The Miner's Wife

by Diane Allen

  She passed the squawking gaggle and made her way to the postbox, walking down the cobbled street and over the river bridge, where she stopped for a while to watch the water-wheel turning the stones that ground the corn inside the mill. The waters of the fosse were low, but they still made a spectacular sight as she urged herself on with the task in hand.

  She stopped outside the post office and looked at the letter, before placing it in the postbox. Would it be arriving at a house of death, and would her cousin Dan succumb to the terrible sickness? Perhaps her father’s money would never be needed, or would be spent by someone who was left to open the letter on the death of her aunt and Dan, if it arrived too late for any good to come of it? Anyway, she had done her bit, she thought, as she listened to it slip into the metal basket, for collection from the hexagonal green box marked with Queen Victoria’s head. It was truly a marvel that a letter posted in Hawes would be read by somebody in Liverpool in a few days’ time. She only hoped it would not arrive too late.

  The smell of fresh bread at the baker’s made her linger and press her nose up against the glass window of the shop. Inside she could see newly baked bread, scones, cakes and biscuits, and although she was still full from her normal breakfast of porridge, her mouth watered at the temptation of a treat. A treat she couldn’t have, as she was penniless. She looked up as the shop’s bell tinkled and a middle-aged woman, reasonably dressed but not in too fine clothes, exited, only to stop in her tracks as the shop girl called her back. She heard the conversation from within as they both talked.

  ‘Hey, our Jack and Sam would never talk to me again if they knew I’d been over to Hawes and had forgotten their favourite. In fact, Jack asked for it especially, before I left the house and got in the trap with Mrs Pratt. What two long faces I’d have, when they returned from the mine this evening. Thank you, pet, for reminding me.’

  Meg’s ears tuned into the conversation, wondering how likely it was for somebody else to have two sons called Jack and Sam. She watched as the tall, grey-haired woman with a kind face put in her basket the brown bag filled with some treats.

  ‘No problem, Mrs Alderson. We look forward to seeing you next week, perhaps?’ The shop girl smiled.

  ‘Aye, while the weather’s good I’ll be over this way. My two can eat me out of house and home most days, so a bit of fresh baking that I haven’t had to do myself is a real treat. Goodbye for now, pet.’

  Meg watched the woman she now knew to be Sam and Jack’s mother walk past her and trundle up to the marketplace. She seemed a goodly woman; one who loved her sons – as long as she knew when to let go of them, Meg mused, as she made her way home. The trip into Hawes had been worth her while, if only to catch a glimpse of Mrs Alderson, she thought to herself as she reached the farm gate. At least now she knew that they both came from a good, loving home and were who they said they were. The brothers couldn’t be that bad, despite her parents’ warnings.

  The following Thursday could not come soon enough, but she only wished Jack would be meeting her as well as Sam. Jack was the quiet one of the pair and she liked him for that, whereas she knew that Sam was already sweet on her. He didn’t hold back with his attentions, and she found herself thinking of him more and more instead of the placid Jack.

  6

  ‘I’m only taking the trap today, so there will be no room for you, if I’m to take your mother. Besides, I need you to stay at home. I don’t like to leave the farm without anybody about it.’ Tom looked at his scowling daughter as he strapped the horse into the lighter trap, which was not as heavy as the donkey cart and easier for his horse to pull up the steep climb into Swaledale in the hot summer sun.

  ‘But I’ve got to come, Uncle Harry will be expecting me. I always go with the butter.’ Meg tried to hide her disappointment and the tears that were starting to build.

  ‘Your mother’s going in your place, so she’ll explain. Besides, the deathbed of a woman with cancer is no place for a young lass, and your mother and Mary will want time together. Now whisht – go and tell your mother I’m ready.’ Tom hadn’t time for Meg’s protesting; he’d noticed that she never moaned about not going into Swaledale when the weather was bad, but on a fine summer’s day she couldn’t wait to go.

  Meg walked out of the farmyard and into the coolness of the farmhouse kitchen. ‘Father says he’s ready,’ she muttered to her mum with a surly face.

  ‘You know, if the wind changes, your face will stay like that, and then no one will look at the side you are on, with such a sullen face.’ Her mum placed her cotton milk-cap on her head and tied the bow under her chin, as she glanced at her unhappy daughter.

