A Country Girl. Nancy Carson
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‘I’m hungry,’ Algie complained to his mother when he returned home. ‘Is tea ready?’
‘Your tea won’t be ready for another half hour,’ Clara replied, peering into the oven. Its cast-iron door closed with a reassuring clang, but the aroma of roasting cheese and onion had seeped out long before and filled the cottage with a tantalising aroma, making Algie feel even hungrier. Clara regarded him quizzically. ‘What’ve you done to your lip?’
‘My lip? Oh … I did it at work.’
‘It looks as though you’ve been fighting.’
‘Me, fighting? No, I walked into a brass rod somebody was carrying.’
‘You want to be more careful. You could’ve poked your eye out.’
‘How long’s my tea gunna be, Mother?’ he asked again, anxious to divert her from the topic lest he dig himself into a hole and let slip some clue that might reveal the sordid truth of how he’d really acquired his injury.
Clara began slicing a cabbage at the table. ‘It won’t get served till your father comes back from mending a lock gate by the dry dock.’
‘What’s up with it, then?’
‘Winding gear’s broken, he said. Why don’t you go and see if you can help him?’
‘But I’m starving hungry.’
‘Then have one of those jam tarts.’ She nodded at the tray on the table. ‘I’ve already given a few to Marigold.’
‘Marigold?’ He picked one out and took a bite. ‘She’s been here?’
‘She called to say they’d be moored up just beyond the Parkhead Locks.’
Algie beamed. ‘Good. That’s all I wanted to know.’
Clara gave him a knowing look. ‘Just mind what you’m up to with that young girl,’ she said.
‘Course I will,’ he said. ‘What d’you think I’m gunna do?’
‘I’m just afeared she might get too attached to you, and I wouldn’t want you to hurt her.’
‘Hurt her?’ he queried.
‘Yes, hurt her,’ Clara replied. ‘I wasn’t too keen on you seeing her at first, our Algie, but she’s won me over good and proper. She’s a lovely girl. Now … if you’re going to start seeing her regular, just be kind to her.’
What a strange thing for his mother to suggest, as if he was capable of being unkind. He shrugged at her apparent lack of understanding. ‘I don’t intend to hurt her, Mother. I think the world of her. I really like her. Can I have another jam tart?’
‘Help yourself.’ He turned around and took another. ‘What I mean is, Algie, Marigold has it hard enough on the cut. So does her mother, who was never brought up to live life on a narrowboat. It ain’t like living in a nice comfortable house with a warm hearth, soft feather beds and running water laid on, ’specially when that’s what you’ve been used to.’
‘Did you know Marigold’s mother?’ Algie asked, his curiosity roused. ‘Afore she lived on the cut, I mean?’
‘Yes, I knew her. Not well, mind. But I knew of her.’ Clara transferred the cabbage to a pan containing cold water and immersed the shreds.
‘Marigold told me her mother came from round here. So I suppose you could’ve known her before, eh, Mother?’
‘Not that well, like I say.’
Algie took another bite out of his jam tart. ‘So what brought her living on the cut in a narrowboat?’
‘Because she wed a boatman, I suppose,’ Clara answered dismissively. ‘I ain’t so sure I would’ve done, but she did.’
‘There’s good families on the cut, Mother,’ he commented, more in defence of Marigold than anybody else. ‘Old Seth Bingham’s all right. He’s a decent bloke.’
‘I’m not saying he isn’t. And I’m sure Hannah must’ve thought so to marry him …’
He shrugged as if it was of no consequence. ‘As long as she’s content, I say. She seems content. So does Marigold.’
‘’Tis to be hoped she is. ’Tis to be hoped they all are. So does this mean you’ve given up Harriet?’ Clara lifted the pan of cabbage onto the hob. The coals in the fire shifted and a flurry of sparks flitted up the chimney.
‘Yes …’ He took a last bite of jam tart.
‘Shame …’ Clara sighed. ‘She’s a nice respectable girl.’
‘I know she is.’
‘Have you told her yet?’
He shrugged nonchalantly. ‘I’ve tried. I called to see her on my way home tonight, but old Eli wouldn’t let me. He told me to clear off. Says he’s forbid her to see me ever again. He already knew somehow as I’d been with Marigold yesterday. How d’you reckon he found that out, eh? He knew almost as quick as I knew it meself.’
‘Oh, I bet your name’s mud,’ Clara said, with some conviction. ‘Word travels fast in a place like this. Everybody knows everybody else’s business.’
‘But it made me look as though I hadn’t considered Harriet at all, and I had. I had, Mother, honest. I wanted to be straight with her … Oh, well …’ He shrugged, and turned to go. ‘I think I’ll go and see if my dad wants any help. If not, I’ll clean my bike. It could do with an oiling after its dunking in the cut yesterday.’
‘Go on, then, and I’ll give you a shout.’
‘Is our Kate back yet?’
‘She’s upstairs, a-changing.’
‘Changing?’ he queried disdainfully. ‘Let’s hope she changes for the better.’
The implication was lost on his mother, as he knew it would be.
Algie lumbered outside. Out of curiosity he decided to inspect the far side of the shed, where he’d witnessed Kate and Reggie Hodgetts up to their antics, to see if there was any evidence of what had happened. He kicked over the traces and noticed a small footprint in the line of sandy earth where his father’s potatoes were planted, obviously that of a woman – Kate’s, of course. He kicked over that too, else his father was bound to see it and wonder what a woman had been doing there, and under what circumstances, trampling his precious produce. Despite Kate’s unsavoury wantonness, he still had to protect her; she was his sister, after all.
After that, he passed through the gate, clambered over the lock gates and onto the towpath, heading towards the dry dock, where they repaired ailing narrowboats. Will Stokes was bolting a new cast-iron pinion wheel and brake to the lock’s winding gear. Narrowboats from both directions waited in the basins above and below while he completed the job, so they could continue their journeys. Meanwhile, the boatmen gathered around him watching, enjoying good-natured banter and swapping gossip with the workers from the dry dock, who lived in the row of cottages on the other side of a little cast-iron bridge.
‘Hello, Son,’ Will greeted.
‘Did you see the Binghams pass through earlier?’
‘Aye, just before I started work on the lock.’
‘I’ve come to see if you need any help.’
‘It’s the time to come now I’ve nearly finished,’ Will quipped with a grin. ‘Just gotta tighten these bolts, check the alignment and grease it. You can pass me that tub o’ blackjack, though, our Algie.’ Will pointed with a huge spanner to the pail of thick, black bitumen grease.
‘Will it want warming up?’ Algie queried as he went to fetch it from the towpath where it was standing along with Will’s