By the time the fair was over they were all hoarse with laughter and wonderfully dishevelled, their hair tangled, their gloves grimed and their shoes grey with dust. And there was still the supper to come.
So Bessie discharged her last duty of the day, ensuring that Caroline and Euphemia were washed and groomed and dressed for the occasion and sent them down to the meal, glad of the chance to put her feet up. And the Eagle did them proud, with boiled fowl and oysters, a very tasty sirloin, fresh pickles, walnuts and gherkins, wines both dry and sweet, and an excellent strawberry tart heaped with cream.
‘Not half bad,’ Dodo approved, holding up his plate for a second helping of tart. ‘Well, we’ve celebrated the coronation in high old style, wouldn’t you say?’
‘Couldn’t have been bettered,’ Jeff said, propping his feet on the edge of the table. ‘Is there any more claret?’
‘By Jimmy’s elbow,’ Will said, beaming. ‘Fill your glasses, all of you. I’ve a toast to make.’
Glasses were filled and faces lifted towards him, expecting to hear the name of the Queen. But he surprised them. ‘Here’s to my sister, Carrie,’ he said, ‘who is twelve today. Happy birthday Carrie!’ And he walked round the table, glass in hand, to kiss her.
They drank and grinned at her and wished her many happy returns. ‘Did the Queen ask your permission to be crowned on your birthday?’ Tubby teased.
‘Course,’ Caroline said, saucing him. ‘We great ones have to stick together. Am I allowed to offer a toast too?’
‘Offer away, birthday queen!’ Tubby said, spreading his arms wide.
‘A toast!’ Caroline said. ‘A toast to our cousin, Euphemia Callbeck, who celebrated her birthday yesterday.’
‘Euphemia!’ they said, drinking her health. ‘Happy birthday!’ And Will carried his glass round the table once again and bent to kiss her too, briefly, on a cheek grown rose-pink with expectation. And the kiss made her blush so violently that she had to duck her head in a vain attempt to hide her feelings. She had spent her birthday quietly with Caroline because that was only right and proper, and now here she was being given the most public congratulations. Oh, dear dear Will, dear handsome Will. I shall remember this moment for ever.
‘We should drink to the Queen now, shouldn’t we?’ Jimmy said, rescuing her.
‘The Queen, God bless her,’ Jeff said, raising his glass. ‘Long may she reign over us.’
‘She’s young enough, in all conscience,’ Dodo observed when he’d drunk the toast.
‘Mrs Flowerdew says she will start a reign of youth,’ Caroline told him. ‘Youth will come into its own, she says.’
‘And about time too,’ Edward said, smoothing his hair. ‘Youth at the helm, eh? Why should the greybeards run the world?’
‘Because they have more experience of it?’ Will said. He was annoyed with Edward because he’d done nothing at all to help the organizing committee. Lazy toad.
‘Experience, pooh,’ Edward said. ‘What the country needs now is vision, let me tell you, and only young men have vision.’
‘What about young women?’ Caroline asked, ruffled by the superiority of his tone. ‘Don’t they have vision too?’
‘Course not,’ Edward said disparagingly. ‘How could they? They’re women.’
‘There’s a woman on the throne of England.’
‘That’s different,’ he said, rather miffed at being opposed.
‘I don’t see how.’
‘She doesn’t have to do anything.’
‘Oh, how can you talk such rubbish? Of course she has to do things. All sorts of things. And if she can do them so can other women. I mean to do all sorts of things myself.’
‘Like get married and have children,’ Edward said, sneering at her. ‘You may talk of women and their visions if you like, but the only thing that interests you is weddings.’
Caroline rounded on him at once. ‘Well, that’s where you’re wrong, Edward Easter,’ she said fiercely. ‘You ask me what I mean to do and you’ll see.’
‘Very well then,’ Edward said, crossly. ‘What do you mean to do?’
‘She means to work in Easter’s,’ Will said, smiling at her. ‘Don’t you Carrie?’
