“Such as.”

“Such as it’s February, and there ain’t much loading to do. Nothing but coal barges this time of year, and no hope of anything more until spring. We are used to get paid better than most porters, and that’s supposed to help us get through the lean months, but with the gangs at each other’s throats, fighting for what little work there is, we’re hardly making more than if we was lugging apples around for the grocers. And our work is more dangerous, too. Just last week a fellow I know got flattened to his death when a barrel of coal fell on him. Crushed his legs entire, it did. He died two days later and hardly stopped screaming the whole time.”

“And how does Ufford hope to make things better?”

“That I don’t rightly know. I heard his sermons, I but I don’t understand them all proper, like. He says there was a time when the rich looked after the poor, and the poor worked hard but they made their living and were happy. He says these Whigs don’t care nothing for the way things used to be, only for their money at the end of the day, and that they’ll work the poor to death rather than give a good wage.”

“So he wishes you to believe that Tories shall be kindly taskmasters because they are better used to lording it, while Whigs are poor taskmasters because they are new to their power?”

“That sounds about it.”

“Is it true?”

Littleton shrugged. “Dennis Dogmill’s a Whig, they say, and most of the work we do is for him. I can tell you that if every one of his men died after unloading he wouldn’t give a fig if there were others to take their place next time. Does he have a black heart because he’s a Whig or does he have a black heart because that’s what he’s got? I’m inclined to think his politics don’t make much difference.”

Littleton pulled down his hat even lower, a clear sign he wanted less talk and more gin. I therefore amused myself by looking about the tavern for the better part of an hour when a disturbance began near the back. Someone struck up a few candles while a figure stood upon a barrel. He was of middle height and wide of body, perhaps forty years of age, with a narrow face and wide-set eyes that gave him an appearance of surprise or perhaps confusion. He stomped his foot only a few times, and the din of the room began to wane.