The Loom (15 page)

He still had his hand on her mouth.

‘
Well? Are you going to scream,’ he asked. She shook her head.

‘
Good.’ He slowly took his hand away and she immediately let out an ear-splitting shout. He jumped back as though he’d been shot. Then he hit her; slapped her hard, right across her face with such force she slammed against the door, then slid to the floor. She screamed again and began to sob.

There was a sudden loud knocking on the door.

‘
What’s going on; I’ll have no marliking around in my place. Do you hear me Neil?’

‘
It’s all right, Mrs. Dunbridge.’

‘
Let me out,’ Marion shouted. Neil pulled her away and tried to put his hand on her mouth again and she bit down, hard. This time he yelled and they struggled together, landing on the floor with a loud thud.

‘
You bloody bitch,’ he hissed. ‘I’ll get you for this.’

Mrs. Dunbridge was going frantic on the other side.

‘
If you don’t open up Neil Preston I’ll call the police.’

‘
All right, all right, hold your horses.’ Neil glared at Marion and opened the door. Marion got up hastily and straightened her clothes.

Mrs. Dunbridge took one look at Marion, then turned to Neil.

‘
Ee, I’ve a good mind to send for the police anyway, you good for nothing coward. I’ve heard all about you, carrying on about not going to war. Well, I think that’s just what you need. A good dose of what the lads at the Front are getting. Well, I’ll not have you here any longer so you can bugger off.’

She turned to Marion, who cringed at the look. ‘And what the likes of you are doing with the likes of him I’ll never know. You should be ashamed of yourself. Now go on, get out of me house, both of you, and you,’ and she pointed a bony finger at Marion, dirt so thick under the finger nail a paint scraper would have found difficult to dislodge, ‘You just get back where you belong and the quicker the better.’

Before she’d finished Marion was down the stairs and out on the street. She ran and ran for about ten minutes. All she wanted was to get away. Luckily, as she turned down a street with the laughable name of Primrose Lane, she saw a police- man and in no time she was at the Police Station.

She sat and waited on a wood chair, strangely exhausted, but intensely happy and relieved and listened as the policeman explained on the phone, to her father at his office. Then she was whisked home in the Bentley, her father admonishing her all the way about her irresponsible behaviour and the evils of men.

CHAPTER TEN

T
he front door had become a symbol to Emma. A symbol of waiting! She must have opened it a hundred times on this day: January 19, 1918. She stuck her head out and looked up and down the street and for the umpteenth time gave a loud sigh. Where was he? He should have been home by now. As she turned to go back in, Annie Fitton, who was standing on her front step, called out.

‘
Is he not here then, Emma?’

‘No, no I feel like I don’t know whether I’m coming or going I’ve been that het up all morning. I just can’t seem to settle to anything proper.’

‘Now it’s no good getting in a dither, Emma. He’ll turn up sooner or later.’

Emma smoothed her apron and couldn’t help another glance up the street. ‘Aye, aye, you’re right, Annie, but I wish he’d hurry up. Ee, I can’t wait to see him again. It seems like years and I haven’t had a minute’s peace since he went away.’

‘I know just how you feel, Emma. I’ve been through it all, as you well know. He’s been lucky has your Darkie, he has that.’ Annie started to get wound up in her sad reminiscences. ‘Why don’t you come over and have a cuppa. It’ll take your mind off him.’

Emma shook her head. ‘Thanks, Annie, but I’d better not. You never know. He could come when I’m in your place. Janey’s still in bed and he might think no one’s home.’

‘Oh well have it your way.’ Annie wished she could do something. Emma had been like a cat on hot bricks since she’d had word that Darkie was coming home on leave. ‘I’ll let you get back in then,’ she said.

‘Aye, I’ve still got a few odds and ends to do. You’re coming over later, aren’t you, Annie? We’re just having a bit of a celebration like to welcome Darkie home. Shamus and Mara and the rest of the family are coming and me cousin, Johnny Braithwaite’s over from Blackburn. There’ll probably be a few others as well.’

Annie nodded, her fat face beaming enthusiastically. ‘Oh, aye, I wouldn’t miss it for anything. It’ll be good to see Darkie again. He’s a grand lad your Darkie. Do you want me to bring anything over for you?’

