Keeping Bad Company (15 page)

‘Not necessarily.'

That was all her voice said, but her eyes were looking into his, so close that he could feel her breath on his face, and what her great dark eyes said was something else altogether.

Once in his life, every man should be in love and plotting a palace coup. An eagle must feel like that, high up above the mountains with senses that can pick out the shift of a single pebble on a scree slope. I spoke my words in some receptive ears. They sounded good sense to me and seemed to make sense to others. I became more sociable with my own kind, even seeking out the company of my old friends, The Soldier and The Merchant. Of course, I said nothing to them about the plot, but from the occasional remark they let out, I could tell that the princess had been doing her work well. She kept mostly to her own wing and did not come out in society much, but everybody seemed impressed by her. One night The Soldier remarked that it was a pity her brother didn't have more of her intelligence and The Merchant agreed with him, adding that she seemed to have a surprisingly good grasp of business, for a woman. Later, The Griff reported to the princess.

‘You should be careful,' I told her. ‘If they think you're too clever, they won't want you.'

She only laughed, touched my neck with her light fingers in the way she had. Only much later, when it was all over, did I start wondering how The Merchant and The Soldier had developed their good opinions of her.

We failed. After all those weeks of preparation, the thing was over in a matter of hours. One damp dawn, her soldiers in their bright clothes with their pretty horses, surrounded the quarters where the British were staying, calling for independence and the princess. The officers of the Company's army didn't hesitate. They lined up their soldiers and gave the order to fire over the rebels' heads. The order was obeyed. That was all it needed. Nobody died. A couple of men were injured when bullets ricocheted. The rebels were marched away, technically under arrest. They were released later when the prince agreed to pay a fine to the Company for their extra trouble. The Griff ran to the princess.

‘I have two good horses waiting downstairs. We must hurry. No luggage.'

She looked at him, not a trace in her expression of the tension of the last few hours.

‘Hurry? Why? And where?'

‘Before the officers come to arrest you. If we get to Bombay before the news of this does, we can embark on a fast ship and be in England by the time . . .'

Her smile was tolerant, as to an excited child.

‘What would I do in England? Of course they won't arrest me.'

She was right. It was never even discussed. As far as the princess's part in the regrettable incident was mentioned at all, it was as a figurehead for overambitious officers in her brother's army. Her friend the old commander was sent into comfortable internal exile. And The Griff? He was sent back to Calcutta. No blame attached to him, at least not officially. Since the princess was not to be blamed for the incident, a Company servant could hardly be accused of conspiring with her. Still, they all knew. For the rest of his career in India, The Griff was to be kept on a short lead. No advisory missions to remote princedoms. No politics. A desk life was all he was given and – largely – all he wanted. It took him some time to recover from those few weeks of being an eagle. When he did, his consolation was his Indian studies. If he couldn't help the country, at least he could try to understand it a little.

The Princedom disappeared a few years later. Or, to put it more officially, the growing incapacity of the prince made it desirable, for administrative reasons, to amalgamate judicial and fiscal functions with those of the neighbouring principality. (That same principality, by the by, that had gone to war over a strip of useless land.) All done in a calm and gentlemanly manner, but as arrant a piece of robbery as ever committed by any highwayman on Hounslow Heath. The Company ran everything. The prince stayed in his palace, not knowing or caring. The Griff asked a man he could trust, more or less, about the princess.

‘They've given her an estate of her own with an old castle, quite comfortable, usual complement of servants, elephants, peacocks and so on. Doesn't go out and about much, I gather.'

If she'd summoned him, The Griff would have left his desk and gone, no doubt about that. But she didn't.

