Durham Trilogy 02. The Darkening Skies

by Janet MacLeod Trotter

  She felt a flood of different emotions at the strange sights and sounds of this bustling town; fear at being so far from home and the people she loved, apprehension at the thought of working for Dolly Sergeant, curiosity at the world beckoning outside, a twinge of excitement that she was sixteen, in a new place where anything could happen, even romance.

  Then someone, unseen, went by whistling. It was an ordinary whistle of a popular song, but it tore off the protective layer in which she had bound her grief for her dead father. He had been a whistler of songs and of secret messages to his dog Cath and the familiar sound pulled unmercifully at her heart. Sinking on to the unsteady bed, Sara buried her face in her hands and wept.

  Chapter Five

  It was stiflingly hot. Sara lay on top of the rickety bed in her nightgown. Marina, who was snoring loudly in the high bed, had not wanted the window open and Aunt Ida had asked Sara to keep it shut in case the young girl caught a chill. But Sara had drawn back one of the curtains and a street lamp cast light into the room so she could see to write her diary. It was the first time she had scribbled in it since her father’s death and she found the familiarity of confiding in it a comfort.

  It was so noisy here, Sara wrote to herself. People were still shouting and singing to each other along the back lanes, setting off a chorus of barking from Colin’s whippets and other dogs around. She could hear two cats screaming and spitting in a fight on a neighbouring roof and always there was the monotonous hum of the pit. And Marina snoring … Sara sighed in annoyance. She had not known it was possible for a seven-year-old to snore like an old engine and she would have to endure it for months.

  She longed for the comforting sound of Chrissie’s even breathing in the bed next to hers, but tonight her sister would be sharing a bed with her mother in Bill’s tiny cottage.

  A motorcycle roared past and Sara craned for a better view. Marina stirred and her breathing altered. In the lamplight, Sara could see two boys on the back of the bike laughing as they skidded over the rough lane. The portly, aproned proprietor with the large moustaches at the ice-cream shop came out and shouted at them. There were lights still on inside the cafe though the clock on the landing had just struck eleven. Who was still buying ice-cream at this late hour? Sara wondered in fascination.

  ‘What are you doing?’ a small voice accused from the bed above. Marina was awake.

  ‘Nothing,’ Sara whispered, thrusting her diary under the covers, ‘I just can’t sleep.’

  ‘You woke me!’ Marina’s voice was petulant.

  ‘I didn’t,’ Sara protested. ‘It must have been that motorcycle.’

  ‘I don’t like sharing a room with you,’ the young girl complained. ‘I wish you hadn’t come.’

  Silently, Sara wished the same. ‘Go back to sleep,’ she coaxed, trying to keep the hurt out of her voice.

  In the distance she could hear the soft whistling of a train. Was it going back to Weardale? she thought with yearning. How I miss Mam! At that moment, Sara would have given anything for her mother to be there or her to be home. What was she doing here? she thought bleakly.

  It was hot and noisy and impossible to sleep, and the Cummingses didn’t want her, except, possibly, Aunt Ida. Money, came the dull answer in her head; that’s why I’m here, to earn my keep.

  The motorcycle revved again, somewhere further away in the dark.

  ‘I can’t sleep now,’ Marina fretted, ‘and it’s all your fault.’

  Sara pulled a face in the dark. ‘Would you like me to sing you to sleep?’ she asked, willing herself to be patient.

  ‘No!’

  ‘Suit yourself.’ Sara drew the curtain and lay down under the sheet once more.

  After a minute of silence. ‘What can you sing?’ a muffled voice came from under the pink quilt.

  ‘Bobby Shafto,’ Sara suggested.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Blaydon Races?’

  ‘No. Something modern.’

  Sara searched her tired brain. ‘Teddy Bears’ Picnic? Chrissie loves me singing that -I know all the words.’

  ‘Yes,’ Marina agreed. ‘Sing that one.’

  So Sara did. When she got to the end, her cousin requested it again. Then Sara sang Bobby Shafto because her mother had often sung it to her and it drew her closer to home. There was no protest from the pink bed and for the next quarter of an hour,’ Sara sang softly to herself, the popular love songs she had heard on the gramophone. She thought of herself and Tom dancing to them when he was on leave only weeks ago, though it seemed in another age. And Sid, kind and bashful Sid, did he think of her at that moment? No, Sara thought ruefully, he would be sleeping soundly after a day’s hard labouring she was sure. She felt a fault twist of regret that she had turned her back on the gentle farmer’s son. Faced with months of living with the strange Cummingses, the idea of being married to Sid suddenly had greater appeal.

