A Spectacle Of Corruption Part 28

I thought about this: how to find out information that would be of use to me. "How do you know what he wants of you? How does he contact you?"

"It's his man," the Riding Officer said. "All the customs men meet at a tavern near the Tower called the Broken Lamp, on Thursday nights. We get paid what we're owed, and if he's got special instructions, he tells us then. Sometimes if it's urgent, such as when you broke loose, we get a note, but otherwise it's always a Thursday."

I sensed I was getting close to something. "And who is his man?"

He shook his head. "I don't know. He don't say his name. He just pays us. If you want to find out, you can come Thursday."

Good advice, but how could I dare to go if he knew I would be attending? "Where do you live?" I asked. He hesitated a moment, so I kicked him in the ribs. "Where do you live?" I asked again.

He groaned. "In Mrs. Trenchard's house off Drury Lane."

"You know I do not work alone," I told him. "You have been thwarted by my aides in the past and you will be again, if you don't leave the metropolis without mentioning a word of this to anyone. You may come back in a few months, but if I see you sooner, or if any of my allies see you sooner, we shall not hesitate to burn Mrs. Trenchard's house down about your ears and with you still in it too." I gave him another kick to cement my point, though I don't know that my efforts were required. "Now get away," I said, and watched him attempt to push himself to his feet.

I then walked off slowly in an effort to show my contempt. I would not know if my warning had meant anything until I visited the tavern come Thursday.

As for Littleton, I wanted to hear from his own lips that Melbury had hired him. I could not say what this information would give me other than the satisfaction of knowing the woman I loved was married to a liar, but that seemed reason enough. I awaited him as he came out of Mrs. Yate's house that morning, and when he turned a corner I grabbed his arm.

"Off to do some rioting?" I asked.

He flashed me his easy grin. "It's good weather for it, I think. I guess you've seen me and the boys down there, giving as good as Dogmill's boys, and then some. We might not be able to make them go away, but we can keep the odds even. Sooner or later, Dogmill will agree to a truce."

"That's Melbury's thinking, is it?"

He made a face as though he'd tasted something sour. "Melbury be d.a.m.ned. That tightpurse wouldn't pay for a good riot if the election depended on it, which it does."

"What?" I demanded. "If Melbury isn't paying you, why are you rioting? Surely it is not for the pleasure of facing off against Greenbill and Dogmill."

"I won't deny there is a pleasure, but it's more than that. We're getting paid, I can tell you, only not by Melbury. It's a risk, you know. If Dogmill wishes, he might send us to the devil for rioting against Greenbill, but I don't think he will. If we go, he won't have nothing but Greenbill's boys on the quays, and then they'll be able to set their wages as they like. No, this way we get a few shillings in our pockets to get us through the winter, and we have a fine time as well."

"Who pays you?"

He shrugged. "The devil, for all I know. A dapper Irishman called Johnson offered me the coin if I would take Melbury's part. It seemed to me too fine an offer to turn away; the boys had grown restless at any rate." He stopped to stare at me. "Now that I think on it, did you not inquire of me regarding a man named Johnson? Is this the same?"

I shook my head. "No, I don't think so."

That evening I sat in my room, staring at a book without reading. Mrs. Sears knocked on my door and told me I had a visitor, so I dusted myself off and walked into my sitting room, where I found myself face-to-face with Johnson once more. He bowed to me and then politely dismissed the landlady.

"These are fine rooms you've taken, Mr. Evans."

Until he spoke my name, I don't think I recalled that in our previous encounter, Mr. Johnson had known me only as Weaver. It was now evident that he had discovered my false persona. I had made every effort to be careful when leaving and returning to these rooms, but I had not been careful enough.

"Please have a seat," I said, unwilling to show my concern. I offered him some port, and he took it gladly. I then poured a gla.s.s for myself and sat across from him.

"Let us be honest with each other," I said, having in that instant decided to take the more direct approach available to me. After all, Johnson, and therefore all the Jacobites, now knew my secret. Dissimulation and caution would get me little. "You have discovered my disguise, and you wish me to know it. What do you want of me?"

Johnson laughed agreeably, as though I had just recalled something witty from a mutual past. "You're a suspicious man, sir, though I cannot say I much blame you. Yours is a difficult situation. I shall therefore be direct with you, as you have honored me with your forthrightness. I understand you went to visit Mr. Littleton today."

"That's right," I said uneasily, for I began to see his meaning.

"And you inquired of my business."

I smiled. "I did not know it was your business until I inquired."

"Ah," he said. He swirled his wine about his goblet. "Well, now you know."

