The Loom Part 2

Leah gave Janey a push to wake her and flung back the bedclothes. The oil- cloth was freezing and she could see her breath condense in the cold air. She ran across the room and selected her clothes from the still sizeable pile on the chair.

'Get up, Janey,' she called as she ran from the room.

'Shurrup,' Darkie called. Leah bit her lip. She'd forgotten Darkie would still be asleep.

Janey snuggled deeper into bed. She was still not used to working in the mill in the morning and attending school in the afternoons. By the time she'd done her stint in the mill she was so tired that she almost fell asleep at her desk. 'It's a waste of time,' she complained to her mother.

'It's the law,' Emma would retort. Emma wished Janey had more of the get up and go, that Leah had. All Janey seemed to be interested in at the moment was movie stars!

'You look half starved, love,' Emma said as Leah opened the door into the living room and skittered across to sit as near to the fire as she could. She poured some of the porridge into a dish and gave it to Leah. 'Here, get this down you, it'll warm you up.'

'Ta, Mam.' Leah ate hungrily. She loved porridge and it filled you up so that you didn't feel hungry for hours after.

'Did you wake our Janey?'

Leah nodded, still spooning in the porridge and Emma was relieved to see some colour creep into her cheeks. 'You know our Janey,' Leah said, in-between mouthfuls, ' it would take a bomb to get her out of bed.'

'Well, she'd better not make us late again,' Emma said in exasperation. She went to the bottom of the stairs and called up, not too loudly. 'Janey...Janey...'

She went back into the living room and took a hairbrush off the mantle. 'Get dressed Leah and then come on over here and I'll give your hair a good brush and plait it for you.'

Slipping off her nighty Leah quickly pulled on long flannel bloomers, liberty bodice, vest, flannel underskirt and thick black stockings. On top of all this she put a black shift then a bleached calico ap.r.o.n. She sat on the chair whilst her mother brushed her hair.

Emma had just tied Leah's plaits with blue ribbons when there was a loud knock on the door. It made them jump and Emma looked up in surprise.

'Who on earth can that be at this hour,' she said.

'I'll bet its Annie Fitton,' Leah said angrily. 'I know she's deaf , but does she think we are as well? One day she'll go clean through the door with that knocker.'

Emma hurried through to the front to answer the knock as another loud one echoed through the house. 'Just be civil if it is Annie,' Emma said over her shoulder. 'She can't help being deaf and she's just lost her Ned and him only eighteen. Ee, I feel sorry for her, I do that.'

Leah heard Emma open the door, then Annie's loud voice. I knew it, she thought in irritation. She's never away. We might as well get her a bed here.

Annie Fitton was indeed standing on the front door step when Emma opened the door. Annie was fat, extremely fat. Her large round pudding face with its blackcurrant eyes stared at Emma worriedly. 'I'm sorry to bother you, Emma,' she said apologetically, 'But could you let me have a bit of sugar. I'm right out and I can't drink me tea without it.'

'Aye, course I can. Come in a minute.' Emma turned and walked quickly back into the front room. Annie followed ponderously behind. A moonbeam of a smile lit her face when she saw Leah.

'Ee, it's your Leah. You do look bonny this morning, Leah.'

'Ta, Annie. Cold, though, isn't it.'

Annie c.o.c.ked her head. 'Sorry, love, I didn't hear that.'

'It's cold,' Leah shouted.

'Aye, it is that,' Annie said, 'But all this,' and she patted herself, 'Keeps me warm.' She let out a bellowing laugh, her layers of fat rippling like a tidal wave. Leah stared, mesmerized. Annie was just too fat. She'd explode if she put on any more weight.

Annie sat down on a chair next to Leah. The chair creaked ominously. She smiled again at Leah with her toothless mouth and Leah suppressed a grimace. When was she going to get some false teeth? She'd had no teeth for years. Leah had nightmares about losing her teeth. She put her finger to her own surrept.i.tiously. She'd make sure she gave them a good clean with salt before she left for work.

'Would you like a cup of tea Annie, love,' Emma said.

Annie turned to Emma. 'Ee, I haven't seen the scissors for a fortnight,' she said. Emma and Leah burst out laughing.

