The Four White Days E-Book

Fred Merrick White

• Herausgeber: WS
• Kategorie: Poesie und Drama
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Seitenzahl: 30

Beschreibung

Fred M. White published this fictional story in 1903 about London in the grip of a severe 4-day arctic snow-storm, showing the hardships and consequences for which the city was unprepared, including price gouging and angry mobs.

Actually, the "The history of British winters" page at www.netweather.tv shows many severe winters, including this dramatic entry: "25th December 1836, roads impassable, snow depths reached a staggering 5-15 feet in many places, and most astonishingly, drifts of 20-50 feet!"

That entry doesn't say where in Great Britain those snowfalls occurred, but this one mentions London: "1885-1886: Snow fell in October, November, December, January, February, March, April and May! London recorded 1ft of snow in 7 hours in early January." Generally in the record, a snowfall of 6 to 12 inches in London would be considered unusually severe. Compare that with the snowfall described in this story.

First published in Pearson's Magazine, January 1903 with illustrations by Warwick Goble. Reprinted in Science Fiction By The Rivals Of H.G. Wells, Castle Books, 1979.

Leseprobe

The Four White Days

Fred Merrick White

Booklassic 2015 ISBN 978-963-526-722-4

Chapter1

THE editor of The Daily Chat wondered a little vaguely why he had come down to the office at all. Here was the thermometer down to 11° with every prospect of touching zero before daybreak, and you can't fill a morning paper with weather reports. Besides, nothing was coming in from the North of the Trent beyond the curt information that all telegraphic and telephonic communication beyond was impossible. There was a huge blizzard, a heavy fall of snow nipped hard by the terrific frost and—silence.

To-morrow—January 25th—would see a pretty poor paper unless America roused up to a sense of her responsibility and sent something hot to go on with. The Land's End cables often obliged in that way. There was the next chapter of the Beef and Bread Trust, for instance. Was Silas X. Brett going to prove successful in his attempt to corner the world's supply? That Brett had been a pawnbroker's assistant a year ago mattered little. That he might at any time emerge a penniless adventurer mattered less. From a press point of view he was good for three columns.

The chief "sub" came in, blowing his fingers. The remark that he was frozen to the marrow caused no particular sympathy.

"Going to be a funeral rag to-morrow," the editor said curtly.

"That's so," Gough admitted cheerfully. "We've drawn a thrilling picture of the Thames impassable to craft—and well it might be after a week of this Arctic weather. For days not a carcase or a sack of flour has been brought in. Under the circumstances we were justified in prophesying a bread and meat famine. And we've had our customary gibe at Silas X. Brett. But still, it's poor stuff."

The editor thought he would go home. Still he dallied, on the off chance of something turning up. It was a little after midnight when he began to catch the suggestion of excitement that seemed to be simmering in the sub-editor's room. There was a clatter of footsteps outside. By magic the place began to hum like a hive.

"What have you struck, Gough?" the editor cried.

Gough came tumbling in, a sheaf of flimsies in his hand.

"Brett's burst," he gasped. "It's a real godsend, Mr. Fisher. I've got enough here to make three columns. Brett's committed suicide."

Fisher slipped out of his overcoat. Everything comes to the man who waits. He ran his trained eyes over the flimsies; he could see his way to a pretty elaboration.

"The danger of the corner is over," he said, later, "but the fact remains that we are still short of supplies; there are few provision ships on the seas, and if they were close at hand they couldn't get into port with all this ice about. Don't say that London is on the verge of a famine, but you can hint it."

Gough winked slightly and withdrew. An hour later and the presses were kicking and coughing away in earnest. There was a flaming contents bill, so that Fisher went off drowsily through the driving snow Bedford Square way with a feeling that there was not much the matter with the world after all.

It was piercingly cold, the wind had come up from the east, the steely blue sky of the last few days had gone.

Fisher doubled before the wind that seemed to grip his very soul. On reaching home he shuddered as he hung over the stove in the hall.

"My word," he muttered as he glanced at the barometer. "Down half-an-inch since dinner time. And a depression on top that you could lie in. Don't ever recollect London under the lash of a real blizzard, but it's come now."

A blast of wind, as he spoke, shook the house like some unreasoning fury.

Chapter2