Stone's Fall (21 page)

What did I think? Nothing; I was overcome by the scale of it all, by the power one man had created. Now, for the first time, I could see why all the descriptions of him were superlatives. Powerful, frightening, a genius, a monster. I had heard or read all of these. They were all true. Only such a person would have dared.

“I’m afraid that I cannot offer you a tour of the ship itself,” Mr. Williams said, interrupting my reverie. He was pleased by my reaction, I could see. I think I must have had a look of stunned amazement on my face; my silence was very much more eloquent than anything I might have said. “It is dangerous when it is in such a state, and in fact there is little to see which would interest anyone but a specialist in naval architecture. I simply wanted you to see it up close. It is an impressive sight, don’t you think?”

I nodded, but continued to gaze up and along to take in the vastness of the thing. It was dark; the hull had completely blotted out the sun, and the depths of the huge trench in the ground in which the ship was taking shape were cold, and windy and dark. I shivered.

“It does get cold. Sometimes it even starts to rain inside the dry dock, even though it is a fine enough day outside. The construction generates a lot of heat and vapour; that condenses against the sides and falls as rain. It is quite a problem sometimes. One of those little difficulties that even the most perceptive of planners cannot imagine in advance. I hope, by the way, you are convinced that this yard does actually exist now.”

I nodded. “I think the executors might concede that one,” I said with a vague smile. “And I must thank you for your time. It has been most generous of you.”

“Not at all. As you may have noticed, I am very proud of this place. It gives me great pleasure to show it off.”

“And your workers? Are they proud of it as well?”

“Oh, yes. I think so. They should be; they know they are the best in the world. And they are paid well. We cannot afford even one incompetent riveter or mechanic. They have to be paid well, and supervised very closely. When we launched
Intrepid
last year the whole city came to a halt so everyone could watch. They knew they’d done something remarkable. Come along.”

We walked back to the cab, and the horse walked wearily off once more, taking a different route this time. After a few minutes, Mr. Williams asked the driver to stop. “Please forgive me,” he said with a smile. “I must just check with one of our people in here. Do come in, if you wish.”

I followed him into the entrance of a block of offices, which was attached to another giant building of such size that ordinarily it alone would have made one pause for thought. But I was almost getting used to them now. Another building the size of St. Paul’s. Oh, well. I wanted my lunch. Mr. Williams led the way into the warren of offices, where dozens of clerks sat at rows of oak desks, each with his piles of paper. Then through more, where men with drawing boards were working. Mr. Williams popped his head into one room, and called one of the men out.

“I have to see Mr. Ashley for a few moments. Would you be so kind as to take Mr. Braddock here to see our little arsenal?”

The young man, clearly pleased to have been chosen for such a task and to have attracted the attention of the most powerful man in the northeast, said he would be delighted. His name was Fredericks, he told me, as he led the way. He was a senior draughtsman, working on gun turrets. He had worked at Beswick for twelve years now, ever since he was fourteen. His father also worked here, in the yards. His brothers and uncles did as well.

“A family firm, then,” I said, more for something to say than anything else.

“I don’t suppose there’s a single family in Newcastle which doesn’t have someone who works in the yard,” he replied. “Here we are.”

He pulled open a heavy wooden door, and then followed me through. Again I was astonished, even though it took me some time to work out what I was looking at. Guns. But not ordinary guns, not like in museums, or put out for display at the Tower of London. These were more like tree trunks from some vast forest; twenty, thirty feet long, three feet thick, tapering meanly and menacingly towards the muzzle. And there were dozens and dozens of them, some long and almost elegant, other short and squat, lined up in rows on huge trestles.

“That’s our biggest,” Fredericks said, pointing to one of the longest, which lay in the middle of the building, shining dully from a protective layer of oil. “The 12/45 mark 10. With the breech it weighs fifty-eight tons and it can throw an 850-pound shell nearly eleven miles and land within thirty feet of the target. If the people operating it know what they’re about. Which I doubt they will.”

“And these are all for HMS
Anson
?”

“She’ll take a dozen of them. Think of the effect of a single broadside. And these can fire once a minute. We think.”

“You think? I got the impression that everyone who worked here knew. I didn’t think guessing was allowed.”

