by James Clarke
Shell stopped herself from touching her hair. A moth buzzed past and broke for freedom.
“Arthur’s broth—”
“I know who you are, daft bastard.”
She still couldn’t see him.
“So is he in?” Het said.
“Who?”
“Tha knows who.”
“Why?”
“Because he weren’t out for ballot, and don’t you go making excuses for him.”
“Well don’t you go telling me what to do on my own doorstep.”
Het’s voice rose, or perhaps he’d come closer to the house. “Most important night in years and he can’t be bothered to show his face. Is he in or what, Shell?”
“No he’s not and this is the first I’ve heard of it.”
“And you his wife.”
Shell’s fist caused the door chain to rattle. She stepped into the yard and said “Het you can either come in or leave off because I’m not standing in the cold while you mither me for something I know nothing of.”
Silence followed, the sound of gravel. Shell was about to head back indoors when the latch on the gate clicked and Het faltered into view. He was taller, more broad-shouldered and terse-faced than Arthur. Between his black donkey jacket, his dark hair and the night, Het looked stained by the coal he helped cut from the earth most days. A rubbery burn had scarred part of his neck and jaw and the left tip of his mouth. He touched the scar, as he often did when he was nervous. His hair was slicked to one side, Shell noticed, and that suited him. Everything suited Het.
“Sorry, love. It’s just—”
Shell chucked away her dog-end. “Don’t need to tell me what Arthur’s like.”
“I know that. I do.”
“An’ there’s no excuse for talking to me the way you just did.”
Het made to turn. “I’m sorry,” he said. “You’re right.”
“Oh, shut up. How are you anyway, stranger?”
“Not bad,” ventured Het. “Well, been better . . . in all honesty.”
In the kitchen she made them tea. Black with one sugar for him, strong with lots of milk for her. The teaspoon clinked against the plate of Arthur’s by now completely defrosted dinner.
“How did it go?” Shell said, knowing the answer, and when Het told her the strike was going ahead, said she was glad. Het accepted his drink and blew it cooler, causing the puckered stain on his neck to stretch. Shell was disappointed when he didn’t ask why she was glad, because she wasn’t really.
“Sorry for just turning up out the blue like this.”
“You’re all right. Not seen you for an age.”
It had been a long time. Their unfamiliar reflection was reminder enough of that. Caught within the frame of the window, they could have been in a painting: two people with china mugs, one balancing her chair on two legs, the other interlocking his fingers on the table. Het drank his tea. Shell drank hers.
“Good job it were you at the door,” Het said. “I might have cracked him one.”
“Wouldn’t have been first time.”
Het chuckled and emptied the tea into his mouth. It must have been scalding. “You’ve no idea where he might be?”
“Why do you wanna know?” said Shell, her initial surprise at Het’s appearance giving way to her suspicious nature.
“Just do.”
“Aye, but since when do you ever pop round for a chat?”
She went to the biscuit barrel, opened it and found nothing inside.
“Already said. He weren’t at ballot.”
“Aye well our Arthur never turns up to half union shite. And let’s face it, he’d skip his own funeral if he could.”
“Ah, Shell . . .”
“What?”
Het was smiling. Shell sat in the chair closest to him.
“Nothing, really. You just reminded me of what me mam used to say: there’s two kinds of people you don’t need to worry about if you’ve not seen them in an age. Those you can’t forget, and those who never change.”
“An’ which am I?”
“Oh, bit of both.”
Het’s knuckles were terrific things, like bolts, and Shell was surprised at her urge to reach out and touch them. She pinched her thigh under the table and said, “Well, believe it or not, I have changed. Unlike some.” She finally succumbed and touched her hair. “Once upon a time I’d have dragged from you what you wanted wi’ Arthur. Now I’m not bothered.”
She counted to five in her head.
“I just need to know he’s on board with everything,” Het said.
“What for?” asked Shell, suppressing a smile. “They’re only closing a few pits.”
“Serious?”
Casual shrug.
