Twisted Strands (13 page)

‘What is it you have against women, Bob?’

‘Nowt. Just that to me a woman’s place is in the home, looking after her family. Mebbe doing a bit of drawing at home. And it’s all right young unmarried lasses working in the
warehouse, I suppose, but . . .’

Eveleen’s patience was being severely tested and before she could prevent herself, she had snapped, ‘Oh, very magnanimous of you.’

Bob, a stocky, balding man, leapt to his feet with surprising agility. ‘Don’t you play the high ’n mighty with me, missis. I remember where you came from. Off the
streets.’ His tone implied much more than that Eveleen and her family had once been homeless. ‘And if it hadn’t been for Mr Richard marrying you,’ he wagged a grimy
forefinger in her face, ‘you’d still ’ave been there.’

Eveleen, her eyes flashing with anger, glared at him, their faces only inches apart, so close that she could feel the waft of his stale breath. ‘But he did marry me,’ she said
pointedly. ‘And right now it’s me who could have you put out on the street.’

She drew back and willed herself to calmness, but her tone was icy as she said, ‘Now, Bob, you have two choices. You can either work with me on this or you can leave right now.’

‘Oh aye, reckon you could run this factory single-handed, do you?’

‘No,’ she said levelly, knowing that for the moment she had the upper hand. ‘But there are plenty of men out there,’ she waved her hand through the office window,
‘who’ve worked here long enough and could take over your job tomorrow without batting an eyelid.’

A look of doubt crossed the man’s face. ‘Think so? It’s not as easy as it looks.’ His words were defiant, but she could see that his confidence was shaken. One word from
Eveleen to her father-in-law and the factory manager knew he could be out on his ear. And without the words needing to be spoken, Bob knew that the man who had once held his position was now
Eveleen’s stepfather. No doubt Bob would think that Eveleen only had to ask and Josh Carpenter would come to her aid.

He was not a man to cave in too quickly, but she knew she had rattled his confidence. Defiant to the last, Bob said, ‘Mebbe it’s time I picked up mi scissors and hook and walked down
the road, eh?’

‘And where exactly would you walk to, Bob? You know as well as I do that all the factories are facing the same difficulties as we are.’

‘Mebbe, but they aren’t bringing women in,’ he said scathingly.

‘I think you’ll find,’ Eveleen said quietly, ‘that, in time, they’ll do just that. They’ll have to if they want to survive.’

There was a long silence between them until at last Bob sat down in his chair again, leant back and linked his fingers across the paunch that drinking five pints every night in the pub on the
corner of his street had caused. ‘So,’ he said sarcastically, ‘what’s this grand plan then?’

Bridie didn’t think she had ever been so happy in her life. At least that would have been the case but for the ever-present worry over the war and all its
consequences.

On her first morning Eveleen had taken her up to the inspection room on the top floor of the warehouse building and left her in Helen’s care.

‘You must remember to call her Miss Binkley when you’re at work,’ Eveleen had warned her. ‘Not Auntie Helen.’

Bridie had nodded, speechless with excitement. Her hair was plaited, as always, but now it was wound around her crown and pinned in position. Her aunt had also bought a plain white blouse and a
long black skirt for her to wear for work. Gone, now, was the frilled white smock of childhood. As they entered the workroom, Bridie could see that all the girls and women were similarly dressed.
Only Helen, as the supervisor, wore a smart, close-fitting plum-coloured costume with a white, ruffle-necked silk blouse beneath it.

When Eveleen left, Helen said, ‘Now, I’ll put you with Mrs Hyde. She looks after all the newcomers.’

The woman was large and rotund, her grey hair scraped into a bun at the nape of her neck. But her round, florid face beamed a welcome. ‘Come and sit by me. We’ll soon show yer
what’s what.’

In spite of her nervousness at facing a roomful of chattering women, all of whom were eyeing her curiously, Bridie smiled. Mrs Hyde’s way of talking was just like Josh’s and
immediately Bridie warmed to her.

It was not long before she had heard Mrs Hyde’s life history. ‘I’ve got seven kids and they’re all terrors, the lot of ’em. But I wouldn’t be without
’em for the world.’

‘How old are they?’ Bridie was wide-eyed and envious of a large family with brothers and sisters.