He looked a bit disconcerted by this. “Well, you see, it’s not the guns. We know they work. It’s the gun control. The hydraulics.
Anson
will have an entirely new design. The trouble is…”

“You can’t test it in advance too easily.”

He nodded. “It’s what I work on. I think it will be just fine. But if it isn’t…”

“So, what are the other ones for? If twelve go on
Anson,
there must be another couple of dozen of those great big ones here.”

He shrugged. “Who knows? It’s not as if they tell us. But it’s the same all over the yard. There’s enough guns and plate and girders to build a battle fleet out of the spare parts, with more being made. But there are no more orders.”

“Who’s they?”

“Scuttlebutt. Gossip. Talk in the pub. Who knows where these things come from? People are worrying about layoffs, once
Anson
’s finished.”

“What about foreign orders?”

He shook his head. “Perhaps they’re being kept secret.”

He laughed. “You don’t know shipyards, sir. There aren’t any secrets from the workers. Do you think there is anything that affects our jobs we don’t know about?”

I looked thoughtfully at the vast pieces of metal lined up in that gigantic, chilly room, and shivered. It was calm in there, peaceful almost; it was impossible to connect the atmosphere with what those things were for, or what they could do.

“Tell me,” I said, “perhaps you can help. I am looking for a man called James Steptoe. He works here, I believe.”

Fredericks’s expression changed instantly. “No,” he said shortly. “He doesn’t. Not anymore.”

“Are you sure? I am certain…”

“He used to work here. He was dismissed.”

“Oh? Why?”

“Theft.” He turned away, and I had to grab him by the arm.

“I wish to speak to him.”

“I don’t. Nobody likes a thief.”

“Nonetheless, I must talk to him. Ah. Here comes Mr. Williams. Perhaps he will be able to tell me…”

“Thirty-three Wellington Street. That’s where he lives,” he said hurriedly. “Please…”

“Not a word,” I whispered back.

And then Mr. Williams came within earshot and that was the end of the conversation, but in some ways it was the most interesting part yet of my visit. A pity I hadn’t had more time with the young man, who seemed serious and observant.

“I’m surprised you let me in there,” I remarked as we went back to the cab. “I mean, I read in the newspapers all about spies trying to steal secrets about guns and things.”

Mr. Williams laughed. “Oh, steal away, if you wish. There is nothing you have seen which is so very secret. What a gun looks like tells you nothing. It is how the metal is made, how the hydraulics work, how it is aimed. That’s where the true secrets lie. And we are careful about that. Except for the gun-metal part.”

“Why?”

He winked, and bent towards me conspiratorially. “Because the Germans already know.”

“How come?” I asked, eager to hear a tale of espionage.

“Because they invented the process.
We
stole it from
them.
” He leaned back his head and chuckled. “They’re the best in the world at that, the Germans. Very advanced.”

“So you have spies in Germany?”

“Oh, good heavens no. Lord Ravenscliff had shareholdings. That is very much better. He had a substantial shareholding in Krupp’s, the German steel company. Not in his own name, of course; through an intermediary bank in Hamburg. They were able to obtain whatever he wanted. And Schneider in France.”

I was astonished. I didn’t think it worked like that at all. “But secret processes from here are not learned by the Germans by the same methods in reverse?”

Mr. Williams looked shocked. “Of course not. His Lordship was an Englishman, and a patriot.”

Fair enough, I thought. On the other hand, what about that tale Seyd had told me, about building submarines for the Russians? How patriotic was that?

“So tell me, Mr. Braddock,” the manager said as we headed back to the factory gate, “what did you find most impressive about Beswick?
Anson,
I imagine.”

I considered. “Certainly it is a staggering sight,” I said. “Quite beyond belief, really. It was worth the journey just to see it. But, oddly, I do not think that was the most impressive. I think the fact that this yard exists, and can produce such a thing more remarkable still. The idea that anyone can organise this anthill of a place is the most surprising.”

I had said the right thing. Williams almost glowed at my words.

“That was Lord Ravenscliff ’s genius, and why the greatest compliment to his skill is to say he will not be missed. Do not misunderstand me,” he said with a smile as I raised an eyebrow. “It is what he wanted. To create an organisation so perfect it could run by itself, or rather with only the managers, each of whom knows their business. I believe he succeeded.”

