The prince of Eden

by Harris, Marilyn, 1931-

  A few learned about the Great Exhibition in much the same way as Edward and John did, cutting through Hyde Park on a December evening, having delivered a trunk to a house on Edgware Road after they had put in a day's labor on the great covered platform of Euston Station as porters, carrying baggage of all shapes and sizes. They had reported for work at six in the morning and had spent the day hauling luggage up and down the platform of Euston.

  Still the employment was welcome, for it meant that they took home fourteen shillings a week between them, and with no rent to pay and with Elizabeth's skillful planning, which amounted at times to genius, they could feed themselves and about thirty regulars for whom the Common Kitchen meant the difference between dying and living.

  So it was that in the dusk of this bitter December evening, Edward walked quietly alongside John, trying to think of something suitable to say to ease the silence between them. Fatigue of course had taken a toll as always. Added to the day's labor was the walk of several miles home. Still he longed for communication, for some way to convince the boy that manual labor did not diminish him, that they were doing very well, in spite of everything. Elizabeth had miraculously converted the small house in Bermondsey into a sheltering warmth. Why couldn't John share his pleasure at seeing the old men and women, and many young ones as well, seated along the low benches, their heads bent over their bowls of hot soup, a good fellowship springing up between all of them.

  But apparently he couldn't and while he was no longer openly hostile, as he had been that first day after they'd left Oxford Street, the silences between them were growing deeper.

  For Edward, the loss of his son's support and affection was a deep wound. And compounding this pain was the realization that as the winter deepened, the shillings would have to be woefully stretched to include firewood and fuel.

  Now, on this evening, as they cut across the edge of Hyde Park, Edward looked up from his assortment of worries and saw a remarkable sight, the land beyond the Serpentine cleared, one enormous column fixed on the right and an army of workmen dragging heavy ropes along pegs which had been driven into the ground as though marking off a vast area.

  In the dusk of evening, the sight had appeared before him with the suddenness of a mirage. He observed that John, walking a few paces ahead, had seen it as well. Now, though no words were spoken, they both cut across the newly scraped earth, heading toward a cluster of low-lying sheds which seemed to be the center of activity. Edward saw a burly, black-haired man wearing a corduroy jacket and leathern gaiters standing over a small coal fire. He was at that moment shouting instructions at a group of workers with coils of heavy rope wrapped about their necks. "Watch the cut, you bastards," he shouted angrily. "You! There! Your fill is too heavy. Back off! Back away!"

  Apparently the men did not understand the commands and continued to stand in clear confusion. At that moment another man emerged from the small shed. Tall, lean, with a haughtily inquiring face, he came up behind the man in the corduroy jacket. "It would help if you would hire a few with brains," he suggested quietly.

  The dark-haired man turned, enraged. "With the rush on, I hire them that first appears."

  At that, the tall man drew himself up. "Do your best," he muttered and walked back into the shed.

  Edward watched the frustration of both the man and the workmen for a few moments, then walked forward, his hands shoved into his pockets. "Substructure?" he inquired softly.

  The man looked up as though at last someone was speaking his language. "To you, maybe," he grumbled, "and to me. But to them"— and here he stabbed a finger at the workmen—"one of the great mysteries of the world."

  Edward laughed. "And what's the structure to be?"

  The man ran a rough fist across his dripping nose and stared incredulously at Edward. "What's it to be?" he parroted. "My God, man, where have you been?" Now he gestured broadly with arms outstretched. "This here is to be Prince Albert's Crystal Palace it is," he entoned, a note of pride in his voice. "An Exhibition, that's what it's to be, an advertisement for British enterprise. Let 'em all come. Prince Al has said. We can do everything that they can do, and do it cheaper and better. A wonder of the world, that's what it'll be."

  "If you can get the substructure laid, that is," Edward said.

  The man looked across the small fire at him, sternly at first, then his weathered face softened into a smile. "If we can get the substructure laid."