  Don’t be daft! she chided herself. She was going to work in a shop where she would meet people and she consoled herself with the thought.

  Marina’s breathing was regular once more. Sara lay longing for sleep, listening to the hours on the landing clock chime their way into early Sunday morning.

  ‘Mam says you’re to keep my room tidy,’ Marina declared, tossing a pair of white ankle socks on to the floor as they made ready for church. ‘And Daddy says if you make a nuisance of yourself he’ll send you home.’ Sara grimaced in the frameless wall mirror as she pulled a brush through her long fair hair. She noticed her green eyes were dark-ringed and puffy from crying. She had lain awake for hours after it had grown too dark to write her diary, feeling quite alone and miserable.

  Binding the front strands of hair behind her head and biting back a sarcastic reply, she said, ‘Do you want a hand with your plaits? I’m used to tying up Chrissie’s hair.’

  Turning round she saw Marina considering her with hard blue eyes.

  ‘Yes, you can help me,’ she answered, holding up the yellow satin ribbons. Sara took them and began to plait the girl’s thick brown hair into pigtails. ‘Make sure the parting’s straight at the back.’

  ‘Does Colin go with you to church?’ Sara asked, trying to be friendly. It had been decreed last night that Sara would accompany Aunt Ida and Marina to the Eucharist at St Cuthbert’s.

  ‘That’s if you want to be religious,’ her Uncle Alfred had said in a disparaging tone. The fact that Sara might like to attend the chapel as she was used to doing was never considered.

  Marina giggled at the idea of Colin in church. ‘Mam doesn’t like him with her, not since he broke a cup and saucer at the parish sale-of-work. He’s too embarrassing and he wouldn’t want to come anyway.’

  ‘So what does he do Sundays?’ Sara asked, feeling sympathetic towards her hapless cousin.

  ‘Sleeps, then takes Flash and Gypsy for a walk,’ Marina answered. ‘He’s not bothered about anything but those dogs. I think they smell.’

  Sara bound the ribbon around the end of the first plait. ‘When did your dad stop going to chapel?’ Sara asked. Her mother used to talk about her and Uncle Alfred being chapel-goers and attending all the functions in their youth.

  ‘Daddy’s never been to chapel,’ Marina said dismissively. ‘Only the common pitmen go to chapel. Posh people go to St Cuthbert’s - or the officials’ club like Daddy. He’s a very important man.’

  Or thinks he is, Sara thought to herself.

  ‘Ow! Don’t pull my hair, stupid.’ Marina’s face creased in a cross expression. Sara apologised, biting back words of irritation. What Marina wanted, Marina got, as far as Sara could see, but there was no point in antagonising Uncle Alfred’s favourite. At breakfast Aunt Ida had attempted half-heartedly to tell her daughter off for kicking Colin under the table. Marina had blubbered that Colin had started it and Uncle Alfred had sent Colin out of the room and Ida had ended up saying sorry to Marina. No, dislike the girl as she did, Sara was resigned to placating her to keep the peace.

  Uncle Alfred was re
ading a Sunday paper in the parlour when they descended, a cup of tea on the table beside him. There was no sign of the banished Colin.

  ‘Give your dad a kiss,’ he ordered. Marina ran forward and presented her cheek. ‘Pretty as a picture,’ he beamed, approving Marina’s powder-blue dress with the yellow smocking. She wore a straw Sunday hat anchored around her small face with elastic.

  Ida bustled in. Despite the warm sunshine outside, she wore a sensible blue coat buttoned up to her thin neck, and a felt hat skewered on to her wiry brown hair with a huge, pearl-headed pin.

  ‘Ready, girls?’ She gave her anxious smile. Alfred stood and pecked her on the forehead with a proprietorial kiss. ‘There’s more tea in the pot, Father,’ Ida assured her husband.

  ‘Aye, now be off with you, or you’ll be late,’ he shooed them out of the door. Sara followed her aunt, feeling relief at the gust of blustery air that greeted them. It smelt of cinders, but it was fresh compared to indoors. The green was deserted save for a mangy horse grazing beside some makeshift football posts.

