The heat from Anna’s chest started to run down her arm and—she felt sure of it—into Sally’s fingers.
For a moment she stood there, confusion and astonishment locking her in place. The heat died, and her arm loosened, and she lifted her hand away.
Sally’s fingers were pink and raw, like new skin after a burn, but they were straight and whole again. In a week they’d show no sign of the injury.
Maud Farlin stomped up with some of her women and looked to Sally, her gruff face set grim. “What happened?”
Sally was vacant and numb, pale with shock.
Maud looked to Anna instead. “Did you see it?”
“No, but her shuttle’s stuck and there’s blood all over the weave. Reckon it caught her as she untangled the threads. Cold fingers ain’t fast fingers.”
Maud grimaced. “Aye, girl, that’s the Lord’s truth. Well let’s have a look, Sally. See how bad it is.”
Maud reached thick fingers down and lifted Sally’s hand into a feeble beam of sunlight.
“Teeth o’ Jesus,” said one of Maud’s women, “don’t know as I’d still be sharp enough after a full shift to focus my Squalor and fix myself that good.”
Anna kept quiet. What had happened? What . . . what was that?
“This is on Shuttleworth,” said Maud. “I’m amazed we ain’t had more of this today. Near as amazed as I am that you fixed yourself up, Sally. Ain’t many could do that.” She looked at Anna as she said it, looked at her closely, before turning to her women. More had gathered as they talked, and Maud raised her voice to them all. “I ain’t standing for this. No one should have to risk themselves with these long shifts and cold draughts for his profit. C’mon Sally.” Maud put her hands on Sally’s shoulders and gently, but firmly, stood her up and led her out of the bucket of water and up to the front of the factory floor, beneath Shuttleworth’s balcony.
Anna got caught up in the group of women and hustled along with them.
“Shuttleworth!” shouted Maud. The factory slowed as all the women turned, uncertain what was happening.
No answer came from the office.
“Shuttleworth!”
Maud’s voice echoed in the silence. All the looms had stilled. Thin cloth whispered as women stood and joined the crowd.
“Shuttleworth!”
The door opened at last and Sir John stepped out, expression distracted and annoyed. He seemed surprised to find the mass of workers staring at him and his factory halted. The anger in the air broke through his arrogance for the briefest second before he regained his composure and set his hawkish face in a mask of disdain.
“Pay will be docked for this stoppage. Further punishment will be meted out to the ringleaders in due course, but I have more pressing appointments in town.”
In town? Oh Christ, not the orphanage! I’ve got to get to the boys! Anna tried to wriggle her way out of the crowd but she was held in, pinned at the front of it all.
“I will return at two hours past dusk, and I expect you all still to be working,” continued Shuttleworth. “If production does not meet my expectations, then I have a number of . . . newly redundant workers in need of fresh employment.” He turned to leave, black cloak flaring out as he spun.
Maud said, “We’ll not stand for this anymore, Shuttleworth.”
If the floor had seemed silent before, it almost ached with the absence of sound now.
Anna could feel the wrath in Sir John from here. The way he moved back to face Maud Farlin was too controlled, too tight, with none of his usual flamboyance.
“I do not care what you will stand for,” he said, knuckles white as they gripped the railing, “because it does not matter to me. You think your petty concerns are important when set against the empire? Against progress?”
“You think us less important because we have to worry about food on the table each night?” Maud’s voice was just as quiet, just as angry.
“I think you less important because you are less important, woman! Learn your place and keep to it, else I will find someone else to fill it. All of you!” He stormed down the iron steps and out the factory, rage in every step.
“You hear that?” yelled Maud, face still upturned as if Shuttleworth remained on his balcony. “You hear what he thinks of us?” The crowd grumbled. “He thinks us inferior! He thinks us contemptible! He thinks us desperate!”
We are desperate. Anna tried to worm her way out of the crowd, her terror growing lockstep with the mob’s fury.
