A Spectacle of Corruption (10 page)

“What people? Who told you to sway the jury against me?” I demanded.

Silence. But I held up the carving knife, and he reconsidered his reticence.

“Oh, bother it! I’ll not be mutilated on his behalf. I hardly bear that much love for the man, and I curse that I ever involved myself in this. But there is a general election upon us, and no man can afford to remain neutral.”

I felt myself tense. “What? The election again? What does the election have to do with this?”

“It was Griffin Melbury,” he said. “Griffin Melbury told me to do it, but I must beg you not to say I’ve told you. The man is a dangerous enemy, and I won’t have him set his cap at me.”

His words so surprised me I nearly dropped my knife. I checked the loosening of my grip, however, and found that my hold grew tighter—so tight that my fingers turned white.

Griffin Melbury. The Tory candidate standing for Westminster. The man who had married my Miriam.

“E
xplain it all to me,” I said. “Omit nothing.”

“Melbury called me to meet him the instant I drew your trial. He said it was imperative that you be found guilty, that you hang. All the Tory values—a strong Church, a strong monarchy, controlling the new wealth and the liberal thinkers—all of it was to depend upon my taking this action. He made it quite clear that should I not do my duty in this matter I would find that, following the election, there would be by far more Tories in power than necessary to see me lose my place.”

I knew that most judges were political creatures and owed their loyalty to one of the two parties. I also knew well that these men thought nothing of allowing their affiliations to influence their rulings. I could not, however, imagine why the Tories should wish to see me convicted for this crime. How could my fate be bound up with the Tory cause? Unless, of course, Melbury only fabricated the urgency of the situation, and for him it was a matter of honor. But having never met Griffin Melbury, having never crossed him or angered him, I could hardly believe that he would hold so powerful a grudge against me simply because I had once courted the woman who became his wife.

“Why?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” he snapped, as though I were his child and had asked him why the sky is blue. “I don’t know. He did not say; he would not say. I demanded an answer, but he only offered me threats. You must believe I had no satisfaction in doing as I did. I had no choice.”

“What have I to do with this? How can I have anything to say of the Tory cause?”

“How should I know when Melbury would tell me nothing? I would think that you might answer that question better than I. If I could have avoided the scene in the court today, I would have. I have no love of seeing my reputation weakened on your account—or on his, for that matter. I acted as I did because there was nothing else for me to do.”

I remained still for a long while, hearing nothing—not the crackling of the fire or the ticking of the clock or the deep breathing of Piers Rowley, whose hands had ceased their stanching of his long-clotted wound and had instead commenced to hold his teary face.

I found him nothing but risible. “Show me your banknotes,” I said.

Rowley removed his hands from his face. He had been content to cower and shake when I merely threatened his life, but now that I sought his wealth, I had roused the lion in him. “I thought you had more honor in you than to turn thief,” he said steadily. His voice had gained some composure, and I thought that either the man truly loved his money or the cowardice he had displayed had merely been a bit of mummery meant to stave off more brutal punishment.

“I have been convicted of a felony,” I said. “The court, I am certain, wasted no time in descending upon my rooms and confiscating my belongings. I now have no home and no money, but since you have been the architect of that conviction, I think it only just that you compensate me for my losses. Now, where are your banknotes?”

“I won’t tell you, Weaver. I’ll not be robbed. Not by you.”

I won’t tell you?
Surely he had lost his wits. Better to say he had no notes. I brandished the carving knife, but Rowley remained defiant.

“I think this little wound you’ve given me proves that you are not a man of senseless violence,” he said. “You might have done worse, but you haven’t.”

At that moment, I heard a scuffle emanating from the kitchen. And then I heard a woman’s shriek. The serving girl, whose virtue was safe with the footman, had returned early and found her fellow domestics in a dire condition. I had not much time to dally in the judge’s house.

“The banknotes,” I said. “Now.”

He ventured the slightest of smiles. “I think not.” I could see his eyes go wide as he concentrated to find the courage to defy me. “You see, Weaver, your reputation has done you some harm. You may brandish sword and pistols, and even use them when threatened or facing dangerous rogues, but I am but an aging man of the law, defenseless in his own home. I doubt you will hurt so powerless a creature as I am, and I say that I have had enough of your threats. I’ve told you what you wanted and put myself at great risk in doing so. Now get out if you still can, for I won’t give you a penny, not one farthing. If you believe yourself entitled to compensation, you must take up the matter with Griffin Melbury.”

