Leaving the Aire to meander on its way, Kit veered south and headed towards the Calder, for her destination lay almost at the confluence of the two rivers. The undulations of the landscape became gentler now, the city of Leeds behind her a smudged outline of towering chimneys on the distant horizon.
The land here was low-lying and fertile. Kit left the main road, climbed over a stile and, avoiding the foetid bristles of hogweed, took a short cut across a field, leaving a trail of footprints in the boggy ground to her wake. The meadow was of a purplish hue, spangled with clumps of buttercup and tendrils of purple vetch that curled around the traveller’s feet. Quaking spikelets of flowering grass clung to her skirts as, at times, she waded knee-deep in foliage, making for the village in the distance.
At the other side of the meadow she rejoined the road that would eventually lead her into the heart of the pit village, but as yet there was a mile to go.
Ralph Royd was a small and ancient hamlet with a church, two chapels, several shops, a post office, an inn and a row of almshouses, whose once pretty view over the wooded valley had been devalued by the ugly pit headgear, the pumping shaft and its great Cornish beam engine, the slag heaps, locomotive sheds and the accompanying network of railway lines that connected to the Aire and Calder Navigation. But the optimistic Kit preferred to focus on the brighter aspects of her route, occasionally calling a greeting to a familiar face.
After the group of farmworkers’ cottages stood a whitewashed public house, the Robin Hood’s Well, and from its open door came the gentle waft of malted hops. Now, only a few hundred yards lay between Kit and the place she called home. Turning off Main Street between the post office and the church graveyard, she travelled up an incline, the fronts of her thighs beginning to feel the strain. On her left, smelling of sun-warmed greenery and manure, was a stretch of allotment gardens where pigsty, chicken coop and pigeon loft nestled amongst a veritable forest of rhubarb, their occupants clucking, cooing and grunting in contentment. Crossing the road, her pace much slower now, she followed the grimy wall of the churchyard, heading for the sequence of houses erected by the colliery owner for its workforce – Fenton Row at the very top of the incline which overlooked a moor, Charlesworth Street in the middle and, thankfully before these, at the very bottom, Savile Row where her brother lived. Perspiring and tired now, she rounded a corner, almost barging into a knot of men in flat caps and coloured neckerchiefs who waited to use the communal privy.
‘Eh up, Kit!’ Pipe in hand, one grizzled miner hailed her. ‘That’s a grand hat tha’s wearin’.’
Involuntarily, Kit touched her new apparel, a huge straw bonnet trimmed with loops of blue ribbon and white heather, and was about to thank him when another made droll contribution: ‘Nay, that’s not a hat it’s a roof.’ Succeeding in drawing a chuckle from his companions, the culprit grinned at her to show his humour was not malicious. ‘Eh, I can get thee a cheap quote on guttering if tha’s interested.’
‘Cheeky monkey!’ Kit summoned a not entirely genuine laugh and marched on along the final stretch.
The bricks of the thirty-six houses had been made from fire clay dug from the mine, their roofs constructed of thin grey slate and every one of them belonged to the mine-owner, yet the majority of tenants took pride in their homes. Each step and sill gleamed with freshly applied donkey-stone, its effect almost blinding, and Kit was forced to squint to block out the glare. On their way back from an outing, a young couple came towards her, arrayed in their Sunday best. The woman carried a baby swathed in a shawl.
Forgetting the insult over her hat, Kit greeted the two and stopped to probe eagerly between the crocheted layers around the infant’s face. ‘Come out, we’ve seen thee!’ The West Country accent was long gone, replaced by local dialect. ‘Aw, there you are – isn’t he a grand little chap!’ She offered a digit which the babe immediately grasped, apologizing upon being told that the child was female. ‘Ooh, sorry! What do you call her?’ Babbling over her mistake, Kit heaped undue praise upon the infant, before finally tearing herself away.
Envying the new parents, she continued thoughtfully, imagining herself in the maternal role – for a family was the thing she desired most in all the world. The vague thought occurred that she already had a family, but was just as quickly dismissed. Kit had never really felt part of it, forever isolated because of something she had done. Fantasizing about the children she would one day have, their names and fortunes, Kit wished that she could remember her own parents, but they were a distant memory now.
