Is

by Joan Aiken

  ‘Tell me what?’

  ‘About what keeps him ticking over; why he’s lived for sich a tarnal long time.’

  One glance at his face assured her that this information was still Mr Twite’s own secret.

  So, she thought thankfully, Gold Kingy’s got plenty of reason for wanting to keep Grandpa alive and kicking.

  ‘Gower! Take the girl away!’ yelled Uncle Roy.

  The man who had silently appeared during the interview and stood behind Is now gestured to her with a jerk of his head to follow him.

  So he must be the husband of that poor worried lady, thought Is – she said he was an important government official, the Deputy Moderator. He’s the dad of little Coppy.

  ‘I seen your little boy, your little Coppy the other day, Mr Gower,’ she told him chattily as she turned to leave the Audience Chamber. ‘He’s a real nice, bright little fellow. Too bad you gotta send him off to school, all the way to Scotland!’ She received a look of fury in return from Mr Gower: a tall, thin, black-haired man with a closed, shut-in face and such a small, sour mouth that, thought Is, he’d have a precious awkward job opening it far enough to swallow a cherry.

  ‘You have a boy, Gower?’ demanded Gold Kingy sharply. ‘Why was I not told? Do I know your boy?’

  ‘Oh, I am quite certain that I have told you about him, sir – at one time or another. He is young as yet – barely three I understand – still wholly in the nursery, sir.’

  Gold Kingy nodded, then suddenly flung the hammer on to the floor so that it cracked a pink marble paving stone.

  ‘We need them smaller in the mines every day, remember!’ he said ominously. ‘He could be a trapper – he could be an opener!’ And, turning, marched off to the back of the chamber.

  Does Uncle Roy have a wife – children? wondered Is, as he vanished through a door. It seemed unlikely. Where could he be going now? What to do? Practise the flute? Read? Play cards with somebody?

  Mr Gower angrily escorted Is to the street.

  ‘You go home and behave yourself, as the Leader said,’ he snapped. ‘And I advise you to behave much more respectfully towards your uncle from now on, or you will find yourself in very bad trouble.’

  ‘Yus. I can see that,’ said Is. And then she thought: I’m sorry I gabbed about little Coppy. I done it to tease that prune-faced Gower, but I shouldn’t have spoke out about him in front of Gold Kingy. He seemed a real decent little nipper. That was a stupid thing to do.

  7

  Sieve my lady’s oatmeal

  Grind my lady’s flour . . .

  If I ever let Gold Kingy guess that he frightens me, thought Is, I’ll never get anywhere.

  She could see that his whole power was built on fear – everybody who worked for him was afraid of somebody else, so nobody dared make any protest, even when terrible things were done. And people had grown accustomed to the terrible things.

  ‘We need them smaller in the mines every day!’ Gold Kingy had shouted at Mr Gower; that had put Gower in a cold sweat, because he was terrified for little Coppy. Was Uncle Roy planning to pass a law that four-year-olds might be taken for work in the mines?

  The best thing I can do, thought Is, will be to disobey Uncle Roy; not go home, like he told me, but nip straight to the foundries and ask some more questions. That’ll show him I don’t care for him and his threats.

  The shortest way to the foundries from Gold Kingy’s royal residence was through the smaller, darker streets that lay to the rear of the palace, and past the entrance to the mine. The mine gates were, as usual, locked and heavily guarded, and the approach to them illuminated by a blaze of white light shining down from the rock roof overhead.

  Opposite the gate was another statue of Uncle Roy, mounted on a horse, wielding a pick-axe, and much larger than lifesize. The horse, in particular, was enormous; big as a small elephant, thought Is, who had once seen an elephant trundling along in a circus procession. The horse was rearing up on its hind-legs and Uncle Roy sat in the saddle with a nonchalance that made Is chuckle each time she passed the statue, for she felt sure that he had never ridden a real horse in his whole life. The statues of horse and rider, and the big rocky base on which they balanced, cast black shadows over the ground, and as she walked nearby Is thought she saw something – someone? – scurry into the shadow and vanish in the patch of inky black. What – who – could it be? Holdernesse swarmed with rats and mice, but it was too big for one of those; big enough for a dog, or a small person. A child? The guards, yawning at their posts, had observed nothing. They pounced on Is and made her show her pass; now she wondered why Gold Kingy had not confiscated this. You’d think he’d do that right away, she pondered, walking quickly and lightly along the road that led to the town’s dockside entrance. The lights here were scanty, between them lay long patches of shadow. Now and then Is thought she heard footsteps behind – but that might have been the echo from the tunnel roof.

