He saw a tide of pink rise in her face and wished he had not asked the last question but told himself he had a right to wonder why she had come round after so long. He saw her take a deep breath and begin to speak and, impulsively, took her hand. ‘Oh, Lizzie, it’s good to see you! Do you want to talk here or would you rather come to the common room?’
Lizzie relaxed and the pink gradually receded from her cheeks. ‘I wanted to say I was sorry for being so horrid to you the last time we met, and to tell you . . . well, that my worries over you-know-who are dead and buried, like her old man.’ She glanced across at
the long wooden bench on which he and Reggie had been working. ‘What’s that you’re making?’ she asked curiously. ‘It looks a bit like a skate.’
‘First you apologise, then you insult me all over again,’ Geoff said, grinning. ‘It
is
a skate, you daft girl. Me and me pal Reggie’s been toiling over them for a week now, scared stiff that the frost will go before we finish.’ He turned to his friend. ‘Reggie, this is Lizzie Devlin. I don’t think you’ve met her but you’ve heard me talk of her often enough, I daresay. Lizzie, this is me old mate, Reggie Phelps.’
The two young people murmured hello and then Geoff took Lizzie’s arm, addressing Reggie as he led her from the room. ‘Shan’t be more than ten minutes, old feller, so keep up the good work.’
Once he and Lizzie had reached the street, he grabbed her hands and gave them a squeeze. ‘I’ve really missed you, young Lizzie,’ he said. ‘Let’s not quarrel again, especially over something so silly. Now what’s all this about your Uncle Perce – I take it that’s what you meant?’
Lizzie told the story briefly but well. At the end of it, Geoff gave a low whistle and gazed into the distance, tapping his teeth with a forefinger.
‘It
is
good, isn’t it?’ Lizzie said, a trifle apprehensively as the silence lengthened. ‘It does mean that Flossie will have to find herself a new feller – one with money? And surely that means she’ll leave Uncle Perce alone?’
Geoff frowned, looking down into her small, fair face and worried blue eyes. ‘We -ell,’ he said slowly, ‘I daresay you’re right and old Sharpe’s death – and the will – should end the business. Only – only it gives me an uneasy sort of feeling. It’s too neat somehow.’
He half hoped that Lizzie would disagree with him
but instead she gave a deep sigh and said: ‘I know what you mean, actually. In fact, Uncle Perce’s been quite different for weeks now, much nicer to Aunt Annie, and though he does go down to the pub of an evening, he isn’t there long. They’re sharing a bedroom as well, and he says nice things to me aunt when she makes a good dinner and doesn’t harass the hens, either. And yet . . . and yet . . .’
Geoff gave a shiver and took hold of her shoulders, turning her back towards the house. ‘It’s too bleedin’ cold to hang around out here, talking in circles,’ he said. ‘I’m sure you’re right and everything’s going to be grand from now on. If it isn’t, it’s something to face when it happens and not before. Now what are you doing Sunday morning? Only Reggie and me want to catch a bus which will take us up river a bit, so’s we can find a frozen pond and try out the skates. Want to come along? There’s only the two pairs of skates, but we can take turns.’
‘I’d love to. Can I bring Sally?’ Lizzie said eagerly. She smiled up at Geoff as they re-entered the workroom. ‘We don’t want to have another quarrel over a threesome, do we?’
He chuckled. ‘You’re right there, queen,’ he agreed. ‘Have you seen Clem since the quarrel?’
‘No, we’ve not met,’ Lizzie admitted. ‘It’s difficult, Geoff, because last time we were together, all I did was shriek at him. Now I’ve no idea when
The Liverpool Rose
is due back in again.’
‘I reckon you’ve got a bit of apologising to do in that direction,’ Geoff said, reaching out an affectionate hand and ruffling the rich gold of her hair. ‘Poor old Lizzie, that’ll teach you to lose your temper with us fellers.’
She laughed a trifle ruefully and then perched on a
tall wooden stool and watched as the boys carried on making their skates. Very soon the three of them were chattering away like old friends, full of the proposed expedition to try out the skates the following Sunday.
Aferwards Geoff walked with Lizzie to the tram stop and waved her off, then returned to the YMCA and went straight to his room. He was delighted that he and Lizzie were friends once more but the period that they had spent apart had taught him something. He liked Lizzie very much, she had been a good friend to him, but his affection for her was more like that of a brother for his sister. It had none of the restless yearning he had felt over the loss of Evie Evans. He still thought of her constantly, searched faces in the street for a glimpse of those lovely features, and believed that one day he would find her again. Until then, he was content to be friendly with Lizzie and to hope that she, too, would find someone she could truly love.
