Finally Riis walked over to Joe and said quietly, "You are making a great deal of noise, and I need to concentrate."
Joe winced. "Am I? Sorry, Jake. It's just that it makes me so bloody angry."
Jacob patted him on the back. "I know," he sighed. "I know. But your anger doesn't get you your money. Good photos do. And good stories. Read by good people, who then get angry themselves and yell at their MPs. It's their anger we need. So quiet down now and let me work."
Joe nodded sheepishly. Since he was of no use here, he decided to go outside. He would find the children and their parents some much-needed food. He pushed himself up the plank ramp they'd laid over the basement steps and out to the street. There were no shops in the immediate vicinity of the house, so he headed north, where he knew there were a few.
As he made his way over the rutted streets, he thought about Jake's words: "your anger doesn't get you your money." Joe knew he was right, but there were times when anger was all he had. Anger made him fight. It had made him bring Riis here, it had made him work to interest newspaper editors in his photos, and it made him keep hammering away at his government's complacency. With any luck it would be anger--not his, but the prime minister's--that would get him the money he wanted. All one hundred thou-sand pounds of it.
The PM was angry already--not at the condition of the East London poor, unfortunately, but at him. He was furious at Joe's unrelenting criticism of the Uganda railway and the shocking sum that had been spent to build it. He was so angry, in fact, that he'd summoned Joe to his office a month ago, along with select members of the Colonial office, to see if there was any way they could shut him up.
"It's a quid pro quo we're after," Campbell-Bannerman had said. "You pipe down about the railway and we'll come up with some money for you."
"How much?"
"I think we could see our way clear to twenty thousand pounds."
"That's one-fifth of what I need. It's a bleedin' insult," Joe said, preparing to leave.
"Be reasonable, man! We need that railway."
"To do what?" Joe asked. "Carry a bunch of fat-arsed sportsmen around? Take the quality sightseeing? Deliver land-grabbers to the choicest acreage?"
"That's a damned cynical view," Freddie Lytton had said hotly. "The Uganda line wasn't established to aid speculators, but to further exploration and carry missionaries to the natives."
Joe had laughed out loud. "The government spent five million pounds to transport missionaries, did it? Those Africans don't know how lucky they are. We get prize farmland, new import and export markets, an expanded empire, and they get a god they don't want and some bloody hymn books." He shook his head bitterly. "Well, I guess fair exchange is no robbery. At least they can all sing �Nunc Dimittis' while they're trying to graze their cattle on the five flippin' acres we've left them."
"You, sir, are out of line," Campbell-Bannerman said coldly.
Joe ignored the censure. "You're planning additional branches on the railway. I've read the engineers' reports. How much are they going to cost? Another million? Two? What are you spending on hospitals in Hackney? On schools in Whitechapel? On soup kitchens in Limehouse? Do you know that right now, as I speak, little children are dying of hunger--bloody hunger!--right here in London? No, of course you don't. Because you've never set foot in the East End."
"Your compassion is very touching," Freddie said acidly. "And so unusual in such a wealthy man. It wouldn't have anything to do with courting your voters, would it?"
"No, it wouldn't. And for your information, Freddie, I'm not a wealthy man. I'm a poor man with a lot of money. Big difference. I've never forgotten what it's like to be hungry and cold, and I never will."
"If we give you this money," Campbell-Bannerman asked, "will you call off the dogs?"
"Yes."
"And if we don't?"
"I'll let the whole bloody kennel loose."
"I'd almost say you were blackmailing me."
"For Christ's sake, Henry, I am blackmailing you!"
"What, exactly, do you want?"
"I want one hundred thousand pounds to establish five clinics and five schools in my constituency. That's ten thousand a project--to build or renovate, supply, and endow." He threw a thick folder onto the table. "That's how I'm going to do it. It's a comprehensive proposal on suggested sites, builders, and costs."
Campbell-Bannerman had made promising noises, but no promises, and Joe had left Downing Street smoldering. He'd returned to his office, bellowing at Trudy to get Jacob Riis here on the next boat.
So far, Jake had run only three stories--two in the Clarion, one in The Times--and already the Central Lobby at Westminster was noticeably more crowded, noticeably noisier. The postmaster of the Commons post room had told him he had roughly double the number of incoming sacks of letters. Joe expected to be summoned back to Downing Street any day now.
He had to pass by old St. Patrick's church, with its walled graveyard, to get to the food shops. As he approached it, he saw that a smart black carriage had stopped near the gates. It was unusual to see such an expensive conveyance in this part of town. He rolled closer, then realized with a start that it belonged to him. It was one of two broughams he owned, the one Fiona used. He knew that her parents and sister were buried here and that she tended the graves herself. She must be here now, he thought. He knew where the graves were and headed through the gates down a curving dirt path toward them.
