"You love me, don't you, Jonnie?
"You'd better love me.
"I didn't mean to hurt you. I just get scared. I've got nobody but you.
"And you're alive.
"I love you, Jonnie. I'll never let you go.
"I love you to death."
The Industrial Revolution blackens the countryside.
Women and children hack at coal underground and drag loaded tubs like animals.
Rattle is one of them: a dirty, pipe-smoking, swearing collier-wench who dresses and swaggers like a boy.
But Rattle is in love with Jonathan Turner, a young farmer and a prim, God-fearing Methodist.
Rattle is determined to have him. But he's already married.
To a ghost.