Durham Trilogy 02. The Darkening Skies

by Janet MacLeod Trotter

  ‘Come, let’s eat,’ she encouraged a subdued Sara, who was still feeling responsible for failing to find them shelter for the night.

  Around them birds sang in the hedgerows and a musky smell of wild roses permeated the still evening. Sara was reassured by the peacefulness of the countryside and the uninterested munching of the grazing sheep. She watched her mother-in-law sitting gracefully on the rough ground, peeling an apple with a small knife, a few stray wisps of hair the only sign of their exhausting day and marvelled at her calm acceptance of their situation.

  ‘Do you ever feel frightened like I did back there?’ Sara blurted out.

  Anna looked up and regarded her with dark eyes like Joe’s. ‘Sometimes, of course.’

  ‘You never show it,’ Sara said with admiration. ‘You just seem to take what comes to you - like when the shop was smashed up and your husband taken away - now this, sleeping in a field like a vagrant. I wouldn’t have thought…’

  Anna gave a slow smile. ‘I’ve slept in fields before. My father was a shepherd.’

  ‘Just like my dad!’ Sara exclaimed. ‘I’ve never thought of you as a country person,’ Sara said, tilting her head to one side, finding it hard to imagine Anna Dimarco doing anything outside her shop. The older woman seemed to read her mind.

  ‘We haven’t always had the business,’ she explained. ‘We were very poor people in Italy. Arturo and Davide walked halfway across Europe to find work before they came to Durham. They had nothing. It has never been an easy life like some people think - they see our shop and our van - but we worked night and day to have our own business, to have something to pass on to our children -’

  Anna broke off, her eyes smarting at the memory that Paolo, who had been groomed to inherit the shop, was dead.

  ‘Do you ever wish you had never come to England?’ Sara dared to ask.

  Anna struggled for a moment to compose herself. ‘There have been times in the last year when I have thought such a thing. And sometimes I think it would have been wiser to have gone back with Domenica and Nonna Maria.’ Anna shrugged. ‘But it is useless to wish. God leads us where he will and we must accept the lives we are given.’

  ‘I’m glad you and Mr Dimarco came to Whitton Grange,’ Sara said quietly, ‘else I would never have met Joe.’ Anna did not answer. A sheep bleated nearby.

  ‘We should try and sleep,’ Anna said, shaking crumbs from her skirt.

  Impulsively Sara reached out and touched her arm. ‘One day, Mrs Dimarco, I’ll take you up to my family’s farm. It’ll make you feel at home, you being a country lass.’

  Anna was startled by the sudden gesture, once again taken aback by the girl’s warmth towards her. Fleetingly, she covered Sara’s hand with her own.

  ‘I’d like that. One day we go. Now we sleep.’

  They lay back-to-back for warmth as the sun dipped and the stars appeared in a heliotrope sky, each grateful for the companionship of the other.

  The following day they walked back to the railway station and continued their journey. Two days later they were on the Isle of Man, at Ramsey camp where Arturo was held. The camp was a terraced row of former boarding houses, now shabby from neglect and surrounded by barbed-wire fences. Washing hung limply from open windows and bored men peered with interest at the visitors, waving through the perimeter fence. The women’s first reaction was one of relief to see that conditions were not too squalid.

  But when they were allowed to see Arturo under the eye of a guard, Sara was shocked by his lacklustre appearance. Joe’s father had lost weight, his face was sagging and haggard like an old man’s and his dark hair had turned quite grey. She looked for a sign of his old ebullience, but his attempts to be cheerful were shadowed with fatigue and Sara found herself quite tongue-tied.

  ‘We’ve brought you some homemade sausage,’ Anna fumbled with her parcel. ‘And a bottle of rhubarb wine. It’s not as good as your own, but it’s drinkable. Benito had some.’

  ‘Ah, Benito,’ Arturo said, latching on to the name. ‘He’s left us. Davide is sad - and his health is bad.’ He lapsed into thought.

  Anna tried again to kindle his interest with talk of the family. ‘Linda is becoming a little chatterbox and Mary is sweet-natured like Rosa - she’s taken her first steps.’

  ‘Rosa.’ Arturo’s sad eyes sparked. ‘Why has Rosa not come?’

