Elegy for Eddie (6 page)

“And what about the men on the gantry? Is that a new procedure?”

Mills shook his head. “No, they’ve always been there.”

“Who was there on the day Eddie died?”

“Oh, I can’t give you that information, Miss Dobbs. They’ve both been thoroughly questioned regarding their observations, and no fault has been attributed to their actions.”

“Couldn’t they have stopped the belt if it was going out of control? Couldn’t the man who sounded the horn have been alerted?”

“All new procedures, Miss. We can’t bring back Mr. Pettit, but we can make sure no one suffers in the same way again. Perhaps that will comfort his mother a little.” He looked at his watch. “Now, if you don’t mind, Miss Dobbs, I really must be getting on. This is a place of work, after all.” Mills paused again. “May I suggest you contact the firm’s solicitors for further information? And please let Mrs. Pettit know that we think of her, here at Bookhams. Eddie might not have been an employee, but he was well liked around the factory, and we’re very sorry that he was caught up in the accident. Terrible thing, it was. Terrible.”

Maisie thanked the man, and had turned to leave when she stopped, and faced him again. “Oh, Mr. Mills, just one more thing, if you don’t mind. In one of the newspapers a manager was quoted as saying that Eddie wouldn’t have felt a thing when the roll of paper fell onto him, given that he was backward. Do you know who might have made that statement?”

“Well, first off, that wasn’t reported in an Otterburn paper—not that you asked, but I wanted to make that clear. Secondly, I know the report you’re talking about because I read it myself, and we looked into it. I can tell you it wasn’t a manager here at Bookhams. We reckon the newspaperman went down to the pub—on the corner, at the end of the road—and talked to the blokes who work on the floor. One of them must’ve made the remark, or whatever was said was twisted. You know what these reporters are like; anything to add a bit of excitement.”

“But, why would anyone say such a thing, even a reporter embellishing a story? I thought Eddie was well liked here.”

“And so he was, but well liked doesn’t mean liked by all, does it?”

“Did Eddie have enemies?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say he had enemies, but you always get people who take advantage of someone like Eddie being around, and they push a joke a bit too far. They make themselves seem bigger by showing up the weaker ones.”

“And who would you say is like that at Bookhams?”

Mills shook his head. “I couldn’t say, Miss Dobbs. I’m management. The men keep themselves to themselves. They don’t include me in anything not directly connected to their work.”

“Does that have anything to do with the fact that there’s no union activity here?”

“I can’t talk about company policy regarding organized labor, as I am sure you know. Like I said when you first arrived, I think you should be talking to Bookhams’ legal counsel.”

“And if I wanted to do just that, to whom should I speak?”

“Sanders and Herrold, at Lincoln’s Inn. Mr. York Herrold.”

“York Herrold? That sounds like a newspaper, not a man,” said Maisie. “No wonder he’s the company’s legal counsel.”

Mills smiled. “I’m told he was named after where he was born. York. In any case, he’s very sharp, but approachable. Not like some of them. He can answer all the questions that I can’t—or shouldn’t have.” A horn sounded on the factory floor again. “Now, if that’s all, Miss Dobbs.”

“Yes. Thank you for your time. I am sure the fact that I have been here to see you will give Mrs. Pettit a little peace of mind.”

“Indeed. Please give her our kindest regards.”

Maisie had just reached the door at the bottom of the stairs when footsteps behind her on the concrete caused her to look back. “Miss Marchant—don’t worry, I’ll close the door behind me.”

“No, that’s all right,” said the secretary. “I mean, well, I’ll see to it, but that’s not why I ran after you.”

“Did I leave something?” asked Maisie.

The young woman shook her head. “No. I overheard part of your conversation with Mr. Mills and I wanted to talk to you.” She paused, looking back up the staircase before bringing her attention back to Maisie. “I liked Eddie, Miss Dobbs. He was a good man—more like a boy, really. He reminded me of my brother; he was like that too, you know, a bit slow. He was older than me and died a few years ago, when he was thirty-six. Very gentle person, he was, and I have to tell you, I do miss him. Always cheerful, and a sweet man, just like Eddie Pettit.”

