For a Mother's Sins

by Diane Allen

  ‘I’ll be back in a minute,’ Molly cut in. ‘There’s something I must do.’ She broke away from them, almost running in her haste to get to the first-class carriages.

  ‘Hey, you!’ Molly shouted at the top of her voice, causing the bowler-hatted businessman and Mr Ashwell to turn in astonishment. ‘Yes, you – the toff from Leeds.’

  ‘Mrs Mason! Stop this right now. This isn’t the time or the place to deal with any problems you may have.’ Mr Ashwell turned away, keen to usher the visiting dignitary away from any unpleasantness. ‘Come and see me in my hut later, if you must, but this is our director and he hasn’t the time—’

  ‘Don’t you turn your backs on me! I’ve sat up all night with a dying lass. Now she’s dead and there’s nowhere to bury her. I haven’t a problem, but he has – ’ Molly poked her finger at the speechless director. ‘If he doesn’t come up with the money to extend that churchyard, I’ll see that not another length of track or another brick on that dammed viaduct gets laid.’

  Hands on her hips, Molly stood her ground, staring defiantly. Behind her, there were murmurs from the onlookers. Though none of them were prepared to be as openly defiant as Molly, it was obvious the navvies and their families shared her opinion.

  ‘Well, what are you going to do?’ Molly demanded.

  ‘Mrs Mason, please . . .’

  James Ashwell was interrupted by the director: ‘My good lady, I have in my pocket a banker’s draft made out to the vicar. It was my intention to present it later today, on behalf of the Midland Railway.’ From underneath the brim of his bowler hat, beady eyes peered at the forthright woman standing before him, and the surly-faced navvies gathered behind her.

  The news came as a complete surprise to James Ashwell, who had lodged a number of appeals with the Board of Directors to no avail, but he knew better than to show it: ‘I’m sure these strong and faithful workers will get to work immediately, clearing a new burial ground,’ he declared, gesturing with his walking stick at the crowd of navvies. ‘Is that not right, my good men?’

  The navvies conferred amongst themselves for a moment, then a spokesman shouted, ‘Aye, that’s right, Florrie will get her graveyard.’ This was followed by a rumble of agreement.

  ‘You see, madam?’ said the director. ‘The matter is in hand. Now, if you will just leave us to conclude arrangements with the vicar, the graveyard will be extended and blessed by next week, in time for your funeral – my condolences to the young woman’s family, by the way.’

  Considering Molly dismissed, the director was already walking in the direction of the contractor’s hut when her voice rang out again.

  ‘So I have your word on it, sir?’ she shouted after him.

  Without turning, the director raised his stick in acknowledgement. To his relief, the crowd had begun to disperse. For a while there it had looked as though he’d have an uprising on his hands if he didn’t concede to her demands. As soon as they were out of earshot of the navvies, he instructed James Ashwell to find out how much the vicar needed and obtain a banker’s draft forthwith.

  It was all James Ashwell could do not to smile. Lizzie’s mother might have a caustic tongue on her, but she’d succeeded where he had failed, shaming the railway into paying for the extension. Now he knew where young Lizzie got her brains.

  ‘Mam, you didn’t half show me up! And why didn’t you tell me that Florrie had died? Everyone’s seen me crying now.’ Lizzie blew her nose, trying to compose herself.

  ‘I hadn’t time, love. I didn’t want that fat bugger getting away before I’d made him hand over the money so’s we can all rest in peace when our time comes.’ Molly pulled Lizzie close, wrapping an arm around her as they set off down the track. ‘Bloody liar – he’d no intention of paying up. Well, he’s got no choice now.’

  John walked quietly behind them, watching as navvies approached Molly, patting her on the shoulder to show their gratitude. When they came to the junction, she asked Lizzie, ‘You all right, pet? Are you away to your job now? Have you both eaten?’

  ‘Yes, and yes. That is, assuming I’ve a job to go to. I’m not sure Mr Ashwell will have me back after this morning.’ Lizzie bowed her head.

  ‘Go on with you! He’d not sack you – he wouldn’t dare.’ Molly pulled Lizzie’s chin up and kissed her on both cheeks. ‘We’ll talk tonight.’ And then she gently patted her on her bum and sent her on her way.

