The Bobbin Girls

by Freda Lightfoot

  Surprising really that Alena had been so kind, when she usually gave the impression of being a bit stuck-up. The way she talked, with scarcely any sign of a Lancashire accent, always having new frocks to wear, and a brand new bicycle bought her last Christmas. Ma Townsen spoiled her daughter, everybody said so. Short of nothing of what she’s got, that lass. And never away from Ellersgarth Hall and young Rob Hollinthwaite. Thought she was somebody because she was friends with the son of the mill owner. Huh! Such niceties didn’t cut any ice with Dolly. Her mam said the Hollinthwaites might have a lot of fancy goods on show in their shop window, but a lot of dusty goings on in their back store rooms that didn’t bear the light of day. Dolly still hadn’t managed quite to discover what she’d meant by this description, since the Hollinthwaites didn’t own a shop, but it sounded intriguing, and not quite proper. Anyroad, those two were nobbut a pair of li’le bairns, Dolly thought, rather condescendingly. Why bother about them?

  ‘We could go for a walk on Saturday,’ Alena was saying. ‘I could do with a bit of company myself just now.’ And she smiled such a winning smile that her lovely face lit up and the last shreds of Dolly’s resentment faded away. No wonder she got away with all sorts of mischief. What a cracker she was, and no mistake. Why was it some girls had everything? Wasn’t bloody fair. Like this Hallowe’en business. Most folk would simply smile and say, Ah, it’s only Alena up to her mischief.’ But when her neighbours thought she, Dolly Sutton, was responsible, then it was a different story. Just because her dad hadn’t made an honest woman of her mam. What did marriage matter anyway?

  It just did, she thought bleakly. For all her mother had lost her man in a war, she’d grown lonely and bitter as she’d suffered the stigma of being a single woman with a fatherless child. Dolly hated the idea of ending up like that.

  ‘What do you say?’ Alena persisted. ‘A walk would be good. We could take a picnic and go as far as Devil’s Gallop or even Esthwaite Water.’ That would show Rob Hollinthwaite she had other friends she could call upon, and didn’t have to wait on him.

  Dolly, far from keen on walking at the best of times but unwilling to give offence, hesitated. Yet there seemed no help for it, and the exercise might solve her problem. Or better still, things might be different by Saturday, back to normal, and then she could change her mind and go and have a cuddle with Tom instead. She might even get round to telling him. He was such a good-looking, big-hearted sort of chap with half the village girls after him, she wondered why she was worrying at all. ‘All right,’ she said. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Where were you? Why didn’t you come? I waited hours and hours, every night this week.’ Alena stood with arms akimbo, fists bunched into her waist, lovely face tight with her fury.

  ‘I couldn’t.’

  It was late Friday afternoon. School was over for the week and really she was itching to tell Rob all about Dolly’s revelation, but meant to make him suffer for his neglect before she did so. Then it occurred to her that he wasn’t suffering at all from her show of temper. There was an air of suppressed excitement about him. With his brown hair sprouting in every direction, checked shirt buttoned up wrong as if done in a great hurry, and his skinny legs protruding from long grey shorts, he seemed to be bubbling over with some secret he could barely contain. ‘What is it?’ she asked, abandoning her stance. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘Guess?’

  ‘Oh, if you’re going to play silly games, I’m not interested.’ She flounced away to scramble up into the old tree and sit hunched upon a crooked branch, hurt by his attitude. There were no sounds in the woods but the carolling of a lone blackbird. It sounded so melancholy and forlorn it almost brought tears to her eyes. She certainly wasn’t crying over Rob Hollinthwaite.

  ‘You couldn’t begin to guess,’ he said, eyes glittering. Not in a million years.’

  Alena gave a long-suffering sigh, and a teasing smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. ‘Your Aunt Maud has bought you a new top and whip?’

  He snorted and started to toss acorns up into the high branches to show he really didn’t care whether she guessed or not. ‘Don’t be soppy. Anyway, I haven’t got an Aunt Maud.’

  Alena rolled her eyes, as if pretending to think, but with her mind still on Dolly, she said, ‘Old Simpleton is having a mad passionate affair?’

  ‘That’ll be the day. But you’re getting warm. It is to do with Miss Simpson.’ He could keep it to himself no longer. He came to lean with studied nonchalance against the trunk of the tree, hands in pockets, and looked up into Alena’s questioning gaze. ‘She’s leaving.’

