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  Matthew Kneale was born in London in 1960, the son and grandson of writers, and studied Modern History at Magdalen College, Oxford. He has written five novels, including English Passengers, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and won the Whitbread Book of the Year Award. His latest book is non-fiction, Rome: A History in Seven Sackings, which was a Daily Telegraph and Sunday Times book of the year. He lives in Rome with his wife and two children.

  ALSO BY MATTHEW KNEALE

  Fiction

  Mr Foreigner

  Inside Rose’s Kingdom

  English Passengers

  Small Crimes in an Age of Abundance

  When We Were Romans

  Non-fiction

  An Atheist’s History of Belief

  Rome: A History in Seven Sackings

  First published in Great Britain in 1992 by Sinclair Stevenson.

  This paperback edition published in 2018 by Atlantic Books,

  an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd.

  Copyright © Matthew Kneale, 1992

  The moral right of Matthew Kneale to be identified as the author

  of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the

  Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,

  stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by

  any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or

  otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright

  owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and

  incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination.

  Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or

  localities, is entirely coincidental.

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available

  from the British Library.

  Paperback ISBN: 978 1 78649 640 9

  E-book ISBN: 978 1 78649 641 6

  Printed in Great Britain

  Atlantic Books

  An Imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd

  Ormond House

  26–27 Boswell Street

  London

  WC1N 3JZ

  www.atlantic-books.co.uk

  This book is dedicated to

  HENRY MAYHEW

  Victorian journalist of genius,

  without whom it could not

  have been written.

  Author’s Note

  Readers of this book should know that, though fiction, it is no historical fantasy. Far from it. The more strange, painful or ludicrous an incident may seem, the more closely based upon actual occurrences it is likely to be.

  Note on Names

  Those interested in the history of the mid-nineteenth century may notice that some fictional figures and institutions in this novel bear close resemblance to those actually existent at that time. I found this a useful means of avoiding becoming too directly tied to the daily narrative of 1849.

  Thus the fictional character of Edwin Sleak-Cunningham may have more than a little in common with Mr Edwin Chadwick, important figure in the Victorian sanitary movement. The same closeness is true of the fictional Metropolitan Committee for Sewers to the Metropolitan Commission for Sewers; the fictional Association for the Promotion of Health in Cities to the Health of Towns Association; and the fictional National Council for Health to the actual Board of Health.

  Chapter One

  The glory of a London unobstructed by effluent. This was the vision of the future that flashed into my imagination as I stood above the sewerage outlet on the north Thames bank. Our metropolis free from noxious odours affronting the nostrils, from unsightly deposits, from the miasma cloud of gases hanging above the rooftops. I grew lightheaded at this dazzling prospect. Until I realized, surprised, that juices were stirring in my loins.

  ‘Thirteen inches deep here,’ Hayle, my assistant for the morning, called up from before the sewer where he stood ankle deep in the current effluent.

  I noted the quantity in my field book.

  ‘That enough measurements yet for you, sir?’ In his voice there was a detectable note of complaint. ‘We don’t want to overdo it, do we.’

  I knew the cause of his grumbling well enough; we had been at work since half past five in the morning, on this, Easter Monday, when most of London was in holiday mood, perhaps out for a spree at the Greenwich Fair. Not that this was an unusual state of affairs for me; the urgency of my task had required that every spare moment be put to good use, including – to my own shame – more than a few sabbaths.

  Half past five. My lack of sleep gave the morning a dreamlike quality. Still I felt no sympathy for my servant. After all, nothing had forced him to work so early except his own eagerness to earn my shillings.

  ‘Mr Hayle,’ I told him, ‘if you don’t mind, I’ll be the arbiter of when we’re finished here.’ As I peered down at my notebook I was sure I detected, from the corner of my eye, quick movement of his fingers, as if he were making some obscene gesture. Looking up, however, I saw nothing except a faint smile on his lips.

  ‘Whatever you say, sir.’

  I had never liked the fellow. More than a few times I had discerned in his manner a sarcasm, as if to work for me were beneath him. Even for a servant – a class I especially detested – there was in Hayle much ‘I know better though I will not say it clear’. He was quite a crone, having served in some lowly rank of soldiering in the war against Bonaparte, and probably it was there that he had learned to treat his masters as a snide nanny might her charge. Frequently I had discerned in him sneering. Sneering at my mere five-and-twenty years of age. Sneering that my drainage scheme for London had found no supporters in the world of engineering. Sneering at my humble background – my father had been a repairer of watches – and my having grown up into the world without Hayles of my own to direct.

  But it was he who was stood in the shit.

  ‘Try over there,’ I suggested, watching not without satisfaction as he wobbled against the current into a deeper part, and the liquid nearly overran the top of one of his boots.

  ‘Mister, mister…’ The street urchin tugged at my sleeve. He had been following us for an hour or more as we toured the sewerage outlets into the river, regularly demanding a shilling. A sadly vile creature, he resembled a torn sack poorly repaired with string; string, indeed, seemed the greater part of him, holding together what remained of his rags – shiny with grime – with bulbous knots bulging about his wrists, ankles and waist. But at least, in the furtherance of his own cause of begging, he displayed a lively perseverance quite absent in Hayle.

