The Railway Girls Read online

  Author’s Note

  The Railway Girls is a reissue of my second novel, originally published in 1997 under my original name, Helene Wiggin as Trouble on the Wind. Now that I am better known as Leah Fleming, I’m keeping life simple by sticking to that name.

  The novel has its origins in the fight to save the Settle to Carlisle Railway from closure. It was written to celebrate its reprieve.

  Leah Fleming

  Travel northwards via the Settle to Carlisle route and you will cross the Ribblehead Viaduct over Batty Green Moss to Blea Moor, Arten Gill, Dent Head and beyond. Nature has erased the brief presence of ‘navvy time’. Nothing remains of our shantytowns but tracks etched into the turf, spoilheaps overgrown; in lonely village kirkyards rest the bones of us rough men and women who battled against the ferocious climate to build this iron road of blood.

  Our spirits roam over the fells like sheep and lament like curlews in the wind. Hear our voices, marvel at our deeds and pray for our salvation.

  Glossary

  bogtrotter

  a tramp

  boggart

  a ghost, often mischievous

  bowdykite

  a mischief-maker

  to blether

  to talk

  to bray

  to fight

  clacking

  gossiping

  dock

  a navvy’s lodgings

  to mash

  make a brew of tea

  flayed

  frightened

  flummoxed

  confused

  to jack

  give up

  kelpie

  water sprite

  ragabash

  ne’er-do-well

  scuddies

  naked

  shippon

  cowshed

  to slope

  to leave without notice

  taws

  marbles

  wick

  quick and lively

  wishin’ dance

  kiss and cushion dance

  The Gathering

  April 1871

  Rattle his bones over the stones,

  Only an old navvy, nobody owns . . .

  Chapter One

  Tat! Come back here, yer daft hound! Tat! I’ll give yer what for when I catch you! Tatty Widdup . . .’ yelled a small girl into the wind as she raced across the open fells towards a distant streak of brown whippet leaping over the grey stone walls, sniffing out the scent of rabbit warrens and the flash of white bobtails scurrying for cover underground.

  Tizzy Widdup wrapped her shawl tightly across her chest against the stiffening April breeze, picking up her sackcloth skirt which was sticking between her knees, hindering her struggle uphill, cursing to herself. Trust Tat to dive off as soon as she untied him from the handcart.

  The family had only just arrived at the makeshift navvy camp high on the West Riding fells. Granda Fettle made a beeline for the ale hut to wet his whistle, while her sister, Mally, leapt off to see if there was news of their father, Ironfist, and his tunnel gang in the camp. Tizzy was just unloading the tent when the tripehound darted off leaving muggins to follow suit.

  Now he was just a speck on the horizon and the sky was banking up storm clouds. There were sheep dotted on the rough grass like boulders with cottonfluff lambs cowering under their udders for cover as she approached. Tizzy scanned the open spaces fenced by sturdy stone walls which crisscrossed the fellsides, mysteriously disappearing over the brow of each hill. She had never been so far north before. It was a fearsome spot.

  When I get hold of him, he’ll get such a wallop, panted Tizzy, closing in wearily as the dog stopped in his tracks with one paw raised, ears pricked, catching her call for a second. Tat turned round, his tail curved under his hind legs, sensing trouble from his mistress.

  Suddenly from a gap in the stone wall boundary a young man in shirtsleeves and thick breeches dashed forward ranting and cursing, throwing a rock at Tat, stunning the animal. The dog staggered for a second, then keeled over and yelped. Just enough time for his assailant to close in to knock him down, hammering at his skinny body with a stick.

  ‘Stop! Stop it!’ screamed Tizzy, frantic to prevent the brutal onslaught. ‘He’s only a pup . . . He won’t do no harm. Please, sir, please . . .’ The man was venting his fury, oblivious to her pleas, hitting the dog into the ground. Tizzy pulled at his shirt, beating him. ‘Oh please, sir, give over. He won’t harm yer sheep!’

  ‘That’s what they all say so I’m seeing this one off for good. Are you blind? Can’t you see there’s lambs in this field and we’ve lost enough already?’ He wiped his brow, vengeance satisfied; a lad in his twenties with thick thighs and a pudgy face dotted with fiery pustules, gathered in red clumps across his cheeks, still weeping from a recent shave.

