‘Ah, yer can’t scare me!’ Winston cried shrilly, nonetheless retreating to the Welsh dresser, putting the table safely between them. ‘Yer wouldn’t dare hit me! Me mam won’t never forgive yer, if yer puts that strap on me!’ he warned.
Big Jack Harte appeared not to hear. He moved forward rapidly and with agility, the black leather strap dangling ominously in his tightened fist. He lifted his arm and would have brought the strap down across the boy’s head if Emma had not rushed across the room at this moment and jumped in front of her father. She grabbed his arm and held it with both hands, using all of her strength. Her face was gaunt in the firelight and she shook with rage. She stood before her father unflinchingly. She was the only one who dared defy him, who had the nerve to stand up to him. And she could usually quell his wrath, subdue him into docility.
Although her voice was quiet when she spoke there was vehemence in her words. ‘Shut up, Dad! What’s got in ter yer? Shouting and bawling at this hour and our mam lying badly upstairs. Yer should know better, our dad. And yer should be ashamed of yerself! Now sit down and drink yer tea, or I’ll be the one that runs away, and then where would yer all be, eh?’ She held tightly on to his raised arm, which she could not move. ‘Come on, Dad,’ she cajoled in a softer tone, ‘don’t be stubborn. Our Winston won’t run off ter the navy. That’s all big talk on his part.’
‘That’s what yer think, is it, Miss Nosy Parker?’ Winston interjected furiously from the safety of his corner on the other side of the room. ‘Well, yer wrong for once in yer short life, our Emma. I mean it. Yes, I do.’
Emma swung around to face her brother. She strove to control herself. ‘Stop it, Winston,’ she hissed. ‘Yer’ll have me mam downstairs next and her so poorly. And stop this stupid talk of joining the Royal Navy. Me dad’s right, yer are too young. And yer’ll break our mam’s heart if yer runs away. So stop it. And now!’
Winston’s eyes gleamed with unfamiliar resentment and hostility. ‘Miss Bossy Knickers, that’s what yer are,’ he cried derisively. ‘Mind yer own business, Miss Bossy. Always interfering. Yer make me sick. Yer nowt but a slip of a lass and what do yer knows about owt, Emma Harte!’ There was a tinge of venom in his voice, but he recoiled under her piercing gaze, which was full of coldness. Her expression was one of indifference as she turned her back on him with deliberateness. Winston was vaguely conscious that he was afraid of his sister. Not afraid in the sense that he was afraid of his father’s brute force, but in another, wholly different way which he did not fully comprehend. As if to belie his feelings, he sucked in his breath and cried, ‘Too big for yer boots, Emma Harte. That’s what yer are!’ Emma ignored this last outburst and pressed her lips together, willing herself not to respond.
Jack had been dimly aware of this heated exchange between his two eldest children and he had used the few seconds to cool his rage. Now he turned his leonine head slowly and regarded his son with penetrating intensity. ‘Enough’s enough, Winston,’ he said in a voice still roughened with the residue of anger, yet controlled. ‘Leave thee sister alone. Thee’s done plenty of damage for one day, and I won’t be forgetting it for a hell of a long time.’
‘She’s always poking her nose inter me business—’ Winston retorted, but stopped short when he saw the irate glint in his father’s eyes, the flush rising on his neck to suffuse his face. Jack moved restlessly under Emma’s loosening grip and Winston thought better of arousing his father again. He slid with catlike grace to the far end of the kitchen, towards their younger brother Frank, who had been cowering against the set pot shaking with fear and whimpering during the uproar.
Emma was seething at his stupidity and inability to gauge their father’s moods, to know when to hold his tongue. Watching him whispering to Frank and consoling him, she wished he would run away and then perhaps they would have some peace. This disloyal thought so paralysed her she let go of her father’s arm. Winston’s presence had always been necessary to her and they were inseparable. He was her ally, her only friend, and as such she had considered him to be indispensable. The realization that perhaps he was not stunned her. She turned back quickly to her father, took his arm, and, somewhat shaken, said quietly, ‘Come on, Dad, sit down now.’
