A Place Called Freedom - Ken Follett [40]
They made Mack stand up, then they lashed the horse again. The blow to the stomach had winded Mack, and his left leg felt weak, but he was forced into a limping backward run.
He gritted his teeth and tried to settle into a rhythm. He had seen others suffer this punishment—Jimmy Lee, for one. They had survived, although they bore the marks: Jimmy Lee had a scar over his left eye where the horse had kicked him, and the resentment that burned inside Jimmy was fueled by the memory of the humiliation. Mack, too, would survive. His mind dulled with pain and cold and defeat, he thought of nothing but staying on his feet and avoiding those deadly hooves.
As time went by he began to feel an affinity with the horse. They were both in harness and compelled to run in a circle. When the ostler cracked his whip, Mack went a little faster; and when Mack stumbled, the horse seemed to slacken its pace for a moment to allow him to recover.
He was aware of the hewers arriving at midnight to begin their shift. They came up the hill talking and shouting, ribbing one another and telling jokes as usual; then they fell silent as they approached the pithead and saw Mack. The keepers hefted their muskets menacingly whenever a miner seemed disposed to stop. Mack heard Jimmy Lee’s voice raised in indignation and saw, from the corner of his eye, three or four other miners surround Jimmy, taking him by the arms and pushing and shoving him toward the pit to keep him out of trouble.
Gradually Mack lost all sense of time. The bearers arrived, women and children chattering on their way up the hill then falling silent, as the men had, when they passed Mack. He heard Annie cry: “Oh dear God, they’ve made Mack go the round!” She was kept away from him by the Jamissons’ men, but she called out: “Esther’s looking for you—I’ll fetch her.”
Esther appeared some time later, and before the keepers could prevent her she stopped the horse. She held a flagon of hot sweetened milk to Mack’s lips. It tasted like the elixir of life, and he gulped it frantically, almost choking himself. He managed to drain the jug before they pulled Esther away.
The night wore on as slow as a year. The keepers put down their muskets and sat around the ostler’s fire. Coal mining went on. The bearers came up from the pit, emptied their corves on the dump, and went down again in their endless round. When the ostler changed the horse Mack got a few minutes’ rest, but the fresh horse trotted faster.
There came a moment when he realized it was daylight again. Now it could be only an hour or two until the hewers stopped work, but an hour was forever.
A pony came up the hill. Out of the corner of his eye Mack saw the rider get off and stand staring at him. Looking briefly in that direction he recognized Lizzie Hallim, in the same black fur coat she had worn to church. Was she here to mock him? he wondered. He felt humiliated, and wished she would go away. But when he looked again at her elfin face he saw no mockery there. Instead there was compassion, anger, and something else he could not read.
Another horse came up the hill and Robert got off. He spoke to Lizzie in an irate undertone. Lizzie’s reply was clearly audible: “This is barbaric!” In his distress Mack felt profoundly grateful to her. Her indignation comforted him. It was some consolation to know that there was one person among the gentry who felt human beings should not be treated this way.
Robert replied indignantly, but Mack could not make out his words. While they were arguing, the men began to come up from the pit. However, they did not return to their homes. Instead they stood