Polly's Pride Read Free

couldn’t blame her mother-in-law for feeling exasperated. She had indeed worked herself up into a fine lather with largely imagined terrors. Every year it was the same. Being turned out of her own home, even for the annual fumigation, filled her with insecurity. She longed for Matthew to come home, knowing he would understand her fears and soothe them.
    Her husband was good and kind and strong. She felt herself lucky to have been courted and wed by such a man. He didn’t drink all his money away like some, but brought it home for the care of his children, and the wife he loved and cherished above everything. She’d looked forward to his coming home all day, as she always did, but tonight there would be no easy chat over supper, no time to cuddle up beneath the blankets and old army greatcoats in their own bed. But he’d be there all the same, her rock, so really she had nothing to fret about at all.
     
    When Matthew did arrive home, exhausted after a day spent up and down the Rochdale canal on the narrow-boats, it was to find his wife and children standing forlornly in the street, herded together with his neighbours, ready to be carried off like refugees.
    ‘Hello, lad,’ Connie Green hailed him. ‘Here we go again, on us holidays.’
    ‘Aye, who wants to go to Blackpool when they can lie on t’floor of Ardwick Barracks?’ quipped Bet Sutcliffe, who owned the old clothes shop a few doors up the street.
    Matthew managed a smile but, distracted by problems of his own, didn’t come back with a joke as he would normally have done. He could see Davey Murphy ordering his wife about as usual while trying to disguise the fact that she sported another bruise. Matt nodded to him, acknowledging his presence, then turned away, not wishing to appear over-curious. Instead he put his arms about his own wife and drew her to his side, knowing how she hated this annual ritual.
    The smell of the gasworks, rubber works and chemical factory was strong in his nostrils, but to this would soon be added the stink of the fumigating gas. The men were already busily sealing fireplaces, windows and doors with sticky tape. Then they would set fire to tins of powder which would hiss and spit as they ran out, slamming the doors behind them, sealing each one with a sheet of rubber to keep the gas in. By the time the occupants were allowed back from their sojourn at the barracks, the houses should be blessedly free from their unwelcome visitors, for a while at least.
    Matt felt Polly shudder in his arms and, experiencing a rush of love for her, gave her a little squeeze. ‘Don’t fret, love. It’ll be over soon enough, and think what a blessed relief for us to be rid of the blackjacks for a while.’ He helped her climb aboard the truck which would take them to the barracks, where he knew they’d spend an uncomfortable, cold night sleeping on bare boards. Not that he minded. The way he was feeling right now, sleeping on a clothes line wouldn’t trouble him in the least, he was that tired.
    ‘I’ve told them my house is clean, but they’ll not listen.’  
    ‘The bugs would still come, love, clean or not.’
    ‘I know,’ she admitted with a rueful smile, feeling better already just to have him there.
    He smiled back at her, a gentle giant of a man with fair hair and blue-grey eyes that did not quite meet her gaze as they usually did, so that he could hide his own insecurities and fears. He’d been doing reasonably well lately, getting three, or sometimes four days a week regular work, but the gaffer had warned of a slack period coming up with fewer shipments due. As a result, pay and hours would be cut and a restlessness was growing among the men, with renewed talk of unions which employers viewed as a threat to their power.
    Matthew did his best to avoid such talk and patiently hoped for the best. He’d no wish to involve himself in any political protest which he knew could degenerate with frightening swiftness into something violent