He spotted her amid the headstones. Daffodils and bluebells bloomed all around them. She had raked debris from the grass and was now on her knees, clipping spent leaves. Her movements were awkward and slow because of the baby. He saw her brush dust off her father's headstone, then stretch her hand out to one marked Charlie Finnegan. The real Sid Malone--the lad who had attacked the young Charlie Finnegan, and whom Charlie had killed--was buried there. When Fiona had discovered the truth, she'd refused to change the name, worried that it might provoke unwanted questions. Joe saw her touch the letters of her brother's name, then cover her face with her hands and lower her head. She was weeping.
He sped down the path as fast as he could push the wheels of his chair. The sound of the wheels crunching over the gravel startled Fiona. She looked up.
"Joe?" she said, hastily wiping her eyes. "What are you doing here?"
"Working with Riis. What's wrong, Fee?"
"Nothing. Nothing at all. I just..."
"Fiona, I saw you. It's all right, luv, you can tell me."
They were both aware of the damage her pursuit of Sid had done to their marriage. Since the day he'd come out of his coma--and told the police and the press that it was Frankie Betts, not Sid Malone, who had shot him--Fiona had talked about her brother only once, to tell Joe he'd come to their house, and that she and Seamie had helped him get out of the country. She had never mentioned him again after that.
"I try not to think of him too much," she said now. "But it's hard not to when I come here. It's knowing he can't come home that upsets me. Ever. If someone recognized him and went to the police, he'd be arrested. Alvin Donaldson and Freddie Lytton would still like to see him hang for Gemma Dean's murder. I wish he could come back, Joe. I wish I could see him again someday."
Tears came again. Joe wiped them away. It hurt him to know that she had tried so hard for so long to hide her pain from him. And it hurt him to see that she was still suffering. And yet he didn't know what to do to ease her grief. When he'd come out of his coma, and heard that Sid was said to have had shot him, he was able to say that he had not. Gemma Dean, however, had been in no such position.
As soon as Alvin Donaldson learned it was Betts who'd shot Joe, he pulled out all the stops to find him. Eventually he did, in Deptford. Donaldson had interrogated him about Gemma Dean's death as well, but Frankie denied he'd had anything to do with the Dean murder. Suspicion had fallen back on Sid Malone, where it had remained. Joe knew that Fiona was right. Her brother could never come home.
When Fiona's tears had subsided,
Joe insisted that she leave St. Patrick's and go home. "The churchyard's no place for you, Fee. Not now. It's not good for you and it's not good for the baby. Go home and sit in the garden and I'll come as soon as Jake finishes."
She finally relented and he accompanied her back up the path and to her carriage. He kissed her goodbye, guilt pricking at his conscience. As the carriage pulled away, he thought of how hard he fought on behalf of total strangers while his own wife cried alone in a graveyard. It wasn't right. He must do something for her. He must try to clear Sid's name. He didn't know how, but he knew it would involve getting to the bottom of Gemma Dean's murder.
He would start tomorrow. With the man who had nearly killed him.
He would pay a visit to Mad Frank Betts.
Chapter 93
"Bloody hell," Willa swore.
"Again?"
She nodded, put her pencil down, and trotted off behind a boulder. Seamie, busy taking sightings of Mawenzi's west face from a quadrant, could hear her retching.
"All right?" he shouted.
"All right," came the reply.
A few minutes later she was back, standing at the stove. Snow was melting in a pan on top of it. She swished some of the water around her mouth and spat it.
"What's doing it? Altitude alone?" Seamie asked.
"It's not altitude. It's the Chaggas' angry mountain god. His name is Vomitus and he's mad as hell," she said.
Seamie laughed out loud, bumping the quadrant and wrecking his reading.
At the village of Taveta, where they'd stopped to top up their provisions, they'd found two Chagga tribesmen. It had taken some doing, but Seamie and Willa had persuaded them to guide them through the dense forest that circled the mountain. The Chagga, who had named the mountain Kilema Kyaro, which means That Which Cannot Be Conquered, believed that an angry god lived inside Kili and would punish any who dared climb it. Willa had had to offer them a lantern, a small mirror, a knife, and her gold signet ring before they would agree to guide them. Tepili, who didn't trust the Chagga, had been unhappy and silent throughout the forest trek. Peter Boedeker had cautioned them to be wary of the Chagga, too, but neither Willa nor Seamie had had any difficulty with them, and thought both Boedeker and Tepili had exaggerated their ferociousness.
"Drink some of that water," Seamie said to her now. "Don't just spit it."
"Ugh."
"Drink. You have to. If you don't, it'll get worse."
"Don't see how it could."
Ever since they'd reached twelve thousand feet, Willa had been plagued by altitude sickness. Their plan had been to climb to the saddle--a long slope of land that stretched between the Kibo and Mawenzi peaks--and set up camp close to Mawenzi. From there they would explore the peak's west face from the ground, using the surveying and navigation tools they'd brought to get a more accurate idea of heights, distance, and hazards before they started climbing.
Their initial difficulty had been staying on course through the dense forest at Kili's base, but their Chagga guides had helped them, bringing them out of the hilly forest and onto the mountain proper without once consulting a compass. Seamie had marveled at the primeval feeling of the forest after days spent trekking on the hot, arid plains. Camphor, fig, and padocarpus trees had shaded them on the climb. Curious colobus monkeys had followed them, swinging along on hanging vines. Hornbills and red-striped turaco birds fiew overhead, squawking. And once a leopard dashed snarling from a clutch of giant ferns.
