The Peeler

By: Will B
(© 2009-2010 by the author)
 

The author retains all rights. No reproductions are allowed without the author's consent. Comments are appreciated at...

Chapter 1 

London, June 20, 1837

At four a.m. a young girl was awakened by her mama. Together the two women went downstairs to the drawing room where two elderly gentlemen arose at their approach. The men both sank to their knees and after a few murmured words, kissed the young girl’s hand and after a few more words of sympathy, rose and backed out of her presence.

After they had left the older woman said, “Come Victoria, I think you should come back to bed for a little while.”

“Yes, Mama, I will, but from now on I should like to have a bed room of my own. I’ll see you later this morning before I leave for my first Privy Council Meeting.”

“But, Victoria….”

“A room of my own. Thank you so much, Mama. Now, good night.”

At six-thirty a.m. that same morning, twenty-five year old Frederick Fitzwilliam was suddenly awakened.

BOM! »»  BOM! »» BOM! »» BOM!»»

‘Damn and blast,’ he thought to himself. ‘What is that noise? Are we at war?’

Throwing off his covers, he swung his muscular legs over the side of the bed, got up, and put on a dressing gown and went to the window and flung open the shutters and threw up the sash.

“Sir! Sir!” he called to an older man walking in the street below. “What’s amiss?”

“It’s the King, Sir. He died in the night. We have a new Queen now; God Bless Her,” the man replied.

“God Bless her, indeed. Thank you, sir,” Frederick replied as he closed the window and shutters, and went to stir up the fire and heat a little water so he could wash and shave. That done, he put on the uniform of a sergeant in Sir Robert Peel’s new Metropolitan police force.*

Leaving the apartment building where he had his dwelling, he went out on the street, where the noise of the bells was even louder than it had been in his room.

He stopped at a street vendor’s and purchased a cup of coffee and a mutton pie, and then took a hansom cab** to the police station where he had his office.

Arriving at his place of work, the duty constable greeted him and the two men chatted about the death of King William IV, known to many as ’Silly Billy.’

“You know what this means, Constable Williams,” said Frederick. “We will be having a coronation and every pick pocket, confidence man, and trollop in the land will be coming to London to pick up what ever they can.”

“Right you are about that, Sergeant,” replied Constable, who was fifty-six years old, and of a kindly disposition, but who also had a realistic view of the world. “We’ll have our work cut out for us….oh, and by the way, sir, this letter was delivered for you just before you arrived.” The constable handed him a sealed letter and Frederick took it into his office.

Sitting at his desk, he opened the letter and saw it was from his solicitor, Simon Dawlish. ‘Hmm… He wants me to call on him as soon as possible,’ Fitzwilliam understood as he read. ‘He has something to tell me of great importance.’ 

“Constable, I have to be out on some personal business. I’ll be back in about two hours.”

“Right-oh! Sir. I’ll sign you out.”

Once again Frederick was sitting in a hansom, bowling through the streets of London. As he passed Kensington Palace he saw crowds of men and women, most of them dressed in black, moving towards the palace, perhaps in the hopes of catching a sight of the new queen, but more likely just to be there, to show sympathy.

Frederick saw there sights that saddened him. He saw a small boy deftly pick a man’s pocket and then run away into the crowd. He saw other boys sitting on street corners, begging for tuppence so they could buy a bit of bread. As his cab crossed Waterloo Bridge,*** he saw mudlarks—men, women, boys, and girls--scrounging in the mud, looking for something they could sell: a piece of metal, a piece of timber, some rope—anything they could sell so they could get sustenance to survive another day.

‘If only something could be done,’ he pondered. He remembered how, when his parents had died suddenly when he was only twelve, he might have ended up on the streets like the children he had glimpsed on his way to Simon Dawlish’s office.

He remembered that first interview with Dawlish. He was twelve, and Dawlish was forty-two. Frederick had sat in the lawyer’s office wondering what was to become of him.

“Well, now, young man,” Dawlish had said. “I am sorry your parents have died, and I am sure you are wondering what is going to happen to you now.”

“Y-y-yes, sir,” Frederick had replied. “W-w-will I have to go to the workhouse?”

“Oh, no,” Dawlish had replied. “Your parents may not have told you, but you have an uncle who has made some provision for you, but you may not accept it unless you give me your solemn word that you will make no attempt to contact him. Do you so promise?”

“Yes, sir. I promise.”

“Excellent! Now here is what is going to happen. You will be sent to Harrow, an excellent school just outside of London, and you will attain the education and the social skills needed to enable you to make your way in the world. Unfortunately, there is no money to send you to university,” Dawlish explained. “However, if you earn good marks in your classes, there will be a position open for you, somewhere. I promise you.”

As Frederick rode through the streets he thought about that interview and then he thought about those years at Harrow.**** He had arrived in 1825, a new boy, more than a little frightened about this new environment and wondering if he would make any friends.

That uncertainty ended one week after his arrival when Dawlish sent a ‘tuck box,’ filled with cakes, pies, tarts, biscuits, and all manner of good things to eat. Simon had offered to share with the other boys in his class. That did it! The ice was broken. The sharing of food broke down any barriers of shyness, isolation, or just plain snobbery that might have existed on the part of the other boys.