  ‘She has Mary to look after,’ Anna explained patiently, as if to a child. ‘Sara offered to travel with me.’ The women exchanged looks and Anna steeled herself to add, ‘She’s one of the family now.’

  Arturo looked at them both blankly and Sara wondered if the news of her marriage to Joe would prove too much of a shock to the disheartened Arturo. No one had written to tell him of the marriage, Anna insisting that it would be better to tell her husband in person.

  Sara cleared her throat. ‘Joe and I got married,’ she told him, her heart beating nervously, ‘when he was on leave at Christmas.’

  ‘Joseph - and you?’ Arturo queried, finding it hard to grasp this latest piece of news. His life had been so turned upside down that nothing seemed to make sense anymore. He no longer had control over anything that happened and he was overwhelmed by his impotence. It was Anna who held the family together and it was little Bobby who was the breadwinner. He had not been able to prevent Paolo from dying or Domenica from returning to Italy or Rosa from bearing an illegitimate baby - and now Joseph had defied him in his absence and married this Durham girl.

  Arturo gave a sigh of frustration and to the consternation of them all, began to weep.

  ‘Please, Arturo,’ Anna gasped, as the guard looked on with derision.

  ‘Forgive me,’ he sobbed. ‘I am not worthy of the name Dimarco.’

  Anna was dismayed at the broken man before her. She had come to beg him to renounce his nationality and return home to look after them, but the feeble man before her was not the brave and considerate husband who had fought in the Great War and battled to give his family a good home against all the odds. A part of her despised him for his show of weakness and yet she wanted to fling her arms around him and protect him from any more trouble. Whatever happened, Arturo Dimarco was her husband whom she loved and now it was her turn to take care of him.

  ‘Come home, Arturo,’ she begged softly, clasping his hands in hers. ‘We need you with us. Your first duty is to us, not the men here.’

  ‘But Davide…’ Arturo sniffed, trying to pull himself together.

  ‘Make your own decision,’ Anna challenged. ‘You don’t have to do everything that your brother says.’

  Arturo’s head drooped at the thought of what she was asking him to do, to deny his Italianata. But was his pride more important than his own family? he asked himself.

  ‘The girls and the children,’ Anna persisted, ‘they wait for you. Do you want me to go home and tell them you would rather sit here in this dump than help them? They have no shoes to wear, we go hungry half the week, children spit at us when they walk past.’

  Arturo was jolted out of his indecision by her words. ‘Anna, I’m sorry,’ he squeezed her hands. ‘I will do what you want,’ he forced out the words.

  The women left with spirits raised at the success of their visit, yet Sara could tell her mother-in-law was shaken by the state in which they had found Arturo.

  ‘He will recover once he is home again,’ Anna said with fortitude and they spoke no more about it. And although Arturo had been so obviously upset about her marriage to Joe, Sara took heart from Anna’s words that she was now part of the family.

  When they arrived back at Whitton Grange, Bobby came speeding down Pit Street on a bicycle to greet them. Their news of the trip was cut short by Bobby’s cry. ‘You’ve missed him, he went this morning!’

  ‘Who went?’ Anna asked as the boy dismounted and took his mother’s small bag.

  ‘Joe,’ Bobby said, glancing shyly at Sara under his thick black lashes.

  ‘He’s gone?’ Sara cried in dismay.


  ‘Aye,’ Bobby nodded. ‘Came the day after you left, but he couldn’t stay any longer. He’s going abroad.’

  ‘Where?’ Sara asked, feeling sick as they approached the shop.

  ‘He didn’t know. But somewhere hot, I reckon, ‘cos he’s got a special cotton uniform,’ Bobby announced, feeling knowledgeable.

  Rosa rushed down the stairs having spotted them at the window and gave Sara a hug.

  ‘Joe left a letter for you,’ she told her disappointed friend. ‘He was that upset at missing you.’

  Sara took the letter and hurried off to read it alone. She sat on a charred tree stump in the dene, close to where the German bomb had dropped and set fire to the budding trees in April.

  Joe’s letter was short and cheerful and intimate. He was sick at missing her and teased her that she would go anywhere to have a few days off work. He told her he loved her and missed her like hell and he’d make it up with a month in bed when he next came home.

