A Song Twice Over (11 page)

‘I don't think – Cara – that there is anything we can do.'

But Cara's youth, her vanity, her quite ruthless appetite for the nineteen years already lived and at least a hundred more to come, would have none of that.

‘There's always something to be done.'

Odette, retreating again behind her veil – her shroud – had smiled gently, pityingly, and shaken her head. No. Her money had gone. Her employment had been terminated in such a manner that no one else would employ her. Unjustly? Of course. But what of that? There was money owing. A debt which never
could
be paid. And she too was tired. Not afraid precisely. In fact, and most oddly, not afraid at all. What would happen would happen. Perhaps she would just sit down somewhere and wait for it.

Taking her roughly by the elbow Cara had hurried her at once and with all the speed she could muster to the Thackrays, pushed her through the door to be claimed and held fast by Liam and then, before Sairellen could stop her, had dashed off again down the cobbled street straight into the clamorous heart of Frizingley, to find Miss Ernestine Baker, dressmaker and milliner, whose arid, virginal heart had been aroused – most likely, she thought, by accident – to love and cruelty by Kieron Adeane.

And there, in the dark, discreet shop with its odours of thread and fabric she had stood with meekly bowed head, offering herself as a new victim to appease Miss Baker's jealous ire; her bewildered outrage that she could have entertained such sentiments about an Irish wastrel in the first place and that he – when he had deigned to notice them – had spurned her. Had preferred, in fact, his sad little foreign drab, Odette.

‘I have considerable experience in the dressmaking trade,' Cara had murmured, meaning ‘You have abused my mother until it bored you. Now – if you like – you can abuse me.' It was almost a promise. Odette had not understood Miss Baker's need to punish. Cara did not consciously understand it either. She simply knew that jealous old cats require to scratch and that this one might scratch as hard as she pleased if it opened the door to employment.

‘What experience?'

And Cara had not spoken of Paris, neither Miss Baker's restrained appearance nor the discreet quality of her merchandise having much in common with the rue Saint Honoré, but of her apprenticeship in the more serious-minded city of Edinburgh, her work as a skilled journeywoman in Dublin.

‘It has long been my view,' replied Miss Baker, ‘that persons of Celtic origin are not reliable. An opinion not unshared, believe me, in this locality where you will find many doors completely barred to –
Celts
.'

But Cara had merely breathed ‘I am sure you are right,' her voice promising to be humble, to do penance for her father's sins in any manner Miss Baker liked, for as long that is, as she continued to pay living wages.

And Miss Ernestine Baker, immaculate spinster of the parish of Frizingley, had been tempted.

‘Our hours of work in this establishment,' she had said, tight-lipped, straight-backed, quite certain that this flibbertigibbet would never stand it, ‘are twelve daily, from six in the morning until the same hour at night, including Saturdays. That is, of course, when conditions of work are normal. During periods of increased business – Easter, for example, when all my ladies are requiring new bonnets, or a ball at the Assembly Rooms to which all my ladies are naturally invited – then my women are required to remain at their work until it is finished. Simply that. Eighteen hours. Twenty. For as long as the busy period lasts.'

‘Of course, Miss Baker.' As much would be asked of her anywhere else. And she had too much sense even to imagine that Miss Baker would pay overtime.

‘Very well.' Miss Baker drew back her thin lips, exposing prominent, well-regimented teeth in a satisfied smile. ‘Let me give an example – Adeane – of the effort which will often be required of you. Last winter, shortly before the festive season, my orders for ball gowns and dinner gowns were such that my women, apprentices included, had no time even to change their clothes for seven full days and nights. They remained here, in the workroom, for the whole of that time, taking turns to rest on the mattress I provided, not even leaving their work for meals which I had served to them at their work-tables. I even had their meat cut up for them by the good woman who cooks for me, to save delay. Such – you see – is my reputation for excellence in my trade, that the ladies of Frizingley and hereabouts refuse to go elsewhere.'

‘You are to be congratulated, Miss Baker.'