  Her mouth literally dropped open. This was indeed the last thing she had expected. The governess doted on Rob, adored him, had lived and worked at Ellersgarth Hall since he was a tiny baby. Nothing but a disaster of cataclysmic proportions would drive her from his side. ‘Why?’ She dropped down from the branch and together they sat in their favourite place between the roots of the great tree as, with arms wrapped about her knees Alena prepared to listen to his tale with breathless anticipation.

  Rob dragged the suspense out for a moment longer, until she was almost bouncing with impatience and begging him to get on with it. ‘Because I’m going away to school. What do you think about that?’

  It was only as he watched her face turn deathly white that the full implications of his news hit home. Of course, it would mean that they wouldn’t see each other any more. Why hadn’t he thought of that? Because he’d been desperate to go to school for so long, he’d been thrilled when his father had told him. Even the loss of good old Simpleton, of whom he was really quite fond and would miss hugely, had paled into insignificance beside the prospect of this new adventure. Now he wasn’t so sure.

  When?’ Alena’s voice sounded all fuzzy and wobbly, like the wavering image of her pale face.

  ‘Soon. After Christmas, I imagine. I’ll be home every holiday, of course, and we get weeks and weeks so…’ He let the sentence hang unfinished. Excitement had died in him and unease began to grow. He changed tack and started to talk about the ‘new opportunities’ that were waiting for him. ‘Rugger and soccer,’ he explained. ‘The school has its own swimming pool and running track. There’ll be lots of work, of course, exams and such, but…

  He pulled a face, and once again his voice tailed away as he watched the changing expressions on Alena’s face. Her white skin seemed to be going all red and blotchy now, right before his eyes. Hardly surprising since a surge of fury so hot and fierce she couldn’t hope to contain it, was coursing through Alena’s veins. She felt sick, was sure that at any moment she would throw up all over his stupid feet. How could he look so pleased with himself? How dare he be so happy that he was going away?

  ‘You’re too old to go to school,’ she said with great scorn. ‘I’ll be leaving soon, starting work and earning money.’ This was far from true. Hadn’t she promised to stay on to take her school certificate, which everyone thought she could get quite easily?

  ‘I’m not.’ She had hit upon Rob’s greatest worry: that it was too late for him to go to a proper school. That he’d be too far behind the other boys. The nickname ‘Simpleton’ suited Miss Simpson rather too well. She wasn’t the finest teacher in the world, not by a long chalk, but she had brought joy and enthusiasm to her lessons. Perhaps the new schoolmasters wouldn’t. He almost hated his father for leaving it till the last minute like this. Rob struggled to recapture his earlier pleasure as the worries rushed in. ‘Age doesn’t matter. Being a boarder is different.’

  ‘I hate you,’ said Alena. ‘I hope it’s a stinking school and you’re miserable as hell in it.’ Then she turned and ran through the woods as fast as she could.

  Chapter Three

  Alena stormed angrily back and forth in the small overcrowded kitchen. A clothes maiden of steaming damp laundry stood in her way and, half blinded with tears, she pushed against it, sending it toppling. ‘He can’t do it!’ she cried. ‘He can’t send Rob away. I won’t let him.’
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  ‘I doubt you’ll have any say in the matter.’

  Having righted the laundry and rescued a bowl of starch which looked like going the same way, Lizzie attempted to calm her irate daughter. The chances of her survival had once been so poor they’d had her christened within days of her birth. Jaundiced and unable to suckle properly, it had seemed a miracle when against all the odds the weakly infant had thrived. Lizzie had marvelled at the time on the mysterious workings of God and nature, and still did so today as she looked on the girl with wonder.

  No tears brimmed in the sparkling blue eyes, only a hot dry anger. Not naturally uncaring, this recklessness was born from very real misery. Bright hair flung back, face pinched with a resolute fury, she’d been a difficult baby, a wilful child, and had now grown into this strong-minded, beautiful young woman who would prove a formidable adversary for anyone. Even James Hollinthwaite. ‘Have you no thought for Rob?’ Lizzie gently chided. ‘Did it not occur to you that he might enjoy it, that it might do him some good?’

  ‘I suppose you’re going to say it’ll make a man of him?’ Alena s voice was hard with desperation.

  ‘Happen it will.’