“Well if twenty thousand jobs is a few I’d hate to think what a lot is. And what about Cortonwood?” Het began picking at the skin around his fingernails. “Perfectly good pit is Cortonwood.”
Shell glanced over the table. Het looked unbelievably weary.
“I just don’t understand it,” he said.
“TV said only Yorkshire’s voted yes.”
“Rest’ll follow.”
“They’ve changed welfare.”
“Union’ll sort it.”
“Frigging union.”
“There’s power in a union,” said Het. “That’s why I’m here, ’cause this is important. I need to make sure our kid’s up for it, Shell, as if my own brother’s not . . . Well, it doesn’t exactly bode well, does it?”
“Never had you pegged as superstitious.”
“What I’m saying is if we can get everyone on board we’ll be fine. Six weeks and done, tops.”
Shell had never seen Het like this. She hadn’t seen him in years, really, not since she’d gotten married. Het and Arthur had fallen out after Sam was sent to borstal for putting their father in hospital. And who had Shell been to say anything? She was new to the family, just another woman with an opinion.
Het continued. “They’ll back down if everyone stands up,” he said, “they’d have to. Shutting working mines, it’s a deliberate attempt to provoke us. If a pit’s not exhausted or unsafe, it can’t be shut, let alone wi’out union say so.”
“Sounds like they can and not much anyone can do about it.”
“There flaming is.”
Smartened-up as he’d never been, Het was finally grinning. A working man, far too proud of it. The grin became a nod as he gestured to ask if he could use the toilet. Shell nodded, then, hand flat against her neck, exhaled loudly as Het left the room. Her stampeding pulse frightened her.
Het returned. Shell couldn’t help noticing the damp patches on his cords from where he’d wiped his hands after washing them. Or maybe it was piss, she thought.
“So he’ll be down pub?”
“Probably.”
“Which ones does he go in?”
“All of them.”
The living-room door opened and struck Het in the back. It was Lawrence, dressed in his parka, a red t-shirt and jeans.
“Uncle Het,” he said. “What’s he doing here, Mam?”
Het stared at Lawrence’s head.
“He’s after that father of yours,” Shell said. “Off out somewhere?”
“After us Dad, Het?”
“Right first time.”
“Well, he’s not in.”
Lawrence stepped properly into the room, spotting his trainers under the coffee table where he’d kicked them off earlier. He went over and began to pull them on.
“I can see that,” said Het.
“Er . . . Lawrence?” said Shell.
“He’s gone out,” said Lawrence to Het.
“All right, Sherlock . . .”
“An’ I know where he is.”
“What? Where?” said Shell.
“I’ll show you, Het. S’where I’m headed.”
“You’ve school tomorrow,” Shell insisted.
“This is important,” Het said, missing the look Shell gave him. “An’ I’ll keep an eye on him.”
They’d only ignore her if she didn’t give permission. Shell watched them bustle outside and hurry towards Het’s car. After they’d gone she went to the tissue box, extricated the bobble from her hair and shook her curls loose. The fags were finished so it was back to waiting. The bars of the fireplace throbbed their volcanic orange. She could not forget Het’s eyes. She pinched her thigh at the thought of them.
She pinched it as hard as she could.
3
There was a crusted pattern flecked across Arthur’s hand. It was too dark to see, but he could feel it.
And his knuckles hurt when he flexed his fingers. He was lying on the grass, in the countryside or maybe a garden, and the stars studded above him like beads. He was damp all over. He hated the damp.
He sat up to rub the wetter target-shapes on his back. He could taste iron, actually, wasn’t as drunk as before but still felt it, and how long had he been bleeding for?
There was the gargoyle, the marker overlooking Threndle House. Arthur groaned, sort-of-remembering resting against the warm metal counter of the chippy, dinner out of a newspaper by the bandstand, then the pub. Always the pub. Front teeth clacking the glass’ brim, sprawl of empties in front, alone because everyone else was at the welfare for the ballot. Every hand packed bolting to vote yes.
Every hand except his. Withered rollies and then the shop, pointing over the bloke’s shoulder at the serious stuff regimented like bottles in a shooting gallery. Arthur must have come here afterwards, wandering the grounds of Threndle House a firmer prospect than home.
