THE DEPRIVED... Chapter 4... Part 1.

A continuation of my book.

CHAPTER 4.

SAM.

1888… PLYMOUTH.

The steamer ship was a deep-sea vessel which boasted not only a full set of rigged masts but also the new steam engines which were used when the winds calmed. The Tamar had docked at the port of Plymouth after its long voyage from the port of Fremantle in Australia and now the Captain leaned out from the bridge and stared down at the passengers who streamed down the gangplank and who now thronged the dockside, moving about like undecided busy ants. The majority of passengers had left the ship and the Captain watched as the ‘New Colonists’, those who had served their time as convicts in Australia and now having gained their freedom were returning to England in the hope of picking up their lives again. The Captain watched as the line of men descended the gangplank, to stand on the dockside as a bemused pack, each afraid to break away from the group as if the group was a security against an attack from outsiders, like fish which cloud together against attacks by sharks. The Captain smiled at his thoughts and had seen this tight bunching many times on his going and returned trips. But now his attention was taken up by one man, a man of slim build, middle-aged with cropped grey hair and deeply tanned from a hot Australian sun, who carried an old brown leather case and who turned up his coat collar before moving out from the bunch and without a word or a backward look made his way quickly towards the exit barrier, to disappear among the crowd who waited to have tickets and baggage examined. The Captain sighed and returned his attention to the lists of cargo which would be taken out from the holds once all the passengers had disembarked.

The Post-Coach took three days to reach London from Plymouth, stopping each night at the set stations where the passengers clambered out from the coach, stiff and tired from the rattling and bumping as the coach ran through rain and over large pot-holes in the country roads. Four men sat atop the coach. The driver and guard sat to the fore and overlooking the backs of the horses while at the back on a wooden seat sat the two men who had not paid the full fare which allowed them the comfort of sitting inside the coach. One of the men had the dress of a seaman, pig-tailed and with tattooed arms. The other sat silent and slouched with his coat collar pulled up and tanned deep by a hot foreign sun. They did not talk to each other throughout the journey. It’s not that the sailor did not try to talk to the sun-tanned man but gave up trying when he received no answer at all to his openings. Even when each night the pair slept out in the barns of the tavern halts, instead of enjoying the comfort of food and drink and a night’s comfortable bed at the tavern, there was no talking. At each stop, the sun-tanned man would pull out a loaf of bread and cheese from his pocket and break off a piece to quietly chew then drink water from the horse trough, oblivious to the seaman who ordered and paid for a bowl of thick soup and bread along with a quash of ale.
At the arrival of the coach at its station just beyond the south side of London Bridge, the sun-tanned man climbed down from the coach and without a word to anyone he walked away in a deliberate step which told a watcher that he knew exactly where he was going and that he was no stranger to London. He walked fast, crossing the bridge and only stopping once, having reached halfway across to stare down towards the Tower with dark eyes searching the Wharves. He had allowed his mouth to twist in a grimace before walking on and turned right at the end of the bridge, making his way towards the East-End of London.

Joe Ingram was not the owner of the lodging house, at least that’s what he always told those who came to him with complaints.
“It aint me what's responsible for the bed-bugs and bleeding stink! Don’t blame me! I only collects the rent!” he would grumble to those who grumbled at him.
But those who knew him also knew that he was the sole owner of the large house which was in bad need of repair.
“That’s all I’m saying to you.” he said to the man who had rented the cheap attic room. “It aint my fault if the rain comes in, is all I’m saying. That’s two bob and a tanner, half a crown in sterling a week.”
The man set down his brown leather suitcase and drew out a leather purse, turning his back as he counted out the money before turning back to drop the money into Joe Ingram’s open palm.
“So how long is it you’ll be staying?” asked Joe Ingram.
The man looked at the landlord with dark eyes which seemed aged and haunted, dark and piercing. He said nothing.
“It aint my fault in me asking.” whined Joe Ingram, frightened by the look and turning his eyes to the floor. “It’s me governor who makes me ask.”
He continued to blame his governor for all the wrongs in the world as he descended the stairs. The man shut the door to the attic room and laid out on the hard bunk, his dark eyes raised to take in the ceiling joists which showed through the broken ceiling like bare ribs against torn flesh. Running his eyes around the small attic room he took in the shabbiness of rough and missing plaster to the walls and the old chair by a far wall. With a grim twist to his mouth he turned over onto his side and within minutes he was asleep.

The fog had swept up from the estuary of the River Thames like a dark velvet sheet which reached forward to match the tides of that river until it spread and smothered the lights of the gas-lamps in the streets so that one had a problem of seeing more than two yards in front of them.
Joe Ingram had heard the creak of footsteps on the stairs and rose from the table, turning to look at his wife with fingers to his lips. Moving softly to the door he lifted the lid from the spy-hole and peered out to see the man who had rented the attic-room descend the stairs and walk down the passage. Joe Ingram heard the street door open then close.
“He’s a queer ‘un.” he said to his wife as he sat at the table again. “He don’t say a word, not a bleeding one, he don’t.”
“You said he looks foreign, aint it so?” reminded the wife, bending to rake at the fire. “It might be he aint got our lingo as yet.”
“Well, whether he’s here from other shores or not, he’s a weird sort and what’s he doing going out on a night like this? It aint fit for man nor beast, is this weather. I only have a hope as it don’t rain ‘cause if it does then he aint going to be happy when the rain comes through the ceiling.” finished Joe Ingram.

The Seven Bells Inn to the Aldgate end of Commercial Road had been gutted by fire ten years earlier and though the outside remained its inners were a charred mess which stared back at those who peered in through the shutters like the eyes of a skull, cavernous and black. And this is what the man saw as he stood alone in the street with the fog swirling around his form. The man stood for a long time with his eyes closed and his face pressed hard against the wood of the shutter, his mind conveying pictures of a different scene as he watched the more vibrant picture of men drinking at tables while others held women to their laps, the laughter rising above the music of the piano as the man remembered it when a boy, so many years ago. He kept his eyes closed as he visualised the memory of seeing for the first time the secret booth to the rear, seeing a curtain which opened to reveal a woman dressed in revealing clothes and who entertained the men brought to her by a big brassy blonde-haired woman. Tears came as the man remembered how he had seen the woman come out from behind the curtain and how she had laughed as she led the men upstairs to the room above.