Suddenly realizing that her daydreaming had taken her two doors beyond her intended terminus, she laughed at herself and retraced her steps.
Even before she entered she could hear snatches of conversation through the open window, most of it conducted in flat West Riding vowels. Of the family, only Monty and Gwen retained any trace of their Somerset burr. The younger ones, teased unmercifully on their arrival here twelve years ago, had been quick to adopt the local vernacular.
Kit was not surprised to find all her siblings here. Traditionally they had always gathered on the first Sabbath of every month, travelling from their homes in nearby townships. Only Owen had not so far to come, living only a few streets away. On these occasions spouses and children were left behind, not simply because the dimensions of the house forbade such mass invasion, but because this was the Kilmasters’ special day to commemorate the time when their parents had been killed and their newly wed brother Monty had vowed that he would fight to keep the family together – and to his credit he had. Hence, once a month they would gather here to bicker and snipe and chide over misunderstandings as families were wont to do. They were adults now, but the childhood pecking order remained.
A beaming Kit poked her head round the door, opening it with care lest anyone were seated behind it. The living room was large but had many people to accommodate. The draught of her entry billowed the green curtains, which in turn panicked the canary into fluttering about in its cage. Kit edged her way in, the scent of fresh air clinging to her clothes. Taking prominence in the room was the Yorkshire range, black and gleaming like some living beast, its iron face cast with garlands and wreaths and roses. The fire in the grate had been allowed to burn low without actually going out, but still it brought a glow to the cheeks on such a hot day. There was a large oven on one side of the fire and a boiler on the other and before the hearth was a rug made from clippings by every member of the family. Kit knew exactly which section she had done, as did everyone else. It was the only covering upon the stone floor.
Indeed there were few trappings in her brother’s house. Those that existed had been with him a long time and came not from his own endeavours, for every penny had been spent on his extended family: the bible on the sideboard in which was listed every Kilmaster birth, death and marriage in the past fifty years; a print of John Wesley, and a painting – an amateurish attempt to depict the Welsh landscape by one of Sarah’s sisters. Over the fireplace was a mirror which reflected the clock on the opposite wall. Kit had become adept at reading the time back to front whilst brushing her hair. It was not actually an entire clock, just the face and workings of an old timepiece found in a junk shop, secured to the whitewashed wall by a nail. The only other adornment was a map of the world on the wall opposite the window. Apart from the scullery with its shallow stone sink, a pantry, and a cylindrical copper for boiling clothes with a fireplace underneath it, this was the extent of the downstairs living area.
The conversation stopped with Kit’s entry, Owen first to remark on his sister’s appearance. ‘Good Lord! If tha can’t fight, wear a big hat.’
‘A big hat for a big girl.’ Gwen made critical observation of Kit. ‘Every time I come here you seem to have got fatter.’
Before the subject could utter displeasure, Amelia jumped in, brimming with importance. ‘That’s what I’ve told her! She’ll never get wed if she doesn’t stop stuffing her face.’
Kit finally managed to insert her objection.
‘I hardly eat a thing!’ It seemed grossly unfair that whilst Owen’s appetite would put a gannet to shame he remained as thin as a lath. In further self-defence – a lifelong stance for poor Kit – she reminded her female detractors, ‘Neither of you are exactly whippet-like. And I’m a lot taller than any of you.’
‘You can’t kid me an extra six inches in height justifies an extra six stones,’ teased Amelia.
‘Well, at least mine’s in all the right places,’ retorted Kit, thrusting out her enormous bosom whilst looking disparagingly upon Gwen’s barrel shape and Amelia’s disproportionate rear.
An objective observer would agree, Kit’s flesh was evenly distributed. In all she was a striking figure with beautiful copper tones to her hair, whilst Amelia’s pale skin was framed by an insipid carroty frizz which, along with her wide blue eyes, gave the impression that she was in a state of permanent fright. The premature death of their mother and father was etched in both sets of blue eyes, yet in Kit’s there was a certain calmness, a knowledge that death could come at any time and there was no point worrying over it.
