Chasing Schrödinger’s Cat - A Steampunk Novel (13 page)

Chapter
XXXIV:

A
Proclamation – The Battle

T
he first
sign of trouble came in the form of government notices posted on lampposts
announcing that the British League of Fascists had received permission to
conduct a march the following Sunday.
 
They planned to start at the Tower
of London and finish at
Victoria Park where Sir Osgood Wellesley would address his followers.
 
Instead of taking the most direct route, the
BLF proposed to go through the heart of the East End
along

While
it is understood that this event may offend some persons, Her Majesty’s
Government has reached the decision that the principles of free speech override
any such concerns.
 
All persons should be
advised that a suitable contingent of police officers will accompany the marchers
to ensure that peace and good order are maintained.

“Bloody cheek,” Percy said, after
reading one of the notices.
 
“Like to see
what they’d do if our lot wanted to march through Mayfair to Hyde
Park.
 
Wouldn’t be any free
speech then.”

You could sense the tension growing
in the East End as the week progressed.
 
Everywhere you looked, the walls were painted
with the whitewashed slogan ‘They Shall Not Pass.’
 
The air was electric on Sunday, as though a
thunderstorm were about to break.

Percy had been looking forward to
the march as though it were being staged for his personal entertainment.
 
“Come on, Bob,” he said when he shook me awake
that morning.
 
“Let’s go down to

“Who exactly are you planning to
butcher?” I said, once again wishing Percy came with subtitles.

“A butcher’s hook.
 
A look.”

T
here had to
be at least thirty thousand people waiting on

Percy and I found a vantage point
next to a spike-tipped wrought iron fence surrounding the Jewish Cemetery.
 
The waiting crowd was silent, apart from the
occasional murmured comment or outburst of nervous laughter.
 
I remember thinking this is what it must have
been like at the center of the Union line while they waited for Pickett’s
charge at Gettysburg.

The military overtones became even
more pronounced when the distant
brrmp-brrmp
of a
snare drum echoed through the still air accompanied by the tramp of marching
feet and a chorus of male voices.

Comrades, the voices of the dead battalions,

Of those who fell that Britain
might be great,

Join in our song, for they still march within us,

And urge us on to gain the fascist state!

We're of their blood, and spirit of their spirit,

Sprung from that soil for whose dear sake they bled,

Against the vested powers, and masses of the Red Front,

We lead the fight for freedom and for bread!

Our first sight of the black-shirts took the form of a tall man in a black
uniform riding a large chestnut gelding.
 
Sir Osgood Wellesley stopped his horse when he saw us and leaned over to
say something to the mounted police sergeant who was in charge of his
escort.
 
The riders parted and we heard the
clanking tracks of two steam-powered armored vehicles equipped with water
cannon.

“This works out nicely,” observed one of the waiting east-enders.
 
“I missed me bath last month.”

A high pressure jet of water issued from the turret of the nearest armored
car and traversed the line of protestors.
 
People fell to the cobblestones and were swept aside like so much
debris.
 
But the line did not break.
 
The crowd linked arms and formed a solid
chain which was impervious to the violent flow of water.

I’ve always rooted for the underdog.
 
If I’m watching a football game, I cheer for whichever team is
behind.
 
Maybe that accounts for what I
did next.

“Percy,” I said.
 
“Pick up a
cobblestone and follow my lead.
 
I’ll
take the right car and you take the left.”

We ran down the street hugging the walls, leap frogging from one doorway to
the next.
 
When I reached the first
armored car I jammed my paving stone between its tread and the lower idler
wheel.
 
The car veered sharply left and
plunged forward into the wall of nearest building where the tread split and fell
off onto the street.

Percy put the second car out of action soon afterwards and we ran back up
the street to the cheers and safety of the waiting crowd.

Willie Fitzgerald, my would-be recruiter, was especially
congratulatory.
 
“I always knew you were a
man of action Brother
Liddel
,” he said, slapping me
on the shoulder.
 
“I do wish you would join
us.
 
