ST ELMO’S
CROWN
Short Story
By Gary
Bills
Books mean absolutely nothing down here. A coal mine
demands its own long study, and its themes are darkness and danger.
The cage
lift, the tunnels and the coal seams were never meant for me. My mother gave
birth to a scholar. But shift by shift, I’m shoulder to shoulder in a lift with
men who sweat exactly like me; they’re men who stare into nightmares, just like
me. None of us speak as they winch us down, from the light to the long
suffocation. Sometimes, you can barely breathe. It gets us all like that.
I am right next to Malpass, who nudges my
elbow and hisses: “Yo am fer it today, College Boy...!”
Which I
take to be one of his common threats, in his common dialect.
My mouth
goes dry with dread. What Malpass doesn’t realise is how very much I despise
him, even more than he despises me. At least I can read properly, and at least
I can eat a sandwich without dribbling.
I might have thought differently of my
colleagues, if they had treated me with kindness. However, from the outset, I
was the butt of malice. My flask of tea would be emptied out. My sandwiches of
egg and cress would be peppered with coal dust.
“Yo cor be a miner if yo cor grind up
coal...”
Most of the men despise me because I do not
talk like them, and I do not think like them. I am the scholarship boy who won
his place at St Benedict’s Roman Catholic High School. But what is the point of
a scholarship when it does not even pay for the uniform and the books? It might
have turned out fine, if Mother had not been diagnosed with TB. She had to give up her position as a
solicitor’s clerk. As it stood, with Father long dead, we were left to rely on
either charity or the sweat of my brow, and that’s no choice, is it?
True, there are far worse mines than the
Saggery. Its owners, the Millers, have a mind to be modern, so long as being
modern doesn’t interfere with profits. We have electric cap lamps from America.
They even have rechargeable batteries. These lamps work well enough, so long as
the batteries stay dry in their metal boxes, which are on our leather belts.
Otherwise, once the light fails, you have no choice but to sit it out if you’re
alone, until someone comes looking for you. But the Millers will dock your pay
for every moment you fail to swing a pick. That’s fair, isn’t it?
We work
virtually naked on occasions, because you don’t want to be wearing your Sunday
best when you’re on your side in a narrow chamber, trying to work a coal seam.
If you cut yourself, the coal dust will leave you with a permanent blue scar. I
have five such scars on my hands, and two on my chest. It is perilous labour,
even though some pit-props are steel. However, most of them are still wood, and
roof collapses are common. I’m almost nineteen now. In the three years I’ve
worked here, there have been eleven deaths.
On bad days – and there are plenty of those, I envy the dead.
I’m walking
down a tunnel, along the narrow railway line. We are walking, not crawling,
because the tunnel is relatively high and wide, and it leads to The Picture
House. That’s what the men call this chamber. It is a well-worked cavern,
far larger than most of the chasms down here. Somebody once said, “Yo could
show a Charlie Chaplin film down ‘ere!” - and although that was a whopping
exaggeration, it made us all laugh, and the name stuck... The Picture House,
where a seam of coal is the height of two men, and above that is a roof of
dripping sandstone. It’s a damp place, The Picture House; the kind of
spot where your batteries might fail. But we aren’t there yet.
I’m walking
with Malpass and Hunt and I’m keeping myself to myself. But Malpass is right
behind me and he’s practising his sliding football tackles. He’s hurting my
heels and my ankles as I stumble over railway sleepers. My leather boots are
thick and strong, but I’m anticipating bruises. My heels and ankles are
throbbing now – and to think I have to work like this; a shift of ten
hours. I’m shaking and breathless, but I
can’t complain, because I can do nothing about it. Malpass fights for wagers in
the pub, and he usually wins. On the other hand, I am a physical coward.
Malpass is
the worst of the bullies, and the fact he lost two older brothers at the Somme
is no excuse for him to bully me or anyone else, if you ask me. We all have our
shadows, after all.
“Hey, Holy Joe,” he’s saying, “has the cat
got yer tongue?”
kick-stumble-kick-stumble...
“Hey, College Boy,” he says, “have yo ever
dipped yer wick? Hey, I’m speakin’ ter yo!”
kick-stumble-kick-stumble...
