‘The very fastest you can do the journey to Scotland is two days, but that’s without stopping for the night and I don’t advise it. I suggest you break your journey at least a couple of times – take four or five days over it.’ He leaned over me to pull a map of Britain out of the side pocket of the carriage door. Spreading it out over his knees, he traced the route north for us. ‘The stagecoach stops every fifteen miles or so to change horses, which means you’ll have plenty of inns to choose from. When we get to Cambridge, I’ll send my man to purchase tickets and make enquiries about the best inns.’
Gazing out the window to admire the golden boughs that arched over the road, I reflected how splendid it would be to have staff at my beck and call. Frank took such things for granted, but having someone else sort out the mundane details of life was a luxury worth even more than a well-sprung carriage.
After an early dinner at an inn in Saffron Walden, we rumbled into Cambridge at dusk. It seemed an unlikely city, spiking out of the flat fenland in a crop of towers and elegant colleges. Unlike the press of traffic, beggars and working folk that thronged the streets of London, Cambridge seemed relatively empty, the lanes given over to flocks of rich young men intent on making a nuisance of themselves. The carriage rattled on the cobbles and drew to a halt outside an impressive gateway with two little turrets standing guard either side. The first thing I noticed was the statue of one of my least favourite kings, the wife-murdering Henry, over the large centre doors. With his left foot a little forward, peeking over the ledge, he looked as if he was about to cut a caper. Two irreverent stone lions guarded a shield underneath him with their tongues stuck out at all passers-by, I thought them most comical.
Frank jumped out, making the carriage rock. ‘Wait here a moment. I’m just going to have a word with the porter.’
I craned my head out of the window and watched him disappear under the archway through a smaller door. Black-robed students flapped in and out of the portal like bats entering and leaving their cave. Frank came back in a trice, beaming.
‘I’ve arranged a room for you with the porter’s family. They live opposite College. If you would like to settle in, I’ll fetch Charlie.’
I glimpsed through the gateway a tempting stretch of green sward and elegant wide paths. There lay hidden the forbidden fruit of male scholarship – but I was Eve’s daughter, Reader, and tempted to taste. ‘I’ve come all this way, Frank. Can’t I see your college?’
Frank glanced around as if checking whether or not he could be overheard. ‘I can’t take a lady in without permission from the dean, Cat. It’s a bit late to go and ask him now.’
I raised a brow.
He took one look at my face and groaned. ‘Oh, all right, I’ll think of something. I meant to show you my set of rooms; I just hadn’t worked out how.’
That was more like it. I grinned my approval.
Frank ran his hands through his hair, a little exasperated. ‘You can be dashed manipulative sometimes, you know, Cat?’
I looked at him in innocent wonderment. ‘What? Me? Did I say anything, Bridgit?’
The Irish girl shook her head and laughed. ‘No, that you did not.’
‘See!’
‘You don’t have to say anything,’ grumbled Frank. ‘You just have to fix me with those big green eyes of yours and I find myself doing all sorts of ridiculous things. I’ll call to fetch you in about an hour.’
Exactly sixty minutes later Mrs Grandley, our hostess, knocked politely on the door to our chamber.
‘Miss Royal, there are two gentlemen waiting for you.’
‘Coming?’ I asked my companion.
Bridgit was stretched out on the bed, relishing the clean cotton sheets and soft feather mattress. She shook her head.
‘No, thank you. They’re your friends. Mrs Grandley has said I could have a bath in the kitchen.’
Leaving her to be pampered, I jumped down the stairs and burst into the little front parlour of this higgledy-piggledy lodging house. The two occupants seemed to fill the entire space, their heads brushing the low-beamed ceiling, long academic gowns sweeping almost to the floor. As tall as each other, the young Cambridge scholars made an impressive sight – black pillars of wisdom and learning. At least that was the appearance; reality was rather more fun.
‘Charlie!’ I launched myself at my old school-friend, giving him a hug before remembering my manners. I pushed back and bobbed a curtsey. He still had a mop of black hair which he now clubbed back in a ribbon.
‘Tom Cat!’ Charlie laughed with delight and caught me up in a second hug, refusing to go all formal. ‘I can’t believe how my little brother has grown into such an intrepid traveller. France, America, the Caribbean – I’ve been quite agog at your antics!’
