The Flight of Swallows Read online

  ‘’E told tha’ not ter come, lass,’ Kizzie had said to her. ‘Tha’ knows ’e’s a man of ’is word an’ if ’e closes this place down an’ dismisses me an’ Meggie what’ll Jenny an’ ’er baby do? Where’ll they go? Doctor ses another few days then she can get up but she’s not strong enough ter . . . well, I dunno.’

  ‘Kizzie, dearest, I will let nothing happen to you, Meggie or Jenny. Let me worry about the master. I shall have to do as he wishes but I’m bloody well not going to give up this place. I discovered another little gate to the side of this house leading on to a lane and up to the back door, quite hidden from the big house. It means the doctor can come without being seen. Trust me, I’ll find an answer. I shall fight and scream in front of the servants and anyone else before I’ll let anyone turn you three out nor the babies. He’ll . . .’ She gulped, remembering that perfect moment a few nights ago, saddened that it had not returned. Would it ever?

  ‘Eh, lovey . . .’ Kizzie shook her head sadly.

  She caused a minor sensation when she entered Jack and Patsy Ackroyd’s ballroom on her husband’s arm and those already dancing made her smile for they were so busy staring at her and Brooke they kept bumping into one another, the women tripping over the small trains of their evening gowns before they regained their equilibrium.

  Brooke had made love to her every night since the day he had laid down the law about the Dower House but it had not been the same. She had submitted, as she had done in the past, but she had viciously damped down the small flare of desire that had done its best to burst into life when he caressed her. They were back to the first days of their marriage when they had both been scrupulously polite with one another.

  Now she was doing what he had asked by socialising with these people who were the elite of the district. Jack Ackroyd, though he was in wool as were many of the company, did not actually work in his mills and factories but had inherited what he had from men, millmasters, who had started the woollen industry a century or more ago. The Ackroyds lived in an impressive house just south of Wakefield, Calder Field, which had vast gardens, woodland, tennis courts and stables containing Jack’s dozen or so horses, since both he and Patsy were keen members of the Danby Hunt.

  ‘Well, I can see you’re going to give me a lot of pleasure, Charlotte. I may call you Charlotte, mayn’t I?’ Patsy chortled as she hurried to take them from the butler who was announcing them. Her husband, who was a good deal older than her, was not quite sure how to deal with this radiant creature nor his young wife’s reaction to her arrival.

  ‘There are a lot of stuffy people here,’ she had said in an aside to him, ‘so I invited them to make up a few younger ones,’ then turned brightly back to Brooke and Charlotte. ‘And what a gorgeous gown; it must be Worth or Doucet, not bought in Wakefield, I’m sure. Now tell the truth, Brooke, where did you take your wife to acquire such a garment? You put us all to shame, indeed you do.’ Charlotte wore a silver sheath, shimmering in the soft wall lights Patsy preferred, a slim line that showed off her perfect figure, flaring at the knees like a mermaid’s tail, the bodice slipping carelessly off one shoulder to reveal the whiteness of her skin. In her hair she wore a silver ribbon which was meant to hold it in place but in fact allowed it to escape in an enchanting tumble of curls.

  ‘Paris,’ Brooke admitted coolly, for he had disapproved of the defiant way Charlotte wore it, ‘on our honeymoon,’ glancing down at Charlotte who so far had said not one word.

  It was the same all evening and the guests, men and women, all whispered to one another that though Brooke Armstrong’s wife was quite startling in her loveliness, she was very dull! She was seen to chat with several of the ladies when she was not dancing, as she was never short of a partner, the men clustering round her to take her on the floor, but she merely smiled and allowed them to hold her in their eager arms to dip and sway about the room.

  ‘She asked me if I had ever visited the West Riding Industrial Home for Females,’ Milly Pickford told Maddy Hill, shocked to the core, for what lady would do such a thing.

  ‘Well, she’s decidedly odd, I must say: she asked me if I knew of any young women taken into the Wakefield Union Workhouse. What would I know of such a thing, I ask you?’

  ‘She questioned me on Charles’s shoddy mill, for heaven’s sake, as if I would know the slightest thing about it,’ Rosemary Denton cried. ‘Really, I don’t think she will fit in at all!’

