The Silk Factory

by Judith Allnatt

  After their meeting on the day that the boxes of snowdrops had toppled, he had returned each day at the same time, as if his ride always took him along the same route and coincided with the departure of the carter, so that they might walk together from the nuttery. She had been shy and cautious at first but he had asked her many questions. He said that he knew nothing about these parts and had enquired about the countryside around them and the history of the villages, to draw her into conversation. She found herself telling him where the source of the river was to be found, bubbling up from underground beneath a path near the woods, and the stories of the lords and ladies entombed in the churches, their sleeping alabaster effigies carved so fine you could trace the strands of the lords’ beards or the embroidered flowers on the ladies’ bodices. He had spoken of his family and his boyhood in Oakley, until her reserve broke down and she told him of her father’s work as carpenter for Hob Talbot’s estate, for which he needed to read, write and figure, for measuring and the drawing up of plans. He had taught her mother, who in turn had taught Effie, for her father believed that learning was a way out of poverty for the common man and that it should be the birthright of all, for all were equal in the eyes of the Lord. He had written, in the front of their family Bible, the words of the old radical, John Ball: When Adam delved and Eve span, Who was then the gentleman? Effie had smiled as she told him this; partly at the memory of how readily her father used to quote it and partly in recognition of how she could bandy words with Jack quite happily on subjects that others would assume beyond her station both as a woman and as a common farmhand. His interest and his easy conversation made her forget the difference in their stations.

  She had told him Tobias and Beulah’s names and ages, proudly, as if she were their mother, and a little of their natures and accomplishments: Beulah swift to smile or anger and quick to learn her letters; Tobias, less interested in book-learning than craft and skill and, at fourteen, leaving boyish things behind, determined to become a master weaver and raise their lot. Here she had stopped though, as she wished to say nothing of the family’s money troubles.

  Then one day Jack had not come and she had walked home alone, realising for the first time how much she had come to look forward to their exchanges and berating herself for letting her heart soften over a soldier. An hour later, as she struggled from the well behind the house with a pail whose handle almost froze to her skin, she had heard a knocking at the door and, rounding the corner, had come upon Maisie tied to the gatepost and Jack at her door, raising his hand hesitantly to knock again. ‘Maisie threw a shoe,’ he said ruefully. ‘So it was Shanks’s pony for me.’ He looked perished.

  Effie had stood there at a loss, blushing that he should see the state of the cottage in which they lived, clutching the bucket before her as if she could hide behind it and her shame be swallowed up.

  ‘Forgive me for calling on you without an invitation,’ he said, ‘but I was so disappointed not to see you.’ He looked at her with his hopeful, open expression. ‘I thought you might wonder where I was.’ He stepped forward. ‘Please – let me carry that for you,’ and she relinquished the bucket and found herself opening the door so that he could take it to the fireside for her.

  Remembering her manners, she offered him refreshment, apologising that she only had small beer and oat bread in the house and he said that he would only take it if she let him ‘earn his keep’ by replenishing the woodpile for her. He led Maisie into the neighbouring derelict cottage, drew water for the horse and rubbed her down before setting to work splitting logs, while Effie took the chance to set the room a little straighter and cheer the fire.

  As they sat together at the deal table, breaking bread and talking, Effie put from her mind all thought of the piles of washing yet to do, of the tin in which too few coins rattled, of the pantry cupboard empty save for some carrots and a few potatoes that would barely make a soup. For a short, glorious hour she was neither labourer nor tenant, nor washerwoman nor stand-in mother, but simply a woman talking and laughing with a man. His attention warmed her as thoroughly as the fire, a prickle of excitement on her skin as sudden and unexpected as the rising sparks thrown by the crackling logs.