  When the two of them were alone, Molly turned to John, who’d been standing silently waiting for her.

  ‘Are you all right, Moll? I take it it’s been a bad night?’

  ‘Aye, it’s not been the best. Spending hours sat amongst the dead and dying doesn’t do anything for your peace of mind. Thanks for looking after Lizzie. And, John, I’m sorry I snapped last night. I knew it was going to be a bad at the hospital, and your news of moving just put the cap on it.’ Molly had regretted her mood swing ever since she’d slammed the hut door the previous night. That was no way to treat the man you loved. ‘Come to supper tonight. You’ll need company ahead of your father’s funeral tomorrow.’

  ‘Aye, go on then. I’m nosy to hear the outcome of the graveyard saga and no doubt Lizzie will be full of it. Besides, happen I can brighten her night up a bit. She’ll be broken-hearted that she’s lost her best mate.’

  ‘Right, I’ll see you tonight, then.’ Molly adjusted her shawl and took a deep breath, trying to keep the weariness at bay while she carried out the task that lay ahead of her. ‘I’m off to the Welcome Inn to break the news to Helen Parker. God help her, she’s not only lost her daughter but her first grandchild. What am I going to say to her?’ Molly shook her head.

  ‘I don’t know, lass, but you’ll do it. She wouldn’t want to hear it from anyone else.’

  Molly looked on as Helen Parker sobbed into her mucky hankie. She’d arrived to find her with a fresh bruise on her chin, a split lip, and her two youngest clutching at her skirts, looking lost in their filthy rags. Although a good few years younger than Molly, the constant beatings she’d endured had aged Helen. Here she was, running a thriving business, and yet her clothes were shabby and unkempt. The whole time she was talking to Molly, there was a haunted look in her eyes and she seemed constantly on edge, casting glances at the door in case Henry should appear.

  ‘She was a good girl, our Florrie. I’ll be lost without her, she was a good hand, helped me keep this place going. What am I going to do now? How am I going to tell the little ’uns that their big sister won’t be coming back?’ Helen clutched at her lank hair, gazing wretchedly at the toddlers playing with the cat on the sawdust on the floor of the inn.

  ‘Helen, I’m sorry, there’s no easy way to say this . . . did you know she was with child? The baby died along with her, but I’d say she looked to be about seven month gone.’ Molly’s own eyes filled with tears as she watched Helen Parker fighting for breath between the great ragged sobs that shook her body.

  ‘No! That’s not possible. She couldn’t – our Florrie was a good girl. She’d not let a fella touch her. It wouldn’t be her fault, she must have been taken advantage of.’

  Beside herself with grief, Helen frantically cast her mind back over the last few months. At the time, she’d thought nothing of it – too busy with the younger children and the inn and fending off her bullying husband – but there had been changes in Florrie. She’d become moody and quiet, withdrawing from her mother. Helen had put it down to her age. What kind of mother was she, not to notice her own daughter in that condition?

  ‘I’m afraid there’s no doubt about it, love,’ said Molly. ‘She’d been hiding her belly under her skirts.’ Unable to think of anything else to say, Molly rose from her seat. ‘Helen, I’ll leave you now. If there’s anything I can do, let me know. I’ll be back at the hospital after dinnertime, and I’ll take you to see her in the mortuary, if that’s what you want.’

  Giving the heartbroken mother a final hug, Molly walked out of the inn. What a state to be in. Molly shook her h
ead; she’d have been up and gone long since if it was her. No man would ever treat her that way. Then she stopped herself, remembering how in the aftermath of Tommy’s death she’d allowed Cloggie into her bed. Who was she to judge? If she hadn’t come to her senses, she could easily have wound up in as sorry a state as Helen.

  Wrapping her shawl tight around her, she stepped out into the harsh daylight. Time to get home and snatch a few hours’ sleep before returning to the hospital. All around her, the dale echoed to the sound of work in progress. From high up on the moor came the booming of the blasts as they continued work on the tunnel, from the viaduct and the embankments came the sound of hammers striking stone, horses pulling wagons, visiting traders from Ingleton and Hawes yelling out their wares to the shanty dwellers. One of the traders pulled up on the bridge beside her. She almost waved him on, but then decided to buy some bacon for supper.