He stood up, drunk. Was that smoke nearby? There could hardly be many fires going at this hour. Likely it was just mist.
The burning rug had made its mark. Arthur kept smelling it, its rank scent summarising his past-its-best marriage, Eau de Shite, a staleness such as came out of your hair when you washed it the morning after the night before.
When you still had hair, that was. Arthur circled the house until he felt the uneasy texture of broken glass under his feet. This must be the place, Threndle’s façade. One of the two panes of glass in the French doors had a hole in it. Arthur put his finger to the nasty edges. Was this his handy work? It had to be. After all, there was nobody else around.
He whistled. Delicious was the moment. They always were, visceral cigarette burns in the fabric of your day. Twisting the aerial from a car, tipping the bins over on your way home late at night, maintaining eye contact for that extra moment; doing something just for the pleasure of doing it when no one was around to catch you almost outweighed the desperate need to deny everything later on if ever questioned about the act. Arthur crouched. Here was proof of his presence: the neck of a bottle of white rum, broken off, the cap still screwed-on tight.
Now he remembered drinking the last of it, tightening the lid then throwing the empty bottle at the wall. Its detonation had zinged his face just as that coal lump at Brantford had done. Just as the firework had done on the 5th of November, 1957, when Het’s unforgettable scream tore through the Yorkshire air, seconds after The Mighty Atom blasted out of Sam’s hand and struck him in the jaw. Arthur was made to pay for that. He’d bought the fireworks and lit the Atom as Sam held it. “For a joke,” he’d wept. “I didn’t mean it.” His dad’s fist impacted on the bridge of his nose anyway.
“Fuck off.”
You could talk directly to the past when you wanted to. Arthur dropped the piece of bottle, licked his finger and weighed the options presenting themselves. Go home or go further. Bollocks or brains. Threndle House was the ancestral home of the Brantfords, who owned the pit before the whole industry went up the Litten Path, nationalised. Its windows felt almost unreal as he touched their stone surroundings, although he supposed everything felt a little fake when you really questioned it.
There was a longing inside of Arthur, and what could be done about that? He knew all about futility. All his life he’d done his best, and still he was a disappointment to his son. And as for Shell, thanks would be a fine thing. So they’d loved each other; she’d gotten pregnant. She was the one who wanted to do it all the time and hated rubber johnnies. Not to mention Arthur’s father always getting at them, constantly telling them how ashamed he was they weren’t married. Alec Newman refused to even look Shell’s parents in the eye until their children were wed. Shell didn’t have to listen to old Alec like Arthur did. She could have said no when the ring came out. And maybe she ought to have, if this was how she was going to be about it.
Fuck it. He pushed his hand through the hole in the French door’s window and reached for the key inside, finding nothing there. He belched, tasted rum, vomit and chips. He’d take a look around like he’d done on the night he found the moth rug. See what having the world on a fork got you. Let a politician be on the end of an executive decision for once. See how they bloody liked it.
He had to kick his way inside. This fucking living room was the size of the whole downstairs of his house, that igloo on Water Street. Everything was cast in blue. Arthur’s shadow pushed across the room’s cloaked features. He put his arms out so that his shadow looked like it had claws: a monster rising up the wall, sneaking up on the settee and the footstool, the sideboard, the piano, the armchair.
Those French doors had been locked tighter than he’d thought and now his foot was bloody killing him. He limped to the wall and managed to switch on the light, revealing an overcrowded room. Fancy wood with swirls in it. Raised wallpaper, dense carpet, a polished candelabra and cut glass. A large painting was there, too, and loads of boxes were piled up. Stacked and collected gubbins in every corner.
