For a Mother's Sins (24 page)

‘It’s been a long day, Father, and I’m fair worn out. That new preacher’s gone back to Bradford already. Apparently, his family’s badly. Tobias wasn’t too
happy about having to do without his help.’

‘He should bloody well do without your help an’ all,’ said Jim, looking at his wife’s tired face.‘Lord knows I’ve told you plenty of times: let him get a
young lass in there to cook and clean. You’re an old bird, our Rose. It’s time you took it easy.’

‘Happen you’re right. I’ll tell him to go and hire somebody at the end of the week. I thought I’d manage. Turns out the head’s willing but my poor old body is on
its last. I still think I’m sixteen, that’s my trouble. It’ll have to be a cold supper tonight, all right?’

Jim grunted. ‘Aye, I suppose. That’s the third night in a row, mind. There’s only so much cured pork a man can eat, Rose. No wonder our John’s found a new trough to eat
from.’

‘What do you mean?’ Rose was suddenly alert. ‘Is he out again?’ She leaned forward, trying to decipher the expression on Jim’s face.

‘He told me he was at a mate’s, having supper there. I think he’s got pally with a lad that lives on top of Blea Moor. He seems to mention him a lot. Joe or Josh or something
similar . . .’

‘As long as he’s not across the way with that hussy, I don’t mind. It’ll do him good to make a few new mates, broaden his horizon – provided they don’t
drink.’ Rose carved the cold pork and got out the pickle jar and a loaf of bread and placed it on the table.

Jim prayed under his breath to the Almighty. He hoped he’d be forgiven for telling lies, in the circumstances. The lad was back with Molly and the pair of them seemed happy. He for one
wasn’t going to stand in their way.

He looked mournfully at the plate of cold meat in front of him. All day he’d been hoping for a warm meal like the one Reverend Tiplady was probably enjoying right now. Instead she’d
served up the same fare as he’d endured last night and the night before. Thank God Rose had finally seen it was too much for her, looking after the Reverend and her own family. Hopefully by
this time next week she’d be cooking for him alone.

‘So is your ma going to be a bridesmaid at this wonderful wedding that’s coming off in the dale?’ John asked Lizzie. Molly, who was standing just behind him,
washing the dishes, had declared him a terrible tease and refused to say another word on the subject. ‘I hear Starchy Drawers wants to get married at St Leonard’s, and right
quickly.’

‘Ma says the wedding’s next weekend and it’ll be a quiet do, but we’re invited. I think we’ll be the only ones there. None of Doctor Thistlethwaite’s family
are still alive and she’s from up Scotland. It’s a good job Mam finished my new dress, else I’d have nothing to go in, but I think I look pretty enough in this. At least, George
says I do.’ Lizzie blushed and did a small twirl to show off her dress for John.

‘Happen young George is right: you’re pretty as a picture. The bonniest lass up the dale – apart from your ma, that is. She’s the apple of my eye, but you come a close
second. I’ll treat you to a new hair comb next time I’m in Ingleton and then you’ll look spot on.’ John laughed as Lizzie kissed him on the cheek and then blushed.

‘Hey, that’s enough of that, young lady! He’s my man, not yours,’ Molly joked.

‘I think you two should get married. Then John could be my dad.’ Lizzie stopped twirling and looked at the couple. ‘Why don’t you? You’ve been friends for months
– Doctor Thistlethwaite’s only been walking out with Starchy Drawers a few weeks. Florrie reckons you’d make a perfect couple. She saw the pair of you kissing the other
day.’

‘That’s enough. John and I are just good friends, which is how it should be at the moment. And you can tell that Florrie Parker to keep her comments to herself.’ Molly’s
voice was warm but stern. ‘Now how about you go to bed – it’s past ten o’clock and I don’t want you twining in the morning when you’ve got to get up.’

‘But, Mam . . . John’s still here,’ Lizzie whined.

‘I’ll be on my way.’ John rose from his chair, embarrassed by Lizzie’s suggestion and Molly’s response.

‘No, stop – I want you to stay. I need to talk to you. Lizzie, I’ll pull the curtain across and then John can’t see you undress. No more lip, all right? It’s bed
time and that’s final.’

John sat back down in his chair as Molly drew the curtain that separated the sleeping quarters.

‘Night, John,’ Lizzie shouted from behind the curtain as she blew out the candle next to her bed, the smell of candle wax filling the air.