For a moment Jack Harte would not yield under the determined but light pressure of her hands on his muscular body. He looked down at the girl and thought how thin she was and he knew how easy it would be to free himself from her grip. With a flick of his wrist he could send her frail body hurtling across the room. But he had never struck Emma and he never would. He relaxed and allowed her to manoeuvre him into the chair. He gazed at the pale face, usually so grave and thoughtful, which still slightly twitched with aggravation, and he was moved as only she, of all his children, could move him. And as he contemplated his daughter, the only one who dared to challenge him, Big Jack had a rare and sudden flash of insight. He recognized with great clarity of vision that he was facing implacable will. A will wrought of iron and, in one so young, frightening and shocking. That unyielding little countenance filled him with a mixture of emotions, new emotions for him, compounded of pride and fear. He was proud of Emma’s strength, yet afraid for her because of it. It would get her into trouble one day, of that he felt sure. She was independent of spirit and there was no room for independent spirits in their world. Their class was inevitably ground under the heels of the bosses. Emma’s fierce will would be broken and he dreaded that day. He prayed then that he would not be around to see it, for it would break his heart, just as surely as it would break hers.
As he continued to stare at her, he saw the girl clearly for the first time in years. He saw the undernourished body, the thin neck, and the scrawny shoulders underneath the shabby little nightgown. But he also saw something else. He saw the transparency of the skin, as white as the snow that lingered still on the highest fells. He saw the sparkling eyes full of emerald fire, twin reflections of his own. He saw the richness of the russet hair that came to a widow’s peak above the proud brow. He saw in that undeveloped childish body the beginning of prettiness, but would it ever come to flower? His heart shifted and seemed to move imperceptibly with an unbearable ache and he was filled with profound anger and grief when he thought of the life of drudgery that lay ahead of her. She was a drudge already, here and at Fairley Hall, and she was so young.
Her light, girlish voice brought him out of his reverie. ‘Dad, Dad, don’t yer feel well?’ She was bending over him.
‘There’s nowt wrong with me, lass. Have thee looked in on thee mam? How is she?’
‘She was a bit poorly afore I came down, but she’s resting easy like now. I’m going ter take her some tea in a minute.’
She started to move away from him and he smiled at her, white teeth flashing, eyes loving, but she did not respond in her usual affectionate way, the way he had anticipated. She simply patted his arm and gave him a long careful look and he felt curiously reproached and shamed by his own child, as if he were the child and she the parent. And it bothered him enormously, for Emma was his favourite and he understood her and had the most profound love for her. He did not want to be diminished in her eyes. Her esteem was very necessary to him. Mechanically he leaned over and lifted his boots from the hearth. It was getting late and he would have to leave soon for the Fairley brickyard, where he and Winston worked. It was on the Pudsey road and it took them a full hour to walk there.
Emma crossed the kitchen with a burst of energy and renewed purpose. She wanted to dispel the mood, return things to normal, for although their thoughtlessness still rankled, she was not one to bear a grudge for long. She spied Frank at the set pot. He was calm again and with great concentration was preparing the sandwiches for their lunch and tea breaks, which they took to work with them in their jock boxes. She hurried over to join him, rolling up her sleeves purposefully, the air crackling with her vitality.
‘Frank, lad, whatever do yer think yer doing!’ she cried when she reached the boy, her eyes widening in surpris
e, her head bobbing from side to side in her excitement. ‘Lathering that dripping on like there’s no termorrow!’ She grabbed the knife from the startled boy’s hand and, clucking in mild irritation, she began to scrape some of the dripping off the bread. These scrapings she thriftily returned to the brown stone jar that stood on the wooden chopping board which covered the set pot opening. ‘We’re not gentry yet, our Frank,’ she went on, and expertly finished making the sandwiches herself, folding the bread cakes over and cutting them in half decisively and with a little flourish.
Frank shrank from Emma, his lower lip trembling, his hazel eyes brimming with hot tears, his small face pinched and scared. Frank was twelve and small for his age. He had a head of fair hair as soft as duck’s down, a milky skin, and a gentle face, almost girlish in its prettiness. Much to his humiliation, his sweet appearance had earned him the nicknames of ‘Sissy’ and ‘Nancy’ at the Fairley mill, where he worked as a bobbin ligger. Under Winston’s expert tuition he had learned to fight back with his fists, but his preference was to walk away from the taunts and jibes, his head held high, ignoring them. And that was the way he would be all of his life, always sensitive and thin-skinned, but capable of turning the other cheek, proudly and with disdain.
