The Railway Girl

by Nancy Carson

  ‘Coming twenty. Twenty next September.’

  ‘And still single? Still no sign of e’er a chap?’

  Haden grinned smugly. ‘Her’s met ne’er a chap yet as matches up to her fairther, that’s why. I doh think for a minute as her’s short of admirers, though, but I reckon they’m all tongue-tied. Not like we used to be, eh, Ben?’

  Ben cackled as he was reminded of his youth. ‘No, we was never back’ard in coming forwards.’

  ‘Anyroad, I want no Tom, Dick or Harry sniffing round our Lucy, so keep your eye on her for me, Ben, anytime I ain’t there.’

  ‘Bring her wi’ yer tonight, eh? I’ll get the missus to show her the ropes.’

  ‘That’ll please the wench no end. Yo’m a pal, Ben. A real pal.’

  ‘How’s your other daughter, Haden?’

  ‘Our Jane? As happy as Ode Nick now as her’s wed. I’m happy for her that her chap come back from the Crimea, even though he does have to get about on a crutch these days.’

  ‘Better to walk on crutches than be jed and buried in some graveyard in Balaclava, I’d say. I tek it as he can still get his good leg over the wench, though.’

  Haden guffawed. ‘’Tis to be hoped. He’ll be getting boils on the back of his neck, else. But there’s no sign of e’er a babby yet. Mind you, there’s no boils on his neck either.’

  They had arrived at the corner where Haden turned off. He thanked Ben Elwell again for agreeing to take on Lucy as a barmaid, waved and went home.

  Waiting by the entry was Bobby the shaggy sheepdog, named after Sir Robert Peel. Bobby lay with his nose between his paws and nonchalantly opened one eye when he heard Haden’s footsteps approaching. When he saw his master he stretched, got to his feet and wagged his tired tail, anticipating being fussed.

  ‘Christ, I bet you’ve had a bloody hard day looking after your mother, eh, Bobby?’ Haden said, bending forward to ruffle the dog’s thick mane. ‘All that shut-eye and lolling about. Christ knows how you keep it up.’ The dog licked Haden’s hand affectionately. ‘Is your mother inside then? Has her fed yer?’ He patted the dog and straightened up. ‘It’s all right for some, all rest and no work. I expect yo’ll want some dinner off me now, eh?’

  As he opened the door the smell of cooking welcomed him. He saw a pot of rabbit stew standing on the hob of the cast iron fire grate and knew that he would not go hungry. Lucy was standing half-dressed, tying up her long dark hair.

  ‘Where’s your mother?’

  ‘I’m upstairs,’ a voice called.

  ‘What yer doing up there? It’s time for me vittles.’

  ‘I’ll be down in a minute.’

  Haden looked at his younger daughter as he tossed his snap bag on the settle. ‘I had a word with Ben Elwell. He says if you go to the Whimsey tonight his missus will show you the ropes.’

  Lucy’s eyes lit up and she grinned. ‘So he’ll let me start working there nights?’

  ‘And he’ll keep his eye on yer. I want no drunken louts a-pestering yer. All right?’

  ‘Course, dad.’

  ‘Then it’s settled. Lord knows what he’ll pay yer, though. We never mentioned money.’

  ‘I don’t care. I’d do it for nothing, Dad.’

  ‘No need to do it for nothing, my wench. Ben’s fair. He’ll pay fair. Now, get yourself dressed and fetch me some water so’s I can wash me feet. When yo’ve done that, tek the brown jug wi’ yer to the Whimsey and have it filled wi’ beer … Here’s sixpence …’

  So Lucy, grateful that her father had had a word with Ben Elwell, went to the pump down the street and fetched water. Then she took the brown jug from the cupboard next to the fire grate and stepped out into the early evening sunshine to fetch his beer.

  The Piddocks sat down to eat, civilly and with all the decorum of a well-bred household, a habit which Hannah, Haden’s wife, had imported and insisted upon. Her years employed as a housemaid in one of the big important houses in Kingswinford, the adjoining parish, had instilled much domestic refinement into her, which time and their own modest way of life had not diminished.

  ‘I don’t know as I hold with our Lucy serving ale to all them loudmouth hobbledehoys with their rough manners what get in the Whimsey,’ Hannah remarked with maternal anxiety. ‘No decent young woman should be seen in such a place. And will she be safe walking home at night?’

