The Barrister and the Letter of Marque

by Todd M Johnson

  Madeleine’s heart picked up a beat. “Harold, I’m sorry, but I need to shorten our visit today.”

  “Of course. You must have many matters of your own to attend to. I’ve been miserably self-absorbed. Please, before you go, tell me how is your father? And the estate? How about old Davidson?”

  “They’re fine,” she said, though she knew nothing about home the past week—another source of anxiety. “And you shouldn’t concern yourself with such things. There will be time enough in the future. Please tell me, though, if I were to encounter your first mate, how would I know him? I mean, beyond doubt.”

  Harold thought a moment. “He has a tattoo on his upper arm, the left. Of a schooner he once served on.”

  “Thank you. Please stay hopeful, cousin.”

  “Wait,” Harold said.

  Stepping back into the darker part of the cell, he returned with a stack of papers. “These are letters to Rebekah. I’ve written every day but didn’t want to send them only to have them discarded by her family. Please see that she receives them. Particularly if things don’t go as we hope.”

  Tears gathered in Madeleine’s eyes.

  “Things will go exactly as we hope and pray, Harold,” she said. “Mr. Snopes is the best barrister in all of London, perhaps all of England, and now I know him as a good man too. He’ll win your case. I’m certain of it.”

  Madeleine strode the London streets, diverging from Newgate, rushing through the moving crowds even though she didn’t know where she was going.

  How did she navigate this?

  If the first mate had taken to a smuggler’s ship, she could try the docks once more, inquiring from that angle. She’d need to get her horse and ride to the docks to do so.

  But if that failed, a better though more difficult source of information would be the American.

  Except all of this created a dilemma. She couldn’t tell William about the American without admitting her earlier lies. Perhaps she’d be willing to do that, hoping he’d forgive her: confess to William and Obadiah and Edmund and risk the death of any esteem they had for her.

  But she couldn’t risk William assuming that Harold had also withheld information about the American smuggler—even though it would be a false assumption. If William was so sensitive to lies as Suzanne had said, she couldn’t risk the loss of William’s belief in Harold and the dampening of his enthusiasm for his defense.

  She turned to the street, raising a hand to hail a carriage. A two-seater came into sight and moved across traffic toward her.

  “Your destination, miss?” the carriage driver called from his perch.

  “I’ve no idea,” she murmured, then shook her head and gave the driver the address for Obadiah’s home where her horse was stabled.

  33

  WHITECHAPEL

  EAST END, LONDON

  William faced the bar in the tavern on Leman Street.

  The snowy road was befouled by passing horses, coal-fire soot, and pools of garbage water thrown from upper stories and storefronts alike. His feet ached, and his nose was numbed by the chill and the odorous assaults. He’d already walked half the Whitechapel streets that flowed like marsh water through a district where so many squeezed out a living on the nearby docks.

  It occurred to him as he walked that he’d not heard the notes of a single piece in his head for days. Not since his epiphany at Lady Jameson’s home.

  He missed it. Even a funeral dirge would be welcome over the deafening silence.

  He’d finally gotten to this task—searching for the boy Simon’s father—spending five of his precious few remaining hours in the last days before trial. William had visited seventeen pubs and taverns, yet not a single manager admitted to hearing of a cobbler named Ladner—let alone one who’d recently lost his wife and apprenticed his son to the Padget. William’s last visit with the captain had heightened a growing anxiety at their failure to find helpful evidence. Would he also fail to overcome objections to the jury hearing of the boy’s killing?

  The latest pub manager began as dismissively as the prior ones.

  “Sad story, that,” he said. “But never ’eard of him.” He turned to stack a small barrel behind the bar. “Two weeks since the boy died, eh? He’d likely be in the groun’ by now, right? Anyone bringin’ the boy’s body to Whitechapel would’ve delivered him to his kin, or the local undertakers who’d try ta find the kin. The undertaker’d give it a go, hopin’ to find a relative willin’ to pay for the boy’s disposition. But if they ’ad no luck, in a couple of days they’d collect the smaller city fee for layin’ him in the potter’s field. The undertakers, they’d have a record of the poor souls that picked up the boy’s body.”