His fair hair fell over his eyes and he pushed it away nervously, turning pathetically to Winston, his defender, who had just finished washing at the sink. ‘I didn’t mean no harm, Winston,’ he said, and the tears slid down his freckled cheeks.
Winston had witnessed this scene at first with astonishment and then with amusement, aware that Emma’s brisk manner was her way of reasserting her motherly authority over them, and also of restoring their usual morning routine. He knew that her clucking and spluttering about the dripping was harmless. He put down the towel he had been using and pulled the younger boy to him, holding him comfortingly in the crook of his arm.
‘Well, I’ll go ter hell and back!’ he exclaimed, feigning horror, as he addressed his father. He bit his lip to hide a smile and continued, ‘I never thought I’d live ter see the day our Emma turned inter a nip scrape. I think some of old man Fairley’s habits have rubbed off on yon lass.’ He spoke mildly, all the hostility washed out of his eyes.
Emma whirled on them, her face flushed in the firelight that blazed up the chimney and filled her hair full of golden lights. She brandished the knife before her. ‘That’s not fair! I’m not a nip scrape! Am I, Dad?’ she appealed, and rushed on breathlessly before he could answer, ‘Anyway, old man Fairley’s that well off he’s bowlegged with brass and do yer know why? Because he wouldn’t nip a currant in two and give yer half. So there!’ She spoke heatedly, although not with anger, and there was an embarrassed expression on her crimson face. Winston knew his teasing had hit its mark, for Emma loathed stinginess and it was the worst accusation anyone could level at her, even in jest.
Bridling and tossing her head, she said huffily, ‘That dripping was two inches thick. Yer couldn’t have eaten them sandwiches. Yer would’ve been sick, that yer would.’
Winston started to laugh, unable to suppress his amusement any longer. Jack threw him a startled glance, his thick black brows puckering together in a jagged line across his brow as he gazed at the boy mystified. But he saw at once that Winston’s laughter was not malicious and he saw, too, Emma’s increasing confusion and humiliation. As he looked from one to the other the boy’s mirth infected him. He chuckled and slapped his knee.
Emma glared at them and slowly a sheepish grin spread itself across her face. She was laughing herself. ‘What a fuss over a ha’porth of dripping,’ she muttered through her laughter, shaking her head as she put down the knife. Frank looked in bewilderment at them all, at first uncomprehending, and as he realized their merriment was real he laughed, too, wiping away his tears on the sleeve of his grey shirt. Emma hugged him to her. ‘Don’t take on so, Frank luv. I meant no harm, yer silly duck nut. And don’t wipe yer nose on yer sleeve,’ she scolded gruffly as she stroked back his hair and kissed the top of his head with tenderness.
A feeling of friendliness and genuine family affection was miraculously restored. Emma sighed with relief and began her managerial bustling again. ‘We’ll all have ter look sharp and get a move on, or we’ll be late for work,’ she cried, catching sight of the clock on the mantel. It had just turned a quarter to five and her father and Winston had to leave at five o’clock to reach the brickyard by six, when they had to clock in. She felt the teapot under the cosy. The pot was still hot. ‘Come on, Frank, take this tea up ter our mam for me,’ she said, pouring tea into a mug and adding generous portions of milk and sugar. ‘And, Dad, mend the fire for me, will yer, please. Bank it up so that it lasts till me Aunt Lily comes in. And, Winston, wash the pots whilst I finish making yer jock. And, Dad, don’t forget the fireguard.’
She handed the mug of tea to Frank. ‘And ask me mam if she wants some bread and jam, and hurry up about it, me lad, there’s still a lot of chores ter be done afore I go ter the Hall.’ Frank took the tea carefully in both of his small hands and hurried across the room, his boots ringing hollowly on the brick floor as he headed for the staircase. Whistling under his breath, Winston gathered the dirty mugs and plates from the table and carried them over to the sink, whilst Jack turned to the fireplace and began stacking on the logs. Emma smiled to herself. Peace was restored. She moved to the set pot and began to wrap the sandwiches in the cotton serviettes her mother had so carefully hemmed, dampening them first so that the sandwiches would stay fresh.