Simon smiled to himself as he remembered those golden summer days on the river. He and his classmates went wading, jumping, splashing, diving, and later, swimming. Of course, nobody wore any kind of swim clothes. The boys went into their water in their birthday suits.

Being boys of high spirits, a certain amount of curiosity was present. This later changed to tickling, and as their bodies matured, the boys began to enjoy ‘pleasuring’ themselves—and their buddies. Frederick enjoyed these sessions, perhaps a little more than some of the other boys.

As the boys grew older, they began to speculate about girls and what could be done about, or with, or to them.  Frederick, or ‘Fitz,’ as his classmates had begun calling him, was not curious about girls at all. In fact he much preferred…

This attitude was solidified one summer afternoon when he came across two of the upperclassmen lying in the grass, copulating like two boars. Fritz didn’t make a sound, but he watched, surprised, and then entranced. ‘What would it be like…What would it feel like…?’  He wondered to himself.

These reveries ended when the hansom cab stopped outside the building in which Simon Dawlish’s office was located. Frederick got down, paid the cabbie, and walked up to the front door and went in.

“Come in, Mr. Fitzwilliam, come in,” John Digby, Mr. Dawlish’s clerk, greeted him warmly. “Mr. Dawlish is expecting you.”

 Frederick walked into Mr. Dawlish’s book-lined office and the solicitor rose to greet him.  “Good morning, Frederick. How are you?” Dawlish asked.

“Just fine, sir, and you?”

“In good health, thank you. Now please be seated, and we will get down to business,” Dawlish replied.

Taking some papers from a folder, he looked at Frederick and said, “I am empowered to tell you that your uncle had followed your progress all through Harrow, and he was pleased that you did so well. When you left Harrow, he was even more pleased when you came to work as a clerk in my office, and I was delighted to tell him what a good worker you were. You showed initiative, intelligence, and discretion.”

“Thank you, sir. It was a pleasure to work for you,” Frederick replied.

“Hrumph! Yes, well. When you left here after a few months to become a member of Sir Robert Peel’s police force, your uncle and I were both very impressed that you would leave a steady job that might have led to advancement to go into a line of work that might be dangerous at times, but would certainly be a benefit to society,” Dawlish continued.

“It’s something I wanted to do, sir,” Frederick answered with a smile.

“It is my sad duty to tell you that your uncle has died, but he has left you a bequest. It is a property in London not to far from the river, and I think it would be a good idea if we go to look at it today so you can decide what you want to do with it. We’ll take my carriage.”

“I would like to see the property…but I am supposed to be back at work in an hour…I don’t know…,” Fred replied.

“Don’t worry. I have taken the liberty of writing to your Divisional Superintendent Lane, who is an old friend of mine, by the way. I told him that a matter involving some property has arisen and that you might not be returning to the office until this evening. I hope you will forgive me for taking such a high-handed approach to your affairs.”

“I would like to see this property, so…thank you, sir,” was Frederick’s reply.

Dawlish sent his clerk to have the carriage brought around and in a few minutes the two men were seated driving to this property.

When they arrived at the address, Frederick saw a three-story building that occupied almost a whole city square. Across a lane there was a public bathhouse, and on the other side of that was a tavern.

The building itself was dark, but Dawlish had brought a couple of lanterns so they could see their way around the interior of the building. Dawlish unlocked the door and they went in. The ground floor was made up of large offices, now empty of all furniture except for one that had a desk and two chairs.  The first floor (second floor to Americans) had rooms that appeared to have been used as individual offices.

The floor above that had large open areas that might have been used for storage.

When they had walked through the entire building, Dawlish suggested that they go to the nearby tavern and take some refreshment. Frederick agreed, but he was very quiet.

When they were seated and had given their orders, Dawlish asked “What do you think of the property? You could sell it…or you could attempt to rent it…?”

Frederick looked at Dawlish and said, “Sir, you may think I’m crazy, but if I had the money I’d like to have that building cleaned, walls plastered and painted, and furnished. I’d like to have a school…, a home…, where boys who were at risk of falling into a life of crime and poverty could live in safety, and be taught to read and write and then be apprenticed out to respectable merchants and artisans to learn a trade.”

“Yes, Frederick,” Dawlish said seriously, “many people would think you were mad…fit to be locked up in bedlam!”

“What do you think, sir?”

“What do I think? I think your uncle would be happy that you wanted to use his property in such a way, and I know that I am delighted in your decision. And now that you have made that decision, I will tell you the rest of your uncle’s bequest to you.”

To be continued...

Author’s notes.

A bow and a tip of the hat to Helen Hayes, Anna Nagle, Irene Dunn, Julie Harris, Dame Judy Dench, and Emily Blunt, who have all portrayed the life or portions of the life of that young eighteen year old girl we met at the beginning of this chapter.

* In 1829 an Act of Parliament established an effective police force in London, the work of Prime Minister Robert Peel. This force covered the entire urban area. The force gained the nickname of "bobbies" or "peelers" named after Robert Peel.

** Hansom cabs, two-wheeled one-horse cabs, were introduced in London in 1834.

*** Waterloo Bridge opened in 1817.

**** Harrow School had been founded by John Lyon in 1571.

As always my thanks to my reader, mentor, and friend, “Critter,” who watches my p’s and q’s and commas and semicolons.

Posted: 10/22/10