  William was stunned by the simple brilliance of the observation. “Who are the local undertakers?”

  “Two in Whitechapel hereabouts. Blackstone up on High Whitechapel Road and Stein on Peek Street.”

  He slapped a coin on the bar. “Your ale should be blessed for the remainder of your days. You’ve been helpful beyond words.”

  The sign on High Whitechapel Road announced Blackstone’s Mortuary and Undertaking Establishment. Rising over a main road through the district, the place had an air of prosperity compared to the businesses buried on the narrower, darker streets William had slogged through all afternoon. Seated in a small parlor inside the shop, William faced the man who’d greeted him when he arrived: older, all in black, a tall top hat resting on thin wisps of gray hair. He’d paid respectful attention to William after surveying his suit, which was clean at least.

  “Name again?” he asked William.

  “Ladner. The boy’s name was Simon Ladner.”

  “Uh-hmm. I do recall that name.”

  The undertaker disappeared into the back, returning with a thick volume he set down to page through.

  “Two weeks ago, the casket was brought here. A boy’s casket. Quite light it was. Paperwork said he died of a gunshot wound. The casket was sealed, and the accompanying paperwork instructed against opening it.”

  “That’s it,” William said. “Did you find his father?”

  “His father? Hmmm.” The undertaker ran a finger along the volume. “No. But this is coming back to me now. The casket was delivered without instructions as to kin. As is my practice, I planned to put an advertisement in the local, but a day later, the casket was collected.”

  “What was the collector’s name?”

  The undertaker surveyed William once more. “It doesn’t say,” he replied slowly. “Could have been anyone.”

  William reached deep into his coat pocket, in his haste and impatience producing a full pound’s worth of coins to lay on the volume.

  “The casket was picked up by whom?”

  The coins were gone in an instant.

  “Man didn’t give a name. Didn’t have to. He was Lonny McPherson.”

  “Where does this Mr. McPherson live?”

  “Don’t know. Just know of him.”

  “How do you know him?”

  “Mr. McPherson’s well known for his . . . business pursuits. Here in Whitechapel and in greater London. A bit under the board, if you take my meaning.”

  “Do you know why he came for the boy’s body?”

  “Didn’t ask. All I know is he paid the fee and collected the casket.”

  “What does the man look like?”

  “Oh, you can’t miss him. He has a scar about here. And a droop of the eye below it.”

  William stared, hardly believing. “You’re sure?” he asked stupidly.

  “’Of course I’m sure. You can’t miss it.”

  William walked out of the parlor, ignoring the undertaker’s plea for more pay for the “extra bit of information.”

  Lonny McPherson was the man who’d been following them. And he’d also picked up Simon Ladner’s casket.

  William walked along, dazed. He’d assumed the man following them and arranging Solicitor Mortimer’s departure was a paid hand, rendered dangerous only i
f he had also arranged for the killing of Madeleine’s mare. He’d planned on merely trying to avoid the man, considering him a distraction from discovering the real bosses behind the piracy prosecution and theft of the Letter.

  Now he wanted to talk to him. Needed to talk to him.

  At least for that, William knew exactly where to go.

  NEAR THE TOWER OF LONDON

  William surveyed the yellow brick building in the dusky light, new enough not to be blotted by London’s characteristic gray coal-smoke veneer.

  No sign adorned the front. It wasn’t necessary. Everyone in the city knew that this was the office of the Bow Street Runners, the only detection agents in all of London.

  His knock was answered by a squat young man with a flowing mustache.

  “Yes?” the man asked.

  “I’m Barrister William Snopes. Is Joel Carver in?”

  Eyebrows went up. “Joel? Uh, it’s late, Mr. . . . Come back—”

  “Snopes?” someone called from inside. “Is that your voice I hear? Stand aside, Pidger. Let a real English barrister through!”

