the future in finding a servant that suits,’ and with a nod Ella left the room, and the house, before Mr Ottershaw could reply.
She was trembling, whether with anger, shock or terror at what she had just done, she could not say.
Sarah listened without comment to her tale when she reached home, then hugged her and sent her to fetch ink and paper. While Ella set to, mopping fevered brows, singing calming songs and bringing cooling drinks of water for the sickly family, Sarah wrote a note to Mrs Ward and took it herself to the post office. When Mr Ottershaw came to the door that evening to demand that Ella should return, having broken the terms of her employment, Sarah informed him that he was putting himself at risk of the fever in coming to their house. Furthermore, she had reason to believe that the Ottershaws themselves had broken the terms of their contract with Ella on many occasions and they should make it their business to look elsewhere for a servant. And with that she shut the door firmly in his face.
When word came back that Ella was to present herself as soon as possible at the Ward household in York, she was thrown into a panic. Once she had escaped the drudgery of the Ottershaws’ house, the planning of her further escape from Nortonstall had been all consuming. Now that it was going to happen, Ella was seized with doubt. She had never left the confines of her immediate locality before. Although in her younger years she had roamed far and wide across the fields and moors, she had barely travelled a distance greater than five miles from home. Now she was to travel nearer sixty, and the greater part of that journey was to be via the railway, from Nortonstall to Leeds and then on to York. Although the railway had run through the town for a while now, there were still those who viewed it with deep distrust and wouldn’t dream of setting foot inside a carriage, let alone allowing it to transport them anywhere. Ella had seen and heard the trains as they passed through the town, but she had never had reason, nor the money, to take one. Nor, if she was honest with herself, did she wish to. The Wards had enclosed her fare for the trip and, although Ella had favoured the idea of begging a ride with a carter leaving Nortonstall for Leeds, Sarah wouldn’t hear of it.
‘When have you ever been to Leeds?’ she demanded. ‘You won’t have the first idea of how to go about finding yourself a ride from there to York.’
‘Yes, I will.’ Ella was defiant. ‘The carter can help when I alight. He’s bound to stop at an inn and it will be easy to ask around there to find someone who’s travelling on to York.’
‘Well, I won’t have it,’ Sarah said. ‘You’ll be lucky to accomplish the journey in a day, so you’d have to find lodgings or journey through the night. All manner of things could go wrong.’
She was working herself into a state and even Ella began to be daunted by the possibilities of unforeseen disaster.
‘In any case,’ Sarah continued, determined to put a stop to the debate. ‘Mrs Ward has sent you the fare and will expect you to arrive in good time, and fresh to start work. The train it must be.’
So Ella found herself standing on the platform at Nortonstall station, watching anxiously down the tracks as the engine approached, a plume of steam trailing through the chill morning air behind it and hanging there, like mist. A great flourish of squealing brakes and belching steam heralded the train’s arrival at the platform, quickly followed by a rush of activity as doors swung open, porters were hailed, and the passengers who had been waiting quietly on the platform were now galvanised into action. Ella stood for a moment, bewildered and made nervous by the noises of the train at rest, the creaks and groans of the metal and the chug of the engine.
‘Are you taking this train? You’d best make haste, miss.’
One of the porters, wheeling a trolley of mail sacks, paused momentarily beside her. Ella shook herself free of her reverie in time to realise that the doors were closing and the only people left on the platform were passengers leaving the station.
‘Third, is it?’ the porter said. ‘There, the last carriage. Hurry now.’
Tightly clutching her bundle of belongings and pasteboard ticket, Ella all but ran along the short platform to the last carriage. A whistle blew as she put her foot on the carriage running board and hands reached out to take her arms and pull her in as the train started to move, with a squeal of protest and yet another belch of steam. The door was slammed behind her and Ella, suddenly breathless, stood embarrassed among the men pressed up by the door.
They passed her between themselves like a parcel until she found herself at the end of the rows of hard bench seats, which faced each other and were mainly occupied by women clutching baskets and small children.
‘Any room for a little ’un?’ one of her rescuers asked cheerfully, and a woman at the end of the bench obligingly scooped up a young child and made room for Ella to sit down.
‘Nearly miss it, did you?’ she asked, looking Ella up and down.
‘I… why, yes, I suppose I did,’ said Ella. She sat in silence for a minute or two, aware of her fast-beating heart and the high colour on her cheeks.
‘I’ve never travelled on a train before,’ she suddenly blurted out to her neighbour.
The woman laughed, while a couple of near neighbours smiled.
‘Well, you’ve discovered the joys of them now, love. No going back. They’re the quickest way to get around. Where are you headed?’
‘York,’ said Ella. ‘Well, Leeds first.’
‘Best watch yourself at the station,’ her neighbour advised. ‘Plenty of people there looking to take advantage of a young girl like you travelling alone. Keep to yourself and keep a tight hold on your things.’ She glanced at the bundle, bound up in a shawl, on Ella’s lap. ‘There’s plenty there whose job it is to part you from your possessions.’
Ella spent the rest of the journey taking in her surroundings and getting used to the novelty of seeing the countryside moving fast past the window as she tried to settle herself on the hard, slippery seat. After a while, fields gave way to rows of back-to-back houses and, an hour after she had climbed on board, Ella stepped down from the carriage and onto the platform. She stopped, transfixed. The other alighting passengers bumped and jostled her but she was oblivious. She’d never seen a building quite like it: great metal arches soaring skywards and everywhere noise echoing and the smell of coal fumes hanging in the air.
Light streamed in through the huge curved glass roof as well as from the end of the great building. Here, where the station opened out onto the tracks, Ella could see the comings and goings of even more trains. There weren’t just two platforms, as at Nortonstall, she quickly realised as she let herself be carried along with the remaining passengers heading for the gate, but many platforms.
‘The train for York?’ she enquired tentatively of the man at the gate, who was checking and taking their tickets.
‘Not here, love,’ he said. ‘You need New Station.’ Ella was dumbfounded. She hadn’t realised she would need to change stations, as well as trains. The ticket collector looked her up and down, taking in her bundle and lost expression, and took pity on her. ‘It’s just around the corner. Follow Wellington Street, then turn into Bishopgate Street. You can’t miss it. Follow the crowd.’
Ella did as he said, tagging along behind a group of people who were striding purposefully along as they left the station. Nonetheless, her heart was beating fast and she was worried that she might get lost. She barely had time to register how big and busy the streets were, and how tall and grimy the buildings, before she found herself turning away from a grand square straight into bustling crowds of people who were coming and going from a vast and forbidding brick-built building, much larger than anything she had ever seen before. Once inside, Ella was quickly overawed by the size of the space and the confident manner in which the other travellers seemed to be going about their business. Enquiring somewhat timidly about the next train to York, she