Annie looked surprised. 'What, what,' she said, continuing to look at Leah with admiration. Emma was so lucky that she had two such bonny la.s.ses!

Emma laughed and wiped her eyes with her pinny.

'Ee, Annie, I don't know how you got scissors out of that. That one really beats the band. A cup of tea then, love?' she shouted.

'Go on then.'

Janey walked in as they sat drinking their tea. She yawned widely.

'h.e.l.lo, Annie, you're early.'

'What?'

'You're early,' Janey shouted.

Leah raised her eyes to the ceiling. She loved her mother but she felt she was over friendly with neighbours, especially Annie. She left the front door unlocked all day so that people could just walk in. In this respect she was not like most people in Harwood, who usually kept their distance. Familiarity breeds contempt, Leah often thought, but again this wasn't true about her mother. Everyone liked and respected Emma.

Annie got up with great difficulty. The chair creaked. They all looked worried until Annie heaved herself upright.

'Thanks for the tea, Emma, love. I'll bring the sugar back today.'

'No hurry, Annie.' She saw Annie to the door and then rushed back into the living room to finish getting ready for work.

Janey had dressed herself by this time and eaten her porridge. The noise of clattering clogs increased outside as more and more people hurried to the mills.

'Hurry up you two, we'll be late,' Emma said. She picked her large black shawl up off the chair and wrapped it round herself.

Kitty O'Shea was waiting for them as they stepped from their front step onto the street. She worked in the same mill as they did.

'Thought you were never going to come,' she said as they set off up the street. It was still damp and cold and Leah and Janey crept under Emma's shawl, which they had done since they were small. Kitty strode along next to them, her cheeks like two red flags. She had vivid blue eyes and long black hair. Darkie was keen on her and was relentlessly teased about it by the rest of the family.

'Annie Fitton called in,' Emma said as they almost ran up the street. 'I don't mind her calling but morning's not a good time for me.' Kitty was Leah's best friend and had been since the O'Shea's had moved next door ten years ago.

Mara and Shamus O'Shea were perfect neighbours for the Hammonds. They liked company, although they never overstepped the mark and made a nuisance of themselves. But they could always be relied on, and they found the same with Emma. Mara ruled in the O'Shea household. She was large and efficient, had a warm and loving nature and bossed her husband unmercifully. This didn't bother Shamus at all because he loved his wife to distraction. Shamus was small and wiry, and dark haired and blue eyed like his daughter. He liked a drink, or, as Mara would state sarcastically, 'he liked a bucketful of it'. Emma could hardly keep her face straight when Mara admitted that she'd given him a 'good hiding' one day when he'd had a bit too much.

Paddy O'Shea was Darkie's age and, like Darkie, worked in the mines. They were good friends and already Paddy had his eye on Leah. Leah knew this only because Kitty had told her, and was horrified.

'But he's more like my brother, Kitty,' she said. 'I couldn't ever like Paddy like that.'

Kitty had been a bit put out, because she liked Darkie, so why couldn't Leah like their Paddy. Why did Leah always have to be so awkward, she thought? It could all have been so perfect!

When the little group reached the top of Glebe Street, Leah and Janey left the warmth of Emma's shawl because they worked at the b.u.t.t's mill at the far end of town and Emma worked at the Premier, which was in the other direction.

'I'll see you tonight then,' Emma said as she waved them off. She watched them walking down St. Hubert's Road for a moment. She always felt a pang when she did this. Her girls! What would she do without them? She wasn't one for tears, but somehow the sight of them, all in black, made her want to. She wasn't one for sentiments either, but, she wondered, wasn't there a better kind of life for her girls: something better than the dreariness of the mills, of drab Harwood; the backbreaking toil, which would probably be their future. She would think of Darkie, too, and it was fear more than a pang, which made her heart beat faster. Then her usual optimism would take over and she would give herself a shake and tell herself to stop being a soft happorth.

The girls hurried down the street, now warmer with their brisk walk. They could see Dora Baker, waiting for them at the next corner. They waved but she didn't' wave back.

'Oh, ho,' Leah said. 'Something's up. I can tell from here. Remember what happened last week, Janey?' Janey laughed.

'Lenny still hasn't forgiven us.'

