Wronged: A Story of the Dark (Alexis Carew Book 301)

by J. A. Sutherland

  He sighed.

  “Then came the rumors and the stories. Said we were smugglers at first.” His jaw clenched as well as his fists and Jon could see how angry he was. “And that we’d pirated our own ships for the insurance.”

  “Father would never —”

  “I know. None of us would, but especially not Edward. My brother was a right bastard, but he was a right-honest bastard.”

  Jon said nothing. It was the sort of characterization his father would hear and shrug, accepting the truth of it.

  “The insurance company announced they’d investigate. What else could they do? But that drove things lower yet.”

  Wyatt looked around.

  “Should’ve gone to a pub. I could use a stiff one.” He rubbed his face with both hands.

  “Then the Crown Prosecutor got involved. Not the man here, mind you, but a special one in from Bowstable. Just showed up one day. He had evidence, he said. Statements from men who were a part of it — taking our own ships and selling them and the cargoes, then making the insurance claims. And more statements that we were smuggling far and wide.

  “That’s what broke him. Edward. Your father.” Wyatt’s eyes were wet and red-rimmed when he looked up. “He used a laser. It was quick.”

  He reached across the table and squeezed Jon’s hand, but Jon barely felt it.

  “He left a note — said the prosecutor implied the whole mess would go away if somehow Edward wasn’t about anymore. I don’t know how that could be. But if a man knew your father he’d know that would be the way … the way to make him do such a thing. ’Course it didn’t go away.

  “So they turned those statements on Elizabeth, and I know for a fact what they said to her. ‘Plead guilty,’ they said, ‘and we’ll not go after the others in the family — the others named in the statements.’”

  He looked up and met Jon’s eyes again.

  “You were named.”

  “Me?” Jon was shocked. He’d sailed aboard family ships, of course, even worked them, but what could he have been accused of?

  “Statements made about your summer cruises. That you smuggled more than once on them. Not just what would avoid duty and tax, neither, but other things.”

  “I —”

  “We know it’s not true, Jon. Even if you were the sort to do it, what was described … well, it would have taken others to be involved. Too many others.”

  “Then how could they have these statements?” Jon was confused. He hadn’t understood how all of this could have happened, but it was sounding so much more bizarre than what he’d read.

  Wyatt’s eyes narrowed. “Do you not see it, Jon? Do you even yet think this was some misunderstanding or an accident? Just bad luck?”

  “I don’t know what to think. What —”

  “In the end, the rest of the family had to give up their shares or join your mother in the dock – that was the other part of the deal. So we lost the company — the whole of it gone in one swoop. And who do you think came in at the end? Buys the ships, the routes, reassures the shareholders who’re left?”

  Jon stared at him blankly, then frowned. That was no proof. Someone would have to buy the remnants, after all. “That doesn’t prove —”

  “The same being based on Bowstable where the Crown Prosecutor came from? The same who has holdings in the new bank we went to? The very bank that called our loans first? The same who had cause to wish your father harm for speaking against him in the guild and who has pockets deep enough to sell our stock short like it was water on Penduli?”

  “Marchant …” Jon couldn’t believe it. True, his father had spoken against them and their ways more than once, but this?

  “Frederick bloody Marchant and his Marchant Company,” Wyatt said. He pulled his tablet from his pocket and slid it across the table to Jon. “Our solicitor managed one thing before it all fell apart. He got the statements made against us … and the names of those making them. Small matter then to find out where those speakers are employed now.”

  Jon ran his eyes down the list. Nearly every name listed had an employer of the Marchant Company or one of its subsidiaries. More, he recognized many of the names. Men and women who’d worked for Bartlett Shipping and had worked with Jon himself on summer cruises. Of the names he recognized, there were none he’d have named good spacers or reliable hands — hard men and women, quick to anger and quicker to cause trouble aboard ship.

  “But if we know this —”

  “Knowing and proving are different things, lad.”

  “But —”

  “And solicitors cost.” Wyatt lowered his eyes. “There’s none of us left with much. Not nearly enough.” He shook his head. “All the assets were seized and orders went out to impound our ships in port. The family’s scattered, penniless save what coin they have with them. I’m —” He cleared his throat. “Mary had a bit tucked away. In her name, from her family. It’s not much, but it’s enough for us and the little ones to get away from here. Buy a single share in some colony far out where they’ve never heard of what happened and the name Bartlett doesn’t make people’s noses wrinkle at the stench.”

  Jon’s body was chilled. He couldn’t believe what he’d heard. What he’d thought had happened was bad, he knew, but to hear that it had been done deliberately — not just happenstance …

  Frederick Marchant did this?

  Caused it all. The family’s ruin, his mother transported God knew where, his father’s suicide …

  No, not suicide at all. It was murder, pure and simple, atop all the rest.

  “You could come with us, lad,” Wyatt said.

  “What?” Jon looked up. He hadn’t really heard. He’d been too lost in his thoughts and the sudden realization.

  “Come with us. Mary and me.” He shrugged. “Colonies’re a hard life, I know, but … it’s better than what’s left for you here, lad.”

