“So we, les Français, we should cede to you, les Anglais?”
“Why, yes, that’s it in a crux, my friend. Well done.” Hogarth taps Thomas on the back. “And you too, Madame widow, you too should switch sides. That is my advice.”
Hélène smiles, as placidly as Thomas has seen her smile in days. For his part, Thomas hunches his shoulders. He makes his face as obliging as he can and tenders an outstretched hand. “Are we not here, in this your land?”
“That you are. Just make sure you don’t slip back to the other side.”
“Monsieur Hogarth, what is that?”
Thomas hears genuine wonder in Hélène’s voice. He looks to where she points. It’s farther upriver than the Greenwich shore they are now gliding by. She is pointing almost straight ahead, just slightly off to the right of the bow. There is what even at this distance appears to be a giant dome. Dozens of slender spires prick the air on either side. Thomas could easily guess, but he looks to Hogarth for the obvious answer to Hélène’s question.
An intake of air swells William Hogarth’s chest. “That, Madame, is your new home. The dome is Wren’s great masterpiece, St. Paul’s. All around is but a hint of our fair London town.”
VII
Welcome
London
November 1731
The man holding the tiller, the one named William who is not Hogarth, ignores the shouts of abuse that rain down upon him. The anger is coming from the three men aboard the fishing vessel alongside. They have been outmanoeuvred by the painter. Hélène and Thomas each check the faces of their fellow travellers in the boat to see what one does in London when others with red faces shake their arms and curse. Apparently, you pretend you’re deaf. Their boat glides into a spot beside a set of stone steps.
As soon as contact is made with the stone, the five Englishmen dash about like their boat is on fire. Two jump to the quayside, where they secure the ropes to the closest bollards. The other three remain aboard, but each is hurriedly packing up his things. Hélène recalls that Hogarth had whispered to her hours earlier that the boat was liberated for an adventure without permission.
“Oh, mon Seigneur.” Hélène pinches her nose. Thomas covers his face with his arm. The stink from the river where they are now docked is horrendous. They look down at the choppy water and see a thick slurry of God knows what. Sewage from some of London’s six hundred thousand asses and offal from one or more slaughterhouses is Hélène’s guess. And this is November. She cannot imagine how bad the stench must be in a summer’s heat.
Hélène swallows back a lurch. She sees Thomas does the same. She turns to focus on the reactions of the Englishmen aboard. Not one is letting on that their noses are picking up any hint of the stink. Are they simply used to it? Or are English noses like their ears? They select what they allow to get in.
Hélène looks skyward at the seabirds wheeling and diving overhead. Their cries are making it hard to think. She looks at Thomas and pretends, for an instant, to cover her ears. But then she realizes that it’s not the birds but the shouting men in other boats or those toiling on the docks who are making it so deafening. She sees dozens of carters rolling their iron-capped carts and wheeled barrows up and down the docks. Hélène cannot make out what is being yelled, yet she hears enough to know that the words are sharp and fierce. They are curses of some sort. Will everyone in London be as angry as this?
—
Thomas feels his chest go tight. He covers his nose so as to not take in the foul air. He hopes he will not lose his hearing amidst all the calls and shouts. He cannot help but think this journey to England may be a mistake. He could have found some level of comfort in a small city in France that was better than this. The English capital is a jumble of confused, rude sounds. And it stinks.
But wait, thinks Thomas. This is but the main landing point for London when coming upriver from the sea. The rest of the city will not, could not, be like this. Their king, their government, their notables all live here. What was the line of verse Hogarth sang out? “London thou art the flower of Cities all.” Thomas will hold his judgement until he has seen, heard and smelled more than this dock. Paris has its abattoirs and shitty sewers running through the streets. Those are simple necessaries, like this Bills Gate. The wailing labourers are but playing their noisy parts, just as lawyers stride into rooms as if high born. Here at the docks everyone yells at the top of his voice. And her voice as well, for Thomas discerns there are more than a few women onshore. Their faces are just as red and angry as those of the men.