Arthur fixed himself a glass of port. He’d never liked it much but it was the kind of thing people drank in places like this, so he thought he should probably give it another go. He sank to the settee, drink slopping on to the cushions. The trick was to let your eyes close and your thoughts run. It was his mansion, his living-room. There was a gruff dog at his feet and the walls could have been made from wedding cake they were that white. Candles were lit everywhere, too. He’d wear a suit if he lived here. All day, every day. No tweed or worsted. A simple dinner black. The missus would be smiling by the piano. Shell. A younger Shell with bigger tits. Arthur knocked the port back and poured another. It tasted like cough syrup. He picked a candle up and put it down again, sparked it up then ran his finger along its length, into the swamp up top. Wax concealed his fingerprint. It was hot for a couple of seconds and then it was fine.
He opened his eyes. Same old Arthur. Couple of hundred quid a week Arthur. Shouting to make yourself heard Arthur. Sweating your tits off under halogen work lights Arthur. He took another sip of port, eased his shoe off and massaged his aching foot. Pain and swirling troubles were his lot, a life that would one day be lost that he’d never really had chance to start living.
After a while he shuffled into the atrium, stopping at the foot of the stairs to inhale the heavy smell of turps and white spirit. Threndle House felt deserted in the same way that schools do when the children have gone home for the day. In the same way that multi-storey car parks do when dusk falls.
There was a noise nearby that brought him back to Brantford, a persistent scrape similar to those made by the pit mice that first arrived in the hay bales when the ponies of old were still in use. Rodents in the districts, white-furred because they never saw natural light, chewing holes in your fucking butties if you ever made the mistake of putting them down. Arthur fumbled for another light switch, managed to find one and illuminated the hall, to be greeted by an ugly sight. Dust sheets bobbled with scrunches of masking tape were twisted into mad plaits up the floor, while padded fibreglass insulation the colour of intestines and a ta
bloid newspaper were scattered nearby. There were hunks of rubble and all kinds of detritus. The place was a bloody building site.
Arthur ran a hand along a wall covered by a landscape of part-stripped wallpaper, torn into bladed shapes, serrated peaks. Nearby a radio lay on its side with the battery panel open to reveal it had nothing to power it.
Down went the last of the port, only its rich taste mixed with the smell of turps made Arthur gag. He spat out his mouthful, leaving a thick puddle on the dusty tiles, and looked up to see an old mirror propped against the staircase.
He let the glass tumbler break on the floor, then knelt down so he could blink at his own reflection in the mirror and stick his tongue out, that overworked slab of grey meat.
He opened his mouth as wide as it would go and tensed his head until he could feel the blood in his temples going like the clappers and his face turning a boggling crimson. He used to do this in front of the old bedroom mirror when he was a kid after his classes with Miss Bose. Miss Bose, a retired local teacher who had way too much time on her hands, had been enlisted to help on Wednesday evenings because Arthur had a problem saying his ‘S’, or as his father put it, problems getting his mouth around what needed saying because he was otherwise satisfied getting it wrong.
Miss Bose’s services were paid for in kind: the three Newman boys to help her when she needed something doing. This might be a message delivering, a fence painting, her shopping fetching or her yard weeding. Old bird had aspic in the kitchen: a plate of opaque jelly with a boiled egg in it; pork pies or segments of spam. She devoured the Reader’s Digest and eschewed home remedies. She’d once held Arthur’s head over a can of tar because she said it would help with his chesty cough.
“New York, unique, unique New York,” said Arthur. That was one of the exercises Miss Bose used to have him say, walking from one end of her lounge to the other with an encyclopaedia balanced on his head.
“Red lorry, yellow lorry, red lorry, yellow lorry.”
That was another.
He’d hated her lessons at the time. Now he enjoyed thinking about them. He liked to think of Miss Bose. The plastic headscarf she wore, her rouge, the way she scrubbed soot from her front step with a donkey stone and swept the dust from the pavement, feathered her ornaments. With her potted aspidistra and her rose petal perfume, the old lady was a throwback to the energy of the past, to having a future laid out for you, to a time when you didn’t have to work in the noise and the hot dark, spending your spare moments at the pub, the library or the moor, thinking often of that Larkin poem from your mam’s copy of The Less Deceived: ‘Spring’. The lines about those the female season has the least use for, seeing her the best of all.