Eve

by Beverley Hughesdon

  Then there was the other big difference – which I’d see as a plus one day, and a minus the next, depending on my mood – and that was being WATCHED. Scarborough was crammed with holiday-makers and day trippers, all eager to see the sights – and we were one of the sights. Especially as Mairi and I were based at a farlin right next to the street, though the fish pier was several feet below the level of the roadway. Iron railings ran along the edge of the pavement above us, and except for first thing in the morning there always seemed to be a group of panama and straw-hatted holiday makers leaning over the rails, watching us at our work.

  Mairi said that some girls wouldn’t go to Scarborough at all, on the grounds that they were being turned into a free peepshow – but, she insisted, you’ll find that when you’re working hard you won’t notice. I did notice. But then, I probably wasn’t working as hard as Mairi – yes, I’m quite sure I wasn’t, or even as hard as I had at Lerwick. I was aware that I’d done Mairi and Bridget a considerable favour by staying on, and in any case, you could keep up the same pace with less effort in Scarborough, because the English grading system wasn’t so rigid as that in Scotland. There were only four sizes, and although in my head I still heard the full chorus the choices didn’t have to be made so precisely – so the spectators did secure some of my attention.

  As I told you earlier, I really was in two minds about the whole business. Some days I enjoyed the sense of being on stage, part of an elaborate performance – and I’d play up to my audience – show off by leaping over a barrel or two as I ran back with the empty gut basket – the way one does. I even got the odd cheer, rewarded by a quick curtsey on my part and a frown on Mairi’s.

  But on other days I felt just like an animal in a zoo, and equally as irritated. Comments like: ‘My, aren’t they quick,’ or ‘It’s a wonder they don’t cut their fingers off, it really is,’ when repeated day after boiling hot day by people idling around in light-weight clothes and straw hats about other people sweating guts out in oilskin aprons and big leather boots – yes, those comments do pall.

  You would think that people only a few feet above our heads would realise that we could hear practically every word they said, but that didn’t stop them passing remarks like: ‘The small dark one would be quite pretty if her face wasn’t all smeared with slime,’ or: ‘That tall redhead has even got fishscales in her hair!’ ‘Matches her freckles, though,’ said with a giggle. ‘Yes, she’s got loads, hasn’t she? There’s this lotion Annie Cooper told me about—’

  When I expressed my fury to Mairi, ‘They go on about us as if we’re completely deaf!’ she said, ‘It’s because we’re all speaking the Gaelic at this farlin – they think we don’t understand English.’

  That was what gave me the idea. I needed a partner to play this game, but luckily ‘the small dark one’ – who was actually extremely pretty, and, like me, more than a touch bored by herring gutting at this stage in the season – was a willing accomplice. Morag from Stornoway – where are you now, I wonder? Morag, who with two short words altered the entire course of my life. And which two words? Fish hook.

  Our game began in quite a simple form. After all, railings are double-sided – so who were really the animals in the zoo, us – or them?

  Morag and I decided to make it them. We began to label our watchers: ‘With that beard he’s got to be a Dunbeath billy-goat.’ ‘Look, Eve – codface!’ Oh, he was, he was! We giggled.

  Morag’s elder sister Raonaid and Mairi spoke up in chorus: ‘That’s bad manners!’

  ‘But,’ we chorused back, ‘They can’t hear us because we’re speaking in Gaelic!’

  The Gaelic of the Western Isles is not quite the same as that of Helspie – but Morag and I could understand each other alright. And our flights of fancy grew more extreme as the days passed.

  By now it was nearing the end of August – the new Wick High School had held its opening ceremony without being favoured by my presence – and in Scarborough the holidaymakers were undergoing a subtle, but quite apparent change. Our audience was now graced by a number of men sporting boaters and wearing extremely well-tailored suits, and often accompanied by befrilled females waving dainty parasols – it was like being back at the Naini Tal Regatta.

  Two men with military bearing and carrying silver-topped canes strode up. The one with the neatly-trimmed moustache spoke – in a voice that matched that of Major Broome back in Almora. I glanced up again. He stood there, straight-backed – just like Apa – his companion replied, his voice lighter in tone but still with that clipped accent – just like my Apa’s – For a moment I was shaking too much to use my knife.

