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12M

P3

A Matter of Family Pride

by

August A. Raymont

Synopsis

Set in Norfolk in the nineteenth century, the story begins with the murder of a deckhand by the first mate of a British Ship in the Far East.

This tragedy has a tremendous impact on the lives of the first mate’s wife and son, particularly on his sense of values in business and in family life.

Taught to believe that his father, who absconded from custody, might still be alive somewhere in the Far East, he sets forth at the age of sixteen to find him.

Ten years later he returns alone. A silent man with an air of brooding mystery, compounded by the fact that, although leaving a penniless boy, he returns with sufficient wealth to open business premises among the rich merchants and ship owners of the town.

In 1895 at the age of seventy four, he decides to make spectacular changes in his business, with sensational effects on the lives of his family.

 

Considering the different characters in the story and their lives, the story could be arranged into a film or a six-part T.V. series or longer with a sequel.

 

 

A Matter of Family Pride

 

Chapter One

 

The light of the April day was already changing from afternoon clarity to evening softness when Anthony Cheverton stopped in the office doorway. His excitement had been suppressed all day and was now a little out of control. He was conscious of his heartbeat and hardly able to stop himself from whistling. He smiled into the street and tipped his high hat to an audacious angle.

“I’ll want the gig at number 30 in half an hour,” he called back to the gas lit office.

Without waiting for a reply, he strode along the South Quay in the direction of King Street and his father’s house.

The evening was of that tender kind, so frequent in the spring. The open sky was luminous where the sun had passed, and the afternoon rain glittered on roofs and on cobblestone streets. Smoke rose leisurely from chimneys. The air was warm and filled with noises of the relaxing day. Anthony splashed along the puddle footpaths aware only of his thoughts, dominated by the private pleasure that disturbed him. Anthony was a merchant and ship owner, and moved in rivalry, friendship and pride among his fellow merchants in this ancient town of Lynn. King Street ran parallel with the seaward flow of the river. At the crossing where short streets cut the town from East to West, he could observe the regular flow of the great river past the docks, carts and ships, some of which he recognised as his own. Anthony quickly left it all behind him this evening, and went at top speed along Queen Street and into King Street where he rattled the heavy brass knocker of number 30, his father’s house.

His sister Agnes let him in and took his hat and cape. In spite of the open secret that John Cheverton’s daughters must have ten thousand pounds each, no man came courting Agnes. No one, that is, of whom the Chevertons would approve or permit to marry. She was thirty now, only three years younger than Anthony and there was nothing for it but to accept her as an old maid. Her virgin state irritated Anthony at times as it did other members of the family. It did not suit the Chevertons’ pride that any bearer of that name should appear to the world as unimportant. However, Anthony’s thoughts were not on Agnes tonight. Taper in hand, she climbed to light the hanging lamp as he went past her quickly into the dining room.

‘Big John Cheverton, as he was known among the seafaring people of the town, was sitting upright in his leather and mahogany chair that had been drawn away from the fire towards the window. He had a newspaper in his hands, but was gazing past it at what he could see of the street. He was a heavily built, broody old man. His well-shaped head was thickly covered with grey hair. His forehead was deeply wrinkled, and his bushy eyebrows, heavily tinted with grey, hung gloomily over his sombre blue eyes. He wore neither beard nor moustache, but bushy white whiskers grew low on his cheeks. His suit of broadcloth was expensive but untidy. There were stains on his waistcoat and his powerful hands were discoloured through neglect, as if subjected to continuous heavy manual labour.

John Daniel Anthony Cheverton had had a hard but successful life. Born in the village of Wiggenhall St Peter to a seafaring family in May 1821, he had known hardships and tragedies that only the cruel sea can impose. This also taught him self-discipline and self-reliance, and gave him the courage to face adversity and to take calculated risks.

There was no portrait of John’s father, Daniel Cheverton, who had disappeared at sea in 1826, presumably drowned, and his children often wondered what their grandfather looked like. Though they talked little, and never in public, of this unedifying story, they knew its outline from the transcript of the inquest. As first mate of the Seraphim, bound for Hong Kong, in a savage storm he killed a deck hand for behaviour tantamount to mutiny. One night, when the Seraphim was riding at anchor off the coast of Penang, he took advantage of his cabin door being left unlocked, slipped quietly out and overboard to swim for the shore and freedom.

