Patricia Falvey (9 page)

The tram, an electric one installed by the mill owners to bring in workers from outlying towns, rattled up a hillside as we approached Queensbrook. When we reached the top, I looked down on a lovely valley ringed by the Camlough Mountains and saw in the distance my beloved Slieve Gullion. But as the tram descended, dozens of gray buildings rose like hideous granite beasts out of the early morning mist. The tallest were four stories high, with gabled roofs and rows of windows marching in formation along the front. Chimneys, like cathedral spires, clawed the sky, belching clouds of gray smoke. Surrounding the cluster of buildings was a river, sparkling and innocent as the morning itself.

“There’s a lovely wee village down there where the local workers live,” P.J. said, ignoring the look of horror on my face. “It’s a model village built by the mill owners. You’ll see it better when you get the chance to walk around. Protestants and Catholics live in it side by side nice as you like, and not a hint of trouble. There’s everything you’d be in need of there,” he continued, “shops, churches, schools.” He smiled, his red face crinkling up with merriment. “Ah, but there’s no pub,” he said, “and no police station or pawnshop, either. The Sheridans who own the mill are Quakers, and they don’t believe in the drink. And without the drink, they’re thinking there’s no need for the pawnshop or the police station. A queer lot, the Quakers. Good people in their own way, I suppose, but they just don’t understand the Irish.”

I shot a look at P.J. Sheridan? The name sounded an alarm somewhere down deep inside me.

“Wasn’t Sheridan the name of the boyo who lost the Yellow House to Great-Grandda Hugh in a game of cards?”

P.J. looked over at me. “Aye”—he nodded—“one and the same, an ancestor of the family that owns the mill.”

The sick feeling of the worried child washed over me again. “I always thought they would come to take it back,” I whispered.

P.J. patted me on the knee. “It wasn’t the Sheridans as took it, darlin’,” he said gently, “it was a crowd of Ulster blackguards.” He shook his thick red mane. “Them and that eejit Billy Craig.”

The men with the torches had all been caught. They were rogue members of the newly formed Ulster Volunteer Force, whose intent was to preserve Ulster for the Unionists and to fight with force any attempts to impose Home Rule. The band who attacked the Yellow House had been acting without orders. They were all jailed, except for Billy. His da, Mr. Craig at the bank, had managed to get him off. Some said Craig did it only to save himself from the embarrassment of having a son in jail and not because he had any love for Billy.

“They’re all one and the same,” I muttered, “Sheridans, Ulster Volunteers, Billy, they’re all feckin’ Protestants.”

We left the tram and walked through the main gate of one of the buildings and up to a hut where a guard sat.

“This is Eileen O’Neill. She’s to see Joe Shields,” P.J. said. “He’s arranged for her to start today.”

Joe Shields managed the spinning mill, and P.J. knew him because he sometimes played with the Music Men at a pub in Newry. “A Protestant fellow,” P.J. had said, “and brilliant on the accordion.”

P.J. put his hand on my arm. “I’ll be going, Eileen. You know how to find your way back on the tram now?”

I nodded. I was suddenly sorry to see him go. I wanted to call out after him not to leave me. But that would have been childish, and I was no longer a child. Instead, I grasped the tin lunch box P.J.’s wife had given me and followed the guard into the mill building and up the stairs.

The heat assaulted me even before we arrived at the top of the stairs. The guard led me into an enormous, noisy room filled with machines and workers. The heat in the room was stifling, and sweat began to ooze out of my skin. The smell of oil sickened my stomach. As I followed the guard to a small office in the corner of the room, I tried to take in everything I saw, but it was a blur.

“A new one for you,” the guard said to a fat man seated behind a desk, “I forgot her name.”

“Eileen O’Neill,” I said more sharply than I intended. “P. J. Mullen sent me. I’m to see Mr. Shields.”