  Still, it was a relief to come out of the cave into daylight – even if only the grey light of a murky December afternoon – among the slag-heaps of the dock, the drums of tar, piles of firebricks, rail wagons filled with coke, coal, or ingots.

  It’s all so ugly here, Is thought sorrowfully, and a great wave of longing nearly choked her – longing for the frosty silence of Blackheath Woods, for the mist rising, the drowsy bedtime whispers of the birds, the glisten of toadstools in wet grass among layers of dead leaves – for her cat Figgin, bounding ahead towards the gleam of light that would be Penny simmering a kettle on the hob.

  I dunno how folk can stand it here, thought Is, taking a long, resentful breath of the sharp, thick air that always smelt so strongly of burnt milk. And she stood still for a moment, trying to squeeze her homesickness into a manageable size, collecting it into a kind of solid lump inside her chest, so that she could bear it and go on. If I feel so, what about all them poor devils on the train, who believed – the silly nuddikins – that they were due for a lifetime of larks in Sugar-Candy-Land; now they’re slaves in the mines or mills, and no way to get out. At least I’m free, and can go where I like.

  But oh – don’t I jist wish I were in Blackheath Woods this very minute!

  The Touch came to her again: the long, cold, piercing finger of contact. We share it, the voices told her. We feel that too, all of us. And it is not so terrible if it is shared.

  Is looked round her in bewilderment, almost expecting to see a huge host of companions marshalled over the waste spaces of the dock; but the spaces were empty, except for herself. In the distance, the foundries roared and glimmered. Sudden gusts of flame spurted upwards as fuel was tipped into the furnaces; the clang and thud of the steam hammers recalled Gold Kingy saying, ‘You know what it’s like to lose a hand.’

  ‘I’ve come to see the ones that were burned in the blow-out,’ Is announced boldly, stepping into the flaring, gas-tainted, dusky confusion of the main area. And she showed her pass to the overseer.

  ‘Most of ’em’s back at work now. There’s only two left out in the butteker – and I reckon they’re past crying for,’ he told her indifferently. ‘You can go and look at ’em if you’ve a mind to.’

  She made her way to the storage shed where the hurt workers had been taken, and found that the last two were indeed past crying for; both were cold and dead, and had probably been so for a day at least. A little snow had fallen on them, through gaps in the roof, and had frozen. One of the two – a girl with badly burned hands and arms – still seemed to clutch something in one of those burned hands.

  What can she have set such store by? wondered Is. Something that might give a name to her – be sent back to her family? Or a bit of bread?

  Hating the task, she pried at the stiff, frozen fingers.

  ‘There’s naught now,’ said a voice behind her. At the overseer’s orders, two boys had followed her. ‘Tha’ll find naught, luv.’

  The second boy said, ‘T’gaffer gave orders to drop ’em in t’river if they’re done for. T’l
ass did have like a keepsake i’ her hand, but one of t’others took it.’

  ‘What kind of keepsake?’

  ‘Kind of a bootten, like,’ he said indifferently.

  ‘Did it once belong to a boy called David Stuart?’

  ‘I’d not knaw that. Ann used to keep it i’ her mouth.’

  The second boy said, ‘T’lass as took it off Ann is called Nettie. A red-haired lass. Reckon she’s still aboot – she was workin’ as a sampler, last time Ah see ’er.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘In t’main building. Can’t stop now, luv, or t’gaffer’ll have our hides.’

  Without more ado, they dropped the two frozen bodies in the river, which was tidal here, frothy and swift-flowing.

  Is went back to the main building.

  The samplers were equipped with long-handled ladles. It was their job, Dr Lemman had told Is, every time a load of molten ore was discharged down the trough, to dip out a sample, allow it to cool a bit, and take it to the engineers’ office to be tested for impurities. The task was fairly dangerous, because of the heat of the white-hot metal running down the trough and the sparks that cascaded out from it, but the work was not heavy, so it was mostly done by girls.

