The Great Stink by Clare Clark

Author:Clare Clark
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Mariner Books

XVII

In accordance with his agreement with Polly, William made no mention of a murder to the authorities when he returned to work at the offices in Greek-street immediately after Christmas. Indeed he said little of anything to anyone and instead hid himself in his narrow carrel, speaking only when spoken to. Even then it was often necessary to touch him upon the shoulder so that he might realize that he was being addressed. As he bent over his work, he pressed his pencil downwards with such force that the lead snapped and the blotter beneath his paper was carved with a perfect facsimile of his calculations. His face had a sickly pallor, save for the dark smudges that stained the skin beneath his eyes, while the eyes themselves were yellowed and bloodshot beneath their heavy lids. As Hawke remarked with interest to Lovick, the illness seemed to have aged the surveyor ten years at the very least. Surely, Hawke added, the burdens of May's position were now likely to prove intolerable to the poor man, particularly given his history of ill health and what might justly — and here Hawke trusted that this was a frank exchange between men of professional integrity — be called downright unsteadiness. Greek-street was not an infirmary, the Board hardly a charitable institution for convalescents. Should not some other surveyor be appointed in his place?

Lovick, who disliked Hawke and privately harboured grave doubts as to his professional integrity, was forced to agree. May was clearly unwell. He therefore had the surveyor discharged from his underground duties. He did not, however, dismiss him. Instead he reassigned William to the group of men responsible for the construction of the pumping station at Abbey Mills where all three northern intercepting sewers would combine. Bazalgette's careful ingenuity of design ensured that the high- and the middle-level sewers discharged to the east by gravitation alone but, in order for the stream from the lower-level sewer to converge with its fellows, its entire contents had to be pumped upwards more than fourteen feet to meet the other streams before the aggregate river could flow along an outfall sewer, to be built above ground across the marshes, to a reservoir just west of Barking Creek. To that end Bazalgette had commissioned James Watt & Co. to build eight vast beam engines to his particular specifications. He also designed a building to accommodate them and to provide access to the vast tunnel system required by the confluence of the three huge and separate sewers.

There might have been little difficulty in the design and construction of a structure that would adequately fulfil its practical function, although the sheer weight of the vast coal-powered beam engines would ensure it was the source of headaches amongst the surveyors and builders charged with its execution. A simple matter of walls and a roof would likely have sufficed, with ladders to provide access to the upper reaches of the engines. But, for Bazalgette and the Board, the pumping

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