‘And now Scotland,’ chipped in Frank.
‘And I understand we only have your company for a day.’ Charlie pulled a sad face.
‘Unfortunately, yes,’ I replied.
He reached for my hand. ‘Come on then – don’t you want to see our college?’
‘I’d love to, but Frank mumbled something about it not being allowed.’ I rolled my eyes in disgust.
Charlie smiled. ‘It’s not. But when has that ever stopped us?’
Frank stepped forward at this point and shook out a third robe with a flourish. ‘In honour of past adventures, I borrowed this from one of the gentleman commoners – it should do the trick.’
Charlie produced an academic cap and plonked it on my head. ‘Good job it’s getting dark, or no one would mistake you for an undergraduate.’
Suitably disguised, I followed my friends through the hallowed portals and into the hidden world beyond. We emerged into a huge courtyard, almost as big as Covent Garden, I would guess, but without the clutter of stalls and people. The atmosphere was hushed, somewhat like a cathedral cloister. A rook cawed as it perched on one of the pinnacles that decorated the buildings like a row of Indian arrowheads. Students hugged the paths around the edge of the Great Court, leaving the perfect green lawns unsullied by their feet. I peered at a little sign sticking out of the ground. It stated in no uncertain terms that undergraduates were not allowed on the grass. How perfectly silly! I felt an irrepressible desire to do something outrageous. I recognized that feeling: it had never done me any good but I could not stop myself.
‘Frank, Charlie – I’m sorry but I just have to.’
Before they could grab me, I chucked Charlie my hat and took a run, leaping the low barrier. Six perfect cartwheels later I was back on the path, still running, this time fleeing the shouts of an outraged porter. The long legs of Frank and Charlie caught up with me and they hauled me into a doorway and up a flight of stairs. I arrived outside their set, out of breath but immensely pleased with myself.
Frank pushed me inside. ‘The idea of the disguise was to make you less conspicuous, Cat.’
‘But where’s the fun in that, hey?’
Frank raised his eyes heavenward. ‘Give me strength!’
‘I can’t believe you just did that,’ Charlie marvelled. ‘You’ve broken more college rules in five minutes than I’ve managed in a month.’
‘Missed me, have you?’ I grabbed the cap back and skimmed it to the peg by the door. It fell perfectly in place and I applauded myself.
‘Course we have,’ laughed Charlie. ‘Now, tell me everything while I make us some toast.’
The stay in Cambridge was all too short. After a day’s rest, Bridgit and I climbed inside the Edinburgh mail in the yard of the coaching inn. Frank had insisted on treating us to this conveyance rather than the slower stage, saying he felt happier knowing that we were travelling with the well-armed guard who looked after the mail sack. Highwaymen were known to be active on the Great North Road and Frank said he did not want to be responsible for subjecting a poor innocent thief to the experience of trying to rob Cat Royal.
Once free of city traffic, the mail set a cracking speed – about ten miles an hour from the rapidity with wh
ich the waymarkers flashed by. An astonishing pace and one our grandparents’ generation would find difficult to imagine. Not as comfortable as Frank’s carriage, the mail was still relatively smooth, making light work of the turnpike roads. The bugle sounded frequently to warn other travellers of our approach and we would gallop by, leaving lumbering carts in our dust. As the flat lands of Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire fell behind, we were more frequently asked to alight to assist the horses in climbing particularly steep hills. Once, as we crossed what seemed an unending stretch of boggy moorland somewhere near York, we all had to help push when a wheel got stuck in a rut three feet deep. But all in all we made excellent progress. The hostlers at the coaching inns had horse changes down to a fine art, the swiftest being but three minutes by the pocket watch of the lawyer who sat opposite us for a long stretch of the journey in Yorkshire.
Moors gave way to rolling green dales: grazing sliced up into an uneven patchwork quilt by grey stone walls; the steep fells were home to shepherds, stubborn sheep and little else. Cottages snuggled in valleys or in the shelter of trees, hinting of harsher winters and bitter winds this far north. In Northumberland, we passed an earth bank littered with tumbled stones. Hadrian’s Wall according to a friendly cleric – boundary of the Roman Empire, last bastion of civilization.
‘Beyond this, they’re all savages,’ he joked.