We need people like you.”

“Thanks Willie,” I said, “but the sewing circle does take up most of my
time.”

“Well perhaps you could
sew
us up a few bayonets,
‘cause the buggers have brought in the cavalry.”
 
He pointed down the street where a contingent
of mounted policeman had formed up in line abreast and were coming toward us at
the walk.
 
Each blue-coated rider had a
heavy truncheon resting across his saddle.

“No bayonets, but how about that fence over there?” I said, pointing toward
the cemetery.

Willie looked over and saw what I was talking about.
 
He put his fingers to his mouth and whistled
up a group of his mates who ran over to the fence, pulled it out and brought it
back in one piece.

“Jam the base into the cobblestones and lean the spikes toward the horses,”
I shouted.

The lines of policemen were now coming at the gallop.
 
We no sooner had the fence in place when the
first riders were upon us.
 
Each man knelt
down, bracing his section of the fence so that the high spikes protected him
from the policemen’s swinging truncheons.

Some of the first riders tried to get their mounts to jump the fence but
the terrified animals refused.
 
The
second line of attackers collided with the first and the air filled with the
whinnying screams of horses and the curses of their riders, many of whom were
thrown to the ground.
 
The
riderless
horses turned tail and ran back down the street
where they collided with the front ranks of the black-shirted marchers.

“Now’s our chance lads,” Willie Fitzgerald shouted, seeing the disarray in
the ranks of the BLF.
 
He grabbed a
flagpole from one of his mates and unfurled a plain red flag.
 
Waving it aloft, he charged toward the black-shirts
followed by a howling crowd of east-enders.

For the first time in my life, I experienced the almost narcotic release that
comes from surrendering to the will of a group.
 
I was part of a surging tsunami of rage that bore inexorably down on the
black-shirts.
 
Wellesley’s followers stared at us in
disbelief.
 
They simply could not credit
the possibility that their ‘inferiors’ would stand up to them.

Wellesley left the scene as soon as he saw us coming.
 
He urged his horse down a side street and
abandoned his followers to their fate.

W
hat became known as
The
Battle of Gable Street started as a series of skirmishes between the front
ranks of the two opposing crowds.
 
Willie
Fitzgerald and his Red Brigade set upon a group of club-wielding Fascists.
 
A group of bearded Hasidim fought a pitched
battle with a cluster of black-shirts holding a banner depicting a hook-nosed
Jew with blood-covered vampire fangs.

The melee turned into a series of
one-on-one struggles as the two groups became intermingled.
 
The black-shirts favored a stylized,
knuckles-high style of pugilism that was ill-equipped to deal with the east
enders’ kicks and head-butts.
 
Even so,
they held their own at first, notwithstanding the chamber pots and bricks being
pelted at them by screaming housewives leaning out of second-story windows
overhead.

The tide turned in favor of the
home team after a few minutes and the black-shirts started to retreat.
 
I was about to join in the chase when I saw
Percy being man-handled toward a police van by two beefy constables.
 
I ran up behind them and kicked the larger of
the two in the knee, causing him to fall to the cobblestones.
 
His comrade turned on me and the last thing I
remember was the words ‘bolshie bastard’ and a brass knuckle-duster arcing down
at my head.

Chapter
XXXV:

A
Field Hospital – Stitches

I
awoke to
find myself in an improvised first-aid station set up in the Bakers’ Hall.
 
Scores of wounded lay on the bare wooden
floor, most with minor injuries, but some with broken bones or deep cuts that
stained their clothing red.
 
For all
their pain, the injured rioters were in a cheery mood.

“Did them buggers up a treat,
didn’t we?” said a Scotsman with a broken arm.
 
“Bet they’ll think twice before showing their ugly mugs around here
again.”

Sarah was attending to the more
serious injuries assisted by Edith Cowan and some of the other neighborhood
women.
 
Percy stood over her watching as
she and his mother splinted the Scotsman’s arm.

“Shove off Percy, there’s a good
lad,” his mother said.
 
