it’s a minuscule amount, and to meet the funding conditions we’re required to be impartial. But there would be no interest without a certain amount of speculation.’
‘I like your bracelet.’ Bryant pointed to the Osiris panel hanging from Rachel’s wrist.
‘Thank you. It’s a copy of a Victorian design often worn by mud larks. The regeneration symbol is meant to prove lucky when you’re searching the river shores.’
‘Is it, indeed? That’s useful to know.’ So Ubeda is superstitious. What else does he believe? Bryant wondered.
‘How can I help you?’
‘Do you get people looking for particular tributaries?’
‘Not really. Very few stretches are accessible, and actually it’s illegal to do so now under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, because the tunnels pass beneath sensitive property, so you’d be trespassing. Also, there’s the risk of disease.’
‘I’m particularly interested in the Fleet.’
‘Everyone is,’ smiled Rachel. ‘It’s the granddaddy of underground rivers. Once it was crystal clear, but eventually it came to be associated with death, regularly filling with the corpses of animals and babies, not to mention the odd drunk. It’s a poet’s river; Pope used it as a location for The Dunciad.’ A light shone in her eyes as she recited the lines from memory: ‘ “To where Fleet-Ditch with disemboguing streams/ Rolls the large tribute of dead dogs to Thames”. And Swift wrote: “Filths of all hues and odours seem to tell/ What street they sail’d from by their sight and smell”. Not the most attractive image of London Town, is it?’
‘Interesting enough to write about,’ said Bryant. Or be murdered above, he thought.
‘It was certainly that. One pub backing on to the Fleet, the Red Lion, was the hide-out of Dick Turpin. Another, the Rose Tavern, was frequented by Falstaff. The river was in a ravine crossed with bridges, none more beautiful or extravagantly Venetian than Wren’s Fleet Bridge, situated at its mouth.’
‘Can you think of any mythical connections?’ asked Bryant.
Rachel gave the idea her attention, moving from screen to screen. ‘I suppose of all London’s lost rivers, the Fleet is most associated with evil. Prostitutes and cut-throats populated its length. Anyone who fell into the filth usually suffocated. In 1862 so much gas collected that the hot weather actually caused the river to blow up. It blasted a hole in the road and knocked down a couple of houses. So I suppose if we were matching them up with the Roman rivers of the Underworld, the Fleet should really correspond to Phlegethon, the river of fire—but perhaps it would be better associated with the Styx. Acheron, the river of woe, would fit the Tyburn, which led to a place of death, the gallows of Tyburn Tree. Victorian passengers could float under Buckingham Palace on the Tyburn. They sang “God Save the Queen” as they passed beneath.’
Bryant wondered if he had perhaps made a mistake assuming that Jackson Ubeda was pursuing the rivers’ mythical connections. One last thought struck him. ‘Were any of the lost rivers particularly associated with the Romans?’
‘That would have to be the Walbrook. It was the first river to become lost. It ran through the old centre of London, from Old Street and Moorfields to Cannon Street. We know that the Romans used it to sail to a Temple of Mithras, and regarded it as a sacred river. The trouble is, no one really knows where the Walbrook was, because the entire area was wet and marshy, and the riverbanks were poorly defined.’
‘What kind of people hit your website?’ asked Bryant, not daring to touch any of the keyboards.
‘Students, mostly—but anyone with an interest in London history. A few nutters hoping to find treasure trove.’
Bryant’s ears pricked up. ‘What would they be looking for?’
‘Oh, the usual—Roman coins, chains, pottery. To be fair, quite a bit is still uncovered by amateurs from time to time, mostly builders working on the sites of new office blocks. There was a big discovery just a few months ago.’
‘Do you have any details?’
Rachel typed in a reference and hit Return. A viciously bright news-site unfurled on the screen before her. ‘Here you go. Roman chain recovered from a building site near Monument with a large number of its links intact—a very unusual find.’
‘Why so?’
‘Not many contractors can dig far down in the city because it’s a maze of tunnels, pipes and cables. Many new buildings are constructed on steel stilts to avoid the problem of digging out deep foundations. This site was lucky in that they found artefacts rather than ancient architecture.’