  At length he apologised that he must leave as he had a duty that afternoon to oversee a delivery of a thousand muskets from Birmingham, to replace those sent recently to London. ‘I must make haste, as I shall have to lead Maisie,’ he said, ‘although I had much rather stay.’ At the door, he had taken her hand and, as their eyes met, he had raised it to his lips, holding her gaze. Although she knew that this was the gentry’s farewell to a lady, she had felt that his eyes and his touch were more ardent than form required. She returned to her work all of a dither: sorting the washing all wrong so that wool and worsted got in with the cottons and letting the copper boil over, nearly putting out the fire.

  Since then he had visited almost every day, staying for as long as his duties would allow. Each time he helped her with whatever task she had on hand, until Tobias noticed the growing woodpile and the mended chicken coop and commented that she need not take over his chores and, rather haughtily, that it was a man’s work. After that, she only allowed Jack to draw water for her, so that no trace should be left of his presence.

  He began to bring gifts. First he brought a pair of gloves that he said were to protect her hands when she was working at the nuttery but, although they were soft, pliable leather, she knew that, wearing them, she would not be able to feel the slender stems of the snowdrops, thin as grass, and so had not been able to use them. If she had come by them any other way she could have sold them and the family could have eaten well on the proceeds, but instead she had laid them away at the bottom of the clothes chest: guilty treasures. Yesterday, as he was about to leave, he had brought out a parcel wrapped in crackling paper: a shawl of pale mauve wool woven so fine that when she held it up the light shone through, revealing a delicate cobweb pattern. ‘It’s the loveliest thing!’ she’d exclaimed. ‘But I couldn’t wear it. Everyone would know I had a follower. It’s far too good for me, anyway.’

  He had placed it around her shoulders and taken her by the hands, holding her at arm’s length the better to look at her. ‘Never say that. Nothing is too good for you, dearest Effie,’ he’d said, looking gravely into her eyes. Then he had drawn her towards him and they had kissed; a long kiss that had left her breathless and quivering when they drew apart. He had touched her hair, laying a shining strand against the pale wool before kissing her again on the forehead, like a blessing, and taking his leave.

  She had said nothing to Tobias or Beulah of Jack’s visits. She had been concerned when he had been calling at the nuttery to find her, in case any of the other women should be lingering or the carter with his suspicious looks should still be there. There were plenty in the village who gossiped and some who envied her the cottage, however humble, and said that her family had no right to it after her father died. They said that it should have been given to one of the other labourers, usually citing their own kin in particular, and that orphans belonged in the workhouse. Effie feared that a rumour reaching Hob suggesting anything less than blameless behaviour on her part could bring that state about all too quickly.

  She lived from day to day, longing to see Jack. She was glad that now he visited her at home, where the track led nowhere other than her house and no one had any reason to come, but at the same time she knew that should he be discovered there it would be near impossible to pass his visit off as chance. The risk of discovery was less but the circumstances more damning. Far better that Tobias and Beulah knew nothing, for what they didn’t know, they couldn’t let slip.

  For the umpteenth time, Effie bent to replenish the tiny pen filler ready to dribble a little more on to the back of the lamb’s tongue and rub its throat to encourage it to swallow. There was a scuffling with the latch and Martin, the shepherd, came in with a gust of freezing air that almost blew out the tiny fire. He pulled the door closed behind him, making the
flames bend and dance, and strode over to hold his broad hands out over its meagre warmth. ‘Oh, ’tis bitter cold, m’duck – colder’n a dog’s nose, a woman’s knees or a man’s behind.’ The snow dripping from his sleeves made the fire hiss and sputter. He nodded at the lamb. ‘There’s still life in ’er then?’

  Effie nodded. ‘She’s thawed out and taken a fair bit.’ She stroked the lamb’s ears.

  ‘You’m the same patience as your father, God rest ’im. We worked alongside each other twenty year and he’d allus stick at a job ’til it were done.’ The shepherd squatted down and lifted the animal’s chin. ‘Eyes’re bright enough,’ he said. The lamb stretched out its neck and let out a long bleating cry. He stood again. ‘Bring ’er along. There’s summat I want to try.’

