The Telling

will read the Riot Act,’ he said. ‘If this doesn’t resolve itself swiftly, they will read the Riot Act and they will send for troops. There’s a company of Militia at Skipton; they’ll ask for a detachment to be sent.’
    ‘For my dad?’
    ‘Maybe.’
    ‘For you?’
    He inclined his head.
    ‘But you’ve done nothing.’ I was indignant, and then flushed with shame: I hadn’t been able to feel indignant on Dad’s behalf.
    ‘The state of the country,’ Mr Moore said. ‘A tiny percentage of the population owns the vast majority of the country’s wealth. That suits them, but at the same time it’s terrifying; they are so outnumbered and have so much to lose. The idea that we might act in concert is appalling, that we might work towards something grander and more permanent than the filling of our bellies – they will crush this; they are too terrified to do otherwise.’
    He raised a hand to his eyes, pressing them with his fingertips; the white line of the scar down his thumb moved with the movement of sinew and muscle.
    ‘I should have had more sense,’ he said. ‘I should have seen where this was tending.’
    ‘No.’
    I came over to the fireplace and sat down opposite him. He didn’t speak. Half his face was lit from the embers, the other half in shadow. He looked worn and tired. He looked unloved.
    ‘That scar,’ I asked. ‘How did you do it?’
    He shook his head, not understanding.
    ‘On your thumb; that white scar running the length of your thumb.’
    He glanced down at it. ‘I’ve had it since I was a lad. I did it with a chisel; I was holding it wrong. My master let me find out for myself.’
    ‘That’s cruel. To do that to a boy. How were you to know?’
    ‘He didn’t have to tell me twice.’
    We both looked at his scarred hand. It was a moment before I could raise my eyes to meet his.
    ‘You said there would be troops. What will happen to you if –’
    He shook his head. ‘The other side of the world. Tasmania. It’s beautiful, but it’s hard. The winters are cold; people get sick, and I’m not a young man any more.’
    ‘But you said so yourself, to Wolfenden, you haven’t committed any crime.’
    ‘You’d be surprised how circumstances can conspire against you, how things can be construed. This place was quiet as the grave till I arrived. If someone gets hurt, someone gets killed, then – with my reputation –’
    I had to say it. The words were freighted with misery, but they had to be said. ‘You must leave now. Before anything can happen, before there is any charge to lay against you. You must get away from here.’
    He looked at me. ‘I’ve been telling myself that all day, telling myself that for weeks. It’s suicide to stay here, in this house, your father’s house, of all places.’ He shrugged. ‘Yet here I am.’
    I could feel my face warming as I spoke, but it didn’t matter in the near darkness: ‘Your wife, having supported you through everything, would she have wanted –’
    He gave an abrupt laugh. ‘If there is a heaven, and Jane is there, she’ll be splitting her sides laughing at me now.’
    ‘No,’ I said. ‘No, I don’t believe that.’
    ‘I wouldn’t blame her. I’m not an easy man – I was not a good father.’
    ‘You –’ I said, ‘I am sure you –’
    He interrupted me again. ‘They died, Elizabeth. They died in misery and squalor. Had I been there to look after them –’
    ‘But you were transported .’
    His eyes fixed on mine; they caught the fire’s glow, and glittered. ‘And for what? That poor girl still walks with a limp; my wife and child are dead; that policeman is probably all the keener to strike the first blow. I am a very stupid man, and the older I get the more stupid I become; it took far too long for me to –’
    The door crashed open and my father tumbled in, his cap pushed back and his shirt-tail hanging out, his face blank with drink. He started to say something, but the words were slurred. He staggered. Mr Moore stood up to help him, and was brushed off. He tried again, taking my father under the arms and speaking mildly. He helped him upstairs to bed, a slow dragging shuffle, way-marked with outbursts from my dad. Afterwards, I heard Mr Moore’s careful tread through to his room. He did not come down again. I went up and checked on my mother and the boys, and listened for a moment outside his door. He’d left a light burning; there was no sound from within, so I hoped he’d managed to