Death of a Fop (Bow Street Consultant series Book 1) (19 page)

“Jane-girl, I’m a tolerable shot; it will not come to that” said Caleb gently. “My barking-iron suffered a flash in the pan that terrible night; I hurled it at the one Fowler shot and wrestled with the other for want of anything better to do. When my ball discharges I may expect to be as accurate as any man living that does not make a living duelling. I will kill any man who tries to carry off Frances to indentured slavery or any such fate.”

“You are very good” said Jane softly; reaching out a hand to lay on his good arm. He smiled at her and the world stood still for a moment that was also an eternity.

The locksmith must be paid however, and meals ordered and all the other little tasks to oversee in a busy household; and if Jane busied herself with more minutiae than she required it was as much to prevent her heart hammering in fear over what might happen at the hands of the Jeweller as to ignore its hammering over the close proximity of Caleb Armitage.

She could not communicate her fears to Miss Bates who stood in the place of a mother to her; for the good woman would be quite paralysed with fear if Jane told her but a tenth of all that she herself feared and imagined; nor might she speak to Dorothy, who was turning out a biddable girl but not long in understanding and just pleased that her own nasty burns were healing well and that she was somewhere safe. Whether or not it was safe, Jane could not guess; what she had heard on the subject of what Caleb called ‘cracking a crib’ suggested that no house, hall or palace in the land might be said to be truly impervious to penetration from the cleverest of crooks.

It was almost in relief that Fowler came respectfully into the parlour to tell her that a Dutch gentleman wished to see her and that he waited in the book room.

“My dear Mrs Churchill!” Poul de Vries attempted a smile. Jane considered it about as friendly as the grin of the crocodile that was held in the menagerie at the Tower of London. The possessor of the smile was doubtless about as genial and safe to handle as the crocodile too.

“Excuse me; do I know you?” Jane let her eyes be limpid pools and smiled in a tentative and fluttery sort of way.

“Why yes, Mrs Churchill; you bought a piece of mourning jewellery from me” said Mr De Vries.

Jane made a moue.

“What you are come to tell me that it was on display by mistake, that it was already ordered for somebody else?” she said. “I really do not think that I am wishful to hear such excuses.”

“Oh no my good lady; not at all,” said de Vries, “I merely mentioned that as I hoped to jog your memory concerning my identity. No, it is that I am wishful to purchase from you a piece of jewellery that your husband had in his possession; I suspect it may have been intended as a gift for you when he believed it real…. A trumpery piece of paste which he passed on to a young woman of his acquaintance…. But I know someone who would like to buy such a piece of well made paste in case of highway robbery….. there are so many violent thieves about these days, one hardly knows where one might be safe.”

Jane hid a shudder; that was a threat. Really she should be almost thankful that the tedious days pretending with Frank in Highbury had prepared her to hide her true feelings and present a bland and slightly puzzled countenance to this horrid man.

“Paste? Jewellery? Oh, Dolly did mention that she had been given a necklace; unfortunately my husband was very good about buying gifts but less good about paying bills; she pawned it, for colourless stones were not to her taste in any case” said Jane in a careless voice.

The sight of him changing colour to purple and then white was quite priceless.

“She – she has
pawned
it?” he looked ghastly “But – but – where? Which pawnbroker?”

“La, I have no idea,” said Jane, “and I doubt she has either; the girl is quite half-witted, I felt I had to take her under my protection; I expect she has already spent the whole five pounds she got for it; and it is as well if she has forgotten, for if the pawnbroker finds out it was paste and she has cheated him I should think he will be cross as crabs. I am sorry; but if you are a jeweller, then making paste pieces is easy enough for you is it not?” she smiled brightly.

“F-five pounds? That stupid girl got rid of it for
FIVE POUNDS
?” he cried.

“Outrageous, is it not?” said Jane. “But perhaps he was sorry for her. I only hope he does not come looking for her to complain. I am sure though that she cannot have been stupid enough to have mentioned my late husband’s name to him that he come here; she prattles artlessly in her odd argot, but nobody would bother to listen, even if she was indiscreet. But anyway, I am sorry that I cannot help you; the necklace is long gone. Are you all right? Do you require a doctor? For you look most unwell…..”

“I am perfectly well” snapped De Vries. “Thank you; I can see myself out.”

“Oh Fowler will not mind” said Jane knowing that Fowler was waiting.

