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Post by Idris on Apr 11, 2009 19:26:05 GMT
Franklin Place was a small terrace of typical London town houses, tall and narrow, each with tiled steps to the heavy front door, a curving bay hung above a semi-basement area railed with wrought iron, and three further stories of windows, under a shallow slate roof broken up by uncurtained dormer windows. The houses had once been the private homes of comfortably off merchants and city gentlemen, but most had now become small hotels. They were well kept places with high airy rooms, decent toilet facilities, good plain cooking, a pleasant view, and very reasonable prices.
Daniel Evans was renting a room on the second floor at the back of the Abbey Hotel, so the view behind the lace curtains was of the boxlike arrangement of small walled gardens, with their leafless trees and scrubby lawns. As he came into the front hall, the landlady popped out from her cubby hole and gave him two letters, one of which he could see at a glance was from his sister Elizabeth, now married to a fellow missionary in the Cape. The other was postmarked Dorsetshire.
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Post by skyman on Apr 12, 2009 7:54:03 GMT
Daniel picked up the letter from Elizabeth and ran his hands over it. The paper was browned and warped from exposure to sun, wind, and heat followed by periods of damp. He treasured those flaws; they were proof that Elizabeth had held it all the way in Cape Colony, and it had passed through the hands of a dozen travelers, members of the empire and otherwise, before it reached him.
Daniel headed back to sit on his bed. He unsealed the letter and glanced over it to make sure there was nothing urgent like a death in the family, and put it aside. That night he would read it over closely and compose a response. Elizabeth had made him promise to write, and refused to let him leave until he agreed.
He moved on to the other letter, and realized he was nervous. It was a strange feeling for him. With all he'd gone through in Africa, Turkey, Arabia... why would a response about a job make him nervous? Perhaps it was a sign that he shouldn't have come back, that soon he'd want to leave England again.
He opened the letter.
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Post by Idris on Apr 12, 2009 21:15:26 GMT
The letter from Dorsetshire was written on heavy cream vellum to match the envelope, in a fine if somewhat formal hand, and signed with a flourish. The message was simple enough. Daniel was invited to visit the Ravenswood-Gussage family home in Bedford Square, Bloomsbury on Saturday 12th March 1881 at 11 o’clock in the morning. Five days to prepare, for it was Monday already.
Taking up the other letter, the news from Elizabeth was mixed, but mostly not out of the ordinary. Their father had been ill but was now improving. He was nearly sixty but determined not to let his age affect him. The mission was thriving, and there were many more children attending the mission school, but they were in need of more funds. Elizabeth wanted to know if he had heard from Mary yet - she had not received a reply to her letter. The last he had heard of their younger sister she had intended paying a visit to the family in Colchester after recently qualifying as a doctor in Paris.
At the end of her letter Elizabeth had added, “I have one piece of bad news. Do you recall Don, the young Canadian soldier you befriended when he was stationed here? Every time he visited you would spend hours arguing over history. Well, last month Father heard that he is in gaol. I would not have believed it, but he had it from Captain Bromhead himself. He seemed such a decent thoughtful fellow, and now he has been dismissed the service and confined in Wandsworth prison. The words of the Lord come to mind, ‘when I was in prison you visited me’, and I do hope that if you are able you might do so for this poor boy, who is so far from the support of his family."
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Post by skyman on Apr 12, 2009 22:23:52 GMT
Thoughts of the job disappeared at Elizabeth's information about Don. Daniel indeed remembered him well; he wasn't exactly of the same predilections as Daniel, but he was still an interesting and likable fellow who shouldn't be in Wandsworth.
Daniel put aside the letters and got his coat. He would head over there immediately.
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Post by Idris on Apr 14, 2009 21:29:30 GMT
Daniel soon found that Wandsworth was south and west of where he was staying, on the other side of the Thames. A policeman informed Daniel that it was a very long walk, and that the easiest way to travel there was by omnibus. A new branch of the District service of the Underground Railway had recently been opened but the nearest station was still on this side of the river.
The omnibus seemed to take a most indirect route, and Daniel found himself travelling through districts he had never seen before. Row upon row of houses - all with their chimneys belching smoke into the chilly air - churches, public houses, shops and parks. He began to realise just how large a city London was.
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Post by skyman on Apr 15, 2009 6:54:47 GMT
Dan had spent time in many great cities. Paris was a patchwork of wonderful little hideaways for thinkers of all sorts, Florence was so beautiful and ancient, Konstaniniyye was vibrant and so different from anything he'd known... but London seemed filled with so much power. It radiated off of the Palace of Westminster and off of the bricks of the meanest little poorhouse, as surely as heat radiated off the stone buildings of Cape Colony. This city was the center of a wheel, with the great spokes of empire spreading from it across the globe. Not everyone in London knew it, and many would never benefit from the wealth that was shipped from all the mines and crops and ancient tombs, but this city had the destiny of the globe in its hands. It disconcerted him. He tried his best to see the houses as just houses, the churches as just churches.
What mattered in the here and now was Donald McGregor. Daniel could no more change the course of the London juggernaut than he could wrestle Samson. All he could do was help out his friend, and then go and do his best to get that job.
