A Curse Dark as Gold (2 page)

Other wool towns have a bustling marketplace, an official Wool Hall overseen by the Wool Guild, even a weekly cloth market. But not Shearing. Although the town had grown up when Stirwaters turned a disorganized country sheep market into a proper village, Shearing had never quite fulfilled the dreams of our founding ancestor. But we were still the Gold Valley's wool market, and so, for a few short weeks each year, everyone piled into the only building in town big enough for such an event: Stirwaters's woolshed. Wool, sheep, traders, and all stumbled over one another, and the normally spacious and peaceful shed became a scene of pandaemonium.

Over the next several hours, I passed among the wool-men and their fleeces, dodging sheep and sheep-messes and the representatives of other mills along the Stowe, who smiled at me approvingly, giving me nods of encouragement as I sailed by. It was a fine season for wool, but I should have to be careful how I spent my meager budget. I combed through packs of snowy pale fleeces, dug my fingers deep into the backs of plump, placid ewes, and twisted prices down shilling by shilling, penny by penny.

"Eighteen shillings for these Stowewold ewes, and thirty even on the Merino. Mr. Colly," I added, seeing the stocky woolman hesitate, "you've already shorn them. What a waste it would be to have to pack up all these fleeces and haul them back upvalley, and it not at all certain you could find another buyer before the moths get to them."

Mr. Colly burst out laughing, by which I knew I'd won. "Ah, I know why my nephew thinks so highly of you lasses," he said. He sobered for a moment, and looked me up and down with the keen eye of a stockman. "Ye've grown, lass -- and it looks good on you. You keep this up and you'll be rivalin' your mam soon enough."

I had to take a very deep breath to keep my voice from shaking. "Thank you, sir. And can you send Harte down to the mill later? Rosie's dying for him to take a look at that tangle of gears by the fulling stocks."

Mr. Colly nodded. "How is that sister of yours? All sass and vinegar like her mam, I'll wager."

"I sometimes think it's a good thing the millworks are in such disrepair. She'd probably run wild if she didn't have something useful to do."

"Ah, never Miss Rosie," he said. "She's more sense than that. The pair of you -- worth more than many a man's son."

"Well," I said, "it's a good thing, because we're all this old place has." I gave Mr. Colly a wave and went down the line.

The clamor and bustle of sheep and men filled the shed, mingling with the other, more curious stirrings that always seemed to characterize Shearing's wool market -- shears that went inexplicably dull; unheard noises that spooked the sheep; possessions that were at hand one moment, vanished the next, then turned up hours later in the most improbable locations. Generally folk shrugged and laughed it off; a few murmured, "Stirwaters," with a roll of the eyes and a shake of the head; still more adorned their flocks with red and blue ribbons, or marked their bales with chalk symbols -- just in case.

Adding an edge to the frenzy this year was the presence of a man from Pinchfields, a big new mill in Harrowgate.
He had slipped into the crowd and might have remained anonymous if a buyer from Burlingham hadn't pointed him out to me. We'd never had a wool buyer from Pinchfields in Shearing before, and there was something strange about him. He haunted our woolshed -- like a ferret in a dovecote, Rosie said -- looking down his nose and scratching notes in a little book he carried everywhere. Moreover, he had no eye at all for quality, buying without a second glance stock the rest of us had rejected -- discolored lots, older fleeces, wool with too much cotting and canary stain.

"I don't understand it," I said to Rosie. "What's he up to? He can't use that any more than we can. It'll ruin his run."

"Maybe he doesn't care. His factory's so big he can put out anything he wants."

"But won't his customers care?" I persisted.

She just looked at me. "I suppose we'll find out."

The wool he was buying came so cheaply it would cost Pinchfields almost nothing to produce their cloth from it. In turn, they could sell that cloth for much less than anything Stirwaters could make. They'd bury us in no time if they could keep up that sort of business. And they knew it.

