The Revenge of Captain Paine pm-2

by Andrew Pepper

  ‘Well, was he?’

  ‘Perhaps.’ Pyke took another slug of ale. ‘I think so.’

  ‘Any proof?’

  Pyke thought about his suspicion about Bellows and the dealings between Bolter and Rockingham. ‘Not yet.’ He wiped his mouth and added, without altering his tone, ‘How about the name Jimmy Trotter?’

  Jackman stared at him blankly. ‘What’s he supposed to have done?’

  Briefly Pyke told him about Trotter’s role in inciting the navvies to violence but decided not to mention anything about the headless corpse and a possible link to letters stolen from Sir John Conroy.

  ‘Do you know where one might find this Jimmy Trotter?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘Because when you do, I’d be interested in paying him a visit.’

  ‘You’ll have to get in line.’

  That drew a thin smile. ‘You’re not a bad sort, for a capitalist.’

  ‘Tell me something, Jackman. What is it that you’re planning?’

  ‘I’m not sure what you mean.’

  ‘It’s just that you don’t strike me as the kind of man who’s going to do nothing.’

  The radical’s eyelids twitched. ‘The Grand National Consolidated Trades Union is planning another march through the capital. They’ve been gathering together signatures for a petition in support of the navvies for the past week.’

  ‘I take it from your tone that you don’t think much of their plans.’

  Jackman shrugged. ‘Something happens, people’s first thought is to plan a march. It might look impressive on the day, thousands of folk filing through the streets, but what’s changed at the end of the day when it’s over and everyone goes home?’

  ‘So you’re planning a more lasting action?’

  The radical stared down at the wooden table. ‘I’m presuming you’ve heard of Wat Tyler.’

  ‘He was hung in Bartholomew’s Field for his part in the Peasants’ Revolt.’

  ‘Tyler had the whole of the city within his grasp but he chose to negotiate with the King and his ministers. At first, they agreed to his demands; his army disbanded and went home. Then Tyler and his ringleaders were arrested, tried and put to death.’

  ‘It’s an interesting story,’ Pyke said, staring at the radical, trying to determine why he’d told it.

  ‘We’ve decided to call ourselves the Wat Tyler Brigade.’

  ‘Then let’s hope for your sake that you don’t end up like your namesake.’

  ‘It’s important to learn from history, from other people’s mistakes.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Don’t negotiate, for a start.’

  ‘That’s a tough position to take. Politics is all about compromise.’

  Jackman leaned forward across the table and whispered, ‘Did you learn that from Peel?’

  ‘Why do you say that?’ Pyke asked, the skin tightening across his face.

  ‘I heard you were close to the Tory leader,’ the radical said dismissively, as though the matter weren’t important.

  ‘From?’ Pyke turned the options over in his mind. Emily? She had no idea about their current arrangement and, anyway, she would never betray his confidence. Or would she?

  Jackman tapped the end of his nose. ‘That would be telling, now, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘If you knew me better, you’d know I’m not one for playing games. If you’ve got something to say, say it.’

  ‘What if I were to tell you there’s a gentleman, here in London, who’s determined to wipe us out?’

  ‘I’d want to know more.’ Pyke waited for a moment. ‘I’d also want to know what you’re busy planning.’

  ‘Who said we’re planning something?’ Jackman’s eyes glistened. ‘Did Emily tell you that?’

  Pyke finished his ale and put the pot down on the table. ‘I’ve told you I’m not one for playing games but let me give you a little warning, something to take to heart.’

  Jackman’s eyes rose lazily to meet Pyke’s stare. ‘Oh?’

  ‘I know you saved my life and I owe you for that, but if Emily is hurt in any way because of her involvement in your affairs, I’ll come down on you so hard you’ll think what happened in Huntingdon was a gentle scolding.’

  It was a chilly evening, with just a hint of coal dust in the raw air, but under starry skies, the promenade of the pleasure gardens at Vauxhall was already beginning to fill up with strollers. Under gas lamps and strings of lanterns symmetrically arranged in the bare branches of trees, the gardens looked immaculate, though in recent years the clientele had fallen with the entrance fee and now you were just as likely to see milliners and shop girls mixing with the elegantly attired ladies who paraded up and down the promenade in their silk dresses.