  Effie gathered the sacking around the lamb and followed him from the cottage into the whirling whiteness. The wind took her breath away so that she must put her head down and gasp, and the snow stung her cheeks and eyes: gritty particles of ice rather than soft flakes. The shepherd’s heavy boots sank in, leaving holes in the snow that Effie stepped into, in a vain attempt not to overtop her own button boots. Ice water seeped in at the eyelets and through the holes in one sole and her teeth began to chatter.

  They reached the fold; Martin called to one of the men to open the gate and they sidled quickly through and got in amongst the wet press of sheep. Hob and one of the labourers were busy examining the ewes and dividing them into two separate pens: one for those whose udders had dropped, showing that their time was close, and the other for those that still had some way to go. When Hob caught sight of Effie, he paused and straightened up to get a better look at her.

  A well-built man in his mid-forties, his thick dark hair was still only a little grey and good food and comfortable living had kept him in rude health; he cut a fine bulky figure, swathed in his great coat. He was known in the village as a man of appetites: a big drinker, a hard hunter who had an eye for the women; last year a dairymaid, Susannah Cleave, had been sent packing by the mistress, setting tongues clacking. He turned to give an order to the labourer, as if he were about to come over, and Effie’s heart sank. She wanted neither his attention nor the gossip that would attend it and she bent her head over the lamb, trying to avoid meeting his eye. Martin dropped back beside her and made some show of checking on the lamb.

  ‘You mind the maister,’ he said. ‘He’s one o’ they men as acts like the wife at home has her head up the chimney. You come along o’ me.’ He took her elbow and steered her over towards the lambing pens. Hob stayed where he was, his gaze following their progress around the edge of the flock.

  ‘This un’s the ewe we tried before.’ Martin pointed into one of the rough thatched shelters where a black-faced ewe stood ruminating, another lamb asleep in the straw at her feet. ‘Put the lamb in with ’er,’ he said, ‘I’ll be back presently.’ Effie did as she was bid and the lamb tottered a few steps and sank to its knees. She righted it and gave it a little push towards the ewe but the ewe showed no interest. She pushed the lamb closer but each time she tried it the ewe walked away.

  Martin returned with one of the dogs. ‘This un’s a good quiet un,’ he said. He put the collie into a pen two down from the ewe, with an empty pen between them. ‘He won’t bark or scare ’er something dreadful but having ’im there should make ’er feel a bit more motherly, like.’

  The ewe, sensing the threat, walked fast up and down the pen and then stood in front of her sleeping lamb, her nostrils flaring as she took in the scent of the dog. Effie found a patch of straw where the ewe had urinated and rubbed it over the orphan lamb’s back. Slowly she approached the ewe, set the lamb down on the straw in front of her and backed away. The ewe sniffed the new lamb, sniffed again and began to lick until the lamb struggled awkwardly to its feet. It swayed for a moment and then took a halting step forward. The ewe, its eyes still fixed upon the crouching dog, stood still and let it find the udder. The lamb found the teat and began to suck, weakly at first and then with eyes closed, ears laid back, its whole being concentrated on its awakening struggle for life.

  Effie and Martin exchanged a smile, Effie feeling the triumphant elation that a new life always brought. They leant on the hurdle watching for a few moments. ‘I reckon she’s taken to ’er now,’ Martin said. ‘I’d best get on and you’d best not stand about.’ He looked around to locate a farmhand working at a distance from the master and said, ‘Go on down and help Jones.’

  Effie made her way down the line of pens, tying her old worsted shawl tightly in front of her to leave her hands free for lambing. Beneath her clothes, her body was warm, wrapped in pale mauve wool. She could feel it as she moved, soft against her skin.

  Beulah stood at the long table in the kitchen at the back of the silk factory, peeling potatoes. Mrs Gundy, under whose supervision Beulah had been placed three weeks ago, was poking at a ham bone in a huge pot of boiling water, scraping off the scraps of meat that still adhered to it in order to make a thin stock in which the potatoes would be boiled and served to the workers as ‘broth’.