  ‘I’d keep an eye on him, sir,’ the servant called up. ‘He’ll have your watch.’

  ‘That’s not so, mister, never so.’ The urchin’s face was wizened into resemblance more of an old man than a boy. Framing his forehead with a kind of sad exoticism was a red ‘Wide Awake’ hat, brim long since lost, so that it resembled a filthy fez. ‘I just wanted to ask a question, didn’t I. Just a question.’

  I was curious. ‘And what was your question?’

  ‘Why’s ’e jabbing that stick into all that filth?’

  It was a not unintelligent enquiry considering the source. ‘He’s measuring the depth,’ I explained.

  His face screwed itself into a fist of incomprehension. ‘Wha’s he want to do that fer?’

  ‘So a fine new system of drainage for our city may be planned.’ I studied the lad’s face, wondering if the quickness in his eyes represented interest in my words or mere alertness for opportunities of theft. ‘We must know how much liquid pours through the sewers, you see.’
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  Hayle glanced up from his work. ‘Training him as your assistant, are you? You’d be better off leaving him to turn into the nat’ral grown murderer he’s intended for.’

  ‘You should show a little Christian faith, Hayle, rather than condemning the boy.’ I returned to the urchin. ‘What’s your name, lad?’

  ‘Jem.’

  ‘Well Jem, is our work interesting to you?’

  ‘Oh yes, certinly ’tis.’ The creature bolstered his reply with a kind of smile, half-toothed and hungry, the effect by no means reassuring.

  ‘Then you shall learn more of it.’ I glanced at Hayle, yawning extravagantly in the stream of effluent. ‘My servant here shall act as demonstrator of the methods we are using.’

  The yawn abruptly died.

  It had not been the best of mornings. Throughout I had been uneasy, agitated by a dream. Absurd, I reasoned, to be so alarmed by a mere imagining. One, moreover, whose subject I could not so much as remember, as all recollection had slipped from my grasp on the instant of gaining consciousness – at that quiet, early hour – eluding all effort at recapture. But still the nightmare clung to me, troubling my thoughts with its aftertaste; something of a smouldering panic, almost as if I had committed a crime.

  I was dimly convinced it had involved my wife.

  ‘Over there, nearer towards that boat,’ Jem ordered. Hayle obeyed his new master with visible sulkiness, petulantly splashing through the flow towards the skeleton of a rotted skiff. He planted the measuring stick sharply, as if hoping to impale unsuspecting submarine vermin.

  ‘Twelve inches.’

  The urchin peered down at him with seriousness, not at all playing a game. ‘Now do the bit with the wood.’

  With a glare at the lad, Hayle held the measuring stick just above the level of the liquid, plucked a red-painted wood chip from a sack on his back, and dropped this into the flow, regarding its speed of progress past the stick’s markings while also observing the watch in the palm of his hand. ‘Two seconds and a quarter.’

  ‘Thank you.’ I noted the figure in my field book.

  ‘Wha’s’at strapped to you?’

  The child had observed the case attached about my waist, and I opened it up to extract the handy portable sextant it contained. The instrument – which I had had little enough need of that day – was new and shone pleasantly.

  Jem’s eyes widened. ‘Gold, is it?’

  ‘Listen to him,’ called out Hayle. ‘No mystery what studyin’ ’e’s bin up to.’

  ‘The boy’s showing no more than a healthy interest in the science of the device,’ I retorted. I held the object before the creature, without actually releasing it into his hands. ‘It’s brass.’

  He touched it with his finger, leaving a small greasy smudge.

  ‘Will you remember what you’ve learned today?’ I asked him.

  ‘Oh yes, mister.’

  ‘Then you shall have a reward.’ I replaced the sextant in its case and took from my pocket a shilling. The lad stared, clutched towards it, then, when I released the coin, darted back some yards – doubtless lest I change my mind – and despatched it into some recess of his rags with the swiftness of one well alive to the danger of letting silver see the light of day an instant too long. Without a word he scampered away along the river.

  ‘Waste of good money.’ Hayle looked put out. He would have liked the shilling for himself.

  ‘Don’t be so mean-spirited,’ I told him. ‘Probably you are wearied and agitated by your exertions – you’re no longer so young, after all – and this has made you so.’ I glanced at the columns of figures in my field book; ample now. There was no sense in detaining the servant longer. ‘Pack up the things and that’ll be enough for today.’

  He trudged from the sewer to a street handpump close behind, where he began cleansing his boots and the measuring stick, subjecting them to angry belches of water.

  The charitable exercise had, of course, been partly to taunt Hayle for his sneerings, but not for that purpose alone. I had also been fired by a genuine hope that the lad would somehow be won over to the importance of sanitary change. It was a notion very much in the spirit of my passions of that time; I was caught by an urgent wish that all – however lacking in usefulness they might appear – might be won to the brave cause of drainage reform.

