The Emerald Valley (13 page)

‘Can you eat a bit more bacon?' Charlotte asked, her fork hovering over his plate, and he shook his head.

Suddenly he did not have a great deal of appetite left. Disappointment was fermenting inside him like yeast, filling his stomach, bubbling and swelling … and his anger against the blackleg train and the men who would drive it grew too.

A General Strike ought to
be
general if it was to do any good – nothing moving anywhere. That way, the bosses would be forced to climb down the sooner and give the miners a decent living wage.

I wish I could do something about it, thought Harry. I wish there was some way I could stop it running.

The other night he had vowed to make someone hear him, but as yet his voice was not loud enough and he had no idea what to say. Now there might be an opportunity to hinder the strike-breakers and he could not think how to do that either.

But there must be a way, he decided. And if only he could find it, nobody would stop him carrying out his plan.

The idea came to him that evening as he was attending to his pigeons, delighting him so much that he laughed out loud, frightening the birds. It was simple – so simple he could not understand why he hadn't thought of it before – but it would be wonderfully effective in stopping the train.

Along the Rank he could hear the two youngest Clements boys, Tommy and Reg, playing a half-hearted game of football, and he decided to let them in on his plan. Reg, who was the same age as Harry, was always game for a bit of fun and Tommy, two years older, was one of the keenest young members of the Federation at Middle Pit.

Harry settled the birds and locked up the shed for the night. Then he went up the garden to Tommy and Reg. Although there were two years between them, the boys were as like as peas in a pod; people often mistook them for twins and sometimes confused them altogether. Harry, however, had lived next door to them all his life, and had no difficulty in knowing it was Reg who slammed the ball towards him as he rounded the corner of the washhouse. He fielded it with his chest, got a foot to it and kicked it back with such enthusiasm that it hit the wall, skidded past the two boys and sent Peggy Yelling's cat bounding for the safety of the gardens.

‘Hey – watch it, you three – you'll be breaking a window in a minute!' Molly, the Clements boys' stepmother, yelled from her window and they grinned at one another. They might be past their middle teens now and working men all three of them, but they had been yelled at from kitchen windows since they were toddlers and the feeling of fellowship it aroused in them was as comfortable and familiar as the boots on their feet.

It was also just the right atmosphere for persuading the Clements boys to join him in his plan, thought Harry.

‘Listen, lads, come here a minute,' he began. ‘No – let's go round the corner. I want to talk to you.'

They rescued the ball and followed him, bouncing it idly on the stones. Then, once they were out of earshot of the houses and leaning against the wall of the sheds, Harry told them about the blackleg train and outlined his ideas for stopping it.

His suggestion was greeted by hoots of laughter and unstinted enthusiasm.

‘Oh, that's brilliant!'

‘You're a dark horse, Harry. Fancy thinking of something like that! Count us in!'

They talked for a while longer, working out a plan of attack, decided where to get the things they would need and speculating about what would happen if they were able to do as they planned.

‘There'll be some red faces and no mistake!' Tommy chortled. ‘That early train is always chock-a-block with people going from Bath to Wells or Shepton – and most of them toffs, too. If it can't get any further than Hillsbridge, they'll either have to walk or stay on it and go back again.'

‘We'd better meet early then,' Harry said. ‘It's easy enough for me, as I promised to go up and give our Dolly a hand. But what about you – will you be up?'

‘I shall,' Tommy said. ‘Our Reg would sleep till the cows come home, but I'll make sure he gets up tomorrow!'

Reg laughed aloud. ‘Don't worry about me – wouldn't miss this for worlds!' he said.

It was a sentiment they all shared.

Harry was awake much earlier than he needed to be next morning. He got up, dressed and went downstairs, taking Charlotte and James completely by surprise.

‘Whatever has got into you?' Charlotte asked, pouring him a cup of tea. ‘I've never known you get up this early when you didn't have to.'