Thomas snorts out the stink. Yet his nostrils fill again. It will clearly take a while before he gets used to it the way Hogarth, Sam Scott and the others are.
Thomas swivels to study farther upriver, toward the city that stretches out on both sides of the Thames beyond where the boat is tied up. Great warehouses of brick and stone line the water’s edge. There are spires of what he assumes are churches nearly everywhere. A high column stands out. It has a golden shape at the top. That must be the memorial Hogarth mentioned, the one that pays homage to the Great Fire of 1666. Two hundred and five feet high and standing two hundred and five feet from where the fire started in a bakery in Pudding Lane.
Yet even that column is dominated – the very word for it, thinks Thomas – by the immense dome of St. Paul’s. It looms high above and over every single thing. It is odd to think that not one of the church steeples he sees is of the Roman Catholic faith. Though there must be secret Catholics about – because there have to be – most of the English belong to what the Protestants claim is one or another of the many Reformation cults. Their beliefs are heretical to what he was taught in France, yet here they are orthodox. What sense does that make? You get in a boat and sail across the Manche and all at once the world of religion is upside down. Gallatin is surely right when he says that all religious beliefs serve those who have something to safeguard. Thomas wonders if his friend still detests all religion, or might he have mellowed and gone over to the Protestant side now that he has been in London for five years?
Thomas brings his gaze back to the water level to his immediate left. Not far away – maybe a hundred feet – is what he’s been told is London’s one and only bridge. Imagine, a river city with only a single bridge! Yet, as he has seen, the Thames River is much wider and its tide more of a force than the Seine. The Thames can rise and fall, according to these Englishmen, some twenty feet twice a day. Its breadth of churning waters makes it an understandable challenge for engineers and builders. The one bridge he does spy is a most top-heavy affair. Above its low stone arches is a wobbly looking wooden structure several storeys in height with individual buildings overhanging the edge. They must be houses or shops. How they bulge and sag. Hard to believe the bridge is safe. Why do the English not build something like the Pont Neuf?
Samuel Scott says there’s talk of raising another bridge farther upriver, at or near Westminster where the houses of government sit. The watermen who run the ferries on the strength of their arms and oars are much against it, the painter explains. Scott also says the arches of London Bridge are so narrow and low they do not permit vessels of much size from passing under. Only shallow craft without masts – the rowboats, wherries and barges – are able to run the gauntlet of the rapid water that flows beneath the arches. The painter says each year a dozen watermen lose their lives taking that risk.
Thomas feels Hélène tugging at his sleeve.
“What are we going to do?” She is speaking in French and pointing at the trunk.
“C’est vrai.” Thomas switches to English. “Monsieur Hogarth, can you bring us assistance for this?”
“Ah yes, your trunk.” Hogarth puts down his own belongings beside a bollard. “Keep an eye on these,” he asks of the man called John. John grimaces but nods agreement.
Hogarth is biting his lower lip as he slips back down into the boat. “Hadn’t forgotten you. W
orry pas. It’s just that we as a group—” he wiggles his fingers at the four other Englishmen, all of whom are standing dockside and looking down into the boat, “Well, we’ve had a rather good frolic and are now eager for its end. Yet we did invite you to come along. So we must see this through. Tyrell, you take that end and I’ll take this.
“Madame Kharlamov,” Hogarth gestures with a nod, “would you mind stepping out of the boat? It would give us more room to hoist.”
With her own satchel and Thomas’s clutched to her chest, Hélène steps up on the rail of the boat and then onto the quayside, beneath the wooden gable roof overhead.
“Now?” asks Thomas. He is stooped over and has his knees bent. He has both hands beneath the trunk.
“On the count of three. Once we get it up onto the dock I’ll see if I can get you a hell-cart.”
“A Hell cart? L’enfer?”