  ‘I wanted to go today, but he says there isn’t the room for me.’ Meg sat down at the table and hid her head in her folded arms.

  ‘Now, how old are you? Nine or nineteen? Don’t you be doing this on me, my girl. I’m going to see Mary, and you are staying at home. So I don’t want to hear another word. Haven’t your father and I got enough worries, what with not knowing who’s alive or dead in Liverpool, and Mary so ill she can barely speak? You moping about is just not good enough, especially when it’s over something and nothing! You can go next week.’ Agnes picked up her basket of butter and sighed. ‘Pass the day in the garden. Besides, we won’t be long. Your father will not be calling in the King’s Head today; he’s getting Blossom shoed while I sit with Mary, and then we will be straight home.’

  ‘But I wanted to come,’ Meg wailed.

  ‘I haven’t time for this. Hold your noise and stop being so selfish, else you are not too old to get your father’s belt around you,’ Agnes threatened. She’d made the same threat for nineteen years and never once had it come to pass. Tom would never raise his hand to his daughter, let alone belt her. ‘Right, we’ll be back later in the day. Make yourself busy. The Devil makes work for idle hands, as your father always says. Next week will soon come round. I didn’t realize the trip into Swaledale meant that much to you, as you’ve never bothered about it in the past.’

  Agnes stood in the porch and looked back at her daughter. She wasn’t going to exchange places with her, as she knew that her oldest friend, Mary, was in need of her comfort.

  ‘That lass of ours is enough to make you swear sometimes,’ Agnes said to Tom as she climbed up in the light gig and balanced the basket on her knee.

  ‘It’s because you’ve spoilt her, with her being the only one,’ Tom growled as he gently whipped Blossom into action.

  ‘That’s it, blame me. It always is my fault, no matter what,’ Agnes moaned as she held onto the narrow seat of the gig while they made their way down the rough field track.

  Meg watched her parents for as long as she could, seeing them eventually going out of sight as they crossed the river bridge. She wiped the tears from her eyes and went out of the dark, cool farmhouse into the sunshine, sitting down on the branch of a fallen damson tree in the orchard, at the side of the farmhouse that adjoined her patch of garden. She looked at her rows of weeded potatoes, cabbages, beetroots, radishes, carrots and Brussels sprouts, along with other vegetables that she usually enjoyed tending. Her heart wasn’t in it today, as she thought about Sam waiting for her under the sycamore tree in Swaledale, with no explanation as to why she was not there. Would he realize that she’d had no choice; that if she could fly like the robin that was picking through the garden grubs she would have been there by his side, no matter what the weather or the distance? She put her head in her hands and sobbed. She’d never felt like this before. The feelings that were stirring in her were new to her; all she knew was that she needed to see Sam again as soon as possible.

  ‘Hello, is there anybody there? Hello?’

  Meg lifted her head and wiped her eyes and running nose with the back of her hand as she heard an unfamiliar voice echo round the farmhouse.

  ‘Yes. Hello, I’m here, can I help?’ She stood up and breathed in, making herself respectable for her unknown visitor, as she walked round the front of the house to w
here the voice was coming from.

  ‘This is Beck Side, isn’t it? Tom and Agnes Oversby do live here, don’t they?’ A mucky-faced lad stood in front of Meg, his clothes as dirty as his face and looking worn and too small for his lean, wiry body. His trousers were halfway up his leg and held up by a piece of rope.

  ‘They do, but what do you want with them? We’ve no need of a farm lad, and we don’t encourage beggars or hawkers,’ Meg added quickly when she noticed the hessian sack by his side.

  ‘It’s a good job, then, that I’m neither of them.’ The lad grinned and pulled his flat cap off his head. ‘Am I bloody glad to be here! I didn’t think I’d ever manage it. If it hadn’t been for the wagoner giving me a lift from Lancaster, I’d still be tramping the roads. You must be Meg – my mother said Uncle Tom had a lass.’ He held a hand out to be shaken and looked across at Meg, who was gawping at him.

  ‘Are you Dan? What are you doing here? Does your mother know you are here?’ Meg ignored the outstretched hand and looked at the scruff of a lad who stood in front of her, not quite believing that this could be her cousin from Liverpool.

