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by Edward Rutherfurd


  Lady St James had already made arrangements with one of the more venerable of these ecclesiastical gentlemen who would come, as soon as she summoned him, to the Clink and perform the ceremony there. Only when it was done, she had decided, should Jack come out, relieved of his debts, to play.

  Only one thing irked her, as the days went by. The lack of social occasion. She was determined that Jack should remain safely shut up until she had her marriage. They also knew that discretion dictated they should instantly depart London for a while. And yet – she was a creature of society. That was what she was there for. Surely there must be some way that this all-important event could be marked by a social gathering. Without a party, it seemed to her, the business was not hallowed, was scarcely real. And it was while she was seeking for some excuse in her mind that she remembered Fleming.

  He had seen her when her face was so swollen and bruised. His presence had infuriated her at the time, but now it suddenly occurred to her that he could be rather useful: a witness, the only one, to her ill-treatment. As she thought of it, she saw exactly what to do. A small gathering, a few friends, a wedding cake – something special, of course, worthy of remark – from Fleming. And a word to a friend or two:

  “I always use Fleming. Quite the best. And a good little fellow. He saw me once, you know, after St James had . . .” She could hear her own voice trailing off. “But I feel I can trust him to keep his mouth shut, just as I trust you.” Her friends would be round at Fleming’s shop in a trice.

  Secure now in the knowledge that a social gathering was truly needed, she had begun to plan a little gathering for a day or two after the marriage in the Clink. Just a few of her closest friends. Very select.

  “I want a cake,” she told Fleming, “that will be remembered. Something quite out of the ordinary. If I am satisfied, I will perhaps even relent and recommend you.” She gave him a nod which, in so far as the vast social gulf between them made possible, was almost friendly.

  All the time Fleming, a little wiser now in his dealings with the upper class, was wondering if he’d get paid.

  “If I am pleased,” she remarked casually, “I shall even pay your present account as well. Shall we say, a total of forty pounds?”

  Forty pounds. If she paid, he’d be almost in the clear. For the price of making one wedding cake, even the finest, he couldn’t afford not to take the chance. Which she knows very well, he thought to himself. But his concave face creased into a smile that seemed to indicate genuine delight and gratitude.

  “That’s very generous, your ladyship,” he said. “We’ll see what we can do – to really surprise them,” he permitted himself to suggest. Lady St James departed in very good humour.

  “And what sort of cake will it be?” his wife asked him afterwards.

  “I haven’t an idea,” he confessed glumly. “And I bet she won’t pay me either.”

  The marriage of Captain Jack Meredith and Lady St James took place quietly the following day. There were no bridesmaids. The elderly clergyman from the Fleet officiated. Ebenezer Silversleeves, who had changed into a magnificent coat which had belonged to a former inmate, since deceased, was best man.

  “And now, Jack,” the bride announced, as soon as it was done. “I’m off to pay your debts.”

  “So when do I get out of here?” he asked.

  “Tomorrow,” she said with a bright smile. “I expect.”

  There were few more fashionable places to be seen in London than the Foundling Hospital in Coram Fields above Holborn. That such a surprising venue should be so blessed was thanks mostly to the composer Handel who, during his long residence in London, had become an active worker for several good causes. In recent years, having taken an interest in the new venture for orphan children, he had not only donated an organ to the place but trained an excellent children’s choir there. He had already, that year, given several performances of his Messiah, to which all London came, and which raised the notable sum of seven thousand pounds – making the great composer one of the few to be remembered almost as much for his philanthropy as for his genius. And it was to one of these performances that Captain and Mrs Jack Meredith, as they now were, decided to go that very afternoon, from the house in Hanover Square.

  Mrs Meredith, that day, was a happier woman than she had ever been before, and Jack had only been home from prison a few hours.