  Red-haired Nettie was there, neatly dipping out a ladleful of white-gold ore. Like giants’ jewellery, thought Is.

  While she stood waiting for it to be cool enough to carry, Is asked her, ‘Did you take a token off a dead girl called Ann?’

  Nettie glared at her suspiciously, then recognised the doctor’s helper and nodded.

  ‘Ah, I did. But it weren’t for mysen. A gal called Tilda wanted it, but she couldn’t no way get there; she’s on the bellows, see, at the blast furnace, working all the time.’

  ‘Why did she want it? Was it like this?’

  Is showed a corner of her own token, through a gap in her jacket-seam.

  ‘Ah! That it were! Tilda wanted it ’cos she’d been friends with a lad who’d been friends wi’ the cove as had it.’

  ‘Davie?’

  ‘Ah dinna knaw.’

  ‘Is Tilda still here?’

  ‘Look, lass, I must flit, or he’ll toss me in t’runner.’

  She tipped her red-hot ingot into a metal pan with a wooden handle and ran off with it.

  Is felt a hand on her shoulder. The overseer was glaring at her with black disapproval.

  ‘I never gave thee leave to come in here, young ’un, interferin’ wi’ the workers – that I dunna. Be off with thee – right away – or I’ll call the constables.’

  And what would the constables do with me? Is wondered, reluctantly obeying; in fact she had no choice, as, with his heavy hand on her shoulder, he practically shoved her out of the melting-shop. Would they send me to prison? Is there a prison in Holdernesse? That’s one word I’ve never heard. Maybe they don’t need a prison here – everywhere else is just as bad.

  Is made a detour on her way home to visit a couple of Dr Lemman’s older patients. These were among what he and Ishie called ‘the Warren’ – various of Aunt Ishie’s friends who had either secretly disobeyed the order to move into new accommodation in Holdernesse, or had stealthily and inconspicuously left that new accommodation again, once the general move was over and the authorities were no longer paying heed to them.

  There were twenty or so of them scattered over the dismantled landscape of Old Blastburn, making what use they could of its ruined amenities. Mostly they were old people, living like rabbits in concealed burrows: small half-ruined houses in out-of-the-way glens or dells where they could grow a few cabbages, keep a hen or two, and kindle a morsel of fire at twilight without being observed.

  Miss Sibley and Mrs Crockett were among these: two elderly sisters, one of them a widow. They lived on the western side of Holdernesse Hill in what had once been a flour-mill, surrounded by a few scrub fir-trees that had managed to survive the poisonous fumes from the blast furnaces. The roadway to Corso Mill ran up to a bridge which was half broken. A young and agile caller might just be able to cross the gap by taking a tremendous leap over the millrace which ran below, but the two elderly owners preferred to follow a more circuitous route, crossing the stream lower down by a natural bridge formed from fallen ash-trees webbed together by creeper. Dr Lemman also used this approach, tethering the mare to a tree on the near side.

  ‘What’ll you do when the trunks rot through?’ Is had asked on her first visit.

  ‘My dear, by that time our aged bones will be long scattered. And this rustic gangway provides a useful defence against persons of a superstitious habit. There are plenty in Blastburn – yes, I assure you! – who, already half suspecting us of witchcraft, are afraid to cross a bridge composed of mountain-ash trunks.’

  What the sisters lived on, nobody knew. Mrs Crockett suffered severely from rheumatism (very possibly because their hideout in the ruined mill building was so close to the mill-stream); she was obliged to go about almost on all-fours, bent double, and helped by a short stick. Dr Lemman called on her as often as he could, treated her with aconite and bryony and applied arnica to her joints with a camel-hair brush.

  The sisters had been schoolteachers in the days when there had been schools. Now they were certainly thought to be witches, if anybody thought about them at all.

  Is, carefully manipulating Mrs Crockett’s stiff joints, told them about Grandpa Twite’s plan to print story-books for the workers.

  ‘There’s a fine library still in Blastburn, did ye know?’ said Mrs Crockett. (‘Ah, that does me a power of good; thank you, my dear.’)

  ‘A library? In the new town?’

