A Different Day, A Different Destiny (The Snipesville Chronicles)

by Laing, Annette

  “I’ll come with you,” Brandon said eagerly.

  She shook her head. “No, you can’t do that. You must stay here.”

  Brandon was upset. “Nothing personal, Professor, but no way am I going back down that mine. I mean, for what? Why can’t you help me get a good job?”

  But the Professor was angry too. “You’re starting to sound like Hannah. Look, I’m not running some time-traveling internship program here, okay? I can’t promise you that you’ll get useful training so you can make a lot of money when you grow up. You’ve heard of the Industrial Revolution, right? When most people move from farm work to factory work? Well, here it is, and somebody has to do it. Why shouldn’t it be you doing a crummy job? Do you think you’re better than those guys in there?” She jerked her head toward the other bar. “None of them wanted to be miners, but that’s practically the only way they can make a living. I mean, they could work in the foundries with boiling hot metal and no safety equipment, or they could quarry limestone with no safety equipment, or they can mine with no safety equipment. Or they can starve, because most of the old farming jobs have disappeared. Those are pretty much the choices for most of these men, except the ones lucky enough to know a skilled trade.”

  Brandon struggled to answer her tirade. She had never spoken to him like this before. “Well, no, I guess I… No, wait! Yes, I am better qualified than this! I can read, and I have a skilled trade. I trained with Mr. Gordon as a dentist’s assistant.”

  “Okay, fine,” said the Professor in a resigned voice, as she got to her feet, drawing her shawl around her shoulders. “I’m sure you will have no trouble finding yourself a professional job in the Black Country, as a partly-trained dentist with no certification. Off you go.”

  Brandon didn’t move.

  “Go on,” said the Professor, folding her arms. “You obviously have loads of opportunities, so why don’t take one of them?”

  Brandon looked at her with utter loathing. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’m starting to think Hannah’s right about you. You are mean. You really don’t care what happens to us.”

  “I do care, Brandon,” she said, “But not in the way you expect. Look, I’m not in charge here. You’re now part of England in 1851. There’s only so much I can do for you, and mostly, this is in your hands. You’re in a place where everything is changing, people are on the move, and not always out of choice. You can stay in the Black Country, and work in the mine, or you can take your chances somewhere else. But I can’t guarantee that if you leave, I’ll find you again. Ever.”

  Brandon took a sharp intake of breath. That was scary. Throughout the kids’ adventure in twentieth-century England, the Professor had always reassured them, always promised them that everything would be okay. He asked nervously, “So how are we all going to get home? Is it when one of us finds your calculator? Is that it?”

  “I don’t know,” she said with a sigh. “Alex has already found the calculator, but I still have a lot of questions I need to research. I can’t be too hasty.” There was an awkward silence. Finally, the Professor clasped her hands, laid them on the rickety table, and looked Brandon in the eye. “Brandon, please stay. Just for a while…”

  But Brandon was more and more certain that he could not bear life in Hitherton for another day. “I want to go,” he said determinedly. “I’ll head to Balesworth, because I’m guessing that’s where Alex and Hannah will be…”

  “They’re not,” said the Professor abruptly. “Alex is in Savannah, and his sister is a factory worker in Scotland.”

  “Hannah? Working in a factory?” Brandon’s eyes bulged at the very idea. “Wow, how does she like it?”

  The Professor laughed. “Oh, she doesn’t like it very much at all, but she’s doing it. Please, Brandon, just stick it out for a few days. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  “But where will I live?”

  “Oh,” she said, “Yes. Well. Um.”

  “It’s not good, is it?” he said apprehensively.

  “Not terrific, no. But here you go. Here’s your address.” She handed him a letter, and got to her feet. By the time Brandon had opened the envelope and read the note inside, she was gone, leaving him to wonder what was meant by “The Union Workhouse, Hitherton.”

  ****

  Hannah had never in her life heard so much noise. The factory’s spinning room was the size of a small gym, and it was lined with row after row of clacking spinning machines called mules. They were all powered by watermills on the River Clyde that gushed past New Lanark.