It was the creaking which woke Clem up. He had been cuddled down beneath his blanket in the butty boat with Brutus curled into the hollow of his body, their shared warmth making the cold bearable. At first, the creaking had merely entered his dreams and disturbed him not at all. Then it grew louder and somehow more threatening and he found himself sitting upright, his heart hammering, convinced that someone was attacking one of the boats.
The odd thing was that Brutus had not stirred until Clem sat up. Then he had stared, not out at the deck but at Clem himself, as though wondering why his master had awoken so abruptly. Knowing how the dog would rouse at a footstep on the towpath which no human being could possibly have heard, Clem
relaxed a little. Whatever the creaking was, it could not be caused by an intruder. He was about to lie down again when realisation suddenly hit him. It was the ice! Before he went to bed, he had cleared a good two foot of ice from round the butty boat and
The Liverpool Rose
. Now, because of the extreme cold, it had formed again and was squeezing the hull, causing the creaking sounds.
In weather like this, no one undressed to go to bed though it was usual to remove one’s garnsey and corduroy trousers. Clem was still clad in a thick woolly shirt, and underpants and his hand-knitted boat socks. Hastily, he heaved on corduroys, garnsey and clogs and reached for his jacket. He crawled out on to the deck and saw that he had been right. The ice round the boat was as thick as it had been when he had broken it up earlier; if he did not get a move on, they could easily find themselves trapped here until the boat was cracked open like a walnut shell, causing damage it would cost a small fortune to repair.
He seized the great iron bar which Jake kept for just this purpose and began hammering at the ice. As the first blow struck, he heard what sounded like an echo from the boat ahead and, glancing towards it, saw that Jake must have woken as he had and was freeing
The Liverpool Rose
. Brutus, making his way cautiously along the decking, was slowly wagging his plumed tail. Though Clem could see no one in the darkness, he realised the dog was greeting a friend and was not surprised when the boat heeled over as someone stepped on board.
‘Clem? Want a hand wi’ rocking her or is she too fast stuck already? Odd, ain’t it, that we all woke at about the same time? If you get on to the stern, we can try what rockin’ will do.’
‘It’s okay, Priddy, the ice isn’t as thick as it looks, it’s coming away in slabs now,’ Clem shouted cheerfully. ‘Any idea of the time?’
‘Breakfast time,’ she said. ‘At least, it ain’t breakfast time, it’s more like five o’clock, but we might as well have our breakfast and then get moving since we’re all awake. I’ve never wanted to own a fly boat – travellin’ all night an’ all day ain’t my idea of a decent life – but in this sort o’ weather, we’ll be warmer moving than moored, I reckon. So when you’ve cleared the butty, p’raps you can get Hal out of the stable and tack him up. Leave his blanket on, ’cos it’s mortal cold, and put an extra handful or two of oats into his nosebag, then he’ll be ready to move when we are.’
‘Right, I’ll do that,’ Clem said, and heard Paddy’s footsteps retreating down the towpath. Presently he smelt the good smell of bacon frying. Away to the east he could see a lightening in the sky. He knew that dawn would soon be on its way and thought for the hundredth time how lucky he was. He had fled from a life in the coal mines, which he had hated, and fallen by the merest chance into a life he loved, for he knew he would not swap his place on
The Liverpool Rose,
not even for the job of King of England had it been offered.
Presently, with the ice cleared and a warm glow suffusing his whole body from the vigour with which he had attacked it, Clem took the lantern from where it hung above his make-shift bed, lit it, climbed on to the bank and went over to the dim bulk of the stables. Hal was in the end stall, sleeping on his feet as horses usually do, but he woke as Clem opened the half door and took down the harness from its hook on the wall. Clem led him down to the towpath with the tack over
one arm since it would be far easier to tack the horse up out here, rather than within the confines of the stable. First he rubbed the horse down vigorously with a handful of hay and then buckled on the harness, slung the heavy collar round Hal’s enormous shoulders then fastened on the swingle tree, from which the towrope would presently depend. Hal stood patiently while Clem worked, shifting his hooves occasionally on the iron-hard path, looking twice the size by lamplight that he did by day.