  Only now could she feel sure that if life and love were a treacherous battle, she had won. She had got everything she wanted; she had caught her man and brought him safely in. Around her home she could see only peace and security. It was a new feeling; she supposed it would take some getting used to. Even the little party she had so carefully planned for the next day suddenly seemed unimportant; the year-long tour of Europe might be curtailed. Perhaps six months would do, she thought. Then I could have him all to myself at Bocton. This thought had been filling her imagination for several delicious minutes as she prepared to go out when the quiet of the house was suddenly disturbed by a shout, followed by a piteous cry.

  “What the devil can that be?” Jack remarked as he went to the door and vanished down the passage.

  He appeared, a minute later, grinning broadly at her, and holding firmly, by one ear, a boot-blackened urchin.

  “Dear heavens, Jack,” she cried half in horror, half amusement, “don’t bring the filthy thing in here. Why are you holding it?”

  “Why, because,” he informed her with a wink, “this is a dangerous criminal. Your footman’s just caught him stealing a shilling off the kitchen table. He was supposed to be sweeping the chimney.” He turned to the boy. “We’ll call the Bow Street Runners, you little monster. What do you think of that?”

  “I never stole nothing,” the boy cried.

  “You did.”

  “Never before, sir. I promise. Please don’t be hard on me.” It was said with such conviction one would almost have believed him.

  “Take the creature away, Jack,” the lady of the house pleaded, “whatever you do.”

  But Jack Meredith, who hadn’t the least intention of doing anything more than boxing the boy’s ears and kicking him out, was rather enjoying the spectacle of all this soot threatening his wife’s spotless chamber. The urchin, who had now started to cry, most obligingly shook his head, scattering soot and causing my lady to scream in vexation. The tear streaks left white marks down his blackened cheeks. It had to be admitted that he looked a rather pitiful sight. Like a small animal caught fatally in the claws of some much larger predator, he seemed suddenly to give up, hanging limply at the captain’s side, and quivering with fear. Even the fastidious lady of the house began to feel a little sorry for him.

  “What’s your name, boy?” she brought herself to ask more kindly.

  No answer.

  “Do you always steal?”

  The head shook vigorously.

  “Don’t you know it’s wrong?”

  The head nodded with real conviction.

  “Does someone tell you to do it?” Meredith asked.

  An unhappy nod.

  “Who?”

  No reply.

  Just then, as the two adults looked at each other and shrugged, the little boy made a sudden, desperate bid to escape. With a wrench that must have caused his ear agonizing pain, he jerked his head away, whipped round, and scuttled down the passage.

  With three rapid strides and a long arm, Jack caught him this time by the hand, whirled him back to where he came from, and then exclaimed in surprise.

  “Here’s a strange thing. Look at this.”

  He held up the boy’s hand. Then he took the other hand, remarking that it was the same. He noticed also, at that moment, that the boy’s hair, out of which most of the soot had now fallen, had a curious white patch in it. “What an odd little fellow,” he remarked. “He’s got spirit, though.” And glanced back at his wife.

  She stood transfixed, white as though she had seen a ghost, staring at the child speechlessly.

  “Wha
t is it?” he cried in alarm.

  But Lady St James, as she had become again in her own mind at that moment, could say nothing, except, “Oh, my God. It cannot . . . surely . . . oh, dear God.”

  And Meredith was so flabbergasted that he scarcely realized that he had let go of the child who, seconds later, had vanished into the street, not to be seen again.

  She would not speak. She would tell him nothing. Neither cajoling nor even, at last, a show of anger would get it from her.

  “It was something about the boy, wasn’t it?” he demanded. “Shall I go and find him?”

  “No! On no account,” she cried.

  Whatever it was that had so shocked her, she would not speak of it. They drove to the recital in silence. Afterwards, she spoke of other things – the party the next day, their departure for the Continent – yet with a pale absence. Whatever the secret was that she had determined to keep locked inside her, he could see it was torturing her. Yet she still would not share it, even with him.

  Until the dark and silent watches of the night.

