was growing darker outside and in the dimly lit room the firelight cast its strange and mysterious shadows across the walls and the ceiling and in amongst them she saw so many old and familiar faces. Her friends. Her enemies. All of them dead long ago. Ghosts … just ghosts that could no longer touch her or hers.
Life is like a circle, she mused. My life began with the Fairleys and it will end with them. The two points have now joined to make the full circle.
Long is the way
And hard, that out
of hell leads up to light.
– JOHN MILTON, Paradise Lost
‘Mam … Mam … Are yer awake?’ Emma called softly from the doorway. There was no answer.
She hovered uncertainly near the door, her ears straining for the slightest sound, but the room was as still as the grave. Nervously she pulled the meagre shawl more tightly around her slender shoulders, shivering in the thin nightgown in the bitter cold before the dawn, her pale face a ghostly beacon in the murky darkness.
‘Mam! Mam!’ she cried in an urgent whisper, and crept further into the room, moving cautiously, feeling her way around the few mean pieces of furniture, her eyes not yet adjusted to the gloom. She could scarcely breathe, so dank and stale was the malodorous air. She shuddered, momentarily repelled by the mingled odours of musty walls, soiled bed-clothes, and cloying sweat. It was the unmistakable stench of poverty and sickness. She sucked in her breath and edged forward.
When she reached the iron bedstead her heart missed a beat as she peered down at the sick woman who lay inert underneath the bedclothes, which were thrown about in disarray. Her mother was dying. Perhaps she was already dead. Panic and fear sent shudders through her thin little body, so that she shook uncontrollably. She bent forward and pressed her face to her mother’s body, straining towards that fragile form, as if to imbue it with renewed vigour, to give it life. She screwed her eyes tightly shut and uttered a silent prayer, passionate and beseeching, every ounce of her concentration pouring into it. Please, God, don’t let me mam die! I’ll be good for the rest of me life. I’ll do anything Yer want, God. I will, God, I will! Just don’t let me mam die. Emma believed that God was good. Her mother had told her that God was Goodness. That He was understanding and forgiving. Emma did not believe in a wrathful God, the God of retribution and revenge that the Methodist minister warned about in his sermons on Sundays. Her mother had said God was Inconceivable Love and her mam knew best. Emma’s God was compassionate. He would answer her prayer.
She opened her eyes and began to stroke the woman’s feverish brow gently. ‘Mam! Mam! Can yer hear me? Are yer all right?’ she asked again in a voice quavering with dread. There was still no visible response.
In the wavering light from the tiny candle flame the woman’s face was clearly in focus. Usually pale, it had taken on an ashen cast and beads of sweat coated it with a glistening film that looked ghastly in the weak light. The once luxuriant brown hair fell in limp and listless fronds across the damp brow and lay in a tangled mass on the sodden pillow behind her. There was a sweetness in the face, which the pain and suffering had not completely obliterated, but all the traces of the gentle beauty of her youth had been dissipated by the ravages of grim poverty, by the years of punishing struggle for survival, and finally by this deadly and virulent sickness. An aureole of death was around Elizabeth Harte and she would not live to see these last few months of winter move forward into spring. She was suffering from the wasting disease which was consuming her little by little every day, leaving her a withered and wraith-like old woman. She was not quite thirty-four years old.
Hers was a grim sickroom, for it contained few elements of comfort or beauty, none of the amenities of life. The bed was the dominant piece of furniture and it took up most of the space under the sloping eaves. Apart from the bed there were few scant furnishings. The rickety table, made of bamboo, was wedged in the corner, between the bed and the small window, and upon this reposed a worn black Bible, a pottery mug, and the medicine Dr Malcolm had prescribed. Near the door there was a crude wooden chest, whilst the mahogany washstand, with its cracked white marble top, rested against the wall on the far side of the window. The cottage was built into the side of the moorland and this made it cruelly damp and unhealthy through all the seasons of the year, but especially so in these harsh northern winters when rain-soaked gales and driving snow blew ferociously across the fells. Yet in spite of the dampness, the spartan frugality, and the dreary ambiance, the room was spotlessly clean. Freshly washed and starched cotton curtains hung at the window, and the few pieces of rustic furniture gleamed brightly with beeswax and Emma’s constant care. Not a speck of dust marred the worn wooden floor, which was covered in part with clipped rugs, homemade from pieces of gaily coloured rags hooked into sacking. Only the bed was unkempt and neglected, for Emma could change the bed linen but once a week, when she came home from Fairley Hall, where she was in service.
Elizabeth moved uneasily and with some agitation. ‘Is that our Emma?’ The voice was so feeble with fatigue it was barely audible.
‘Yes, Mam, it’s me,’ the girl cried, clutching her mother’s hand.
‘What time is it, Emma?’
‘Just turned four o’clock. Old Willy knocked us up early this morning. I’m sorry if I waked yer, Mam, but I wanted ter make sure yer were all right, afore I went up yonder ter the Hall.’
Elizabeth sighed. ‘Aye, lass. I’m not so badly. Don’t fret so. I’ll get up later and—’ She began to cough violently and pressed her fragile hands to her chest trying to contain the tremors that shook her. Emma poured medicine into the pot mug on the table and, slipping her arms around her mother, she propped her up so that she could drink from the pot. ‘Try this, Mam. It’s the stuff from Dr Mac, and it seems ter do yer good,’ she exclaimed, in the most cheerful voice she could summon. Elizabeth attempted to sip from the pot between bouts of the persistent coughing that racked her body. Slowly the obstinate rattle in her chest abated and eventually she was able to take a long draught of the medicine. Although she was suffering from shortness of breath and exertion she managed to speak.
‘Yer’d best go down and see ter yer father and the lads, luv. I’ll rest a while and perhaps afore yer go ter work yer’ll bring me up some tea.’ The febrile light in her eyes was dimming and she seemed more conscious of her surroundings, more aware of the girl who stood beside the bed.
Emma bent down and kissed the woman’s lined cheek with tenderness and pulled the blankets up around the wasted shoulders protectively. ‘Aye, I will.’ She slipped out of the room and closed the door softly. As she ran down the narrow stone staircase, ignoring its high perilous slant in her haste, raised voices wafted up to meet her halfway. Emma stood quite still and drew in her breath sharply, her heart sinking into the pit of her stomach. A feeling of nausea swept over her as she envisioned the ugly scene awaiting her. Winston, her brother, and her father were quarrelling again and the violence of their confrontation was only too evident from their angrily raised voices. The chilling thought that they would disturb her mother caused Emma to cry out involuntarily. She stifled the frightened half cry, pressing her roughened hands to her mouth, and sat down heavily on the cold stone steps, wondering helplessly how she could stop them fighting. If her mam heard them she would crawl out of bed to make peace between