Higher up, the forest had given way to alpine moorland, then cliffs, ridges, and scree, and then to the high-altitude desert of the saddle. The first signs of altitude sickness--pounding headaches--had hit them just past nine thousand feet. Nausea and fatigue followed. Keeping to their plan to climb high and sleep low, they'd taken five days to carry their gear up from the alpine moors over the glacier ice, deposit it at the Mawenzi camp, then climb back down below three thousand feet to sleep. Their Masai porters, unequipped for ice climbing, had stayed behind on the moorland to wait for their final descent. It had been hard work carrying a tent, a stove and fuel, sleeping bags, lanterns, food, clothing, cameras, and tools in rucksacks over the ice. Their ice-axes had been helpful, but the crampons had proved invaluable, performing better than their hobnailed boots. Willa said she'd felt as if she were positively glued to the ice in them.
It had taken Seamie only three days to acclimatize. He still had the odd headache, and his energy level wasn't what it had been on the plains, but he was improving. Willa wasn't. He worried about her, and said so, but she shrugged off his concern. She was suffering, he knew she was, but she made no concessions to her symptoms, keeping up with him in every aspect of their reconnaissance--from trekking and climbing to surveying and photographing.
Willa crumbled a lump of snow into the pot on the stove to replace what she'd drunk, then walked over to Seamie and the small drafting table they'd set up. She looked at the map they were still roughing out, at his jotted readings, then at the mountain face itself. Their reconnaissance was nearly done. By the end of the day, they would have a working map of the west face. She had taken all the photographs she needed for her book. In a day--two at the most--they would start their ascent.
"Still thinking of the couloir?" she asked.
Seamie nodded thoughtfully.
"Could be tricky."
Seamie knew that it would be tricky. Couloirs--gullies that were steep and angled--often provided the best access to the summit. Unfortunately, they also acted as chutes for debris. Chunks of ice and rock, loosened by the heat of the sun, could come crashing down them without warning.
"If we're on the couloir early, before the sun's warm, we might be all right. See where that buttress meets the ridge? We climb by that northwest corrie to reach it, bivouac under the ridge for a night, then make a start on the couloir at dawn, clear it, take the summit, and get back down to the ridge. If we need to bivi again, we do. If not, we grab our gear and descend the same way, via the corrie."
Willa was frowning at the snowy face.
"It's not without risk," Seamie added. "We'll have to move bloody fast."
Seamie knew that Willa would understand his meaning--that no quarter would be given to altitude sickness.
She frowned up at the forbidding, snow-covered peak. She was quiet for a few long seconds, then she said, "We'll be the first to summit Mawenzi."
He was struck by the tone of her voice, by the determination in it, the sheer bloody will. It signaled there would be no compromises, no negotiation, only victory or defeat. He'd heard it before--in Shackleton's voice, in Scott's, in his own.
Willa was driven, competitive, ambitious, eager to make a name for herself. It inspired him. And unsettled him. Not because she was a woman. He was used to fierce women--he'd been raised by Fiona, after all--but because he loved her.
One paid a price for winning and sometimes that price was high. The trekking they'd done, even the ice climbing on the glacier, though arduous, was nothing compared to free-climbing a sheer rock face in subfreezing temperatures while straining to pull oxygen into one's lungs in thin air.
He'd have to be able to forget who she was when they were scaling Mawenzi, to forget his feelings for her. He wondered if he'd be able to.
"The route's good," she said suddenly, decisively. "As long as we're off the couloir before the sun's hot, we'll be fine. Let's just hope the angry god isn't too angry that day."
Seamie squinted up at the long icy sweep of the couloir again. He looked at the jagged peaks of the summit and the snow clouds crossing them and said, "Let's hope he's not even miffed."
Chapter 94
Charlotte Lytton gazed at the creature at her feet, lying limp and crumpled, blood seeping from its slack lips, flies feasting at its eyes. The porters
had placed it there, thinking she would want to see it. She didn't. She didn't understand why anyone would want to do this, to destroy something so beautiful. She raised her head and looked at the man who had shot the lion--
her handsome, laughing father. He was being made much of. Lord Delamere slapped him on the back and Sir James Hayes Sadler handed him a glass of champagne. Watching him, she did something she'd done for as long as she could remember. She whispered, "You are not my father. You are not. You're a thief. You've stolen my real father and put yourself in his place. Just like in a fairy story."
She could smell the lion's blood now. It made her feel dizzy and sick, but she knew that to faint would make her father angry. So instead, she took his hand and said, "Congratulations, Papa."
He turned to her, smiled briefly, and patted her head, which was what he always did when he wanted to appear loving in public. She knew, however, that he did not love her. It was all right, for she did not love him. She never had. They both pretended. Though she was better at it.
The Winter Rose Page 76