The Stony Path

by Rita Bradshaw

  ‘Eee, don’t you worry, lass, I’ll take it,’ Betsy said as Ruth went to help her. ‘Weighs nowt more than half a sack of spuds or a basket of wet washin’ fresh from the mangle.’

  There was only dappled sunlight on the landing besides Emily, and once they were all ensconced in Polly’s room, and Polly was sitting feeding Alice, Betsy pushed the box under the bed and Ruth covered it with a blanket just to be sure, although it was not visible to anyone standing in the room.

  ‘I’ll go an’ finish in your mam’s room, lass, an’ then I’ll be back,’ Betsy said. ‘Don’t want her nosin’ about before we’re straight. Come on, Emily.’

  ‘And I’ll go down and make a cup of tea for us all for when you’ve finished,’ Ruth put in swiftly. ‘I’ll bring it up here with that seed cake you made yesterday, Betsy, and we’ll have a little celebration.’

  They all beamed at her as they filed out, and Polly beamed back. Aye, she was rich all right, and she wanted Alice to grow up surrounded by all this love, and why not? Aye, why not indeed? she thought as Alice continued to suckle and the vista beyond the window was bathed in mellow golden sunlight. She could make this money work for them, for them all. Luke could leave the pit for good, and it would enable him to follow the desire of his heart and get involved in local politics to begin with. He could educate himself further, do whatever was necessary, and then . . . who knew? The sky was the limit. Money opened doors. It wasn’t right maybe, but that was the way of the world, and the social reforms that Luke and others were already working and fighting for might come to pass all the quicker.

  She and Luke could buy a nice house, a big house, but not just for themselves. Ruth could live with them, Betsy and Emily too, and she and the three other women could run the place as a boarding house to begin with – she had had practice enough back on her grandda’s farm. And then, once Luke was established and if things turned out well, they could maybe think about taking in non-paying guests – a sort of halfway house for needy or destitute families, perhaps? There was a need, a desperate need for such places. She didn’t quite know how the mechanics of such an operation would work, but all that could be sorted out later – for the moment, it was enough that it could happen. And it could, oh, it could.

  A few minutes later the others came bustling back and Polly reflected that her mother couldn’t fail to be suspicious of the glow on their faces if she saw them. All three women were positively bursting with excitement.

  ‘You know what this means, don’t you?’ Polly said once they were drinking tea and eating cake. ‘We’re all free of the farm and the past – we can make our own life, all of us, if we want to.’

  ‘I’m not with you, lass,’ Betsy said bemusedly.

  ‘Oh yes you are, Betsy.’ And now Polly’s face was alight too. ‘You’re with me all right, the same as Ruth and Emily are. If you want to you can leave here, and soon, as quickly as I can arrange things.’

  ‘Have you gone doolally, lass?’

  ‘Probably, but it feels wonderful!’

  ‘Polly, what exactly are you saying?’ Ruth asked softly.

  She quickly outlined her thoughts to them, and as their mouths dropped open, one by one, it was truly comical. ‘We can set the boarding house up as a business between us all,’ Polly said eagerly, ‘and we’ll have it stated in writing legally by Mr Johnson. Then any profits – as well as the hard work and worry a business entails – can be shared by us all.’

  ‘I don’t know what to say, lass.’ Betsy looked to be near tears, and then she dug Emily in the ribs as she added, her voice stronger, ‘An’ stop your blubbin’, you! You oughta be down on your knees thankin’ God for today, not bawlin’ your eyes out.’

  ‘Do you think Luke will agree to you sharing with us?’ Ruth asked quietly.

  ‘Oh, yes.’

  ‘He might not. He might think you’re being far too generous.’

  ‘Not Luke,’ Polly said positively. ‘He’s the only man I know who has always put his money where his mouth is. He’s a man for the people, Ruth, that’s the only way I can explain it. He’ll make a difference, I know he will, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s a Member of Parliament one day. Times are changing, and fast; you ought to hear him talk the last few nights. He’s . . . he’s wonderful.’

  ‘When are you going to tell him?’

  ‘Now, today. I want you to help me get Alice dressed and ready for a drive, and I’m going to pack enough to tide us over until I can get everything I need picked up.’ And to the chorus of protest that immediately ensued, Polly added, ‘I can’t stay here another day,’ in a tone of voice that quietened the others.

  ‘But, lass, you’re not well enough,’ said Betsy soberly.

