Hudson's Kill--A Justice Flanagan Thriller

by Paddy Hirsch

  Justy shrugged. “I can’t think of anything else.”

  Hays sat in the silence, thinking. “So what can you prove?”

  “It depends on Shard. A man like that might prefer to die than stand up in court and confess the kinds of sins he’s being blackmailed for. But we can squeeze him a little, to see if he’ll talk.”

  Hays held his glass up to the wan light coming though the grubby window and examined the liquid. “You have built quite a case, Justice. Despite my instructions.”

  “The evidence—”

  “Hang the evidence. You had it out for young Riker over the girl. You just happen to have scraped this up instead.”

  “I think the two might still be connected.”

  Hays drained his glass.

  “I look forward to seeing what contortions you perform to prove it.”

  THIRTY-TWO

  Thursday

  Justy breakfasted on a sweet roll bought from a pannam-fencer on the Broad Way. He ate on the hoof, walking up to the Almshouse, drawing up a list of questions in his head for Robert Shard, attorney-at-law. But when he arrived, the lawyer was still unconscious.

  “He wakes up occasionally,” Sister Marie-Therese said. Shard had kicked his blankets loose, and the vestal gestured at a novice to pull them back over his feet.

  “Does he say anything?” Justy asked.

  “Oh, terrible things.” Lars stood behind them, orange stubble on his face and scalp, and black bags under his eyes. He grinned. “The temptations of the flesh, the fires of hell. The Devil himself.”

  Sister Marie-Therese’s face was bright red. “And where have you been, Captain Hokkanssen? You’ve had us tearing this place apart looking for you.”

  “Did I not say I’d be going out last night, Sister?”

  “You did not. And if you had, we would not have permitted it. This is not a hostel for you to come and go as you please.” She sniffed. “And where did you go?”

  “Just out for a bit of snap.”

  “For a drink, more like.”

  He shrugged. “Well, I feel fit enough.”

  “Consider yourself discharged, then. And whatever befalls you, it’s on your own head.”

  They watched her walk away, her bonnet like a sail in a full wind.

  “God save me from landlords and sisters of mercy,” Lars muttered. “Now let’s get out of it.”

  They went down into the street, Justy limping slightly, and Lars with his jaw clenched as the stitches in his side pulled with every step.

  “Look at the hack of the two of us,” the sailor said, when they reached the bottom of the staircase. “Soft as curds.”

  “Tell me about Shard. Did he make any kind of sense?”

  “In the end. Once I’d given him a nip.”

  “You’re joking.”

  “I am not, indeed. I’ve seen enough men with the fever of drink to recognize a fellow that’s suffering from the lack of it. He woke up at midnight, so I sat him up and handed him the flask and encouraged him to unburden himself. And I’m a good listener, as you know.”

  “So what did he tell you?”

  “A whole mess of things. The plain religion, his marriage, the temptation, the girls. All of that he said was well enough disposed to deal with on his conscience, he said, until the Devil came. It got a bit dark after that.”

  “Oh yes?”

  “He said the Devil made him do terrible things to one girl. Unspeakable things. And then he held those acts over him and made him break the law, over and over, until he was so deep in the pit there was no getting out.” He paused. “That grim look on your face tells me you know what he’s talking about.”

  “I think so. Did the Devil have a name?”

  “No.”

  Hardluck pulled the carriage up to the curb. Lars opened the door. “Come on. We need to go see your uncle.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Well, after I said good night to Shard, I took a wander down to the Buttered Bun. Lizzie Toms told me your uncle’s looking to settle things over that ruck the other night. Sharpening the knives, she said.”

  Justy groaned. “Jesus, that’s all we need. A pitched battle between Owens and the Bull. We may as well just set fire to the city ourselves.”

  “Well, that’s the interesting part. Owens isn’t the one your uncle’s after. In fact, Lizzie told me the two of them are teaming up. To go after your man Umar.”

  “Of course.” Justy felt a queasy sensation. “Any idea when?”

