‘I’m sure it will be a great help to tide them over after Christmas,’ said Robert. ‘We’re just sorry we won’t be here.’
As they continued talking, Jayne heard the sound of a message on her mobile phone. She searched for her bag, and dug it out.
The message was from Tom Smithson.
Dear Mrs Sinclair, I’d just thought I’d let you know, I put together a consortium of friends and we managed to purchase the first edition of A Christmas Carol . We were lucky though, our ceiling was 80,000 .
Jayne immediately texted back.
Great news, Tom, well done to you. I’m so happy it’s staying in the country where it was written.
Jayne looked up from her phone to find her Robert, Vera and Ronald still talking about Christmas.
‘I’m so looking forward to telling my Scottish cousins about your book, Ronald.’
A slow smile developed on Ronald’s face. ‘My book? I suppose it is my book, I discovered it after all.
‘I also have something to say. We talked about it in the car driving here. Ronald and I will be spending Christmas Day together.’
Everybody looked at her including Ronald.
‘And we won’t be having baked beans,’ she added.
His face fell. ‘A great pity,’ he whispered but then another broad smile spread across it. ‘Just joking. I love turkey too.’
Jayne pointed to a copy of A Christmas Carol lying next to her on the table. ‘We’ve decided to take Charles Dickens advice.’
.
Chapter forty-Three
Christmas Day, 1843
Devonshire Terrace, London
Charles Dickens patted the bulging stomach beneath his gold waistcoat and pushed back his chair from the table.
They had all eaten well and celebrated even better.
He had performed his magic tricks with the help of his friend, Forster, amazing everybody with their dexterity for one whole hour. Ladies’ handkerchiefs had been changed into bonbons, and a box of bran had been transformed into a live guinea pig which proceeded to scurry across the table, diving into Fanny’s lap.
The piece de resistance however, was pouring flour, raw eggs, raising nuts, sugar and assorted dried fruit, into a top hat, bringing out, after the correct mumbling of the magic words and waving of his conjurer’s magic wand, a complete plum pudding, already steamed and ready to serve.
Even Doctor Sharp’s mouth had dropped open at the audacity of the trick. He had examined Harry earlier and was positive he could effect a cure. It would be expensive but what was money when Harry’s happiness and health were concerned?
It had been a good Christmas.
He still had his money worries, his publishers were still a problem to be solved and Chuzzlewit remained short of a satisfactory ending.
But A Christmas Carol had been an undoubted success. The six weeks he had spent feverishly writing the story had been well used. The book was handsomely printed and all 5000 copies had sold out, ensuring a second printing almost immediately.
It had not been the financial success he had hoped, profits from the sale amounted to a little less than 200 pounds, an amount unlikely to put much of a dent in the red ink of his finances. But as an artistic endeavour, it had been a triumph, with all the reviews being overwhelmingly positive.
It seemed he had struck a chord in the country, writing a book people wanted to read and remember. Even better, it was a book that had given people hope at this difficult time, exactly as he had planned.
For that, he was extremely grateful to the gods who decide the fate of all writers.
Fanny tapped the top of the pianoforte. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, we wish to continue the evenings celebrations with a selection of carols.’
Harry was placed upright in a chair, while Charles was carried by his mother. Dickens’ children; Boz, Mary and Kate joined Henry and Fanny. They all began singing in their perfect voices as the first chords rang out from the pianoforte.
Silent night! Holy night
All is calm, all is bright
Round yon virgin mother and child
Holy infant, so tender and mild,
Sleep in heavenly peace
Sleep in heavenly peace
Charles Dickens closed his eyes and listened to the music sung by his family.
It had been a good Christmas. A Christmas full of hope for the future.
What more could he want?
Chapter forty-Four
Christmas Day, 2019
Limelight Mission, Manchester
Jayne adjusted her red Santa hat, pushing it back over her head, and looked out over the hall. It was packed with every table occupied and the queue for food still getting longer.
A man's face in front of her peered out of a purple hoodie. She could just see a tousled grey beard, skin the colour of mahogany and eyes the clearest, brightness blue. He wore a soiled overcoat that looked as though he hadn’t take it off for the last century.
‘What would you like to eat?’ Jayne asked indicating the turkey, vegetables, roast potatoes, and mash in trays in front of her.
‘Everything, please,’ the voice was deep and smoke laden.
Jayne began spooning out the food onto a plate. Ronald leaned over and said. ‘We’ve run out of gravy, I’ll just go and get some.’
For once, he wasn’t feeling uncomfortable surrounded by a crowd of people. In fact, it seemed as if he were totally at home.
‘Can I have more sprouts. I like sprouts.’
’No problem, I love them too.’ The sprouts were perfectly cooked even if she said so herself. She’d made them this morning, parboiling and then finishing them off in a frying pan with butter and bacon. Perfect.
Ronald placed a jug next to her. ‘Would you like gravy, Mr…?’ she asked.
‘It’s Sunderland Tony, and I’d like lots.’