“What woman
would have yo? But ar bet it's the altar boys yo like the best, ay that
right? - at that Papist Church of
yours!”
kick-stumble-kick-stumble...
“What’s wrong with Chapel, College Boy?”
kick-stumble...
“Hey!”
Hunt must have rabbit-punched Malpass on the
back of his neck, because I turn and see how Malpass is face down, stretched
out along the track and groaning. His cap is off and it’s floating in a pool of
oily water, near his head. The cap lamp has unclipped itself and it has somehow
managed to land on Malpass’s bottom. A nice soft landing – it must be, because
the lamp is still shining.
Hunt is giving Malpass the toe.
“Gerrup! There’s werk to do!”
Malpass stirs. He grabs his wet cap; he
growls and swears, and he’s getting to his feet, somewhat groggily. He attaches
his cap lamp, and then he’s face to face with Hunt, screaming obscenities while
Hunt is smirking. It might well be fisticuffs; but Hunt is three years older
than us, and he is brawny. Malpass knows this and suddenly he doesn’t fancy his
chances and he steps back. He’s breathing hard and his face, which is usually
red and freckled, is blotchy with purples.
Hunt tells Malpass, “Ar told yo, if yo
bullied him again, yo would have me to answer to.”
Malpass is sneering: “What's he to yo then? -
your sweetheart...?”
And this was ill-advised, because Malpass is
down again – on his knees, with a bleeding nose.
Now he’s up once more as a groggy clown.
He’s wiping his nose and yelling at Hunt, three paces away: “Next time you're
at the Wheatsheaf, it's yo and me, Hunt, toe to toe. It's yo and me.”
Hunt
laughs. “Yo fight me now. Malpass, or yo turn round nicely, walk to your shift,
and yo keep that big mouth shut...”
And Malpass, with a handkerchief to his
nose, decides to walk away.
This was to be Malpass’s last shift, as it
transpired, and while you should never speak ill of the dead, he’ll get no
tears from me.
We arrive at The Picture House. An
empty wheeled tub is waiting for us, up against a buffer where the track ends.
In one hour, sharp, the pit pony man will arrive and a full tub will be drawn
away. But he will have left us with another empty tub at the little siding, and
this must also be filled within the hour, if we are to get full pay. Ten tubs a
day; that’s our target. It's teamwork and we need to be organised. At the end
of each shift, we’ll leave our picks and shovels neatly stacked, for the
following day’s work, or for the night shift boys who might follow us. Night or
day; what does it matter down here?
The picks
are swinging at rings of yellow light. We stand in a row together, working the
big seam. We grunt like pigs and seldom speak. What is there to say?
We cannot shovel the tumbled coal into the
tub directly, because the rails finish some six feet behind us. They haven’t
been extended from the time this seam was first worked, because that would cost
the Millers too much money. After all, it only takes muscle and strain to move
the fallen coal from the face to the tub, by using our big shovels. We do this
task every fifteen minutes, and it becomes a welcome break from the otherwise
relentless jolting of the pick.
That day, we were halfway through our shift
when the noises began. There was a rustling sound, like wind through leaves,
and the faint hum of insects, such as you might hear on a spring morning when
the sun is rising and blossoms and flowers are at their best, attracting the
bees and the flies and the wasps.
We all stop to listen.
“Fust time I’ve heard this,” murmurs Hunt,
and I can catch his wonder.
“What is it then?” asks Malpass, and I can
catch his fear.
Hunt says: “The old boys say yo can still
hear the forests that were here, yonks and yonks ago, before the coal was made;
and sometimes, inside a block of coal, when yo crack it open, yo can find the
shape of a leaf.”
“Bollocks!” says Malpass. But he’s still
scared.
I think I remember one tortured creak and
the snap of a pit-prop breaking somewhere, quite far off it seemed; but our
roof came tumbling down suddenly, with a deluge of rocks and filthy brown
water.
Malpass isn’t standing where Malpass stood
and Hunt has pulled me back from another fall of sandstone chunks. A spring
must have burst through the roof, because the water isn’t stopping and we are
up to our knees, Hunt and me, and now the water is up to our waists!
“Quick - give me your ond, “says Hunt, and I
give him my hand, and he’s dragging me quickly through the flood to the nearest
face, where we end up standing on either side of a sandstone boulder.
