The Stone Book Quartet

The new steeple on the new church glowed in the sun: but something glinted. The spire, stone like a needle, was cluttered with the masons’ platforms that were left. All the way under the Wood Hill Mary watched the golden spark that had not been there before.

She reached the brick cottage on the brink of the Moss. Between there and the railway station were the houses that were being built. The railway had fetched a lot of people to Chorley. Before, Father said, there hadn’t been enough work. But he had made gate posts, and the station walls, and the bridges and the Queen’s Family Hotel; and he had even cut a road through rock with his chisel, and put his mark on it. Every mason had his mark, and Father put his at the back of a stone, or on its bed, where it wouldn’t spoil the facing. But when he cut the road on the hill he put his mark on the face once, just once, to prove it.

Then Chorley must have a church next, and a school.

Father had picked the site for the quarry at the bottom of the Wood Hill. Close by the place, at the road, there was stone to be seen, but it was the soft red gangue that wouldn’t last ten years of weather. Yet Father had looked at the way the trees grew, and had felt the earth and the leaf-mould between his fingers, and had said they must dig there. And there they had found the hard yellow-white dimension stone that was the best of all sands for building.

The beech trees had been cleared over a space, and two loads of the big branches had saved them coals at home for a year. It was one of the first memories of her life; the rock bared and cut by Father, and silver bark in the fire.

Now the quarry seemed so small, and the church so big. The quarry would fit inside a corner of the church; but the stone had come from it. People said it was because Father cut well, but Father said that a church was only a bit of stone round a lot of air.

Mary stood at the gate and looked up. High clouds moving made the steeple topple towards her.

‘Father!’

She could hear his hammer, tac, tac, as he combed the stone.

The golden spark was a weathercock. It had been put up that week, and under its spike was the top platform. Father’s head showed over the edge of the platform.

‘Below!’ His voice sounded nearer than he looked.

‘I’ve brought your baggin!’ Mary shouted.

‘Fetch it, then!’

‘All the way?’

‘Must I come down when I’m working?’

‘But what about the Governor?’ said Mary.

‘He’s gone! I’m the Governor of this gang! There’s only me stayed to finish! Have you the tea?’

‘Yes!’

‘Plenty of sugar?’

‘Yes!’

‘I can’t spit for shouting! Come up!’

Mary hitched her frock and put the knot of the baggin cloth between her teeth and climbed the first ladder.

The ladders were spiked and roped, but the beginning of the steeple was square, a straight drop, and the ladders clattered on the side. She didn’t like that.

‘Keep fast hold of that tea!’ she heard Father call, but she didn’t lift her head, and she didn’t look down.

Up she went. It felt worse than a rock because it was so straight and it had been made. Father had made parts of it. She knew the pattern of his combing hammer on the sandstone.

Up she went.

‘Watch when you change to the spire!’ Father’s voice sounded no nearer.

At the spire, the pitch of the ladders was against the stone, and Mary had to step sideways to change. The ladders were firmer, but she began to feel a breeze. She heard an engine get up steam on the railway. The baggin cloth kept her mouth wet, but it felt dry.

The spire narrowed. There were sides to it. She saw the shallow corners begin. Up and up. Tac, tac, tac, tac, above her head. The spire narrowed. Now she couldn’t stop the blue sky from showing at the sides. Then land. Far away.

Mary felt her hands close on the rungs, and her wrists go stiff.

Tac, tac, tac, tac. She climbed to the hammer. The spire was thin. Father was not working, but giving her a rhythm. The sky was now inside the ladder. The ladder was broader than the spire.

Father’s hand took the baggin cloth out of Mary’s mouth, and his other hand steadied her as she came up through the platform.

The platform was made of good planks, and Father had lashed them, but it moved. Mary didn’t like the gaps between. She put her arms around the spire.

‘That was a bonny climb,’ said Father.

‘I do hope the next baby’s a lad,’ said Mary.

‘Have some tea,’ said Father.

She drank from the bottle. The cold sweet drink stopped her trembling.

‘Don’t look yet,’ said Father. ‘And when you do, look away first, not near. How’s Mother?’

‘Resting. She could only do five hours at the picking today, it got that hot.’

‘That’s why I’ve stayed,’ said Father. ‘They want us to finish for Sunday, and there’s one more dab of capping to do. There may be a sixpence for it.’

‘Doesn’t it fear you up here?’ said Mary.

‘Now why should it?’ said Father. ‘Glaze Hill’s higher.’

‘But you can’t fall off Glaze Hill,’ said Mary. ‘Not all at once.’

‘There’s nothing here to hurt you,’ said Father. ‘There’s stone, and wood and rope, and sky, same as at home. It’s the same ground.’

‘It’s further,’ said Mary.

‘But it’ll never hurt. And I’ll go down with you. Down’s harder.’

‘I hope the next one’s a lad,’ said Mary. ‘I’m fed up with being a lad – Father! See at the view! Isn’t it!’

Mary stood and looked out from the spire. ‘And the church,’ she said. ‘It’s so far away.’ She knelt and squinted between the planks. ‘The roof’s as far as the ground. We’re flying.’

Father watched her; his combing hammer swung from his arm.

‘There’s not many who’ll be able to say they’ve been to the top of Saint Philip’s.’