UNRULY DESIRES [LAWLESS]
After Lodestar’s departure, the atmosphere grew less convivial.
I found myself preoccupied. I was mulling over my discussion with Ruth on the train: “Are the French so asinine,” she had said, “as to invade?” To which I had no answer. Was the Portsmouth Plan unpracticable? The panic engendered by the threat was bad enough: perhaps they intended that uncertainty, without ever intending to invade. A politic charade: cheaper than invading; safer than invading; ruinous expense for us.
Such worries I could not voice at dinner. Nor could I tell Roxbury how his changed behaviour concerned me, and how it concerned the Home Office. I must see in what way he was changed; I must judge was his behaviour erratic. Did it, as Ruth thought, simply speak of grief?
Thus preoccupied, I noticed none of Molly’s discomfort.
Wilfred made flash comments. He asked for the salt as if insulting her honour. He threw a strop when tea was served without his special mustachio cup, with its porcelain strip preventing whiskery spillage. But these are the ways of the young these days, I told myself, especially the young and privileged. I would have thought the earl’s children better brought up; but he had been so involved with the nation’s struggles, he could not be blamed.
“I suppose, your Lordship, sir,” said Molly, “that when Miss Villiers and old Watchman here leave on Monday, I may as well go along with them.”
The earl’s fork stopped halfway to his mouth. He returned it plateward untouched. “Why on earth would you do that? And what’s this ‘Your Lordship’ nonsense, Moll?”
Wilfred watched her keenly.
Ruth observed them both.
Molly scratched her head. “As my post here is fulfilled.” She blinked. “You know. Tutoring your rowdy brood.”
“Tosh!” The earl wiped his mouth and tossed his napkin energetically aside. “That was a sideshow. It’s time for the engagement I originally required you for. Did I not make that plain?”
Molly shifted in her seat. She was rarely discomfited. Her upbringing taught her to cope with situations cavalierly, risking unruly refusals. She was a diamond uncut, sparkling by nature. But the expectations of her new social station had quite unsettled her. “Sir, I understood Miss Villiers recommended me as a drawing mistress.”
“True, Molly.” Ruth smiled. “But you are a girl of many talents—a woman, rather.”
Molly nodded. “I scribble a passable caricature.”
“Ha,” said Roxbury. “You’ve skewered us all on your satirical pen. It’s quite a portfolio. Her sketch of Wilfred here is an archetype of the louche modern gent.”
I was looking between Ruth and Roxbury, for I sensed they had discussed securing Molly’s place without telling me. “Your Lordship,” I said, “enlighten poor Molly.”
“The menagerie, old girl.” He beamed at her. “Illustrate the animals. Up to it? Lear said you would be, and he should know. Chuck in the rare botanicals as backgrounds. I’ll publish it privately, if you’ll strike a deal over it. What do you say, old girl? You haven’t business down south?”
Molly blinked again, pleasure dawning across her face.
“Quite a job.” Ruth put on her bargaining face, trying to hide her pleasure. “How many days will you employ her, sir?”
“Pshaw.” The earl scratched his head. “Sixty odd species, leaving aside beetles and arachnids. Say, one a week.”
Ruth made quick scribbles on the back of an envelope. She gave Molly the nod.
“No,” said Molly, making our hearts sink. “I’ll do one a day, Roxy. I prefer to work hard.”
He laughed (and lovely to hear it). “Two days per animal then. From preparatory sketch to final illustration.”
I raised my glass, delighted, and the wine warmed my heart. I was delighted that the children loved her so, that the earl had taken to her, that she had pulled off the stunt of impersonating a drawing mistress—of becoming a drawing mistress. Now her gainful employment could continue. And her surveillance of the earl. I needed him more than ever. In this hour of need, we all needed Roxbury Industries to keep the ship of state safe.
Ruth wasn’t done bargaining on her charge’s behalf. “Holidays?”
“Four days off per month, same as all my employees.”
“Sick pay?”
Wilfred wiped his mouth with his sleeve. “Have we communists in the house?”
“Now, now, Miss Villiers.” Roxy tutted, totting on his fingers. “You’ll want free medical treatment next. Five months, I make it.”
“A hundred and fifty-eight days,” said Ruth, “and a half. Takes us to Valentine’s Day, or thereabouts.”