  Sara smiled and kissed the letter. Dragging herself up, she turned for Pit Street, realising, as she did so, that she thought of it as home for the first time.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Arturo came home in the late summer, when the leaves were beginning to tinge with yellow and fade. He was sent to work in a munitions factory outside Durham and was away for long hours, cycling to work on Paolo’s old bicycle.

  ‘They’ve taken my driving licence off me,’ he complained to Anna.

  ‘Well, we have no petrol for the van anyway,’ she answered briskly. ‘We’ve been using Gelato for the past year.’

  But they talked little of the past; it only fed Arturo’s moroseness to think how they had suffered in his absence. To Anna’s relief, her husband’s health improved and it was a leaner and fitter Arturo who cycled fifteen miles every day to and from the factory and, when the winter set in, was sometimes seen riding the icy roads on Gelato. Yet at home he remained subdued, preferring to sit in the corner brooding behind a veil of cigarette smoke, rather than join in the family chatter.

  He seemed happiest when Rosa sat at his feet and played with Mary, who was turning into an enchanting child with light brown hair and eyes like her father Emilio’s and an infectious giggle that brought a smile to Arturo’s weathered face. Anna saw how Elvira and Albina’s presence in the cramped flat irritated her husband and served to remind him of his brother Davide still interned with the other Italians.

  But as Davide remained a prisoner, the women had nowhere else to go and Anna did her best to try and smooth over the petty arguments and aggravations that arose during the winter months which saw them all hemmed in by the blackout for long evenings.

  She set Albina to unravelling old jumpers to re-knit into outfits for the children, while Sylvia and Sara played endless games of Ludo with Peter. It was Sara, however, who saved Anna from insanity that winter by teaching her to read. The tuition started accidentally when a letter arrived from Joe.

  ‘What does he say?’ Anna asked Sara eagerly.

  Sara skimmed over the more intimate messages and read, ‘The weather’s canny during the day, but it gets parky at night. Don’t know how the locals can stand it, just dressed in long nighties. At night all the stars come out, much clearer than at home with all the smoke from the houses. The only other lights are from our cigarette ends, all glowing in the dark. There’s nowt else to do out here. I wish I was at home with you…’ Sara broke off and blushed.

  Anna humphed over her mending. ‘If he has nothing to do, why doesn’t he write letters to me too, eh?’

  Albina laughed disparagingly, ‘Because you can’t read like we can, Aunt Anna.’

  Sara saw her mother-in-law flush with embarrassment. ‘I -I never had the opportunity like you girls - and I manage well enough.’

  ‘I could teach you, Mrs Dimarco,’ Sara suggested tentatively. ‘Then you could surprise Joe and write him a letter.’

  Anna was flustered by the idea. ‘No! I’m too old to learn. You can write for me.’

  ‘I think it would be grand if you learned a bit of reading and writing,’ Rosa piped up. ‘Think how pleased Joe would be to get a letter from you, Mam.’

  At first Anna had refused and the subject was dropped, but one evening, when all but she and Arturo had gone to bed and Sara came in late from visiting the Ritsons, Anna approached her with a recipe.

  ‘What does this say?’ she asked, avoiding Sara’s eyes. ‘Rosa cut it out from an old newspaper.’

  Sara took the scrap of paper without showing her surprise. ‘It’s a recipe for using up stale bread. And there’s another one here for carrot jam. Sounds disgusting.’

  Arturo grunted in agreement, but Anna persisted. ‘Which word says carrot?’ Sara pointed it out. ‘And that says bread?’ Anna asked.

  ‘Aye,’ Sara nodded. ‘How did you know?’

  ‘I’ve seen it written in shop windows,’ Anna replied defensively. ‘I can read some words. I’m not the village fool.’

  ‘You’re anything but a fool, Mrs Dimarco,’ Sara agreed. ‘I don’t think it would take you long to learn to read all of this,’ she waved the cutting. ‘It’s just you’ve always worked so hard, you’ve never had time for reading and writing.’

  Anna appeared pleased at her words of encouragement. ‘And when would I have time now?’ she said, only half resisting.

  Arturo spoke unexpectedly. ‘Sara could teach you in the evenings - Albina can do your sewing, seeing as she has the brains for two.’

  The women laughed at his sudden flash of humour and Anna looked at him with fondness for his support.

  ‘Bene,’ Anna smiled. ‘Tomorrow I go to school, yes?’