“The same. It’s a fitting nickname for the wretched things. You’ll see. One, two, three. Lift.”
—
With the trunk tied down with crisscross ropes atop the luggage wagon being towed behind the hackney coach Hogarth calls a hell-cart, Hélène and Thomas climb inside the passenger compartment.
“No windows?” whispers Hélène. She wants to practise her English even though only Thomas can hear her.
Thomas reaches out to touch the surface where in France a window of glass or translucent paper would be. He taps it hard. It gives a metallic sound.
“Only little holes. Does it go down, Thomas?”
Thomas finds a handle, and yes it does. The late afternoon daylight floods in. An instant later, Hogarth’s round and smiling face is looking in. He must be standing on an outside rung.
“It’s like being trapped inside a bucket, is it not? The tin blinds are to keep the weather out,” the painter explains. “And dust and soot and smoke. It depends on the day and where in the city you are. Less expensive than glass.”
Hogarth jumps down to the ground, but shouts so Thomas and Hélène inside the coach can hear.
“I’m going to come along. I want to make sure you end up where you should. My brother-in-law John will look after my things. Be right there.”
Though they cannot see him in action, Hélène and Thomas listen intently as Hogarth yells at the driver of the coach.
“Mary Hill to Little East Cheap then left until Grace Church Street and turn right. Climb Grace Church till you’re well up on Bishopsgate. No other route than that, good fellow, no deviations. Understand? Won’t stand it, we won’t. Then head for the new church near the market at Spitalfields. We’re looking for a Church Street thereabouts.”
With that, Hogarth is up and in. There’s a crack of the whip and the coach jerks away. The conveyance has barely gone ten feet and already all three passengers are bouncing sharply up and down.
“Mais pourquoi?” Hélène reaches out to steady herself as best she can.
“What is it wrong?” Thomas’s imploring hand goes out to Hogarth.
“As I said, hell-carts. No springs, just leather straps. This awful bouncing is the result.”
“Less expensive?” Thomas does not hide the pucker on his lips.
Hogarth smiles as he reaches out to steady himself. “You’re beginning to grasp this city, my dear Tyrell. Business first and business last is London’s creed. All the rest, mere trappings that come and go.”
Hélène looks at Thomas then back to Hogarth. “So, to succeed here, Thomas and me need business place?”
“Either that or marry up. If not, you’ll be heading back to poxy France.” Hogarth winks at her. “Our London’s a great city, but it’s not for the idle or faint of heart.”
—
The advance of the hell-cart is slow. It’s more stop than go. Keeping his gaze out through the lowered window space as much as he can, Thomas sees London’s streets are crowded with an endless flow of people with barrows and carts. Many coaches and many people simply walking about. The stink and the yells of the docks and fish market are soon but memories. The outside sounds are the more familiar calls of sellers on streets, and the creak and grate of their carts. Except for the fact that the words are English, not French, it’s like travelling up a Paris street.
There are women, men and children of all levels and stations. As in Paris, Thomas notices, those walking keep to the sides. The middle is for carts and coaches. He sees several dark servants, or maybe they’re slaves, from Africa or the sugar islands. They appear to be more numerous here than in Paris. He knows there is great wealth generated by the labour of slaves for the wealthy in both England and France. The overseas colonies are more and more important with each passing decade.
It surprises him to hear snatches of shouts and conversations in not only English, but also German, Portuguese and French.
“People are from everywhere, il semble,” Hélène says. Judging by the expression on her face, she is pleased by what she sees and hears.
“That they are. The entire world.” Hogarth speaks as if London might be his first-born son.
“From China? Indians from the Americas?” Thomas leans back. He knows he is offering a smug look. He believes Hogarth will take such teasing well.
Hogarth smiles and reluctantly shakes his head. “Not so many perhaps. But our London does have coffee shops where all you’ll hear are strangers speaking their own tongues. French. Spanish. German too. My father once opened a coffee shop for Latin-speakers.”
