The Skull and the Nightingale. Michael Irwin

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СКАЧАТЬ but it perspired freely, causing him to dab at it with a handkerchief.

       ‘I am pleased to see you, Mr Fenwick,’ said he. ‘I hope you will sing with me again.’

       ‘With great pleasure.’

       ‘By the way, I am acquainted with Lord Vincent, whom I believe you know.’

       ‘Very slightly.’

       ‘I have been observing you. You yourself I see to be watchful, eager to take in everything about you.’

       ‘I hope I am,’ said I, by now embarrassed.

       ‘You were deep in conversation with Mr Pike, who is often taciturn.’

       ‘I found him most interesting.’

       ‘That shows judgement. He may be the most interesting man in the room.’

       He turned away and rapped for silence: ‘Gentlemen, if you will indulge me, I feel disposed to sing.’

       Amid applause he got himself to his feet. I could see that he was immersed in his performance, half jocose though it was. While he sang no one would have thought of his unwieldy body – he lived through his voice:

      Come, friends, and bear me company:

      I dare not go to bed.

      I’ve drunk too little or drunk too much,

      And my heart is heavy as lead.

      Although this life is all too short

      The nights can last too long,

      So help me pass the lingering hours,

      And join me in a song.

       The whole company did indeed join lustily in the chorus:

      In an hour, in a week, in a month, in a year,

      Where shall we be? No man can say.

      If we drink, if we fight, if we whore while we’re here,

      Then sooner or later the devil’s to pay.

      So sing through the night,

      Sing while we may,

      Till a new dawn reminds us to live for the day.

       Crocker lowered his great rump amid much cheering and stamping of feet. By now the room was very warm and we were all in a tipsy sweat. Invited by our host to perform, I offered ‘The soaring lark salutes the morn’. When I had concluded, Crocker and I were persuaded to sing an indecorous duet:

      A tippler’s throat is a conduit pipe:

      Pour, landlord, pour.

      We drink to piss, and piss our drink, and drink to piss once more.

      A man don’t leak till a man has drunk,

      So let the liquor flow:

      We take it in and shake it down, and then we let it go.

       The assembled tipplers sang with us till the windows shook and our ears rang.

       It seems to be the custom at these gatherings to drink and talk at large until Crocker takes the lead in some way. When the singing was done the former general carousal was resumed. Voices rose and laughter rang out. Somewhat elevated myself, I noticed the prudent Latimer slip away. I was sitting with Horn, who was by now very loud, at one point laughing so hard that he fell to the floor.

       At length Crocker again forced himself upright.

       ‘Gentlemen!’ he cried, ‘there is work to be done. Let us withdraw.’

       I confess that, owing to the influence of wine, my recollections of what followed are less than distinct. Crocker’s table was pulled aside, and he stalked ponderously from the room. The rest of us rose – with a crashing of chairs, bottles and glasses – and followed him into the night air. Crocker ensconced himself in what was apparently his private chair, to be borne away by four men, with the company trooping at their heels. I wondered if we were to be plunged into some violence of the Mohock kind – though in truth I had never heard that Crocker was associated with such doings. We made a strange procession: an obese, chair-borne Achilles followed by a rabble of drunken Myrmidons. There was no show of provocation or aggression, although I fancy anyone standing in our way might have been thrown aside. Perhaps Crocker himself and Pike, who stayed close to his chair, were the only individuals among us still in a condition to think clearly. At some point we turned from the main thoroughfare and followed a link-boy through a maze of unlighted alleys.

       At length we were motioned to a halt. The moon, emerging from a cloud, showed us to be standing beside a long wall. It seemed an unpromising destination. I was aware of Crocker alighting from his chariot and, through the agency of Pike, getting us, his foot soldiers, positioned at short intervals along the wall. He himself took a central place. His stentorian command, ringing through the night air, enjoined us to set our shoulders to the brickwork and then push rhythmically against it in response to his further shouts, as though trying to budge a great wagon. All concerned fell uncomplainingly to this apparently futile task. We strained in unison, strained repeatedly – and strained to no effect. But after a number of such lunges there seemed, to my surprise, to be some slight sense of motion in the brickwork. We maintained our efforts till a distinct swaying ensued and eventually, to the accompaniment of a ragged cheer, an indeterminate length of the wall gave way completely, collapsing inwards with a rumbling crash.

       Like many others, I went down with the wall, and had to stumble to my feet among broken bricks. There was a confusion of curses and a loud barking of dogs. The moon was now hidden by a cloud of dust. All present hastily dispersed as best they could, given the darkness, their drunken state and the shock of the fall. I found my way to Cathcart Street I know not how, my clothes filthy, my wig full of dirt, and one stocking soaked with blood.

       Next morning I wondered at the course the evening had taken, and asked myself whose wall we had destroyed, and why. I also felt some astonishment that the wall had indeed collapsed. My uncertain conclusion was that the cause had to do with vibration, the faint movement communicated to the brickwork engendering a counter-movement.

       Why Crocker should have organized this assault I cannot imagine. He appeared to be fairly sober throughout the evening, his freakish size perhaps rendering him resistant to the inebriating power of punch. Nor would I take him to be a belligerent man. I look forward to finding out more about him, and about the strange doings of the past night.

       Yours, &c.

      This escapade had left me rather the worse for wear. Not until the afternoon was I washed, dressed and restored to rights. A feeble explanation to Mrs Deacon concerning the state of my laundry – I had suffered an ‘unfortunate mishap’ – was received civilly, but with the hint of amusement that it deserved. It would not do for me СКАЧАТЬ