Lenny, Dora's brother, who Leah hated 'too handy with his thumpings' she'd said to her mother', had a nasty experience the week before, together with his cronies, Tony Penny and Bertie Keaton.

After Leah and Janey's scare with the corpse they had indeed gone to Dora's mother to ask for some money, but she hadn't been in. Only the children had been there and then friends of Lenny's had turned up and they'd begun to tease the girls, who eventually, with a lot of pushing and shoving managed to lock them out of the house. The three girls then rushed up the stairs, saw the full chamber pot with a t.u.r.d floating in it, took it to the window and proceeded to empty it on the upturned faced of the boys standing below, who by this time were hurling abuse and uttering dire threats of what they would do when they caught up with them.

As Leah thought of this she couldn't help smiling as she remembered the sight of the drenched boys who had almost gone berserk at the horrible concoction: emptying that pot had been altogether too much of a temptation, but when Leah saw Dora standing waiting for them she wondered uneasily about Lenny. He would try to get even with them, of that she had no doubt.

'What's the matter, Dora?' Leah said, although she really didn't need to be told. Dora was down in the dumps again, (not unusual for her).

'It's me dad,' she said dolefully, 'at it again.' She made a tippling gesture with her hand.

'He's not!' Leah said. Dora nodded. Leah put her arm through Dora's. 'Never mind; at least he doesn't belt you.'

'I know but me Mam's getting fed up with him and they were going at it hammer and tongs when I left. It's awful.' She sighed and Leah pulled her on.

'Try to forget it, Dora. Come on or we'll be late.'

(Three months later Leah, Janey and Emma stood on the Liverpool dock and waved goodbye to Dora, Lenny and Mrs. Baker.

'I've had enough,' Dora's mother had said to Emma after her husband's latest binge. 'I'm off to California. I've an uncle there and he said he'd put us up. Not a m.u.f.f though. If Ed finds out he'll stop us.' So it had been a big secret for a month or more until the ship sailed away. They never returned to Harwood and Ed drowned himself in drink, literally dying of cirrhosis of the liver a few years later).

They hurried on in silence except for the loud clang of their clogs. Kitty knew what it was like to have a father who drank, although Shamus was not violent with it.

'Goes right soft, he does,' Mara would say.

Leah and Janey held their own counsel and were silently thankful that they didn't have to put up with that. Thank G.o.d Mam had left their Dad!

Strange the way most men in Harwood drank, Leah thought. She supposed that was their entertainment. It was different for women. They didn't have time for entertainment. They were too worn out working in the mill all day and then cooking and cleaning, sewing and knitting for their families afterwards. It wasn't fair, but women seemed to accept the situation. She'd never once heard her mother complain about how hard she worked.

CHAPTER FOUR.

Limbo is an in between place. A neither here nor there place! A place of doubt, of insecurity, of not knowing just what is going to happen!

Darkie Hammond had heard of limbo from Paddy O'Shea, who'd explained all about it together with purgatory, the holy-ghost and extreme unction.

Darkie had listened rather scornfully, but now he could relate to that there limbo, he thought, as he lay in his bed, listening to his mother in the room across the landing.

He had woken briefly when he heard Leah call out, again when his mother went down the stairs; then he turned over and slept deeply until ten. His sleep had not been soothing. He often dreamt of the war, although he had no actual experience of it. He'd heard stories though: disturbing stories, which conjured dreadful images that flitted in and out of his consciousness.

In other dreams (or nightmares, he would think later) he was trapped down the pit. These terrified him more than those of war. Strange, how men seemed to want to go to war. Because of this, or so the history books said, there had always been wars. War seemed to be the main aim of the human race. Why did he want to go he often wondered, knowing how terrible it was? When the War began he'd been thirteen. His mother had not worried about him going then. It would all be over by Christmas, so everyone said. Three years later it was still going strong. He was sixteen, now. Still too young to join, but how many had signed up at fourteen and even younger? Quite a few, if you believed the stories! The last time he'd been out with his mother to the Square she'd dragged him away when she saw him staring at the picture of Kitchener pasted to the wall of the Mercer Clock.

'Don't even think about it,' she threatened. He did, though, even after he'd wake sweating.