  With the spring weather of 1942, unrest sprouted at the Eleanor pit over low wages and bad morale. News abroad was grim, with India threatened and U-boat attacks on merchant ships in the Atlantic slowly strangling the life-blood of supplies. Annual holidays for the pitmen were suspended once more and at Easter the government appealed for people to stay at home.

  ‘As if we ever go anywhere at Easter!’ Sam Ritson was scornful. ‘It’s not holidays that are causing loss of production - it’s lack of fit men. We’ve got old men working down there, ‘cos none of the young ‘uns want to work for a pittance. And the conditions!’ he complained to Louie and Sara as they sat working over a hooky mat. ‘We’ve had more accidents this year already than for the whole of last year. There was another fall of ground on the flat this morning and it’s a miracle no one was hurt.’

  ‘Aye, even the lasses at the munitions factory are getting more than lads at the face,’ Raymond said, adding his discontent. He had returned reluctantly to the pit that winter, not relishing the thought of being underground for long hours once more. But Dolly Sergeant had ‘sent him home with a flea in his ear’, as Louie had put it. Raymond would not tell them why he had been sacked, but he suspected Sara had guessed the martinet Mrs Sergeant had found him carrying on with Nancy Bell in the storeroom. She had teased him about Nancy on several occasions, but he did not tell her that Nancy was keener on him than he was on her. Louie, however, had appeared strangely relieved that he was no longer working at Sergeant’s and to his surprise did not protest at him taking a putter’s job underground.

  ‘Even Seward-Scott agrees with us that the price of Durham coal should be raised to give us better wages,’ Sam continued. ‘Now there’s a turn-up for the books.’

  ‘And if the government doesn’t agree?’ Louie asked, prodding a scrap of material in to the hessian stretched on the frame.

  ‘We’ll withdraw our labour,’ Sam said firmly.

  Sara saw Louie’s face sag with worry and decided to argue.

  ‘It doesn’t seem right to strike when our lads are out in the desert fighting for us and our ships are being sunk every week - and people in this street are saving every spare penny to buy a Bren gun.’

  ‘That’s the excuse the government makes to keep our wages low,’ Sam said sharply. ‘But it’s just short-sighted. Us pitmen don
’t do a glamorous job like the lads in fancy uniforms, but we’re just as important when it comes to winning this war.’

  ‘Joe and Tom didn’t join the army just to wear fancy uniforms!’ Sara sparked.

  Sam saw he had upset the girl and lowered his voice. ‘Listen, pet, I’m sorry. Joe and your brother are doing a grand job. All I’m saying is that we’re trying to do our bit, too, but our efforts are wasted if they won’t spend money on improving the conditions underground and if we can’t earn enough money to buy the extra rations we need to keep us strong. It’s bloody hard work digging for coal, believe me.’

  ‘What you need is a pit canteen,’ Louie suggested calmly. ‘Some lads have to walk miles in wet clothes before they get home for something to eat. It’s no wonder they’re done in. An extra meal in their stomachs would make all the difference.’

  ‘Seward-Scott would never agree to it,’ Sam was sceptical.

  ‘He will if he thinks it’s in his own interests to keep his workforce fed,’ Louie countered.

  Sam fell into thought as Raymond bolted down his cheese pie and grabbed his cap. He was smelling of hair oil and his face was well scrubbed and mischievous. At seventeen, Louie’s nephew was a handsome sight, taller than Sam, his thick auburn hair short-cropped and his chin darkening with a man’s bristle.

  ‘Where you off to?’ Louie demanded.

  ‘Pictures,’ Raymond said lightly.

  ‘She must be special for you to miss football practice,’ Sara teased.

  ‘I remember when you were never out of The Palace,’ he joked back, sliding her a look with impish blue eyes. Sara laughed, but Louie looked anxious.

  ‘Who are you going with?’

  ‘The Queen of Sheba,’ Raymond laughed and left.

  ‘I thought he would have come and watched the Home Guard play tonight,’ Sam said aggrieved. ‘It’s our charity match for Warship Week.’

  Sara could not hide her amusement. ‘It must be love.’

  ‘He’s seeing that Nancy Bell, I’m sure of it.’ Louie’s face was set with worry. ‘How else would he know what the lasses at the factory are getting paid? Nancy’s working there now, Minnie said. You’ll have to speak to him, Sam.’