Burning Bright (23 page)

If he thought his demand would humiliate the other man, however, he had miscalculated; Dick Butterfield pulled the book to him and read reasonably fluidly, and even with feeling that he may not have actually felt, the following:

When Dick Butterfield finished reading, John Roberts set a bottle of ink on the table and held out a pen. “Will you sign, sir?”

To Maggie's astonishment, Dick Butterfield took the pen, uncorked the ink, dipped it in, and began to sign at the bottom of the list of signatures. “Pa, what you doing?” she hissed. She hated the hectoring attitude of John Roberts and her employer, Mr. Beaufoy, indeed of all of the men who'd spoken at the meeting, and had assumed her father would as well.

Dick Butterfield paused. “What d'you mean? What's wrong with signing? I happen to agree—though them words is a bit fancy for my taste.”

“But you just said you didn't think the Frenchies were a threat!”

“This an't about the Frenchies—it's about us. I support old King George—I done all right by him.” He applied pen to paper again. In the silence, the entire pub concentrated on its scratching across the page. When he finished, Dick Butterfield looked around and feigned surprise at the attention. He turned to John Roberts. “Anything else you want?”

“Write down where you live as well.”

“It's no. 6 Bastille Row.” Dick Butterfield chuckled. “But p'raps York Place'd be better for such a document, eh?” He wrote it next to his name. “There. No need to visit, then, eh?”

Now Maggie recalled several crates of port that had appeared from nowhere a few days earlier and were hidden under her parents' bed, and smiled: Dick Butterfield had signed so readily because he didn't want these men paying any visits to Bastille Row.

Once he had captured Dick Butterfield's details, John Roberts slid the open book across to Thomas Kellaway. “Now you.”

Thomas Kellaway gazed down at the page, with its carefully composed declaration—its rhetoric-laden, almost incomprehensi-ble wording decided on at an earlier, smaller meeting, its messengers with their books fanning out across Lambeth's pubs and markets even before the Cumberland Gardens meeting was over—and its ragtag signatures, some confident, others wavering, along with several Xs with names and addresses scrawled after them in John Roberts's hand. It was all too complicated for him. “I don't understand—why must I sign this?”

John Roberts leaned over and rapped his knuckles on the table next to the ledger. “You're signing in support of the King! You're saying you want him to be your King, and you'll fight those who want to get rid of him.” He peered at the chairmaker's puzzled face. “What, are you a fool, sir? Do you not call the King your King?”

Thomas Kellaway was not a fool, but words worried him. He had always lived by a policy of signing as few documents as possi-ble, and those only for business. He did not even sign the letters Maisie wrote to Sam, and discouraged her from writing anything about him. This way, he thought, there was little trace of him in the world, apart from his chairs, and he would not be misunderstood. This document before him, he felt with a clarity that surprised him, was open to misunderstanding. “I am not sure the King be in danger,” he said. “There be no French here, do there?”

John Roberts narrowed his eyes. “You would be surprised at what an ill-informed Englishman is capable of.”

“And what d'you mean by publications?” Thomas Kellaway continued without appearing to have heard John Roberts. “I don't know anything about publications.”

John Roberts looked around. The goodwill that Dick Butterfield's signature had garnered with the rest of the pub was rapidly diminishing with every ponderous word Thomas Kellaway uttered. “I haven't time for this,” he hissed. “There are plenty of others here waiting to sign. Where do you live, sir?” He flipped to another page and waited with pen poised to note down the address. “Someone will visit you later to explain.”

“No. 12 Hercules Buildings,” Thomas Kellaway replied.

John Roberts stiffened. “You live at Hercules Buildings?”

Thomas Kellaway nodded. Jem felt a knot tighten in his stomach.

“Do you know a William Blake, who is a printer in that street?”

Jem, Maggie, and Dick Butterfield caught on at the same time, partly thanks to Thomas Kellaway's mention of publications. Maggie kicked Thomas Kellaway's stool and frowned at him, while Dick Butterfield feigned a coughing fit.

Unfortunately, Thomas Kellaway could be a bit of a terrier when it came to making a point. “Yes, I know Mr. Blake. He's our neighbor.” And, because he did not care for the unfriendly look on John Roberts's face, he decided to make his feelings clear. “He be a good man—he helped out my daughter a month or two back.”

