The Inheritance of Solomon Farthing

Home > Other > The Inheritance of Solomon Farthing > Page 14
The Inheritance of Solomon Farthing Page 14

by Mary Paulson-Ellis


  Then again, perhaps this lost child belonged to another branch of the Farthing family tree Solomon had never taken the time to research. A line that ran parallel to Solomon’s own, connected by blood at the top, divided by secrets at the bottom. Solomon had a sudden vision of DCI Franklin and the boy who had been spirited away from her, returned now as a young man so that their pasts could be reconfigured. Perhaps he and the DCI had more in common than he had thought.

  Solomon took the crumpled piece of paper on which he had started to draw Thomas Methven’s family tree from his folder, leaned against the page of Walter Pringle’s ledger and was about to write 1919 in the space where his client’s d.o.b. should be, followed by a question mark. Then he looked again at the wording for the advert, counted back six months and wrote 1918 instead. Then he moved his pen to the space where the name of his client’s father should appear. He tried to imagine what DCI Franklin would say if it turned out that all of the fifty thousand belonged to him, Thomas Methven and his grandfather connected by more than just a small slip of blue.

  It took Walter Pringle to puncture his flight of fancy – like any good Borders man would. ‘It seems the ad was cancelled,’ he said. ‘G. F. didn’t even claim the refund.’

  Solomon frowned, bent to see where the 6d required to place this particular advertisement had been struck through.

  ‘Why would they cancel?’ he said.

  ‘Maybe they changed their minds,’ Pringle replied. ‘Got cold feet.’

  And Solomon reconfigured the image of his own grandfather in khaki handing over a baby on a village green, to make way for someone else instead. He lifted the little newspaper cutting from the page of the ledger, held it up for a moment to look at his grandfather’s writing neat along the edge.

  ‘It doesn’t say anything about a Thomas Methven, does it?’

  ‘Ah, now. Why didn’t you say earlier.’ Pringle’s eyes gleamed then like a falcon spotting its prey. ‘If that’s who you’re after, you’ll need to go to church.’

  Two

  The church was a small thing, a single storey of ancient stone perched on a rise at the edge of the village, a bell at one end of the gable and a cross on the other in reply. The graveyard surrounding it was filled with ancient stones leaning here and there like the few teeth left in an old man’s mouth. It reminded Solomon of his namesake – Old Mortality – travelling the borderlands on his white pony, scraping at graves just like these until they were clear once again. As he entered by the small gate he bent and scratched at one of the memorials with his fingernail to see what might be revealed. The name he uncovered made his left hand flutter.

  Methven, 1896.

  The door to the church had been painted red once, long ago. An invitation, Solomon thought as he approached to try the handle. Or, perhaps, a warning. Border Men always had been suspicious. Unlike Edinburgh Men, who knew that whatever came their way they were likely to prevail.

  Inside the church smelled of wood shavings and poison put down for the mice. The walls were white, paint peeling in great damp curls. There was a simple choir stall and a solitary lectern at the front, a few wooden pews on either side of the aisle. The aisle itself was paved with stones belonging to the long-since departed, as though they did not mind being walked upon now that they were dead. The dog pattered its way across them to stand in front of the modest altar. But Solomon stayed at the back of the church to study the names, Methvens repeating themselves over and over as one generation made way for the next.

  There was the sudden shuffle of footsteps on flagstones, a cough that reverberated around the cold walls. Solomon turned to find an old man standing at the door, jumper unravelling at the hem. The man coughed again – the kind that results from smoking with joy for more than sixty years.

  ‘Who’re you looking for?’ he said by way of introduction.

  ‘Methven,’ said Solomon.

  ‘Aye, that’s me. Who’s asking?’

  And Solomon understood that he had arrived at the source.

  ‘Mr Methven,’ he said. ‘Solomon Farthing.’

  Didn’t offer his hand this time.

  ‘Aye,’ said the man. ‘Pringle said you were on your way. It’s Archibald and Mabel you’ll be wanting.’

  Somehow it didn’t surprise Solomon that a Border Man might know his business before he’d even got to it himself.