  They set off along South Parade, Ida nodding at a neighbour they passed on the way and Marina chattering about a skipping game.

  ‘Nancy Bell got up to twenty. Of course I could’ve done better, but I didn’t want to play.’

  ‘Didn’t you, pet?’ Ida enquired.

  ‘No, Nancy Bell’s common. She lives in Oswald Street and doesn’t have a proper bathroom, just an outside toilet,’ Marina sneered.

  ‘Didn’t you used to live in Oswald Street?’ Sara asked without guile, remembering the name.

  ‘Yes,’ Ida replied with a faint flush to her narrow cheeks, ‘but we moved soon after Marina was born - when your Uncle Alfred was made an overman.’

  ‘Well, Nancy Bell’s still common - her dad’s on the dole.’ Marina was stubborn.

  Ida did not correct her; instead she began a diatribe on the unemployed. ‘Yes, men like Bomber Bell think the government owe them a job, but you don’t get something for nothing. It’s Father’s hard work that’s got us a nice modern house with a bathroom. Hard work and sensible housekeeping. Standing around on street corners getting into trouble never got anyone a decent home. There are too many idle men in Whitton Grange who don’t know the meaning of hard work.’ Sara listened in astonishment to hear her aunt so forthright. ‘Father says half the men hanging around the labour exchange don’t really want to work- they’re just there for a bit of idle gossip. Like Colin, for instance. He’s been left school for three years and he’s never done a proper day’s work in his life!’

  ‘Could Uncle Alfred not get him a job at the pit?’ Sara tried to be helpful. The idea turned her aunt’s face magenta.

  ‘Well, he would have done, of course,’ she exclaimed, ‘but three years ago they weren’t taking on young boys at the pits. Colin wasn’t suited to the idea, any road - he wanted to go and work on a farm among dirty animals. Naturally, Father wouldn’t allow it - he wanted Colin to get a steady job and get on. But not our Colin, he’s as lazy as they come.’

  Sara thought the criticism of her cousin harsh; he could hardly be blamed for the lack of jobs in the town.

  ‘Farming’s just as important as working down a pit,’ she said. ‘And a lot less dirty, to go by the men who got on the bus yesterday.’

  Ida looked at her with bafflement in her close-set blue eyes, but chose to ignore the interruption to her moralising.

  ‘Of course, Father says if there’s war, they’ll all have to get off their haunches and do their bit for King and Country - aye, even communists like Bomber Bell and Sam Ritson.’

  ‘Don’t let’s talk of war,’ Sara begged and ended the conversation and Marina skipped ahead.

  Turning into the wide road Sara had seen yesterday from the bus, their steps echoed around the empty high street, its shops closed and shuttered and the cinema queues gone. A dog sidled past, sniffing at the drains and the breeze picked up a page of discarded newspaper and whipped it in a crazy dance down the road.

  They crossed over and walked along a side street, emerging on to the Durham Road bordering the dene. Metal-hard pavements gave way to an uneven track along the verge, glinting black with coal dust. The sound of voices came once again and Sara saw swathes of church-goers gathering on the steps of a cavernous gothic building of brash red bricks. Small girls in elaborate white dresses lent a festive air to the crowd. Ida called Marina to her side.

  ‘Catholics,’ Marina announced with disapproval, raising her pert nose in the air. Her mother took her hand and crossed over the road, avoiding contact. Sara hurried after them, puzzled.

  ‘Looks like something special,’ she suggested, curious at the throng of people.

  ‘First communion, I suspect,’ Ida mumbled.

  ‘We don’t mix with their son,’ Marina spoke loudly. ‘Daddy says they’re always drunk and gambling on a Sunday. And they don’t wash properly. There’s a Catholic in my class and she smells.’

  Sara wanted to laugh at such nonsense, but the nod of agreement from her aunt indicated that she shared such prejudice.

  Ida made another pronouncement, ‘Your Uncle Alfred doesn’t hold with Roman Catholics - they’ve been known to give him trouble at the pit. They’re not quite … respectable.’ She blushed at the word.

  Sara glanced back at the jovial parishioners, dressed in their Sunday best and wondered why they had been condemned out of hand by the censorious Cummingses when it was obviously quite respectable for her uncle to spend the morning drinking at the officials’ club. Farmers, unemployed, Catholics; was there anyone her relations approved of? she wondered with impatience.

