The Silent Boy (31 page)

Charles picks up his shoes and, still with the blanket around him, takes a step into the room. Then another. This brings him within reach of the table. His fingertips dance over the scarred surface. He feels the outline of a small piece of cheese. He puts it in the pocket of his breeches.

His eyes adjust to what light there is. The man in the blue coat sprawls on his blankets in the corner, with his head on the velvet cushion. Step by step, Charles edges towards the door beside the window. It is impossible to do this silently, no matter how hard he tries. The warped timbers of the boathouse are in league with his enemies. They groan and squeak like malevolent animals underneath the floor.

All this time, the snoring does not stop. At last Charles touches the door. He runs his hand over it until he finds the lock. The key is not there. He almost stamps with vexation. The key could be anywhere – on the table, on the floor or – worst of all – in the pocket of the man in the blue coat. The room is too dark to see anything clearly.

Perhaps this door is warped, as the cupboard door was. Charles lifts the heavy latch and tugs it away from the jamb beside it. With a sigh, the door swings into him with such force that he almost falls backwards into the room. It stops abruptly when the bottom of it catches a slightly raised board in the uneven floor.

There is a gap between door and jamb of about a foot. Charles slips through it and pulls the door shut. It is only then that his brain catches up with his reflexes, and he understands what has happened: the man in the blue coat has forgotten to lock the door.

The day is beginning. The ruined garden is silvered with dew. Charles descends the steps and turns to his right. The great grey river runs past the bottom of the garden. The further bank is a dark blur, apart from a handful of lights from early risers.

A wooden jetty runs alongside the boathouse and projects a few yards into the water. The door to the lower part of the boathouse stands ajar. Charles looks inside. The dinghy rocks at its moorings, audible as much as visible. He glances up at the ceiling, at the wooden planks that form the floor of the room above. The snores drift down and mingle with the heave and slap of the water.

For a moment he entertains a wild idea that he will sail away downstream until the river takes him out to sea: the gentle wind will guide him to a desert island where he may live in peace as a hermit and never see blood again or hear the sounds of cracking walnuts. But the practicalities of such a voyage are overwhelming. Besides, the river is a cold, grim thing and he does not want to trust himself to it.

But the dinghy?

He unties the painter. Hand over hand, he eases the boat along the jetty and pushes it into the river. The current catches it. It turns full circle in the water and slides away from the bank. It moves downstream. A mist is hanging on the water and soon it is out of sight.

Find the island, he thinks, find the island. If nothing else it will make the man in the blue coat think that Charles has escaped by the river.

Seagulls cry. He walks away from the water. A dog barks in the distance.

On the landward side, the boathouse is masked by the overgrown trees and bushes. Even the gravelled path is thick with tall weeds, drenched with moisture. But someone has beaten down a path of sorts among them.

The further Charles walks from the river, the clearer the path comes and more light pours into the world. The silhouette of a house appears, its chimneys and roofs sharp against the brightening sky. He veers away from it and draws the blanket over his head like a shawl.

A wall looms. It is built of brick and is at least six feet high. A fox appears and darts away, seeming to evaporate in the air before Charles’s very eyes.

The reason is that the upper part of the wall has collapsed, leaving a gap a yard wide. It offers an easy jump for a fox and an easy scramble for a boy.

Beyond the wall is a meadow. Charles has a crushing sense of the world’s immensity, of his own insignificance. He wishes himself back among the half-known terrors of the boathouse.

Only a moment.

Weeping, he staggers across the uneven grass. A dark shadow stands in his way. It is the size and shape of a cottage. He is almost within touching distance before he realizes it is a laden haywain sheeted with canvas, not a house.

The tears are cold on his cheeks. There is a pain in his belly. Weariness weighs him down.

It seems the most natural thing in the world to scramble into the belly of the wain and to wriggle higher and deeper into the loose, sweet-smelling and slightly damp hay. Covering himself with the blanket, Charles cries himself to sleep.

At first he is at sea, going to his island. The ship is swaying from side to side. The rigging creaks and groans. A strange rumbling sends vibrations through the timbers.