She thought she recognised the accent. ‘Here you go, enjoy your meal. Next please.’
Another man shuffled in front of her handing across his plate.
She had been there since 7 am that morning, preparing, slicing, dicing and peeling the food, then helping to cook it. Now, she was serving it to her guests, the people who mattered; the homeless of Manchester, still spending days and nights on the streets even in the middle of winter.
Despite all the hard work, she was extremely happy. Looking over the people in the hall, she realised that Dickens had been right.
Christmas was a wonderful time of the year.
And while family and friends and gifts were important, even more crucial was giving back something to the people that had less than her.
Her life, despite its ups and downs, had been blessed. Others had been far less fortunate. Christmas was a time to help them and help each other.
Dickens had written about it nearly 180 years ago and he had been as right then as he was now.
She began spooning food on to the man’s plate as a choir of children from one of the local churches came in and walked onto the stage. After setting themselves up properly with the help of their choir master, a young girl, aged around ten, stepped forward to the microphone.
‘Hello everyone, we’re going to sing a few carols for you today. I hope you are enjoying your Christmas lunch.’
As the girl stepped back and the choir began to sing ‘Silent Night, Holy Night’, a tear crept into the corner of Jayne’s eye.
A gruff voice brought her instantly down to earth. ’Hang on, love, no sprouts, I can’t stand them.’
‘No worries, I’ll give you more roast spuds instead.’’
‘Ta, I like a roastie.’
Despite Vera and Robert not being with her, this was the best Christmas she had ever enjoyed.
‘God bless you,’ she said as the man walked away with his tray.
He stopped, looking back over his shoulder, ‘God bless us, Jayne, one and all.’ A toothless smile. ‘God bless us, one and all.’
THE END
<<<<>>>>
Historical Note
This is a work of fiction but, as ever with Jayne Sinclair novels, it has a foundation of fact.
It came about through three serendipitous events.
The first was being given a copy of A Christmas Carol as a present when I was just thirteen years old. This Christmas gift was to begin a lifelong love affair with Dickens and his stories.
The second was buying an old book from a second-hand shop a couple of years ago, and discovering a book plate inside describing that the book had been given to a Miss Sarah Hardcastle by a Methodist Sunday School in 1899. Using the Census of 1901, I was able to find out who the young girl was, and follow her life until her death in 1972.
The third event was discovering by chance that Dickens visited Manchester often because his sister, Fanny, lived in the city with her husband until her untimely death in 1848. In fact, he visited the city just ten days before he began writing A Christmas Carol.
This all started me thinking, and I began to research the genesis of the Dickens novel.
A Christmas Carol was written in six feverish weeks starting around October 15, 1843 and ending on December 2nd of the same year, being published to high acclaim in the edition described in my book.
The fact that Manchester inspired A Christmas Carol is undoubted. He gave a speech at a fund raising event for the Manchester Athenaeum on October 5, 1843, visiting the city and spending time with his sister.
There is no mention of such a novel in his letters before his visit, nor had he described any plans to write anything about Christmas or with a Christmas theme prior to going to Manchester.
In his personal life, he was under immense financial pressure during the visit, having been just informed that he was overdrawn at his bank. Debt and bankruptcy play a large role in Dickens’ works. The memories of his father being thrown into debtor’s prison and him being sent to work in a blacking factory at the same time, haunted him for the rest of his life.
His publishers, Chapman and Hall, were not supporting him, as his latest serialisation, Martin Chuzzlewit , was not doing well. In fact, they were seeking money from him. He was still only half way through writing the story, and had not yet worked an ending.
This lack of support continued with A Christmas Carol. He ended paying for the first edition himself, commissioning the illustrator, John Leech, and choosing the paper stock and the binding himself.
To add to all these woes and pressure, his wife, Catherine, was pregnant with his fourth child and his father was in debt yet again, demanding that Dickens give him money..
All in all, it was not the most propitious time to consider writing a new book, but we are fortunate that Dickens did.
Ten days after leaving Manchester, despite everything going on in his life, he began work on A Christmas Carol , full of desire to get his words down on paper.
The rest, as they say, is history.
As for the cast of characters I have assembled in this novel, some are factual and others the result of my imagination.
James Crossley did collect books, founding the Chetham Society in 1843, and often collaborating with Harrison Ainsworth, a friend of Dickens.
Elizabeth Gaskell was living in Manchester at this time with her husband, a Unitarian minister. Dickens had just joined the congregation in London so it would be more than likely that he would have been introduced when he visited the city. He also played a large role in Mrs Gaskell’s later career as a novelist, often advising her on her books and stories. The Gaskell collection at John Rylands Library contains many letters from Dickens to her.
Manchester was the centre of England’s (and the world’s) cotton industry at this period. Silas Grindley is a figment of my imagination. But he represents the Benthamite views of many of the mill owners of the time. Views repeated in one of Dickens’ later novels, Hard Times, and its character, Mr Gradgrind.