Harry shrugged evasively, glad he had arranged to meet the Clements boys along at the corner instead of outside the door. If Charlotte had seen them all together she would have smelled a rat.

‘I thought I'd get up to our Dolly's nice and early,' he said and had the grace to blush when Charlotte praised him for his thoughtfulness.

At about a quarter to eight he escaped. Tommy and Reg were already waiting at the end of the Rank, sharing a Woodbine as they leaned against the wall of the end house.

‘Ready, then?' he greeted them.

‘Yes! We thought you weren't coming.'

‘Let's get going then.'

They started off down the hill with jaunty step.

‘Have you got what we need?' Tommy asked.

Harry's hands closed over a heavy metal padlock which was concealed in his pocket. Last night he had found it at the bottom of his father's toolbox after half an hour's frenzied searching when he had almost given up, thinking someone must have moved it and that the plan would have to be abandoned.

‘I've got it,' he told them and they chortled in anticipation.

They were still laughing as they turned the corner at the bottom of the hill and their objective came in sight.

Here in the centre of the town two sets of railway lines bisected the main street, protected by level-crossing gates. Closest to Conygre Hill was the Somerset and Dorset – the line that ran from Bath to Shepton Mallet and beyond, passing on its way through South Compton where, in about half-an-hour's time, the blackleg train would run. At present the crossing gates were open, sealing off the line until such time as they were swung by means of a lever in the signal box to stop any traffic and allow the train a passage across the road.

But this was what Harry was determined should not happen. If the gates failed to open, the train would be unable to leave the station – and then it would have no option but to turn around and go back to Bath, he reasoned.

And with a padlock as strong as the one in his pocket to fasten them together, those gates would take some opening!

As they neared the railway line, however, Harry swore. ‘Sod it! There's somebody up in the signal box already!'

The others looked … and groaned with him. They had made their plans on the assumption that with the railways on strike and the blackleg train the only one due on the line this morning, some volunteer or other would go up to the signal box at the last moment to open the gates and go through the formality of lowering the signals. Finding someone already there was a blow. The signal box provided a wonderful vantage point and it would be virtually impossible to tamper with the gates without being seen from there.

‘We should have done it last night, while it was dark,' Tommy grumbled.

‘I know what we
should
have done – but it's a bit late now to worry about that.' Harry caught hold of Reg's sleeve, giving it a jerk. ‘Let's go back round the corner and have a think.'

They retreated out of sight of the signal box and Tommy got out his Woodbines and passed them round. Then they squatted down on their haunches against the wall in the time-honoured fashion of miners.

‘There's only one way to do it,' Harry said after a moment. ‘And that's to wait until the train's due.'

‘We shall be seen,' Tommy objected.

‘Of course we shall. But at least that way they won't have time to do anything about it. We're going to be seen whenever we do it – are you worried?'

‘No!' they said together.

‘Right, we'll wait here then.'

The strike had cast an unnatural hush over the town. There were no hooters to blare their clarion call into the fresh morning air, no rattle of pit-boots on the pavements, no distant thundery rumble from the stone quarries away over the hills as there was so often on clear mornings. Instead there was only bird-song, the soft rush of the river that ran through the centre of Hillsbridge between the two sets of railway lines and the occasional clip-clop of a horse and cart to break the stillness.

After they had been there a few minutes, however, the lads heard footsteps and voices and turned to see a group of older miners coming down the hill.

‘Morning, boys – you coming to join the protest, be you?' they greeted Harry and the Clements brothers.

‘Protest? What protest's that?' Tommy asked.

‘You've heard about the train, haven't you? Well, we be going to stand on the platform and boo when it comes through,' one of the men replied.

Harry viewed them scornfully. How weak! he thought. A fat lot of good booing would do. But it was typical of the peaceable approach of Hillsbridge miners – they might have a reputation for rowdiness on a Saturday night, but when it came to standing up for their rights they were a law-abiding lot.