The sailors are talking among themselves.

‘Say what you like,’ says one, ‘it’s not right.’

‘Only day that’s left,’ says another.

‘But it’s Sunday.’

‘No Sabbaths on a farm. You know that.’

‘They’ll have to stack it themselves.’

‘What’s that to us, Dick? Besides, horses don’t care what day of the week it is. Got to eat, don’t they, even on Sundays, same as us.’

So Charles learns that he is not on a boat, not at sea. He is still embedded in hay and he is thirsty. On the other hand, he is warm and surprisingly comfortable. He feels happier – or at least less unhappy, less fearful – than he has since leaving Charnwood on the terrible morning when Louis was revealed as a false friend.

The wain moves very slowly along a road. The voices of the two men are different from the peasants’ voices in Somersetshire, sharper and harder and faster. He makes a peephole in the straw but all he sees are muddy fields.

Charles eats the cheese, which is salty and makes him thirstier. He licks and then sucks some of the damper pieces of hay. After a while he dozes, lulled by the grinding of the great wheels and the rising and fall of the voices. He has no idea where the men are taking him. He does not care.

Hours drift between waking and sleeping in the sweet-smelling new-mown grass. Charles sucks hay and dreams.

At length he becomes aware that there is a change in the sounds that envelop him. The heavy iron clatter of the wheels is still there, and so too are the voices of the men. But around them and beyond them is a deep, rolling roar like a waterfall. People are shouting, too, and once he hears a child scream.

Charles burrows to the side of the load and makes a peephole in the hay. The air is so foul that he retches. He sees the first-floor windows of houses passing slowly by, and then two men on horseback. A woman in black sweeps a doorstep. They have come to a town, perhaps London itself.

The more deeply they penetrate the city, the more slowly the haywain goes; the more halts there are; and the more the realization grows on Charles that he must not stay here until the wagon reaches its destination. They will unload the hay and he cannot fail to be discovered.

He negotiates his way to the back. The sides of the wain splay out from the bed on which the hay rests. They are formed of vertical planks with spaces for the air between them. But the spaces are too narrow for Charles to squeeze through. He struggles up to the rail that connects the planks at the top. He misjudges the speed of his ascent, and his head pokes out in plain sight, just above the rail.

Directly in front of him is a cart drawn by a skinny pony. An old man is sitting in the cart, a pipe clenched between his teeth and a hat drawn over his eyes. But the reins are held by the boy who sits beside him.

In the same instant, the boy sees Charles and Charles sees the boy. The boy sticks out his tongue and wrinkles his nose. Before he can prevent himself, Charles does likewise. The boy grins. Charles grins.

The wain comes to a halt again. So does the cart. Somewhere ahead, drivers are arguing and growing angry. Charles clambers up and rolls over the rail.

He lands heavily on cobbles smeared with horse droppings. The impact drives the air from his lungs. He scrambles up. The boy on the cart is craning over to watch him. He pokes out his tongue at Charles. He puts his thumbs to his ears and he wiggles his fingers.

‘Yah …’ he says.

The traffic begins to move again.

Charles runs through the streets. It is Sunday, late afternoon, shading into early evening. Despite the holiness of the day, streams of people pass up and down the streets and the roadways are crowded with vehicles. Though some establishments are closed, there are many shoppers about. The air smells of sewage and smoke.

Already lamps and candles glow inside some of the shops. Instinct keeps him to the busier thoroughfares. Dangers lurk in dark, unfrequented places, not among crowds.

He steals a roll from a stall in a poorly lit doorway and runs on, his heart hammering with fear. The roll is stale but it tastes wonderful: ‘Quite divine,’ Maman would say when she was served a dish she liked, for she had an appetite for food and a keen appreciation of it. ‘Fit for the gods.’

Afterwards, he wanders on. A sign in the window of a shirtmaker’s reads: THE FINEST LINEN IN LONDON. AS PATRONIZED BY THE NOBILITY AND GENTRY. PRAY WALK IN AND INSPECT OUR MANY TESTIMONIALS. So at least he can be sure he is in London.