“Did he, now?” John Roberts smiled and slammed shut the book. “Well, we were planning to pay a visit to Mr. Blake this evening, and can call on you as well. Good day to you.” He scooped up the quill and ink bottle and went on to the next table. As he made his way around the pub collecting signatures—Jem noticed that no one other than his father refused to sign—John Roberts glanced over now and then at Thomas Kellaway with the same sneer. It made Jem's stomach turn over. “Let's go, Pa,” he said in a low voice.

“Let me just finish my beer.” Thomas Kellaway was not going to be rushed by anyone, not when he had half a pint left to finish, even if the beer was watery. He sat squarely on his stool, hands resting on the table on each side of his mug, his eyes on its contents, his mind on Mr. Blake. He was wondering if he had got him into trouble. Though he did not know him well the way his children seemed to, he was sure Mr. Blake was a good man.

“What should we do?” Jem said in a low voice to Maggie. He too was thinking about Mr. Blake.

“Leave it be,” Dick Butterfield butted in. “Blake'll probably sign it,” he added, glancing sideways at Thomas Kellaway. “Like most people.”

“We'll warn him,” Maggie declared, ignoring her father. “That's what we'll do.”

“Mr. Blake is working, my dears,” Mrs. Blake said. “He can't be disturbed.”

“Oh, but it's important, ma'am!” Maggie cried, in her impatience darting to one side as if to get around her. But Mrs. Blake comfortably blocked the doorway, and did not move.

“He is in the middle of making one of his plates, and he likes to do that all in one sitting,” Mrs. Blake explained. “So we mustn't stop him.”

“I'm afraid it be important, ma'am,” Jem said.

“Then you may tell me, and I'll pass it on to Mr. Blake.”

Jem looked around, for once wishing there were a deadening fog about that would hide them from curious passersby. Since their earlier encounter with John Roberts, he'd felt as if there were eyes on them everywhere, watching them as they walked up the road. He expected any moment that Miss Pelham's yellow curtains would twitch. As it was, a man driving past on a cart loaded with bricks glanced at the little group in the doorway, his gaze seeming to linger.

“Can we come in, ma'am? We'll tell you inside.”

Mrs. Blake studied his serious face, then stood aside and let them pass, shutting the door behind them without looking around, as others might. She put her finger to her lips and led them down the passage, past the front room with the printing press, past the closed door of Mr. Blake's workroom and down the stairs to the basement kitchen. Jem and Maggie were already familiar with the room, for they had sat there with Maisie to warm her up after her encounter with John Astley. It was dark and smelled of cabbage and coal, with only a bit of light coming in from the front window, but the fire was lit and it was warm.

Mrs. Blake gestured for them to sit at the table; Jem noted that the chairs were his father's Windsors. “Now, what is it, my dears?” she asked, leaning against the sideboard.

“We heard something in the pub,” Maggie said. “You're to have a visit tonight.” She described the meeting at Cumberland Gardens and their encounter with John Roberts, leaving out that her father had signed the declaration.

A deep line appeared between Mrs. Blake's eyebrows. “Was this meeting run by the Association for the Preservation of Liberty and Property Against Republicans and Levellers?” She rattled off the name as if she were very familiar with it.

“They was mentioned,” Maggie answered, “though they just called the local branch the Lambeth Association.”

Mrs. Blake sighed. “We'd best go up and tell Mr. Blake, then. You were right to come.” She wiped her hands on her apron as if she had just been washing something, though her hands were dry.

Mr. Blake's workroom was very tidy, with books and papers in various stacks on one table, and Mr. Blake at another table by the room's back window. He was hunched over a metal plate the size of his hand, and did not look up immediately when they came in, but continued dabbing a brush in a line from right to left across the surface of the plate. While Maggie went to the fire to warm herself, Jem stepped up and watched him at work. It took him a minute to make out that Mr. Blake was writing words by painting them with the brush onto the plate. “You're writing backwards, an't you, sir?” Jem blurted out, though he knew he shouldn't interrupt.

Mr. Blake did not answer until he had reached the end of the line. Then he looked up. “That I am, my lad, that I am.”

“Why?”

