The Water Room

31. THE RIVER FINDS A WAY

The Holmes Road Working Men’s Hostel had once been a small Victorian sub-post-office, a fussy urban cottage of ginger brick and curling cream lintels, constructed on a human scale, that welcomed all. Now a pair of standard-issue council doors had been fitted over the front entrance, a wheelchair ramp had replaced the steps, and the ground-floor windows had been mesh-wired. Inside, eye-scorching fluorescent strips and lack of curtains lent the building an almost unbearable air of melancholic dislocation. The borough’s approach to rethinking the usage of such buildings rarely extended beyond slapping another coat of paint over frayed interiors.

Arthur Bryant was admitted to a small bare holding bay, and waited while the receptionist checked the register behind a wall of scratched plexiglass.

‘If you’ve come about admittance for longer than a single night, you’ll need a referral from your doctor,’ she said briskly.

‘I’m not a rough sleeper, I’m a Detective Inspector,’ Bryant complained. The receptionist eyed his threadbare overcoat disbelievingly. With a sigh of annoyance, Bryant pulled out his ID and slapped it on the window. ‘I’m looking for someone called Tate.’

‘You’re in luck,’ she declared, in a booming, institutional timbre that probably proved useful when dealing with the inebriated, but was guaranteed to annoy everyone else. She was the type born for a certain kind of council employment: proprietorial, frozen, rule-bound and battle-scarred, but on some basic level decent enough to care. She flicked the book shut and checked her key board. ‘He’s back in. Tate usually prefers to sleep rough. He stays out in all weathers. Says rooms make him claustrophobic.’

After examining the accommodation, Bryant could see why. Thin MDF partitions had carved the old sorting rooms into quarters, then eighths. Some dividers segmented windows and parts of the blue and white corridor. Each room was large enough for a single bed and a tiny plywood table. A communal dining room reeked of boiled stews and reheated gravy. There were notices about needles and fires and depression and missing persons, and, oddly, one about ballroom dancing.

‘How long has he been with you?’ Bryant asked.

‘I was only transferred here from Housing six weeks ago,’ explained the receptionist. ‘He doesn’t have much documentation beyond his health record, the usual alcohol-related pulmonary problems. He’s had pneumonia a couple of times. The next time will be his last. Admitted without any paperwork-nothing unusual about that, of course-but he does seem local to the borough. Everyone calls him Tate, although it’s not his real name. He hoards tins of golden syrup. He’s too far gone to remember how he might have been christened.’

‘How old is he?’

‘Probably in his late fifties. It’s hard to tell when they’ve lived rough for so long.’

‘Can I see him?’

‘You won’t get anything out of him. He doesn’t like to talk.’ The receptionist buzzed Bryant in and led him to the end of the first-floor corridor. She knocked briskly on the door and slipped her key into the lock before there was an answer. Tate was sitting on the edge of his bed, hands folded in his lap, staring through the condensation-smeared window. ‘I’ll leave you two alone,’ she said, then, raising her voice, added, ‘Lunch in ten minutes, Mr Tate.’

Bryant waited until her footsteps had been folded away by the swing-doors, then stood watching the street from the window. The room’s occupant had not acknowledged his presence.

‘I could watch a London street all day,’ Bryant remarked. ‘So many different types of people. Much more going on than in the old days.’

‘And you think that’s a good thing, do you?’ said the man on the bed. The voice was surprisingly cultured, but had perhaps lost its edge of late.

‘No, just different. More strangers now, coming and going. I used to know my neighbours.’

‘You’re the copper.’ Tate turned and studied him. ‘Are you going to keep that coat?’

‘This happens to be an old favourite,’ said Bryant, pulling the lapels closer.

‘I can see that. Am I under arrest?’

‘Well, we don’t like you sneaking into people’s gardens and watching them, because you upset them, but no, you’re not under arrest. What were you doing?’

‘Praying. But you have to be careful. Sudden prayers make God jump.’ Tate smiled. He had no teeth at all-an unusual sight these days. ‘Why are you here?’