I considered his words for a moment and then reached out with a speed that even I found remarkable. With one hand I grabbed his right ear, and with the other I used my knife to sever a substantial part of it. I held the bloody thing in my fingers and showed it to him before tossing it onto his writing desk, where it landed on a pile of correspondence with a heavy slap. Too astonished to cry out or even to move, Rowley only stared at the little pieces of flesh.

“Where do you keep your banknotes?” I asked again.

T
o my delight, I discovered that Mr. Rowley had more than four hundred pounds’ worth of negotiable notes on his person—in addition to another twenty-odd pounds in cash—and I was able to gather them up and quit the house before the girl had returned with whomever it was she had gone to fetch. Although it was small recompense for the harm he had done me, it was nevertheless satisfying to relieve him of so large an amount and reassuring to have it in my possession.

I had no clear idea of how best to use the information that Rowley had provided me, what course of action I would pursue, or where I should find myself a safe hiding place. I knew, however, where I would go next.

CHAPTER 6

I
HAD NEVER
before imagined the life of a footman, but in my travels toward Bloomsbury Square I found myself greeted by whores, jeered by other men in livery who observed something lacking in my presentment, taunted by linkboys, and offered drinks by apprentices. A footman walks the thinnest of boundaries between privilege and powerlessness, living in both camps and mocked by each if he dares to step too far into the territory of one or the other.

I avoided these tormentors as best I could, for I had no idea how convincing I might appear should anyone get too close. Most footmen were somewhat younger than I, though not all, and my age would not prove the most treacherous of my features. My ill-fitting wig did far more damage, for though I had taken some pains to tuck my own locks underneath, it sat oddly and bulging on my head, and I knew it would answer poorly to any extended scrutiny.

I approached my friend Elias Gordon’s lodgings with some trepidation. I could only presume that my escape had, by now, been discovered, and anyone familiar with my habits would know that Elias, who often lent his assistance in my inquiries, might well be the first man from whom I sought refuge. If his house was being watched, I could presume that my uncle’s was as well, along with those of a half dozen or so of my closest friends and relations. But of all the people I knew, I believed I could most trust Elias, not only to protect my safety but to consider the problems I faced with a clear and open mind.

Elias, though a surgeon by trade, was something of a philosopher. During my efforts to unravel the knot of secrecy surrounding my father’s death, it had been Elias who introduced me to the mysterious workings of the great financial institutions of this kingdom. More important, it had been he who taught me to understand the theory of probability—the very philosophical engine that ran the machinery of finance—and to use it to solve a crime without witnesses or evidence. My troubles now seemed far more dire than they had then, but I had hope that Elias might see what I could not.

I therefore chose to take the chance in visiting him, relying on my disguise, my quickness of mind, and—somewhat diminished but nevertheless dependable—strength of body. Unless a small army awaited me, I convinced myself I should dispatch easily enough any man who interfered.

The rain had eased since my escape from Newgate, though not let up entirely, and the streets were dark and slick with muck. As I approached Elias’s lodgings, I saw two men posted guard outside, hunched over to protect themselves from the drizzle. They were both of about my years, neither particularly dominating of body. They wore dark clothes of the respectable middling sort, short wigs, and small hats, all of which were heavy with water. Not quite a livery, but near enough to one. I could not guess who they were, though I could see most clearly that they were neither constables nor soldiers. They were, however, quite well armed. I saw each clutched a pistol in one hand, and their pockets were heavy, surely well loaded with spares. I, on the other hand, had no weapons upon me but the carving knife, which I had hidden in the interior of my coat.

I thought to go around these men and enter through the back way, but one of them sighted me and called me to him.

“Ho, there, fellow,” he said. “What business have you?”

“I’m come to see Mr. Jacob Monck, what lives here,” I said, using the name of a lodger I knew to dwell within. I also affected a heavy Yorkshire accent, hoping this would put them off my scent.

The two men approached. “What’s your business with this Monck?” asked the one who had called out to me.

“The delivering of a message.” I took a step closer.

“Whose message?” He wiped the cold rain off his face.

I did not pause for an instant. “Me lady’s,” I told him, hoping he had not done his business so well that he knew Monck to be septuagenarian and little likely to be involved in intrigues.

“Who is your lady?”

I smirked at him and rolled my eyes as I had seen saucy footmen do a hundred times before. “That ain’t none of your business, nor for you to know neither. Who might you be, who stand in my way like insolent fellows?”

