The Life of Riley
By Frank Riley

BOOK 1 - SPIKE ISLAND

Chapter Twenty Six: Over The Coals

When the cold winds blew and winter's chilling hand gripped the island with icy, frigid fingers we were, in a sense, cut off from the rest of the town and left to fend for ourselves throughout the dark, dank months. Gone were the laughing, frolicking children. Gone were the birds, especially the beautiful swans.

Even the pathetic gamblers stayed away when the ice and snow became too thick; notwithstanding their desperate need, they could not endure the biting cold long enough to wait for Lady Luck to smile on them. In the depths of a particularly severe winter the barge traffic would frequently be brought to a standstill. It was as though the world as we knew it had suddenly been put away in a cupboard until the warmer seasons came round again.

It was a lonely time in some ways. Yet there was always adventure to be found among the snow-covered ruins or on the frozen waters of the canal. Mike and I, along with the Masons, would be brought closer together by the winter circumstance. It was natural that this should happen, I suppose, since no-one came. And who could blame them for not wanting to expose themselves to arctic winds and hazard-filled walkways? Why should they leave a warm hearth to come for a comfortless, bone-numbing visit?

We, of course, were obliged to stay there, and to travel to and from the town, since that was our little nest. We had no choice about the matter and, indeed, it became commonplace for us to have to live out the chilling months in isolation.

Travelling up the pathway to the town was always a risky business when the snow and ice set in. It could sometimes take a very long time to negotiate the treacherous black-ice-covered ground as we made our way up to West Bank. It was especially dangerous when in later years the covered walkway was dismantled and a concrete path was laid down instead. The old walkway had suffered badly over the years. The roof disappeared, parts of the walls went the same way, and some of the floorboards were missing, exposing gaps like a giant's broken-toothed smile. It seems the town's people needed firewood far more than we needed a safe footpath.

It was because of these hazardous conditions that the intrepid coal-men became a little less trepid when it came to delivering our ration of coal. Although, it is not surprising that they refused to bring it all the way down to the island when everything underfoot was like glass. It was bad enough to wend one's way unencumbered up or down the path; to be asked to carry a hundred-weight of coal on one's back whilst doing it was quite out of the question.

So, as a result of this wintry embargo, we were obliged to resort to other methods in order to keep the heartless chills at bay. The was no electricity on the island, only gas, and this was used for lighting. We had in each room a mantle-lamp which fed off the gas lines - the ones which used those fragile mantle globes made of some flimsy material which disintegrated in your hands if you touched them accidentally. We also had a decrepit gas stove but I can never remember its working while we were there.

The only source of heating came from the two fireplaces, one in the front room and one in the back. And since there were no trees on the island, and very little scrap wood to be found, it was necessary to feed the fires with coal. Now it just so happened that the railway company used to shunt scores of wagons laden with the precious black lumps in sidings on both sides of the canal. There we were, sitting in winter misery, and all around us was this magnificent store of fuel. How could we resist the temptation?

Around 1961, and a coal train steams off Spike Island onto the Garston - Warrington line. The Sankey is on the left, with the Widnes - Runcorn bridge under construction in the centre.

Dad used to send us out in the dead of night with sacks over our shoulders to scour the tracks for the coal wagons. Off we would go, dressed in black in order to melt into the night, and set about our criminal tasks. This camouflage was pretty damn useless when the snow had fallen because we would stick out like flies in milk, but it didn't matter to us, we'd be caught up with the excitement of it all.

Under and over the wagons we would scurry, searching for the precious cargo. Once having located one filled with coal one of us would climb up and begin to throw lumps of it down, while the other would fill up the sacks. All the while it was necessary to keep a lookout for any stray policeman or railway guard. Many's the time we were almost sprung as some nosy official wandered by. But we were too quick for them. The crunch of a government boot in the cold black night would see us dissolve into the background until the inquisitor had passed on.

But when the snow fell we had the additional problem of footprints to take care of. We became quite adept at laying false trails. The two most successful methods we used were: one, to walk along the railway line itself until we were well away from the scene of the crime, and, two, especially if we were feeling mischievous, to make a track which led directly from the wagon to the canal bank, as though the thieves had walked right into the water, or disappeared under the ice if the canal was frozen over. The latter method took a little more effort since we had to ensure that no tell-tale tracks led back to our house, but being resourceful little brats, this was not too much of a problem.