The food has steadied him. Charles knows that he cannot walk the streets for ever, that he must find shelter. He cannot ask a stranger for help, for who would listen to a boy who cannot speak?

His mysterious uncle Rampton must live in London but he has no idea where. So does Mr Savill, who lives in a place called Nightingale Lane, with his daughter, Lizzie, the girl who once looked like Charles himself.

Lizzie, Charles thinks, my sister.

All at once, she seems the obvious solution to his difficulty. She is grown up now. She will protect him. He does not have to stay with her if he does not like her. She will do for now, at least until Mr Savill returns.

Nightingale Lane is on the northern edge of the city. That is what Mr Savill said. It is near a place where they are building new houses for rich people. There is an alehouse called the Royal Oak nearby. Nightingale Lane and the Royal Oak belong in the country, and the new houses belong in the city. There is a walnut tree in Mr Savill’s garden.

Tip-tap.
Cracking a walnut. A walnut tree. What does the coincidence mean?

Charles is passing a churchyard crowded with memorials, some broken, others at drunken angles. The tower attached to the church is crumbling and a wooden paling has been erected around it.

Movement catches his eye. He glances up at the house on the corner. A maidservant carrying a lamp has entered an upper room. The light is dim, and filtered through thick, distorted glass; but as the woman moves to the window to draw the curtains across, the outline of a canopied bed appears briefly behind her.

A bed. Bedford. That is the name of the new houses. Bedford Square.

Charles slips inside the churchyard and takes the pencil and paper from his pocket. Using a gravestone as a writing slope, he prints six words in careful capitals:

OAK TREE

NIGHTINGALE-LANE

BEDFORD-SQUARE

He is in a quandary. He must not speak.
Say nothing. Not a word to anyone.

Until now he has extended the prohibition to cover writing as well, for Father Viré taught him long ago in his other life that God does not split hairs, that the spirit of His commands should be considered and obeyed, not merely their literal meaning.

But surely God and Father Viré would not want him to wander the streets of London for ever? Will they pardon him if he uses those six words in his hour of need? Or will they bring down their most terrible vengeance on his head?

The smell of the river hung in the air, mingling with the acrid smoke of the kitchen fires. The three houses were set back from the thoroughfare on the west side of Arundel Street, separated from the road by an area paved with granite setts slippery with rain.

Mr Vereker’s establishment was open for business. As Savill went towards it, an apprentice laid aside his broom and rushed to hold the door for him. A young man was polishing a large set of scales that formed a centrepiece in the middle of the shop. He set aside his cloth and bowed.

‘Good day, sir. How may I serve you?’

‘I wish to see Mr Vereker.’

‘He is at breakfast, sir. He will be down in five or ten minutes. But in the meantime, perhaps—’

‘I have not leisure to wait,’ Savill said, wishing that he himself had had time for breakfast before leaving the lodgings in Crown Street that Malbourne had procured for him. ‘Pray tell him I must see him now. I come from the magistrates’ office.’ He patted his coat pocket. ‘I have a warrant.’

The assistant retreated to a curtained doorway at the back of the shop, contriving to bow as he went. The apprentice stopped sweeping and stared at Savill with interest.

There were voices above and then heavy footsteps on the stairs. A thin man with hunched shoulders came into the shop. He had a napkin in his hand and there were crumbs on his coat. His wig was askew and his chin was thick with grey stubble.

‘What’s this, sir? A magistrate?’

‘Mr Vereker? My name is Savill.’ He took out his letter of authorization and waved it. ‘As you see, Mr Ford of the Westminster Magistrates’ Office appoints me to act as his agent or deputy.’

Frowning, the old man took the letter, unfolded it and glanced at its contents. Too agitated to read it carefully, he thrust it back towards Savill. ‘But – what is this about, sir? I have not reported a robbery or—’

‘A telescope bearing your name was found at the scene of a crime, sir. It is of the utmost urgency that we establish to whom it belongs. It may lead us to the perpetrator.’

‘Dear me.’ Mr Vereker sank into a chair. ‘How very distressing. A glass of my manufacture?’