  She danced several times with her husband but it was noticed by several of the ladies who sat out, some of them with marriageable daughters who must, of course, be chaperoned, that though he spoke to her she barely answered him, her face averted.

  She got through it. She had done as he asked and in the carriage ride home, though he said not a word, she knew he was only barely holding in the temper she had not known he had until a few days ago. She reached the safety of their bedroom without a word being spoken, for there were servants still about, but with the door closed behind them he grabbed her from behind as she walked towards her dressing table and whirled her to face him.

  ‘So is this how it is to be?’ he hissed, his breath hot on her face, breath that reeked of brandy.

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘I think you do, madam. If I will not allow this mad idea you have of taking prostitutes off the streets and housing them and their offspring you will treat me and my friends to the contempt you think we deserve. You behaved abominably tonight.’

  ‘I was as good as gold.’

  ‘Really. Well, tell me this. For what purpose did you ask Milly Pickford if she had ever visited—’

  ‘So, she told you, did she?’

  ‘Her husband did and—’

  ‘I know. You won’t have it—’

  He hit her then, twice across the face, viciously and accurately so that her neck muscles wrenched in agony and her head, reeling backwards, struck hard against the wall. Then he tore her lovely silver gown from her, stripped her naked and threw her on the bed.

  He made her pregnant that night and though she fought him, bit him, snapping at his face with her teeth, she gloried in it, and so did he!

  14

  She drove the gig herself with Kizzie beside her and nobody tried to stop them, for the yard men had had no instructions from the master. It was March and the month had come in like the proverbial lamb with a warm breeze which was welcome after the bitter cold of February. The sun shone from a pale blue sky and though Charlotte felt the sighing sadness of the last few days weigh heavily upon her the sunshine lifted her spirits a little. The country lanes along which Misty stepped out smartly were just coming into the glory that would be spring: primroses in the midst of their crown of green leaves, celandine buds, coltsfoot and field speedwell scattered in the waist-high banks and the buds of daffodils standing up above the grass, straight, like little lance-heads among their spears of green.

  Jenny and the babies were well enough to be left in Meggie’s capable hands and surprisingly, since she was not what Kizzie would call a taking baby, Meggie was quite smitten with Ruth’s little thing, giving most of her time to her since Jenny doted on Rose and now that she was out of bed would let no one else go near her! Meggie had asked tentatively if Kizzie would mind if Ruth’s infant could be called Pearl.

  ‘Eeh, ’tis not up ter me, lass, an’ why Pearl?’ Kizzie had asked her.

  ‘Well, she looks like one, our Kizzie,’ though to Kizzie’s certain knowledge their Meggie had never clapped eyes on such a thing. ‘Sorta plain, pale, but wi’ summat smooth about ’er.’

  ‘Tha’ can be a bit daft at times, our Meggie.’ Kizzie had been amazed but she didn’t care what the infant was called.

  Charlotte came to the outskirts of Batley, guiding Misty along cobbled highways lined on either side with small terraced houses, the actual road busy with horse-drawn vehicles, farm carts, small gigs such as the one she drove, men on horseback, men dragging handcarts, and all moving steadily towards the centre of the
town. It was Thursday, market day, and the market-place was a sea of covered stalls where anything might be bought from a reel of cotton, new and secondhand clothing, boots, farm eggs, butter, jars of honey, farm implements, lidded baskets filled with cackling hens, and as they moved nearer to the square, the busier it became. There were tramlines running beside the market and a tramcar rattled by pulled by horses. When it stopped a dozen people alighted, mostly working women come to spy out a bargain on the stalls.

  Charlotte had been given instructions by a helpful passer-by as to how she might get to the nearest shoddy mill. The passer-by, a respectable working man in his decent go-to-market suit and bright blue neckerchief, looked somewhat surprised that this well-bred and well-spoken lady in her gig should ask for such a thing. No, she didn’t know the name of the mill, she told him, but as she had learned there were many such in the town of Batley, perhaps he could direct her to the closest.

  The name of the mill turned out to be Victoria Mill owned by Edward Ramsbottom and it was off Commercial Street. Aye, just go straight on . . . pointing his finger along the road.

