Black Hearts in Battersea (3 page)

"Out," said Simon. He had no intention of retailing all his doings to her and having them discussed by the Twite family.

Dido's face fell. "What about my donkey ride?" she said, looking at him from under where her brows would have been had she had any.

Although she was an unattractive brat, she had such a forlorn, neglected air that Simon's heart softened. "All right," he said, "I'll get Caroline and give you a ride if you'll do something for me while I'm fetching her."

"What?" said Dido suspiciously.

"Wash your face." He went whistling up the street.

After he had given Dido her ride he asked, "What time is your father likely to get up?"

"Not till noon—perhaps not till three or four. Pa works evenings and sleeps all day—if Penny or I wake him he throws his hoboy at us."

Simon could not imagine what a hoboy might be, but it seemed plain that no information was to be had from Mr. Twite until the evening.

"Well, good-by. I'll see you when I come home. What do you do with yourself all day? Do you go to school?"

"No," she said peevishly. "Sometimes Pa teaches me the hoboy or Aunt Tinty sets me sums. Uncle Buckle used to teach me but he doesn't any more. Mostly I does tasks for Ma—peel the spuds, sweep the stairs, stoke the furnace—"

"Furnace!" exclaimed Simon. "That was the name!"

"What name?"

"Oh, nothing that concerns you. The principal of the art academy where I am to learn painting."

He had thrown the information over his shoulder as he walked away not thinking that it could be of any possible interest to Dido Twite. He would have been surprised to see the sudden flash of alert calculation in her eyes.

Simon asked his way through the streets till he reached Chelsea—no very great distance, as it proved. Here he inquired of a man in the uniform of a beadle where he would find an academy of art presided over by a Dr. Furnace.

The beadle scratched his head.

"Dr. Furnace?" he said. "Can't say as I recall the name."

Simon's heart sank. Was Dr. Furnace to prove as elusive as Dr. Field? But then the beadle turned and shouted, "Dan!" to a man who was just emerging from an arched gateway leading a horse and gaily painted dust-cart with a cracked wheel.

"Hallo?" replied this man. "What's the row?"

"Young cove here wants Furnace's Art Academy. Know what he means?"

Both men turned and stared at Simon. The man called Dan, who was dressed in moleskin clothes from cap to leggings, slowly chewed a straw to its end, spat, and then said, "Furnace's Academy? Ah. I know what he means. He means Rivière's."

"Ah," said the beadle wisely. "That's what you mean,
me boy. You means Rivière's."

"Is that far from here?" said Simon, his hopes rising.

"Matter o' ten minutes' walk," said Dan. "Going that way meself. I'll take you."

"Thank you, sir."

They strolled off, Dan leading the horse.

"I'm going to me brother-in-law's," he explained. "Does the smithying and wheelwrighting for the parish. Nice line o' business."

Simon was interested. He had worked for a blacksmith himself and knew a fair amount about the wheelwright's trade.

"There must be plenty of customers for a wheelwright in London," he said, looking about him. "I've never seen so many different kinds of carriages before. Where I come from it's mostly closed coaches and farm carts."

"Countryfied sort o' stuff," said Dan pityingly. "No art in it—and mind you, there's a lot of art in the coachmaker's trade. You get the
length
without the 'ighth, it looks poky and old-fashioned, to my mind, but, contrariwise, you get the 'ighth without enough body and it looks a reg'lar hurrah's-nest. Now
there's
a lovely bit o' bodywork—see that barouche coming along—the plum-colored one with the olive-drab outwork? Ah, very racy, that is—Duke o' Battersea's trot-box; know it well. Seen it at me brother-in-law's for repair: cracked panel."

Simon turned and saw an elegantly turned-out vehicle in which was seated an elderly lady dressed in the height of fashion with waterfalls of diamonds ornamenting her
apple-peel satin gown, and a tremendous ostrich-plume headdress. She was accompanied by a pretty young girl who held a reticule, two billiard cues, a large shopping basket, and a small spaniel.

"Why!" Simon exclaimed. "That's
Sophie!
"

His voice rang across the street and the young girl turned her head sharply. But just then a high closed carriage came between Simon and the barouche and, a succession of other traffic following after, no second view of the girl could be obtained.

"I know that girl! She's a friend of mine!" Simon said, overjoyed. He looked at Dan with shining eyes.

