by Keegan, Mel
“Or would he have packed the prize into a smaller bag,” Jim mused, “and buried it inside an ocean of rank pickled onions?” He made a face. “There’s a pry-bar here somewhere.”
“You’ll take the onions? Damn! Then, I’ll take the rafters,” Toby offered. “You don’t want to be up there, Jim.” He had seen the ladder leaning against the wall in the back.
The work was as filthy as before, and much more aromatic. One barrel was half full of pickled walnuts that had fermented long ago and reeked to high heaven. The onions looked like hundred year old eggs floating in a lake of tar, and Jim wrapped his nose and mouth in a scarf as he probed to the bottom, raking around in search of a bag, a box, anything.
“Nothing,” he told Toby as the other man shinned back down the ladder. “Give me a hand with these barrels – the stink would make a pig lose his dinner! Damnation, I’ve got to get rid of these.”
“They must have been here since Nell Chegwidden owned the place … and they were a good bet.” Toby sneezed repeatedly on the dust he had raised in the rafters. His clothes and hair wore a fine film of it, and he brushed himself down as he surveyed onions, walnuts, forgotten potatoes that had turned into wizened clusters of black roots.
One barrel held contents so rotten as to be utterly unidentifiable. The crates contained a rare assortment of nails, broken china, little glass window squares, oakum, discarded tools, oddments of clothing set aside to be ripped for rags. Jim vaguely remembered sweeping the clutter together and stowing it, in the weeks after Charlie passed away. One by one trunks, crates and barrels were resealed, and he glanced up into the dimness high overhead. “No sign, I suppose, that Charlie was every up there?”
“No sign,” Toby said dryly, “that anything human has ever been up there! There’s twenty years of pigeon dung on everything, and you can’t see through the dust on the cobwebs. I startled a dozen wicked-looking spiders, to get into the corners.”
“Shite.” Jim sighed in annoyance. “Under the barrels, then?”
“Under.” Toby was frowning at the floor and seeing exactly what Jim saw – a lot of very coarse mortar which had been laid down before either of them was born, and had not been disturbed since. “If Charlie was able to get a pick through this floor,” Toby said resignedly, “he’d have to park something big, heavy, dirty, stinking, on top of it, to cover up the work. He’d be thinking, nobody’s going to be interested in pickled walnuts and rusted nails.” He pushed up his sleeves. “How’s the leg? Can you help me manhandle them aside?”
The leg was aching, and Jim knew better than Toby would ever guess how close to the end of his endurance he was. He had done more work in the last day than he had done in months, and he knew he would pay the price for it. The thought of a generous swig of laudanum had begun to taunt him, but he took a deep breath, physically shoved the pain aside. “I can help,” he said quietly, “but this is the last for me, today and maybe tomorrow. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” Toby took a grip on one edge of the first barrel, tipped it toward him and began to roll it sideways to expose the floor underneath. “You think I can’t see you limping on that leg – and you think I don’t care? You do me ill, Jim, if you believe I’ll watch you in pain and not fret.”
It was so long since anyone had cared, Jim was almost discomfited. He felt a flush of embarrassment as he shouldered in beside Toby and worked with him to move the entire load. Every time they shifted a barrel or crate, they peered at the same old mortar; and when they moved the last one it was Toby’s turn to whisper fluent curses.
“Not the floor, then. Damnit, Charlie, you old rascal! You left me a good one to solve, didn’t you?” He glanced sidelong at Jim, and dropped both long arms around him. “You need to take the weight off the leg.”
It was true, and Jim did not argue. He took the dusty kiss Toby was offering, and dropped his buttocks onto a leather-bound trunk which creaked beneath his weight. “Loose bricking in some part of the walls?”
“Possibly. Probably.” Toby flexed his back and shoulders, which were obviously aching. “We’re not going to find it, Jim, not in here, not in the time we have left. Can you hear that?”
Now he mentioned it, Jim was absently aware of the gurgle of running water, and he hoisted himself back to his feet with an oath. Toby was at the door, where a sheet of water, inches deep now, rippled on the stones flagging the yard; and beyond the yard, the water stretched on toward the beach. The coarse bushes marking the head of the dunes and following the path seemed to be standing in a lake that moved perceptibly with the waves breaking seventy yards further out.
