Fourpenny Flyer (63 page)

‘Your own, John.'

There is always something happening in this family, Harriet thought. And for once in her life she was very glad of it.

‘Is that
it,
Nanna?' Will asked.

‘That's it,' Nan said. ‘That's a locomotive. The wonder of the age, so they say. What do 'ee think of it?'

Will considered the wonder of the age for several seconds, concentrating as well as he could for the pressure and noise of the crowd all around them. ‘It looks like a water tank on wheels,' he said. ‘A round one, with valves and things all over it and a box of coal up behind it.'

His father laughed out loud. ‘A capital answer, Will,' he said. ‘I'm blessed if I ever heard better. A water tank on wheels, eh Mama?'

‘With the power of thirty horses, don't ee' forget,' Nan said, grinning at them both.

The grand opening of the Stockton and Darlington Railway had attracted an even bigger crowd than the organizers had hoped. Hundreds of people had arrived from Middlesbrough and Darlington, of course. That was to be expected. But there were coachloads from York and Leeds and Harrogate too, and it was even rumoured among the locals that there were visitors who had travelled there from as far afield as London and Manchester. It was a great occasion, and the local street sellers did a roaring trade in hot pies and baked potatoes, shrimps and cockles, books and ballads and balloons. In fact there were so many people standing along the banks of the Tee that afternoon or ambling up and down on rather startled horses, and so many carts and carriages lined up on the rough track behind them that a casual observer could have been forgiven for supposing that he had stumbled upon a royal progress.

The focus of all their attention perched on two narrow rails between the crowd and the river, occasionally blowing a small round cloud of steam from the long stovepipe that stuck into the air where the horse's head would have been if it had truly been a carriage. It didn't look capable of moving, leave alone pulling all the open carriages that were attached behind it.

‘Will it really roll along those little rails, Nanna?' Meg wanted to know.

‘So they say.'

‘It smells horrid,' Matty said wrinkling her nose.

‘How will the driver see where he's going with that great pipe sticking up in front of him?' Jimmy said. He'd been feeling concerned for the driver ever since they arrived. This locomotive looked a rackety old thing when you got up close to it, and he was sure it wasn't safe to be balanced on rails like that.

The three seven-year-olds stood in a group together right at the front of the crowd where Nan had pushed them, with Jimmy closely protective behind them. But Dotty and Edward hung back, clinging to their grandmother's hands, nervous in such a vast crowd, and a little afraid of the great iron machine they were all supposed to be admiring.

‘It won't come off the rails will it?' Edward asked. It would squash them all if it did.

But Nan didn't have time to reassure him because one of the officials was beaming towards her. ‘This way, Mrs Easter ma'am, this way. If you and your party would be so good as to take your seats, ma'am. You are in the second carriage.'

The second carriage was a crude open cart with wooden seats set all around the sides. It was extremely uncomfortable but it gave them a fine view of the crowds agog with excitement on their right-hand side, and the river peacefully minding its own business on the left, and the wonder of the age before them now busily puffing more steam through its tall stovepipe.

They were a large party, so they had the carriage to themselves, Nan and John and Billy sitting on the
left-hand side, Harriet and Matilda on the right, with the six children distributed between them. People were climbing up into the carriages all along the track. And the wind was freshening.

‘If it rains,' Matilda said, ‘we shall all be absolutely soaked.' She had joined this silly jaunt on sufferance and because Billy had begged her to, but really, all this way just to sit in a cart!

‘There's a man on horseback in the middle of the track,' Jimmy said. Now that was better. A horse was dependable. You knew where you were with a horse.

‘He's come to lead us to Darlington,' Nan said.

‘Why is he carrying a red flag?' Will wanted to know.

‘To let people know we're on the move.'

‘But we're not,' Meg said.

The locomotive gave a sudden sharp shriek as if it was surprised and began to glide along the rails, slowly at first so that the movement was barely perceptible, but then gradually picking up speed. And the crowds cheered and a shower of black smut fell backwards out of the stovepipe all over the illustrious guests in the first carriage.

‘Well if that's how it's going to go on,' Matilda said crossly, ‘I shall put up my umbrella.' Which she did. ‘I see no reason why we should be covered in filth for our pains.'

