The Devil's Making (3 page)

‘Drunken bastard. See the beach down there?' Jeroboam pointed with his whip at a stretch of mud between the plank houses and the water. ‘A coupla years back, the Songhees chief – Chief Freezy we call him – cut the head off of one of his wives, right on the beach, facing across the harbour. Supposed to be because she'd been doing jig-a-jig with a white man. But usually they don't care what their squaws do, so long as they bring back money. He musta wanted to impress people.'

Victoria itself is a sort of human zoo, containing respectable-looking ladies in hooped dresses and capes, and some men as well dressed as in London, though all must pick their way along a filthy boardwalk against a backdrop of wooden buildings, mostly taverns. Other men in slouch hats and ragged clothes are sprawled asleep against walls in the drizzle. There are also some quite ferocious Indians with painted faces, wearing a mixture of white man's clothing and their own, a conical hat made of basketry and a bark-woven cape, or dirty blankets in garish colours. The men's faces are light brown, Mongolian-looking, beardless but with thin drooping moustaches, as in an engraving of Genghis Khan. I saw one woman in a petticoat with bare feet and a blanket around her shoulders, her breasts exposed completely. Her nipples were pink.

When we came to the hotel Jeroboam had recommended (I had asked for the second best), the Argyle, there were several Indian men squatting on a wooden veranda. They stared at me. One of them made a remark in his language, guttural sounds and clicks of the tongue. Then he straightened his head and shoulders, drew down his mouth, contracted his nostrils so that they developed a pinched expression, raised his eyebrows slightly, and for an instant, to my horror, I was looking at a perfect reflection of myself! The face of a haughty Englishman! After only a second or two the Indian's face reverted to its former brutish impassivity. The others burst out laughing, one of them literally rolling on the boards of the veranda.

The Argyle is a square house of yellow painted wood. Inside there is a lobby of surprising but dilapidated elegance, like a huge drawing room, with a fireplace of logs burning vigorously, armchairs, sofas, back-to-back settees, tables with waxed fruit under glass, panelled walls hung with paintings of the ‘Monarch of the Glen' variety – stags or eagles standing on crags. A page boy in a shabby uniform jacket with brass buttons, but not wearing a cap, appeared promptly and took my coat and oilskin cape, holding them away from him. ‘I'll dry 'em in the kitchen', he announced. Then a dramatic middle aged woman in a pink crinoline and lace mob-cap decorated with girlish ribbons appeared, and made me welcome, in an Irish accent on which genteel vowels had been superimposed. A Mrs Larose, whose poor dear husband was recently deceased. He had been a French ‘homme d'affaires' in her words (pronouncing the ‘h' of homme and the ‘s' of affaires). She swiftly negotiated a stiff price: 16 dollars, or £4 a week without meals. ‘Such awful, terrible weather it is. You'll be so tired. How is Home?' she gushed as she herself undertook to show me my room, up a narrow staircase. It is just as in England, with a brass bedstead, wash-stand, wine-coloured carpet of indifferent floral design but at least clean. The walls, papered in the inevitable motif of incessantly repeated flowers, are slightly crooked as if the building were comfortably old, although nowhere in Victoria could have been built more than 15 years ago. The window looks out onto Broad Street and a row of wooden shacks which proclaim themselves to be the offices of an insurance broker and a real-estate agent, alternating with taverns.

Although I was dying to settle in, wash my hands and face, and find the water closet to relieve myself after that bumpy journey on the cart, Mrs Larose lingered in the doorway and after a few more polite questions about ‘home' – meaning England where I wondered if she had ever been – began to tell me (Yes!) her life story. At least the more recent part. The purchase of the hotel. The late Mr Larose's final decline and dementia from a venereal disease … Yes, she told me that! ‘Of course once I knew, I could never sleep with him,' she said, ‘it became a marreeyage de conveeniaunce.' She is a great Francophile. Even Mr Larose's disease came with him from
France,
certainly
not
– and here she lowered her voice as if speaking of the dead, although she had sounded quite cheerful, even excited, speaking of the really dead Mr Larose – from a filthy Indian. He had
nothing – rien!
– to do with
them.
And the venereal disease – with French politeness, I found myself supposing – had refrained from attacking her although of course she had ‘been with' her husband for many years while he must have had it –
dormant
(pronounced in the French way) of course – without knowing about it. ‘I'm so sorry you're not a doctor, Mr Hobbes', she burbled, ‘We
so
much need good doctors in this Colony. They are mere
horse
doctors, as I hope you are not misfortunate enough to find out. They don't understand the agonies of mature women!'

