The Clay Dreaming

by Ed Hillyer

  Hayman shrugged. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘that’s why touring seemed such a good idea. But they don’t like to work. Not all of the time.’

  He seemed to surprise himself with that rare moment of insight, and looked the guiltier for it.

  Lawrence knew full well about their nocturnal habits, the Aboriginal foraging for Bush tucker. He had done his best to suppress these urges while they were on English soil, but, in the night, he guessed they went ahead anyway.

  And now one of their number had run off.

  Teaching, controlling, reproving, governing…had he been too harsh?

  Only when Sarah lifted her head to look at the clock did she realise the hours that had passed, so absorbed was she in George Bruce’s book. If she didn’t soon begin her transcription, she would have nothing to show Brippoki on his next visit.

  There could be no doubt – The Life of a Greenwich Pensioner was the work of the same man. Given what she had already understood from his pamphleteered Memoirs, Bruce had been the first white man to live amongst the natives of New Zealand, as one of them. He had even gone so far as to marry their princess, and possibly to father her a child. Whatever became of them all, Sarah soon expected to learn for herself.

  She turned again to the opening text of the first page.

  The most. Wonderful. Adventrs of A man Ho was born in sant Pols Shadwell London. the frist of my remembrence. was That my father hilt a satuation under. mrster woodhum a disteeler at Limhous. I. was one of thirteen Children Wich God was pleased to Bless my Father and mother with. all so I was The greatest favouright of that family by an icstronory ad vent at my birth.

  As used as she was to both antiquarian language and handwritten scrawl, the wording of the manuscript was hard to make out at first.

  Resisting her eagerness to skim ahead and discover all, Sarah directed her energies towards initiating a transcript. As per her normal working practice, she started out with an assessment, a brief note describing the book itself.

  A labelled notebook, the pages had been numbered by hand, 119 in total. The flyleaves were watermarked 1847, indicating an approximate date when the pages had been assembled between covers: somebody had cared enough to look after it. That in itself perhaps furnished a clue as to when the Museum might first have acquired the original manuscript.

  The work was principally of one hand, but with at least three differing scripts alternating. It seemed fair to presume George Bruce illiterate, dictating his story for others to record. A service performed most likely by his fellow inmates; they were, unfortunately, not so very literate themselves. The text, however, looked to be complete, in good condition, and – excepting occasional idiosyncrasies in spelling or grammar – relatively easy to decipher.

  Steeling herself, Sarah began her transliteration.

  The most wonderful adventures of a man who was born in Saint Paul’s, Shadwell, London.

  She made a separate note – ‘St Paul’s, Shadwell’. His birthplace had already been given as ‘the parish of Ratcliff in 1779’ – a parish centred on the Highway, that notorious stretch of slumland struck through the riverside hamlets of Stepney and Limehouse. St Paul’s was presumably the parish church there, St Paul himself a persistent echo worth investigating.

  The first of my remembrance was that my father held a situation under Mister Wood, him a distiller at Limehouse.

  ‘Wood? Woodham?’ Sarah made another note in the margins. Thus, details rendered in both Literary Panorama and Memoirs were confirmed.

  I was one of thirteen children which God was pleased to bless my father and mother with. Also, I was the greatest favourite of that family by an…

  ‘…icstronory ad vent. Icstronory ad vent.’ Sarah repeated the confounding phrase over and over under her breath, before making additional notes. All that seemed necessary to solve each riddle was to read the text out loud, if discreetly. It made sense, if the words had been dictated in the first instance.

  An extraordinary advent at my birth. That was, I slept for twelve months on my face, taking no refuge but the suck from my mother’s breast and returning to my sleep. This wonderful event caused my mother many (a) time to sigh and say I was born to a most horrid and dreadful life, or a good fortune.

  Every new line started with a capital letter; other random capitals were scattered throughout the text. Following careful consideration, Sarah elected to record the exact wording, peculiarities and faults intact, although eliminating the unnecessary capitals. It made for harder going and slowed her down, but better preserved the narrative’s antiquated charm. The unlearned, almost phonetic nature of the original transcript was quaint; more than that, intrinsic.