  ‘Ruth will come with me.’ Polly stretched out her hand to her sister, and as Ruth clasped it, Polly said, ‘We’ll stay in town somewhere, we’re not exactly short of cash,’ and they both laughed with the shrillness of nervous excitement. ‘And then once everything is ready, we’ll send for you and Emily.’

  ‘But you shouldn’t be out of bed for another two weeks!’

  ‘I don’t think I’ve ever done what I was told to do, Betsy, just what I felt I had to,’ Polly said with a big grin. ‘And I need to do this. I . . . I have to get away from my mother.’ And here the smile faded. ‘She means Alice harm, I can feel it in my bones.’

  Betsy would have liked to reassure Polly she was merely in the grip of a first rush of fiercely protective maternal love, but in all honesty she could not. Hilda had all the natural motherly instincts of a spitting cobra, and was the reason Betsy herself had slept with one ear cocked since the little one had been born. She would never forget the wild exultation on Hilda’s face when Polly had gone into premature labour, or the almost insane rage when she had discovered the child was alive. Her own granddaughter! She felt a little shiver slither down her spine. Perhaps it was best Polly left today, even though she was still middling.

  When Emily went to find Croft in order that the horse and cart – the trap not being large enough to accommodate both women and the luggage they would take – could be harnessed, she found he was dealing with one of the large beasts down in the far field, and so it was into the afternoon before they were ready. Hilda had been back in her own quarters since mid morning, and whilst the house was quiet, Betsy had helped Ruth pack a large trunk with the women’s clothing and night attire – the contents of the tin box now secure under several pairs of Ruth’s calico drawers and petticoats – along with a small portmanteau holding items for Alice.

  It was just touching three o’clock when Polly, feeling a little shaky but determined to leave, began to descend the staircase, Ruth a step or so behind her with Alice in her arms, and Betsy and Emily carrying the trunk between them with the portmanteau tucked under Betsy’s other arm.

  Polly had just reached the foot of the stairs when the door of the sitting room opened and Hilda stood framed on the threshold. Polly heard her sister gasp, but she herself was not surprised. This confrontation had had to come; whether by accident or when Hilda had seen them leave from her vantage point in the rooms overlooking the front garden and farmyard.

  ‘Aha! I knew something was going on.’ Hilda advanced on Polly, one arm pointing in a theatrical gesture. ‘Those two –’ here she waved a disparaging hand at Betsy and Emily – ‘are as transparent as glass.’

  ‘They clearly haven’t got your gift of duplicity, Mother.’ As Polly faced this woman who had, in one way or another, been the bane of her life ever since she could remember, she felt none of the turmoil normally associated with a head-to-head encounter with her mother. Hilda’s vindictiveness regarding Luke, her desire to incriminate him, had finally cut the emotional umbilical cord, and it had happened that day Polly had discovered her mother’s scheming to have Luke arrested. There was nothing left any more.

  ‘And what does that mean?’

  ‘You knew your stepbrother cheated my grandparents out of what was rightfully theirs, didn’t
you?’ Polly said steadily. And as her mother’s face betrayed her guilt, Polly added quietly, ‘I pray to God there is no part of you in me. I’m leaving, Mother, and Ruth is coming with me. You can call this your home for as long as you live, and I hope playing the mistress brings you pleasure, because that is the only pleasure you will know. There will be no children or grandchildren to alleviate your isolation, no one to love you. Perhaps I ought to feel sorry for you, but in all truthfulness I don’t.’

  ‘You’re leaving?’ Her mother’s eyes had opened wide. Whatever she had been expecting, it clearly wasn’t this latest development. ‘But . . . the farm . . .’

  ‘Croft will take care of the running of the farm; he’s been doing it for years anyway whilst Frederick played the gentleman at his club and with his hunt cronies.’

  ‘Croft!’ It was a snort. ‘You’re mad, girl! Croft’s not capable—’

  ‘Croft is extremely capable,’ Polly interrupted evenly, ‘and I shall be sending a tutor to the farm every week for the foreseeable future to teach him the elementaries regarding accounts and such. Frederick believed in keeping his workers illiterate where he could; I do not. Croft knows his letters but he needs further instruction, and I intend to see that he – and any of the others who wish to avail themselves of the opportunity – receive it. Croft will report to me on a monthly basis until Alice reaches the age of twenty-one and is able to decide whether she wishes to run the farm herself or sell it. Should anything happen to me before then, Ruth will assume responsibility.’

  ‘You can’t do this!’