  Every few minutes, the spinners pulled the iron machines backward on their wheels along railroad-like tracks bolted to the floor. While the machines rested, kids and young teens ran down the length of them, pausing here and there to lean over and repair broken threads by gathering them up and quickly rubbing them together. Meanwhile, younger kids scurried on their hands and knees under the machines to clean up dust and oil with brushes, dustpans, and fingers. When the machines started up again with a great screech, the kids scampered away like mice, and the spinners moved the machines forward. Hannah thought that her machine, with its whirring spindles of cotton thread, looked like a giant abacus. The “gaffer”, her boss Mr. MacDonald, had introduced her to a red-haired young woman called Elspeth, a spinner, who carried on spinning while she explained to Hannah how the mill worked.

  Hannah found it hard to hear Elspeth over the noise, and her attention wandered. She glanced out of the window, and soon was transfixed by the sight of the roaring waters of the Clyde tumbling over the falls below. Suddenly, Elspeth was tugging her arm.

  “Ow! Let go of me!” Hannah yelled, batting at Elspeth.

  “Well, pay attention then, would you?” Elspeth yelled over the noise, dragging Hannah backward with her as she pulled on the spinning frame.

  "I watched what you did and I get it,” Hannah shouted confidently. “Just get me started on a machine, okay?”

  “But you’re not a spinner like me,” replied Elspeth, shaking her head in exasperation. “You mustn’t copy what I do. You’re starting as a piecer.”

  “And what does a piecer do?” shouted Hannah over the racket.

  Elspeth looked exhausted by Hannah. “Have you not been listening to a word I say?”

  Hannah shrugged. “I can’t hear you!”

  Elspeth buried her face in her hands. “Oh, in the name of … Look, Hannah. Look over there, at the wee bairns on the ground.” She pointed to the children, who lay flat on their stomachs, keeping their heads down under the machinery as they flailed away at the floorboards with brushes. “They’re called the scavengers. Now, look at Bella coming down the row.” She pointed to Bella, who was running down the aisle between spinning machines. “She’s a piecer. That’s what you’ll be doing. ”

  Hannah watched as Bella stopped, reached over, deftly picked up a handful of threads, and rubbed them together, before rushing onward. Suddenly, Elspeth began pulling back on the machine, and she called out to Hannah, “Now, away and follow Bella.”

  Within an hour, Hannah had started to learn how to piece. As she rubbed the threads together, her hands began to tingle and then sting, and her feet started throbbing from all the standing. Glancing at the wall clock, she realized she still had five more hours of work to go. How would she ever manage? At the end of the day, Hannah staggered from the mill, following Bella amid a large crowd of women, men, boys and girls. Hannah repeatedly looked at her hands and cringed. Her fingers were bright red and agonizingly painful, especially in several patches where the skin had rubbed away. Her whole body ached, and especially her right knee, on which she had leaned her weight as she pieced.

  Hannah was exhausted, and as she dragged herself back up the hill toward Mrs. Nicolson’s tenement, she began to sob. Her working day would begin again tomorrow at 6 a.m., and she simply couldn’t face it, not for an hour more, much less ten and a half hours every day.

  When Bella heard Hannah crying, she turned to her. “Co
me now, Hannah, it’ll be all right. You’ll get used to it. I’ve been doing this same work since I was nine, when I started as a half-timer, working six hours a day. It’s no so bad.”

  Hannah cried harder. Bella tried again to cheer her up. “You can go to the school with me at noon. It’s only fourpence a month, and you can learn to read and write.”

  Hannah wailed. “That’s the good news? Are you kidding me?”

  Before Hannah reached the main door of Mrs. Nicholson’s tenement building, she had decided to quit.

  Chapter 6: Fired Up

  Bella pushed open the door to the tenement flat—it had no lock. Mrs. Nicolson was standing at the fireplace, bending forward to stir something in a black cauldron. Even to Hannah, who was very picky about food, whatever she was cooking smelled good. She had worked so very hard, and she was desperately hungry. “Ah, here you are,” said Mrs. Nicolson, straightening up. “Would you girls like a cup of tea? The kettle’s just boiled.”

  Bella smiled gratefully. “Tea? Oh, thank you, Mrs. Nicolson.”

  Hannah said, “Sure, tea, yeah, okay,” and collapsed onto her back on the nearest bed.

  “And would you mind sitting in a chair?” grated Mrs. Nicolson. She was already irritated that Hannah had accepted her offer of tea with so little grace. Tea was expensive. Reluctantly, Hannah slid off the bed onto the floor, staggered dramatically to her feet, and threw herself into one of the rickety chairs.

