A Grumpy Old Man’s Tale 36 Changes Modern and Ancient
It was a Saturday eve, so as usual Gladys, Pete, Harriet and Gustav had all ready for a full house at the Green Dragon Inn,(1) the social centre of Bearthwaite. Gladys and Harriet, her daughter, had all ready for the ladies of the village in the best room and Pete and Gustav, his soon to be son in law, had all ready for the weekly meeting of the Grumpy Old Men’s Society in the taproom. The fires were lit and the hods of coal and logs were filled for the eve. The glasses, barrels and bottles of spirituous beverages of dubious safety and zero legality were ready for thirsty menfolk, though doubtless more would be required before the eve’s drinking had reached its end. Veronica and Harriet had supper on the stoves and in the ovens and it would be ready when required. Harriet had been trying her hand at making Eccles cakes(2) using flaky pastry of her own making and they were on oven trays ready for baking.
The first evidence of customers was the dozen or so dogs entering via the open back door. The dogs went straight into the taproom looking for the bowls of kibble, food scraps and water left for them. Harriet surmised their owners would be expecting Pete, her dad, to be pulling pints within the minute. Pete had a dozen pints ready on the bar before the first of the men walked into the taproom from the rear entrance. There was a front door to the taproom, but it was only used by outsiders. It was considered somewhat effeminate by local men to use it. Perhaps most telling was that none of the dogs ever tried to get into the taproom that way.
As the men walked in, having escorted their womenfolk to the front entrance of the Dragon before following the dogs, Denis seeing the wound on Alf’s forehead when he took his hat off said, “Fuck me that looks nasty, Alf. You took a fair thraping(3) with that, Son. How’d it happen?
“Not sure, Denis. I’ve been using a tarmac tamp to flatten food tins and the like, so they pack down tighter for weighing in at Moss Bay Metals in Workington, for years. I used it the other day and it seemed to spring back on me. Mayhap I didn’t use it square on, but I don’t know for sure. Any hap the bastard rebounded back and twatted(4) me on the forehead and split the skin. There was blood everywhere. Telling you what a friggin mess. However, Ellen sorted me out in a couple of minutes and I was back at work in a quarter of an hour, so it wasn’t too bad.” Alf laught and said, “Nothing a few scoops(5) and some chemic(6) tonight won’t put right, though I’ll admit I’m raring to take Eric at dominoes after the pasting he gave me last week.”
“For fuck’s sake, Alf, you’re too bloody sensitive about brains. Brains aren’t the be all and end all of what matters. We all know you’re the best at mechanical stuff. Don’t kid yourself, despite his education, even Bertie says you’re way better than him when it comes to dreaming up off the wall solutions to tricky problems which is how to earn a living from it.”
Alf interrupted to say, “That’s just down to experience, Denis, and Bertie will get that with age.” Alf laught and said, “And then like every other old bugger he’ll be wishing he had neither. Still I shan’t be here to listen to him moan because I’ll have been dressed in my wooden overcoat with brass handles(7) by then.”
There were laughs of agreement at that and Stan said, “Denis is right, Alf. Okay I admit playing dominoes is different, and I’ll take every opportunity to slaughter you and every other fucker too at that, but win or lose that’s just a game, entertainment, mate. Life is different and you are one of us.” As Stan concluded the rest of the local men were nodding and making comments of agreement.
Alf nodded but said, “You lot just don’t understand how it was for me. I really didn’t get what school was all about. I was the best pupil they’d ever had at woodwork and metalwork, but most of what went on went completely over my head. I was really grateful that for the last two years at school the head allowed me to spend most of my time helping the caretaker and the maintenance men. I hung doors, reglazed broken windows and anything else that needed doing, and I left the day I turned fifteen. Actually I didn’t go in for a month or two before that because I knew the wagman(8) wouldn’t chase me up since I was so close to leaving.”
“Come on, Alf, we know you’re no Einstein, but you’re not thick. The amount of stuff you know is bloody incredible. You’re like an encyclopaedia on growing stuff and making and mending stuff.”
“No. I’m being serious, Stan. Other than learning to read, write and reckon, school was a complete waste of my time, and the teachers’ too. God knows I felt sorry for them, cos they tried with me, they really did, but I just don’t learn anything that way. True I’m not thick, and I agree I do know a lot of stuff, but I learnt it by doing it because it was relevant to what I was doing at the time. I still know stuff from years ago that I’ve never needed since because my memory is pretty good. Straight up though I was so clever at school it was five years after I’d left before I discovered the euthanasia that was being discussed in RE [religious education] wasn’t about kids in India. I’ve never wanted nor needed sympathy because I am what I am and I’ve always been happy about that. Ellen has always been happy with me being what I am, and the kids and grandkids are fine with that too. May hap I’m finally coming to terms with myself, possibly as a result of my contributions during this Covid, but whatever the truth of it I’m happy being me, but I wouldn’t mind being a bit cleverer.” The matter was allowed to drop because all his friends knew Alf would never change. The truth was they too were happy with him just like he was and probably didn’t want him to change because then he wouldn’t be Alf.
Some of the women of Bearthwaite had gone out earlier in the day for shopping and pampering and had enjoyed themselves.
“You’re supposed to be a clever girl, Jane. What do you make of David coming out as Stephanie? Bit of a shock that wasn’t it.” A number of the women at the hair and beauty salon were nodding in agreement with Clarice concerning the surprising event.
Beatrix added, “What I find a little galling is she is so pretty she doesn’t need the services of a place like this. Not fair that.”
There was almost total agreement with that, but Ellery the village hairdresser said in disagreement, “She may not need the services of a place like this, but that doesn’t mean she won’t enjoy them.” There were nods of agreement.
Margaret who was not quite seventy said, “I don’t get it, Jane. At the age of twenty-four with no warning or prior indication at all after finishing university with a first class honours degree in child psychology and a teacher’s ticket on top of it she comes back home to live wearing a rather spectacularly filled out frock, and it was obviously filled with the real thing, announcing she is now Stephanie and she is no longer a work in progress. Mind Penny’s not backward in coming forward regarding her bosom is she? When she came home last time three summers ago it was David who came home not Stephanie, and none had even a hint of suspicion of any changes, so it’s all happened in the last three years years at most. Though I got the impression from Penny that it came as a complete surprise to her and Ian when she came home that they now had a daughter not a son. Naturally and properly enough they are completely supportive and are saying little if anything about it. Ian telt John Stephanie was his child and since she was a girl he’d decided it was all best left to her mum. Penny telt me that it was up to Stephanie to explain or not to whoever she chose and she wasn’t going to risk losing her daughter by telling tales out of turn, which I considered to be right and proper.”
There was a murmur of agreement with that before Margaret continued. “Stephanie is good friends with my granddaughters, three of who went to school with David, and they all come round at least once a week. The girls say they’re just socialising and after a cup of tea, but the truth is they’re decent well reared girls who are checking up that the old folks are still breathing and not in need of anything, just like we did decades ago.” There was a ripple of laughter at that as most of the older women had younger relatives who did the same, and those who hadn’t were visited by the younger relatives of friends with the same intent, but who said their mum had sent them round to see if they wanted anything from the shops. “I like Stephanie, and if I hadn’t known her family since I went to school with all four of her grandparents there’s no way I would have suspected she ever was anything but a pleasant young woman. I know David was never a girl chaser, but he was a perfectly normal and good looking boy and then young man who had his share of girlfriends. He went out with my granddaughter Amy for a while when they were fifteen or sixteen. Then this overnight change happened and it just doesn’t make sense. You’d think there would have been some indication David was different. Even Amy said she was surprised. I reckon that girl is a bit of a dark horse because she was blushing as she said it, so who knows what they’d got up to her make her blush by recalling it. Mind, at that age I suppose it could have been anything.”
“Aye,” agreed Clarice. “I can’t help but wonder what Harriet and Sam Shaw make of it.”
“I don’t know about what Harriet or Samantha make of it,” Beatrix said, “but I do know Elle was impressed that after finishing her education Stephanie returned home to start a play group and early years classes at the library rather than going elsewhere to earn a lot more money. Elle telt me she achieved as highly as any can at the university and gave up a certainty of a high salary outside to gamble that folk here would put their hands in their pockets to support her in return for her looking after and educating their little ones. I know none has ever considered it before, but we’d never manage to provide early years education any other way, so we need to support her because we need what she is offering. There’re any number of young women and girls too who would regard the opportunity to help, even if only part time, as a career opportunity, something to put on their CV,(9) though mayhap many would prefer to stay here.
“It may well be that we need to support any of our young men who may be interested in her too. She is one of us, a proper Bearthwaite woman in every sense, and we need to ensure she remains one of us and stays in Bearthwaite. If she wants to live and work here as a married woman with a family we need to enable that, so we don’t need or want any of our young men worried about what their mates will say if they take up with her. So, Girls, we need to lean on them and lean hard as to how they should react to her. In short the same as they do to any other young, single woman. Agreed? Better still if we can get her set up with one of the local single parents struggling to rear kids. There are any number of them both men and women.” There were nods and expressions of agreement all around. “Anyone know where her interests lie?”
“The girls tell me she is only interested in men and has gone out with a few outsiders for a meal and a drink of a weekend night from time to time,” Margaret replied immediately understanding Beatrix. “There is no indication that she’s interested in women. I think you’re right, Beatrix. We really don’t want her taking up with an outsider and then moving away, so I suggest we put the word out and start doing the necessary. Changing the subject, but still considering Stephanie, Elle suggested a while back that she and Sasha would match any funding that we raised to employ her and if necessary fund converting an old building for her to use rather than the school library which isn’t really big enough, so let’s get to it regarding raising funds too.”
Julie said, “I heard that too. My Stan knows Elle’s old man Sasha well, they’ve been friends for years, and he said that was the way Sasha would do it. We’d have to make the effort to raise money before he’d give us any. Stan says Sasha has more money than you can dream about and he’s a very charitable man, but he’s selective about where he gives it and he likes to see evidence that folk are doing what they can for themselves, which is more than fair enough. We all know that he funded the Green Dragon extensions and refurbishments for the entire village to enjoy and avoid the risk of a chain brewery turning the place into something we wouldn’t like. Stan says that Sasha, Pete and Gustav are as thick as thieves now the brewery is a going concern providing jobs for locals. I reckon that those story tellers that meet at the Dragon are like the local mafia. Still why should we worry; they’re on our side because we feed ’em and sleep with ’em.” There was a great deal of laughter at that, but all present understood. Men were men and completely inexplicable to any woman, but these were their men they were talking about, and every last one of them was a decent human being, the young, the old and all those in between too, but their women had no illusions that life was oft a harsh and unforgiving affair made easier by a good marriage, family and community, They could and willingly did provide what it was their menfolk as men so badly needed to function as providers for themselves and their families down the generations, and as a result they would make sure what their womenfolk required for themselves their children and their descendants too was provided too. It was a trade that went back to the dawning of humanity and was considered to be an equitable and enjoyable one by Bearthwaite women and men alike. It was only ever referred to obliquely, but all knew it boiled down to sex for security and it was not taken lightly by any of the Bearthwaite folk. All knew women ensured their family circumstances ran as smoothly as possible from their beds.
The Bearthwaite women all came from the village of Bearthwaite, which was an isolated, tightly knit community perhaps typically forty miles from any of the local centres of population that offered major retail opportunities, and they were out enjoying their recently instituted two monthly girls’ day at one of the local towns courtesy of the double decker bus Alf had recently bought and made road legal on behalf of the village which now owned it as a community resource like the library, the school and the sporting facilities. Today they were in Carlisle, and shopping, lunch, hair, nails and gossip were the order of the day before returning home to dress up and spend a pleasant Saturday evening in the best room of the Green Dragon whilst their menfolk drank and swapped tales, lies and probably subversive thoughts too before doing war on each other with dominoes in the taproom. The women ranged in age from single in their mid teens to grandmothers in their sixties, a few were their with their daughters, and Margaret was there with one of her daughters and two of her granddaughters, all four of them mothers.
They all looked to Jane who was an academic in her middle forties who had moved into the village twelve years before when she had married Arnold Wright, who’d been a bitter and acrimoniously divorced local builder with custody of his six children. Her love had returned Arnie, as he was generally known, back to the well balanced family man he’d been before Chelsea, the girl he’d married from outside, had shewn her true colours and run off with an outsider leaving him with the children. How Jane had reached through to Arnie whose hard shell due to his emotional crippling by Chelsea had rendered him unapproachable to any, including his children, had been a subject of much hopeful speculation at the time to the Bearthwaite womenfolk who had effectively been looking after and seeing to the mothering needs of his children. It had been immediately noticed by those Bearthwaite womenfolk that once Jane had come on the Bearthwaite scene she’d looked after Arnie’s children like a mother should and the children had started calling her Mum from the beginning.
Other Bearthwaite mothers had soon heard tales from their children that indicated Jane’s children had rapidly started to forget Chelsea and that the village children, who’d not liked Chelsea, too considered Jane to be their friends’ mother. The mothers had been led to believe that Chelsea had hit her children a lot, and they’d been too frightened of consequences to tell any one about it, but now they had mum who was far more free with her kisses than her scoldings and she’d never smacked them. That their children liked Auntie Jane, as they referred to her in accordance with local usage which indicated their total acceptance of her, and spent far more time with Arnie’s children at their house than they had before Chelsea had left had meant Jane had been well thought of right from the beginning, the main reason being she lived by the unwritten codes of Bearthwaite folk, in particular those that applied to Bearthwaite womenfolk and especially those that involved motherhood. Of most note was that Jane like all the other Bearthwaite mothers thought nothing of feeding a couple of dozen children at no notice at all who just turned up with her own at meal time, though properly she insisted on informing their mothers as to their whereabouts. In short she was a one of their own, a Bearthwaite woman, wife and mother who like a number of them was looking forward to becoming a grandmother in the not too far distant future.
