Barefoot on the Cobbles

by Janet Few

  Memories of the alleged misdemeanour that had led to her unjust punishment surfaced and Eadie’s bottom lip trembled. She sucked it between her teeth to stop herself crying again before these nice folk. She knew Mrs William of course, her ma sometimes stopped to pass the time of day and she’d often watched Albert head down to the beach with his father and brother, to man one of the small fleet of fishing boats that put out from the shore. This was the first time she had been inside their cottage though. Eadie was overwhelmed by the neatness, by the order, by the silence. No baby’s napkins drying on a clothes horse, hindering whoever was trying to stir the cooking pot. No sisters squabbling, pulling hair and laying claim to prizes that Eadie herself had found tossed up by the sea.

  Albert was explaining to his mother how he had rescued a distressed Eadie from the square.

  ‘Mebbe you stay here for a day or two maid, ’til your da calms down,’ said Mary.

  There was reassurance in the words but who was the more comforted, Mary or this dark-visaged child with sadness in her soul? Mary turned to her son, who had unwittingly presented her with a few days of companionship.

  ‘Albert, when you’ve had your dinner, you must tell Mrs Tommy her maid be here. Mayhap she will worry else.’

  Mary’s mind was racing; unlike her heart, the cottage lacked space for a small girl. Could the child perhaps sleep on a mattress in the scullery? wondered Mary. Invigorated and hardly daring to think how long she might extend the stay of their unexpected visitor, Mary heaped crispy, golden fish and a pile of boiled potatoes on to a thick china plate. Eadie stuffed the food in her mouth with a voracity that suggested she was used to fighting her siblings for a share. Two plates were loaded for the absent William and Fred and set to keep warm in the Bodley. Relieved to have passed the responsibility of Eadie to his mother, Albert sat absently at the table, his thoughts elsewhere, occupied with wondering if he would meet the Wakely girls after chapel on Sunday. The eldest, Lydia, always approached him with a proprietary air but he preferred Polly, feisty too but still over-shadowed by her pushy elder sister. He’d heard their brother was now a coachman in Scotland. Scotland; it was another world. Albert was restless in Bucks Mills, would he ever escape? Maybe not as far as Scotland but many a man his age was married and set up on his own. Here he was, with his brother Fred, still crewing his father’s boat like a youngster. His mother’s voice drew him back to the present.

  ‘Eat up son.’

  A steaming syrup pudding, anointed with thick yellow custard, was set on the scrubbed wooden table.

  Mary turned to Eadie, ‘Tuck in maid. Your da will be in soon, tide’s on the turn.’

  Unaware of her slip of the tongue, Mary was already letting the child put down tenacious roots, roots that were to weave their way into the fabric of this home like the ivy that was embedded in the walls of Eadie’s own cottage. Had Mary been able to see into the future she would have been surprised and gratified to know that these bonds were to tether Eadie to Rose Cottage for the rest of her life.

  Hobnails clashed and sparked on the cobbles outside and the menfolk filled the small room with their bulk and the scent of the sea.

  ‘Good catch?’ asked Mary.

  ‘Plenty enough,’ replied William. ‘Takey’s off to Bideford with a cart load. We were late in, so he was already pretty full and we’ve some left he wouldn’t have, so they’ll need salting down.’

  Mary suppressed a sigh. Although she was brought up in a farming family, she’d been the wife of a fisherman long enough to have accepted the tasks that were her lot but her hands were increasingly cramped from years of cleaning and gutting fish. She could get Eadie to help perhaps but she baulked at subjecting those still soft, starfish hands to the cuts and the pain of the salt water that would impregnate them. Eadie, replete with the unaccustomed good food and the warmth of the welcome, remained unobtrusive in the shadowy corner. Turning, William spotted the smock-bedecked child whose bow, now re-tied, was almost as large as the face beneath it.

  ‘What’s Tommy’s maid doing here?’ he asked.