“But the brats are back for Christmas.” The earl nodded. “You may as well keep tutoring them. And Easter. Close to a year, near as damn it. Hoi, Birtle! Birtle, could we add Miss Molly to the permanent staff? Birtle? Where is the recalcitrant devil?”
“Occupied, sir. In the tower.” Lodestar strode in to hand me a telegram. “This rattled in as I was on my way, via the pneumatic. Thought you’d want to see it.”
“Not bad news, I hope.” I tore it open. “I’m looking forward to my tour of the grounds.” I read aloud:
Ship ablaze, Liverpool harbour.
Rendezvous Birkenhead Pier tomorrow 5pm?
Visit Whitworth arranged subsequent.
Jeffcoat
“Liverpool?” said Lodestar. “I am just returned from there. I could offer you a lift to the station, although my journey lies in the other direction.”
“No, no,” I said. “Thank you. You go on. If Jeffcoat says tomorrow, that will be time enough.”
THE DANGERS OF CHARM [LAWLESS]
Due to Roxbury’s proximity to the north west, I managed to have my tour early, before dashing to Liverpool.
I did not hear of Wilfred’s saturnine departure till much later. Of how Ruth teased out of Molly the tale of Wilfred’s black eye, how he kissed her, chased her, and worse. I never learned the full details; Ruth, I think, knows all. Can no man be trusted? What women face—even today, in this modern age, when we think we’ve tamed the savage within us—oh, it’s intolerable. For all Molly’s savvy and resilience, no woman five foot four can fight off a sinewy lovelorn brute fresh in from the Raj.
If I had understood at the time, I would have told Molly to give up her task. But I did not know; she did not tell; she enjoined Ruth not to tell. She dug her heels in, determined to do her duty, chuffed with the earl’s approval, and—another thing I didn’t see—basking in the radiance of Lodestar. Of that discussion, Ruth did tell me.
* * *
They were in the art room, tackling another puzzle map. Molly looked at Ruth. “What do you make of him?”
“Wilfred?”
She made a face. “Lodestar, I meant.”
“Dangerously charming.” Ruth wrinkled her nose.
Molly laughed. “Where’s the danger in a little charm?”
“You, of all people, need to ask me that? I heard about your East End escapade.” Ruth regretted saying this, as it made Molly look anxious. “Moll, we’re on your side. I do hate it when you embroil yourself in criminality. But I know you can’t resist a little excitement. That’s your upbringing.”
“Finely brung up I was too. But aren’t you proud how I’ve settled to the life of a rustic drawing mistress?”
“Still with an eye for excitement, I think.” Ruth stood up, moving to the window. “Lodestar has caught your eye not just because he is easy to look at. He represents modernity.”
“Perhaps.” Molly gestured toward the glasshouses. “There sits old Roxy in his laboratory—I do mean to secure an invitation— and he invents something. A new electrical force, say. Lodestar engages the scientists to check it, perfect it, develop it.” Her fingers tap-tap-tapped their way across the map. “Within a sixmonth, there are dockers here, here and here, Bombay to Bristol to Buenos Aires, thanking the heavens for this miraculous improvement. Their jobs are swifter, their limbs safer.”
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“An ever-hungry beast, this industrial world. Roxbury’s cranes speed up the loading of cargo. Some johnny betters them, in Singapore or Sebastopol. Johnny gets rich, someone else is impoverished. The cycle of demand and consumption accelerates.”
“Not Roxy’s fault.”
“Nor Lodestar’s.” Ruth nodded. “No one’s fault. But where it ends I cannot imagine.”
Molly spread her hands across the world. “I’ve lived in the world’s greatest city. But even from this rural backwater, how these coils of industry electrify the empire.”
“I’m glad some happiness is finding you here, despite Wilfred and his brutishness.” Ruth came over and squeezed her hand. “Of dark handsome men, though, especially thrusting fellows such as Lodestar, I bid you beware. He is an egotist. If you need something from him, flatter him. He will not resist flattery, I think. If something goes wrong, tell him that we can arrange for important people to visit. That will pique his interest, and keep you safe.”
Molly bit her lip. “You think very poorly of him.”
