The Vice Of Virtue (A Poor Man At The Gate Series Book 10)

by Andrew Wareham

  James did not like the open-ended obligation this inferred. What if the Belgians ever became aggressors, were they to call upon redcoats to fight their war for them?

  "Not if their rulers are to enjoy incomes from our coffers, James. Belgian foreign policy must be made in the English Treasury!"

  English guineas had played a major role in the defeat of Napoleon; there was nothing new in the concept.

  "What of other European powers? Might they attempt to outbid us?"

  "Russia is too poor, and the Prussians spend their all upon their army, they do not have cash to spare. France is habitually impoverished by its government's spendthrift idiocies; the hunt for colonies and influence throughout the Mediterranean cripples them. The sole threat actually comes from Austria, and they are hell-bent on the destruction of the Ottoman in Europe, will be unlikely to aggress in the west; add to that, the Italian states are restless and wish to expel the Empire from amongst them. In the next few years the Belgians need us, as do the Dutch; it is a question merely of which option we choose."

  "Which will it be?"

  "At the moment, with Wellington's voice loudest, it must be the Belgians. He will give the Dutch nothing, for the old reason."

  Even James knew that His Grace had only contempt for the Prince of Orange.

  "Then it is no more than a question of ensuring that the money is placed in the right hands at the correct time, I presume."

  "There needs be some element of discretion, brother. It is never wise to be too public in one's purchase of foreign politicians."

  James could not see why that should be - corruption was a fact of life at Westminster, why treat foreigners differently?

  "How is it to be done, Robert?"

  "Through the banks, I expect, the payments disguised as commercial transactions."

  "So, for example, one might send money to Goldsmids in Vienna, and they could then transfer it to their people in, where is it, Amsterdam? Then they could pay into accounts in Antwerp - all at second hand, then."

  Robert stared in amaze at James - he had not thought of that route, using as it would the services of Lord Frederick Masters, who could be trusted to respect the English interest, and earn a not insignificant commission as well, thus aiding the family in process.

  "Brilliant, James! I will broach the matter to Michael, and he will pass word to his people, while you speak directly to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. The matter can be put in hand directly, so that the actual payments can commence as soon as need is perceived; we shall, for once, be prepared in advance!"

  The French proceeded incompetently into another revolution, stumbling from one unnecessary crisis to another, contemptuously observed by all of the European powers, none of whom chose to intervene. The French King was a fool, they agreed, and would not thank them for their aid, inasmuch that he believed he ruled by divine right and the assistance of other monarchs would be at the will of the Almighty. It was best that he should permitted to flee France in disgrace, and that the French should then endure another period of ineffectual rule by whoever could be dug out of the shadows to be called King. Perhaps the sole item of agreement for every other European country was that the French army should not be permitted to grow strong and break their borders again; the barbarian aggression of Bonaparte had left a powerful legacy of suspicion and distrust.

  Belgium caught the whiff of unrest and the Dutch moved clumsily to suppress the movement for freedom, believing that their best argument lay in the musket and sabre. Inevitably the Dutch slaughtered the innocent and ordinary folk took to the streets in angry protest.

  The Hoods were disturbed from an idle Saturday afternoon, sat in the drawing room and playing at cribbage in between discussing whether they really must be seen with the Family in London during the Coronation festivities. There was the sound of wheels on the driveway leading to the front door and stableyard; a team by the sound of it, visitors of some importance if they ran to four horses.

  Captain Hood glanced out of the window.

  "Travelling carriage, not a post-chaise. Crest on the doors, and I can't quite see what - either your parents or St Helens, my dear - we have no other titled acquaintance to be calling on us unheralded."

  The housekeeper brought Lord St Helens to them within two minutes; he had not delayed at all in front of a mirror.

  "Please accept my apologies for intruding upon you, my lady, Captain Hood. The matter is, as you must surmise, of some urgency."

  "A shipwreck, my lord? Please to take a seat, sir."

  Lady Margaret signed to the housekeeper to bring refreshments.

  "No, Captain Hood, something more in your old line of business, sir. I presume that Lady Margaret is aware..."

  "I am, my lord, but the servants are not. We might wish to enjoy a cup of tea or coffee out on the lawns, perhaps."

  There was a rustic table and chairs to the side of the house, not so far from a post and rail fence closing off a cow pasture and with no tree, bush or building within hearing range. It was in some ways an inconvenient location, particularly in the wasp and horse-fly season, but conversation there was wholly private.

  "You have kept yourself informed on the Belgian business, Captain Hood?"

  "Of course, my lord."

  "Briefly then, Whitehall has found it desirable to offer a little pecuniary assistance to the French-speaking inhabitants, and more recently has arranged for some consignments of muskets, powder and ball to reach willing hands. Common sense dictated that such aid should not proceed directly from London, and a barge load - or two perhaps, certainly no more than six - was directed along the Meuse river, through French territory."

  Captain Hood nodded his understanding.

  "Intercepted, one presumes, my lord?"