‘No, no don’t worry about a thing, Annie. I’ve been baking since six, on and off and I’ve enough to feed an army. It was a bit of a struggle but I’m not stinting on this day. We’ll just make do for the rest of the week. Bread and dripping till pay day.’

‘All right then, Emma.’ Annie waved and went inside. Emma gave another last look. No, he still wasn’t coming and she shouldn’t be wasting her time keep rushing to the door. He’d come in his own good time and worrying herself sick wasn’t going to bring him any faster.

Darkie huddled further into his greatcoat and pulled the collar up as far as it would go. He’d sat in this position all the way from Manchester. The weather had turned icy and the railway carriage was as cold as a coffin. The wind whipped under the end door and through any chink it could find and from the look of the leaden sky outside it would snow at any minute.

The two other soldiers in the carriage looked as frozen and miserable as Darkie. As the train huffed and puffed and rattled its way into the station they roused themselves, reaching up to the rack above to lift their kit bags, letting them fall to the floor with a loud thud.

Darkie looked out of the window as the station-master’s hut slid past. ‘Doesn’t look like it’s changed much,’ he said with a grimace.

Peter Duxbury gave a snort. ‘No, it doesn’t. Bloody hell, I can’t wait to get home and get some sleep in a proper bed and without me feet being wet all the bloody time.’

Darkie stared at Peter’s weary, gaunt face. Did he look as bad?

‘Aye, if I know Mam, she’ll have a good feed ready and a good fire,’ he said. ‘I can’t wait to sink my teeth into one of her steak pies. And to think we couldn’t wait to get away! Just goes to show what people bloody know, doesn’t it?’

Bill Dixon remained seated. He was going on to Clitheroe.

‘
Well, enjoy your leave, lads. I know I will. I feel like sleeping for a week. I wish we had longer. It’ll go like a flash and we’ll feel like we’ve not been back.’

‘Shut up, will you, you bloody wet blanket.’ Darkie aimed a mock punch at him, which Bill pretended to dodge. ‘That’s all we need.’

The train drew to a stop and Darkie and Peter jumped off. ‘We’ll see you on the way back then, Bill. Don’t go getting into trouble now, will you?’

Bill grinned and made a rude sign. They stood on the platform until the train departed, watching until Bill’s face disappeared from sight. Darkie looked along the cold wet platform and stamped his feet. ‘I’ll be on me way then, Peter.’

Peter nodded. ‘Aye, all right then. It looks like it’s going to pour down or snow and me feet are bloody frozen.’

They split up as they walked out of the station. The place was deserted. Darkie was glad. He felt dead from his brain to his feet and couldn’t have spoken to any one if he’d tried. ‘I’ll see you at the Wellington tomorrow,’ Darkie called after Peter.

Peter turned back. ‘Aye, all right, there’s nowt much else to do here.’

The two soldiers went their separate ways, back to the life before the war, but which to them was now as unreal as war had been to them before it began.

The small living room was packed. Everyone seemed to be talking at once, or laughing out loud, great gusts of noisy merriment interrupting the hum of conversation.

The party was in full swing, all determined to enjoy Emma’s welcome home party for Darkie.

Shamus was already swaying, his arm around Mara’s ample waist like an anchor. Annie Fitton stood next to them, her round face red and puffed up with the heat and excitement, her toothless smile stretched from ear to ear. Next to Annie was Uncle Dickie. You could die of boredom with Uncle Dickie. The extent of his conversation was either ay um or ay ei in between puffs on his pipe. Annie’s deafness saved her from what Leah described as a fate worse than death. ‘I wanted to hit him with a frying pan the last time he came over.’

Friends and neighbours had been popping in all day, so Emma had been busy and she’d hardly got to say a word to Darkie. The room was almost suffocating with all the people and the roaring fire blazing up the chimney. Emma sat in her old chair and watched the festivities. Her eyes strayed frequently to the tall figure of Darkie, who was talking to Paddy in the corner, squashed next to her cousin and Uncle Dickie.

