The Iron Master

by Jean Stubbs

  ‘Hannah,’ she said, ‘who is this lady in Warwickshire?’

  ‘She’s one of young Mr Caleb’s sisters,’ Hannah replied, empty even of sorrow. ‘Will must have confided in Mr Caleb, because when he followed him up here in June he brought a letter with him. And they’ve been talking together, quiet-like, as they worked. I guessed some of it, and Stephen told me the rest — not meaning harm, just chatting-like, being interested. But the lady’s very young, and her family don’t know, and Will and Mr Caleb don’t want them to find out, neither, because old Mr Scholes wants her to wed somebody else.’

  ‘Dear God in heaven,’ said Dorcas, horrified, exasperated.

  For William had not been satisfied to ruin one woman, but was risking the ironmaster’s patronage by courting his daughter. ‘Do you know her name?’ Dorcas asked cautiously.

  ‘Aye, I do, Mrs Howarth. It’s a strange name for a lass, though taken from the Holy Book. The name of the city where Saul and Jonathan was buried. Zelah.’

  ‘And she is engaged to someone else?’

  ‘They have an understanding,’ said Hannah, without irony.

  The knowledge that Dorcas would help her, and was sharing some of the responsibility, had released Hannah from the most cruel of her anxieties. She sounded tired, almost uninterested.

  ‘Let us talk of you for a while,’ said Dorcas gently. ‘Where will you go, and how shall you live, when you leave here?’

  The woman gathered strength, spoke with a rough eloquence which touched Dorcas closely.

  ‘I’ve thought it all out, so’s the child won’t be shamed. I shall go far off. I don’t know where I’ll settle. But I’ll put a few places between here and there, so’s I can say truthfully as I was travelling round a bit. I’m a widow, and I’ll pass for one again. Folk don’t know what goes on from one valley to the next, and a big place like Manchester or Liverpool could be the end of the world for most. There’s one thing more as you could do for me, Mrs Howarth. Would you give me a piece of paper as says I’m honest and hard-working?’ Dorcas nodded, and clasped her hands a little more firmly. ‘I could keep house for somebody, and have the child with me. And I don’t want them gossiping at the Methodist Chapel, or round Flawnes Green, so I’ve been putting about that I heard my sister was in trouble with her health. A word here and there soon spreads. Mrs Boulton said to me the other day, “Hannah, you’re not with us these days. If you feel you’ve got to go then your job’s here when you get back!” But I shall write her a line or two, later on, saying as I shall stop there for good. And Will — well, perhaps you’d look around for somebody for him. I’d rather not tell him myself. I can leave him a line. You could say we’d talked together, so he wouldn’t think I were leaving him in the lurch, like.’

  ‘And you will write to me from time to time, will you not?’ said Dorcas. ‘And send me your address so that I know where to contact you?’

  ‘You’ll excuse me, Mrs Howarth,’ said Hannah, very low, ‘but when I leave here I leave for good. You won’t see nor hear from me no more, like I told you. You’ve got your lives, and we’ve got ours. I want to cover my tracks so’s we all stand a fair chance. I don’t want to be beholden to nobody.’

  Dorcas bowed her head, and then said, ‘But at least, if you are ever in difficulties, you can ask me, can you not? I could not rest if I thought you were so much alone.’

  After a moment, Hannah said reluctantly, ‘I’ll send word if I must, Mrs Howarth. I know you mean it for the best.’

  ‘I am ashamed,’ said Dorcas, ‘that you should suffer.’ Then she stood up, for there was no more to be said on that matter, only the practical side to be resolved.

  ‘I shall bring you one hundred pounds in sovereigns from Millbridge, late this afternoon. Will my son be here?’

  The sum stopped Hannah for a moment. She seemed about to protest, but Dorcas’s upraised hand forbade argument.

  On a lower note Hannah answered, ‘Aye, he will, but I’ll be in my cottage. You can see it across the field over there. If you wanted, you could say you were having a word with me, and walk over.’

  ‘I shall do that. And I shall say nothing to him of your going. I can find somebody, if that is necessary. William and Caleb are seldom here nowadays. A whitster to collect the washing … we are scarcely a mile from Millbridge. one of the Bowker girls … ’

  ‘Aye, I know you’ll manage summat for him,’ said Hannah lifelessly. ‘I’ll give Mrs Boulton my notice.’

