by Robin Paige
With a small smile, Kate retrieved her hand and made a show of consulting the watch pinned to her jacket lapel. It was almost nine. “I think it is time we returned to the Lodge. I have some letters to write before the post goes.”
Friedrich took a step back and bowed at the waist. If he was disappointed, Kate thought with relief, he was too much of a gentleman to show it. “In that case,” he said, “it is quicker to return by this path.” He pointed to a walk that angled across the Friendship Garden.
“Thank you,” Kate said, and then could not think of anything else to say, until they rounded a corner and she suddenly put her hand to her mouth and cried, “Oh!”
Friedrich put a protective arm around her shoulders, saying, in a stunned whisper, “Dear God!”
They had come upon Reginald Wallace. He was lying on his back, a look of shocked surprise on his face, his wide-open eyes staring upward. There was a bullet hole in the center of his forehead.
13
There is always more misery among the lower classes than there is humanity in the higher.
—VICTOR HUGO Les Miserables
Royal pennant fluttering, the Prince’s entourage made steady progress along the narrow track toward the market town of Chelmsford. The day was warm for November, the sky a brilliant blue, and Charles sat back, willing himself to enjoy the ride. The beeches had lost almost all their golden leaves and their limbs were stark against the sky, but the oaks still kept their bronze-brown foliage and the hedges and banks were bright with the warm gold of nut leaves and bracken, the red of creeper and bramble. Noisy flocks of starlings, sparrows, and finches scoured the stubble fields, and along the hedges, redwings and fieldfares foraged for seeds of cow parsnip and dock.
While the Daimler generally outpaced the other two vehicles, it was seldom out of view for long. The motorcar would disappear for a time, then they would overtake it sitting along the verge while its pilot attended to some necessary lubrication or demonstrated some point about the operation of the automobile or indicated some scenic view to his two passengers. The Prince, who had seemed at best resigned to the excursion, now appeared to take it as a holiday, waving to workers in the field and saluting those they passed, who appeared surprised and not a little frightened by the motorcar and the noise and clouds of dust that attended it. Charles thought that their parade must make an odd impression on its witnesses, and he wondered if they realized it was led by their future king. He also wondered if Bradford was making any headway in persuading the monarch-to-be to take a more liberal view of motoring.
As the entourage approached the outskirts of Chelmsford, it began to take on a carnival air. The vehicles were joined by a ragtag gang of boys rolling iron hoops and racing alongside with gleeful shouts, then by a baker’s boy in knickers riding an old-fashioned high-wheeled bicycle with packets of fresh-baked bread lashed to his back. Charles heard more shouting and turned to see a brewer’s dray falling into line behind the wagon, trailed by three or four barking dogs and an aproned girl with a flock of raucous white geese. It looked like a gypsy troupe had come to town.
Daisy turned to peer over her shoulder. “What we need,” she remarked wryly, “is a brass band marching in front.”
“No,” Charles replied, “what we need marching in front is a man with a red flag.”
He was right. As they approached a dusty intersection, a uniformed constable suddenly pedaled up on a safety bicycle, skidded to a stop, and raised his white-gloved hand.
“Halt!” he cried. “In the name of the C-C-Crown!”
“Oh, dear,” Daisy said.
The constable pulled a black book from his pocket, opened it, and began to read, as loudly and as rapidly as he could, given that he was afflicted by a violent stutter.
“It is my d-d-duty to advise you that you have violated the first t-t-two sections of the Locomotive Act of 1865, t-t-to wit, Section One: P-p-persons exceeding the sp-sp-speed limit of t-t-two miles p-p-per hour are in violation of this act.” He paused in his recitation, wiped his mouth with the back of his white-gloved hand, and went on. “Section T-t-two, P-p-persons failing to p-p-post a man b-b-bearing a red flag t-t-two hundred yards in front of a moving vehicle are in violation of this act.” He lowered the book. “Inasmuch as you are in violation of t-t-two sections of the aforesaid act, it is my d-d-duty to arrest you in the name of Her Majesty the Q-Q-Q—” He stopped and tried again. “In the name of Her Majesty the Q-Q-Q—”
Bradford sounded his electric bell. Startled, the constable looked up. His gaze alighted upon the Royal pennant. His mouth fell open and he gaped at the unmistakable outline of the stout passenger in the passenger seat.