"Ah. Duchess's lady's-maid, maybe? Nice-looking young gel. Very good position—good family to work for. Duke very affable sort o' gentleman—when he comes out o' those everlasting experiments of his. Bugs, chemicals, mice—queer setout for a lord. But his lady's a proper lady, so I've been told. O' course young Lord Bakerloo ain't up to much."

"Where does he live—the Duke of Battersea?" asked Simon, who had not been paying much attention.

"Battersea Castle o' course—when the family's in London. Places in the country too, nat'rally. Dorset, Yorkshire—that where you met the gel? Now, here's me brother-in-law's establishment, and, down by the river, that big place with the pillars is Rivière's."

Dan's brother-in-law's place was almost as impressive as the art academy beyond. Inside the big double gates (over which ran the legend "Cobb's Coaches," in gold) was a
wide yard containing every conceivable kind of coach, carriage, phaeton, barouche, landau, chariot, and curricle, in every imaginable state of disrepair. A shed at the side contained a forge, with bellows roaring and sparks blowing, while elsewhere lathes turned, carpenters hammered, and chips flew.

"Do you suppose I could get work here?" Simon asked impulsively. "Of an evening—when I've finished at the academy?"

"No 'arm in asking, is there? Always plenty to do at Sam Cobb's, that I do know. Depends what you can do, dunnit?"

Dan led his dust-cart through the gates and then lifted up his voice and bawled,
"Sam!"

A large, cheerful man came toward them.

"Why, bless me!" he exclaimed. "If it's not old Dan back again. I don't know what you do to your cart, Dan, I don't indeed.
I
believe it's fast driving.
I
believe you're out of an evening carriage-racing on the Brighton Road. You can't expect the parish dust-carts to stand up to it, Dan, no you can't, me boy."

Dan took these pleasantries agreeably, and asked after his sister Flossie. Then he said, "Here's a young cove, Sam, as wants a bit of evening work. Any use to you?"

"Any use to me?" said Mr. Cobb, summing up Simon with a shrewd but friendly eye. "Depends what he can do, eh? Looks a well-set-up young 'un. What can you do, young 'un? Can you carpenter?"

"Yes," said Simon.

"Done any blacksmith's work?"

"Yes," said Simon.

"Used to horses?"

"Yes," said Simon.

"Ever tried your hand at ornamental painting?" said Mr. Cobb, gesturing toward a little greengrocer's cart, newly and beautifully ornamented with roses and lettuces. "This sort o' thing? Or emblazoning?" He waved at a carriage with a coat-of-arms on the panel.

"I can paint a bit," said Simon. "That's why I've come to London—to study painting."

"Proper all-rounder, ennee?" said Mr. Cobb, rolling his eyes in admiration.

"You'd best take him on, Sam, then you'll be able to retire," Dan remarked.

"Well, I like a young 'un who has confidence in hisself, I like a bit o' spunk. And dear knows there's plenty of work. Tell you what, young 'un, you come round here this evening, fiveish, and I'll see what you can do. Agreeable?"

"Very thank you sir," Simon answered cheerfully. "And thank you, for setting me on my way," he said to Dan, who winked at him in a friendly manner.

"Good-by, young 'un. Now then, Dan," said Mr. Cobb, "it's early, to be sure, but there's such a nip in the air these misty mornings; what do you say to a little drop of Organ-Grinder's Oil?"

***

Simon felt somewhat nervous, as he approached the academy, but was encouraged to find that on a nearer view it presented a less imposing aspect. Some ingenious spirit had hit on the notion of suspending clotheslines between the Grecian columns supporting the roof, and from these dangled a great many socks, shirts, and other garments, while all round the marble fountain in front of the academy knelt or squatted young persons of both sexes busily engaged in washing various articles of apparel.

Simon approached a young man who was scrubbing a pair of red socks with a bar of yellow soap, and said, "Can you tell me, please, where I shall find Dr. Furnace?"

The young man rinsed his socks, held them up, sniffed them, glanced at the sun, and said, "About ten o'clock, is it? He'll be having breakfast. In his room on the first floor."

He sniffed his socks again, remarked that they still smelt of paint, and set to rubbing them once more.

Simon walked on, wondering if the young man kept his paints in his socks. In the doorway a sudden recollection hit him. Paint! That was the smell that had seemed so familiar in the top front room at Mrs. Twite's. Of course it was paint! Then—Simon stopped, assailed by suspicion—was that why Mrs. Twite had been scrubbing with Bath brick? To remove the smell of paint? Why?