  Tizzy bent over Tat, horrified. The dog was panting, prostrate, but still tried to wag its tail at the sight of her. Tears were rolling down her face, tears of rage at being too small to attack the man, tears of fear that he might start on her next.

  ‘Gerroff this field and take that scrap of bones with you. If I see you anywhere near these fells again, I’ll take me belt to you as well.’ Tizzy stood stock-still, staring at the young man whose greasy black hair fell over his face like rat’s tails.

  ‘Are you deaf or summat?’ said the lad, unnerved by her fierce stare. ‘That’ll teach you navvy scumbags to keep out of Scarsdale and off our land. Go on . . . get back to yer sod huts where you belong, scarper.’

  Tizzy was rooted to the spot. Instinctively she pulled out the magic dagger which Dad had once found in a drained lake. It was tied with rope around her waist like a belt, looped together with her bag of marbles and a bunch of tail feathers: all her precious collection of treasures. She fixed her eyes, dark as wet slate, sternly on his face. ‘I’m telling of you, telling my dad and his gang. My dad’s a tunnel tiger with fists like hammers and he’ll come and get you for what you done to Tat. So there!’

  Then Tizzy spat on the knife and slowly made wild zigzag patterns in the air with trembling hands, trying to remember Owd Granny Reilly’s spellings; the pedlar woman had shown her secret runes and signs to ward off warts and the evil eye. Now a strange power was coming over her, lifting her high off the ground.

  ‘Eeny, meeny, miney, mo. As God is the witness, a curse on you shall go. As you did so shall be done to you and worse. So there!’ Tizzy spat out, hoping her made-up words sounded solemn, powered by the sound of the hammering stick on Tat’s poor back. She stood her ground.

  For a second the farmer was transfixed and stepped back at the sight of the wild-eyed child sprouting braids the colour of dried leaves, circling round him with a knife, cursing him to heaven. She was nobbut a skinny lass in a flour-bag skirt and filthy shirt. She looked as if she had not had a wash for weeks and her face was grimy but there was something in the way her eyes flashed. He stepped forward to cuff her but she was too wick.

  ‘Don’t you touch me. Don’t you dare! You’re dead.’ Tizzy took her shawl and tenderly covered the bleeding dog, wrapping him tightly, cradling him across her back like the camp women carried their bairns.

  As she trundled back down the fellside on the mossy turf, she was deaf to the curlew’s bubbling call and skylark’s soaring, blind to the beauty of the majestic Yorkshire peaks, emerald and golden against the clearing skies. One thought only possessed her as she bent forward to give Tat a softer ride.

  It’s all my fault. If I could have run faster, caught up with Tat, but these stupid skirts held me back. Why are girls so weak and useless? If only I’d been a lad . . . our Billy would have rescued Tat. But Billy was dead and she had no other brothers to call on. Mally was useless. She had breasts and they wobbled
when she ran. Mally liked being a girl and skivvying, curling her hair and eyeing up the navvy lads. Mally was stupid like that.

  It’s not fair blaming Tat for what he never done. How was he to know the farmer hated navvy dogs? She was fed up of being cursed and spat at just because they tramped the streets to earn a living. Tizzy knew the daggery looks they got when they arrived in a village, pushing their cart. ‘Here come the rogues and vagabonds. Shut yer door and hide yer childer, navvies’ll steal them like the gypsies.’ Mally would hide her head under her shawl with shame but Tizzy put her tongue out and pretended she did not care.

  At least they had strong boots on their feet, which was more than could be said for some of the name-callers, and her belly was always full of mutton, for navvy men got good wages and huts to live in. They were not beggars living on the poor box. Oh no! The Widdups tramped from site to site following the railways and Dad said that was important work.

  Ironfist told her that the railways would spread all over the country one day, taking goods and passengers from one place to another. He said when a station came to a town then money soon followed and towns were queuing up to buy one. So why was it when they came to build the track or dig embankments no one wanted to have any builders there?

