and holes, for Mr Arkwright seemed preoccupied with what lay ahead, rather than our present safety. We reached Blackmarsh in about half the usual time and found that the gas lamps had been lit and the pit head, the wheel, the chimney and all the buildings looked blacker than ever in the yellow light. The iron gates had been taken off their hinges and thrown down and there were large groups of men some arguing, some agreeing, everywhere.

  Their voices grew angry when they saw Mr Arkwright and they began to crowd us, answering his quiet words with shouts, swearing and threatening gestures. I didn’t like being in the centre of this sea of surging, angry men. I tried to back away for sticks and clubs were being brandished round my head, but Mr Arkwright rode me forward calling upon them to disperse and go home and not to do anything that they would afterwards regret. It seemed to me that we were losing the battle of words and that at any moment we would be set upon and I would have an eye knocked out by one of the vicious-looking sticks. I carried my head as high as I could and tried not to flinch but I was very frightened of the united anger of the crowd.

  Just as I decided that our last moment had come, for one man had grabbed my rein and they were pressed round so close that I could see no way to escape, except by plunging into them and trampling on the fallen bodies, there was a shout and a cheer and then a crash of breaking glass across at the manager’s house. The crowd turned and then, as more crashes and more cheers followed, they ran to join this new sport.

  A crowd of men and boys were pulling up the railings round the manager’s garden.

  ‘Where is the Mayor,’ muttered Mr Arkwright, ‘what the devil’s holding him up?’ He took out his watch. Every pane of glass had vanished from the conservatory and the crowd were looking round for new victims. A man appeared suddenly with a flaming torch. ‘Burn ’em out,’ he shouted. ‘Get some straw from the stable. Come on we’ll burn the rats out.’ Half the crowd cheered, but the other half shouted against it. One of the women called, ‘There’s children in there,’ but another shouted, ‘they don’t care if ours starve.’

  A lot of people were calling to the man with the torch to put it out, but he made a sudden dash towards the front of the house and at the same moment Mr Arkwright said, ‘Come on, Ebony!’ and we shot forward too. The crowd had cleared from the front so we had a clear path and reached the man just as he was thrusting the firebrand through one of the broken panes. I stopped right against him and for a moment he and Mr Arkwright wrestled for the torch, there was a smell of oil and smoke, sparks landed on me. Then Mr Arkwright had it. I turned. The crowd was shouting and cheering again and some of the young men were running up for an attempt to recapture the torch, everyone was pressing in on the side where the railings were down. The railings which still stood were a fair-sized jump, but I didn’t mean to be trapped in the garden. I broke into a canter hoping Mr Arkwright’s leg was up to it; if he fell off . . . He was quick to realise my intention. He had the flaming torch in one hand but I felt him get the other hand down and grip my mane, I knew he was doubting his leg too. I took the railings as smoothly as I could, the landing was hard, but we were out on our own.

  There was a roar, half annoyance and half admiration, from the crowd and then Mr Arkwright was guiding me. He rode to a stone water trough, that was there for the benefit of the coal cart horses, and plunged the firebrand in; it hissed and died. I was thinking that the coal cart horses were not going to be pleased with the taste of oil, charred wood and cloth when there was a clatter of hoofs and a carriage came rattling through the colliery entrance.

  ‘The Mayor at last,’ said Mr Arkwright who was binding a handkerchief round his hand.

  The Mayor, who seemed to be a very ordinary man with a gold chain round his neck, climbed up on the box of his carriage and while his coachman held a light and two policemen stood guard below he read out something called the Riot Act. There was a lot about dispersing and departing peaceably to their habitations or to their lawful business and the more peaceful miners came to listen, but the less peaceful ones went on smashing up the manager’s summer house and breaking the last of his windows. Then we heard the sound of many hoofs on the road and the special jingle soldiers make because of their swords and spurs. The shouting stopped, the crowd began to melt away. The soldiers stopped a little way down the road and one man fired his carbine into the air, the sharp crack made me start, but then they just walked in quietly and the officer came to talk to Mr Arkwright and the Mayor. The horses were a smart-looking lot, strong but not fast, I decided. Mr Wilson the manager had come out and joined in the conversation, it seemed that no one was hurt though his younger children had been much frightened. He and Mr Arkwright began to make arrangements for the repair of the damage and some of the soldiers went to hoist the great iron gates back on their hinges. The Mayor left and at last Mr Arkwright decided that we could go too.

  It was very dark and there was no moon but we set off cheerfully for we knew the road well and the night is never so black when you have been out in it a little. We passed the valley of the manufactories and stopped for a moment to look down at the great cotton mills, every window blazing with gas light, smoke and steam and the red glow of furnaces all rising up from the valley and then being swallowed into the vast darkness of the sky.