  Behind him, Edward was aware of John's impatience. He knew the boy was hungry and tired. Still he continued to watch as again the burly man shouted instructions at the workers. But apparently nothing he said made the slightest difference.

  Without a word, Edward moved across the field to where the workers stood, about thirty in all. Quickly he separated them into two groups, took the coil of rope from around one fellow's neck, stooped down to the nearest peg in demonstration of what was to be done, and in the remarkably short time of about twenty minutes had the two crews working in opposite directions, the ropes stretching out in mammoth squares and rectangles, clearly marking off the shape and size of the structure.

  As he walked back to the small fire, he saw the foreman's face, eyes squinted as though he were now surveying Edward in a new light. "You, there," he shouted while Edward was still a distance away. "You for hire?"

  "Depends," Edward answered, warming his hands over the fire. "What's the wage?"

  The man paused, his face going momentarily blank into the bargaining mask when it behooved a man to quote small and not blink. "Four shillings," he announced finally.

  Edward shook his head and started away from the fire.

  "A day," the man called after him.

  Edward stopped. "My son, too?" he asked over his shoulder.

  "Does he have a brain like you?"

  "Better."

  "Agreed then."

  Dear God, eight shillings a day, seven days a week, food, firewood, perhaps blankets—Edward closed his eyes, then opened them and turned back to the man. "When do we start?"

  "Now."

  "Night labor?"

  "Night and day until it's finished and the Queen herself comes to proclaim the opening."

  "And when would that be?"

  "May first, God willing."

  Edward nodded. He looked across at John standing a distance away. Perhaps he should have conferred with him. Why was it that when the

  boy had been four, it had been easier for Edward to talk to him than now, at thirteen?

  "John?" he began, approaching him slowly. "Four shillings a day, night labor, eight shillings plus—"

  Abruptly John interrupted. "I can add, Papa," he smiled. He walked a few steps away, then looked back. "We're rich men, aren't we. Papa?"

  The sarcasm in his voice was clear. Then the foreman in the corduroy jacket was upon him again with a black ledger book. "What's your name?" he demanded.

  "Eden," Edward replied, still watching as John walked away. "Edward Eden."

  "And the boy?"

  "John Murrey Eden."

  "Can you read and write?"

  Edward nodded.

  "The boy as well?"

  Again Edward nodded.

  The man grinned. "Then you're both on," he announced. "Jack Willmot's the name," he added, extending his hand. "Bad bark, no bite, if you do the work."

  Edward smiled and took the hand extended to him.

  "Eight-hour shifts," Willmot instructed further, "with hour intervals in between and four hours for rest until the job's done."

  At this, Edward looked sharply up. Oxen in the field were not driven thus. Still the wages were good. So in spite of his fatigue after his day's labor, he started off across the field following after John, who had already taken his place with the other workers, a coil of rope about his neck.

  What had Willmot called it? A Crystal Palace? A great exhibition?

  No matter. To Edward and all the other workers dragging heavy ropes across the muddy field, it was four shillings a day and
another chance to stave off hunger and cold and perhaps death.

  Look yonder where the engines toil: These England's arms of conquest are The Trophies of her bloodless war: Brave weapons, these.

  Victorious over wave and soil, With these she sails, she weaves, she tills. Pierces the ever-lasting hills. And spans the seas.

  With that bit of doggerel, Thackeray prepared himself for the first of May, 1851, and sat back to await the great dawn.

  For others, as the day approached, there was no waiting, but increasingly feverish activity. Throughout the long winter and early spring of 1851, Edward and John, along with twenty-two hundred other British workingmen, had caused a miracle to rise on the meadows of Hyde Park.

  It had been hard labor, but good and most rewarding. In six months the meadows of Hyde Park had been transformed from ordinary greenery to a spectacle which might have been taken from the pages of the Arabian Nights. These twenty-two hundred workers had laid the foundations, manuevered four thousand tons of ironwork into position, raised the two thousand three hundred cast-iron girders, the three thousand three hundred pillars, the thirty miles of rainwater guttering, the two hundred and two miles of sash-bars, and the eight hundred thousand feet of glass.

