11
AFTER LEAVING CHARLOTTE, Pitt walked on down the street towards the sugar factory. The heavy, sickly smell caught in his nose and throat, but not even the thought of standing the night watch there could dull the happiness that welled up inside him at having seen her, even for a short time. She was so exactly as his memory had re-created her in the long nights alone: the warmth of her, the line of her cheek, her lips, above all her eyes as she looked back at him.
He turned in at the factory gates, the huge building towering over him, the men jostling at his sides. All he wished to know was if they needed him that night. He called by to check most mornings.
“Yeah,” the senior watchman said cheerfully. He looked tired today, his blue eyes faded and all but hidden by the folds of his skin.
“Right,” Pitt replied regretfully. He would prefer a night’s sleep. “How is your wife?”
The night watchman shook his head. “Poorly,” he said with an attempt at a smile.
“I’m sorry.” Pitt meant it. He always asked, and the answer varied from day to day, but she was failing and they both knew it. He stayed and talked a few moments longer. Wally was lonely and he always wanted a listening ear to share his anxieties.
Afterwards, Pitt hurried back towards Saul’s workshop, now a trifle late. He was late from his first errand too, because a wagonload of barrels had spilled out onto the street, and he stopped and helped the carter put them back. The little bubble of peace inside him made him impervious to the gray streets, the anger and the fear that set nerves on edge.
He went back to Heneagle Street early. Isaac was not home yet and Leah was busy in the kitchen.
“That you, Thomas?” she called as she heard his footsteps at the bottom of the stairs.
He could smell cooking, sharp, sweet herbs. He was more accustomed to them now and had grown to like them.
“Yes,” he answered. “How are you?”
She never responded directly. “Are you hungry? You should eat more … and not keep all those late hours at that factory. It’s not good for you.”
He smiled. “Yes, I am hungry, and I’ve got to do the early watch tonight.”
“Then come and eat!”
He went upstairs first to wash his face and hands, and found the clean laundry she had laid on the chest for him. He picked up the shirt on top, and saw that she had turned the cuffs for him, placing the worn edges to the inside.
A wave of homesickness washed over him so overwhelmingly that for a moment he was almost unaware of the room around him. It was a simple domestic kindness, the sort of thing Charlotte did. He had seen her spend all evening mending, turning collars or cuffs, needle clicking against her thimble, light flashing silver on it as it wove in and out in tiny stitches.
Then he was furious for so many women like Leah Karansky, who were never asked whether they wanted revolution or what price they would pay for someone else’s idea of social justice or reform. Perhaps all they wanted was their family safe at home at night, and enough food to put something on the table fit to eat.
He looked at Leah’s stitches on his cuff and knew how long it had taken her to do. He must thank her, let her know he was mindful of the kindness, perhaps talk to her about something interesting as he did. Or better, listen to her with all his attention while she talked.
After supper, still smiling at Leah’s stories, he walked into the sugar factory yard just as Wally arrived.
“Ah, you again!” Wally said cheerfully. “Wot d’yer do with all yer money, eh? Silk all day and sugar all night. I tell yer, somebody’s ’avin’ a soft life on yer labor, fer certain.”
“Me, one day,” Pitt said with a wink.
Wally laughed. “ ’Ere, I ’eard a good story about a candle maker an’ an old woman.” And without waiting he proceeded to tell it with relish.
An hour later Pitt made his first round of his area of patrol, and Wally went in the opposite direction, still chuckling to himself. There was still a skeleton staff working. The boilers never went out, and he checked in each room, climbing the narrow stairs past every floor. The rooms were small, the ceilings low to cram in as many storeys as possible. The windows were tiny; from outside in the daylight the building looked almost blind. Now, of course, it was lit by lamps, carefully guarded because the syrup was highly flammable.
Each room he passed was filled with vats, casks, retorts and huge dish-shaped boilers and pans several feet wide. The few men still working glanced around, and he spoke a few words to them and continued on. The smell of raw, almost rotting sweetness was everywhere. He felt as if he never got it out of his clothes and hair.
Half an hour later he reported back down to Wally. They boiled a kettle on the brazier in the open yard and sat on old hogshead barrels in which the raw sugar came from the West Indies, and sipped the tea until it was cool enough to drink. They swapped stories and jokes; some of them were very long and only mildly funny, but it was the companionship that mattered.
Once or twice there was movement in the shadows. The first time, Wally went to investigate and returned to say he thought it had been a cat. The second time, Pitt went, and found one of the boiler men asleep behind a pile of casks. His slight stirring had upset one of the casks and sent it rolling across the cobbles.
They each completed another round, and another.
Once, Pitt saw a man leaving whom he did not recognize. He seemed older than most of the workers, but then life in Spitalfields aged people. It was the cast of his features which caught Pitt’s attention: strong, fine-boned, dark complexioned. He kept his eyes averted, merely raising one hand in a quick salute, and light flashed for an instant on a dark-stoned ring. There was a sense of intelligence in him that remained in the memory even as Pitt returned to the yard and found Wally boiling the kettle again.
“Do many men leave shift at this time?” Pitt asked.