  Was it the suddenness of the shock? Was it the secret toll of the last three weeks’ events when she had so coolly diced with life and death? Was it, perhaps, that having at last secured love herself, her heart had begun to open, and soften? For it was not only horror and it was not only guilt that racked her body and tortured her mind in her sleep. It was the pain, the longing, the great, overpowering emotion of the mother that caused her, without knowing it, to cry out to her new husband, again and again in the early hours:

  “The child. Oh, my God. My lost child.”

  When she awoke, she found Meredith sitting quietly in a chair beside the bed. Gently but firmly he took her hand and asked her:

  “What did you do with the child? Don’t deny it. You spoke in your sleep.”

  “I gave it away,” she confessed. “But, oh, Jack, it was long ago. It is all over. There is nothing to be done now. Let us go away, today, and forget it.”

  “Whose was it?”

  She hesitated. “It doesn’t matter.”

  “I think it does. Was it St James’s?”

  She paused. Then at last nodded.

  “The heir to the estate, then?”

  “Our son. We shall have a son. He’ll have the estate. The other was . . . you saw for yourself.” She shuddered at the old memory. He was . . . his hands . . .”

  But then Captain Jack Meredith knew what he must do to save his soul, and hers.

  “I’ve killed the father. But I’m damned if I’ll disinherit the child,” he said quietly. “If you don’t take the child back, I will leave you.”

  And she knew that he would.

  “You may not find him, anyway,” she said at last.

  It did not take him long. Though the Dogget boys had decided to avoid Hanover Square after the disaster of the day before, it was just after turning into Grosvenor Square that he caught sight of a blackened urchin with a sweep’s broom who, after one look at him, dropped the brush and began to run. The little fellow made off down Audley Street and dodged about, but Meredith was fit, and by Hay’s Mews he laid hold of him.

  “Take me to your father,” he ordered, “or it’ll be the worse for you.”

  So together they set off in the direction of Seven Dials.

  They encountered the costermonger in Covent Garden, where the flower market was still in progress. He was standing by his barrow, with a cap on his head. As he often did when pushing the barrow, he wore a pair of leather gloves. His eyes just then had been resting on a rather pretty young girl selling at one of the stalls, but seeing Meredith and the boy advancing he turned without ceremony and enquired: “What’s up?”

  “Your boy was stealing in a house yesterday,” the captain answered.

  “Never,” the costermonger replied. “’E’d never do such a thing.”

  “I think he would,” Meredith cheerfully countered. “But that isn’t why I’m here.”

  “No, sir?” Dogget grinned. “You ain’t come for a fight I s’pose, ’ave you?”

  “Not today. What I’d like to know is, how did you come to possess this boy? Was he born yours?”

  “I dare say.” Dogget looked wary.

  “Is that yes or no?”

  “An’ ’oo for that matter, sir, might you be, an’ why are you askin’?”

  “I’m Captain Meredith,” Jack replied pleasantly, “and I’ve reason to think this boy may have been given away by” – he lied smoothly – “a servant who was discharged from a certain house. That’s all I can say at present. But if the boy’s yours, we’ll say no more.”

  And now Harry Dogget became very thoughtful indeed.

  “I’ve been this boy’s father since ’e was a tiny baby,” he said at last. “Given ’im a good home. I can’t let ’im be taken off just anywhere.”

  “Take a look at me, then,” the captain said.

  “You look a reg’lar gentleman, I’ll allow,” Dogget agreed. Then he told Meredith exactly how he had found the baby, at Seven Dials.

  “Then I must tell you,” Meredith explained, when he had heard it all, “that this is undoubtedly the missing child.”

  “But Dad,” cried the little boy, in real distress. He had conceived no affection for the tall stranger and was now hopelessly confused.

  “Shut your north and south,” the costermonger said kindly, “you little thief. You don’t know wotcha talkin’ about ’cos you wasn’t ’ardly born.”

  The boy reluctantly kept quiet.

  “But how d’you know it’s ’im?” Dogget enquired of the captain.