  Beulah’s legs ached from long standing and her fingers ached from long peeling but neither pain was as bad as the ache for the company of the other children still working upstairs. She had no understanding of why she had been singled out for this punishment, for punishment she was sure it was; she had seen the gleam in Fowler’s eye when he had told her that she was relieved of her bobbin-winding duties and would now be maid-of-all-work and like it. She had bitten back the urge to question why she must leave the others and he had stood over her as if waiting for her to speak, watching her like a cat with a mouse between its paws. She had cast her eyes down so that he shouldn’t see her dismay. ‘You are a sullen, ungrateful child,’ he’d said and, taking her by the arm, he’d pulled her roughly from the line and the frightened glances of the others and clattered down the stairs, hauling her behind him so that she stumbled and bumped her way down the steps and arrived in the kitchen close to tears. She had blinked them away. She would not cry in front of him. He peered into her face giving a sneering kind of smile and pushed her towards Mrs Gundy, saying, ‘Help in the kitchen and general errands, Mrs G. May be required for deliveries from time to time. To be kept busy fetching and carrying. Any idleness, send her directly to me.’

  Beulah peeled the last potato, dropped it into the bucket and added the peelings to the overflowing pail of pigswill beside her. Without turning round, Mrs Gundy said in her flat voice, ‘Take the slops out and then collect the eggs.’ Beulah hefted the pail up in front of her with the handle at her chest and struggled outside. The snow had stopped and the wind had dropped, leaving a blue sky and clear air sharp as spring water. The trees in the orchard were shapes outlined in white: the felled apple trees softly rounded, the new saplings straight and twiggy and the older trees sculptural in their twisted shapes, trunks patterned by peeling bark and patches of green and yellow lichen. The chicken house at the back of the orchard was topped with an eight-inch layer of snow, as if it had been crowned with a hat. The hens pecked around the dungheap for grubs and worms, tan feathers and red wattles bright glimpses of colour between the trees.

  Beulah gave good day to the carpenter as he passed her on his way in with a long length of timber; he was building shelves in the cellar in readiness for the trays that would eventually hold the silk worms, at Mr Fowler’s request. She tramped over a stretch of virgin snow, with its frozen crust that gave under her feet with a crunch into softer powder beneath. It pinched her toes in her holey boots and soaked her dress so that it clung to her ankles.

  The pig was a brute: a lumbering, snorting, stinking beast, and Beulah dared not go into the sty. The first time she’d done so, she’d almost been caught between its huge bulk and the wall and had been afraid she’d be crushed, for the hardest of pokes and shoves made no odds to the creature; its thick, sparse-haired hide seemed to have no feeling. Next time, she had searched around until she’d found an old barrel and upended
it beside the sty wall as a makeshift step.

  She rested the bucket on top of the wall, clambered up on to the barrel and tipped the slops over into the trough below, calling, ‘Pig-ho! Pig-ho!’ The pig emerged from the makeshift lean-to shelter, which consisted of an old door propped on its side against the wall. Its ears flopped over its eyes and its legs were covered in filth, giving it a comical look, Beulah thought, like a fat pink lady with long stockings. She stole a few moments to amuse herself by scratching its back with a stick, and watched it rub itself against the brick wall in an ecstasy of relief from itching. ‘You wicked creature!’ she said to it. ‘You greedy hog!’ becoming bold now that she was relieved of the need to get too near it.

  She perched herself on the wall and took a handful of straw from the grey pile beside the sty, to wipe out the bucket and then line it in preparation for egg collecting.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a movement among the trees of the orchard, but, turning to look, saw nothing but a blackbird hopping from branch to branch. She clambered down from the wall and made her way past the rows of sapling mulberry trees towards the hen house. She climbed the shallow ladder and ducked her head in through the low door. Once her eyes had grown accustomed to the dimness, she slipped her hand into each nesting place in turn to feel amongst the straw for the solid smoothness of an egg. She soon had a dozen or so and climbed back down, intending to search the other laying places she knew: in the hollows of the roots of certain apple trees and the sheltered nooks under the blackcurrant bushes.