  The door opened wider. A familiar man as skinny and tall as a ladder burst through to give William a long-armed hug. William reciprocated uncomfortably.

  “Come in, William, you old shyster,” Joel declared. “Getting ready for that trial coming day after tomorrow? It’s the talk of the courthouse. Come along to my office. Pidger, you come along too. You might learn a thing or two from this man.”

  William was soon seated in a room larger than his own office at the Inn. Crates were stacked and piled in every corner, overflowing with paper. Dusty shades were pulled tightly closed.

  “Seems you’re busy enough, Joel,” William observed.

  “Busy? You’d think they’d emptied the jails of every thief and scoundrel, we’re kept so busy. Not just here. We’ve got agents now in every city in the realm. But never too busy to spend a moment with my favorite defense barrister. You seldom come our way, my friend.”

  “I know most of your work is for prosecutors, Joel, and I don’t want to put you in a bad light.”

  “Don’t worry about that.”

  He leaned toward Pidger, who was standing in the corner, and waved a hand for the man’s attention. “When this man was still a youngster of a barrister, I did the investigation for prosecution in a trespass case against Snopes’s client. He represented a farmer, who swore it wasn’t his goat that got into the study of a banker who just happened to be foreclosing on the farmer’s land. The creature had eaten most of the banker’s furniture in a single night. My investigation had the farmer dead to rights—even to a witness, who saw him leading a goat across the heath toward the banker’s house under a half-moon that night. Then this man here, Barrister Snopes himself, gets up and cross-exams me, pointing out in the process that the six-month-old goat in the banker’s study hadn’t been castrated, like everyone knew the farmer did to all his goats at twelve weeks. Embarrassed me to no end! The jury found against us. Had to waive the fee to my client when we lost.”

  “A highlight of my young career.” William smiled lightly. “But you and your Bow Street colleagues don’t have to return many fees, do you, Joel.”

  “That’s a fact. But tell me now, what’s troubling you that you’d cross the line to speak to one of us?”

  “In the last twenty-four hours, I’ve come across a name I’m unfamiliar with. I wondered if you’ve heard of him and could tell me how to find him. The name’s Lonny McPherson.”

  Joel let out a whistle, pointing to his colleague in the corner. “You’ve had a run-in or two with old Lonny, haven’t you, Pidger?”

  The squat man nodded. “Aye. A slippery one. Has his hands in many pots. Known to be engaged in some dubious enterprises.”

  “Has he been prosecuted?”

  “A few times,” Pidger answered. “But the man’s got a ruthless streak. We did an investigation for the Central London constables a few years back. We had a key witness against Lonny turn tail and refuse to testify, making the prosecution fall. Word had it that Lonny skinned the man’s dog and pinned it to his gate, then promised the same to his family if he took the oath against him.”

  The image of such a man or his proxy threatening Madeleine at her estate made William blanch with instant worry.

  “Mr. McPherson picked up a casket a few weeks back, containing the body of a young boy named Simon Ladner,” William said. “The boy was about fourteen years old. He was killed aboard a ship docked on the Thames. Don’t suppose you ever heard of him.”

  “Can’t say that I have,” Joel replied.

  Pidger shook his head. “Not at all.”

  “Any idea why McPherson would do such a thing? Does he have family that might have included the Ladner boy?”

  “Not that I’ve heard,” Joel said.

  “Could’ve been from his canon,” Pidger added.

  William was startled at the reference to a pickpocket gang. “Lonny McPherson runs a canon?”

  “Surely does,” Joel said. “Runs a very loyal and very frightened crew. Lonny finds the vulnerable ones living on the street and wraps them up tight. Becomes something between a devil and a father to them. Sometimes he pairs ’em off, like siblings, to cement their loyalty to the canon. Maybe this boy had some connection to Lonny’s crew.”

  William thought a moment. “Joel, is there any chance you could help me locate this Lonny McPherson?”

  “Is this about your trial?”

  “It is.”

  “Consider it done.”

