[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
vague. As a child, I'd imagined that greatguildsmen would look out of the
windows, sniff the morning air, and decide that England needed a fresh coat of
paint . . . I knew that the First Age of Industry had started with the
execution of the last king, the second with some massive and complex
re-organisation of the guilds, and that the start of the third had been
signalled by the triumphant exhibition at World's End. But how?
Why? Even in the pages of the
Guild Times, let alone those of the
New
Dawn, there was no consensus.
`Morning, citizen!'
The buildings quivered. The Thames shrank and exhaled. It was a summer of
visions and portents. A real hermit took up residence on
Hermit's Hill and started proclaiming the end, not just of the Age, but of
time itself. Church attendances went up and the dark seemed denser when you
passed the tall open doorways, scented with a new variety of hymnal wine. A
tree in the courtyard of one of the great guildhalls which hadn't budded for
five centuries fulfilled some old prophecy and came into leaf Almost all the
Page 145
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
citizens of the Easterlies seemed to have signed a huge petition calling for
change known as the Twelve Demands. Dry thunder rattled over the Kite Hills.
The evenings smelled close and foetid and muddy, and the gaslights simply
added to the yellow swell of heat. The days were so hot now that people took
to sleeping through them and coming out at night, and many of the shops
remained open, and everyone was spending. Prices had increased so much
recently that, in an odd kind of way, the value of money suddenly seemed less
important. The masthead of the latest edition of the
New Dawn said
4
Pence, or Something Useful in Exchange, and Saul and I often returned home
with shrivelled marrows and bent cigarettes.
`So . . .' Saul lit a cheroot and waved away the match as we sat outside one
evening in a bar which had tumbled into Doxy Street. `When are you going to
tell us all about that shiftend of yours down by the seaside?'
`There really isn't much to tell. The people are much like the ones you see
here, only with more money and worse accents. They're ...' I
thought about Walcote House the soft carpets and high ceilings and
dissolving walls. Just the other day in the
Guild Times, I'd noticed an announcement of the marriage of Grandmistress
Sarah Elizabeth
Sophina York Passington to Greatmaster Ademus Isumbard Porrett of the General
Guild of Distemperers, which would take place at Walcote
House on something called the Feast of St Steven. Innocence, really was
the overriding impression I'd taken back with me from Walcote House to
London. Those people were like children and they would still be dancing,
laughing, clinking crystal glasses, when the mob came to beat down their doors
.. .
`Go on and there must be an article in all of it somewhere.
Better than that weird thing you wrote last shift about Goldenwhite and the
Unholy Rebellion. I mean who believes in fairy stories?'
`All I was saying was that she was a leader of the people in her own way, too.
It was a revolt, wasn't it? And it did happen. She led her people. She was
defeated at Clerkenwell.'
Saul chuckled. `Have you been to Clerkenwell?'
Of course I had we both had, many times. But I'd never found what I'd been
looking for, mainly because I still didn't know what it was.
A statue, a monument? I ordered another beer. Posters flapped on the walls in
the hot night breeze; exhortations to come to gatherings and meetings long
gone if, indeed, they had ever taken place at all. Old scraps of the
New Dawn or one of the dozens of other similar Easterlies papers bowled
merrily along the gutters.
`Have you heard about the fruitworkers of Kent?' Saul was saying.
`They've formed a collective. They make their own decisions. The signs are
there'll be a record harvest, and then they'll be able to share the profits
and re-invest. It's a halfway house, I know, to true shared ownership, but I
thought we might join them soon as this Age has changed. Not too many acres,
of course. Just enough for me and Maud and the little 'un ...'
I was thinking of the Stropcocks the Bowdly-Smarts whose sour faces still
seemed real to me in this glowing city now that Walcote
Manor had receded.
`What did you just say?'
Saul chuckled. `Thought you weren't with me there for a moment, Robbie. Maud's
expecting a baby ... I'm going to be a daddy!' He shot out a laugh, shook his
head.
I went to a Workers Fair one afternoon that summer up on the
Page 146
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
Kite Hills. All the vast and hazy city lay spread below. Spires and towers.
Hallam's slow blink. And there really were kites on these hills coloured
flotillas which caught and bobbed on the hot wind and tugged at the
puppetstring people below. One, the size of a small shed, but silken,
shimmering, crimson, was temporarily grounded, and had gathered a cluster of
onlookers.
`Used to have one like that myself. Well, perhaps not quite so big
..'
I turned to see Highermaster George.
`It was the most complicated thing I ever did, Robbie, getting that thing in
the air. It was aethered, of course. Just like this one see those strings.'
The kite roared up. We and the land seemed to drop away. `So,' he said,
squinting as the sun flared on his freckled scalp, `I suppose you're here to
sell the
New Dawn?'
I nodded, and George bought one of the copies I had under my arm, then
surprised and flattered me by revealing that he'd already read it, including
my own rambling piece. He did his best, he said, to keep abreast of what he
called the debate.
