—
Hélène sees the shadow of confusion cross Thomas’s face as they stand near each other outside the parlour. Her words and smile are to let him know that though they’re continuing to live this fiction of being cousins, and to sleep in separate rooms on separate floors, she wouldn’t mind having him make love to her once in a while. Of course, only when Gallatin is not around, and she’s not in her fertile time. She’s finding she’s missing the intimacy they used to share.
—
The first sight of what might be as many as three hundred men gathered in a circle, with their shouts and raucous laughter filling the air, makes both Hélène and Thomas slow their pace.
“Where are the women?” she asks.
“There are a few. Et des gosses aussi. Come on.” He reaches out and takes her by the hand.
As they weave through those on the outer layer of the crowd, Hélène is reassured. There are indeed quite a few women here, and lots of children. Boys and girls are pushing past people’s knees to try to get as close as they can to the wooden rail. Nearly everyone looks to be in a joyous mood, though there are fierce expressions on the faces of a few. Those will be the ones who have wagered large bets is Hélène’s guess.
“Par ici.” Thomas is tugging her hand, pulling her out of the crowd.
“You don’t want to see it after all?” she asks.
“Over there.” Thomas gestures at an empty cart. She nods. He’s right.
Once they are atop the cart, Hélène and Thomas can see exactly what is going on inside the circle here at Hockley-in-the-Hole.
An enormous black bull is tied to an iron stake. It’s held by a thick rope about fifteen feet long. The bull is snorting the air and pawing the ground.
A man dressed in shabby clothes, a handler of some sort, approaches the beast from behind, a small can in his hand. The onlookers seem to hold their breath. The man reaches up and out and turns the can upside down. He’s sprinkling something close to the bull’s nose. The huge beast shakes its head with loud snorts, its horns rending the air and breaking the dirt. An enormous cheer rises from the crowd.
“What was that?” Hélène asks.
Thomas shrugs his shoulders. “Pepper?”
Almost at once, a tiny round dog, yapping fierceness, runs into the ring. He goes underneath the bull’s belly. The bull’s legs kick out at the dog, his hooves raising dust. The dog darts in and out, again and again. Hélène watches in horror. It looks like the little round terror is trying to sink his teeth into the bull’s most vulnerable place.
“Mon Seigneur,” she hears Thomas say.
The bull catches the dog with its horns. He does not pierce its body but catches it between its legs and raises the little thing up in the air. With a strong flick of its head, the bull sends the dog flying through the air.
“Look at that,” Thomas cries out.
Someone in the crowd has caught the dog. Why, he’s putting him down to get back into the fight. The dog must be wounded or dizzy, because he does not dart like he did before. This time, when he scampers underneath the bull’s belly, teeth bared, the bull is able to strike him with a hoof. The bull crushes the dog’s back. The high-pitched cry from the dying dog silences the crowd.
“Oh, Thomas,” Hélène says.
An instant later, a second dog is let loose. A different colour than the first, but everything else is the same.
“Let’s get away from here,” Thomas says.
Hand in hand, they get down off the cart and hurry away.
“What’s the sport in that?” she hears Thomas ask. “A staked animal cannot win.”
Hélène looks down at her clothes. She got dressed up for this?
—
Thomas follows Gallatin through the entrance door. They slide past a crowd of men standing in the larger of the two rooms on the ground floor. The voices in the room are loud, bouncing off the dark beams overhead. Each speaker is straining to be heard above the rest. Gallatin and Thomas do not even pause to look around. They know their friends will not be up here. They will be one or two floors below, where conversations can be carried on without shouts.