“Can’t you see
we’re chock a block?”

“You might want to send Sarah over
to our Bob next,” Percy said.
 
“He’s in a
bad way.”

“He will just have to wait his
turn,” Sarah said.
 
“Where is he anyway?”

Percy pointed at me and her
expression changed.
 
“Can you finish this
one, Edith?” she asked.

If I had been expecting sympathy I
had come to the wrong place.
 
“How could
you be so bloody stupid?” she asked, as she inspected the three-inch flap of
skin hanging from my right cheek.
 
“This
isn’t even your country.”

“Maybe not, but he saved me going
to the nick,” Percy said.
 
“That makes
him one of us in my book.”

“Well this is going to hurt and it
serves him right,” Sarah said, unfastening the bag that held her sutures.
 
I was interested to note that she had somehow
come by a supply of catgut since the day she had repaired Malone’s arm.

“Here Bob,” Percy said, holding a
flask to my mouth.
 
“This will help with
the pain.”

I took a swallow of what had to be
one hundred and fifty proof rum.
 
Never
mind dulling the pain, my whole body felt numb.

Sarah patched me up as best she
could, but a piece of my cheek must still have been lying somewhere out on

“Go home at once,” Sarah said when
she was done.
 
“And do try not to get
into any more trouble.”

“Bugger going home,” Percy
whispered, as soon as she had gone.
 
“The
lads are having a huge
pissup
at the Lascar’s.
 
We’d best get down before the taps run dry.”

Chapter
XXXVI:

The
Lascar’s Head – Edith’s Advice

I
knew I
should go home, but The Lascar’s Head was high on my list of favorite places in
the east end.
 
From its grimy windows, to
its scarred wooden tables, it was everything a dive bar should be.

The party was in full swing when we
got there.
 
We had to step over a large
pool of vomit just to get in the door.
 
Once inside, we were forced against the wall by ring of people dancing
the Hokey
Cokey
.

You put your right hand in,

You put your right hand out,

You give your hand a shake, shake ,shake

And turn yourself about

Two sweating men in butcher’s aprons were arm wrestling
at a corner table; a slip of a girl in a white pinafore had just beaten the
local blacksmith in a chugging contest; a big-breasted barmaid pushed her way
through the crowd holding pints of beer above her head; the air was thick with
the smells of sweat, spilled beer and pipe tobacco.

The evening’s musical accompaniment
was provided courtesy of a pair of dust-covered navies with their two-part
harmony version of ‘
You're My Heart's Desire, I Love You Nellie Dean
.’

All
the world seems sad and lonely, Nellie Dean

For
I love you and you only, Nellie Dean

And
I wonder if on high

You
still love me, if you sigh

For
the happy days gone by, Nellie Dean

I was starting to think Sarah might
have been right about going straight home.
 
Every table was full and there was no way I would be able to stand the
whole evening.
 
I was just about to make
my excuses to Percy when Willie Fitzgerald spotted us.

“It’s themselves, Percy and Bob,”
he shouted in his best Irish brogue.
 
“Make way for the cobblestone crew.”

A cheer went up and we were
surrounded by a crowd of well-wishers who showed every sign of wanting to hoist
us up on their shoulders until Percy talked them out of it.

“Don’t be manhandling our Bob,” he
said.
 
“Any rough stuff and his cheek
will split open and how’s he going to drink then?”

“
Cor
,
would you look at that?” said a man with an eye patch as he inspected my
stitches with his remaining eyeball.
 
“Looks
like they ran the
Whitechapel and
Bow Railway
down the side of his head.”

Several pints later, the ache in
the side of my face had subsided enough that I was able to give a lecture on the
Seattle Seahawks to a group of bemused teamsters.
 
I told them about the disastrous off-season
trade of Elvis Wilkins for an unproven quarterback , the weaknesses on the line,
the too-frequent changes in the
linebacking
corps.

“But most of all, they lack three
things.
 
They lack enthusiasm.”
 
I said, pounding right hand over my heart for
emphasis.
 
