A Place Called Freedom (1995) Page 14

  “Thank God you’re all right!”

  He gave her a peculiar look. “It’s very … kind of you to care.”

  She felt embarrassed. “I can’t think why I do,” she said in a brittle tone. “You’re only a coal miner who doesn’t know his place.” Then to her horror she felt tears running down her face. “It’s very hard to watch a friend being beaten to a pulp,” she said with a catch in her voice that she could not control.

  He watched her cry. “Lizzie Hallim,” he said wonderingly, “will I ever understand you?”

  15

  BRANDY EASED THE PAIN OF MACK’S WOUNDS THAT evening, but on the following morning he woke up in agony. He hurt in every part of his body that he could identify, from his sore toes—injured by kicking Rees Preece so hard—to the top of his skull, where he had a headache that felt as if it would never go away. The face in the shard of mirror he used for shaving was all cuts and bruises, and too tender to be touched, let alone shaved.

  All the same, his spirits were high. Lizzie Hallim never failed to stimulate him. Her irrepressible boldness made all things seem possible. Whatever would she do next? When he had recognized her, sitting on the edge of the bed, he had suffered a barely controllable urge to take her in his arms. He had resisted the temptation by reminding himself that such a move would be the end of their peculiar friendship. It was one thing for her to break the rules, she was a lady. She might play rough-and-tumble with a puppy dog, but if once it bit her she would put it out in the yard.

  She had told him she was going to marry Jay Jamisson, and he had bitten his tongue instead of telling her she was a damn fool. It was none of his business and he did not want to offend her.

  Dermot’s wife, Bridget, made a breakfast of salt porridge and Mack ate it with the children. Bridget was a woman of about thirty who had once been beautiful but now just looked tired. When the food was all gone Mack and Dermot went out to look for work. “Bring home some money,” Bridget called as they left.

  It was not a lucky day. They toured the food markets of London, offering themselves as porters for the baskets of wet fish, barrels of wine, and bloody sides of beef the hungry city needed every day; but there were too many men and not enough work. At midday they gave up and walked to the West End to try the coffeehouses. By the end of the afternoon they were as weary as if they had worked all day, but they had nothing to show for it.

  As they turned into the Strand a small figure shot out of an alley, like a bolting rabbit, and crashed into Dermot. It was a girl of about thirteen, ragged and thin and scared. Dermot made a noise like a punctured bladder. The child squealed in fright, stumbled, and regained her balance.

  After her came a brawny young man in expensive but disheveled clothes. He came within an inch of grabbing her as she bounced off Dermot, but she ducked and dodged and ran on. Then she slipped and fell, and he was on her.

  She screamed in terror. The man was mad with rage. He picked up the slight body and punched the side of her head, knocking her down again, then he kicked her puny chest with his booted foot.

  Mack had become hardened to the violence on the streets of London. Men, women and children fought constantly, punching and scratching one another, their battles usually fueled by the cheap gin that was sold at every corner shop. But he had never seen a strong man beat a small child so mercilessly. It looked as if he might kill her. Mack was still in pain from his encounter with the Welsh Mountain, and the last thing he wanted was another fight, but he could not stand still and watch this. As the man was about to kick her again Mack grabbed him roughly and jerked him back.

  He turned around. He was several inches taller than Mack. He put his hand in the center of Mack’s chest and shoved him powerfully away. Mack staggered backward. The man turned again to the child. She was scrambling to her feet. He hit her a mighty slap to her face that sent her flying.

  Mack saw red. He grabbed the man by the collar and the seat of the breeches and lifted him bodily off the ground. The man roared with surprise and anger, and began to writhe violently, but Mack held him and lifted him up over his head.

  Dermot stared in surprise at the ease with which Mack held him up. “You’re a strong boy, Mack, by gob,” he said.

  “Get your filthy hands off me!” the man shouted.

  Mack set him on the ground but kept hold of one wrist. “Just leave the child alone.”

  Dermot helped the girl stand up and held her gently but firmly.

  “She’s a damned thief!” said the man aggressively; then he noticed Mack’s ravaged face and decided not to make a fight of it.

