Shining Threads (10 page)

On this day, as he followed Drew inside, the din and confusion which met him at the door instantly stunned him, taking his mind and his determination. His step faltered. His eyes went black and
sightless and but for the broad back of his brother ahead of him he would have lost his way. He was like a sleep-walker, but some tiny, still-intelligent part of his mind told him he must just
follow that back wherever it went: hang on to that thought, to that solid, dependable shape ahead of him, the brother who had never in all their young lives together let him down or deserted him,
who had been his other half for sixteen years and who would lead him from this place which, with every second, was closing in on him.

But it was no use, his last desperate thought told him, as the greyness about him became black. He felt himself slip on the oil-soaked floor, his stomach heaved and the blood began to drain away
from his head.

‘Just bend ower, lad,’ a light voice said and he felt a pressure on his arm and across his back and though it was not forceful he found himself obeying. He was hanging, head down
– how in hell had he got here? – over a motionless machine. He could see nothing but oil and cotton-waste and the face, young and cheeky, of a little piecer who had crept beneath the
machine to get a better look at him. There were bare feet everywhere, dirty and splayed, ugly some of them with swollen veins and joints, but the pair nearest to him, though just as dirty, were
small and fine, narrow and really rather shapely. He sensed dozens of pairs of curious, probably amused eyes on him; then he was gripped again in a violent spasm of nausea.

‘Come on, old chap,’ a gentle voice said and familiar, strong brown hands, duplicates of his own, grasped his. He clung gratefully to them as they began to lead him, blind and ill,
towards the doorway at the end of the interminably long room and out into the yard.

‘Fresh air’ll see ’im right,’ a voice said briskly, as though the owner of it really had no time to be wasting on him, then he was out . . . thank God, thank God . . .
out of the smell and the din and the enveloping walls, the hellish confusion, and at once he was recovered.

He lifted his head and looked into Drew’s concerned face, which grinned at once, letting him know that though he did not really understand what ailed his twin he was quite willing to try,
and to stand shoulder to shoulder with him should anyone turn awkward over it. There was a girl there, small, light-boned and thin and yet giving the impression, strangely, that she was as sturdy
as the weeds which grew in the hedgerow. Her face was pale, and plain as a bleached yard of cotton. Her eyes were a sharp and almost colourless blue and her fine, mousy hair was dragged back from
her face into what must surely have been a painful knot at the back of her head. Her bare feet stepped without concern on the bare cobbles and he knew that this must be the person who had, with her
quick thinking, saved him from losing consciousness.

‘Tha’ll be reet now. Tek a few deep breaths,’ she ordered, wiping her hands down her sacking apron. She did not look away when his eyes met hers, nor shuffle about awkwardly as
the lower orders often did in the presence of their superiors, but met his glance steadily. He had never seen a girl less comely and yet she had a quiet dignity which was unusual in someone of her
age and class. ‘Tha’ll get used to it, like we all ’ave to,’ she added ready, now that he was recovered, to get back to her work.

‘Like hell I will,’ he answered harshly, wiping his arm across his sweated face. ‘I’ll run away to sea before I’ll go in there again.’

‘Hold on, brother.’ Drew’s lazy drawl and narrowed eyes indicated to him that the undertackler, Broadbent, was not far away but Pearce was beyond caution.

‘No! You hold on, brother. It’s not you who turns faint like some puling woman . . .’

‘I never ’eard such nonsense in me life. Turnin’ sick ower a bit o’ stink. We none of us like it, Mr Greenwood, but we’ve no choice. It’s work or starve wheer
I come from an’ let me tell thi, we’re glad o’t work. ’Ave thi ever bin in Abbotts mill or any on ’em in this valley? ’Ave thi? Conditions ’ere are like a
palace compared to t’other ’uns. Thee’d ’ave summat ter be sick ower if thi ’ad ter work theer.’

