The Denniston Rose by Jenny Pattrick Page A

shift, and a rumble. But I was out then — in the sun. An earthquake, I thought.’
    And as the miners came closer, menacing: ‘Look, my friends …’ (Josiah spat on the ground before him) ‘… you can’t blame a fellow for worrying about the air you breathe. I am sorry about the accident, but how was I to know …’
    Josiah stabbed a finger at him. ‘Accident! Murder, more like. Don’t you insult us with your wild excuses!’
    Jimmy took a step back and his bad knee gave way. He fell awkwardly but not a man, not even the manager, put out a hand to help him up.
    Josiah, his face set like stone, eyes boring holes, pronounced thecurse. ‘God’s wrath be called down on you! You and all your kind. We have no wish ever to set eyes upon you, in this world or the next.’ He turned to Eddie Carmichael. ‘If this man comes within a chain of Banbury or of any other mine on this whole hill every miner here will walk off the job.’ The men rumbled assent. ‘Moreover,’ said Josiah, ‘if he comes down to Burnett’s Face at all we will find it hard to muster any Christian charity, and will more likely do the man in.’
    More nods. Without another word the men left, leaving a white-faced Jimmy struggling upright, and an angry mine manager watching him.
    They say Eddie pleaded with Jimmy to leave that night; offered him and his family assistance on the Incline to get them down safely. When he refused, Eddie fired him. There would be no further work, said Eddie, not now or in the future. Jimmy must have been mad or worse, they said, to stay. But stay he did, in his hut at the corner of the Camp, with few friends and many enemies. With Eva, and with Rose.

School of Six
    MARY SCOBIE BROUGHT up the idea of the school, which was not surprising. The Scobies were organisers, every one of them.
    ‘Born stirrers more like,’ Mr McConnochie had grumbled on more than one occasion, but held his peace now, because they were born miners too.
    Totty was pleased to stop work for a moment, and intrigued. She knew there were women up at Burnett’s Face; Tom, building houses for the immigrants, had brought the news. But this was the first time in six months one had paid a formal visit.
    ‘Come in, come in,’ she says, wondering whether to put the visitor in the boarders’ parlour or the kitchen where it is warm.
    The stout woman, leaning heavily on her stick, makes the decision for her. ‘I won’t come past the kitchen, Mrs Hanratty, myskirt is a good six inches in mud. Do you mind if my Brennan comes in too?’
    And there at the gate stands a sturdy little fellow in trousers a few sizes too big, mud on his knees, his hands, in his hair even. He looks down — perhaps he’s crying.
    ‘He would not take notice of where his feet were carrying him and fell twice, in the thickest mud, wouldn’t you know it?’ The woman sighs bleakly as she looks at the muddy boy. ‘I have told him to stay at the gate till I ask permission to bring in such a rascal. But there. I am not much cleaner and have stayed upright all the way. It is more than time the Company put in a road or two.’ Her flat voice rises a peg or two, then fades into silence. She is exhausted. And some other darkness lies behind the black eyes, the tightly corseted exterior.
    ‘Please come in, both of you,’ says Totty. ‘We will wash off the worst of your boy’s mud in a moment.’
    In the warm kitchen the two women make the formal introductions.
    ‘I am Mrs Josiah Scobie from Burnett’s Face. Please call me Mary.’
    Burnett’s Face is the settlement further in on the plateau, close to the new mines being opened up. Fifty or so miners live there now. It is a two-mile walk and one not often made for purely social reasons.
    Totty nods. She understands now, the darkness that has entered with the woman. ‘My husband, Mr Tom Hanratty, has spoken of you. Of your tragedy.’
    ‘Aye.’
    ‘I am