The man behind the desk had a round face with cheeks streaked pink and purple. His black hair had receded, leaving bumps exposed on his white forehead. His arms were fleshy, and his fat white hands looked soft as a baby’s. I supposed he hadn’t done much hard work in his life, just sat here on his fat arse giving orders. He looked me up and down, eyeing the lemon cotton dress and white peep-toe shoes I wore. Mrs. Mullen had been delighted when she gave them to me. “We want you to look as well as the next girl up there, love,” she said.

“I’m Joe Shields,” he said at last, waving a fat arm at the guard to leave. “Sit down.” He pointed to a chair. “So, I see you have no experience. If you had, you would not be coming here in a getup like that.”

I looked down at my dress, unsure of what he meant.

“No matter,” he continued, “I told P.J. I’d do him the favor. I’ll give you a start. One week only. We’re not the Sisters of Charity here. You’ll have to show you can earn your keep.”

I stuffed down the anger that rose up in me. A hundred defiant answers raced through my head, but I took a deep breath and lowered my eyes. “I’ll do my best, sir,” I said.

“Good,” said Shields. “You’ll start as a doffer. That’s how all our young girls start. You’ll be responsible for keeping the bobbins on the spinning frames going. You’ll take off the full ones and put up empty ones. And you need to be fast. We don’t want you slowing down the spinners.” He stood up. “I’ll get Miss Galway. She’s the doffing mistress. She’ll get you started. Wait here.”

He went out, and I stared at the empty chair where he had sat. Spinning frames? Bobbins? It was a foreign language. I had no idea what he was on about. Sweat poured off me. Jesus, it was hot in there.

I soon found out what was wrong with my clothing. Miss Galway, the doffing mistress, looked at me in horror. Her thin lips opened wide, revealing buckteeth that put me in mind of an old donkey we once had at the Yellow House. I had to stop myself from smiling.

“Oh, that will not do!” she exclaimed. “Will not do at all!”

I looked up at her. She was a tall woman, six feet surely, reed thin and bony. She had a long face and a chin as sharp as a shovel, her black hair pulled back in a bun. She wore a long gray dress with a white collar, a heavy black apron, and laced-up brogue shoes. The shoes had seen better days, I thought; they were battered and shapeless.

“Come with me,” she commanded.

I followed her out into the main spinning room, clutching my tin box. I saw now that the wooden floors were wet from the water that sprayed out from the spindles on the spinning frames. I hadn’t noticed it earlier. Most of the women and girls were working in bare feet. They all had their hair tied up in scarves and wore the same heavy black aprons as Miss Galway. I looked down at my lovely lemon frock with its white collar and buttons all the way down the front, and my white peep-toe shoes, and blushed.

“Will you look at the cut of the frock?”

“Aye, and the shoes. She must think it’s a garden party.”

“I’ll give her a day at the most!”

Raucous laughter followed me as I walked the length of the room to Miss Galway’s office. I squared my shoulders and looked straight ahead. I noticed younger girls—some could not have been more than twelve years old. They scattered when they saw Miss Galway coming. There were a few boys as well, around the same age, gawking at me. I wanted to ask them what they were looking at, but I kept silent. I learned later that these children were half-timers, working mornings in the mill and going to school in the afternoons.

“Now then,” Miss Galway said crisply, “here’s an apron for you. I would advise you to take off your shoes and leave them here. And here’s the picker to remove the bobbins.” She handed me a queer-looking tool the shape of a spoon. “Josephine!” She motioned to a girl a bit older than me, with black matted hair and a pale face. “This is Eileen. She will follow you today, and you will show her how to change the bobbins.”

Miss Galway turned to me with a thin smile. “Josephine is one of our most experienced doffers, aren’t you, Josephine?” The girl gave her a surly nod. “You will do well to learn from her.”

The girl scowled at me. She was in no mood to be teaching anybody, I could see. She shrugged and walked away toward a row of spinning frames. I followed her. The spinning frames were wide iron contraptions with rows of spindles that grinned out at me like grisly teeth. Two rows of spinning bobbins around which the flax threads were wound ran the length of the frame. The spindles spat out boiling water like devils hissing from hell. The frame clanked and roared like an animal that defied taming. A young woman, about twenty, operated two side-by-side machines. She was surprisingly calm as she glided back and forth along the length of the frames, smoothing the threads and spreading oil on hanks of flax waiting to be spun. I watched her, fascinated. I wondered if I could learn to run such a monster. I made up my mind that I could, and I would.