  “No.” Lars hauled himself aboard. He held out his hand to Justy. “But if the working girls know about it, I’d say that means sooner rather than later.”

  * * *

  There was no barrier laid across the top of Dover Street, but the moment Hardluck began to make the turn, a man stepped out and grabbed one of the horses by the bridle.

  “Get on away out of it, Snowdrop.” The man waved a thick length of wood. “There’s no one comes down here today.”

  Justy climbed out of the cab. The man was young and tough, and puffed up by his position. But he was not used to dealing with the quality, and while he would have sent an ordinary citizen packing with a clip around the head, Justy’s sleek carriage and tailored clothes made him pause.

  “So what is it? A pothole being fixed? Or did a cart shed its load?” Justy asked.

  The man looked confused. “Wha’?”

  Lars leaned out the cab window. “He wants to know why you’ve closed the road, son.”

  “You don’t need to know the reason why. You just need to get on out of it.”

  Justy said, “Do you know the penalty for blocking one of the city’s thoroughfares without cause?”

  “I know I’ll give you a thick ear if you don’t fuck off and quickly.”

  Justy smiled. “I’m a city Marshal, lad, and the beaks don’t take well to having officers of the law insulted and assaulted. But if you step back now, I’ll let you away with that flagrant display of disrespect. Take a swing at me, though, and you’ll end up in Newgate.”

  Lars grinned. “I’d listen to him, if I was you, son.”

  But the young man was committed. He hefted the length of wood in his hand, expecting Justy to take one look at it and run. Instead Justy drove himself forward, crouching slightly, fists up.

  The man’s eyes widened, and he swung. Justy leaned backwards to let the stave hiss past his nose. He grabbed the man’s forearm and shoved hard, driving him into a pirouette that twisted the man’s left ankle and sent him sprawling on the hard-packed stone.

  Lars clapped. “Looks like Owney Clearey taught you a thing or two after all.”

  “Don’t get up,” Justy warned the man. But he sprang to his feet, red in the face and breathing hard. He raised the stave, but Justy was already nose-to-nose with him, grabbing his wrist and holding it in the air while he rammed his knee up hard into the man’s groin.

  The man folded into the gutter. Justy stepped back to see a small crowd of men in waistcoats and farmer’s caps crowding the entrance to the street.

  “Move out of it.”

  A man pushed his way to the front. He was tall and broad-shouldered, with a long-skirted black riding coat that flapped around him. His graying hair curled over a forehead bumped with pustules, and a nose that looked as though an oxcart had driven over it.

  The young man pulled himself to his feet. “I’m sorry, Mister O’Toole, I—”

  O’Toole hammered the side of his bunched fist into the man’s temple. The man’s eyes rolled up in his head and he went down again, like a fresh-cut tree.

  “Justice,” O’Toole said, as though they were just passing on the street.

  “O’Toole.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I’m here to see my uncle.”

  “No one passes. Not today. Not even you.”

  “You can’t just block roads in this city when you feel like it.”

  O’Toole sneered. “I’ll remind you, son, this here’s the wa
terfront, which means it belongs to the Bull, not those noddies you work with up by Federal Hall. The Bull put up these buildings and he paved these roads. If we’d have waited for your lot to lift a finger, we’d still be sloshing about in our own filth. So if the Bull wants to close a street for a day, in his part of the town, he’ll damned well do it.”

  He had a point. Since the war, the city fathers had deliberately ignored the poorer parts of the city, and lavished all their attention on the new developments north and east of the city, out to Corlears Hook and along the Bowery. Canvas Town and the East River waterfront, where the immigrants lived, got nothing. But the Bull realized that by diverting some of the river of dirty money that flowed along the waterfront into some improvements bought him goodwill and protection. So he paved the roads with stolen stone, and repaired the warehouses with pilfered timber. And the people loved him for it.

  “Fair enough. But I still want to see my uncle.”

  “Well, he doesn’t want to see you. So you’d best fuck off. And don’t try going around the back, for my lads have orders to break the arms of any man trying to pass.”

  O’Toole’s face was like a wall, but the men behind him were smirking.

