Riot Most Uncouth (18 page)

“Do you intend to threaten me again, here upon the public street?” Burke asked. “I see you are without your bear today.”

He thought, perhaps, it was safer to confront me in the street than it had been in my residence, but Burke didn't know that, while my protestations of grief over Felicity Whippleby's death had been a convenient excuse to avoid dealing with him, I was truly anguished about the loss of Violet Tower. Burke didn't know that the bear was tame, whereas I was the danger.

“Why are you still in Cambridge?” I asked him, squeezing my right fist until the knuckles turned white, while adjusting my gun-belt with my left hand. “I told you that Mr. Hanson, in London, is the gentleman you need to speak to regarding any legal matters.”

His Adam's apple seemed to recede slightly into his neck as his jaw clenched. “If I was satisfied to get run around by your lawyer, I would never have made the trip. In any case, you made the deal with Lafitte without consulting counsel, so I don't see why you need a lawyer to correct these defects.”

“Well, first of all, I ought not concede that there are any defects in the agreement until my counsel has reviewed your allegations. And, second, if there are any defects, they are only innocent mistakes, consequences of M. Lafitte's incompetence as a banker, and perhaps attributable, in some small measure, to my own youthful inexperience in the norms of business.”

“Be serious,” said Burke. “After swindling our banker, you cannot really intend to play the naïf.”

“You just accused me of serious criminal fraud, and this isn't the first time you have done so. I think I should have no further dealings or conversations with you or your client without Mr. Hanson present.”

“You have our money, and are spending wantonly, by all reports. We lack proper collateral to secure our interest, due to your false representations. With each day that passes, you waste more of our funds, which we shall later be unable to recover. Only last night, I've learned, you and several dozen guests feasted on foie gras and champagne, though you'd refused to discuss business with me earlier the same day because you were overwhelmed with grief over the death of Felicity Whippleby.”

“Are you upset because I didn't invite you to the party?” I asked. “I felt the adversarial tone of our dealings might have caused tension or awkwardness in a social setting. Also, I find your company unpleasant.”

Burke leaned toward me. On the public street, without the Professor around, he was less frightened of me than he'd been the previous day in my residence. “If you need a lawyer, find one in Cambridge.”

“Absolutely not.” I would stand firm on this point. “I will not engage in dealings with you if I am to be deprived of my trusted advisor.”

“This matter needs to be resolved at once.”

I nodded. “I understand, Mr. Burke, and you can rest assured that Mr. Hanson and I will treat this with all due urgency. His practice in London is, of course, quite busy, and I am deeply engaged with my studies here in Cambridge. However, I am confident that, with some effort, we can arrange to meet together within three months, assuming your availability coincides with ours.”

Burke stared at me, aghast. I think, if I had struck him, he might have been less piqued. “In three months, you will have wasted all of my client's money,” he said. “I must have either security or repayment, and I must have it immediately.”

“Perhaps you should sue me. How much money do you think I can waste before a court rules on your petition?”

“I came here to seek your assistance in finding an amicable resolution to this problem. If proceedings become adversarial, you'll find I can be much less friendly. If we involve the courts in this matter, they'll rule for my client and order you to return the funds. If you cannot, you'll face debtors' prison.” He poked his finger at me, and I slapped it away.

“Debtors' prison? Do you think I'm stupid? I'm shielded by the privileges of nobility, and your client is a foreign concern based in a nation that is presently at war with England. Given those facts, an English court is likely to rule that the defects in the agreement absolve me of all repayment obligations.” I had no idea whether this was true, but my rage was fully stoked, and aggression seemed a necessity under the circumstances.

“Such an outcome would be unprecedented.” He stammered as he spoke and he took a step back, away from me. All at once, his rage seemed to break open, exposing the impotence behind the threatening façade. I could see the fragility of his negotiating position in his downcast eyes and in the quivering corners of his mouth. And I lost all interest in his precedents or his threats. Really, I lost interest in the insignificant personage of Frederick Burke.

“It might be unprecedented, or it might not be. I really don't know, which is why I must rely on my lawyer.”

Burke's hands clenched and unclenched. His Adam's apple seemed to crawl up and down his weird, long throat. A vein throbbed on his forehead. His whole body seemed poised for action. I wondered if he might try to hit me, or if he might flee in terror and humiliation.

He did neither; instead, he lowered his voice, nearly to a whisper. “Why on earth does a man of high birth defraud a bank? Why did you need the money so badly? Did you spend it on anything but women and drink?”

“I am not going to speak to you anymore without my lawyer.”

“I've learned about you, Lord Byron, in performing my due diligence; my preparation to handle this matter. You delight in flouting rules and systems. You have treated your corrupt and dishonest dealings with Banque Crédit Française as a kind of game. You twist the rules of the College by keeping that awful bear. Even men who number you among their friends would not trust you alone with their daughters or wives. Nor with their sons, for that matter.”

“I don't need your scolding, Mr. Burke. If we have business to conduct, you may contact Mr. Hanson.”

Burke ignored me and continued speaking. His voice grew even softer, but the cords of his neck were tight with rage, constricting his Adam's apple so tightly, I thought his throat might burst. “You avail yourself unashamedly of all the advantages that come with your inherited title. Yet you defy the very strictures and norms that have elevated you to your position of privilege. Why should you be celebrated for your knavishness? Why should your wrongs go unpunished?”

I turned and walked away from Burke in a crisp imitation of Archibald Knifing's military gait. I'd actually been somewhat worried about what he might able to do, but it was now clear that he was entirely helpless. I would not be subjected to the indignities my father had suffered at the hands of his creditors. I was a baron, while Mad Jack had only been the nephew of one.

 

Chapter 23

And, after all, what is a lie? 'Tis but

The truth in masquerade; and I defy

Historians, heroes, lawyers, priests, to put

A fact without some leaven of a lie.