  As the red-faced trader took her money and handed over the parcel of bacon, Molly reminded herself that, hard as it was getting by on her own, she had proved that she could get by, relying on no one. Perhaps that was the best way to be.

  Long after Molly had gone, Helen Parker remained sitting on the bench, her mind in turmoil as her two youngest played unheeded around her feet. She’d cried until she felt completely drained, until it seemed there were no tears left in her. When the doctor had carried Florrie from the inn, part of her had known that she would never come back. It was obvious the girl was deathly ill. Helen thought she’d steeled herself for bad news. But this was worse than she could have imagined. To be told that her fourteen-year-old daughter was expecting, and the baby had died with her . . . That was too much to take.

  The inn was full of fellas who liked to flirt, but none of them would have dared touch Florrie. Oh, they teased her, all right, same way they teased all the young lasses. But that’s as far as they’d go. No, the father wasn’t one of the navvies. The bastard who’d done that to Florrie was right there under her roof.

  Now Helen understood why she’d not been bothered since the birth of her last one. She’d been so relieved to find his side of the bed empty, she’d not given a thought to where he was. Until it was too late.

  That was why Florrie had withdrawn into herself. That was why she’d not confided in her mother. The bastard! To do that to his own daughter! Well, he’d not do it again. Henry Parker could hit her all he wanted, but never again would he lay a finger on her children. That she’d make certain of.

  ‘So, your mam did it – she made him put his hand in his pocket?’ John shovelled in his supper while grinning at Lizzie’s tale of the director’s visit. ‘Good lass, Moll!’ He raised his fork in acknowledgement of Molly’s triumph. He was enjoying every mouthful, he’d barely eaten since his father had died and hadn’t realized until now just how hungry he had been.

  ‘Aye, I thought it was too good to be true this morning, all that talk about a banker’s draft in his pocket. But it’s done now – the vicar’s got his money and the graveyard’s to be extended.’ Molly put another spoonful of potatoes on John’s plate to accompany the last rasher of bacon.

  ‘Mr Ashwell’s already organized a gang of men to build a wall around the new plot and clear the ground. I wasn’t sure how he’d be at first – he took me outside and warned me not to let on whose daughter I was. Not that I was going to anyway – I’m not that daft.’ Lizzie chuckled to herself. ‘But as soon as the director was gone, Mr Ashwell was laughing and grinning and happy as could be. So was George – he thinks you’re marvellous, Mam.’

  ‘Does he now? Well, you can tell that George to behave himself, else I’ll be after him and all.’

  ‘Mam, he always does behave. We’re just friends.’

  Molly narrowed her eyes at her daughter. In another week she’d be fifteen. At that age, Molly had been besotted with a spotty youth, hanging on his every word and gazing lovingly into his eyes. Eighteen months later, they were married with Lizzie on the way. She’d been far too young. She wanted her daughter to take it slower, see life before getting herself entangled in commitments.

  ‘Right, I’m off,’ said John, sensing a change in the atmosphere and eager to make himself scarce before the lecture got underway. ‘I’ve a bit of tidying to do before the funeral tomorrow. You will be there, won’t you? My father would have wanted it. He always liked you, regardless of what my mother thought.’

  Molly assured him that they would and pecked him lightly on the cheek. With a parting wink at Lizzie, he closed the door behind him and set off into the night. He was going to miss suppers like the one they had just shared, but he could make better money if he was lodging in Jerusalem, right next to the tunnel. Hard as it would be, his feelings would have to take second place for a while. Once John had his heart set on something, he’d go all out until he got it.

  22

  ‘So you’re really off then, we can’t change your mind?’ Molly watched as John loaded the few things he wanted to take up to Jerusalem with him on the cart.

  ‘No, Moll, I’m off. It’ll save me walking that mile or two every day up to my work – why waste time walking when I could be working and getting paid for it? If there’s anything you want from my old hut, help yourself before the new tenant moves in.’ John tipped the last load of bedding off his shoulder and into the cart. ‘There’s all my ma’s fancy bits still in there – I’d rather you had ’em than anyone else.’ He stood fussing over tying things down in the wagon rather than meet her eyes. It was hard to know whether he was doing the right thing, but something told him it was better to go for a while. Maybe then he’d see things a bit clearer.