Lizzie Burns is a real character. She was the daughter of an Irish cotton worker who became Friedrich Engels mistress, living with him until the 1870s while he was working at his father’s mills in Eccles and Salford. Unfortunately, she left no written records of her life, but she is a fascinating character.
There are plenty of written records of the living conditions in Manchester at this time. Angel Meadow was as bad as I have described it ( and probably far worse). Today, it is a park and part of the area favoured for living by the young and ineffably trendy known as Northern Quarter.
Robert Duckworth, however, is an invented character but the methods Jayne uses to search for him are valid. The 1851 Census for Manchester did suffer water damage in London and parts of it are unreadable.
Finally, a word about the libraries featured in this book. Manchester is blessed with four amazing, world-class libraries, a function of the mill owners following Dickens advice in his speech at the Athenaeum and using their hard earned brass to create oases of civilisation amongst the mill chimneys.
Chetham’s Library was founded in 1653 and is a beautiful building, well worth a visit if you are in the city. The Portico Library opened in 1806, and is still open to this day, serving a lovely lunch along with a wonderful selection of documents and books.
The John Rylands Library established by Enriqueta Rylands in 1900 is an amazing temple to learning, even enjoying a visit from the Korean girl band, Blackpink, last year.
Finally, Central Library, opened by the future Edward VIII in 1934, is where I spent a lot of time as a child, not doing much reading I’m afraid but enjoying the peace and serenity of the place. It has recently been renovated and is an indispensable source for genealogists researching their Manchester ancestors.
As ever, I will leave the last word to Dickens. He loved Christmas and his novel shows that love on every page. He believed fervently that the only way to improve the world was to rid it of want and ignorance through education. A declaration he made plain in his speech at the Athenaeum which I quote in my book. In a Christmas Carol, he is far more literary in his denunciation.
“This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased.” Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol
This is the essential message of A Christmas Carol, and perhaps the reason why it resonates so profoundly with people even though the book was written 176 years ago.
I’ll leave the final word with Tiny Tim and wish all my readers a very, very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
‘God bless us, every one!’
If you enjoyed reading this Jayne Sinclair Genealogical Mystery, please consider leaving a short review on Amazon. It will help other readers know how much you enjoyed the book.
If you would like to get in touch, I can be reached at
www.writermjlee.com . I look forward to hearing from you.
Other books in the Jayne Sinclair Series:
The Irish Inheritance
When an adopted American businessman who is dying of cancer asks her to investigate his background, it opens up a world of intrigue and forgotten secrets for Jayne Sinclair, genealogical investigator.
She only has two clues: a book and an old photograph. Can she find out the truth before her client dies?
The Somme Legacy
Who is the real heir to the Lappiter millions? This is the problem facing genealogical investigator Jayne Sinclair.
Her quest leads to a secret that has been buried in the trenches of World War One for over a hundred years – and a race against time to discover the truth of the Somme Legacy.
The American Candidate
Jayne Sinclair, genealogical investigator, is tasked to research the family history of a potential candidate for the Presidency of the United States of America. A man whose grandfather had emigrated to the country seventy years before.
When the politician who commissioned the genealogical research is shot dead in front of her, Jayne is forced to flee for her life. Why was he killed? And
who is trying to stop the details of the American Candidate’s family past from being revealed?
The Vanished Child
What would you do if you discovered you had a brother you never knew existed?
On her deathbed, Freda Duckworth confesses to giving birth to an illegitimate child in 1944 and placing him in a children’s home. Seven years later she returned for him, but he had vanished. What happened to the child? Why did he disappear? Where did he go?
Jayne Sinclair, genealogical investigator, is faced with lies, secrets and one of the most shameful episodes in recent history as she attempts to uncover the truth.
Can she find the Vanished Child?
The Silent Christmas
In a time of war, they discovered peace.
When David Wright finds a label, a silver button and a lump of old leather in a chest in the attic, it opens up a window on to the true joy of Christmas.
Jayne Sinclair, genealogical investigator, has just a few days to unravel the mystery and discover the truth of what happened on December 25, 1914.
Why did her client’s great-grandfather keep these objects hidden for so long? What did they mean to him? And will they help bring the joy of Christmas to a young boy stuck in hospital?
The Sinclair Betrayal
In the middle of a war, the first casualty is truth.
Jayne Sinclair is back and this time she’s investigating her own family history.
For years, Jayne has avoided researching the past of her own family. There are just too many secrets she would prefer to stay hidden. Then she is forced to face up to the biggest secret of all; her father is still alive. Even worse, he is in prison for the cold-blooded killing of an old civil servant. A killing supposedly motivated by the betrayal and death of his mother decades before.
Was he guilty or innocent?
Was her grandmother really a spy?
And who betrayed her to the Germans?
Jayne uses all her genealogical and police skills to investigate the world of the SOE and of secrets hidden in the dark days of World War Two.
A world that leads her into a battle with herself, her conscience and her own family.
The Christmas Carol: A Jayne Sinclair Genealogical Mystery Page 17