  Commercial Street was cobbled, like most of the streets in the town and the gig bounced in the ruts. It was, like the market-place, busy with men in caps, women in shawls, a donkey pulling a small cart, a boy pushing a trolley on wheels in the centre of the road so that they were forced to swerve to avoid him, women in aprons and boys in knee-length trousers. Lining the road were dozens of shops: Smith’s the watchmaker, Salter’s Boot Store, Clayton’s Garment Store, the front of each shop shrouded with a canopy as though the sun were cracking the flagstones, Kizzie murmured.

  They turned at the corner of Rutland Road as instructed by the helpful working man, drove along it for a hundred yards and there it was. Their destination. Victoria Shoddy Mill. Edward Ramsbottom, prop.

  Charlotte drew in her breath. ‘Well, here it is, Kizzie. Our future and theirs.’

  ‘If I knew what tha’ were up to ’appen I might understand.’ Kizzie looked at the wide gates that opened into a yard that was a hive of activity: a positive whirlwind of men and wagons, great bales that looked to be made up of filthy tatters lying about the yard. More loaded wagons edged past them as they stared in horrified fascination, disgorging more bales to those already piled there while others took away bales that seemed no different to those that had just arrived.

  Shoddy was the result of mixing old rags with some virgin wool, a process developed almost a hundred years previously. The rags came from old clothes which were collected by ragmen for a price, the rags being then sold to the rag merchant. Another source was new rags bought by the rag merchant as scrap from clothing manufacturers and tailors. It was these rags that Charlotte was after.

  ‘Rug-making, Kizzie,’ Charlotte said absently. ‘I told you about it earlier.’

  ‘What?’ Kizzie turned to stare at her.

  ‘Rug-making. With Jenny to show them how, I mean to employ girls—’

  ‘Prostitutes?’

  ‘No, not particularly. Girls who are in trouble and can’t get work. Like Jenny. But not just to make sturdy rag rugs to be sold on the market and laid on the kitchen floor, but wall hangings, like the ones Jenny makes. When Patsy Ackroyd sat in the drawing room she spotted Jenny’s work and was greatly interested. She thought it was a painting. So there we have two outlets for the girls’ work.’

  ‘Two. Good God, lass, dost know what tha’re talking about? Dost ’onestly think Mr Brooke’ll let thi’ go in that there mill an’ deal wi’ men?’

  ‘He won’t know, Kizzie.’

  ‘It’ll get back to ’im, lass. There’s nowt ’appens ’ereabouts that don’t get back to ’im.’

  ‘I’ll just have to take the chance then, won’t I?’

  Avoiding the wagons and the men who stopped work to stare at her and Kizzie, she drove in through the gates and pulled up in front of steps leading to what might be offices. Climbing down from the gig, she beckoned to one man who seemed to have a knowing air about him and, when he had hurried across, asked him politely if he could see to her horse and gig and if he could direct her to Mr Ramsbottom’s office.

  He would have willingly helped her, for she was a good-looking young woman but his mouth dropped open and he seemed to be speechless.

  ‘Is there something wrong?’ she asked him, aware that the yard which had been so noisy a minute or two ago was now as quiet as a churchyard.

  ‘Mr Ramsbottom,’ she prompted him, glad when Kizzie sidled up to her, standing close.

  ‘Nay, lass,’ the man croaked. ‘Mr Ramsbottom don’t come ’ere. ’Is manager’s in’t th’office though. Reckon tha’ could talk to ’im.’

  She was dressed in one of her fashionable outfits bought in Paris. A skirt, flared and reaching her ankle bone and a three-quarter coat in a shade of dove grey with gloves and kid boots to match. Her hat was plain by the standards of the day, for knowing she would be entering a factory she had put on a dove-grey boater with a ribbon round it in yellow. She looked glorious, the sunshine putting golden streaks in her tawny hair which was tied up with a yellow ribbon into a bun just beneath the brim of her boater. She was excited and there was a flush of rose in her cheeks, though one of them looked suspiciously – to them who knew about such things – as though she had been thumped and her poppy lips were parted, ready to smile.

  ‘Bloody Nora!’ one brawny fellow whispered. ‘What’s goin’ on?’ But none of them could answer since they were as amazed as he.