A little further down the hill, where the kites' shadows danced in the air
which rose off London like the heat from an oven, a straggle of marquees and [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl freetocraft.keep.pl
vague. As a child, I'd imagined that greatguildsmen would look out of the
windows, sniff the morning air, and decide that England needed a fresh coat of
paint . . . I knew that the First Age of Industry had started with the
execution of the last king, the second with some massive and complex
re-organisation of the guilds, and that the start of the third had been
signalled by the triumphant exhibition at World's End. But how?
Why? Even in the pages of the
Guild Times, let alone those of the
New
Dawn, there was no consensus.
`Morning, citizen!'
The buildings quivered. The Thames shrank and exhaled. It was a summer of
visions and portents. A real hermit took up residence on
Hermit's Hill and started proclaiming the end, not just of the Age, but of
time itself. Church attendances went up and the dark seemed denser when you
passed the tall open doorways, scented with a new variety of hymnal wine. A
tree in the courtyard of one of the great guildhalls which hadn't budded for
five centuries fulfilled some old prophecy and came into leaf Almost all the
Page 145
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
citizens of the Easterlies seemed to have signed a huge petition calling for
change known as the Twelve Demands. Dry thunder rattled over the Kite Hills.
The evenings smelled close and foetid and muddy, and the gaslights simply
added to the yellow swell of heat. The days were so hot now that people took
to sleeping through them and coming out at night, and many of the shops
remained open, and everyone was spending. Prices had increased so much
recently that, in an odd kind of way, the value of money suddenly seemed less
important. The masthead of the latest edition of the
New Dawn said
4
Pence, or Something Useful in Exchange, and Saul and I often returned home
with shrivelled marrows and bent cigarettes.
`So . . .' Saul lit a cheroot and waved away the match as we sat outside one
evening in a bar which had tumbled into Doxy Street. `When are you going to
tell us all about that shiftend of yours down by the seaside?'
`There really isn't much to tell. The people are much like the ones you see
here, only with more money and worse accents. They're ...' I
thought about Walcote House the soft carpets and high ceilings and
dissolving walls. Just the other day in the
Guild Times, I'd noticed an announcement of the marriage of Grandmistress
Sarah Elizabeth
Sophina York Passington to Greatmaster Ademus Isumbard Porrett of the General
Guild of Distemperers, which would take place at Walcote
House on something called the Feast of St Steven. Innocence, really was
the overriding impression I'd taken back with me from Walcote House to
London. Those people were like children and they would still be dancing,
laughing, clinking crystal glasses, when the mob came to beat down their doors
.. .
`Go on and there must be an article in all of it somewhere.
Better than that weird thing you wrote last shift about Goldenwhite and the
Unholy Rebellion. I mean who believes in fairy stories?'
`All I was saying was that she was a leader of the people in her own way, too.
It was a revolt, wasn't it? And it did happen. She led her people. She was
defeated at Clerkenwell.'
Saul chuckled. `Have you been to Clerkenwell?'
Of course I had we both had, many times. But I'd never found what I'd been
looking for, mainly because I still didn't know what it was.
A statue, a monument? I ordered another beer. Posters flapped on the walls in
the hot night breeze; exhortations to come to gatherings and meetings long
gone if, indeed, they had ever taken place at all. Old scraps of the
New Dawn or one of the dozens of other similar Easterlies papers bowled
merrily along the gutters.
`Have you heard about the fruitworkers of Kent?' Saul was saying.
`They've formed a collective. They make their own decisions. The signs are
there'll be a record harvest, and then they'll be able to share the profits
and re-invest. It's a halfway house, I know, to true shared ownership, but I
thought we might join them soon as this Age has changed. Not too many acres,
of course. Just enough for me and Maud and the little 'un ...'
I was thinking of the Stropcocks the Bowdly-Smarts whose sour faces still
seemed real to me in this glowing city now that Walcote
Manor had receded.
`What did you just say?'
Saul chuckled. `Thought you weren't with me there for a moment, Robbie. Maud's
expecting a baby ... I'm going to be a daddy!' He shot out a laugh, shook his
head.
I went to a Workers Fair one afternoon that summer up on the
Page 146
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
Kite Hills. All the vast and hazy city lay spread below. Spires and towers.
Hallam's slow blink. And there really were kites on these hills coloured
flotillas which caught and bobbed on the hot wind and tugged at the
puppetstring people below. One, the size of a small shed, but silken,
shimmering, crimson, was temporarily grounded, and had gathered a cluster of
onlookers.
`Used to have one like that myself. Well, perhaps not quite so big
..'
I turned to see Highermaster George.
`It was the most complicated thing I ever did, Robbie, getting that thing in
the air. It was aethered, of course. Just like this one see those strings.'
The kite roared up. We and the land seemed to drop away. `So,' he said,
squinting as the sun flared on his freckled scalp, `I suppose you're here to
sell the
New Dawn?'
I nodded, and George bought one of the copies I had under my arm, then
surprised and flattered me by revealing that he'd already read it, including
my own rambling piece. He did his best, he said, to keep abreast of what he
called the debate.
A little further down the hill, where the kites' shadows danced in the air
which rose off London like the heat from an oven, a straggle of marquees and [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]