  ‘The child,’ Dorcas began, concerned for them both.

  A subdued radiance was for the first time apparent in the weary woman before her.

  ‘Eh, bless you,’ said Hannah in her old warm way, ‘dunnot fret about the child. I’ve allus wanted one. I wanted one so much that I can’t see it as a judgement on me, nor think of it as a sin. I’m grateful, Mrs Howarth, for the child. And I thank you for helping us.’

  The sun was at its height when Dorcas drove away from Flawnes Green, and the day which had begun so splendidly now became oppressive. Her new velvet reticule, her silk gloves, her fashionable slippers had lost their importance. The Millbridge shops had nothing to offer in the way of consolation. Thornton House was dull and languid, Phoebe Jarrett querulous, old Agnes forgetful, and Sally preoccupied with jam-making.

  During the afternoon the heat increased. Dorcas, fanning herself and making conversation, waited until six o’clock before venturing homewards. Then William and Caleb kept her talking longer than she wished, at the smithy, and her visit to Hannah was brief and unsatisfactory in consequence. And the weight of the secret dragged her down. Why should she be the one to know, to help, to cover up, to say nothing? Abruptly, she took her departure. The day had crawled along, getting nowhere. The hour was late. As the rim of the sun slipped down behind the Stoops she saw Ned in the distance, white head erect, brass blunderbuss at his side, and whipped up the horse in sorrow and relief.

  ‘Why, whatever’s to do?’ he asked, as soon as he saw her tired face, her tired ribbons.

  ‘Oh, such a day, but do not ask me! Let us talk of anything else, Ned. Oh, Phoebe is growing old, and Hannah Garside is leaving, and I shall be glad to get home. I wish there were someone else to hear all their troubles and make matters right … ’

  ‘Well, I’ve told thee often enough,’ said Ned kindly, ‘as they’ll allus drive a willing horse!’

  ‘Calling me a horse!’ cried Dorcas, lip trembling.

  He dismounted, tied his stallion to the farm trap, got up beside her and took the reins.

  ‘Come on now, my lass,’ he said, ‘let’s get thee home. Nellie’s cooked a pig’s face for supper, and peas, and there’s a boiled chicken if you don’t fancy the other. You should never have gone visiting in this sort of weather. You know it tires you out … ’

  So he pretended to grumble while she wiped her eyes and gradually felt a little better, and the evening came on cool and blue, and folk began to light their candles against the dark.

  *

  Hannah sat up until midnight, sewing one hundred gold sovereigns into her best black linsey-wolsey gown, and folded it to form the base of her luggage. She possessed very few belongings: some clothes, her Bible, a trinket or two which Abel had bought at a fair. Round them all she wrapped her black shawl. She had cleaned the cottage from top to bottom, and left her cooking pots and wash-tub behind her. A letter for Mrs Boulton lay on the scrubbed table. She walked across the field for the last time.

  It was easy to avoid William, since he was avoiding her, and Stephen had gone over to Brigge House Farm to shoe a team of oxen, so she was spared explanations and farewells. The ritual cleaning done, and dinner in the oven, she picked up her bundle and stood at the side of the Black Road until a passing farmer gave her a lift into Millbridge. There she made enquiries, and found that an afternoon stage-coach called at The Royal George on its way to Liverpool. So it became quite a holiday for her. She ate a pie at the pie-shop and drank a mug of ale, and looked shyly round the town, and thoug
ht it all wonderfully fine. And at the appointed hour she obtained an outside place for the sum of ten shillings and sixpence.

  Hannah Garside might have driven out of the world, that summer afternoon in 1792, sitting steadfastly on top of a coach for the first time in her life, with her bundle on her knees. For none of them ever saw her again.

  Partnerships

  Nine

  The letter was waiting for him, propped up against the washbasin in the bedroom which had been theirs for five years, carefully sealed with a blob of red wax.

  My deer lad Im off and I shant cum bak for that is wot yu want. I understand so dunnot fret deer lad for I shall be orl rite. Yor deer mother nos I am leeving but I hav told evribody that my — sista Suzan is ill and Im gon to luk after her. The rest is bitween thee and me and allwaze steal be and I thank yu for the hapines deer lad. Deer lad I wish yu luk wi the iernwents and a hapy lif wi yor ladiwife and childer to bless yu both. Tak cayr deer Will and may God kep yu safe. Yor luving Hannah. Amen.