“How so?”

“The job of any company is to make as much profit as possible. As long as that is the main aim of the managers, then there is no need to direct them. They will, collectively, take the right decisions.”

“And you will soon find out whether that is the case.”

We had arrived by the gate. A cab, one of several, was waiting patiently to take me back into the centre of Newcastle. Williams courteously held the door for me as I got in.

“Indeed. It will be very interesting. Have a safe journey back to London. I hope you have enjoyed yourself.”

CHAPTER
23

At eight o’clock, after a rapid meal, I left once more, this time walking away from the works and into the rows of houses to the west of the city centre. Mr. James Steptoe lived somewhere in that rabbit warren. It was a dreary journey, into monotonous redbrick streets, each house exactly the same as the next, all built, I suspected, by the works and for the works. Each had a door and two windows facing the street. All the doors were green, all the windows brown. There were no trees, few patches of green, and surprisingly few pubs; I supposed that the works had intervened there as well and banned such places in order to keep its workforce sober and efficient. Or it was looking after its health, and acting responsibly. Take your pick.

But it was neat and well ordered, no doubt about that, and a few streets of newer houses showed signs of a different way of thinking. Curved porches, more fanciful roofs. Small enough, and mean enough, no doubt, but a place to live and be comfortable. There were churches and schools and shops, all laid out with thought and care. I had seen very much worse in the East End, which was a hellish, confused nightmare in comparison with this disciplined, uniform place, which, if it was a barracks, at least allowed its occupants to pretend.

The road I was looking for was off a street, and off an avenue. All were named after imperial heroes and events of the not too distant past. I wondered how many of the inhabitants noticed after a while. Did it make their hearts swell with pride that they lived in Victoria Road? Did it make them work harder, or drink less for having a house in Khartoum Place? Were they better husbands and fathers because they walked to work along Mafeking Road, then into Gordon Street? Was Mr. James Steptoe, I thought as I knocked on the door, a more respectable, patriotic Englishman for living at 33 Wellington Street?

Hard to tell. His mother, who answered the door, certainly looked respectable enough as she peered uncertainly at me. The trouble was, I could make out only a little of what she was saying; I supposed she was speaking English, but the accent was so thick she might almost have been another Serbo-Croatian anarchist. This was a problem I had not anticipated. Still, if I couldn’t understand her, she seemed to understand me well enough, and invited me in, and showed me to the little parlour, kept for best. After a while James Steptoe came in, warily and cautiously; he was shaped rather like a bull, almost as broad as he was tall, with a thick neck emerging from his collarless shirt, and black hair covering his forearms where the sleeves had been rolled up. He had thick dark eyebrows, and a shadow of beard around his mouth. He looked like someone who played rugby, or worked down a mine rather than pushing pens and dockets.

I shook hands, and introduced myself.

“Are you the police?” A short sentence, gruffly spoken, but a great relief. I understood it. Mr. Steptoe was bilingual.

“Certainly not. Why should I be?”

“I’m eating,” he said.

“I do apologise for disturbing you. I can either go away for a while, or wait, as you please. But I’m afraid I must talk to you this evening. I have to return to London tomorrow morning.”

He studied me carefully. “Are you hungry?”

If I write out his words in normal speech, and say I could understand them, do not think that he spoke in a normal, or easily comprehensible fashion. He did not; my time with Mr. Steptoe was a triumph of concentration and much of what the rest of his family said escaped me entirely. I said I had eaten, thank you, but could easily eat some more.

He nodded at this then led me down the little corridor into the kitchen. It was a bit like being presented at a court ball; eight faces examined me intently as I came in and stood, a little sheepishly, by the little stove. I felt like an interloper, a foreigner, a threatening presence.

“Father, this is Mr. Braddock, from London. This is my mother”—the old woman smiled severely—“my sister Annie, my two brothers Jack and Arthur, Lily, my fiancée, and Uncle Bill. Jack—move. Mr. Braddock here wants your chair.”

“London?” said the father, who tended to speak in one-word sentences.

“That’s right,” I said. “I’m here to sort out a few legal matters with regard to Lord Ravenscliff ’s estate. I need to discuss a few matters with your son.”

