A dream crushed

By ten o’clock, the busiest time in the morning, the telegrams were pouring in to the little office in Parliament Street like flood water through a burst dyke. Babington fought to stay abreast of the flow, logging each one and reducing it or correcting it for scale-errors, elevation or temperature as required. As soon as they had been adjusted they were passed on to FitzRoy, to be entered on to that day’s chart of the British Isles. They did not have much time: the first forecast of the day had to be ready by eleven, for the and the. Nobody spoke but three pairs of hands fairly raced across the paper in front of them. It was like this every day: the preceding years had seen their routine become extremely well practised. Sulivan knew this, which was why he delayed his visit until the initial morning rush had begun to wane, and the copyists had taken on the burden of replicating the forecasts goodness knows how many times for the benefit of goodness knows how many recipients.