A Place Called Freedom (1995)

“What happens is, the undertakers bribe the ships’ captains not to use the new gangs. Then there’s trouble and fighting between the gangs. And it’s the new gangs that get punished for the fights, because the magistrates are undertakers themselves, or friends of undertakers … and in the end all the coal heavers go back to the old ways.”

“Damn fools,” Mack said.

Charlie looked offended. “I suppose if they were clever they wouldn’t be coal heavers.”

Mack realized he had been supercilious, but it angered him when men were their own worst enemies. “They only need a little determination and solidarity,” he said.

Gordonson put in: “There’s more to it than that. It’s a question of politics. I remember the last coal heavers’ dispute. They were defeated because they had no champion. The undertakers were against them and no one was for them.”

“Why should it be different this time?” said Mack.

“Because of John Wilkes.”

Wilkes was the defender of liberty, but he was in exile. “He can’t do much for us in Paris.”

“He’s not in Paris. He’s back.”

That was a surprise. “What’s he going to do?”

“Stand for Parliament.”

Mack could imagine how that would stir up trouble in London’s political circles. “But I still don’t see how it helps us.”

“Mikes will take the coal heavers’ part, and the government will side with the undertakers. Such a dispute, with workingmen plainly in the right, and having the law on their side too, would do Wilkes nothing but good.”

“How do you know what Wilkes will do?”

Gordonson smiled. “I’m his electoral agent.”

Gordonson was more powerful than Mack had realized. This was a piece of luck.

Charlie Smith, still skeptical, said: “So you’re planning to use the coal heavers to advance your own political purposes.”

“Fair point,” Gordonson said mildly. He put down his pipe. “But why do I support Wilkes? Let me explain. You came to me today complaining of injustice. This kind of thing happens all too often: ordinary men and women cruelly abused for the benefit of some greedy brute, a George Jamisson or a Sidney Lennox. It harms trade, because the bad enterprises undermine the good. And even if it were good for trade it would be wicked. I love my country and I hate the brutes who would destroy its people and ruin its prosperity. So I spend my life fighting for justice.” He smiled and put his pipe back in his mouth. “I hope that doesn’t sound too pompous.”

“Not at all,” said Mack. “I’m glad you’re on our side.”

16

JAY JAMISSON’S WEDDING DAY WAS COLD AND DAMP. From his bedroom in Grosvenor Square he could see Hyde Park, where his regiment was bivouacked. A low mist covered the ground, and the soldiers’ tents looked like ships’ sails on a swirling gray sea. Dull fires smoked here and there, adding to the fug. The men would be miserable, but soldiers were always miserable.

He turned from the window. Chip Marlborough, his brideman, was holding Jay’s new coat. Jay shrugged into it with a grunt of thanks. Chip was a captain in the Third Foot Guards, like Jay. His father was Lord Arebury, who had business dealings with Jay’s father. Jay was flattered that such an aristocratic scion had agreed to stand beside him on his wedding day.

“Have you seen to the horses?” Jay asked anxiously.

“Of course,” said Chip.

Although the Third Foot was an infantry regiment, officers always went mounted, and Jay’s responsibility was to supervise the men who looked after the horses. He was good with horses: he understood them instinctively. He had two days’ leave for his wedding but he still worried whether the beasts were being looked after properly.

His leave was so short because the regiment was on active service. There was no war: the last war the British army had fought was the Seven Years’ War, against the French in America, and that had ended while Jay and Chip were schoolboys. But the people of London were so restless and turbulent that the troops were standing by to suppress riots. Every few days some group of angry craftsmen went on strike or marched on Parliament or ran through the streets breaking windows. Only this week silk weavers, outraged by a reduction in their rate of pay, had destroyed three of the new engine looms in Spitalfields.

“I hope the regiment isn’t called out while I’m on leave,” Jay said. “It would be just my luck to miss the action.”

“Stop worrying!” Chip poured brandy from a decanter into two glasses. He was a great brandy drinker. “To love!” he said.

“To love,” Jay repeated.

He did not know much about love, he reflected. He had lost his virginity five years ago with Arabella, one of his father’s housemaids. He thought at the time that he was seducing her but, looking back, he could see that it had been the other way around. After he had shared her bed three times she said she was pregnant. He had paid her thirty pounds—which he had borrowed from a moneylender—to disappear. He now suspected she had never been pregnant and the whole thing was a deliberate swindle.