The Two Confessions Page 5

  In all truth, as he soon found out, there was a steep mountain to climb. At the same time things became much more simple for him - in a complicated sort of way. He had to have her - and not just in the sexual sense, but have everything she represented too. That was the long and the short of it: a life's project capable of summary in five words. He had to have her. Whatever it took, that's what he'd spend his time doing. There was no point debating it.

  Once again, Samuel Trevan uncomplainingly ate what was put before him. Only this time he was ravenous - and salivating: covetous of a feast intended for his betters.

  ************

  She (for it was some time before enquiries grafted on a name) lived in comfort and Southover. Those two words went together like horse and cart. There were a few paupers' places over towards the priory grounds, drawn and protected by that institution, sustained by the charity it offered daily, but otherwise Southover held mostly nice houses. Samuel's heart dipped on hearing she emanated from that part of Lewes town.

  He'd moved cautiously to learn what he wanted. There was no question of being so crass as to search her out himself. Neither could he employ anyone who might be curious about his curiosity. This was a weighty matter, too important for haste or hostages to fortune. In the few gaps in Orphanage routine he pondered little else. In the Chapel he sought guidance in prayer.

  Providence then sent him an itinerant knife-grinder, a sad crippled veteran of the Welsh wars, who did business all over Lewes. From Snowdonia sniper days he'd learnt the art of careful observation - and the joys of silence. For his part, Samuel had contacts in the Orphanage kitchen and could arrange regular, much needed, business. There was a conversation, skirting round matters of mutual benefit, innocent of crude bargaining. Even then Samuel knew solicitude for other people's dignity, especially among the luckless, was half the battle. They easily came to an arrangement.

  The old soldier plied the streets longer and more attentively than was usual. It didn't matter that his stump-leg rubbed raw and his good eye tired: he'd been entrusted, like in past days. Shortly after, the target entered his sights. He reported back - and got sufficient trade to drink himself to sleep every night for a week, easing both the inner and outer pain. Each blade in St Philip's, every metal tool capable of taking an edge, was honed like a barber's razor. Father Omar was caused to slice his thumb open when peeling an apple.

  Samuel Trevan then took charge of the metaphoric musket. She was in his sights now - never to leave them again.

  A few days later the orphans were granted a holiday, consequent on a great Crusader victory in Latvia - or possibly the Crimea: Samuel was too preoccupied to take in the details. He made straightaway to Southover.

  The Town was ablaze with bright stars of tin or painted wood - or even paper in the poorer quarters - to mark the impending nativity. Man's weak imitation of God's night sky, they symbolised the coming of light into the world - or maybe the Star of Bethlehem: opinions varied. It was just another of those innovations brought back by the victorious Crusaders three centuries ago, and now as 'traditional' as the twice life-sized crib scene dominating the brow of High Street. Pious folk even cast stars up into the boughs of evergreens, acquitting the innocent trees of Baltic-pagan Yuletide associations.

  Her home was in Keere Street, whose constellations were among the best; polished steel sunbursts from the Wealden forest foundries, or complex glass and wire lattices harbouring a lamp within. Apparently, she resided near the bottom of that steep and select cobbled road.

  For one bad moment Samuel thought it was Southover House, the great edifice built of Caen-stone robbed from the first priory of St Pancras back in ‘Reformation-Devastation’ times. The Church, when it returned in victory, robbed it back so to speak, and bestowed the freehold on more faithful servants. That happened to be the Howards of Arundel, Earls of Sussex, advisors to Cardinals and Kings, and even Trevan's energies quailed before the notion of approaching them. He didn't dare consider what favoured tenant or retainer they'd installed within. Father Omar (a fanatic re local history) related how the Blessed Isaac Newton had conversed with the Creator in that very property, writing down verbatim the 'Aetheria Principia'. The study in which the voice of God once resounded was now forever sealed; a shrine to Christendom's few dabblers in 'natural philosophy'.

  It was all too intimidating for Samuel to contemplate. Despair stood in the wings, poised to come on. Fortunately, his misapprehension soon became evident.