Of course I ended up apologising for not being a doctor. I was bewildered, as usual, with women. I hoped she wasn't flirting with me. But no, there was no sidling towards me, she remained respectably in the doorway. She was simply a raving chatterbox, like a landlady at home (Oh God, I shall get the habit of calling England ‘home') but with a total lack of inhibition. Eventually I made motions towards the wash-stand and she left.

*   *   *

My first meal in Victoria: breakfast at Ringo's restaurant – recommended to me by Jeroboam as he set me down at the Argyle. Ham and eggs, muffins with butter and jam, two glasses of coffee. All for 35 cents. Ringo is a carbon copy, as it were, of Jeroboam, and although he did not exactly tell me his life story, he let me know proudly that he had been one of the first Negroes in Victoria, before the Civil War, as a runaway slave. I sat on, browsing through the last few editions of the
British Colonist.
Victoria is in political ferment. There are indignant editorials about the horrifying prospect of annexation to the U.S.A., and the salvation promised by confederation with Canada. An election is coming up in which a Confederation Party led by someone called Amor de Cosmos is battling with a status quo party which, according to the
Colonist,
claims to maintain British interests but in fact harbours the secret agenda of annexation to the United States. Yet there are only 3,000 voters in the election. In their hands the fate of a land half as large as Europe!

The rest of the local factional conflicts are of the parish pump variety. The Governor used the prison chain gang to set out a croquet lawn at his residence, Carey Castle. The Anglican Bishop, a dandy known as Beau Brummel, is threatened by schism from his evangelistic Dean.

Ringo gave me directions to the only man I knew who might be in Victoria, Frederick Blundell, a friend of friends at Oxford, at Brasenose College. I had heard before leaving home that he was ‘in trade' here, which I assumed meant banking or something such. But Ringo said, ‘You'll find Fred at the ironmonger's on Store Street.'

The clouds had dissolved, and I stepped out into a surprisingly warm sun. The sky is a paler and brighter blue than in England. The wooden buildings were steaming as the rain dried. I made my way downhill to Wharf Street, now bustling with wagons and with men unloading a ship for the Hudson's Bay Company, then across a rickety bridge over a ravine whose sides were strewn with rubbish, offal, and pieces of broken wood, to Store Street. The ironmonger's had a brick front but wooden sides. Inside, tubs, kettles, buckets and watering cans were hanging from the ceiling on wires. I had to duck around them. Counters on each side were laden with boxes of nails and coils of wire. The walls were hung with shovels, picks, and more bunches of kettles and buckets. A small boy behind one counter was dealing with the shop's only customers, two men arguing quietly about nails. Behind the opposite counter Frederick was lounging on a high stool, reading a book. He looked at me blankly for a moment then broke into a smile and leapt up. ‘Chad Hobbes! Old chap, it's you, isn't it?' As if long lost brothers!

Another life story. Poor Frederick, with a poor degree and always a bit dim, seems to have sunk rather than swum out here. Spent his money in the Cariboo, looking for gold. Now saving his meagre earnings in the hope of starting a private school some time in the future. From what he said of the recent fall in the local economy, this seems as unlikely a dream as finding gold. Like my own hopes of working in the law! As Frederick put it, rattling on, ‘No go, old chap, I should think. Even if you'd become a barrister before leaving England there wouldn't be much work here. When people are caught red-handed in crimes they don't bother with a legal defense. There are five or six barristers who flourished on all the litigation during the Gold Rush, when everyone was suing everyone else over land frauds and money, but they seem poor as church mice now. There are a number of solicitors too, but there isn't the legal work, in conveyancing and so on, since there are so few sales. You might try Carey Castle but they're an awful crowd – sycophants and hangers-on, minor gentry from home, puffed up with importance and snobbery. And you should try the Legislature. Perhaps they need a clerk or something. Sorry, old chap, but that's the sort of possible level. Go over there and, yes, see old Matthew Begbie, the terror of the Cariboo, the dear old Indian-lover. He's an absolute gentleman, although born in South Africa or somewhere. He doesn't hear cases in Victoria. In fact there's a feud on about that. The judge here is a rather foolish chap called Needham, and although Begbie is Chief Justice he is stuck over on the mainland at New Westminster. But he comes over every couple of weeks on the steamer and sits in legislative councils. Can I sell you a pair of Wellington boots, old chap? Not strictly speaking iron, but we do “carry them”, as they say. You'll need them for the Legislature. To get there. The bridge has finally rotted through and been condemned, so you'll have to walk around James Bay in the mud. Watch out for the signs that say “No bottom”. They mean it. I'll draw you a map. Look, I have some splendid Wellingtons here.'