“Are you going to let him talk to you like that?” Maud faced her audience now, gesturing roughly. “Put you down like that? He ain’t no better than us. He’s no God-fearing man like he pretends. He’s sent by Satan himself! Building his dark mills on our fair moors! He’s a canker on our land and a canker on our souls. Why should we let him drag us down with him? Why should we suffer at his tainted hands? No more of his abuse or his scorn or his evil! No more!” Maud turned and stomped out, the looms seeming to quake as she passed, all the women behind her.
Anna followed out the door and then fled up the road, leaving the mob to their riot.
Anna ran for the orphanage, ran with abandon and fear, ran as fast as ever she could.
When Shuttleworth’s black and gold coach passed her, going back the other way, she ran even faster still.
She burst in through the front door and raced through the old house, searching for Mrs. Hobble, searching for the boys.
“Hello, love.” Mrs. Hobble’s voice was soft.
“Where are the boys? Where are the boys?”
“I’m sorry, love, I tried to keep them back . . . he had me gather all the boys in the front room, and I made sure your lads were tucked away, near hiding behind the sofa, but he went straight to ’em . . . walked past all the boys standing proud and confident, like he wanted the frightened ones. I’m so sorry, love, I really am.” She twisted her colored skirts between her hands.
Anna swallowed back the tears and the screams and the panic. Her throat hurt when she spoke. “It’s not your fault. Thank you for trying.” She gripped Mrs. Hobble’s arms in as reassuring a manner as she could muster, and then turned and fled before she could break down.
He wants the frightened ones. Boys that’ll scare easy down a mine. Where’s these mines he’s taking ’em to, though? He said he’d be back at the factory past dusk, he must be taking them there first.
Anna ran. The exhaustion of a full day’s shift and the bitter Lancashire winter dulled her thoughts till she became focused on the run, the run to the factory, the run to the boys, eyes glazed and feet pounding and lungs burning like they were on—
Fire.
Fire, filling the horizon, blazing orange against the night.
Fire filling the factory and eating it up and casting the dark iron beams as shadows, huge black ribs bending inwards like a consumptive wreck on his deathbed.
“No . . .”
The heat of it washed against her face from all these hundreds of feet away, and the sharp smell of burning cotton stabbed at her nose. The fire flared in a gust of wind, and part of the roof collapsed.
“No!” she shouted, lurching forward into a sprint. Maybe there was a corner that hadn’t caught yet, maybe they’d gotten out and were standing the other side, maybe she could find them and help them and—
Strong arms wrapped themselves around her and lifted her off the ground.
“Careful now, girl, easy now. Easy!”
Anna kicked her heels and struggled against the grip, but she was held tight, and she was exhausted. She went limp, and let herself be lowered to the ground. A half-choked sob burst from her throat.
“Easy now, girl. You don’t want to be running down there.”
Anna looked up through tearful eyes. “Maud? Maud Farlin?”
“What you doing back here, girl?”
“I—my br
others—I—” and Anna collapsed again, a broken doll with strings cut by grief.
Maud waited. Anna wept out her tears, and mumbled, “They were in the factory.”
“Say what, girl?”
“My brothers. They were in the factory.”
“Can’t have been. We made sure no one were about. What would they have been doing in there?”
“Shuttleworth took them from the orphanage earlier. He picked them out special and took ’em in his carriage, so now they’ve burned with him in that factory.” She broke down in tears again.
“Nelly!” shouted a new voice, rising up the hill—one of Maud’s women, thunder on her face. “We best get going. We’ve dallied too long.”
Maud—Nelly?—turned to the new woman. “Aye, in a moment. You lot need to vanish. Go on, all of you.”
“You can’t hang about. If they catch themselves Nelly Ludd, they’ll go hard on you.”
“I’ll be all right. I can look after myself, can’t I? Now get on with you.”
The woman clenched her jaw, but walked away without further argument.
Anna picked through what she’d heard. “Nelly . . . Ludd? You’re Nelly Ludd? What’s been attacking all the factories hereabouts? But you work in ours!”