  William sat upon the bed, and between shame and sadness and relief could have wept aloud. He sat so long that Stephen mounted the wooden stairs to see if all was well, bringing with him an uncertain mood and tone: a compound of sorrow and accusation.

  ‘It’s a bit of a winder,’ said William slowly, folding the note. ‘Did Hannah say anything to you, Steve?’

  ‘Summat and nowt. Mrs Boulton knows more nor anybody else. Oh, and your mother — Mrs Howarth, that is — left word that she’s sending a woman in from the Green tomorrow.’

  ‘So I am the last to know. Well, if Hannah felt she must go then she was in the right of it.’ Heavily.

  Stephen made a curious movement of the mouth as though he were about to spit, then checked himself and ruminated on his master.

  ‘Aye,’ he said finally, ‘whatever Hannah did were right If anybody tells me any different I’ll punch the living daylights out of them. She were a good woman and there’s not so many that we can afford to lose them!’

  Then he turned and went clumsily down the narrow stair, leaving William to make what he would of that remark, and taking his own feelings out on the anvil. While the future ironmaster stayed deep in thought, until at length he put the letter away, being unable to destroy it.

  *

  From the first, William and Caleb’s partnership in Belbrook Iron Foundry was very like that of husband and wife, for though their investment of money and work might be equal, their positions were not. William had originally laid claim to the wasteland, cleared it, envisioned it. He looked always outward into the world, always forward, seeing what could be and therefore must be, regardless of present circumstances. Whereas Caleb, accustomed to the subordinate role, toiled over domestic detail conscientiously and with a certain quiet enjoyment. Therefore it seemed that William was in charge, though he deferred to Caleb in routine business. Already folk were inclined to say, ‘Th’iron-works? Oh, Howarth’s tha means?’ and to refer to William alone as ‘Th’iron-master’. The interviews with Lord Kersall were conducted by William, while young Caleb provided shrewd counsel from the background. But, the partnership being complementary, it looked to work well from the start.

  Before the spring of 1793 all legal formalities had been concluded and the construction of the Foundry began. The little wooden hut which Ned and William had first built on the site, where they might eat and shelter, was now furnished with tables, chairs and shelves. Here, warmed by an iron stove whose pipe stuck rakishly through the roof, Caleb installed himself and his papers and the files labelled BELBROOK IRON FOUNDRY. Upon the door, under which blew a bitter draught, was nailed a plaque which read COMPANY OFFICE. The administration was complete.

  Outside the hut William consulted with their foreman, Jim Cartwright, and the carpenter Harry Orrell. His tone was genial, authoritative, so that they knew he was master and yet a fellow man.

  ‘Now before we start,’ said William briskly, ‘I want the men to see what they’re building. So I got Mr Ellis Field to draw up a simple plan, clearly marked, which they can understand,’ and he smoothed out his map upon a flat stone to show them. ‘Now then, Orrell, I want you to make me a frame to fit this plan, and make it strong and good. Set it here by the river, on stout posts, so that it catches the eye. And Jim, we shall want a sheet of glass over it, for it shall stop there until the Foundry is finished. And I’ll be speaking to the men, so have it up there for Monday, will you?’

  They nodded, touching their foreheads in respect, puzzled by this curious notion. For what did it matter, after all, that a labourer should comprehend his ultimate goal, provided he reached it? But William was a great believer in inspiration.

  The architect had allowed himself considerable scope, and flattered William, by being slightly fanciful in his vision of the future. Though his drawing was accurate in that it depicted the workings (from the upper furnace pool and dam, through the foundry buildings and lower furnace pool, to the upper and lower forge pools, and on to the wharf and warehouses) it flourished with trees as yet unplanted, workers’ houses as yet unbuilt, and a general air of prosperity which could only be attributed to faith and optimism. Nevertheless, the picture was heartening to everyone concerned with this enterprise.

  Caleb surveyed it with a wry smile, and produced a list of rules for William to read out when he exhorted the men to work. His vision was less popular, more practical, and quite as necessary.