So my old acquaintance Frederick Blundell of Brasenose sold me a pair of rubber Wellingtons for the sum of three dollars.

*   *   *

Government Street, Victoria's main thoroughfare, comes to an end at a long wooden bridge to the Legislature buildings, known as the ‘bird-cages', across a wide bay of the Inner Harbour. The bridge is closed off and is visibly rotten, with slats fallen into the water. It's necessary either to take a ‘ferry' – one of the rowboats moored nearby, whose owners charge a dollar a trip – or to skirt the bay by a road which is merely a slough of mud and puddles. I took the road. There were only a few shanties here and there, with chickens or ducks running or paddling around them, stretches of long grass, and the frost-blackened remains of vegetable patches. On a rise up to my left was a wooden church – the cathedral – a humble site for the world-shaking doctrinal schisms which apparently threaten. Several horses and carts passed, with passengers in elegant coats, presumably coming from the Legislature. I was kept busy scrambling away from the road to avoid being splashed with mud. I felt pleased not to be doing the rounds of the failed lawyers, suppliant for a job. Visiting the Legislature gave me a sense of purpose, at least until I arrived there.

The ‘birdcages' are indeed a grotesque architectural feat, but not disagreeable. They are faced with pink brick and half-timbered to give an Elizabethan effect, though the timbers have been painted red. The roofs are also red, and pagoda-shaped. The main building has a little square bell tower, and is fronted with wooden steps to a door with a fan-light window. Horses were hitched to nearby posts, and the drivers of carts or buggies were standing in conversation in the sun at the edge of pleasant lush lawns. There were even flowerbeds with Michaelmas daisies, asters and chrysanthemums, only slightly frost-blackened. I followed a path which led past the carts and to the back where a wider flight of steps than in front led up to a long veranda on which some men in frock coats were standing arguing. They turned to look at me with cold curiosity. I asked whether Mr Begbie was in Victoria at present.

‘You're in luck. Here's here now', one man said. He had fixed intense eyes and a silly coal-scuttle shaped beard sticking aggressively forward. His accent was not quite like the local American.

The men continued to stare at me as I went in the door which was propped open on a chock of wood. There was a large panelled vestibule lined with benches, a circular staircase, and various doors. A man dressed in a black coat with silver buttons came forward and I handed him my letter of introduction. He took it and went through one of the doors. I sat on a bench and waited, twiddling my thumbs, aware that my Wellingtons were incongruous. Eventually the porter reappeared, followed by another man, who from his fussy air appeared to be a clerk. ‘Mr Hobbes? Mr Begbie will see you now.'

He escorted me into a large room whose windows looked out onto the front veranda. There was a fireplace with a wood fire, a table with documents strewn over it, and leather chairs.

‘Mr Hobbes. I am Matthew Begbie. Welcome to Victoria.' His voice is English, sharp, and high-pitched for such an imposing man. He is tall, dandyish, but broad shouldered. Thinning hair, a pointed grey-brown beard, aristocratic face with wide brow. Like engravings of Walter Raleigh. An elegant courtier. Frock coat, ruffed cravat, jewelled pin. Frederick mentioned, while I was trying on the boots, that Begbie was a tough customer who travelled by horseback or foot hundreds of miles on circuit, in snow or sun, pitching his own tent in the forest, living off wild game, handing out impartial judgement in the mining camps in an attempt to make Americans into peaceful British citizens. He is known both as a hanging judge and as an Indian-lover: he has hanged quite a few Indians, but believes they have title to the land they live and hunt in. This is apparently unpopular with the Legislature.