‘These’re childbearing hips,’ came Amelia’s attempt at having the last word.
‘So are mine,’ volleyed Kit.
‘I can’t see you putting ’em to much use.’ Owen, a black-haired billy goat with a pale high forehead, tiny pointed chin and eyebrows like strips of astrakhan, was in one of his acerbic moods today, needled by the reminder that Kit was taller than himself. ‘The bloke who’ll take you on ’ud need to throw up some scaffolding first.’
Kit levelled a derogatory eye at the wad of Socialist pamphlets on his lap. ‘The man I take on will have better things to do on his day off than shove bumfodder through people’s letter boxes.’
‘I can’t think of owt better to do on me day off than helping my fellow man.’ At Kit’s dubious smile Owen wagged the pamphlets at her. ‘We all have our ways of serving the Lord and this is mine. What’s thine – wearing big hats?’
Monty, seated in one of the fireside chairs, sighed at the way the afternoon was turning out. He rubbed a knee that was swollen with fluid and callused from kneeling at the coalface. Sixteen years down the pit had taken its toll on his body. But there would be no let-up until he dropped dead. He worked alongside men who were in their seventies – one of them eighty. There was even no let-up at home. ‘If it’s an argument you want ’ee can do it in your own homes.’
He might as well not have spoken, for the days were gone when one word from their brother could silence them and Gwen carried on as if there had been no interjection. ‘Men have no respect for women who draw too much attention to themselves, you know.’ An observant eye could discern that she was Kit’s sister, though with her rather waxen features it was as if Gwen’s face had melted round the edges, presenting an air of misery. Creeping towards middle age, she had still not learned to curb her bossiness and frowned on her youngest sibling’s habit of always trying to gain an audience by these outlandish displays. ‘Lord help us, every time I come here you’re sporting a new hat! Couldn’t ’ee fit any more ornaments on it? ’Tis a wonder you know whether to wear it or prune it.’
The tone of the banter was in the most part good-natured, but that didn’t prevent it being hurtful.
Sensing this, Beata tried to help. With only four years between them, she and Kit were more like sisters than aunt and niece. ‘Heather’s very lucky.’
‘She’ll need more than a cartload of heather on her hat to conjure up the bloke who’ll take her on,’ scoffed Owen.
Kit wondered why it was that she was meant to accept these indignities with composure, when the perpetrators would take umbrage were she to turn the tables. She’d given Owen short shrift once and had cut him to the quick. He had looked so bewildered and hurt that she had not done it again. Gwen too could be destroyed with one harsh word, yet even knowing how it felt, the two of them remained quick to judge Kit. Amelia was just thoughtless. Often, the idea had occurred to Kit that she had been born into the wrong family – why was it a sin to want nice things, or to enjoy oneself?
As usual it was the amiable Charity who sprang to her aid. ‘Leave the lass alone!’ Now twenty-seven, she had developed into a large-boned, capable-looking woman – though nowhere near as tall as Kit – her dark hair and eyes accompanied by sallow skin lending her an almost exotic look.
‘She dun’t mind! quipped Owen in genuine fondness. ‘She knows we don’t mean owt. Skin like a pachyderm has our Kit.’
‘What’s one o’ them when it’s at home?’ obliged Amelia as he had known she would, thereby allowing him to donate the benefits of his knowledge.
He feigned surprise as if expecting everyone else to know this. ‘Why, it’s an animal with a thick skin like an elephant or rhino.’ These little snippets of information were a sop to his own self-esteem, for despite all hopes being pinned upon him Owen had failed the examinations that would have elevated him to college and thus from the pit.
Kit objected to the comparison.
‘We’re only saying it for your own good,’ provided Gwen, as she saw it quite truthfully.
‘Well, I think she looks grand,’ smiled Charity. ‘How are you, Kit?’