Many of the womenfolk of Bearthwaite were puzzled by events concerning Stephanie, though certainly not concerned by them, for it was known by all that Harriet, the popular adopted daughter of Gladys and Pete Maxwell the licencees of the Green Dragon, who lived with her Bavarian fiancé Gustav at the Dragon was trans. The young couple who were in the process of arranging their wedding, a matter that most of the village were involved in, were fully approved as adoptive parents by the adoption agency they had registered with and Social Services, though they were still waiting for appropriate children to adopt. There was for the village children an air of expectation and excitement concerning the matter. Perhaps more to the point the village adults approved of the young couple’s decision to adopt trans children who’d been rejected by their families, for the rejection of children was an alien concept to the inhabitants of Bearthwaite, and they were aware that the national umbrella organisation all adoption agencies registered with had flagged the couple’s application and it was purely a matter of time before children with the needs they could so easily meet were identified, and Bearthwaite was a place where all children could thrive. Being trans was a nonissue to the folk of Bearthwaite, what mattered was belonging which was evidenced by behaviour and nothing else.
Too, Samantha Shaw, who had earned her living as a welder for British Gas, but who now with her husband Gee farmed the valley head and did jobbing engineering work, often with Alf her mentor from childhood, was trans too, and she like Harriet was accepted as a local woman by their community for exactly the same reasons that any woman was; she lived by the unwritten codes of the Bearthwaite womenfolk. That Sam and Gee had registered with the same adoption agency as Harriet and Gustav to adopt trans children reviled and rejected by their families was regarded as recognition that not only was Samantha, who was Bearthwaite born and reared, one of their own, but so was Gee who had been an outsider. Bearthwaite was a community that only cared about matters that truly mattered: folk who cared about folk who cared.
Jane laughed and said, “I’m not sure what perfectly normal means when applied to folk, and it’s said the only constant in life is change.” She’d said that to give herself a few moments more to decide how to express her thoughts. “Since time immemorial it has always been considered by some that moments and events of change are magical. The turning of night into day and that of day into night, dawn and dusk, the gloaming. The phases of the moon, day length changes, the sun return at the winter solstice and all fallows eve at the summer solstice, even the equinoxes were considered special, though less so. Even the tide’s changes were so considered.”
The women were puzzled as to the relevance of what Jane was saying, but she was a professor and head of the chemistry department at a north eastern university. She was also a kind and generous woman who’d always been active in social matters in the village and she played a major rôle in the village during the recent and ongoing Covid events. Perhaps more importantly she had long taken her turn arranging the flowers in the church which defined her as a Bearthwaite woman. As such she was accorded a great deal of respect and had been accepted as one of themselves since her arrival at Bearthwaite a dozen years ago.
“Strange is it not that modern day scientists have come to regard such events and their concomitant energy changes as deep problems? I do not wish to appear to look down on any, but to a scientist deep means subject matter so complex it is of potentially Nobel prize winning nature. The details concerning phase changes like solids turning to liquid or liquids to gas, and of course the reversals of those changes are still almost a complete mystery to us. Similarly with the allotropic changes of, to name but a few, sulphur, iron and tin. That’s where elements change their structure usually due to temperature and pressure changes. The most dramatic and though probably unknown to you is perhaps the most easily understood. Graphite and diamond are both just carbon in different forms. Graphite is a dirty, messy, black substance used as a lubricant on its own and in grease by engineers like Alf. Diamond is a clean sparkly crystal that every female is more than familiar with. Both are effectively purified soot or coal and given the right conditions one can be turned into the other. Industrial diamonds are used for cutting and polishing and have been manufactured from carbon on a vast scale for a few decades.” Jane had a moue of distaste on her face before she continued, “I hate to tell you this, Girls, but diamonds can be burnt as fuel just like coal. I know the thought of that is painful to contemplate, but it is true.
“Too, there is a huge branch of science that overlaps many disciplines and mathematics too that is often referred to by the media as chaos theory which can be viewed as essentially the study of changes. Some of what little knowledge we have was known to the ancients, but most of that little we do know has only relatively recently been discovered. An example easily understood of that is iron which when it becomes hot enough will no longer be attracted to a magnet. For centuries blacksmiths have regarded the change from magnetic to non magnetic that occurs when steel, which is mostly iron with a little bit of carbon added, is almost white hot to be a significant matter for the heat treatment and forge welding of the steel. Steel heated and appropriately cooled, which smiths call quenched can be heat treated to be a hard cutting material like a good kitchen knife, or a soft easily shaped material depending on exactly what is done to it. It can only be forge welded by a blacksmith when it is non magnetic and so hot and soft it is almost liquid. Folk like Simon, Alf, Samantha and Gee will be very familiar with these matters. However, though those facts have been known for centuries, perhaps millennia, it is only relatively recently that studies have understood the change is due to a matter of an internal rearrangement of the crystalline structure of the steel. Possibly the only person we know who would understand that sort of thing is Bertie.” Bertie was one of Alf’s grandsons who worked with him and had a first class honours degree in mechanical engineering.
“However, back to the matter at hand, but staying with the concept of changes. Nowadays, the matter of male and female is considered by the open minded to be a very broad multi dimensional continuum, a multi dimensional spectrum if you like, rather than two points at the opposite ends of a single dimensional line. However, the questions I would love to have answered are at what point, and why, does a person of one apparent gender or perhaps that’s better expressed as one apparent identity, wherever they are on that multi dimensional spectrum, make the decision that they are in the wrong body, or indeed accept that they are in the right one? I’m asking what is the trigger mechanism that brings about that magical transformation? I know the matter is much more complicated than that, but you have to start somewhere. I am sure I’m not the only one who would like to know. I also suspect the matter to be deep, very, very deep.
“There is a phenomenon called super heating. There are many other phenomena associated with changes of many kinds, but super heating may be familiar to you. It occurs when, for example water, is heated slowly without any mechanical vibrations and it reaches a temperature above its boiling point at that particular pressure. By rights it should have turned to steam, but presumably there has been no initiating event to cause the transition. The change can happen when a superheated liquid is removed from a microwave oven and the vibrations caused by doing so cause the liquid to almost explosively boil and instantly change to steam in the vapour phase. Some very unpleasant scalding accidents have happened as a result of such events.” Many of her listeners were familiar with that event and were nodding. “Yet if the microwave is turned off before the explosion and the liquid is left undisturbed it will simply cool to below its boiling point never having turned to steam. You can check with one of those point and click infrared thermometers that it was indeed above the point at which it should have boiled. They are available from Ebay for less than a tenner [$15] from China.
“Similarly lakes can become supercooled due to a slow temperature drop in the air above them taking the water down to a temperature below its freezing point whilst still remaining liquid. Such lakes have been observed to instantly freeze to a depth of eight to twelve inches [20-30cm], and again point and click infrared thermometers confirmed the water was well below its freezing point before it suddenly changed state. This phenomenon has been seen to freeze herds of drinking deer in place with tragic results. I’ve seen photographs and videos of such events.
“The reason I mention the last two phenomena is because to me though they sound different in kind they sound to be not so different in principle from some of the more extreme transition experiences of some of my trans friends at the university. Most happened slowly over time, but some were almost explosive events with difficult to cope with or even tragic consequences. I conclude that like many other changes they are natural events, variable in their details, sometimes beautiful to watch, sometimes hard to accept, sometimes dangerous or even tragic, but naytheless always magical. I admit I am a romantic, but too I believe that life is better, though perhaps no easier, if you focus on the better aspects of all events.”
Most of the women were thinking deeply about what Jane had said and were gradually coming to understand what to them had been her rather esoteric, exotic and intellectual point of view. “So what are you saying, Jane? That David becoming Stephanie was nothing more than a natural event that was overdue to happen, and David always was Stephanie, but an event hadn’t happened that would initiate the change? And had there been no such event David would never have become Stephanie? But once that triggering event happened David became inevitably Stephanie quite quickly?”
Jane took her time answering Clarice, but eventually replied, “I can no more speak for Stephanie than any can for someone else, but I suppose I am saying that it’s possible, or may be even probable.” There was stunned silence when Jane finished by saying, “You can decide for yourselves who is the lucky one Stephanie or I, for I was never sure what I was and it took me three decades to decide I was female and not male, though my transition was certainly a magical and explosive event in comparison with my life before that.”
Several hours later, the ladies having settled in the best room of the Green Dragon with appropriate glasses of refreshment the earlier conversation in Carlisle was résuméed and resumed for the benefit of the women who’d not gone to Carlisle. However, the focus was no longer so much on the unexpectedness of David becoming Stephanie, but more on how Stephanie could be persuaded to stay in the village and continue providing the families with young children with the service she so clearly was not only good at but derived considerable satisfaction from too. Elle summed up opinion by saying, “I think you have it in a nut shell, Ladies. If we can but find her a good man who can provide her with children of her own, she’ll never have a reason to leave, and, more to the point, she’ll never wish to, for it seems to me that would give her all she wants and make her happy. Girls like her are safest living here, and I know none of us would want her to be just another fatal trans statistic on the news.” At that there were nods of agreement all around. “However, there may be a more obvious solution to the problem than most of us are aware of. I’ll need to check with Sasha before I have anything like even a definite possibility.
“I’ll out line it for you, but I don’t want this being telt to any outsiders, our folk yes, but outsiders no because that could ruin all hope of a successful outcome. There is an outsider who has been attending the story telling for two or three months now. Sasha said he has never telt a tale and is a quiet man who doesn’t drink much because he probably can’t afford it. Naytheless he is regarded well by all our menfolk. He appears to be thirty give or take two or three and has admitted he is single. Bachelor, separated or divorcee Sasha didn’t know. I’ll have him find out. Sasha talked to him at the end of the eve a couple of weeks ago because he thought he looked depressed and tormented. What is interesting is he has a couple of nieces and a nephew who are the orphans of his eldest sister and her husband whom he and his three sisters are rearing amongst them. He’s the children’s official guardian. He’s the youngest of the four remaining siblings and his parents apparently named him Chance because they’d taken a chance on getting a boy as their last child. The sisters are all married with families, but none of the siblings are really in a position financially to look after the children all the time. They all lied to Social Services, so as to keep the children in the family with folk they knew rather than being farmed out into the care system, and they are desperately afraid they’ll be found out and lose the children. Though legally the children are under Chance’s wardship they are cared for by his sisters and their husbands between the kids finishing school at half three and Chance getting home from work at half five. The kids sleep over with their cousins on Saturday night. They do the rounds of Chance’s sisters each Saturday and he collects them late Sunday afternoon to eat at home with him. Saturday eve is his only time off and he comes here to get his head back in order, so he can face the week ahead.”
“How on Earth did Sasha find all that out, Elle?”
“You know how persuasive and insightful he is, Julie. Chance probably wasn’t even aware of just how much information he’d given Sasha, and he certainly wouldn’t have been aware of how much more Sasha had deduced. Sasha doesn’t know what he does for a living, but said he dresses well and sounds and speaks like a well educated man. I’m not prepared to go into the taproom, but I’ll ask Gladys to tell Sasha I want a word. We’re already housing Stephanie as part of her salary in one of the flats in the old vicarage, but it’d be no big issue to house her and her family in suitable accommodation on the same terms if required. Chance knows Harriet is trans and is clearly okay with that, but that’s a long way from being prepared to enter into a relationship with a trans woman. I have no idea if it is even a possibility to get them together, but I do think it needs looking into on the usual Bearthwaite terms.”
The women nodded in agreement, understanding that part of the deal if it went through would be Stephanie’s adoption of the children, in part to protect them in case anything happened to Chance and in part to give them a mother Chance would have to negotiate with if their relationship foundered. He would be prevented from just leaving with the children Stephanie would certainly have come to love quickly.
When Sasha arrived to see what Elle wanted him for she took him into the empty dance hall for privacy and asked, “Is Chance here tonight, Love?”
“Yes why?”
Elle outlined her view of the situation and asked, “What do you think, Lover of mine?
“I don’t know what to think, Belovèd, other than it needs to be looked into, and it needs looking into quickly. I’ll speak to Chance after folk have left. As he’s always done before he’s booked a room, so he’ll still be around. I’ll have to be blunt because though you have time to play with for Stephanie, I suspect Chance’s family are running out of time. His parents are still both alive, but they are too elderly and fragile to be able to help with the children. However, no matter how much those children are in need of help, I’m not prepared to push a trans girl from here into a relationship with Chance if he has issues with that just to help those children. If it comes to that they’d be better off in the care system with an immediate application from Harriet and Gustav to adopt them. I’ll make sure I am made aware of them going into care the same day the decision is made, and in the meanwhile we’ll have Harriet and Gustav apply to be placed on the foster parents list prior to anything happening. That covers the children and possibly Stephanie and Chance too. I don’t think there’s anything else we can do for the moment. I’ll tell you how it went with Chance on the way home and then you can say whatever is necessary to Stephanie tomorrow.”
Elle kissed him and said, “That’s why I love you, Sasha Vetrov. Even under pressure you can think a long enough game to derail the authorities when vulnerable folk are involved. I’ll talk to you later, Love.”
As Elle left the dance hall, Gladys seeing her smiling asked, “I take it the Cossack came up with a plan?”
“Indeed, clever as always. I’ll tell you all when we get to the room. Could I have another Courvoisier please, Gladys?”
