Chapter 9

Deciding to read something other than his textbooks, he prowled around, to explore other books that littered the house; many of which had been amassed by him and his wives in recent months. Some had been bought, but others had been appropriated, after asking, from the homes of his wives’ parents. None of the parents seemed to mind, for once a book has been read you are unlikely to go back to reread it. Thus the parents had no objection to their daughters’ desire for increased erudition.

He picked up one about the technology of ancient Greece, and within minutes was staggered by something he read, that he had not encountered before. The Isthmus of Corinth had possessed a haulage-way for transporting small ships overland before they had built the famous canal. The mechanism used grooves cut into the limestone pavement to guide wheeled vehicles: an early form of railway system. Reg hadn’t known the concept of railways appeared so far back in time.

The grooves had a gauge very similar to the modern standard gauge, so the wheel distances for vehicles must have been standardised, so that every goods cart, or support trolley to carry boats, could fit the tracks. He wondered how the transport vehicles could pass each other when they met. The modern railways employed passing loops, but perhaps the traffic was not such a problem back then. Perhaps they exited from the track at regular points along it, and another cart could access the wheel grooves. It seemed unnecessary complicated to Reg, but it was all experimental back then.

Certainly the records indicated it being used to haul warcraft across the isthmus.

Apparently the Romans later used the same idea for some of their military roads. Passing was not a problem for the military, for they were all going the same direction. Reg remembered the desert convoys in preparation for the Iraq war, when a thousand military vehicles could constitute one division’s move along a road. Any unit that broke down was simply shoved off the road and left for the vehicle recovery teams to deal with later. Reg filed this tracked road data away in his head, for introducing sneakily during a seminar on the beginning of railways.

This discovery was similar to the long-held assumption that electricity was unknown in the ancient world; that it was not until the burgeoning European science of the middle ages discovered it. That assumption meant ignoring ancient electroplated jewellery and vessels; ignoring the obvious battery found in Babylon’s ruins; and ignoring the lightning rods attached to the roofs of ancient temples, including the Temple of Solomon. Medals and coins illustrating these temples all over the ancient world often showed pointed rods atop their roofs. It might be an assumption that these were lightning rods, but the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem was reputed to have never in all its history been struck by lightning (presumably actually meaning ‘damaged by lightning’).

It was mid-morning next day before Hermione reported to him.

“Sorry to have taken so long to gather this data, boss, but there were more insurance firms than I expected, and I had to be careful how they were approached.”

“I appreciate that, Hermione. How did it go?”

“It is an entirely negative report, I am afraid. Not one of these companies have any record of any request for insurance by the man you identified; never mind insurance for a violin. Most odd, sir!”

Reg’s eyes lit up at this report, and he grinned.

“It is nice when a weird idea turns into a reality, Hermione. Our next target is to find some relationship between him and the person in the insurance company who accepted the insurance proposal. Please ring our client contact, Mr. George Capaldi. Tell him I need to know the name and home address of the person who dealt with the proposal for insurance of the violin, and any reference to her family connections ... Tell him you are merely asking on my behalf as I am busy with other tasks just now.”

“That’s it? Just the name, address and family links?”

“Now that you remind me, also ask how long he or she – I think it is a ‘she’ - has worked with the insurance company; it may prove relevant. Give him my advice - not to pay out on the claim, as we may get the evidence he needs.”

“Very well, boss. You must know what you are doing: I wish I did!”

“I will explain my thinking to you later, Hermione, once we get further with our enquiries.”

Shortly after, Jessica wandered in to speak to Reg.

“My darling man, can you do without me for an hour or so? I am feeling much better, so I propose to go out a short walk with Sidra and Elizabeth, plus Maryam’s girls, for a breath of fresh air. We will keep to the local streets, and stay together for protection.”

Reg frowned and countered, “Do you mind if I join you? I think the presence of a male would be better for all concerned. I presume you remember all your self-defence measures that we were taught by Tom?”

“I haven’t forgotten, Reg! You saw that at the hospital, remember.”

“Oh, yes, sorry. But you don’t object to me coming?”