  “Do you know where Mother is?” She was all he had left, really. Perhaps that’s where he belonged, helping her.

  Wyatt shook his head. “Put aboard the transport ships and sent to the Fringe. No telling where her indenture was bought, unless she manages to get a message to someone.”

  Jon nodded. So that was out, then. It would take far more time and coin to gain access to those records and travel to her than he had. The indenture ships traveled long loops amongst the Fringe Worlds, taking on and selling off indentures. It could be a year or more before that ship’s records made it back to a central office — assuming, even, that it wasn’t an independent ship that had no office more than its captain’s cabin.

  Mother’s as much gone to me as Father is.

  “Come with us,” Wyatt repeated. “A new world. A fresh start.”

  Jon stared at him for a moment. A fresh start … it was really giving up, though, wasn’t it? Fleeing and letting Marchant get away with it.

  “Thank you for the offer, Uncle Wyatt, but I think there’s … I think there’s more I need to do.”

  Wyatt shook his head.

  “Oh, Jon, don’t be a fool. Do you think I don’t want vengeance myself? What do you think you’ll do? Get yourself killed or jailed storming onto one of their ships with your pistol waving in the air?”

  Jon shook his head.

  “No. Father always counseled patience. I don’t know just yet what I’ll do, but I can’t simply leave.”

  Wyatt met Jon’s eyes for a long time, then his eyes filled and his lips trembled. Jon was shocked — he’d never seen his uncle in such a state.

  “You’ve got his look about you,” Wyatt said.

  “What?”

  “Edward’s. That set of his jaw and the coldness in his eyes when he was hell and determined on something.” He looked down at the table as though unable to meet Jon’s eye. “I can’t, Jon. I have Mary and the little ones to think of … I can’t.”

  “I know, Uncle Wyatt. You and the others have families to care for — there’s no one looking to me.”

  Wyatt pull
ed out his tablet. “I can give you a bit … not much … colony shares’re dear.”

  “It’s all right. You don’t have to —”

  “No. A hundred pounds, though I can’t do more. Enough for a start.” He looked up from his tablet. “You can’t be a Bartlett, you know.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The name, Jon. It’s sullied now.”

  Jon nodded. He hadn’t thought of that, but he’d experienced it with the hatches being shut on him as soon as he gave his name and documents.

  “And then there’s the Marchants. Frederick Marchant isn’t known for doing things by half. He may not be done with us, at least if there’s any of our name underfoot. That’s why the family’s scattered so far.”

  Jon frowned.

  “There are men,” Wyatt said, “who can forge what you need. You’ve heard of it, sure?”

  He had. Some men would jump ship and seek out a new identity. He didn’t know how to go about it, though. How did one even begin?

  “I’ve a couple places you can post messages,” Wyatt said. “No names, but I’ve heard things. Don’t go for the cheapest — not what the common hands would be able to pay. They’ll not have work that’ll hold up for long.”

  Jon nodded. His tablet pinged, announcing the transfer of funds and messages from Wyatt.

  Wyatt reached across the table and gripped his hand.

  “If you’re determined, well, then my best to you, lad. You get them, Jon. You get the bastards that did this to us and make them pay.”

  Chapter 10

  Jon entered the pub and headed straight for the bar. The messages he’d received in response to his veiled inquiries had mostly been dismissed, but one seemed promising. He couldn’t be certain, of course. Aside from the illegality of it, there was the concern, as Uncle Wyatt had said, that the Marchants were not entirely done with the Bartletts.

  The message had stated which table to go to, but Jon wanted to view the man he was to meet before going over.

  “A pint of pils, if you please,” he told the barkeep. “I’m not particular.”

  In fact, he planned to nurse the one drink through this entire meeting. He wanted his wits about him even after, in case it was a trap of some sort.

  “Three,” the barkeep said, sliding a glass in front of him.

  Jon slid the coins back in return, wincing at the cost. Even with the hundred pounds from Uncle Wyatt, he begrudged every pence, as there was no telling when he’d be able to earn more. He raised his glass and took a sip, grimacing.

  I should have been particular.

  He set the glass down and used the mirror behind the bar to scan the compartment. The table he’d been instructed to go to was occupied by a single man. As Jon’s gaze passed over him, the man looked up and met Jon’s eyes in the mirror.

  “Mister Bartlett!” he called out.

  Jon jumped, startled. He hadn’t mentioned his name in the messages, and even if he had, how would the man recognize him?

  “Yoo-hoo!” The man waved a hand in the air. “Mister Bartlett! Over here! You seem to have forgotten which table I said!”

  Jon looked around, but none of the other patrons seemed to be paying any attention. He hurried over to the table and sat down.

  “Are you mad?” Jon glared at the man. He was tempted to leave, but this was the only response he’d received to his inquiry that seemed it might be valid. “Do you not understand the need for discretion?”

  The man laughed. Now that he was viewing him up close, Jon tried to fix the man’s appearance in his mind, but found there was simply nothing at all distinctive about him. Average, in every way, was the best he could come up with to describe him. Even his age was difficult to estimate — one moment Jon would swear the man was his own age and in the next, as though with a change of the light, he could be a decade or more older.

