The Castlefield Collector Read online

  Chapter Two

  Dolly ran down Dawson Street, cut across the rickety wooden bridge that spanned the River Medlock, the water beneath black with rubbish and oil. On Potato Wharf she passed carters in their leather jackets, a traction engine bringing bales of cotton to the mills, barges tipping out their cargoes or collecting finished goods to ship to Liverpool and the world beyond. Not lingering to chat to any of the folks she knew, she turned up Elm Street and pushed her way into the Navigation, eyes scanning the crush of men that filled the taproom.

  ‘Have you seen me dad?’ she asked of anyone she recognised.

  Heads were shaken, bellows of laughter and a few ribald jokes about old Cal having got a boatload on again, meaning he was probably drunk somewhere.

  ‘Take his missus a sweetener till he gets home, chuck,’ said one chap, indicating she should buy Maisie a jug of stout.

  But she only shook her head and dashed off again. He wasn’t in the Queens either, or any of his other usual haunts so, barely pausing for breath she ran the length of Liverpool Road, down Duke Street and round the corner into Bridgewater Street. Neither was he under the viaduct or by the old roman fort, not even by the Rochdale Canal playing pitch and toss, one of his favourite sports. After a few more enquiries she finally learned of a meeting being held on Coal Wharf, something to do with the strike.

  It was growing dark by the time she found him and Dolly felt faint with exhaustion, but there he was with a crowd of other textile workers, all shouting their heads off about ‘Reds and Bolshies,’ which puzzled Dolly since they’d been told in lessons at John Street School that the Russian revolution had been settled long ago, before the end of the Great War. Didn’t England rule the waves?

  Dolly knew that Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, who Calvin largely approved of, was in power now and that while his government had tried to lure the miners into accepting a reduction in wages, they’d also urged the owners to make concessions too, to offer better working conditions such as pithead baths and shorter hours. So why didn’t the bosses agree to the terms and let them all get back to work? She wished grown-ups wouldn’t argue so much.

  Her own dad was forever shouting at her mam, who rarely retaliated. Maisie always looked battered and crestfallen, as if she’d fought a battle and lost, when she hadn’t even opened her mouth. When he got bored with beating the hell out of her, he’d start on at their Willy for always being poorly, or at Josh, Abel or Eli whenever they came calling with their families, which was less often these days. When the lads had still been at home, there’d been endless scenes of warfare in their house, so was it any wonder.

  ‘It’s worse than being back on the Somme,’ Josh would say. All four of her older brothers had served in the Great War but only three had come home, Manny having been killed at Ypres. But in Dolly’s opinion, a prime minister should surely do better and be able to sort things out good and proper.

  From the turmoil she saw unfolding before her eyes, it would seem not. While the miners were yelling ‘Not a penny off the pay, not a minute on the day,’ many of the textile workers were reminding them that half a loaf was better than no bread and refusing to support them.

  ‘Transport and General have already come out. What are we waiting for?’ called one man.

  ‘Aye, and I reckon gas and electricity will be next.’

  There was a good deal of booing, bawling and shouting, some men resorting to fisticuffs in an effort to make their point; much of it, Dolly realised, out of desperation for their own plight. She could see Calvin waving his great fist and shouting louder than the rest.

  ‘Nothing to do wi’ us,’ he roared. ‘Why should we lose our wages for you lot? How will it help if our families starve an’ all?’

  It shamed her that her own father, a great brawn of a man who’d never lost a day’s work through ill health in his life, could have so little sympathy for his fellow men: miners who worked in appalling conditions underground. And he cared even less for his own wife. It was all right him shouting about how his own family would starve if they agreed to the strike, but weren’t they close to starvation already? Wasn’t he throwing good money down the drain every time he used his hard-earned brass to place a bet?

  If she could just reach him before he’d spent it all today, they might get by for another week, although Nifty Jack would take most of what she and Aggie earned. At least they didn’t need money to buy coal, since there was none to be had because of the strike. She wished Aggie had come with her, since Dad always listened to her sister. He’d never paid any heed to whatever she had to say, or anything she’d ever done for that matter. Half the time he didn’t seem to notice she was around, and when he did it was more often than not to bawl her out or clock her one.