“Certainly not. I was being considerate of your current illness. If you feel up to a brief walk, grab a coat or something, for it is not that warm outside.”

Reg located the light anorak that he had bought from a charity shop when he first came to the university, and put it on. He went back to where Jessica was waiting.

“Right, Jessica: ready when you are.”

“Right. I have told the twins who is going and what is planned, so we just have to add you to the list, and we can go.” She went through to the kitchen and reported to Carol and Holly about the amendment, then collected Sidra, Elizabeth and the younger girls. They all went out the front door, and Jessica dictated the direction of the walk, and the careful instructions on pacing to allow for her and Reg’s infirmities. Reg quickly noted it was the road towards the Robson farm.

“Why this direction, Jessica?” he enquired.

“Practice, for your recovery, Reg darling. I want you to get used to coming near the field where you got your shock. Today, we just need to come part way to the farmhouse; that’s all, so it shouldn’t be awkward for you, my love. You agree with me, girls?”

Sidra and Elizabeth spoke almost as one. “Yes, Mum. You should do this, Dad!” The younger girls just looked puzzled at this exchange, given the disparate ages of Reg and Jessica.

Reg gave in to his orders. “I can tell when I am outnumbered. I will do as you say, ladies.”

The weather cooperated with the group, and made the walk very pleasant. Reg took off his thin anorak and folded it over his arm to carry it. Jessica slowed even more under the conditions, for she had been told to take things very easy. It became more of an amble along the road towards the farm. Sidra and Elizabeth talked to the other girls about their learning as they walked together behind the adults, until Elizabeth went forward to tug on Reg’s arm.

“Dad, how important were canals to the Industrial Revolution? You never see much commercial transport on canals today, if at all.”

Reg stopped and decided this was the place to reverse direction. He announced this, and moved back to walk beside his daughters, with Jessica and the new girls following. “That is a very intelligent question, Elizabeth. Like so many points in history, the technology of the particular time is what matters, not what the technology might be today. When the Industrial Revolution began, its impetus was the close availability of coal, iron and limestone. Handy resources meant economical manufacturing of iron.

That worked well until the expansion of the iron business required larger quantities of materials to come in, and similar large quantities of heavy goods going out. With more goods produced, you needed to move them to more distant markets to sell. Packhorses were the previous mode of transport, but the roads were not much more than rough tracks, so no decent wheeled carts, and horses could not carry much of a load. Improving the road system was an expensive option at the time, so larger loads were moved by barge using the local rivers. See the idea?

Not all the rivers were navigable for heavy barges, so it was a choice between spending a fortune making other rivers deep enough for barges, or building your own river, for that is what a canal is: an artificial river! The attraction of a canal is that you can have it go in the direction you want, as opposed to the natural river system, which is determined by geographic factors. The natural river may not go towards where your cargo needs to be sent.

Major landowners who had coal under their land saw that investing in a new method of transport would be expensive to build but cheap to run, so they were the first canal builders in England. The actual construction needed a technologist to do the job, and a man named James Brindley became the go-to man for this. He was a millwright turned consulting engineer, and had been recruited to assist with certain aspects of the Duke of Bridgewater’s canal project, such as the Barton Aqueduct.”

Jessica had come closer to hear the conversation, and interrupted.

“Reg, I understood that canals were in use in the Middle East, thousands of years ago.”

“Quite right, Jessica. You know a lot more than you make it appear, darling. Yes, the Egyptians built a forerunner of the Suez canal in the 7th century BC. It was not large enough, so was often blocked by drifting sand, and was eventually abandoned. England did not have that difficulty!”

“But I meant even earlier, Reg: Babylon.”

“True. Hammurabi’s code of laws mentions several times about maintaining the canals. The trouble with that example is that these canals were built to supply water in an area where water was a vital commodity for an empire. There may have been a few canals that were wide enough and deep enough to provide for water transport, but that is only a guess. The surviving evidence is for narrow channels. The records are not specific enough to tell us more.”

“When was that, Dad?” asked Sidra.