“If the water gets too high, we’ll stand on
this,” says Hunt, as his lamp flickers and dies. His flabby round face is
looking at me, despairing, in a yellow circle of light from my lamp; and then
my lamp flickers and we are in real trouble. The water has flooded the
batteries on our belts. The cheap tin boxes have failed to keep it out.
I notice
one remarkable thing - how my body is quaking with dread while my mind is
detached and observant. While I sweat and shiver, I’m observing implacable
darkness and listening to the anger of rushing water. My body fears death but
my mind is not afraid, somehow. It is as if all this is happening to someone
else.
Hunt is
shouting for Malpass, but he knows it’s no use. He shouts his name three or
four times, because he’ll have to face Malpass’s relatives, if we survive this.
They’ll have to believe we did everything we possibly could.
But Hunt
tells me: “A rock hit him. It hit him hard and down he went. I saw it. He must
be floating out there in the water, somewhere."
Hunt’s voice is matter of fact, and I know
he doesn’t give a damn about Malpass. But I ask, “Shouldn't we go looking for
him, then?”
“Oh arr?” says Hunt, “and how will yo find
him, when yo cor see a thing? Anyway, he was no friend of yours.”
We stand there, saying nothing. It makes me
feel empty and small, somehow, that I also don’t give a damn about Malpass. I
wonder if anyone really gives a damn about Malpass.
We can hear
the mine groaning - sudden rumbles, and the exploding of dozens of pit-props in
the tunnel.
“If that tunnel’s properly blocked, then
we’re done for,” says Hunt. “They won’t hurry themselves, not on our account.
There are other seams for men to work today...”
I reach
into the inside pocket of my jacket and find the Bakelite figurine of Our Lady.
If she’s with us, we won’t die alone. I know that Hunt is very Chapel, but what
he can’t see won’t upset him, and Our Lady will bless him too, even though it’s
a cheap effigy, of a nasty pale green colour. It’s all I could afford. She’ll
understand. Feeling my way, I set her down on a level piece of the sandstone
boulder, between Hunt and me. I won’t let her drown; not if I can help it.
It’s then
the strange noises start once more, above the tumult of water. But this time
it's the rattle of dragonfly wings, the sighing of ferns and curious chirruping
calls, now and then - now and then.... They remind me of bird calls, but
somehow, they are different.
Who saw the blue light first, I can’t
remember. I think it was Hunt.
Yes - I hear him cry out and I’m scanning the
darkness wildly, and I spot what he is seeing – a thin ribbon of blue flame,
about eight feet in length. Sinuous like a snake, it’s moving back and forth -
back and forth, over the opposite rock face, as if it is searching for
something.
“Well, College Boy,” murmurs Hunt, “yo tell me
what that is...”
He doesn’t know, and he sounds really scared
for once. I realise that I need to tell him something.
“St Elmo’s fire,” I say. “It’s a blue light –
electricity I think, which flickers along the masts of the tall ships, during
storms.”
Hunt snorts. “Very good, Professor; but I'd
say we’re a long way from the sea down here, despite all this water.”
Soon, there are more sinuous blue lights,
almost everywhere you look. The cavern is bathed in a faint blue glow and we
can see the rippling of water, about our waists, and the shapes of fallen
rocks. They are breaking the surface like icebergs. The sound of the flowing water begins to
diminish, from a waterfall to a stream, and Hunt says that’s a very good sign.
He also thinks the entrance can’t be utterly blocked; and if the water is
running out, into the tunnel, there’s a chance we won’t drown. We’re up to our
ribs, but the level isn’t rising anymore.
We’re both
very cold, however. The water’s icy. I can hear Hunt’s teeth a-chattering, and
I expect he can hear mine. How long have we been trapped down here? There’s no
way to know. We are not talking much, as we watch the weird blue lights go to
and fro, about the walls. But Hunt gasps and points. My statue of Our Lady is
glowing a phosphorescent blue. It’s faint at first, then suddenly it is fierce.
She stands in a corona of blue flames. I’m worried that the Bakelite might be
melting, and stretching out my hand I do detect heat, as if from a candle. But
Our Lady isn’t melting, and the heat is a welcome warmth. In fact, the more I
hold my hand above her, the warmer it gets. I’m losing the numbness in my
fingertips, as a particularly bright blue flare bursts from her head. It turns
into a coronet of blue fire, and the flames are moving clockwise - spinning,
whirling - encircling her brow like energetic dancers. I can’t help but think of the gas ring at
home, when our kettle’s on.