  Most had escorts and wore their hair piled up in curls under wide-brimmed straw bonnets trimmed with different colours of silk ribbon.

  Pyke saw Marguerite Morris strolling towards him from a distance, as though she had all the time in the world. It was hard not to notice the admiring and jealous glances of other people, for even in her mourning clothes she turned heads in a way that few women would be capable of. An elaborately darted black silk dress was drawn tightly around her waist to reveal her hourglass figure and cut low around the neck to show off her flesh.

  Marguerite seemed oblivious to the attention and greeted Pyke with a flicker of her eyelashes.

  Pyke had requested to meet her here, rather than at her house or the bank, because he hadn’t wanted to risk a meeting in private, but almost immediately he wondered about the wisdom of this decision: this was a place where lovers came to flirt and cavort away from the eyes of their parents and guardians.

  ‘Eddy’s will was read yesterday. His lawyer confirmed what I already knew. He left it all to me.’ As they walked, Marguerite threaded her arm through his, as though it were the most natural thing in the world to do.

  ‘You don’t seem very excited about it.’ As they walked, Pyke thought about his conversation with Jackman and the radical’s offhand reference to someone who wanted to wipe out the Wat Tyler Brigade. Who had he been referring to, and why had he told Pyke about it? Was it some kind of warning?

  ‘Eddy wasn’t as wealthy as some might have imagined. He had money tied up in stocks and shares, mostly in the Grand Northern, and as you know he bought Cranborne Park…’ Up close her breath smelled of stale wine.

  ‘Not something to be sniffed at.’

  ‘He owned it outright. But his lawyer told me that Eddy had recently requested the deeds to the estate and when I looked for them in his safe, I couldn’t find them.’

  Pyke nodded, as though he appreciated the dilemma. ‘And without the deeds, the ownership of the estate can’t be transferred into your name.’

  Marguerite’s body stiffened. ‘Don’t play games with me, Pyke. He gave the deeds to you, as security for the personal loan you told me you made to him.’

  ‘So you believe me now?’

  Pyke walked ahead and, having gathered up her skirt, she hurried to keep up with him. ‘How much did Eddy borrow?’

  ‘Ten thousand.’

  She absorbed this information without comment or apparent response. ‘Then why don’t you produce the loan papers, together with the deeds, and lodge your claim against Eddy’s estate?’

  ‘You sound angry at this prospect.’

  ‘Why shouldn’t I be? Bankers always have a way of clawing back their money.’

  This time, he stopped to look at her. ‘But it still doesn’t explain where the money went, does it?’

  ‘You mean, the money you claimed you lent him?’

  ‘Your husband walked out of my bank with ten thousand pounds of my money. I intend to get it back.’

  Out of the blue, Marguerite broke into a throaty laugh and said, ‘God, you haven’t changed much, have you, Pyke. You were always so serious, especially when money was being discussed.’

  ‘Back in those days it was harder for some of us to earn our bread th
an others,’ he said, walking ahead. In the distance, he could the drum of a military band.

  Marguerite hurried after him. ‘And you were always a self-righteous prig too,’ she said, a little out of breath.

  Above them, the night sky was momentarily illuminated by a volley of fireworks. They paused for a moment, to look up at the spectacle, sparks of light fanning out across the sky in a giant spider’s web. ‘Look, I’ll make you a deal,’ she added, in the same flinty tone. ‘If you can unearth the deeds to Cranborne Park, I’ll give you Eddy’s shares in the Grand Northern.’ She laughed bitterly. ‘Right now, they’re hardly worth the paper they’re written on.’

  ‘How many shares are we talking about?’

  ‘I don’t know. Five thousand, maybe.’

  Pyke did a quick calculation. At face value these shares were worth fifty thousand pounds. Marguerite was quite right to say their actual valuation was far lower, but even so they could be sold on the stock exchange for perhaps five thousand, still a vast amount of money. He was immediately suspicious. ‘And why would you make me such a generous offer?’

  ‘I need the deeds. Eddy gave them to you as collateral for a loan you made him. If you give them back to me, I’m prepared to make it worth your while. That’s how business is done.’

