Read Online Give Us This Day by R.F. Delderfield - Free Book Online Page A

never noticed, not even now, after he had been inhaling the furze and heather scents of the Weald throughout years of lazy-daisy idleness. He knew every cranny of the enclosure and loved what he knew, seeing it as the powerhouse of the four clamorous tribes that had used this tideway as a base to conquer half the world. Not with sabres and muzzle-loaders like traditional conquerors (although the British had resorted to these times enough) but latterly with merchandise, spewed from their clattering machines and the gold that poured into these few square miles of avarice, expertise and grimed splendour.
    He was proud of his contribution, although he would never admit it, not even to his intimates. It was a pride he kept locked away in his big body and restless brain, to be taken out and contemplated at moments like this when he thought, vaingloriously: All the others had a part in it. Josh Avery, who traded it all for a Spanis h whore; Keate, the waggonmaster and Tybalt the clerk, whose hearts were in piling up credit in heaven; that foul-mouthed old rascal Blubb, who pulled us out of that shambles at Staplehurst and died doing it; Lovell, the erudite Welshman; Radcliffe, the West Country clown and all the other viceroys. But it was me who created it and set it in motion. And “the fruit of my loins,” as old Keate would put it, are keeping it rolling to this day.
    He crossed the road and entered the open gate that led to the weighbridge, and the weighbridge clerk jumped off his perch, giving him the quasi-military salute all the veterans reserved for him after it got about that he had seen the Light Brigade go down at Balaclava, and later helped Lord Roberts, the nation’s darling, to empty that stinking well at Cawnpore. The clerk said, “Afternoon, Mr. Swann. We don’t often see you nowadays.” He replied, jovially, “No, Rigby. I was seventy this month and I make damned sure you don’t! Is Mr. George in his office?”
    “No, sir, I think not. Can’t be sure, sir, but I think he’s off in the regions somewhere. Mr. Tybalt’ll know.”
    “Thank you, Rigby.”
    He had a continuing liking for the older men still seen about the yard, but falling away year by year now that younger ones were pushing from behind. Lockhart, the master smith, was one, directing his four journeymen and three apprentices at the glowing forge. Bixley, the night watchman, was another, but he wouldn’t show up for an hour or so. Everyone, old and young, greeted him respectfully and it occurred to him that they still thought of him as the real gaffer, despite the New Broom’s many innovations, of which there was evidence everywhere in enlarged warehouses: a new exit in Tower Street, the new clerical block where the old wooden stables had stood, now replaced by the red-brick building running the full length of the northside.
    His own quarters in the tower were used as a lumber room now and he climbed the narrow, curving staircase to find the queer octagonal room strewn with crates, sacks, and discarded harness, its narrow window, where he had watched many sunsets and not a few dawns, opaque with dust and grime. He took a piece of sacking and rubbed a pane, catching a glimpse of the Conqueror’s Tower on the far bank and the swirl of river traffic east of the bridge. It was still as heavy and continuous, a never-ending stream of barges and wherries skimming down to the docks where funnels outnumbered masts by about two to one. It made him feel old and lonely up here among debris that was not his any more, and he stumped down into the open again, pausing to examine a heavy double padlock on one of the last original warehouses, with its own exit into Tooley Street.
    In his day they never locked warehouses in the daytime and he wondered whether this was the result of one of George’s edicts, or whether the place contained a particularly valuable consignment. He hoisted himself up on a baulk of timber and glanced through the grilled window, but