‘Mi eldest daughter, Janie, she’s eighteen. That’s ’er over there. And next to her is Kathleen. She’s seventeen. Then there’s Bertie, sixteen. Joyce is
fourteen. She’s over there.’ The woman twisted slightly in her seat and jabbed her sewing needle in the air towards a thin, mousy-haired girl stooping over her work. Mrs Hyde leant
towards Bridie and lowered her voice. ‘She’s not ever so strong, bless her. Had scarlet fever as a bairn and ’as never been right since. Still, she’s a good little worker
and Mrs Stokes and Miss Binkley are very understanding if she has to ’ave a day off now and then. Then Christopher’s nearly twelve, Lillian’s ten and Connie’s eight.
They’re still at school, o’ course, but Christopher’s going to start in the factory when he leaves.’

‘How lucky they all are, to be part of such a lovely, big family.’

‘You got brothers and sisters?’ the kindly woman asked.

Bridie shook her head. ‘No, there’s only me. Me mam died having me.’

‘Aw, that’s a shame, luvvie.’

About her father, Bridie volunteered nothing.

At the end of September Richard and Andrew volunteered together with three more young men from Singleton’s Yard in Flawford and seven volunteers from the Reckitt and
Stokes’s factory, one of whom was Leslie Holmes, Helen’s young man.

‘We’ve all enlisted in the Sherwood Foresters and we have to report to Newark next Friday,’ Richard told Eveleen when he returned home. ‘We’ll be in the same
regiment, even the same company, I think. Don’t worry, I’ll look after them all.’

‘But who’s going to look after you?’

‘We’ll watch out for each other,’ he tried to reassure her, but she was not so easily convinced. ‘We won’t be going to France for ages yet. We’ll have all
sorts of training – a lot of drill, I expect – and all sorts of courses to go on.’ He tickled her chin with his forefinger. ‘Let’s make the most of this last week.
We’ll all have a lovely day at the Goose Fair on Thursday, the day before we leave.’

Eveleen smiled thinly. Only a week and he would be gone.

On the Wednesday evening Richard, Eveleen and even Bridie and Andrew were invited to dinner at the home of Richard’s parents. The atmosphere was strained. Andrew was uncomfortable in his
best suit and starched collar and Bridie was nervous at being in such grand surroundings as the Stokes’s elegant home. She dropped her knife on the floor and, when she bent to pick it up, her
head collided with the manservant’s, who had also bent down to retrieve it for her. Bridie was scarlet with embarrassment, even though Richard smiled at her understandingly.

‘I don’t know why you have to join the ranks, Richard,’ Sophia was saying, angry and disappointed that she would not be able to boast to her elegant friends. ‘You’d
be so much safer as an officer too apart from, well . . .’ She paused, realizing that her comments were a little out of place in the present company. Bridie, forgetting her own discomfort,
glanced across the table at Andrew. But he sat silently, his eyes downcast, and she knew he was feeling every bit as awkward and out of place as she was. The thought comforted her. She glanced to
the end of the table towards their hostess, admiring the elegant, sophisticated Sophia Stokes. She is very beautiful but she’s cold, the girl thought with an astuteness beyond her years. Mr
Brinsley’s nice – he’s like Uncle Richard – but she’s only bothered about whether or not her son is going to be an officer.

In answer to his mother’s remark, Richard only smiled. ‘I’d much rather be with friends, Mother.’

At the end of the meal, as they moved from the dining room to the drawing room, the gentlemen accompanying the ladies instead of staying at the table to smoke and drink port, Andrew drew Eveleen
to one side. ‘I have something to ask you,’ he said quietly.

‘Of course I’ll look after Bridie,’ Eveleen said at once. ‘You don’t need to ask.’

He smiled, though his eyes were troubled with a hint of the apprehension that all those who had volunteered must be feeling. ‘I know you will. It wasn’t that. Eveleen, when I filled
in the papers, I put you as my next of kin. I hope you don’t mind?’

‘Of course, I don’t mind, but isn’t there anyone else?’

Andrew shook his head. ‘I have no family and I didn’t want to put Mr Singleton’s name. I – I’m not sure he would let you know – let Bridie know – if
anything happened to me.’

Eveleen clutched at his arm. ‘Nothing’s going to happen to you. To any of you.’ She sounded so determined that Andrew could almost believe that the very strength of her will
would make it so. ‘It’ll all be over in a few weeks and you’ll be home again.’

There was a silence between them for a moment before he went on, ‘And I’ve arranged for part of my pay – and that . . .’ She wasn’t sure what the ‘and
that’ meant, but she said nothing. ‘To come to you. Will you see that Bridie gets it? Put it in a bank account or something for when she comes of age.’