Last night he had a beautiful dream (for a nice change). He was paddling in a stream: a crystal clear stream, the ripples emanating slowly outwards from his moving feet. It was a warm day and his feet felt so cool in the water. Then a rosy face appeared in the water's reflection. Shining black hair lifted in the breeze. Blue eyes gazed into his through the water. White teeth smiled at him. A dimple deepened. Kitty!

Darkie Hammond had worked in the Townsend pit since he was fourteen. He hated the job but the pay was good and the heavy work had filled him out and with his naturally solid build, at sixteen he looked like a prizefighter.

He got up, had some bread and dripping for his breakfast and a cup of strong tea which still remained in the teapot on the range. He didn't start the next shift until later and he decided to have a walk to the Town Square. He looked out of the window. The rain had stopped and the sun was trying its best to shine. Perhaps it would clear up? It was still cold, though and he was glad of the heavy jumper, which his mother had knitted, as he walked purposefully up Glebe Street towards the Co-op. Most people were at work but a number of women were doing their shopping, baskets in hand, coats, or more often shawls wrapped warmly around them.

Darkie strode on up the street and then was suddenly aware that the woman coming towards him was holding her hand up. He automatically raised his, although he didn't think he knew the woman. As she pa.s.sed by she slipped something into his hand. She hadn't smiled, hadn't said a word, but he knew immediately what it was. His fingers uncurled about the small white feather, which lay in his palm. He looked at it and swore softly. b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l, another one! This was the third time it had happened. The first time he'd laughed it off and flung the feather from him without another thought. The second time he hadn't been quite as amused. Now he was b.l.o.o.d.y mad. It wasn't his fault that he looked old enough to be at the Front. He was no coward and if it hadn't been for his Mam he'd be there!

He was still fuming on the incident when he heard a voice calling him. He turned round. Paddy O'Shea was running to catch up, so he waited. 'What the h.e.l.l's the hurry,' Paddy said, breathing heavily.

'No hurry,' Darkie growled. He held up the feather.

'Join the club!' Paddy dropped his disdainfully on the ground. They both laughed ruefully.

'They must be doing a roaring trade.'

'Aye, looks like they've really got it in for us. Seems like people have nowt else to do these days.'

'I'm getting b.l.o.o.d.y sick of it,' Darkie said.

Paddy nodded. 'Aye; b.l.o.o.d.y silly women must be bored to death if they've nothing better to do than run around town all day giving us feathers. They need a bit more work, that's what.'

'What I'd like to know,' said Darkie, still seething, 'Is how these b.l.o.o.d.y women have the cheek to give us feathers when none of 'em have ever been in a war. They want the vote and everything else so why can't someone give 'em a rifle if they're so keen and let them shoot a few of the Hun. It'd keep 'em off our backs, any road!'

Paddy laughed. 'Now don't get so het up, Darkie lad. You know what women are like. Anyway, it doesn't bother me how many b.l.o.o.d.y feathers they give me. All I know is that I'm not going until I have to.' He gave Darkie an affectionate push on the shoulder. 'Come on; stop thinking about the b.l.o.o.d.y things. Life's too short to worry.'

Darkie looked sheepish. 'I do get a bit riled up. I should be more easy going, like you, Paddy.'

Paddy couldn't understand Darkie. They could give him a sack full of feathers for all he cared. What he did was his business and he knew what those silly women could do with their feathers.

Darkie was fond of Paddy. He had been his best friend for as long as he could remember, was easy going, generous and had a good sense of humour, even if he didn't want to 'go' to war. Paddy didn't worry about anything much. Yet he wasn't a push over, either. Darkie had seen evidence of this when Paddy had given Ted Ainsely a black eye. Just like that, bang! Ted had been obnoxious Darkie had to admit, a dirty talker, mainly about women. Paddy couldn't abide him.

'So I hit him,' Paddy said to Emma when Darkie related the incident, 'me Mam's a woman. I think he forgot that in his dirty talk.' Emma nodded, pleased.

'So what're you going to do today,' Paddy said as they sauntered on to the Square. The sun had come out and a few older people were sitting on the benches around the railings enclosing the clock.

Darkie shrugged. 'Oh, nowt much; I might have a bit of a kip later and then go down to the mill and catch Kitty when she comes out.'