A Spectacle Of Corruption Part 31

I stared at him. "Your sister. How should I know?"

"Allow me to put him to the question, Mr. Dogmill," Greenbill said, taking a step forward.

Dogmill paid him no mind.

"I know who you are," he told me, through his teeth. "I took the liberty of writing to some gentlemen from Jamaica." He now held up the letters I had forged. "I have been informed that you have used the name Matthew Evans before, though it is not your true name. Instead, you are a scoundrel known as Jeremiah Baker, a confidence trickster, who has made his wretched living by abducting young ladies and then demanding money for their safe return. One of these gentlemen, upon receiving my note, rode all the way to London to warn me of you. Shortly after receiving this intelligence, I thought it wise to make certain of my sister's whereabouts, but she had not then been seen for more than a day."

I took a gla.s.s that I presumed to have been Dogmill's and emptied the contents upon the hard dirt floor. I then poured a fresh helping from the bottle and sipped from it. "You have thus saved me the trouble of informing you of the current situation. We may now agreeably come to terms."

Dogmill slammed his hand upon the table so hard I thought it should break. "There are no terms but that I shall get my sister and then I shall rip your head from your neck."

Hertcomb reached forward and put a hand on Dogmill's shoulder. "I don't know that you are giving the fellow a reason to negotiate in good faith."

"Nicely said, Hertcomb."

"Don't think to play my friend," he said petulantly. "I restrain Mr. Dogmill out of concern for his sister, not you. You betrayed my trust."

"Your trust is hardly so precious a thing that one need treat it with care," I answered.

Hertcomb opened his mouth but said nothing. I thought he might weep, and I confess I felt some remorse at having spoken to him so, but I played a part, and I would play it to the end.

Dogmill took a deep breath and turned to me. "You had better understand, Baker, that you have chosen to cross the wrong man."

"This," I asked, "is your idea of negotiating in good faith?"

"It is," he said, "for I tell you the truth. You shan't get a penny from me. Not a farthing. I will not endure that a fellow of the lowest sort like you should force me to pay to see my own sister returned. Instead, I shall offer you something else. If you send my sister back unscathed, I will give you a single day before beginning my pursuit of you. In that time, if you are wise, you can get yourself gone and from my grasp, for if I do catch hold of you, I will rend you to pieces. That is the best offer I can propose."

I shook my head. "I must tell you, it is not what I had in mind when I took your pretty sister, tied her hands behind her back, and shoved a rag in her mouth."

Greenbill, standing behind his master, suppressed a grin. Regardless of his loyalties, he liked a good bit of violence against a young woman when he could have it.

I thought that Hertcomb would be called on once more to restrain his friend, but Dogmill did not move. "You may have thought to gain something else, but you shan't. You must now decide if you wish to sacrifice your life along with your hopes of wealth."

"Most men," I said, "are willing to part with a few pounds if it will save the life of a person they love. And it is you who are threatened here, not me. It is time you recognized that."

"You think I have nothing more to show for myself than bl.u.s.ter?" he asked. "You've tasted a small portion of my wrath, you may recall. But I have more than that." He turned to Hertcomb. "Have Mr. Gregor walk in."

Hertcomb rose and disappeared for a moment, only to return with a tall thin gentleman in tow. He smiled at me and took a seat.

"You know this gentleman, I believe?" Dogmill said.

"I do," I answered, for the gentleman in question was Elias Gordon.

"Mr. Gregor here is willing to swear out an arrest warrant for the theft of some notes you took from his home in Jamaica. So you see, you are very much in my power."

"Would you do what he threatens, Mr. Gregor?"

Elias was nervous, but he appeared to be enjoying himself. There was something of the dramatic in this performance, and he could not help but indulge. "I think you know quite well what I am willing to do," he said.

I did know, for he had already done it. He had convinced Dogmill of the urgency of the danger against Grace. I had wanted the matter resolved at once, and Elias had strolled into Dogmill's house to make certain this would happen.

"You see, you have no options," Dogmill said. "You must do what I tell you, or you will be destroyed."

"Well," I said, "as that is the case, we may yet work for ourselves a compromise. I am willing to forgo any demands of wealth, given the dire nature of my situation. What say you to exchanging your sister for some mere information. Does that trouble you so much?"

He blinked a few times as he attempted to make sense of my proposal. "What information?" he demanded.

"Information regarding Walter Yate," I said.

Here Greenbill turned flush and something I could not quite identify flashed across Dogmill's face. "What should I know of it?"

I shrugged. "Something, I hope, if you wish to see your sister again."

"Why is this important to you?" he demanded.

"Idle curiosity," I said, taking a sip of wine. "If you tell me why you had him killed, and a few other details, I shall free your sister. It is as simple as that."

"I had him killed?" Dogmill repeated. "You must be mad."

"Perhaps I must." I finished my wine and set down the goblet. "I shall be off, then. You may leave a note here in the next forty-eight hours if you should happen to change your mind. If not, you can depend upon never seeing Miss Dogmill again." With that I rose to my feet and began toward the door.

Greenbill now walked over to block my way.

"I shall not let you leave," Dogmill said to me. "I cannot endure that my sister is in your hands, and you shan't leave here without telling me where she is. You may speak of all the forty-eight hours you like, but one way or another, sir, this will end tonight."

