But let the bigger thief go loose
who stole the common from the goose.
(Anonymous, 17th century)
“Who is
presenting today?”
“Rhodri Hactonby.
He’s in his final year.”
“Ah, you
mean Lord Hactonby.” Dr Coster chuckled. “I wonder what the connection
is with Hactonby. It’s in Lincolnshire, isn’t it? Perhaps his father owns it.”
“I’m afraid
I know little of such matters,” said Dr Coster. “I’m just a humble Wykehamist.”
“Actually I
can’t say I liked Hactonby much even then.”
“Oh,” said
Coster. “By the way, I take it you circulated his presentation to the group?”
“I did.”
Dean was a postgraduate and assisted Dr Coster with the Historiography course.
He was likeable, if quiet; lately he had been quieter. Dr Coster noticed that
he was staring into the middle distance, where a slim figure in jeans and a
T-shirt was walking ahead of them towards the School of History.
“Ah. Miss
Jade Smith,” he said. “Our token pleb.”
“I like
her,” said Dean.
Coster
looked at him. “She’s a little hard to like sometimes,” he said. Dean made no
reply.
They seated
themselves in the lecture room, Coster on the dais from which he would chair
the seminar. Dean sat with the 15 or 16 students, next to Jade; the chair
beside her had remained vacant until they came in. She was a slight figure,
five foot nothing with a gaunt face and a full mouth. her eyes were dark and
her skin scarred by acne.
Hactonby
was presenting. He was tall with a floppy mane of blond hair; his face was pale
and rather fleshy. He moved himself across the room with restless energy,
waving his hands about and pointing now and then at the screen. His first slide
read:
UNCOVERING
PROGRESS
THE MAPS OF GUNTERSFORD PARVA
His next slide showed a patchwork quilt of a village, with long fingers of land divided into narrow ribbons.
“This is the parish around 1350, at the time of the Black Death,” he said. “This map is obviously not contemporaneous. It was put together by the late Professor Blanchflower from parish records and from the archaeological project that he conducted in this and a number of Midland parishes in the 1970s. It is splendid work and I commend it to you. We may observe” – he waved his hand at the image – “the land was farmed on the strip system; a peasant subsistence economy. But two hundred years later” – he clicked the remote control – “things are very different. This is the parish after an Act of Enclosure. The strip system is gone and we see larger, more efficient units, given to sheep production…. In the wake of the Black Death, a labour shortage had caused the peasants to pressure landowners for improved conditions. Their response was to enclose the land and institute less labour-intensive, more productive agriculture.”
“Yes,
Jade?” said Hactonby. He looked a little put out.
“Where did
the people go?” she asked.
“The
people?”
“The ones
who wanted better conditions.”
“Well, I
imagine they went to the growing towns of Elizabethan England,” said Hactonby.
He frowned. “Rural-urban migration must have eased the pressure on the
countryside.”
“I wonder if it did,” said Jade. Her accent was from the West Midlands, and jarred a little in the room. “You may have read A.L. Rowse. In his The England of Elizabeth he notes that in rural parishes in the 16th century, there was a surplus of births over deaths. In urban ones there was a surplus of deaths over births. So migrating doesn’t seem to have worked out very well for them, does it?”
“Well,” said Hactonby. “One must look at the bigger picture. A country must progress.” He clicked to the next slide. “Here we see the parish in 1800, as sketched out by the Rector of Guntersford Parva, Elias Winterbottom.” He turned to the room. “A most estimable gentleman who did much for the poor of the parish. His journals are in my family’s archives.” He indicated the map. “As you will see, there is now a mill and some housing.” He clicked again. “The year 1920. The same approximate area though it is now part of the urban Borough of Guntersford. The mill buildings have been replaced by the factory complex of Grimly and Straight, boilermakers and later transmission manufacturers…” He turned to Jade. “I understand my family leased the land to the firm, and invested in its plant. One fancies that the descendants of those peasants then found productive work forging the pistons and spars for Spitfires and Hurricanes.”“Jolly good
for them,” said Jade.
Hactonby displayed the next slide. “And here is the parish in the year of our Lord 2024. I have cheated; this is from Google Maps.” The room tittered. “The manufacturing plant complex is long gone. The buildings you see now are, as far as I can establish, a call centre and an Amazon fulfilment centre.” He steepled his hands in a gesture that Dean thought theatrical, and continued:
“In maps we
see the progress of a country. A subsistence economy that produces little
surplus value. When it ceases to be economic, it is replaced by a form of
agriculture that does. Its labour requirements are less but people will
continue to breed, so a labour surplus allows us to proceed to a manufacturing
economy and, when that too ceases to pay, to a services one. The evolution is,
for now, complete. And the maps show it all.”
“No they
don’t,” said Jade. “They show f**k all. What happened to the peasants when they
left the land? What happened to the workers when the mill closed? Did the
factory take them? Or were they made to bugger off?”
“Jade,”
said Dr Coster, “these are fair questions but please be civil.”
“About
what? About what this little shit’s family did to the likes of mine for 700
years?”
There was a
mixed reaction in the room. Some groaned. Some laughed. Dr Coster sat with his
mouth slightly open. Dean’s face showed a sort of pain.
“I say,”
said Hactonby, ”would you like to discuss this over dinner?” He grinned.
There were
snorts of laughter. Coster smiled. Jade stood and blundered to the door. It
slammed behind her and she caught ironic cheers as she walked away.
“That is
enough,” said Dr Coster. “Please, that is quite enough.”
Dean went
to the door too. As he opened it he turned back towards Hactonby. “Rhodri,” he
said, “you are a f**king peasant. You always were.”
“Jade.”
“What.”
He trotted
up to her. “I don’t suppose he meant any harm,” he panted.
“Oh, he f**king
did.” She glared at him. “You don’t get it, do you? We’re so different, me and
him, you and me. It’s a different country for you, isn’t it? Even maps don’t
say the same things for you.” She closed and opened her eyes and he realised
she was crying. ”I hate it here,” she said. “I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. I
hate you all. I wish I’d never come.”
She turned
and moved away, head bowed.
“Jade!” he
called.
“F**k off,”
she choked.
“Jade!
Stop!” She turned around.
“I love
you!” he yelled.
“You what?”
A Deliveroo driver turned and looked at them,
then hurried on.
“I love you,” he repeated. They stood and looked at each other, their clothes soaked, her hair matted against her face by the rain.
No Old Etonians or Oxbridge students were harmed during the writing of this piece.
More flash
fiction:
Cold
Everything is cold here
Homecoming
A sort of love story
Solitude
A Cold War story
Hiraeth
A yearning…
Strange Places
A spirit in the sky
A Sideways Journey
Things might have been different
Displaced
Encounter on E94th Street
Belonging
Do you? Where?
Leaving Home
A house has memories