‘Oh, Andrew,’ Eveleen said unsteadily. He seemed to have thought of everything. But, even yet, he hadn’t finished. And again he was thinking of others before himself.
‘One thing more – and this is the most difficult to ask.’ He bit his lip, as if still uncertain whether to make this particular request.

‘Go on,’ Eveleen prompted gently.

‘Could you – will you – go to Flawford now and then to see that they’re all right there?’ He squeezed her hand tightly, emphasizing the need for his request –
a request he knew would cause Eveleen a great deal of soul-searching and courage. He rushed on. ‘I don’t know what’s going to happen there once I’ve gone.’

She forbore, at this final moment, to say in harsh accusation: Then why are you going? Instead she said huskily, ‘Of course I will. I’ll make sure they’re all right.’

As the evening ended, much to the relief of both Bridie and Andrew, Richard said, ‘So, are we all going to the Goose Fair tomorrow?’

‘Oh, my dear,’ Sophia said languidly, ‘count me out. I can’t bear all those crowds. Your father has promised to take me to Derby to see an old friend. Her son left for
the Front last week. He’s been in the army for several years. He’s a regular.’ She paused and added pointedly, ‘Of course, he’s an officer.’

Richard turned to Andrew. ‘So, it’s just the four of us, is it? You’ll come, won’t you, Andrew?’

Andrew shook his head apologetically, but before he could speak Bridie burst out, ‘Oh Andrew, I’ve never been to the Goose Fair. You must come.’

‘Bridie, love, I’d like nothing better. Believe me. But I must go home to see how things are. There’s so many of us gone from what is only a small workshop anyway that . .
.’

‘You care more about them and your work than you do about me,’ Bridie burst out petulantly. She was suddenly the little girl again.

Andrew regarded her helplessly. ‘That’s not true, but I just have to go home.’

‘Can’t you go the day after?’

Andrew shook his head sorrowfully. ‘We leave at midday on Friday. There wouldn’t be time. I’m sorry, Bridie.’

‘What about you, Evie? You’ll come with us, won’t you?’ Richard asked.

Eveleen glanced helplessly between her husband and her father-in-law. ‘I – I don’t think I can. I shall have to stay at the factory. One of us ought to be there. There’ll
be so many leaving the next day and so much to see to. I’m sorry, Richard.’

The first three girls brought in as auxiliary workers to help the twisthands had started that morning and Eveleen dared not leave them to the tender mercies of a very disgruntled Bob Porter. The
reaction of the other male workers had been mixed.

‘Mek a nice change, I reckon, seeing pretty lasses about the place instead of your ugly mug,’ Jake Morrison chafed a workmate. But when the girls had arrived dressed in long overalls
and their hair tucked out of sight beneath a frilled cap, his face had fallen.

‘Well, they do look a sight,’ he had sniffed and turned back to his own machine.

‘They’ve got to be sensibly dressed,’ Luke Manning had pointed out. ‘We can’t have their hair or part of their dress getting caught in the machinery, can we?’
He had walked over to where the three young women were standing with Eveleen. ‘I’ll tek one of ’em, Eveleen.’

Years before, Luke had been the one to try to train Jimmy and, unknowingly at the time, also Eveleen. He had never seen the need to change his attitude towards her just because she had married
Richard Stokes.

Eveleen smiled at him. ‘Thank you, Luke. What about the other two?’ she asked. ‘Who do you suggest for them?’

Luke glanced about him. ‘Arthur for one, and Jake for the other.’

Eveleen frowned. ‘Arthur, I agree, but I’m not sure about Jake.’ It had been Jake who had raised a protest at the start of the war, suggesting that Richard’s motives were
less than altruistic.

Luke laughed. ‘He’s a bit of a loudmouth, but he’s all right. And I’ll keep me eye on the lasses.’

‘Thanks, Luke,’ Eveleen said, thankful to have at least one of the old hands on her side. Luke would be like a father to them, but even so Eveleen had wanted to be on hand whilst the
new arrivals settled in.

‘I’m really sorry, Richard,’ she said again.

Richard regarded her gravely, ‘So am I, Eveleen. So am I.’

‘So, Bridie, it’s just you and me, is it?’

Bridie nodded. ‘Andrew can’t come. He – he has to go home to see how things are at Flawford.’

Richard raised his left eyebrow sardonically. ‘Seems they’re smitten with the same bug.’

‘Pardon?’ Bridie was puzzled.

‘Work’s more important to them. Never mind, my dear. We’ll have a lovely day. Just the two of us. How about it?’ Bridie nodded and giggled as he crooked his arm with a
gesture of gallantry. ‘Your escort awaits, m’lady.’