  The correct address was not so unattainably grand, but a powerful mismatch all the same. The best destiny Samuel could reasonably aspire to was a trade apprenticeship in the Town - and even scrolling on a decade or two, once qualified and Guild-approved, no Lewes artisan, however assiduous or fortunate, would end up in such favoured accommodation. There was Caen-stone in those walls as well as good Wealden brick (though insufficient to merit Church repossession). The roof was capped by strong Horsham-stone, not thatch, and the wide windows were defined by fashionable 'mathematical' tiles (peculiar to well-to-do Lewes and Brighton) in pink and red. In the small front garden there sat an ancient sundial. But best of all, the front gate bore a brass name-plate, boldly stating:

  GALEN HOUSE

  M. Farncombe Esq. MA (Wessex). Surgeon.

  The house was old and yet preserved and improved all at the same time - and thus perfectly in keeping with the spirit of the age. Samuel stood before it and did homage.

  There was no way of knowing, but he indulged himself and just assumed she was within. He thought of her at the - presumed - grand dining table, or seated before a harpsichord, or even, despite the hour, pink and naked tucked up in bed. They were all equally ravishing visions. He remained there a long while and barely noticed a brief shower of rain.

  Perhaps Samuel's fervent thoughts called her forth, or maybe made the atmosphere inside humid and unbearable. Whatever the reason, like an answer to his prayers, she emerged.

  The girl was arm in arm with her presumed father, a set-faced man in a stovepipe hat. He loomed over her, stiff and unaffectionate in Samuel's attuned judgement: though little enough time was wasted in studying him.

  As for her, in cape and black crinoline and matching riding bonnet, she looked even grander than at their first encounter - and more glorious. The reality was plumper and paler than the image he'd treasured, but it was the reality, not illusion, he was after. False, enhanced, recollections were mercilessly jettisoned without regret in favour of the actual. His sincerity was vindicated.

  Father and daughter noticed him at the same time. Myriad minor signs told them this was no pure and simple passer-by. Father glared - though unsure why. Daughter surveyed - although free to interpose her opened umbrella. She and Samuel fixed glances: for just one precious second.

  ‘Ignore him, Melissa,’ ordered Papa. ‘Keep walking.’

  ‘Melissa’ obeyed. Then they were past the interloper.

  It was an inconsequential encounter to all outward appearance. Superficially, there was nothing untoward about it. In a relatively unrushed world people often stood and stared. Yet, inwardly, each of them knew, even if presently only via a vague dislocation, that something life-long had been born.

  ************

  ‘Your going is a cloud in the clear sky of our happiness. We require you to repent and reconsider.’

  For all his years in Sussex, Father Omar retained the courtly and poetic form of speech peculiar to his homeland. What scholars called 'Jerusalem dialect' beautifully mutated whichever tongue it employed.

  ‘Ask anything else.’ Samuel's bad conscience made him hard-faced and curt. Being a disobedient son left internal scars. ‘You know the one thing that's impossible and then ask for it. That's not right.’

  The autumn of life had come upon Father Omar swiftly. His spade beard, hair's final redoubt on his head, was grizzled. Those broad shoulders found it an effort not to slump. Both locks and vigour had fled away and now Samuel proposed to emulate them.

  ‘Infor
m me,’ said the priest, ‘oh Samuel-of-the-single-mind, who first taught you of right and wrong? Who whispered the sublime notions in your infant ear? Do you now instruct me?’

  ‘If need be!’

  Samuel's eyes were porcine and uncharitable at the best of times: but, them being God-given, he couldn’t be held responsible. However, in surrender to anger they became as hard and shiny as sea pebbles. Blame might be attached to that sight.

  The priest accepted their ill will without demur - which only made the situation worse.

  ‘You have answered me correctly, child,’ said Omar, gently. ‘A dawn breaks in our darkness. We have taught you well.’

  Samuel sat back and closed those same eyes, pretending that summer sunshine slanting through the window pained them. Yet the scene persisted, printed upon the retina.

  ‘I am an ungrateful sod,’ he said. ‘I know. I'm sorry: really sorry.’