Jack devoted his attention to the fire, interspersing the logs with treasured pieces of coal and then heaping on coal dust so that the fire would last until his sister Lily came in to tend to Elizabeth later in the morning. As he swung his great body around to reach for the fireguard he glanced surreptitiously at Winston, who was mechanically washing the pots at the kitchen sink. He regretted his outburst of anger earlier. There was no deep-rooted hatred between them, only this irritation that was increasingly difficult to repress in them both. He did not even blame the boy for wanting to leave Fairley; nevertheless, he could not permit him to go. Dr Malcolm had said nothing specific about Elizabeth’s health, but Jack did not require a medical opinion to confirm what he already suspected. She was dying. Winston’s departure at this time would be the last nail in her coffin. He was her favourite child. She loved all of her children, but Winston was special, being the eldest and so like her in looks. Jack dare not let him leave and yet he could not tell the boy his reasons. ‘And he always picks the wrong time ter discuss it,’ Jack muttered to himself as he put the fireguard around the grate. He rested for a moment against the guard, staring into the fire, blinded by searing grief and overwhelming despair. It was grief for Elizabeth, who had been so brutalized by life, despair for his young children, who would be motherless before the last of the snows melted into spring.
He felt a light touch on his arm and he knew it was Emma. He swallowed hard, his throat constricted. He coughed hoarsely and straightened himself to his full height, attempting a smile. ‘Yes, luv, what is it?’
‘Yer’ll be late, Dad. Yer best go and see me mam now, afore yer leave.’
‘Aye, lass. I’ll just wash this coal dust off me hands.’ Jack moved to the sink, where Winston was drying the pots. ‘Go up and see thee mam, lad, and I’ll be up in a minute. Thee knows how upset she gets if we don’t all see her afore we leaves.’ Winston nodded, wiped the last of the mugs quickly, and left the kitchen, still nervously whistling between his teeth.
Jack looked over at Emma, who was standing at the set pot, the tea caddy in her hands. She was measuring out their mashings of tea and sugar into small pieces of paper, screwing the ends together securely so nothing would be spilled. ‘Thee’ll be catching thee death in that nightgown, Emma, and there’s no warmth in that shawl. Thee best get dressed lass, now everything’s in order down here.’
‘Yes, I will, Dad. I’ve finished putting up yer mashings,’ she said with a sunny smile that illuminated
her serious face with sudden radiance. Her eyes, so unusually deep and vividly green, were bright and shining, and Jack knew that her affection for him was intact. She ran across the kitchen to her father. He was smiling down at her. Emma stood on tiptoe and, putting her thin arms around his neck, she pulled his face down to hers. She kissed his cheek and said, ‘I’ll see yer next Saturday, Dad.’ Jack held her for a brief moment longer, his sinewy arms tightening around her protectively as a surge of tenderness swept through him. ‘Aye, luv, and take care of theeself up yonder at the Hall,’ he mumbled in a tight voice. She was gone before he could catch his breath, slipping out of his arms and streaking across the room like a flash of lightning, and Jack was alone in the kitchen.
He sighed and reached for his coat on the peg behind the door. He felt around in the pockets for the small leather straps he fastened around his corduroy trousers to prevent the dust from the bricks rising up his legs. He sat down at the table and buckled them on, wondering as he did whether he should tell Elizabeth he had given in his notice at the brickyard. He frowned, his large hands expertly tightening the straps until he had just the right pressure. It had been a hard decision for Jack to make, since jobs were scarce and so many men were out of work, and also he liked working in the fresh air, even though slinging wet clay up on to a gantry for ten hours a day was killing work for any man. He did not object to the hard work, he did object to the pay it brought him and he had said so to Stan, the gaffer, last Friday. ‘Eighteen shillings and tenpence is nowt much ter take home at the end of the week, Stan. And me a married man with three kids. I’m not blaming me kids on anybody but meself, mind thee, but bloody old man Fairley’s paying starvation wages. That he is, Stan, and thee knows it,’ he had said with a quiet vehemence.
A Woman of Substance Page 11