  At the age of eleven years, my father failed in business, and Death entered our family when burying ten out of thirteen children.

  Sarah halted again.

  This Propety Drove the famely in the utmost distrees.

  ‘Propety,’ she hummed, ‘propety.’ Property? Poverty! Like Brippoki perhaps, Bruce could not pronounce his Fs and Vs.

  I then to mrster ballmney His Rope Groond To turn the weeill for A woman Who wos Spining of twin. hear wos Clasekly hadcakted With all sorts of infemeny in short I Soon be came A quanted with the most Noterast gaan of thieefs and murdres that ever existeed on he face of the Earth.

  It was going to be a long day.

  The Isle of Dogs is a truly terrifying place, where impossibly tall chimneys vomit clouds of thick, black smoke. Circulating among the swirling crowds of workers are bluecoat constables: burly men with thick necks, dressed in dark uniforms. They brandish staves, and snarling dogs restrained on short leashes. Gatekeepers and watchmen patrol the high walls, or check the rolling carts, in and out. Each of the dock-gates and various entrances is heavily guarded.

  None of it presents too much of a problem for Brippoki. When he doesn’t wish to be seen, he is quite invisible.

  The air rings with the constant din of a smithy. The clangour of the hammer shapes iron across anvil, and mandril, and quare. Wind and water turn to steam. Wooden vessels become ironclads.

  Turned in a gradual circle, Brippoki makes his way back towards the docks at the top of the island. Outside the main gates an enormous crowd gathers, blown in, as surely as the ships, on the westerly wind. Inquisitive, he joins on at the fringes. With every passing second more bodies arrive, amassing behind. Desperately, they press themselves forward against the chain barriers. Before he knows it, the swollen crush pens Brippoki in.

  Skin of one beast, within its enclosure the crowd snarls and strains. When the calling foremen appear, a primal thrill ripples through the throng. Then they take to nearby platforms at the front of the crush: there is a rush and a push, a sudden great step forward. The scuffling begins, and the scrambling, the stretching forth of countless hands. For a moment Brippoki’s feet no longer touch the ground. Instinctively, he lets his body go limp. Should he be knocked to the ground, he knows, it would be the end of him.

  Strict and ceremonial, the foremen begin to select their work gangs, calling out from a register of names. Men in the crowd volunteer their own names. Others, if they know them, call out the family names of the foremen, and some their Christian names. Faces twist into masks of anxiety. For many this is a struggle fought twice daily, with each and every turn of the tide.

  Everyone begins shouting at once and the noise is fearsome. Unable to move, Brippoki’s head soaks with perspiration. He gives off a low, animal stink.

  ‘Harry! HARRY!’ a man beside him calls. ‘For the love of God…’

  Hapless thousands stand ready. Jobs await only a fraction. As each selection is made, every man’s chance of a payday dwindles. The competition becomes more severe. Frantic, the castaways begin to leap up and down, waving their arms and kicking out with their legs, pushing and tugging frantically to get nearer the front. There is savage jostling for position. Fights break out all around. Some men jump onto the backs of others, the stronger ones literally grinding those weaker under fo
ot. The crowd as a whole begins to pitch and roll, circulating furiously. A whirlpool forms. Brippoki too has to thrash in constant motion, just to keep his head above the undertow. Carried away, quite literally, he also feels compelled to cry out his name.

  ‘Bripumyarrimin!’ he shouts, gasping for air. ‘Bripumyarrimin!’

  Raised aloft opposite the last of the foremen, and turned bodily in the air, he is confronted by a maddening sight. Men fight tooth and nail, but they are drowning, all of them, death etched on a thousand screaming faces.

  ‘BRIPUMYARRIMIN!’

  He is overwhelmed.

  Before she knew it the time had come for Sarah to return the book.

  The admonition, printed on the reverse side of every Reader’s Book-ticket, was quite clear.