“Of course. I’ll join you, though I’ll have an Asbach.”
“Everything okay, Sasha?” Pete asked.
Sasha shrugged and replied, “Yes, just the womenfolk rearing up on me again. You’d think Elle would know better by now, but it’ll all come out in the wash by tomorrow lunch. It just gives me more to do.”
“So what did you say, Sasha?” Simon the blacksmith asked.
Sasha grinned and replied, “Yes, Dear.” At that there was lot of laughter but no further questions, for they were all familiar with the classic male self preservation tactic Sasha had employed on something that clearly didn’t matter to him.
Harry said said, “Talking of the womenfolk rearing up, I’ve worked out a perfect solution to bring Kathleen round. She’s gey(10) fond of pickled onions, so when she’s mad with me and and not speaking I tighten the pickle jar lid, so she has to talk to me to get the bugger open.” Many of the men instinctively looked behind the bar to see if Gladys or Harriet were there before joining in with the laughter of their friends.
Back in the lounge, after Elle had telt the women what had been agreed Harriet said, “Uncle Sasha is without doubt the most manipulative and devious man I have ever heard of.” She smiled and added, “And probably the kindest too. I’ll put Gustav and myself down on the fostering list as soon as Social Services are open at nine tomorrow morning. We’re already cleared with them so there shouldn’t be any issues. I’ll just tell them that till we adopt we’ll do what we can to help because I want children around me.”
Samantha Shaw added, “Let’s play it as safe as we can. I’ll have Gee and myself put on the list too, cos we’ve both been cleared as well.” The were murmurings of agreement with that.
Back in the taproom Pete was pulling pints, Denis was threwing logs on the fires and Bertie was pouring various corrosive liquors into glasses whilst Tommy was passing round the children’s Christmas party collection box to the outsiders who wished a glass from Bertie. Stan went to let some of the dogs out and returned to say, “I’ve been watching a lot of Youtube videos recently on wood turning and various restoration projects. I was absolutely gob smacked to see how many idiots there were turning wood wearing rings on their fingers and then after turning the lathe off slowing the wood down to look at it with a hand wearing a ring. I haven’t seen any wearing ties yet, but I suspect it’s just a matter of time.
Gerry asked, “What do you think to that, Alf?”
Alf replied slowly, “If some one is that desperate to lose a finger or strangle themselves what right have I to interfere? There’s no point in talking to someone who’s a sandwich short of a picnic(11) because they don’t listen, after all why should they? They know, just like teenagers, they’re immortal and invulnerable. The only difference between idiots like that and blokes like me is they clearly didn’t have their arses kicked hard enough and often enough when they were learning. That’s why I won’t wear a wedding ring, just in case I forget to take it off when I’m working. It’s an easy enough mistake to make, but it’s one I can’t make. The only bloke I’ve ever seen on Youtube who make a point of taking his ring and watch off before using a lathe is called Scott Bennet. He makes his living restoring furniture and owns what I presume is a one man band called Wooden It Be Nice. He has a Youtube channel called Fixing Furniture. I assume he’s Canadian because he sounds like one and he once said Robertson screws were common in his parts and the only place I know of where that is true is Canada. Robertson screws have a square recess in the top and were invented in Canada in nineteen oh seven I think. I’m sure there must be many others who’ve made a point of it on Youtube and elsewhere, but I haven’t come across them.”
“You’ve never worn a ring have you, Alf?”
“I’ve got one, Gerry. I wore it when I got wed. Ellen insisted. I think to women it’s kind of like them putting their brand on you. She’s okay about me not wearing it most of the time, for she doesn’t want me to lose a finger any more than I do. I only wear it to formal events. If I’m wearing a suit I wear my wedding ring, if it’s not an event that requires a suit I don’t. I don’t even know where Ellen keeps it. With her jewellery I suppose. When required she gets my suit and ring out, and when I’m shaved, washed and dressed she inspects me to check I’m fit to be seen out. When we get home she makes sure I take my ring off, hangs my suit up and puts my ring away.” As many of the men laught Alf just shrugged, for it was what he did to keep Ellen happy and it was just one of the things he and Ellen did to ensure an in the main peaceful marriage. He knew all couples had their quirks and accommodations arrived at over the years to make their marriage more harmonious and he wasn’t perturbed by what anyone thought about how he and Ellen managed their relationship.
“Sasha, you’ve been very quiet concerning the recent furore concerning the quality of writing submitted to the sites you are involved with. I’ve been watching and waiting for you to defend your position. Do you not have a view or a reaction to that that you wish to put out there?”
“Well, Pete, the simple answer is no I do not. I find it unrewarding to be involved in such disputes because I don’t care enough. I read what I enjoy and ignore what I don’t. I believe it is not up to me to have a go at those whose views I despise. They are after all entitled to their opinion. Think about it, you never bothered with Bert, you certainly weren’t prepared to be involved in an argument with him. He treated Harriet badly, and when you found out about it you took her in and ultimately adopted her. End of story. He lost a child he clearly didn’t care about, and you and Gladys gained a daughter who loves the pair of you. Why would you want to become involved in a dispute you had already won?
“Poor writers are like politicians, if you don’t approve of what they appear to stand for you don’t vote for them, or in writers’ cases you don’t bother to read their views and works. You know when a politician is lying because their lips are moving. Similarly a writer whose work isn’t convincing is probably not what they purport to be.
“As to the critics, strange is it not that folk, who as far as I can tell have never written anything other that negative criticism, are such experts on what constitutes good writing and an excellent story. Even stranger is the appalling English that most of them use when writing their criticisms. And it matters not whether they are using an English, American, Canadian, Australian or South African version of the language, nor indeed any other variant, for as a result of their total lack of consistency and the rabidness of their writing one can only conclude they are illiterate, unimaginative, small minded and exceedingly jealous souls who can do no other than resent their more creative peers and colleagues. That many of those creative colleagues are perfectly happy to admit their imperfect skills at using the written word, yet are still driven to express their creative souls in writing seems to infuriate their soulless uncreative critics even more. Many of those imperfect users of the written language write wonderful stories that more than make up for their lack of technical skills in writing, and I am delighted when I come across a new work of theirs to read. I hasten to add that I’m not having a go at English speakers and writers because it no different in all of the dozen or so other languages I am able to use well enough to be able to tell. I suspect it’s the same in all languages.”
“What about those who have a go at your own writing? How do you react to them?”
“I don’t react to them, for they only do it once that I read. After that I block them and don’t bother my head about their lack of manners. Most folk can cope with being hated, reviled, spat at even, but they can’t cope with being ignored, so if you really wish to hurt them just ignore them. It requires fortitude for most folk to see that through, but I’ve been doing it since I was a young child and I know it works. But back to the works of others, if I read a story I consider to be indicative of both a lack of writing skill and a lack of imagination I just don’t read that writer’s work again, but I certainly wouldn’t dream of having a go at them hence allowing others to consider I had been bad mannered. Time, and lack of readers, will either force them to improve or give up. Both are a good result. Lest, by the bye, you consider that to be noble or particularly decent of me Elle would tell you the truth if you asked her. I’m that way because most folk bore the shit out of me, and I truly don’t give a fuck what they think, if that is they are capable of thought, which is why I just don’t wish to engage with them in any way because I don’t wish to encourage them.”
“Christ, Alf,” responded Stan, “do you realise what that means?”
Alf looked puzzled and said, “Not a clue, Stan. Do I want to know?”
“Course you do, Lad. It means you and I and the rest of the lads don’t bore the shit out of Sasha, cos we’re folk who count in the universe of Sasha the chief bull shitter of the Bearthwaite Grumpy Old Men’s Society based at the Green Dragon.”
As Alf began to smile, the rest of the men in the taproom were laughing uproariously and Vincent announced, “You deserved that, Sasha, and it’s your shout,(12) Lad.”
Sasha nodded and said, “Start pulling pints, Pete, and we’ll have a bit more of the rare stuff to go with them if you will please, Bertie. I’ve got some serious chemic from Yuri that’s in need of some lads with appreciative taste buds. Alf, I’d appreciate it if you fetched a case(13) up.”
“You serious, Sasha? I took those bottles down the other day, and they’re recycled half gallon Bells whisky bottles. [5 US pints] A case?”
“Well if we don’t drink it all tonight there’s always next week isn’t there?”
“Okay, Lad, what ever you say. I’m on it. Bertie, give me a lift will you?”
Bertie, Alf’s grandson who worked with him, nodded and said, “No bother, Granddad, but I’ll fetch a case of that Canary Island potato vodka of mine up as well. Any want anything else in particular? Or shall I just fetch a case of mixed bottles up?”
As Bertie looked around, Pete said, “Fetch a mixed case, Bertie Lad.”
Alf stood, and as he left the taproom in a hurry he said, “Got to go, Lads. Back in a minute.” On his return he said, “I don’t mind getting old, but I bloody hate getting knackered. The only thing I’ve got that works as well as it did when I was younger is my frigging bladder. Actually the sodding thing works ten times better than it did then. Ten times more often at least.”
A lot of the old men were nodding in agreement when Sasha said drily, “Just be grateful you’re a bloke, Alf.” Seeing some puzzled looks around him he added, “Many an older lass wouldn’t have made it in time. That’s why they go to the ladies at frequent and regular intervals even when they don’t feel the need, because by they time they feel the need it’s already too late.”
At that there were even more looks of agreement and understanding from the older men, but Vincent the village slaughterman and butcher, known as Vince the mince,(14) added cynically, “Better your bladder working over time than your arse, Alf. Just be grateful.”
“How long have we got till supper, Harriet Love?” Vincent asked Harriet who was topping up kibble and water dishes for the dogs from a couple of pails.
“Probably twenty minutes maybe twenty-five, Uncle Vincent. It’s Cumberland Tatie Pot(15) with Auntie Aggie’s pickled red cabbage. I’ll bring some of her pickled beetroot too just in case anyone would prefer that.”
Pete asked, “Any one got a short one, Lads? Anything about food seeing as it’s nearly suppertime.”
“I’ve got a five minute tale maybe less.”
“Have at it, Clarence Lad.” Clarence was Gustav’s master brewer and as such an important man in Bearthwaite.
“Last week Amy and I decided to have a day out to Kendal. Normally we’d stop and have lunch at Oakhurst Garden Centre just outside Cockermouth. You can sit outside on the balcony which projects right out into the tree tops over the valley which is gey steep sided. The red squirrels are so tame you have to watch they don’t nick your food off the table. The food is excellent and reasonably priced, and a wander round the spot is an enjoyable way to spend a couple of hours. But it’s where we always go if we’re going out west, so we decided on a change and ate somewhere in Kendal not far from the Moot Hall. There’re several places to eat round there and not knowing anything about any of them we just picked one at random. I can’t remember the name of the place and I don’t want to. Amy had steak and ale pie with chips [US fries] and peas, and said it was excellent. I should have joined her. Most of my meal was okay, the mash, [mashed potato] cabbage and parsley sauce were all superb. All the vegetables including the chips were cooked from fresh not from frozen. The gammon however was shite, nothing but pure fucking salt. It took me a couple of pints or maybe that was three just to wash it down, and it was all a hell of a sight dearer than the garden centre. Still at least the beer was excellent.”
Vincent said in explanation, “That was how virtually all bacon and gammon uest to be made when I was a kid. It was understandable in those days, for the salt was needed to keep the meat fit to eat over winter and spring till the first lambs and bull calves were big enough to justify killing em. Folk couldn’t provide the feed to prevent them loosing weight over the winter, so all the pigs other than breeding stock were slaughtered at the back end whilst they were still in prime condition as soon as the weather had started to cool. I mind my dad and granddad wouldn’t slaughter pigs till the first overnight ground frost, for handling pork in warm weather is unpleasant and it goes off on you as fast as you can look at it. Handling salt pork in warm weather is even worse, for the salt draws moisture out of the air to the meat and it is said to sweat because it’s becomes slimy. It’s difficult to handle because you can’t get a decent grip on it. You have to mind there were no chiller units nor freezers then. To make sure the meat kept the brine used was gey strang.(16) Some folks cured pork using dry salt which made for even saltier bacon. The flitches(17) of bacon and hams hanging up in the back cured that way were crusted with salt. Before it was cooked it was always soaked overnight in water to leach some of the salt out. Granddad used to leave a flitch in the beck(18) overnight before drying it off the following morning to cut up for bacon. He did the same with hams. Sounds to me that some tosser of an amateur has been making so called artisan bacon and gammon using a recipe out of a decades old if not more than a century old cookery book like Mrs Beaton’s Book of Household Management which was first published in eighteen sixty-one and used a shed load of salt in curing pork. The problem is they didn’t bother to read the bit about soaking it overnight before cooking it.”
Pete asked, “That it, Clarence?”
“Aye I said it wasn’t much of a tale. It was only made interesting by what Vince had to say.”
Sasha said, “Well I’ve a tale, well a question really. Is it just me, or is all ice cream shite now? I’ve tried it all, every make I’ve been able to lay my hands on and it all tastes like shit, even the expensive so called luxury brands, and as for those Magnum lollies, they’re okay, but they’ve got bugger all to do with ice cream. If you allow any variety to thaw out you get some crap tasting gritty froth on the top and at least half of it is some kind of vegetable oil emulsion that sinks to the bottom. A friend of mine who’s a dairy farmer out Kirkbride way telt me that even Twentymans in Allonby who’ve been selling their own ice cream since nineteen twenty have made their ice cream from powder for years now, but they used to use whole milk from local herds. I’ve no idea if that is true, but I think Keith would know. I do know I used to enjoy their ice cream and what they sell these days isn’t worth buying. Once I used to stop for ice cream every time I passed that way, now I just don’t bother. Maybe my taste buds are old and knackered like the rest of me, but I don’t think so. Elle says the only way to get decent stuff is to make it yourself using proper ingredients, so I bought her a machine with a stirrer and a freezer unit in it, takes an hour to make a litre and a half. That tastes damned good, if that is I can get to any before the kids.”