Gallatin and Thomas take hold of the rope at the top of the stairs that lead to the below-ground rooms. The rope at the Friend at Hand is thick, the kind used aboard ships. Here it serves as a railing heading down the steep and uneven stairs. The descent is narrow, reminding Thomas of a crypt. Here, however, no one is buried, at least not as far as he knows. Parts of the building are said to date back to the time of Henry VIII. Its half-timber framing and hand-hewn beams are visible everywhere. The structure stands just outside the zone where the Great Fire levelled so much of London. Thomas does not doubt that portions of the place, especially beneath the ground, could date back to Tudor times, for in the months he’s been coming here he’s noticed in several spots tiny rose designs embedded in glass or plaster. They are not decorations for decoration’s sake but long ago declarations of support for the Tudor claim.
The first floor below the ground level has half a dozen tables, a couple of booths and a counter behind which labours a serving wench. Two smouldering lanterns and a few candles give off a burnt orange glow. The air is thick. Half the tables are filled with men smoking clay pipes and nursing cups of coffee. There’s a thin bewigged man, a customer, standing at the counter. He’s handling one of the pewter measuring vessels that belong to the establishment while leering at the serving wench. It is her lot in life to have enormous, swelling breasts and it is these that are the objects of the man’s gaze. Thomas can see that the poor server is doing her best to ignore the man. She holds her chin up high and is keeping her eyes on the other patrons in the room.
Gallatin pauses and looks around. He takes the few extra steps required to leave the stairwell so he can peer into a booth. Sometimes this is where their group is forced to meet, should one of the rooms on the floor below be taken. Gallatin’s inquiring squint is greeted by a dismissive wave of the hand.
“Must be below,” he calls over to Thomas on the stairs. Then he goes and gets two cups of coffee from the server at the counter. He makes a point to turn his back toward the leering man as he pays the girl and gives her a tip. Thomas shows his approval with a forward tilt of his head.
Coffees in hand, Thomas and Gallatin continue their descent down the next set of stairs. The smell of freshly chinked mortar competes with the rich aroma rising from their steaming cups. In the week since Thomas and Gallatin were last here the owner must have had some work done on the wall. Thomas traces two fingers along the fresh white grooves between the stones. He likes the smooth cool crack of a mortared wall.
“There they are. The Frenchies! Just in time.”
Thomas and Gallatin squint through the dim light to see who it is calling out. It’s Hogarth, and he’s on his feet. With a broad smile he’s beckoning them to hurry on, to join him, Sam Scott, Henry Fielding and another at their long table. There is room on the benches for the newcomers. Two tall candles stand in the middle of the table. Each of the four men already has a cup in his hands – talking juice as Fielding calls it. Coffee certainly is that. In the centre of the table, between the candlesticks, Thomas makes out the usual two stacks. The higher of the two, as always, is a pile of newspapers. The other consists of pamphlets. Members of the group bring along whatever pieces of writing they want the others to discuss and debate. Everyone gets his turn to show how smart or polished or contrary he can be.
There is only one face at the table Thomas has not seen before. He’s easily the oldest in the group. He looks to be at least fifty. He has a rounded, jowly sort of face with a soft floppy nightcap upon his head. Thomas hopes his face does not betray any of his disapproval. Nightcaps, he believes, should be worn only inside one’s home, not out on the town.
“Neither of you has a stake in this question,” Hogarth announces in a loud voice, gestu
ring at Thomas and Gallatin to take the empty places. “Two strangers to our land. So we should have their impartial continental judgement on the matter, I think.”
“What weighty matter is that?” Gallatin winks at Thomas as he sits down beside Hogarth.
“I am sorry,” Thomas says, hand outstretched to the man he does not know. “I don’t think we’ve met.”
“I’m sorry, Thomas,” says Gallatin.
“As am I,” adds Hogarth. “I thought everyone knew everyone. My apologies.”
The older man rises from his seat and takes Thomas’s hand. He has a smile affixed to his face.
“Edward Cave,” he says, then immediately, as if it were a part of his name, he adds, “Gentleman’s Magazine. Always looking for new writers, you know. We’re in our second year.”
Thomas knows the publication well. It is the brightest and most talked about of London’s magazines – that word borrowed from the French and made to mean in English a storehouse of stories and ideas.