  “Discretion? Whatever for?”

  “This transaction,” Jon whispered. He wished the man would lower his voice.

  “Yes, well, I wouldn’t have chosen a place where anyone would care what our business was, now would I?”

  Jon looked around. True, no one seemed to be paying them the least bit of attention. Rather studiously so, given the man’s volume.

  “Who are you?”

  “Ah, yes, the introductions.” The man held out his hand. “Malcom Eades, at your service, Mister Bartlett. I represent … well, let us say an organization to whom I believe you may be of some service in return for my being of service to you in this matter.”

  “And how do you know who I am? Or what service I might be?”

  “It’s my business to know things,” Eades said. He signaled for the barkeep and ordered a bottle of wine, which was quickly delivered. Eades poured himself a glass and drank. He appeared to be in no particular hurry to discuss their business.

  “Can you do it?” Jon asked finally.

  “Do it?”

  “Yes, damn you, the whole bit we discussed!”

  Eades raised his eyebrows and took another sip.

  “The whole bit, eh? A new identity, ship’s officers’ certificates … a past that doesn’t haunt you, yes?”

  Jon clenched his jaw. Who was this man to speak so to him? What did he know of a haunted past? He’d expected this to be a simple transaction, cash for the necessary work, not a bloody discussion of his life.

  “Yes.”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  Eades frowned. “Well, I suppose I could … except the past bit, that would be on you, I’m afraid, but an identity and certificates I could accomplish if I chose to.”

  Jon stared at him for a moment, not at all certain he’d heard correctly.

  “If you choose to? If you won’t do it, why message me? Why meet?”

  He scanned the room again, wondering if it was some trap of the Marchants and he should prepare to run.

  “To convince you to change your plan, Mister Bartlett,” Eades said. “Your current course is doomed to failure.”

  “You can’t know what I plan. You’re —”

  Eades sighed. “Mister Bartlett, you wish a new identity and credentials as a ship’s officer. You plan to find a berth with the Marchant Company, learn what you may of them and their ways, then cause them some harm in vengeance for what the Marchants did to your own family. Have I got it right? Left anything out?”

  Jon stared at him in shock. He knew not only what Jon did, indeed, plan, but so casually stated what no one else believed — that the Marchants were responsible for the harm done to the Bartletts.

  “It is my business to know.” Eades settled back into his chair and regarded Jon critically. “Your plan is unworkable on its face. Go aboard a Marchant ship as an officer, regardless of how well made your new documents are, and you’ll be found out within a fortnight. The community of ship’s officers is far too small — remarkably small and close, given the size of the universe and number of ships. Incestuous, even, it sometimes seems.”

  Eades took Jon’s glass of beer, poured the contents onto the floor, seemingly without a thought that the proprietor might object, and then filled it halfway with wine from his bottle.

  “Here. Have a proper drink. You look as though you could use one, and that particular pilsner is vile.”

  Jon lifted the glass and drained it without really tasting the wine. It might as well have been the beer, vile as it was, for all he noticed. Eades filled the glass again when Jon lowered it.

  “No,” Eades continued. “You’ll want to join the common crew, perhaps work your way to master’s mate, but no higher. No more visibility than that.” He filled his own glass and signaled for another bottle, waiting to speak more until it arrived. “Besides which, it’s the crews that really know things — where the bodies are buried, so to speak … or possibly more literally than you imagine. The crews know and the crews have loose tongues — but not to an officer.”

  “Who are you?”

  Eades smiled, the first thing
Jon found remarkable about the man, and he felt a shiver run down his back. He decided he much preferred this man, Eades, as innocuous and unremarkable, rather than that distinctive smile.

  “I am someone with whom your own interests coincide at this particular juncture, Mister Bartlett. You wish to know more about the Marchant Company.” Eades shrugged. “I wish to know more about the Marchant Company. Why should we not assist each other in this mutual endeavor?”

  Jon swallowed, throat tight. He was becoming more and more uneasy about Malcom Eades and began to wish he’d never posted his inquiry.

  “The enemy of my enemy is my friend?”

  “The enemy of your enemy is sometimes a useful tool, Mister Bartlett. It would be foolish not to make use of him.” Eades smiled again. “I have no friends, I assure you.

  “A new name, Mister Bartlett, untainted by scandal.” He frowned, examining Jon. “Records of … three years aboard ships, I think, so we’ll make you a year or two older than you are. You can pass for that. Rated Able … a brief stint as master’s mate aboard your last ship, one that’s now gone off far from the Sibwards, Lesser and Greater both, and away from any Marchant trading routes.”

  “Solid records?” Jon asked. “You can do that?”

  “Solid as rock, Mister Bartlett.” Eades smiled again, as though at some secret joke he found most amusing. “Solid as though Her Majesty Herself had stamped them for you.”

  “And in return?”

  “You tell me what you learn. Simple as that.” Eades held out his hand. “A bargain, sir?”

  Jon eyed the hand for a moment. It was a deal with the devil himself, he suspected, but Eades was likely his only chance. No one else had responded to the message — it was as though no one had even seen it after Eades replied. Was vengeance worth it?