“They lack willpower.”
 
Again with the heart pound.
 
“They lack heart.”

One of the teamsters, a grizzled
man with a Yosemite Sam moustache spat and looked at me.
 
“This Elvis Wilkins you been going on about,”
he asked.
 
“Would he be any relation to Bert
Wilkins as runs the
chippy
over on Leek Street?”

S
omewhere
along the line, Percy and I hooked up with two sisters named Marge and Lucy, or
maybe it was Louise.
 
I got Marge and at
first I thought I was getting the better of the deal.
  
Marge had bigger breasts and nicer teeth.
 
But she turned out to be a chronic
kvetcher
.

“It’s all well and good for you men,”
she said, offering her views on the afternoon’s clash with the BLF.
 
“You get to go out and play at soldiers in
the street.
 
But who’s got to clean up
the mess afterwards?
 
Us women, that’s
who.”
 
She drained her mug in two swallows
and slammed it to the table to emphasize the depths of male perfidy.

Percy’s girl, Louise or Lucy, was
more accommodating.
 
She sat on his lap
with her arm around his neck, the better to whisper in his ear.
 
Most of her murmured comments were inaudible
but the words “me mum’s not home” made their way across the table in one of the
rare breaks in her sister’s relentless assault on the world.

“Just you keep them knees together
girl,” Marge said, glaring at her.
 
“Last
thing our lot needs is another mouth to feed.”

Just then an odd mixture of
resentment and guilt came over Percy’s face.
 
I thought at first Marge had embarrassed him, but I realized the cause
was more serious when I felt someone slap the back of my head.

“This isn’t what I meant when I told
you to take out the rubbish,” said Edith Cowan.

“Who the bleeding hell are you?”
said belligerent Marge.

“Someone who’s going to sort you
out if you don’t shove off.”

Marge seemed about to protest but
changed her mind when she saw the look in Edith’s eye.
 
“C’mon Luce,” she said to her sister.
 
“It’s getting stuffy in here.”
 
She and her sister drained their pints, rose
unsteadily from the table and lurched off into the crowd.

Percy reached for his glass but his
mother took it away and poured its contents onto the floor.
 
“
Oy
.” he said.
 
“You always told me not to be wasteful.”

“I also told you not to be a right
berk
, but that didn’t stop you did it?
 
You get yourself off home.
 
Bob and I have matters to discuss.”
 
She pulled her son up by the collar and propelled
him toward the door before taking the seat facing me.
 
“What have you got to say for yourself then?”
she said.

“About what?”

“About hanging about with tarts
while our Sarah sits at home.”

“What’s Sarah got to do with
anything?”

“I don’t know how things are in
America, but around here they’ve got a name for a man who two-times his woman.”

“What are you talking about?
 
Sarah’s not my woman.”

“Then what have the two of you been
up to, riding about together all over the country?
 
Are you saying you don’t fancy her?”

“Even if I did, it wouldn’t
matter.
 
She thinks she’s too good for
me.”

“She might have done once, but
she’s come down off her high horse long since.”

I took another sip of my beer while
I pondered this new information.
 
“What’s
she been saying to you?” I asked finally.

“Never you mind.
 
Anyhow it doesn’t matter.
 
I could tell how she feels even if she hadn’t
said nothing at all.”
 
Now it was Edith’s
turn to think things over.
 
“I am a proper
woman and I wouldn’t normally say this but you need to strike while the iron is
hot.”

“What iron?”

“God’s truth you’re thick.
 
You need to have her the way a man has a
woman.
 
You can make her respectable
later.”

“You mean marry her?
 
No need.
 
We already are.”

“What are you on about now?”

“Well funny story,” I said, before
telling her about our escape in handcuffs and our registry office wedding.
 
Edith’s lips grew thinner and thinner as she
listened.

“So you’re already married?” she
said.

“Pretty much.”

“Finish that pint and get yourself
off home in five minutes,” she said, rising to her feet.
 
“And not a minute longer mind.”