  ‘We’ll miss you, especially Lizzie, she worships you.’ Molly really wanted to say, I worship you too, please don’t go. But she had her pride.

  ‘Aye, well, I’ll be down every weekend. I’m best out of this spot – too many memories.’ John bowed his head.

  Molly rushed forward and hugged him with all her strength, looking up into his eyes. ‘You know I love you. I just wish things had been different. Don’t forget about us, will you?’

  ‘Nay, I’ll not do that, not when you’re the two bonniest women for miles around. Take care of yourselves – don’t you be catching smallpox, and don’t be working too hard. It’s time you let Starchy Drawers take the strain!’ John grinned and kissed Molly on the lips, lingering while he thought how stupid he was, leaving this woman on her own. ‘Give Lizzie a kiss from me and tell her to behave herself.’ He turned away hurriedly and mounted the buckboard, stirring the horses into action.

  Molly watched with tears in her eyes. She kept them focused on the horse and cart as it made its way up the track to Blea Moor and camp Jerusalem. Happen if he had time away from her, he might realize that their lives together could be salvaged from the past. She hoped so, else there was no future for her. She loved that man too much to lose him. She’d realized that as she stood with Lizzie underneath the sprawling yew tree in the old churchyard, watching as Jim Pratt was laid to rest. She was a woman alone with a teenage daughter and no one in the world cared about them except John. And he was so mixed up he didn’t know what he wanted.

  ‘Mam, look at this.’ Lizzie pulled out a fancy lace table cloth from one of the drawers in John’s abandoned hut. ‘Did he really say we could have what we wanted?’

  ‘Aye, that’s what he said, so we might as well take the lot, rather than leave it for some rough buggers that’d not appreciate it.’ Molly was busy taking down the chintz curtains. She’d always made fun of them when Rose was alive, but secretly she had admired them. She had been so jealous of Rose’s frills and fancies.

  ‘Look at these doilies, Mam. When will we ever use all this stuff?’ Lizzie was loving every moment of ransacking the hut. After the tragedies of the past week, it was a bit of much-needed brightness.

  ‘Stick them in the sheet, Liz, then we’ll bundle it all up and carry it home. I think we’re going to have to make two journeys with it all. At least if John regrets moving, his stuff
will be safe with us.’

  Molly hummed a song while she placed everything in the double sheet that she’d brought from home. She was going to have the poshest hut in the shantytown. How things had changed. Now all she needed was a proper home, and she was already thinking of a scheme for that. There was no way she was going back to Bradford when the railway line was finished. It might be wild and rugged at Ribblehead but she loved it, especially on blue-sky days like the last few had been.

  ‘How about we have a ride on the train down to Settle on Saturday? I think I can just about manage the fare – it can be an early birthday treat,’ said Molly in a moment of madness, the home improvements going to her head.

  ‘Mam! Mam! Do you mean it, can we really go on a proper train? It’s a lot of money.’

  ‘Why not? I don’t know about you, but I could do with a break from all this depression. We had some more cases of smallpox admitted this morning. It makes you realize that life’s too short to worry about money. We should enjoy ourselves while we can.’ Molly tied the curtains back and looked around her now cosy home. She just prayed that neither she nor Lizzie would catch the disfiguring disease. At least these days they were better fed than they had been a year ago. That would give them a better chance of fighting off the disease, though the scars the disease left on the faces of its victims filled Molly with almost as much fear as death itself. She gave a shudder at the thought.

  No, whatever the expense, they should make the most of life while they had the chance. Who knew what the future held?

  Helen Parker glared with hatred at her husband, drunk behind the bar. He hadn’t shed a single tear at the death of his daughter, in fact, he’d seemed quite relieved. But then again, since the baby was no doubt his, it must have come as a huge relief that he’d be spared the shame of exposure. Helen had gone alone to the hospital to see her daughter’s body in the morgue. Then she’d come home, beside herself with grief, only for him to kick and punch her because his supper wasn’t on the table.