‘I were fine till I came in here!’ Adept at hiding her wounds, Kit gave her tormentors a theatrical glare, then turned her smiling attention to the little red-headed girls who crowded round her in greeting, each of them pulling at her skirts to attract notice and telling her to sit by them. ‘Oh, now then, now then!’ She bent to receive their hugs.
‘They never welcome me like that,’ muttered Gwen.
Kit could have made a nasty response, saying that there was no wonder that Gwen was unpopular when she was always speaking her mind, but it was not in her nature. ‘It’s only cupboard love.’ Smiling down at the girls she withdrew a bag of locusts from her skirt pocket and warned the children not to squabble as their fingers tussled over the pods. All were wearing ribbons in their hair and freshly laundered pinafore smocks which always started out white for chapel and Sunday school but after a couple of days would be creased and grubby.
‘She’s trying to make thee as fat as she is,’ Owen jokingly warned the girls.
Anticipating more insults from her sisters, Kit ordered, ‘Oh, shut tha gob, there’s a train coming!’
Monty pointed a finger at her, his meaning made clear by the expression in his bright blue eyes.
Beata, by nature the antithesis of the grandmother whose name she carried, thought the others unfair and, in gently compassionate manner, advised, ‘Don’t pay no heed, Kit, they’re only jealous.’
Owen cackled. ‘Oh, aye! I’ve been saving up for ages to get meself a bonnet like that. Just the job for t’pit. We could all shelter under it if t’roof caves in.’
‘Do you all mind if I manage to sit down first before you cast any more slurs?’ Kit looked for a place to accommodate her bottom. The benches on which the younger ones usually sat up to the table had been taken by the visitors, so the children were seated on the hearth and on the mat. There were two wooden armchairs for their parents and two more basic rush-bottomed ones which were regularly fought over if the parents weren’t around.
Beata was admiring her aunt’s hat. ‘Shall you be wearing it for Amelia’s wedding?’
Amelia’s blue eyes turned icy, mainly at the lack of deference from her niece. She had always clung defiantly to the fact that she was not the youngest in the family, preferring to group herself with her married sisters – as she would soon be able do quite legitimately – and her attitude showed that she resented this familiarity from one so young. Just because Kit allowed the girl to drop the suffix Aunt, did not mean that all should comply. However, out of fear of alienating her elder brother, she chose not to voice her resentment openly – nothing was aired openly in this household, but made apparent in more furtive ways, usually via Kit’s expense. ‘Anyone appears at my wedding in an abomination like that’ll find themselves barred.’
Unaware
of her own wrongdoing, Beata objected. ‘Aw, I think it’s lovely!’
Kit took the hat off, then pulled a sheet of paper from her pocket and, inserting her hips into the space that had been made available to her, leaned towards the tall but underdeveloped figure with the translucent skin, blue eyes and large nose, the latter being a family characteristic. ‘Just look at this one then, Beat! I tore it out of Mrs Larder’s magazine.’ The two dark auburn heads came together. There followed an animated discussion about the latest in millinery – an even more ostentatious example than that which she wore today. ‘Look it’s got bird wings on! And there’s instructions on how to make a cheaper version using a domestic fowl.’ As the other little girls gathered round to marvel at the pictured hat, Kit voiced her determination to acquire one. ‘I’ve got a plain straw bonnet just lying there begging for decoration.’
‘Eh up, our Monty,’ warned Owen, ‘she’ll be after thy banties. I’d keep me eye on poor Sammy, an’ all.’ This was the canary.
Kit made an uncomplimentary reply, then, faced with disapproval from her elder sisters, sat quietly for a time, pondering her hat.
Owen resurrected the conversation he had been having with Monty before Kit entered. ‘So are you coming to our meeting on Thursday or what, then?’ The other shook his head, drawing forth a complaint. ‘Well, it’s a fine thing when a man can’t rely on his own brother! I’ve fought tooth and nail to get this union recognized. What point has there been if the majority don’t join? We’ve got to get the numbers up otherwise we’ll have no clout.’ The Ralph Royd Coal Company was known as one of the most uncompromising in West Yorkshire.
A Sense of Duty Page 6