‘We b'ain't the only ones,' one of the men said, seeing his look. ‘There's more lads coming from the other way. You want to come over and make your voices heard wi'the rest of us.'

‘All right, we'll be over later,' Harry agreed and when the older miners had gone, the lads had another laugh over their plan and settled back to wait again.

From where they were squatting, Harry had only to peep around the corner to be able to see the town clock in its tower above the market building, but the hands seemed to move with painful slowness.

‘How are we going?' Tommy asked every so often.

‘Another ten minutes.'

‘S'pose the train's early?'

They looked at one another.

‘Would we hear the bell from here?' Harry asked, referring to the bell that rang on the platform as the train passed through the next station up the line, to warn of its approach.

‘I could get a bit closer,' Reg offered. ‘If it was just me nobody would take any notice. Then I could tip you the wink.'

‘All right – but walk naturally and don't make it look as if you've got anything to hide,' Harry instructed.

‘If I'm caught I shall pretend to be our Tommy,' Reg said with a grin, tossing his Woodbine into the gutter.

‘Thanks very much!' his brother called after him. However, a moment later as Reg came hurrying back, his face a picture, the amusement disappeared from his tone: ‘What's the matter?'

‘There's a policeman over by the station,' Reg informed them. ‘It looks like Sergeant Eyles.'

They all looked at one another. This was something else they had not bargained for.

‘They must have thought there might be trouble,' Harry said. ‘Damn all those men and their silly booing! Well, we'll just have to do our best, won't we?'

Reg was looking worried. ‘You mean we're still going to do it?'

‘'Course we are.'

‘But we'm bound to get caught.'

Harry's jaw was set in a stubborn line. Anyone who knew him would have been able to tell in a moment that it would take a whole army of police officers to stop him carrying out his plan.

‘Well, I'm doing it. Whether you join in is up to you.'

There was a brief silence and then Tommy said evasively, ‘It wouldn't be so noticeable, would it – only one?'

The sense of that was undeniable, but Harry felt a sharp sense of let-down all the same.

‘How about attracting old Eyles'attention, so he's less likely to notice me?'

‘Well – yes …' But the Clements boys didn't sound too keen. They had attracted the policeman's attention a great deal too much in their time – and usually without meaning to.

‘What could we do?'

‘Oh, I don't know. Go down under the subway and make a noise. Make it sound as if
you're
the ones doing something …'

Clearly they didn't like it, but there was little alternative. After a few moment's consultation they set off, crossing the forecourts of the George Hotel where the stalls spilled out from the Market Hall on market days and going – with as much obvious stealth as they could muster – down the steps and into the subway that ran under the railway line. From around the corner Harry watched. Knowing their reputation, as soon as he heard and saw them the chances were that Sergeant Eyles would go to investigate what they were up to, but he was out of Harry's sight so the timing would have to be more a matter of luck than judgement.

Harry waited a few moments, then ducked out from cover. There were a few people on the platform waiting for the blackleg train, he noticed, keeping well away from the line of angry miners, but of the policeman there was no sign. Harry's fingers closed over the padlock in his pocket, easing it open and ready. There was no hope of any cover for him; he would just have to walk across the road, wind the chain around the gate-posts and hope that it worked.

Trying to look nonchalant, he approached the crossing. Then, as he reached the gates he pulled out the padlock and threaded the chain through the struts. His trembling hands made him awkward and slow and before he could loop the padlock onto the chain a shout went up.

‘Hoi! You! What do you think you're doing?'

He looked up to see a gentleman clad in pinstripe trousers and bowler hat angrily waving an umbrella at him. Harry fought down a sudden urge to laugh. He had not known there was anyone in Hillsbridge who went to work dressed like that. It just went to show, there were two quite separate worlds in this little mining town. But this was not the time for social speculation. Panic was making Harry's adrenalin flow freely, for he knew the shout would attract the attention of Sergeant Eyles. With a quick movement, he snapped the padlock shut and jerked out the key.