  ‘It won’t. He’ll hate it at that awful school. Rob is sensitive. Quiet and shy.’

  ‘Happen it’s time he learned not to be.’

  ‘He’ll hate being away from Ellersgarth.’ Alena wanted to say that most of all he would hate being away from her, but that sounded rather over-dramatic so instead she struggled to express her thoughts fairly and calmly. ‘He’s used to being on his own. He isn’t made to cope with the rough and tumble of a load of uncaring toffs. I just know he’ll hate it.’ She’d forgotten about meaning to keep calm.

  Such vehemence, Lizzie thought. Had it not been so sincerely felt, she might have laughed. But she could remember her own youthful passions and knew that for some reason Alena felt things more keenly than most, certainly more than any other member of this all male household; more than was good for her at times. Lizzie turned away to stir some life into the glowing coals, trying to summon up sufficient heat to dry her washing on this dismal November day.

  ‘He’ll be with right-thinking people. I’m sure it will be a good school, and you’ll see plenty of him in the holidays.’ But the girl did have a point, no doubt about that. Robert was a shy boy, a loner, happy to follow where Alena’s more vigorous enthusiasms and imagination led him. ‘Happen it’s time you made other friends too, young lady,’ Lizzie said with feeling. ‘You’ll be a woman soon.’

  ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, now you sound like his father.’

  Lizzie pursed her lips. ‘Maybe he has a point. It don’t do to be too narrow-minded where friends are concerned. The more the merrier, that’s what I say. Now set that table and stop fretting. The subject is closed.’

  When her mother spoke in that tone, Alena could do nothing but comply, but the subject, so far as she was concerned, was very far from closed.

  As soon as school was over for the day, Alena made her way to Ellersgarth Hall like a homing pigeon.

  The house stood four-square at the edge of Hollin Woods. its grey slate walls seeming to have grown out of the ground itself. A dour, drab building, rather like its owner, Lizzie spoke of a time when it had once been almost derelict. She told how Mr Hollinthwaite had spent a small fortune restoring it: putting in new windows, repairing the traditional circular chimneys and building on a new porch over the front door. Its starkness was softened by a garden thick with weigela, climbing roses and honeysuckle at the appropriate season. Winter jasmine now brushed against her cheek as Alena made her way round to the back.

  She hadn’t seen Rob for nearly two weeks. Alena had waited for him every evening by the oak tree, but he hadn’t come. They’d gone for a few days without speaking before, but never this long. It was unbearable. She had to find him and apologise for the terrible things she’d said. Even so she felt certain he would have long since got over his fancy for going away to school. She meant them to put their heads together and try to think of some way of making his father change his mind. Rob could come to the local school with her and they’d be as happy as Larry together. Which was why she had decided to see Mrs Hollinthwaite, who would surely be on her side

  ‘Hello, Alena. How lovely of you to call.’ Olivia was standing at the stove stirring soup when Alena burst through the back door, as usual without knocking. Ellersgarth Hall was like a second home to her, and she’d never been told that any formality was necessary. The kitchen was warm and cosy on this brisk autumn day, the smell of herbs and vegetables deliciously appetising.

  Rob, it seemed, was not in. He had been taken by his father to visit the new school, which was in Yorkshire, so they wouldn’t be back until the next day. Alena wondered why Mrs Hollinthwaite hadn’t gone with them but was too polite to ask.

  Olivia insisted that she stay and drink a cup of tea with her. ‘I was about to put the kettle on anyway. Let’s be cosy and chat, or have a bit of crack as they say round here.’

  This was one of the things Alena liked most about Mrs Hollinthwaite. She wasn’t a bit stand-offish. And despite having a cook-general, the redoubtable Mrs Milburn, she was not above doing kitchen tasks herself. She was an excellent cook and proved it now by bringing forth a plate of freshly baked scones and a jar of home-made blackcurrant jelly. Alena chose a scone, slit it in half and spread it thickly with the jam.

  ‘Hmm,’ she mumbled through the crumbs. `Delicious. How do you find the time?’

  ‘Heavens, my life is easy compared to most. Ask your mother how she manages to keep house for a husband, four grown sons and a daughter, and still hold down a job as canteen lady and general factotum at the bobbin mill?’