  ‘I’ll be walking home with her nights, I daresay,’ Haden said, and shoved a forkful of rabbit meat into his mouth.

  Lucy looked from one to the other. ‘I’ll be all right, Mother,’ she affirmed. ‘I’ll come to no harm. They’re not all rough folk that go to the Whimsey.’

  ‘’Tis to be hoped. But if ever you’m on your own and hear somebody behind yer, run for your life.’

  ‘I will, Mother. I’m not daft.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’m a-fretting about, Hannah,’ Haden said. ‘Things am quieter now than they used to be. I mean, there’s nothing to get excited about any more – well, not at the Whimsey, anyroad. There’s no bull-baiting or cock-fighting these days to get folk worked up. All right, there might be the occasional badger-drawing when the Patrollers ain’t about … I remember Coronation Day—’

  ‘Oh, spare us the details, Haden.’

  ‘No, Mother, I’d like to hear,’ Lucy insisted. ‘My dad always comes out with some good tales.’

  ‘Except I’ve heard ’em all afore, our Lucy. Too many times.’

  ‘Well, I haven’t. So tell us, Dad.’

  Haden took a long quaff from his beer. ‘It was June in thirty-eight,’ he began again with a smile for his daughter. ‘It started the day afore the Coronation of our young queen Victoria, God bless her. We’d heard that there was due to be a bear-baiting at the Old Bell up in Bell Street. The bear had been brought over from Wednesbury, and to keep him comfortable for the night they found him an empty pigsty. Next day, everybody as had got a bulldog – and that was a good many in them days – brought ’em along to bait poor old Bruin. So the bear-herd fetched the bear out o’ the pigsty and led him over to the old clay pit. They drove an iron stake into the middle and put the ring at the end of the bear’s chain over the stake, so as the animal could move about easy but not too far. Course, loads o’ spectators lined the clay pit, a chap in a clean white smock among ’em.’

  Bobby had installed himself at the side of the table near Haden and waited patiently with imploring eyes for a morsel to descend to the stone flags of the floor. But Haden was in full flow.

  ‘As it happened, the ground had been softened by rain a day or two before, and as the kerfuffle started nobody noticed that the stake had come loose in the mud. I tell yer, there was plenty fun as them dogs baited the bear, but then it dawned on everybody that the bear had got free. We all ran for our lives, and the poor bugger in the white smock fell over. He was rolled over umpteen times in the mud as folk trampled all over him.’ Haden laughed aloud as he recalled it. ‘He was a sight – the poor bugger did look woebegone.’

  ‘Then what happened?’ Lucy asked, wide-eyed.

  ‘The daft thing was, the poor bear was as frit as everybody else, and run off back to the pigsty.’

  ‘The poor, poor bear,’ she said full of sympathy for the animal. ‘I’m glad they put a stop to all that savagery.’

  ‘Savagery?’ Haden repeated. ‘I’ve seen savagery. I’ve watched bull-baiting at the Whimsey – in the days when everybody called it “Turley’s”. Once, a bull gored a bulldog, pushing his horns right into its guts. He ripped it open and tossed it higher than the house.’

  ‘Ugh! That’s enough to put you off your dinner,’ Lucy complained, turning her mouth down in distaste.

  ‘Another time at a wake,’ Haden went on, ‘I watched a bull, that was maddened by the dogs, break free of his stake and cause havoc among the crowd. When they caught him they slaughtered him without a second thought and cut him up, and the meat was sold to anybody as wanted it at a few coppers a pound. Then they all trooped off to watch the n
ext baiting.’

  ‘I’m only glad it doesn’t go on now,’ Lucy said. ‘Do you remember it, Mother?’

  ‘I remember it going on. I’d never go and watch such things meself, though. But then I had you kids to look after.’

  ‘Yes, they was rough days,’ Haden admitted. ‘We only had one parish constable in them days and he couldn’t be everywhere. Like as not he was paid to turn a blind eye, especially by the street wenches or their blasted pimps. But folk was poor and nobody had any education. They knew no better, knew no other life. These days, there’s work about and while they’m still poor, they ain’t as hard done by as they used to be.’

  Bobby impatiently tapped Haden’s leg with his paw to remind his master that he was still awaiting a morsel.

