by Leah Fleming
If he were to recommend my journey he must see for himself what had become of me over the years. There were still many persecutions in the district and my help was sorely needed on the farm.
I needed no persuasion to head back to my beloved hills. It would be a loving duty to see the family who had nurtured me from birth so I laid his letter before the meeting and obtained leave to make this visit, escorted as far as Scarperton on my journey by Friends attending a gathering there. We would travel by cart into the hills.
It was the first time Ellinor and I had been parted for many months and I would miss her company but the thought of seeing her with Jacob disturbed me. I am ashamed to say that I did not want to be a witness to their happiness. Uncle Roger would cheer my troubled heart. I had stayed away from them too long.
18
I have endured many harsh winters in my life, winters that began before leaf fall and lasted until the coming of the first or second month of the year. The autumn of my return to the hills was a strange twisted season of great winds and rainfall that battered down the leaves early, turning the tracks to a quagmire and the fording places impassable.
It was as if every hindrance was put in our path as we strove to make headway in the tempest, taking shelter where we could, afraid of falling branches and whirling thatch. It made that first journey south with the Crankes all that time ago seem so free of trouble as the three of us struggled on horseback, slithering and sliding along the treacherous bridleways.
My companions were travelling Friends, Ben Foster and his wife, Ann, guiding their horses through the lanes. They knew the terrain and suggested we took a higher track away from the flood plain of the River Aire. We followed the packmen and pedlars, humping packs strapped to their backs, who knew the hill routes and the most sheltered places to rest.
We talked over all the excitement of the past months and the call to go abroad which had stirred their hearts like mine but now they were wavering.
‘Friend Wrathall has a way with words. It is easy for a single man to travel untrammelled by family cares and responsibilities. The cost of such a venture is beyond our means and now we have a child to consider soon,’ said Ann as she bent her head into the wind.
‘It will take wilder hearts than ours to leave this high country for good, I fear,’ added Ben shaking his sodden hat so it sprayed water like a fountain. ‘I would not like to take a young babby on board a ship bound for the wilderness countries. We have waited many a year for this blessing.’
How could I not agree with their doubts? They were only saying aloud what my heart had been thinking for months. Ellinor was strong in spirit but not in body. What if there was sickness aboard and foul weather? I had asked her.
She had laughed away my fears as if they were trifles. ‘It’s not like you to be cautious, Joy. There’s danger in everything we do in this life. Maids can drown getting water from a well or a river. Children die from fever even in the grandest houses. Boys fall from trees and under cart wheels every day. The house could burn down over our heads. Don’t fret thyself over such matters, they’re in higher hands than ours.’
When it was almost dusk, Ben pointed to a lonely farmstead hidden in the lee of the hill far ahead. ‘That’s where we’ll stop the night. They’re distant kin to my owd mother, God rest her soul. Peggy Ackroyd won’t turn us from her door and if she does there’s allus her barn straw to kip down on.’
‘Aye, they’re not of our persuasion but Dales folk will not bar the door against us on such a terrible night as this,’ said Ann.
Her words were drowned out by the wind moaning and groaning. The rain was stinging my cheeks like whipcords.. Many an old tree would not survive, nor loose stones in a swollen wall. It was a Joshua night and no mistake. I smiled, thinking of Uncle Roger’s words. Was I really a Joshua girl or had he made that up for my comfort?
With every step northwards and westwards I was yearning to be back at Windebank once more just to see the faces I might never see in this life again; Aunt Margery, little Dilly and Mall who would be quite grown up now.
Enough years had passed for all the old business to be forgotten, I hoped. Having twenty summers behind me and almost a city girl, they would consider me old enough to know my mind and my place. I could still milk a cow and stir the porridge, card up wool rolls and spin a fleece.
There is a scent to high country, a scent of heather and peat bog, a chill damp air, the cackle of rooks and water rushing over rocks even in the storm that I can summon up at will to remind me of this blessed land as I write these words.