  Now they were stuck in the wildest moorland while the gangs were blasting out tunnels and building bridges through the mountains and over the villages to make the fastest line from London to Scotland. Rumour was that it would take years to build the Settle to Carlisle line, so that meant plenty of work for all.

  Tizzy did not blame Ironfist for losing his family somewhere along the way. Families always trailed behind. His gang would want to find the Midland Railway contractor’s hut and get themselves on site. If only he would send word which part of the seventy-mile track he was on, though. Dad was hopeless with his lettering so they must rely on hearsay and the odd message.

  He didn’t know about Billy and Granny Widdup. He didn’t know how much they needed his money. That was why they had traipsed from Leeds, over Ilkley Moor to Skipton and Settle and up into this godforsaken wilderness to seek him out. She was sick of rumours and false sightings. There must be plenty of work for tunnel miners blasting holes underground with dynamite but no record of Ironfist at Batty Green, the main shantytown. So on they had trudged over drover’s tracks, the cartwheels sticking in the ruts, sleeping in barns, climbing upwards and onwards. Living rough was hard with treacle and porridge, oatcakes, bread and scrape, poaching out of the River Ribble and endless rabbit stew. Sometimes they took turns with fellow travellers to fill the pot and no one went hungry but this journey had been made alone.

  Tizzy was looking forward to settling for the summer even in these wild open spaces. Now she was not so sure. The sound of the stick kept ringing in her ears but she kept on down the track. Anger made her burden light. Once she got Tat back to the tent then she could nurse him better.

  She paused to catch her breath, looking down over the makeshift camp. Already there were muddy tracks carving up the grass fields, spirals of blue smoke curling around the huts on wheels where the contractor had set up offices, buildings dotted higgledy-piggledy on the terraced slopes. She could hear the banging of wooden huts being erected in lines ready for the workmen and their families. The field was on a terraced slope above the valley. Someone had made a bonfire and the smell of woodsmoke wafted upwards.

  In the distance a silver stream snaked through trees in the valley bottom; already the tips were tinged with the first green shoots of spring and the beck shimmered onwards to a village of grey houses, snuggled up together, sleeping in the cold misty morning. The camp would be spreadeagled up the hillside, catching the winds as they whirled off the fellsides, but at least the huts would be on a south-facing slope to glean the best of any warmth going free.

  Once the shanty huts were up, there would be a dry bed and a fire to cook on with perhaps a canteen to cadge from. Mally would sew and mend, turn rabbit skins into waistcoats and fancy muffs and barter them for eggs and old clothing. She was nifty with her fingers. Granda Fettle would join the night soil men clearing out the earth closets, disposing of the middens. It was all he was fit for since he got the stiffness in his joints. His eyesight was feeble but he was still a wizard with metal, fettling up broken kettles, tools, handles and staying up all night to solve a tricky job. ‘Fettler Widdup never gives up on the job’ was his motto but he was as worn as a rubbed rag.

  Tizzy knew he was tired of tramping, of stinking to high heaven with other people’s filth, but someone had to keep the camps clean. It had cost them dear enough last summer when he brought the fever from the reservoir shantytown back to their wagon. They said it came on his clothes and carried off Granny and Billy within a week.

  Then everyone fled and the bodies were buried in a pit and burned. Ironfist stayed away. Granda shrunk two sizes and said little but he must have hollow legs the amount he swallowed in the ale huts after that. He would stagger back, fall asleep and wet himself. That got Mally all steamed up and shouting.

  Everything was going wrong again, Tizzy snivelled, as she reached the tent: just two arched branches and a canvas cover.

  Mally was standing po-faced with her arms folded across her chest, looking stern, with her dark hair scraped back severely making her ears stick out like jug handles. ‘Where’ve you been? I had to do it all myself as usual . . . What on earth!’ Tizzy off-loaded her dog from her back and laid him on the ground.

  ‘Give us a hand, he’s right badly.’ Mally bent down to examine Tat, unwrapping the shawl gently. His eyes were open to the sky, his body warm but breath had long departed from his crushed bones.

  ‘Who did this?’ Mally shook her head sadly and covered him up again.