‘No,’ she said, smiling back. ‘I mean to be the managing director.’
In the cheering amazement that followed none of them noticed that Edward was looking sour.
Later that evening when his guests were finally in bed, Will started his first newspaper article, ‘Picnic at Parker’s Piece’, sitting alone in his room with two candles at his elbow and their reflected images flickering like stars in all the dark panes of the window beside him. He had used up so much energy in observation during the day that now he was exhausted, but he wrote at speed, his pen scratching the paper and his hair falling into his eyes, afraid he would forget half the things he wanted to say before he could commit them to paper. The rich helping the poor, gown serving town, commoner and Queen rejoicing together.
He was still writing when the dawn chorus began and the sky lightened to a dark dusty blue, then to blue streaked grey, then to grey streaked green. And he wasn’t satisfied with what he’d written until the sun was up, the candles snuffed and another summer’s day was blowing warmth upon him through his newly opened window. He took the article to the post before breakfast, tremulous with hope and fatigue. Then he went to Benet Street to wake his sister.
Whatever came of it, he had taken his first step towards the career he wanted. Now it was just a matter of waiting and keeping quiet. He told no one what he’d written, not even Carrie, just in case he was rejected, and he determined to fill the waiting days with study for much the same reason.
He didn’t have to wait long. His article was published by the Morning Advertiser the following day and that afternoon a letter arrived with a sizeable fee and the offer of a job, ‘six months as a reporter exclusive to this Paper’. When he rode over to Bury on Saturday morning, Caroline and Euphemia greeted him like a hero.
‘My brother, the journalist!’ Caroline said, hugging him. ‘We’ve started a scrap book, ain’t we, Pheemy. Come and see. We’re going to keep every single one of your articles and you’re to sign them with loving messages for us so that we can show our friends. Here’s a pen.’
Her admiration was like sunshine. ‘Where’s Nan?’ he said, basking.
‘Gone to London to see Pa. She said it was good too, didn’t she, Pheemy?’
‘I must go to London tomorrow,’ he said. ‘The editor wants to see me on Monday morning.’ How marvellous to be able to say such a thing. But he knew he would have to speak to his father first and that was going to be difficult. Perhaps Nan would help him. What a blessing she was in London too.
Chapter 6
‘I can’t say I’m not disappointed,’ John Easter said. ‘No, no. You know I can’t say that. You know how much the company means to me.’
‘Yes,’ Will said. He was torn by the pain he was causing his father but he was still resolved, buoyed up by success and an odd boiling excitement that was putting fight into him whether he would or no. ‘I do know father.’
‘Yes,’ John echoed, giving Will his wry smile. ‘I can see that you do. So what is to be done?’
‘I would like to accept their offer.’
‘For six months?’
The true answer should have been ‘For ever’, but the warning flicker of Nan’s glance and his own compassion suppressed it. ‘For six months, yes.’
‘I had hoped you would start work with me this summer,’ John said. But then he felt alarmed to be showing his feelings so clearly. ‘However …’
The cloth had been removed but they were still at table. Outside in Bedford Square a blackbird was piping its sad, sweet, full-throated song into the opal colours of the sunset. Nan stood up and walked across to the window, looking out into the deepening green of the gardens.
‘You could spend a part of your time with the firm, I daresay, Will,’ she said quietly, ‘even if
you did take up with this reporting. That en’t beyond the bounds of possibility. Two or three mornings a week, perhaps, some afternoons. To learn the trade.’
It seemed a pointless exercise to Will but seeing the hope on his father’s face he agreed that he could. ‘After finals, of course.’
That was understood. ‘It would be sensible to get to know the business,’ John said. ‘Just in case …’
‘Yes.’
‘I would prefer you not to undertake to work abroad.’
Work abroad was forsworn, ‘for the time being’. It was a sacrifice, but a possible one considering what was being gained.
‘Then I think we have found a workable solution,’ John said. And they shook hands upon it.
Like all compromises it didn’t satisfy either of them, but they were pleased with it nevertheless. All was not lost. There was still hope.