“St Elmo’s
Crown,” Hunt murmurs, and he stretches out both hands to share the warmth.
We don’t question any of this. Somehow, it
is bringing me hope, and why question hope?
Hunt is more talkative again. “You’re all
right, yo know, Bridger? Despite what the other blokes say about you.”
I glance at his jowly face: a pale blue
cartoon planet, with kindly eyes. I nod, just as the rustling of trees and
ferns is filling the chamber again.
Hunt has
spotted my apprehension. He nods back and says, “Oh, don’t yo mind that! I like
the sound of growing things. That's what I love. I’ve got an allotment off the
Bromley Road; - most Sunday afternoons, that's where you’ll find me... I'm just
thinking, if yo ever want to come down, I'll show yo around, if yo like? Not
twisting your arm...”
It’s good to think of life beyond this
moment, and I tell Hunt I would like that, and he smiles a broken-toothed
smile.
Hunt is
telling me how he wanted to be a gardener’s apprentice, but he says: “They
didn’t like the look of me, at Oldville Court...”
He stops talking, because we’ve both turned
our heads. We’re listening to the disturbing slosh-sloshing of something slow -
something heavy, moving through flood water. It’s heading towards us.
“Malpass?” I ask, in a near whisper, and Hunt
calls me a bloody fool, because Malpass must be dead...
“And if he ay dead by now, he's got no
business being alive!”
But a figure stumbles into the encircling
blue glow, and it is indeed Malpass, but not as he was before. The left side of
his skull has been knocked in, as if he’s been tapped by a giant’s egg spoon,
and his left eye is completely out. It is bouncing on his cheek, while
suspended on a twisted purple stalk.
Hunt, to his credit, seems nonchalant; but I
can only imagine the expression on my face. Am I frightened? Yes, I’m very,
very frightened. I know I must be gaping like a fool, not least because I
cannot answer a question that keeps running through my mind -
“Is this man alive, or is he dead?”
“Decided to join us then, Malpass?” asks
Hunt, and Malpass nods. He takes his place on the outside edge of the boulder.
But Malpass is saying nothing. He seems nervous while his one good eye – a pale
blue eye - switches from me to Hunt and back again, as if making desperate
calculations, known only to himself.
So, there we wait – two living men and one
man possibly dead, but still standing. Malpass is warming his hands above St
Elmo’s crown, sharing the space and the comfort, and his good eye never
settles, not on my face, nor on Hunt’s face, as if he’s lost the confidence to
stare.
At last – at long last – we think we hear
voices in the tunnel, and then we are sure of it, and Malpass groans and
staggers back, out of the blue glow and back into darkness. Then we are in
darkness too, because St Elmo’s crown flickers out, and there are no more blue
snakes on the rock faces.
When the rescue party finally broke through
and searched The Picture House with powerful electric lamps, they did
not seem to notice us at first. Hunt and I were still by our boulder, near a
far corner. But three men waded out to a floating body, and I heard one declare
that Malpass must have been dead for hours, because nobody could survive
injuries like that.
All this was a few months back, and since
then I have struck up quite a rare friendship with Hunt, and I visit him every
Sunday afternoon, at his allotment. It always amuses me how he likes to fuss
around me in the shed, where he offers me tea in a cracked cup and saucer, as
if I were the Queen of Sheba and might refuse! Sometimes, there’s even a slice
of cake. It is all very pleasant; but we never speak about what happened in the
mine, because we really don’t see the need. In any case, we both still have to
work there, and it does not do to dwell on things too much.
Yes, it is grand to have a special friend
for once, and I never leave without a bundle of fresh vegetables or a bunch of
chrysanthemums, which I always give to Mother.
I still have hopes that I will make it to
university, and I’d like to think that Hunt will also leave the mine one day,
to begin a marvellous life as a gardener. I hope we’ll stay in touch, whatever
comes. But for now, from Monday to Saturday, we are just workers in the cage
lift, two of many...
Day by day, they lower us from our dreams.
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