  READERS ARE PARTICULARLY REQUESTED:

  Before leaving the Room, to return each book, or set of books,

  to an attendant, and to obtain the corresponding ticket,

  the READER BEING RESPONSIBLE FOR THE BOOKS

  SO LONG AS THE TICKET REMAINS UNCANCELLED.

  Seeing Sarah approach, book in hand, Benjamin J. Jeffery’s face gently glowed.

  ‘I would like to keep the book out for a few more days, if I may,’ she said, polite but firm. ‘Do you think that would be possible?’

  The young man fingered one of the Reader’s Manuscript-tickets. Since no green ticket had been filled in the first place, there was none to cancel. Nor could one be filled ad hoc without either Press Mark or individual catalogue entry number, both of which the vital manuscript lacked.

  The junior assistant visibly wrestled with the problem.

  ‘I would very much like it,’ Sarah quietly insisted.

  Loath to be parted from it, she gripped the book tightly. She did not wish the manuscript misplaced, not even temporarily.

  A light sheen of sweat beading his forehead, Benjamin J. Jeffery drew closer. He phrased his words carefully. ‘You may want to leave it out. For today,’ he said. ‘Among the catalogues, perhaps.’

  Sarah turned and considered. The catalogue shelves seemed awfully close to the attendants – under their very noses.

  ‘I could place it in an unfrequented part of the open shelves,’ she suggested.

  His eyes glazed over, and she saw his Adam’s apple bob up and down. ‘Whatever,’ he gulped, ‘you think best.’

  Hidden in plain sight, the risk of discovery appeared minimal. Were the misplaced manuscript found, nothing connected her to it. The worst that could happen – and most certainly, it would be terrible – would be for it to disappear, returned to an anonymous pile.

  Done, and done.

  She passed him by.

  ‘Thank you, Mr Jeffery,’ she said, most sincerely.

  Sarah strode out of the Reading-room, an unusual spring in her step. She rather relished their collusion – her own small act of rebellion.

  CHAPTER XXVII

  Wednesday the 3rd of June, 1868

  STORYTELLING

  ‘Shades of the prison-house begin to close

  Upon the growing Boy…’

  ~ William Wordsworth,

  ‘Ode: Intimations of Immortality’

  ‘How are you feeling, father? How was your day?’

  Lambert Larkin let out a long, grey moan.

  ‘Oh, dear,’ said Sarah. Her lips formed a moue. Laying a chill palm to his forehead, she winced. His bedchamber long since filled with that peculiar sickbed smell, her father had lately developed quite appalling bad breath.

  Neither warm nor cold beneath its blanket of low cloud, the day was moderate: opening the window a while presented no great risk.

  ‘I have been to the library,’ she said.

  Thank you for asking.

  ‘No great news, I know.’

  There, fresh air. Well, air anyway.

  He flapped a hand towards the remains of a bread roll from his largely uneaten breakfast, and she knew what to do. Ever since boyhood her father had always loved to watch the birds, and was a careful observer of their habits.

  Family tradition held that he acquired his lifelong interest in birds and animals from Sir John Downman, the illustrious portrait artist and Royal Academician. Between 1804 and 1806 or so, the painter had briefly made his home at Went House, Town Malling, leaving behind a number of his pictures still on the walls there. Lambert would have been seven to nine years old, his deep and abiding love of nature encouraged, in childhood’s formative years, by the quiet and solemn old artist, who would have then been approaching 60 years of age.

  Ordained as a curate a decade later, Lambert had planted his vicarage gardens with red cedars, limes, Turkey oaks, and Tulip trees: by all accounts, they yet flourished. On the 20th of July, 1831, he married Frances Twytten, Sarah’s mother, dear departed. Sarah herself was born another ten years on, almost to the day.

  She stood, staring down into her empty hands. Broken bread lay scattered all across the windowsill.

  Lambert, who was anyway not in the best of moods, squirmed in the bed, obviously irked by her lingering. ‘Where is your mind, child?’ he said.