  Dolly could still recall with painful clarity the day of the Sunday school party. They were expected to take a penny each in order to pay for it. There was just Willy, Aggie and herself, the others being too old for such things by then. Yet even with only the three of them left to worry about and pay for, he’d forgotten all about her. When Aggie had opened the purse there were only two pennies inside, one for herself and one for Willy. Neither of them were prepared to give up their chance of the party, and if it hadn’t been for her friends, Sam Clayton and Matt, who’d begged the Sunday School Superintendent to let Dolly in for nothing, she would have missed it altogether. It was the most humiliating experience of her young life.

  But this didn’t stop Dolly from worshipping the ground Calvin walked on, great giant of a man that he was with his broad, square shoulders, pot belly and trousers hanging low from a leather belt she’d felt the weight of more than once across her backside. She always forgave him, as her mother did, for his unfeeling behaviour because that’s how he was. He knew no different.

  His own parents, who had been so neglectful they’d often forgotten to feed him, or even cut his hair and nails, had shut him in a coalhole for hours on end. Both his brothers had died in infancy and after his father died, the young Calvin had cared for his mother without a word of thanks or sign of gratitude until one day she’d up and left and he’d never clapped eyes on her from that day to this. Consequently, Calvin Tomkins wasn’t an easy man to love but he was, nonetheless, Dolly’s dad and she lived in hope that he would wake up one day and see that she was only trying to do her best by him and her mam.

  Pushing through the crowd, she came up beside him and tugged on his sleeve. ‘Dad, are you coming home soon? Mam’s waiting for your wages. She’s already had the rent man call, put a penny in the gas meter and settled what were on tick. Nifty Jack nearly kicked the door in wanting his whack. He’s threatened to come back later.’ She relayed this tale in one breathless rush, hoping to impress him with the urgency of the situation.

  Calvin shook himself free of her grasp, as if irritated to be reminded of his responsibilities. ‘What the bleedin’ hell are you doing here? Gerroff home. Can’t you see I’m busy and what’s going on?’

  Dolly realised instantly that she should have taken more care. The minute she’d set eyes on him, she should have known that he was roaring drunk, his great belly in its filthy vest nearly knocking her over as he staggered and rocked, belched and hiccupped.

  ‘Buzz off, you!’ he shouted, but Dolly didn’t move. She was too used to his raucous behaviour, to his peppering every other sentence with ‘bloody’ or ‘bleeding’. There were times when he used worse epithets to vent his wrath but she didn’t mind those either. Not in the least. Far better than the days, weeks even, when he didn’t speak to her at all. At least when he was shouting at her he was paying her some attention, and Dolly would persuade herself that this meant he did care for her. Yet he could be so cruel! So unkind! Almost as if he didn’t love her at all but then there were times when Dolly wasn’t sure that she truly loved him, her own father. Maybe she hated him.

  Not that this was the moment to be worrying about all of that, judging by the size of the crowd milling about. She could tell they were growing a
ngrier by the minute. Perhaps Dad was right. She shouldn’t be here at all. Dolly gazed up at him out of frightened eyes. ‘I can see that Mam’s at her wits’ end. Give me some money, Dad, and I’ll go. Give us yer wage packet. Please! That’s all me mam wants.’

  ‘Want, want, want! That’s all I hear from her these days. What do you think I work for, to see every shilling disappear into Nifty Jack’s pocket? Not flaming likely.’

  ‘She doesn’t want it wasted on booze and betting, not with the threat of a general strike.’

  ‘This is men’s business, gerroff wi’ you.’ He gave her a hefty shove and Dolly very nearly fell to the ground, might well have done so and been trampled underfoot, save for the press of men who left her barely enough room to stand, let alone fall. A man standing on a wall began ranting on about this not being the moment for revolution, asking who wanted to risk lockouts and starvation? Another responded by saying that if they didn’t stand together, they’d all go under.

  And then a voice rang out. ‘Hey up, rozzers are coming.’