By the time Hal was tacked up, his nosebag satisfactorily full of good things and the towrope attached, Priddy was handing out thick cuts of bread, sandwiched together round equally thick cuts of bacon. Clem sat on the stern of
The Liverpool Rose,
with bacon grease running down his chin, while Jake told him that in future, because of the severity of the weather, they would have to have someone on watch whenever they were not moving, so that the boat could be rocked from side to side to discourage the ice from forming as it had done earlier.
‘I dunno why I didn’t think of it before,’ he said, tipping his head back to look up at the fading stars. ‘A clear night means a sharp frost and I knowed it would be a clear night, so what were I thinkin’ of?’ He sighed deeply and took a pull of tea from his tin mug. ‘I’m gettin’ old and careless, that’s what,’ he said sadly. ‘You’re such a good worker, young Clem, that I’m takin’ it easy, leavin’ you to do too much. But it won’t happen again – can’t be allowed to happen again – ’cos if we’d not woke when we did, we could have been drowned dead in our beds. That’s what happens when a barge gets iced in an’ cracked open. She just sinks when the water rushes in and because the water’s so bitter cold, the crew don’t get a chance to
struggle out. They’re dead before they know what’s happenin’,’ he concluded.
Clem nodded soberly. He knew the old saying ‘wooden boats, iron men’, and had long ago realised that, though life on the canals was idyllic much of the year, it also involved very hard manual work and risks which landsmen never encountered. But even so, he reminded himself as the sky grew lighter, I wouldn’t change it for a fortune, and nor would Jake and Priddy, whatever they may pretend.
Thinking about Jake and Priddy, who had spent all their lives on the canal, made him remember Lizzie and his half-formed hopes in that direction. Until he had acquired Brutus, Lizzie had seemed as fascinated by life on the canals as he was himself, and he had hoped that one day she might accompany them on a long-haul trip and see for herself the delights of the countryside he knew so well. He longed to show her Martin Mere, dreaming amongst the trees, home to a wide variety of water birds, whilst the small animals of the area had their homes within easy reach of it. Then there were the high moors and fells with a strange harsh beauty all of their own, brought about by the combination of the luxuriant, brilliantly coloured heather, gorse and broom which crowded every slope, and the great escarpments and obelisks of rock which pushed up through them.
But since the quarrel, Clem supposed that this trip was indeed nothing but a dream. Lizzie would never come with him now, even if he left Brutus with a friend aboard one of the other boats, and he could not see the dog agreeing to this. Like all Alsatians, the dog acknowledged only one master and, though he was strongly attached to Priddy and Jake, seldom left Clem’s side unless ordered to remain behind. Then,
Clem knew, he would neither eat nor drink until his master’s return, though he remained steadfastly at his post.
Trudging along at Hal’s head with one hand looped through the cheek strap, Clem was aware of the dog at his side. He glanced down at Brutus and rumpled the fur behind his large pricked ears. ‘You’re a grand feller, so you are,’ he said affectionately. ‘If only Lizzie weren’t so scared of dogs! But there’s other girls . . . girls who’ve worked the canals all their lives and know how important it is to have a guard dog when you’re passing through a bad area.’
Brutus looked up at him and grinned as though he understood every word, a cloud of steam escaping from his mouth as he did so. ‘Who cares about girls?’ Clem asked him teasingly, and tried to ignore the ache in his heart, surprised by how much he had missed seeing Lizzie when they had docked in Liverpool.
‘It’s still dreadfully cold,’ Lizzie remarked as the two girls got off the tram on Scotland Road. They had just spent an enjoyable evening having a Christmas jolly with others from the bottling plant. The firm had booked the Rialto for the evening so that all the staff and their friends could have a Christmas party, providing refreshments when the dancing was over. It would have been even more fun had Geoff and Reggie been able to accompany them but with Christmas approaching fast Geoff had been working overtime at the bank, glad enough to augment his income at this time of year.
‘Yes, I’m half-frozen, but it were a good evening even without the fellers. I do like them. Weren’t the skating fun?’ Sally said as they headed towards
Burlington Stret. ‘If the frost holds we might do it again, I daresay.’
The skating party had been a great success. Lizzie and Sally had decided that their contribution to the day should be the nicest picnic they could afford. So Sally had made a mound of cheese, ham and egg sandwiches and Lizzie had contributed a large meat pie, a bag of rosy apples and a number of iced fairy cakes which she had made the previous day.