  It was still only quarter past eleven. I had promised my wife I would be home by one o’clock, as she had planned a small luncheon party; though I had little fondness for the guests invited, it was so unusual for her to suggest such an event nowadays that I felt I should give every encouragement. Who knew, perhaps it might help set her upon a brighter course.

  An hour and three quarters. It was quite an amount of time. I stared out across the river, pondering what useful task I might set myself; one that would not take me far from my route back to Pimlico, yet would also be attainable without the help of a servant.

  It was low tide and beyond the marker-less mire of Thames mud the river seemed little more than a ditch in the ooze. A black Thames barge crept warily along its surface, heavy brown sail flapping in the light breeze. To the west four figures were advancing along the water’s edge, silhouetted dark against the grey sheen and, idly watching, I studied their progress nearer, until they were close enough to observe in detail.

  A strange party they were. Each carried a pole that was taller than himself, with a hoe attached to the end, and had a sack strapped to his back. All were shoeless, and wore similar coats: long and greasy, with objects dangling from the breasts that seemed to be lanterns. Lanterns? My interest grew as I realized they were not passing by, but seemed to be making their way towards the very sewer entrance we had just investigated. For what possible reason? They had reached the place where Hayle had stood only a short while earlier, when the tallest chanced to glance up. Seeing me, he let out a cry.

  ‘Spy.’

  In an instant they were off, bare feet producing a faint squelching in the mud as they dashed away eastwards, towards Wapping.

  I turned to ask Hayle what manner of men they could possibly be. But he had already gone.

  Foreign sunlight shines in between the slats of the shutters, bright and hot even in the late afternoon. Through the distance of miles and two full years I see that London summer in a remembrance strangely focused. It is as if it were not me but a different man who lived through those months of fearsome discoveries. I can almost see him thus, as a soul separate from myself.

  There. Still puzzled by the sight of the four men with poles, he steps forward to cross the Strand, watching for horse dung, picking his way between the omnibuses and coal wagons that creak and crunch and raise up clouds of street dust. Joshua Jeavons dodging a brewer’s dray, eyes alert, keen, seeing no impediments to his progress that he cannot swiftly overcome. Joshua Jeavons, his young man’s beard short and pointing sharply ahead from his chin, pulling forward, as if in representation of some greater propellant within. Joshua Jeavons, now striding past a newcomer from the country who is halted by the never-still hooves and wheels before him. Joshua Jeavons, pressing on past the fellow. Joshua Jeavons possessed by strange eagerness, as one set on outpacing an electric storm.

  The task I had chosen myself had been to inspect the possible site of one of the Effluent Transformational Depositories. According to my scheme these would be established all across the metropolis at locations of low height, so the fluids would flow into them by gravitational process. The valuable elements would then be removed from the rest by sedimentary separation, and drawn out by steam engine, to be transported away in specially designed carts to rural areas, where they would be sold – at a wonderful profit – to farmers.

  The spot was in an area of small roads to the east of Covent Garden. It had seemed simple enough to locate when I sat in my study inspecting my map of the metropolis; so much so that I had not troubled to bring the bulky plan with me. Once in the district, however, the streets proved quite a maze, and for some time I wandered, unhap
pily aware of the roar of Strand traffic – echoing mischievously from the high brick façades so it was hard to say from exactly whence it came – growing fainter behind me, telling that I was venturing even further from my quarry.

  I paused to ask the way of a clean-chinned fellow selling apples, who pointed me in a direction quite unexpected. ‘Through that way, mister, though it’s a bit of a step from ’ere.’

  Onward I hurried, through narrowing lanes, urchins emerging from alley-ways, yelling and pestering until I scattered them with a raised hand. This was no place for the unwary. Even at this hour the bricks of the walls seemed to murmur faint warnings, and my glance darted ahead, alert for some over-swift movement, perhaps a flash of metal. Indeed, I pondered, such streets – stench and decay rising up from the defective sewers they were built upon – were an aching instance of the need for improving work by engineers such as myself. The effluential evil should be plucked out. Nor only here; half the metropolis required urgent attention. A giant cleansing, a renewal. That the nation might embark upon a new and sanitary road.

  I rounded the corner and, with a start, found myself in a chasm-like alley that seemed familiar. No, there was no mistaking it; the clean-chinned apple salesman had utterly misdirected me, whether by accident or from malicious design. I quietly cursed the fellow, glancing up at the shabby houses that seemed to be elbowing one another for space, as a parade of drunken giants, divided by a passage so narrow that wooden rails stretched across from window to window opposite, from which washing flapped idly in the gloom.

  I was close to the Seven Dials, fifty yards or so from the rookery of St Giles, a nest of all manner of criminality and vice. My chosen site for the Effluent Depository had, of course, been left far behind, and I reluctantly accepted that I should not attempt retracing my steps; after all, I might only become lost again.

  ‘I’ll give you a good time sir, nice gent like yourself.’ The speaker was coarse-featured, her face and neck red from exposure to the weather. She clutched at me with her grimy hands and I warned her off with a shout. Other voices murmured their entreaties.