The Devil's Acre (28 page)

‘That Orange bastard is nothing to us, Martin,’ he’d snapped.
‘Nothing.
He ain’t got the brains, he ain’t got the heart, and he ain’t got the bleedin’ strength neither. The Molly Maguires ain’t concerned, ye hear?’

And yet now Slattery was a battered mess, one of their three Navys was lost and the Mollys were properly spooked. It was obvious that Noone had been watching them closely, probably since the ejection of Slattery and the rest from the works, following them throughout the city with a practised eye. As he’d stormed back along Piccadilly towards the circus, with Mr Quill chasing behind him calling out some more of his well-meaning words, Martin had wondered how the devil Noone had heard about baby Michael – for he surely had, with his pointed talk of infants being left for wolves and so forth. Here was the answer. The spying watchman had made it his business to learn everything about them.

Martin knew that he could never return to the Colt works now. This was a bitter realisation. Noone would be on him the instant he passed through the gates, dragging him around the yard by his hair most likely, seeking to humiliate Mr Quill with the capture of a thief whose ejection he had prevented the first time around – whose good character he had vouched for. Not, of course, that his disappearance would protect Quill at all. The watchman would enjoy making the details of Martin’s duplicity public, and would certainly stress the vital role played by the foolish, trusting chief engineer. It might even end up costing Quill his position with Colt. He would soon have very good reason to curse the name of Martin Rea.

After setting Slattery down on a pallet in the upstairs room, the Irishmen held an urgent meeting in the bar of the Holy Lamb. They agreed that the two remaining revolvers should be separated, to lessen their chance of discovery by
Colt’s men. Owen produced them; young Joe took one, saying that he would hide it in his uncle’s butcher’s shop on Golden Lane, over in the East End. He walked from the tavern and vanished without trace. Neither man nor gun was ever seen again.

They gathered in the Lamb a couple of days later. Slattery was up from his sick-bed, heavily bandaged, grey-skinned and drinking hard. He had a simple explanation for this latest setback.

‘The bugger’s fled,’ he said. ‘Pawned the weapon and used the coin to get hisself as far from London as he can. Lost his damn nerve, ain’t he, the bleedin’ coward.’

The others weren’t so sure and started to murmur uneasily, suspecting that this was more of Walter Noone’s handiwork.

‘Now yous
listen to me,’
Slattery shouted, striking the bar. ‘Yous are Molly’s lads, and you’ll do her biddin’. Lord John Russell will still die at our hands, and in the same manner as before. It can still be done.’

‘How, then?’ demanded Martin, his patience gone. ‘I’ve no place in the factory. I can’t find me sister-in-law anywhere – she sure as hell ain’t at Colt no more. How we going to get your bleedin’ guns, Slattery?’

‘Oh, we’ll get them, don’t you worry. And what’s more, we’ll give this jumped-up Yankee a bit o’ bleedin’ punishment for sending his men out after us. D’ye hear me? We’ll have our revenge on Colonel Colt for what he done. That’s right, brothers – Molly’s got us a
new plan.’

Martin glared balefully at the bar’s scratched surface. He’d come to the Lamb that night hoping to hear the scheme abandoned, and escape routes discussed; he saw now that he really should have known better. Slattery’s pride had taken as sound a beating as his body, and he was bent on a reckless gesture. It was a sure bet that this new plan would involve even more mortal danger than the first.

‘Enough,’ he announced angrily, rising from his stool. ‘I’m leaving. It’s over, Slattery. There’s nothing more that can be done here. This bastard Noone is after us, and I’ve a wife and child to consider.’

Arriving back in Soho after the unholy chaos of Bonfire Night, Martin had found Amy asleep on the floor with Katie whimpering on her breast, an empty gin-bottle at her side. He’d woken her up and told her that it was over – that the thefts had been discovered. Caroline had already done the sensible thing, he’d said, and made herself scarce; and they would be following her as soon as he’d squared things with his friends. She’d nodded blearily, worried for her sister but trusting Martin, and clearly relieved to hear that they would be departing London at last, whatever the circumstances. He’d put them both to bed, feeling a familiar queasiness at his own half-truths and omissions. At least, he’d thought, we’ll soon be free of all this.

Thady stepped forward, blocking his path to the tavern door. Martin looked around; the Mollys were drawing in, ready to stop him going. Even Jack, dear old Jack who he’d hoped might want to come with him, seemed set to wrestle him to the ground.