  Aloud she said, ‘Well, our postman’s a Catholic and he’s as respectable as they come.’ No one answered as Ida quickened their pace towards the trees and an insistent peel of bells. Marina stuck out her tongue at Sara, without her mother noticing.

  ‘And he doesn’t smell,’ Sara added, with a glare at her cousin.

  A last row of cottages petered out and the squat tower of the old parish church emerged above a frill of pink cherry blossom and fresh green leaves. Frail petals were scattered along the path that led from the lych-gate to the church door. Over the clang of bells, Ida greeted fellow parishioners and filed into the cool church beside a large, elderly woman in a close-fitting hat.

  ‘Good morning, Mrs Cummings,’ she wheezed. ‘Good morning, Marina. How are we today?’

  ‘Good morning, Mrs Naylor.’ Marina smiled back sweetly at the lady, formidable in a green tweed coat that bound in her large bosom.

  ‘Mrs Naylor,’ Aunt Ida said nervously, ‘this is Alfred’s niece, Sara Pallister, who’s come to stay with us.’ She pushed Sara forward.

  ‘Oh! How do you do?’ Mrs Naylor held out a gloved hand, giving Sara an appraising look with brown eyes that sagged in her puffy face. ‘Will you be with us long, Sara?’

  ‘A few months, I think,’ Sara replied, trying not to wince from the crushing handshake she was receiving.

  ‘Mrs Naylor’s the under-manager’s wife.’ Ida’s voice was full of deference. Sara knew she was supposed to be impressed, but could think of nothing to say, so she just smiled.

  ‘Well, it’s nice to have another Cummings in the fold,’ Mrs Naylor nodded. ‘Such a good family. Your uncle’s a well-respected member of the community, I hope you know?’

  ‘Aye,’ Sara said without enthusiasm, resenting being called a Cummings. Mrs Naylor turned away with a regal wave and headed for the front of the nave. Ida let out a breath and bustled Sara into a pew halfway down on the left. Shivering in the gloom of the old building, Sara thought of the coldness of dead centuries emanating from the grey stones. The church was cluttered with memorial slabs and moth-eaten flags and the prone bodies of two ancient knights petrified on their tombstones. Yet there was beauty, too, in the splashes of vivid colour from the freshly arranged flowers and the gold-embroidered altar cloth. Huge candlesticks glinted in the light of their names, giving off a powerful smell of burning wax that
was at once familiar. With a stab, Sara realised it conjured up the smell of candles in her bedroom at home.

  The church filled up and the service began. It was all a mystery to Sara, as to when she should stand or sit, chant or remain silent. Everyone else seemed to know the incantations and responses that echoed around the lofty roof, the organ spurring them on to greater praise. Marina sniggered at Sara’s confused bobbing and by the end, Sara’s back and knees ached from all the kneeling. No one in her chapel at home ever kneeled.

  When Ida followed a stream of people up to the altar for communion, Marina nudged her and whispered, ‘That’s Sir Reginald.’ A tall, distinguished man with greying hair and trim moustache marched stiffly back down the aisle. He looked expressionless, like a lead soldier.

  ‘Who’s Sir Reginald?’ Sara asked under her breath.

  ‘Sir Reginald Seward-Scott.’ Marina’s look was impatient, as if Sara should know. ‘The coalowner. He’s the most important man in Whitton Grange. And that’s Lady Seward-Scott - isn’t she pretty?’

  Sara watched a thick-set woman with permed red hair rippling under a green slouch hat, striding behind her husband. She was expensively clad in a silk dress and short jacket, but Sara thought her unremarkable. They disappeared through an arched side door that led on to the gallery steps.

  ‘They live at The Grange,’ Marina whispered under cover of the shuffle of communicants. ‘It’s the poshest house I’ve ever seen. I’ve been in and had mince pies at Christmas with the Sunday School.’ She shook her pigtails with importance.

  ‘And Lady Seward-Scott let me ride one of her ponies at the summer fete last year. She spoke to me. I want to be like her when I grow up.’ Marina’s face shone with admiration.

  A woman behind them prodded Marina in the back and told her to be quiet. Marina glared at the interruption, but ceased her gossiping.