  Father Omar steepled his massive hands and looked out of his office at the river.

  ‘No, son-of-chance, you are not one of these sods. You are driven. We pity you. We will never approve but we... sympathise.’

  That surprised Samuel and he opened his eyes again. He realised he should have had faith. In consequence, and if it were possible, he felt even more unworthy.

  ‘So, I go with your blessing?’

  Father Omar smiled.

  ‘Samuel Trevan, my blessings will never leave you. No child of these walls is ever threatened by mere conditional love. All I implore is that you do not tread a perilous path.’

  Samuel looked down, burning a hole in the floor.

  ‘I have to. Otherwise I'd stay, I'd take the apprenticeship and never leave. But... I'm not destined to be a barrel-maker.’

  Omar disdainfully shook his head.

  ‘There is no such thing as destiny, or what you English called wyrd. There are only decisions. Today you are fifteen years and 364 days old, and thus in our charge. Your 'destiny' is still our remit. Tomorrow that changes. Decide well tomorrow, Samuel, but never for one moment think our care for you could be severed by a birthday.’

  So that was it. All the family he'd even known or wanted had acquiesced to his radical plans. He'd steeled himself to do it but, thank God, there'd be no final rupture. Despond was replaced by elation.

  ‘If you forgive me,’ Trevan blurted out, ‘then I have all I want!’

  The priest frowned, unable to prevent it.

  ‘Not all, surely?’ he said quietly. ‘You only go to London in hope of procuring what you do not have – and what a Lewes barrel-maker can never have.’

  It needed no elaboration. He spoke unmistakably of Miss Melissa Farncombe. The past year had been dominated by Samuel's stormy courtship of her - and seared by the lightning it produced. Not that he had disgraced himself, instead proceeding like the gentleman he wasn’t with 'chance' meetings and the most decorous of letters. Even so, the air between Cliffe and Southover turned sulphurous when Mr Farncombe found out. Father Omar had aborted talk of 'horsewhipping' or the stocks: he had that much influence in the town. Nevertheless, the price of peace was a strict cordon separating Samuel and Southover.

  Being a dutiful son of St Philip's - for a little longer - Trevan had complied with every term imposed. A promise to Father Omar was like a bargain with the Deity he represented. But both parties knew that this was just a cease-fire, a postponement of the struggle rather than defeat. The boy was quite open about it: the campaign would continue as soon as he was free and a man - and a freeman.

  Samuel declined to discuss the painful subject. That ambition was forever bubbling up inside him, just below the surface, close to boiling over. Thoughts of it prompted his next question.

  ‘So, do I get my file?’

  It was the usual practice, though at their discretion, for the Orphanage to offer their parentage records (if any) to children leaving its custody. A surprising number spurned the chance, wisely passing up on the usual sad litany of accident, bastardy and abandonment. Unlike them, Samuel thought he could take it. And besides, there was always the outside chance of some favourable circumstance of birth - admittedly gone horribly wrong - being revealed. That might assist him in his great project.

  Father Omar crushed the suggestion with finality absent from his previous strictures. The answer came out in unadorned English.

  ‘No. You do not. It should not matter to you. Where you are going people are as careless of backgrounds as you have hitherto been. I shall pray that that remains the only similarity between Samuel Trevan and London life.’

  U[U[U[U[U[U[U

  cHAPTER 7

  '... if you are reading these words and have not so far transformed yourself as to forget my instructions, I must assume that you have remained obdurate and are now in London. I send you greetings - and my fears. I fear that life has equipped you all too well to survive. Your strength of brawn and brain may tempt you to the straightest routes. Recall that straight routes are quickest but oft cross other persons' property. Do not trample that which is in the way merely because you can.

  I am mindful that your leaving bounty is inadequate. In Lewes it would have been your start and sufficient; but in the big city where you are alone, £20 is a razor-breadth from poverty. I would not have you resort to crime. I have little enough but need even less. In my sinful selfishness I desired to retain sufficient to purchase my obit Masses for when I am gone from here. But no, you shall have it all and my remembrance shall be your duty. Herein is a promissory note drawn on an Arundel goldsmith, now amended in your favour. I believe you may redeem or invest it with a Hebrew merchant, of which, it is said, there are many in London Town. Alternatively, a Church Bank could safeguard this sum but you would not, of course, earn interest. Recall Matthew, 25:14, the parable of the talents.