And the jewels went, those glittering tigers, ruby and emerald snakes, great diamonds, and to this day nobody knows where. They were not part of the Company's official booty. They never figured in the accounts in Calcutta. The prince – or more likely his Indian friends – believed they had gone to Calcutta and petitioned now and then to have them back. On one of those occasions, a worried adviser to the governor came to my desk and asked if I had any idea what had become of them. I told him, in all honesty, that I had not. By that time The Merchant was in Canton, becoming one of the biggest men in the opium trade. The Soldier had been brought low by one of those liver ailments that so often follow fevers and been invalided home to England. It remains a mystery. There is little now that can be done to put much of this right, but if the foregoing helps my countrymen to see what is being done in their names, so that at least such things may not happen in the future, then this life has not been entirely wasted. Perhaps, even now, some small part of the injustice may be put right at last. That is the devout wish of the writer who signs himself The Griff.

N
ext morning, at a quarter to midday, I waited in an alleyway opposite Robinson's printing shop at Ludgate Hill. The man had said he'd be at Robinson's for the manuscript copy on the stroke of twelve. My intention was to see him and follow him, without being seen myself. I wasn't confident. Tabby was better at this kind of thing. In her street urchin clothes she'd have loitered without being conspicuous, following him through a maze of streets like a ferret down a rabbit hole. I'd dressed as plainly as possible, but was still out of place in this commercial part of town where there weren't many women around. I'd already been pestered by two beggars, a crossing sweeper and a man handing out Biblical tracts.

A boy went into the print shop and came out loaded with papers. A flock of pigeons skirmished over oats dropped from a horse's nosebag. A dog was chased out of the bookseller's next door. The man was punctual. At one minute to twelve, a cab drew up and a middle-aged clerkly-looking man stepped out. Nobody I recognized. His face was pasty, lips pursed. He opened them just enough to issue one word to the cabby: ‘Wait.' Then he crossed the pavement and went inside the shop the instant the clocks all round began striking twelve. I knew his business wouldn't take long. There'd be an admission from Robinson that he had not recovered the manuscript then an angry exit. I turned over the waistband of my skirt, lifting the hem to ankle-height to help me walk fast. Not respectable but nor was following an unknown man. The cab looked quite new, the horse fresh and brisk. I couldn't keep up with them for long. My best hope was that they'd be delayed in the traffic, but as bad luck would have it there seemed less than usual.

Then my luck turned. Another cab came round the corner. It was old and the horse unenthusiastic, but the great thing, it was empty. I rushed out of my hiding place, hoping that the man was still giving Robinson a piece of his mind, and called up to the driver to wait.

‘Where to, ma'am?'

‘Wait until a man comes out and gets into that cab there, then follow them.'

‘Where're they going then?'

‘Not far.' (I hoped.)

I passed up half a crown into his hand to silence further questions, opened the doors at the front of the cab and settled myself in, pulling my bonnet down to shade my face and sitting well back in the seat. Almost at once the man came striding out of the print shop empty-handed, mouth clamped even more tightly. He snapped something at his driver and practically threw himself into the cab. It went off at a brisk walk, had to halt briefly at the turning into Ludgate Hill, then turned left towards the Mansion House and the commercial heart of the City. My cab got off to an annoyingly slow start but caught up at the Ludgate Hill junction, then stayed within twenty yards or so of the one in front. If the angry gentleman had happened to look behind him, he'd see nothing suspicious about it. The City was as full of cabs as an old dog of fleas. Into Threadneedle Street, still close together. I'd hoped that the cab might confirm my suspicions by making for East India House, but instead it turned into narrow Bartholomew Lane.

Capel Court, the stock exchange, was in Bartholomew Lane. I was too occupied with watching the cab in front to wonder why that nagged at my memory. It stopped, and we stopped too, our horse's nose almost nudging the back of the man's cab. I watched as he got out and started stumping up the steps of the stock exchange then threw myself out and went to follow him.

‘Oy, ma'am, one shilling and threepence.'

My cabby's bellow from the top of his box. Over the odds, especially considering the money I'd already given him, but I didn't want to draw attention by arguing. I was uneasily conscious that I'd forgotten to turn my waist band over and lower my skirt, so my ankles were showing. Nothing to be done about that now. Reluctantly, I handed up the coins and hurried up the steps. The man had disappeared by now. A broad-shouldered doorman with a face like a section of brick wall, wearing some kind of uniform and a top hat was standing at the top of the steps. He stretched out a meaty palm.