  ‘Aye, that’s me: Dan Ryan. And don’t you be fretting about my mother – she died on Sunday, but told me to find you all, as she lay dying on her deathbed, and gave me the money your father sent her, to help me on my way. Look, I still have a bob or two in my pocket. I was lucky because, as I said, a wagoner helped me most of the journey. He took pity on me, although he wouldn’t have done if I’d told him I’d lost both my mother and father to cholera. Everybody seems to think you can catch it, but I heard them that came to take my mother’s body away that it’s the water that’s been killing everybody. The water pump at the end of our street has something in it. That’s why I’m alright. I’ve been spending my time in Toxteth and haven’t been drinking from the same pump.’ Dan put his grimy hand in his pocket, then revealed the change from the money sent to his mother. ‘Your father can have it back, now I’m here, because my mother said he’d look after me once I got here.’

  Meg stared at the strangely spoken lad and didn’t know what to say. He seemed to have taken the death of both his parents in his stride. He also seemed to think that now he was with her at Beck Side, he had a new home and everything would be alright.

  ‘Any chance of something to eat? I’m starving, and my belly thinks my throat’s been cut. I’ve walked on my own from Ingleton and never stopped until I was here.’ Dan looked around him. ‘Big spot this, innit? It must be worth a bob or two.’

  ‘Sorry, I just can’t believe you are standing in front of me and talking about your parents’ deaths without any tears. I’d be broken-hearted. I dare not even think about losing my dear mother. You poor thing, you must have been through hell.’ Meg started to walk towards the kitchen door, with Dan following her.

  ‘It’s life, innit? One day you are here, and the next day you can be gone. There’s ten folk died on our street. The authorities never left the street alone, with their hessian sacks and sprinkling of McDougall’s powder over the bodies. They’ve all been buried in one grave at St Mary’s, so at least my ma and pa are together.’ The young man walked behind her with his hands in his pockets.

  ‘McDougall’s powder? What’s that?’ Meg stopped in her tracks and looked at the hard-headed lad who was standing in front of her.

  ‘It’s a powder they cover the dead with before they put them in a hessian sack, and then they place them in a coffin and cover that with the powder and all, before they are buried. It’s a disinfectant, if that’s what it’s called? I’m not right good with big words.’ Dan shrugged his shoulders. ‘Anyway, all I know is that I’ve no home; they cleared the house out and burned all the furniture, even though they said it was the water that made my mother and father badly.’ He breathed in deeply as he looked around the oak-beamed kitchen of Beck Side. ‘Bloody hell, I was right. I thought I’d want for nothing if I made myself known here. Just look at this kitchen: you’ve bacon and ham, and look at the bread that’s on the table. Cut us a slice, Meg, and put some butter on it. A pot of tea would go down well and all.’ His eyes took in everything as he glanced around the kitchen and made himself at home in Tom’s chair.

  ‘That’s my father’s chair – you’ll have to shift when he comes back.’ Meg placed the kettle on the fire and sliced and buttered two pieces of bread, placing them on a plate along with some cheese and boiled ham that she brought out of the dairy.

  ‘He’s not here yet, so he’s not to know, is he? A bit of a stickler, is he? I heard he was a miserable old sod, but that your mother would keep him straight, when it came to me.’ Dan filled his mouth with bread, cheese and ham and looked at Meg as she poured the tea.

  ‘He can be, but he works hard and looks after us all.’ Meg sat down opposite her cousin and wondered if she should have asked him into the house. After all, he could be contagious, but she hadn’t had much choice in the matter. ‘Where’s Toxteth? You said you’d been there.’

  ‘Aye, I have. I’ve been cow-keeping with old Fawcett – he’s got ten cows that he keeps in the house next door to the one he lives in. Toxteth is a part of Liverpool; it’s got a big park, and Fawcett’s allowed to let his cows graze there, as it keeps the grass down. He feeds them brewery grains and molasses from the factories down by the docks, in winter. I deliver the milk to folk in a trap some days, for the old bugger, and some days I help with his packhorses, but to be honest I’ve had enough of it all. Especially now that I can see what a life I could have here. I bet you want for nowt.’ Dan belched as he made himself comfortable in his uncle’s chair.

  ‘Cows living in houses – I’ve heard it all now.’ Meg shook her head in disbelief.

  ‘It’s right, I tell you. He’s converted the terraced house downstairs to hold his ten cows and he has a dairy to keep the milk cold, and outside in the yard he’s got a stable and hayloft, with a midden in one corner. It’s a farm in the middle of the city. There’s a lot of cow-keepers getting to be in Liverpool, as city folk need their milk just like you lot do.’ Dan yawned. He was tired, as the journey here had been hard, and in truth he hadn’t slept for a good few days.