After three days of bone-wearying travel and a coach change in Edinburgh, Bridgit and I finally arrived at the Scottish town of Lanark, both heartily sick of being constantly on the move. Our bags were thrown down at our feet and the coach rumbled onwards, bound for Glasgow.
Bridgit put her hands on her hips and gazed round the marketplace, crowded with people coming and going, their pattens and boots clacking on the dark cobbles. I rubbed the small of my back, feeling my spine would never be quite the same after all that jolting. In the light drizzle that was falling, Lanark did not appear very welcoming. The stallholders were packing up after a morning’s business. The houses were built of sombre grey stone and reminded me of a huddle of Quakers waiting in silent worship around the square. The town was built on a slope and surrounded by steep wooded hills, giving the impression that if the houses did not hang on tight we would all slide off and land in the bottom of the valley like children spilling off a sledge.
‘What now, Cat?’ Bridgit asked.
Mentally giving my spirits a kick, I replied, ‘We find our cotton mill, of course. Let’s ask someone.’
I approached a boy of about my age lounging by a mounting block. He feigned indolence as he chewed on a straw but I’d noted that he had been watching us closely ever since we got off the coach. He had a book stuffed in the pocket of his jacket and a pair of steel-rimmed glasses hanging from a buttonhole in his waistcoat. I took these signs to mean he was educated, which in turn would hopefully mean he would have wit enough to help us.
‘Excuse me, can you direct us to the mill?’ Even to my ears, my voice sounded obviously and ridiculously English compared to the locals.
The boy spat out the stalk and rubbed his freckled nose as if pausing to translate my question.
‘Ye’ll be wanting New Lanark?’*
‘Er, I think so. Is that where the mill is?’
‘Aye.’
‘Can you show us?’
The boy grinned, displaying his crooked front teeth. ‘I can –’ I opened my mouth to thank him, but he laughed – ‘but I didna say I would.’
Too tired for teasing, Bridgit turned away. ‘Leave him – he’s no use at all.’
‘Nae use? I ken the place like the back of my hand. I live there. Ye’ll find nae one better to show ye.’
‘Maybe, but we want someone willing,’ I replied. ‘And as you so obviously have an important task here today keeping that mounting block company, we’ll bid you good day,’ adding under my breath, ‘blockhead.’
He whipped a cap up off the stone and shoved it on his scruffy hair. ‘Stop all yer bletherin’ and come along wi’ me.’ He strutted off without pausing to see if we were following, like a master striding in front of recalcitrant pupils.
I looked at Bridgit, who shrugged.
‘Seems the professor has changed his mind.’ I picked up my bag. ‘Let’s not lose him.’
We caught up with our unhelpful guide as he turned down a road leading out of town.
‘The mill – is it far?’ I panted.
‘Very far for sapsie Sassenachs.’ He refused to look at us.
I guessed this was an insult. ‘And for un-sapsie ones?’
‘No so far.’
‘Good.’
‘What you want wi’ the mill?’
‘Employment. What else?’
‘It’s sair-work, no for soft lasses.’
‘We’re not soft.’
He shrugged as if he doubted my word but did not feel it worth the bother of arguing.
Bridgit gave me an expressive look and took over the interrogation.
‘What’s your name?’ she asked, deftly diverting him from our little quarrel.
He seemed to respond well to her quietly spoken question and gave her a smile. ‘Jamie Kelly, miss. And yers?’
Bridgit swiftly introduced us.
‘Pleased to meet ye, Miss O’Riley.’ He removed his cap then clamped it back on his head. ‘I’m always happy to be o’ service to a bonny lass.’
‘Why, thank you, Mr Kelly.’ Bridgit laughed at his compliment. He blushed, the redness creeping up his cheeks to the roots of his dark copper hair. ‘And what do you do at the mill?’
‘Faither’s a mechanic; he looks after Mill Number Two. It’s a very important position.’ He tucked his thumbs in the pocket of his waistcoat and swaggered a little. I hid a smile.
‘I do not doubt it,’ Bridgit assured him. ‘And you? Do you work in the mill?’
He shook his head. ‘Nae, I go to the mill day-school. Faither wants me to be a mechanic wi’ him so I need schooling, he says.’