  Eadie, sensing that her reprieve might now be on an uncertain footing, shrunk down and tried to make herself invisible. As the gaze of this giant of a man raked her, instinctively, the child looked up, dark eyes widening and she smiled broadly, lightening her sharp features. Her loose top teeth had been unceremoniously yanked from her mouth by her father earlier that week. String had been duly tied round the troublesome incisors and attached to the open door before its sudden slamming. Memories of pain and a blood-filled mouth had already dimmed in Eadie’s consciousness, eclipsed by other hurts. Unbeknowing, in the split second of that disarming toothless smile, Eadie secured her future in this family unit.

  Firmly and before she could be gainsaid, Mary answered, ‘She be staying put. There’s too many of them down at Ivy. I could do with some help in the house now me arthritics be so bad and she will walk up to school with Johnny Adelaide’s girls. Norah’s about her age and Gertie can keep an eye on them both on the way. She won’t be no trouble.’

  The words sounded like a plea but the tone was decisive. William shrugged. Children, especially female children, were women’s business. He guessed Mary knew what she was about, he wasn’t going to argue. He didn’t suppose such a small scrap would stop him supping tea and dozing by the Bodley of an evening.

  ***

  Mary took mothering Eadie in her stride and as the weeks went by, both woman and child flourished, enfolded in the comfort of their budding relationship. The villagers shrugged their shoulders and minded their own business, unquestioningly accepting that Eadie now belonged to Mr and Mrs William instead of Crumplefoot Tommy and his wife. Casual comments, exchanged as neighbours passed in the street, paid tribute to the mutual benefits of the new arrangement.

  ‘Mrs William’s looking well. Niver seed her so cheery.’

  ‘That there Eadie’s growing apace, she be a pretty maid with her hair all combed.’

  ‘I saw Mrs Tommy out with the bebby. She’s perked up a bit. Not like all that trouble she had after young Eadie was born. That must be a relief to Tommy an’ all.’

  The spectre of the asylum was a pall that hung over every one of them. That Eadie’s mother had spent time there was acknowledged but rarely vocalised. It was alluded to in hushed tones or conveniently ignored. It was as if refusing to name their fears would spare them from the grasp of that dreaded building in the south of the county. Their silence would grant them immunity. If the words remained unspoken, madness would not reach out and claim them, as it had claimed the poor overworked woman at Ivy Cottage, whose only crime was to have another child. Sometimes the comments delved a little deeper, as the chattering women sought to show off a more intimate knowledge of their neighbours.

  ‘Well Mrs Tommy could niver quite take to the maid you know. She came back from you know where when Eadie was just a tiny mite and next they knew they lost their young lad.’

  ‘Apple of Mrs Tommy’s eye he were. Don’t think she ever quite forgave Eadie for being spared when their Sammy was taken.’

  ‘Them’ve all been left to run wild down at Ivy if truth be told.’

  ‘Well, they did have a time of it.’

  The tone made it sound like a plea, but the words were decisive. Mary took pride in fashioning a Sunday bonnet and new smock for the child. She derived a welcome contentment from having a girl about the house. Here was someone she could cook with, knit with, even confide in. The child’s bubbling chatter was a refreshing antidote to the rough, monosyllabic masculinity of her husband and sons. Eadie submitted to Mary’s ministrations with equanimity. She was comfortable in her new home; its serenity encircled her. It was a far cry from the muddled, cramped inefficiencies that had been an integral part of life at Ivy Cottage. Her mother, Ellen, had seemed glad to have one fewer mouth to feed, one fewer offspring to cope with. Although Eadie sometimes regretted not being able to mind the baby, she did not miss her sisters. She was free from the argume
nts, the noise and the clutter. Solitude suited her. The minute hole that Eadie had left in the chaotic life of Ivy Cottage had filled imperceptibly, as if she had never been.

  ***

  There was a reassuring rhythm to Sundays in the cottage at the top of the street. Mary would spend the morning cooking, whilst William dozed in the kitchen chair; rarely stirring as his wife tutted and flustered round him, pans banging on the stove. Albert and Fred, uneasy in their Sunday clothes, would be fidgeting restlessly, aware that there were nets to mend or pots to make but knowing that these were not tasks for the Sabbath. Sometimes, the young men might stroll down to look longingly at the sea, skimming stones and watching the tide swirl over The Gore, as the boats lay idle above the reach of the waves. In between scrubbing carrots and basting potatoes, Mary would help Eadie to learn the verses that she would be expected to recite at Sunday school in the afternoon. Sunday school brought Bible stories, carefully coloured texts, and gusty renditions of Jesus Bids us Shine in unformed reedy voices. Then it would be home for a tea of cut-rounds and cake. It was the family’s habit to attend the early evening service at the Methodist Chapel. Such an emphasis on chapel-going was something new for Eadie. Under her parents’ regime, religious observance had been sporadic at best.

