docklands of Liverpool and Manchester. It was a Spartan and often violent existence – an unmerciful regime of work relieved one night a week by drinking themselves into oblivion and passing out in the bed of some worn out whore, too long in her trade to do better for herself. Cufflin had learnt years ago to believe in the old adage: ‘when you raise your voice and nothing happens, it is time to raise your fist!’
It was exactly this that was bothering him now. What was happening in the room was not in question – the men gathered here to collect their week’s earnings were in a state of high agitation. From experience he knew that he was sitting on a powder keg. The question which was bothering him was, ‘Why?’ This should have been an easy evening. Apart from some early frost setting back the digging a little, the contract was running to time. No one had been injured, and the Company always paid the going rate to its workforce. So why, when the two fifteen-men gangs had assembled, were they looking for trouble? As usual, the gangs, having arrived in town, had drifted straight into the tavern. By the time he had arrived with the pay satchel securely looped across his body, most had taken a few pints of George Camm’s Burton Ale, and were awaiting payment for their week’s labours.
The big Irishman with the curly hair and beard was the instigator of the trouble. As soon as the queue for pay began to form he had elbowed his way to the front and, with
