“Thirty,” said Fraser, “and if I’d known what I was up against it would have been thirty-five and cheap at the price.” Then, staring the old man down, “Why does a man of your experience cheat himself on every inland haul he makes? Damn it, man, you save pennies and squander sixpences. You say my rates are high and so they are, compared with the trash you use to carry your goods north and west out of Eyemouth. But you can see for yourself the kind of equipment I use, and the men and horses my gaffer in London has me employ. Do you think a reputation like Swann's was built on saddle-galled, knock-kneed beasts, and a few patched-up manure carts bought secondhand from a crofter? Time is money, or so I’ve always heard, and you often handle more fragile goods than that coal we’ve been dredging up for close on a week.”
“Aye, aye,” said the old man, “but you’ll own you’ve been well paid for it.” Fraser said, wiping his grimy hands on his breeches, “I’ll tell you summat, Mr. McAlpin. I didn’t do this job for money. I did it to prove something. If I had your contracts I could cut your delivery dates in half and offload everything you put aboard intact. Will you not at least think on it, man?”
But McAlpin, it seemed, had already thought upon it. By the end of that week Fraser had established a sizeable bridgehead north of the border and Swann-on-Wheels waggons were soon seen as far north as the Royal Mile, hauling coal, timber, and Newcastle-manufactured ironmongery not merely across the border but over the Forth and, now and again, beyond the Tay. Ian Fraser, watching the first convoy set out, experienced a glow of satisfaction that had nothing to do with the boost McAlpin's contract gave his turnover. It was linked, in some way, to long-dead Frasers who had raided hereabouts in the days of Bruce and Wallace, and whose bleached bones, scattered between the ramparts of Berwick and Solway Firth, rested easier on his account.
3
It was not all beer, skittles, hayrides, and new contracts. That same month trouble flared in the Southern Triangle.
On the last day of the month, buried in a sheaf of reports from lieutenants trumpeting their triumphs, was a letter addressed to Adam personally concerning the youngest foreman in the network, the pink-cheeked urchin Rookwood, recently promoted from clerk to trainee foreman at the specific request of Keate, his original sponsor. Adam remembered questioning the appointment at the time. Some of Abbott's waggoners were elderly and as set in their ways as Blubb. It did not seem likely that a lad of Rookwood's age, notwithstanding his keenness, would be able to exert much authority over them, but after a trial period Abbott, under whom he was placed, had given him an exceptionally high rating, so Adam had concurred. And here, a month or so later, was a lawyer's letter stating that manager and foreman had come to blows, and that Rookwood was threatening to sue on charges of assault and wrongful dismissal.
The whole affair struck Adam as ridiculous. Rookwood, he recalled, was one of Keate's Thameside boys, who had shown clerical promise at Headquarters. He was literate and Adam had been surprised when the boy asked for an opportunity to begin managerial training, but this particular letter, he noted, had been written by a stranger signing himself Gilroy, a lawyer's clerk with whom Rookwood had taken lodgings. Mr. Gilroy, not a man to beat about the bush it seemed, wrote: “Sir, I write on behalf of my client, Albert Rookwood, a resident boarder in my house, who is claiming two weeks’ wages in lieu of notice, namely the sum of £5.10.0 (five pounds ten shillings) being wages plus overtime. On the 27th instant there was a dispute between my client and one, George Abbott, your manager, concerning deliveries to Ringwood. In the course of this dispute Mr. Abbott committed a physical assault upon my client, blacking his eyes and cutting his lip. There was no provocation, other than a formal complaint concerning the use of horses, and my client assures me he did not strike the first blow. Be that as it may, he was not only severely assaulted but summarily discharged without the requisite notice (due under his contract), or the back-pay owed to him from June. My client did not, in fact, wish to take the matter further, but he is under age and not clear concerning his rights. In view of this I persuaded him to communicate through me with his firm's headquarters, with a view of laying the matter before you. In the event of not receiving the money due (slips enclosed) I would be glad to have your comments, if any. Yours faithfully, Cedric C. Gilroy.”
It was the first letter of its kind that had ever arrived on his desk and it puzzled him a good deal. Abbott was known as a hard taskmaster but had never, so far as Adam knew, used his fists on his staff, and the matter was further complicated by the fact that it was the manager who had urged the lad be appointed to a position of responsibility. Not knowing what to make of it he sent for Keate, the waggon-master, and showed him Gilroy's letter. Keate said, frowning, “Young Rookwood is the last lad I should have expected to be involved in violence. He's one of the best boys I ever had, and one of the first I took home. Amiable, and quick to learn, and with more ambition than most. I taught him to read, I recollect, and I was glad when Abbott recommended his promotion. You’ll call him to mind, sir, a quietly spoken boy, hardworking and easy to get along with?”
Suddenly Adam did recall him, not only as the urchin who had grinned at him from the communal bed on the floor of Keate's upper room, but the eager boy who had shown him Tybalt's personnel map the day he went north to find Edith Wadsworth, and had later assisted the head clerk to take notes at the conference.