“Maybe I read him wrong. I hope so.” She swallowed. “I suffered at the hands of such a man, when I was little older than you. How I wish to warn you, Molly, but you never listen to warnings. What fantasies of love I suffered. I sound like a prim old maid, but they were fantasies of lust.” She blew out a sharp breath. “Oh, do what you want, you contrary child. We are not alike in background, you and I. But in temperament—”
“We’ve the odd thing in common, Miss V.” Molly nodded. “Easy to look at, as you said, such a fellow.”
“Easy to fall.” Ruth sighed. “Harder to rise.”
LIGHTNING TOUR [LAWLESS]
Wilfred vanished back to Oxford, without a farewell.
* * *
I toured the grounds. Ruth excused herself, to hold a pow-wow with Molly, claiming fatigue from the journey. (Not true: Ruth was always energised by travelling.)
Jem drove, with Roxbury guiding. I apologised for monopolising his time. He insisted it was a pleasure to be dragged from his usual melancholic round of duties.
We drove out through the mighty rear courtyard. The wings of the house stretched back into the hillside, their gothic archways shadowing us. All was designed for efficacy, not just for the family, but servants. At the door of the kitchens, a hatch for deliveries. Trap doors for laundry. Culverts and pipes diverting water from the gorge for various purposes: drinking, cooking, cleaning, sewerage. Not forgetting the essential hydraulics: descending from the reservoirs above, the water drove dumb waiters, centralised heating, lifts, gongs, baths, and ever more contraptions, as Roxbury devised them.
We snaked down the hillside, negotiating the hairpin bends between the Burnfoot and the rockery. I let the earl do the talking.
Admitting me to the greenhouses via the heat lock of the ingenious double doors, he pointed out rare flowers, exotic herbs which transformed hearty English fodder into Babylonian feasts. In the past, they had entertained sultans, princes and emperors. Cloves, sumach, cinnamon, kaffir lime, lemongrass, pineapple sage and bergamot.
Attending this poetic roll call of species was a scientist, snipping leaves.
Roxbury smiled, wiping his brow. “For experimentation.”
We toured the quadrangle known as the scientific quarter: glasshouses, botanicals, arboretum, menagerie and laboratories. Rounded off by the curve of the Burnfoot stream, these formed an angular horseshoe, like a mirror image of the house. The glass was held by wrought-iron stanchions, a crystalline reflection of the wild woodland and watery estate. He showed me the furnace beneath temperate and tropical houses, then we got back into the gig.
“And underneath us—Jem, hold a moment—there!” Roxbury stood up in his seat. He beckoned me, peering between the rocks. “See? That curve. One of our tunnels.”
“Tunnels?”
He gave me a mischievous schoolboy grin. “Tunnels to the house. The biggest for pneumatic packets: food and drink down; dirty dishes back, usually with a nice note from the scientists. And once in a while notice of a discovery.”
“And the lesser tunnels?”
“Communication. We can wire out to the train station. Or up to my laboratory. If they are about to annihilate the distance from Cork to Newfoundland, I’m damned well not letting ten furlongs from the station slow down messages.” Talking of these wonders, he was animated; how he could describe himself as melancholic was a mystery. “Did you see the turbine of the Pump House?”
“For electricity?” I said.
“Electricity. Unlimited amounts. Converting the river’s force into energy. Pistons and gears, batteries and coils. This,” he said, shaking his finger aloft, “this will be the future, mark my words. Coal and gas will do for now, for heat and light and combustion engines. But they are a tremendous waste. This river provides as much calorific potential as a coal mine at full production. Hydraulic power already does the heavy jobs once reliant on coal. Electricity will take over the rest. Even today’s sunlight, if we could harness it, would run every machine in Roxbury Industries.” He glanced up at the pale northern sun. “Without choking us. Without polluting the skies. Without blackening our pictures and our lungs. Hear that breeze in the treetops? Another possibility for harnessing elemental power. One day, mark me. One day.”
Was he mad? Or prescient? This man, to whom the whole world came for invention and mechanisation and ordnance, the epitome of the modern industrialist, already looked beyond to a future where his machines are obsolete. He might have withdrawn from public life, but he had not given up new developments. He might be changed, but he was not lost to us.
