The Miner’s Girl

by Maggie Hope

  ‘But the boy can go to Durham School – it’s a good school too. He’ll have a good chance there. Merry, all the time I’ve been away I’ve dreamt of coming home and us being together as we used to be, looking out for one another. Merry, you have no reason really or the reasons you have don’t matter much.’

  Merry thought of the small grave in the cemetery at Eden Hope and knew she wasn’t yet ready to abandon it. And besides, she told herself, here she was independent, she was useful to Dr Macready and was learning a lot about being his assistant, which was almost as good as being a nurse.

  ‘They matter to me, Ben,’ she said.

  ‘Merry, listen to me, I want you and the bairn with me. I’m worried for you. Miles Gallagher has something against us both, I’m sure he has—’

  He was interrupted by the opening of the sitting-room door. Neither of them had heard anyone coming up the stairs but a second later Dr Macready walked in. He looked from Ben to Merry and back again before speaking.

  ‘What’s going on? Who is this man, Merry?’

  Dr Macready was standing there dressed but in his carpet slippers and looked very angry indeed. Merry stared at him, colour staining her cheeks almost as though he had caught her entertaining a lover. As she hesitated Ben stepped forward and held out his hand.

  ‘I’m so sorry we disturbed you, Doctor,’ he said. ‘I am Merry’s brother and I’m very glad to meet you.’

  Dr Macready looked at him sceptically. ‘Her brother? I didn’t know she had a brother.’

  Merry found her voice. ‘Well I have, Dr Macready. I didn’t mention him before because I thought he was . . . dead. Doctor, this is my brother Benjamin. I named the boy after him. Ben, this is Dr Macready, my employer.’

  Dr Macready studied the face of the man before him and, evidently satisfied, shook his hand. ‘How do you do?’ he said formally. ‘Now I look at you I can see who you are. Not that you look so much like Merry but the boy seems to take after you, in colouring at least.’ He still looked a little puzzled though. Both Merry’s brother and son reminded him of someone else, the brother in particular. He just couldn’t put a name to whom it was though it hovered in the back of his mind. It would come back to him of course, he told himself, for he prided himself on his good memory.

  ‘Well, Merry, it’s nice to know you have some family. I always thought you and the boy were on your own,’ he said.

  ‘My brother has been in South Africa. I thought he was dead,’ she replied.

  ‘Well, that’s great that he isn’t. Look, it’s very late, I’ll go now and leave you in peace.’ He turned to Ben. ‘I’m sure we will meet again. I would love to hear about your travels.’

  ‘I will look forward to it, Doctor,’ said Ben as Dr Macready nodded and went back down the stairs.

  ‘Damn,’ said Ben. ‘I didn’t want anyone to know I was here. It might get back to Miles Gallagher. I didn’t want to put you in any danger.’

  ‘But surely I’m not,’ said Merry, looking surprised.

  Ben gave her an exasperated look. ‘For goodness sake, Merry, haven’t I told you it’s dangerous for you?’

  ‘But Miles Gallagher hasn’t threatened me before. If he wanted to he could easily have found out where I am. I think you’re worrying too much, Ben.’

  ‘I’m not, believe me, I’m not.’

  ‘Well,’ said Merry, ‘I don’t think Dr Macready is a friend of Miles Gallagher. In fact I wouldn’t be surprised if he even knows him.’

  Ben had sat down beside the dying fire but now he got to his feet. ‘I’m not going to argue now, Merry. It’s time we were both in bed. But I’m not giving up on this either. I’ll away now and let you get to bed.’

  Thirty-One

  Tom closed the surgery door after the last patient and breathed a sigh of relief. He picked up the pile of notes on his desk, took them over to the filing cabinet and began to file them away. Normally his assistant, an ex-miner who had been injured in an accident ten years ago and now had a limp, did the job for him but tonight being Friday, Walter was out collecting the panel pence in the rows. Walter had been a deputy and a safety-man and was proving to be very useful in the surgery, being trained as a St John Ambulance man.

  Tom put the last file in place and banged the drawer shut, before sitting down behind his desk and leaning back in his chair for a rare moment of relaxation. As always his thoughts turned to Merry and the boy.

