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{harry in his last year of employment} david caddy He brought his milk round with him, clicking in his mouth, when we entered the hot room. Harry in his last year of employment and I in my first. Two greenhorns hugging baskets of yellow curd towards an electric hopper. Crumbs, an acrid smell, filling our open shirts. Harry sifts bird calls in his frequent blows. His wholeness drifting in bits of past lives. Stone picker. Bird scarer. Stone-breaker, hauler. Road builder in the Twenties and Thirties. Turns on the boundary of speech, takes seconds to reply to a question or an order. Leaning over hot vats to cut and turn, forcing sword like knives inwards two-handed as if punting, exhaling every second, third stroke. Two men attempting to carefully empty top hats, trimming their edges, restoring body, shape, relentlessly told to empty yet more vats. Harry rubs both nostrils with his forefingers as if shaving off some unwanted flakes. Vision ceases as the hopper clogs. Wedges removed. Hands opened to release distant dreams. Recaptured as the connection sparks. Whiff of rennet, old man, wet coat. Harry spits. The pour of his head wringing out inner strength. Veins in full display. Effort effervescent. Between bursts, he inspects callouses. He insists on filling the muslin covered moulds refusing impulses to slow down, their sheer volume seemingly a challenge to his name’s aura. He thrusts his shovel to the trolley bottom and in measured experience presses his weight sideways on, whilst I with nimbler hands weigh, fold muslin, remove pins, apply the pump re-weigh and place on the press room belt. We become a team. Old-timer. A level student. By hose down he’s nearly spent. Handkerchief knotted. I offer to take the shovel. Am met with an iron no and cannot grasp. I sulk. We do not speak. Other workers avoided the shovel, sniggered. Later I saw marks on the scales, his fear, and Harry lost two fingers in the hopper, and left. |