“There were sounds of general agreement with Sasha and Pete added, “Belgium and Italy are famous for their ice cream, and it’s controlled by law what you can put into stuff that’s selt as ice cream. Nothing selt over here would be legal over there. It’s like chocolate in Switzerland and Belgium and beer and sausage in Germany. None of our chocolate, beer and sausage would be legal there.”
Gustav said, “Clarence’s beers would be okay, but most sausage wouldn’t be. Vincent’s Cumberland sausage would be okay. I sent some home a month or so ago for one of my brothers’ birthdays. They were celebrating with a barbecue at the inn, and my brothers and their friends said it was excellent. Ernst wants some more sometime, so, Vincent, when it’s convenient any chance of fifty kilos? [110 pounds]
“No bother, Gustav, but now we’re out of the EU won’t there be a problem sending it to Germany?”
Gustav smiled and said, “Those regulations only apply to food, Vincent, not to packages labelled industrial engineering samples.”
Amidst the laughter Pete said, “That boy has been associating with too many disreputable old men for too long. I think he’s completely corrupted and beyond hope now. There’s no way he could go back to live in Bavaria now, he belongs here.”
Gee said, “I’ve got a short one about food, well about eating out, anyway. Samantha and I decided to eat out with a couple of friends at the Golf Hotel in Silloth. It was a good meal and good crack too. They’re married, like us both welders and we had two or three years’ worth of catching up to do from since we last worked with them. I tried a very spicy green lipped New Zealand mussel dish as a starter. The chile blew my mouth away, but it was delicious. I followed that with steak and ale pie with mixed vegetables and mashed potatoes. All the vegetables there are frozen I think, but all the stuff like the pie is made on the premises as are most of the puddings. We all said we’d go there again, so if you want a decent meal out in the kind of spacious surroundings that only a Victorian spot like the Golf offers I can recommend it. We all thought the food was excellent, not cheap but well worth it. We were using taxis and I’d had three maybe four pints, so a visit to the gents was called for. Now obviously I’ve got no problems with the trans, but I have to say it was quite a shock when a good looking lass in a full length frock pulled up at the next urinal to me to take a leak by hitching her skirts up. Apart from anything else she was a hell of a sight bigger than me.
“I said nothing when I got back to the others, but I telt Sam about it in the taxi on the way home. She was fair pissed off by it and said that sort of behaviour got all the trans a bad name. She asked me if the lass passed and I had to admit there was no way I would have known her as anything other than a lass, and a pretty one at that. That seemed to make her even angrier, and she telt me she should have used a stall in the ladies and none would have been any the wiser. Now I may be married to a trans lass, but I’ve never had to walk in her shoes, so I said nowt because I don’t reckon I have a right to an opinion. However, a few days later we were back in Silloth doing a bit of business, and after that we went into the coöp for a can of pop apiece because it was a hot day. Sam met a mate of hers called Sally in there and telt her the tale getting me to describe the lass. I was asked how tall was she and I replied at least six foot maybe a bit more. Sally said she’s known to every one round there and gets a lot of shit for it. Seems she’s down for GRS surgery next month and has said she’ll not be returning to Silloth after that. Sally said she’d have been crucified if she’d gone into the ladies, beaten up for sure by some of the local idiots. That calmed Sam down, but it upset her at the same time. Can’t say I felt too good about it either.”
Sasha said, “It’s a shame that folk get so wound up over something that doesn’t have to be an issue. We’ve got a much higher than statistically representative proportion of trans living here and none give a damn because we’ve got more important things to worry about. Like keeping our early years teacher, and pressing forward with anything that creates jobs here without us losing our culture to outsiders with money. What’s the lass do for a living, Gee? Do you know anything about her?”
“Who the trans lass or Sally?
“The trans lass.”
“She works in an office in Carlisle, but I don’t know what she does. Her parents have both died, but Sally said her dad was from West Newton(19) and her mum was German. The lass’s name is Adalheidis Maxwell.”
Sasha had a speculative gleam in his eyes as he said, “Get Sam to find out what she does for a living will you, and see if she’s got something lined up to go to after she leaves Silloth. If not we may wish to have a chat with her.”
Gustav added, “Adalheidis is the older form of what has now become Adelheid which is the full version of the name Heidi. Adelheid is the modern Dutch and German form of the Old High German female given name Adalheidis, which meant nobility or nobleness. Though Adalheidis is rare these days it is still used and both versions of the name are considered to be a very feminine names back home.”
Stan said in tones of mock reproval, “Christ above, Gustav you’re going to have to cut back on that education, Son. You’re making most of us look thick.”
Like lightening Gustave riposted, “That’s a lie. It’s not me that makes you look thick, Stan. You don’t need my or any one else’s help to do that because it comes naturally.”
To around of clapping and banging of beer glasses on tables Alf said, “Got to give it to the lad, Stan, he had you fair and square there, but you set yourself up for it.”
Wryly Stan admitted, “Aye fair enough, but Pete was right, he belongs here. He can’t go back to Bavaria now.”
“Harriet announced as she came in pushing a trolley and then depositing jars of pickled red cabbage and beetroot on the tables along with cruet sets, “Right, Gentlemen. Clear the tables, supper will be in here inside five minutes. Mum and Auntie Veronica are dishing up next door right now. I’ve put some pickled onion jars out too. Auntie Aggie wants them used up because they’re the last of that batch and she’s got a new lot already on the shelves that’ll be ready next week.”
Alf added, “That latest batch she made are not a usual pickling onion. They’re a French shallot called Hermine. The pickling onions didn’t do well this year, but the shallots did. Hermine is a white, round shallot that I’ve been growing for a few years mostly for pickling. According to the experts they are mild and don’t keep very well. I’ve never come across what they say regarding pickling. I don’t reckon mild is a fair description. I think they have a pleasant, sweet flavour. I agree they don’t keep particularly well, but since they pickle really well I can’t say that bothers me.”
Pete started collecting empty glasses whilst Gustav went behind the bar to pull fresh pints, most of which were beers crafted by Clarence in Gustav’s brewery and brewed by a work force who all lived in the village, many of who were in the taproom. A couple of minutes later Harriet arrived pushing a trolley with cutlery and crockery on the bottom shelf and two huge oven dishes of Tatie Pot on the top. “Careful with the plates, Gentlemen, they are straight out of the oven and very hot.” It was seen that she was correct because as she ladled the Tatie Pot out it was seen to sizzle and spit on contact with the plates.
There was not much conversation for the next ten minutes as the men concentrated on their supper. “By hell, Lass, that hit the spot,” Alf said with approval. “I can tell you made it, not Veronica nor your mum.”
“How did you know that, Uncle Alf?”
“Veronica uses slightly more celery and less carrot than you. Your mum uses more pepper and less salt than either of you. All damned fine suppers, just slightly different.” He chuckled and added, “Most folk think I just wolf my food, but I pay attention to what I’m eating. That’s why I enjoy food so much. And I am to Tatie Pot what an expert sommelier is to wine.”
Pete said, “You bloody well should be, Alf, you’ve scoffed enough of it over the years to keep piglets awake at night. Their mums tell them if they don’t behave they’ll send them to Uncle Alf’s winter festival as guests of honour.”
The roars of laughter eventually quietened down and after Harriet had cleared the tables and taken all away she returned with a huge silver salver with pastries on. Pete asked, “What’s this, Love?”
“It’s guinea pig time, Dad. I’ve tried my hand at these for the first time and I need honest opinions if I’m going to improve. Buttered Eccles cakes using Auntie Aggie’s recipe with local butter. I’ve never made this type of flaky pastry before though I have prepared the filling for Auntie Veronica before. I’m including them in the supper price because the margin on Tatie Pot is a little more than on most suppers. These are traditional with just currants, though like Auntie Aggie I soaked them overnight, but if folk want me to I’ll include some sultanas or raisins or even mixed dried fruit including some glacé citrus peel next time.
“That was the good news, the bad news is the price of a supper is going up from two pound to two pounds fifty. We’ve held the price at two pounds for as long as we can. Everything’s going up in price. They say it’s due to Covid and the war in the Ukraine, but I reckon it’s just due to greed. However, Uncle Vincent is having to pay more for his meat, and despite helping us out as much as he can he has to pass it on to us. Uncle Dave and Auntie Lucy at the grocers and Uncle Phil and Auntie Alice at the mill are all in the same boat. It’s not reasonable to expect Uncle Alf and his allotment mates to subsidise us. Some of those men need the money to feed their families. As before we have arrived at a price to charge regardless of what any particular supper cost to put on. If we get cheap conies or even a free deer carcass off the road we’re in front, which is off set when we serve fish or steak. We hope we’ve got it right, but if the price is a little high it’ll stay fixed for longer. If on the other hand it’s too low you’ll be seeing three pound suppers soon enough. Next week it’s haggis wi basht neeps and tatties(20) which will hold the price a while.”
Dave, Vincent and Phil were nodding in agreement and Vincent said, “I’ll do my best lads, but I’m helping out more than just us in here. Some of the old folk need help more than we do.”
There was a general agreement and Clayton one of the outsiders said, “Two fifty is still a damned cheap night out. A fiver for the two of us to have supper, cheap, bloody good beer, a decent slug of poison for a mere two quid in the kids’ party box, and free entertainment to boot. There’s nowhere we could go for a decent night out for several times the price. I’ve been coming here for going on three years and supper was good value at two quid back then. If three it has to be I’ll be happy to pay it.” There was no further discussion regarding supper prices. Most were looking around to see who was telling the next tale.
Vince seeing none wanted to speak immediately said, “I had Mark and Mason build me a new smoker using bricks in the yard behind the shop. My old one was wooden, lost a lot of smoke from the cracks and was too small for what I want to do. This one is like a decent sized walk in building with a smoke tight galvanised tin roof. Up to now I’ve only ever smoked bacon and ham, but I went for a drink with Jot a lad I’ve known for thirty years out Bowness on Solway way a month or so ago. He lives there and does a bit of haaf netting.(21) He offered to get me a few salmon and shewed me his smoker, so I’m going to have a go. I’ll try other things too. I went on the internet the other night to see what I could find. I’d no idea so much stuff could be smoked.”
There was a long silence as men drank but eventually it was filled. “I broke my damned specs last Tuesday,” announced George. Two months old and hellish expensive varifocals. Had to trail all the way to Specsavers in Workington, but eventually I had them replaced for free. I was cleaning them with the stuff they gave me to clean them with, and the frame at the bottom of the lens just parted and the lens dropped out. Fortunately I catched it before it hit the floor and got scratched. They tried every way to insinuate I was responsible, but in the end they said they’d replace them for free. They had me walking all over the shop and said I could have any pair in the shop as mine were top of the range. New lenses for the new frames would be necessary, but they would be free too. It makes you wonder what the profit margin is doesn’t it. In the end when I was losing the will to live I asked why wasn’t it possible to just replace my frame with the same frame and put my lenses in that because that one I liked and I didn’t like anything else. They produced an identical frame from a storeroom in less than a minute. I expected it to take ten days and to have to trail back forty miles each way again, but they said a technician could put my old lenses in the new frame in ten minutes. The technician said the problem was my old lens had not been fitted properly, it had been slightly oversize and that had stressed the frame enough to break it. Twenty minutes later I walked out wearing a new frame with my old lenses in it. Problem solved, but if I hadn’t pushed for the same frame it would have been a fortnight for new lenses to be fitted to a new frame which would have been another day and thirty or forty quid in fuel up the Suwannee and no specs for a fortnight. Joke is my specs were free, but it cost me half a day, a hundred and fifty to fill the tank and Christine spent over two hundred quid in Tesco.”
George continued by asking, “How’re things going with the wedding and all the rest of it, Gustav?”
Gustav shrugged and said, “Dad and I just leave the matter of the wedding to Mum, Harriet and anyone else they involve. Life is a lot more peaceful that way. I’ve finally realised the significance of ‘Yes, Dear,’ to an Englishman.” There was a lot of laughter at that and when it quietened Gustav said more seriously, “We’re still waiting regards adoption. It’ll happen in its own good time. There’s nothing we can do to make it happen any faster. Harriet is upset about it. No, that’s not quite right, she’s disappointed not upset, but she knows she just has to accept it too.”
There were a number of men who said words to the effect of the harder you push officialdom the more counter productive it is in the long term. Tony who was a dentist from outside added bitterly, “That’s right because the bottom line is they just don’t care. At five o’clock the problem ceases to exist when they go home, and it only becomes real again after their first coffee in the office, somewhere round nine thirty the next working day.”
Græme who lived at Beckfoot asked, “How’s the brewery extension going, Gustav?” Græme was a chemical engineer with an extensive understanding of brewing and distillation which was tacitly understood to derive from illegal experience.
“Work has started on the brewery extension and Clarence is looking forward having more space for extra equipment with a view to the creation of his new beers. My brothers have managed to buy a lot of second hand brewery equipment at reasonable prices from establishments that no longer brew their own beer. Alf and some others are going over to collect it and bring it back when there is a full load. It seems we are swimming against the tide of current trends, but it’s making money and creating employment here. I’m still looking into the feasibility of buying a bottling plant, so we can sell beer farther afield than barrels will travel, maybe aluminium kegs are the way forward, but I don’t know yet. Whatever we do we’ll trial it here, so you’ll be the first to know about it. I’ve managed to buy a considerable amount of land and the Peabodys will be growing barley, other cereals and hops for us on a contract basis. All that’s looking good. Some of the major drink companies are sniffing round with a view to buying us out, but I’m not even prepared to talk to them. They after all are why the Dragon and the brewery in its turn exist.”