  Iain explained this change in our audience. ‘The cricket festival’ll be starting soon, real posh do, that is.’ He grinned, ‘We always get the nobs hanging round, this time o’ year.’

  Bridget looked up reprovingly from her barrel – it was first thing in the morning, so we were filling up, ‘You shouldn’t call them that – very nice ladies and gentlemen they are – lovely manners.’

  Morag retorted, ‘I don’t call it good manners – making personal remarks over our heads.’

  And they were, they were. Obviously the other holiday makers had done it too – but generally there’d been a certain camaraderie in their tone, sometimes they’d call out to us: ‘Mind your fingers, do!’ (Hen, flapping), or an admiring: ‘My, aren’t you girls fast!’ (Squirrel – hands held in nut-nibbling position.) And always there’d been a kind of underlying awareness that everyone had to work, and although they certainly wouldn’t choose our job, they were basically in the same boat as we were.

  Our new spectators clearly were not – whatever boat they were inhabiting, someone else was doing the rowing. And that was reflected in their comments. ‘My goodness, how can they stand it?’

  ‘You must remember, Caecelia, that girls of that class are much coarser-fibred – why, some of them even look quite cheerful!’ Morag and I glanced at each other. Neither of us was looking at all cheerful now.

  So we hatched our plot. it was not enough just to passively label our tormentors any longer – we were going on the offensive. Mairi tried to molllfy us, repeating yet again, ‘They don’t think we can understand English—’ Well, they certainly didn’t understand Gaelic, so we would use their ignorance as our weapon.

  ‘You can’t do that!’ chorused Mairi and Raonaid – who by now had formed the firm alliance of the mutually beleaguered. In the face of their combined firepower we did compromise and modify our chosen insult. If someone made a personal remark about us we would simply reply, rudely but quite justifiably, ‘Duin do chab.’ Shut your gob. Fair enough.

  Flaonaid and Mairi retreated – defeated. ‘They’re only a pair of silly girls.’

  ‘If they want to be childish and play games—’ We did want to play games.

  Now all the best games have rules – and a challenge. So our rule was that either of us could dare the other by saying a code word. Our challenge was, that in order to claim a hit we had to insult the spectator in such a way that they failed to realise we were being rude. So we would smile as we told them in a bright, friendly tone of voice, ‘Shut your gob.’ Not as easy as it sounds, but then, that was part of the fun. And the code word? ‘Fish hook’, or, as it was to be said in Gaelic, ‘hook of the fish’ – ‘dubhan iasgaich’.

  Morag won the biggest triumph on our first day, with her bishop. The leather-gaitered, purple-vested, wide brimmed-hatted clergyman (hook nose, so clearly a purple-breasted parrot) made some innocuous but technically personal comment. I exclaimed, ‘Fish hook!’, and Morag, with her most winning smile, called out, ‘Duin do chab.’ He blinked, then with a smile, lifted his wide-brimmed hat and called back, ‘And duin do chab to you, too.’

  We were ecstatic.

  The next day, victory was to me. I’d managed to evade Mairi and slip my boots off. Morag was away emptying her gut basket when I heard a small female screech. I muttered automatically, ‘Peahen’ as I heard above m
y head, ‘Hilda, that girl is in her bare feet – how can she bear it?’

  Hilda (goose) replied, ‘Oh, it’s different for her, she’s only a herring girl – some of them don’t even speak English, you know. They’re really just peasants—’

  A returning Morag rapped out, ‘Fish hook.’

  At once I called up to Hilda, ‘Duin do chab!’ And managed to smile – somehow.

  Hilda smiled uncertainly back at me before turning to peahen and saying, ‘How quaint – she’s trying to talk to us.’ She leant over the rail and said, very loudly and slowly, ‘Good – girl – you – are – working – very – hard.’ Round two to me; I was pleased as punch.

  But I didn’t have long to enjoy my success, because a letter had arrived by the afternoon post. Not for me, for Mairi, from her mother – but enclosed was a missive from Mrs Sinclair at Wick. Alerted no doubt by the headmaster, Mr Henderson had written enquiring of my whereabouts, so Mrs Sinclair was now asking me where I was. The letter had been sent to the croft, from whence Mrs Fraser, who had the key, and the confidence of the postman, had retrieved it and sent it on to Scarborough.