We were a sorry band of bedraggled travellers, mud-splattered and soaked through, whose presence the farm dogs barked out before we reached the yard. A storm lantern swung from a hook. The walls were thick and the roof low-thatched with twine and stones hung to hold the thatch against the wind. The shutters were closed and we had to bang hard on the studded door.
‘Who goes there?’ shouted a gruff Dales voice.
‘It’s Mason Ackroyd’s grandson, Ben Foster, travelling on to Skipton in need of shelter for his wife and a young lass,’ he bellowed. ‘She’s one of the Windebanks up Scarperton way!’
The door was unlatched slowly and a weathered face peered out from the darkness.
‘I’ve never met thee, have I, lad but come in,’ said the farmer. ‘It’s no night for honest men to be gadding about. ‘I’d’ve thowt thee had more sense but sit thesen down, it’s wild out there.’ The man stared at us, scratching his head as we dripped pools of water onto his dry rushes. ‘The wife’ll give thee summat to warm thy bones, seeing as you’re here now. And who might this be then, the wife or the maid?’ he said nodding in my direction.
‘Joy Moorside, late of Windebank, come to visit her kin before she goes abroad to America. This is Henry Ackroyd,’ Ben said, taking delight in showing me off.
‘I’d ’ave thowt a lass’d more sense than go tramping into savage lands. Whatever for? Has she done summat wrong?’ the farmer replied, looking me up and down. ‘Or has the Justice seen her off? I hear he’s a right stickler for the law.’
‘I’m answering a call,’ I said with a little too much pride in my voice.
‘Who’s calling thee? It’s a mighty far off way for someone to be calling out,’ he laughed. ‘Away with her, she’s having me on, America indeed! I hear it’s a wilderness.’ With that he plonked himself by the fireside and sucked on his pipe as if drawing in all our words to make sense of them while his wife fussed over us taking our cloaks and hoods to dry them off.
Two young boys appeared dressed in thick leather jerkins and britches and were told to rub down the horses and take them to shelter and some oats.
‘Mind and wrap up afore ye go!’ shouted their father. They wrapped sacking hoods over their shoulders.
It was a small rough dwelling with wooden benches to sit on, an earth floor strewn with rush matting, a scrubbed table. The kettle pot was boiling and the hob irons sparkled in the firelight. Rush lights dripped their burning mutton fat and smoke, the draughts swirled around the chamber but this was a welcome shelter for weary travellers. The noise of the howling wind rattled above us.
‘I’ll go and see to the lads,’ said the farmer rising up to follow his sons.
How lonely winter nights can be on upland farmsteadings cut off by snow and swollen tracks, I thought. Few strangers would knock on this door, perhaps chapmen and pedlars given a warm brew and a sit down and bog trotters sent packing with a crust. They would be grilled for fresh gossip and it would be chewed over for days afterwards and spread like muck across the fields to the next farmstead or market gathering.
At least there was always company down at Riverbank and among Friends.
This was not the place to talk of missions and ministry or advertise our chosen faith. Anyone could tell by our simple dress and our manner of talking with each other that we were Dissenters of some sort or another.
‘I hope you’ve not come up here to cause trouble,’ said
Henry as if reading my thoughts. ‘Market place is that thick with preachers you’d think the end of the word is nigh,’ he laughed. ‘There’s this man from Settle who likes to bring curses down on the owd vicar. He spends most of the market day in the stocks pelted with horse muck. You’d think he’d nothing better to do, disturbing the peace.’
‘Henry! Give over, you know our Mason was that way inclined . . . I expect Benjamin knows his own mind on these matters without you giving him your penny-worth of ranting,’ shushed his wife, raising her eyebrows. ‘Take no heed, he just likes to blether on.’
‘We thank you for taking us in on such a wild night. It wasn’t this bad in Leeds when we left, was it? I’d forgotten it’s a cloak or two colder in these parts,’ I said, changing the subject.
‘Aye, there’ll be a fair few bunking down in barns and byres for shelter tonight. Not a good sign is this, being so early in the season . . . Happen we’ll be snowed up for months.’
‘I expect you make good provisions,’ I replied knowing how farmer’s wives hoarded away all the summer harvest needed to feed a hungry family in bad weather.