She had been shocked at the change in her son: that pasty white face, so thin his eyes seemed to stick out of it as though they were on stalks. She’d have to feed him up before he went back. She blinked to hide the tears when she thought of this. She should be laughing not crying now he was home, but it was as though sadness and happiness lay so close in her she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

Darkie stood in the corner and made small talk to Paddy. He knew Paddy was dying to talk about the war, but he couldn’t. He felt strange, disorientated when he saw his mother. His emotions had run the whole gamut. She’d changed, seemed to have shrunk, too. Had she always been so small? And those lines, he was sure they’d not been there before he went away. He had felt like crying but hadn’t. Harwood men didn’t cry!

He was trying to act normal, but it was hard. He’d arrived home to an emotional welcome from his Mother, this in itself unusual from the normally reticent Emma. He hadn’t known how to behave; one minute he wanting to laugh like a madman, the next, to put his head down and cry like a baby. His nerves were shot to pieces! Any sound and he almost jumped out of his skin. Perversely the peace and quiet seemed to accentuate his tension.

His gaze roved the room, now full of people, and felt strangely detached from them all. To him the real world was no longer Harwood! It was the whine of bullets, detonating shells, the stench of death and above it all the mud. The stinking, cloying, sucking mud and even in his sleep he couldn’t escape, for it was ravaged by the same nightmare quality as his waking hours.

‘
Come on Johnny, give us a dance,’ Shamus called. More voices joined in the demand. Johnny was known as the best clog dancer in two counties and Emma had seen him take a flying leap onto his mother’s wood table at one of their parties and clog dance on that.

‘
Where’s Ben with his fiddle?’ Ben was pushed forward, the clippy mat rolled back and every one moved to the side.

Johnny, (Emma’s cousin) was a small, dapper man in his mid thirties. He removed his coat with a flourish.

‘
Ready Ben,’ he said and Ben nodded and Johnny was off, his clogs clacking on the floor to the rhythm and people singing and clapping to the music.

Darkie stood and watched. He noticed that Paddy had taken this opportunity to stare at Leah with something akin to rapture. He’s got it bad, he thought, poor sod. It made him think of Kitty. He hadn’t thought of Kitty for some time. The war had done that, at least.

Darkie had been surprised at the change in Leah. She was now almost sixteen. A bonny sixteen! That had not surprised him so much as her self-assurance. And that voice; as though she’d been brought up in Buckingham Palace. He noticed some people didn’t like it, but then again, Harwood people didn’t like change. They were shocked if you wore a different jacket. He’d changed, too. At one time he would have felt like all the rest. That’s what being away from home had done for him. He wasn’t sure it was a good thing. It had all seemed easier before.

Leah watched Johnny with enjoyment. She loved to watch him. He was a character, too she thought affectionately. Most people liked Johnny because he was like her mother: he could make people laugh at nothing. She puzzled about Johnny. He lived with his widowed mother in Blackburn and sometimes she’d visit him with Mam. Most times when they saw him he was dressed like a woman. No-one seemed to think this at all strange, so she’d come to accept it, too. She’d even heard her mother compliment him on some of the dresses he wore, which Johnny acknowledged graciously as though it was the most natural thing in the world. When she’d questioned her mother Emma been a bit vague with her reply.

‘
Ee, I don’t know why he likes to wear dresses, love. He just does. It’s like dressing up, I suppose. Even when we were little, he always wanted the frocks. But you know that old saying ‘there’s nowt queerer than folk’.’

The room seemed to be full of watchers: Emma watching Darkie; Paddy watching Leah and Janey watched Paddy, with mounting annoyance! Why couldn’t he look at her like that, she thought, as Paddy continued to stare at Leah? He was lovely was Paddy O’Shea and she’d set her cap for him as soon as Leah had gone. It hadn’t made any difference though, because he was smitten with their Leah. And she’s still as thin as a lathe, Janey thought angrily. You’d think he’d want someone with curves, like me. Janey had a lush figure, which she was proud of. Men stared at Janey, all of them except Paddy. And all the women stared at Paddy! No wonder, she thought he’s a smasher. Paddy was black Irish with startling blue eyes and black curly hair. He was tall, although not as tall as their Darkie, but more handsome Janey thought. What did he see in Leah?