  ‘I shall give my speech first,’ said William, and he was right ‘Then Cartwright can read all this out,’ he added, and was right again.

  So it came about on a cold March morning that William stood bare-headed before the little crowd of workmen, and spoke up loud and dearly.

  ‘My name’s Will Howarth, as most of you know. And this is my partner, Caleb Scholes, and a famous name in the world of iron. I wanted to say a few words to you all, so that you know who and what you’re working for, and why! This is the Age of Iron, men. And, though England has been manufacturing iron goods for longer back than I can remember, she’s never known such an age as this one shall be. This works you’re engaged on building will be known as The Belbrook Foundry, and every inch of ground on which you build, and every yard on which you tread, has been cleared by me and a handful of others. You’re not working for some fancy gentleman from Manchester or Liverpool, who wouldn’t know a pick-axe or a spade if you put it in his hands, you’re working for us. Caleb Scholes and I were apprenticed in Birmingham together as blacksmiths, and Mr Scholes’s father is one of the foremost ironmasters in the land. So we know what we’re about, and we know what we want We want Belbrook built as soon as possible. We want her working as soon as possible. And even then we haven’t finished with you! Belbrook isn’t the end, she’s the beginning. Lancashire isn’t rich in ironworks, like Yorkshire or Shropshire, but she’s going to lead the world. This drawing may not seem much to you’ — he knew that it had impressed them, that they were even now murmuring about it among themselves, seeing themselves as part of an idea instead of slaves to someone else’s ideas — ‘but wait until you hear what we have in mind. You can be employed for ever!’

  He had not intended to finish upon this note, but the hardship of the times was upon them, and they cheered wildly. So he cleverly forgot the rest of his speech, which was mostly statistics to impress them, and repeated his words with a great flourish of the arms as though he called for another cheer.

  ‘Employed for ever!’ cried William. ‘For ever! For ever!’ They threw up their old felt hats and shouted, ‘Hurrah! Hurrah!’

  ‘All right, Mr Cartwright,’ said William calmly, ‘you can carry on now.’

  Caleb greeted his partner with a knowing smile as he stepped down from the improvised rostrum.

  ‘I believe thee should have been a politician, William,’ said Caleb.

  ‘I may be, in the end,’ William replied carelessly, ‘but someone must inspire them. They must work as I did, not as though I were labouring but as though I drew breath. And I shall
be among them at all times of the day and when they least expect me. There shall be nothing that the lowest and poorest of them are asked to do that I cannot do better. Thus shall Belbrook rise and flourish, Caleb. That I promise you!’

  The quiet Quaker turned to watch the crowd, and smiled again.

  ‘See how they greet my homily!’ he observed, without disappointment or pique. ‘So it always is with mankind. They can be exhorted to battle for glory, even at the cost of maiming or death, but the daily concern to live in harmony with themselves and their neighbours defeats them!’

  ‘Well, it is difficult not to take a swig of spirits to keep out the cold,’ said William reasonably, ‘and the Irish will fight; whether they drink or no! As for profanity, my dear Caleb, they do not know it from the common tongue.’

  ‘Yet our own workpeople must observe these rules when the Foundry is built,’ Caleb replied. ‘I am thinking already of their general welfare and health. When thou halt time, Will, wouldst thee like to discuss our Welfare Society? I had thought of a subscription scheme, with graded payments for illness, accident and death.’

  William’s attention was already wandering. The work-gangs were marching off: a dozen men to each gang, led by a ganger who would see that they laboured long and hard since his cut of the wages depended on it.

  ‘My dear Caleb,’ said William, in his most charming manner, ‘what can I offer as advice or criticism? You know what you are about better than I do. And we have one aim in all this. I pray you, do as you think best!’

  He walked rapidly after the men who were to dredge the upper furnace pool and strengthen the dam. There, they would be furthest from the office. But the safety of this dam was more important than anything else on this burgeoning site, William told himself, and he had promised to oversee everything personally. So he strode away.

  Caleb stood looking after him for a few moments, then turned towards his hut, only to be greeted by the sight of Fanner Cotrell alternately hobbling and waving his stick. Courteously, the younger man assisted him into the warmth, thus compounding the destruction of his morning.