She laughed. ‘Aye, lass, and with two bairns with hollow legs to fill. They’d eat the flesh off our milk cow’s back given half the chance.’
The boys came in soaked and needed rubbing down by the fireside, sitting down to warm themselves by the hearth, boys of about eight or ten, one black-haired and the other a coppernob who stared at us wide-eyed.
‘Say good evening to our visitors,’ she prompted them. ‘This is Hal and t’other is Holly. Show the ladies your manners, lads.’ They stood up, bowed and promptly sat down again.
‘You’ll not get a peep out of them when we’ve company but out in the yard, ’tis another matter,’ said their mother.
‘Thank you for seeing to the horses,’ said Ben, slipping them a coin each.
‘We’ll have none of that, son,’ said Henry. ‘They have their duties same as anyone else on this farm. I can see thee’s gone soft in the city. Big place is it? I heard the houses are all stuck together there.’
Ann nodded, smiling, ‘I hope when my time comes I’ll have a son as strong as they. How did you manage, being so far from midwives and village women?’
Peggy put down her mug and leant towards us. ‘I was spared that agony. The Lord never blessed me with bairns of my own.’ There was an awkward silence.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Ann looking puzzled. ‘I thought you said they were your boys.’
‘Hal and Holly’re as good as any I might have borned mesen, grand lads. I took them in when they were nobbut babbies, many years ago . . .’
Why was my heart throbbing in my ribs, banging so I thought everyone could hear. Hal and Holly, surely not Halifax and Holderness, those names were carved into my memory. Was it possible these were the boys that the Crankes had brought to Scarperton?
‘When was that?’ I heard myself asking.
‘ ’Twere after the yon big flood and the great snow, you know I can’t rightly recall. A friend told me how these poor babbies needed a home . . . What’s it to you?’ she said, her blue eyes hardening. Did I see a flash of fear in them?
I had crossed a line of politeness in such personal questions and withdrew with a smile. ‘It makes an interesting tale, that is all,’ I replied.
‘How’s that?’ she snapped.
‘Oh, many years ago when I lived in Scarperton I heard tell of two little boys who disappeared overnight. Halifax and Holderness were the names given to me. As I recall they were sent to a farm for the winter . . .’
‘I hope you don’t think my Henry and Oliver are owt to do with it. They’ve as good home here as any in the land,’ she said rising up quickly, flushed in the face and I wished for once I could have bitten off my tongue.
‘Remember, we’re their guests!’ whispered Ann, sensing the atmosphere.
‘It was just a tale,’ I shrugged my shoulders but the voice in my head was ringing. It’s them, I know it’s them; the two boys I saw in the market place, the stolen children farmed out for a gold piece or two.
Those Crankes had gathered young children like wool fleece from fence posts and scattered them far away: children who were too young to know their way back home, who soon forgot their real names. Surely they should know the truth?
‘It’s just a strange coincidence,’ I replied, not wanting to let the matter go. ‘I am curious, that’s all.’
‘It’s not thy business to ask such questions,’ Ann whispered, shaking her head.
We tossed and turned by the fireside on sheepskin rugs, glad of the warmth of the embers, lying in our dried off cloaks, tired and sated with kettle broth. Outside the wind roared and the stones banged against the walls. I felt the roof was going to blow away any moment. My mind was racing with the sight of the boys after all these years, convinced that Hal and Ness were found at long last but there was no comfort in the discovery.
In the morning we woke to the scent of salted bacon sizzling in the skillet, the porridge pot was warmed up topped with cream skimmings from the dairy at the back of the house place.
‘It were a bad ’un all right,’ said Henry. ‘There’s trees down all over. It’s still blowin’ hard. Best to stick to high road out of here, the valley bottoms’ll be flooded out, I reckon.’
‘They’ll be anxious for us to be on our way,’ said Ben, sipping his porridge with a slurp. Peggy Ackroyd never once looked me in the eye as she dished out some oatcakes and cheese for our snack. The boys were nowhere to be seen.
