Читать книгу The Railway Girl - Nancy Carson - Страница 6

Arthur Goodrich, a man of average height and average looks, was twenty-five years old. He was a stonemason by trade, employed in the family firm of Jeremiah Goodrich and Sons, Monumental Masons and Sepulchral Architects. While Jeremiah, Arthur’s father, tended to concentrate on the sepulchral design and construction side of the business in the relative comfort of the workshop along with Talbot, Arthur’s older brother, poor Arthur, by dint of being younger and thus subordinate, was meanwhile generally despatched to the further reaches of the Black Country to effect the more menial, though no less skilled, work of cutting and blacking inscriptions on existing headstones in the area’s sundry graveyards. For Arthur this was an eternal source of discontent to add to his many others.

Thus it was one Saturday morning in late September. Arthur, complete with a toolbag full of freshly sharpened chisels, several wooden mallets, a cushion to sit on and various other appliances of his craft, had been despatched early to the hallowed ground of St Mark’s church in Pensnett, a good twenty minutes’ walk even for a sprightly lad like himself. The apathetic morning had rounded up a herd of frowning clouds that matched Arthur’s mood. He hoped that the rain would keep off, for today was the last cricket match of the season, against Stourbridge Cricket Club, and he had been picked to play.

He had been assigned two headstones to amend that day and possessed a rough plan on paper of where they were situated within the graveyard. He located the first, a shining black grave, the granite imported at vast expense on behalf of the occupier’s wife. The deceased had been a local claymaster, piously religious and a pillar of local society. Arthur put down his toolbag, sat on the grave and read the inscription to himself:

‘To the memory of Jacob Onions who passed away 15th October 1853.

Farewell dear husband must we now part,

Who lay so near each others’ heart.

The time will come I hope when we

Will both enjoy Felicity.’

Composed, obviously, by a grieving Mrs Onions, hoping for the better fortune of someday lying together again. Well, now that same grieving wife had joined her beloved husband, and Arthur was to append the inscription that confirmed it. He fumbled in the pocket of his jacket for the two pieces of paper that told him which words to cut on the relevant headstones. Just at that moment, an ominous pain convulsed his stomach and he trapped the piece of paper under the grave vase so that he could clutch his aching gut. Within a few seconds the pain had gone.

Wind.

A decent breaking of wind would relieve it. He lifted one cheek experimentally but nothing happened, so he took the cushion from his toolbag, an essential item of kit when sitting or kneeling on cold graves for hours on end, and placed it beneath him near the headstone. He opened a jar of grey paint – some magical kind that dried quickly and could be easily scraped off afterwards – grabbed a brush and daubed the area to be marked out with the lettering. While it dried, he located the other grave and performed the same task there. He read the inscription already carved on that headstone too.

‘In remembrance of Henry Tether who died in his cups 6th June 1840, a free spirit who in his lifetime would have preferred all spirits to be free.’ So poor Henry Tether had a partiality for drink. Now it was time to add the name of Henry’s dear departed wife Octavia after sixteen years of widowhood. He left the scrap of paper that held the words for its appended inscription under its grave vase also, to save fumbling later for it in his pockets.

As Arthur made his way back to the first grave he was gripped again by the menacing pain in his stomach. Perhaps he was pregnant somehow and he was having contractions … No, that was plain stupid. He was a man, and men didn’t give birth. Besides, he was not wed so how could he possibly be pregnant? Of course, it was something he’d eaten that had upset his stomach. He attempted to break wind again but … oh, dear … It was a mistake. Perhaps he shouldn’t, for fear of an embarrassing accident.

He returned to the first grave and checked the paint. It was dry. It would not take long to mark out the lettering that was to be added, and nobody at the firm was as quick as him when it came to cutting letters. He picked up his blacklead to mark it out …

The pains in his gut returned … They were persistent now and he could hear a tremendous amount of gurgling going on there, as if there were some serious flaw in his intestinal plumbing. It was obvious he must hurry his work, for there were no privies within a quarter of a mile that he could discern. He dared not stoop to do it in the graveyard either, for it was on high ground, exposed to the passing traffic of Pensnett High Street, for all to witness. The vicar might appear like the risen Christ just at the crucial moment … it would be just Arthur’s luck. So, in agony, he carried on marking out the letters and words, taken from the piece of paper he was working from.