  ‘You stay here.’ The old man indicated one of the pews. ‘I’ll go get the others.’

  ‘The others?’

  The minister. The elders. The people who kept the accounts. Or whoever it was in this parish that knew exactly who had been born, and who had died. And where the bodies were buried now.

  The late afternoon sun cast long shadows on the floor as Solomon Farthing settled himself on a pew at the back of the church to await the old Mr Methven’s return, a pattern of diamonds stretching across one man’s grave to reach the foot of the next. The dog trotted back up the aisle to lie by Solomon’s feet, the familiar creak of wood joints easing as Solomon shifted, the murmur of a hundred boys inside his head.

  Our Father who art in heaven . . . give us this day our daily bread . . .

  The stillness reminded Solomon of the church his grandfather used to take him to in Edinburgh when he was young. Every Sunday, up the Mile and down again, into the gloom of Old St Paul’s. Old St Paul’s was high church – incense and candles dripping, vaulted ceiling hung with lamps. But it was dark, too, everywhere grey stone rising. Also that chapel to the side, a memorial to the fallen, names hammered into the stone. A message board for the Sick and the Departed. And a martyrs’ cross hanging on the wall.

  He had always touched that cross – Solomon’s grandfather – when they arrived, then again when they left. He had liked things gloomy, Godfrey Farthing, that was what Solomon had learned as he was growing up. Whereas he always had been drawn to excess. Mary slick with varnish. Children rimmed with gold. But sitting in this plain little church, the triangles of light its only adornment, Solomon found he preferred it now, just as his grandfather had once preferred it, too. The austere. The stripping of everything to the kernel. A church with not much in it but silence and an air of all that was past.

  Five minutes later the clue to Thomas Methven’s past returned as some sort of posse: three men identifiable as related by the way they tended to scratch at the top of their ears when asked a question they did not have the answer for. Mr Methven of the smoker’s cough did the introductions.

  ‘I’m the older Methven,’ he said. ‘And this here’s another Thomas. Known to us as Tom.’

  Tom was a middle-aged gentleman who wore a green padded jacket.

  ‘Not your Thomas, though,’ he said. ‘Heard from Pringle he was dead.’

  A younger man in a boiler suit with dirt smeared across the front pushed forwards, held out a hand.

  ‘Archie,’ he said with a broad smile as Solomon returned the unexpected gesture.

  Archie was wearing wellington boots, a trail of mud in his wake. Farmer boy, thought Solomon. Unlike his Thomas Methven, who had lived out his entire life in the city, never did leave it behind. The three men trooped to the front of the church, Solomon following, perched themselves along the edge of the nearest pew like three crows on a wire. A few minutes passed. Nobody spoke.

  ‘Are we waiting for someone else?’ said Solomon eventually.

  ‘Aye, son,’ said the older Mr Methven. ‘The oracle.’

  All the men chuckled at that.

  The oracle arrived a few minutes later with a rush and a bang of the door, a huge bag over her shoulder, hair all over her shoulders, too.

  ‘Sorry, sorry!’

  She scurried up the aisle as though she was late for a baptism or a wake. The three men levered themselves from the edge of the pew and stood as though they had been awaiting a wedding and now the bride had arrived.

  ‘How’s things?’ said Tom once the oracle reached them.

  ‘Oh –’ the woman flapped her hands – ‘the usua
l. Births, marriages, deaths, salvation.’

  And she laughed. She offered her hand to Solomon.

  ‘The Reverend Jennie Methven. Welcome to my patch.’

  Solomon knew he should not have been surprised. Women ran everything these days. But still, he was.

  ‘Pleased to meet you,’ he said.

  ‘You too,’ said the Reverend Jennie, shaking Solomon’s fluttering fingers as though she was used to being in charge. ‘Now, it’s a Thomas Methven you’re enquiring about, I understand, died recently in Edinburgh?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Solomon, thinking that Walter Pringle had done his job well. ‘And his parents. Or any other relative I can find.’

  ‘Well, you’ve come to the right place, then. Plenty of Methvens around here.’ The oracle laughed again, the men too. She dumped her bag on the flagstones. ‘And when was your man born?’