To Jim’s shrewd eye, the tavern had just less than three feet of vertical space left before they would be getting their feet wet indoors. He had always known a moment must come when their priorities changed, and this was it.
“It’s time we got the tavern secured,” he said bitterly. “We need to get food and firewood and rugs up off the floor, get the good furniture upstairs. Can you handle it? I’m going to trowel a pail of mortar around the trapdoor to the cellar, while I’ve still got the chance.”
“Old fashioned oilskins and mortar,” Toby remembered. “I saw the gear not ten minutes ago. Now, where was it?”
Four sacks of mortar were stacked behind the ladder, and a roll of cracked old oilskins, tied with frayed rope, lay with them. They had been used before, for just this purpose. While Toby carried them back to the kitchen, Jim hunted for the broad pail and the big trowel he used to mix the mortar. He found them soon enough, but even then he realized they had probably left it too late to save the cellar. Even with the fire blazing in the kitchen, the mortar would take six or eight hours to dry. They were cutting it too fine, and they both knew it.
“Last chance to get out and go home, Edith,” Toby told the old woman as they let the dogs out for a constitutional.
The front door of The Raven stood wide open to a strange view – as if the sea washed almost up to the door, with just a scant few yards of gravel and pebbles between the granite step and the lap of the water.
“I can get you out to Budleigh,” Jim suggested, “if you want to stay at the church. It’s set too high to flood … though the graveyard surely will.”
She gave an animated shudder. “When I were a lass, it rained ten days one March, put the whole churchyard underwater. The boxes washed right outta the ground. Any poor sod who’d been buried in the last ten month were floatin’ away, an’ ’alf the ’eadstones sagged after that, so they looked drunk as a gaggle o’ lords.”
“So, you don’t want to go to the church,” Jim concluded.
“An’ me cottage’ll be up to its windersills,” she said disgustedly. “It goes under even afore yon path does.”
“What about going to your grandson’s house?” Jim was watching the dogs paw at the water. Bess took a lap at it and whined. It was likely closer to salt than fresh, and fifty privies would have overflowed into it, back up the course of the beck. “I can see the boat – you see her there, Toby? She’s still upside down, and she’s hung herself in the bushes, but we can flop her over between us.”
“Flop ’er over an’ go where?” Mrs. Clitheroe demanded. “Thee thinks Exmouth’s gunna be any better? Me grandson’ll be bailing out ’is parlor, an’ that stupid cow of a wife of ’is, she’ll be weeping an’ wailing, some bilge water about the end o’ the world. Nay, lad. I’ll say where I be.”
She made an excellent point, and Toby gave Jim an almost amused look. “I think we’ll be settling in for the duration. A day or three till the beck stops running, then it’ll be all hands on deck with every mop and broom you possess.”
“We’ve done it before,” Jim admitted, resigned to repeating a process that would be just a little less tedious with Toby in residence. “I want to get a lot of firewood upstairs – and food. You can always put a pan on the hob in any of the bedchambers. Keep a decent fire going, wait it out. It’ll take as long as it takes.” He turned his back to the odd view of a wor
ld comprised almost entirely of water, and was already deciding which furniture to move, and which of the firewood Toby had cut just days before was the driest and best. “If you want to get a start, I’ll mix enough mortar to secure the cellar. There’s enough life left in this leg of mine to help you get the good chairs upstairs. Take any bedchamber you prefer, Edith, and … now, what’s got into them?”
He was talking about the dogs, whose yapping was swiftly turning into loud, angry barking, and he turned back from his survey of the tavern to see what they were up to. He saw Toby’s face first. It had set into a mask as hard and as dark as quarried slate.
The blue eyes flickered in Jim’s direction and then returned to the west, and the water. The pink tip of Toby’s tongue ran once around his lips to moisten them, and he said softly,
“We just ran out of time, Jim. And out of luck.”