“Your. . . Highness?” he asked faintly.
The Prince pulled off his goggles. “Good show, old chap!” he chortled. He leaned over and punched Kirk-Smythe’s arm. “I’ve never been arrested before!”
Somebody shouted, “Three cheers fer ‘Is Rile ’Ighness!” and the assembled crowd, which now included a ruddy-cheeked fishmonger with a wooden tray suspended from his neck and a group of pinafore-clad schoolchildren with their slates, began to huzza. Hats flew in the air, boys whistled, girls clapped, dogs barked, geese honked. The fishmonger and the brewer’s drayman broke into a chorus of “Fer ’e’s a jolly good fellow.” Charles couldn’t help feeling enormously relieved. One never knew these days whether the people would respond to Royalty with respect or resentment. If an Anarchist had been in the crowd, the welcome could have turned nasty.
Daisy was chewing on her lip. “I do hope Bertie does not resent the familiarity,” she said nervously.
“He seems to be enjoying himself,” Charles observed.
He did indeed. The Prince had disembarked from the Daimler and was standing beside it, ready to receive the constable. That nervous gentleman pulled off his hat and approached the Royal presence with obvious trepidation.
“Good morning, Constable,” the Prince said genially.
“G-G-Good mornin’, Your Highness, sir,” the constable managed. Thrusting his hat under his arm, he came to rigid attention, his face as red as a brick, and saluted.
“At ease,” the Prince said. “Now, what was it you wanted, Constable?”
The constable could barely manage the words. “It seems, Yer Highness ...” He was suddenly seized by a fit of coughing. “B-B-By yer leave, Yer Roy’l Highness—” He cleared his throat mightily and tried again. “I fear I must p-p-point out, sir . . .” He faltered once more.
“You must point out that His Highness’s motorcar is breaking the law.” The Prince tactfully finished the constable’s sentence, since the constable seemed unable to do so.
The constable had gone quite pale. “Yes, sir,” he whispered wretchedly.
“And we can’t have that, now, can we?” the Prince said, with great good humor. “It wouldn’t do, wouldn’t do at all, would it?”
“No, sir,” the constable said, biting his lip.
“Well, then,” the Prince said affably, “what we need is a red flag.” He turned and spotted the fishmonger, who was wearing a dirty red bandanna tied around his neck. “My good man, what will you take for your neckerchief?”
“A shillin’, sir,” the fishmonger replied, whipping it off and handing it up through the crowd to the Prince.
“Done,” said the Prince, and tossed the fishmonger a coin, as the crowd cheered and others clamored to trade their neckwear for a Royal coin. Holding the filthy neckerchief delicately by one corner, he turned to the constable. “We shall also require a man to lead us. Would you be so kind, Constable?”
Thus presented with an ingenious resolution of the difficulty, the constable gave an audible sigh of relief. “Oh, yes, sir,” he cried. He looped the handkerchief around the handlebar of his bicycle. “And where are we g-g-goin‘, sir, ’f I may ask?”
“To the workhouse!” the Prince exclaimed, and climbed back into the Daimler.
“To the . . . w-w-workhouse?” the amazed constable stammered, as t
he assembly applauded and whistled.
“Let us be off!” the Prince cried and flung up his arm. In a moment, the parade was moving again, led by the dazed constable on his bicycle, flying the fishmonger’s dirty neckerchief as if it were His Highness’s very own pennant.
Afterward, Charles had occasion to ponder on the ironic contrast between the lighthearted prologue of their comedic journey and the tragic despair of the bleak place at which they arrived. The workhouse was surrounded by a neighborhood that belonged in one of the circles of Dante’s Inferno, and Charles would not have been surprised to see over one of the doors a sign that read, “Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.” A filthier or more wretched collection of buildings and alleys he had never seen.
The sun had disappeared behind a bank of dark gray clouds, and the air was heavy with fetid odors. The cobbled street—so narrow that he could almost reach out and touch the dingy buildings on either side—was lined with ragged children who gaped at the Royal parade as if it conveyed beings from a distant country. And perhaps it did, Charles reflected, contrasting the splendor of the estate they had left to the dirty doorways and foul gutters. He wondered what the Prince made of the scene. Was he moved by the misery of his poorest subjects, or was he so thoroughly cocooned in Royal cotton wool that he could neither see nor hear nor smell it?