Late that afternoon I was haggling over a fleece with the fat ewe still wearing it, deep in negotiation at shear-point. Not the craftiest of creatures, sheep nonetheless have instincts that tell them who they must and needn't mind.

Old Bossie had taken my measure straightaway and, judging me a novice, was little inclined to cooperate. She struggled in my grip -- I swear she would have bitten me if I'd let go her jaw even for a moment. Smeared with lanolin from knees to bosom, I at last managed to pin her beneath one leg and was just starting to drive the shears through the clotted wool on her belly when the Pinchfields man sauntered up to me and gave a big look around the room.

"Such a quaint place you have here, Miss Miller," he said. "It's all just so charmingly old-fashioned."

Blood flooding my cheeks, I bent my head low over the sheep to hide my flushed face. "We're very proud of Stirwaters's long history," I mumbled.

At that moment, the great stupid ewe heaved free of my grip, yanking the shears from my hand. They clattered against the floor as Bossie sprung away to the safety of the feed pen, dragging her half-shorn fleece behind her on the ground.

The man from Pinchfields laughed, a small, ugly sound like the grating of rusty metal. "Oh, very proud, I'm sure. Well, if you're ever in Harrowgate, I do hope you'll return the honor and come to Pinchfields. I've no doubt you'll be impressed. Everything's new. But, well --" here he paused and drew something from his waistcoat pocket. "We just don't have the prestige of an old, distinguished label like Stirwaters on our cloth." He held out a scrap of muslin wrapping, revealing the stamped Stirwaters coat of arms on the fabric.

For a moment I didn't understand. Then something echoed in my mind:
like flies to a carcass.
I rose to my feet, heedless of my tangled skirts. "And you won't," I said. "Stirwaters is not for sale."

"Are you sure about that? In my experience there's a price on everything. What would you say to, oh, two hundred pounds?" He fished in his waistcoat for his book, which was fairly bursting with banknotes. "You'd keep your home, of course; we wouldn't have any interest in keeping the mill running."

I stood straighter, but my cheeks were red from outrage now, not from shame. "Sir, I'm afraid you misunderstood me. Stirwaters isn't for sale, at any price."

"Oh, come now -- five hundred. That's more money than you'd see out of this place in your lifetime. You're a fool not to take it."

"This is a wool market, sir, not a
mill
market. I suggest you take your offer somewhere else."

The man from Pinchfields leaned his narrow frame over me. "Look here, you stupid girl, this is the last time you'll see an offer this good. Eight hundred. Take it."

His thin face was close enough for me to see the tobacco stains on his teeth, cringe from his sour breath. I shook my head.

"Curse you Millers for stubborn fools! I guarantee you -- six months from now, a year -- you'll be wishing you'd sold."

I hadn't noticed that a crowd had gathered, watching us, until Jack Townley stepped forward. A sizeable man, he stood quiet and calm beside me.
"I
believe the lady said no, sir," he said in an easy voice. The man from Pinchfields looked around. Besides the wool-buying crowd, we were surrounded now by the bulk of my Stirwaters family, who make a formidable presence when they put their minds to it. George Harte and Eben Fuller ambled up behind Jack, followed shortly by Janet Lamb, casually brandishing a baling hook.

The Pinchfields wool buyer eased back and smoothed his jacket with his wiry hands. "Is that how it is, then?" He tucked his book and the money back into his coat and gave another glance round the woolshed. "That's a shame, Miss Miller. I know I'd hate to see that infamous Stirwaters curse get the better of you."

I drew in my breath. "I'm sure I don't know what you mean."

He smiled thinly. "I mean, Miss Miller, that if I were you I'd reconsider our offer -- before your name and label are all you have left to sell."

Chapter Two
Two
weeks later, Tom and Abby Weaver left us. The millhands had been loyal and supportive immediately following my father's death, but as the strain of uncertainty began to wear on everyone, workers deserted us like rats fleeing a burning hayrick. We lost good people in those days -- a skilled carder, weavers, a finisher, a man-of-all-work. I watched them go with a mixture of grief and resignation. Who could blame them? They were Harrowgate-bound, or Burlingham, or Stowemouth ... to seek their fortunes somewhere fortunes may be made.