  “Is that all?” Mack said. “By the way you were kicking her I thought she’d murdered the king.”

  “What business of yours is it what she’s done?” The man was calming down and catching his breath.

  Mack let him go. “Whatever it was, I think you’ve punished her enough.”

  The man looked at him. “You’re obviously just off the boat,” he said. “You’re a strong lad but, even so, you won’t last long in London if you put your trust in the likes of her.” With that he walked off.

  The girl said: “Thanks, Jock—you saved my life.”

  People knew Mack was Scottish as soon as he spoke. He had not realized that he had an accent until he came to London. In Heugh everyone spoke the same: even the Jamissons had a softened version of the Scots dialect. Here it was like a badge.

  Mack looked at the girl. She had dark hair roughly cropped and a pretty face already swelling with bruises from the beating. Her body was that of a child but there was a knowing, adult look in her eyes. She gazed warily at him, evidently wondering what he wanted from her. He said: “Are you all right?”

  “I hurt,” she said, holding her side. “I wish you’d killed that Christforsaken John.”

  “What did you do to him?”

  “I tried to rob him while he was fucking Cora, but he cottoned to it.”

  Mack nodded. He had heard that prostitutes sometimes had accomplices who robbed their clients. “Would you like something to drink?”

  “I’d kiss the pope’s arse for a glass of gin.”

  Mack had never heard such talk from anyone, let alone a little girl. He did not know whether to be shocked or amused.

  On the other side of the road was the Bear, the tavern where Mack had knocked down the Bermondsey Bruiser and won a pound from a dwarf. They crossed the street and went in. Mack bought three mugs of beer and they stood in a corner to drink them.

  The girl tossed most of hers down in a few gulps and said: “You’re a good man, Jock.”

  “My name is Mack,” he said. “This is Dermot.”

  “I’m Peggy. They call me Quick Peg.”

  “On account of the way you drink, I suppose.”

  She grinned. “In this city, if you don’t drink quick someone will steal your liquor. Where are you from, Jock?”

  “A village called Heugh, about fifty miles from Edinburgh.”

  “Where’s Edinburgh?”

  “Scotland.”

  “How far away is that, then?”

  “It took me a week on a ship, down the coast.” It had been a long week. Mack was unnerved by the sea. After fifteen years working down a pit the endless ocean made him dizzy. But he had been obliged to climb the masts to tie ropes in all weathers. He would never be a sailor. “I believe the stagecoach takes thirteen days,” he added.

  “Why did you leave?”

  “To be free. I ran away. In Scotland, coal miners are slaves.”

  “You mean like the blacks in Jamaicky?”

  “You seem to know more about Jamaicky than Scotland.”

  She resented the implied criticism. “Why shouldn’t I?”

  “Scotland is nearer, that’s all.”

  “I knew that.” She was lying, Mack could tell. She was only a little girl, despite her bravado, and she touched his heart

  A woman’s voice said breathlessly: “Peg, are you all right?”

  Mack looked up t
o see a young woman wearing a dress the color of an orange.

  Peg said: “Hello, Cora. I was rescued by a handsome prince. Meet Scotch Jock McKnock.”

  Cora smiled at Mack and said: “Thank you for helping Peg. I hope you didn’t get those bruises in the process.”

  Mack shook his head. “That was another brute.”

  “Let me buy you a drink of gin.”

  Mack was about to refuse—he preferred beer—but Dermot said: “Very kind, we thank you.”

  Mack watched her as she went to the bar. She was about twenty years old, with an angelic face and a mass of flaming red hair. It was shocking to think someone so young and pretty was a whore. He said to Peg: “So she shagged that fellow who chased you, did she?”

  “She doesn’t usually have to go all the way with a man,” Peg said knowiedgeabry. “She generally leaves him in some alley with his dick up and his breeches down.”

  “While you run off with his purse,” Dermot said.

  “Me? Get off. I’m a lady-in-waiting to Queen Charlotte.”

