Читать книгу The Heights: A dark story of obsession and revenge - Juliet Bell, Juliet Bell - Страница 17

Chapter Nine

February, 1985

‘Godless heathens,’ Father Joseph muttered as a white police van swept past. He pulled his heavy black coat tighter against the bitter February winds. The hem of his cassock was damp with the rain as it flapped around his ankles, but at least the snow was gone.

The mid-morning light was dim and dreary, and his stomach was rumbling as he closed the church gate behind him and set out along the road into the town. His Ash Wednesday fast was two days away. To be followed by forty days of Lent. Father Joseph observed the fast with passion. But there was nothing in the canon law to say he couldn’t have one good meal before Lent started. God knew he’d been hungry more than once in this past year.

Father Joseph turned the corner into the high street. It was deserted. All the men were down the picket line. Most of the women too. Those that weren’t stayed home. There was no money to spend, so no reason to come up the shops. The pub was empty too. For a long time, the pub had stayed open. It was a place for the men to cheer themselves on with strong words and talk about their upcoming victory. Then it had become a place to meet and console themselves. Now, there was no money for beer.

Father Joseph could have gone into the pub for a shot of the whisky he so enjoyed. The church always had money, and not all of his stipend had gone into the pool to feed the mine families. But he didn’t want to get aggro from some parishioner who didn’t understand that his situation was rightly different to theirs.

And he did have that one last bottle stashed back at the rectory, jealously guarded and eked out for almost a year of this cursed strike. There was one shot left. Perhaps tonight…

The sound of laughter caused him to stop and turn.

A few yards behind him, two figures darted out from behind the deserted pub. He knew them in an instant.

‘Catherine Earnshaw. Heathcliff. Come here. Immediately.’

The two paused in mid-flight and turned to look at him. Father Joseph frowned as Cathy’s hand closed around the boy’s. They shared a look that was so intense and so private it was almost like they were hearing each other’s thoughts. Then they walked towards him, their hands still linked.

‘What do you two think you’re doing?’ Father Joseph demanded. ‘Come with me.’ He grabbed the girl by the arm to drag her back around the corner. As he did, the youth at her side made a strangled sound in his throat. If he’d been a dog, he would have been growling. Father Joseph would have crossed himself, had he not needed to hang on to the girl.

The wall behind the pub was covered in graffiti. Two fresh paint cans lay tossed to one side on the footpath. One end of the wall glistened with fresh paint. Cathy, it said, in huge letters.

Father Joseph turned to Heathcliff. ‘You did this?’

The two shared another look, but said nothing. Nor did they hang their heads in shame, as rightly they should. In fact, the girl lifted her eyes to his face, her large brown eyes shining with wickedness as her lips curled into a smile.

By Jesus and all the saints, the girl was trying to tease him. But she was just a child. Father Joseph took a closer look. The way the girl looked at Heathcliff was nothing short of sinful.

Before he could say another word, the two turned and ran down the street. Cathy, in hand-me-down trousers that were far too tight for her, paused and flung a final glare back at the priest.

They disappeared down a side lane and were gone. He knew they’d be heading up into the blue hills. Well, it was time that was stopped. The good Lord only knew what they were doing all alone up there and unsupervised. Ray Earnshaw was a good man, but he’d been neglecting those two since his harlot of a wife ran off. No more, Father Joseph vowed. Those children had to be brought back under control before the devil took them.

He turned around, all thoughts of shopping for his supper gone. He looked across the valley towards the mine. The crowd around the gates seemed even larger than usual. The newspapers were predicting that the strike was almost over. That Thatcher had won. Anyone looking at the picket line would disagree. There were more miners there now than ever before. They had come from far and wide to stand behind the lads from Gimmerton.

Movement at the base of the blue hills caught his eye. It was too big to be those kids. Vehicles. Horse trailers, and that meant mounted police. This time, Father Joseph did cross himself. He’d seen the violence from the other pits on the telly. May all the saints preserve them; today it was Gimmerton’s turn.

He began to run towards the bridge over the stream. He had to warn the miners what was coming. Help them prepare. And God help him, he would stand by their side against the heathen police.

He was gasping for breath as he crossed the bridge and started up the hill towards the mine gates. He could hear the noise; the chant as familiar to him as the Lord’s Prayer.

‘Miners united will never be defeated.’

He rounded the last corner and slid to a halt, taking in the scene in front of him.

The pickets had formed a long line, three or four men deep across the road, blocking the gates of the pit. Opposite them, twice that number of police were standing, protected by their shields, and with truncheons at the ready. And behind them, Father Joseph could see the mounted police moving into formation.

There was an almighty uproar to his left. Some of the lads had thrown their weight and a couple of crow bars at a brick wall which was now falling around them. Willing hands were reaching for the bricks. Ammunition for the battle to come.

Father Joseph felt his legs begin to shake. He could not have moved even had he wanted to.