Both young gentlemen turned to stare at the girl who spoke. She might have been some creature from another world, or a gatepost which one does not, naturally, expect to speak, so deep was the
amazed consideration they gave her now. Indeed, despite their close proximity to them, the two boys had never actually
noticed
an operative in the weeks they had been working in the mill.
The girl stared back at them grimly, such a plain, drab little thing, resembling nothing so much as the sparrows which nested in the ivy on the walls of Greenacres, a sparrow which, nevertheless,
was prepared to take on two magnificent soaring eagles. Her expression asked quite plainly what else could you expect of these pampered young fools who were playing, reluctantly she had heard, at
being commercial gentlemen. Their aunt and uncle knew exactly what she and the hundreds of others in the mill endured day after day, though this was a good mill. Both of them knew the meaning of
work
. These two young bucks, quite evidently, would soon tire of the discipline, the sheer physical discomfort of the factory floor and take themselves back to their old pastimes of shooting
everything that took wing and riding like madmen with others of similar inclination, chasing the fox through the farmer’s cornfield.

‘I’ll get back ter me machine, then,’ she added coldly. ‘Time’s money ter me, an’ I’ve already lost ’alf an ’our wi’ thee.’ With
that she turned on her heel and walked away, her thin back straight, her narrow shoulders squared.

‘Sorry about that, Mr Broadbent,’ she said to the overlooker who still leaned in the doorway. He was watching the two young men. They were laughing now, quite amused, it seemed, by
the strange girl who had given them the sharp end of her tongue but not the least offended since, really, did she matter? They had got themselves, through her, out of the damned spinning room and
why not take advantage of it? They strolled towards the gate with the appearance of gentlemen who, having done their day’s work, were off about more important matters, though it was barely
seven o’clock.

‘Nay, Annie, don’t fret, lass. It’s not the first time it’s happened and it’ll not be the last.’

‘Does’t tha think they’ll come back, then?’ she asked, surprised.

‘Oh, aye. Their father’s set on it, it seems. It’s to be their mill, after all.’

‘God ’elp us, then.’

‘Happen he’ll get over it, the sickness.’

‘’Appen, but that’ll not mek ’im into a millmaister, Mr Broadbent.’

There was a sudden commotion at the closed gate and the man who had charge of the key ran frantically across the yard to unlock it. Every morning the gate was locked on those late-comers who had
no legitimate excuse, such as the illness of a child, and not opened again until eight o’clock, but the girl who was shouting to be let in was not one of those and the gatekeeper knew better
than to keep her waiting. The mare was restlessly sidestepping, catching her rider’s impatience, and the gatekeeper fumbled with his keys whilst the voice on the other side urged him to get a
move on. At last he had it open and in she came, hair flying out in a banner behind her, scattering the same men and boys Will had watched her disperse a few weeks ago. He had not seen her since
that day but she was just the same. Heedless of those who got in her way, she went straight as an arrow towards her target, her two cousins who had turned to look at her.

She did not dismount. Drew put up a hand to her mare’s nose as she leaned down to him. All the men in the yard, grumbling beneath their breath, had turned to look at her, as Will was sure
she intended. Her mare moved sideways again, nervously shying away from the enormous waggon which was just entering the yard, but she held it in expertly, her gloved hands firm on the rein, her
slim, muscled legs strong and lovely in their dove-grey breeches.

Her eyes narrowed as she caught sight of him across the heads of the men and there was a burst of laughter as she said something to her cousins. All three turned to look at him and he could feel
the hard knot of anger tie itself beneath his breastbone. The two young men lounged indolently against the mill wall, their hands shoved deep in their trouser pockets, their dark eyebrows arched,
their eyes gleaming in identical amusement. He saw their good white teeth flash in their sun-darkened faces and then, with the insolence of the lordly young gentlemen they considered themselves to
be, they turned away. He was nothing to them, merely that breed known as overlooker in their mill, a man
under
the man who was in charge of the spinners, but not of
them
. Pearce left
the other two for a moment, making some sign to the boy who hung about the yard and whose job it was to attend to the horse of any caller. In a moment the boy returned, leading the two restive bays
which the brothers rode. They all three turned to look at Will again, the girl grinning now to let him see that this was really
her
doing. The boys mounted gracefully and one turned to him,
grinning, his voice flippant since they all knew he was lying.

