Easterleigh Hall

by Margaret Graham

  Martin jogged his arm so that his lamp cast chaotic shadows. ‘Aye, maybe. And if you churn out any more long words we’ll have to notch your tongue out. Too much reading under the covers is bad, lad. You’ll go blind.’

  Ben and Sam laughed from behind them. The floor dipped a few inches and they scudded up the dust. The roof was lowering, they were stooping. It was killing on the neck. It was hotter.

  Bob peeled off to the left, taking another two to their placement. ‘Keep going, I’ll catch up.’

  The roof was lowering by the stride. They could see little by the light of their lamps, but enough. ‘Penny for ’em,’ Martin grunted.

  ‘More of the same. The bairns are going to be hungrier next year unless we hammer out a good deal,’ Jack replied.

  Da caught up as the roof became even lower and they bent double, kicking up crud with every step, and though they cursed they did so silently because to open their mouths invited a lungful of dust. Jack risked it for a moment. ‘Jeb’s mebbe coming to talk about it all at the end of shift when we head to the cage.’ He ended up choking and coughing.

  ‘Save it lad,’ Luke called. ‘See you later.’ He and his marra peeled off.

  It was so hot this far down, sweat was streaming off Jack’s face and dripping to the ground. He grinned, not a bad idea, they could do with some damping of the dust. His nose still hurt but it wasn’t the first time it had been broken and not the last, if he kept on fighting. But he had to. They were not far off what they thought would be the price of Froggett’s house. OK they weren’t there yet, but it was doable. Just look at the Gala fight – five guineas. There could be other purses that big and with Evie’s pay . . .

  His father squeezed past, panting. ‘Time I took the front.’ He was bent double as they all were now, and still the roof scraped their backs. More button scabs torn off. So what was new? His father set up a good pace. Deputyship needed men who cared, men who took safety seriously.

  Ben shouted, ‘Am I talking to myself back here? Or do I just eat your dirt to amuse myself? Keep your bloody feet gentle in front, won’t you? What d’you say, Sam?’

  His brother retorted, ‘Keep your gob shut and you won’t swallow so much.’

  Da was at the turn-off to Jack and Martin’s placement now, crouched down low. Jack’s back was screaming as he followed, his legs bent. Martin was breathing hard and his leg must kill but you’d not hear a word from him. They changed to a crawl. His da was checking the props at the seam face, which was slightly higher. He was crouched on his knees, which was how the hewers would have to work. Jack eyed it up. Or maybe this shift would be spent lying on their sides. It depended how much they cut away.

  ‘Martin, Jack, get alongside.’ Bob pointed with his saw at the sides. ‘I’ll get some more props sent up. You’ll need to set them as you cut away. The putters will have to push in the tubs for the coal and leave the Galloway wagons back where there’s headroom. It’ll slow you down, mark you, but don’t be tempted to take bloody risks. You hear me now?’ He looked up at the roof. ‘Get back now, both of you.’

  They did as he checked the roof. ‘Right, lads, you’re safe and sound.’

  Jack and Martin grinned at one another. That was a new one – down a pit and safe and sound? His da saw them and shrugged. ‘Make sure you keep it that way.’ He pressed Jack’s shoulder as he passed. ‘You make sure,’ he murmured.

  ‘Same for you, Da.’

  Jack and Martin had drawn a favourable placement in the cavil, so their piece rates were good. Martin had gone on to the face and was busy already, wielding his pick in short jerks. Jack shovelled the chunks to the rear as they fell to the ground. ‘Putter!’ he yelled. The tub came up as far as it could. Eddie shovelled the coal into the tub. Soon it could be Timmie doing that. Jack thrust his shovel beneath the coal as he thought for the first time, really thought, about a hotel. Well, why not, it was a grand idea, and Evie was a grand lass, as well as a grand cook. Timmie could work there, his da too. Well, they could. He couldn’t leave his marra, never could he do that.

  All morning they hacked with their picks and shovels in the light from their oil lamps. Would miracles happen, would the Bastard introduce electrics like some of the other pits? Would he hell. By bait time they’d stripped out of their hoggers and were down to their underwear, with sweat stinging their open cuts and running rivulets through their dust-coated bodies. They were lying on their sides getting at the under-coal.

