Michael went to the little church school of St. Mary's for four terms. It was hardly light when he left home on winter mornings and almost dark when he returned. He had to come home for lunch. There were no school meals and no supervision for children during lunchtime.
Margaret, meanwhile, had no-one to look after Gwyn. It was too far for her to walk into town and she was too heavy for Margaret to carry all the way. She had to go in the pram, despite being a bit big for that now.
Margaret dragged the heavy contraption over the rough unmade roads and accompanied Michael down Scale Hall Lane and Morecambe Road. By Carlisle Bridge, she would see him across the road and watched him disappear up the slope to the footbridge that ran alongside the railway. She'd wait until he reappeared on the quayside in front of the school — he'd wave from across the river and go in. At lunchtime and after school, she met him on the opposite side of the road. It was a mile each way, and it took her two hours each day.
Gwyn was very ill again. She couldn't be taken in the pram or left in the house on her own. Margaret had no one to look after her, so Michael had to go to school unaccompanied. There was a short-cut over fields coming out close to the bridge. He went that way on his own because there was no pram to be considered.
The short-cut halved the distance but without his mother being with him it doubled his terrors. When she took him as far as the bridge he had only its crossing to worry about. When he was on his own there was a gang of lads who gave him a bad time. His nights were filled with ever-more troublesome dreams and he dreaded going to school.
"I've a stomach ache Mam," he would whine. "I don't want anything to eat. I think I'd better go back to bed."
She fell for it a couple of times before he was rumbled.
"All right -- you go to bed. I'll send for the doctor."
"I don't think it's that bad. It feels a bit better.."
"Put your coat on then! You don't want to be late for school."
"Must I, Mam?"
"Yes, you must. Give me a kiss and off you go! I've got to go upstairs and see to Gwyn."
Margaret put a brave face on it but she was worried sick all day, fearful of him having to cross the main road without her supervision.
She'd written a note to the teacher. The reply told her not to worry. Miss Clemence would ask an older child to look after him.
His tormentors were usually late arrivals at school so it wasn't too bad on the way there. He was usually at least five minutes ahead of them. It was after school when they bullied him.
60 years later, Michael would hear about racists' criminal activities at the top end of Ryelands Estate. A shop-keeper named Mal Hussain was the owner of the old Ryelands Co-operative Stores. He suffered all kinds of verbal and physical abuse at their hands. The inability of the police to deal with the situation created a national scandal.
The adult Michael wondered if those louts were the descendants of the bullies who'd made his life a misery in 1938 and 1939. He'd learned that some people love to have a victim and any excuse will do. Anyone who stands out is asking for trouble from their kind.
Michael's crime was not the different colour of his skin. It was the swift progress he was making at reading, writing and doing sums with Miss Clemence. She was always praising him, so he had a new nick-name -- 'Teacher's Pet'.
On his way home they started on him. A girl in the top year saw Michael across the road. Then she left him and went along a footpath called the Khyber Pass by the side of the railway, her quickest route home. Michael was on his own and at the boys' mercy.
There were six of them. They'd surround him as he tramped over the rough grass. He'd walk with some of them prancing in front of him. Another might jab him in the back. Once he was tripped up. One day his school cap was snatched and trampled on. There were constant jeers and hoots of derision directed at him.
"Teacher's Pet!"
"Wet the bed!"
"Cissy!"
Before they reached the top of Sefton Road, they wheeled off to the right and headed for the top of Austwick Road, hooting after him.
He never said anything to his mother. "I know what she's like," he thought. "She'll only make things worse. She'll tell the teacher. What can she do? They'll still get me when she's not there."
If only he'd been as brave and strong as one of King Arthur's knights! He'd have shown them a thing or two. But no, his story had no happy ending. He endured frequent assaults and kept it all to himself. One day they rubbed mud on his face. Sometimes his clothing would be dirtied.
"What have you been up to now, our Michael?" she would shout. "Playing rough games again I suppose!
"Money doesn't grow on trees you know! I'll have to have a word with your Dad. You'll have to stop playing those games. Do you hear?"
"Yes, Mam."
"Look at these trousers! How on earth did you manage to get dirt all over them?"
"I slipped Mam."
"Huh!"
The worst thing wasn't the bullies. Crossing Carlisle footbridge was worse than anything the lads said or did to him. It terrified him.