The chain of events that led to the murder of the deck hand and the actual act of murder, as told by the captain of the Seraphin, based entirely on the hearsay of the dead-tired crew, would not give Daniel Cheverton a fair trial had he returned to England. John’s mother, Sarah Cheverton, would not believe the story of the ship’s captain, whose character, as it emerged at the inquest, did not inspire any confidence. Nor would she accept the verdict of the Court of Inquiry, knowing well the kind of man her husband was. From that day onwards she ensured that John knew the qualities of his father.

Sarah Cheverton left the village of Wiggenhall St Peter for Lynn, where she took a lease on property in Blackfriars Road and opened a drapery shop. Through the passing years, she never as much as mentioned to her son her belief that his father might be alive somewhere in the Far East. Young John, as he grew older, began nevertheless to read those secret thoughts in her eyes, which seemed tirelessly to scan the street as if at any moment she would see his father again.

John grew into a quiet, undemonstrative boy who was average at his lessons and, though well built and strong for his age, not very fond of sport. A loner whose interest seemed to be to hang around the harbour listening to seamen’s stories and watch, with admiration, the graceful slender hulls of the ships swaying gently at their moorings and listening to the familiar creak of the ships’ tackle. He seemed to have no desire to do anything else. Ten years later, at the age of sixteen, and looking older than his years, John Cheverton was on board the Samaritan, bound for the Far East. Youth for him was over.

As the years passed by, the memory in people’s minds, of both the father and the son, began to fade. Only Sarah Cheverton’s eyes continued to search the streets, but now she looked not only for the face of her husband but also that of her son. His departure for the strange and distant lands of the Far East, though motivated by his never easing desire to find his father, broke her heart.

Ten years later, almost to the day, John Cheverton returned alone. A silent man with an air of brooding mystery, which made him seem older than his twenty-six years. He bought number 30 King Street and brought his mother from Blackfriars Road to live with him. The following year he married a local girl, sweet, gentle and docile. She bore him eleven children, eight of whom reached maturity. He hardly ever spoke of his years spent in the Far East. When he did, he referred only to places, ports and ships, never to any detail of his personal life. The mystery of those years was compounded by the fact that he left Lynn a penniless boy of sixteen and returned the owner of a fleet of six ships, able to take a lease on business premises in South Quay and proudly display the sign above, John Cheverton, Ship Owner and General Merchant.

His conversations with his fellow merchants and ship owners were confined to business only. Such interests as he had in national and international affairs were merely for their material reactions on his business and, in later years, his family. He was a hard master but affectionate father, undemonstrative with his sons, but genial and courteous to his daughters. As with every year his wealth and respectability grew in the town, so did his pride in the accident of his name. To be a Cheverton seemed to him a special and magnificent responsibility. All his children had grown up to agree with him.

He was seventy-two now, the autocratic owner of a successful shipping and merchandising business. His wife was dead these fifteen years and doctors were constantly telling him that his heart needed constant care, but, however his children besought him, he refused to pay any regard. He was rich and respected. His carriage was drawn by a superb pair of high stepping bay thoroughbreds. He lived in a fine house in the best part of town. His eldest son was a doctor, his second a priest, two others were in business with him. Three of his daughters were honourably married and lived near him. The youngest, Agnes, was the companion of his fireside. He had eighteen grandchildren and possessed the means to provide well for all of them. Additionally, he had the love of his children. They had feared him in their youth, but now, in their riper years they showered him with great affection. It was not easy, therefore, to account for the depth of sadness in the eyes of John Cheverton, or to say why his powerful shoulders sagged so often as if under a heavier load than his seventy-two years.

Anthony was now in his thirty-third year. He was John’s youngest son and looked as if nothing could be more satisfying than to be a Cheverton. He was the best looking of all the family with the exception of his sister, Caroline Hartland. He also showed himself the most vigorous and forthright, with a lively intelligence that often irritated others. Anthony was fair-haired with a clear and vivid face, clean-shaven except for a small moustache. His eyes were bright blue and deep set. His teeth were strong and even. He had his father’s breadth of shoulders, but greater height. His strong hands were better kept than his father’s. Though he was too impatient to be a dandy, he wore good clothes and wore them well. He had vitality, quick wit and charm.

Something of the bond with his father was stirring in Anthony’s mood tonight.