  Jack called a halt at midday, and they sat against the wall, pulling out their butties and casting great shadows on the walls of coal and shale in the yellow fluttering light. Jack’s butties were stuffed with the remains of the ham, and for a moment he was at the beck again with Evie. She’d probably be serving up the servants’ lunch now, and halfway through preparing the upstairs meal. How many courses would that be? At least she wasn’t sweeping up the family’s detritus or scuttling down the corridor to stay out of sight. What did the nobs think would happen to them if they cast eyes on a servant? That they’d turn to a pillar of salt? Beggars they were, but at least they were paying to aid her escape. He felt his mouth twist. There was a grand justice in it.

  Martin handed him one of his butties. ‘Cheese. Swap?’

  ‘Aye, just the one.’

  They swigged from their water bottles. ‘How’s your Evie?’

  Jack shrugged. ‘Si will look after her, if she needs it. But you know her, she’s our Evie.’

  Martin laughed, a piece of ham falling to his lap. He picked it up with coal-coated fingers and ate it. Jack could hear the crunch of teeth on dust.

  Jack eased his back on the wall and felt the pain of torn scabs and the blood from the old and new running down into his drawers. All around was the thick smell of coal. It was a strange way to live your life, in the dark and always close to death. It changed you, gave you a different attitude which must be useful for something, but who the hell knew what.

  Martin gulped at his water, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘I was thinking. There’s talk that the Brampton whelp could be coming in here to peer over Davies’ shoulder. Bet it’ll end in more cutbacks. Someone heard something from the office, so they say.’

  Jack shook his head. ‘They say a lot, but I can’t see it, can you, man? That beggar Brampton’s a businessman and it’s not good business to put in a fool like Auberon. By, I’d give my right arm to go to the university, and for him to chuck it up . . . If he’s a gambler, he’d have done well to put money on my fight. Just shows what a daft beggar he is.’

  They laughed, then Martin coughed and spat. In this light Jack couldn’t see the colour. Martin coughed again. Jack said, ‘Stop smoking so many of those Woodbines would you, you daft beggar? Don’t you reckon your chest has enough to put up with?’

  Martin nudged him with his foot. ‘Are you my mam?’

  ‘Aye, haven’t you noticed my skirts?’

  Beside him Martin tossed his crust into the dark where there’d be a rat or ten waiting. Jack said, ‘I’ll ask Evie to see what she can find out. It’s bound to be only gossip.’

  Their bait time was over. It was back to work. They crawled to the face, then froze. Something . . . what? Neither moved, both listened. No creaks above, just the usual sighing. Then a rumble, shouts. Way off. Was it down the east seam? Martin looked at Jack. ‘Bugger of a life, eh?’ It was some poor sod’s unlucky day but not theirs, this time. They’d hear whose soon enough and put something into the collection, but all they could do now was to get on.

  They crawled on. They spent too much time on their knees, far too much. Too many workers did, from the dockers to the railwaymen, to the miners, to the domestics, and if this went on there’d be a revolution just as he’d said to Evie. Jack wielded his pick and felt the judder right into his shoulder, and settled in to hacking out the coal because he had enough to think about without straying into the land of maybe. He’d just listen hard and perhaps he’d hear the roof before it came down.

&nbs
p; Chapter Five

  IT WAS HER first morning at Easterleigh Hall. Monday, the day the miners hated. The clock chimed on the wall of the corridor outside Evie’s bedroom. It was 5 a.m. and she’d barely closed her eyes, so worried had she been that she’d not hear the corridor clock chime the time and not be down to light the range furnace at five thirty. Annie was still asleep, the blanket pulled up around her head. She had put her two shawls over the bed for extra warmth, just as Evie had done.

  Evie lay quite still listening for the noises of the house. There were none. At home in her box room she would have heard coughs from the men’s bedrooms, a stirring from her mother downstairs, the barking of a dog further along the terrace. A sense of loss drenched her, but she had no time for that.

  She crept to the washing bowl, the wooden floor like ice. She’d bring one of her mam’s proggy mats and let Mrs Green try and stop her. She poured in bitterly cold water from the jug which she’d lugged up last night. It was midnight before she’d finished clearing the kitchen with Annie, but what did that matter when her clear soup had been acceptable, and her vegetable-chopping adequate, or so Mrs Moore had said with a smile before retiring to her room further along the corridor from the servants’ hall.