  As we climbed higher we found fog and the higher we went the thicker it grew, swirling round us, nuzzling us with its wet kiss, blotting out everything. Mr Arkwright dismounted and led me. He was limping and I could see that the hand he’d hurt getting the torch was paining him. We were both cold and tired now that the excitement and terror of the evening had died away.

  We plodded on wearily, following the road by the feel of its hard surface beneath our feet and noticing the change directly if we strayed on to the turf or heather at the side. Then we began to go downhill and the fog was thinning a little and suddenly I knew we were on the wrong road. I stopped and lifted my head and sniffed the air. Mr Arkwright swore. ‘We must have gone wrong a
t the cross-roads on the top,’ he said. ‘I don’t see how we did it, except that all senses of direction are suspended in a fog. Come on Ebony, we’ll have to back.’ We turned and I began to hurry. I’d had enough of this outing and wanted my supper and stable. Suddenly Mr Arkwirght slipped and fell. For a moment he rolled and twisted in pain, then he half sat up. ‘This really is the last straw!’ he said. ‘I’ve done something to that ankle and they’ll never find me here though they search all night.’ He felt his leg gingerly and then he made an attempt to rise. I positioned myself near him thinking that he might like to pull himself up by the stirrup. He took the hint and got himself up on his good foot then he tried to put the other to the ground, but gasped and staggered and would have fallen had I not been there to lean against.

  Carefully he lowered himself to the ground. ‘I must stay here until I’m found. Well, the weather’s not too bad. Many a man has died up here, lost in the snow, but I shall get away with an uncomfortable night and a chill. If only I was not so damnably cold already.’ He looked at me. ‘Go on, Ebony, home.’ He clapped his hands and clicked his tongue. ‘Go on, raise the alarm and, even if you can’t tell them where I am, at least you’ll be in a warm stable and there won’t be two of us down with pneumonia.’

  I felt very reluctant to leave him, but I set off, reins and stirrups dangling, at a purposeful walk. I went uphill back into the thickest fog and tried to find the homeward road. I was at the cross-roads and wandering uncertainly when I heard the sound of hoofs and the rattle of a trap. I neighed and hurried forward to meet it. Storm’s neigh answered mine. I trotted down the road neighing with joy. It was the dogcart with its lamps lit and voices called, ‘Mr Arkwright, sir, are you all right?’ Then they saw my empty saddle. ‘Oh God, the Master’s had another fall.’ ‘Jump down Harry and see if Ebony’s all right,’ directed Draper. ‘Here take the lamp and look at his knees; has he been down?’

  ‘No, not a scratch on him.’

  ‘Well keep the lamp and walk on. Go carefully we don’t want to injure him if he’s lying senseless in the road.’

  ‘I had no such fear so I dragged Harry along at a brisk pace trying to show him that I knew what I was doing.

  ‘Watch the sides of the road too,’ called Draper. ‘He may be lying on the grass and we don’t want to miss him.’

  We came to the cross-roads and this time I was certain of my direction and when Harry tried to continue along the Blackmarsh road I refused to follow.

  ‘Here, where do you think you’re going, Ebony? It’s this way,’ he clicked at me and tried to pull me forward. From behind Draper flicked me with the driving whip, ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘No messing about, we’ve got to find the Master.’

  I pulled hard and dragged Harry down the right road, hampered by the lamp he could only pull me round in a circle, and when he tried to get me going again, I jibbed. Both men shouted at me. I still refused to move. They were getting angry, Harry jerked roughly at my mouth, I reared. Draper gave me a sharp cut with the whip. I reared again, higher. And as I came down, narrowly missing Harry with my hoofs, I twisted and plunged and wrenched the reins from his hands. I had galloped a few strides down the road before I trod on the reins flapping round my feet and jagged my mouth severely. They broke. I trotted a few more yards and then turned to see if Harry was following me. He wasn’t, so I neighed. He came on and I waited for him. Then, as he got near, I whirled away, he followed me cursing. I did this several times and then Draper began to call from the cross-roads. ‘Leave him, Harry, come on back, we’ve got to find the Master.’

  Harry wavered. I neighed loudly and then listened. There came on the foggy air a faint answering shout. Harry heard it too. He waved his lamp aloft and shouted, ‘There’s someone down here.’ I moved on hoping that I was going to find Mr Arkwright. Harry followed ignoring the distant shouts from the cross-roads. Suddenly a voice said, ‘Well done, Ebony, whom have you brought?’

  ‘Is that you, Mr Arkwright?’ asked Harry holding the lamp high, and then, suddenly seeing him. ‘Oh thank God. We never thought to find you here. Are you much hurt?’

  After that it all went easily. Harry ran back to tell Draper. There was a flask of brandy and a rug in the dog cart so Mr Arkwright was soon feeling better and then they lifted him in. Harry made me reins of a piece of cord and mounted and we set off for home. The dog cart took the shortest way, but Harry and I went round by the doctor’s house and asked him to come quickly to The Hall.