  William thought again of the Letter of Marque and the absence of any record of its being issued by the Lord Privy Seal.

  “Joel, my case may also involve a very good forger. Could you check who might be involved through your sources? This forger would specialize in government documents. In particular, a Letter of Marque. They’d have to be first rate. The forged document in our case passed inspection by an expert.”

  “That narrows the field considerably. I don’t believe there’s a forger of that quality this side of Newgate’s walls at present. But I’ll ask about.”

  “I’d be eternally grateful. And I’d pay any fee involved.”

  Joel waved his hand again. “We’ll discuss that later. Find you at your office?”

  William smiled wanly. “Unless you have news by this evening, I’ll be at The Old Bailey.”

  Bundled against the chilly damp of early evening, Edmund leaned on the alley wall across the street from the newspaper office. It had been several hours and not the first time he’d awaited Hardacre—both there and at the gambling hall. The man had disappeared in the week since Edmund threatened him. Apparently, a threat the writer didn’t take seriously.

  The door to the building opened and shut, and Edmund scrutinized the face.

  Not his man.

  The trial starting in the morning would fail, as things were, with disastrous consequences for Captain Tuttle. Edmund had helped Mr. Snopes prepare the examination and had been assigned some of the witnesses as his own—and all that was good, as far as it went. But all the hard questioning in the world couldn’t overcome the absence of evidence of the Letter of Marque.

  He stomped his feet on the ground and blew on his chilled hands. Maybe he’d been dragged kicking into this case, yet the only thing he disliked more than the preening classes was losing a case to one of them. Like Sir Barnabas who, he was ashamed to admit, had intimidated him on their first meeting.

  But unless they were dealt a good hand soon, losing was exactly what would happen.

  He’d even started liking the captain, bringing him food at Newgate. And the lady wasn’t nearly so bad as he’d thought either.

  The door opened again. A man with a top hat emerged, looked both ways, then started up the street. It was the hunched shape of Phineas Hardacre.

  Edmund stepped out to follow on stiff legs. Whistling his way through a street thinning by the hour, the reporter made several turns. They were approaching
a park ahead.

  Edmund hurried his pace to draw nearer.

  The reporter entered an empty passage running under the street. Edmund began running, catching him only a few yards from the far end.

  “Hardacre!” he shouted, grabbing the man’s coat.

  The man turned. The frightened gaze of a stranger stared back at Edmund.

  “Sorry,” Edmund muttered.

  “My wallet,” the man stammered, reaching into his pocket. “Go ahead. Take it. You can have the money.”

  “Keep your money,” Edmund growled back. “I’d only lose it at cards.”

  34

  OFFICE OF BARRISTER WILLIAM SNOPES

  GRAY’S INN

  LONDON

  “You’re sure of this, Mr. Snopes?” Obadiah asked, nearly bobbing in the client chair in his uncommon display of excitement.

  “Yes. This Lonny McPherson picked up Simon Ladner’s casket and is the same man who followed Edmund and myself. Also the one who’d arranged for Solicitor Mortimer to leave town before trial. I’d wager he had some role in threatening Lady Jameson at her estate as well.”

  “And the Bow Street Runners were sure he’s a leader of a pickpocket canon?”

  “Without question. Why would the leader of a bunch of trained diggers care about the Ladner boy? How would he be engaged with the Padget affair at all, for that matter?”

  “I’ve another question, sir. What happened to the boy’s father in Whitechapel?”

  William shook his head. “He sounds like a fiction. Which makes me wonder whether the first mate knows this or was deceived as well.”

  “Could this Lonny McPherson be one of Mandy Bristol’s investors?”

  “Unlikely. He’s exactly the sort Mandy tries to disassociate from. I’d wager McPherson is employed by the bosses in this affair, whether they’re the investors, the folks behind the Crown’s arrest and prosecution, or someone else. It’s a jumble. But if we can run this McPherson to ground, we should learn a great deal.”

  “Then how do we proceed, sir?”

  William pondered a moment longer.