  Sarah battled an overwhelming temptation to confide in her father concerning Brippoki. And yet, from experience, she knew it could rebound in a fashion most unpleasant. Following her trip to the Oval the week before, she hadn’t known what to say – whether to admit to her mistake in missing the cricket, or not mention the day at all. In the end she had told him almost everything. Having witnessed the astonishing flights of the boomerang, how could she not? He had deemed her colourful tales regarding the Aboriginal Sports far too frivolous…so, to reveal her subsequent association with one of the cricketers themselves…? The thought of them meeting provoked and terrified her in equal measure.

  It was not that she ached to tell her father, specifically; more, she craved to share her news with at least someone. And who else was there?

  When Brippoki showed up at their front door he looked wan and dejected, something even the proverbial cat would discard, slumped on the step. His red-rimmed eyes were once again bloodshot. He smelt strong and strange.

  A woman of lesser character might not have invited him inside so readily.

  Sarah offered him a hot drink, for which he appeared grateful, and a portion of their evening meal. She had been considerate enough to make extra. This he refused, but she kept the covered plate to hand in case he should change his mind.

  News regarding Bruce’s book inspired Brippoki’s almost immediate recovery. His spirits revived, he appeared very keen to hear the dead man’s tale.

  Sarah’s reading of the text was slow going but, out loud and in company, much more effective than when she had tackled it alone. Having Brippoki for an audience brought the story to life. The relation of the infant’s year-long sleep, in particular, held him enthralled. Then, when he heard of the loss of ten out of the family’s thirteen children, he became so wretched with sadness that heavy tears rolled through the dust on his cheeks.

  I then to Mister…

  ‘Ballmeany?’ said Sarah. ‘Bellamy, possibly…’

  Mister Bellamy’s rope ground, to turn the wheel for a woman who was spinning twine.

  She read to Brippoki those very same words Bruce himself must have spoken, half a century before.

  Here I was classically educated with all sorts of infamy.

  ‘Really, ahem, I’m guessing,’ she said. ‘If you could see a sample of the handwriting I have to unravel!’

  Reflexively, Sarah held out her old notebook. Brippoki flinched.

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘it’s the spelling presents the greater obstacle…’

  Her voice trailed away. Sarah looked her guest over brightly, in a trice, before bending her head to resume with the reading. She’d had an excellent idea, but it could wait.

  In short, I soon became acquainted with the most notorious gang of thieves and murderers that ever existed on the face of the Earth!

  Sarah felt gratified to hear Brippoki gasp.
And this was but one, early indication of George Bruce’s colourful way with words. He turned quite a phrase for an illiterate sailor.

  She continued.

  Here the serpent took a hold of my heart…

  Brippoki sprung forward, nearly falling off the edge of his seat.

  ‘Yes,’ she confirmed. ‘He means Satan… You know who Satan is, don’t you?’

  ‘Uah,’ said Brippoki. ‘Debbil-man!’

  ‘Yes, the devil.’

  ‘The black man!’ Brippoki shouted, excitedly.

  The… Why should he say that?

  Here the serpent took hold of my heart, charring me up in every wickedness.

  ‘He means, I think, that he was…blackened by fire. By hellfire, as it were.’ She thought the coincidence odd.

  So I went on for two years. My poor broken-hearted father and mother by this time became acquainted with my horrid life and strove their utmost power to stop me, but it was in vain.

  ‘Horrid life!’ Brippoki intoned. ‘“Horrid and dreadful life”!’

  ‘Why, yes, his fate,’ remembered Sarah. ‘I hadn’t noticed.’ According to Bruce’s own mother, his long sleep in infancy ramified either his fate or his fortune: Brippoki had requested, nay, insisted, that she repeat this part over and again. She read on.

  Many a time I cursed my dearest mother to her face. One day, when she was chastising me for my wickedness, she pronounced on me a few words as follows:

  – You wicked wretch, for your disobedience to God you will wander in the wilderness like a pilgrim seeking for refuge, and will find none!