Chapter Twelve
A boat was sliding in from the sea. It looked like a whaler’s longboat, Jim thought, and the two men at the oars were skilled. The sea was calmer than it had been in days, and the run of the tide did not seem to trouble them much as they brought the craft in. It grounded out when its keel hit the path, and one of them hopped over the side. His boots were rolled right up to the thighs to keep out the water as he forced his way through, cutting the shortest line for the tavern door. Wisely, Mrs. Clitheroe beat a swift retreat. Jim heard the squeal of a hinge as the kitchen door closed halfway over.
“Nathaniel Burke,” Toby said very softly. “He always fancied himself the skipper of our company. Don’t misjudge the other bastard, Jim, but of the two Burke is the dangerous one, because he’s intelligent.”
“And the other?” Jim asked in the same undertone.
“Joseph Pledge. Joe to his friends and enemies alike. Keep a wide berth between the two of you … he likes to hurt. To Joe pain is hilariously funny, so long as it’s someone else’s agony.” He whistled softly to Bess. “Come here, girl. Stay close, now.” He gave Jim a sidelong glance. “He’ll hurt any of us, if he can, and the dogs are fair game.”
“Boxer – here, lad.” Jim slapped his thigh to bring the ratter to him, and watched Pledge disentangle himself from the oars and step over into the cold swirl of the water.
Of the pair, Nathaniel Burke was also the more physically imposing. He was a tall man and big through the shoulders, with white scars on his face, neck and hands, visible from a good distance away. His expression seemed to be set in a permanent grimace, as if he had worn the look for so long, it has set in place. He was not a young man, Jim saw; ten years older than Toby at least, and he wore his years with less grace than Toby. In his day he must have been passable handsome, but now the stubble clinging to his cheeks was white, the bags under his eyes were the size of a seaman’s chest and his nose had been broken, set off-center, so it angled toward his right cheek. His clothes were well worn but just as well repaired; his tricorn was black, set at a rakish angle at odds with the slope of his nose.
With their weight out of it the boat floated off once more, and Burke and Pledge dragged it up to the gravel and pebbles marking the edge of The Raven’s old foundations. If the tavern had not been built on the leveled ruins of a previous building, it would have been flooded already, and Jim knew how lucky they were. Biding his time, keeping silent, he studied the strangers.
Joe Pledge was short, as rotund as he was muscular, oily, with yellow teeth which were bared in a grimace of effort as the keel scraped up onto the pebbles and refused to be moved any further. Under a battered tricorn, his brown hair hung in greasy ringlets about a face as square-jawed as a prize fighter; his skin was sallow, where Burke wore a mahogany tan, and as his coat shifted with effort Jim saw the butts of a pair of pistols in his belt. Like Burke, he was not dressed well, and he had none of Burke’s sense of style. The tricorn was crammed down over his eyes, the coat flapping, the waistcoat unbuttoned, the shirt beneath stained by pickles and the same tobacco juice that had yellowed his teeth. Jim took in all of this with one glance which lingered on the pistols.
Another pair of almost identical pistols rode Burke’s own broad belt, and Jim remembered what Toby had said – they would be loaded, even if Pledge’s were not. The coat pockets of both men bulged. He knew the look of shot and powder bags when he saw them.
“There should be three more of the bastards,” Toby said softly as the boat grounded out the second time, and without waiting for Burke or Pledge to speak he pinned on a smile and called, “You took your time getting here, Nathaniel! I thought you’d never show your face! Where’s Eli and Willie?” And to Jim, so softly that his voice would not carry, “Eli Hobbs and Willie Tuttle. They drifted into Exmouth the evening before I walked out. The last one, Rufus Bigelow, hadn’t arrived when I left.”
Coughing heavily after the exertion of pulling up the boat, Burke spat into the water and pulled the back of his hand over his mouth. His voice was deep, rum-rough, with the accent of Bristol. “They’s back in the drinkin’ house, still gettin’ ’emselves proper soused and bedded. They’ll be along in a day or three, when this shite weather lets up.” He glared at the sky as if he had a private, personal grudge against it. “So, Toby. They told us back in Exmouth … we’re just a mite late to drink Charlie’s health in rum. He’s dead and gone these last six years or so, and The Raven belongs to another young lad. Nice lad, they said, but gammy-legged. And the whores whereabouts say he’s a eunuch. This un. You been here all along, Toby?”
