by Maggie Hope
Today Eliza was going out to Blue House colliery but she had a few calls to make on the way. Still, she reckoned she would be finished by one o’clock and then she would be free to go to see her mother. Worry niggled at Eliza’s mind at the thought of Mary Anne. Her mother was showing symptoms of heart disease though she tried to hide it.
The miners and their wives had to be in dire straits with regard to their health before they could be persuaded to visit a doctor. Most often it was too late when they did. Eliza was determined that Mary Anne should have medical help. She perhaps needed digitalis, the drug made from foxgloves, and Eliza would prefer she had it from a doctor rather than some concoction brewed up by the local wise woman.
Mary Anne had started to fail after the death of Miley a couple of years before. She refused to be comforted by anyone, even Tommy. Instead she had worked harder than ever, not going to bed at all some nights as the lads were on different shifts and needed a hot meal when they came in after twelve hours at the face. And in spite of this she had begun to take in washing and ironing from a number of widowers in the rows.
‘If I have to bury another one of my bairns it will not be in a pauper’s grave,’ she said to Eliza, her voice hard.
‘Oh, Mam,’ Eliza said helplessly. She felt guilty because she had not been able to pay for the funeral. Her income was reduced severely after she first left the hospital and she had Tot to keep. Now she had acquired a reputation for excellent nursing and her patients were from the middle classes as well as the poor. But then …
‘Mary Anne, you listen to our Eliza,’ said Tommy as he came in the door. ‘I’m not having it, not any more. You have to think of the lads that are with us, never mind when they are gone.’
Now Mary Anne was not capable of doing any extra work. It was a phase that hadn’t lasted long.
Well, I’m making a living for us now, Tot and me and a bit to spare. Bertha keeps herself, practically, Eliza mused as she stopped the tub trap in the street before the house where her next patient lived.
‘Stay there, be good, Dolly,’ she ordered the pony and Dolly turned her head and regarded her with intelligent eyes. Sometimes she could swear that Dolly understood every word she said.
‘Good morning, Nurse.’ The girl who answered her knock could have been taken for Bertha’s sister. She too had been brought up in the workhouse, where she had been taken at the age of three when her mother, a widow, became too ill to work. Now she was thirteen and hired out as a maid of all work. Mrs Green, who was Eliza’s patient, was suffering from rheumatic fever so her husband had taken Lottie from the workhouse to look after him and his five sons. And his wife, of course. Mr Green was a nightshift overman at the pit.
‘A lovely morning it is, Lottie,’ replied Eliza, stepping over the threshold. ‘How is Mrs Green today?’
‘Tolerable,’ said Lottie. ‘She had a bad night, she says. I got up to her twice as Mr Green was at the pit.’ Indeed, Lottie’s small pale face looked pinched and there were dark circles under her eyes. Eliza paused before going into the downstairs sitting room, which had been converted into a bedroom for Mrs Green.
‘Why don’t you go out into the lane for a few minutes, Lottie? Just while I’m here. The boys are at school, aren’t they?’
Lottie nodded. ‘They are,’ she said and looked longingly at the sunlit day outside. ‘I don’t know—’
‘It’ll be fine,’ urged Eliza. ‘I can call you if I need you, just stay within earshot.’
‘I’ll just walk to the end of the road and back,’ Lottie decided. Her eyes had brightened already at the idea.
‘She’s still a bairn herself,’ Eliza murmured aloud as she went in to Mrs Green. The woman was lying back on the pillows with her eyes closed. Her lips moved and there was a deceptive flush to her cheeks that could have been mistaken for health, but which Eliza knew showed she was running a temperature. Her hair was lank.
‘Don’t touch me, please,’ she begged. ‘I can’t bear anyone to touch me.’
‘It’s only me, Mrs Green. I’ve come to try to make you more comfortable,’ Eliza said gently. ‘Is the pain bad just now?’
‘Aye, oh aye, it is.’ Mrs Green opened her eyes and looked at Eliza. ‘Can I have some of my drops? I’ve not had any since last night and the pain is bad.’