  The clock chimed five fifteen, by which time she was washed and dressed. She’d left her corset looser than was thought desirable, but she couldn’t see the point of agony. She dragged on her boots, tied her hessian apron, then shook Annie. ‘Come on, lass, time to get up and at ’em.’

  Annie groaned. ‘In a minute. It’s your job to get the furnace going, not mine. So get it going.’ She turned over, her face puffy from tiredness and her light brown hair a bird’s nest.

  Downstairs Evie hurried into the kitchen and mice scuttled in all directions. She froze, but within a few seconds they’d disappeared. ‘Darned beggars.’ She hated them, always had, always would. She dared the furnace to misbehave, though Mrs Moore had said it would be fine if there was a brisk wind to draw it. And when wasn’t there hereabouts, even in the valley? Dropping to her knees, she cleared the ash into the buckets left by Kev the hallboy. She heard him coming in from outside with the coal. He slept in the bell corridor on an apology for a bed, but had told her yesterday evening that one day he’d be a butler, and he’d show his beggar of an uncle in Consett who’d wanted him in the steelworks.

  ‘Here’s your kindling too, Evie.’ He had not washed, or if he had the coal had worked its magic and left its usual coating. Paper and kindling laid, she carefully placed the coal, finding the familiar smell comforting. What was more, it was top grade, not a trace of shale anywhere. She opened the flue, lit the paper and prayed.

  Kev laughed. ‘You don’t need that sort of help, the wind’s fierce today.’

  Annie said from behind, ‘He’s right, you know. It’ll go like the clappers.’

  Kev disappeared back into the bell corridor to clean the shoes, all twenty or so pairs of them including those of the upper servants. Annie had soaked the blacklead for the ranges overnight, and they worked until Evie’s hair was sweat-soaked. Finally the ranges gleamed, but not as much as Evie’s mam’s. ‘They’ll do,’ Annie groaned. ‘Old Moore can’t see too well, even with her glasses.’

  They tackled the fender with emery paper and by then their hands were sore and smudged, their nails torn. At Miss Manton’s, Susan from Hawton had sculleried for her and Evie realised just how lucky she’d been. The kettle was boiling and it was time for biscuits and tea for Mrs Green, Mr Harvey, and Mrs Moore.

  As instructed, Evie left the sustenance on the occasional table in both Mrs Green’s sitting room and Mr Harvey’s parlour, which was opposite Mrs Moore. She tapped lightly on the cook’s parlour door, and put her tea and biscuit on her table. It was a nice room but cold, with a fireplace laid but unlit, and photographs on the wall. Evie glanced at these as she headed for the bedroom. She saw a young woman who must have been Miss Manton sitting in a garden, alone, smiling into the camera. She radiated joy.

  Evie kicked something as she was about to knock on the bedroom door. It was an empty gin bottle. Mrs Moore had asked her to make sure she knocked long and hard. She left the bottle where it was, because to move it would show that she knew. She knocked again, and again. At last she heard Mrs Moore call, ‘Enough. I’m awake. Leave the tea, get out. Just go. Get out.’

  She went, wanting to bang the door shut on the canny old witch, but did not.

  Evie checked her list of ‘things to do’. Some of the copper pans had been left from the night before, though Mrs Moore had written that they should not be. Annie had already started on them in the bitter cold of the scullery and Evie rushed in, dipping into the mixture of silver sand, salt and vinegar and starting to rub the largest, gasping at the stinging of her raw flesh. ‘Quick, she’s awake and not happy.’

  Annie looked up at her, her face still puffy, a Woodbine hanging from her mouth. ‘Never is in the morning. Don’t know why, except I’m not either. She’s got a touch of the rheumatics is all. No need to make such a do of it, is there. Don’t worry, she’ll be half an hour yet and by then she’ll expect this kitchen to be on the way to being perfect, with the table laid up. But that’s your job, not bloody mine. How it can all be done just by us two I don’t bloody well know.’ Her ash dropped into the pan, her cigarette clung to her bottom lip. How could she talk with it in her mouth? The same way Jack and his marras did.