  Now, in the gathering shadows of dusk on April 30, 1851, Edward sat on the banks of the Serpentine and gazed out at the incredible spectacle. The rays of the evening sun struck the cathedral-high glass walls and caused them to shimmer with glorious hues of pink and blue. There were sightseers all about, a public impatient to enter the grand hall and see what miracles Englishmen had wrought.

  In this brief, quiet moment, facing one more task before his job was done, with John lounging in the grass beside him, it occurred to Edward that, though weary beyond description, he'd never known such peace.

  Although John appeared relaxed beside him, Edward could see his impatience to be off for the north entrance, where for the last few days, the boy had watched, fascinated, as wagon after wagon had arrived from the Midlands bearing impressive machinery, all the mysterious inventions which had brought both a new simplicity and a new complexity to English life.

  At Edward's insistence, John had reluctantly given up his vigil for a few moments' rest and a bite of cheese and roll while they waited for nightfall, for the curiosity seekers to depart, and for the arrival of the greatest invention of all, Mr. Harrison's Power Loom, which was at present on its way from Manchester on a specially constructed wagon

  drawn by sixteen horses, under cover of canvas, to arrive in secrecy sometime yet tonight. At that time Edward and John, along with fifty other men, would transfer it to the iron platform specially designed for its use and transport it into the Industrial Exhibit where, like the predominant jewel in a brooch, it would take its place in a proper setting.

  This was the last task remaining to be done. With luck, Edward and John would be home by midnight, where that morning Elizabeth had threatened to have a hot tub waiting in which they could scour the dirt of six months' labor from their bodies and make themselves presentable for the Grand Opening.

  Again Edward smiled, recalling Elizabeth's excitement that morning. She was making a new frock for herself, he knew that much, although she'd kept its design and color a secret. "With the Queen in attendance," she'd said proudly, "I must look my best."

  He felt it again, a strong emotion, curiously tinged with melancholy. Why should the thought of Elizabeth sewing herself a new gown stir him?

  Then it passed, and all that was important was that John was beside him, warmer and more loving these last few weeks than ever before, that out of their increased wages they had managed to share bread nightly with over fifty people who might not otherwise have had any. All that, plus the magnificent results of their labors, shimmering in the evening sun.

  There it was again, that embarrassing moisture in the corners of his eyes. He wiped it quickly away and dragged himself to his feet, nudging John in passing. "Come," he said, "let's go study your machines. Perhaps you can explain them to me, for I must confess, their meaning eludes me."

  John scrambled to his feet. "No mystery. Papa," he grinned. "They make men rich."

  "Is that their only purpose?" Edward teased.

  "Of course not."

  "Then what?"

  "They save time, increase productivity, and—"

  He paused and Edward filled the silence, "—and make men rich."

  John returned his grin. "Yes," he concurred. Suddenly he raced ahead a few yards, his youthful exuberance clearly getting the best of him. He stopped abruptly and turned about and, walking backwards, asked, "Are we really coming tomorrow. Papa, for the opening, I mean?"

  "Of course we're coming," Edward called out to him.

  "Elizabeth, too?"

  "Try leaving her behind."

  "For the whole day?"

  Edward nodded, blissful in the face of his son*s eagerness. "For the whole day." Then he said the words he knew John was waiting to hear. "Run along if you wish. I'll catch up in time. The North Gate, remember, at dark. Then, home."

  The boy scooped his crushed hat from his head and tossed it into the air. "Home," he cried out, then raced off across the broad green lawn, dodging artfully through the crowds, on his way toward the North Gate and his shiny black pets that "made men rich."

  Edward stopped to watch him as he ran, feeling a sudden loss, a sense, no doubt, of his son growing up. The boy's external character was impressive, an endless source of pride to Edward. He was a willing worker, honest, without deceit, blunt, too blunt on occasion, tall for his age, with fair hair and eyes as blue as his mother's.