Clarence added, “If they bought us out, even if they didn’t just mothball the brewery they’d lay off most of the staff pleading a poor economic climate and start brewing gnat’s piss that you could buy anywhere and everywhere. They just don’t understand they and their ilk are the problem of our time. They and the way they do business and manipulate economies and communities are certainly not a solution to anything.”
A lot of the men nodded and made expressions of agreement before Græme continued, “So if all that is going well, what’s the fly in the ointment?”
“I’m sorry I don’t understand.”
“It’s an expression that means what’s not going so well, Gustav.”
“The negotiations for a distillery licence. It’s a different government department that deals with that, and they seem to operate on the principle that we are all thieves and our only objective is to defraud the government. I’ve never met any one as suspicious, and the ridiculous thing is all distillation has to be undertaken behind a calibrated spirit safe(22) so they know to the millilitre how much you have produced and they have right of unannounced access twenty-four hours a day and can without justification have a twenty-four hour a day presence on the premises. We don’t seem to have made any progress at all in the last two months, though I have found a retired still master who used to work for Martell the cognac company. Jean-Claude is a widower who lives on his own near Alston and is willing to relocate. He’s a decent man who speaks English with a strong French accent. I’ve been looking for someone with his experience for a while now, so as soon as I persuade him to move I’ll start paying him because I want him available as soon as we get the licence.”
Græme smiled and said, “It drives the Customs and Excise crazy to think you might be robbing anyone because they hate the competition. Liquor would be virtually the same price as water but for the tax. Taxmen of all descriptions are the only legally sanctioned monopolies of theft anywhere in the world. Amongst some criminals they use the verb to tax as a synonym for the verb to steal.”
Pete announced, “I reckon that’s it, Lads. Time for dominoes. I’ll start pulling pints and put some bottles on the bar. Some one let those dogs out. You can leave the back door open.”
A number of men stood heading for the gents and Alf said, “I’ll deal with the dogs, Pete.” Ten minutes later the taproom was quiet as the no holds barred dominoes battles commenced.
At the end of the eve when most of the clientele had left the Dragon and Chance was about to make his way to his room Sasha asked, “Could you spare me a little of your time, Chance, please? Pete you too if you would?”
Pete knew what was going on having briefly discussed the matter with Sasha earlier in the eve, but Chance was completely mystified. There were just the three men in the taproom when Pete said, “I’ll get us a glass of Lagavulin. Don’t say it’s okay, Chance. We’ve figured you don’t have a lot of money and are no leech, but this is a gift because we have something serious to discuss with you that calls for it. Sasha?”
“Sit down please, Chance. There is no easy way to approach this, so I’ll go straight at it. After my last conversation with you I had the distinct impression you and your sisters were worried that Social Services were going to find out you’d been a little economical with the truth and take the children off you. Don’t worry, we’re are on your side here, and we have a potential solution that could possibly solve your family’s problem, a serious issue for the village of Bearthwaite, and a personal issue for a rather special young lady who is one of us.”
“I would be overjoyed if that were to be so, but I’m afraid I just don’t see what I could do to help to bring that about. I can barely manage my own life as it is, Sasha.”
Pete fetched three glasses and the bottle too. He sat down and cracked the seal on the bottle before pouring the glasses three-quarters full which left maybe two and a half inches [6 cm] of whisky in the bottle. Sasha nodded in approval thinking Pete was taking no chances with Chance which made him chuckle if only to himself.
Sasha said quietly, “The proposal is that you become one of us by taking up with the young lady who works here as our early years teacher and play group leader. She is seeking a man to settle down with and we are keen to make sure she settles down here and remains our early years teacher and play group leader. She is housed as part of her contractual agreements which would house you and the three children. I know you are single, but are you currently married awaiting divorce?”
“No. I’ve never been married.”
“Good. That’s one less complication to have to deal with. Pete?”
Pete picked up where Sasha had left off. “You may think you understand us, but I assure you you don’t. The reality of life here is very different from anything you, or indeed any other outsider, will ever have heard of. Every one here watches every one else’s back all the time. Not all who live here are wealthy, but there are no folk living in poverty and need here. Vincent referred to that obliquely tonight when he said he had others to help too and some of the old folk needed more help than we did. There are a number of old folk who live here who would never be able to afford to eat meat if he didn’t give it to them. Even more who can only eat meat because their families help them.”
“How can he afford to do that?”
“Others in the village help him in turn. In may ways ultimately Covid did us more good than harm, for it refocussed our entire community on what matters and what doesn’t, and many things changed as a result. Things that are going to remain changed, for that way is better for our community. Mostly we just went back to how things were done decades if not centuries ago. In reality this place is very wealthy and that wealth is shared in many ways, and much of it can’t be assessed nor accounted in terms of money. The folk who live here own the sporting facilities and the green. We put the road in around the green to enable us to receive artic(23) deliveries in stead of a dozen or more large white vans which cuts our costs. We put that road in not just with our own money, but with our own sweat too. We own the school, the library and the bus that is maintained at cost by Alf. If it came to pass that he hit hard times we would pay him for that, but for the moment like many of our residents he considers what he does to be his contribution to our community. We own the pumps that can clear the floods and the boat too that is used to connect to the outside when it is not desirable to pump the flood water away. We pay for the early years and play group teacher, the young woman Sasha was referring to, as well as all the other expenses of the school which is a privately owned and controlled non local education authority establishment. The purchase, modernisation, refurbishment and extension mortgages on the Dragon are all held privately at very low interest rates.
“My soon to be son in law, Gustav was obviously an outsider once, but as I said this place is a place no outsider can possibly understand, for once understanding is reached that person is no longer an outsider. No matter what happens between Gustav and Harriet in the future, Gustav has been my son for some time now and that will never change. I can’t remember when he first called me Dad and I doubt if he does either, but as far as I am aware it has never been commented on by any resident of Bearthwaite, for it is a natural thing that is fully in keeping with the way we all live and as such is taken for granted here. Gustav owns the brewery outright and I’m not sure just how many folk he now employs, certainly fifty. He has recently acquired thousands of acres on which to grow barley, other cereals and hops which will provide more employment next year. I know you heard him speak of that, but he owns that land outright. There is no outside financial organisation with a stake of any size involved. There is nothing here that can be foreclosed on by an outside agency. We have a number of very wealthy folk living here and we all help when things get difficult. We consider that you would fit well here and would soon become one of us.”
Chance was clearly taken aback. A shy man with not a great deal of self esteem he couldn’t think of anything to say as it all seemed to be almost a dream.
Pete exchanged a glance with Sasha before continuing. “You know my daughter is trans?”
“Yes what of it. She’s always been kind and polite to me and seems to be a nice girl. Gustav certainly thinks so.”
Sasha and Pete were watching Chance very closely when Sasha nodded to Pete who very casually announced, “So is Stephanie, the young lady Sasha was referring to.” If Chance had any negative reaction to that neither Sasha nor Pete saw so much as a flicker of it though he did look worried.
“You seem to wish to know if that would make a difference to me. It doesn’t. I’m interested, why should I not be? If it goes nowhere I will have tried, but if it does I’m a not very long qualified accountant and I don’t earn a huge salary. Not enough to pay in the near future for any surgery Stephanie may want, and no bank would regard me as a good credit risk. I’m not saying she would have to have surgery that’s not my decision, but I suspect even our joint salaries with free accommodation could not run to it soon, and that I would find embarrassing. I’m no film star, nor an athlete, and have never been of interest to girls, so I probably won’t be of interest to Stephanie either. To be honest I’ve never been particularly bothered by that since I’ve was never overly interest in girls at school nor women since then. I’m not interested in men either, it’s just that I’ve never been obsessed by women unlike most of the boys I went to school with. I was bullied at school by girls as well as boys and worked hard to go to university to read accountancy in order to start a new life. Unfortunately it didn’t work out as well as I’d hoped, and where I live now is not much different from school, so I keep a low profile. I don’t like where I live, but I can’t afford to live anywhere else. Most of the folk who live there have never done a day’s work in their lives and are criminals, many of them are violent, and I would be really glad to be given an opportunity to leave. To live here would be a dream come true.”
Sasha looked at Pete as Chance’s words died out. They barely nodded to each other and Chance hadn’t notice their nods because he’d not been looking. Sasha asked, “It is our belief that we have little time to waste and if possible we should act pre-emptively so as to forestall any possible action that Social Services could take with regard to your children. If my wife has words with Stephanie tomorrow morning would you be prepared to meet with her later in the day with a view to exploring possibilities?”
Chance was a little taken aback for that was the first time any had ever referred to the children as his children, but he immediately albeit nervously replied, “Yes. Where?”
Pete replied, “Here. You could take a walk round the reservoir. It’s maybe three or four miles, an hour or an hour and a half.”
Chance smiled, and for the first time since Sasha had started Chance looked less unhappy. “Yes that sounds pleasant, but why are you doing this for me?”
Pete replied, “You may not be aware of it, but all of the Bearthwaite menfolk you have met think well of you. This, if it works, helps you, the children, your family, Stephanie and the village too. It’s also possible we could offer you a job as an accountant.”
“I’m not experienced enough to work on my own,” Chance protested. “The women at work made sure I only was given the most trivial routine tasks to do like sorting out boxes of receipts. I try to avoid them because they act in ways that are sexually inappropriate trying to provoke me into doing something that would get me sacked, which doubtless they would consider to be funny. The truth is I avoid women because they scare the hell out of me.”
“We have an experienced accountant who lives here called Murray. He does the accounts for all that the village owns as community resources. Strictly he’s retired, but he also does a bit of work for locals along with Bertie’s wife, Emily. I know he would be delighted to mentor you.” Sasha continued, “Now lest you start to think that this is all your birthdays and Christmases come together obviously there are terms, but they may not be what you would expect. We’ll accept you as one of us only once you marry Stephanie and on marriage you sign that she adopts the children. Till then you would be living in her home and could be evicted. You’ve got three months in which to make it happen. That’s why I wished to know if you were married. Waiting to be divorced would have complicated matters. If you can’t make it happen in three months you never will, so at that point you’re out. The reasons for the marriage are obvious, the reasons for the adoption are less so. One is to protect the children in case anything happens to you. If Stephanie had adopted them Social Services can’t take them off her and into care. The second reason is to protect Stephanie. If you decided to abandon her you would not be able to just remove the children if they were hers. Given her nature and her relationships with children she would have come to love them as their mother quickly and would be devastated if she lost them. Those are absolute and non negotiable terms. If you can’t agree to them now there is no point in this going any further and Stephanie has no need be telt anything.”
Chance smiled again and said, “I see the necessity, and those are not unreasonable conditions, but I do get the feeling you have done this before or at least something like it.”
Pete said, “Not the same, but any number of things like it. Harriet was my eldest brother’s child and he tret her badly. He is not welcome here. Gladys and I adopted her. Sasha was involved in that too. We’ve been involved in a few messy marriage breakdowns between locals and outsiders too, so we have a little experience of these sorts of thing. I’ll add that Harriet and Stephanie are not the only trans women who live here, but those are not my tales to tell.”
Chance said, “Today was not a good day for me for a variety of reasons. The kids are all bullied at school and the school seems to think it’s my fault because they never go outside to play at home. The reason they don’t is because they are too frightened of the local kids, and after having been beaten up a few times at at odds of over ten to one they have reason to be. The letter from school as well as the utility bills I have no idea how I’m going to pay all arrived in the post this morning. However, it seems to be a better day now. I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep or not, but if I can’t at least it won’t be due to crippling anxiety. I’ll bid you goodnight and look forward to seeing you and Stephanie tomorrow. I do hope we can make something of it, but only time will tell. I’ll top this up if you don’t mind, Pete, and take it to bed.” At that Chance filled his glass which emptied the bottle and left saying, “Goodnight, Sasha, Pete.”
“What do you think, Sasha? I notice you deliberately didn’t tell him Stephanie was post op. Nor about Harriet and Gustav going on the foster parent list.”
“Like you said, Pete, not my tale to tell, and he doesn’t need to know about Harriet and Gustav. That’s a safety net for the kids, not a sword of Damocles to hold over his head. I think the relief from knowing that someone, anyone, is willing to help even if the chance that it will improve things is vanishingly small, which is how I think he sees it, is overwhelming him at the moment. That tells you just how little support he has had from anyone other than his family who aren’t in a position to do much because they have to look after their own kids and their parents too. I think he really doesn’t care that Stephanie is trans or whether she’s pre or post op. What part his low level libido plays in that I don’t know. I also think unless something happens soon to change his life significantly, something that gives him a place in life, a rôle, a purpose and some light at the end of the tunnel he’ll end up committing suicide before long. Such a mind set is dangerous in people who have kids they care about because their minds become so disturbed they often take the kids with them rather than risk them ending up in even worse circumstances. Keep that to yourself, Pete. None else who can’t reason it out for himself needs to know.” Pete just nodded. “His lack of self confidence and self esteem and the fear he’ll lose the children is crippling him to the point of being barely able to function. Christ his whole life has been one unending pile of shite, whatever happens has got to be an improvement. A decent single bloke with no life experience worth a damn and even less self confidence who has clearly been reviled and abused all his life by women as well as men was given the custody of his sister and brother in law’s three orphaned kids because his parents are too old and his sisters already have a family and can’t afford to take the kids in, and with no bloody support at all he was expected to cope playing mother and father both to the kids. He’s doing his damnedest, but what the fuck were the powers that be thinking of?”