‘Some urgent business. Tell Wilson, if you please.’ With their coat-tails flying and the girl’s hair and ribbon streaming out behind her, they galloped madly from the yard,
down the street towards the edge of town and the wild moorland which was the only place they really wished to be.

Mr Wilson came slowly down the steps from the first-floor spinning room, his face resigned but not unduly concerned since they were not
his
problem, thank God.

‘Where the devil have those two gone now?’ the men in the yard heard him say out loud, shrugging, for what else could you expect? It was no good trying to tame a bird which has flown
free since it came from the egg and in their opinion, their good-humoured north-country faces seemed to say, best save your breath to cool your porridge. It was too late. A flogging once a week
starting in the nursery was what those two had needed, her an’ all, really, then happen they might have shaped themselves. Too late now, they repeated as they resumed the work which had been
so violently disrupted, bloody glad it was nowt to do with them.

‘Urgent business, they said, Mr Wilson,’ Will answered him, eyebrows sardonically raised, and was not surprised when Mr Wilson swore quite rudely beneath his breath before turning
back to the stairs.

5

She had given her mare her head, letting her go flat out over the rough stretch of moorland known as Besom Hill, seeing the coarse grass blur beneath the animal’s hooves.
Her face was pressed close to the mare’s neck as she bent down with her into the wind. Her dratted hair had come loose as usual, whipping about her head and eyes, blinding her for a moment,
and she did not see the half a dozen rabbit holes until her mare swerved to avoid them. She felt herself move forward over the animal’s neck, her co-ordination gone completely with her
balance; when she hit the ground, though she landed in a clump of heather which broke her fall somewhat, the breath was knocked from her body. She lay for a minute or two, gasping for air, watching
the sky swing in sickening loops above her, then as it steadied and became still and serene again, she sat up, looking around for her mare.

She was high up here, almost at the top of the moorland sweep with a splendid view of the rock-strewn stretch of moor which went on endlessly as far as the eye could see. It was bleak and
treeless, rough ground pierced with moss-covered boulders, submerged in gorse and bracken, with a dozen shades of green from the paleness of the ferns which sheltered by a dry-stone wall, to the
dark, cloud-shadowed foliage on the far side of the deep clough which split the land. A soaring, grey-green landscape, hard and enduring, cut with water and rocks, where a bird or two wheeled above
her head, and nothing else.

There was no sign of her mare.

‘Damnation,’ she said softly, swinging back her mane of hair. Then, feeling for the ribbon which confined it and finding it gone, she pulled her scarf from around her neck and
carelessly bound up the troublesome locks. She stood up and dusted off her cream, doeskin breeches. Shading her eyes from the sun, she looked about her, her eyes penetrating the vast landscape for
a sight of her mare. There was nothing to be seen, no movement of any kind beyond that of the birds above her head.

It was not cold and the clouds were broken and low, some enfolding the top of the highest peaks. They moved quickly allowing the sun to show through, and for half an hour she sat on a rock and
stared out across the tops, to the next and the next, whistling now and again to attract her mare, should she still be in the vicinity. But the mare was not inclined to show herself and would, no
doubt, be well on her way to the stables at Greenacres by now. There was no alternative but to walk: almost five miles, she reckoned, skirting Edgeclough and Harrops Edge and following the rough
moorland track to the back of the Greenacres parkland.

It was warm walking but very pleasant. She removed her jacket and was tempted to hide it under a rock, picking it up the next time she came this way for it was cumbersome to carry. She draped it
over one shoulder, climbing steadily up the next rocky incline until she reached the brow, then, carried by her own momentum, almost running down the far side.

Her boots began to chafe her heel. She was used only to riding in them; in fact, come to think of it, she really had no footwear suitable for striding out across the hills since she rarely did
it. She walked over the Squire’s moor when she accompanied Drew and Pearce on one of his shoots but that was in a much more leisurely fashion, more of a stroll than a walk.

She skirted Edgeclough an hour later, clambering over a dry-stone wall to walk on the rutted path, once a ‘salt-way’, she had been told, which led past the town, or hamlet as it had
been in the old days. The clamouring of factory bells and whistles announced the changing of shifts and far below she could make out the patient crowds of ant-like men, women and children streaming
through half a dozen factory gates.