The very shadow of true Truth would shut

Up annals, revelations, poesy,

And prophecy—except it should be dated

Some years before the incidents related.

—
Lord Byron,
Don Juan,
canto 11

To tell a lie is the most unnatural thing in the world. It's a contravention of human nature, a violation of the social contract. Most people can't do it, or at least they can't do it well. Language fails them when they try. Their twitchy eyes betray them. Their hands sweat. There aren't many people who can maintain a steady gaze and an authoritative tone while telling a lie.

I can. I've had a lot of practice.

For as long as I can remember, I've had a secret ritual, one I have concealed from even my mother, Joe Murray, and the Professor.

Late at night, while everyone else sleeps, I sit in front of a mirror, and I lie to myself.

“Your father loves you,” I say. “He would never abandon you.”

A gifted liar believes every word he says, even though he knows his statements misrepresent the facts. Such is his faith in his own narrative that he believes he can remake the world through the exercise of charisma, persuasion, and sheer force of will. Only falsehood can reconcile the world as it exists with the world as it should be. Or, at least, if there's another way, it requires a great deal more effort.

Alone, in my darkened bedroom, I stare into my own reflected visage and try not to blink.

“He is away, in the East. He has traveled beyond the horizon, beyond the sunrise, in search of secrets.”

If there is doubt in my voice, I reproach myself for my faithlessness. How dare I slander the father who loves me so much that he has gone questing, like Odysseus, through the savage places of the world so that he may bring back the secret of immortality?

In any case, he had to leave; he was in my way. If he'd stayed, he'd be Lord Byron, and thus, he'd be keeping me from my special destiny. He forsook his own birthright, such was his love for me.

A lie is like a seduction, and the skillful liar knows a falsehood's recipient is a co-conspirator rather than a victim. If the lie is framed in a way that makes the listener want to believe it, he becomes a willing party to his own deception.

That's why I don't ask myself how Mad Jack knew that William's heirs would predecease him. I don't want to think about that. I don't want to examine the lie too closely. My rise was no accident; it was all designed, by Providence and by Mad Jack, my ever-vigilant benefactor.

To write a poem, it is said, is to tell the truth; poetry is worthless dross if it is not true. But the truth of poetry isn't the truth of the world observed. Poetic truth is the truth of the world imagined; a truth made true by artistry and artifice and the sheer certainty of the writer and his reader that the world can be this way, and that, if it can be this way, it must be this way.

So I sit in front of the mirror.

My hand is steady. My eye is steady.

My cup is full, and then empty, and then full again.

And I say to myself: “Your father is not dead. He cannot be dead.

“He searches, in the East, for the secret of eternal persistence.

“You are loved.

“Your father loves you. Your mother loves you. Your friends love you.

“You will never be alone.

“You are a special boy, meant for a special destiny.

“Death is not an inevitability. Where others falter and cease, you will endure.

“Empires will rise and fall, and cities will crumble to dust, and you will persist, unchanging, drinking and dancing and making love.

“Forever.”

My hand is steady. My eyes do not falter. I sit in front of the mirror and I lie to myself.

My cup is full, and then empty, and then full again.

And I believe every word I say.

 

Chapter 24

But 'midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of men,

To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess,

And roam along, the world's tired denizen,

With none who bless us, none whom we can bless;

Minions of splendour shrinking from distress!

—
Lord Byron,
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage,
canto 2

Upon my return to the campus, I found the lawn at the center of the Great Court crowded with students. Old Beardy, the professor who was so concerned with my growth as a man, was speaking from a makeshift dais.

“The College has been beset by senseless tragedy,” he was saying. “We have lost two beloved members of our faculty. This happened without warning, for no very good reason.”

Of course, if there had been any response from the College to the murder of Felicity Whippleby, perhaps these killings might have been avoided. Perhaps, had Cambridge been alarmed after the first murder, volunteers could have patrolled the streets and kept the killer at bay. Violet Tower's maid might have been properly warned of the danger, and she would not have opened the door when the killer knocked.

But warnings probably would have done no good; Joe Murray had admitted three strangers to my quarters since Felicity's death; Frederick Burke, Archibald Knifing, and Fielding Dingle. He also let Leif Sedgewyck into the party. I would have to give him a stern lecture and, perhaps, dock his wages. I could not have him subjecting me to unreasonable risks as a result of his genial and trusting nature. But even I had not previously thought to warn him of this.

“It is the role of the academy to serve as a beacon of civilization in a world predominated by cruelty and brutishness, so this kind of disruption cuts to the quick in a place like Cambridge,” Beardy said. He was impressive as a speaker. His voice swelled to a volume that overwhelmed the noise coming from the restive and nervous crowd, and his even, commanding tone seemed to calm the students. Though his esteemed colleagues were being torn to pieces in the streets, the men of Cambridge could not imagine a world where Beardy's authority was anything but absolute.

“We live in a nation in which there are vast inequalities of means among the elites and ordinary folk. All of us are the beneficiaries of these imbalances, at least to some extent, and in many cases, to a great extent.” Here, he paused. Nobody laughed, so he continued: “But the desperation of the underclass produces ill effects that will bring sorrow and suffering to the more fortunate. A man who cannot buy bread will kill a well-dressed stranger for the coins in his purse. Every day, men and boys die in coal mines, crushed beneath the earth or asphyxiated by toxic fumes. Every day, women and children are mangled in textile factories. If the poor are desperate enough to do these things to themselves, think of what they'd do to us, given a chance. As long as we live in close proximity to the hungry and the hopeless, as long as we allow untreated lunatics to roam the streets, our walls will never be high enough, our locks will never be sturdy enough, and our guns will never have enough bullets to keep us safe.”