  "Not quite... The Dutch seem to be aware of the possibility and are in process of checking barges entering the disputed lands. We believe at least one barge to be close to the point where it may be discovered - perhaps two or three days from its rendezvous. It will be delaying, we are told, to reach its place of delivery exactly to time. It seems, unfortunately, that Lord Frederick Masters, who has been involved on the financial side, found the need to escort this consignment in person - one understands that gold coins that should have been aboard a previous run disappeared before reaching their destination."

  Margaret looked at her husband, confident that he would deal with the situation; she knew he could. He met her eye, responded immediately – he had no alternative.

  "I will go, of course. What details have you for me?"

  There was a naval cutter waiting for its passenger at Chatham; it was the fastest of all vessels in the Channel and would deliver Captain Hood to the coast outside Dunkerque before daylight next morning.

  "Horses are still to be found at the old stables, sir, and there will be a groom to hand. There will be papers as well. Current information is that you should make your way to Namur and then proceed south down the river road towards Dinant and Hastieres and the French border."

  Easy to say, but what was the position of the Dutch troops? Were the regiments still in their forts or out patrolling the roads and 'pacifying' the small towns? What of the Customs Service? Were the men loyal? To whom?

  A gentleman from the Foreign Office was sat in the Port-Admiral's offices at Chatham and answered some of Hood's questions.

  "The Flemings are less fractious than the Walloons, as a general rule, but they still do not like the Dutch. There is little reason to suppose they like the English or the French either. As a general statement, and given without guarantee, the Flemings will neither help nor hinder you, Captain Hood. If a local patrol of police or gendarmes or whatever should stop you they will probably wave you on when discovering you are English. The great bulk of the Walloons, the French speakers, will offer active support if you tell them you are acting for the British government. You should, of course, tell them nothing, if it can be avoided - far better to be invisible - and, absolutely, the
re must be no evidence of British collusion with rebels against their legitimate government. It would be exceedingly embarrassing if, for example, a British nobleman was to surface in Dutch hands; particularly if he was able to talk to them."

  That explained why St Helens had come to him, Hood realised. If Lord Frederick was to die at his hands then the family could not complain to Whitehall. Killed by one of the departments then the Masters might cause a fuss - but they could hardly cry foul play when a son by marriage pulled the trigger. What Margaret might say was a different matter. The game was easier for a single man, it seemed; in fact, it was exclusively for single men. This was the last time, he had too much to lose, he did not need the thrill now.

  "Should the young gentleman have been in the particular location, sir?"

  "He was to have remained in Amsterdam, Captain Hood, offering oversight of the financial transactions and ensuring all was silent there. He had no business to be in France at all and certainly should never have come within one hundred miles of the consignments of muskets and coinage!"

  "Have we a reason for his presence?"

  "Excitement? He has been living a very mundane existence, one understands. He has been busy with the bank, but – being a gentleman - has little respect for 'mere money-making'."

  "Foolish! If I am so fortunate as to extricate him from his stupidity, where should I deposit him, sir?"

  "On a ship to New York, if you would be so good, Captain Hood. With the instruction that he should show himself at the Embassy in Washington at his earliest convenience and to appear at diplomatic functions in the city. If all is tidy then he may return from the Americas, very publicly, having been travelling there for the last two years. If he has been certainly identified as present at any scene in France or Belgium, then he must stay away for the next decade, at least. The family will be able to send him a regular remittance, I presume?"

  "That can be done, sir - either the Stars or the Andrews, who have a very close relative in the States, will do so."

  Captain Hood landed by small boat on a beach near La Panne, not so far from Dunkerque harbour, and walked less than a mile to a smallish but prosperous seeming tavern, entering the yard at the rear and nodding to a middle-aged ostler, identifiable by a missing finger.

  "Johnny Beefsteak, I presume?"

  "Good morning, sir," the ostler responded, not at all surprised to hear the old identification code. "I did expect there might be a man or two through bearing in mind the troubles we are having nowadays."

  His accent was London, and educated to some small extent, which was as it should be. He had been a dragoon in the wars, a sergeant who had stayed with a local girl after the armies had returned home. The word was that he had run away from a respectable merchant home to join up, for good enough reason, no doubt, and had preferred never to return.

  "I need a man and at least four good horses to make Namur as quickly as possible. I may not come back this way."

  "Accounts cleared with the department, sir?"

  "All above board. If the need arises then a note to London, to the offices of Goldsmids Bank, marked for the attention of Lord Beefsteak, will be attended to immediately, in gold. If you are blown upon, and that is unlikely except your man is taken up, then present yourself and any of your followers at the same address."

  "Do you have the languages, sir, or will you require a man to speak for you?"

  "I have French and Dutch, and have got by in Flemish on occasion."

  "Good. My wife's brother will go with you. I would prefer that you did not lose him, sir. He will not be armed, sir - it would not be wise for a local man to be seen to carry just at the moment."

  Hood accepted that, said that he could deal with minor problems himself.