“Aye, girl. So as I could keep an eye on that toad Shuttleworth. So as I’d know when he wasn’t about and we could burn his factory without burning him. I ain’t becoming a murderer on his account.”
It took a moment for Nelly’s words to sink in. “Sir John . . . wasn’t there?”
“No, girl. Nor was your boys. We knew Shuttleworth was coming back, so we waited till he left again.”
Relief washed through Anna. They’re ok, they’re ok, they’re not dead, they’re ok.
“Where are they, then?” she asked, looking up from the damp grass. “Has he taken them to his mines?”
“Shuttleworth ain’t got no mines, girl. Where’d you hear that?”
“But—why else take them? Where could they be?”
“Damned if I know. But they ain’t here.”
“You’ve got to help me find them!”
Nelly barked a single laugh. “I’ve got to get away from here is all I’ve got to do. I’ve got my own worries, girl.”
Anna stood. “No. No, you will help me. ’Cos I know it was you now, what’s been burning the factories.”
Nelly’s face darkened. “You threatening me, girl?”
“What you gonna do? You wouldn’t burn Sir John for all he’s done, but you’d hurt me? Kill me? No, I don’t reckon that’s your way. I reckon you’ll help me. Because whatever he’s got planned with my brothers, stopping it would hurt his cause, and you’ll do it for that, if not for my boys.”
Nelly stared for a long moment, and then her broad face cracked a wicked grin. “I like you, girl. You got fight. Come on, then.”
“Where we going?”
“To Gawthorpe Hall. To Shuttleworth’s home.”
Habergham Drive was a tunnel through trees made bare by winter. The full moon slipped through the naked branches and littered the path with fractured shapes.
Anna and Nelly had walked in silence since turning away from the burning factory.
Nelly said, “Girl, say what’s bothering you.”
“Why did you burn the factory?”
“To stop Shuttleworth. To show him he can’t have it all his own way.”
“Like what?”
“Like chilling the factory floor so we work faster. Like us suffering the poisoning from Parkes’ bloody lead alloy. Like paying us in pennies and promises of an empire we’ve got no interest in.”
“Like you, then.”
“Careful how you speak, girl. I ain’t like him.”
“No? Burning that factory down to get back at Sir John? There’s people on that floor need those wages to eat, for their kids to eat, but you’ve made the decision for ’em. You’ve dragged them into your fight whether they wanted it or not.”
“I’m being brave for them. They’d never stand up otherwise.”
“I expect Sir John’d say the same about his empire, if you asked him. He’s being strong for ’em, showing them how to stand up tall so as they can build something magnificent.”
“Tell me, girl, how does your Squalor work? Yours, mine, everyone’s?”
Anna’s indignation stumbled at the swerve in the conversation. “Well . . . necessity. Deprivation, I suppose. Squalor gives you just enough of what you need most, and you’ve got to really need it.”
“Exactly. Anyone could use Squalor, even all the toffs. But you ain’t got that necessity if you’re comfortable. So you think Shuttleworth and his kind’ll ever let us share in their wealth? No. They need us poor to build this empire. Their machines’d stop dead if we ever had it good enough. The rich’ll get richer and the poor’ll stay poor and they’ll keep us in our place so as they can keep exploiting us.”
“And you don’t exploit people? You use them as tools to try and change the world in a way you reckon is best, thinking you know better. There’s ways of changing the world without ruining lives like you have tonight.”
“I ain’t the one who’s stolen your brothers,” said Nelly, quiet with rage.
“No, I suppose you ain’t at that. You’re the one helping me get ’em back. But even then, you’re doing that to get at Sir John, not out of charity. You and everyone else in this world, you’re all so selfish now.”
Nelly didn’t seem angry at that. If anything, she looked sorrowful. “Aye, girl, the world’s a selfish place now. Time was people cared for others. We didn’t only have Squalor to save us then. We had Sympathy too.” Nelly looked askance at Anna, an odd expression in her eyes, but she put a finger to her lips before Anna could ask more. She stepped behind an ash tree at the edge of the wood and motioned for Anna to join her. “We’re there.”