  Cora sat beside Mack. She wore a heavy, spicy perfume that had sandalwood and cinnamon in it “What are you doing in London, Jock?”

  He stared at her. She was very attractive. “Looking for work.”

  “Find any?”

  “Not much.”

  She shook her head. “It’s been a whore of a winter, cold as the grave, and the price of bread is shocking. There’s too many men like you.”

  Peg put in: “That was what made my father turn to thieving, two years ago, only he didn’t have the knack.”

  Mack reluctantly tore his gaze away from Cora and looked at Peg. “What happened to him?”

  “He danced with the sheriff’s collar on.”

  “What?”

  Dermot explained. “It means he was hanged.”

  Mack said: “Oh, dear, I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t feel sorry for me, you Scotch git, it makes me sick.”

  Peg was a real hard case. “All right, all right, I won’t,” Mack said mildly.

  Cora said: “If you want work, I know someone who’s looking for coal heavers, to unload the coal ships. The work is so heavy that only young men can do it, and they prefer out-of-towners who aren’t so quick to complain.”

  “I’ll do anything,” Mack said, thinking of Esther.

  “The coal heaving gangs are all run by tavern keepers down in Wapping. I know one of them, Sidney Lennox at the Sun.”

  “Is he a good man?”

  Cora and Peg laughed. Cora said: “He’s a lying, cheating, miserable-faced, evil-smelling festering drunken pig, but they’re all the same, so what can you do?”

  “Will you take us to the Sun?”

  “Be it on your own head,” said Cora.

  A warm fog of sweat and coal dust filled the airless hold of the wooden ship. Mack stood on a mountain of coal, wielding a broad-bladed shovel, scooping up lumps of coal, working with a steady rhythm. The work was brutally hard; his arms ached and he was bathed in perspiration; but he felt good. He was young and strong, he was earning good money, and he was no one’s slave.

  He was one of a gang of sixteen coal heavers, bent over their shovels, grunting and swearing and making jokes. Most of the others were muscular young Irish farm boys: the work was too hard for stunted city-born men. Dermot was thirty and he was the oldest on the gang.

  It seemed he could not escape from coal. But it made the world turn. As Mack worked he thought about where this coal was going: all the London drawing rooms it would heat, all the thousands of kitchen fires, all the bakery ovens and breweries it would fuel. The city had an appetite for coal that was never satisfied.

  It was Saturday afternoon, and the gang had almost emptied this ship, the Black Swan from Newcastle. Mack enjoyed calculating how much he would be paid tonight. This was the second ship they had unloaded this week, and the gang got sixteen pence, a penny per man, for every score, or twenty sacks of coal. A strong man with a big shovel could move a sackful in two minutes. He reckoned each man had earned six pounds gross.

  However, there were deductions. Sidney Lennox, the middleman or “undertaker,” sent vast quantities of beer and gin on board for the men. They had to drink a lot to replace the gallons of fluid they lost by sweating, but Lennox gave them more than was necessary and most of the men drank it, gin too. Consequently there was generally at least one accident before the end of the day. And the liquor had to be paid for. So Mack was not sure how much he would receive when he lined up for his wages at the Sun tavern tonight However, even if half of the money was lost in deductions—an estimate surely too high—the remainder would still be double what a coal miner would earn for a six-day week.

  And at that rate he could send for Esther in a few weeks. Then he and his twin would be free of slavery. His heart leaped at the prospect.

  He had written to Esther as soon as he had settled at Dermot’s place, and she had replied. His escape was the talk of the glen, she said. Some of the young hewers were trying to get up a petition to the English Parliament protesting against slavery in the mines. And Annie had married Jimmy Lee. Mack felt a pang of regret about Annie. He would never again roll in the heather with her. But Jimmy Lee was a good man. Perhaps the petition would be the beginning of a change; perhaps the children of Jimmy and Annie would be free.

  The last of the coal was shoveled into sacks and stacked on a barge, to be rowed to the shore and stored in a coal yard. Mack stretched his aching back and shouldered his shovel. Up on deck the cold air hit him like a blast, and he put on his shirt and the fur cloak Lizzie Hallim had given him. The coal heavers rode to shore with the last of the sacks, then walked to the Sun to get their wages.