“Somewhere around 1700 years before Christ, Sidra. North American natives also built canals in the more arid environments, but these were purely for water supply for irrigation and for human consumption. That reminds me: China also had early canals; proper canals for boats. The Grand Canal took six centuries to complete – 7th to 13th century if I remember rightly – and is about 650 miles long. That one is genuinely a transportation route, and I think at least part of it remains in use today.”

Sidra commented, “So like so many things, there was not a specific time when the canal was invented? It was a development from river and sea transport, water supply shortage, and a need for a more efficient method of inland transportation.”

“That is it in a nutshell, Sidra, and it worked well until the railways came along as a game changer. Hey, looks like we are close to home, and I nevr once thought of the bombs. This chat has kept my mind off what I found by digging on the farm!”

Jessica had a thought.

“Reg darling, do you think you will be able to dig our garden? Or would it bring back bad memories of the bombs, do you think?”

Reg’s face drained of blood as he envisaged digging again, and finding such dangerous objects. He pulled himself together mentally.

“Jessica, it might be a good idea for me to attempt some digging in our garden, if it would help my reactions to digging these bombs. If I can get my mind and body to accept that digging is not necessarily dangerous, that might be a step in the right direction.”

“Fine. I’ll bring it up with Frances. She will probably want at least one person with you when you try that, in case you collapse or get the shakes. I wonder of Jemima will do that chore?”

“Someone will have to be there, and standaing around for a long time would not be good for my condition, but my daughters might benefit from some physical work. It would make a change from walks and runs, though! What do you think, Elizabeth?”

Elizabeth took it on.

“If someone can show us how to do it, we might manage. I have never done digging before now. Can you show us, Dad?”

Reg was embarrassed, and admitted, “I have not done garden digging before, either, Elizabeth. Our house did not run to a garden while I was growing up. We would both be beginners.”

Thinking about the farm, Sidra asked Reg, “Do you think we could ask Mr and Mrs Robson about farming practices, so that we can learn more about food production, Dad?”

Reg raised his eyebrows. “Have you not spoken to Hermione and Jemima about that, girls? They lived on a farm.”

Sidra exclaimed, “I never thought about that possibility. These ladies never talk about living on a farm, so I forgot that they were from a farming family. Do you think they would be able to tell us much, Dad?”

“Well, they were brought up in a farmhouse, so even though they had little active interest in the running of the farm, they must have absorbed a great deal, just by being there all the time. They may not be good at passing on facts and figures, but they could give you an idea of what it is like, living on a farm all your life. They also have a changed outlook on the subject, which may help.”

Their arrival was welcomed by the twins, and Holly told Reg, “Next time there is to be a walk, we want to be part of it; we are stuck here most of the time since we broke it off with the Pringle brothers.”

Jessica told them, “We can arrange something soon, but Reg and I need to lie down for a while after that expedition; we are both tired.”

Jessica took Reg’s hand and told him, “Reg, time for you to lie down and relax after that walk.”

She led him to his bedroom, the one with the over-large bed, and he went quietly. He was still thinking about the idea of digging in the garden, and it unsettled him somewhat.

In his bedroom, he started to undress, to get into his pyjamas, but Jessica stopped him going for the drawer where they were kept.

“You don’t need them for now, darling.”

As he looked at her in surprise, she started undressing in front of him, until she was just as naked as him.

“Are you needing a cuddle, Jessica?”

“I am, dear. Today, on our expedition, it brought back to me how different you are from my first husband. You exhibit love to me in so many ways, and just as much to your other wives; it is amazing. I am comfortable with you, in every way, so give me a warm cuddle and then I will let you get some sleep. It will be some time before I can embark on sex once more!”

Reg looked into the eyes of his oldest lover, and liked what he found.

“For you, Jessica my love: anything.”

He put his arm round her waist and tugged her closer. As her nipples prodded his chest, he noted how hard they were. They stripped and let their bodies enjoy the closeness they felt, and both slipped into slumber. Theyb were indeed both tired.