But it was not all losses. George Harte, having had his arm twisted by Rosie to look at the millworks, stepped one foot inside Stirwaters and could not seem to pull himself away again. With the blessings of his uncle and his black collie, Pilot, he traded his shepherd's crook for a spanner and installed himself in the spare rooms at the woolshed. I was more grateful than I could say -- an act of faith like that was precisely what I needed just then. The presence of Pilot, patrolling the millyard by night with her sharp eyes and even sharper bark, was likewise a comfort. We had never been scared at Stirwaters, but we had never been alone, either.
One afternoon I sat in the office, frowning over our ledger books. Somewhere between my dismay over our oil bill and the amount still owed to the undertaker, Rosie came flinging into the office, bearing the post. With a sigh, I sorted through the letters she cast onto the desk. Past-due notice, bill, another bill -- probably a notice that we were
about
to become past due ... Maybe we could get by without eating this spring.

"Charlotte, look at this! Who do you think it's from?"

"Not another one from Pinchfields, I hope," I said, distracted by the incomprehensible handwriting of our teasel supplier. Since Market Days, we had received two more offers from the Harrowgate factory, each more elaborately generous than the last.

"Not unless they've started putting perfume in their offers."

I looked up sharply. "What did you say?"

Rosie broke the seal on her letter, and now I could smell a faint flowery scent from the paper. "It's written in purple ink," she said.

I peered in closer. "Are you sure that's for us? It sounds like somebody's love letter."

Rosie turned it over to look at the address. "It has both our names on it. And I don't see why it couldn't be a love letter," she added indignantly. "I can't tell who it's from -- the ink is all smeared here." She unfolded the note. Her eyes grew wide, and she held the letter up for me to read.

"Does that say 'Wheeler'?" I asked.

She was starting to smile. "It does indeed."

Mam's brother? I took the letter from her hand.
My dearest girls,

Please forgive the tardiness of my condolences; I have been travelling abroad and only just heard of your father's death. What a dreadful shock; how tragic that you two are all alone now. It brings back the sadness of your dear mother's death all those years ago, and I wept when I heard the news.

I hope this note finds you both well, but I shudder to think what you have been going through. Be assured that you will not be alone for long now; I am making haste to come to Shearing immediately.

Yours affectionately,your uncle,

Ellison H. Wheeler, Esquire

We had never met our mother's brother, but I could almost remember her speaking of him fondly, if I tried. Some years her junior, he would have been a child when she left home. I read the letter over and over, trying to bring up a picture of the man, as if doing so could conjure my mother, too -- and Father with her. I forced back a sudden sadness and squeezed Rosie's hand. She smiled at me, but her eyes were very bright.

We spent the next several days preparing for our uncle's visit, waiting and watching anxiously for his arrival. I pictured a masculine version of Mam, with her same round face and reddish hair, a sturdy man in workaday clothes who would embrace us roughly, tousle our hair, and speak in low, thoughtful tones. Rosie had him shorter, with a paunch and a pipe and a big jolly grin beneath a receding hairline.

We could not have shot farther from the mark.

One sunny morning late in the week, I stood outside Stirwaters, watching the churning wheel send mist into the glittering air. The pretty scene concealed a grim truth. Built of limestone and slate, the building should have withstood the elements for centuries, but time and neglect had taken their toll, and the mill looked much older than its scarce hundred years. I studied the old building, the moss and lichen spreading up the stones, the crumbling mortar, the broken windows that let wind and rain spray through the workrooms. Inside, things were just as bad -- cracks in the floors so wide you could drop a hammer through them; plaster falling off in chunks. Here and there a half-hearted attempt at patching or repair had been made over the years, but it always seemed as if ruin had the upper hand.