More Tales of the Ridings

by F. W. Moorman

Step by step the weaver led her on to tell him the story of what had led up to the shameful transaction in the market-place. It was no mere curiosity that moved him, but a realisation that there could be no peace of mind for Mary Whittaker until she had found relief by unburdening her tortured soul. The weaver's gentle ways and tactful bearing were slowly winning her heart, and, painful though the recital of her past history was for her, Parfitt knew that it would bring relief. It was a long story that Mary had to tell. She had little art of narrative, and her endeavours to shield both her mother and stepfather as far as possible from blame impeded the flow of her words. Reduced to plain terms, her story ran as follows:—

Mary Whittaker was a girl of fourteen when her mother had married Samuel Learoyd. Of her father she knew nothing. He had died when she was a baby. From the first the Learoyds had proved an ill-matched pair. Anne Learoyd, her mother, had been brought up in Leeds, and having been used to all the excitements of life in a big town, found the solitary farm lonesome. Samuel Learoyd, though genial enough at times in the society of his male friends, was capricious. His temper was often sullen, and when in one of his gloomy moods he would spend the whole evening in his farm kitchen in morose silence. This state of mind was in part due to physical infirmity. As a child he had been subject to epileptic fits, and though these grew less frequent as he advanced to manhood, he never entirely shook them off, and during his married life a long spell of gloomy misanthropy would sometimes end in the return of one of these attacks. He was, too, a proud man, and his pride bred in him a morbid sensibility towards any slight, real or fanciful, that was practised on him. He treated his stepdaughter not unkindly, but never accepted any parental responsibility towards her.

Meanwhile Anne Learoyd, finding no congenial society in her own home, spent much of her time in neighbours' houses. Her chief friend was the landlady of the Woolpack Inn, a public-house situated midway between the farm-house and Holmton. Here whole afternoons and evenings were spent, and the work of the farm-house was left in the hands of Mary Whittaker, towards whom her mother had never shown any real affection. Years passed away and the relations between husband and wife grew steadily worse, till at length the crisis came. A new barman was appointed at the Woolpack, a man whom Anne Learoyd had known during her early life in Leeds. Rumour was soon busy with the relations which existed between the barman and the farmer's wife, and after a time suspicious stories reached the ears of Samuel Learoyd. A violent scene between husband and wife took place in the farm kitchen, but, in spite of this, Anne's visits to the public-house continued as before. One afternoon, when her husband was attending a cattle-mart in a neighbouring town, Anne Learoyd, without saying a word to her daughter, left the house and was still absent when her husband returned for supper. Mary Whittaker was at once dispatched to the Woolpack Inn, and, after an hour, returned with the news that her mother was not there and that the barman was also missing. With an oath, Learoyd saddled his mare and rode in all haste to Holmton. Finding no news of the missing couple in the town he made his way to the nearest station, where he found that a man and woman answering to his description had left by train for Liverpool four hours before. Learoyd, his heart raging with fury and wounded pride, followed in pursuit. He arrived at Liverpool in the early hours of the next morning, and, making his way to the docks, discovered that the fugitives had sailed at midnight for America. Further pursuit was impossible. He returned home, and late that same evening was found lying dead drunk on the road-side within a hundred yards of the local railway station. He was brought home and put to bed, and next day was seized with a severe fit of epilepsy. For weeks his life was in danger, and when at last he recovered strength of body, his mind remained in a state of moroseness that at times bordered on insanity. He became a fierce hater of women, and the chief victim of his frenzy was his stepdaughter, Mary Whittaker.

She bore his harshness with a Griselda patience, but this seemed only to add provocation to his anger. In her he saw the daughter of the woman who had trodden his pride in the dust, and he marked her out as the object of his vengeance. Finding that bitter words and deeds of cruelty left her seemingly unmoved, his morose and wounded spirit devised other and darker plans of revenge. At first he conceived the idea of driving her penniless from his doors, but, realising that the girl would find no difficulty in obtaining a place as servant on one of the neighbouring farms, he abandoned it as furnishing insufficient satisfaction for his tortured heart. One day he heard how a farmer had some years before ignominiously sold by public auction the wife of whom he had grown tired, and Learoyd gloated over the story with malicious glee. Here was a means of satisfying his vengeance to the full. To his warped imagination it mattered little that Mary Whittaker was entirely innocent of her mother's desertion of him, or that Anne Learoyd, far away in America, would probably never hear of her daughter's shame. Inasmuch as the guilty wife was out of his clutch, he was content with the vicarious sacrifice that he could demand from her daughter.

For some days he brooded over his cruel purpose, and it found ever more favour in his eyes. Market day came and the time was ripe for action. Roughly informing his stepdaughter that she must go with him to market, he left the house with her on foot, carrying a halter in his hand. On the road he brutally informed her of his purpose. A chill of horror seized the girl when she heard the news, but her tears and entreaties, so far from melting his heart, filled him with an unholy joy. As they passed a farm-house on the road Mary screamed out for help, but Learoyd silenced her with a blow on the mouth, and then, leaving the high road, took the path through the fields in order to avoid company. Arriving at the outskirts of the town, he slipped the halter over her head and dragged her through the by-streets to the market-place.

Such was Mary's story as told to the weaver that evening in his cottage. Tom Parfitt was a man of few words, but the tears that rolled down his cheek showed his sympathy. "Poor lass, poor lass" was his frequent comment as he listened to the harrowing details and thought of the agony of the market-place; and when she had ended her tale his voice was broken with sobs.

"Thou sal niver want for a home, lass, so lang as I can addle a bite an' a sup wi' my weyvin'."

"Happen Learoyd will be wantin' me back agean when he's gotten ower things a bit."

"Then he'll noan get thee," and the weaver struck his fist on the table with unusual vehemence. "A wilful man mun have his way, fowks say; an' I reckon Sam Learoyd has had it; but he'll noan have it twice ower, if I know owt about justice."

"But he's bin sadly tewed wi' mother leavin' him an' all," replied Mary, "and there's them fits that he has to contend wi'. If he wants me I mun go. There's nobody left on t' farm to fend for him."