At lunchtime a whistle screeched, and the machines ground into silence. I picked up my lunch box and followed the crowd down the stairs and outside. The sun shone, but I shivered. Coming out of that hot, humid hellhole into the fresh air left me light-headed. I sat on a low brick wall that ran along the river and opened my lunch box. The cheese sandwich was dry as cardboard in my throat. No one spoke to me. I watched the crowds of workers come and go. Some sat along the wall by the river. Others spread themselves out on the grass near the mill pond. The women chatted and laughed. Men sat in small clusters, smoking and watching the women. It struck me that I had seen no men in the spinning room. Like anywhere, I supposed, all the men had the soft jobs bossing around the working women.

The afternoon passed slowly. The younger workers left, but Josephine stayed on. She never smiled once. I wondered how long she had been there doing that same job. I picked it up quickly. My height and my long arms made it easy for me to reach the top row of bobbins. By the end of the day, I did the work while Josephine watched me, hands on her hips. Miss Galway came over to give me her nod of approval.

“Well done, Eileen,” she said. “I shall have a good report to present to Mr. Shields.”

I suppose I should have been pleased, but I really wanted to tell her to go feck herself. Her smug voice sent shivers down my back. I was relieved when the closing whistle blew at six o’clock.

I SURVIVED THE
first week at Queensbrook. Each day, the routine became a little easier. I got over the shock of the blast of heat and the smell of oil that slapped me each morning as I climbed the stairs to the spinning room. I swapped my lemon frock for one of Mrs. Mullen’s gray smocks and a green head scarf. I wore my old boots but took them off as soon as I reached the spinning frames. I lined up the boots alongside all the other shoes in a dry corner of the big room. Miss Galway nodded her approval.

As the week wore on, I continued following Josephine around. I removed full bobbins and replaced them with empty ones while she stood there with one arm as long as the other. It didn’t take long before I realized she was a bit simple. She had been a doffer for eight years—ever since she started as a half-timer. The younger girls giggled at her and teased her. She should have moved up to a spinner long before now, they said, but she wasn’t fit for it. I suppose I should have felt sorry for her, but I just shrugged. She was one less person ahead of me in the queue. I was determined to move up to the spinner’s job as fast as I could. I watched the operators carefully, memorizing their every move so I would be ready when the time came.

We worked shifts from seven in the morning until six at night, with an hour off to eat lunch. That hour didn’t count toward our shift. On Saturdays, we worked from seven until noon. We were off on Sundays. On the first Saturday morning, as I joined the other workers on our way up the stairs, I noticed that the mood was lighter. The girls and women smiled and joked. Some even tossed a smile at me—the first time that week. When the closing whistle blew at twelve o’clock, the machines ground to a halt and the women raced to snatch up their shoes. They flew down the stairs, jostling and pushing one another good-naturedly. As they ran, they tore off their black aprons and dull smocks and rolled them into balls, tucking them under their arms. They smoothed their bright summer dresses and chirped and laughed. I thought of the butterflies that used to swarm around the Yellow House in summer. Da had explained that they had transformed from wee brown grubs into beautiful creatures decked out in all their finery, but that they lived for only one day. I felt a stab of sadness as I thought of these gay, colorful girls creeping back to the cave of the mill on Monday, brown and dull as worms.

I stood aside and let them rush past me. I felt only a distant connection with them. I recognized my place among their gender, but I would not share their fate. I was no ordinary girl. I was Eileen O’Neill, and I was a warrior.

Joe Shields stood behind a table set up in the entryway, calling off names from a list. As their name was called, each worker came up to take an envelope from him and sign the list. I noticed that one or two of them made only a squiggle. What kind of people could not spell their own name? When my turn came, Shields held up the pay envelope in front of my face like a bone to a dog.