He had to hurry. It was a matter of dire urgency. He was desperate for a privy, for anywhere, hallowed ground if need be. Hallowed ground it would have to be, he decided … until a youngish woman, evidently a recent widow, accompanied by three of her children, tearfully presented themselves and a posy of flowers at a nearby grave. It would be the ultimate discourtesy to relieve himself in front of her at this moment. So he pressed on, cutting letters now as fast as he could, blunting one chisel and picking up another, till he had finished the first headstone. By this time his guts were about to burst. There was no time to complete the second headstone. He had to depart. Right now. This minute. He could return once he had procured relief. So he threw his tools into his bag and fled as fast as his tormented guts would allow. Clenching his buttocks stalwartly and with a fraught look upon his face, he strode across the graveyard and down the long winding path that led to High Street. If he didn’t find a privy soon, Pensnett would be subjected to the foulest pollution ever likely to strike it, an event that could become folklore for generations.

As he emerged onto the high road, behold, there was a row of houses in a side street opposite with an entry that led to a backyard. He must make use of their facilities without permission, for there was no time to seek it … and what if he did and they withheld their consent?… He could always knock on a door afterwards and confess his trespass, by which time it would be a done deed.

He crept up the entry and was thankful to find nobody in the backyard which served the terrace of four houses. He located a privy behind one of the brewhouses and burst the door open. It was a double-holer. Arthur had never seen a double-holer before. A roosting hen was perched on a shelf above and Arthur impatiently removed the fowl to a squawk of protest. Just in time he managed to lower his trousers and perch over one of the holes …

Arthur was wallowing in the ecstasy of blissful relief for a minute or two afterwards, in no rush to move lest another bout of the vile stomach ache assail him, when the latch rattled and the door opened. A woman about the same age as his mother entered.

‘Mornin’.’

‘Morning,’ Arthur replied, more than a little taken aback.

‘That’s my side …’

‘Oh … I beg your pardon.’ With hands clutched embarrassed in front of him, he shifted across to the next hole and made himself comfortable again.

The woman proceeded to hitch up her skirt and positioned herself over the other hole. ‘The sky’s a bit frowsy this mornin’, ai’ it? ’Tis to be hoped we have ne’er a shower,’

‘’Tis to be hoped,’ Arthur agreed tentatively, hearing the unmistakable trickle of spent water into the soil below them. He was uncertain whether to proceed with the conversation and prolong their encounter, or to say nothing more in the hope of curtailing it. Never in his life had he shared a moment like this with a complete stranger, nor anybody familiar either for that matter. He wanted to get off his seat and scarper, and allow the woman her privacy, but there was the hygiene aspect of his sojourn that had yet to be attended to. He glanced around him in the dimness looking for squares of paper.

Happily, he was released from his dilemma when the woman stood up and allowed her skirts to fall back.

‘I’m mekkin’ a cup o’ tay. Dun yer want e’er un? I’ll bring thee one out if yo’ve a mind.’

‘No, thank you,’ Arthur replied with a shake of his head. ‘That’s very kind. But I’m just on my way. I just popped in for a quick one.’

‘Suit yerself then, my son. Ta-ra.’

Arthur lived with his father, whom he hated, and his mother whom he felt sorry for, in Brierley Hill in a lane called Lower Delph, commonly referred to as The Delph. His older brother Talbot had fled the nest to feather his own when he was married some five years earlier, to a fine girl rejoicing in the name Magnolia. The family business had been founded by his father years ago and was conducted from the workshop, yard and stables which adjoined the house. Arthur was a man of many interests, but his big love was cricket.