Thomas cannot keep a bemused expression off his face.
“You are right,” says Hogarth, “it did not do well. But to change the subject, London has twelve papers. By that I mean newspapers.”
Thomas nods approvingly.
“And countless pamphleteers, book publishers and that most high craft, engravers like me. London is the greatest friend the printing press has ever had.”
“So my friend, so our friend Gallatin writes.” Thomas pretends to keep listening to Hogarth as he goes on, but his thoughts are his own. He has always wanted to try to write for a living. Could he do that in England when he could not in France? But can he write in English? He’s far from sure.
“What’s that I taste?” Hélène asks.
Hogarth looks out the window for an instant. “Ah, you were more likely used to wood smoke. We English burn more coal than wood. It gives a hint of sulphur, I suppose. You soon won’t notice it at all.”
Thomas runs his tongue along his teeth. There is a grit, and it has a bitter taste.
“From time to time,” says Hogarth, continuing on, “our Thames freezes over.”
Thomas looks to Hélène; they share doubting looks.
“It takes a prolonged cold snap, of course,” Hogarth continues, waving their doubt away. “The small arches of London Bridge keep the ice from shifting downstream with the tides. So the ice builds up. It’s not happened in a few years, but when it does, we have a Frost Fair. The entire city, it moves onto the Thames. Entertainment, food, we artists, even the whores, excuse me Madame, but everyone sets up shops and booths on the ice.”
Thomas thinks he hears Hélène sigh. Or is it he himself? He glances at her face. There is fatigue showing around her eyes. And, he notices now, she is wringing her hands. Well, no surprise. They have put in two long, long days.
“Oh,” gasps Hélène as the hackney coach dips in and out of a sudden large rut. Thomas grabs for the side of the coach.
“An adventure, is it not?” Hogarth says. He’s beaming like he’s having the time of his life.
“Hogarth,” ventures Thomas, “I see no lamps?”
“Of course we have lamps.”
“No, in Paris we have lamps that hang on ropes with large candles in glass boxes across many streets. It makes our darkness safe. Well, safer than no lamps.”
“And who pays for that?”
“I do not know. The
city. Those who govern.” Thomas holds up his hands.
“What I thought. No, that is not London’s way. We have lamps here and there, especially in front of the great houses. But one can go anywhere, as long as one hires a boy.”
“A boy? Un garçon?”
“Yes, lads. Link-boys, we call them. They have torches made of pitch and tallow. You pay a farthing and the boy lights the flame and accompanies you to where you have to go. Then they extinguish them and wait for the next gentleman to come by. It works better than what you describe. The cost is borne only by the man who is out and about, no one else.”
Thomas blinks and sits back in his seat. He does not know what to say.
“Tell me, Tyrell, your Paris has a police force as well as lamps, does it not?” Hogarth narrows his eyes.
“Of course it does. For the threat, especially of the night. Me, I was once chased by a gang of thieves. I—”
Hogarth waves his hand to interrupt. “There, you see. Your lamps and your police did not prevent a thing. We’ve all been chased, and sometimes caught. It’s just how it is. But we draw the line on police. We value our liberty too much. Your most famous writer agrees. He wrote we were a ‘paradise of tolerance’.”
“My most famous writer. Who is that?” Thomas leans back firmly in his seat.
“Voltaire. He lived here for a few years a while back. Must have drunk fifty cups of coffee a day. Which kept him in a spin. Still, a pleasant enough chap. Though I can’t say I much like the perpetual grin he keeps on his face.”
Thomas and Hélène share a look. When she declines to comment, Thomas decides he should say what’s on his mind. “Voltaire has a fine plume, Hogarth, I agree. Fine words, cependant, are not always true.”
“Could not agree more, Tyrell. But your Voltaire is right about London being a paradise.”
“All is perfect then?” Thomas says deadpan.
“Good God, we’ve a hundred wrongs, but the point is, fewer than anywhere else.”
The Maze Page 17