Grunting with discomfort, Slattery heaved his aching carcass over from the bar. ‘Then
consider them,
Martin,’ he hissed. ‘We’d certainly catch you if you tried to run out on us now. We
know
you, remember. We know the routes you’d take, the hiding places you’d pick. A woman and an infant really slow a fellow down as well. You wouldn’t stand a chance – and by the Holy Mother, there’d be bleedin’ consequences for that sort of betrayal.’ He jabbed an angry finger in Martin’s face, shaking loose the blood-encrusted dressing stuck over his nose. ‘We’ll let you go when we have our pistols and are set to knock down Lord John, and not a second before. You might not be in that Colt’s factory no longer, but there’s plenty else you can do for us.’ Slattery sucked in some air with a rasping snort and then spat a thumb-sized gobbet of blood and mucus onto the sawdust floor. ‘Your debt to Molly Maguire ain’t paid yet, pal, not by a good bleedin’ distance.’

‘Well, Mr Noone,’ Sam said, rising from his chair, ‘what d’you have to tell me? Good news, I take it? Quickly, man, I’ve got to be off.’

He looked over at the watchman. The mad mutt appeared distinctly pleased with himself; the thin little cracks of his eyes were glinting in the winter light, hard as twice-baked biscuit. Heavens, thought Sam, what mayhem and agony must he have inflicted?

‘I’ve found the thieves, Colonel. Motherfucking Gaels – that man of Ben Quill’s, the one I tried to throw out back in the spring, and a female relation of his from the packing room. There’s a gang, too, over in the Westminster rookery. Each and every one of ‘em dumb as carthorses.’

Sam scooped up his hat. ‘I don’t know about that, Mr Noone. They got a bunch of my guns out of this factory, and from right under your goddamn nose. How many was it – five? Did you get ‘em all back?’

Noone shifted his weight from foot to foot, a good deal of his satisfaction departing. ‘Three of ‘em, yes. One was disposed of by the girl from the packing room – she panicked once she realised we was on to her and got rid of it somewhere. They still have one.’ He looked over stiffly at the office’s circular window. ‘We’ll recover it soon enough.’

‘See that you do. I needn’t remind you, Mr Noone, just how important it is that this particular pistol don’t fall into the clutches of any kind of British official. All we need is
for these Irish fools to try a spot of robbery with the thing, and get caught – and we might as well pack this whole place right up and go back to Hartford.’

‘Won’t happen.’ The watchman’s head swivelled back around. There was absolute certainty in his voice; he crossed his callused hands in front of him. ‘I’ll stop these fuckers, Colonel. I’ll stop ‘em dead.’

Sam flattened his hair and fitted on the hat. ‘Don’t you go getting carried away here, Mr Noone,’ he warned. ‘These ain’t your pomo Indians, y’hear? The Colt Company don’t need the kind of attention that a massacre of Irishmen would bring. It really don’t.’

Noone didn’t like this. ‘I’ve done pretty well by you so far, ain’t I, Colonel?’ he growled. ‘Three guns back, and not so much as a whisker of the law? It’ll end the same way.’

The gun-maker sighed; their meanings were not quite the same. He considered explaining the difference to his bloodthirsty underling but decided it would only be a waste of his time. ‘You got any leads on this missing gun?’

‘The Irishmen are gathered in their slum-tavern. They’re under watch – we’ll keep picking ‘em off until we get the pistol. The packing-room girl’s slipped us for now, but we’ll track her down.’

‘What d’you know of her? Anything?’

Noone paused, raising his chin a couple of inches. ‘She was friendly with your secretary, Colonel.
Proper
friendly, if you follow me. I saw ‘em together a while back, when that Hungarian fellow visited the works. Seemed to go cold, but I reckon that could’ve just been part of the scheme.’

Sam started across the office, shaking his head. ‘Coincidence,’ he declared, ‘and that’s all. By God, Mr Lowry ain’t in on this! You’re off course there, Mr Noone – way off course. Just get me that goddamn pistol back.’

Noone eyed him inscrutably as he opened the office door. ‘Right you are, Colonel.’

Normally when Sam rejected a notion it left his head completely, jettisoned like slops from a transatlantic steamer. Not this one, though. The watchman’s comment about the secretary nagged at him all the way along the corridor, down
the staircase and out into the yard, riling him with its sheer absurdity. Noone had a determinedly suspicious way of thinking that could lead him in some truly nonsensical directions. Mr Lowry was a businessman, a professional to the bone – that was why he’d been taken on. His ultimate goal was to assume the management of Colt’s European operations. Sam was sure of it. Such a fellow would never risk all that for a few stolen guns, for a few pounds in ill-gotten profit. At a stretch, Sam could imagine him defecting to a rival, to Adams perhaps – which would make him a louse and a cocksucker and a miserable ingrate bastard – but base theft, and on such a piddling scale? It was so goddamn
unambitious.

