Nancy Carson - Poppy’s Dilemma

Jericho had not bothered Poppy since, either. She noticed his ignoring her, but she was steeped in thoughts of Robert Crawford. It did seem odd, though, that Jericho should suddenly fail to pay her any attention at all after the fuss he made over her at first. Evidently he was just another of the faithless type she’d heard about, the type that blows hot and cold, fickle, unpredictable. For all that, she was a little intrigued. How could somebody show such an obvious interest one day, then turn away from her the next? Maybe she had expressed a little too strongly that she was not like the other girls he’d met, that she was not easy meat. Yet he’d said he rose to such a challenge. Well, he hadn’t risen to this one – and thank goodness.

Another person who had not been near Poppy, although he had not been entirely avoiding her, was Robert Crawford. Actually, he found her totally disarming, which began to worry him seriously. He was torn between leaving her be, because of her lowly upbringing and complete lack of any station in life, and the desire to gaze upon her striking countenance once more. If he could find a plausible excuse to see her again he would. He had considered offering her some help in overcoming the same lowliness that was manifestly dividing them. But how could he help? It would hardly be seemly to give her money, even if he could afford it. He could hardly whisk her away from the encampment and set her up in a lodging house without the world accusing him of keeping a very young mistress, when that was not his intention. Such an accusation would not do his situation any good at all, with all the responsibilities it entailed.

So he didn’t go out of his way to see Poppy. He lacked the excuse. In any case, he didn’t want her to get the wrong idea and think he harboured a romantic interest. How could he possibly be interested in the illegitimate daughter of some navvy who’d had to flee the site to avoid prosecution and likely transportation? Just because her face was angelically beautiful and he couldn’t keep his eyes off her … Just because there was this undeniable grace and elegance behind the rags and tatters and hideous clogs that she wore … He would be a laughing stock. All the same, it was a great sin that that same undeniable grace and elegance would never have the chance to surface and decorate the world. It was a greater sin that her natural intelligence would never have the opportunity to shine through. Could it not be nurtured somehow and put to good use, at least for the benefit of the navvy community, if not for society in general?

If only he could devise some way of helping her without compromising either of them. She was worthy of help, that Poppy Silk. She deserved better than the unremitting mediocrity of the life she led. She warranted something more uplifting than constant exposure to the crushing, unrestrainable coarseness and brutality of the navvies’ encampment to which she was shackled. But what? How could he, a mere engineer, possibly help her ?

And then he had an idea.

On the first Saturday of June, as it was approaching yo-ho – the time when navvies finished their work – Sheba and Poppy were sweating over the copper. Lottie and Rose, Sheba’s younger daughters, were outside in the sunshine. Her son, Little Lightning, was still at work. Each man’s dinner was wrapped in a linen cloth and boiled in the copper, tied to a stick from which it hung. Because the women could not read, each stick bore identifying notches. If a stick had five notches cut into it, it belonged to Tweedle Beak. If it had three notches it was Waxy Boyle’s, and so on.

They chatted as they worked, speculating on how much Crabface Lijah had paid for his bit of beef and a few spuds, how much Brummagem Joe’s lamb shank had cost, which he was intending having with a cabbage that was also netted in the copper.

Poppy looked up at the clock over the outside door and saw that it was five minutes to one. ‘I expect we shall be trampled underfoot in a few minutes,’ she said, anticipating the hungry navvies.

‘Here,’ said Sheba. ‘Have this key and unlock the barrel ready. They’ll be red mad for their beer as well.’

Poppy took the key and unlocked the barrel. No sooner had she done it than the door opened and Tweedle Beak stepped inside, carrying a dead rabbit.

‘Cop ote o’ this and skin and gut it, young Poppy, wut? I’ll have it for me dinner with a few taters. And doh forget to tek the yed off.’

Poppy looked at the sad, limp thing with distaste. Drawing and skinning dead animals was not her favourite pastime, but she took it from Tweedle and dropped it into the stone sink.

‘All right if I help meself to a jar o’ beer?’ Tweedle enquired.

‘So long as you give me the money first,’ Poppy replied.

He lifted a mug from a hook that was screwed into a beam above his head and began to fill it from the barrel. ‘Yo’ll have yer money, have no fear. I’ll tot up how many I’n had and pay your mother after. Eh, Sheba?’

Sheba turned around from her copper. ‘I’d rather I totted it up meself.’

‘Never let yer down yet, have I?’

‘No. You’m one of the decent ones, Tweedle. Any road, the first time you don’t pay will be the last.’

Tweedle uttered a rumble of laughter. ‘Yo’m a fine, spirited wench and no two ways, Sheba,’ he said, stepping up to her from the barrel and slapping her backside. ‘And yo’ve got a fine arse an’ all, eh?’

‘My arse is my own business,’ Sheba proclaimed, feigning indignation at his familiarity. ‘So just you keep your hands to yourself.’

Poppy noticed with surprise that her mother had blushed, and pondered its significance. Tweedle laughed again, and the facial movement seemed to make his long nose even more pointed.

He swigged at his beer eagerly then looked over to Poppy. ‘Hast skinned me bit o’ rabbit yet?’

Poppy said that she had, and reached for a chopper that was hanging on a nail, to sever its head. Already, there was blood and entrails on her hands.

Tweedle refilled his mug. ‘Yo’m a decent wench an’ all, young Poppy …’Cept for yer damned cheek,’ he said with a matey grin.

Poppy placed the skinned rabbit on the wooden table and hacked its head off. Then she picked up the head and threw it into a pail that was standing on the floor beside her to collect the rest of the kitchen debris. She drew the innards like an experienced butcher and cleaned inside the carcass while Tweedle watched.

‘Yo’d mek somebody a lovely wife, young Poppy, and that’s the truth. Her’s got the mekins, Sheba, wouldn’t yer say?’

‘Oh, she’s got the makings and no two ways.’

‘Her’d be a heap of fun in bed an’ all, I’ll wager. Bist thou a-courtin’ yet, Poppy?’

‘No.’

‘Has nobody tried to bed thee? Nobody fought over thee?’

‘No.’ She looked up at Tweedle with a steady gaze that belied her years, to add emphasis to her response.

‘What a mortal bloody waste—’

There was a knock on the door and it opened. Dandy Punch, the timekeeper, thrust his head round the jamb. ‘Rent day,’ he called officiously. ‘Have you got some money for me this week, Sheba?’

Sheba had not been looking forward to this visit. Resignedly, she dried her hands on her apron and went to the door. ‘You can come inside if you want to.’

Dandy Punch stepped inside. At once his eyes fell on Poppy, who was wrapping the skinned rabbit in the linen, ready to hang it in the copper with Tweedle Beak’s potatoes.

‘It’s three weeks since Lightning Jack sloped off,’ Dandy Punch said. ‘Now you owe rent to the company for five weeks. Unless you pay me today, Sheba, I have to tell you you’m to be evicted.’

Evicted … Sheba sighed heavily, well aware that if she was evicted she would have no alternative but to go on tramp, taking her children with her. They would have to sleep rough under the stars. If they failed to locate Lightning Jack – a likely situation – they would be picked up in some town or village as vagrants and shipped off to the nearest workhouse. Almost certainly she would be separated from her children, and they would all have to wear workhouse clothes to set them apart from everybody else. But this was what it had come to, and she could not afford to wait for Lightning any longer. Why hadn’t he come back? Didn’t he realise the predicament his absence would put her in?