Pondering this, Simon sat down on the first convenient object he found—a stone statue of a lion, half finished—to unravel the matter a little further.

Dido said Dr. Field had not been at the Twites'. But the
rooms were as he had described them, the address was as he had given it, and the room smelt of paint, which suggested that he had occupied it.

Perhaps, Simon thought, perhaps he had fallen out with the Twites—had had something stolen, or found the house too dirty, or objected to being woken at one in the morning by Hanoverian songs. He had complained, taken his leave, and moved away. The Twites, annoyed at losing a lodger, had contrived an elaborate pretense that no Dr. Field had ever lived with them...

Somehow Simon found it hard to believe this. For one thing, Dr. Field was far from fussy, and, provided he was furnished with privacy and a good light for painting, was unlikely to object if his neighbors practiced cannibalism or played the bass drum all day so long as they let him alone. And, secondly why should the Twites bother to make such a pretense about a trivial matter? Haifa dozen people, neighbors, patients, local tradesmen, would be able to give their story the lie.

Then it occurred to Simon that he had not yet heard what Mr. or Mrs. Twite had to say; he had only had Dido's version. Perhaps the whole mystery was just her nonsense, and when he got back that night he would be handed a piece of paper with Dr. Field's address on it.

Cheered by this reasonable notion, Simon stood up and crossed the entrance hall. A large double flight of marble stairs faced him, and between them stood a statue of a man in a huge wig, dressed in knee breeches and a painter's smock. He held a marble paintbrush and was engaged in
painting a marble picture on a marble easel. The back of the easel bore an inscription:

MARIUS RIVIÈRE
1759–1819
FOUNDED THIS ACADEMY

Simon noticed, when he was high enough up the stairs to be able to look over the marble gentleman's shoulder, that someone had painted a picture of a pink pig wearing a blue bow on the marble canvas.

Opposite the top of the stairs he saw a door labeled "Principal." Rather timidly he knocked on it, and an impatient voice shouted, "
Alors—entrez!
"

Walking in, Simon found himself in a medium-sized room that was overpoweringly warm and smelt strongly of garlic and coffee and turpentine. The warmth came from two braziers full of glowing charcoal, on one of which a kettle steamed briskly. The room was so untidy—littered with stacks of canvases, baskets of fruit, wood carvings, strings of onions hanging from the ceiling, easels with pictures on them, statues—that at first Simon did not see the little man who had told him to come in. But after a moment the same irascible voice said, "
Eh bien!
Shut the door, if you please and declare yourself!"

"Are—are you Dr. Furnace, please, sir?" Simon said hesitantly.

"
Furrneaux,
if you please,
Furrneaux—I
cannot endure the English pronunciation."

Dr. Furnace or Furrneaux was hardly more than three feet six inches high, and extraordinarily whiskery. As he rose up from behind his desk he reminded Simon irresistibly of a prawn. His whiskers waved, his hands waved, a pair of snapping black eyes took in every inch of Simon from his dusty shoes to the kitten's face poking inquisitively out of his jacket.

"And so, and so?" Dr. Furrneaux said impatiently. "Who may you be?"

"If you please, sir, my name is Simon, and I believe Dr. Field spoke about me—"

"Ah, yes, Gabriel Field. A boy named Simon.
Attendez—
"

Dr. Furrneaux waved his antennae imperatively, darted over to a cupboard, returned with a coffeepot, tipped coffee into it from a blue paper bag, poured in hot water, produced cups from a tea chest and sugar from another blue paper bag.

"Now we wait a moment. A boy named Simon, yes. Gabriel Field mentioned you, yes. In a moment I shall see what you can do. You are hungry?" he said, looking sternly at Simon. "Take the bread off that brazier—zere, blockhead!—and find some plates and some butter. In ze brown jar, of course!" as Simon, bewildered, looked uncertainly about him. The brown earthenware jar resembled something from
The Arabian Nights
and could easily have held Ali Baba and a couple of thieves.

"So, now we eat," said Dr. Furrneaux, breaking eight inches off a loaf shaped like a rolling pin and handing it to Simon. "I will pour ze coffee in a moment. Tell me about
my good friend Dr. Gabriel Field—how is it wiss him?"

"Dr. Field?" Simon stammered, absently taking a large bite of the crisp bread which flew into crumbs all round him, "but—haven't you seen him? I thought he would be here."