“Been here,” Toby said in a light tone of voice. “Sang for my supper a couple of times, cut some wood, helped get her battened down for the storm.”
“Sang fer yer supper?” Pledge echoed, and barked a laugh. “Yer didn’t fuck fer it? Now, there’s a turn up fer the books.” His accent was London, not quite Cockney but close. He peered at Jim now, brows knitted over dark brown eyes. “This un’s pretty. Yer didn’t try yer luck?”
Heat bloomed in Jim’s face, and when he looked back at Toby he saw the pink rising in his cheeks. It might have been humiliation or anger, Jim could not guess, since Toby’s expression was carefully shuttered.
“Yes, well I might have tried it on,” he growled, “but Master Fairley doesn’t have a share in such sin and infamy, and I was gentleman enough to let it rest with innuendo.”
“Gentleman? You?” Pledge roared with laughter and jabbed Burke with his elbow. “And ’e’s usin’ them big words again.”
“Him that speaks Latin like he was born to it,” Burke mused, as if it represented a serious flaw in Toby’s character. He thrust both hands into the deep pockets of the blue coat, deliberately shifting it to show the pistols. “You look well fed, well slept.”
“I did my work.” Toby’s eyes dropped; his lips pressed tight. “Master Fairley runs an honest house. You work, you get fed and a place to sleep. And there were plenty of jobs, with the storms.”
“Aye, maybe so.” Burke’s dark eyes moved on to Jim now, and Jim met them with the faintest flinch, held them with difficulty. Burke and Pledge should be complete strangers to him – he must not let them realize Toby had described them, much less warned against them. Burke continued to flay him alive with his eyes, but he spoke to Toby. “Where’s Barney?”
“Flat on his face, drunk, the last time I saw him,” Toby said promptly.
“What, ’ere?” Pledge demanded.
“No.” Toby gestured into the west. “The Cattlemarket. Artie Polgreen’s house, back yonder, closer to Exmouth.”
“Barney left bloody Exmouth a couple of days after you, Trelane.” Burke hawked and spat. “He was headed right here.”
“He didn’t get here.” Toby shrugged offhandly. “He probably got waylaid. This isn’t the only tavern on the coast, and some of the others have the kind of doxies he fancies. You know.” He cupped both hands, a foot in front of his chest. “He’s back there somewhere, getting himself thoroughly poxed and waiting for the water to go down. You want me to take the boat, go and scare him up? I walked past two o
ther inns on my way here. I know where they are.”
For a long moment Jim was sure Burke was about to tell him to go, and he held his breath. Being alone in The Raven with these two was far from desirable. Burke was still scrutinizing him, deliberately rude. At last the big man growled, “Leave him be. If Barney wants to be absent when the spoils get divvied up, and if he comes up a handful or two short for his bone-bloody-idleness, so be it.” His brows rose. “To business, lad.” He was intent on Toby. “Let’s be having it. You’ve been here long enough.”
Now, Toby cleared his throat. “I haven’t found it yet.” He shot a glance sidelong at Jim. “I’ve been trying not to let Master Fairley know I’ve been looking, but I’ve searched the upstairs, the stable, the coach house. Even the taproom, when he was asleep. Nothing yet. Charlie made a damned good job of hiding it – and be glad he did, Nathaniel. If he’d made it easy, Jim or his father would have stumbled over it. It’s been a long time.”
Jim knew he ought to be saying something, and he summoned a chuckle. “I have no idea what you’re all talking about, but I do know this. It’s cold out here, and it’s starting to rain again. Will you come inside, have pie and ale, and tell me what in hell you want? God knows, if you tell me what it is, I might be able to help you!”
Fat chance of Burke and Pledge telling him, he knew, but it was a sound gambit, typical of the publican who had dealt with every kind of man across the years. He called the terrier with him and retreated to the kitchen with a leisurely pace, exaggerating the limp. The more lame Burke and Pledge believed him, the greater advantage he would have, if a moment came when he needed it. He called the dogs with him, held a finger to his lips to silence the old woman, and listened.