Perry Scrimshaw's Rite of Passage (2 page)

‘
You’re right,
I doubt we would,’ said the shorter one, ‘only you knocked into one
of the housemaids when you ran away.’

He searched his memory, yes, he
had, but a bump was all. ‘Aye, I was filling my sack with apples
when I heard the yell from the house. I was ashamed. I’m no thief
by nature. I didn’t want the Sexton’s to see my face, so I ran
through the orchard to the back way. Only I was running so fast
through the gate, I didn’t see her. She was coming the other way. I
bundled her over to be sure and she was shocked some, but I checked
she was fine before I went on my way. She was a dumpling of a
woman, plenty of fat to break her fall.’

He smiled at the policemen,
hoping the story would find some chord within them, that they might
know he was a plain enough man, not given to this sort of thing.
They both glared back at him with a stony expression.

‘
Fat you
say?’

‘
Aye, she
was.’

‘
Pregnant more
like.’

‘
What?’

‘
She lost the
babe.’

His mind went white as if
punched in the head. He barely felt the cuffs land on his wrists
and he had to be led to the doorway for he couldn’t think his feet
into moving. It was only when he got into the police carriage and
the policeman took his seat opposite that he thought to ask.

‘
My boy, what
will happen to him?’

‘
Any living
relatives?’

Samuel shook his head.

‘
There are
places, homes that get a stipend from the parish, we’ll find him a
place somewhere.’

Numb, Samuel nodded. The
carriage lurched forward. He cleared the foggy glass with his
sleeve. The other policeman was there, Perry at his side, his
little hand raised, and waving him goodbye.

2

Southampton, April 1890

7 years later

With a long drag on its horn, a
great steamship eased through the Solent, black smoke belching from
its funnels and burrowing into the heavenly sky. The horn’s echo
was colossal enough to touch every brick in the town and reach the
ear of every man who called this den of a port home.

At the dry docks a ship was in
for repairs, its red funnels gleaming in the spring sunshine. The
metal stays were so straight, thick and true that an artist might
have ruled them against the sky. It was chaos around the ship;
metalworkers, carpenters, furnishers, prenticeboys and lackeys
alike swarmed around, ordering, carrying, pointing, sawing and
hammering. Nearby, there was a fenced compound used to store the
decking timber and house the exotic wood furnishings for the First
Class areas. Foolishly, a single watchman alone guarded this
goldmine.

At the back fence, in grey
bakers boy cap and jacket done up to the neck, Perry Scrimshaw
whistled a tune. At his side was an empty barrow, rusted with age.
A lackey rounded the corner, an apish lad with meat-chop sideburns,
pushing a barrow full of sand, the wheel squeaking rhythmically
with each revolution. Perry stooped and pretended to tie his laces.
The lackey passed and paid him no mind.

Perry rose to his full height
again, checked the coast was clear and tapped his elbow twice
against the fence. A wood plank appeared above and Perry negotiated
its safe passage over to his side and balanced it on his
wheelbarrow.

‘
Quick, post
over the rest,’ he hissed.

Four pieces
passed over, one at a time, three more decking planks and a rounded
mahogany piece. The last was surprisingly heavy for its size and he
had to shuffle the other pieces to even out the weight in the
barrow. Next were some smaller pieces, pine by the looks of it,
about the size of chopping boards. He turned one around in his
hand. They
were
chopping boards, destined for the ship’s kitchen he
supposed.

‘
That’ll do,’ a
voice came from the other side.

‘
Come on then,
quick, it’s still clear.’

There was a scramble on the
other side, fingers appeared on top of the fence followed by a
grunt and then the gritted face of Peter appeared. He was the
second eldest in Mrs Donnegan’s pack of boys, behind Perry, and was
a little taller. Puffing his cheeks, Peter hauled one leg over and
sat awkwardly on the fence.

Perry heard the squeak of the
barrow ape returning.

‘
Quick Peter!
Someone’s coming, haul Rodney up.’

Peter reached down and heaved
up a second boy, all red hair and freckles. He scrambled up and
over like a monkey and landed deftly on the ground. Rodney was a
little scrap of a lad, just eleven and Perry thought he had the
makings of a sweep, a prolific thief or perhaps both. Peter landed
with a thud, just as the lackey returned, his barrow now
yellow-dusted and empty. The lackey watched the three of them as he
passed, glanced at the barrow of wood, but said nothing.

