by C. S. Harris
She put out a hand, stopping him when he would have turned away. “You didn’t get that from me.”
He nodded, his gaze on her handsome, fine-boned face. “Jules said Seamus was orphaned when he was eight or nine.”
“Thereabouts. Why?”
“What did his father do before he died?”
Something gleamed in her eyes, something that was there and then gone before he could identify it. “Danny was his name. Daniel Faddy. Kept a tavern in Halfpenny Court.” She tilted her head to one side, her expression, as always, unreadable. “Reckon you can make of that what you will.”
Chapter 49
A Stuart-era hostelry dating back to the first years of the sixteenth century, the Pelican rose three stories tall directly from the shores of the Thames. Built of yellow brick, with two wide bow windows recently added to its ground-floor entrance, the Pelican was known for attracting an unsavory mix of smugglers, bargers, seamen, cutthroats, and thieves. Before venturing into its ancient smoky depths, Sebastian swung by Brook Street to rub ashes into his clean face, disorder his hair, and change his well-tailored coat, fine buckskins, and gleaming Hessians for an unfashionable collection of secondhand clothes culled from the rag fair in Rosemary Lane.
It was only late afternoon, but the Pelican’s taproom was already thick with a raucous, boisterous assortment of unshaven, unwashed men. Here by the waterfront, every other man was a stranger, and no one paid Sebastian much heed as he pushed through to the bar, ordered a pint, and let his gaze drift over the motley crowd. It wasn’t simply a matter of wearing the right clothes. Sebastian had learned long ago that if he wished to pass unobserved, he needed to change his entire way of walking and standing, the way he looked at the world and expected the world to look at him. He couldn’t see Seamus in the crowd. But one man—a short, gray-whiskered sailor Sebastian had never seen before—stared at him intently for a moment, then quietly left.
Sebastian was still at the bar, holding a pot of beer but not drinking it, when Seamus Faddy strolled into the taproom and came to stand nearby, his back to the bar, his elbows on the scarred counter, his hat tipped low over his eyes. He had his back teeth clenched on the long stem of a white clay pipe with a bowl decorated with a horse’s head, his eyes narrowed against the rising smoke.
“I take it yer here lookin’ fer me?” said Seamus.
Sebastian studied the river thief’s youthful profile. “You were seen down by Nightingale Lane last Saturday night.”
Seamus pursed his lips, a quiver of what might have been amusement tugging at his mouth. “Nah. ’Twas foggy that night. Weery foggy. Reckon a man could make a mistake, thinkin’ ’e saw somebody ’e didn’t.”
“So you’re denying it?”
Seamus turned his head to look directly at him. He was not smiling. “I am.”
“I understand your father kept a tavern in the Tower Hamlets before he died.”
The intelligent green eyes widened slightly. “The Turk’s Head. What of it?”
“Halfpenny Court isn’t that far from New Gravel Lane. He must have known Old John, the publican of the King’s Arms.”
“Reckon ’e did.”
“When did your father die?”
Seamus cupped the bowl of his pipe in one hand, as if considering the question. “Nine years ago or thereabouts. Why?”
Sebastian was aware of the great age of the room around them, of the centuries-old heavy beams, the worn flagstone floor, the massive old-fashioned hearth. Nine years ago would put Seamus’s father’s death at around 1805, or six years before the Ratcliffe Highway killings. Was that significant?
Impossible to know.
Sebastian said, “Did your father have trouble with the magistrates on the Middlesex licensing committee?”
“Ye only have trouble if ye fight ’em.”
“And was your father a fighter?”
Seamus sucked on his pipe for a moment. “Never thought ’e was. But sometimes folks can surprise ye.”
Which wasn’t exactly an answer, Sebastian thought. And yet in some ways, it was. Aloud he said, “How did he die?”
“Somebody stabbed ’im in the back.”
Sebastian drew a sharp breath. “Did they ever find who did it?”
Seamus looked over at him. “What ye think?”
The blaze of combined intelligence and willpower in the man’s eyes was impossible to miss. And Sebastian found himself thinking he could understand how Seamus came to command a crew on the river at such a young age.
“Did you know Timothy Marr?” said Sebastian.
“The linen draper? Nah.”
“Why do you think the Marrs were killed?”
“How would I know?”
“I think you have an idea. You told me you hear things—that it’s an important part of your business.”
“Those murders had nothin’ t’ do with the docks or the shippin’ on the river.”
“No? Seems as if there were a lot of seafaring men involved.”
Seamus lifted his shoulders in a dismissive shrug. “This is Wapping. What do ye expect?”
Sebastian rested his pot of beer on the counter. “You heard that the publican of the Pear Tree was found dead this morning?”
“I heard.”
“I suppose you don’t know anything about that, either?”
“If I did, ye don’t think I’d tell ye?”
“Probably not.”
Seamus surprised him by smiling and jerked his chin toward the crowded, noisy room. “One nod from me and half a dozen men ’ere would slit yer throat, no questions asked.”
“Is that a threat?”
“A threat?” Seamus gave him a cocky wink. “Nah. That’s jist an observation.”
