Authors: Irene Carr
‘
Liza?’ She listened to the sound of it and liked it. ‘Aye, that’s all right.’ And she told her mother, ‘I’m Liza now.’
‘
I called you Eliza because I thought your father would like it. That was his mother’s name.’ She glanced at Andrew, who was sitting on the other side of the fireplace.
He grinned.
‘Kitty, Eliza or Liza. I’ve got what I want now, anyway.’
SUMMER 1899, NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE
‘Now you’ve got to say, “Yes, Miss Parkin.” Go on.’ Liza stood in front of the class, pointing at the blackboard with the teacher’s cane and looking down her nose as Miss Parkin did, lips pursed.
They all giggled and chorused,
‘Yes, Miss Parkin.’
‘
Do Mr Blackaby again,’ Betty said.
Liza gave her imitation of the school caretaker as he came to stoke up the fire at the front of the class, shuffling bent-kneed with an imaginary scuttle full of coal, wiping his nose on the back of his hand. This time the giggles were louder.
‘Do Mr Stewart!’
Miss Parkin, who had been watching surreptitiously from outside, decided now that enough was enough and walked in. The giggles were replaced by a shocked silence. Liza straightened as her teacher raised a warning finger.
‘I trust you do not dare to mimic the headmaster.’ In fact, she knew that Liza did — and so did Mr Stewart. She did not wait for an answer but waved Liza to her seat beside Betty Wood. ‘Now, then, dictation and handwriting ...’
Liza and the class heaved a silent sigh of relief: there was to be no punishment. They did not know why, were just glad.
Amelia Parkin knew that their schooldays were nearly over now and that they would soon be cast out into the world of work, which would probably be back-breaking and certainly poorly paid. She was fond of them and could not chastise them now, could only pray that what she had been able to do for them would help along the way.
The following day Betty sought out Liza in the schoolyard.
‘We’re moving,’ she said miserably. ‘My dad’s found another job in Hartlepool and we’re all going to live there.’
‘
Oh, I’m sorry,’ Liza said. They had been friends for five years now. ‘I’ll miss you.’
‘
I won’t know anybody there and I’ll be going out to work in a strange place.’
Liza put an arm round her.
‘Cheer up. I bet it’ll be really nice and you’ll love it. Now come on, smile.’ And, when Betty managed a feeble response, ‘That’s better. I’ll be starting work as well, but I don’t know where.’ A week later they embraced for the last time and Betty went off to Hartlepool.
Liza
’s parents were concerned for their daughter’s future and discussed it. ‘When she leaves school I’d like her to go into service in a big house like I did,’ Kitty said. ‘It’s hard work and long hours but you have some security. She can sew, wash and iron, and she’s been out to confinements a dozen times with me and Jinnie. There’s not many can say that.’
Security was important. Andrew
’s work in the shipyards was broken by periods when the yard he worked for ran out of orders. Over the years when he had been ashore he had been out of work for weeks, sometimes months. More than once he had said, ‘I’ll get a ship.’
But Kitty had answered fiercely:
‘No! You’ll do nothing of the sort. You’re nearly sixty now and that’s far ower old for going back to sea.’
He had obeyed reluctantly and until he found work again they had lived on their tiny savings and what
Kitty could make from cleaning.
Now he argued,
‘She’s still only thirteen and I don’t want her leaving home yet.’
Kitty sighed.
‘Neither do I. And, anyway, all these big houses want older lasses with a bit of experience. But, remember, both of us left home early. It’s the way the world is.’ She looked out of the window to the backyard where Liza was pegging out some washing. ‘But isn’t she growing up a bonny lass? And aren’t you glad you gave up the sea and you’re able to see it?’
Andrew nodded, and agreed fondly,
‘Aye, and that’s another reason I want to keep her here.’
He was not the first father to feel like that about his daughter, or the first to be disappointed. Eventually after he had another succession of long spells without a job, and their savings had dribbled away until debt and hunger stared them in the face, he agreed to Liza going into service.
