Trapped In She Town : A Romantic Novella (The Jute Mills Series)

Mary Johnston flew
into the country lane leading back to the village of Summerhill with her heart
singing. She ran through the fiery, red and orange leaves that were starting to
fall from the elm and sycamore trees that bordered the lane. The wind was just
starting to whip at her clothes and hair. The green, shapeless, woollen dress
that she wore couldn’t disguise her slim, shapely figure as she tore along,
head thrown back and a huge face-splitting grin across her beautiful,
unblemished face. As usual her long, wild and untamed, chestnut hair was
breaking free from the pins that struggled to hold it in place, and was
tumbling down out of her bonnet, round her face and shoulders. She kicked the
autumnal leaves with joy; she just couldn’t believe it was true. George Cassidy
had actually brought up the subject of marriage. Of course, he had only
tentatively mentioned it – he would want to ask Mary’s father properly for the
hand of his daughter - but he had definitely said that he wanted to marry her -
little Mary Johnston.

George, a farm
labourer, had been given an afternoon free from the fields, because of the
successful completion of the harvesting the week before, and had asked Mary to
accompany him on a picnic. She had begged her mother and father to allow her to
go. Not only did she feel like she needed a rest from the continual household
chores that were required of her, but her heart always skipped a beat when she
saw the handsome, rugged face of George. Her parents also knew how hard she
toiled in the house, that they eventually relented and said she could go.

“As long as you’re
home by three thirty to get the evening meal prepared” her father had given in
gruffly.

It was now twenty past
and she would need to fly like the wind to make it the two miles back to the
cottage. She knew she would never make it in time but nothing could dampen her
spirits today even the light rain that had started to fall.

It had been a beautiful
autumn day and she could still see the lovely picnic that George had laid out,
and hear the musical song of the blackbirds in the trees that bordered the
field where they had laid down the picnic rug. They had both talked about their
mornings. George had told Mary about the sick calf he was tending and how the
mother wouldn’t stop bellowing until she saw her baby. She in turn told George
of the mayhem of her morning; the chores that she had rushed to complete, in
double quick time, so she could get away early to meet him. He laughed loudly
as she described getting tangled up in the bed sheets as she had tried to pin
them onto the wash line, before he hesitantly turned the conversation around to
the future - their future to be precise.

She could hardly
breathe when he had mentioned the word marriage and and that she was the only
girl he ever wanted to marry. Trying to stay calm and grinning from ear to ear
she told him that she did not want anything else in the world except to marry
George. However, she also had to explain with a sinking heart, that she
couldn’t leave her mother and father yet as she was needed at home to help with
the chores and her younger siblings. Her sister Beth would not leave school
until the next summer when she would be able to take over the household tasks.
So Mary would not be free to leave home and marry George until the next summer.

“I’ll understand if
you don’t want to wait that long” she said in a shaky, little voice.

George had suddenly
jumped to his feet and grabbed her up, into his strong, muscular arms, twirling
her round and round. “Of course I can wait until next summer, silly“ he
responded and Mary’s heart soared once again.

But now she had to
stop dilly dallying and get home. Why hadn’t she left earlier? She knew how
long the trip back to the village was and now the rain was coming down in
bucketfuls. She should never have let George detain her past 3 o’clock, but it
was so hard to wrench herself from his strong, manly embrace and she turned red
as she remembered the intensity of his kisses as she tried to leave. Her skin
felt raw around her mouth where his stubble had rubbed and chafed. He had
looked at her with such longing that all she wanted to do was collapse into his
arms and sink back down on to the rug with him.

Suddenly, she heard
the sound of a horse’s hooves coming along the lane and stood aside to allow
the horse and cart to pass. It was Tom Moffat the baker from the village.

“Hop on board, young
Mary – you off home?” Tom shouted.

“I am, Tom. You’re a
lifesaver. My Da would have had my guts for garters if I wasn’t home to start
peeling the spuds by half past.”  Mary laughed her face shining with happiness.

“How’s your mother
doing?” asked Tom.

“Well, she still seems
really exhausted, Tom. She hasn’t risen from bed yet, this time round.”

Mary’s face took on a
graver expression at the thought of her mother. She had given birth two days
before to a sickly baby brother and she had also lain in bed for two months
before the birth, on the doctor’s orders. She knew her father was really
worried about her.

But her big, gruff,
lovable father was also sick. His plough had tumbled down an incline last year,
with him still strapped to it, and he had badly twisted his back. He still had
to hobble to work each day though, so the family could eat. However when Mary
got home, to her surprise, her mother was up and peeling the potatoes at the
sink. She looked so pale and exhausted that Mary quickly took off her coat and
hurried over to her mother saying “Let me do that mother you shouldn’t be
peeling the spuds.”

“What else was she
going to do when you are out gallivanting” her father grumbled.

 "But Da, you
know I just took an afternoon to go and see George. He wants to marry me you
know" she burst out.