  As for John's interior character, of course it wasn't fully revealed as yet. He was loving, perhaps more in need of receiving love than giving it. But the signs were there and promising.

  Without warning, Edward felt self-conscious, standing in the middle of the green, gazing blankly into the distance where hoardes of people gaped upward at the Crystal Palace. It was his estimate that there was about an hour remaining until nightfall.

  Then he would walk and enjoy the calm evening, the color of dying sun on green boughs, the sweet elixir of early-blooming lilacs, and for a brief period clear his head of labor and effort and powerful machines. His thoughts of late had gone mysteriously back to his mother. How he missed her. And to Eden, his thoughts had traveled there as well.

  It must be age, he thought, starting off along the winding path which led deep into the park. He set an easy pace, his hands laced behind his back. Yes, surely age, that peculiar and incoherent mix of nostalgia for one's past, the place of the beginning. And he missed Daniel as well, as he'd missed him daily since his death several years ago. How Daniel would have loved the Crystal Palace, the excitement of the Great Exhibition. What a life they had had together, were still having, at least in memory.

  He smiled. Then he laughed softly, and suddenly caught himself up. Passers-by were gaping, undoubtedly thinking him balmy. What a sight he must present, a poor thin workman with graying hair and worn clothes, walking alone on a glorious spring evening, laughing at absolutely nothing.

  He would have been happy to explain it to them, if only he could have explained it to himself.

  532

  I

  Jack Willmot stood at the North Gate, staring at the access road lined with small charcoal fires burning on either side, the monster itself moving slowly forward, glowing black and fiery red in the night shadows.

  Now, "Move it forward," he shouted to the thirty or so workmen who had run out to take possession of the sixteen horses who had dragged the monster all the way from Manchester. Still under canvas covering, the Power Loom sat like a great inert lump while the horses strained, and dozens of men ran alongside, shouting good-natured greetings to the six men high atop the wagon seats.

  As the crew of six scrambled down, stretching. Jack Willmot saw his own hand-picked men offer warm greetings. Let them rest a moment, he thought, before the final effort. A good lot, all. Never bef
ore had he looked with dread to saying goodbye to a crew.

  Standing a short distance away from the massive wagon and the talking, laughing men, he crossed his arms, mystified by the difference. In a way he wished they were just starting the job. With what pleasure he would go through the entire six months again. He supposed that part of the difference was in the men themselves, all first-rate workmen, sharing their enthusiasm, and on occasion, for Jack had witnessed it, their bread as well.

  At that moment he saw a man emerge from the shadows on the far side of the park and join the others standing in a close huddle next to the wagon. The latecomer was greeted warmly and welcomed into the circle, more than welcomed. At his appearance the circle of men opened and immediately closed again as though it had consumed him.

  It was Eden. Willmot had recognized him. A strange one, that one. Jack Willmot still remembered that cold December night when Eden and his son had signed on and taken over the substructure crew. And from that day to this, the man's labors and efforts had been ceaseless. And he was no young plow either, clearly showing his rust and age.

  Yet, how he had worked, and how noisily and eagerly the men clustered around him. If there was general fatigue and grumbling, Eden would set a new pace. If someone faltered, Eden would take his place. If there was hunger, Eden produced bread.

  Look at them now. Eden was saying something and where moments before they had been shifting aimlessly about, now they stood with rapt attention, the only movement that of the men around the perimeter of the circle who were trying to move closer to the center.

  What was it the men called him? The Prince of Eden? Jack Willmot had no idea where that foolishness had come from. He'd heard dozens

  of rumors concerning the man, wild tales that always grew wilder after several pints. One bloke had proclaimed that he knew it for a fact that Edward Eden once had been a very wealthy man.

  Recalling that bit of nonsense, Jack Willmot smiled. He'd worked for rich men before and knew the smell and weight and appearance of money. No. While Willmot knew little of substance concerning Edward Eden, he knew most definitely that the man had never been rich.