  The Sun was a rough place used by seamen and stevedores. Its earth floor was muddy, the benches and tables were battered and stained, and the smoky fire gave little heat. The landlord, Sidney Lennox, was a gambler, and there was always a game of some kind going on: cards, dice, or a complicated contest with a marked board and counters. The only good thing about the place was Black Mary, the African cook, who used shellfish and cheap cuts of meat to make spicy, hearty stews the customers loved.

  Mack and Dermot were the first to arrive. They found Peg sitting in the bar with her legs crossed underneath her, smoking Virginia tobacco in a clay pipe. She lived at the Sun, sleeping on the floor in a corner of the bar. Lennox was a receiver as well as an undertaker, and Peg sold him the things she stole. When she saw Mack she spat into the fire and said cheerfully: “What ho, Jock—rescued any more maidens?”

  “Not today.” He grinned.

  Black Mary put her smiling face around the kitchen door. “Oxtail soup, boys?” She had a Low Countries accent: people said she had once been the slave of a Dutch sea captain.

  “No more than a couple of barrelfuls for me, please,” Mack replied.

  She smiled. “Hungry, eh? Been working hard?”

  “Just taking a little exercise to give us an appetite,” said Dermot.

  Mack had no money to pay for his supper, but Lennox gave all the coal heavers credit against their earnings. After tonight, Mack resolved, he would pay cash on the nail for everything: he did not want to get into debt.

  He sat beside Peg. “How’s business?” he said facetiously.

  She took his question seriously. “Me and Cora tumbled a rich old gent this afternoon so we’re having the evening off.”

  Mack found it odd to be friends with a thief. He knew what drove her to it: she had no alternative but starvation. All the same something in him, some residue of his mother’s attitudes, made him disapprove.

  Peg was small and frail, with a bony frame and pretty blue eyes, but she had the callous air of a hardened criminal, and that was how people treated her. Mack suspected that her tough exterior was protective coloring: below the surface there was probably just a frightened little girl who had no one in the world to take care of her.

  Black Mary brought him soup with oysters floating in it, a
slab of bread and a tankard of dark beer, and he fell on it like a wolf.

  The other coal heavers drifted in. There was no sign of Lennox, which was unusual: he was normally playing cards or dice with his customers. Mack wished he would hurry up. Mack was impatient to find out how much money he had made this week. He guessed Lennox was keeping the men waiting for their wages so they would spend more at the bar.

  Cora came in after an hour or so. She looked as striking as ever, in a mustard-colored outfit with black trimmings. All the men greeted her, but to Mack’s surprise she came and sat with him. “I hear you had a profitable afternoon,” he said.

  “Easy money,” she said. “A man old enough to know better.”

  “You’d better tell me how you do it, so I don’t fall victim to someone like you.”

  She gave him a flirtatious look. “You’ll never have to pay girls, Mack, I can promise you that”

  “Tell me anyway—I’m curious.”

  “The simplest way is to pick up a wealthy drunk, get him amorous, take him down a dark alley then run off with his money.”

  “Is that what you did today?”

  “No, this was better. We found an empty house and bribed the caretaker. I played the role of a bored housewife—Peg was my maid. We took him to the house, pretending I lived there. I got his clothes off and got him into bed, then Peg came rushing in to say my husband was back unexpectedly.”

  Peg laughed. “Poor old geezer, you should have seen his face, he was terrified. He hid in the wardrobe!”

  “And we left, with his wallet, his watch and all his clothes.”

  “He’s probably still in that wardrobe!” said Peg, and they both went off into gales of laughter.

  The coal heavers’ wives began to appear, many of them with babies in their arms and children clinging to their skirts. Some had the spirit and beauty of youth, but others looked weary and underfed, the beaten wives of violent and drunken men. Mack guessed they were all here in the hope of getting hold of some of the wages before all the money was drunk, gambled or stolen by whores. Bridget Riley came in with her five children and sat with Dermot and Mack.