  He would confront his father, he decided. He had not been through to Winnipeg Colliery since he learned about Benjamin – there just hadn’t been the time to spare. Diphtheria had returned to the village, though thankfully not as virulent as the year before; still, it had been a busy few weeks. His father had been through to see him but unfortunately he had been out on a case, a difficult and protracted birth and Miles had gone by the time he got home.

  He thought about his father, biting his lip and sighing as he did so. Miles was one of those men who thought that all a pitman was good for was to dig coal and their families little more than ignorant savages. Tom could quite see him sending Merry away and not even mentioning the incident but all the same, it filled him with rage.

  He sighed again and got to his feet. He had arranged for a locum this weekend coming and he was determined to go to Winton and see Merry and his son, combining the visit with one to his father. It was well past the time he should be taking over responsibility for the boy, and his mother too. He bitterly regretted the years he had missed but the thought of seeing them gave him a pleasurable glow of anticipation as he went through to the house for supper.

  Afterwards he telephoned his father at Canny Hill, the company house Tom had been raised in, to tell him he would be over at the weekend.

  ‘Will you be at Winnipeg Colliery or Canny Hill?’ he asked.

  ‘Canny Hill,’ Miles said tersely.

  ‘Well, I thought Bertha might have managed to change your mind and got you to move in to her house, at least at weekends. I know she tries hard enough.’

  ‘She won’t succeed. You know it is one of the conditions of my employment by Bolton and Co. The agent must live in the company’s house or at least make it his main residence.’

  ‘I thought you might have decided to give the position up. After all—’

  ‘Why should I?’ Miles exploded. ‘I can perfectly well see to my own colliery and see to the company’s. After all, I have good managers. I like my position with Bolton’s. It suits me.’

  ‘You’re not getting any younger,’ Tom reminded him.

  ‘For God’s sake, if you have nothing of interest to say get off the telephone!’ Miles said and Tom wisely did as he was told. His father sounded as though he might just have an apoplectic fit, he thought. He must check him over when he went to Bishop Auckland – before he demanded to know why he had sent Merry away.

  It was Friday evening when Merry was shocked awake by a commotion beneath her window. Her first thought was that Ben had come but of course it couldn’t be him – since Dr Macready had met him he didn’t need to use stealth, though he was still careful that as few people as possible knew he was about. She put a match to the gas mantle, which was set in the wall above the fireplace in her bedroom, and saw by the clock on the mantelpiece that it was only ten-thirty. She must have been asleep for less than half an hour.

  The racket below the window got louder, the banging and shouting loud on the night air. Merry went to the window and opened it, poking her head out cautiously.

  ‘Aye, I knew you were in there somewhere!’

  Her heart sank as her fears were confirmed – it was Robbie and he was with a young girl she recognised as the youngest of Jim Hawthorne’s daughters, Bessie, named after her mother. The girl was rolling about, unable to stand up but for the fact that she was hanging on to Robbie’s arm.

  ‘Bessie! What are you doing? You’ve been drinking!’ Merry gazed at the girl in horror, for she was barely seventeen. Bessie grinned back, her mouth hanging open, her shirtwaist grubby
and with a wet stain that gleamed darkly in the moonlight.

  Bessie laughed and staggered against Robbie who put an arm round her waist. ‘I’m going to marry your man,’ she said. At least that was what Merry thought she said, though her words were slurred together.

  ‘Bessie, you can’t, you’re just a bairn, get away home to your mam,’ Merry replied. ‘She must be looking for you.’ Mrs Hawthorne was a decent, chapel-going woman, who must be frantic that Bessie was out so late, especially if she knew she was with an older man such as Robbie Wright.

  ‘Never you mind, you slut!’ Robbie shouted. ‘It’s none of your business, any road. I’ve come to tell you I’m going to divorce you. I’m going to marry Bessie, aren’t I, pet?’ He moved his hand from the girl’s waist to cover her breast and she squirmed.

  ‘Take the lass home, Robbie, go on,’ Merry implored. ‘Her dad will be mad, her brothers an’ all; they’ll come after you.’

  ‘You don’t think I’m frightened of Jim Hawthorne, do you? Nor his bloody sons. Let them come, me an’ Bessie are going to get wed. I’ve promised her.’

  Merry could imagine why. She hesitated – any minute now Dr Macready would hear the commotion and would come to find out what was causing it, and she didn’t want that.

