by Sean Gabb
Chapter Nine
Sarah was a woman. She had the perfect excuse to look bored and wait for the spy to slope off in search of others to entrap. But old Johnson was awake and growling approval from his corner.
“All these Dutchlings be dammed,” he said thickly—too much gin in his coffee again, or too little coffee in his gin. “There was never shortage of cash when James was King.”
He burped and looked blearily about for his snuffbox.
“Those bastard Dutch have stole all England’s money.”
Technically, this was only sedition. The fool hadn’t gone the whole way to treason by referring to James as King merely out of possession. But everyone knew this was only the slip of an old man’s tongue. Like snow on a rooftop in March, it needed only one more touch to bring down a full profession of the Jacobite creed.
Two men sat nearest the door got up quietly and left. Beside her coffee boiler, Mrs Clapton was letting off scared looks in every direction.
Samuel stood up and walked into the centre of the room. He turned to the spy and made an elaborate bow.
“You are mistaken, Sir, if you conceive that the purpose of the recoinage is other than benevolent.”
He moved again, this time standing between Johnson and the spy.
“It is notorious that every silver coin in England has, for many years, been subject to clipping—and that, once clipped beyond the inner ring, it becomes difficult to tell real coins from false. Even before the late Revolution, there was little money that contained its face value in silver.
“There can be no doubt that, sooner or later, the Government would have had to recall the debased coins and replace them with new coins, marked on the edge to prevent clipping.”
The spy was on his feet. He made his own bow to Samuel, and tried to see what Johnson was about. Without seeming to notice, Samuel moved again.
The spy could have given up. Before the Assassination Plot, Mrs Clapton’s had been noted for its loose talk. Johnson then hadn’t been at all the most forthright in his support of the exiled king. But that was then. Today, the only easy pickings would be Johnson himself. He might say enough to justify an arrest. That would earn him a few nights in Newgate. But no grand jury would find a bill to prosecute anyone so broken down.
Even if he had a second witness to swear for him, the spy would never collect his bounty.
The spy could have given up. But he didn’t.
“I grant, Sir, the excellency with which you have put the Government’s case,” he opened. He looked round again. No one looked at him now.
“Nevertheless, you do not explain the process by which so many of the new coins have been minted in England to circulate in Holland. A guinea in London may not buy twenty shillings of the new coins, assuming they can be had at all. In Amsterdam, the same guinea will buy twenty three.”
“Bravo, Sir—well said!” Johnson called out, banging his cup on the table.
“Come, take a pinch of snuff with me!”
Samuel raised his arm and stared the spy back into his seat. “I readily grant that money has flowed out of England since the Revolution,” he said. “But how else can it be, when we are at war with France, and the main theatre of war is in the Low Countries? Would you have us stop paying our armies? Or would you be happy to see the war fought on English soil? English money would certainly then be spent in England.”
He paused and looked dramatically across at the new print of King William. “Or would you have us stop fighting a war that was forced on us and that we are winning?”
He moved closer to the spy, still speaking in the conversational tone that could fill a playhouse. “War was declared on us by France, when King Lewis objected to the Revolution that restored our liberties and preserved our Reformed Faith, and threw off the French shackles that James of evil memory had put upon us.
“Have you forgotten how we were attacked in Ireland and on the sea? Are you ignorant of how we reconquered Ireland and made ourselves supreme at sea? Will you use a temporary shortage of sixpences as your excuse to end a war that, with so much expense of blood and treasure, we have nearly won—and won against the greatest power in Europe?
“Indeed, Sir, are you telling us we should bring back James at the head of an army of French protectors and Popish priests?”
Sarah could see he was nearly there. “Dear God!” he boomed. “We are barely months away from the time when Jacobite traitors, inspired by French gold, tried to murder our lawful King here in England. With Fenwick still at large, will you dare show your face in the light of day, and preach fresh rebellion?”
He puffed out his chest. “The law requires two witnesses to an act of treason. Who will join with me in taking this self-confessed traitor before the magistrates?”
That was enough. With a last angry look round, the spy was on his feet and making for the door.
Samuel’s parting threat of violence was loud enough to cover Johnson’s cry of disappointment that he’d have no one after all to try putting a rope about his neck.
Samuel sat down again and pulled his wig off. “Was that a brilliant or merely a fine performance?” he whispered.
He dashed off the remains of his coffee, then sprawled back in his chair. Someone got up and bowed to him. Mrs Clapton shovelled more pulverised coffee into her boiler. Gradually, the room went back to normal.
Pretending to stare at the print of the King, Sarah looked at Samuel. No one could call him handsome. Leave aside the lack of harmony in the elements of his face—he was, in the ordinary course of things, rather too stout for the roles he took on the stage. But neither could anyone deny his force of character, or the peculiar grace of his speaking voice. Sarah would deny him nothing, except applause.
“You’ve earned free coffee for the next month,” she sniffed. “But when can I have my 27/-6d in silver?”
He went back to his easy smile. “What I do so admire about you, Sarah, is the clear view you take of the essentials.”
He lowered his voice. “But, if there was no choice about fumigating him, that Government man was perfectly right. Dutch William has fucked us for silver. Search me why there’s a recoinage in time of war. We were reduced to taking brass buttons at the door last night.
“If I can only have your Prologue, though, there’ll be seven guineas from His Lordship tonight.”
Sarah blinked. “Tonight?” she asked, wondering if she’d misheard.
“Surely, you’re putting it on next Wednesday?”
Still smiling, Samuel shrugged. “Bailiffs, my dear, bailiffs—they just won’t wait. I need Fremont’s cash, so we’re putting on the Siege of Constantinople tonight. We all know the lines. I only need the Prologue you’ve agreed to father on Fremont.
“Can I have it before six? It won’t do for Mrs Juniper to read it from the page.”
He reached for his wig and stood up.
“Tonight?” Sarah repeated, still aghast. She could feel the warmth the opium had planted in her stomach drain steadily away. “But I haven’t finished redoing the love scene between Araminta and the Sultan.
“As for the Prologue, I…”
He stopped her with a cheerful wave. “Oh, never mind the love scene,” he said. “Fremont won’t care if the dialogue doesn’t make sense. It’s Mrs Juniper and his Prologue he’ll want to see.”
He put his hand on the door. “Do be there before six. You know how Mrs Juniper hates last minute learning.”
For longer than she had to spare, Sarah sat looking at the grounds and the greasy residue in her cup.
She was interrupted by Mrs Clapton. “Lovely boy, don’t you agree, Mrs Goodricke?” she asked.
She looked at the closed door. “I went to see him last week in your own Fop Discover’d. Talk about laughing—I near split me sides!”
She stood fully up and waddled into a kind of twirl. After a deep breath, she recited:
You fear lest Evelina see you rage?
You’d better fear if she were told your age!
She waited for her other patrons to finish their low cheer of recognition, then sat down in the chair that Samuel had vacated. She took out a fan of stained ivory.
“Such a lovely boy,” she repeated, setting about her sweaty face. “Don’t you never think—you being a widow woman and all…?”
Sarah got up. “I fear, Mrs Clapton, that I must take leave of you.”
After a long inward groan, she managed a smile. “But, if you can make your way tonight to Parker’s Lane, you’ll see Mr Lambert at his very best.”
“God damn William, Prince of Orange!” Johnson finally gasped. “God damn all who’d keep King James out of his own!”
Unless one of her usuals had turned informer, Mrs Clapton was in no danger of a visit. But she hurried across to him. If she was to keep him quieter than this till she closed, the old man would need something stronger than gin.