  Solomon scrabbled in his pocket for the scrap of paper on which he had written out the roots of Thomas Methven’s family tree.

  Thomas Methven b. 1920/21, 1918? d. 2016.

  The Reverend Jennie nodded as though it was normal to have this degree of latitude when it came to date of birth. She crouched to where her bag was slumped at the foot of the lectern, pulled out a roll of paper, let the thing unfurl.

  The tree was huge. Methvens here. Methvens there. Methvens everywhere. And all their extended kin. Solomon stared at the scroll, all its horizontals, all its verticals, all its little boxes containing a myriad of human lives.

  ‘Crikey,’ he said. ‘Did you draw this?’

  The Reverend Jennie smiled. ‘Something of a hobby.’

  But Solomon knew a fellow traveller when he met one. ‘Ever thought of becoming a probate researcher? You can make money from this sort of thing.’

  ‘You mean an Heir Hunter.’

  Solomon felt hot suddenly beneath his crumpled shirt. Heir Hunter. Angel to the Intestate. Ambulance chaser of the dead. He had been called all sorts of names over the years, most of them to his face.

  The Reverend Jennie, it turned out, was the chronicler of the Methven family history. Any piece of information dragged from the past, down it went on her chart. Solomon had met a few amateur genealogists in his time. They were indefatigable, never gave up. But this was extraordinary. Six generations of Methvens spread about his feet.

  The three living Methven men got down on their knees, Reverend Jennie gesturing to Solomon to get down on his, too. The dog pattered over to sniff at the edge of the chart, sat next to Solomon with a quick thump of its tail. Once they were settled, the Reverend Jennie began to point out possible candidates:

  Thomas George Methven: born to be a farmer, ended as an engineer.

  Thomas Sinclair Methven: had five children, two of them called Thomas, too.

  Thomas Abel Methven: never married, died with one leg.

  Tommy ‘the Ginger’ Methven: known for some reason as Fred.

  She knew all the stories, all the jingle and the brass.

  And yet . . .

  Whichever way her fingers wandered along the horizontals and up the verticals, they always returned to the same small square amidst the mass.

  Thomas Archibald Methven, b. 1913.

  ‘Told you,’ said the older Mr Methven with a firm nod of his head. ‘Archibald and Mabel.’

  Pointed to the names of the child’s parents inscribed above. Archibald Methven & Mabel Methven née Kerr. But inside Solomon could already feel his stomach falling, falling, knew that he had pursued the wrong branch.

  ‘It’s not him,’ he said. ‘Wrong date of birth. I already discounted a Thomas Methven with these dates in my initial search at Register House. Too old even for my client.’

  ‘Plus the problem that he’s been dead for almost a hundred years,’ said Archie.

  Thomas Archibald Methven, b. 1913. d. 1918.

  Buried in the grass outside.

  The men all leaned back then, the older Methven scratching at the top of his ear. The Reverend Jennie frowned.

  ‘Are you sure your dates are correct?’ she said to Solomon. ‘I have verified everything here.’

  Yes, no, maybe, thought Solomon.

  ‘I don’t doubt it,’ he replied.

  Never argue with an amateur genealogist. That’s what he had learned.

  ‘Well, let’s double check, shall we?’

  Reverend Jennie turned to a hole in the stone wall behind her, drew out a huge book thick with pages cut rough at the edges, a metal clasp holding the bottom to the top. The book looked like a Bible, all the family names inscribed in the front. But it was much more interesting than that.

  ‘It used to be the official record,’ she said settling it on top of the Methven family tree. ‘Births, marriages and deaths till the 1850s. Just baptisms after. All the ins and outs.’

  She unlocked the clasp with a tiny key foraged from inside her capacious handbag, began to turn the pages, stroking each one before she flipped it over as though putting the past and all the people in it to bed. As Solomon watched he felt his whole body suddenly soft, his knees, his shoulders, the insides of his gut, nothing to hear inside the church but the sound of pages turning; and outside, the call of a blackbird in a hedge. This was what he loved most about his profession – that moment when the dead waited for the living to wake them, bring them home again.

  It didn’t take the oracle long to find the good news, pressing her fingertip to a line written in flowing copperplate and exclaiming like the interlopers at New Register House.