“That’s obvious, Sasha. They weren’t thinking at all beyond their own convenience. He was there, had what they could present to the court as a graduate level job and his sisters were in the background. Case closed. Closed that is till his inability to cope starts to threaten their comfortable little worlds at which point they’ll pour shite and blame all over him and with the kids taken off him and dumped into what they laughingly refer to as the care system they are in the clear.”
Sasha sighed and said, “Unfortunately I suspect you are correct in every detail, Pete. I think this could work out very well, but if it doesn’t we need to work out some thing that will help him and the kids and get them here. We’ve gone too far with it to just walk away if Stephanie and he can’t see a future as a couple. Having given him some hope, if we took it away from him, we’ll have effectively sent him down the road to suicide and passed a death sentence on those kids. However, it occurs to me that Murray would benefit from having him handle the bulk of the routine work immediately, and he would benefit from Murray’s experience and mentoring which will eventually enable him to take over from Murray entirely. Emily will be glad of him. She doesn’t wish to commit the time that taking over the Bearthwaite Village Community Ownership Company accounts and the Bearthwaite Property Developments Company accounts would require when Murray finally retires, so she’ll help Chance too. She’ll do whatever she can to help, but she’s a pregnant young mum with a family to look after, so it’s understandable. There’s not a lot to do really, for we can provide him with a decent place to live and a job with training at a sensible salary that will enable him to pay for it. The kids will be infinitely better off here than in Raffles. If it goes belly up with Stephanie we just turn the rest over to the women. It won’t take them long to find him a wife and Stephanie a man with kids. No, Pete, we’re doing okay. All we need to do now is acquire Bearthwaite a decent solicitor next. I can’t bring to mind all the details, but there is something I heard a goodly while back in connection with that trans girl from Silloth that is intriguing me.”
“Adalheidis?”
“Aye. I’m sure it would be the same lass because I doubt there being two with the name Adalheidis in a place the size of Silloth. I first heard something about her just after she left the secondary school at Silloth. Mostly it was the usual bigotry that trans folks are only too familiar with, but there was something about her living in a flat in Carlisle and working in an office there. I’m not sure because it was going on ten years ago, but I can’t get it out of my head that there was a connection to Cartmell Shepherd, but that could be about someone else and my mind is making a incorrect connection.”
“What the big solicitors on the Viaduct?”
“Yes, so since I don’t wish to advertise, perhaps some discreet questions wouldn’t go amiss. I’ll ask Sam Shaw to look into it for us.” Sasha drained his glass and said, “That bottle did more than its share. Who paid for it?”
Pete shrugged and replied, “You? Me? One of the lads? It was on the counter behind the bar, so I’ve no idea. Who cares, it tastes the same irrespective of who paid for it. If I’m asked what happened to it I’ll replace it, but I doubt if I shall be. You better go, Lad, or Elle will be looking for blood. She’ll not come in here after you, but she be pacing waiting for you getting madder by the second. I’ll tell Gladys what was said with Chance, and have her ring Elle first thing. Goodnight, Sasha.”
Sasha wished Pete a goodnight and walked round to the room. “Home, Elle. I’ll give you the details on the way, but in short an excellent result. Gladys is going to ring you first thing to discuss what happens next.”
Gladys rang Elle at eight the following morning and the pair went to visit Stephanie at nine. Stephanie looked a little panicked at being telt a man was being arranged for her, but further details soon calmed her down. “We do not wish you to leave, Stephanie,” Elle telt her. “We do believe it is neither in the interests of yourself nor the village, in that order. Since you came home you’ve always admitted that you are looking for a man and a future, and we admit to being a pair of interfering old women, but this was agreed upon by most of the women in the village. We wish you to find a man you can settle down and be happy with, and this one comes with three children whom he is terrified of losing to Social Services. We also wish you to settle down here where you are safe and amongst friends, folk who care about you. You’ve never mentioned what your life was like before you returned, but we’re not daft. It’s obvious it wasn’t too good. If you can make this work you need not leave and Chance’s children are safe from officialdom. If you can’t we’ll still be looking for a man with kids for you because as I said, we do not want you to leave. We’ll sort things for you too. I want you to be contractually employed as just another school teacher here. The arrangement we have is ridiculous, for you are no less important than the teachers of the older children, and I don’t want you to be regarded by any including yourself as any different because that may make it more likely that we will lose you. There were good reasons for initially using the current arrangements, but they no longer exist and there are good reasons for changing them.”
“Thank you, but what if he doesn’t want to live here, Elle?”
Elle was please to note that Stephanie’s mind was more focussed on Chance than her job, and replied “Sasha tells me he’s an accountant and a gentle character who has been bullied a lot. He doesn’t like living in Raffles, for it not a good area and the children are bullied at school for which he is being held responsible by the school. It doesn’t take much insight to realise that it is not going to be long before the Education Authority brings the full weight of Children’s Services to bear on him which will mean the children will go into the fostering system. We already have a response in place for that eventuality.” Stephanie raised her eyebrows and Elle continued, “Harriet and Gustave and Samantha and Gee rang at nine this morning to register on the list of foster parents. They are already cleared, and Social services are desperate for foster parents, so there shouldn’t be any issues. Sasha will be informed as soon as it is decided to remove the children from Chance’s care if that happens. I have no idea how that works and since it is probably illegal I don’t wish to. I suggest you forget I mentioned it.”
Stephanie shuddered and said, “I can understand him wanting out of Raffles. I’ve lived somewhere similar. Those children need out, to a decent school and environment. It’s good that there is something in place for them in case Chance and I don’t take to each other.”
“Sasha reckons he’ll enjoy working with Murray here. I’ll sort you out a house big enough for the five of you in your name to start with. Sasha telt Chance he has three months to get married and have you adopt the children. I presume you don’t need that explaining, Stephanie?”
“No. That’s obvious, and in any case if we can’t get there in three months it’s unlikely we ever should. What’s he like, Gladys? To look at I mean.”
“I was wondering where your pride was, Steph, I’m sorry, Stephanie, I know you don’t like that. I thought you’d never ask.” Gladys pulled her phone out of her handbag and said, “These were all taken last night.”
“Christ he looks gey unhappy!”
“Yeah, but Pete said he looked a lot happier after he and Sasha had talked to him.”
“So they played good shrink, bad shrink with him?”
“Probably, though Pete didn’t say. He did say they telt him nothing concerning your surgeries and that he was worried he didn’t earn enough to help you pay for them if that were what you wanted. He went to considerable lengths to explain that wasn’t a condition of marriage, but if that were what you wanted he was embarrassed that your joint salaries wouldn’t be able to pay for them any time soon. He is of no sexual experience whatsoever and appears to have a low libido, but Pete said his past history of being bullied and general lack of self confidence undoubtedly played a major rôle in that. Chance also made it clear he was heterosexual, but just had never chased girls nor women, because none had ever shewn any interest in him, not even just to talk to. Apparently some of the women where he works consider it to be entertaining to sexually taunt and humiliate him.”
“Bitches don’t deserve a pair of— They don’t deserve to be women.”
Elle and Gladys smiled and to Stephanie’s surprise, Elle said, “Quite. Women like that get us all a bad name.”
It was clear Gladys agreed with her when she said, “Women like that may catch a decent man, but sure as seawater is salty they won’t be able to keep one.”
Stephanie continued, “Well he definitely becomes more interesting now. What happens next?”
Elle replied, “Gladys introduces you at the Dragon and you go for a walk round the reservoir. You should be able to arrange things for yourselves after that, though I suggest you meet the children today if things go okay. That will take some of the pressure of Chance and his sisters. If you text me it’s going forward as soon as you can, I’ll close matters with the Heywards concerning their house here. They moved back to Essex three months ago. For speed I’ll buy the house in the name of the Bearthwaite Property Developments Company and transfer the money immediately. We can sort the details out at our leisure. I’ll text you as soon as that’s done and you two can move in with the kids later today. Bearthwaite one, Social Services nil which is a satisfactory result. Despite the assurances the Heywards gave me, I think I’ll complete the purchase as soon as possible no matter what. That was a little remiss of me for I should have done that weeks ago just to prevent it ever going on the open market. Assurances are not a contract, so I’ll not take that risk again. You okay with that?”
“Yes. Nervous and excited, but I’m okay with it.”
“Good off you go with Gladys. I’ve a couple of houses to complete the purchases on.”
Stephanie and Chance were very nervous, but both had had matters clearly explained to them and they were barely over the foot bridge at the beginning of the reservoir about half a mile [800m] from the Dragon, when they were holding hands. “This feels like an arranged marriage, Stephanie. I never even considered that I’d be in this position.”
“Me neither, but I shan’t mind if it works. Things tend to be different in Bearthwaite, but this is different even for Bearthwaite. I’ll tell you what’s going on. I currently live in a flat in the old vicarage, it’s part of my salary, but there will shortly be a house available for all five of us if you and I can move forward on this. The folk that lived there were outsiders and they returned to Essex. It’s one of the last few houses owned by outsiders, for the Bearthwaite Property Developments Company usually buys up all such as fast as they come up for sale. Outsiders have caused us problems in the past and folk who come here and then expect us to live the way they consider to be appropriate are neither welcome nor wanted. We can live without the Local Authority investigating their vexatious and trivial complaints lodged purely to cause us unnecessary problems that were never found to be justifyable. There are a few who originally came from outside who have been made welcome, but that is because it was clear they were like us, and so they were welcomed as one of us. If they hadn’t been like us they would have been unable to buy property here and none of the retailers would have selt them anything. Too none would allow their children to play with theirs. Since the school here is private, owned and financed by us, and not under LEA(24) control they would have had to take their primary school age children fourteen miles to the nearest LEA school and fourteen miles back. Their secondary school age children would have to go twenty-four miles to school the same as ours. However, the road severely floods every winter, often six to eight feet deep and a mile or more of it under water. It’s the only way in and out of Bearthwaite other than the old pack pony route out of the valley head which is a steep and difficult route for the fit and able in summer. In winter it’s either covered in ice, fast running water or both and it’s very dangerous. Other than the air ambulance helicopter that’s it. For most it’s the road or nothing. The residents of Bearthwaite own the boat and the pumps. The pumps are expensive to run and would not be used to clear the road just so some unwelcome outsiders could get their children to school. We wouldn’t be prepared to use the boat to enable their children to get to school and back either. There are any number of highly educated folk live here, and we educate our own children of all ages during times of flood. In addition, our secondary school age children lost no school time due to Covid, but the outsiders’ children were not educated by us, so missed out on considerable education. That convinced a number of particularly obnoxious outsiders to sell up and leave as soon as the flood waters subsided. The Bearthwaite Property Developments Company, which is overseen by Elle Sasha’s wife, bought their properties as soon as they were on the market. There are only a few outsiders living here now, unwelcome and shunned they’ll go soon, and as soon as their property comes on the market it’ll be snapped up, even if it is at ten times it’s value.”
“How can that be done?”
“Simple. Sasha. He’s a multi billionaire and the only thing he cares about is the well being of Bearthwaite. He was given a lot of grief by outsiders who lived near him for a good few years. That’s why he founded the Bearthwaite Property Developments Company, to buy up property as soon as it became available and make sure it was never selt to undesirables. He is incredibly clever and was a pure mathematician of international renown, welcomed everywhere in the world, Europe, the old USSR, now Russia, the States, China, everywhere. He chose to settle here and converted his house from a ruin into what it is today himself. I wasn’t born then, but we all know about it, and every tradesman and craftsman here has a huge respect for his abilities. He’s completely unsnobbish about it all and one of his best mates is Uncle Alf Winstanley who though he is a mechanical genius describes himself as having been a teachers’ nightmare and as thick as a stump.”
“What, Alf is your uncle?”
“Not exactly. All adults are referred to as Auntie or Uncle by children here, it’s a respect and a caring thing, and that doesn’t change when we reach adulthood ourselves.”
“I knew this place was different, but how will I and my children fit in? Will we even be welcome?”
“You are already liked by the Grumpy Old Men, the men who really count here. That means you are also respected and liked by the older women, the women who really count here.”
“Why? I’ve never met any of them.”
“Because that’s how marriage works here. Their menfolk like you, they love their menfolk and respect their opinions regards other men, so of course they like you. It works both ways. An incomer woman, for example Jane Wright who came here when I was about twelve and married Arnie who had six children, who is respected and liked by Bearthwaite women will be respected and liked by Bearthwaite men simply because they love their womenfolk and respect their opinions regards other women. That’s how it works here. That’s why the trans don’t present a problem to anyone here. Bearthwaite men don’t have any direct opinions concerning me as a woman because I’m not one of them. Like all women here regardless of our history I’m appraised constantly by every other woman here including me and as long as the consensus is that someone measures up to our codes of conduct they’re accepted by us as a Bearthwaite woman like every other Bearthwaite woman. If they are accepted by the women it’s automatic that they are accepted by the men too.”