  ‘Lord, I forgot all about thee, mutt,’ he said, picking a thigh bone from his plate and tossing it to the dog. ‘Here, that’ll keep thee going for a bit.’

  Chapter 2

  Arthur Goodrich, a man of average height and average looks, was twenty-five years old. He was a stonemason by trade, employed in the family firm of Jeremiah Goodrich and Sons, Monumental Masons and Sepulchral Architects. While Jeremiah, Arthur’s father, tended to concentrate on the sepulchral design and construction side of the business in the relative comfort of the workshop along with Talbot, Arthur’s older brother, poor Arthur, by dint of being younger and thus subordinate, was meanwhile generally despatched to the further reaches of the Black Country to effect the more menial, though no less skilled, work of cutting and blacking inscriptions on existing headstones in the area’s sundry graveyards. For Arthur this was an eternal source of discontent to add to his many others.

  Thus it was one Saturday morning in late September. Arthur, complete with a toolbag full of freshly sharpened chisels, several wooden mallets, a cushion to sit on and various other appliances of his craft, had been despatched early to the hallowed ground of St Mark’s church in Pensnett, a good twenty minutes’ walk even for a sprightly lad like himself. The apathetic morning had rounded up a herd of frowning clouds that matched Arthur’s mood. He hoped that the rain would keep off, for today was the last cricket match of the season, against Stourbridge Cricket Club, and he had been picked to play.

  He had been assigned two headstones to amend that day and possessed a rough plan on paper of where they were situated within the graveyard. He located the first, a shining black grave, the granite imported at vast expense on behalf of the occupier’s wife. The deceased had been a local claymaster, piously religious and a pillar of local society. Arthur put down his toolbag, sat on the grave and read the inscription to himself:

  ‘To the memory of Jacob Onions who passed away 15th October 1853.

  Farewell dear husband must we now part,

  Who lay so near each others’ heart.

  The time will come I hope when we

  Will both enjoy Felicity.’

  Composed, obviously, by a grieving Mrs Onions, hoping for the better fortune of someday lying together again. Well, now that same grieving wife had joined her beloved husband, and Arthur was to append the inscription that confirmed it. He fumbled in the pocket of his jacket for the two pieces of paper that told him which words to cut on the relevant headstones. Just at that moment, an ominous pain convulsed his stomach and he trapped the piece of paper under the grave vase so that he could clutch his aching gut. Within a few seconds the pain had gone.

  Wind.

  A decent breaking of wind would relieve it. He lifted one cheek experimentally but nothing happened, so he took the cushion from his toolbag, an essential item of kit when sitting or kneeling on cold graves for hours on end, and placed it beneath him near the headstone. He opened a jar of grey paint – some magical kind that dried quickly and could be easily scraped off afterwards – grabbed a brush and daubed the area to be marked out with the lettering. While it dried, he located the other grave and performed the same task there. He read the inscription already carved on that headstone too.

  ‘In remembrance of Henry Tether who died in his cups 6th June 1840, a free spirit who in his lifetime would have preferred all spirits to be free.’ So poor Henry Tether had a partiality for drink. Now it was time to add the name of Henry’s dear departed wife Octavia after sixteen years of widowhood. He left the scrap of paper that held the words for its appended inscription under its grave vase also, to save fumbling later for it in his pockets.

  As Arthur made his way back to the first grave he was gripped again by the menacing pain in his stomach. Perhaps he was pregnant somehow and he was having contractions … No, that was plain stupid. He was a man, and men didn’t give birth. Besides, he was not wed so how could he possibly be pregnant? Of course, it was something he’d eaten that had upset his stomach. He attempted to break wind again but … oh, dear … It was a mistake. Perhaps he shouldn’t, for fear of an embarrassing accident.

  He returned to the first grave and checked the paint. It was dry. It would not take long to mark out the lettering that was to be added, and nobody at the firm was as quick as him when it came to cutting letters. He picked up his blacklead to mark it out …

  The pains in his gut returned … They were persistent now and he could hear a tremendous amount of gurgling going on there, as if there were some serious flaw in his intestinal plumbing. It was obvious he must hurry his work, for there were no privies within a quarter of a mile that he could discern. He dared not stoop to do it in the graveyard either, for it was on high ground, exposed to the passing traffic of Pensnett High Street, for all to witness. The vicar might appear like the risen Christ just at the crucial moment … it would be just Arthur’s luck. So, in agony, he carried on marking out the letters and words, taken from the piece of paper he was working from.