  My grandfather came from Egypt, the land, as you would recall if you paid attention to your geography lessons, of the Mameluke-Caliph. However, there were rulers there long, long before them, called 'Pharaohs'. They are mentioned in Scripture. This was right at the beginning of time, soon after Creation and the Fall; before Christ but after Babel. Consequently, their script is strange although scholars have translated some of it. Thus my father's father could tell me of a blessing of theirs that he saw, painted on a tomb wall even before Abraham left Ur at the command of the Almighty. It had lingered and waited patiently through all human history for me to repeat to you now – because I feel it is apposite to your situation:

  'May G*d be between you and harm in all the empty places you walk.'

  To the greater glory of G*d, from Omar Abdalhaqq ibn J'nna.

  St Philip Howard's Foundlings Refuge, Cliffe, Lewes, Sussex.

  The 23rd day of June, The Year of Our Salvation 1989.

  One hundred and twenty-seven pounds! One hundred! And twenty-seven! Pounds!

  It was a fortune - and yet not enough. He could buy his way into a decent Guild apprenticeship with it and look forward to a settled, fairly well-off, life. Employing hard haggling he might even acquire a little shop... or something.

  Samuel was both glad - and not. This was the antidote to starvation - but at the same time his doom. The temptations to mediocrity and compromise were back again, powerfully reinforced. He'd retained a strong grasp on his ambitions, for all that fear and hunger were stamping on his fingertips. It helped that there was little alternative - but now....

  ‘May the Lord keep you, Father Omar,’ Samuel whispered, ‘and also forgive my ingratitude.’

  He was in the right place to say such things, having come into a church to read the letter. The workers' hostel which had been draining the last of his pennies was too much a madhouse of noise for serious reading or thought or anything.

  The absence of a mother figure meant many of St Philip's inmates developed a strong devotion to Mary. Samuel didn't go so far as some, but neither was he immune. Sighting a 'Our Lady of Flowers' image, ablaze in candlelight, he was reminded. He offered up to her his sore feet, dirty clothes and e
mpty belly - and a vow.

  ‘It's like this!’ Samuel stated, setting the Universe straight. ‘When Omar goes, I'll see to his obit Masses: the high altar, Lewes Cathedral: every year. It's my business now. That's how it'll be.’

  In his amateur opinion he doubted Father Omar would be long in purgatory anyway - but that wasn't for him to judge.

  ‘Also, sweet lady,’ he added, ‘give me strength.’

  And She - or someone - apparently did.

  ************

  ‘Now, are you sure?’

  ‘Completely.’

  ‘Young man, I wish there to be no doubt. Your signature entrusts this money for five long years. Otherwise you gain no interest. This way the rate is good but meanwhile you cannot dip within free of penalty.’

  ‘Bloody hell, Christ-killer! How many more times?’

  The Hebrew thought and then decided. He smiled to reduce the tension and pushed the tally book forward. Samuel took up the offered inkstick and added his name to the form of words.

  ‘I hope you will forgive some further observations...,’ said the goldsmith-cum-banker.

  ‘Depends what they are,’ answered Trevan.

  ‘It is merely that you seem... young to possess such a note. Yet the name in Arundel is good with me; the making over to yourself faultless....’

  Samuel saved the man some trouble.

  ‘But I look like I've been through a hedge backwards, right?’

  The Hebrew shrugged, a disarming it’s-your-life gesture. The tassels on his prayer shawl repeated it at waist level. He could afford to be relaxed. Given the nature of his trade there was security aplenty to hand: a stiletto beneath the shop counter, three hefty sons out the back. Even so, there was something innate to this young Christian that impelled the seeking out of his right side. And if his professional life had taught the Hebrew anything it was that instinct knew best. He decided to go with it.