Stephanie laught and said, “It not difficult. The main thing is no trousers, so sorry, but you’ll never see a tight pair of jeans stretched over my backside. I’ve always supposed that there’s a similar mechanism amongst the men, but I don’t know because though born a boy I became a closeted girl from the age of maybe four, so I never became enough of a man to find out. I was just good at hiding what I really was till I was ready to come out, which was at the beginning of my second year at university, though I’d started on blockers and hormones at the beginning of my first year. For the next three years I didn’t come back home. For the first two of those three years I finished my degree and during the last one I did my PGCE, (25) the teachers’ ticket at a different university. My degree was difficult because I had a hard time being trans at Birmingham, but by the time I left I looked like I do now complete with the boobs and bum that I inherited from my mum. None ever suspected I was anything other than a girl at Bath University where I did my primary and early years PGCE. I was lucky in that the only surgery I required was GRS and I had that over the summer in Thailand at the end of my second year at Birmingham. I don’t have implants and my face didn’t need anything because other than my long hair I always looked like this. I had very little body or facial hair and what little I had disappeared due to the hormones.
“Addressing your concerns for the children, children rapidly absorb the culture of the children they associate with. Though there have been a couple of exceptions. There were a pair of siblings, a brother and sister from Manchester, though I was only three and don’t remember them, who came here who were already beyond redemption. Bullies and thugs in their early teens, they systematically made life hell for other children. I no more than any other, including the police, have any real idea what happened, but they were found drowned in the reservoir. An accident? Perhaps, but it’s strange that there have only ever been those two deaths in the reservoir since it was created in Victorian days. They’d been seen swimming and diving from overhanging trees into the water in the area by many adults for a couple of weeks prior to their deaths. The corner’s reports concluded from the pathologist’s reports that they had been swimming and that they had dived into an area that was not as deep as they’d thought. They’d hit their heads on the rocky bottom and drowned.”
“What do you believe happened?”
“I believe they paid for their behaviour. I believe they were executed by other children who’d suffered enough. I say executed, not murdered, deliberately. You asked, so I answered, but I’ll warn you it would not be wise of you to ever repeat what I said to an outsider, for if my belief is correct the folk who did it are probably in their middle thirties now, and who knows what they would be prepared to do to avoid discovery.”
“Are you threatening me?”
“No, Chance. If you truly wish to become one of us no threat is necessary. If you do not I don’t care what happens to you, for I am Bearthwaite folk and like everyone else here I see most outsiders as a threat to us and our way of life. If you do repeat what I said I shall deny ever having said it, and the ranks will close to protect me and every other inhabitant here too, and you and yours will be outside those ranks. The choice is yours. Become one of us and you and yours have protection for ever. Pretend to be one of us and you and yours are expendable, worthless and of no interest to anyone here, and it would be discovered sooner rather than later. Certainly, if that is how you feel you should ask yourself why should any here make any move to prevent your nieces and nephew from being taken from you and into the care system. We all have choices to make, and I have made mine. I may not have been born a Bearthwaite girl, but I am a Bearthwaite woman, and one thing I have learnt since this morning is just how important both are to me. Whether we make this work or not, I’m not leaving here just for a man. No matter how much I want and need a husband and children I’d rather be single here than married with a family anywhere else. Here I’m safe, valued and loved, outside all I ever received was abuse, pain and disdain. As I understand it that is something you are only too familiar with, so you should at least understand why I feel that way.”
After considerable thought Chance asked, “Will you marry me, Stephanie?”
“No, for I have not met the children. Introduce us and after an hour you shall have my answer, but I will kiss you.”
Using Chance’s clapped out Citroën, an hour and a half later they were in Raffles, a notorious estate [US hood] of Carlisle and Stephanie met her future children. Grace the oldest was nine, Erin the middle child was seven and Luke the youngest was four. Not unfamiliar with such places, that the children, who were polite and timid, had to live there made her cry. That they never went outside to play for fear of being beaten up again didn’t make her cry, it made her angry. She was talking to the children with the girls either side of her and Luke on her knee when she received the text that telt her the old Heyward house was now available for her use. She texted back ‘van boxes 32 ca2 7wz i w8’(26) and telt Chance to start getting everything packed up. Stephanie was amazed at how little the entire family had in the way of possessions and clothes. The entire kitchen packed into a couple of cardboard boxes that weren’t very big and that included all the food too. She had more in her kitchen for just herself than Chance had for four of them. They seemed to have the clothes they were wearing and a single change of clothes. Since there was no washing equipment and their clothes were clean Stephanie concluded Chance must use a launderette. The children had virtually no toys and no entertainment devices, not even a radio to listen to. A dinning table and four chairs and four very narrow beds, no more than sixty centimetres [24 inches] wide and that was it.
Alf arrived driving the village bus with three dozen men, half a dozen women and the boxes. After dismantling the beds and the table, they had loaded up and were ready to head home within half an hour. As they were about to leave a gang of a hundred or more older teenagers approached and one said, “We want some money before you can go.” The men got off the bus to confront the growing crowd. The Bearthwaite men were seen to be all carrying heavy gevlik(27) bars which made some in the crowd leave and others step back, but there were more than enough who thinking the odds were in their favour were not deterred.
Alf stepped out of the driver’s cab and with out saying a word walked right up to the crowd and with a reaction speed that perplexed the thugs grabbed hold of the leader and his henchman by the throat. Alf at well over seven feet tall and of a massive build shook the two like a puppy shaking a rag for several seconds and finally spoke. “You may possibly give us a beating, but I’m betting I can cripple a couple of dozen of you before you do, and the lads will take out even more of you. Those gevliks they’re holding will put any one they hit in hospital for months and in a wheel chair for life. If anyone feels like trying it I suggest you don’t fuck about waiting, but just get on with it.” He dropped the two he’d suspended in the air with their feet a foot off the ground and kicked them both in the belly, just once each. They wouldn’t be getting up due to difficulty breathing for several minutes, and without their leaders Alf had reckoned the rest would behave like sheep.
He continued, “You’re just acting tough. Those guys with the gevliks are the real deal, don’t even think about the fact that they’re way older than you, most are ex special forces trained to kill, so I suggest you leave. The police are on their way and as we speak are watching the video footage. They know what happened, so lying about it won’t help you. I suggest you go and avoid the trouble before they arrive and I’ll warn you any who gets in the way of the bus will end up under it, because I won’t be slowing down never mind stopping. After all if I kill you that way I can always claim I was looking somewhere else due to your actions and it was just an accident. I’ll get a suspended sentence and a fine at most, and my neighbours will help me pay the fine.” The crowd dispersed dragging the two Alf had man handled with them.
Once on the main road and on their way home far from Raffles, Chance asked Bertie, who was more or less as big as Alf, “Is that true, you are mostly special forces, and the police were on their way watching video of it all?”
Bertie laught and replied, “Granddad could easily have take two or even three dozen out on his own and we’d have sorted the rest out with no bother. They weren’t men, just thugs used to getting all their own way. They wouldn’t have lasted two minutes if it had got real. But mostly Granddad was just bull shitting to avoid the problems that violence would have caused us. I reckon he’s been associating with Sasha for too long.”
“How do you mean, Bertie?”
“Obviously Sasha is a master story teller of master story tellers right?” Chance nodded. “Well, he reckons a good tale teller should never allow the truth to interfere with a good tale, so he uses what he calls story tellers’ licence. That’s the right to enhance the tale for audience enjoyment. He says no story teller ever tells lies they merely create the new truth. I reckon Sasha wouldn’t recognise the real truth if it hit him in the face like a yard [a metre] of fresh tripe. Actually I reckon the concept of truth has no meaning to Sasha because he considers it to be a matter of where one perceives it from, and there is no such thing as the real truth. I also reckon that’s no bad thing, quite the contrary. You’ll learn what I mean when you start to understand what Sasha has done for Bearthwaite. Tell you, when he goes that funeral wake will be something else, but we all hope he’s going to live for ever. Folk don’t say much, but we all hope he goes when the road is flooded, so the funeral will be completely private with no outsiders there. There’s already been talk of dropping the reservoir water onto the road to make sure. Even if it’s dry at the time it would take forty-eight hours for the water to subside. He’s already picked his plot and his monument has been carved, though there’s still discussion on the words. He wants it to read ‘Here lies Sasha Vetrov, creator of the new truth.’ That will certainly be there, but only Elle knows what else will be there too, and it shall be her decision alone. She’s almost as difficult to understand as her man. Truth is her background and history is even more of an enigma than Sasha’s and he was a KGB officer.”
It was a thoughtful Chance who sat holding hands with Stephanie who having heard what Bertie had said respected Chance’s introspection. She knew he was still coming to terms with the reality of becoming Bearthwaite folk, though she was convinced he was already there. He just didn’t realise it. He was she understood at a deep level as damaged as she had been and he would become in Sasha’s words a new truth. A new and real version of himself, as she had become a new and real version of herself on returning home. She regretted the pain she had had to undergo outside her home environment in order to acquire the education she so desperately wanted, but she had no regrets now she had acquired it and was permanently back at home where she belonged. She was committed to Chance as her man, the mother of his adopted family, and knew he would do all he considered necessary to make sure all recognised he was equally committed to her, the children and Bearthwaite. That the men liked him she knew, but eventually his care for children that weren’t his, even though kin, would mean the Bearthwaite women would regard him as a man among men and she would be regarded as a fortunate woman. It would perhaps be a couple of decades before Chance was able to accept that, but she was thinking about it now.
Grace, Erin and Luke somehow understood their uncle, who they knew was legally their father now, was struggling to come to terms with events. Exactly what that involved they didn’t understand, but that he needed Stephanie to function as their guardian and protector they did understand, so they left the couple alone and interacted with the others on the bus. Grace speaking on behalf of the three asked Gladys, “What is going to happen next? Are we safe now? We know Uncle Chance and our aunties have been trying hard to avoid us being taken away to live with folk we don’t know who would possibly hurt us, but we don’t understand what is happening. Are we safe now? And are we not going to be taken away to folk who would separate and hurt us?”
Gladys telt Grace, “You are all safe now, Pet. Your Uncle Chance has legally been your father for some time. Social Services could only have taken you away from him if he had not had the resources, that’s money and a decent place to live, to support you. He is going to marry Stephanie, who wishes to be your mum, and she has a large house for you all to live in. Your new parents are more than able to make sure you are safe from Social Services, for you are now Bearthwaite children. Bearthwaite is where we live. It’s where you live now, and you’ll never have to go back to where you used to live. You’ll go to our school now, not the school you used to attend. Your new teachers are kind and will help you to learn. None of our children are bullies, so you are safe at school and at home and can go outside to enjoy playing with other children, nice girls and boys. I suggest you start calling Stephanie and your uncle Mum and Dad because it’s what our children will expect you to do. I’m Auntie Gladys. Bearthwaite will provide whatever is necessary to ensure your safety from outsiders, and Social Services are without doubt outsiders. We’ve known your dad for a few months now, and we like him. He has a new job working with us, so he’ll never have to go back to that dreadful place where he used to work. Please explain all that to Erin and Luke and if you need help just ask.
An hour later they had unloaded all of Chance’s family’s chattels at their new house and others were moving Stephanie’s possessions from her flat to join them. An hour after that with their furniture reassembled they had moved in and Stephanie was cooking their first dinner as a family, chicken korma. That she could create something that looked like takeaway food amazed Chance and the children. That it tasted so much better than takeaway they found hard to believe. Their reactions to poppadoms with plain boiled Basmati rice, served with chicken legs she’d cut off a whole chicken, a few vegetables and spices cooked in a supermarket jar of korma cook in sauce perplexed Stephanie, for to her it was a quick lash up because it was late and the children had to be up early to go to school the following day. “What on earth did you eat before?” she asked.
“Ready meals for the microwave,” Chance replied. “I don’t know how to cook.” That explains the lack of cookware in the kitchen Stephanie thought.
“Well I’m not eating that rubbish,” Stephanie responded hotly. “And further more nor are the children. It’s not good for them. They need fresh fruit and vegetables, fish and meat, dairy products made from quality milk, freshly cooked grains and decent bread to be healthy. I buy my bread, but it is good bread baked at the mill just down the road.”
After Stephanie’s outburst over food the children were cautious in their dealings with her, but when she asked bluntly in Bearthwaite fashion, “Do you want me as your mum? I want to marry your uncle who is now your legal dad. He wants to marry me. I have always wanted children, but I can’t have any. I would love to adopt you to be your legal mum. I am a teacher of lots of young children, and I enjoy that, but I have always wanted some of my own.” They all started crying and whispering admitted that they wanted a mum. It was clear they not only wanted a mum they needed a mum. Stephanie telt Grace and Erin, “Good food is important and everyone should be able to cook. Luke is not yet old enough, but you two should be learning. There is an after school cooking club you could go to on Wednesdays, but you could help me in the kitchen too. We’ll all be busy tomorrow, but you could make a trifle after school whilst I’m preparing dinner. That only needs the kettle to be boiled for the jelly and some milk heated for the custard, the rest is easy. You can do it together all by yourselves. Would you like that?”
The girls clearly were interested though Stephanie suspected they had no idea what a trifle was. The goodnight kisses when Stephanie put the children to bed eased relationships enormously, and she was surprised but happy when at breakfast the children all called her Mum.
Whilst the children washed and partially dressed Stephanie was cooking breakfast of scrambled eggs on toast when Chance asked her again, “Will you marry me?”
“After last night? I rather think I should, so yes. Sit down, Children. I’ll dish up your breakfast in a sec.” Stephanie produced plates for all five of them with buttered toast on saying, “You too, Chance, sit down.”
As she spooned the scrambled egg onto the toast Erin asked, “What is it, Mum?”
“Scrambled egg. Try it. It’s nice. What did you usually have for breakfast?”
“Cornflakes,” Luke replied.
“Do you like cornflakes?”
“They’re okay.”
“So do I buy some more?”