With another roar, the strikers launched a hail of bricks at the police, and surged forward. The police lines held for a few heartbeats, then they began to fall back. A couple of men were dragged to safety by their neighbours as the solid wall of blue began to disintegrate. A long whistle blast sounded, and the police began to fall back at a run. Opening a wide path, down which the horses were now advancing at a canter.

Father Joseph could see the fear on the faces of the miners. There was Ray Earnshaw, right in the middle of the line. Ray’s face stood out for a second, white among the dark clothes that surrounded him. And then everything was confusion. Miners running in every direction. People yelling. Anything that could be picked up was being thrown. So much anger. Between the miners and the police, between the men driven back to work by starvation and those determined to hold out. A man could fall in a melee like that and nobody would ever be able to say what caused it.

‘Mick! Mick! Earnshaw!’ Mick turned off his drill and looked towards the voice. The gaffer jerked his thumb towards the doorway of the half-finished new-build. ‘Your girl’s in the office.’

‘Who?’ Mick had a girl, but he’d been keeping that pretty quiet. He didn’t fancy the comments and jokes he heard every time another one of the lads fell by the wayside. The whip-crack mimes and ‘under the thumb’ jokes. And the other stuff. The jokes about the size of her boobs and arse, over cards when they’d finished up onsite. He wasn’t having that. She was a special, his Frances, a cut about the Sharons and Julies he usually got off with.

Doug shrugged. ‘Some blonde bint.’

Mick put his tools down and took the two-minute walk across the site to the foreman’s portakabin. Frances really was a bit of all right. He’d met her at his digs. It was mainly builders and apprentices, but the three rooms on the top floor were all girls. Dancers. Two of them were right stuck-up, but Frances was different. She’d always smiled at him when they passed on the stairs, even when he was staggering back after a skinful. He didn’t do that so much any more. He spent more time with Frances and less down the pub. He was saving his money because he had plans, he did, and those plans involved Frances. Now, she was standing on her own in the middle of the cramped room, not sitting on the orange plastic chair. She had arms wrapped tightly across her body. Mick moved towards her and she stepped back. ‘Have you heard the news?’

He shook his head. ‘Nah. Can’t hear the radio. Have to wear these things.’ He tapped the set of ear protectors hanging round his neck.

‘Well, there was some trouble on the picket line.’ She stared at the floor. ‘At Gimmerton.’

Mick’s stomach tightened. ‘What sort of trouble?’

She still wasn’t meeting his eye. ‘The police phoned the digs.’

The knot in Mick’s stomach jumped to his throat. He stared at the floor. There were two different offcuts of lino on the floor. One grey. One blood-red. He’d never noticed that before.

‘They said your dad got in a fight with some other miners.’

Mick shook his head. That wasn’t right. The lads only scrapped with each other over beer and women and his dad could take or leave both of those. ‘Was it a scab?’

‘What?’

‘Did he get in a fight with a scab?’ That could be it. His dad wouldn’t have scabs at his pit. And Ray Earnshaw knew how to use his fists if he had to. He could’ve done the other bloke some proper damage.

Frances bit her lip. ‘I don’t know.’

‘So what? Is he in hospital or summat? I hope they don’t expect me to sort out those bloody kids.’

Silence filled the tiny room. It seemed to last for hours. Finally Frances stepped towards him, reaching out her fingertips to his cheek. ‘I’m really sorry, love.’

Mick couldn’t bring himself to ask the question, to hear her confirm what he thought he already knew. He let her wrap an arm around his waist and sink her face into his shoulder. Normally she didn’t like to hug him until he’d washed and changed. Now she pressed herself against his dust and grime. ‘I’m so, so sorry.’

‘Something’s going on.’

Heathcliff was right. Something was wrong. Why else would there be so much activity in Moor Lane? There were people standing around in the street, talking. There were two police cars. And they were parked outside the last house in the street.

Their house.

Cathy tightened her grip on Heathcliff’s hand. ‘I don’t like the look of this. Let’s stay away.’

The two of them had been coming home, after a day spent on the blue hills. They had walked through the heather. Lain on their backs and watched the clouds scudding past. It was cold, but not wet, and for February that was a rare joy. Cathy loved days like those, up in the hills with Heathcliff. Sometimes they talked. Other times they didn’t. They didn’t have to. It was too cold now to swim in the lake up behind the pit, but they could watch the birds riding the updrafts of air as they searched for prey. They could pretend there was no strike. There was no school. There was nothing but the two of them.

Cathy was the one who always turned for home first. She had to get dinner on before her father got home. She wished she didn’t have to, but wishing didn’t change things. Just as staying out all night wouldn’t change whatever was waiting for them below.

‘I’m frightened, Heathcliff.’

His arms went around her, pulling her close. ‘Don’t be frightened. I’m here. Nothing can touch us when we’re together.’

She led the way out of the hills and across the wasteland at the end of the road. As they got closer to the house, another car pulled up, and a woman got out.