‘
He saw us,’
Peter muttered, ‘he knows.’

‘
No way,’
Rodney said his high-pitched voice, ‘long as he didn’t see us
climbing in or out we’re fine.’

‘
It doesn’t
matter,’ Perry said, ‘I say we still try and sell it back to them
now.’

‘
Too risky,’
Peter shook his head, ‘the lackey saw us. And even if he didn’t,
what if they recognise the wood as theirs? I say we take it to that
carpenter on Bugle Street.’

Peter and Rodney looked to
Perry for the final decision. He knew they would. He took off his
cap and ran his hand through his sandy locks, making a show of
giving it some thought.

‘
No,’ he
replaced his cap, the matter closed. ‘That tight-fist always gives
us a lousy price and we’ve got too much. We can’t wheel this lot
all the way over there, it’s too far,’ Perry grabbed the handles of
the wheelbarrow.

‘
I’ll try my
luck. Wait here.’

Peter folded his arms, clearly
not happy. Rodney, for his part simply stuffed his hands in his
pockets and shrugged.

Five minutes later, Perry
returned empty-handed in a cloud of dejection.

‘
I knew it,’
Peter seethed, ‘you never bloody listen.’

‘
I’m sorry,’
Perry said, ‘it was that mahogany tabletop – it was too
recognisable.’

Peter turned on Rodney, ‘I told
you not to pick that.’

Rodney scrunched up his nose.
Perry could never tell if he was about to shrug or cry.

‘
It’s not his
fault, the mahogany was worth the most, it was a good choice. If
you want to blame anyone, you should blame me.’

‘
Oh I do,’
Peter jammed his finger into Perry’s chest, ‘you may be the eldest
but you ain’t the smartest. Not by a long stretch. Next time, we’ll
do it on my say so and we’ll go home with some coin in each of our
pockets instead of bugger all!’

Perry lowered his gaze. Peter
could have his tantrum.

‘
Fair
enough.’

The three boys walked back
waterside, passing the old bathing house and then onto Simnel
Street. Mrs Donnegan’s was a strange abode, usually bedecked with a
brace of yellow-beaked herring gulls on its spattered roof. Noisy
buggers, they were.

Barely inside the threshold and
the yelps and whoops coming from the kitchen were enough to make
you want to run back out. The littleuns were home. The hallway’s
huge wardrobe doors were open and clothes leaked from drawers and
gathered in cloth puddles on the floor.

‘
What a mess.’
Perry picked a shirt from the floor - maybe his, maybe not, he
could hardly tell anymore - and tossed it back into the
wardrobe.

‘
I’ll make us a
brew boys.’

‘
Thanks Perry,’
Rodney said, hopping on one foot as he tried to prise off a
shoe.

Peter barged past him, bumping
shoulders.

Fine, Perry thought, have your
mood. They had to get along; he knew it and Peter did too. Six boys
called this place home. All slept in the front room on the ground
floor; their mattresses positioned strategically to allow a narrow
square walkway around the room. The tight space encouraged
infighting amongst the boys as much as it stifled it. Arguments
were frequent but short-lived and it need be no different on this
occasion. A cuppa and a night’s rest and Peter would be his friend
again come morning, he’d soon see to that.

He went into the kitchen and
immediately wished he hadn’t: it was bedlam. The much-prized tin
bath was out, full of steaming grey water and in it cowered the
youngest, Dicken. Sat on a stool, Mrs Donnegan scrubbed the boy’s
back vigorously with a brush. The two other littleuns were naked,
slipping and sliding around the kitchen while swordfighting with
twisted towels.

‘
En
guarde!
’

‘
Yield!’

‘
Evening boys,’
Perry spotted the kettle on the kitchen table. The scrubbing
stopped.

‘
And where the
devil have you lot been? The littleuns have been back from school
for hours!’