But Samson had his hair cut, he thought. I wonder what will bring down London?
He tapped his foot impatiently as the bus bounced down the street. He stopped when the woman next to him gave a dirty look.
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Post by Idris on Apr 15, 2009 22:33:05 GMT
Finally the omnibus halted next to a large park, where pigeons pecked on green grass and buds were showing on the branches of the leafless trees. In the park a woman pushed a perambulator, while two small children circled about her, intent on some private game of their own.
“Here you are sir,” the bus conductor called out to Daniel. “Wandsworth Common.”
It was very quiet once the omnibus had rattled off down the street and the slow clopping of the horses' hooves faded in the distance. The prison could easily be seen, looming beyond the houses like an ugly castle. On closer inspection, it appeared even more so, with its massive stone gatehouse and Gothic windows.
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Post by skyman on Apr 16, 2009 0:14:55 GMT
Castles were meant to keep people out, thought Daniel. What lovely individual had the idea to repurpose them like this?
Wandsworth certainly was no Panopticon. Bentham would have shuddered at its anachronicity. And somehow Dan doubted that its warden was concerned with the private reform of its residents' minds and souls. Power over the body was quite enough for most wardens, military leaders, priests, and headmasters, in Daniel's experience.
With a silent incantation to Don's well-being, Daniel approached the gatehouse.
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Post by Idris on Apr 16, 2009 21:01:20 GMT
As Daniel approached the prison, it became clear that it was no mediaeval pile. Beneath the London soot which smothered the stones, he could see the outlines of a building only decades old. Letters carved above the door read Surrey House of Correction.
There was a motley group of people standing about in the street outside the main gate. Several poorly dressed women with snot-nosed children, a painfully thin girl whose constant racking cough and fiery spot of colour in each cheek betokened a consumptive, an old man bent almost double over his walking stick, and a grossly fat woman with a voice so loud and carrying, Daniel could hear it well before she came into view.
“It’s bleeding shameful, that’s what it is,” she was proclaiming as Daniel walked up the street. “Keeping a body awaiting out ‘ere in the cold. Look at that poor little mite, coughing her guts up. If she dies, it’ll be all the fault of them warders.”
At this the old man hawked and spat noisily on the pavement, perhaps expressing his agreement.
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Post by skyman on Apr 17, 2009 22:14:55 GMT
Poor girl, thought Dan. Even if they got her in a good warm place, it's likely as not to kill her.
"They're not letting visitors in?" he asked sympathetically, as he moved up to the gate.
"Gentlemen," he called out in case someone could hear behind the gate. "I have rather pressing business here, and this poor child clearly needs to get inside. You'll have my gratitude if you could open up as quickly as possible." They probably wouldn't care, but perhaps a more educated voice would hurry them up; they didn't want to get on the bad side of a rich toff.
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Post by Idris on Apr 19, 2009 21:27:14 GMT
There was no immediate reaction, but after about five minutes a wicket opened in the main gate, and a small stocky man in uniform stepped out of it. Holding up his hands to step the flow of questions and pleas, he announced in a loud voice.
“There will be no visiting today.”
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Post by skyman on Apr 26, 2009 20:28:53 GMT
Daniel didn't want to go back after having come this far. He stepped forward.
"Please sir, I must request an exception. I've been sent by a Mrs Elizabeth Gossage," (he used her new surname) "to see one Donald McGregor, and she won't take no for an answer." He did his best to sound self-important and refined. If this man thought Elizabeth was the wife of some important public citizen, and Daniel her messenger, all the better.
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Post by Idris on May 3, 2009 18:20:46 GMT
The uniformed man looked surprised. He indicated to Daniel that he should come to one side so that he might speak confidentially to him.
“I am sorry sir, but there has been some...ah...trouble. Under the circumstances I am unable to...ah... guarantee your safety or that of any visitors. But if you will come back later I will endeavour to arrange something. I cannot...um...promise that it will be possible however...”
As the man was talking, behind him Daniel suddenly saw the emaciated girl raise her hand to her head, then collapse onto the pavement.
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Post by skyman on May 5, 2009 21:57:38 GMT
Dear God, I hope Don isn't in danger...
Daniel bit his lip and nodded at the uniformed fellow. "Well, perhaps I could leave a letter for him, if that's acceptable. I-" He was cut off by the sight of the girl falling. He rushed past the man and over to the girl, bending over her to see if anything could be done. Live... live...
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Post by Idris on May 6, 2009 21:42:44 GMT
It appeared that the girl had fainted – she was breathing and her pulse, although rapid, beat regularly. The high colour had washed out of her cheeks and her skin looked like paper, with a kind of translucence about it. Daniel thought that she might have been pretty if her body were not being systematically destroyed by sickness or starvation or both.
He quickly realised that the first was certainly true – her brown hair clung damply to her pale forehead, and her hands were hot with fever. Daniel judged that her first need was to remain lying down, to come round from the faint, and that she must be kept warm while she recovered her senses.
One of the women, poorly dressed as she was, divested herself of her shawl and held it out to Daniel. "For her head, sir. The stones are so hard and cold."
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