‘I suppose I wanted to find out a bit about you. My name’s Arthur Bryant. I was told you don’t talk.’

‘I don’t talk to her.’ He jerked a dirty thumb at the wall.

‘Why not?’

‘She has nothing to say. It’s all square meals and personal hygiene. Not an ounce of poetry in her soul that hasn’t been scrubbed away with carbolic.’

‘You must have been in this neighbourhood a long time. Everyone seems to know you.’

‘You won’t catch me out like that. I don’t have to answer questions.’

‘Oh, it’s not really questions, just conversation. I’m interested. Tell me, why would you sleep in the drain, when you have a nice warm bed here?’

‘It’s safer.’

‘Is someone giving you trouble?’

‘No, not yet.’

‘But you think they will?’

No answer. Tate turned back to the window.

‘Well, the weather’s changed. The tunnels are flooding. You can’t stay down there through the winter.’

‘The water will always find a way to go wherever it wants. It can go around me.’

‘But it won’t.’

‘Oh yes, it will.’

‘How?’

‘I can make it.’

‘I see.’

‘Why are you here?’

‘I told you, I’ve been hearing things about the area that interest me.’ Bryant sat on the bed beside his host. ‘These houses, the residents leave a few marks to show they were there, then move on. It’s funny when you think about it.’

‘They were built for the families of the men who built the railways. Little terraced boxes for the workers.’

‘So I understand.’

‘That’s why there’s no decoration, see. No mouldings. No panels or friezes. Workers don’t need to see beauty.’

‘Why not?’

‘Gives them ideas above their station. They won’t miss what they’ve never had.’

As he spoke, Tate lost his nondescript appearance and attitude. For a moment, Bryant was afforded a glimpse of the man inside. He wondered if Tate had once been a teacher. ‘Who are you?’ he asked gently.

‘Poor and old is a terrible combination.’ Tate shook his head, barely hearing. ‘You become so unimportant. Your past achievements are forgotten. No one believes you. Your life is trodden on by strangers. You’ve nothing to show anyone who you were.’

‘Then tell me.’

Tate glanced back at the window. This time, Bryant saw nervousness in his eyes. ‘I’m no one. Let’s wash it all away, wash the past away until there are only clean new things left.’

Bryant decided to try another tack. ‘You must know the streets around here very well.’

‘I know the streets, the houses, and under the streets.’

‘There seem to be lots of ghost stories.’

‘Because of the river,’ Tate agreed. ‘Is it any wonder? The roads were laid over the Cloaca Maxima, the Fleet sewer, a highway of corpses. Plague and pestilence. On its way to the witch of Camden Town, it flooded and rotted the timbers of the houses.’

‘You mean Mother Red Cap.’ Bryant remembered the pub of the same name that stood on the site of the infamous witch’s house, now pointlessly renamed and spoiled. It had been the reason why Maggie Armitage had based her office, the Coven of St James the Elder, on its first floor.

Tate’s voice grew fainter. ‘1809-the snow was thick, and suddenly thawed in bright sunshine. The torrent of the Fleet was forced between the river’s arches, gaining great speed until it burst into the houses of the poor and drowned them. It always drowned the poor.’ He rubbed his chin, thinking. ‘I had a book on it once. I haven’t got it any more. They’ve no books here, just magazines about football and telly. I miss the books. I’ve just my own special ones, but they’re not for reading. I’ve nothing to read.’

‘Look, if I could get you some books, would you talk to me again?’

For a moment Tate seemed pleased by the prospect. Then his eyes clouded. ‘Too late to talk. Look, my useless hands.’ He raised trembling red fingers. The thumb of his right hand had been broken, and the bone had knitted poorly.

‘I’ll bring some books anyway,’ said Bryant, rising. ‘Please, stay here at the hostel for a few days, so I can find you.’

Tate returned his gaze to the window. ‘I can’t leave anyway. The rain’s not going to stop until the river finds a path again,’ he warned. ‘Then it will all be too late.’