  ‘But at current value, the shares still don’t cover the cost of the loan.’

  Marguerite turned to him and smiled. ‘So find the money you loaned my husband and you can keep that, as well.’

  ‘And where would I look for it?’ Pyke caught her eyes and felt a sudden jolt in his stomach. ‘Under your pillow?’

  But Marguerite had walked ahead of him without answering and the moment was lost. Pyke followed her, as they headed off the beaten track. ‘Do you know when the next meeting of the Grand Northern committee is?’

  She looked at him, laughing bitterly. ‘You mean when they can all pick over poor Eddy’s carcass?’

  ‘And decide what will happen to the railway.’

  ‘Next week, I think. But you can find out for yourself easily enough.’ Marguerite shrugged, as though the matter weren’t important.

  They walked for a while in silence. ‘There was a man at your ball with a mastiff. Jake Bolter. He said you gave him permission to bring the dog with him.’

  ‘So?’ Marguerite continued to walk, but a note of caution had crept into her voice.

  ‘So I was curious to know how you first became acquainted with someone of his character.’

  ‘I take it the two of you didn’t see eye to eye.’

  ‘You could say that.’ Pyke waited for a moment. ‘I don’t tend to think too warmly of people involved in the procurement and selling of children for profit.’

  This time she stopped to face him. Her expression was a mixture of bewilderment and anger. ‘That’s a terrible thing to accuse him of. I’ve found him uncouth, of course, but quite reasonable.’

  ‘So you do know him, then?’

  She looked over his shoulder. ‘From time to time, I donate a little bit of money to the orphans’ school in Tooting where he works. The man’s never been anything less than courteous to me. Unlike others I could mention.’

  ‘The man who owns the school, Bartholomew Prosser, procures children from the workhouses in the city, earns a fee from the workhouse managers, and then sells them to the sweaters in the East End, who put the children to work in their hovels for sixteen hours a day and pay them slave wages.’ He paused. ‘Your good friend Bolter helps to transport the children from the school to the sweat hovels.’

  They walked for another hundred yards in silence, into an area of the gardens that was deserted and shrouded in darkness. ‘What’s it like?’ Marguerite asked eventually. ‘To always be right? To always know what to do and make the choices. It must be hard being so perfect.’

  They were now facing one another and he could feel the heat coming off her face. ‘Is that what you think? That I don’t have to live every day with the consequences of bad choices I’ve made?’

  ‘Give me an example.’

  ‘My bank lent the sweater I’ve just described the money to start up his business.’

  That mollified her a little. When Marguerite next looked up at him, her eyes had moistened and she even managed a smile. ‘And was letting me go all those years ago one of those bad choices, too?’

  Pyke was momentarily lost for words.

  ‘Or marrying the wrong woman?’

  In the darkness he could see her breath vaporise in the chilly night air. ‘Who said I married the wrong woman?’ But he could feel his heart beating a little quicker.

  ‘Don’t you ever wonder what would have happened if you’d come with me to France?’

  Pyke swallowed some cold air and tried to avoid meeting her stare. ‘You know, I watched you climb aboard that stagecoach from the other side of the street. I hid behind a flower stall.’

  ‘You were there?’ Her voice was suddenly softer, warmer. ‘I looked up and down the street for you, willing you to appear.’

  ‘But you still left without me.’

  ‘And you chose not to join me,’ she said, stiffly. ‘I didn’t have a choice. I had to leave.’

  She had owed money to someone, he remembered, and faced the prospect of a few years in a debtor’s prison.

  ‘We always have choices, Maggie. It’s just that the things we have to choose between aren’t always pleasant.’

  This time her laugh was without any warmth. ‘You always did know how to hide behind false principles.’

  Pyke chose not to respond and a fragile silence settled between them.

  ‘Do you remember how it used to be?’ Marguerite said eventually, while fingering the stitching on her skirt.

  ‘Fifteen years is a long time.’

  ‘Nearly sixteen.’ Marguerite hitched up her skirt and turned to leave. ‘And what pains me the most is thinking about the good life we could have had together.’ But before he had the opportunity to respond, she had started to walk away, leaving him in the park alone.