Ahead of them, the Daimler slowed, and Kirk-Smythe jumped out and began to walk alongside, watching the by-standers warily. Charles wondered if he were carrying a pistol.
“Perhaps this expedition wasn’t such a good idea,” Daisy said, glancing nervously at a pair of ill-looking fellows lounging against a rubble heap. “Bertie is often offended by unpleasant sights and smells. Perhaps you had better tell Bradford to remain with the motorcar and prepare to leave at a moment’s notice.”
Charles nodded. Given the neighborhood, he felt certain that Bradford needed no encouragement to remain with the motorcar. “Is that the workhouse?” he asked, glancing ahead, and Daisy nodded, tight-lipped.
Built of red brick stained with fifty years of black soot, the workhouse stood atop a small rise at the end of the street, which led up to it and stopped at its door. A welcoming party was assembled at the top of the three front steps, upon which a tattered and stained red carpet had been laid—borrowed, as its conspicuous gold insignia indicated, from the office of Chelmsford’s Lord Mayor. Indeed, the mayor himself, a cheerful, smooth-cheeked individual wearing a red velvet cap and a matching ermine-trimmed cape, had come to receive the Prince, along with two more somber men in black frock coats and a small round lady in black silk with an old-fashioned lace cap perched on her fuzzy gray curls.
The entourage came to a stop. Kirk-Smythe helped the Prince alight, while Charles handed Daisy out of the brougham. The mayor doffed his large red hat and bowed low, and there followed a good deal of bowing and curtsying as Lady Warwick, who was already acquainted with the welcoming committee, introduced to the Prince the mayor, Warden Holden, Matron Kingsley, and Guardian Brocklehurst, the latter a member of the Workhouse Board of Guardians. Each of these persons in turn expressed his or her humble gratitude for His Royal Highness’s concern and her ladyship’s compassion, and hoped that the visit would not prove too trying.
While this was going on, Charles retrieved his camera, mounted it on its stout wooden tripod, and got down to the business of documenting the Prince’s visit. He was hunched under the black shroud, planning his first photograph, when Guardian Brocklehurst, a burly man with sandy whiskers and hairless brows, came toward him.
“You, there, stop!” he growled. “No one has been authorized to take photographs.” He had his hand on the camera, about to wrench it away, when Kirk-Smythe intervened.
“This is the Royal photographer,” he said sternly.
The Prince turned around. “I say,” he called out. “Is there a problem?”
Warden Holden stepped forward. “If it please Your Highness.” He extended a soft white hand that would have done justice to an undertaker. “The Board of Guardians has ruled that photographers are not allowed within our doors. We have had several unfortunate experiences with—”
“That is to say, sir,” Matron Kingsley put in, “there are those who would portray our good work here in an unfavorable light.” Her gray curls bobbed earnestly. “Our funds are woefully inadequate, sir. We cannot do all we might wish to assist the poor souls under our—”
“Well, then,” the Prince said briskly, “I should think that photographs of these woeful inadequacies could be used to wring the hearts and purses of the rich.” He smiled. “I promise you, Matron, that my personal photographer will capture as many unfortunate scenes as possible.”
Guardian Brocklehurst continued to glare at the camera, and Warden Holden bit his lip nervously. But at Charles’s request, the party stood for a photograph on the front steps, the Prince in the middle with Daisy on one side and the mayor on the other, the remaining three behind. Then, leaving Bradford, Lawrence, and the two coachmen to guard the vehicles, they went around the building to the back, where there was a walled-in recreation ground. In the middle were three long wooden benches on which were seated forty or so well-scrubbed and tractable inmates wearing what looked to be freshly ironed clothing, the men on one bench, the women on another, the children on a third.
“And what have we here?” asked the Prince, striding in front of the benches, swinging his silver-headed walking stick as if he were reviewing the Guards.
“Takin’ the air, sir,” Warden Holden said.
“They take the air several times a day, sir,” Matron Kingsley added. She turned to Sir Charles. “This ’ud make a good photograph.” Charles set down his tripod, thinking that the scene was so obviously staged that it was hardly worth wasting a photographic plate on it. But there was a sad pathos on the scrubbed faces that pulled at his heart.