"Marry you!” her
father replied and shot a quick look at Mary’s mother. “We'll have to see about
that won’t we. You know you are needed in this house while your Ma is sick. I
should not expect to come home from a hard day toiling in the fields to have no
potatoes peeled. The children will be home from school soon”.

“Da! I’m peeling them
now.” Mary replied “I have already told George that I am needed here. But
surely come next summer when Beth finishes school I can be relieved and allowed
to marry George.”

Again, Mary saw the
look that shot between her mother and father, before her father said ”We’ll
talk of this at a later date, Mary.”

“George wants to do it
right, Da. He wants to come and ask you for my hand. I’m sure he just got
excited today when he mentioned it to me. We are so in love and...”

“Enough Mary!”
bellowed her father.

~~~

Mary was the eldest of
6 children, not including the newborn William, and since she had left school
last year at 17, she had been helping her mother with the household chores.
Mary’s teacher had wanted her to stay on and continue her education. She had
been the brightest child in the school however she was now needed at home.
There was always so much to do, especially since her mother had taken to bed,
and she did not seem to be getting any better.

Mary had been stepping
out with George for six months. He was the only child of a tenant farmer and
was expected to take over the tenancy when his father retired in 2 years time.
He was 6’1” tall with broad shoulders and a handsome, chiselled face with dark
brown hair that flopped in waves over his deep chocolate brown eyes.

Monday started out
like any other day for Mary. She was up at 6am to wash herself and then out to
collect the eggs from the hens that her mother kept. She made breakfast for her
siblings and after they had set off for school she started on her day’s chores
- Monday was washing day and that meant the strenuous task of washing the
bedclothes. Mary’s sore, chapped hands were already beginning to show signs of the
hard work she was getting used to. She would set the kettle to boil on the fire
and then stripped the bedclothes from all of the beds, ready for washing. She
poured the hot water into the big wooden tub which was out in the back yard and
got the big bar of soap from the kitchen and shaved off a piece to put in the
tub. She took one of the large white sheets and started to scrub. Mary loved to
sing as she did her chores as she found that this helped her to keep going when
her arms ached from all the scrubbing. Then she had to get the old wrench out
of the shed and feed the sheets through it one by one. Once she had them
wrenched, she hung them out to dry in the sunshine. Today was a lucky day she
thought to herself, as the sun was out and shining brightly. If it had been the
usual grey drizzle of March she would have had to carry the sheets into the
kitchen and hang them up there. However, this made the sweeping and cleaning
inside difficult with the damp sheets hanging around never quite drying.

In the afternoon after
serving some soup to her Mother, Mary swept the front room and the 2 small
bedrooms. One room for her mother, father and baby William. The other for her
and all her siblings. She shared a bed with her sisters Beth and Lizzie while
the boys shared a bed on the other side of the room. Luckily none of them had
many belongings as there was nowhere to store them.

Once the sheets were
dried and back on the beds, Mary would start the preparations for the evening
meal. Things had been getting very tough for the Johnston family since her
father had had his accident last year, and he was now often away from his
plough work sick. His back could no longer take the strain. The farmer, Mr
Brown tried to keep the job open for him, as he had been such a good worker in
the past, but had told him last week that he couldn’t have any more days away
from work. So her father hobbled away up the lane towards the farm each morning
with his face set against the pain.

Mary was getting to be
a dab hand at making the food go further. Tonight again there would be no meat
so she would make an omelette from the eggs she had collected this morning,
adding any vegetables she could find to make it go further.

She had noticed all
her brothers and sisters getting thinner over the last few months, but most of
all she had noticed her mother. Since giving birth to William her mother Agnes
had never really recovered her strength and now spent most days in bed. Mary
thought to herself that tonight she would eat less of her meal and keep some
extra for her mother.

Suddenly the door
banged open and there was her brother James in the doorway, quickly followed by
the rest of her siblings. The peace of the house was shattered with the noise
as they all tumbled in the door of the little cottage, which suddenly seemed to
be bursting at the seams. The evening meal was a noisy affair and afterwards
Mary's brothers and sisters would help to clear the table and wash and dry the
dishes. Evenings were usually spent in front of the fire, sewing and mending
clothes - so all the clothes could be handed down to younger members of the
family. Everyone would tell their tales from the day. This had always been
Mary's favourite time of day, even although her body ached from the tiredness
of her day’s work; she loved hearing all her siblings stories.

However tonight, as
the last of the dishes were being put away in the kitchen, Mary's father and
mother came into the room and told all the children to go through to the front
room, except Mary. They sat Mary down at the table and explained that her
father had been talking to Mary's old school teacher, Mrs Pryce, in the
village. There was a vacancy in a large house in Dundee - a very prestigious
post. It was about 90 miles away, however her father explained that they desperately
needed the money that Mary would earn in the house. He was unsure how much
longer he would be able to work and so they would need an additional income to
ensure there was food on the table. Beth would leave school three months
earlier than originally planned to take over Mary’s household chores.