Sometimes the wagons would begin to move unexpectedly as some late-night shunting took place and this was a very dangerous time. To be caught between the cast-iron buffers would have spelled the end of all our earthly troubles. Once, I was atop one of the wagons when it began to move and it pulled away from Mike who was filling the sacks. It began to pick up speed and I thought, if this thing doesn't stop, I'll end up somewhere in Siberia, for Heaven's sake! But then, all of a sudden, it braked and I was about to climb out and look for Mike, when, for no apparent reason it started going back the way it had come. It came to a halt almost exactly where it had began and I thought to myself: Well, what a pretty useless exercise that was!

Dad, through all of these enterprises was most encouraging. Into the house we would come with the sacks of coal and dump them in the scuttle underneath the stairs, and he would rub his hands with glee at our haul. Never once did he join us on these nocturnal escapades, but then I suppose he could not be seen to be stealing from his own employer, now could he?

One night, a Saturday, a night I'll never forget, Mike was caught red-handed. Dad had bought the world's first portable television, a monstrous thing with metal sides, about the size of a small family car, which ran on car-batteries and could be lifted quite easily by three grown men. This magnificent piece of modern technology had proved from the very start to be something of a disaster. The day he brought it home it just happened to be Cup Final day and Mike and I were looking forward to seeing the greatest soccer match of the year on a "real" television. Before the match a movie was playing, but throughout it all a black line kept moving from the bottom of the screen to the top. I remember distinctly asking Mike, in all my innocence, whether what we were watching was indeed a "moving picture", hence the description, "movies".

"Get off, yer silly bugger!" was how he dispelled this notion. It was in fact the vertical-hold that was playing up. The Cup Final at last came on and about fifteen minutes into the game the television set gave up the ghost. Nothing Mike could do would bring it back to life and the great game was lost to us.

Dad somehow managed to haul it back to the shop where he had purchased it and after about three-month's wrangling, where the proprietor of the shop inexplicably got himself jailed for fraud, we got the monstrosity back in our safe-keeping. Now, I was able to converse with my school chums, who had had electricity since the days of Noah, about current television programs. But even then I found that I was terribly out of whack with what they knew about certain famous identities. I didn't dare tell them that our television was run on car-batteries and it was a close secret between Mike and me, and decidedly infra dig, to explain that we still didn't have electricity.

Anyway, on the Saturday night in question, Mike had been sent out by Dad to get some coal, as our stocks were running hopelessly low. Dad and I were watching our newly-repaired television in modern, state-of-the-art comfort when the telephone rang. Dad answered it and within a few seconds his face dropped. He put down the receiver and immediately began to curse and swear and generally defame his eldest son for being so stupid as to get caught by the police while in possession of a bag of coal.

He rushed out of the house and made his way to the police-station to see what use, if any, he could be. When he arrived at the lock-up he was informed by the arresting-officer that in the course of his duty, on the night of blah, blah blah, he had apprehended Mike in possession of the said bag of coal, whereupon he had arrested him and taken him back to the police-station in which they now found themselves, having, in the process, ordered Mike to carry the evidence. The said bag of coal was lying guiltily at Mike's feet as Dad listened to all this and Mike was standing in glum silence waiting for sentence to be passed.

Dad flew into a rage, expressing all his anger, for the benefit of the policemen, at poor Mike. "You stupid little bugger! How dare you do such a thing! What the hell did you think you were doing?" he spake, in righteous indignation. "Who were you getting it for? We certainly don't need it!" he continued, also for the ears of the law.

"Wait till I get you home, you little prick, I'll kill you!" he added, and began to back out of the door. Amazingly, after some further display of parental anger, the policemen let both Mike and Dad go. Perhaps they thought that Mike would learn a far better lesson from an honest, upright father than anything the law could teach him.

On the way home, Dad gave Mike a terrible hiding. But the punishment was not for so much that he got caught, but that he had been stupid enough to carry the evidence all the way to the police-station! "Why didn't you make him carry it? Or why didn't you throw it in the canal, yer silly bugger?"

Such was the "justice" meted out to poor old Mike. In future he would have to be much more vigilant when he was on a night-time coal raid.

An ironic conclusion to this episode came in the fact that the movie I was watching on our elephantine television that night was none other than, "The Thief of Bagdad"! Now, wasn't that appropriate?

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