“You have your office in Clerkenwell, do you not?” Thomas seeks out Cave’s hand to shake it a second time, this time out of desire, not protocol. Cave is slightly surprised at this gesture.
“Yes, we’re at St. John’s Gate. Are you a writer or a bookseller? Or an aspiring printer like Earnest John?” Cave extricates his hand from Thomas’s grip.
Thomas finds himself lowering his voice. “Oui, I am a writer, I am.”
“I did not catch the name.”
“Thomas Pi— Tyrell.”
“Well, Thomas P. Tyrell, bring us something to consider. Always interested in a foreigner’s view of London, as long as it’s filled with praise, that is.” Cave makes his eyebrows dance.
“That is what I have.” Thomas’s chest inflates. He speaks loud and fast. “I compare Paris to London. Streets, buildings, customs, religion too. Many differences but not so many after all.”
“I see. I’m not sure. Is it a pamphlet or a book?”
“It’s not complete.”
“Ah, well.” Edward Cave reclaims his seat. “You’ll have to finish it before— before someone else gets me their work first.”
“Yes, of course.” Thomas takes the chair beside Cave. He will not speak any more about this project until it’s done. He does not want to be yet another name on the long list of writers who talk about books and articles they could write but never do.
—
The biggest problem in London is unquestionably the excessive consumption of gin. That particular alcoholic drink is everywhere, and easily obtained. It is so inexpensive, even the poor can afford it easily. It is the source of ills too many to name.
Thomas lifts his quill. Should he name those ills or leave it to the readers of his eventual book to deduce? Surely they understand what excessive alcohol consumption does to a land. Thefts, violence, prostitution, burglary, sickness, filth. He’ll ask Gallatin if he needs to spell all that out. In addition to improving Thomas’s English, Jean is wise about these things. No, what is Thomas thinking? He can decide that by himself. It’s his book, not Gallatin’s. Thomas puts down that page and picks up a clean sheet. He begins to set down his thoughts on a different topic.
Although Londoners, and the English or Britons in general, like to think themselves a people completely apart from the French, it is amusing for a visiting Frenchman to see how closely they follow all the news from Paris and Versailles. This is especially so when it comes to fashion. For where do the fashionable people of London look for the latest cuts and fabrics, periwigs and all the rest? They gaze longingly across the Manche, to that great capital on the Seine.
Thomas blows out a jet of air. No, he’d better change that. He must remember that to the English, it’s the Channel, not the Manche. And he has to be recognisant that the readers of the Gentleman’s Magazine are not going to want to see themselves depicted in a dependent light, especially where that dependency is on the French. Perhaps he will not include anything on fashion at all. It is one area of life where the English are weak.
Still, he cannot avoid the truth. And one truth is that there are in London very mixed emotions about the French. He refreshes his quill in the inkwell.
There are a great many French in London, with the Huguenots making up the largest number. They are concentrated in the eastern part of the city, in areas known as Spitalfields and Shoreditch. There are hundreds of Huguenot master weavers in this general area, with perhaps ten thousand looms.That makes them an important part of the English economy. Because of religious prejudices then, what France lost by persecuting the Huguenots turned out to be England’s gain.
Thomas looks up from the page. He must be careful about that as well. He expects to go back to the other kingdom one day and to work for its officials and all the surrounding attitudes, policies and protocols. It’s never wise to burn any bridge. Then again, this book will not be traced to anyone named Pichon. It will be the work of one Thomas Tyrell.
The Huguenots have their own churches in London and since 1718 a major hospital in Rochester. Many of that belief system are also said to reside in the county of Kent. They’re supposed to be especially thick in Canterbury.
Thick doesn’t sound good. He’ll have to find a different word than that. He’ll ask Gallatin.
Thomas looks at the small clock on the table beside his bed. It’s getting late. But he does want to jot down something about the Great Fire before he snuffs the candle out. Though Paris has had many fires, it has not had anything as widespread as the famous London blaze.