  “I know what you’re planning,” Justy said. “You and the Bull and Owens.”

  “We’re planning to get my daughter back safe, Justice. Your uncle’s god-daughter. That black bastard Owens’ cousin. Family.”

  Justy shook his head. “This isn’t about Kerry. You and I both know she’s just an excuse.”

  “If you’ve come to lend a hand, Justice, you’re welcome.” O’Toole’s eyes were as flat and hard as the ice on a Mayo marsh in winter. “But if not, you’d best stand aside while we deal with those filthy heathens.”

  Justy laughed. “Heathens, is it? And when was the last time you were in church?”

  He knew the answer to that one. It was nearly twenty years ago, the day O’Toole’s wife had died giving birth to Kerry. O’Toole had taken the squalling baby down to St. Peter’s church, wrapped her in a piece of green silk, and left her on the altar. And then he went to get drunk.

  O’Toole’s face shifted in what might have been a smile. “I don’t need some cock in a cassock to tell me what’s unholy and what’s not. These filthy devils are like a gangrened hand. You’ve to cut it off and burn the stump, if the disease isn’t to spread.”

  “Very poetic.” But Justy knew O’Toole didn’t speak in riddles. If he talked about cutting and burning, it meant that he fully intended to gut every man, woman, and child in the compound like so many fish, and then reduce the whole thing to ashes.

  Justy felt the frustration well up in him. Even if he could put O’Toole down, there were too many others to fight, and he couldn’t order Hardluck to try to force the carriage through. The Bull’s men would cut the ligaments on the backs of the horses’ legs and then slice their bellies open. And then they would pull Hardluck off the cab and do the same to him.

  He took a step backwards and his shoe slid on a loose stone. His leg bent awkwardly and O’Toole laughed. “You look crocked, Justice.”

  Justy felt the blood rush into his face as he remembered his mad dash after Riker’s carriage, and then his undignified, painful sprawl in the street. He thought about how the gleaming blue cab had looked as it rounded the corner, its pennants jaunty in the wind. He smiled to himself.

  He nodded at the young man lying in the street. “Don’t be too hard on the lad, O’Toole. He was just doing his job.”

  O’Toole sneered. “I don’t need to be hard on him. He got dropped by a crocked cossack. He’s going to have to live that down every day for the rest of his puff.”

  Justy turned his back on the crowd. Lars was still leaning out of the carriage. He gave Justy a sympathetic look. “I suppose we’ll have to do this ourselves then, a chara.”

  “Aye,” Justy said. “I suppose we will.”

  THIRTY-THREE

  “This is a bad idea,” Lars said.

  They were driving as fast as they could up the Broad Way. The sky was swollen and a light rain was making the driving conditions as bad as they could be. The water on the cobbles mixed with dirt and dung and formed an ooze. A heavy rain would wash it away, but soft weather like this just turned the streets into a treacherous slick of lumpy stone, on which a horse might turn a hoof, or a wheel might slip.

  Justy pulled on the sash that opened the window, letting the cool, moist air into the cab. He felt rain on his face.

  “It’ll work,” he said. Although he had no idea whether it would.

  It was his memory of the switches bobbing on the back of Riker’s coach like an insult that had given him the idea. They had hurried back to Hughson’s and he had written two notes, one for Gorton, and the other for Hays that one of Tully’s serving boys went to carry to the Federal Hall. Hardluck went hunting, first rummaging in the tavern’s rubbish tip, and then out into Canvas Town. It was a half hour before he returned, a huge smile on his face and the two switches clutched in his hand, their long, jaunty pennants still attached.

  The pennants bounced at the back of the carriage as it bumped up the Broad Way. Hardluck was hunched on the top of the cab, his cloak on, and his hood up.

  “I don’t see how,” Lars said. “We’re just going to drive in there and set to? Me with a fin that I can barely flap and you with a dodgy stump?”

  “I’m not aiming to get into a tilt. And if we do, it won’t just be the two of us. I’ve told Gorton to get a crew together. And we’ll have Hardluck.”