When they finally woke and got dressed, they came downstairs. The other wives had just arrived home, and the house was full of chattering women: Reg wondered if he should retreat again!

He was accosted by Prudence, who wanted to know what he could tell her about the earliest Americans.

“Reg, our professor said something that puzzled me; the date of native Americans in America. Is it true that there is considerable doubt about when humans first appeared in America?”

Reg nodded. “Yes. There is very little archaeological evidence to go on, but it is a huge continent, and a temporary hunting camp leaves very little evidence, should you even be able to find it! There is more conjecture than evidence. Finding human bones, or artwork or worked stone is the most you can expect, so context is the major decider. If you can date the strata that the object is found inside, it is assumed that this dates the human presence, but dating is a variable beast, with later adjustments to radiocarbon dating, forcing more correlation with luminescence dating, dendrochronology, and palaeomagnetism, to give a few examples.

Stone points for arrows or spears are usually dated from their design, but then you get into trouble when early points in America are found to be almost identical to some from an area in France, 20,000 years ago! The only way humans could have got there from Europe, assuming there might be a link, was by skirting the Arctic ice sheet in boats, fishing as you went. It seems an impossible journey, but the other possibility is walking or sailing along the coast from Siberia.

The first assumption was that they all arrived over the Bering Strait land bridge before the sea level rose, but more problems arose when discoveries in South America were dated to around the same time, but many thousands of miles distant! The latest suggestion is that some may have come by sea across the Pacific Ocean, which with the direction of ocean currents makes sense.”

“Hmm. That was the general trend of what the professor was saying, but he seemed more interested in the later period, sort of post-5,000 BC, when there is more archaeology to be found.”

“Not surprising, really. All the earliest dating is circumstantial and doesn’t really tell you much about human society; just what tools they used and what they ate. Nuts were a strong component in the native diet for thousands of years, but a marine diet was important in coastal areas. River valleys in South America also led to a high amount of fish in the diet. With lots of fish, they must have been fairly well fed, so that suggests a society that was fairly egalitarian,” he said to her.

“Why do you say that?” she queried.

“In societies that have rich and poor, the poor tend to have a bad diet, and that shows up in their bones. Early Americans, where bones are unearthed, are consistently found to have been healthy and well-fed, so that suggests a society that has few poor people; thus everyone seems to have been taken care of by those better-off members of society. Conclusion: an egalitarian society.”

“I see what you mean. That is a lot to derive from a few facts, though.”

“Prudence, the few facts are what exists, but add another fact. Where there was a base camp, lived in permanently, all the burials are the same, century after century, so the total of the few facts, repeated and repeated, makes a compelling case for accuracy of the conclusion drawn from these few facts.”

Hermione came to speak to Reg.

“Boss, I want to tell you what I have done about these two people we were researching.”

“Oh, yes. Anything interesting?”

“I asked your wives for ideas, and several of them suggested using the Internet to search, and one said a digital archival newspaper website might be worthwhile. I have been trying my best, but I kept finding more and more websites that turn out to be repeating what was on another website, almost word for word, and mostly without reference to the source. It is so frustrating!”

“So did you find data on either of the names?”

“Most certainly, but for both names, there were anything up to a dozen entries for different people of the same name.”

“I can understand that,” said Reg, “but most of them would be American, surely, and so can be discounted from the search?”

“Really? I hadn’t thought of that?”

“You don’t know much about the Internet, Hermione! It is overloaded with American data.”

“So, if I delete any entries that are clearly USA, that should reduce the options?”

“Yes, but remember that not everyone has an Internet presence; we just have to hope that these two people appear somewhere. Once we have enough evidence of who they are, we can try other sources, from the local newspaper to the local police force – if we do it quietly. We may have to ask our friendly policeman to make enquiries on our behalf. We can promise him a donation to the local police benevolent fund, or whatever they call it.”

“Okay, that should give me something to work on. Thanks, boss; you are a darling man.”

She went off, and Reg grinned to himself. Hermione was a changed character from her old self. She had fire in her belly, now that she had an aim to her life. She was much easier to live with now in the family.