  When Pyke returned to Blackwood’s bank, Sir Henry Bellows was waiting for him in a carriage parked opposite the Royal Exchange on Cornhill. At first Pyke thought about ignoring him, but one of his officers made it clear that the chief magistrate wanted to talk to him so finally Pyke relented. But rather than climbing into the carriage, Pyke peered in through the open window. Bellows sat forward, the light from a gas lamp illuminating his high forehead.

  ‘What do you know about a man called Septimus Yellowplush?’ Bellows wanted to know.

  The question took Pyke by surprise. He hadn’t imagined that the chief magistrate had connections with Huntingdon. ‘Why is Yellowplush any of your business?’

  ‘His body was dug up the other day in a field outside the town.’ Bellows’s voice was as dry as a tinderbox. ‘He had been shot.’

  ‘It would seem that Huntingdon’s a dangerous place at the moment. Just ask the navvies who died there.’

  ‘An off-duty soldier was also shot and killed while pursuing a suspect.’

  ‘Then the question you should be asking is what an off-duty soldier was doing trying to keep the peace.’

  Bellows leaned forward and whispered, ‘There are a dozen witnesses who saw you playing cards with Yellowplush on the night before he was shot in a coaching inn on the High Street.’

  ‘I thought your jurisdiction ended at Temple Bar.’

  ‘So you don’t deny arguing with Yellowplush?’

  ‘I asked him how much his integrity as a judge had cost. I might ask you the same question.’

  Bellows looked at him, almost amused. ‘You’ve no idea what you’re dealing with here, do you?’

  ‘So enlighten me.’

  ‘Two fine men died that night in Huntingdon. As a man of the law, I intend to see that justice is served.’

  ‘And will the navvies get the same kind of justice?’

  The skin wrinkled at the corners of the chief magistrate’s eyes. ‘Go ba
ck to your family and stay out of this.’ He paused for a few moments, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. ‘And if you had any sense, you would persuade your wife to do the same.’

  Pyke put his head through the carriage window. The inside smelt mildewed and sour. ‘What did you just say, Bellows?’

  ‘You heard me the first time. I’m not going to repeat myself.’

  ‘Then clear something up for me. Did you just threaten my wife?’

  ‘Threaten is an ugly word. Let’s just say I’ve simply given you a friendly warning.’

  ‘And if I don’t choose to take it?’ Pyke hesitated. ‘And if my wife chooses not to take it?’

  Bellows looked at him and shrugged. ‘Then you’ll only have yourselves to blame, won’t you?’

  As Pyke watched the carriage disappear along the street, he couldn’t get rid of the sour taste their exchange had left.

  TWENTY

  A fine mist had drifted up the Thames by the time Pyke reached the creaking old wharf at Cowgate, a mist that just obscured the tops of the ships’ masts as they bobbed up and down in the choppy waters of the river. It was late, maybe as late as midnight, and the wharf was deserted. Early morning was the time to see warehousemen carrying crates of sugar, rum, rubber, tea and coffee to the stores, and gangs of coal-whippers unloading the colliers lined up along the river. Pyke looked over towards the Southwark bank, the giant brewery just about visible through the dense forest of rigging, cables and masts, though it, too, was silent. What never changed, he thought, was the smell. The river was at low tide and when this happened, the raw sewage that flowed into the river from the cess trenches that criss-crossed the city gathered on exposed banks to form mountains of slime; slime that produced gas bubbles whose stench was bad enough to make your teeth rattle.

  Pyke found the former crimping house easily enough. In fact, he had once tracked down a man who had returned from transportation to one of its rooms and remembered its inside a little. During the Napoleonic wars, the building had been used to hold ‘pressed’ seamen before they were transported to vessels, and afterwards it had briefly been used as a place where sailors wounded in combat could convalesce. But money made available by the Admiralty had long since dried up, and in recent years the building had become home to every kind of docker, mudlark and scavenger that depended upon the river to earn their living. Downstairs, there was a long, narrow passageway that led to a communal kitchen, if he remembered correctly, and upstairs was a rabbit warren of interconnecting rooms and passageways. He would have to be lucky to surprise Trotter, if he was there, and even if he was, the chances were that Trotter would hear him coming and escape to somewhere else in the building.