‘It seems there’s nowt else for it,’ he said dejectedly. They had just eaten breakfast of bread and dripping and he looked around the cosy little kitchen. ‘I just want you to be happy, bonny lass.’ He stooped to kiss his daughter, then pulled on his cap. ‘I’m away to look for a job.’
Kitty went with him as far as the front door.
‘Now don’t you fret,’ she told him. ‘Something will turn up and we’ll manage.’
‘
Aye, you’re right. I just wish I was a bit younger. It doesn’t help when you’re looking for work at getting on for sixty.’ He grinned lopsidedly. ‘But you always cheer me up.’ He kissed her and she watched him go. He turned to wave at the end of the street, then rounded the corner and was gone.
Kitty sighed and returned to the kitchen. Liza was clearing the table.
‘I’ll be able to help out all day long after this.’ It was to be her last day at school and she sang about the house as she worked before she left. That cheered Kitty, but then Liza waved farewell and her mother had the house to herself. Her happiness fell away. She knew it would be almost impossible for Andrew to find work at his age.
*
* *
Andrew walked the banks of the Tyne for two hours that morning and his spirits were sinking, but then he was taken on at Armstrong, Whitworth
’s yard. Kitty had given him a packet of sandwiches and these he ate at midday. In the evening he made his way home, hurrying with the joyous news. He had listened to the talk between his foreman and the other men, learned that the yard had just won an order to build a vessel and he had a job for a year or more.
In his haste he took a short-cut through the back lane instead of walking round to the front door. He was humming to himself when he came to the back gate and found it bolted inside. That did not worry him. He was still wiry and active and climbed the wall as he had before. But this time he slipped as he swung his legs over and fell head first. His skull was cracked and he died instantly. The man who had climbed the rigging in howling gales had been killed by a fall from a seven-foot wall.
Liza had to support and comfort her mother through the first days of shock and grief, and then through the funeral. They stood together, with a little knot of neighbours, at the graveside. It was a day of bright sunshine, the cemetery filled with birdsong, a day like many Liza had shared with her father. She could picture him laughing and hear him calling, ‘Away, bonny lass!’
The next day Kitty woke her daughter.
‘Come on, now, we’ve got to get on and find you a job.’ She had to see her started off in life. ‘It’s time to look ahead.’ She had already done that, and knew she could barely earn enough to feed herself. She foresaw a time when they would have to apply for parish relief or starve. Liza would be better off in a big house where she would have enough to eat and a roof over her head. ‘You must try to work your way up to being a lady’s maid. It’s hard getting there and I never managed it, but a lady’s maid is top of the tree. It’s clean work, good money, the next best job to housekeeper. And there are even some ladies, widowed or lost their money, glad to be housekeeper in a big house. It’s almost like being one of the family.’ But, as she had said earlier, big houses wanted girls with experience and strength. Liza was no weakling but not tall and had no experience. Kitty had taught her a lot but a potential employer would not take that on trust. They searched diligently through the newspapers and finally found an advertisement that read: ‘Girl required to attend single lady, helping cook and general. Live in. Apply Mrs Fanshaw.’ There was an address in Tynemouth.
The house was one in a terrace, with three storeys above ground and a cellar kitchen, which had a window that looked out on to a well at the front of the house and was approached from the street by a flight of stone stairs. There were three steps up to the front door, which, Liza noted, needed cleaning; the brass knocker and letterbox were dull from lack of polish. Kitty bit her lip but said nothing. She had worked in big houses with a score of bedrooms and as many servants. She knew that work in a small house like this was the worst kind. The only girl did everything, and the employer either could not afford to pay her a fair wage or was too mean.
She rapped on the door with the knocker. After a minute it was opened by a breathless, middle-aged woman in a black dress that strained over her ample figure. Her round face was florid and she peered at them owlishly. ‘Aye?’
Kitty held up the paper with the advertisement.
‘It’s about the position in here. I’ve brought my daughter to see Mrs Fanshaw, if it’s still open.’