The only cricket team he had access to play for was the one loosely attached to the old red brick church of St Michael, which he regularly attended on Sundays. The solemnity of Anglican worship and the richness of religious language appealed to his serious side. St Michael’s cricket team played their home matches on a decently maintained area of flat ground in Silver End, adjacent to the railway line. Now Arthur was afraid that the acute bout of diarrhoea he’d suffered that very morning might manifest itself again on the cricket field, which would be to his ultimate embarrassment.

‘I’ve cut you some bread to go with this, my lad,’ his mother, Dinah, said as she placed a bowl of groaty pudding and hefty chunks of a loaf before him at the scullery table. ‘It’ll help bung yer up.’

‘’Tis to be hoped,’ Arthur said miserably, repeating the supplication he’d made perched on the seat of the Pensnett privy. He wore an exaggerated look of pain on his face to elicit his mother’s sympathy.

‘Your father’s feeling none too well either.’ She returned to the mug of beer she’d neglected while serving Arthur’s dinner, and took a gulp.

Arthur dipped a lump of bread into the stew-like morass. ‘But I bet he ain’t got the diarrhee, has he? You can’t imagine what it’s like being took short in a graveyard with the diarrhee and no privy for miles.’

‘There’s ne’er a privy at the cricket pitch neither, but that ain’t going to stop you playing cricket there this afternoon by the looks of it,’ Dinah remarked astutely. ‘’Tis to be hoped as you’m well enough to knock a few runs without shitting yourself.’

‘’Tis to be hoped,’ Arthur said again and grinned, thankful that his family were not so high-faluting that they could not discuss such delicate matters in plain English at the scullery table. ‘I’m nursing meself so as I can play cricket this afternoon.’

‘I wish I’d got the time to nurse meself,’ Dinah said, and took another swig of beer. ‘I’m certain sure as I’ve sprained me wrist humping buckets of coal up from the damn cellar.’

Arthur contemplated that it did not prevent her from lifting a mug of beer, but made no comment. ‘I’d have fetched the coal up for you,’ he said instead and winced as if there were another twinge of pain in his gut. ‘You know I would.’

‘Never mind, you weren’t here.’

‘It’s just a pity Father’s too miserable to spend money employing a maid. You could have sent the maid to the cellar for coal.’

‘A maid? He’ll never employ a maid. He’s too mean.’

‘That’s what I just said.’

Arthur finished his dinner, fetched his bat from the cupboard under the stairs and walked steadily and circumspectly to the cricket field, looking forward to the game against Stourbridge Cricket Club with a mixture of eagerness and anxiety.

St Michael’s team lost the match. Arthur was the sixth man to bat, surviving the remaining batsmen who came after him. His team needed fifty-five runs to win and Arthur felt it was his responsibility to try and get those runs. But he experienced that dreaded loose feeling in his bowels again and had no option but to get himself run out when they still needed forty-eight, ending the team’s innings. It turned out to be a false alarm, and Arthur sincerely regretted having thrown the match.

‘I couldn’t run,’ he lamented to Joey Eccleston, with whom he had been batting at the end. They walked back together to the tent that was always erected on match days, to a ripple of applause from the attendant wives and sweethearts. ‘I had the diarrhee this morning and I was afeared to shake me guts up too much for fear it come on again.’

‘Well, we tried, Arthur,’ Joey said philosophically and patted his colleague on the back. ‘You especially. But we were no match for Stourbridge today. Next year, maybe. There’s always next year. Next year we’ll give ’em a thrashing … Coming for a drink after?’

‘No, I’m due an early night, Joe. I promised my mother. My guts are still all of a quiver. I got to get myself better for work on Monday. The old man’s already queer ’cause I didn’t finish my job off this morning. Maybe I’ll have a spot or two of laudanum to go to bed with.’

‘It won’t hurt you to come for a drink first. A drop of brandy or whisky would settle your stomach. You don’t have to stop out late. It’s been the last match of the season today. We’ll all be going. You can’t not come as well.’

They reached the tent and Arthur pulled off his old and worn batting gloves. ‘I suppose it’ll be regarded as bad form if I don’t go, eh, Joey?’