“Coal will run out, given the rate we waste it.” He tapped Jem’s shoulder to set him driving again. “Even if we find reserves unimaginable today. But consumption will grow. Our working class will demand the luxury we take for granted. Then the Europeans, Slavs, Indians and Chinamen will demand it, as they should, if our world is to strive for equality. Once coal is done, in 200 years say, we scientific chaps must ensure nature’s bounty is harnessed for our use.”
Below the Pump House, I caught sight of walls above the greenhouses, near the Iron Bridge. I had not spotted them as we descended. “What’s that? A monastic retreat?”
Roxbury looked up. His eyes closed momentarily, his lips compressed. He turned to me, as if to answer. “The Walled Garden…” He trailed off. Across his features played a series of smiles and frowns, as if assailed by memories. He touched Jem’s shoulder again. “Jem will show you later, perhaps. Shall we drive on?” His voice was steady, yet I felt I had upset him.
Not wishing to let my inadvertent error sour the day, I cleared my throat to apologise.
Jem glanced round from the driving seat, away from Roxbury, so his look would not be observed, and gave the tiniest shake of the head.
“Scientists’ elevenses.” The earl tapped at his watch. “I’ll go to work.”
“And I’d best be off.” I bit my lip. “No time to see the scientific quarter?”
“Oh, Lodestar deals with all that.” Roxbury excused himself. “Au revoir.”
* * *
No chance to ask of experiments. Perhaps that’s how he planned it. Any impresario guards his secrecy, and I’d heard that Roxbury Industries was more guarded than any. I glimpsed the vast trees, the vivid flowers; I heard the screech of birds and the squeals of animals. I picked up the packed lunch sent down by Skirtle, at Molly’s behest. I had no chance to quiz any scientists, to assess how they felt: was Roxbury Industries flourishing, were they still at the forefront? But then many were just trainees on temporary placements.
My query about the Walled Garden remained unmentioned. My visit had been otherwise fruitful, eliciting information not mentioned in Molly’s letters. I felt reassured. Roxbury was robust, and rigorous, if troubled.
* * *
Now, with the train hurtling toward Liverpool, I thought through matters he had shrugged off. How far beneath the surface lurked melancholy? How did
it affect the company?
He had said, more than once, “Oh, Lodestar deals with that.”
Of course, a manager cannot deal with every minute decision of the vast company. Roxbury had retreated to a wonderland of experimentation in his aqueous Arcadia. Lodestar it was who made the wider decisions, those of national consequence, of international import, and export. It was of him I must enquire further, in person and clandestinely.
BOOK IV
NORTH AND SOUTH
Terrific Explosion on the Mersey
[Liverpool Mercury, September 1864]
A great blast shook the Mersey last night. Upward of eleven tons of gunpowder exploded, aboard the Florence Veigh, a vessel passing near the Monks Ferry defences lately recommissioned. Causing enormous destruction of property, and consternation around town, this event occasioned such universal alarm as has no other in living memory.
The Florence Veigh was bound for Africa. The cargo included claret, sherry, and port, and gunpowder: 960 quarter-kegs of powder in the hold, more than eleven tons, beneath the captain’s stateroom.
Shortly after 6pm, the steward saw a lamp extinguished outside the captain’s room. As he filled the lamp, he heard a buzzer go off within. There followed a detonation, not immense, but enough to set fire to the curtains. By misfortune, his paraffin can was ignited. Horror-stricken, he dropped the can, and watched its flaming contents flow into the cabin. In a flash bed clothes, bed and furniture were ignited. The fiery stream poured unstoppable through the grating of the lazarette. Within minutes, the cargo in the afterhold was alight.
By dint of the steward’s alarm, the crew were able to flee, half-dressed and in haste, on to the steamer Queen Bee whose captain happened to hear the shouts and, fearing mutiny, drew alongside. As the report of a flaming vessel spread, hundreds flocked to the water’s edge to witness the spectacle. Not suspecting the cargo, none were anticipating the frightful calamity.
The pandemonium of noise, as the vessel blew up, is impossible to describe. Every part of Liverpool shook. Indescribable terror gripped the town. Warehouses, offices, and private dwellings were shaken to their foundations. Locked doors were thrown wide, thousands of windows shattered. With street lamps extinguished, the alarm redoubled, jeopardising those who rushed to help.
Lawless and the House of Electricity Page 15