* * *
Sebastian found himself turning his conversation with Seamus over and over in his head as he drove toward Tower Hill. An idea was forming on the fringes of his consciousness. Faint and amorphous, it taunted him with hints of insight and clarity. Yet when he tried to grasp it, it skittered away.
He found Paul Gibson in the stone outbuilding at the base of his yard, the cadaver of a slim, dark-haired man on the slab before him. “If you’re here to know more about that Wapping publican,” said the surgeon, glancing up at him, “I haven’t had a chance to look at him yet. A couple of doxies got into a knife fight over in St. Katharine’s and needed to be stitched up. Then I had to cut the leg off a bricklayer who slipped off a scaffold and crushed his knee, and a kitchen maid scalded herself so bad she’ll be lucky if she doesn’t lose her arm. And that’s not to mention this fellow who was brought in last night.”
Sebastian felt his breath back up in his throat as he took a better look at the dead man between them, at the waxy olive skin, the hawklike nose, the thin, deeply incised line of bruising left around the neck by what looked like a garrote.
“A couple of watermen pulled him out of the Thames near the Tower,” Gibson was saying. “But he obviously didn’t drown—not wearing a purple necklace like that. Looks a bit French, wouldn’t you say? No one seems to know who he is.”
“He is French,” said Sebastian, his voice sounding odd even to his own ears. “His name is Labourne. Émile Labourne.”
Chapter 50
Jarvis was coming through the neoclassical marble colonnade that screened Carlton House from Pall Mall when Devlin intercepted him. The last of the daylight was fading from the sky, the temperature plummeting, the flickering lamplight filling the air with the scent of hot oil.
“The body of a Frenchman by the name of Émile Labourne was fished from the Thames last night,” said the Viscount without preamble. “You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”
Jarvis paused, his gaze taking in his son-in-law’s filthy face, the ragged, ill-cut coat and trousers, the scuffed boots, the black kerchief instead of a cravat. �
��Good God. I hope you weren’t intending to try to enter the palace looking like that.”
“Labourne. What do you know about him?”
“You can’t seriously think I am to blame for every corpse that turns up in London?”
“Not all of them. But this one was garroted. Very professionally.”
“Oh? And you say he was French?”
Devlin nodded, his lips pressed into a tight, angry line. “When I saw him a week ago, Labourne told me the Bourbons were following him. He was afraid they meant to kill him, and I’d say they have.”
“Why would the Bourbons want to kill this . . . Labourne, did you say?”
“You know why. They’ve been racking up an impressive body count of late.”
“He was antimonarchist?”
“I suppose you could say he was anti the restoration of the theory of the Divine Right of Kings.”
“Well, then.” Jarvis started to turn away, but Devlin shifted to cut him off.
“You know who their assassins are in London.”
Jarvis drew up. “I know some of them, yes, but not all. And if you think I have any intention of giving any of them up to you, I fear you are sadly mistaken.”
“If I find him, I can promise you he will not kill again.”
Jarvis shrugged. Assassins were easy enough to replace. Aloud, he said, “This Labourne was a friend?”
Devlin hesitated a moment before answering. “He worked for me.”
“Ah, I see.” For a moment Jarvis’s gaze met his son-in-law’s, and an acknowledgment of all that could not be said, all that had never been and would never be said, passed between them.
Jarvis said, “I’ve heard she is in Vienna.”
Devlin’s breath came out in a hiss. “Do you know why?”
“That was not divulged to me. All I know is that she recently arrived there.”
“With whom is she traveling?”
“That I don’t know, either.” Jarvis saw the doubt in Devlin’s face. “I see you’re not inclined to believe me, but it’s true. If I knew, why would I conceal it?”
“I suppose that depends on why she is in Vienna.”
Jarvis studied the younger man’s tense, determined features. “You know that no good will come of this quest of yours. One man may already be dead because of it.”
A feral gleam of interest shone in those unnatural yellow eyes. “So you do know something.”
“I know she styles herself Dama Cappello these days, but that is all.”
“Who told you this? Castlereagh?”
“As a matter of fact, yes. He saw her by chance in the Stephansplatz, thought he recognized her, and made some inquiries. It’s said she lives in Paris.”
“Do you know why Paris?”
“No.”
Devlin obviously didn’t believe him. “There are probably more English aristocrats in Paris at the moment than there are in London.”
“Then perhaps you should direct your inquiries to any you consider your confidants. And now you must excuse me.”
He thought the Viscount might detain him further, but he did not.
He simply stood beside one of the palace’s soaring columns, a tall, raggedly dressed figure with the unmistakable air and self-possession of a lord’s son.
Chapter 51
That night Sebastian lay with Hero snuggled in the crook of his arm, the fire crackling on the bedroom hearth, the house dark and quiet around them. In the distance he could hear a dog bark and, nearer, the rattle of a night-soil man’s cart.
She said, “Labourne never sent you the names of possible replacements, did he?”
“No, but then he may not have had the chance to contact anyone. Gibson said he thought the man had been dead for a couple of days before the body was dumped in the river last night.”
“My God,” whispered Hero. She was silent for a moment, her hand coming up to rest lightly on his bare chest. “What are you going to do now?”