I wrinkled my nose in doubt. ‘So why aren’t you there now, Master Kelly?’
‘We had a test so I decided to troon school the day.’ He met my eye in a challenge, daring me to criticize. ‘And if ye tell my faither or the dominie I’ll never forgive ye.’ Perhaps he wasn’t as devoted a scholar as his appearance suggested.
I waved his threat away. ‘If you play truant, Jamie Kelly, that’s your affair. Miss O’Riley and I couldn’t care less.’
We walked on for at least a mile until we reached the top of a hill overlooking a wooded river valley. The air was soft with misty rain, like a gauze curtain over a stage backdrop.
‘Take a keek o’ that, Miss O’Riley.’ Jamie addressed himself to my companion; it appeared he had given me up as a bad lot. ‘That’s what ye came all this way to see.’
‘Keek?’ I snorted.
‘That means “look”, Miss Priss,’ Jamie sneered.
Down below we could make out the dark slate roofs of buildings snaking along the edge of the riverbank, somewhat like the warehouses on the Thames. Nearest the water stood a vast manufactory, walls pierced by many windows in six rows. It struck me as outlandish to see such a modern building of regular lines set down in this once Arcadian spot, like a giant child’s playbricks dropped out of the sky. Even from our bird’s-eye view, I could hear the rumble and clank of machinery. Set a little higher up the slope were a couple of fine houses and several long rows of cottages. I could just glimpse the gardens, bright with autumn flowers and vegetables, behind the workers’ homes. Everything looked neat and gave the impression of a well-ordered enterprise, but for the moment I could see no workers.
‘Where is everyone?’ Bridgit asked, her thoughts travelling a similar path to mine.
‘They willna be out till seven. Then ye’ll see them.’
As the working day was far from over, it seemed that we would have a chance to apply to the owner today. I fingered my letter of recommendation tucked in my pocket.
‘Where might I find Mr Dale???
? I asked Jamie.
‘Mr Dale, is it?’ Jamie laughed. ‘The maister doesna want to be fashed wi’ the likes of ye. Ye go see the overseer if ye want work.’
‘No, I want to see Mr Dale himself. I have a letter for him.’
‘Ye think me a gowk? A snippie lass wi’ a letter for the maister – what clamjamphry is that!’
I was beginning rather to enjoy his colourful words, particularly since I knew he would have to eat them all when I produced the lawyer’s recommendation.
‘Well, Master Kelly, this snippie lass intends to see the maister, gowk-laddie or no. Where is he?’
Jamie bristled at my turning of his own insults back on him. ‘This is something I must see. This way.’
He led us down a steep path to the valley bottom and up to the door of a fine house sitting in its own garden – fit for the maister indeed.
‘Go on wi’ ye. Chap the door,’ he dared me.
I lifted the knocker and gave a smart tap. After several moments, a neatly dressed maid opened it.
‘Can I help ye, miss?’ she asked politely.
‘I have a letter for Mr Dale.’ I produced the missive with a flourish, pleased to note Jamie’s mouth agape with surprise; he had not believed in its existence until that moment.
‘Will ye wait a wee while in the parlour, miss? I’ll enquire if the maister can see ye now.’ The maid beckoned Bridgit and myself inside, ignoring Jamie. I gave him a triumphant nod as she shut the door on him. Showing us into the parlour, she took the letter and disappeared down the passage to the rooms at the back of the house.
Left to ourselves, I had time to admire my surroundings. The parlour was of modest size but comfortably furnished. Fine muslin curtains screened the view of the mill while still letting light pass through, giving the room a muted, genteel atmosphere. An embroidery frame waited by the hearth, a pansy half completed in rich purple silk. The walls held family miniatures and local views, including an impressive painting of a waterfall. I peered at the title: Corra Linn. Tiny figures could be seen on the bank admiring the rainbows in the water. If that was in walking distance, I resolved that I too would go and see it before I left Scotland. The waterfall reminded me of my time with the Creek Indians in America, a poignant memory as one of my friends had died by the banks of a much smaller fall – an incident in which I had very nearly lost my life.* But I knew somehow that if I stood where those people were standing, with the spray of Corra Linn wetting my face, I would feel happiness as well as sorrow. I wondered if my adopted Creek family still thought about me and wished me well. My heart told me that they did.