After he'd crossed the main road, he walked up a steep slope and then climbed over twenty wooden steps and went onto the footbridge. The way was narrow and stretched ahead of him, with room for people two-abreast. Eight foot high fencing was on either side, shielding him from the river below and from the main London to Glasgow railway line on his right.
In places the planks did not fit tightly and near the middle of the bridge there was a gap six inches long and one inch wide. He could see the river swirling a long way below him through it. At low tide, the river was narrow with mud and stones on either side. If he fell down there he would break his legs. If the bridge collapsed when the tide was in and there was lots of fresh water coming down the valley he would surely drown. He'd be swept away by the rushing river, all the way out into Morecambe Bay. He'd be lost for ever. No one would ever see him again!
It was a long way down to that water. Vertigo assailed him, combined with the fear of Davey Jones Locker. The memory of what Granddad Henry had told him about falling into the deep water of the Lancaster Canal returned to him every time he crossed the bridge. Who knew what monsters awaited him down below, ready to drag him down?
"I'll be drowned, just like poor Celia Wilkinson!" he thought.
In his imagination, the possibility of the planks separating, especially the two which were a bit wobbly, became a probability. Whenever a train passed over the bridge he felt trapped. He might hear the distant puffing of a steam-engine. He might hear the shriek of an approaching train's whistle. He might hear the clanking of a signal, on the gantry, near Castle Station and know that an express train was due.
Often there wasn't time to race to the far end and run down the steps. He did not know which was worse: the slow progress of a long goods train or the swift passing of a main-line express. All trains made the bridge shake and the proximity of the train and its noise was awesome. The worst shaking and vibration was the rattling metal shield between him and the engine. It made the noise ten times worse. He was distraught when the engine screamed a warning of its approach. It felt as though the scream was inside his head.
He fled from the noise which signalled an approaching train. He hoped that he would be scampering down the steep steps at the end before it arrived. He would delay going up the steps if he heard a distant train approaching. But he was often caught out by the swift and silent approach of an express. A noisy gusty wind might disguise the sound of any train coming down the line.
If he was trapped, he would stand frozen to the spot. He would tremble with fear, waiting for the long seconds of the powerful machine's crossing to end. It was a calamity if the shaking of the bridge subsided only to start again because a second train surged onto the bridge from the opposite direction. Still trapped, he would have to endure the ordeal all over again. It was well nigh unbearable for him when two trains passed on the bridge.
One morning, the tide rose and overflowed onto the quay. It crossed the road and licked up against the school door. All of the children had to stay in school instead of going home for lunch. There was no way to let the parents know, so Michael did not arrive home at his usual time.
A petrified Margaret wrapped sickly Gwyn up in a blanket and hurried all the way over the fields, the main road and the bridge. She waded through the water and went into the school by the back entrance. She did not know how she had managed to carry Gwyn safely all that way.
A surge of relief! Michael was there with the other children, who were all excited about the flood. They of course thought it was all a great adventure!
Margaret left Gwyn with Miss Clemence and went home to fetch food. She wasn't the only one. Other mothers did the same, much to Michael's relief. He wasn't the only 'Mummy's Boy' that day.
While Margaret was gone, Miss Clemence sat Gwyn on her big chair near the fire and some of the girls were allowed to play with her and make a fuss of the child. Gwyn responded and made them laugh.
When Margaret returned with sandwiches for Michael she thanked Miss Clemence and wrapped Gwyn in the blanket again. Gwyn waved goodbye to the children and told Miss Clemence, "I like school. Can I come again tomorrow?"
"Quiet everybody! Time for reading. Take out your books." Michael was pleased. It was his favourite lesson. He was already on The Second Beacon Reader.
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| An illustration from The Second Beacon Reader |
But the lads' attitude to Michael did not change when they got him on his own. They reminded Michael of the wolves in stories he'd read. Smiling, smirking wolves!
"What big teeth you've got!"
"All the better to eat you with! Grrrr! Get him! Teacher's Pet! Cissy! Wet your pants! Scale Haller! Shitty face!"
"Six lousy wolves!" he thought.
"Don't use that word. It's vulgar!" he imagined his mother remonstrating.
He'd wake up in the middle of the night screaming for help. Dad would be there. Dad still trying to save him from The Uglies.
But he knew it was no use. They would always be there. Out there, waiting for him. All of his life, appearing unexpectedly. Phantoms faking reality. Reality in the guise of ghosts. Old ones. New ones. Future ones.
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| The site of St. Marys School today, seen from the north side of the River Lune. |
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