A flat barrow at the door, a tin trunk and two bags on the barrow, and a
somewhat ragged boy between the handles of the barrow! The curtains
removed from the windows, and the blinds drawn! A double turn of the key
in the portal! And away they went, the ragged boy having previously spit
on his hands in order to get a grip of the barrow. Thus they arrived at
Hanbridge Railway Station, which was a tempest of traffic that Saturday
before Bank Holiday. The whole of the Five Towns appeared to be going
away. The first thing that startled Annie was that William Henry gave
the ragged boy a shilling, quite as much as the youth could have earned
in a couple of days in a regular occupation. William Henry was also
lavish with a porter. When they arrived, after a journey of ten minutes,
at Knype, where they had to change for Liverpool, he was again lavish
with a porter. And the same thing happened at Crewe, where they had to
change once more for Liverpool. They had time at Crewe for an expensive
coloured drink. On the long seething platform William Henry gave Annie
all his money to keep.
"Here, lass!" he said. "This'll be safer with you than with me."
She was flattered.
When it came in, the Liverpool train was crammed to the doors. And two
hundred people pumped themselves into it, as air is forced into a
pneumatic tyre. The entire world seemed to be going to Liverpool. It was
uncomfortable, but it was magnificent. It was joy, it was life. The
chimneys and kilns of the Five Towns were far away. And Annie, though in
a cold perspiration lest she might never see her tin trunk again, was
feverishly happy. At Liverpool William Henry demanded silver coins from
her. She had a glimpse of her trunk. Then they rattled and jolted and
whizzed in an omnibus to Prince's Landing Stage. And William Henry
demanded more coins from her. A great ship awaited them. Need it be said
that Douglas was their destination? The deck of the great ship was like
a market-place. Annie had never seen such a thing. They climbed up into
the market-place among the shouting, gesticulating crowd. There was a
real shop, at which William Henry commanded her to buy a hat-guard. The
hat-guard cost sixpence. At home sixpence was sixpence, and would buy
seven pounds of fine mealy potatoes; but here sixpence was
nothing--certainly it was not more than a halfpenny. They wandered and
found other shops. Annie could not believe that all those solid shops
and the whole market-place could move. And she was not surprised, a
little later, to see Prince's Landing Stage sliding away from the ship,
instead of the ship sliding away from Prince's Landing Stage. Then they
went underground, beneath the market-place, and Annie found marble
halls, colossal staircases, bookshops, trinket shops, highly-decorated
restaurants, glittering bars, and cushioned drawing-rooms. They had the
most exciting meal in the restaurant that Annie had ever had; also the
most expensive; the price of it indeed staggered her; still, William
Henry did not appear to mind that one meal should exceed the cost of two
days living in Birches Street. Then they went up into the market-place
again, and lo! the market-place had somehow of itself got into the
middle of the sea!
Before the end of the voyage they had tea at threepence a cup. Annie
reflected that the best "Home and Colonial" tea cost eighteenpence a
pound, and that a pound would make two hundred and twenty cups.
Similarly with the bread and butter which they ate, and the jam! But it
was glorious. Not the jam (which Annie could have bettered), but life!
Particularly as the sea was smooth! Presently she descried a piece of
chalk sticking up against the horizon, and it was Douglas lighthouse.