  ‘No, no, no. In the old town, in one of those ruined buildings. Nobody sets foot in there now, it has been declared unsafe. Books in Holdernesse? Nobody wants them, nobody reads. They play that game instead, with dice and counters.’

  ‘Yes, I’ve seen them,’ said Is, who had noticed the guards, overseers and constables playing this game when otherwise unoccupied.

  ‘It is called Steal a March – Gold Kingy invented it, so he makes a profit on every set sold.’

  ‘Now the other side, missus, if you’ll turn over,’ said Is. ‘Does Gold Kingy have any family?’

  ‘No, my dear. He did have a wife, but she ran off and left him. (Can’t blame her, can you?) Went off in a ship to Holland, ship got wrecked, that was the end of her. Some said Gold Kingy got word beforehand, had the ship scuttled. Wouldn’t put it past him. Stayed single after that. Out for number one. He always was that, Roy Twite. I knew him from my evening class at the Workers’ Institute – always stealing ideas and textbooks from his next neighbour.’

  There came a loud plangent angry caterwauling from the entrance.

  ‘See to him, my love, would you,’ said Mrs Crockett to her sister, ‘while this dear child just finishes my back.’

  ‘Sounds like a mighty big cat you got out there, missus,’ said Is.

  ‘Oh, it’s not a cat at all, my love, it’s a poor mad boy who thinks he’s a cat. He worked in the foundries and then in the mines, and the things that happened to him unhinged his brain. Now he just scampers over the hills; he’s harmless so he is left alone, even by the authorities. After all they can’t employ a boy who thinks he’s a cat. My sister and I give him a bit of fish when he comes this way; there is always fish in the mill-stream.’

  ‘What’s his name?’ Is asked alertly.

  ‘Bobbert. Bobbert Ginster.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘There, my dear, thank you a thousand times, you have loosened me up remarkably. Now I may even be able to walk upright for a couple of days.’

  Miss Sibley came back, brushing fish-scales off her hands.

  ‘Would he not come in?’ said Mrs Crockett, disappointed.

  ‘He heard the strange voice and that always scares him off. He was very wild tonight. He ran off up the hill.’

  ‘When it is very cold he is prepared to spend a night by our fire,’ Mrs Crockett explained. ‘Poor boy – it is rather sad
.’

  Better than being in the foundries, Is thought, and Miss Sibley echoed her thought.

  ‘He is far happier running wild, Caroline, than in one of those atrocious places. Goodnight, my dear child, and thank you for your care. Our best regards to your aunt.’

  ‘I’ll come again as soon as I kin,’ said Is, stepping out into the windy dark. She wondered if from some bush or whin or ruined building the mad boy who thought he was a cat might be watching her.

  When she got back to Wasteland Cottages she found Grandfather Twite in a desperately dejected and penitent state of mind. Aunt Ishie was hovering over him with a wet cloth for his head and a dose of soda for his stomach. Her eyes were full of pity, although she scolded him.

  ‘Look at that handle! Look at what you nearly did to your grand-daughter.’

  He could not believe in the handle. ‘How could I have done that! Somebody else must have done it. I shall have to get the blacksmith to straighten it. My own handle! I would never do such a thing. Besides not having the strength.’

  ‘Well – you did,’ said Is bluntly. ‘I was there, so I can tell you that if I hadn’t nipped back pretty smartly, you’d be out in the snow a-digging my grave this minute. I’ll not hold it agin you, Grandpa, but I wish you’d smash up all those crocks full of grog in the cellar.’

  ‘Oh, I couldn’t do that,’ said old Mr Twite instantly. ‘I need them, you know – not for myself, but for the requirements of hospitality. However, I swear and declare that I will, myself, never touch spirits again – ’ He paused, looked sorrowful and added, ‘Just the same, you had better not trust me. And – and do not tell me anything that I might divulge to – to unsuitable persons when under the influence.’

  ‘Oh, Grandfather!’ said Is. ‘It ain’t only that. It’s that – when you’re bosky – I can’t trust you not to beat my brains out!’

  ‘I know, I know it!’ he lamented. ‘It is perfectly true! But what can we do about it? I fear, my child, that you must take to carrying arms.’ And he chanted:

  ‘I have a barrel

  But no bung