“Everybody knows all about that,” said he. “Don’t think you have to hide anything from them. What else is there to say? I’ve been tried and found guilty, haven’t I? Everyone knows. Or did he see the light and leave me some money?”

“I’m afraid not,” I said with a grin. “And he didn’t leave me any either, if that makes you feel any better.”

“So?”

“Lord Ravenscliff believed that you were innocent of the accusations made against you.”

This caused a stir. “He could have bloody well told me,” said Steptoe junior.

“As far as I understand, he came to his conclusion about three days before he died. He had no opportunity to tell you.”

There were looks all around the table, half pleased, half resentful that I should have the power to affect their lives in such a fashion.

“Now, there is a problem,” I continued. “While Lord Ravenscliff may have been convinced, he did not put down in writing his reasons. So I have the task of redoing all his work. In other words, to find out what was happening. So I need from you a full account. When it is complete, Lady Ravenscliff will write to Mr. Williams at the plant, you will get your job back and, I am sure, be paid in full for the wages you have lost.”

It was a handsome offer, and one which I was not entitled to make. But it did the trick nicely. From then on they were falling over themselves to tell me whatever I wanted to know.

“So, please tell me the precise circumstances of this accusation.” Lawyerly, I thought.

“It was all lies,” said the mother defiantly. “Jimmy’d never…”

“Yes, Mother, it seems we’re all agreed on that,” he said patiently. He thought for a while, then glanced around at his family with a slight smile, and asked his mother to make another pot of tea. As she filled the kettle from a big bowl of water near the back door and put it on the hob, he began.

“I’m a bookkeeper, you know,” he said. “My dad here didn’t like it, because he’s a shipbuilder, a boilermaker, and didn’t like the idea of me working in a suit. He reckoned I’d get grand ideas, and get above myself. But I was clever at school. I always got high marks in arithmetic and spelling, and my hand was good, copperplate when I wanted. My teacher liked me, and put in a word with the yard, and got me taken on in the offices. I began there about eight years ago, and learned the business of bookkeeping. I went on courses even, to improve myself, and did well. I was promoted, and paid more, and I didn’t get above myself, I don’t think.”

His father scowled amiably, as though to concede the point.

“Anyway, my job was make payments out for bills that came in. Not the big ones, you understand. Miscellaneous and sundries is my department, and there’s no rhyme nor reason to a lot of it. So, when I got in this bill for twenty-five pounds, I paid it, cash in an envelope, posted to the address on the docket. A couple of weeks later, all that remained was a twenty-five-pound deficit, and enough evidence that I must have been the one to have taken it; all the other pieces of paper had vanished. I was asked to explain. No one believed me, and I was fired, and told I was lucky I wasn’t going to gaol.

“I was so upset I could have cried. I did, in fact. I couldn’t believe it had happened to me, and even wondered whether I had made some mistake. But there couldn’t have been. There were only two possible explanations—either I’d stolen the money, or the request for payment had been real. I knew I hadn’t stolen anything, so that meant the dockets must have been removed. I don’t make mistakes, you see. But I was in a right way; there was no chance now of ever getting another job again, not in Newcastle. Pretty soon everyone would hear something, that’s the way it works. I was going to go to live with my second cousin in Liverpool, start again, and hope no one would find anything out. I was even acting as though I was guilty. Only this lot,” he gestured at the people sitting round the table, who nodded, “stood by me. Not even the union would help. They didn’t help thieves, they told me. Not worth their time; they had enough to do with deserving cases.”

He snorted bitterly as he sipped his tea. His father looked uncomfortable.

“And then I got this short letter, asking me—ordering me, more like—to come to the Royal. No signature, nothing. I almost didn’t go, but I thought—why not? I was wondering, you see, what it was about, and I had nothing else to do. So I went, and knocked on the door, and there was His Lord… Ravenscliff, I mean. All alone.

“I was terrified, I don’t mind telling you. Just the room was frightening enough; I’d never seen the like before, even grander than the music hall, with its velvet curtains and golden furniture. And Ravenscliff…”

He paused to shift uncomfortably in his chair, and stirred some more sugar into his cup. “You never met him, you say? If you had I would have to say no more. He was a frightening man. Bulky, not fat, and he never moved much. Didn’t have to; just looked at you, and that was enough. Didn’t speak loud either; he made you listen to him. Did nothing to make you comfortable or at ease. Just told me to sit, and then looked at me, for ages. Didn’t move a muscle all the while, and me getting hotter under the collar, and more and more upset.

