Tangled Threads

by Margaret Dickinson

  Now, as she sat down to write, Eveleen thought, At least I don’t have to pretend for a few moments. At least I am writing this as myself.

  Dear Mr Carpenter, she wrote. Jimmy tells me that you have been asking most kindly after me, for which I thank you. She hesitated to write anything about her Gran. Suddenly, she felt overcome with a strong sense of superstition. What if by acting out her grandmother’s illness, she made it become a reality? Was she tempting Fate? Then Eveleen shook herself and put such fanciful notions out of her head. I can’t say when I’ll be back so if you have to let my job go, I shall understand. As the days passed, Eveleen was increasingly sure that Jimmy would not come home. And she wanted to try to be as fair as she could to Mr Carpenter. She was deceiving him enough already, her guilty conscience reminded her.

  I also want to thank you so much, she went on, for getting us the stocking-machine. I hear that Mr Martin has finished repairing it and Rebecca is thrilled. She is making stockings faster than we can find people to buy them. With many thanks, yours sincerely, Eveleen Hardcastle.

  She read the letter through three times before she was satisfied that she had not made any glaring mistakes.

  She folded the paper into four and wrote on the outside Mr Carpenter – Personal and then laid it on the table for ‘Jimmy’ to deliver the following morning.

  Thirty-Nine

  It was not Josh Carpenter who caused Eveleen any awkward moments the following day, but Richard Stokes.

  Brinsley Stokes and his son, making their daily rounds through the factory, passed close to where Eveleen was working. Glancing up she saw them approaching and, fascinated to see the man who had once been her mother’s lover close to, she stared at Mr Stokes senior. He did not appear to notice her scrutiny, but the son paused by her machine, a slight frown of puzzlement creasing his forehead. So intent had been her concentration upon the father that when Richard spoke to her she jumped.

  ‘You’re new here, aren’t you? How long have you been here?’

  ‘Couple of weeks, mister,’ she said in the offhand way her brother would have answered.

  The young man was still frowning. Close to, he was even handsomer than she had thought him the day she had seen him in the women’s workroom. His hair was like jet, smooth and shining. His skin was dark, his jawline was strong and clearly defined. His thick black eyebrows were a gentle arch, but it was his dark brown eyes, so like her own, that caught and held her attention. He smiled at her now and the tanned skin around his eyes wrinkled endearingly with laughter lines.

  ‘You seem familiar,’ he murmured. ‘Have I seen you before?’

  Eveleen’s heart was in her mouth. He knew her. He recognized her from the workroom and now she was about to be unmasked.

  She manufactured a shrug. ‘Dunno,’ she muttered. ‘You might have.’ Then, a little belligerently, she added, ‘I’ve been stood here for the past two weeks at this machine and you come every day.’

  ‘Mm,’ he said, seeming to accept her reasoning, but his thoughtful gaze was still upon her. ‘Possibly.’ His frown deepened. ‘But there’s something about you. You look . . .’ Then he appeared to shake himself and laughed. ‘I must be imagining it. For a moment, I thought . . .’ He laughed again and added, ‘Oh well, never mind what I thought.’

  As he moved away, Eveleen’s heart was hammering so loudly inside her chest she thought that he must hear it even above the noise of the machinery around them. She could easily guess what had been in his mind. He thought that the young lad standing at the lace-making machine was remarkably like a girl he had seen in the women’s workroom.

  Well, I am, Eveleen reminded herself. I mean, I am even if it really was Jimmy standing here. But somehow she had the uncomfortable feeling that Richard Stokes had seen something more than just the likeness that had always been between the brother and sister. He had looked so deeply into her eyes that the depths of her soul had trembled.

  He was very good-looking. Nice looking, she thought, not just handsome. He’s got kind eyes – warm brown eyes, not cold blue ones. Then she reminded herself sharply that she had better concentrate on her work. She didn’t want to slip back into Jimmy’s ways and lose Luke’s respect. It had been hard enough to earn after Jimmy’s careless start. One more mistake and she could be out of a job.

  Besides, she reminded herself fiercely, she wanted nothing to do with handsome young men. But the girl inside the boy’s outward appearance was startled by the sudden stab of disappointment she felt that Richard Stokes could no longer see her as a woman.