  ‘You look tired. Why don’t you have a sleep, and then my mum and father will be back by the time you wake.’ Meg cleared his empty plate and watched Dan close his eyes and stretch out his legs.

  ‘Aye, I might do that,’ he mumbled as he made himself more comfortable in Tom’s chair. ‘I’m right glad I’m here. I know I’ll be alright now, as my mother said Uncle Tom would do right by me, because he owes us.’ He closed his eyes and hoped that his mother’s words would come true.

  Meg glanced behind her, at Dan asleep in her father’s chair. She was fretting that perhaps she should not have let him into the house, and that her parents would not be happy with her decision to do so. But what else could she have done? She made her way round the side of the house to her garden and picked up a hoe, deciding to weed her newly planted rows of lettuce. They would be the last batch until after the winter, she thought, as she raked away thistles and dandelions from around the small plants. She couldn’t concentrate on the task in hand as she kept thinking about Dan, already making it sound as if Beck Side was automatically going to be his new home; and about the fact that Sam would think he had been forgotten by her. How long would he have waited for her under the sycamore, she wondered, and would he ever want to see her again?

  ‘What are you wittering on about, our Meg? For heaven’s sake, calm down.’ As Agnes climbed down out of the trap, she felt in no mood for Meg and her hysterics. She’d just left the bedside of her best friend, who was dying, and had little patience for her daughter’s selfishness.

  ‘He’s here, Mum. Dan is here! He walked into my garden, as bold as brass, and he’s asleep in the kitchen.’ Meg pulled on her mother’s arm, as her father climbed down from the trap and led the newly shod Blossom into the stable.

  ‘Oh, my Lord, you let him into the house! We will all be to bury; we will all c
atch cholera and be blamed for bringing it into the dale.’ Agnes herself was hysterical as Tom, hearing all the fuss, joined them before stabling Blossom.

  ‘It can’t be our Anne’s lad – how’s he got here? Why’s he not with his mother?’ Tom looked at Meg.

  ‘He says his mum is dead and that she told him to come here, and that you’d look after him. He’s really cheeky, doesn’t stop to think what he’s saying, and I don’t think he cares,’ Meg said as she watched her father’s face cloud over with the thought that his sister was dead, and that she had sent her son to be his ward. ‘But Dan does sound as if he’s been through hell. I think he’s been on the road for at least four days. A carter brought him from Lancaster to here, else he’d still be walking.’

  ‘So, our Anne is dead – that’s me on my own then.’ Tom breathed in and then lifted his head. ‘Especially now that her lad sounds just like his bloody father,’ he growled and walked up through the farmhouse porch and into Beck Side’s kitchen, where he stopped in his tracks as he saw the scruff of a lad asleep in his wooden Windsor chair.

  ‘We can’t have him in here. Look at him, Tom, he’s nothing more than a vagabond. How do we know he is who he says he is? He could be any Tom, Dick or Harry!’ Agnes gasped as she looked at how mucky and scrawny the lad in front of them was.

  ‘No, Mum, he’s definitely who he says he is. He’s got the change from the money Father sent to Liverpool. The reason he hasn’t got cholera is because he’s been helping somebody who keeps cows, and Dan hasn’t been drinking the same water as his parents. That’s how they’ve both caught it, he says,’ Meg whispered as all three of them looked down upon him.

  ‘Here, you, wake up!’ Tom shook the urchin by his shoulder and then harder still, when he did not stir.

  ‘Sorry, sir, I didn’t mean to fall asleep. Don’t hit me, sir, please don’t hit me!’ The lad jumped up, still half-asleep, and looked at the three pairs of staring eyes as he came to his senses. ‘Sorry, I thought it was my old boss and I’d fallen asleep on the job; he didn’t half used to give me a thrashing when I did.’ He looked at the surprise on their three faces and wiped his eyes. ‘You must be my Uncle Tom and Aunty Agnes – nice to meet you.’ He held out his hand to be shaken, but nobody took him up on it. ‘It’s alright, you’ll not catch owt. I’d be six foot under by now if I had anything.’ Dan dropped his hand, knowing exactly why he was not being welcomed with open arms.