De Vries exited all but spluttering.

Jane smiled to herself. Two men she disliked that she had brought close to apoplexy in as many days; really there was an intoxicating quality to this.

Caleb entered the bookroom through the door that communicated with the parlour.

“That was a clever play,” he said, “though I fancy he will work out that it was a play.”

“But the necklace is not here; that was no less than the truth” said Jane. “Did I do wrong to divert his suspicions from the household? I fear his attacks on Frances or Aunt Hetty or Dorothy. I thought if you wanted him confessed it might do to go to his shop and tell him that I have obtained the necklace back and ask him if he had lost it and if he will make me an offer…. In light of my husband’s allowance dying with him. And be on hand to arrest him when he identifies it if I might borrow it to that end.”

“I fancy that the Duchess of Avon will not let it out of her sight again” said Caleb dryly. “I do not know that I can let you risk yourself in a spot of ladylike blackmail however; he might seize you and threaten your person,” he frowned, “and I suspect that he will decide that if Dorothy
had
mentioned your name, that meant that you, and Dorothy and all your household were a risk….. first he will send agents to every pawnbroker in Pimlico and around. That will take some of his time and energy….. then I fancy he will send in agents to murder every one. It has not taken the risk away but has bought some time. Fowler shall run errands; I have a few of the First Regiment of Foot Guards – they are the Grenadier Guards since Waterloo – who owe me the odd favour, who would quietly join the household for a day or two for a bit of milling.”

“Poor Mrs Ketch!” said Jane, “she will be most put out! Still, better put out than dead.”

“Quite so” said Caleb. “I have friends enough who will not let anything happen to you or your household; I can arrange to protect Frances.”

“And let us now go and spend some time with her; I have had enough of villains and I want to hold my daughter” said Jane.

As he appeared to be invited to go along, Caleb was nothing loath to join in the exercise of entertaining Frances, who had taken to him; and Jane was entertained too by the sight of the tall figure of the Bow Street Runner on his hands and knees being a horse neighing and pawing the ground and doing his best to canter for his passenger.

Jane smiled.
What
a good father he would make!

It were best perhaps not to even think along such lines, she told herself severely. Not at least for the time being.

Three slightly disreputable men drifted down into the area and were duly presented to Jane and bowed awkwardly assuring her that they would remain perfectly invisible and do their best to help with any heavy work Mr Fowler and Mrs Ketch set them. One was wearing an eye patch, another held his arm a little stiffly and the third seemed to be simple. Jane asked Caleb about them.

“Plenty were demobbed after the war that can get no honest work,” he said, “a few days with food and a roof over their heads will suit these boys fine in return for guarding the house.”

“Why I must pay them too, to be sure” said Jane. “I would not think of anything else; we shall have to see about what may be done for them for a longer period; is it because they were wounded that they cannot get jobs?”

“Partly, ma’am; partly that there are not enough jobs to be had. Mechanisation has taken many jobs, and those now released from the wars have no jobs to go to, and desperate poor because of these Corn Laws that set the price of bread so high; those with pitiable wounds like peg legs can often make their way by begging. Which leads to soldier-mawnds, beggars that pretend wounds for sympathy, giving a bad name to the many who really have lost legs and the like.”

“How could you pretend to have lost a leg?” said Jane, bewildered “Is it not a little obvious?”

“Bless you for an innocent, my dear Mrs Jane….that is what they call you in the servant’s hall, so I am not too free to use that…. “ he said, giving her a half shy, half defiant look. “They do it by strapping the leg up, bent at the knee and seemingly lost from the knee down; some will wear a stump and others push themselves around in a cart as many genuine legless beggars do; and some of those will too wear clymes, false sores made by bruising crows-foot, spearwort and salt and binding it to the skin to make an angry looking but not too painful sore; they may pick at it and use powdered arsenic on it to make it look worse. If they can seem more injured they get more from sympathetic coves, or more often the morts.”

“Dear me!” said Jane, “there is a lot more to beggars than I had realised; I may have to peer more closely before I give to any.”

“It will make you no friends with the canting crew though it will earn you their grudging respect,” said Caleb, “but genuine beggars will love you for your discernment. I keep in touch with beggars, genuine ones; vail them well and they are my eyes; one of the messages Fowler ran for me was to ask a couple of beggars to shift their patch to keep an eye on Poul de Vries. Nice that we
were
correct in our determination of which one it was!”