  Alena couldn’t help but smile. ‘She’d say it’s because she’s a woman.’ And Mrs Hollinthwaite laughed. It was a lovely, tinkling sound and Alena realised she didn’t hear it very often.

  ‘I’m surprised Jim and Harry aren’t married. Handsome blond giants the pair of them. Even Kit must be nearly twenty-one by now, mustn’t he? Tom not far behind. It’s a wonder none of them has been snapped up.’

  ‘Ma says they’re too comfy at home, but she lives in hope,’ making her laugh again.

  They gossiped about neighbours and village life; the Harvest Supper and the new vicar - latest in a long line since few of them seemed to take to the peculiar isolation of the parish, and how Mrs Rigg at the village shop had promised to get in some of the new lightning zip fasteners as soon as they became generally available. They discussed the tragedy of Sir Henry Seagrove being killed during an attempt to beat the speed record on Lake Windermere in June when his boat Miss England overturned. And, inevitably, they got on to the depression and the increasing number of unemployed which everyone was concerned about. Alena always enjoyed chatting with Olivia, since she talked to her as if she were an equal.

  ‘What are you going to do, young lady, when you leave school?’ It was a question adults loved to ask, Alena had noticed.

  ‘I’ll probably work in the mill too,’ she said, a hint of defiance in her voice. She’d somehow lost all interest in teaching.

  Mrs Hollinthwaite seemed disappointed. ‘I’m rather sorry about that, Alena. You’re bright enough to do better. With women gaining the vote two years back I would’ve thought you’d be keen to make your mark.’

  ‘There’s naught wrong with working in the mill,’ she said, rather heatedly, knowing it was once the last thing she’d wanted. But now somehow she craved it, as if to compound her misery by such sacrifice.

  For a long moment Olivia Hollinthwaite sipped her tea and said nothing. Then, very quietly: ‘You’ll miss Rob when he goes.’

  It was a statement, not a question, and another reason in favour of going to the mill. Without Rob, Alena felt she would need the comfort of familiar folk about her.

  ‘Yes.’ Tears sprang to her eyes but she tightened her lips and ground her teeth together, determined not to give way. If sometimes Alena found her m
ore feminine side in conflict with her tomboyishness, that was a problem she had learned to hide. Rob would think her soppy if she cried.

  ‘He’ll miss you too. I know he’s very fond of you. We all are. And we’ll miss seeing you here every day.’ Their eyes met in a long glance. Mr Hollinthwaite wouldn’t miss her. He barely spoke to Alena, unless he happened to bump into her by mistake. She thought him very full of his own importance.

  ‘Yes,’ Alena said again. Then swallowing the pain in her throat, ‘Is it definitely decided then? Will Rob go whether he likes the school or not?’

  It was a long moment before Olivia answered. ‘I’m afraid so.’ Another pause and she added more brightly, ‘I’m sure it will be good for him. He probably should have gone years ago, though I’m rather glad he didn’t, aren’t you?’

  ‘Why didn’t he?’

  ‘My fault, I suppose. I enjoyed having him at home. What is the point of bringing children into the world then sending them away? That’s what I always said. Though I never had as much time for him as I would’ve liked, so perhaps . . .’ She was frowning now, as if trying to puzzle something out.

  ‘And Mr Hollinthwaite thought the same?’

  ‘What? Oh, yes.’

  ‘Then what changed his mind?’ the girl was eager to know. ‘Why is he sending Rob away now? Why can’t he go to the local school with me?’

  Olivia Hollinthwaite looked into the girl’s bright blue eyes and admitted to herself that she had wondered the very same thing. It couldn’t be entirely due to that silly swimming incident, surely? She’d decided not to mention this to Alena, so as not to embarrass the girl. Fourteen was such a self-conscious age.

  She rather thought her husband had developed grand ambitions for Robert. Several years at a worthy university, followed by marriage to some horse-faced female with land. This was no doubt what James had in mind for his only son and heir, so he’d want to cool this particular friendship. Olivia couldn’t help but smile. Hadn’t he always underestimated Rob? There was much more to the boy than James gave him credit for. But then, Rob wasn’t easy to get to know. For all she’d kept him at home, and their perceived closeness, there were times when his reticence, his quiet stubbornness, left even her perplexed. She was never entirely sure what he was thinking. Which made her wonder if perhaps her reasons for keeping him at home were perhaps a touch selfish, and that it was time to cut the apron strings.