  Mrs. Nicolson handed Hannah a cup of tea in a roughhewn pottery mug, and Hannah sipped at it. It was sweet with sugar, and as she drank it, she cheered up a little.

  There was a long silence as all three of them quietly ingested their tea. Then Mrs. Nicolson said, “Och, Bella, you’re that quiet, you must be tired out this night, are you?”

  Hannah now understood why Bella might be tired out tonight, and every night.

  “Aye,” said Bella sadly, “and I slept through school the day.”

  Hannah couldn’t believe her ears. “And that’s a bad thing?”

  “Of course,” said Bella. “How can I make something of myself if I don’t heed my lessons?” Hannah looked at the small, thin, and sad-faced Bella, and wondered what she thought she could grow to up to become. Chat show host? Supermodel? Hannah giggled to herself.

  Mrs. Nicolson clearly had a similar thought. With a knowing smile, she said to Bella, “Never mind making something of yourself. You’re lucky to be working here.”

  Hannah thought this was a bit extreme. “Lucky? Are you serious? My hands have been bleeding all day, and my legs are so swelled up, I think they’re gonna explode. I mean, look at them! On top of all that, I’m supposed to go to school?”

  Mrs. Nicolson looked crossly at Hannah. “No, it’s not easy here, I’m not saying that, but the work hours are shorter than ever they were. And New Lanark is famous for the owners’ treatment of workers. Men still come from all over the world to see what Mr. Dale and Mr. Owen made here. The gaffers aren’t as cruel as some I’ve heard tell of in Glasgow, and we all learn to read and write. And our houses are provided.”

  “True…,” said Bella. “All so long as the mill makes a profit.”

  “Aye, if the mill makes a profit,” agreed Mrs. Nicolson. “True enough.”

  Bella continued. “Anyways, I never meant that I wanted a better job. What jobs are there for the likes of me? No, all I want is a few more hours to myself, and a few more books to pass the time, and maybe some more pennies to spend.”

  “You’re a dreamer, lass,” tutted Mrs. Nicolson. “By the by, I’ve heard tell the Walkers are seeking a buyer for the mill. Mind, I’ll say this, they’ve never been as good employers as Mr. Owen. He was famous, was Mr. Robert Owen, and he was a good man, aye, that he was.”

  Hannah really wasn’t interested. “It’s all right for you,” she said sullenly to Mrs. Nicolson. “You don’t have to work in the factory.”

  Mrs. Nicolson said calmly, “But, Hannah, I did work in the mill. I was a spinner for fifty years. Now, girls, let us have our supper. I must finish cleaning this house before the bug hunters come.”

  “What’s a bug hunter?” asked Hannah, puzzled. “And what house?”

  “This house,” said Mrs. Nicolson, circling a finger in the air to demonstrate that the room was her house. “The bug hunters are them who inspect to be sure we keep our houses clean.”

  “That’s so rude!” exclaimed Hannah.

  “Aye, well,” said Mrs. Nicolson quietly, “I’ve always thought so, too, but the owners think otherwise, since they own the houses.”

  Hannah was intrigued by the very idea of strangers coming in to check an apartment for cleanliness. She wondered how her mother would have reacted.

  “So what happens if they find a messy house?”

  Mrs. Nicolson said dramatically, “If my house were mucky, I’d be sent to Botany Bay.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Bella answered. “She means that, if her house is found dirty, she’ll be sent as a convict to Australia, like a thief or a robber.”

  Seeing Hannah’s shock, Mrs. Nicolson laughed. “Nah, nah, it’s just our wee joke, Hannah. Our Botany Bay is a tenement down the street. It’s not Australia, mind, but it’s cramped and rickety, a grim enough place, and it’s where they send the folk who displease the bug hunters. Listen, Hannah, workers must always keep our mouths shut, or else be out on the street. You understand, lass? We don’t own the land, or the factories, or the roofs over our heads, so we must bide in silence.”

  Hannah nodded dumbly. Biding in silence was not something she did naturally. It turned out that she wasn’t the only one.

  “Nonsense,” said Bella suddenly. “Mrs. Nicolson, we’re as good as the owners. If we had a union, we would soon turn the tables…Aye, that we would.”