  He came again the following day and the day after that. And always he paused beside her workplace, allowing his father to move ahead out of earshot while he spoke to her.

  On the third day, he was smiling broadly as he approached her.

  ‘Now I know why I thought you seemed familiar,’ he said at once. ‘Mr Carpenter has just been telling me about your sister in the workroom. I saw her in there a week or two back.’ He winked conspiratorially and leaned closer. ‘Such a pretty girl. Marvellous hair.’

  Eveleen tried to adopt the expression that she knew would have been on Jimmy’s face. A slightly sneering, disbelieving look. Never in a million years would Jimmy have acknowledged that his sister was remotely nice-looking, never mind pretty!

  Eveleen shrugged and said gruffly, ‘She’s all right, I suppose. Got a temper on her, though.’

  ‘Mm.’ Richard was looking keenly at her. Even now Eveleen had the uncomfortable feeling that somehow he was disbelieving the evidence in front of his eyes. ‘Well, perhaps she has reason,’ he said in softer tones, so that, above the noise, Eveleen did not hear his words. Working in the machine shop, however, she was fast becoming adept at lip-reading and so guessed what he had said. In reply, she gave the nonchalant laugh of her brother.

  Richard was leaning closer again. ‘When you see her, give her my best wishes and tell her I hope your grandmother will soon be well enough for her to return to us.’ He nodded, stepped back and then moved away, walking down the aisle between the rows of machines with an easy grace.

  Despite her vow to have nothing to do with handsome young men and the impulsive and dramatic change in her persona, Eveleen began to look forward to Richard’s visits to the factory each day. He would smile and nod to her though he would not always stop to speak. Often Eveleen was too busy to pause in her work, but she was always very aware of his nearness.

  Against her will, she began to watch the doorway for his arrival, and more than once was reprimanded by Luke for inattention.

  ‘You’re slipping back into your bad ways,’ he grumbled. ‘I’ll have to tell Bob Porter about you if you don’t buck your ideas up. I’ve my own job to think about, y’know.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Eveleen said, uncharacteristically as Jimmy. Luke cast a sideways glance at her and Eveleen could have kicked herself, not only for her inattention at her work but for allowing herself to think about Richard Stokes.

  For the remainder of that week she refused to glance at him when he paused at the end of the long machine.

  But always, even without looking up, she was acutely conscious of his presence.

  A week later it was Richard who caused her to make her most disastrous mistake yet – even by Jimmy’s standards. It was ironic that she had been so intent upon her work that she had not seen him enter the machine shop and was unaware of him until she felt him touch her shoulder.

  She jumped physically and, to her chagrin, gave a girlish gasp. But Richard was smiling and mouthing the words, ‘How’s your sister? Any news?’

  Eveleen shook her head and Richard shrugged, raised his hand in acknowledgement and moved away.

  Her gaze followed him.

  Suddenly she felt a clout across the back of her head that sent her reeling and she fell to her knees in the aisle between the rows of machines.

  Luke was standing over her, his face purple with rage and roaring at the top of his voice above the noise.

  ‘Look w
hat you’ve done.’

  Eveleen scrambled up. To her horror a thread had broken and she had failed to notice it. Now a flaw was running the length of the fabric.

  ‘That’s it, I’ve had enough of you. I’m telling Bob Porter to fire you. I thought you’d mended your ways, but the first few days you were here I had my doubts about you. Seems I was right all along.’

  Eveleen felt her face grow crimson as Luke’s tirade continued. There was nothing she could do to prevent the girlish blush.

  ‘You’ve had enough chances now,’ the man went on waving his fist in her face. ‘You’re out.’

  ‘Hold on a minute,’ a voice spoke behind them and they both turned to see Josh Carpenter standing there, a letter in his hand. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘It’s this young lad. He’s useless.’

  ‘But you told me only last Friday that he was shaping up much better.’ Josh glanced worriedly from one to the other. ‘My office when your shift ends – both of you.’

  He turned away, still carrying the letter, which, Eveleen was sure, had been another addressed to her.