  The quiet of the August Sunday enveloped the village but all was bustle in Rose Cottage, as Mary straightened her best bonnet and wiped jam from Eadie’s face. At Mary’s chivvying request, reluctantly, William put on his newly shined boots, Albert slicked back his hair and Fred reached for his waistcoat. Then they were ready for the few yards’ walk down the hill to the chapel, ready to hold their heads high in front of their neighbours. Some weeks, in the thunderstorms of summer, hammering rain would beat a soothing rhythm on the tin roof, drowning the preacher’s voice but on this particular Sunday, the sky was cloudless. The long hot day had made the atmosphere inside the tiny hut stifling. Kneeling on a coarse hassock between Mary and Albert, Eadie’s mind wandered as the words of the prayers washed over her. The walls of the chapel echoed back the phrases with an eerie resonance. For Eadie, the sermon was the hardest part. The dust motes swam in the sinking sunlight and she struggled to stay awake as the preacher spoke of sin and salvation. As her thoughts began to drift and her head sank on to Mary’s shoulder, a gentle nudge jerked her awake. She blinked her eyes deliberately, in an attempt to stave off sleep. Respite came when the preacher called for a hymn. Eadie struggled to follow the words in the red-covered hymn book but the music revived her.

  Sometimes, Albert would walk Eadie down to the sea when the service was over. They would call in to greet their grandparents in the cottage on the cliff. Eadie loved the cottage. Even the gate was exciting, having, as it did, a ship’s wheel at the centre. Eadie’s small fingers would proudly trace the name that was engraved in the wooden frame: King’s Cottage. She smiled; her granfer was a king. Thrilling though that thought was, Eadie was in awe of the creaking couple who inhabited this cottage of wonders. The grandfather, Captain James, was held in high regard by the villagers, most of whom were relatives of one kind or another. He could no longer row out to pilot boats in over the bar, or rescue ships in distress, these glories were now merely memories to be shared with the next generation. The old man might still potter in the bay, handline for fish from the shore or sit in the porch and ponder on the past. He would raise his telescope to scan the sea that had been his love and his master for more than eighty years. The telescope was another delight. When Eadie visited, it would be hung proudly above the fireplace. She longed to be allowed to peep through it but it remained in place, its leather lovingly worn and its brass gleaming.

  Two things blighted these Sunday visits for Eadie. Firstly, King’s Cottage was also home to Aunt Matilda, their grandparents’ youngest daughter, who cared for her parents in their old age. She was a strange little woman, slight and swarthy, with rotten teeth and the faintest suggestion of a moustache. The poor woman was inoffensive enough but she dwelt in the corners of Eadie’s nightmares, chilling and dark. Then there were the terrors of the privy to overcome. The privy was a talking point in itself. Not that there was indoor plumbing, that would be unheard of for ordinary folk but here there was no long dark walk to a spider-filled hut in the garden. Eadie would have welcomed the spiders, they held no fears for a country child. She had, after all, grown up in the dust and debris of Ivy Cottage. Her grandparents’ privy however stood resplendent in a tiny room at the back of the cottage. It held horrors for Eadie. Aunt Matilda insisted on plying her with cups of strong tea and Eadie did not know how to refuse. Soon she would be wriggling and squirming, trying to ignore the discomfort of her full bladder. She would look anxiously at Albert, hoping that he would say it was time to go home. Anything to avoid having to heave her small buttocks on to that gaping hole in the high wooden seat and hear below her the rushing of the stream, over which this part of the cottage was built. Once, she had made the mistake of peering down the hole at the dizzying water flowing swiftly past.