"Yes, I do."

"I'll thank you not to concern yourself with it." He set down his gla.s.s of wine. "I understand your affairs are important to you, and I shall not interfere if I don't have to, but you must understand that I cannot permit you to trouble yourself with what I do or to whom I speak."

"I am not certain what you tell me. Am I to refrain from speaking to anyone lest it be an acquaintance of yours?"

"You needn't be so dramatic," he said. "I shall be plain with you. Leave these riots alone, sir. Leave Littleton alone. He is no concern of yours."

"It may be no concern of mine to interfere with the riots, but I should very much like to know more of them."

"Of course. As I have said, we've no desire to see you harmed or captured. While you are free and an enemy of Dogmill, you do our cause as much good as we could hope. I only wish you might clear your name by implicating Dogmill immediately. That would provide us with just the thing."

"It would provide me with just the thing too, I a.s.sure you."

He laughed softly. "Of course. I speak of strategy, but you speak of your life."

"You are quite right. And you cannot blame me for wishing to understand the mechanisms behind these riots. My difficulties are directly related to this election, and I must do all I can to understand the mechanisms that work against me."

"Of course. But we shan't privilege you over our cause."

"I would not expect you to. But I do not see why my inquiries disturb you. I shall keep what I learn to myself."

"For now, you will. Let me say this, Mr. Weaver. You would not want to learn anything that might make you our enemy in the future."

I nodded. Johnson liked that I roamed around the city making things uncomfortable for the Whigs, but he did not like the idea that I might prove my innocence and then be at liberty to speak of what I knew of the Jacobites. I had already indicated an unwillingness to side with his cause, and Johnson feared that, should I vindicate myself, I would reveal what I had learned of him and his allies to the Whigs.

"I owe you a debt of loyalty," I said. "You a.s.sisted me in the matter of the Riding Officers, and I shan't forget it."

"And you will say nothing about us to the ministry once you are safe?"

I shook my head. "I don't yet know. Should a man hold his own honor above concerns of treason?"

He appeared nothing if not amused. "You can see that I am right. You must not learn what you do not wish to know." He stood abruptly. "I trust I have made myself clear."

I stood as well. "Thus far you have. I cannot say I entirely understand what it is you are asking of me."

"Then I shall be plain. I am asking nothing of you, but you must understand that we are not some gang of thieves you cross and then outwit. We have left you alone thus far, sir, because you have achieved a certain popularity, and to move against you might cause us some difficulties. But please know that if you threaten us in any way, we will not hesitate to destroy you."

Mr. Johnson's speeches turned out to be nothing but pretty sentiment, for the next day Mr. Dogmill's friends in the city could no longer stomach turning a blind eye to the violence and posted soldiers in Covent Garden. Had they marched upon the rioters, no doubt great violence would have resulted, for those who would destroy and murder and rob never love to see their English liberties curtailed by that most venomous of beasts, the standing army. Fortunately, these dragoons were deployed with uncommon strategy, stationed in the piazza long before dawn, so when the porters arrived they saw they would be met with a disappointing welcome and slinked off, satisfied that they had performed their duty for more than half a week.

During that time Melbury's lead had suffered serious attrition, but there could be no doubt it would now recover, for the sentiment in Westminster was one of dissatisfaction with Dogmill's influence. The rioters had been a gamble, and a bold one, and the Whigs had hoped to ruin the Tories' lead. But it had only strengthened their cause, and for that I was grateful. I now had little doubt that once Melbury sat in the House, he would do all he could to serve my cause and send his old enemy to ruin.

As the day was Thursday, I spent my time preparing to take myself that night to the tavern mentioned by the Riding Officer. Here was a risk, for I had no choice but to depend that he had followed my advice and fled the metropolis rather than face my wrath. I would, nevertheless, take precautions, the most significant of which was that I thought it best to attend to my business as Matthew Evans, not as Benjamin Weaver. If the Riding Officer had not held his tongue, the men there would be keeping watch for an escaped felon, not a finely dressed gentleman. Of course, because they looked for me in particular, they might well see through my disguise more easily than men not seeking me out. Nevertheless, I was determined to take the chance.

For all my determination, however, I did not entirely believe I would learn very much by going to this tavern. I already knew that Dogmill bribed the Customs men. The world knew it, and the world did not care. What, then, would I discover? The one thing I hoped to learn was the ident.i.ty of the agent who paid the Customs men. This person might well be Dogmill's primary tough, the fellow who executed the violent orders. I held out the faint hope that I might that very night learn the ident.i.ty of the man who had actually beaten Walter Yate to death.