  She turned to Luke unable to stop tears glimmering in her eyes. ‘I’ll put it right, I promise.’

  ‘Pigs might fly,’ he grunted. ‘Well, I’m not letting my work go to the inspection room like that. They’ll likely try to get my pay docked.’

  ‘I’ll mend it. I—’

  Luke shot her a strange glance. ‘That’s women’s work. Know someone who’ll do it for you, do you?’

  Eveleen bit her lip but did not answer. Even if she risked revealing her identity she intended to repair the long mend, as they called the flaw.

  When the length of lace came off the machine, Eveleen bundled it up and, at the end of her shift, carried it with her as she and Luke Manning walked side by side to Josh Carpenter’s office.

  ‘So, what’s all the trouble?’ Josh was frowning, his face even redder than usual as he mopped at his brow with a large, greyish handkerchief.

  ‘No trouble, sir,’ Luke said smoothly. ‘Not now.’

  ‘Well, what was the trouble then? Come on, I want to know. I saw you clout this young lad. You’re not the sort to do that, Luke, without good reason. I know that.’

  Although she kept her voice gruff and resentful, Eveleen could no longer stay totally in Jimmy’s character. She liked Luke and it had been her foolishness that had caused the problem.

  Damn and blast all handsome young men, she thought, including Richard Stokes.

  ‘It was my fault, Mr Carpenter. A thread broke and I didn’t notice it.’ She indicated the fabric she was carrying. ‘But I’ll get it mended.’

  For a moment, Josh’s jowls sagged sorrowfully. ‘If your sister were here, lad, she’d mend it.’ He glanced up at Luke. ‘Lovely worker, she is.’

  ‘Aye, well, we all mek mistakes. And if he can get it mended . . .’ Luke, his anger gone, was now prepared to champion his young apprentice.

  Josh leant back in his chair and linked his podgy fingers across his belly. ‘So you’re prepared to give him another chance.’ Josh’s tone seemed to Eveleen to be more of a statement than a question. Luke must have noticed it too, for he said deferentially, ‘If you think I should, sir.’

  Josh looked sternly at Eveleen. ‘As long as you’ll be more careful in future and keep your mind on your work, lad.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Eveleen whispered. ‘Thank you, sir.’

  Josh leant forward again. ‘That’ll be all, Luke, thank you.’

  As Eveleen turned to leave too, Josh said, ‘A moment, lad, if you please.’

  When Luke had left the office, Josh handed the letter across his desk. ‘Take this to your sister when you see her again, will you?’

  Eveleen merely nodded as she took the envelope. She could not, at this moment, trust herself to speak. So guilty did she feel that she was on the verge of breaking down and confessing her deception.

  As she escaped into the passage outside, she found Luke was waiting for her. ‘Looks like you’ve got a champion, boy.’ His tone was friendly again, his earlier anger forgotten, but as he put his hand on Eveleen’s shoulder and walked alongside her out of the factory, he said, ‘Or is it your sister that old bugger’s interested in, eh?’ When Eveleen did not reply – she did not know what to say – Luke dropped his hand and added, ‘Well, just you tell that lass of yours to mind herself with him. See you tomorrow, bright and early.’

  Eveleen nodded. ‘Thanks, Mr Manning.’

  Again, just briefly, there was a strange look in his eyes as he said, with a veiled warning, ‘And no more chatting when we have – er – visitors round the factory, eh?’

  Eveleen’s heart skipped a beat. It was obvious that Richard’s attentions had not gone unnoticed. At once Eveleen said, ‘Mr Richard was asking me about me sister an’ all.’ Feigning resentment, she added, ‘Can’t think why.’

  Now Luke laughed and there was a look of relief in his eyes. ‘From what I’ve heard, your sister’s a very pretty girl. Can’t say I’ve seen her but it sounds as if I’ve missed something if even Mr Richard’s asking after her welfare. She must be summat special.’

  They had reached the gates and Luke turned in the opposite direction to the way Eveleen went.

  Still chuckling, Luke shouted, ‘Tarr-ra,’ leaving Eveleen standing very still, staring after him.

  His remarks had left her with a warm glow and, despite her resolve, the image of Richard Stokes’s handsome face was in her mind’s eye.