“I remember him very well and you’re right about him being biddable. That fellow Abbott has me worried sometimes. He's a hard worker but he drives his men like blacks.” He made one of his spot decisions. “I’ll go down to Salisbury, Keate, for this is something I should look into personally. Tell Tybalt I’ll be back before he leaves, probably around six,” and when Keate demurred, saying it was surely something that could be dealt with by letter, he said, sharply, “You don’t solve these matters by letter and this concerns you as well as me and Abbott. You sponsored the boy, and things like this could set our entire promotion scheme at risk.”
He went off then, catching a Southern express out of Waterloo at ten o’clock and two hours later he was making his way to Rookwood's lodging in a narrow street off the Cathedral Close.
Gilroy was at his office but Mrs. Gilroy, a forthright, motherly soul, admitted him and showed him into the parlour, darting about straightening chair covers and antimacassars. “Poor Mr. Rookwood is still abed,” she said. “We’ve had a doctor to him, and there's no damage that won’t mend in a week. But, begging your pardon, sir, that man Abbott is a bully and I advised the lad to leave before this happened.”
“You’ve taken to the boy, Mrs. Gilroy? He's a quiet sort of lodger?”
The woman avoided his eye. “Well, yes, sir, but there's a little more to it than that. We’ve got no son—just the daughter, Hetty—and well, we took to him straight off, the both of us.” She looked up, defiantly. “That man Abbott had no call to knock him about that way. My husband says he could be charged for it!”
“Can I see him?”
“Yes, sir, if you give me a minute to tidy.” Then, hesitantly, “Mr. Gilroy says he can find him a job at the office. He won’t get as much money as he's been bringing home lately but he’ll work clean, won’t he?”
Adam was familiar with the phrase. It was part of the new creed among people like the Gilroys—better to “work clean” on next-to-nothing than dirty your hands earning a living wage. It was a point where the fashionable doctrine of self-help verged on the ridiculous, for it took no account of craftsmanship and implied that penmanship in any capacity automatically hoisted a man on to a higher social plane.
He gave her a few minutes and went up, to find Rookwood half-dressed in his attic room, overlooking the Close. The boy's appearance shocked him. Both eyes were badly discoloured and his face was puffy, the lip decorated with sticking plaster. He said, as soon as Mrs. Gilroy had left, “Tell me about it, the full story from the beginning. I thought Abbott had taken a rare fancy to you?”
The boy looked uncomfortable a
nd said, reluctantly, “I reckon he did, sir. Too much of a fancy, mebbe.”
“What do you mean by that?”
The boy began to fidget. Then he said, pleadingly, “Look, sir, can’t we leave it be? Mr. Gilroy wants me to press charges but I won’t, you c’n be sure o’ that. It wouldn’t do none of us no good, for the truth is Mr. Gilroy don’t know all the facts.”
“I’ve got to know them for I employ you both. What happened between you?”
“The rough and tumble started over the ’orses, sir. He works ’em cruel. I warned him offen but he woulden lissen, sir. Ask the waggoners, if you don’t believe me. But that warn’t the real trouble.”
“What was?”
He saw then that Rookwood was blushing and an inkling of what lay behind the assault occurred to him. “He made approaches to you?”
“Several times. But he didn’t get nowhere, sir.” It was curious. You could usually recognise the type at a glance but it had never once occurred to him that Abbott was the kind to molest boys. Women, perhaps, although he had no reputation for wenching, but there was nothing in the least effeminate about his mannerisms or outward appearance. He said, thoughtfully, “Listen, lad, I won’t press charges either, but I’m damned if I’ll sack you under these circumstances. You must realise I can’t leave things as they are, for Abbott has access to all the juniors. If it isn’t you it’ll be somebody else.”
“Oh, it didden amount to all that much,” Rookwood said, miserably, “just a bit o’ pawing in the stable, when the men had gone off. I told him to lay orf. ‘Nothin’ doin’,’ I said, for I’ve met his kind before. Who hasn’t? It was the ’orses that had me worried, and when I refused to let him harness up a pair that had done one trip, and send ’em out again to the Ringwood, he went for me. To get his own back, I reckon.” Suddenly he grinned. “He might be queer, but he's a dab hand when it comes to mixin’ ’em, Mr. Swann. Looker my clock.”
He said, quietly, “Thank you, Rookwood. That's all I need to know,” and went down and out into the Close, without another word to Mrs. Gilroy. It was no good, he told himself, stoking oneself up about this kind of thing. It happened all the time and he had had experience of it in the army more than once. There was very little one could do to protect a man like Abbott from himself, and the only possible course was to get rid of him at once. He did not feel the kind of disgust most men of his generation felt for homosexuality, seeing it as a sickness rather than a vice. That much army life had taught him and he was glad of it.
Abbott did not seemed surprised to see him, and they went into the yard office across from the stables. The man's heavy, fleshy features told him something he might not have noticed had he not been looking for it and suddenly he felt less cocksure about his flair for picking deputies. Abbott said, glumly, “It’ll be about Rookwood, won’t it?”
“I’ve just come from him.”
“What did he tell you?”
“The facts. Did you have to knock him about, just because he wasn’t your kind, Abbott?”