‘That’s settled then,’ Nan said, dusting the palms of her hands against each other. ‘That’s what we’ll do.’
‘Phoo-eep phoo-eep tirralirraloo!’ the blackbird sang. What a sad, sweet, compromised world we live in!
Nobody in the family was surprised by the decision. It was just what they expected.
‘Will’s a sensible lad,’ Billy said to his wife.
‘He always has been,’ she agreed. ‘He is very like his father.’ Actually his good sense and his good looks were a private aggravation to her. ‘Of course he hasn’t got the same brilliance as our Edward, but you can’t have everything.’
‘I would like it better if our Edward had a little of Will’s ability to compromise,’ Billy said gruffly.
‘That ain’t his nature,’ Matilda admitted.
And it never had been. For Edward was a child apart, a creature of extremes, confident to the point of arrogance when he was in command and things were going his way, but withdrawing into a silence that was disquietingly like a melancholy when things were going wrong. Life would have been a great deal easier for all of them if he could have been effortlessly agreeable like his sister Matty or his cousin Will. But that had never been the way of it. It would be a good thing when he’d finished his education and could take his rightful place in the firm and be in command all the time.
When the results of Will’s final examinations were announced, Matilda was rather put out to hear that he had taken a first, but she comforted herself that her son would do just as well when he settled down to serious study. At the moment of course he was still enjoying himself with all his new friends, as she knew very well because she and Billy bore the expense of it, but with his brilliant understanding of mathematics he could afford to waste a little time.
Nevertheless he was still gadding in October when his sister married the Reverend Jimmy Hopkins. That was another family event that caused no surprise. Everyone had always known they would marry. They’d been constant companions from childhood, ever since that awful season when they’d both caught the smallpox that had left them so horribly scarred. And now they were married and had gone to live and work in Clerkenwell because they wanted to help the poor. Edward didn’t think that was at all sensible.
‘If you ask me,’ he said to Will at the wedding breakfast, ‘the poor should learn to help themselves. There’s no need for poverty. Most of it is mere laziness.’
‘Or lack of political power,’ Will suggested. ‘There is a new charter being written to petition for universal suffrage. Did you know that?’
Edward neither knew nor cared.
‘Nan’s friend Mr Place is organizing it. I’m to interview him on Monday. If the poor had the vote, they would be able to help themselves, don’t you think?’
‘Nonsense!’ Edward said. ‘They don’t need the vote. That would be casting pearls before swine. They wouldn’t know what to do with it if we gave it to them. No, no, cousin Will, all they need is determination and a bit of hard work. That’s all. I shouldn’t bother with Mr Place if I were you.’
Will paid no attention to such advice. He’d been looking forward to this particular assignment ever since it was first suggested. Having described the trivialities of a May Ball, an opening night at the theatre, Henley Regatta and Derby Day, it was pleasant to be given something more important to write about. And besides he’d heard a great deal about the renowned Mr Place from Nan, who had known him since they were both young.
‘He’s a good man,’ she told her grandson. ‘He’s been a-worriting for the vote these thirty years, to my certain knowledge, but he don’t weary and he don’t give up. He knew your mother of course. She spoke at several of his meetings after Peterloo. A good man.’
But a very dusty one, standing in the gloom of his untidy bookshop among piles of pamphlets and tables heaped with papers and shelves collapsing under books, blinking in the sudden shaft of sunlight that had entered the door with his visitor; a pale, dusty man with a shock of grey hair bristling above his forehead and a face seamed with worry lines and sharp, bright, shrewd eyes.
‘Come in, come in,’ he said, holding out his hand to Will. ‘You are your mother’s son, Mr Easter. I can see that, even in this poor light.’
It was a good start. And the interview that followed was friendly and informative. A copy of the charter was produced and explained. ‘Six points, as you see, all deemed to be of equal importance, so we may take them in any order you wish. Full adult suffrage, of course, salaries for members of parliament, otherwise a poor man could not stand, voting by secret ballot to avoid corruption, parliaments elected annually to encourage accountability, equal electoral districts for the sake of fairness, and no property qualification for members of parliament, for obvious reasons.’