“About Labourne’s killer, or about my mother?”
“Both.”
“To be honest, I don’t know where to begin looking for Labourne’s assassin. And as for finding my mother . . .”
“Have you thought about going to Paris yourself?”
He drew a deep breath. “I’ve thought about it, but I doubt it will be a quick trip. Perhaps we could all go in the spring, when Simon’s a bit older, so we can more easily take him along. I saw Paris as a boy, but never since.” He shifted so that he could look down at her. “What about you?”
A smile curled her lips. “No. Never.” She was silent for a moment, and he knew her thoughts had drifted. She said, “Do you really think Seamus Faddy could be behind these new killings?”
Sebastian ran his hand up and down her arm. “I think it’s possible, yes, even if I don’t understand yet why he’d choose to make these deaths look like the work of the Ratcliffe Highway murderer. It’s all connected somehow—the new killings and the old. There’s nothing random about any of this.”
“Even the killings of three years ago? You don’t think they were random?”
“Let’s just say I doubt it.”
“But what could possibly have connected that young linen draper and his family to an aged tavern keeper?”
He gathered her in his arms to shift her on top of him. “I don’t know. But I suspect if we could find the answer to that, the events of both today and three years ago would suddenly become much clearer.”
Sunday, 16 October
The next morning Sebastian was still at his breakfast table when Sir Henry Lovejoy came to see him.
“My apologies for troubling you at such an early hour, my lord,” said the magistrate when Morey ushered him hat in hand into the dining room. “Especially on a Sunday. But I thought you’d like to know that some disturbing new evidence has turned up against the publican Ian Ryker.”
“Please, have a seat and a cup of tea,” said Sebastian. “And perhaps some toast?”
Sir Henry hesitated, then pulled out a nearby chair. “Some tea would be lovely, thank you.”
Sebastian reached for the teapot. “What’s been found?”
“We had some of the lads search the Black Devil in Bishopsgate last night, and they found a pair of blood-soaked trousers rolled up with a bloody shirt and waistcoat and stuffed behind a row of casks in the cellar.”
Sebastian looked up from pouring the tea. “That sounds ominous. What does Ryker say?”
“He swears he knows nothing about it—insists that someone must have hidden the clothes there to implicate him. But the woman who does the tavern’s laundry swears the clothes are his.”
* * *
Ian Ryker’s fetters clanked dully as he shuffled into the visitors’ room in Coldbath Fields Prison. He was even more unkempt than before, his clothes torn and bloodstained, both eyes blackened, and his nostrils caked with dried blood. But his gaze was as defiant and hostile as ever.
“Who did this to you?” said Sebastian.
Ryker curled his split lip in a sneer. “Who you think? And if you was to guess some other guest of His Britannic Majesty, then you don’t know much about prisons—especially not this hellhole.”
Sebastian nodded toward the table and stools. “Please, sit.”
Ryker stared back at him, blood-caked nostrils flaring with his breath. Sebastian wouldn’t have been surprised if the man had simply continued to stare his defiance. Instead, his gaze broke away and he sat.
Sebastian sat opposite him. “Tell me about the bloodstained clothes Bow Street found in your cellar.”
The publican leaned back on his stool, both hands pressed flat on the table before him. “You tell me. I don’t know nothin’ about ’em.”
“Your laundress identified them as yours.”
“Maybe. I still don’t
know nothin’ about the blood or how they come to be in the cellar.”
“You’re suggesting Bow Street planted them?”
Ryker huffed something that wasn’t quite a laugh. “You’re the one so cozy with that bloody magistrate. You tell me.”
“Sir Henry wouldn’t do something like that.”
“No? Well, then he ain’t like any magistrate I ever tangled with.”
Sebastian studied the ex-rifleman’s mottled, bruised face. He had no doubt that Ian Ryker was more than capable of killing. But the man hadn’t been in England three years ago, he’d been locked up when someone stuck a knife in Robert Vermilloe’s back, and Sebastian was damned if he could see any reason for the ex-rifleman to be quietly eliminating everyone connected in any way with the old Ratcliffe Highway murders.
Sebastian said, “Did you know Timothy Marr?”
Ryker stared at him, his eyes flat. “Told you I didn’t.”
“What about his wife, Celia Marr? Did you know her?”
The prisoner rolled his shoulders in a dismissive shrug. “Knew her when she was Celia Nichols.”
“When was this?”
“That I knew her? Growin’ up. Her da owned the Bull and Bush in Pearl Street.”
Sebastian felt a strange humming in his body, so intense his hands were tingling. “Celia Marr’s father was a publican?”
“Aye. Heard he gave it up right after his daughter and grandson was murdered.”
“Do you know where he is now?”
“No.” Ryker swiped the back of his hand across a thin line of blood beginning to trickle from one nostril, his eyes never leaving Sebastian’s face. “They’re gonna hang me for this, ain’t they?”
“It might help if you’d tell me everything you know. If you’re innocent, I’m not your enemy.”
Ryker stared at him, all of his animosity, all of his loathing, plain to read in his face. “Don’t you understand? I don’t know nothin’. Nothin’.” He pushed to his feet. “We’re through here.”