Colleen McCullough - Morgan’s Run

In answer, Cousin James-the-druggist opened up the wooden chest with the flair of a fairground conjurer. “I did think of rags already,” he said, burrowing. “If it is possible to keep custody of this box, do so. Sit on it, or be like Dick and tie it to your big toe. The gaoler inspected it minutely when I came in, of course.” He tittered. “No files or hacksaws, which is all he was worried about. Though it seems odd to me, ye’re allowed a razor and a pair of scissors. Perhaps the gaolers do not care if ye cut each other’s throats. A strop and a whetstone.” He lifted the scissors and handed them to Dick. “Start cutting, Cousin.”

“Cut Richard’s hair? I could not!” cried Dick, appalled.

“You must. Places like this are riddled with every kind of vermin. Short hair will not keep them entirely at bay, but at least it means far fewer. I have put in a fine-toothed comb as well, Richard. Trim your body hair too, or pluck it.”

“I have very little, so cutting it will suffice.”

Cousin James-the-druggist was still ferreting, trying to get his hands around something heavy and awkward. Finally he succeeded in dragging it out, and set it triumphantly on the flagging. “Is it not wondrous?” he demanded.

Richard, Dick and Willy stared at the object blankly.

“I am sure it is, Cousin James, but what is it?” asked Richard.

“A dripstone,” said Cousin James-the-druggist proudly. “The stone part, as you can see, is a slightly conical-bottomed dish which holds about three pints of water. The water soaks through the stone and drips from its bottom into the brass dish below it. Whatever magic happens within the stone I do not know, but the water in the collecting dish is as sweet and fresh as the best spring water. Which,” he explained, launched into one of his scientific enthusiasms, “is pure and sparkling because it too makes a journey through porous rocks! I had heard that the Italians-clever people!-have these dripstones, but I could not lay my hands on one. Then about a year ago my friend Captain John Staines came home from Brazilian parts with a cargo of cocoa beans for Joseph Fry and cochineal for me. He called into Teneriffe for water, which that isle has in abundance. Someone showed him this, thinking to interest him for an English market-it is at present exported to those parts of Spain where the water is terrible. Thus he gave it to me rather than to Fry, who cannot think beyond chocolate. I tested it on the water from the Pugsley’s Well pipe-as ye rightly said, Richard, undrinkable. Since the pipe is wooden and passes through four burying grounds, little wonder.”

“How did ye test it, Jim?” asked Dick with a long-suffering look, wincing as he snipped off Richard’s thick and curling hair.

“I drank the water the dripstone produced myself, naturally.”

“I knew ye’d say that.”

“I have begun to import dripstones from Teneriffe, and thought of you immediately,” said Cousin James-the-druggist, tucking the dripstone back into the box. “It will come in handy, Richard, though I warn ye that it does not last forever. My trial one became smelly and the water cloudy after nine months, but it is easy to see when the corruption begins because the inside of the stone bowl grows a sticky brown substance. However,” he went on, “the paper which came with my first shipment says that a dirty dripstone can be purified by soaking it for a week or two in clean sea-water and then drying it in the sun for another week or two.” He sighed. “Not possible in England, alas.”

“Cousin James,” said Richard, smiling with enormous affection, “I kiss your hands and feet.”

“No need to go that far, Richard.” He rose and dusted his hands together, then suffered a change of mood. “I brought the box today,” he said carefully, “because no one will tell me when ye’re likely to be moved to Gloucester. Since the next assizes are not due until Lent, it may not be soon. But it may be tomorrow. And James-of-the-clergy said to tell ye he will be visiting.”

“It will be a joy to see him,” said Richard, feeling light-headed. He rose while Dick, still squatting, scooped up his shorn hair. “Father, wash your hands in vinegar and oil of tar when you get home, and do not touch your face until you do. Bring me clean underdrawers and soap, I beg you!”

The movedid not happen on the morrow. Richard and Willy remained in the Bristol Newgate until into the new year of 1785. A blessing in some ways-his family could see to his needs; a curse in others-his family witnessed the misery of his situation.

Determined to see Richard for herself, Mag came once. But after the horrors of finding him amid that horde of wraiths, one look at his face and bristling scalp saw her faint dead away.

That was not to be the worst. Cousin James-the-druggist came alone just after Christmas. “It is your father, Richard. He has had a stroke.”

The eyes Richard turned upon him had changed out of all recognition. Even through William Henry the tranquillity and flashes of humor had not completely vanished, but now they had. Life was not gone from them, but they observed rather than reacted. “Will he die, Cousin James?”

“No, not of this stroke. I have put him on a strict diet and hope to ensure that no second and third follow. His left arm and left leg are affected, but he can speak and his thought processes are not disordered. He sends all his love, but we feel that it is not wise for him to visit the Newgate.”

“Oh, the Cooper’s Arms! It will kill him to have to leave it.”

“There is no need for him to leave it. Your brother has sent his oldest boy to train as a victualler there-a good lad too, not so money-hungry as William. And pleased to be out of that household, I suspect. William’s wife is as hard as she is watchful-well, I do not need to tell ye that. ”

“I daresay ’tis she has put her foot down and forbidden Will to visit me in gaol. He must be mourning the loss of his gratis saw-setter,” said Richard without rancor. “And Mum?”

“Mag is Mag. Her answer for everything is to work.”

Richard did not reply, just sat on the flags with his legs stretched out in front of him, Willy the shadow on his far side. Fighting tears, Cousin James-the-druggist tried to study him as if he were a stranger-not so difficult these days. How could he be so much handsomer than he used to be? Or was it that his handsomeness had gone unnoticed? The raggedly cropped trying-to-curl hair, no more than half an inch long, revealed the fine shape of the skull, and the sharp cheekbones and aquiline blade of nose stood forth in the smooth, unlined face. If that face had altered, then the change lay in his mouth; the sensuous lower lip remained, yet the whole had firmed and straightened, lost its dreamily peaceful contours. His thin, peaked black brows had always lain close to the eyes beneath, though now they looked-oh, more as if they belonged, as if they had been etched in as emphasis.

He is six-and-thirty, and God is trying him as He tried Job, but somehow Richard is turning the table on God without cheating or insulting Him. Over the course of the last year he has lost wife and only child-lost his fortune-lost his reputation-lost family like his selfish brother. Yet he has not lost himself. How little we know of those we think we know, in spite of a whole lifetime.

Richard suddenly smiled brilliantly, his eyes lighting. “Do not worry about me, Cousin James. Prison has not the power to ruin me. Prison is just something I have to live through.”

Possibly becausefew felons were transferred from Bristol to Gloucester, Richard and Willy received two days’ notice of their going, a bare week into January.

“You can take whatever ye can carry,” said Walter the chief gaoler when they were brought into his presence, “not a fleabite more. Ye’re not allowed a cart or barrow.”