Gawthorpe Hall was imposing in the night, a looming black shadow detailed in silver moonlight. The gravel drive was flanked by open lawns and ornamental gardens. Two coaches stood by the stables, one large and ornate, the other simpler but detailed in gold. Shuttleworth’s coach.
Men in red jackets and towering bearskin hats stood at the entrance, watching the approach.
“What are they doing here?” muttered Nelly.
“Who? Those soldiers?”
“Soldiers? Girl, they’re the Queen’s Guard.”
“Shouldn’t they be with the Queen, then?”
“Aye, girl, they should. But the Mourning Queen hasn’t left London for four years now. Not since Prince Albert died.”
“How we going to get past them?”
“We ain’t. Let’s try round the back.” Nelly moved off through the trees, keeping an eye on the Queen’s Guard and warning Anna into stillness whenever a mounted patrol moved round the garden.
A handful of Douglas firs lined the side of the River Calder behind Gawthorpe Hall, enough of them to hide Anna and Nelly as they crept round. A painted wooden door stood at one corner of the hall, a warm light spilling from the kitchen window next to it.
“You’re faster than I am, girl. See if you can work that door open.”
Anna hunched low and ran across the lawn, a tingling fear at the base of her neck as she crossed the open space, praying against any guards rounding the corner. She grabbed at the black iron handle but it held firm and wouldn’t turn—locked. She tried again, heaving her shoulder against the door, but it remained stubbornly solid. The crawling fear was growing stronger, pressing in, and with a curse Anna turned and ran back to the safety of the treeline.
“No good,” she said, panting clouds of breath in the cold air. “There’s got to be another way in.”
“Hold this,” said Nelly, taking off her winter coat and passing it over.
“What you doing?” asked Anna.
“This hall’s been here more than two hundred and fifty years. Penny to a shilling there’s still a privy that drains into the river. If I can find the grate and work it loose, you might be small enough to make your way in.” Nelly finished taking her boots off and dropped into the river before Anna could question it further.
Anna was near frozen after a few minutes standing there. A frost was already settling under the clear, starry sky, and the wind bit through to her skin. I don’t know how Nelly’s managing in that water. I can bare feel my toes just stood here. The exhaustion was catching up. She’d worked a full shift that day, and Squalor came at a price, drained something out of you. Two guards passed by on horseback, and Anna ducked down behind the trees. Crouched there, tucked away from the wind, Anna’s eyes and limbs grew heavy.
The sudden splash of Nelly heaving herself onto the riverbank shocked Anna back awake. “Help me out, girl,” said Nelly, teeth chattering.
Anna grabbed Nelly’s outstretched hand and hauled her up onto the grass. Anna put the winter coat around her, but it didn’t seem to help stave off the chill.
“Found . . . the grate,” said Nelly, coughing and shaking, “but . . . couldn’t open it . . . lead, not iron, so . . . not rusted.” Nelly pulled the coat tighter around her, but she still convulsed with shivers. “Stayed in . . . too long. Had to try though . . .”
“Nelly, you’re gonna freeze to death! You need to warm yourself!”
“Too cold to . . . focus . . . my Squalor.” Her coughs were already weaker, rasping in her throat.
Oh Christ, she’s going to die on my account, that wind’s cutting through me and I ain’t soaked through with river water. I can’t imagine how cold she must be, in her guts and in her bones. Anna wrapped her arms around Nelly and tried to warm her, tried to give over some of the heat that was churning in her own chest, but the wind and rain stole away what little she had to give. She looked around, desperate, and her eyes caught on the kitchen window and the door next to it.
Anna heaved Nelly up, an arm around her waist and Nelly’s arm over her shoulders, and all but dragged the big woman to the door. She pulled hard at the handle but it was as firm as before, even with Nelly lending what strength she could.
Writers of the Future 32 Science Fiction & Fantasy Anthology (L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future) Page 20