Dorothea Hall Mysteries

Rioting

Emory and Barton, as he insisted I call him, spoke of their shared past as we enjoyed a simple dinner. Freddy was spending some time with Mrs. Jones, who needed help in the bakery. I had been wondering how a carpenter and a rich son of a Scottish coal mine owner had become friends and how Mr. Dabbs came into the story. When they had finished catching up, I led to the subject, none too subtly.

"I am curious to know how the three of you came to meet," I said.

"It was all because of Henry," Emory said.

Barton smiled. "What do you know about the Swing Riots?"

"Protests and violence by agricultural workers a few years back," I said. "I didn't hear much about them here in London. Mostly they were happening in the south."

He nodded. "Not many people know, but the miners got in on the act early on. Back in 1820, some miners who worked for my father decided to protest their awful working conditions by destroying parts of the mines. My father feared they might even decide to threaten his family. He decided to send me to London to stay with his older sister for a while until things calmed down. I was eleven and visiting the big city for the first time, so I decided to go out into the streets on my own."

Emory clapped him on the back. "You should have seen him, a young man in outdated fancy clothes wandering around gaping at everything. Henry had been by the distant relative he lived with to work with my uncle at his shop. The relative hoped that carpentry might be something he'd be good at. It wasn't, but we did become friends and when we were done with our duties we'd run around town like savages."

"I ended up wandering into a part of town I shouldn't have. A large young man and his friends took one look at me and saw prey. I was too naive to run the other way when he asked me 'And where're you going, young toff?' I told him I'd lost my way and asked for directions to my Aunt's house."

"This is when me and Henry came upon the group. I suspect Henry wanted remuneration from the obviously rich young man, but I said we should help him for free, and if he happened to give us a reward that would be icing on the cake. Fortunately, I was muscular and tall even at the age of twelve, and Henry looked like he was a dirty fighter, so we were able to intimidate the tough and his friends."

Barton took up the tale. "I was suitably grateful and treated them to pastries and coffee before they led me home. We became fast friends for the year I lived in London. I even convinced Father to let me invite them to our home in Scotland. Emory couldn't get much time away from his apprenticeship, but visited a number of times over the years. Henry spent as much time at our house as Father would allow. He even charmed his way into attending school with me for a single term."

"I have a feeling your father's liking for Henry is part of the reason he is so very angry at your friend's betrayal of you," Emory said.