“‘I didn’t do it,’ I blurted out when I could stand no more. ‘And if you want to put the police on me, then go ahead…’

“‘Have I said anything about the police?’

“‘So why am I here?’

“‘Well, not for the police,’ he said quietly. ‘I could have you arrested and thrown into gaol without even leaving London, you know. You are here because I want to ask you questions.’

“‘What sort of questions?’

“‘Not why you did it. That is of no interest to me at all. How you did it does concern me, though. The controls should be proof against people like you, and they weren’t. So, in return for your freedom, I want to know how you did it.’

“‘Will you, for the last time, listen to what I am saying? I didn’t do anything. I did not steal anything. Not a penny. Not even half a penny.’

“That’s right,” his mother interrupted, nodding her head in approval. “And when he told me that, I was so proud of him…”

“Ravenscliff stared at me, with no expression on his face at all. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. That was frightening, you know. Normally, you say something, and you know how well it’s gone down. Not with him. You couldn’t tell a thing.

“‘Prove it,’ he said.

“‘I can’t,’ I said bitterly. ‘That’s the trouble.’ And I told him what had happened. Everything I’ve told you, and more. He nodded as I spoke; it was clear he knew the procedures perfectly well. Then he asked me questions.

“‘Every bill is stamped with a number, which runs in sequence. If one was removed, it should have been obvious. The same goes for payment slips.’

“‘I know,’ I said. ‘I can only think that it was stamped with a duplicate number, so that if it was removed, then there would be no gap. That would mean that someone deliberately made out a fake bill, then removed it. And not me, either.’

“‘Why not you?’

“‘Because I wouldn’t have paid it myself, would I? I would have made up a bill, got hold of the stamp and numbered it with a duplicate number, and then slipped it into someone else’s pile for payment. At the end of the day, after the money had been sent out, it would have been easy enough to go to the files, find the bill and remove it. Then gone to the address and picked up the money.’

“‘That is a convincing explanation, Mr. Steptoe,’ he said. ‘But it means you are accusing one of the people who work with you in your office.’

“‘No,’ I said quickly, because I didn’t want to accuse anyone. ‘Lots of people come in and out all day.’

“‘I see.’ Ravenscliff walked to the window and stared out of it. I was confused, a bit, but I didn’t feel as though I should ask. But still, I wondered. This was a rich man, fretting about twenty-five pounds. Look after the pennies, and the pounds will look after themselves, but this seemed stupid.

“And then he told me to go. Didn’t say anything more. Just dismissed me like some footman. I decided then and there to prove it. I’d been sitting at home feeling sorry for myself, but he made me mad. I wasn’t going to be labelled a thief, not by him and not by anyone. I came home, and talked it over with my dad. He told me I had to try. And we talked to my cousin, another cousin, not the one in Liverpool, who works nights. He talked it over with…”

“Does anyone in Newcastle not know about this?” I interrupted.

He looked surprised. “I didn’t tell a soul. Only my family. Of course I told them. They had a right to know. It affects them as much as it does me, you know. To have a thief in the family…? But they stuck with me. Of course I told them.”

“I see. I’m sorry. Go on.”

“Anyway, it was all organised. I’d go in with my uncle and cousin on the night shift and go to the office. It was easy enough to get a key from one of the watchmen, who’s a son-in-law of my Aunt Betty. Then I’d settle down and start going through the books, and leave with the shift when it went off in the morning.”

“And?” I prompted. “And it took ages. I went through every slip of paper, going back months, and then compared those to the shift books, showing who was on duty. Every single one. I couldn’t afford to miss anything.”

I nodded. I knew how he felt. I wondered if the Ravenscliffs made a habit of somehow getting total strangers to do their hard work for them. Elizabeth had done the same with me, after all.

“Eventually, I had it. Six payments, of between twenty-one and thirty-four pounds each, none with matching dockets. That told me that whoever was doing this knew how the office worked. Because anything over thirty-five has to be countersigned by the chief clerk. Whoever was doing this knew not to be too greedy.”

“But you didn’t find out where the money was going?”

“Not exactly.”

“Not exactly?”