‘Night, sweetheart. Sleep tight and mind the bed bugs don’t bite,’ John replied, watching Molly carry a bowl of water from behind the curtain. She gently put her hand on his
shoulder and nodded her head in the direction of the doorway.

He followed her outside and watched as she threw the dirty washing water into the open drain that ran alongside the huts, then sat down on the hut steps alongside him. It was a cold evening and
he put his arm around her, pulling her close.

‘You know I didn’t prompt her to say that.’ Molly laid her hand on John’s knee and looked into his eyes. ‘In fact, little does she know it, but Starchy Drawers was
Doctor Thistlethwaite’s second choice. He was stupid enough to ask me first.’ She smiled at the look of surprise that crossed John’s face. ‘Needless to say I said no. And
now he’s opted to marry Gladys. Poor man’s desperate for company in his old age.’

‘He’d have been a good catch, worth a pretty bob or two. You could have done worse.’ John knew it would have broken his heart if she had accepted. He loved everything about
her: the way her lips quivered when she was upset, the twinkle in those beautiful green eyes when she was happy . . .

‘Oh aye, he’s worth a bob or two, but I couldn’t marry if there was no love there. You can’t share your bed with a man you don’t love.’ Molly’s eyes
dropped.

‘And do you love me, Molly Mason? Because every time I look at you, I want to sing. Sing so loud that even the bloody viaduct would tremble with the noise. I want to tell the world how
much I love you. Most of all I want to marry you. So how about it? Marry me, Molly Mason; and we’ll run away from all this. For God’s sake, say yes and be mine.’ John squeezed her
tight and kissed her hard on the lips. So hard she couldn’t reply for a second or two.

Molly stroked John’s cheek and placed her finger on his lips. ‘You know I love you, but it feels so wrong. For a start, you’re younger than me. And then there’s your
mother. What would she say? She’d be heartbroken – two of her sons marrying trollops.’

‘Bugger her! It’s my life. I want you to be my wife and Lizzie to be my daughter. I don’t care about the rest.’

‘Oh, John, I want to marry you so much. I never thought I’d feel this way again. After everything that happened, I’d become all bitter and twisted – and then you came
along. May God strike me down dead if I’m wrong . . . but yes, I’ll marry you. Only not yet. Let’s be patient, my love, and wait a while. How about in the summer? But the
answer’s yes, John Pratt, I would love to marry you.’

It was a strange marriage that took place at St Leonard’s that cold February Saturday. The groom was considerably older than his bride, and with no congregation bar
Lizzie and Molly, the church was empty. The vicar blessed the couple and wished them well as they set off in the gig that they had hired for the day. Dark evening clouds enfolded the wedding party
as they crossed the moss-covered bridge and climbed the steep hill back to Batty Green.

The vicar blew out the candles one by one and placed his surplice in the small vestibule before putting the church records in a place of safety. It had been a pleasant enough day, a change from
the many funerals he’d been called upon to conduct since the railway came to the dale. Even baptisms were poignant affairs now; more often than not he would hold the tiny babe in his arms to
enter the house of God one day, only for it to return a few months later in a coffin. It was a hard world and his faith was often tried, but the coming together of a couple made up for it. He was
sure the doctor would be happy. Certainly, his new wife seemed overjoyed. But he thought he’d detected a slight pause in the vows and a glance at Molly Mason before Roger Thistlethwaite said,
‘I do.’ Nothing would surprise where that woman was concerned. He recalled all too well the day he caught her child stealing from the church and marched her home, only to find the
mother drunk and in the company of a man who was not her husband.

With the final candle blown out, its wisps of smoke curling down the nave, he looked around the small plain church before closing the door behind him. He stood in the small porch and pulled his
hat on. This infernal rain – could it not keep fine just long enough for the bride and groom to get home and for him to dash to the vicarage? He wrapped his cloak about him and stepped out of
the porch, only to be stopped in his tracks by John Pratt. The lad was bent double, gasping for breath, his face red and sweaty, his jacket and breeches soaked from the rain.

‘Is the doctor here? Is he bloody well here, man?’ John summoned enough breath to speak between gasps. He shook the vicar roughly by the shoulder. ‘Tell me, is he here? My mam,
she’s badly, she looks terrible.’