“I'm writing with a solution that will remain on the plate when the rest gets eaten away by acid. Then when I print them the words will be going forwards, not backwards.”

“Opposite to what they are now.”

“Yes, my boy.”

“Mr. Blake, I'm sorry to trouble you,” his wife interrupted, “but Jem and Maggie have told me something you ought to hear.” Mrs. Blake was wringing her hands now, whether from what Jem and Maggie had told her or because she felt she was disturbing her husband, Jem was not sure.

“It's all right, Kate. While I've stopped, could you get me some more turps? There's some next door. And a glass of water, if you don't mind.”

“Of course, Mr. Blake.” Mrs. Blake stepped out of the room.

“How did you learn to write backwards like that?” Jem asked. “With a mirror?”

Mr. Blake glanced down at the plate. “Practice, my boy, practice. It's easy once you've done it enough. Everything engravers do gets printed opposite. The engraver has to be able to see it both ways.”

“From the middle of the river.”

“That's it. Now, what did you want to tell me?”

Jem repeated what Maggie had said down in the kitchen. “We thought we should warn you that they be coming to see you tonight,” he finished. “Mr. Roberts weren't nice about it,” Jem added, when Mr. Blake did not seem to react to the news. “We thought they might give you trouble.”

“Thank you for that, my children,” Mr. Blake replied. “I am not surprised by any of this. I knew it would come.”

He was not responding at all the way Maggie had expected him to. She'd thought he would jump up and do something—pack a bag and leave the house, or hide all of the books and pamphlets and things he'd printed, or barricade the front windows and door. Instead he simply smiled at them, then dipped his brush into a dish of something resembling glue, and began to write more backwards words across the metal plate. Maggie wanted to kick his chair and shout, “Listen to us! You may be in danger!” But she didn't dare.

Mrs. Blake came back in with a bottle of turps and a glass of water, which she set down by her husband. “They told you about the Association coming tonight, did they?” She at least seemed anxious about what Jem and Maggie had told them.

“They did, my dear.”

“Mr. Blake, why do they want to visit you specially?” Jem asked.

Mr. Blake made a little face and, setting down his brush, twisted around in his chair to face them fully. “Tell me, Jem, what do you think I write about?”

Jem hesitated.

“Children,” Maggie offered.

Mr. Blake nodded. “Yes, my girl—children, and the helpless, and the poor. Children lost and cold and hungry. The government does not like to be told it is not looking after its people. They think I am suggesting revolution, as there has been in France.”

“Are you?” Jem asked.

Mr. Blake waggled his head in a movement that could have meant yes or no.

“Pa says that the Frenchies have gone bad, with all that killing of innocent people,” Maggie said.

“That is not surprising. Doesn't blood flow before judgment? Only look to the Bible for instances of it. Look at the Book of Revelation for blood flowing in the streets. This Association that intends to come tonight, though, wants to stop anyone who questions those in power. But power unchecked leads to moral tyranny.”

Jem and Maggie were silent, trying to follow his words.

“So you see, my children, that is why I must continue making my songs and not run from those who would have me silenced. And so that is what I am doing.” He turned his chair back around so that he faced the desk, and picked up his brush once more.

“What is that you're working on?” Jem asked.

“Is it another song they won't like?” Maggie added.

Mr. Blake looked back and forth between their eager faces and smiled. Setting down his brush once more, he leaned back and began to recite:

Maggie felt her face sweep with heat from a deep blush. She could not look at Jem. If she had, she would have seen that he was not looking at her either.

“Perhaps it's time to go, my dears,” Mrs. Blake interrupted before her husband could continue. “Mr. Blake's very busy just now, aren't you, Mr. Blake?” He jerked his head and sat back; clearly it was rare for her to break in on him when he was reciting.

Maggie and Jem stepped backward toward the door. “Thank you, Mr. Blake,” they said together, though it was not at all clear what they were thanking him for.

Mr. Blake seemed to recover himself. “It is we who should be thanking you,” he said. “We are grateful for the warning about this evening.”

As they left his study, they heard Mrs. Blake murmur, “Really, Mr. Blake, you shouldn't tease them like that, reciting that one rather than what you were working on. They're not ready yet. You saw how they blushed.” They did not hear his reply.