  Sure enough, from under the massive dome of railway arches emerged what seemed to Dolly like an army of police, many on horseback, and her heart surged with fear. What would happen now? Would the men fight and her dad get arrested? She saw the horses begin to trot and then break into a gallop, charging towards the raggle-taggle group of men gathered alongside the canal. She heard a crack, like a firework, and it came to her on a fresh beat of alarm that the police were firing over the heads of the crowd. There was mass panic as men started to run this way and that, but, their exit blocked by the canal, many were falling in, others clambering over each other in a desperate bid to escape. Women screamed, batons were swung, clogs thrown, and the ground seemed to be littered with bodies, strewn clothing and abandoned banners.

  Calvin stood as if paralysed and once again Dolly shook her father’s arm, this time with greater urgency. ‘Dad, Dad, come on home with me now. We’ve got to go quick.’

  ‘I’ve told you to buzz off.’

  This time the flat of his hand caught her smack across the back of her head and Dolly found herself knocked sideways. She was pinioned to the wall, trapped by the crowd, with what seemed like the last of her breath being squeezed out of her by the crush of sweating, frightened men. She felt the weight of a boot come down on her ankle, causing her to scream out loud in agony. Could it be broken? Desperation gave her the strength to hang on, managing not to be dragged to the ground. She became aware of rapidly approaching hoof beats. Utterly convinced she was about to be trampled underfoot by an army of horses, she turned to Calvin for help at exactly the moment her father deserted her. He launched himself into the fleeing crowd, hell-bent on saving his own skin.

  He hadn’t even noticed her perilous situation, paid no heed to her sobs and cries. Dolly was swept away in a relentless tide of heaving bodies and she knew then that it was useless. Instinct told her that her father was angry because there weren’t any wages left for him to hand over. Not a single penny. He’d already lost them in the Navigation or down on the towpath in a betting ring. It was all far too late.

  Dolly limped back home to Tully Court empty-handed and Maisie strapped up her ankle which fortunately was only strained and badly bruised, with no bones broken. There was no trip to the pictures that night, and no potato pie supper. They didn’t dare risk spending even one of their few remaining pennies. Instead, the three women made do with the watery mess from the stew-pot, although Calvin himself came home roaring drunk around midnight.

  * * *

  Ma Liversedge, two doors down from the Tomkins, had another visit from the talleyman later that day, just as she was drinking her milk-less tea out of a jam jar, her only two remaining cups and saucers being kept for best, when he breezed in without even knocking.

  ‘How do, Ma. What’ve you got fer me then?’

  The old woman stared at him grim-faced, the HP sauce buttie in her hand the nearest thing to a meal she’d had all day. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Oh, I think you can do better than that, love. You must have something that you haven’t yet pawned. Thirty bob is what you owe me, including rent, and thirty bob is what I intend to have, one way or another.’ He smiled at her, his small, weasel eyes glittering with menace.

  ‘I’ve told ya, I’ve nothing. Only thing I had left after my George died was the piano, and I pawned that last back end. Everything’s gone, even me double bed. But then I never go upstairs. I sleep on this truckle in t’corner to keep warm by t’fire. What else can I give you? Me virginity? Nay, too late.’ She cackled with delight. ‘Long gone, to a better man than you’ll ever be. I can’t even give you skin off me rice pudding, cause I’ve no bloody milk. Nor rice neither.’ Enchanted by her own wit, the old woman laughed so much, it set her off coughing.

  Ignoring her, Nifty Jack began opening and closing drawers and doors in an ancient cupboard, searching through the detritus of seventy-five long years. He checked the stone shelves in the pantry, finding them largely empty save for stacks of folded newspaper used to cover her kitchen table, and a few jam jars and bottles being saved for the pennies she’d get back on them. He put these into a brown paper carrier bag he’d brought with him. He might as well have them. Every penny helped. Then he rooted under the old brown slopstone sink. ‘You must have something to live on besides my generosity, or why aren’t you in t’workhouse? Where do you hide it then, your stash? Come on, you old witch, hand it over.’

  Her eyes were watchful as he prowled about her kitchen; picked up the empty milk jug, set it down again with a grimace of distaste at the sour stench. She did indeed have a few bob tucked away, sufficient to buy a decent burial and inscribe her name on the headstone of the family grave, but she’d climb into it before she told him where it was. Ma Liversedge folded her arms and her lips, and said nothing.