Daisy was frowning. “When I visited here, unannounced,” she said, “the inmates were not so clean as this, and there were three or four times as many.”
“Today is bath day,” explained Matron Kingsley. “I believe that you were here on the day before bath day, Your Ladyship.”
Daisy’s dark blue eyes narrowed. “And how many souls do you care for in this place?”
The mayor spoke up proudly. “A hundred and thirty-seven last night, Your Ladyship. More every day as the weather turns chill. Winters is always the worst, of course. That’s when the casuals all try to crowd in, whether they need charity or not.”
“That’s right,” said Guardian Brocklehurst. He looked down his long nose. “Why, last night, when the men applying for shelter were searched, one had a whole shilling. He claimed he was saving it for his family, but with that kind of money, he could have paid for a bed at an inn.”
“You searched him?” Daisy asked. “Do you search all the men and women who seek shelter from you?”
Warden Holden folded his soft white hands. “Beg pardon, Yer Ladyship, but our aim is to confiscate pipes, tobacco, and matches, which are not allowed. Each inmate may keep fourpence.”
The Prince was looking impatient. “Where are we off to next?” he demanded.
Matron Kingsley had developed a nervous tic at the corner of her mouth. “We thought, sir, that a view of our Recreation Ground would suffice.”
“But there are no more than forty persons on these benches,” Daisy objected, “which leaves nearly a hundred unaccounted for. And I particularly wanted His Highness to visit your brickworks.”
The mayor stepped forward. “I must suggest to Your Ladyship,” he interjected, “that the sight of too much wretchedness would tire the Royal eyes. I humbly entreat—”
“Damn it!” the Prince said pettishly. “I have ridden thirteen miles in a rattletrap motorcar with the express intention of seeing the unspeakable inmates of your wretched workhouse. Now, I mean to see them—all of them, whether the sight tires the Royal eyes or not!” He aimed his walking stick at the mayor. “Do you take my point, sir?”
&nb
sp; “Y-Y-Yes, Your Highness,” gabbled the mayor.
“Well, then,” His Highness said grimly, “let’s get on with the miserable business.” He tucked his stick under his arm. “Come along, Your Ladyship. You too, Kirk-Smythe. Bring the camera, Sheridan.”
And so it was that Charles, pausing every so often to photograph a scene, followed the Prince and Daisy as they surveyed the dismal interior of the Chelmsford Workhouse, Kirk-Smythe at their heels. They walked hurriedly through the men‘s, women’s, and children’s wards and the nursery, where miserable, half-clothed inhabitants huddled in unclean corners and on filthy beds. Picking up their pace, they quickly toured the kitchen, where a gang of ragged, dirty women was stewing up small quantities of mutton with large quantities of cabbage and potatoes in huge copper kettles on massive stoves, while others made coarse flour into bread. To Daisy’s inquiry, the matron reported that the luncheon menu was the same each day: three ounces of meat, six of cabbage and six of potatoes, and four of bread.
“With four of bread and a pint of broth for supper,” she added hastily, “and four of bread and a pint of porridge for breakfast. So you see they are adequately fed.”
The Prince shuddered. Charles wondered whether he was comparing the meager meal to the enormous breakfast he had put away this morning—ptarmigan pie, deviled kidneys, eggs, bacon, bread, several kinds of fruit. But he only said, “I cannot abide the odor of cooked cabbage,” and left the room.
From the kitchen, they went across the Recreation Ground again—the benches still filled with their sad-faced occupants—to a large barnlike structure at the rear. Inside, several dozen men, women, and children were laboring in the dusty dimness. The children were chopping straw and carrying it to a pug mill turned by a trio of men, while women broke up chunks of clay and mixed it in the mill with buckets of water. Other women were filling molds with the stiff paste that came out of the mill. Men knocked the bricks out of the molds and stacked them to cure, while other men carried the cured bricks to the outdoor kiln that roared like the flames of Hades in the yard behind. The ragged clothes and the weary faces of the laborers were covered by a powdery dusting of clay particles, so that they looked like walking ghosts, and except for the roaring of the kiln and the squeaking of the pug mill, not a human voice was raised. It was a scene of such somber melancholy as Charles had never seen before. In the unnatural quiet, he set up his camera, hoping that his photographs would capture the speechless despair on the workers’ faces.