Eliza measured out a dose of laudanum and administered it to her patient, then waited a while for it to take effect before carefully sponging her down, touching as lightly as possible on her poor inflamed joints. Even combing her hair made Mrs Green moan involuntarily, so Eliza brushed it carefully and tied it away from her forehead with a ribbon. Changing the bed was difficult with the patient still in it but Eliza was well practised at it after five years in the Infirmary.
At last she stood away from the bed and regarded her patient. Mrs Green looked very tired but she was obviously more comfortable than when Eliza came in.
‘I’ll get Lottie to bring you a bowl of beef tea and a little bread and butter,’ she said.
‘No, I won’t be able to eat, I’m not hungry,’ said Mrs Green, her voice barely above a whisper. Eliza felt her pulse and it was fast and thready. The slight effort had taken all her strength.
‘You must try to eat, at least take a little beef tea,’ Eliza urged. She wondered whether she should ask the doctor to call but decided against it. There was nothing he could do. What the woman needed just now was good nursing. And the family couldn’t afford a live-in nurse so young Lottie was the only alternative.
‘I’ll call in this evening on my way back from Haswell,’ she promised. Mrs Green didn’t answer for her eyes were already closing. At least the drug gave her some blessed relief.
Lottie was in the kitchen at the back of the house, banging away at the pots and pans from breakfast. She turned as Eliza came in, wiping her hands on the sacking apron she had put on over her overall.
‘I’m going now, I’ll come back this evening,’ Eliza said. ‘She’s very frail. Try to get some beef tea into her at least. When she wakes, that is. Let her sleep for now.’
‘I’ll try, Nurse,’ Lottie replied. She still retained a little colour in her cheeks from her brief outing and looked almost pretty. ‘I made some fresh yesterday. It’s in the pantry; I’ll just heat a cupful for her.’
Eliza went out to the waiting Dolly, who, in spite of the brake on the tub trap, had managed to pull it askew on to the grass verge in order to snatch a few raspberry leaves that were sticking through the Greens’ hedge. The pony regarded Eliza thoughtfully as she came out then took a last bite and chewed in appreciation.
‘Dolly, you bad girl,’ said Eliza. It took her a few minutes to persuade the pony back onto the road and not before Dolly took another bite at the succulent raspberry leaves. But at last they were on their way.
‘Hey up, Dolly,’ she said and flapped the reins and the pony set off, still chewing. There were two more patients to attend to before she was free to go on to her mother’s house. As they trundled along, Eliza’s thoughts turned to her son as they usually did. Tot was ten and she had ambitions for him to go further in school. But he needed a scholarship or a sponsorship for that.
On Sunday last she had spoken to Peter Collier about the possibility of the boy getting the union to sponsor him.
‘The lad is bright and it would be a shame for him to have to leave school now,’ he said. ‘I doubt the union would look favourably on him, though. After all, he is the grandson of a miner not a son.’
‘But his father is dead, I am a widow, shouldn’t that count for something?’
‘It does, but not in this case,’ Peter explained gently. He looked thoughtfully at the boy, who came up to them as the Sunday School class was released for the afternoon. ‘I’ll look into the scholarships available for you.’
Eliza forebore to say she could do that for herself. The trouble was that there were no certainties about getting a scholarship, and she didn’t want to take a chance on it. She was definitely not a gambler.
The thought put her in mind of Jack. He was a gambler and look where it got him. She wanted nothing to do with gambling; it was a vice that had ruined their lives. Oh, but now, after all these years the bad memories were fading and sometimes she couldn’t help dwelling on the good memories, the times when she and Jack were in love, gloriously in love.
She was still a young woman, not yet thirty, yet she felt as though life, real life, was passing her by. Eliza shook herself mentally; she was becoming maudlin. She was lucky, wasn’t she? She was making a comfortable living for herself and Tot, she reminded herself again. They were all right, the two of them. Three of them really, for there was Bertha. But Bertha too was doing well: she ran a business of her own now, hiring out girls for domestic help. And she ran the business fairly, charging reasonable prices and giving the girls as fair a wage as the business allowed.
‘Mind,’ said Mary Anne as Eliza lifted the sneck into the house in Alice Street. ‘I thought you weren’t coming.’