‘Yes. I am. And furthermore, I require my women to be of good behaviour and good character. Milliners, who often leave their place of employment at a late hour to walk home alone in the dark, inevitably find themselves accosted from time to time by men – one assumes of the lower sort. As a result of which the trade has acquired a reputation for moral laxity which I do not tolerate in anyone in
my
employ. It has even been alleged, perhaps with good reason in some quarters, that needlewomen, in the off-season, are much inclined to supplement their incomes by – well, shall we say by according their favours to men for money? You take my meaning?'

‘I do.'

‘Then also take note of the fact that I do not expect seasonal fluctuations of trade to affect the moral standards of
my
women. I had a competitor – once – whose business never recovered after the loose behaviour of her girls during the slump of 1831 came to light. Ladies do not care to be pinned and fitted into their dresses by hands which are morally unclean. It is not only the indecency they mind, but the possibility of disease.'

‘Of course, Miss Baker.'

‘I repeat. No breath of scandal. Nor do I expect you to put yourself forward in front of customers nor to pass comment of any kind unless specifically invited by
me
to do so. In which case you will simply agree with whatever opinion I happen to have been expressing. Otherwise keep your mouth full of pins when called upon to assist with a fitting, and your eyes on your work.'

‘Yes, Miss Baker.'

The wages would suffice to pay for Odette's board and lodging – hopefully Liam's – with Sairellen Thackray. But there remained the matter of a lodging for herself. And the spectre of her father's debt for which, not the law of England perhaps, but the personal legal code of the landlord of the Fleece Tavern might oblige her to be responsible.

She had still a long, hard way to go.

Liam had shared Odette's bed that first night. Happily, Cara supposed. Although she had had no time to ask him. No energy either, as she had attempted to ease herself into the wooden chair which was all Sairellen had seen fit to offer her, the kitchen grown chilly without its daytime steams and odours of drying laundry and simmering broth. But Luke Thackray, without any expression of concern or sympathy – just getting on quietly and competently with what he thought to be right – had brought her a pillow and a blanket and had made up the fire, in his unhurried manner, with enough coal to last the night.

‘Aye, that's right, lad,' his mother had told him with heavy sarcasm. ‘Don't stint. Just pile it on. There's plenty more coal in the pit, I reckon. So I wouldn't want you to worry about what's left in my cellar.'

But it was no more than the gruff-textured, sharp-edged quality of their affection and instead of reminding her – as he certainly could have done – that, having paid his fair share for the coal he was entitled to his share of the use of it, he merely grinned up at her and went on constructing, with his engineer's precision, a pyramid of fuel designed to burn slowly and steadily and evenly throughout the night.

Such a man was Luke Thackray, who had brought her a mug of hot tea at half past four the next morning, an even more welcome jug of hot water and a shallow metal basin so that she could wash and tidy herself for her first appearance in the workroom of Miss Ernestine Baker. And even Sairellen, with her inbred understanding that a family which fails to feed its workers loses its livelihood, had broken her rule about waifs and strays and offered Cara a slice of the bread and pork-dripping she was putting up for Luke to eat in the mill at breakfast time.

He would come home, of course, at noon for his bacon and potato pie and his barley broth, the fuel a working man needed as much as those infernal machines of theirs needed their steam. What would Cara Adeane find, throughout the next twelve captive hours, to still her hunger? And roughly, abruptly, before she thought better of it, Sairellen had thrust into her hand another slice of bread and lard tied up in a clean red and white spotted handkerchief. A proper mill worker's bundle.

‘Not dainty enough for Miss Baker, I reckon. But if it stops you from swooning into the hat-boxes – like your mother …'

And smiling a ‘thank you kindly'she had known better than to say out loud, Cara had gone off into the damp Frizingley air of a quarter past five o'clock, Luke Thackray beside her, his own spotted calico bundle under his arm, to join the slow-moving ant-stream of workers hurrying three and four abreast to the mill, some of them – the less fleet-footed – fearing to be late and locked out already. For the mill-gates of Mr Ben Braithwaite and Mr John-William Dallam were closed tight shut five minutes after the warning hooter at half past five, to be opened again only at eight o'clock breakfast time. And who, in this crowd, could afford the fine for late arrival and the loss of two and a half hours pay?