‘No matter how ill she is, there’s no call to speak to me in that manner, young man. Anyway they’ve gone, they’re on their way home. You’ll have to catch them
there.’ He wrapped his cloak tight around him and strutted up the path to the vicarage.

John bent over, still trying to get his breath, kicked the foot scraper next to the church’s entrance. ‘Shit, I knew I’d miss them if I came down by the gill,’ he
muttered. Then he wiped his forehead with his cap and set off on the long run home.

Rose Pratt had been shivering and shaking for a few days. She’d thought she was coming down with influenza: her body ached and she’d a raging temperature. But then
the spots and blisters started to appear. At first, they just looked like spots, but now they had started oozing pus and they stank. No matter how she lay, she was in pain. She lay alone in her
bed, her hair matted, her heaving bosom sticky and sweaty. It exhausted her even to hear the sounds of everyday life going on around her.

‘Jim, Jim, fetch me a drink of water, this thirst is killing me,’ Rose whispered, reaching out a feeble hand from underneath the blankets.

Jim lovingly wiped her brow, mindful of the scabs that had appeared on his bonny-faced wife. ‘Here, love, just a sip. Don’t want to chill your belly now, do we?’ He gently
lifted her head and watched her take a small sip, the movement almost too much for her. ‘John’s gone for the doctor. We should have had him sooner – and would have done if we
hadn’t listened to you. I know it’s his wedding day but tha’s more precious to me than his special day.’

He patted her hand lovingly, trying to fight back a tear in his eye. Hard northern fellas like him didn’t cry. He sniffed loudly and walked away, trying to hide his feelings. He was
standing over the sink, not wanting to look at his wife as she lay groaning in her bed, worry and fear overtaking him as the door flew open and John entered with the doctor by his side.

‘How long has she been like this?’ Doctor Thistlethwaite turned white when he saw her condition. He put his hand on Rose’s forehead. ‘She’s burning up.’ He
stepped back and looked at the two burly men. They seemed lost without their matriarch.

‘She started complaining she was tired about a week ago. And then these blisters came out the other day.’ John answered for his father, who had sunk into his chair. The old man knew
all too well what his wife had. He’d seen it once before, when he was a child, and he’d never forgotten the devastation that it had caused.

‘I’m sorry but she’s going to have to come into the hospital. I believe she has smallpox. It’s a fearful disease and I can’t tell you what the outcome will
be.’

‘Tha don’t have to tell me a thing, Doctor,’ said Jim. ‘I know what smallpox is about, I lost my mother to it when I was a little ’un. I caught it an’ all
– look at my neck and shoulders.’ Jim rose from his seat, pulled back his shirt and lifted his long grey hair up to reveal the pits in his skin where the scabs had been. ‘I was
lucky – I don’t have any on my face and I lived, but my Rose here looks in a bad way.’

‘We’ll take her into the hospital and try to make her comfortable. She’ll need to be kept apart from the other patients – this is contagious, as you probably already
know, Mr Pratt.’

‘Aye, I know. It ripped through our little village, barely a family untouched. I’m sorry we’ve fetched it to your door.’ Jim bowed his head and leaned against
Rose’s bed. ‘You’ll be all right, lass, Doctor here will look after you. Our John’s going to carry you into hospital.’

He walked away and gazed into the night while John and the doctor carried Rose out. Her moans brought back to him the night he lost his mother and the pain and anxiety that followed. Wherever
she had caught it from, this was only the beginning. Smallpox would cut through the railway camps like a thief in the night, breeding on the squalid conditions that most of the navvies lived in.
God have mercy on all their souls – not that Jim placed much store in Him. After watching your mother die and most of your family, you gave over believing in such a cruel trickster.

‘I’ll wash everything in sight and burn the bedding. I remember that much from when I was a nipper,’ Jim called after the doctor. ‘Never thought I’d see it again,
though.’ He closed the door and went back into the empty cabin. Rose was so ill, he knew there was little hope she’d survive. He sat in his chair and looked at the unmade bed and the
pots and hangings on the walls in the hut that they had made their home for the last eighteen months. The old biscuit box full of earnings was just visible under the bed. He’d give it all
away if he could save his Rose. He put his head in his hands and sobbed. She was his rock – a bullying, stubborn rock, but no other woman could hold a light to her. She’d better bloody
live, that feisty old bugger . . . else what was he to do?