Anxiety smote Eliza as she regarded her mother. Mary Anne had lost weight and she was sitting in the chair by the fire. This was significant, for Eliza couldn’t remember her ever sitting still doing nothing at all. She didn’t even have mending on her lap and the ashes had not been taken out.
‘Morning, Mam,’ she said. ‘How are you feeling today?’
‘I’m not in very good fettle,’ Mary Anne admitted. ‘I fainted this morning and it’s left me a bit down.’
‘You’re taking your medicine?’
‘I hadn’t any left,’ Mary Anne replied. ‘I was waiting for you to go and get me some from the chemist.’
‘Where are the lads? Couldn’t one of them have got it?’ Eliza spoke sharply. Mary Anne was typical of the miners’ wives, she would not ask her menfolk to do anything besides go to the pit every day.
‘The lads are on night shift, they have enough on without running about after me. And Tommy, well, he was away to Durham the morn, first thing. There’s great things going on at the union. The yearly bond is finished, you must have heard.’
‘I did. A good thing that.’
The union was beginning to find its feet. Apart from the bond being abolished, all the men got an allowance of coal, not just those in the big pits. Though of course the owners fought hard against it, saying the next thing they would be bankrupted and then where would the pitmen be? Why, there was talk of them having to put proper fireplaces in the colliery houses with their own ovens, no less. Eliza had heard all about it from Peter Collier. They usually found time for a short talk after chapel. Sometimes they even shared a picnic on the banks of the Wear.
‘Well, I still think they should do more for you,’ said Eliza.
‘I’d have to be in a very bad way to ask them,’ Mary Anne retorted with a sudden show of spirit. ‘Lads who’ve put a full shift in at the face.’
‘Oh, Mam, I’m sure they would do it. They’re just used to you running after them all the time. You’ve brought them up wrong.’
‘They’re good lads,’ Mary Anne insisted. ‘Mind, if you’ll give me a hand to clean their boots for tonight I’d be grateful.’ She nodded to where two pairs of pit boots stood at the side of the fireplace, drying out from the wet conditions in the seam they were working this quarter.
‘All right. First, though, I’ll away into Haswell to get you your medicine.’
‘Have a cup of tea and a bite first,’ said Mary Anne.
By the time Eliza was driving back from Haswell in her tub trap it was already well into the afternoon and she had to call back to see Mrs Green before she went home. Thank goodness for Bertha, she thought. Bertha could be depended on to see to Tot’s tea when he came in from school. She ran her business from a room in the house in Gilesgate so was there most of the time.
Eliza clambered down from the trap and took the medicine in to her mother, measuring out fifteen minims and insisting that Mary Anne took it and rested by the fire until it was time to call up the boys for their shift.
Later, driving west to Gilesgate once again with the sun low in the sky so that both she and Dolly held their heads down against its brightness, Eliza left Sherburn for the city. Dolly’s pace quickened as they neared home and she anticipated her stable and sweet hay and a handful of oats to eat. The pony was wise in her ways as Galloways so often are and knew her own way to the top of the street and down the alley to the stable at the back.
‘I’ll see to her, Mam,’ said Tot, catching hold of the pony’s reins and holding her as Eliza got down from the trap. He had been watching for her coming, as he usually did. Tot promised to be taller than her brothers and straight-limbed, though not as powerful in the shoulders as they were at his age. For a ten-year-old he handled the pony well. As always, Eliza watched her son with a surge of pride. Those years without him were like a remembered bad dream to her now, no more.
Bertha was inside, just putting fillets of herring on to the large greased griddle. The table was set and there were boiled new potatoes from the long strip of garden behind the house, and fresh green peas.
‘I’m in a bit of a hurry the night,’ said Bertha. ‘I’m off out.’
Eliza looked at her in surpise. ‘Out?’
Bertha didn’t look at her but turned the fillets over expertly with a knife. ‘I’m going to the magic lantern with Charlie,’ she said.
‘With Charlie?’
Eliza didn’t know why she was so surprised. After all, she knew that Charlie had taken to studying Bertha with a certain look in his eye but Bertha – well, Bertha had never shown an interest in the opposite sex that she could recall.