  Mrs. Nicolson raised her eyebrows. “Bella, I wouldn’t be saying that too loudly, if I was you.”

  Just then, the door opened, and a man in his thirties stomped in. Yanking off his cap, he threw it on a peg behind the door. Hannah wondered who he was.

  Silently, the man took his place at the head of the table, and pulled a short, white clay pipe from his jacket pocket, along with a small pouch of tobacco, from which he proceeded to fill the pipe.

  “Good evening to you, Charlie,” Mrs. Nicolson said.

  “Aye, and you, Mother,” Charlie replied. He got to his feet again, took a rolled straw of paper from a holder on the wall, and lit it from the fire, before applying the lit paper to his pipe.

  As the tobacco smoke swirled around her, Hannah coughed in protest, but she already knew it was pointless to complain. Lots of people smoked in 1851, just as they had in 1940. Although, now that Hannah thought about it, she hadn’t yet seen anyone smoking cigarettes. Nor had she seen anyone smoking pipes in the factory. “Why don’t people smoke in the mill?” she suddenly asked Bella.

  “Don’t be daft, girl,” growled Charlie. “One spark and the whole mill would be alight.” Then he fell silent again.

  Mrs. Nicolson brought four steaming wooden bowls to the table, one after the other, starting with Charlie’s. “Hannah’s the new lodger. Here’s your tatties, with a wee bit of milk.” When everyone was seated, Charlie said a grace. But Hannah wasn’t praying: She was staring through her fingers at the food. Three boiled potatoes and milk? What a weird appetizer.

  After they had finished eating in silence, Hannah realized that the potatoes had been supper. All of it. Three boiled potatoes, served with a splash of milk. Charlie had received a double portion.

  After he had eaten, Charlie seemed to mellow a bit. “So you’re the new lodger, eh?” he asked Hannah, as he re-lit his pipe. “And where have you come from?”

  Hannah waved a hand vaguely, implying that she had come from far away. Charlie looked askance at her, and said warningly, “Are you one of the Catholic Irish? I won’t have a Catholic in this house.”

  “What’s wrong with Cath…” Hannah began to say, but Bella kicked her under t
he table. Fortunately, Charlie had lost interest in Hannah, and was looking out of the window. It was just starting to rain.

  “It’s a grand view,” he said wistfully. “I went with the lads over the river on Sunday to kick a ball around, but we were chased off.”

  “Aye, well,” said Mrs. Nicolson, “That’s just as well. Ye shouldn’t be playing on the Sabbath anyways. It’s a sin.”

  Charlie stared mournfully out of the window. “Well and good, Mother, but a man needs more from life than standing all day in a mill.”

  “Don’t we all,” Hannah grumbled. “So how come you’re not allowed to play soccer over there?”

  Charlie continued to look out at the river and the green field and trees beyond. “Och, the two old biddies who own the field told the Walkers they don’t want us workers on their land, even though the field is just empty pasture. They expect us to keep to the village.”

  “Hey, fair enough,” Hannah said dismissively. “It’s their property.” What was this guy’s problem, she wondered?

  Charlie turned and gave her a sidelong look, but said nothing.

  ****

  Late in the night, long after Mrs. Nicolson and Charlie had retired to their curtained beds, and an exhausted Bella had fallen asleep on the trundle on the floor, Hannah was lying wide awake, listening to everyone snoring. Her teeth felt icky: When she had asked Bella for a toothbrush, Bella had handed her a twig. Now she needed to use the bathroom. But there was no bathroom.

  Hannah figured it had to be somewhere in the building. In darkness, she shivered her way on bare feet across the rough floorboards, out of the apartment, and onto the freezing cold stone staircase. She was dressed in her shift, a thin cotton garment that was the only underwear she or any of the other girls possessed. Swiftly, she crossed the landing and cautiously opened a door, only to realize that she was entering someone else’s apartment. A voice in the gloom yelled at her to get out. She slammed the door shut.

  She groped her way up the staircase to the fourth and highest floor, and then turned back, and felt her way downstairs again. In desperation, she looked out the tenement entrance, hoping to spot a nearby outhouse, but she could see nothing that looked likely, and now, she was shivering violently in the night air. Reluctantly, she returned to the flat, and shook Bella awake. “Where’s the bathroom?” she hissed.