  Forty

  There was little privacy in the house in Foundry Yard so Eveleen waited until her mother and Rebecca had gone upstairs before she pulled the letter from her pocket and opened it.

  Dear Eveleen, Josh had written in forward sloping script. I am sorry that your grandmother’s illness keeps you from us. We miss your lovely smile. Eveleen drew in a sharp breath. The word ‘We’ had obviously been altered from ‘I ’ and all that the single letter implied.

  ‘Oh no,’ she groaned aloud to the dying embers in the grate and the soft lamplight. ‘Don’t say they’re right and he really has got a thing for me?’

  She sighed. Was there no man who would be a true friend? Young or old, handsome or ugly? Were they all just after the one thing? Perhaps she was being naïve. Perhaps there was no such thing as a true friendship between the sexes.

  She read on. Don’t worry about your job. There’ll always be room for a good worker like you in our workroom. Your brother is shaping up very nicely now, Luke tells me. Maybe with you being away, a bit of responsibility is good for him. Although I hope that part of it doesn’t last for too long. I am so glad the Griswold is proving useful. I might be able to help with the selling of the socks. Tell your brother to bring some to show me and I’ll see what I can do. Take care of yourself and hurry back. With kind regards, Josh.

  The letter was innocent enough, she supposed, but then she gave an involuntary shudder. If it had fallen into the wrong hands, there was enough in the words to hint at something more. What factory manager, Eveleen asked herself candidly, writes to a lowly girl worker from the inspection room?

  They don’t, was her honest answer.

  She sat there until the embers had grown cold. By the time she rose from the chair and went up the stairs she had decided that she would not reply to Josh’s letter, but then she caught sight of the pile of socks that Rebecca had made waiting for a buyer. Eveleen bit her lip. Just one more letter to thank him, she promised herself, and, as Jimmy, she would take some samples for Josh to see. After that, no more letters. As Jimmy, she might have to fend off his enquiries about Eveleen, but surely when she did not reply to any future correspondence from him and did not return to work, Josh would eventually forget about her.

  As she slid quietly into the bed she shared with her mother, Eveleen could not prevent a stab of disappointment as she realized the full extent of the charade she had undertaken.

  Never again could she talk to a man, any man, as a pretty, lively young girl.


  The pattern went on much the same for the next two weeks. Even though Josh answered her second letter immediately, this time Eveleen did not write back. She was managing to concentrate on her work, although she was intensely aware of his nearness whenever Richard Stokes was standing in the aisle close by her. And almost daily Josh would waylay her on her way into or out of the factory.

  ‘I’ve found an outlet for your cousin’s socks and stockings. Bring ’em all in tomorrow.’

  ‘Right,’ Eveleen said. ‘Ta.’

  And then, as he always did, Josh asked, ‘How is your sister? Any news?’

  Towards the end of the second week, as the shift ended, Josh handed her another letter as she was leaving.

  ‘Take this to your sister. You’ll be seeing her on Sunday?’

  ‘I dunno,’ she answered gruffly and shrugged.

  ‘Then tell me the address and I’ll post it,’ Josh said, his fingers closing again on the letter as if to retrieve it from her grasp.

  ‘No,’ Eveleen said swiftly, suddenly afraid. If letters started arriving in Ranters’ Row addressed to her from a strange man, her uncle’s view that she and all her family were destined for hell and damnation would be justified in his eyes.

  ‘I’ll take it to her,’ she said brusquely, snatching it back from his reaching fingers. She pushed it into the depths of her pocket, crumpling the offending letter carelessly.

  Why, oh why, she asked silently, did he have to go on writing to her? It’s your own fault, a small voice inside her head answered. You shouldn’t have encouraged him. You should never have replied to his letter in the first place. You should have killed this before it even started.

  Several men passing by had witnessed Josh handing the letter to her but Eveleen walked out boldly with the rest of the workers. To try to avoid them, to linger behind until they’d all left, would look even more suspicious. So, pushing her hands into her pockets, she walked jauntily out of the gates and set off for home.

  They were waiting for her round the corner at the end of the street. A gang of lads and one or two of the older men from the machine shop.