‘Aye, Charlie,’ Bertha said now. ‘I’m meeting him at the end of the street in half an hour.’ She slid the fish on to plates and served out potatoes and peas. ‘Give Tot a shout, will you? He’s in the field playing soldiers.’
Obediently, Eliza went out in search of her son. He was in the open space behind the houses as Bertha had said he was. There was a gang of lads shooting pretend guns made out of anything to hand, such as broomsticks and walking sticks. She watched for a moment or two as they re-enacted the Battle of Balaclava as they understood it, or rather, made it up as they went along. The ferocious yells and fierce expressions were enough to frighten any Russian, she thought, smiling.
Tot abandoned his game and came to her as soon as he saw her. ‘What’s for tea, Mam?’ he asked. ‘I’m famished.’
‘Herrings,’ she replied. By, he was a different lad from the fearful boy she had brought back from Northumberland, away from his grandmother’s clutches.
‘You should ask Charlie to tea on Sunday,’ she said to Bertha when they were sitting round the table eating the meal.
‘Nay, I don’t know,’ said Bertha doubtfully. She had been as surprised as Eliza evidently was when Charlie, in his mid-thirties and a single man, asked her out, albeit only to the magic lantern show at the chapel. He was good-looking with kind eyes and Bertha couldn’t believe he was interested in her. She was past the courting age, in her twenties herself, and had never attracted the attentions of a man and didn’t expect to. But oh, he was nice and she liked him; more than liked him. But how could she leave Eliza, who had been her friend for so many years? Mind, she told herself, Charlie hadn’t asked her to wed. She was getting a bit in front of herself, like.
‘Bertha likes Mr Carr,’ said Tot. ‘She let him kiss her.’
‘Tot!’ Bertha was blushing, her face bright red.
‘You did, I saw you,’ said Tot.
‘Well, never you mind, Tot,’ Eliza put in. ‘If you’ve finished your tea go on out for half an hour; you can play for a while.’
Tot wiped his plate with a piece of bread and stuffed it in his mouth then stood up. ‘Well, I did,’ he said and fled the room.
‘I’m sorry, I’ll have to give him a talking to,’ Eliza said ruefully.
‘No, it’s all right. To tell the truth, he did see me and Charlie Carr together. But it doesn’t mean anything.’
‘Why
not? He’s not just playing with your affections, is he? No, he’s not the sort to do that.’
‘No, but—’ Bertha stopped as there came a knock on the front door. ‘I’ll have to go, I’ll be back before nine.’ She took off her enveloping overall and Eliza saw she had her best dress on beneath it.
‘Bertha, wait a minute,’ Eliza began.
‘No, I have to go.’ Bertha rushed out of the room and Eliza heard her open the front door and say something and a man’s voice replying. Then they were gone. She realised that Bertha hadn’t wanted him to come into the house. Why was that? Oh, they would have to talk, she thought, she and Bertha.
Chapter Twenty-One
IT WAS HARD for Eliza to realise that Bertha had a life of her own. She had grown so used to being able to rely on her. Though she was only a few years older she supposed she was almost like a mother to her. But Bertha was a woman and of course she would want to have a family life of her own with a husband and children maybe. Just as any daughter grew away eventually.
It was brought home to her in the following few weeks as Bertha and Charlie settled down to serious courting. Eliza could no longer rely on Bertha being there any time she needed her, she mused ruefully.
‘What time will you be back?’ Bertha asked just about every time Eliza went out. ‘Only Charlie and me plan to go to the magic lantern.’ Or sometimes it was the choir practice, or even a walk along the riverbank. Now, they sometimes went to the farm so Charlie could show Bertha around it.
‘Charlie says this,’ or ‘Charlie says we should do things this way,’ were phrases that were often on Bertha’s lips. Sometimes Eliza, too used by now to doing things her own way and having Bertha follow her example without question, had to clench her teeth to stop herself retorting. But Bertha was happy. She hummed to herself all day and once or twice Eliza caught her standing and just gazing into the distance with a small smile hovering on her lips.
‘Charlie says we can get wed in October, maybe. That’s after the harvest and before the threshing,’ said Bertha early one morning before Eliza set out on her rounds. Eliza paused in packing her bag and stared at her.