His secretary was waiting by the side of the Colt carriage, chewing on an unlit cigar which he promptly stowed away in a pocket. Sam slowed his march across the freshly swept cobbles, studying him for a moment. Mr Lowry was no thief, of that he was certain, but he couldn’t deny the slight distraction that continued to mar the boy’s otherwise impeccable business manner. Sam had yet to uncover a satisfactory explanation for this.

‘You’ve got it all, do you, Mr Lowry?’ he called out as he approached. ‘All the figures?’

‘I have, Colonel,’ he answered smartly, lifted up the folder under his arm, ‘every piece of coal burned, every bar of steel forged, every Colt pistol made in London so far, entered and accounted for.’

‘Good work,’ said Sam – who knew very well that this was far from the case. ‘We’re ready for Mr Street’s man then, eh? Ready for the inner chambers of British government?’

As ever, the secretary made all the right sounds, professing his enthusiasm for this and his expectation of that. Sam looked at his quick, bright face, his firm jaw, his sideburns untouched by grey; and he remembered the wan, jowly reflection that had met him in his dressing-room mirror that morning, inexplicably flabbier and more lined than he felt it had any right to be. Mr Lowry turned from him to climb into the carriage, and he caught something – a misty half-smile, as if the boy had suddenly become lost in a tender
recollection. It lingered around his lips as they took their seats.

Sitting back, Sam made his assessment. ‘By Heavens, Mr Lowry,’ he pronounced, ‘I do believe you’re cunt-struck. And it’s a bad case indeed.’

Mr Lowry demurred, colouring a little. ‘I assure you, Colonel, that I am in no way, as you put it – ’

‘Let me guess,’ the gun-maker cut in. ‘She’s the daughter of some distinguished professional gentleman, well schooled, with modest accomplishments of her own – painting, perhaps, or the teaching of music or arithmetic. These are the best sort of girls for men like us, Mr Lowry. They have brains, yet they are used to the needs of a strong male character.’ Sam decided to make a personal revelation, thinking that this might induce the secretary to reveal something of his own. ‘I myself am engaged to such a woman, in fact.’

The boy stared. ‘You are
engaged,
Colonel?’

Sam nodded, having expected this reaction. The few people he’d told tended to assume that his roving life would make such a commitment impossible – not understanding the rather sedate pace of Connecticut society. ‘To Miss Elizabeth Jarvis of Middletown, and for upwards of eight years now. Her father is an Episcopalian rector, and he has developed in her a serious mind indeed. Time spent with Miss Jarvis has a positively wholesome effect on a fellow.’

Mr Lowry was smiling. ‘I’m sorry to disappoint, Colonel, but Almighty God has yet to favour me with such a salutary companion.’

Sam’s tone hardened. ‘Well, that simpering face ain’t made for no
whore,’
he said. ‘Tell me you ain’t meddling with the lower orders, Mr Lowry. Tell me you ain’t finding your fun up in my goddamn packing room or someplace.’

The smile dropped away. ‘I assure you that I am not.’

These words were delivered with the flat ring of finality; an iron gate had been shut in the path of Sam’s enquiry and bolted from the other side. That’s real resolution there, the gun-maker told himself. He ain’t saying any more on the subject. Sam looked out through the window. They were passing through the main gates onto Thames Bank, ready
to drive up the river to Parliament, and then on to St James’s Park. He glimpsed a well-dressed party clustered around a brazier – and all deliberation of Mr Lowry’s reticence ceased at once. His fingers went straight for the grooved brass bar at the top of the window pane; he wrenched it down and leaned out, treading on the secretary’s toes as he did so.

‘Why, Lady Wardell!’ he called out, as if spotting an old friend. ‘By God, ma’am, it’s been a good long while since you graced my humble establishment with your attentions! Was it the pong of the river or the call of some nobleman’s country house that caused you to abandon us? Would Christ have left off his righteous duty so easy, I wonder?’

A score of middle-aged faces turned up towards the gun-maker like a sour parody of a sunflower patch, every one of them puckered with dislike. Sam’s coachman, hearing his employer’s voice and then seeing his head and shoulders jutting from the side of the vehicle, drew it to a rapid halt, murmuring a few soothing words to the horses.

Lady Wardell herself towered above her comrades, looking really quite magnificent in her outrage, Sam had to admit. ‘We will be coming out here, Colonel, for as long as your infernal factory is producing its death-dealing instruments.’ This met with a muttered chorus of amens. ‘We have seen the revolting advertisements you have been circulating around the city. We have seen how they actively celebrate the part your guns have played in the butchery of your country’s heathen tribes – of poor, simple people who should rightly have been offered the true salvation of the Christian faith, but met with senseless murder! And we mean to put a stop to them – to
you,
Colonel Colt – once and for all!’