  “Oh, the hands. And the hair,” Meredith explained. “Remarkable.”

  Yes, the costermonger agreed, they were.

  So, leaving his barrow with one of the stallholders he knew, Harry Dogget accompanied them back to Hanover Square, whistled when he saw the house, asked – “You mean he’ll live ’ere, not a servant, like, but one o’ the family?” – and being told yes, he shook his head in wonderment. He declined Meredith’s offer to go in but asked: “Can I come back tomorrow to see ’im? Just to make sure ’e’s all right.” Indeed, he was told, he could, and should.

  Thus George, the former Lord Bocton and now the new Earl of St James, was restored to his home.

  For Isaac Fleming, however, dawn had brought no such joy, but only a sense of hopeless failure.

  If only it had not been for that forty pounds. The money weighed upon him crushingly. It was not just that he needed the money so much – that was bad enough. But whether he got it or not all depended upon this one cake. The result was that every time he thought of a design that might please her ladyship, the money hovered over him as if to say: “Is that all? For forty pounds?” He thought of a castle, a ship, even a lion except that he couldn’t make it. Yet each, within the hour, seemed trite, obvious, unremarkable. It’s no good, he thought. I’m not up to it. I lack the genius. It even came into his mind that perhaps Lady St James had been right when she told him that his earlier cakes had been failures.

  “I should give this up,” he told his wife miserably. But he needed forty pounds.

  By the time he woke up that day, he was in despair. The bill for the cobblestones was still there, unpaid. Even the modest shop on Fleet Street, he concluded, was too much for him. He’d have to move, he supposed, to some cheaper part of town. “I’m finished,” he murmured. He would like to have said it out loud, to wake his wife, but he did not do so. Instead he went sadly downstairs, to prepare the oven for baking the morning’s bread.

  Just after he had put the first batch of bread in he stepped outside. Fleet Street was still quiet. There was not yet a cart moving. Eastwards, somewhere over Ludgate, the sun was sending a bright glow across the heavens. The high, wavy clouds in the pale blue sky were like the tresses of a woman’s hair. Towards Ludgate, high over the rooftops, he could see the splendid spire of Sir Christopher Wren’s St Bride’s with its tiers of octagons piled one above the other up heavenward.
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  St Bride’s, he thought. Just the right name for a church, if you were having a wedding.

  And then he had a most wonderful idea.

  The guests were all assembled: just two dozen of her very dearest and most particular fashionable friends.

  They all knew, of course, how badly she had been treated by St James and were full of sympathy. They knew about Fleming the baker too, whose special cake, though it had not yet been brought in, was promised to be remarkable. One lady, more zealous for information than all the rest, had already slipped out to send a footman over to the baker’s shop to get the first description of what exactly Fleming had seen that day.

  “Be sure to find out which eye was blacked: the left or the right,” she had ordered him. “I won’t be made to look a fool by getting it wrong.”

  But even this drama, and the sudden wedding, food for such delicious speculation for weeks to come – even this was quite put in the shade by the latest revelation to emerge from number seventeen, Hanover Square – the discovery of the heir.

  It was astonishing. An evil servant switching the child, it seemed, when the young wife had been practically out of her mind with worry and the discovery that the lost child was a sweep. It had to be true, it was agreed, because there was no conceivable reason why either the lady or her new husband should invent such a thing. They clamoured to see the boy, but were denied.

  “Too much for him,” his mother told them. “I must protect him.”

  Indeed, she had insisted, and Jack had agreed, that the urchin – who could scarcely speak in any language fit to hear, let alone read and write – must spend at least a year in seclusion with a tutor before he was fit to be seen.

  “But to do all this at once, and then leave town,” one of the ladies complained. “Why, she has upstaged us all! I’m mad with jealousy.”

  As for the new Mrs Meredith, who had nearly, though by no means completely got over the shock of the day before, her social triumph – which was to make her immortal for an entire season – was crowned by the arrival, carried by two footmen, of the wedding cake.

 

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