Maisie smiled and put her hand on Miss Marchant’s arm, for she could see a welter of emotion rising in the woman’s eyes. “I’m so sorry you’ve lost your brother, Miss Marchant. I knew Eddie when I was a child. Everybody I know held him dear, and he tried so hard to be useful, to be part of society. It’s fortunate that both men had families who cared for them; otherwise they might have been sent away from an early age.”

“That’s what my mum always said. ‘No one’s taking my boy away to sit and rot in an asylum.’ Our Brian could read and write, you know, and it was all down to my mum. She wouldn’t give up on him.” She cleared her throat and pulled at the hem of her cardigan. “Anyway, what I wanted to tell you is that Eddie had been pushed around a bit by some of the men. A new bloke started a few months ago, name of Jimmy Merton, and he’s what you might call a hard nut. I don’t know why people listen to him, but they do. He started nipping at Eddie—at first he acted like it was a game, you know, and that it was just a bit of harmless joshing. Then he seemed to get a little crew around him. It was surprising, really, because some of the other men—not those in Jimmy’s crowd—would talk about organizing at Bookhams, and they asked people from the union to come down. But Jimmy would say his piece against it and get stroppy with anyone who had a different opinion. He would go on about how the unions were only out for themselves and that he was against it—he could get nasty with it, too. I was in the pub after work with some of the women here—sitting in the corner for a quick drink before we went home on a Saturday—and I heard them talking.” The woman sighed and shook her head, pressing her lips together for a moment as if to quell her emotions. “And I saw him having goes at Eddie—Ed sometimes dropped in to see the landlord, who’d have a bit of work for him. That Jimmy always got up to his mischief when the men who would stand by Eddie weren’t there to see it happening.”

“And you said his name was Jimmy Merton?” asked Maisie.

“Yes. Bit of a boxer on the side, he is. Every night he’s in a boxing gymnasium upstairs at one of the pubs over on the Old Kent Road; that’s where they all go to throw a few punches. I can’t remember what it’s called, though.”

The sound of a door slamming came from the direction of the offices above, and Marchant looked up the stairs. “I’d better get back to work. I just wanted to let you know that Eddie’d had trouble with that Merton and some of his mates, and I reckon it made him miserable. He wasn’t looking himself lately.”

Maisie reached out and touched the woman’s arm again. “Miss Marchant—do you think Eddie’s death was an accident?”

She sighed. “I really don’t know. If I said, ‘Yes, I do,’ I’d go home feeling as if I’d told a lie. But if I said I thought it was deliberate, I think I’d feel the same.” She sighed. “The only thing I know is that it wasn’t right. None of it. I must go now, or Mr. Mills will start docking my pay.”

The woman ran up the stairs, patting her hair as she went. Maisie stood for a moment, then left the building, pulling the door towards her until she heard the loud click that signaled it was closed completely. She retraced her steps until she came to the pub on the corner. It was called The Lighterman, the sign above depicting two men unloading a Thames barge. Billy could pay a visit to the pub; he might find out a thing or two there, thought Maisie. A few shillings invested in buying a drink for some of the men from the paper factory could prove to be a worthy investment.

T
hat Maud Pettit and Jennie had been friends together at the Union Workhouse, along with Jennie’s brother, Wilf, was well known. And that the three had worked hard—two or three jobs each, with hardly any respite—was testament to their resolve never to return to the dank place where they had met. The workhouse was not as full of the dispossessed as it had once been, but it was rumored that poverty caused by the depression had caused an increase in the number of men, women, and children living within the redbrick Victorian buildings. The men were not idlers, and the women had been as busy as they could, but the shifting sands of fortune had pulled any semblance of stability from under their feet and they had fallen on times harder than they could have imagined—thus the workhouse had once again become the shelter of last resort. Maisie shuddered when she thought about it, and considered the conditions that must have existed when Maudie was a girl—no wonder she had worked so very hard to give her son something better.

“Jennie, I wonder if I could bother you and Maud again?” Maisie smiled as Jennie answered the door to the house on Cornwall Road.

Jennie’s face was drawn in a way that might have seemed pinched had she not smiled readily when she opened the door. Maisie remembered being told, when she was a girl, that Jennie had once tried to starve herself to death, such had been her despair in the workhouse. Her body had never recovered, and despite reclaiming the will to live, her frame always seemed to need a bit more flesh on the bones.