‘Sure to be. Anyway, you don’t want to be seen as some stick-in-the-mud, or that you’re mollycoddled.’

Arthur grinned matily. ‘Me mollycoddled? That’ll be the day.’

‘That’s settled then.’

‘So where are we going for a drink?’

‘We’ve settled on the Whimsey.’

The gentlemen of the church cricket team arrived at the Whimsey about eight o’ clock, as the last embers of sunset were finally extinguished. Those who were blessed with wives or lady friends allowed them to attend and they occupied a room they called the parlour and chattered animatedly with each other, while the men stood in three groups in the taproom and got on with the serious business of drinking and analysing their defeat.

The Whimsey had opened for business in 1815. It was situated a couple of hundred yards below St Michael’s church on the busy turnpike road where it was called Church Street. By the time Benjamin Elwell took it over in 1840 it was a well-established concern. Being a Saturday night the Whimsey was busy, and would get even busier. Already, the taproom was hazy with a blue mist of tobacco smoke from the men’s clay pipes, and noisy from the voices of folk trying to be heard over the chatter of their neighbours.

‘Pity you and Joey Eccleston couldn’t keep up your innings a bit longer, Arthur,’ James Paskin, the team captain, commented.

‘I’m sorry, James,’ Arthur answered guiltily, and took a quick slurp of his beer to avoid James’s eyes. ‘I was telling Joey – I had a bad bout of the diarrhee this morning and I was afeared of churning me guts up again on the cricket pitch, so I couldn’t run very well. I didn’t fancy being took short between the wickets.’

‘Good Lord, I didn’t realise,’ James said with concern. ‘In that case it was a valiant effort. Do you feel all right now?’

‘Still a bit queer, to tell the truth.’

‘Well, they beat us fair and square, Arthur. I didn’t have a very good innings myself, nor did old Dingwell Tromans.’

‘We’ll do better next season,’ Arthur said, although such optimism was normally alien to him.

Two youths at a table nearby had pulled the wings off two bluebottles and were betting which would fall off the edge of the table first. Arthur turned his back on such brutal triviality and gazed around the room pretending not to notice, determined not to give the impression that he condoned their puerility.

‘We might not have Dingwell Thomas next season,’ James Paskin was saying. ‘There’s talk of him emigrating to America. D’you think you could take on the job of wicket-keeper, Arthur?’

At that moment, a girl with dark hair, slender and wearing a white apron, was slowly moving in his direction as she collected used tankards and crocks from the tables. She was not excessively pretty but, for Arthur, there was something powerfully alluring about her classic good looks and reserved demeanour. She possessed the most appealing, friendly smile, but also a look of shyness that struck a distinctly harmonic chord within Arthur, a sort of instant empathy. He watched her, fascinated, waiting to see her face again as she leaned forward to pick up more tankards. Then, just before she reached him, she turned and made her way back towards the counter, swivelling her body tantalisingly to avoid bumping into customers.

‘Sorry, James, what was you saying?’

‘About you having a go at wicket-keeping next season.’

‘Oh … I wouldn’t mind giving it a try … I’ve done a bit of wicket-keeping in the past, but I wouldn’t say I was as good as Dingwell. But with a bit of practice, you never know …’

Suddenly Arthur was aware of a commotion behind him. Two dogs, one large, old and lethargic, the other a small, young and animated terrier, were snarling at each other under a table. The owner of the small dog lurched forward to grab it and knocked over his table in the process, sending several tankards of ale flying. They wetted not only the flagged floor but poor Arthur’s good pair of trousers, and the coat of one other man. At once the indignation of the man, who was unknown to Arthur, was high, but mostly, it seemed, at losing his beer. Arthur, however, was largely unperturbed, realising it was merely an accident.

‘I’ll get thee another, Enoch, as soon as I’n gi’d me blasted dog a kick,’ the offender said to his peeved acquaintance, righting the table. He went outside, taking his dog with him, its little legs dangling as he held it by the scruff of its neck.