They were women mostly, shawl-wrapped against the cold and anonymous, their feet in wooden clogs strident on the cobbles. And children. A little older than they used to be since ‘The Act' – seven years ago now – had forbidden the masters to employ children under nine years old; although Cara had noticed plenty that morning who looked no more than a frail, bleary-eyed six or seven. For who but a mother could be expected to remember just when a child was born? And, with many an overlooker being happy to take a mother's word, they were still coming in droves to the factories, pasty and puny for the most part, marked with the crooked spines and bandy legs, the stunted growth that came from forcing soft young bones to hard work and long hours too soon. Although the hours were fewer now, since ‘The Act'. No more than forty-eight a week for children from nine to thirteen, rising, at eighteen, to a mere sixty-eight.

Sairellen Thackray had known far worse than that in her day. So had Cara. So had Odette, having spent even more time than her daughter in the one-room workshops of the sweated trades where none of ‘The Act's'new factory inspectors came to call. Nor would have gained admittance had they done so.

Children were put to work by their parents who needed the money. It had been ever thus. And if John-William Dallam's clever daughter, Gemma, disliked the sight of these wizened, visibly ageing babies tottering through his mill-gates every morning then – as he had once sharply reminded her – she would do well to follow her mother's example by declining to look. Whereas Cara had looked so often that her vision was often blurred, busy with other matters, obscured.

But a child had stumbled against her that first morning and watching her set him to rights, Luke Thackray had said ‘You'd not care to take your own little lad to the mill this morning? Or put him down a mine?'

‘I would not.'

‘Nor I. It is a vile practice. An abomination.' Yet he had spoken the emotional words quietly, no agitation even remotely visible on his craggy, overcrowded face.

‘Yes. I suppose it is.' She saw not the remotest possibility of anything being done to change it.

‘Have you heard of Richard Oastler?'

No. She had not. And unless he had a silk mercer's shop in which to employ her, or was about to set up business as a fan maker, what could she wish to know?

‘Oastler of Huddersfield? They call him the Factory King.'

A rich man then? Powerful? Her interest had rekindled. But no.

‘He is the leader of the Ten Hours'Movement. Have you heard of that? A ten hour working day, not just for children but for everybody.'

‘The Act'again? But Luke had shaken his head.

‘If the Act had gone far enough you'd not see these little sleepwalkers now, would you? They'd be still in their beds, or getting ready for school which is where they
ought
to be going. And I wouldn't have to keep my eyes open all day to make sure they don't fall asleep at their work. One of my own brothers, years back, lost an arm from nodding off over a loom. And if the lasses get their hair caught in the machinery then, like as not, it scalps them. I make them pin their hair up but not everybody bothers. And twelve hours a day – at nine years old – with happen a three mile walk to get there and a three mile walk back … Well – they get sleepy on that, the little'uns. And, in a factory, sleepy bairns can mean dead bairns – often enough. That's why so many of the overlookers use a strap. Better a few clouts on the backside than arms and legs going round the shaft. Oastler was determined to put a stop to it. Still is.'

‘And you follow him – this Oastler?'

Looking down at her Luke Thackray gave her his steady smile, his pale eyes filled with a quiet, shrewd, wholly clement humour.

‘Aye. Although Ben Braithwaite would very likely sack me if he knew it. I walked ninety miles behind Oastler once. Me and a few thousand others – Ten Hours'Men, and women, from all over the West Riding. Eight years back when we were fighting for ‘The Act' – or for what we thought an act of parliament ought to be. He'd called a mass meeting in the Castle Yard at York and we marched every step of the way – to get justice for the factory children – Oastler with us. And he still had the strength to stand up and talk to us for about five hours when we got there, and attend the dance we gave in Huddersfield when we got back. Four days on the road in all it took us. To get ourselves cheated by that fiddling little Act. We'd asked for ten hours a day for women and children, knowing that it wouldn't pay them to keep the engines running just for the men – so it would be ten hours all round. They gave us twelve hours for the very young, which means no respite at all for the rest of us, since all the masters do is employ the bairns in relays, which means they can keep the mills open day and night. It wasn't enough. And Oastler said so. He's in prison now.'