  “Oh aye, I’m sure he’ll be happy to fight and die for his master.”

  Justy was stung. “He’s not a slave, god damn it!”

  “Oh, he’s not?” Lars feigned surprise. “I must have been at rug when you paid a visit to the beak, then.”

  “I promised to free him. But I’ve been a little pressed for time, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  “I’ve noticed you enjoying bouncing about in this fancy rattler.”

  Justy hammered on the roof of the cab. They stopped. Justy reached over Lars and opened the door. “Get out.”

  Lars looked startled. “What?”

  “Get out.” Justy’s voice was hard. “If you’re not happy with the way I’m going about things, then I’d rather you weren’t with me at all.”

  “I’m only saying—”

  “I don’t give a damn what you’re saying, Lars. I’m trying to help Kerry, and you’ve not come up with any bright ideas, so I’m going ahead with the best plan I can think of. Unless you’ve got something else to say, you can get the hell on out of it.”

  Lars’ jaw tightened. “I’ll tell you what I have to say. And you’ll damned well listen, if you know what’s good for you.”

  “Go on, then.”

  “You may be right about getting us into that place. They might be fooled into thinking this is Riker’s rig. No doubt the weather will help with that. And no doubt your man Gorton will show up with some handy lads who’ll help us when the time is right.”

  “Well, then?”

  Lars leaned forward. “Well, what I’m not prepared to watch is you grabbing up some dumb cull and using that chive of yours to persuade them to tell us where Kerry is.”

  Justy felt himself redden. “You’ve a better idea? Because I’ve not heard it, if you do.”

  “Listen to me, Justy,” Lars’ voice was soft. “You know this is a bad thing you’re thinking of. No good will come of it.”

  “I don’t plan to cut the cully open, Lars.” The image of the girl in the alley flashed in his mind. He imagined the boy holding his knife, the razor-sharp end of the blade making a smooth, even cut, the tears flowing down the boy’s face. He shivered.

  Lars was looking at him, his eyes soft. “Let me do it, a chara. Will you promise me?”

  The rain was loud on the cobbles. People were hurrying past, clamping their hats to their heads. A gust of wind slapped rainwater off the back of the cab. He felt the mist on his face.
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  He reached over his friend, and hauled on the leather pull on the door. He knocked on the roof of the cab again, Hardluck flicked the reins, and they moved on up the hill towards Jericho.

  * * *

  By the time they reached Jericho, the rain was pounding the city and turning the unpaved roads to mud. The sentry was huddled in the entryway, swathed in a sodden cape. He squinted up at the black carriage, at the driver hunched on top, and he waved them in.

  Justy assumed the compound would have the kind of layout that most houses have to handle traffic inside their walls: a route to a stabling area for the homeowner’s own carriages, and a turning circle and waiting area for vehicles staying only a short time.

  It had neither. Once they had made the hard turn through the chicane, the carriage halted. Justy pulled the curtain aside an inch and peered out. They were in a kind of large box, perhaps three times the width of the carriage, and less than twice as long. There was no way out.

  The cab jolted as Hardluck jumped down. He tapped at the door. His cloak was drenched, but he seemed not to notice the rain as it hammered on his head and poured in a stream through one of the folds in his hat. Justy pulled the sash of the window downwards an inch.

  “You have to unharness the horses and spin the rig, sir.” Hardluck had to speak loudly because of the roar of the rain on the roof of the carriage. “Then harness them again after.”

  “A two-man job?”

  “Yes, sir. There’s a passage at the front of us, wide enough for a horse to pass, but no way to get this thing down it.”

  It made sense. Umar and his people likely didn’t use anything larger than a handcart, so they had built an entrance to their fortress that denied access to anything larger. The turning box gave the most basic accommodation to any visitor that might own a carriage, but as Justy thought about it, he realized it might not even have been built for that purpose. It was similar to the atrium-like entrances to the medieval castles that he had visited in England and Ireland, designed to draw the enemy in and concentrate them in a place where they could be assaulted from above.