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Authors: Lloyd Shepherd
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matters of a commercial nature, he will inform Horton of this. Will
that be acceptable?’
It was by no means acceptable to Horton, but he had to admit that it was unlikely he would have been given unfettered access to the internal functions of the Company. Harriott looked furiously
at Ferguson, and seemed about to say so, but then he glanced at Horton, who nodded. Better to have some access than none at all, and talking himself into closed entities like East India House was
not his magistrate’s forte.
‘That will be acceptable,’ Harriott said.
Like a great heart beating in an unseen chamber, the noise from the indigo sale grew and then receded again as Horton followed Putnam into the depths of the gigantic building
– down the whale’s throat and into its gut. They passed windows which looked out on inner courtyards deep within the property, doors festooned with oddly banal titles –
Military Fund Committee, Freight Office, House Committee, Auditor’s Office, Law Suits Committee
– and still they kept going. One ancient black door carried the legend
Secret Committee
, but it was a huge door with massive lettering and was clearly unembarrassed by its conspiratorial title.
It seemed impossible to be walking for so long and still to be within the same building. Left turns followed right turns through a random progression of corridors and staircases. It was as if
the geometries of the City were giving way to the strange secret histories of this extraordinary Company which now, after two centuries, encompassed an Empire.
Putnam tried to make conversation as they walked, his head bobbing as they went. He was the same height as Horton, but his narrow back was bent, as if the head were too heavy for it. He seemed
to have no fat on him whatsoever.
‘I did not know, constable, that you were involved in the
Solander
affair.’
‘You followed the case?’
‘Oh, indeed. Avidly so. The Otaheite connection, you understand. I travelled to that island myself, once.’
‘You were a seaman?’
‘No! Not in any sense, constable. I was sent by the Company to investigate bread fruit as a possible food source for our plantations in India. I have some knowledge of horticulture. I
hated sailing. I was sick for weeks.’
‘It can affect people so.’
‘Yes, indeed. But Otaheite! Such a place. I sometimes think of returning – but then I remember the sea voyage!’
‘You found the island pleasant?’
‘I found it extraordinary. I carry its mark on me still.’
‘Many of the men of the
Solander
thought the same.’
‘Indeed. And some of them died for it, did they not?’
Horton did not answer. They came to a plain door, a door very like all the dozens of doors they had already passed.
Committee For Private Trade
ran the legend inked onto its surface.
Putnam opened the door and in they went.
The inside of the office was dismal, lit by candles and a flickering fire. It might have been May outside, but here within it was mid-February, cold and gloomy. Horton wondered if it had in fact
always been mid-February in this odd little chapel to the personal trades of the Company’s masters and officers. A dozen clerks sat at high desks, quills in their hands, beak-like noses bent
over papers and ledgers and log-books, backs and shoulders bent not by the weight of burdens carried but by fingers following numbers across tables. These were the new monks of the modern religion
of trade. They all turned to look at the three men who came through their door onto the outside world.
‘Do not let us interrupt you,’ said Putnam, as if the clerks were children and he was a headmaster showing round a prospective parent. ‘This is a constable from the River
Police Office, come to look into poor Johnson’s death.’
‘The River Police? But Juh-Juh-Johnson did not drown in the ruh-ruh-ruh-river,’ said one of the clerks. Amidst this coterie of withered men, he was the tallest and thinnest of them
all, his stammer
that be acceptable?’
It was by no means acceptable to Horton, but he had to admit that it was unlikely he would have been given unfettered access to the internal functions of the Company. Harriott looked furiously
at Ferguson, and seemed about to say so, but then he glanced at Horton, who nodded. Better to have some access than none at all, and talking himself into closed entities like East India House was
not his magistrate’s forte.
‘That will be acceptable,’ Harriott said.
Like a great heart beating in an unseen chamber, the noise from the indigo sale grew and then receded again as Horton followed Putnam into the depths of the gigantic building
– down the whale’s throat and into its gut. They passed windows which looked out on inner courtyards deep within the property, doors festooned with oddly banal titles –
Military Fund Committee, Freight Office, House Committee, Auditor’s Office, Law Suits Committee
– and still they kept going. One ancient black door carried the legend
Secret Committee
, but it was a huge door with massive lettering and was clearly unembarrassed by its conspiratorial title.
It seemed impossible to be walking for so long and still to be within the same building. Left turns followed right turns through a random progression of corridors and staircases. It was as if
the geometries of the City were giving way to the strange secret histories of this extraordinary Company which now, after two centuries, encompassed an Empire.
Putnam tried to make conversation as they walked, his head bobbing as they went. He was the same height as Horton, but his narrow back was bent, as if the head were too heavy for it. He seemed
to have no fat on him whatsoever.
‘I did not know, constable, that you were involved in the
Solander
affair.’
‘You followed the case?’
‘Oh, indeed. Avidly so. The Otaheite connection, you understand. I travelled to that island myself, once.’
‘You were a seaman?’
‘No! Not in any sense, constable. I was sent by the Company to investigate bread fruit as a possible food source for our plantations in India. I have some knowledge of horticulture. I
hated sailing. I was sick for weeks.’
‘It can affect people so.’
‘Yes, indeed. But Otaheite! Such a place. I sometimes think of returning – but then I remember the sea voyage!’
‘You found the island pleasant?’
‘I found it extraordinary. I carry its mark on me still.’
‘Many of the men of the
Solander
thought the same.’
‘Indeed. And some of them died for it, did they not?’
Horton did not answer. They came to a plain door, a door very like all the dozens of doors they had already passed.
Committee For Private Trade
ran the legend inked onto its surface.
Putnam opened the door and in they went.
The inside of the office was dismal, lit by candles and a flickering fire. It might have been May outside, but here within it was mid-February, cold and gloomy. Horton wondered if it had in fact
always been mid-February in this odd little chapel to the personal trades of the Company’s masters and officers. A dozen clerks sat at high desks, quills in their hands, beak-like noses bent
over papers and ledgers and log-books, backs and shoulders bent not by the weight of burdens carried but by fingers following numbers across tables. These were the new monks of the modern religion
of trade. They all turned to look at the three men who came through their door onto the outside world.
‘Do not let us interrupt you,’ said Putnam, as if the clerks were children and he was a headmaster showing round a prospective parent. ‘This is a constable from the River
Police Office, come to look into poor Johnson’s death.’
‘The River Police? But Juh-Juh-Johnson did not drown in the ruh-ruh-ruh-river,’ said one of the clerks. Amidst this coterie of withered men, he was the tallest and thinnest of them
all, his stammer
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