  I held that letter as if it were a snake. Suppose Mr Henderson turned up at Wick in person, was directed on to Helspie, made enquiries, and was told I’d spent the whole summer gutting and was currently to be found at Scarborough? I knew I could rely on Uncle Fergus – he never answered anyone’s enquiries, as a matter of principle – and Mistress McNiven wouldn’t split on me, she’d promised, but there were lots of other people who must know I’d gone with Mairi and Bridget.

  There’s one thing worse than being only a herring girl – it’s being an ex-herring girl, currently on the way to boarding school.

  But surely Mr Henderson would never trail all the way down to Scarborough – Mairi’s voice broke into my nightmares. ‘Mam says Jeannie’s finger’s almost right – she’ll soon be here.’ Oh well, there was hardly going to be time for Mr Henderson to catch up with me now –

  By the following morning I’d pushed it to the bottom of my mind. I’d be back in Wick before very long – once there I could spin some tale or other to explain my tardy return. Gone on a cruise, boat run aground on a desert island – smallpox epidemic, had to spend time in quarantine – I’d think of something. Live for the day, Eve, another day of nob baiting…

  A smartly dressed man with a big behind strutted up to watch us. Our calls of: ‘Capercaillie!’ ‘Peacock!’ were simultaneous. He was joined by a male long-tailed fellow, an organ grinder’s monkey and a pair of female stoats. Morag and I waited hopefully. Capercaillie/peacock broke ranks first. Turning to the long-tailed fellow he said, ‘Those two are a pair of goers, I’ll be bound.’ Pointing his cane straight at us.

  Our ‘Fish hooks!’ were simultaneous – though neither of us was clear as to the meaning of ‘goer’, we had no doubts as to its personal nature. Together we called out, ‘Duin do chab!’ wearing our broadest smiles.

  Confusingly peacock turned to long-tailed fellow and smirked, before saying to him in an audible aside, ‘I always pride myself on having an eye for the likely ones! Still, no future in it, is there? The stink of fish would spoil the fun.’ With another smirk he strolled off, completely ignoring us.

  I muttered indignantly, ‘He could at least have replied – what bad manners!’

  I could almost hear the gritting of Mairi’s teeth – instantly followed by those of Raonaid at Morag’s, ‘Stupid old grouse – who does he think he is?’

  The smarter audience was displaced by a horde of street urchins – another dubious delight of working at Scarborough. Sometimes I traded a few insults with them, but on the whole it wasn’t advisable – my command of Yorkshire dialect wasn’t up to it and besides, they didn’t have to try and gut herring at the same time. Then the urchins spotted some other amusement and made off, and some more nobs drifted up. But boringly they refrained from personal comments, so Morag and I had to confine ourselves to: ‘Plaice,’ ‘Haddock,’ ‘Weasel,’ ‘Donkey – look at those ears, you can almost see them twitching—’ Mairi was not in a good mood today, ‘Get your head down in the farlin, Eve – that’s the third mistake you’ve made with your sizing.’ Mattie, mattie, large full –

  I still had my head down when Morag called softly, ‘A horse, Eve – this one really is a horse!’

  I risked a quick glance up to see a big, strong nose – yes, definitely a horse’s face! Head down again – full, filling, large full –

  Morag whispered, ‘He must be a racehorse – he’s brought his jockey with him.’ She giggled.

  Another glance. There was a much smaller man with a beard beside the first one – and he was Dandy-legged. Mat full, large full, spent. Another glance at the taller man – no, not a race horse, a big, broad-shouldered dray horse, all bone and muscle and strength –

  ‘Eve!’ Mairi was definitely annoyed. My head went down again – mattie, mat full, large full, large full – lots of large fulls around all of a sudden – I couldn’t resist it, I looked up again – and the tall man was looking straight at me. I smiled, and his horse’s face smiled broadly back – while his hand went to his boater and raised it. To me.

  Morag muttered, ‘Did you see that?

  Mairi snapped, ‘Eve, your gut basket is spilling overl’

  Seizing hold of it I ran to the gut tub, emptied it, ran even faster back – and noticed that Horseface had turned slightly, and was watching me. I couldn’t resist it. I sank down into my full ‘Gondoliers’ curtsey. As I rose up again, laughing to him, I heard his neighing laugh replying to mine.