But Harriet endured and said nothing, just as she'd been doing ever since that shameful night. She lived in a daily nightmare, outwardly running the household and going to market and teaching the children and trying to answer Will's endless questions, but inwardly anguished by shame and remorse, and terrified in case somebody had seen her in King Street, or Caleb wrote to the house, or her parents got to hear of it. Four days after her return she'd taken the pony-cart into Bury and blushingly asked for letters at the Post Office. To her great relief he'd remembered to be discreet, but the letter he sent crushed her chest with a new fear.

‘There are seven of us kept here and t' cell is a right foul hole, wi' rotten vittles and foul air. But no matter. They've set trial for the Quarter Sessions at the start of
October, so we've to endure a month of it, wi' good consciences for company. That is all they'll keep us, be sure of that, being we've committed no crime.

‘Thine own, imprisoned or free,

‘Caleb.'

‘I will write to him the moment he is free,' she told her diary when she'd burnt the letter. ‘However painful it might be to him, he must be told that I mean to stay faithful to my dear John from henceforth. But I cannot send such a letter to him now. That would be too cruel. Time enough when the trial is over and he is free again. It will be easier for him to accept such tidings then.'

The decision eased her, making her feel that she was beginning to right the great wrong she'd done, and that all might yet be well despite of it. But then, as the days passed and the nightmares receded, she began to suspect that there was another and even more terrible price to pay for her transgression. For the last two weeks she'd been smothering a secret so dreadful that travelling in an open cart or being showered with soot was trivial by comparison. She had ‘seen' nothing since a fortnight before that terrible evening in Norwich, and now with every new unstained day she grew more and more afraid that she was pregnant.

She did her best to stay calm and keep cheerful, but the suspicion weighed upon her so heavily she was perpetually dragged by it, no matter what she did to occupy herself. She wrote to her diary every afternoon, before John came home from work, reporting ‘No change', or trying to persuade herself that she had miscalculated, or hoping that she might just have missed a month, but the writing didn't help her at all, and afterwards as she hid the book underneath the mattress, she was miserably aware that if she
was
pregnant, it was a secret she wouldn't be able to hide for ever. Sooner or later everybody would know, and John would be the first.

It was a relief to her to be involved in this expedition. It gave her plenty to do and quite a lot to think about and it took her far away from Norwich at the time of the trial,
which could have been distressing as it was bound to be reported in detail and that would recall all the events of that evening. It was much better for her to be away. Now she could simply hear the good news of their acquittal when she returned, and meantime she was in Nan's cheerful company, with plenty to see and plenty to do and plenty of children to keep her busy.

But now, as the locomotive picked up speed and the crowds were left behind, she suddenly found herself peculiarly alone. Everybody else was occupied: Jimmy and Matty talking to Matilda, huddled together under her umbrella, Will questioning Nan, Edward and Billy in deep conversation, John nursing Dotty and holding Meg's hand. And her thoughts went sliding back to their incessant preoccuption. She couldn't stop them.

‘We shall soon be there,' Nan said.

John smiled at her. ‘You may say what you like about this locomotive, Mama,' he said, ‘but I tell 'ee 'twill never replace the stagecoach. Never in a million years.'

And Matty was suddenly and violently sick all over her father's new trousers.

‘Ugh!' Meg said, and began to retch in sympathy.

‘Over the side of the carriage, if you please,' John said, turning her body adroitly and not a moment too soon.

‘Oh dear!' Harriet said, for the smell of vomit was turning her stomach. ‘Oh dear!' And then she was hanging over the side of the carriage too.

‘My heart alive,' Nan said. ‘What weak stomachs you've got the lot of you.'

‘If you ask me,' Matilda said, withdrawing her skirts from the mess, ‘Annie and James had the best idea, staying at home.'

‘Cheer up, Tilda,' Billy said, cheerfully giving his trousers a shake, ‘it ain't your clothes she's ruined and we're in sight of Darlington.'

‘And not a minute before time,' Matilda said. ‘The sooner this thing stops the better. I never was so uncomfortable in my life. You come with me, Harriet my dear. Billy can look after the little'uns.'

She was full of tender concern, helping Harriet out of
the carriage the minute their journey was over and the chocks were in place, holding her arm as they walked towards the inn, settling her into the most comfortable chair she could find and then rushing off to order soap and warm water and clean towels. ‘I've told 'em to brew a nice dish of raspberry tea,' she said confidentially. ‘'Tis the best thing I know for your kind of sickness, depend upon it.'