‘
I’m Mrs Fanshaw.’ She looked at Liza and sniffed. ‘She’s a bit small.’ Her accent was a high-pitched ‘refined’. ‘I have no time for idlers and I like my standards kept up.’
‘
I’m quite strong,’ Liza claimed.
‘
Are ye now?’ Mrs Fanshaw did not sound convinced. ‘Well, you’d better come in.’
She led them into the parlour, crowded with chairs and armchairs, little tables and an upright piano. Every surface was littered with sepia photographs — and a fine layer of dust. Mrs Fanshaw sat on an upright chair but left Liza and her mother standing. She eyed the girl.
‘So what can you do, then?’
Kitty had primed Liza to answer that question and she reeled off:
‘I dust and clean, sew and darn, scrub ...’
Mrs Fanshaw listened to the list, then said,
‘Mm. Sounds all right. Whether you can do it ...’ She trailed off, doubtfully. ‘Still, I suppose I can give you a trial for a week. But there’s some things you have to get into your head: You address me as "Madam", speak when you’re spoken to, be quiet about the house, always neat and tidy, and no idling. I’ll pay you ten shillings a month, two shillings if you only last the week. You provide your own clothes: black dress, white cap and pinny. If I take you on permanent you’ll have one evening off every week and one day a month when I go to visit my sister and can’t keep my eye on you. But I want you in here by nine at night. Do you want the job?’
She did not, but knew there was no help for it.
‘Aye, I’d like it, please — Madam.’
Liza settled into her little room at the top of the house, with its narrow, hard bed and bare wooden floor. She pretended it was comfortable enough, bearing in mind that she spent little time there except to sleep, but she anticipated that it would
be bitterly cold in winter. She was homesick, of course, and cried herself to sleep.
She worked a twelve-hour day — at least. Often it was longer. She would rise at seven to make tea for Mrs Fanshaw and carry it up to her. Then she would clean out the grate in that lady
’s bedroom, lay and light the fire so the room should be warm when she eventually rose, then take her a jug of hot water for washing when the time came. The downstairs fires had to be lit, the front steps washed and whitened ... Mrs Garbutt, garrulous and moaning, came in each morning at eight and cooked, but Liza did everything else. She told herself she was gaining experience and everyone had to start at the bottom. She looked forward to the end of the month when she would have her first day off — and she would be able to give her mother seven or eight shillings out of her wages.
Liza learned more about her employer as she worked. While dusting the parlour Mrs Fanshaw lectured her in fluting tones:
‘A house in a good neighbourhood like this needs keeping up to scratch and I insist on it. Perseverance and routine, they’re the key to success, my husband used to say. Fanshaw was a turf accountant and left me well provided for. Not like my poor sister in Newcastle.’ She sighed and her stays creaked. ‘Give us them biscuits.’ Liza handed her the tin and Mrs Fanshaw munched, shedding crumbs for Liza to sweep up.
Later, in the kitchen, Mrs Garbutt snorted.
‘Turf accountant? Ha! I knew Horace Fanshaw and he was a back-lane bookie, with fellers he paid to stand on the corner and watch out for the pollis.’
It was on her second Sunday in her position that Liza answered a knock at the front door. Checking that her white cap was straight, smoothing her pinny, she opened the door and faced a tall, bony girl st
anding on the top step. Recognition was immediate and mutual.
Una Gubbins gaped.
‘Liza Thornton.’ In the time since she had left school, a year earlier than Liza, she had put up her hair and adopted a superior expression. She looked Liza up and down, taking in the uniform, and grinned unpleasantly. ‘Well I never. So you’re the maid here now.’
‘
Aye,’ Liza answered curtly.
‘
You’ve got a lot to learn,’ Una said. ‘You should say, “Yes, Miss.” ’ And when Liza stood tight-lipped, she went on, ‘I’ve come to see my aunt Nelly.’ She saw Liza’s startled reaction and smirked again. ‘That’s right. My mother’s her sister. One word from me and it’ll be the sack for you. I heard your mother had been left on her own. Shame. I expect she needs your money. Now what do you say?’