  Then his gaze lighted on the mantelshelf. All the ornaments and bric-a-brac, which had once adorned its surface, were long gone, including the gold-plated clock her late husband had been presented with for his years in the mill. It had paid for his funeral expenses when he died of byssinosis a year or two back, the result of cotton dust in his lungs. Nifty ran his hand under the pristine clean lace cover, then noting the fineness of the fabric carefully folded it and slid it in the carrier bag with the jam jars.

  The old woman flinched, her mouth trembling with distress. ‘That were me mother’s.’

  ‘And now it’s mine.’ He glowered at her for a moment longer then smiled. ‘It’s the perfect solution. You’ve not pawned your wedding ring.’

  Ma Liversedge was utterly startled, and she cupped her right hand over her left, covering the plain gold band to cradle it against her breast. ‘Nay, lad, my George give me that near fifty year ago. Tha’d not take an old woman’s wedding ring.’

  It took him a long time to get it off, and a good deal of soap to ease it’s path but as he worked it over the bent, swollen knuckles he paid no heed to the old woman’s protests, her shouts and curses, and finally her tearful pleading to spare her this most treasured possession. When he finally succeeded, he slipped it into his pocket with a flourish of triumph and strode away, leaving her slumped in her chair in a state of shock.

  But it was the last money he ever got out of her. Poor Ma Liversedge joined her poor late husband, George, before the week was out.

  Two days later the call came. ‘Everyone out!’ Aggie and Dolly, along with the rest of the women, shut down their spinning frames, flung their shawls over their heads and had no option but to walk out of the mill and join the strike.

  Chapter Three

  ‘Why shouldn’t I have a smoking suit if I want one? They are all the rage. Quite the latest thing, don’t you know? I shall have one made in gold satin, trimmed with burgundy and finished with a matching sash, scarf and turban. Don’t you think that would be too divine? I do believe that I’m sufficiently svelte to have the trousers quite wide, don’t you?’ Evie ran a delicate white hand over one slim hip, while holdi
ng a glass of Tio Pepe with the other.

  Nathan Barker raised his eyes from his copy of The Times, a mere shadow of its former self due to the strike, consisting as it did of a single folded sheet, to scowl at his daughter. ‘You don’t smoke, Evelyn, and I have no intention of allowing you to start such an unpleasant habit, no matter how fashionable, so you will have no requirement for a smoking suit.’

  ‘Oh, fizz, what an absolute bore you are, Pops. Where is the harm? You’re far too serious for words, isn’t he Mummy? You’d have no objection to my having one, would you darling, and a divinely long cigarette holder to hold my Turkish. What do you think, Mumsie sweet?’

  Clara Barker cast a quick glance in her husband’s direction and assured her darling child that she would look utterly sparkling and scintillating in a coarse linen sheet, should she choose to wear one.

  ‘Don’t be silly, Mumsie, but you have no objection to my smoking, have you? And if I do, I must wear the proper outfit, must I not?’

  Clara gave a sigh of resignation but chose not to answer her daughter’s enquiry, rather she turned away from nineteen-year-old Evie, who looked on the verge of one of her tantrums to quietly address her husband, a slight frown marring her usually smooth brow. ‘Is it true that the strike is going ahead?’

  ‘According to The Times there’s been a complete walk-out, although apparently the Stock Exchange remains calm. I’ve never known it so quiet. Eerily so, as if it were a Sunday and not a working day. Not a soul to be seen out on the streets. The mill fires are damped down so there’s no smoke from the chimneys, no trams or buses running, no mail being delivered. Just a few young lads selling these newssheets. I will say there’s little sign of disorder, no lawlessness but then there are soldiers posted around the city. Police on patrol. They at least have no option but to work.’

  ‘But how will it affect us?’

  ‘It could go on too long, quite badly. We’re suffering enough at present, what with foreign imports and the whole way the industry is set up.’ Nathan tossed the paper aside, his florid face filled with irritation as it always was when he expounded on his favourite hobby horse. ‘The fact that we have separate organisations for weaving, another for spinning, one for dying and finishing, merchanting and so on is creating a constraint to the development of the industry. Why can’t anyone see that this may have worked well before the war, but not now, not any more. How can we move forward when we still have one foot planted so firmly in the past?’