Will thought it all manifestly just and honourable.
‘And so it is,’ Mr Place said, ‘as any just and honourable man may see. Now as to the means by which it is to be achieved, we intend to gather a million signatures upon a massive national petition, which will be presented to parliament some time next spring. I trust you will report upon that, too?’
‘So do I, Mr Place, sir. So do I.’ A petition of such a size sounded most impressive.
‘You may not come of a poor family as your mother did,’ Mr Place observed, ‘but I see that you share her sympathies notwithstanding. It is a great credit to you. I am glad to have made your acquaintance, Mr Easter.’
‘And I yours.’
‘Howsomever, if you truly wish to understand this movement and the despair that inspires it, might I suggest that you take your notebook for a stroll through one of the slums of this metropolis. There are plenty of them. Seven Dials for instance, or Spitalfields, or Saffron Hill.’
‘My cousin is rector of the New Church in Saffron Hill.’
‘Then visit with your cousin, sir, with all speed, and preferably before you write this article. Nothing speaks more clearly than first-hand experience. Depend upon it.’
This advice seemed eminently sensible, so Will took it, writing to Jimmy that very evening ‘in hopes of an invitation’, which was instantly given.
He was a most rewarding guest, praising Matty’s housewifery and admiring the furnishings of their home on Clerkenwell Green, and listening at length to Jimmy’s tales of life in Saffron Hill.
‘When I read Mr Dickens’ new novel, you know,’ Jimmy told him, as their meal came to an end, ‘his Oliver Twist, I thought he must surely be exaggerating, but now I know better. It is every bit as bad as he says. Every bit. He wrote the book about this very place, you see, which was one of the reasons why I wanted to work here. The ‘Three Cripples’ is a stone’s throw from my church, and I really do mean a stone’s throw. In fact we are lucky if it is only a stone. The children here will throw anything they can lay their hands upon. But no wonder. No wonder. I cannot blame them, for they know no better. Who is there to teach them better in this dreadful place? That terrible man Fagin lived in Saffron Hill and lives there still as far as I can see.’
Will looked round their dining room, at the bright fire in the hearth and the lamps
glowing against the wall, at the neatly flowered wallpaper and the fine red damask of the curtains, at the table set with good china and well-polished silver and crystal glasses winking in the firelight, and he understood the concern of this tender-hearted cousin of his. ‘You are hero now,’ he said. ‘You will teach them better, I am sure of it.’
‘Indeed yes,’ Jimmy said. ‘I have started a Sunday school already, which is always crowded, I’m very glad to say.’
‘Well of course it’s crowded,’ Matty said, loving him with her eyes, ‘when we feed them soup before we send them home.’
‘What are good words without good works?’ Jimmy said. ‘The soup may tempt them in through the doors in the first place, but it is the word of God that will change their lives. And oh how much these lives need change, Will. I will take you to Field Lane presently, and you will see what it is we have to oppose. It is a mighty task.’
So when Will had been persuaded to remove the diamond pin from his cravat and the cash from his pocket, and to leave his handkerchief and scarf behind, because they could so easily be stolen, the two young men took a lantern and set off on a tour of the parish.
They walked south towards the City, up Little Saffron Hill, where children swarmed like flies outside every beer-shop, tousle-headed, bare-footed and rank-smelling in rags so thin and tatty they gave no warmth and precious little cover, then into Saffron Hill and past Jimmy’s candlelit church, and from there to Field Lane, where a solitary street lamp cast just enough light for a circle of street arabs to play dabs, their grey hands scrabbling in the dirt. It was a very dark alley and so narrow that in some places it would have been possible to stand in the middle of the street and touch the rotting houses on either side. Possible that is, but not likely, for the place was teeming with people and commerce.
Sixpenny Stalls Page 9