  He had to hurry. It was a matter of dire urgency. He was desperate for a privy, for anywhere, hallowed ground if need be. Hallowed ground it would have to be, he decided … until a youngish woman, evidently a recent widow, accompanied by three of her children, tearfully presented themselves and a posy of flowers at a nearby grave. It would be the ultimate discourtesy to relieve himself in front of her at this moment. So he pressed on, cutting letters now as fast as he could, blunting one chisel and picking up another, till he had finished the first headstone. By this time his guts were about to burst. There was no time to complete the second headstone. He had to depart. Right now. This minute. He could return once he had procured relief. So he threw his tools into his bag and fled as fast as his tormented guts would allow. Clenching his buttocks stalwartly and with a fraught look upon his face, he strode across the graveyard and down the long winding path that led to High Street. If he didn’t find a privy soon, Pensnett would be subjected to the foulest pollution ever likely to strike it, an event that could become folklore for generations.

  As he emerged onto the high road, behold, there was a row of houses in a side street opposite with an entry that led to a backyard. He must make use of their facilities without permission, for there was no time to seek it … and what if he did and they withheld their consent?… He could always knock on a door afterwards and confess his trespass, by which time it would be a done deed.

  He crept up the entry and was thankful to find nobody in the backyard which served the terrace of four houses. He located a privy behind one of the brewhouses and burst the door open. It was a double-holer. Arthur had never seen a double-holer before. A roosting hen was perched on a shelf above and Arthur impatiently removed the fowl to a squawk of protest. Just in time he managed to lower his trousers and perch over one of the holes …

  Arthur was wallowing in the ecstasy of blissful relief for a minute or two afterwards, in no rush to move lest another bout of the vile stomach ache assail him, when the latch rattled and the door opened. A woman about the same age as his mother entered.

  ‘Mornin’.’

  ‘Morning,’ Arthur replied, more than a little taken aback.

  ‘That’s my side …’

  ‘Oh … I beg your pardon.
’ With hands clutched embarrassed in front of him, he shifted across to the next hole and made himself comfortable again.

  The woman proceeded to hitch up her skirt and positioned herself over the other hole. ‘The sky’s a bit frowsy this mornin’, ai’ it? ’Tis to be hoped we have ne’er a shower,’

  ‘’Tis to be hoped,’ Arthur agreed tentatively, hearing the unmistakable trickle of spent water into the soil below them. He was uncertain whether to proceed with the conversation and prolong their encounter, or to say nothing more in the hope of curtailing it. Never in his life had he shared a moment like this with a complete stranger, nor anybody familiar either for that matter. He wanted to get off his seat and scarper, and allow the woman her privacy, but there was the hygiene aspect of his sojourn that had yet to be attended to. He glanced around him in the dimness looking for squares of paper.

  Happily, he was released from his dilemma when the woman stood up and allowed her skirts to fall back.

  ‘I’m mekkin’ a cup o’ tay. Dun yer want e’er un? I’ll bring thee one out if yo’ve a mind.’

  ‘No, thank you,’ Arthur replied with a shake of his head. ‘That’s very kind. But I’m just on my way. I just popped in for a quick one.’

  ‘Suit yerself then, my son. Ta-ra.’

  Arthur lived with his father, whom he hated, and his mother whom he felt sorry for, in Brierley Hill in a lane called Lower Delph, commonly referred to as The Delph. His older brother Talbot had fled the nest to feather his own when he was married some five years earlier, to a fine girl rejoicing in the name Magnolia. The family business had been founded by his father years ago and was conducted from the workshop, yard and stables which adjoined the house. Arthur was a man of many interests, but his big love was cricket.

  The only cricket team he had access to play for was the one loosely attached to the old red brick church of St Michael, which he regularly attended on Sundays. The solemnity of Anglican worship and the richness of religious language appealed to his serious side. St Michael’s cricket team played their home matches on a decently maintained area of flat ground in Silver End, adjacent to the railway line. Now Arthur was afraid that the acute bout of diarrhoea he’d suffered that very morning might manifest itself again on the cricket field, which would be to his ultimate embarrassment.