  ‘Go home, take the lass, go on,’ she urged again.

  ‘An’ you go to hell,’ Robbie said calmly and laughed. ‘Don’t think I don’t know what you’re up to neither. I can easy get a divorce after I tell the judge what me mam told me. You riding about in a posh carriage with that sod of a doctor, son of the mining agent, for God’s sake. Talk about selling your own folk out! An’ me mam says that bastard of yours is the spit of him an’ all. I reckon you were carrying on with him all the time you were living wi’ me. Oh, aye, I’ll have no trouble getting a divorce.’

  ‘Please yourself what you do,’ said Merry. ‘Just get away from this house, will you? Have the decency to take Bessie home to her mam, man!’

  ‘Don’t you tell me what to do or I’ll come up there and show you what for, aye an’ your brat an’ all,’ Robbie shouted. He stepped forward, shrugging off the girl who staggered and fell into the bushes at the side of the path. She turned on her front and managed to get onto her hands and knees before vomiting on a cotoneaster bush. The stink of stale stout rose in the air, making Merry gag even at the height of her bedroom window.

  ‘What’s going on there?’

  Merry closed her fists and gritted her teeth – they had woken Dr Macready just as she had dreaded they would. This was the second time he had been wakened up and he wouldn’t stand for it, she knew he wouldn’t; she and the bairn would have to go.

  ‘Just go, Robbie, please. Take Bessie back to her mam, can you not see the lass isn’t feeling well, man?’

  Robbie turned and looked at the young girl who was just clambering to her feet. He shook his head. ‘She can’t hold her beer, that’s the trouble with her,’ he said. But he too had heard Dr Macready and he wasn’t keen to meet up with him. He was sober enough by now to know it might mean a night in the cells if the doctor called the bobbies.

  ‘Aye well, I’ll go,’ he said. ‘I’ve said what I came to say. Mind my words, I’m lying idle come Monday an’ I’m off to see the lawyers. I will get me divorce, see if I don’t. Me mam told us it was a big mistake getting wed to you and by heck she was right.’ He nodded his head a few times as he went over to Bessie and took her by the arm. ‘By God, you stink summat awful for a young lass,’ he said. ‘Howay, then, babby, let’s away.’

  Dr Macready had come around the corner just as Robbie turned away. ‘Just a minute,’ he said with cold authority and Robbie halted. ‘If I catch you on my property again I will call the law. Is that clear?’

  ‘Yes, Doctor,’ Robbie mumbled.

  ‘Now take that child home and if I hear of anything happening to her I will know who is to blame. Do you understand me?’

  ‘Yes, Doctor.’

  The doctor watched the pair until they were out into the road, then turned and looked up at Merry. ‘Just a moment, Merry,’ he said. ‘I’m coming up.’

  She threw a large shawl round her shoulders and crossed it over her breasts before going into the sitting room. Was he going to tell her to go, she wondered, her heart beating fast – he had every right after being disturbed twice like this. Doctors were disturbed often enough in the middle of the night by their patients so needed their sleep when they could get it.

  ‘They didn’t wake the boy?’ Dr Macready asked when he came in, and Merry shook her head. ‘Just as well,’ he said as he went over to the fireplace and stood before the almost dead fire. ‘Merry, something will have to be done. I won’t have these disturbances going on.’

  ‘I know, Doctor. I’m sorry. He’s drunk. He wants a divorce.’

  ‘Hmm. I suppose he needs a bit of Dutch courage to come and tell you. Well, let him have it, you will be well shot of him. But you might have to suffer a bit, you know. Have your name in the Auckland Chronicle and maybe even the Northern Echo. There’s bound to be some notoriety. It’s the boy I’m thinking of. Perhaps you should let him go to the Friends’ School earlier than we thought.’

  Almost on cue, Benjamin appeared in the doorway of the sitting room. Tears were streaming down his face yet he hadn’t made a sound until now.

  ‘That was him, wasn’t it?’ he cried. ‘Mam, we haven’t got to go back and live with him, have we?’ The boy was shaking with terror. Merry held out her arms to him and he ran to her. His nightshirt was soaked with urine, she realised; it was the first time for ages.

  ‘No, lad, we’ll never go back to him. Don’t worry, pet, everything will be all right, you’ll see. Howay, son, I’ll get you changed and back to bed,’ she said and carried him through to his little bedroom. It didn’t take her long to settle him and when she came back into the living room Dr Macready was still there standing before the fire.