“Well once that apprentice called him Mynheer DE Vries, so we had the initials PDV,
and
he twitted me about not being able to wear diamonds or other stones, so it did seem obvious” said Jane. “Catching him out will be the thing. Well, if there is a reward from Lloyds of London, that may help me to find permanent positions for these three friends of yours, even with Frank’s debts to sort out. And they too might run errands and be your eyes on a salary from me; if that would not dent your pride.”

“To be honest I would welcome the chance to do my job better; we are underfunded and undermanned” said Caleb.

“Have you been talking with Fowler’s stone in your mouth?” asked Jane “You are being all refined today, save your canting words.”

He grinned sheepishly.

“Mrs Jane Churchill should have a man whom she can introduce to her gentry friends and not be ashamed of his speech; it may take me the whole year but I am determined that none shall have cause to complain.”

“You know that I am indifferent to such outward signs” said Jane.

“Yes ma’am; but many are not; and would see it as a reflection on you. Besides, I will also get the swell jobs which means in general a higher reward; which makes me more able to hold up my head to you. I know it does not matter to you; I cannot help it mattering somewhat to me” he said.

She nodded.

“It could not be otherwise with a proud man. Frank would hang happily on the sleeve of a wealthier wife; but he was weak. You are not weak in any wise” and she blushed scarlet. “It may be that when I remarry, my allowance from Mr Churchill will be cut; or at least reduced. I plan to lay aside what I may, and so put that into the funds to give an income for the future.”

“You are wise Mrs Jane; and I will in that case definitely advise moving to a smaller house and letting this one; that way you may have both income from it and hold property.”

“I do hate money,” admitted Jane, “or rather I hate having to consider every farthing and how to best use it. Still, I am far better off than many and should not complain. And relative penury with love and happiness would still be an improvement on the sham of high society I lived with Frank. And if it should come to it, I have lived in relative penury with my aunt and grandmother; I am not some useless woman who does not know how to manage a household.”

“My dear, that I had already realised; and we were not going to discuss economics!” said Caleb. “Let me tell you more about Will, Jackie and Daniel.”

“I should like that” said Jane. “I expect each of them has something of a history!”

“Yes and I don’t say I know it all either” said Caleb. “Will was a weaver; decided joining up was better than dying of weaver’s lung. As you see he’s not a big man though he’s tall and lanky; bending over the looms must have hurt something cruel and contributed to his decision.

Tall is good for a Foot Guard; so he did well, lost his eye in the last half hour of Waterloo, which is cruel bad luck. A spent ball lodged in it; one of those unlucky accidents. Jackie, who may be muscular but isn’t tall got in by blague and a big personality; he’ll do most of the talking for them. London boy; not as low class as me, he’s the son of a fishmonger down Billingsgate. One of the other men in his company used to call him ‘The Fish’ until Jackie lost his temper – he had had words before but you can drive a man too far – and he picked this other fellow up bodily and dumped him in the river, and held him under long enough to start worrying; and asked him ‘who’s the fish?’. I was a corporal then; I confess I turned a blind eye to the business. When there’s hazing, the men do best to sort it out for themselves. Jackie took a bullet much the same way I did the other night; only he didn’t have so fine care as me, and that took infection. We cut it to let the poison out, but seemingly it never quite healed right. He reckons we saved the arm cutting the poison out, and when it’s better weather he can use it more; and he can use it, it’s just a little stiff and clumsy. He guts fish for his pa when he can’t get other work but he hates it. Never eats fish if he can avoid it! Daniel, he’s from Essex; a bit slow he was to start off with, which he got teased was for being a country boy; he was right by an artillery piece when it went off premature; got knocked right over and his ears bled. He was deaf for weeks, though it comed back to him. Only we don’t rightly know if he’s still a bit deaf or if the concussion of the blast knocked him sillier; he don’t always seem to mind what you say the first time, and if that’s account that he don’t hear or don’t understand I don’t know nowise; and he never was smart enough to understand to answer if he was asked. Jackie looks out for him; gets him work carrying boxes of fish. He’s strong is Daniel; and as gentle as any unless people he counts friends are in danger. Best thing for our Daniel is to put him under Annie’s orders to guard the babby; he’ll understand that. Nobody won’t hurt Frances with Daniel on guard.”