I took a seat in a dark corner, ordered a pot, and hoped to make myself as unnoticed as I might. Here was no difficult task, for the Customs men busied themselves with their own concerns.

They began to arrive at eight in the evening, as they had been advised to do. I understood well how they were being used, for this was an all too common bit of treachery perpetrated upon the laboring man. On rare occasion their wages would arrive at eight as they had been promised, but most times they would not arrive until eleven, so there was nothing for them to do in the time of waiting but eat and drink. For this consideration, the tardy paymaster would receive from the tavern keeper a little something for his troubles.

After nearly two hours I grew impatient and even considered abandoning my position, but I found that my patience was well rewarded. Some few minutes after ten, a man arrived and was greeted by the cheers of the customs men. They drank a b.u.mper to him, and after he distributed wages all around, they drank another. They even bought this fellow a drink and treated him as though he were a king in his own right rather than an underling merely performing his master's service.

It was Greenbill Billy. The leader of the labor combination worked in the service of the very man he claimed to resist.

My meeting with Greenbill now began to make far more sense to me. He had asked me what I knew of Dogmill's involvement, not to discover for himself but to measure my own understanding. He had urged me to take my revenge against Dogmill, not in the hopes that I would act but rather so he could report back to his master on my willingness to do so.

I now observed him among the Customs men. He was good enough to let the men buy him a few drinks, but he appeared eager to move on afterward. Though they begged him to stay longer, he tipped his cap and bid them good night. I wasted no time and was out the door after him in an instant. To my relief, he took no hackney but appeared content to walk to wherever it was he was intending to go. I might have followed him to learn where he went. I could then pursue him on my own terms at my own leisure. But I had already enjoyed my fill of waiting and deferral. I would wait no longer.

When Greenbill walked past an alley, I broke into a run and knocked him hard in the back of the neck with both my hands clasped together. I had hoped for a bit of good luck here, that he would fall face forward and not catch sight of me, and this time the dice rolled my way. He fell into the alley's filth-the kennel of emptied chamber pots, bits of dead dogs gnawed on by hungry rats, apple cores, and oyster sh.e.l.ls-and I pushed him down hard, knocking his head into the soft earth. Desperate for some way to maintain my anonymity, I then ripped the cravat from around his neck and hastily wrapped it around his eyes. Using one knee to keep his arms pinned, I tied the blindfold tight and only then rolled him over so that his face was out of the muck.

"You seemed mightily keen on yourself at that tavern with the Customs men," I observed, affecting an Irish accent. I did so both to protect my ident.i.ty and to create a likely fiction as to the ident.i.ty of his a.s.sailant-that is to say, a Jacobite agent. "You are not so keen on yourself now, are you, my spark?"

"Mayhap not," he said, "but at the tavern I was not blindfolded and wallowing in s.h.i.t. It's hard to be keen on yourself when you've got that working against you."

"You wallow in far worse than s.h.i.t, friend. I have been watching, and now I know your little secret."

"Which one is that? I'm burgeoned with so many, you know, I doubt you can have learned them all."

"That you are in the service of Dennis Dogmill. I believe that revelation might ruin your reputation among the porters."

"And so it would, boglander," he admitted, "but at least it would make it inevitable that Dogmill would find a more dignified post for me. You think to frighten me by revealing that little tidbit. Why, you'd be doing me a favor. So go ahead and do your Irish worst, Dear Joy. We'll see who benefits and who ends up with nothing for his trouble but a dish of boiled oats."

In a move I had learned during some of my less honorable performances as a fighter, I rolled him over and grabbed his arm, which I bent hard behind his back until he yowled quite unhappily.

"It's the Scots that are famous for their oats," I told him, "not the Irish. And as for my worst, well, bending your arm isn't nearly so bad as what else I have in mind. So now that you see I'm in no mood for nonsense, perhaps you'd like to answer a few of my questions. Or do I have to give another demonstration of my earnestness?" And I pushed hard against the arm.

"What?" he shouted. "Ask me and be d.a.m.ned."

"Who killed Walter Yate?"

"Who do you think, you blockhead?" he growled. "I did. I knocked the fellow over with a metal bar and killed him as he deserved."

I remained stunned in silence. I had been seeking the answer to that question for so long now, I could hardly believe what I had just heard. A confession. An admission of guilt. We both knew I could do nothing about it. Without two witnesses, the confession had no value in a court of law, even a.s.suming I could find an honest judge. But it meant something to me to know that I had finally learned the answer to so pressing a question.

"Did you do it under Dogmill's orders?" I asked.