There was no answer, so Stephanie decided to buy some up market cereals that the children may like because they would eat them with milk and she was concerned that their diet had not been too healthy just recently. The children would doubtless enjoy some of the highly nutritious muesli that Phil the mill and Alice provided the rolled cereal ingredients for and Dave and Lucy the grocers made up customised with dried fruit, nuts and seeds as per request. Stephanie decided she would take the children with her so they could decide how they wished their muesli made up. Lucy and Dave she knew would be happy to make up three different mixes for the children.
Whilst the children were finishing getting dressed, Stephanie picked up her previous conversation with Chance. “As to the wedding. None of us here are exactly religious, but we have a church, though it’s been de-consecrated, so technically it’s not a church any more. The church is well attended even if we have to buy a vicar or registrar in when we need one, which is only for weddings. We have our own ideas of which events are appropriate to celebrate in church, mostly to do with farming, things like harvest festival, that’s important here, and weddings of course. Like all the other women here I help with the flowers in the church. Uncle Alf and his allotment(28) mates grow them specially for the church. Next time it’s my turn to help with the flowers I’ll take the girls with me. It’s what mums with girls do here. The Lawtons have been officially registered undertakers here for generations and we handle our own funerals. None except the very old have been christened, certainly none since the last resident vicar left which was during the second world war. [1939-1945]
“We run our own services, and you’d be surprised who speaks from the pulpit. You can’t call it preaching sermons because mostly it’ll be about things that matter to us, so it’s more like a community meeting. Uncle Alf spoke once about what he needed from everyone else to get the bus back on the road. He did all the mechanical stuff, but the seats were just bare tubular frames, so some of the men did the required woodwork and some of the women did the upholstery. That’s why the bus seats look like the seating in the best room in the Dragon. The church had been falling down for decades with no repairs done since the first world war, [1914-1918] and thirty or forty years ago in the eighties some time the village bought the entire site, the church, the vicarage, the church hall, the grave yard and the three or four acres of land it all stood in from the Church of England. That was when it was de-consecrated.
“The church and the vicarage were restored by local labour at no cost other than materials. The old church hall was demolished to build the Community Centre, the school and the library that is there now the same way, materials costs only, though all the materials that could be recycled into the new buildings were reused. There are photographs in the library that shew it all as it was at every stage of demolition and construction. There are similar photos of Gustav’s brewery too. We’ve been regularly turning down offers of a resident clergyman from the Church of England ever since. They seem to think they’d be doing us a favour. Despite Sasha and several others telling them as bluntly as they could, they don’t understand that from our point of view all that would do is cost us money to listen to nonsense we neither believe in nor want to hear. I suspect they don’t want to understand us. After we paid for the site and repaired the church and the vicarage they seem to think it’s reasonable to expect us to give it back to them. Presumably so they can dictate how we should live. One idiot, a bishop, telt Sasha that if they resumed regular services they’d have to have control of the church building and the vicarage handed over to them for their vicar to live in. Can you believe it‽”
“What did Sasha reply?”
“He swore at him in Russian. The bishop asked him what he had said, and Sasha telt it it translated as, ‘Go and shit in your hat’, which I suppose is funny in a way because bishops wear those pointy hats called mitres. I suppose it would have been rather painful.” The couple were laughing when Stephanie asked, “You okay for a wedding next week? That gives everybody time to organise the service and the reception in the Dragon.”
“Yes.”
“Then we need to tell the children and find sixty quid for an immediate licence. That can all be done over the internet. We’ll also need to find a vicar who needs some cash or a licenced registrar to marry us, but Elle will deal with all that for us because she has the contacts. We also need to set the process of adoption in motion, but again Elle will file the application over the internet though it will require all five of us to go to a family court session of the combined court on Earl Street in Carlisle to be finalised. I don’t know if you are aware of it, but the way the adoption laws work means that legally we shall both be adopting the children, not just me. You need to find Murray today to see about your new job. If he’s not at home I suggest you try Bertie and Emily’s house. She has a big office at home and the pair of them do a lot of their work there. Take all those utility bills, your rent book and the letter from the school with you along with any other outstanding bills including your credit cards. Don’t forget to take all your Bank details too. Murray won’t deal with them himself, but he’ll know who can deal with them on your behalf to best advantage.
“I’ll take the children to school with me. Luke can join my little ones till he settles in then he can go with the others of his age. The girls can join the appropriate classes. Admin will inform their old school they are now being privately educated and ask for their records. Their old school will doubtless be difficult since they’ll resent that they are in a private school, but a solicitor’s letter threatening to take the Education Authority to court for non compliance with the law will sort that out, but it may take six months. The school here won’t be bothered, for they’ll soon understand what the children need to focus on. It’s just that the Education Authority is left wing, doesn’t approve of private education and has tried to make life difficult for them in the past, so they like to return the favour. Completely changing the subject, Chance. Are you okay if I give Grace ten pounds a week pocket money, Erin eight and Luke five? I’ll open a Cumberland building society account for them too, if that’s okay?”
“That’s too much.”
“No it’s not. Children need to learn to handle money and they can’t do that unless they have some of their own to handle. If they save it they’ll learn something from that. If they blow it they’ll learn something different. Anyway there’s not much for children to spend money on here. I suggested those sums because that’s more or less what all children of their ages receive here, and I don’t want them to be embarrassed by being different. The rule of thumb here is add one to a child’s age and that’s how much they get a week. When I was a child the extra one wasn’t added. I guess that’s called inflation. So is that okay?”
“Yes. Thank you.”
“I’m their mum, so thanks are not necessary. What about the building society accounts?”
“I was going to do that myself, but I didn’t have enough money to open them with. After the bills and the food there was never much left over, but I’d have gone crazy and been unable to cope if I hadn’t gone to the Dragon on Saturdays. The first Saturday I went to the Dragon I didn’t have enough money for a room, so I slept in my car.”
“Okay. I’ll see to it. I can open the accounts over the internet.”
“When you said to take all the bills and the rent book as well as my bank details to see Murray why was that?”
“To give you a fresh start. The bills will be paid, credit cards too if you owe anything. Your salary here will be one that is realistic not the pittance you were paid before. If you feel it necessary you can total your debts and pay them back as you can into any Bearthwaite Community endeavour, the kids’ Christmas party if you want, or help supervise after school activities, but it is not expected. There’s a shortage of helpers for after school ballet. I always wanted to do ballet, but I was too scared of what would have been said. Silly really because I now realise even back then none would have been bothered. As far as I’m aware all the dance helpers are women, but their dad helping out would give Grace and Erin some serious status amongst their peers. That would be worth doing, and you’d get to know a lot of children and their mums too that way. The more folk you get to know and the sooner you do so the better your life will become. Changing the subject again, I suggest you let Murray write your resignation letter, he’s good at that sort of thing, and if he writes it there will be no issues with your old employers. You may wish to talk to him about moving here because he and Madeline were outsiders once. The only other thing I need to tell you is I’m taking the children on the bus to Carlisle shopping on Saturday for some clothes and toys. We’re leaving early and there are a few child friendly places to eat lunch. There are a lot of women going and some are taking their children, so the children should have some fun. We’ll probably be back at about four. The children will be exhausted, so I’ll prepare something to eat that will take no time to have on the table for an early dinner in advance.”
“This is like a dream, Stephanie, and I’m terrified I’m going to wake up.”
“It’s actually only too real, Chance. Yes I do understand that you are bowled over by what has been done for you and the children. However, I’m equally certain you don’t understand how grateful the village is now that they know I’m not going to leave. It is true I decided that for myself, but I may not have reached that decision had you not come into my life. I am even more certain that you do not appreciate how grateful I feel at being able to settle down with a family here where I want to live. I am grateful to have you in my life and suspect I am falling love with you. I certainly wish to. I am certain that I love the children already, and I’d truly no idea concerning the emotions being a mum involved. I can’t explain that even to myself, but it is wonderful. Last night was an amazing experience for me. Quite apart from enjoying myself enormously I appreciated being treated gently and not like an object to be hit and treated roughly because that’s how a lot of men believe women should be treated in bed as a result of watching too much pornography. So if this is a dream there are a lot of us dreaming it, and from my point of view long may it continue.”
“I’ve never had a mobile phone nor a computer, so I wouldn’t know about the pornography.”
“Well, well, well. Aren’t I the lucky girl‽ Come on, I have to go to work with the children and you have to find Murray. I’ll just check if the children need any help to get ready. I always eat lunch at school with the children, so you’ll have to fend for yourself. Though doubtless Madeline Murray’s wife or Emily will feed the pair of you, so I’ll see you back here after work. I’m usually home for quarter to four. I’ve the makings of a cottage pie(29) and some fresh peas that need shelling in the fridge, so I’ll make a start on that as soon as I get home whilst the girls make that trifle. We’ll have the rest of the chicken roasted as a meat and two vegetable meal with Yorkshire puddings, boiled and roast potatoes and gravy on Sunday. Tonight I’ll aim to eat at six. You okay with that?”
Chance nodded and by the time he’d thought of something to say, for as he’d admitted he was no cook and they’d lived on ready meals, Stephanie had kissed him and was helping the children on with coats, hats and gloves. “I know it’s not cold, Children, but it’s going to rain later, and it’s easier wearing a coat than carrying it.” They all turned and waved and then they were gone. Gladys had dropped the the coats and hats off whilst the family were moving in which was why they all fitted the children, and being busy he’d not noticed them, but he did wonder where they had come from. As he put a light waterproof on ready to leave he realised the children were adapting far faster than he to their changed circumstances. He was coping so far, yet he knew he’d a lot to face in the near future, but what bothered him most was next Saturday eve in the taproom.
1 Many pubs in the UK are inns and many are hotels. Historically there was a huge difference. Inns, like smiths, in those days served the road, i.e. the traveller. Their millennia old allegiance was to the road, not to the local land owner, and as such they could not legally refuse to provide food, drink or accommodation as long as there was some available, be it stale bread to eat, water to drink and a place to sleep in the stables or on the taproom floor. Likewise a smith could not refuse to shoe a horse as long as the rider or vehicle driver could pay him. A hotel was a private establishment that could turn any one away without providing an explanation, many were owned by the local landowner and tended to be larger and higher class establishments than inns. Inns and smithies were the places to go for local news as well as news from afar. Hotels catered to a more genteel clientele.
2 Eccles cake, An Eccles cake is a small, round cake filled with currants and made from flaky pastry with butter, sometimes topped with demerara sugar. Eccles cakes are named after the English town of Eccles, historically part of Lancashire, but now in the City of Salford, Greater Manchester. They do not have protected geographical status so may be, and are, made anywhere. The first I ate was bought in Morrisons supermarket in Eccles in a packet of four labelled ‘Genuine Eccles cakes’ but it said ‘Product of France’ on the packet. Their history goes back to 1793.
3 Thraping, painful punishment, a beating, not necessarily administered by another man as here. A centuries established usage in localised parts of the northern UK, and it has no connection with modern internet usage which suggests the word is a portmanteau word derived from thrashing and raping.
4 Twatted, struck, hit or punched depending on context.
5 Scoops, scoops of beer, vernacular for beers.
6 Chemic, a colloquial term for spirits, probably derived from the word chemical.
7 Wooden overcoat with brass handles, coffin, casket.
8 Wagman, schools truancy officer. Wagging it is playing hooky. Playing hooky is absenting oneself from school when one should be in class. Originally a US term, but now it is widely used in the UK.
9 CV, Curriculum Vitae, US résumé.
10 Gey, very.
11 A sandwich short of a picnic, not quite right in the head.
12 Your shout, your turn to pay for a round of drinks.
13 Mince, minced meat, US ground meat.
14 Cumberland Tatie Pot, a traditional Cumberland dish containing lamb or mutton, onion, carrot, swede [rutabaga] or turnips, black pudding [blood sausage] and potatoes. There are many variations on the recipe, but the black pudding is what defines the dish. Cumberland was a county that in the administrative reorganisation of 1976 was subsumed into Cumbria of which it formed the northern part.
15 Gey strang, very strong.
16 Flitch, a side of bacon is referred to as a flitch.
17 Beck, stream, burn, a small river. A beck is bigger than a rill.
18 Haggis wi basht neeps and tatties, haggis with mashed swede [rutabaga] and potato.
19 Haaf netting is an ancient type of salmon and sea trout fishing. The technique involves fishermen standing chest-deep in the sea and using large submerged framed nets to scoop up fish that swim towards them. It has been practised on the Solway since Viking days and still is. Haaf is a Norse word meaning channel or sea.
20 Spirit safe, a locked enclosed glass box that the spirit enters immediately it leaves the still. Usually only the Customs and Excise have a key. Modern ones accurately measure the alcohol passing through them enabling Customs and Excise to demand the tax due immediately on distillation. Too within the spirit still are numerous controls enabling the master stillman to remotely determine where any particular part of the distillate is sent, which is the first step in the complex set of processes that constitute blending.
21 Artic, articulated trailers. Trailers using a fifth wheel coupling, eighteen wheelers.
22 LEA, Local Education Authority.
23 PGCE, Post Graduate Certificate of Education, one of the UK qualifications that licences one to teach in the UK.
24 There is no such postcode as CA2 7WZ, though possibly half the properties in Carlisle have post codes beginning CA2. Raffles exists and is as described, for despite numerous initiatives to improve the area the inhabitants remain the same.
25 Gevlik, a heavy, pointed iron prybar or crowbar, usually five or six feet long.
26 Allotments, US community gardens.
27 Cottage pie, traditional dish made with minced [ground] beef, onions, stock, flour to thicken the stock, and seasonings to taste. The above are cooked, placed in an oven dish, covered with mashed potato and put in an oven to warm through and brown the potato tops. Often served with garden peas.
Comments
Always Educational
And always enjoyable.