‘Thank 'ee,' Harriet said weakly. She still felt nauseous and raspberry tea would be calming. ‘You are so good to me, Matilda.'

‘And so I should think,' Matilda said stoutly, ‘after all you did for us when our Matty was ill. Are you restored just a little my dear? Now tell me, do.'

‘Oh yes,' Harriet assured her. ‘I am quite myself again.'

‘'Tis always the same when one carries,' Matilda said carelessly. ‘I was sick every single day, I remember. You do breed, do you not?'

She knows, Harriet thought. Oh dear God, not yet! Not so soon! And what little colour she had drained from her face. ‘I cannot tell,' she stammered. ‘I do not think so.'

‘I'm sure on it,' Matilda said confidently. ‘You wouldn't be so sick otherwise. Won't your John be pleased? And Mrs Easter, too.'

‘Where
is
John?' Harriet said, trying to change the conversation.

‘Gone off with his mother and that Mr Chaplin,' Matilda said, ‘and all talking like ninepence.'

That was a surprise. ‘Mr Chaplin? The coach king? Why whatever is he doing here? Surely he didn't ride on a locomotive?'

Her mother-in-law was saying much the same thing. ‘I must confess I never thought to see
you
here, upon me life.'

‘Reconnoitring the enemy position, Mrs Easter,' Mr Chaplin said cheerfully. ‘If this is to be the new way to travel I mean to know about it.'

‘And
is
it to be the new way to travel, sir?' John asked. ‘I found it mighty uncomfortable and a deal slower than a pair of horses.'

‘Only time will tell us that,' Mr Chaplin said. ‘On balance I think it as likely as not. Meantime I have taken shares in the Stockton and Darlington Company, and would advise you to do the same.'

‘Have you so?' Nan said, her eyes shrewd. ‘Then I declare I will take your advice.'

She would, John thought.

‘We must travel back to London together,' she said, ‘and you must tell me more.'

In the Guildhall at Norwich the Quarter Sessions were under way. The seven accused had been brought across from their squalid cells in the castle prison and shuffled into fresh air and daylight for the first time in more than a month.

‘By t' end of this day,' Caleb whispered to his friends as they trudged up Guildhall Hill, ‘we shall be free men again.'

‘Aye,' his nearest neighbour whispered back, as they passed Mr Rossi's goldsmith's shop, and the brisk winds of early October buffeted downhill against their faces. ‘God willin'!'

But it wasn't God's judgement they had to face that day. It was Justice Ormorod's. And Justice Ormorod was a personal friend to Lord Sidmouth.

He sat in legal glory on the high dais, a handsome man in his heavy wig and his rich red gown, and impressive too with a fine embonpoint and a resonant voice.

‘A legal mind,' the clerk to the court approved to his junior as he wrote up the gentleman's judgement after the first case that morning: ‘Mr Joseph Wiggins, driver of the ‘Phenomena', fined £90 for having in his possession 36 head of partridge. I likes a judge with a legal mind. He'll know what to do with rioters, upon me life he will.'

Proceedings opened calmly, with an admirable statement from Justice Ormorod, assuring ‘this court, the defendants and whomsoever else may be concerned with the outcome of this trial, that matters here this morning will be decided strictly according to the letter of the law and with no other considerations of any kind whatsoever being either permissable or possible.'

Caleb was much heartened by his words. ‘Aye,' he muttered, ‘a fair trial. 'Tis all we ask.'

And at first, as evidence was given in the slow pace and ponderous language of the judiciary, it all felt extremely fair. The seven weavers listened as witnesses were questioned with interminable patience as to the estimated number of people present, and the estimated number of torches the said people took with them, the direction in which the said people had been seen to be walking, or not walking, or marching as the case may be, whether or not banners were carried by the said people and what words were written upon the said banners. The courtroom smelt of polished wood, new leather and ancient parchment, and a spiral of golden motes nudged and gentled in a visible beam of sunshine, falling slowly and delicately, to disappear into the grandeur of the judge's robes. The clerk to the court nodded off beside his table, and up in the public gallery the newspaper reporters were yawning like frogs.