  This week though, Eadie was spared the agonies of embarrassment and fear that accompanied her visits to King’s Cottage, as Albert did not suggest a walk to the sea. Instead, he seemed eager to be off on his own as soon as the service was over.

  ‘I’m walking up to the late service at Goldsworthy ma,’ Albert called back to Mary, as he strode off up the hill.

  Mary’s lips pursed and a worried frown crossed her brow.

  ‘What’s he off up there for?’ asked William. ‘What’s wrong with a godfearing Wesleyan service that he wants to go gallivanting up to the Bible Christian Chapel as well?’

  ‘It’ll be them Wakely girls,’ said Mary. Tales of Albert’s interest in the family had reached her in the way that only insidious village gossip can.

  ‘Hmm,’ replied William, frustrating Mary by his lack of concern.

  ‘He can do better than those Wakelys,’ said Mary, with a mother’s defensiveness. ‘They’re no better than gypsies with their bold eyes and brazen ways.’

  William felt that his wife was overreacting. He was aware of the rumours surrounding the Wakely family from the neighbouring valley but any hint of gypsy blood was generations ago and they seemed relatively harmless. It wasn’t like Mary to take against someone with little reason, thought William. The crux of the matter was not so much the Wakelys’ origins but the fact that they came from outside the village. Marrying a Peppercombe girl brought with it the danger that Albert might decide to leave Bucks Mills and Mary would be distraught if he moved away. William glanced at Eadie, skipping now, freed from the strictures of chapel. Perhaps this small girl could help Mary to come to terms with the thought of their sons leaving home. It was high time Albert took a wife. William looked forward to teaching a grandson the ways of the sea, as his own grandfather had taught him. William shook himself. Why were they worrying when, as far as they knew, Albert wasn’t even walking out with one of the girls?

  ‘Let’s wait to fret when he brings a maid home, mother,’ he soothed.

  ***

  Albert panted up the hill in the day’s lingering warmth. It was a fair step to Goldsworthy and he didn’t want to be late. Maybe today he would pluck up the courage to ask Polly if he could walk her home after the service. This would not be the first time that he had attended Goldsworthy Chapel, as well as his own, in the hope of engaging the Wakelys in conversation. As he walked, he cast his mind back to his first encounter with the sisters. It had been a few months ago, when a temperance rally had been held in Bideford and various local congregations, of the different Methodist denominations, had arranged charabancs to the town. Albert had gone, not really because he had strongly held convictions about temperance, more because it was an opportunity to escape the confines of the village. He had signed the pledge at a young age of course but did not find abstinence irksome. Since the Coffin Arms closed to customers decades ago, there was no ale-house in Bucks Mills, so alcohol was not a temptation.

  It was a large but rather borin
g rally, with platitudes from the platform that Albert had heard many times before. At the end of the afternoon a tea was served and Albert suspected that he was not the only member of the audience to prefer the prospect of refreshments to the preceding lectures. As he queued to take his place at the long tables, Albert became aware of a group of three dark haired girls immediately in front of him. In the crush, one of them stepped back suddenly, landing heavily on Albert’s foot. She twisted round.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ she said.

  The girl was about to turn back to her companions when her gaze took in Albert’s height, his muscularity and his piercing blue eyes. Here was someone who might be worth getting to know. She looked around hastily for signs of a female companion. Establishing that Albert appeared to be alone, the girl boldly struck up a conversation.

  ‘I’m Miss Wakely, Lydia Wakely,’ she said, ‘and these are my younger sisters, Jane and Polly.’

  The emphasis on the word younger did not escape Albert. Miss Wakely was clearly expecting that Albert would consider her sisters too childish to warrant notice.

  ‘Have you come far?’ asked Lydia, after Albert had introduced himself hesitantly. Before he could respond, she went on, ‘We come from Northway, it’s nowhere much. We are with the group from Goldsworthy Chapel. You won’t have heard of that either.’

  As it happened, Albert had been aware of the recently rebuilt chapel, belonging to the Bible Christians, that nestled in the back lanes of Parkham but he didn’t correct Lydia. Instead, he explained that he was from the neighbouring hamlet to their own. At this, Jane Wakely, who was plainly the shyest of the trio, put her hand to her mouth with an ill-disguised gasp of alarm.