“These fart catchers think themselves great gentlemen,” one of the centuries announced. “We’re Riding Officers, that’s who we be, and you are but a bootlick. You oughtn’t to forget that.”

“Go and deliver the message, me lord,” the other one said. “And I beg you pardon our disturbing you as you carry out your important task. I should hate to think I had stood between Mr. Monck and your lady’s cunny.”

I offered a sneer to the one who had spoken and then knocked upon the door; despite my haughty performance, I’d grown restless with alarm. Riding Officers: the agents who enforced the laws of customs and excise. Why would men whose role was to search for smugglers and customs evaders come in search of a supposed murderer who had broken his way out of Newgate? It made no sense, but it suggested that there was even more to the matter of my prosecution than I had yet supposed.

When I heard the doorknob turn, I had further cause for alarm, for Elias’s landlady, Mrs. Henry, would surely recognize me, and I did not know if I could depend on her silence. She had always looked upon me more kindly than is perhaps ordinary, but I was now generally believed to be a murderer, and I knew well that there would be those who might interpret my actions at Mr. Rowley’s house in none the best light.

Fortunately, I had little cause for alarm. Mrs. Henry opened the door, glanced at my face, and, as though she had no idea who I was, asked me my business. I simply repeated what I had told the centuries, and she invited me inside.

I thought she might have questions for me, or pleading words about how I must return myself to prison and have faith in the law and the Lord, but she offered none of that, only a warm smile and a gesture of her head. “Go upstairs, then. He’s there.”

Elias opened the door almost immediately upon my knocking. His eyes went wide for a moment, and then he grabbed me by the arm and pulled me inside. “Are you mad coming here? There are men downstairs looking for you.”

“I know,” I said. “Riding Officers.”

“Customs men? What business can they have with this?” He began to say something on the peculiarity of my pursuers, but changed his mind and instead approached a sideboard with a bottle of wine and some unwashed glasses upon it. Elias’s rooms were pleasant enough, but none the neatest, and old clothes, books, papers, and dirty dishes were spread throughout. He had several candles burning upon his writing table, and he appeared to have been at work on some project or another when I called. Though a surgeon of some reputation, Elias preferred the literary arts to the medical ones and had tried his hand already at playwriting and poetry. He was now, he had told me, at work upon a fictional memoir of a dashing Scottish surgeon making his way through the social labyrinth of London.

“Obviously, you have been through a great deal,” he said, “but before we discuss it, I must urge you to take an enema.” He held a cylinder the size of my index finger. It was brown and looked as hard as a stone.

“Pardon me?”

“An enema,” he explained with great earnestness. “It is a purging of the bowels.”

“Yes, I’m familiar with the concept. But having escaped from the most dreaded prison in the kingdom, I haven’t the inclination to celebrate my freedom by shitting in your pot while you stand by, ready to examine the goods.”

“No one relishes an enema, but that is hardly the point. I’ve been doing a great deal of studying of the matter, and I have come to the conclusion that it is the best thing for you—better even than bleeding. Ideally, you would combine it with a diuretic and a purging, but I suspect you’re not quite willing to subject yourself to all three.”

“It is amazing how well our friends know us,” I observed. “You see my innermost soul as no stranger could, and you perceive that I am in no mood to shit, piss, and vomit all at once.”

He held up his hand. “Let us set the matter aside for the nonce. I have only your health in mind, you know, but I see I cannot force good medicine upon you. I suppose you shan’t object to a glass of wine, however.”

“For reasons I cannot fully articulate, that offer appeals to me more than your other.”

“There’s no need to be sour,” he said, while he poured a glass of pale red wine. As he turned to hand it to me, he seemed, for the first time, to notice my livery. “Service becomes you,” he said.

“It has proved, thus far, an adequate costume.”

“Where did you get it?”

“From Piers Rowley’s footman.”

His eyes widened. “Weaver, you didn’t go there, did you?”

I shrugged. “It seemed like the best course at the time.”

He put a hand to his face, as though I had ruined some great plan of his. He then stood up straight and breathed in deeply. “I trust you engaged in no foolish actions.”

“Of course not,” I said. “I did, however, cut off one of the judge’s ears and take four hundred of his pounds.”

Somehow, the extremity of this revelation calmed him. He cleared a pair of wine-stained breeches from a chair and sat. “You’ll have to get out of the country as quickly as possible, of course. Perhaps the United Provinces. You have a brother there, do you not? Or you could go to France.”