"Not in the way you mean, Teague. Things ain't always so clear."

"I don't understand."

He sucked in some air. "Dogmill said to take care of Yate, so I took care of Yate. I don't know if he meant for me to kill him or not. I don't know if he noticed Yate was dead or not. He only knew that a man he wanted out of the way was gone, and that was enough for him. Dogmill's a great merchant, and to him it don't matter if the likes of us live or die. We're not real men to him, only vermin to be brushed away or squashed-it don't matter which. It only matters to him that we trouble his quiet or we don't."

"But you killed Yate without remorse."

"You say it was without remorse, but you don't mitigate it for certain. I done what I had to in order to keep my place. That's all. I can't say it was good or bad, only that it had to be remunerated."

"And why Benjamin Weaver?" I asked. "Why did Dogmill choose to blame him?"

If my question made him suspect he was in Weaver's hands, he did not show it. "That I can't tell you. I thought it an odd choice meself, and not a man I would have trifled with for no cause. But I never thought to ask Dogmill his motives. They're his own, and I suggest you inquire yourself."

"And what of Arthur Groston, the evidence broker, and the men who testified at Weaver's trial? Did you kill them as well?"

"Dogmill said make it look like the Jew is out to protect himself, and that's just what I done. It ain't nothing more than that. It ain't as though I had something against those sods."

I said nothing. There was no sound but that of both our breathing, thick and heavy in the night air. There was no easy course for me now. I could not bring the man to a justice of the peace or a constable, for the route of honest procedure was foreclosed to me. It could be that an honest judge might inquire honestly into these affairs, but that seemed a fond hope. Therefore, either I could kill Greenbill for what he had done and exact my own petty justice, or I could let him go, perhaps to walk free of the crime of murder, perhaps to lead me better to a chance of clearing my name. The former seemed more satisfying, the latter more practical.

If I let him go, however, he might take himself forever beyond my grasp, and should I be recaptured and hang for his crime, the memory of this moment would be the bitterness of my last days on earth.

I relaxed my grip on him. "Go," I said in a low voice, just above a whisper. "Go and tell your master what you have done in his name. And tell him I am coming for him."

"And who are you?" Greenbill rasped. "An agent of Melbury or the Pretender-or both? If I am to tell him, I must know what to say."

"You may say he will face justice soon enough. He can't hide from me-from us," I added, lest my indulgent speech be understood too well.

I released him and stepped back, allowing Greenbill to struggle to his feet. The arm upon which I had worked my mayhem hung limply by his side, but the other pushed into the filth so he could right himself. Once to his feet, he used his good hand to untie his blindfold, and then he scurried off. I watched him go and felt a remarkable sadness. Before I knew all the facts, I had had the hope of a wondrous discovery that would clarify everything and make my course seem certain and inevitable. I had found just the opposite, the murkiness of ambiguous orders and cowardly deeds. And I hardly knew what to do next.

CHAPTER 24.

THE FOLLOWING NIGHT, a Friday, I made ready to answer Mr. Melbury's invitation to dinner. I thought with some irony that if I were not a wanted criminal, I should very likely be attending my uncle and aunt's house this evening in celebration of the Hebrew Sabbath. Instead, I would be dining with a woman who was once their daughter-in-law and now a member of the Church of England.

I dressed myself in the best of the suits Mr. Swan had labored over, and I took myself to Mr. Melbury's home, where I arrived at precisely the time called for in the invitation. Nevertheless, I found Melbury occupied, and I was asked to cool my heels, as the saying goes, in his parlor. I was there only a few minutes before Melbury uncloseted himself, emerging with an older gentleman dressed in clerical colors. This man walked with a cane, and then only with a great deal of difficulty, and appeared to be in the most fragile of health.

Mr. Melbury smiled at me and introduced me at once to his guest, none other than so famous a personage as Francis Atterbury, Bishop of Rochester. Even I, who followed events of the English Church no more closely than I did events of the Italian b.u.g.g.e.ry, had heard of this luminary, well known to be one of the most eloquent proponents of restoring ancient Church privilege and power. But having heard of him, I felt myself ill at ease, knowing little of the forms belonging to such a lofty personage. I merely bowed and murmured something of what an honor it was to meet his grace. The bishop forced a smile and returned my kind words with some skepticism before hobbling from the room.

"I'm glad to see you once more," Melbury said. He handed me a gla.s.s of claret without asking if I should like one. "Forgive his Grace's taciturnity. He is in great pain from the gout, and you know his wife has died of late."

"I did not know, and I am sorry to hear it. He is a great man," I added, knowing that Tories, in general, thought so.