In 1666, four-fifths of London burned. Though that was nearly seventy years ago, the recollection of the conflagration is still in every Londoner’s thoughts. It began near Billingsgate, where the travellers coming up the Thames go ashore. A man confessed to starting the fire, a Frenchman he was. They hanged him for what he’d done, though now there’s talk that the man who took the blame was not well. His claim was false.
Christopher Wren, the greatest of English architects, proposed that the City of London take advantage of the opportunity that the fire presented. He laid out a plan for a new city that would be laid out on a more geometrical grid, rather than the ancient twisting streets, some of which date likely back to Roman times. However, in the haste to rebuild, Wren’s design was not used. The new construction was carried out upon the old, often narrow and non-aligned streets.
In the rebuilding of London there was a great use of bricks, unlike in Paris where the structures are mostly of quarried stone. The brick buildings of London are mostly black or red, or painted so if their clay was not that hue.
Thomas sits up straight, re-reading what he just wrote. He shakes his head. No one is going to want to read this. He’s simply wasting his time. He puts down his quill, tidies up his pages and goes to relieve himself in the chamber pot.
In bed, with the only light coming from an unseen milky moon, Thomas cannot still his mind or slow his breathing. He decides that he needs to remember that what he has written so far is only a start. He’ll improve it as he goes along. Adding and taking away. He has some good bits and some chaff. He just needs to figure out which are which and what goes in front of which. And it needs to move along. There’s no need to despair, not yet. He has to continue on. Whether or not his inky pages will be of interest to Edward Cave is not something he can control.
—
Seated in the parlour, sipping her bittersweet evening drink, Hélène enjoys hearing Thomas and Gallatin clown about in the hall. It’s not always this way. After months of living together, tensions sometimes arise. When they do, each usually tries to get her on his side. In those instances, it’s not easy for her. She wants to remain friend and confidante with both. So when arguments begin, Hélène tries to hold back, remain aloof. She’s known Thomas for years. They have much in common and have been lovers in many different rooms. Yet Gallatin is her employer now, as well as the person
who owns the house where she lives. He is thoughtful and open about what he feels and thinks. In any case, there is no friction between the two men at this moment. It’s a Wednesday evening and they are in high spirits as they set off to gather with other men at the Friend at Hand. Hélène would be interested to see and hear how they talk and behave when they are out, but she does not ask to go along, and of course it does not occur to them to invite her. So she sits in the parlour waiting for them to leave, sipping her chocolate.
“We won’t be late, Cousin,” says Thomas from the hall. There’s an odd look of mischief in his eyes, one that Hélène cannot place.
“Don’t believe him.” Gallatin’s smile is broad. “Late is obligatory on these nights.”
Hélène sips her chocolate. “Tomorrow then.” She tenders a vague wave.
With the closing of the door, she gets up with the intention of washing the dishes the three of them ate from a short while ago. The baked eel was all right, she thinks, though not exactly to her taste. A little too oily. But she loved the oyster casserole with the Parmesan crust. She would not mind having that again. As she waits for the water to heat in the kettle she has put on the fire, she hears hurrying footsteps out on Church Street. Then comes the sound of a key in the front door. Hélène picks up the poker from the fire.
The door swings open. It’s Thomas. He’s grinning like he might have just stolen the crown jewels.
“Quick,” he whispers. “Quick, upstairs.”
Hélène lowers the poker to her side. “What?”
“I told Jean that I’d forgotten my sample pages. What I am to read to the group tonight. So we’ve got a bit of time before I hurry on. Come on.”
“You lied to Jean? Why?”
“Why do you think? Come on. We can have a quick one.” Thomas arches his eyebrows.
Hélène looks down to the floor, then over to the kettle hanging from the metal arm close to the flames. Returning her gaze to Thomas, she shakes her head. “No.”
“No?” Thomas comes over to her. He puts his hand on either side of her waist. He pulls her close.
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