  ‘No, no, he can’t be dead. Get us some help, quick!’ pleaded Tizzy, desperately trying to find signs of life. ‘We were only up on the tops, doing no harm, and this bloke hits and hits him. He can’t be gone. Oh, let’s get shut of this place, quick, pack up and move on. Dad’s not here, is he?’ Tizzy darted into the tent to collect the pots and blankets.

  ‘Calm down, we’re going nowhere. I’m tired of traipsing on and on. We’re stopping here for a while. Scarsbeck’ll be a good dock for Granda and me. Plenty of huts going up, lots of washing and skivvying and a school perhaps for you. They’re building one of them bridges right over yon village, to keep the line on course; a fancy bridge with brick arches and masonry so there’ll be some decent workmen for a change, ones with tidy ways and clean shirts, well paid to come out to this bleak spot. We could do far worse than settle here for the summer. We’ll find out where Dad is at . . .’ Mally softened her voice to mother her sister. It always worked to calm her down.

  Tizzy backed away in a daze, her tearless eyes transfixed on Tat, her head throbbing. ‘I’ll get that tyke for what he done.’

  ‘What tyke?’ asked Mally, watching her sister pulling at her skirt.

  ‘Farmer in the field what killed our Tat.’ Tizzy darted into the tent, rummaging in the basket where Granda kept his fettling tools. She yanked out a small hacksaw blade and sawed off her two long plaits impatiently. Mally, who had crawled into the tent, gasped with horror as she watched the burnished golden braids drop onto the grass. Tizzy looked down with satisfaction. ‘That’s got rid of them. Fetch me Granda’s shaving tackle.’

  ‘Stop this at once, Matilda Widdup. Have you got moon-fever? What on earth are you cutting off yer lovely hair for? No one will buy it here,’ pleaded Mally as she tried to prise the saw from her hands.

  ‘Shut up! Martha Widdup, can’t you see it’s all my fault? If I were a lad not a stupid girl . . . I’m fed up with being a lass so I’m not going to be one any more. I’ll bury Tat, get mesen a job and find that tyke.’

  ‘You can’t get a job, you dozy brush. You’re only ten.’

  ‘Ten and a half bit, so there. Fats boys carrying grease for the wheels, tea-mashers and nippers running errands. They all have misters who pay them. Who�
�s to know I’m any different?’

  ‘Well I do, and Granda will soon enough. You can’t just pretend to be a lad . . .’ Mally shook her sister roughly.

  ‘Who says I can’t? If I put on Billy’s clothes. The stuff you never burnt. I know they’re still in the flour sack. No one knows us here.’ Tizzy had all her answers pat and looked so fierce, Mally knew better than to argue the toss.

  ‘You’re loony, you are. How will you get away with it . . . goin’ to the bog in front of lads. I bet you haven’t thought about that?’ Mally’s blue eyes flashed, her lips pursed in triumph.

  ‘I have so. I shall use the bushes like I’ve allus done. And I’ll never take me shirt off. Granda’s eyes are bad. He’s always callin’ me Billy Boy, so don’t let on or I’ll tell on you.’

  ‘There’s nowt to tell, our Tizzy,’ sniffed Mally as she stuffed the hair into the sack. It was far too good to be wasted.

  ‘There will be after I’ve finished spinning a tale. Come on, finish me off proper with the shaving blade or I’ll do it mesen and make a right pig’s ear of it.’ Tizzy knelt on the ground and looked so woebegone that Mally felt sorry for her little sister. She clipped the wavy hair as close to the scalp as she dared, leaving some tufts on top. They stuck upright in defiance.

  ‘We’ll have to borrow some Macassar oil to plaster it down. Put this cap on and you’ll get by, I suppose. Oh, Tizzy, what’ve you done to yerself!’

  Tizzy rose in defiance, peeling off her skirt and thick stockings and clogs, putting on Billy’s breeches which smelled damp and musty, stiff and cold. She thought of poor Billy in that burning hole and shuddered. He would understand it was all in a good cause. This way she was free to roam the camp and village unrecognised. Tizzy was going to find Tat’s killer, if only to find out if Owd Granny Reilly’s curses really worked.