“I’m not leaving the country,” I said, as I lifted what appeared to be a lady’s stays from the chair nearest to me. “I’ll not run away and let the world believe me a murderer.” I tossed the article of clothing on top of the breeches and took my seat.

“What do you care what the world believes? Even if you could prove you did not kill this Yate fellow, you will still be hanged for cutting the ear off a judge of the King’s Bench and then taking four hundred pounds. The law frowns upon that sort of thing.”

“It frowns upon judicial corruption too. I am certain that once the world is made to understand that, in his corruption of his office, Rowley left me no choice, any charges against me will be dropped.”

“You’ve gone mad,” he said. “Of course the charges won’t be dropped. You can’t trample upon the law, no matter how just your motivation or logical your reasoning. There’s no fair play to be had. This is the government.”

“We shall see what I can do and what I can’t,” I said, with a confidence I did not possess.

He paused for a moment. “Four hundred pounds is a great deal of money,” he said. “Do you think you’ll need it all?”

“Elias, please.”

“Well, you do owe me thirty pounds, you know, and as you are about to be carted off to the gallows, I think it only right that I bring this up. If I am to finish this little work of fiction I’m composing, I’ll need all the help I can get.”

“Listen to me,” I said. “I can’t stay here long for I told the Riding Officers outside that I was merely here to deliver a billet-doux to your fellow lodger. I will leave now and meet you in one hour at an inn called the Turk and Sun on Charles Street. Do you know of it?”

“Yes, but I’ve never been inside.”

“Neither have I, which is why it will be a good place to meet. And make certain you are not followed.”

“How would I do that?”

“I don’t know. Call upon your writerly muse for inspiration. Take multiple hackneys, perhaps.”

“Very well,” he agreed. “The Turk and Sun in an hour.”

I stood and set my glass down on his writing table.

“How did you get out, anyhow?” he asked me.

“Did you see that woman who embraced me after sentence was pronounced?”

“Truly, I did. A fine-looking creature. Who is she?”

“I don’t know, but she pressed a lockpick into my hand.”

He raised an eyebrow. “How very good-natured of her. You don’t know who she was at all?”

“I can only guess that, following his performance, she might belong to Jonathan Wild. Only the Thieftaker General would have a stable of pick-wielding beauties at his command. However, I won’t even speculate as to why he would wish to see me free, but then I could not suppose why he would have testified so kindly on my behalf.”

“I wondered that myself. When he took the stand, I felt certain he would do all in his power to destroy a rival. He’s treated you mighty shabbily in the past, what with sending his roughs after you to knock you down and stomp upon you. And now he pretends to admire you. It is the confusingest thing in the world, but I don’t expect you care to ask him, do you?”

I laughed. “Not likely. I have no intention of showing up in his tavern while there is a bounty on my head, to ask him if, having done me one good turn, he was responsible for doing me another. Should the answer prove to be no, I would find myself in a bit of trouble.”

Elias nodded. “Even so, if he is responsible for sending that lass to you, it would behoove you to learn why.”

“I will. In the end, I’ll know.”

“As you are no longer inside Newgate, I can only suppose that you put the lockpick to good use.”

“I put it to the best use I could. I picked the locks of my chains,” I said, “tore a bar from the window, which I used to smash through the wall of a chimney I climbed. I then broke through a few more locks, made my way up a series of stairways, and smashed through a barred window and, finally, climbed down a rope made of my own clothes, leaving me naked in the street.”

He stared at me. “An hour,” he repeated, “in the Turk and Sun.”

I
had passed by this inn a hundred times and never entered, for it always looked unremarkable. This unremarkable quality, however, was now precisely what I sought. Inside, the tables were filled with nondescript men of the middling sort, with their rough wool clothes and their coarse laughter. They did what men do in such places—drank, mostly, but also ate their chops, smoked their pipes, and grabbed at the whores who drifted in, looking to earn a few shillings.

I took the most poorly lit table I could find and called for a plate of whatever was warm and a pot of ale. When a boiled fowl in raisin sauce was set before me, I dug at the bird with carnivorous ferocity until my face was slick with grease.

I suppose liveried footmen were not part of the usual patronage of the inn, and for that reason I received my share of curious glances, but I endured no more molestation than that. After I finished eating, I drank my ale and, perhaps for the first time, contemplated in all seriousness how I might go about extricating myself from this terrible situation, surely the worst I had ever faced in a life full of terrible situations. I had reached very few conclusions by the time Elias showed himself. He joined me at the table, hunching over as though afraid someone might toss an apple at his head. I called for ale, which cheered him not a little.