There were more amens, louder this time, and a fat, pasty creature behind the noblewoman started up with a bible quotation, delivered in an irritating, reedy voice – something about how evil men will soon wither away like the grass.

‘Yes, well,’ Sam interrupted, trying his best to stay civil, ‘those boards are only intended to attract private customers, of which we’ve never had more than a handful in this country, to be perfectly honest with you. Our real focus at present, ladies and gentlemen, is the upper regions of the
government. Why, I’m just on my way to see a cabinet minister right now, in fact!’

This quietened them down a bit. ‘And which minister is that, pray?’ asked Lady Wardell, her eyes cold and sharp as icicles.

Sam looked straight back at her. ‘Now
that
I’m not inclined to reveal, ma’am. Let’s just say that he falls well outside your particular sphere of influence.’ He cast a glance up at the rain-clouds that were cruising over from the east of the city. ‘You all be sure to have a pleasant afternoon out here.’

The gun-maker ordered his coachman to carry on, ducked back inside the carriage and closed the window with an emphatic
thud.

‘Jesus Christ on a donkey,’ Sam thought as Lord Palmerston walked across the hall of his mansion-house to greet him. ‘What kind of a man is this?’

Decked out in finest Harris tweed, the Home Secretary was a shade away from seventy but conducted himself in a very lively fashion, moving with a weird, mannered grace as if about to take his place in a grand dance. He wasn’t physically impressive, possessing a short stump of a torso, long, simian limbs and a rather outsized skull. His hair was neatly cut and brushed in a style too modish for one of his years, artfully arranged to hide some thinness at the temples, and copious whiskers gushed over his collar. The colouring of both was strange; brown, broadly speaking, but weak and yellowed in places. Sam suspected that dyes had been employed. His folio of portrait engravings of British political figures had led him to expect a supremely dignified statesman, radiating a diamond-hard intellect. The reality was a good deal more bizarre, but pretty daunting nonetheless; his servants stood about that marble hall at rigid, terrified attention, like men facing a firing squad.

Lord Palmerston was fond of raising his voice without warning, and at unexpected times; having roared Sam’s name, he then adopted a normal tone only to bellow out a commonplace observation about the weather a few seconds
later. The gun-maker’s equally commonplace reply caused a sudden, wild smile to grip the minister’s face, exposing a set of false teeth as ivory-white and even as the keys on a piano, and wrinkling up his eyes so tightly that they threatened to vanish altogether. And then, just as completely, the smile was gone, the nobleman’s thoughts seeming to have switched abruptly to something else. They strolled across the crimson carpet, the conversation continuing in a general vein. Palmerston asked whether the Colonel was taking full advantage of the pleasures of the season, the balls and theatres and so on – London really was at its most brilliant, he opined, during the six weeks before Parliament broke for Christmas.

‘I pursue my customers,’ Sam replied, ‘but beyond that –’

This prompted a gale of jovial laughter, terminated as swiftly as the smile, followed by an enquiry about Sam’s metropolitan residence. ‘Piccadilly, eh?’ Palmerston noted with approval once he’d received his answer. ‘It is the proper region for men of the world such as ourselves. A vivacious place – a place of possibility, of variety. I shall be up there as well before very long, out of this wretchedly dull part of town.’

And then Sam saw it. This here was a faded dandy-gentleman who, despite all his wealth and power, still fancied that he had the strut of fashion left in his warped old bones. He looked around the hall, and the corridors and stairways that led off from it, decorated in the usual overblown aristocratic style; the gilded grandeur was so rich and intense that it jaded the eye. How could a man who dismissed all this as if it were a Bowery garret possibly govern a nation of equal men? These John Bull politicians truly were a rum lot. In America they were lawyers and soldiers, professional fellows who took to the hustings to do something for their country. Over here, though, so many of the most powerful had simply been born to it. They knew nothing else. For them, the governance of millions was but an arena for petty personal contests. There was little method or principle at play, just lordly men expressing their characters, and executing their endless plots and plans against each other. It was a damnably
unpredictable system, and a difficult one indeed for even the most resourceful businessman to navigate.

Lord Palmerston led his guest through to a large smoking room at the back of the house, the walls covered with wide, vaporous landscapes. Lawrence Street was there, along with a couple of others, all of whom rose to their feet at the minister’s entrance. Street met Sam’s eye, and the coolness of his demeanour gave the gun-maker heart. Business would certainly be done that afternoon. Mr Lowry waited by the door, a dapper mouse in a lion’s den.