  As she and Kizzie approached the doorway indicated by the fellow holding Misty’s reins, a man in a suit, totally different to the men in the yard, stepped down from the bottom step, quite speechless with astonishment for a moment since women, ladies, like her did not enter places like this.

  ‘May I help you?’ he enquired when he had regained his speech, looking her up and down with great interest, his eyes appreciating what he saw.

  ‘I am here to speak to . . . to the manager so if you would direct me to him I would be obliged.’

  ‘Well, madam, I’m not sure whether Mr Scales can see anyone just at the moment. He is a busy—’

  ‘And you are?’ cutting through his somewhat affected speech, which sounded as if he hadn’t always spoken thus.

  ‘I am his . . . his . . .’

  ‘Yes?’ She lifted her head imperiously.

  ‘I work in the office.’

  ‘Then will you be kind enough to announce me to Mr Scales.’

  The man shifted uncomfortably and at her back an interested crowd of men and boys nudged one another and waited to see what would happen next, the interruption to their work most pleasing to them. It was not often – in fact never – that a lady such as this one brightened up their day.

  She followed the clerk up the steps with Kizzie at her back.

  As Misty trotted up the drive they could see the doctor’s gig standing by the gate of the Dower House.

  ‘Now what’s ’appened?’ Kizzie asked anxiously. They had left Jenny quite recovered from the birth of her baby, and both babies doing well. At least Rose was doing well and Pearl . . . Pearl . . . was beginning to pull round with the attention Meggie gave her. There was no need for him to call again, he had told them only last week and now he was here, so what catastrophe had befallen their little household while they had been away?

  They pulled up, leaving their gig next to the doctor’s, jumping down on to the gravel and hurrying through the front door into the kitchen. Doctor Chapman was sitting by the fire opposite Jenny who was nursing her baby. He was calmly sipping a cup of tea while Meggie hovered by the kitchen range, a grizzling Pearl in her arms. In a chair pulled up next to the doctor’s was a young girl, probably about fifteen, and even as the two women hesitated in the doorway it was evident she was one of Doctor Chapman’s waifs, those who came to his home in the dead of night asking for help. She was pregnant, sported a black eye and a badly split lip which seemed to have been sewn up, as a small thread hung from the wound. />
  Doctor Chapman stood up politely and smiled.

  ‘Ah, there you are. I was just saying to Megan I really must go for I have visits to make at the Clayton. The Clayton Hospital in Victoria Square, you know?’

  They didn’t, not really, but they both nodded, eyeing the young girl in the chair.

  ‘This is Violet,’ deepening his smile as he turned to the girl. ‘As you can see, she is to have a child and last night her father gave her . . . well, you can see what he did to her so I have brought her here to you.’ He hesitated, looking from one to the other. ‘That is all right, isn’t it? You did say you were to take in girls who were in trouble and would have employment for them?’

  Charlotte took a deep breath, remembering the snarling fury on her husband’s face as he burst into this very room and ordered her to come home; his stated intention to close the place if she did not obey him; to turn out these vulnerable children, for that was what they were. The evening spent at the Ackroyds and what had happened when they returned. Her face was bruised on one cheek though Kizzie, the most diplomatic of friends, had said nothing and then he had . . . he had . . . she almost said raped her, in her own mind of course, though she knew it had not been rape. If it had she had been a most willing victim. What was he to say when he learned of what she had done today? When the wagon arrived carrying the shoddy she had bought? When she showed him quite blatantly that she meant to go her own way and be damned to the Ackroyds and the rest of them. Mr Scales had proved to be a very pleasant young man who obviously was enthusiastic about his work. He gave them quite a wordy explanation on the source of the goods he worked with, explaining that the ‘tatters’ they saw in the yard had come from Poland, from the gypsies of Hungary, from the beggars and scarecrows of Germany, from the frowsy peasants of Muscovy, along with snips and shreds from monks’ cassocks and noblemen’s cloaks, lawyers’ robes, waxing lyrical on what was apparently of great import to him. They would be shredded by ‘devils’, the machines that turned them into what was called mungo fibre, after they had been sorted and put into baskets by quality and colour. She and Kizzie had picked over what was on sale, queried the price and even, on Mr Scales’s recommendation, inspected the canvas and hessian to be had at a stall on Batley Market.