ELEGY FOR EDDIE ~ MAISIE DOBBS #9 ~ by Jacqueline Winspear

When a delegation of costermongers, all clothed in their best, shows up at Maisie Dobb’s office one morning, she is at first bemused. Why are they here? Surely they know that they will each lose money as their appointment cuts into their working hours. Whatever it is must be serious.

And it is, to them.

A “simple” man has recently been killed at a paper factory, crushed by something too heavy falliing on him. The management, naturally, says this was an accident. These men are not so sure. While they may not claim it to be out-and-out murder, nevertheless, something seems wrong.

Jacqueline Winspear, the author of the MAISIE DOBBS series, writes with such empathy about people who are different. Eddie, the simple man, the character of the title of this volume ELEGY FOR EDDY, is the product of a rape between a shadowy assailant, and a 16-year-old girl from the workhouse. Maudie Pettit was so shattered by her experiences growing up in that workhouse, that she works mightily at whatever she is given to do, to ensure that she always has enough to avoid going back there. We learn about Eddie’s birth early on in the novel, and because Maudie would have lost her job if her pregnancy had become known, she has to birth Eddie in secret on a bed of hay surrounded by horses.

It turns out that Eddie, although slow in so many ways, has some outstandiing gifts. He is a genius with horses, always able to calm down even the most high-strung and aggressive. As he is generally good-natured and always willing to help, he acquires a group of fans, who stand up for him when life becomes difficult.

He can do mental arithmetic with great facility, so that even though his Mama insists on his writing down everything he’s earned, actually, he doesn’t need to do that as he can always remember ~ to the nearest farthing ~ exactly how much he has earned. As this is in the days when British coinage was in Pounds, Shillings and Pence, this is quite a feat.

It is not until the end of the novel that we learn about another of Eddie’s outstandiing skills ~ his ability to take in an image and copy it later from memory. And it is this ability that gets Eddie into trouble. For this good-natured man is not going to understand that some images are secret, and there are plenty of powerful people who will try to stop him from copying those images.

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