  ‘Eve! Stop playing games!’ Mairi was distinctly ratty by now. I picked up my knife. Mat full, full, large full, large full – but at my next glance he’d taken his jockey’s arm and moved a short distance away from the railings. The little man’s voice was equally little but Horseface boomed like Major Broome at Almora, so I heard every word as he replied: ‘That tall redhead – she is the one, I’m sure of it!’

  I froze.

  Mattie, mattie, big full – or was it only full? Mairi’s mother had betrayed me – Mr Henderson must have gone to Helspie, and now he’d telegraphed a spy to come and capture me.

  Loud above my head I heard, ‘We’ll go and find the foreman chappie – ask to speak to her.’

  Oh no – I darted a glance round, had I time to run for it now? But that would give the game away completely. I heard Horseface braying with laughter, how dared he – then his confident voice announced, ‘No, you’re wrong – it must be her.’

  Think Eve, think. He couldg’t be sure. Mr Henderson had no photographs of me, and I’d never met this man before, I’d have remembered his face – bluff, Eve, you’ve got to bluff.

  They were moving purposefully away, obviously looking for the steps down on to the fish pier, going in search of the foreman. I whispered to Mairi, ‘Does Mr MacKay know my name – my real name?’ ‘How should I know? Get your head down!’ Mattie, mat full – Oh, why hadn’t I gone back for the beginning of term, then nobody would ever have known – large full, large full – you’re a large fool, Eve – a big, big fool – whatever should I do?

  Chapter Nineteen

  By the time they came walking back along the pier with Mr MacKay I’d decided to stand and fight my corner.

  Mr MacKay said, in English, ‘This is Eve.’

  I exclaimed, ‘I’m Eve Gunn!’

  Mr MacKay looked surprised. ‘Yes, of course you are. Now, Eve, these gentlemen want to ask you some questions…’

  ‘Questions?’

  ‘…about a book.’

  ‘A book?’

  Mr MacKay turned to the two men, his voice apologetic. ‘She’s usually a very quick girl – and I’ve always thought her English was quite good – He began speaking to me very slowly, ‘Eve – this gentleman,’ gesturing to Small Beard, ‘Is – writing – a book – about – Scotland and the fishing, so he wants to ask you some questions about – gutting. Do – you – understand?’

&nbs
p; I nearly fainted with relief.

  Mr MacKay turned back to them to say, ‘If Eve isn’t suitable I’ll ask if the girl next to her—’

  Morag moved quickly towards us calling, ‘I can speak English, and I’m more than willing—’

  My exclamation of, ‘Nae, I’ll dae it!’

  Was matched by Horseface’s, ‘I’m sure our initial choice will do very nicely, thank you.’

  Mr MacKay then pointed out, ‘The girls are on piecework, so—’

  Small Beard reassured him at once, ‘We will naturally ensure that no financial loss is incurred.’ Satisfied, Mr Mackay tipped his hat to them, and left us to it.

  I drew a deep breath and said in my best Lowland Scots accent, ‘Now, what dae ya want me tae tell ye?’

  Horseface turned to the little man. ‘Over to you, Parton – I’m just the observer.’

  Small Beard – Mr Parton – took out his notebook and pencil, smiled a touch nervously but very sweetly to me and said, ‘Perhaps you could tell us how you came to be a herring gutter, Eve?’

  No way. And no way was I going to make any mention of Helspie, either – you couldn’t be too careful. So instead I plunged in about the arles: ‘…set sum of money … pledge we’ll work for the same curer all season…’ Then on to Gremista, the way the herring shoals move around the coast, sail versus steam – I checked they both knew how a drift net worked, likewise Mr Parton’s spelling every time I used a Gaelic word –

  Oh yes, I was quite in control now, full of myself, even. Not just from the relief of my last minute reprieve, but because I was the centre of attention – since although Horseface left the questioning to Mr Parton, he was quite clearly listening – every time I looked at him, he was looking at me. Two smartly-dressed men hanging on my every word! And although nobody would call Horseface good-looking, he was undeniably impressive, and a good half-a-toot taller than me – it was nice to look up, for a change.