  "An hour for him to eat and to saddle up six horses - they are out in the paddocks, sir, will have to be brought in. Change every hour, or more frequently on the hills, and treat them sensibly, sir, and you will be in Namur before nightfall tomorrow - if you can stand up to the pace. One hundred and twenty miles, sir - Jean-Paul will know where he can make changes and there will be fresh horses all the way. He is a horseman and will last the journey easily. Can you make such a ride?"

  "I can. We may well turn north towards Cologne from Namur. I will know when I get there. There was a mention of papers?"

  “Identification – ‘a small man of middle years with thinning hair’ – easily supplied from the stock, sir. You are a groom. Going to the north, to Frankfurt, say, by way of Luxembourg.”

  There was no point to giving the man correct information - Hood did not distrust him, but the truth was far too valuable a commodity to be spread around casually.

  August sunshine made the riding hot, but kept the roads dry and enabled a quick run. The horses were good enough stock and Hood rode light - there were advantages to being a small man - and they reached Namur in late afternoon after a few hours sleep in a small place near Charleroi, presumably a known way-station on whatever criminal route it might be.

  Hood had never seen the old town before, sat in a gorge in the Ardennes, controlling the passage of the river through the hills.

  "Jean-Paul, do you know your way round here?"

  The groom nodded - he had said almost nothing since giving his name at the commencement of the journey. He led the way to a bargees tavern on the southern outskirts, taking the horses into the yard where they were immediately put up out of sight. The main rooms were already noisy although it was still early - the rivermen evidently enjoyed their free time - and he avoided them, taking Hood through a side door and into the pantries behind the kitchens.

  They sat at a small table, waited a few minutes while a message was passed then ate bread and cheese put on wooden plates in front of them, all in silence. The bread was fresh, the cheese of a sort new to Hood - he enjoyed both. A tankard of the local beer appeared, was equally welcome. Ten minutes and the landlord sat across the table from them.

  "Jean-Paul!"

  "Monsieur Maartens."

  Hood noted the Flemish name in a Walloon town, said nothing.

  "Business, Jean-Paul?"

  "In a way. The gentleman is English and has needed to come here in a great hurry. He has not told me why. I suspect he needs to know several things."

  The logical connection between a town on the barge route between the Netherlands and France and the sea-port of Dunkerque had to be smuggling - few other trades would interest both parties. Hood did not have the time to be cautious - he must take the risks involved in speaking out, accepting that criminals tended to be discreet.

  "I am searching for a particular barge, M. Maartens. From the south and carrying goods that the Dutch army would like to lay hands on. The word is out on the cargo and I am sent to find the couriers and get them back across the border. Several borders, in fact. I am very tight for time, I believe, may well be too late already."

  "The barges that have stopped here this afternoon have told me of being checked by the military and customs together, an hour south of the town, this side of Dinant, where the valley is still wide and there is a meadow by the towpath. A troop of cavalry and a pair of small field guns and a larger than normal detachment of douaniers, muskets and carbines well displayed; they have searched the barges running north."

  They were still there so they had not found their prey yet; he might be still be in time.

  "I must make my way past them, to the south. Is there an easy road?"

  "No. The best way is to go east almost to Luxembourg and then well south and come back northwards from France. Two days of hard riding."

  "I do not believe I have two days, M. Maartens."

  "Over the hills and through the forest tracks then. On foot. If I can find a guide who will take you at night. A whole day, at least."

  "Not a good idea when there is cavalry about."

  "A barge, M. Maartens?" Jean-Paul made the suggestion quietly, as if aware that it would not be popular.

  "You could not put ho
rses aboard, would have to take your people south on the water, if you found them. It would cost you, the bargees are not cheap. You would have to forget their faces and know nothing of their cargo."

  Hood explained that he had a very bad memory for people and things that were none of his business.

  "The problem arises that I do not know the name of the barge I seek; or is it a number?"

  "Both, as a rule. If, by some strange perchance, you should be searching for a cargo of muskets, powder and ball, then you will probably find them tied up some ten of your miles to the south of the Dutch checkpoint, close to a small farm. The word will have reached them, with a little of good fortune. They will, I hope, be very busily unloading into the barns there, which are surprisingly large for so small a holding."

  Maartens was taking a risk; his partners in the trade would not be happy that he was giving this information to any outsider. Besides that, this was a political cargo, well out of the ordinary run of things - he should never have heard of it, unless he was directly involved. If he was politically busy then London might not be too pleased to be in direct contact with him - he would know more than was desirable. He must be made sweet.

  "I would wish to abandon the cargo, M. Maartens, and would pay handsomely to any kind gentlemen who could dispose of it on behalf of my people. The good word passed to Jean-Paul's location and English sovereigns would reach your hands within the month. Five hundred?"

  The cargo could be sold on to the insurgents without too much trouble, Hood surmised. Five hundred sovereigns meant they could in fact give it away, to their great future benefit as patriots, and still make a very substantial income. Maartens evidently reached the same conclusion.

  "Come! There is a barge tied up and intending not to move out before dawn. The owner will be happy enough to go this evening at my word. The horses will be walked back later in the week, Jean-Paul."