  ‘Oh yes I can, Mother.’ Hilda was now poised in the doorway as though she was going to fly at her again, but strangely Polly knew no fear or even apprehension. This was a bitter, cruel-natured woman and she was never going to let her intimidate her again. ‘The profits from the farm will be ploughed back into improving conditions, by the way, the first stage of that being new accommodation for Croft and the others.’

  The glare Hilda was levelling at her daughter should have killed Polly on the spot, and Polly was aware of the three women behind her moving protectively round her in a little cluster as her mother hissed, ‘And they say whoring doesn’t pay! By, you could teach some of them sorts down by the dockside a thing or two. You’re scum, girl, scum – like your father before you. And I shall pray to God that He’ll bring you to an end like Henry’s, dangling on the end of a rope with your eyes bulging and your tongue hanging out. You and your flyblow with you.’

  As Betsy went to spring towards Hilda, Polly stopped her with the flat of her hand without taking her eyes off the contorted face of the woman in front of her. ‘My daughter and I will live long and contented lives with the man I love,’ she said, unable to keep the slight tremor her mother’s venom had produced out of her voice, although her head was high and her back was straight. ‘And we’ll be surrounded by family and friends.’

  ‘In a miner’s cottage? Huh!’ Hilda ground out through clenched teeth. ‘More fool you. You’ll soon be tired of him, girl.’

  ‘Goodbye, Mother.’ She would never set foot in this place again. Let Alice do what she wanted with it when she was of an age to come into her inheritance, but she would never come back to Stone Farm, Polly thought, as she turned and walked out of the front door, Ruth just behind her and Betsy and Emily making up the rear.

  Croft was waiting at the entrance to the farmyard, and he came hurrying up to them, helping her over the cobbles and up into the seat at the front of the cart before he did the same with Ruth and Alice, and then placed the trunk and portmanteau in the back of it.

  ‘It will just be a few weeks till I find the right place.’ Polly was bending down to Betsy, who had tears rolling down her face now. ‘And then we’ll all be together for good.’

  ‘God bless you, lass. God bless you.’

  And then the horse was trotting off and Polly straightened in the seat, breathing deeply of the clean summer air as she smiled at Ruth. She had done it. She was leaving. Going to a new life, a new beginning.

  And then she saw him. Walking down the stony path towards them. A tall, dark figure with his cloth jacket slung over his shoulder and his shirt sleeves rolled up in the brilliant sunshine.

  ‘Luke . . .’ His name was a whisper on the soft summer breeze, and then, more strongly, ‘Luke, oh, Luke.’

  She told Croft to stop the horse and was down from the seat before he could help her, and then she was running and stumbling, and Luke – after one short moment of surprise – was running towards her too, his face expressing concern.

  Down the stony path she flew, her heart singing, and as she got nearer, the concern on his face was replaced by anticipation as he saw her glowing countenance. She ran straight into his arms and he lifted her off her feet for a second before saying, ‘What is it? What’s happened? I was on the early shift today so I thought I’d surprise you,’ before he kissed her, careless of the onlookers in the cart.

  ‘I’ve got so much to tell you, but I was coming to you,’ she said breathlessly as he raised his face from hers, her straw bonnet hanging on the back of her neck by its ribbons round her chin and her russet hair tumbling about her pink cheeks. ‘Me and Alice and Ruth, and later there’ll be Betsy and Emily too.’

  He blinked and then laughed, his head going back as he said, ‘Never one to do things by halves, not my Polly Farrow! Not my love.’

  ‘You don’t mind?’

  ‘Mind?’ He looked down into her azure eyes, stroking back the curls from her forehead as he said, ‘Sweetheart, I’d take the whole world on if it meant I’d have you too. We’ll manage, my love. Somehow we’ll manage.’

  She thought of the little bags lying secure in their hidey-hole in the trunk. They wouldn’t have to manage, but that explanation could come later. For now it was enough that he had come for her, that he loved her, that she was his.

  ‘There’s not another like you in the whole wide world, you know that, don’t you?’ Luke whispered lovingly. ‘But are you sure you want to do this today, so soon after having Alice? Are you sure you don’t want to stay at home a few days more?’

  She felt his strong arms around her, her hands resting on the sun-warmed rough cloth of his shirt, through which she could feel the steady beat of his heart, and the past with all its demons melted away. She raised her face to his, her mouth seeking his lips as she whispered, ‘I am home.’

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Part 1 – The Children 1902

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Part 2 – The Family 1906

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Part 3 – The Marriage 1911

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Part 4 – The Child 1912

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three