‘How can we thank thee for thy kind hospitality to strangers in the night? Many would have barred the door against us,’ said Ben, shaking their hands.
‘Company is allus welcome in this house. If it were not for the kindness of strangers, there would be no family here to see to the farm and carry on after we’re gone,’ Henry replied in his gruff thick voice. ‘It’s grand to see kin.’
‘Henry, let them get on their way,’ snapped Peggy plucking at her apron. ‘I’ll not have that one thinking we’ve done wrong in this life by taking in a stranger’s bairns. They’ve given us comfort and we them and hope for the future. No one can say as we’ve treated them ill.’ There were tears in her eyes. ‘These be my sons now, whatever thy lassie might think. We want no trouble.’
‘Not another word will be said on the subject. Miss Moorside will apologise for giving you a night’s worry, won’t you?’ Ben turned to me pleading with his eyes. ‘She’s young and you know how righteous youth can be in its opinions. She was curious and meant no harm.’
‘I’m sorry if I have given offence in suggesting that these boys were the ones stolen by wrongdoers,’ I said. ‘I was mistaken. The matter will go no further. I owe you much for your kindness to us. Forgive my silly questions.’
‘Then that is an end on it,’ snapped Peggy her chin and jaw relaxing. ‘And we can forget that we harboured Quakers in our midst. One good turn deserves another,’ she waved us on our way.
Was there a veiled threat in her words? Did Ben and Ann not recognise it too? We gathered our sacks and went to find the stable. It would be a relief to be on our way with horses refreshed. I looked to see if the boys were in the yard when I found the little office of necessity but there was no sight of them. Perhaps it was better not to know if my suspicions were true or not.
Peggy was waiting for me, wrapped in her cloak and hood. ‘Don’t go plucking up roots that are doing well in these hills. Don’t go stirring up trouble where it’s not wanted, Miss Moorside. I know your sort are all for the truth. There’s trouble enough in this world. Bairns are safe here from the wiles of the wicked world. One day the farm will be theirs to work,’ she cried. ‘Let it be.’
Who could not admit there was merit in any child living high up on pasture and moor? If they were indeed one of the Crankes’ stolen band of children, then they had found a far better nest than being jostled in the back of their caravan at the mercy of bad weather and worse.
Hal
and Holly thrived where they grew; any fool could see that they were well fed and watered. It was not my place to make claims I couldn’t prove.
‘What troubles me, Mistress, is the thought of Titus and Dora Cranke roaming the countryside about their wicked business, stealing other folk’s children for profit, breaking the hearts of parents. There are many that will not know such loving comfort,’ was all I could say to her. She had to know the truth of my suspicions. ‘I meant no harm. You’ve been kind to us.’
‘As God is my witness these bairns came to me as orphans and I have loved them as my own flesh and blood. When you’ve waited nigh on ten year with an empty belly that yearns for a bairn, when you’ve lived with the shame of being one who is called barren then you will know my pain and the joy in receiving an answer to prayer. I don’t know who sent you here but may God in His mercy soften your heart towards us,’ she wept.
‘But it’s a terrible thing to take a child from its parents,’ I argued, trying to stay upright in the gale. ‘That I do know.’
‘Aye and there are plenty who’re careless with them an’ who beat and whip and are cruel slavemasters. Let us be. I know nothing of any stealing. I was told they were orphans. Don’t tear them from the only home they know.’
I knew now how Solomon must have felt when faced with two mothers wanting the same child. Why had we stumbled on this farm out of all the others in the dale?
There was no one to answer me but that inner voice that sometimes springs into my ear, the voice I call the Truth within. ‘Love is what matters most. Where there’s Love and honour, there be God in his glory.’ Was it not possible that the Lord in his wisdom had other plans for these boys than to languish in some city cesspit?
‘The beginning of all wisdom is knowing what you don’t know,’ came the voice again. I could not undo what was done by going to the Justice with unproven suspicions. Look where it had got me before. This matter was neither black or white but grey and murky with arguments on both sides: that I did know and it was beyond my poor judgement.