“We’re not doing anything else important today, though I should warn you that Maud is a bit tired. Come on, she’s in the kitchen. I’ve just put the kettle on to boil.”

“Thank you, Jennie.”

For the second time in as many days, Maisie walked back to the kitchen, where Maud was sitting in a low chair alongside the stove; the fire door had been left open and a blanket drawn around her shoulders, despite the warmth outside. She looked up as Maisie entered, and made as if to stand.

“Afternoon, Maisie girl, I didn’t expect—”

“No, don’t move on my account, Maudie, you just stay where you are. I’ll draw up a chair.”

Maisie pulled one of the wooden kitchen chairs closer and sat alongside Maud. She thought the chairs had once seen service in church, for at the back of each was a holder for a Bible or hymnbook. Jennie went through the motions of making tea as Maisie began to speak again.

“Maud, I just thought I’d drop in to see how you are.”

“Not much of a change from yesterday, or the day before. The house is so quiet without him. Not that he made a lot of noise, even as a little boy. But you just know when someone’s there, don’t you? You can feel them in the house, as if—oh, I don’t know, I’m an old woman rambling—but it’s as if your heart knows that their heart is beating somewhere, and everything’s all right. I know if Jennie’s here the minute I wake up in the morning, or whether she’s gone down to the dairy or the shop.”

Maisie took Maud’s hand. “Maud, I want to ask your permission, if I may. I want to go down to the Co-op, to talk to the undertaker before Eddie’s laid to rest.”

Maud Pettit turned to look at Maisie. “You want to see Eddie, don’t you?”

“Yes . . . yes, I do. If that’s all right with you.”

The woman looked at Jennie, who was closing the stove’s dampers to cool the hot plate. Jennie looked away; it was Maud’s decision.

“Yes, you can go to him. Jennie will write a note for you to give to Mr. Gibson, the undertaker, just so he knows who you are.”

“Thank you.”

Maud turned back again and reached out to Maisie. “It’s me that should be thanking you, after all. You can make sure he’s passed over, that he’s not lingering here in this world, frightened to go to the next.” The woman took a deep breath as if the air in the room were evaporating. “They always said that about you, Maisie. That you and your mother could see things that others couldn’t.”

Maisie felt a shiver go through her. “Oh, Maudie, that was just talk, and I’m sure it started because I was an only child, and because my mum was so ill. She was in great pain at the end. Dad spent every penny we had, and a lot we didn’t, for the doctors, and for special medicine to help her bear the worst of it. They said the powders would make her see things that weren’t there, and they were right about that. I was on my own with her a lot at the time—Dad was working all hours to make extra—so I suppose people thought all sorts of things about us. But I’ll say a prayer for Eddie—that’s what’s important.”

T
he Co-op chapel of rest was housed in separate premises at the back of the main shop. She explained the purpose of her visit to Mr. Gibson, and watched as he perused the letter penned in Jennie’s shaky hand.

Gibson, far from looking like an undertaker, had the build of a well-fed docker. His jacket and trousers—both made of black cloth, but not matching to an extent that the word
suit
could be used to describe the ensemble—appeared to strain at the seams. He was rosy-cheeked and seemed a merry soul, which Maisie thought commendable. She had met many men in his position, and had always thought they resembled Dickens’ Uriah Heep.

“Come this way. We haven’t put the lid on yet. There’s always the chance that the next of kin might want a last-minute look.” Gibson sighed. “And I should tell you, Miss Dobbs, that the body is covered in a sheet from the neck down. His mother gave us a nice pair of trousers and a clean shirt for him, but with his injuries, it wasn’t as if we could dress him. Funny, though, his head looks as if nothing happened to him. It was his body that took the brunt.” He cleared his throat. “Not that I would imagine a nice woman like yourself taking liberties, but I would ask that you don’t pull down the sheets covering his remains.”

Maisie nodded and was led into a room with several empty and two sealed coffins with flower wreaths on top. There was one open coffin containing a body.

“He was in a cold locker until this morning, so there’s more of a blueness around his face than you might usually see, though they’re never exactly flushed, the dead. Would you like me to stay here, Miss Dobbs?”

“No, that’s all right.”

“Right you are. Some of the ladies don’t like to be alone with them, you know.”