The man looked down at the littered table, hands anchored to the projecting edge. His knuckles were gleaming with the pressure he put into the grip.
“Nothing happened between us.”
“It wasn’t your fault it didn’t.”
“Is he taking it further?”
“No. But that doesn’t help, does it?”
“This is the end of the road for me then?”
“You know the answer to that. It's a pity. You’ve done a good job down here, but you couldn’t stay on after this.”
“I wouldn’t lay a finger on him again and you say he won’t blab. I wanted to talk to him, to explain, but I couldn’t get to see him. That lawyer got between us. You won’t give me another chance, then?”
“I can’t, Abbott. There are other boys and it's not only them I’m thinking of.”
“Yes, I see that. I could make promises but I don’t say I could keep them.” He looked up and Adam thought he had never seen a man look more wretched. “What does a man do in these circumstances? I’m forty now. Will it be different when I start ageing?”
“Not if you stay in England. Sooner or later it’ll catch up with you, and you know as well as I do what that means among a race of Puritans. Years on the treadmill, maybe.”
“What could I do, then? What hope is there?”
“Go to a country where you can expect more tolerance.”
Suddenly he felt more sorry for Abbott than for Rookwood. Black eyes and a cut lip healed in a few days, but Abbott had to live with his problem for the rest of his life. He said, “Have you saved since you’ve been down here?”
“I’ve got a hundred or so put by.”
Adam crossed to the window and looked out across the sloping roofs to the point where the cathedral spire soared blandly heavenwards. The men who built it seemed to have had no doubts. What approach did they bring, he wondered, to a situation of this kind. “We’ve been practising Christianity for a thousand years,” he thought, “but how does it help a man like Abbott? If a priest got to hear about it I doubt if he’d visit him in gaol. Whose business is it to help? His bishop's? His doctor's? Where could he expect to find anything but cant?” He said, “You’ve got a hundred saved and I’ve no complaint to make about what you’ve done in the Square. I’ll give you a discharge bonus of another hundred, providing you’ll undertake to leave the country.”
“That's generous.”
“It's not, it's just an easy way out of a mess.”
They were silent for a moment. Then Abbott said, “Who will you get to replace me?”
“I hadn’t thought about it.”
“Why don’t you give the lad a chance?”
“Rookwood? As base manager?”
“I’ll tell you something. That boy has a way with men and horses. People take to him and he's got spunk. He might even do well.”
“But, good God, man, he's only twenty!”
“All the better. He's got his way to make, and Keate regards him as the most promising of that bunch you started out with.”
“Would you be saying that to make amends?”
“I might, but it's true anyway. He knows the territory and a stranger wouldn’t. Get Keate down here to supervise for a week and then turn him loose. He’ll manage, take it from me.” He faltered a moment, still keeping his eyes on the table. Then, “Will you shake hands, Gaffer?”
“Why not?”
He took Abbott's hand, noticing for the first time that it was as soft as a woman's.
“You’ll give me a character?”
“As regards your work, yes.”
He went out then and felt the man's gaze following him across the yard. Suddenly the air began to quiver with pulsing waves of sound, as the cathedral bells began to peal. He thought, sourly, “What the devil have you got to sound so smug about,” and made his way back to Rookwood's lodging.
The lad was downstairs now, drinking cocoa at the kitchen table, and when Adam came in Mrs. Gilroy excused herself so he was able to come straight to the point. “I’ve seen Abbott and he's leaving. You can go back there as soon as you feel up to it. How would you feel about taking over from him?”
Rookwood gaped and then began to splutter, setting down his mug and groping wildly for his handkerchief. “Me, Mr. Swann? Gaffer of the Square?”
“Abbott thinks you could do it. I’d get Mr. Keate down here for a week or so to explain the paper work. Well?”
“I…I dunno, sir. Mr. Gilroy was goin’ to get me a job at his office.”
“You want to be a penpusher all your life?”
“No, sir, I’d sooner work with ’orses. ”
“Would you like to give it a trial?”
The clamour of the bells seemed to fill the room. Adam got up and shut the window. The boy said, slowly, “I’d do that, pervidin’ you don’t expect miracles, sir.”
“I don’t, just patience. Abbott will be gone in a day or so. Keep clear of the place until he ha
s and by then Keate will be here. How are you off for money?”
The boy's ebullience showed in his grin. “I’m not hard up for a shillin’.”
“Then there's no more to be said, except to back yourself to win.” He went out into the Close and crossed the town to the station.
Five
1
RATCLIFFE'S EXCURSIONS; FRASER'S RAID ACROSS THE BORDER; ABBOTT'S dismissal and Rookwood's promotion. These were matters that came within his personal orbit and found their way into the firm's records. But one incident that occurred that summer was not recorded and he was to remain unaware of it for years. It was, in a sense, as experimental as things that were happening elsewhere, but Edith Wadsworth did not think of it as such. To her it was in the nature of a private gamble, and one that would do well to remain buried.
She first noticed him harnessing a frigate for the regular run to Ipswich, a casual replacement recruited by waggonmaster Duckworth to fill a post vacated by a waggoner unable to pass an inn.
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