The owner of the other dog managed to pacify his more docile animal, allowing it to lap beer from his tankard, and it resumed lying quietly at his feet, in a rapture of mild intoxication. Ben Elwell, who disliked such disruptive outbursts in his public house, was over in a flash to investigate, but the flare up had already died down. He saw the pool of beer frothing on the floor and called for a mop and bucket, and the slender girl with the dark hair and the white apron re-appeared to clean it up.

‘Here, I’n got beer all down me coot,’ the man named Enoch told the girl. ‘Hast got summat to rub me down with afore it soaks through to me ganzy?’

‘I’ll bring you a cloth when I’ve mopped this up, Mr Billingham,’ the girl answered apologetically. ‘I’ll only be a minute.’

As she cleaned, the owner of the offending terrier returned. ‘I swear, I’ll drown the little bastard in the cut if he plays up again,’ he muttered, and asked who else’s beer he’d knocked over. He duly went to the bar to make reparations.

‘Fun and games, eh?’ James Paskin remarked to Arthur.

‘That beer went all over my trousers, you know, James. I’m soaked through.’

‘Ask the girl for a cloth.’

‘Think I should?’

‘Course.’

‘I could catch a chill with wet trousers.’

‘It ain’t worth taking the risk, Arthur. Quick, before she goes.’

Arthur hesitated but, just as the girl was about to go, he plucked up his courage and tapped her on the shoulder. ‘Excuse me, miss …’ She turned her head and he saw by the light of the oil lamp hanging overhead that her face was made beautiful by wide eyes which were the most delicate shade of blue, full of lights and expressions. ‘I … I got soaked in beer as well … Would you mind bringing a cloth for me?’

Had it been any of the regulars she would have taken the request with a pinch of salt, knowing it was an attempt at flirting, to get her to wipe their trousers. But there was something in the earnest look of this man that made her realise he was not preoccupied with such triteness. So she nodded and smiled with decorous reserve.

‘I haven’t seen her before,’ Arthur remarked. ‘She’s quite comely.’

‘Fancy her, do you?’

Arthur grinned self-consciously. ‘Like I say, she’s quite comely. She seems to have a pleasant way with her. Don’t you think so, James? But I expect a wench like that is spoken for already. Is it the landlord’s daughter, do you know?’

‘Not that I’m aware of. I’ve not seen her in here before. Not that I’m stuck in here every night of the week, you understand.’

The girl returned and handed a towel to Enoch Billingham, apologising again for his being drenched. Then she turned to Arthur …

‘You wanted a towel as well, sir?’

‘Thank you …’

‘Shall I hold your beer while you wipe your trousers?’ she asked pleasantly.

‘Thank you …’ He began swabbing the spreading wet patch on his trouser leg, feeling suddenly hot. Just as suddenly he felt his bowels turn to water again and knew that he must make another rapid exit. With intense agony he held himself, noticing at the same time that at least the girl was not wearing a wedding ring.

‘What’s your name?’ he managed to ask. ‘I ain’t seen you in here before.’

‘Lucy,’ she said.

‘You live local?’

‘Bull Street.’

‘Funny I’ve never seen you before.’ Arthur was trying manfully to maintain a look of normality.

‘Why, where do you live?’ Lucy asked pleasantly.

‘The Delph.’

‘Fancy. Just up the road.’

Arthur was effecting some severe internal abdominal contortions coupled with heroic buttock clenching, in an effort to maintain not only his composure, but his self respect and his eternal reputation. He was desperate to keep the girl talking as long as he could, to try and find out more about her, but he was even more desperate to win the battle against his wayward bowels. It was a battle he was losing ignominiously, however, for without doubt he had to go.

‘Yes, just up the road … You’ll have to excuse me, Lucy …’ He turned and fled.

‘What’s up with him?’ Lucy enquired of James.

‘Something he ate, I think,’ James replied, being as discreet as he knew how. ‘He’s had a problem all day, I believe.’

Lucy chuckled. ‘Poor chap. Well, he’ll find nowhere to relieve himself that way.’