  They made a great fuss of me in the stable that night. Harry gave everyone a very dramatic account of how I had reared and plunged and led him to the Master. Mrs Draper came with a bowl of apples and carrots and brought all the little Drapers to admire me.

  As for Mr Arkwright it seemed that he had dislocated his ankle, but as it had never been quite right since his hunting accident, there was hope, that now it was properly put back by the surgeons, there would be an improvement.

  He never tired of telling people that I had saved his life, or very nearly so, and the manager’s house on the same day.

  7

  THE EXPLOSION

  ANOTHER YEAR PASSED. Mr Arkwright did manage a day or two’s hunting, but we regarded ourselves as old crocks and came home early. The countryside was so wild that speed and jumping ability were far less necessary than in the south, but the pace was more suitable for a horse of my age.

  Then spring came earlier than usual for the north and a long hot summer followed.

  It was on a particularly hot and heavy day in August when I was standing in the Blackmarsh stable, I was dozing, undisturbed by the familiar sounds of steam engines, clanking trucks and passing coal carts. Then suddenly there was a strange trembling of the ground beneath our feet, followed by a muffled bang and then a much nearer crash. Then men’s voices began to shout and alarm bells sounded.

  Thoroughly awake I listened. It was impossible to see what was going on, but it seemed to be to the pit head that everyone was running. Then Matthew came in to saddle me. He seemed very disturbed and kept shouting at the boy to bed down the spare stalls and fill all the pails with clean water and put the medicine chest ready. The boy was crying, ‘My Dad’s down there, and my two brothers.’ ‘And so are my sons and grandsons,’ answered Matthew. ‘Now, where’s young Wilson?’

  Young Wilson came, he was a youth, dressed for the office, but he soon scrambled up on me.

  ‘Take it steady,’ advised Matthew, letting go of my rein. We set off at a brisk trot and took the Bruddersford road as we turned out of the gate. He wasn’t much of a rider but he had the sense to give me my head and he could click his tongue and cry ‘whoa’ so I understood him. We went into the town at a steady trot, there was no grass and the road was too hard for a canter.

  Our first stop was the hospital, he hitched my reins over the railings and ran in. Then we went to the police station where he told them of the explosion from the steps and then on to the telegraph office where I was hitched to some more railings and waited a very long time with flies buzzing round my head. By the time he came back the news had spread and the whole town seemed to be calling to us. ‘How bad is it?’ ‘How many are missing?’ ‘Are there many trapped?’

  And young Wilson called back that he didn’t know, that the cage had been damaged in the explosion and so far no one had been brought up.

  All the way back we passed groups of anxious-looking women hurrying towards Blackmarsh to ask for news of their menfolk. Many of them had several small children with them and some carried babies.

  Young Wilson didn’t leave me at the stable but rode me right up to the pit head. I had never been so close before and when I saw the shaft, black and bottomless beneath the shadow of the great headstocks and wheel, I began to snort nervously and back away. The men gathered round the shaft seemed to be shouting to men down below. Engineers struggled with cables, instructions were called from the engine house, people ran to and fro with messages and orders.

  ‘Right, we’re ready to
try again,’ shouted an authoritative voice. ‘Stand back, stand back,’ became the general cry. Someone told young Wilson to ‘take that horse away.’ We moved back a little but stayed to watch. There was a good head of steam, the wheel was moving slowly. There was a murmur of relief from the watchers, the cage was coming up.

  We waited fearfully to see what would emerge when the gates opened and it was a sad sight. Men staggered out supporting damaged hands and arms or holding bloody cloths to their heads or faces, some were carried out by their fellows others had to be laid on stretchers. Mr Arkwright was there directing the long string of carts and wagons that had been collected to take the injured to hospital, and they were laid gently on the fresh straw and driven slowly away. The news was being passed from mouth to mouth, there were so many injured, so many missing, this man had seen his mates killed, that one had been parted from his in the dark and smoke and panic. A huge rockfall was reported here, a fire there. Mr Arkwright was questioning some of the less seriously injured. Young Wilson managed to catch his attention for a moment and told him that the hospital were sending a doctor and a nurse to deal with the most badly hurt and had prepared all their beds; that the police were on their way and that he had telegraphed as ordered. ‘Well done,’ said Mr Arkwright absently. ‘Well put that horse away, see he has a drink. You’ll be needed in the office to help make up lists of the injured.’

  A great many injured men were brought up before the first pony found its way into the cage, but presently three very frightened, trembling little animals were led into the stable. One was rather burned and singed, another had a severe cut and the third was unhurt. He said that there had been a great wind and then a terrible bang and flash, the air had rushed past him and there had been a dreadful rumbling and falling of rocks. ‘My boy unhitched me from the tub,’ he said, ‘and we ran together.’