A short story

Although Frank mainly wrote and published poetry, he also wrote short fiction. The following example shows an important side of Frank as writer and artist.

Malley’s Shoe

He returned with a small grey shoebox and placed it on the bench. A cloud of fine dust eddied around its edges as he eased off the lid. Inside was a tissue-wrapped object which he removed, then carefully folded back the tissue to reveal a small, blue child’s shoe. It was immediately obvious that this shoe had been beautifully made. The upper was of soft calf leather and the plaited lace was threaded through small brass eyelets, perfectly stamped into the blue leather between two rows of tiny cream stitches bordering each side of the open mouth. The upper was welted onto a leather sole. The stitches around the edge of the welt, made with bright cream pearly thread, were tiny and immaculately spaced. He held the shoe in the palm of his hand. He said nothing but moved it further into the space between us, his face anticipating some response. The tiny object held us silent and motionless as seconds passed, then, filtering slowly into the forefront of my mind, came objects from behind the dusty window that I had passed when I first entered the shop. I had taken little notice of them then. There were framed documents and a silver cup that had collected so much dust that it was difficult to read the inscription on its base, and as I continued to stare, he said in his quietest voice, “First Prize, Olympia, 1932”.

I cannot describe how this simple act of his had burgeoned my respect. It was not so much the thing in itself but the context out of which it grew: the dim-lit cellar, the piles of clog tops and wooden soles, trays of nails, the gouged and rutted workbench; shiny handled tools; an abrading, polishing and buffing machine for finishing off the soles and heels of mended shoes, now little used; the grey dust clinging to cobwebs hanging in every corner and crevice; then the comfortable homely feel of the warm cellar and the generous, intimate atmosphere created by the contact of the two men as they worked there, hour on hour. And then the shop itself, disused, in a kind of dereliction, an infection set in but halted at the head of the stairs that led down to the cellar where they worked.

I had first arrived here at Malley’s shop half a dozen days before, had caught the bus into Wigan, had got off at an unfamiliar stop and wandered up the long, decayed Victorian terrace that flanked the entrance to the town. The shop was in the middle of the parade. His name, just discernable beneath the grime, had once been well picked-out in gold, serifed script, ‘Shoemaker, Bespoke.’ I pushed the door; it opened stiffly, scratched a sweeping arc across the floor. The counter seemed unused. No-one came. There was no sound except for traffic grinding up the hill into the town.

I first noticed the shop from the upper deck of the bus that I regularly took when going to the cinema or to meet friends. I had looked down through its dirty window at the rows of black leather and shiny metal clogs and wondered at the strange juxtaposition of things, at how a trade continued practicing long after the demand for its products had gone. I’d remembered the miners, who I’d seen and heard in my youth, jumping in gangs from the platforms of their moving bus, billy-cans and snap boxes clanging on their belts; coal black faces, bright pink lips and eyes; dirty white neckerchief tied in a tight knot, one hand holding onto their warped flat caps, and the sparks flying from metal shoes nailed onto the wooden soles of their working clogs; a frightening spectacle for a small boy as the bunch of them hurtled, whooping and laughing, down the pavement towards him; and how the clump of charging bodies would part, and swirl around him as they passed, the mass fragmenting, as each particle ricocheted off in the direction of its respective home. And then on the farm, on their leisure days, where they went to work to earn an extra bob, stacking sheaves of corn or loading hay, still in the same shiny leather clogs. I remembered how the intrinsic quality of these things impressed on me, like any child, absorbent of the way of things, the wonder of its world, the peculiar smells, the shapes and wrinkles where spirit lingers over surfaces and seeps into our stored experience. I wondered then who would buy those things, where any one could wear a clog except in fancy-dress.

I found his number in the telephone directory and with some trepidation, dialled it, not realising I was phoning him at home, assuming that the number would connect me to the shop. I’d had a task to perform, a study of a local craftsman, and thought it would be fun to spend some time focusing on a cobbler like him. When he answered the phone, I groped for words and stuttered out my explanation. It took him time to untangle threads, to work out what it was I meant. “What, making clogs?” he said. Then he’d agreed with no enthusiasm, “OK, come round to the shop, we’re in there most days, we start at eight.”

The first meeting was awkward. They weren’t sure what to do, posing for this college lad. We exchanged bits of information and the situation eased. I perched myself on an old bench in the corner and they got on with their work, forgetting for a time that I was there. My presence became familiar and we carried on like this for days. I slowly began to understand the nature of their work, the points of focus and the pace, understood the way their work place was organised, the sense it made. I watched his partner trim the wooden soles and nail the uppers into place astride the small nailing bench that was also a seat, the shoe gripped between his knees with a thick leather apron to protect his legs. He filled his mouth with nails and then the shiny hammer head blurred like a flying shuttle as it rattled in the rapid stream of nails progressing around the sole. Metal toe and heel caps were hammered on and a strip of leather fixed around the sole with scutcheon pins to hide the joins. It was Malley who repaired the shoes. He showed me the leather that he used, explained about the grain and qualities for different use and shortcuts that he had to take to keep his prices down. “It’s a long time since I’ve made a shoe.” The statement took me by surprise. I glanced around the room and tried to understand from where it came, and in my mind a vista opened like in the garden of a stately home, where all lines tapering, lined with trees, focus on one point, and at that point a folly or a monument. He noticed my confusion and said, as a kind of explanation. “I’ve been a cobbler all my life.” It was then that he had disappeared, returning moments later with the shoe.

All of that was many years ago and still I recollect the shoe, fashioned for a fairy child, an object out of time. I’ve often wondered how some things survive, that seem to hold a spirit in them. Flint axe heads; brooches; Celtic stones. Halted in the task of clearing out a cupboard in my home twenty years had passed, when I came across the study, forgotten, also caked with dust and left unused. I opened it to rediscover photographs and sketches of the workshop, the two men working and the tools; descriptions of the processes he used and, thinking how it was no use to me, decided then to pass it on. But the shop had gone, long since cleared away for other things, so I contacted a friend who knew his daughter, only to discover he had died.

Perhaps two things remain; my study and one shoe, made to fit a fairy child, kept somewhere safe, I’m sure, in the same grey shoe box, by some other soul, who cares about the sanctity of things, while I try to settle with my sense of failure in the way I satisfied my needs, took all that I was offered from this man and gave so little in return.