  ‘Here he is!’

  There on the parish record, one hundred years past or thereabouts, proof that water had been dribbled over the head of a Thomas Archibald Methven in just the way that Solomon Farthing liked to dribble the finest Fino down his throat. The posse of Methvens leaned close, craning to see one of their ancestors brought back into the light.

  Thomas Archibald Methven. b. June 1913. bpt. July 1913. d. 1918. The boy’s name struck through on the register, followed by the initials of his mother, Mabel, as though to confirm the awful fact, a last kiss in ink.

  ‘Only five,’ said Archie. ‘Poor wee bugger.’

  ‘What did he die of?’ asked Tom. ‘Does it say?’

  ‘Got the Spanish, didn’t he –’ the older Mr Methven nodded his head as though he knew all about the Spanish – ‘just like all the rest.’

  ‘You’re right.’ Reverend Jennie pointed at a word, Influenza, inscribed next to the child’s dates. ‘He liked to keep a thorough record, my predecessor. Used to add comments sometimes. Gossip mostly.’

  ‘P’ for Poorhouse.

  ‘D’ for Drunk.

  The older Methven coughed into his sleeve. ‘Sometimes true.’

  The Reverend Jennie turned the pages of the book some more, one year further on, then the next, flipping over several pages at once and running her finger over the baptismal records, just to check. But then she closed the book with a heavy flop, shook her head.

  ‘No sign of any other Thomas Methven, I’m afraid. Nor in 1919 or 1920.’

  She locked the clasp once again with a tiny click, heaved the book back into its hiding place, satisfied that her version of events had prevailed. The older Mr Methven hawked in his throat, made as though to spit onto the flagstones, changed his mind and swallowed it instead.

  ‘He wants Archibald’s and Mabel’s other son,’ he declared. ‘Went out one day, came back with him in the dark.’

  Tom laughed. ‘That old wives’ tale.’

  ‘You calling your grandmother old?’

  ‘She might have got it wrong.’

  ‘The cousins say it, too,’ said Archie.

  ‘Aye, but they’re by marriage only,’ said Tom, rubbing at the top of his ear.

  ‘What’s that got to do with it?’

  ‘Hearsay. Gets in the way of facts.’

  Reverend Jennie agreed. ‘I’ve never found any proof of that story.’

  ‘What story?’ Solomon asked.

  ‘That Mabel took someon
e else’s child and brought him up as her own.’

  Solomon started, touched at his top pocket where a small newspaper clipping sat next to a blue pawn ticket, wondered whether to reveal what had brought him to this altar. But something stopped him. Like any good Heir Hunter, Solomon Farthing knew to be evasive at just the moment all might be revealed.

  ‘What makes you think your Thomas Methven comes from here anyway?’ the Reverend Jennie asked.

  Solomon could tell that she was suspicious, her nose was twitching like a small dog ferreting out a chicken bone.

  ‘Just a hunch,’ he replied.

  ‘Well, there is something else I’ve always wondered about.’

  Reverend Jennie got up from the flagstones and indicated the Bible on the lectern. A huge thing, ornate and solid, pages fine as tissue, closely printed with the Word. Solomon and the Methven troika gathered around as the oracle flipped the pages once again. This time she turned straight to the very back, to a flyleaf all freckled with the years that had passed.

  ‘I’ve always thought it must be some sort of alternative record,’ she said. ‘Off the books, so to speak.’ She tapped one finger at a list of names and dates in faint brown ink. ‘An unofficial register. Of the wayward of the parish.’

  Bastards. And poor boys. Not forgetting the foundlings, of course. They all held their breath as the Reverend Jennie studied each name with care:

  Alice Brown

  Mary McLeod

  John Purvis

  Until she got almost to the bottom.

  ‘Well I never,’ she said then, tucking some wayward strands of hair behind her ears. ‘Here he is.’

  Thomas Methven. bpt. June 1919.

  The Methven men almost knocked heads as they crowded in to stare at the second entry.

  ‘Well, I’ll be,’ said Tom. ‘It is true, then.’

 

‹ Prev