  ‘He soon settled down,’ she said. ‘Doctor, if you want us to go—’

  ‘What? No of course I don’t. But this is not doing the lad any good, is it?’ asked the doctor.

  ‘I don’t think it’ll happen again; I’m sure it won’t. Robbie doesn’t come round here usually. It was just he had a skinful.’

  ‘Well, if Benjamin was over at Great Ayton—’

  ‘My brother wants him to go to Durham School,’ said Merry. The doctor looked astounded.

  ‘Durham? But he has a scholarship to the Friends’ School!’

  ‘I know. But Ben is buying a house in Durham.’

  ‘You’re not leaving us, are you, Merry? Do you want to go? Kirsty will be very sorry to hear that and so would I.’

  The doctor looked agitated as he took a few steps towards the window then back. Merry gazed at him. He and his wife had been so good to her and Benjamin it seemed like gross ingratitude to go against them. But these last few days she had been thinking of what Ben had said and was undecided about what to do. Sometimes though, she did have the feeling that the Macreadys were taking over and wanting to make decisions for her and Benjamin almost as though the boy belonged to them. To be honest, she thought, she didn’t know what she wanted to do – one moment she was worried that the doctor would want her to go and was filled with anxiety, and the next she was toying with the idea of going to Durham.

  Durham, near to where Tom lived and worked. The thought of it enticed her.

  ‘Merry?’

  She shook her head. ‘No not really. I’ve been very happy here and so has the lad. You have been so good to us, both you and Mrs Macready and I love my job an’ all. And even if we did go, we would always keep in touch with you both. You mean such a lot to us.’

  If the doctor noticed the ambiguity of her answer he didn’t comment on it. ‘Well, Merry, I had better go back to bed before my wife comes looking for me,’ he said and walked to the door. ‘I don’t think you’ll hear any more from Robbie Wright, not tonight at any rate. If you did I would get the police without the slight
est hesitation and he knows it.’

  ‘Goodnight, Doctor and thank you,’ said Merry and her thanks were heartfelt. She didn’t know what she would have done without him, even tonight. She knew she would have had trouble getting rid of Robbie and young Bessie if the doctor hadn’t come out.

  She locked the door after him and went through to check on Benjamin. He was lying with one hand under his cheek, his eyelashes still wet, but he was sleeping peacefully enough.

  These few months they had had with the Macreadys had been the happiest in his young life, she thought. In fact he had been transformed from a nervous youngster who had cowered behind her skirts, terrified of Robbie, to a self-confident little boy who was blooming more every day, intelligent and talented; self-confident enough to look forward to going away to boarding school, though he would be home for the weekends. It was a future she would never have hoped to be able to give him.

  Merry pulled the bedclothes up over his shoulder and tucked them in. She dropped a kiss on his forehead and tiptoed out of the room. As she lay down in her own bed the thought of Tom came to her as she pictured him clearly in her mind’s eye. And her heart ached for him.

  She turned over restlessly in bed as her thoughts reverted to Robbie. Divorce was practically unheard of in the rows and she knew she would be in for a lot of stick if he managed to get one. He would say she hadn’t told him Benjamin wasn’t his, and would bring Tom into it too. Oh, she could imagine the lies he would tell – she would be the talk of the place, she was well aware of that. But if Benjamin was away at school it wouldn’t affect him much. Or if they were living in Durham. No, the scandal would affect Tom, and she couldn’t allow that. But how was she to stop it? That vindictive woman, Doris Wright, would tell everyone Tom was Benjamin’s father and there would be a big scandal.

  She had to stop thinking about it, Merry told herself. She was so tired, she needed her sleep. Everything looked worse at night-time, so Gran used to say. And she was right.

  Thirty-Two

  Tom parked the Wolsey on the drive of the agent’s house at Canney Hill and got out. It was a bright morning and he had decided to come here first to see his father before going on to Dr Macready’s place in Winton. Dr Macready would have a Saturday morning surgery and no doubt both he and Merry would be busy there. It was only just gone ten o’clock as he paused and looked around him – at the house where he grew up, the sweep of the drive around the side of it to the stables and, as he turned and looked out over the valley, the view from the front of the house.