He gave Mrs D
his most pacifying smile. She looked fraught, more so than usual.
Her filthy grey ringlets sprouted miserably from her bonnet,
half-moon spectacles perched on the bridge of her sharp nose –
normally so formidable and severe – made her look naught but old
and haggard. He had to remember that she
was
old; he’d asked her years once
and got his ears boxed for his trouble.

‘
Trying to get
another pretniceship wasn’t I? No one will take me on.’

She pointed the scrubbing brush
at him. ‘They probably heard what a mess you’d made of your last
two. Your name’s mud by now.’

She returned to scrubbing
Dicken skin red raw, the lad was clearly in pain but they all knew
better than to complain. Perry was glad he no longer had to endure
one of her ‘thorough’ baths.

‘
We supped
without you three,’ she said and cuffed Dicken around the head,
‘come on child don’t just stand there like a spare spud,’ she
handed Dicken a sponge, ‘wash behind your ears while I
scrub!’

Perry filled the kettle and put
it on the stove.

‘
Ow, ow,
ow!’

One of the swordfighters hopped
up and down.

‘
Has our brave
knight of the realm stubbed his toe?’ Perry said.

‘
For Christ’s
sake child, how many times must I tell you?’ Mrs Donnegan roared,
taking Perry aback. He couldn’t remember seeing her in such a foul
mood. Both the swordfighters looked like they might cry, Perry
stepped across and put a hand on each of their
shoulders,

‘
Come on boys,
time for bed now. Get into your jimjams.’ He coaxed them out of the
kitchen and into the bedroom. Rodney and Peter were sat with their
backs to the wall poring over a tattered Penny Dreadful.

‘
Stick some
clothes on boys, blinkin’ hell,’ said Peter.

‘
Intimidated by
their size are ya?’ Perry couldn’t resist. Peter’s face flushed red
and he clenched his fists.

‘
Tea’s on its
way,’ Perry soothed.

Mrs Donnegan was towelling
Dicken, rubbing the poor lad’s head like she was trying to scour
the bark off a tree.

‘
There,’ she
said, satisfied.

Dicken’s ears were as bright as
candles.

She turned to Perry with a
weathered look, ‘Can you see them all to bed tonight son? My head’s
splitting like an axe through a log.’

So that’s what was eating her.
‘No problem.’

‘
There’s barely
cracker in, must go to the market tomorrow, help yourself to
whatever you can find.’

‘
Will do.’
Perry mussed up Dicken’s damp hair, transforming his black mop into
a fluffy matchstick. ‘Come on. Say goodnight.’

‘
Night night,’
the boy said meekly, but Mrs D was already heading out of the
kitchen, her hands in front of her like a blind person as if
worried she might fall. He waited, listening to the creak of the
stairs and the sigh of her bedsprings. Was this what happened when
you got old?

Perry put the three littleuns
to bed, snuffing out the candles on the window ledge. He busied
himself, taking the tub water out to wash down the privy. He
blotted the kitchen floor with tea towels and poured out more tea.
It was too early to sleep for the three eldest so they sat around
the kitchen table, trading stories while playing a hand of Whist.
Perry, contriving to finish last, underplayed his hand as
convincingly as he could but still ended up beating Rodney.

Rodney was next to bed. Perry
and Peter stayed up a while longer playing a subdued game of
Beggar-My-Neighbour in which Peter thoroughly deserved his win. By
then, they were both yawning and retired to bed themselves,
tiptoeing to their mattresses amongst the soft sputter of
sleep.

‘
Night Peter,’
he whispered.

A long silence.

‘
Night
Perry.’

Friends again. Perry smiled, he
hadn’t even needed to wait for morning.

Peter was a light sleeper and
Perry always found it hard to tell if he was out for the count.
After half an hour, Peter’s breath lengthened and as quietly as he
could, Perry slipped out of bed and tiptoed to the kitchen.
Moonlight bathed it in an eerie jellyfish light; he didn’t even
need to light a candle. He reached into his pocket and carefully
lifted out a knotted handkerchief, untied it and smiled at the
coins glinting within. They clinked softly in his palm as he
scooped them out and laid them on the table. He scooped Mrs D’s
wooden stool up and placed it at the foot of the dresser. He got on
and reached to the top and grasped the old cookie tin. He gathered
it to his chest and put his fingers to the lid.