‘Can't come in here, ma'am.'

I started saying that I only wanted to ask the identity of the man who'd just gone in. He didn't listen, just stood there repeating the same phrase. I was getting angry by then, wondering why the trading of bits of paper with numbers on them was too sacred for profane or female eyes. I might have wasted my breath in saying so, only something happened that changed the scene entirely. Some vegetable – I think it might have been a rotten turnip – came like comet out of nowhere and struck the doorman's hat so hard that it shot off his head and went rolling down the steps.

He stood amazed for a moment, gap-toothed mouth wide open, then yelled and ran down the steps after his hat. Jeers and laughter came from a group of ragged boys opposite. I guessed the vegetable had come from them, then glimpsed one that didn't look quite like the rest of them. The figure was slightly less ragged than the others, booted rather than barefoot, and was moving rapidly out of sight round a corner. A glimpse was enough. I knew from the way she walked, from the whole determined look of her. Tabby. There was a choice to make: run after her and find out what she was doing or use the opportunity she'd made for me. Almost without thinking about it, I did what she expected, even though it hadn't been in my mind before. While the doorman was chasing his hat and shouting threats at the urchins I walked in through the doors of Capel Court. Tabby and I were a team. Sometimes her wildness gave me a push when I needed it, just as my common-sense pulled her back from the brink of some excess. Head up, look as if you have a right to be there.

It was loud inside, like a cattle market without the cow smells. It had a smell of its own, though, that was just as animal in its way, of a lot of men at close quarters being competitive. They were all dressed in formal blacks, whites and greys and the convention of the place seemed to be that top hats remained on heads, even inside. A blue haze of cigar smoke hovered just above the top hats. They were mostly formed in loose groups of three or four but were in constant motion as men broke away from their own groups to join others, like a disorderly country dance. The room was crowded and I guessed my man must be on the outskirts of it. Almost at once, I saw him talking to a stoop-shouldered man who was standing with his back to me. He was probably reporting his failure to get the manuscript. As I came nearer, the other man snapped some remark at him and turned away, his face petulant and impatient. It was an oddly shaped face, low and broad across the forehead then curving inwards to a narrow chin above a thin stalk of neck, like an inverted pear. I'd seen that face before, several times and at close quarters. On the last occasion the expression had been worse than petulant. The man had been literally spluttering in my face with fury. I was doing something I'd hoped never to have to do in my life again – breathing the same air as my ex-client, Cyril Eckington-Smith MP. I decided to leave before he saw me so turned towards the door. But in my surprise at recognizing him, I'd hardly noticed what was happening round me. The noise of conversation was fading like a wave receding. Men were nudging each other, eyes turning in my direction. If a camel had strolled into the cattle market, the ranks of gaping farmers' faces would have looked much like these gentlemen. Naturally, Eckington-Smith turned too, to see the source of the excitement. He saw me.

By now, a tide of gentlemen was slowly advancing. I don't suppose they'd have thrown me out bodily, but I'd no intention of waiting to see. I turned and walked out, briskly but not too hurriedly. The doorkeeper, hat back on head, face shiny from anger and exertion, took a step towards me.

‘I told you, you couldn't go in there.'

‘Yes, I heard.'

I walked past him and across the road. The great thing now was to find Tabby. The urchins had run away from the doorman's wrath, but not very far. I found them loitering round the next corner, dispensed a few pennies and got some answers. Yes, they'd seen the girl before. Only in the past couple of weeks, though. She was an odd one. Sometimes she dressed and talked like them, other times she'd be dressed more like you, miss, then she'd pretend not to know them. They supposed she must be on the game, only she wasn't quite like the others. She had a good aim, for a girl.

‘Do you think she'll come back today?' I said.

A collective shrug.