Middlesteel were his education. He never even looked at the penny sheets. They only reminded him of a world that would never be his; of reading and meals and warm rooms and caring parents.
‘That was Quest, that was Abraham Quest!’
Quest? Ducker was amazed. Circle’s turn; the cleverest man in Middlesteel, it was said. Probably the richest too.
Ducker looked towards the humming carriage disappearing into the distance, a glitter of gold among the dark, sooty streets.
‘You should have asked for two crowns, you bleeding turnip,’ laughed William.
‘I expect we’ll need to fit a footman’s plate to the rear now,’ announced the driver. ‘Because when word of what you just did spreads among his friends, we’re going to be mobbed by guttersnipes at every crossing in the city.’
Abraham Quest stretched back in his seat, unconcerned. ‘Those young children are the future of Jackals, Veryann.’
‘It’s not as if you don’t already give generously enough to the Board of the Poor. And there are those children’s academies you sponsor …’
‘As to the need, so to the means.’ A quotation from the Circlist Book of Common Reflections. ‘Do you never ponder, Veryann, why one child eats off a silver platter and sleeps warm under a woollen blanket, while another goes hungry to a bed filled with twelve others equally desperate? Do you never wonder what discrepancy in fate, motivation or resolve leads to the terrible disparities in this land of ours?’
Veryann turned the carriage onto Drury Dials, steering the humming vehicle towards the House of Guardians. ‘Of all people, you should know the answer to that, Abraham Quest – you a workhouse child risen so far. The strong and the cunning and the quick thrive, the weak fail. It is the way of all nature.’
‘Ah, yes, the answer of a true soldier of the city-states.’ Quest glanced back sadly. ‘I was just like that urchin once. I truly was. It is like staring into a mirror thirty years ago. But things do not have to be this way.’
They were meeting in the Strandswitch Club, two streets down from parliament itself. The First Guardian had a delicious sense of irony. Before the Leveller party swept into power during the last election, Benjamin Carl would have been just about the last person in the kingdom to be voted into Middlesteel’s most prestigious political club. Now the club’s committee had no choice at all but to admit the man.
Guardians and civil servants from Greenhall watched Abraham Quest’s progress across the lush carpet and leather armchairs with the startled glances of those who had just found a copper ha’penny abandoned between the cobbles of the pavement. Did they see him, or did they see his wealth? He already knew the answer. Money was power and notoriety, a lens through which his humanity was distorted by any and all who saw him. All save perhaps the politician he had come to see, who had always seemed curiously unmoved by any such consideration. It was one of the reasons they got on so well.
‘First Guardian,’ announced the club butler. ‘Your guest has arrived.’
Benjamin Carl lay down his copy of the Middlesteel Illustrated News and pointed to an armchair opposite the small table that concealed the frame of his wheelchair.
‘Neutral ground, Benjamin?’
‘Tongues would wag if I received you at my offices in parliament,’ said Carl.
‘More speculation on the amount of my donations to the Leveller party, perhaps?’
‘Yes, it is curious how one’s respect for the cheeky tenacity of Dock Street’s pensmen when in opposition adjusts after winning a majority.’
‘Freedom of expression is one of the great marks of our civilization,’ said Abraham, picking up the politician’s newspaper. There was a black linework cartoon on the front cover. The First Guardian facing down a gaggle of Guardians from the opposition parties in a challenge of debating sticks, a cloud of insults rising from the deliberately doll-sized mob of politicians. Benjamin Carl’s wheelchair had been transformed into a war chariot with iron spikes, his wheels crushing the more radical members of his own party. A speech bubble rose out of Carl’s grinning countenance: ‘This ride is too strong for you, m’compatriots.’
‘So it is,’ said the First Guardian, checking to make sure the club’s other patrons were out of earshot. ‘And it is a little frank speaking which I thought we might engage in this morning, Abraham.’
‘I would expect nothing less from the firebrand author of Community and the Commons.’
Carl ignored the jibe about his book – barely off the banned list for as long as his election as First Guardian. ‘The plain speaking is regarding your commercial concerns.’
‘Another donation, perhaps? I heard parliament was getting sticky again about your proposed labour reforms. I do try and set an example with the House of Quest.’
‘It is not your mill conditions which interest me – the long lines of prospective workers that queue up every time you open up a new concern speak well enough for those. It is your output I wish to discuss – more specifically, that of your airship works at Ruxley Waters.’
‘The Board of the Admiralty haven’t been complaining about the quality of the aerostats my mills turn out, have they, First Guardian?’
‘Hardly,’ replied Carl. ‘Your airwrights are the most proficient in Jackals, your airship designs the most advanced – as you well know from the size of your order-book with the navy.’ The politician jerked a finger towards the lady retainer standing discreetly by the door of the club’s dining room. ‘She is a free company fighter? From the Catosian city-states?’
‘Veryann? Yes, she is.’
‘Our nation has a long, regretful tradition of tolerating the rich and powerful keeping private armies under the fiction that they are fencibles, reserves salted away for times of war. I do not intend to be the first leader of parliament who starts tolerating private aerial navies too.’
‘It’s somewhat difficult to test new aerostat designs without celgas to float the airships we build,’ said Quest.
‘Jackals’ monopoly on celgas has kept our state safe for hundreds of years,’ replied the First Guardian. ‘Your test flights are a little too regular and the discrepancies between the gas barrels you are sent and what comes out of your airship hangars at the other end a little too wide of the mark.’
‘I shall have words with the yard’s overseers,’ said Quest.
‘Please do,’ said Carl. ‘We have our merchant marine to serve our trade and we have the Royal Aerostatical Navy to serve our defence. Your proving flights are one thing, but let me make this absolutely clear: there is no room for a third force in the air above Jackals.’
Quest chortled. ‘I am not a science pirate, Ben. I understand there are subtler ways to ensure reform for our people than standing an airship off the House of Guardians and dropping fin-bombs on the heads of your parliamentarians until you legislate for harmony among the nations and prosperity for the deserving poor.’
‘Then you understand well. Our nation is surrounded by envious tyrannies that covet our people’s wealth and would crush the freedoms that we enjoy; parliament’s backbenches are packed with Heartlanders, Purists, Roarers and Middle Circleans who would all love to see the first Leveller government for a century fail, and as for you …’
‘Mercantilism has always been a competitive business, First Guardian. The number of enemies that are out there circling me is one of the few ways I still keep score.’
A solicitous member of the club’s staff came over, offering the two men a glass of jinn. The Strandswitch Club was traditional that way: brandy still out of fashion after the attempted invasion of Jackals by its neighbour, Quatérshift, a few years earlier. Benjamin Carl took the glass and swirled the alcohol around the rim as if trying to read the future in its pink