  They worked on, and any skin on their hands that had survived was soon as raw as the rest. Evie felt the stinging right up through her arms as far as her eyebrows. Nonetheless, by the time Mrs Moore appeared the pans were hung up on the hooks and gleamed enough to satisfy the pickiest of souls. But not Mrs Moore. ‘They’re a disgrace, take ’em down again and finish them properly and stoke up that furnace, for God’s sake. And I’ll expect them to be cleaned every time we use them today.’ She had the same frown that Jack had after a night at the pub, the same faint tremble of the hands, and that smell.

  She slumped down on her stool. ‘We need the porridge ready for the staff, don’t you forget that, Evie, and I’ll have more tea. Miss Donant, the lady’s maid, will be in hotfoot for her bloody highness’s cuppa and then for Miss Veronica’s, and Archie will have to take up Mr Auberon’s now he’s home, so hoy that down to the butler’s pantry. God almighty, as though we don’t have enough to do. And this table isn’t laid properly. Get the ladle, or are you expecting Mrs Green to serve with her hands? But why haven’t you stoked up the furnace, or is there something wrong with your lugs? Didn’t I say sort it? Let’s get some proper heat.’ As Mrs Moore spoke she was flexing her hands, moving her shoulders, and her face was creased with more than a hangover. Pain was too mild a word. Well, Evie thought, flexing her own hands. Well, what about my pain?

  She exchanged a look with Annie. Mrs Moore eased her back, rolled her shoulders more gently and glanced at Evie. ‘Come on our lass, pour me a cuppa and ignore me for the moment. I’m sorry my pets, grumpy old woman, I am.’ There was sweat beading her forehead as she sat.

  Evie lifted the teapot, wincing at the pressure on her raw hands, and for a moment paused, her eyes fixed on Mrs Moore’s swollen knuckles, and her heart ached for her. ‘You’ve a right, I’d kick every cat in sight and so would Annie if I had your rheumatics.’

  Annie mouthed, ‘Stop buttering up the old hag.’

  Evie poured Mrs Moore’s tea, shovelled more coal into the huge furnace. Within moments the heat had upped enough degrees to ease a million joints, but as Evie looked more closely at the cook she saw what she had not seen before. It was not just pain, but fear. Evie remembered how she had felt on Saturday when she thought her da had lost his job. What would happen to Mrs Moore if she lost hers? Perhaps she could live with Miss Manton, or would it be the workhouse? Evie shook herself back into the moment. It wasn’t going to happen; she, Evie Forbes, would not let it.

  She put the kettles on to boil for the upstairs tea. Along the corridor between the kitchen and the servants�
�� hall Lil was rushing towards the broom cupboard, tucking her hair into her cap. Archie and James, the footmen, were heading off towards the butler’s pantry where Evie should by now have taken Mr Auberon’s tea. Well, she couldn’t do everything and kettles didn’t boil while you watched them.

  Annie had taken down the copper pans again, and was banging about in the scullery. Evie joined her, out came the mixture, along with the elbow grease, scouring their hands again as much as the copper while Annie’s curses accompanied them.

  ‘The kettles have boiled, so make that tea for Mr Auberon now, Evie, if you please.’ Mrs Moore stood in the scullery door, her tone soft. Evie did so, and carried the tray to the butler’s pantry. Young Archie nodded, his face one big scowl that leaked into his shoulders. In fact his whole being was crunched up into one big sulk. ‘Afternoon tea, is it, for heaven’s sake?’ He raced off with the tray while Evie hurried back to the kitchen, wanting to kick him up the backside.

  Miss Donant was there, by the kitchen table, tapping her foot, her hair immaculate, her face scrubbed clean, her mouth pursed into a sparrow’s bum. ‘I need that tea, now. This minute. Her Ladyship shouldn’t have to wait.’

  Mrs Moore was studying her recipe book and without looking up said, ‘If there’s a problem then suggest to her Ladyship she reviews the employment policy, if you wouldn’t mind.’ Miss Donant’s mouth pursed tighter still as Evie provided the tea, wanting to pour it over her head and to do the same to her Ladyship. ‘I’ll return for Lady Veronica’s,’ snapped Miss Donant. She swept from the kitchen.

  So it went on until Evie and Annie had finished the pans, Evie had prepared Lady Veronica’s tray, and both had swept the stone floor clear of mouse droppings, and then scrubbed it. It hurt Evie’s pride as much as her knees. She rushed to collect up knives, spoons, ladles, bowls, plates, and checked everything against the list. They matched, heaven be praised.