I smiled at him, a pitying sort of smile. "Do not make the mistake of thinking that I work alone. Mr. Gregor can attest to my cleverness, I believe."

"He is remarkable clever," Elias said. "You had better hear him out."

Dogmill glared at him but turned back to me. He bit his lip while he attempted to think of what he could say to make me remain in this room on his terms rather than mine, but in the end he came up with nothing. Thus far, my plan continued to work.

"Speak your wretched proposal," he said at last, "and hope it saves your life."

"Very generous. Now, you must know that if I do not return to my set meeting place at a given time, my a.s.sociates have instructions to move Miss Dogmill to a location they have not told me of. If they do not hear from me in one day, they are to remove Miss Dogmill from the miseries of this world. You may, therefore, threaten to torment me until I reveal what you want to know, but I believe myself strong enough to last until the first time of crisis that I mentioned, and once that time has pa.s.sed, you will never be able to find your sister again unless I am at liberty and wish for you to find her. So I tell you, sir, get your dog from my path. Either treat me like a man now or be resolved to do so another day, but I shan't endure this bullying."

Greenbill stared at me, and Dogmill at Hertcomb. Hertcomb stared at his shoes.

Finally, Dogmill let out a sigh. "d.a.m.n you, you rogue. I shall tell you what you want, but you must know that it can do you no good. If you wish to use this information against me, it will be worth nothing, for the testimony of a single witness has no weight in court, and the testimony of a man such as you is worth less than nothing."

"Perhaps," I said, resuming my seat, "but that is my concern and none of yours. I only wish to hear what you have to say for yourself in the matter regarding Walter Yate. You have my word that if you speak to me openly and honestly, you will see your sister's safe return this night."

At long last, Dogmill took a seat at the table, and Hertcomb sheepishly joined him. Greenbill, for his part, remained at the door, looking very much like a goose awaiting the season of the Christian nativity.

"You had Walter Yate murdered by your friend Billy, here," I began. "Is that not so?"

Dogmill smiled thinly. "Wherever did you get such an idea?"

I returned the smile. "From Billy. A few nights past, I knocked him down, affected an Irish accent, and asked him a question or two. He was most accommodating."

"I don't care what this blackguard says," Hertcomb interjected. "You may depend that gentlemen do not engage in murder and deception. That is the province of the likes of you."

"If you are so troubled, Hertcomb, I will tell you that I am sorry I wounded your tender heart," I said, "but your heart has nothing to do with this. Gentlemen are much more brutish creatures than you would allow."

Dogmill, for his part, was glaring at Greenbill. I could see what happened inside his churning Whig mind. Why had Greenbill not confessed this mysterious nocturnal interrogation? That he had not done so had put Dogmill at risk, and I could not but doubt that he would, in exchange, provide Billy with very little shelter.

"I don't know what this rough told you, but you may depend that he had very little to do with Yate's demise. It is true that he had been causing difficulties for me, but I only asked that Billy silence him. I never specified how that might happen."

"Surely you must have known that murder might be one method used."

"I never thought about it. I neither knew nor cared, and frankly I still don't. I cannot say why you do."

"I have my reasons, I promise you. Do you mean to tell me that Billy never once spoke of his dealings to you?"

"We spoke of it. What is it to you? Do you think to confuse the world with these tales that no one will believe? Do you think that if you cannot extort me into paying for my sister's safety you can do so in order to protect me from scandal? You know me not at all if you think that."

"I know you as well as I care to," I said. "I only want now to know your motivations. Why did you have Yate killed?"

"I asked Greenbill to remove Yate from my sight," he corrected, "because the fellow was a nuisance and a troublemaker. He and his labor combination with its communist notions was too great a danger to my business."

"Come, now. Was there not some matter of Yate's knowing of the existence of a Jacobite spy among the Whigs?"

For once, I believe I had truly unbalanced Dogmill. "Where did you hear that?"

"Your problem, Dogmill, is that you have no regard for laboring men. You think them no more than beasts to be driven and tormented and consumed. But unlike beasts, these men have the gift of speech, and they talk freely. By listening to them one can learn a great deal."

"Perhaps it is so, but I shan't listen to leveling cant from an abductor of women."

"I prefer to think of myself as a redistributor of wealth," I said, thoroughly enjoying this role I had adopted. "But you have evaded the question. Did you believe that Yate knew of a Jacobite spy?"

"He came to me and told me that he knew of one, and he wanted money from me in exchange for revealing the name. In other words, he was but a vile extorter, much like yourself."

"And did you come to terms with Mr. Yate?"

"Of course not. I do not deal with men who resort to extortion."

"No? Not even when they are your own men? Did you not have Mr. Greenbill here send threatening notes to a priest named Ufford?"

Dogmill and Greenbill exchanged looks.

"You are mightily well informed," Dogmill told me, "though I cannot imagine what this information will do for you. I had him send a note or two to the meddling Jacobite priest. What of it?"

"As to that, you need not concern yourself. But let us return to the matter of the Whig conspirator. You were content that you should never learn his ident.i.ty?"

"I did not believe that Yate knew anything. He only wished to squeeze some money from me."

"But you had him killed regardless."

"This is but a matter of semantics. If I send a man out to fetch me a new snuffbox, would you call me to account if the man knocked down an innocent to steal what I had sent him to buy? Now, you've asked me your questions, so let me ask mine. When shall I see my sister?"

I said nothing.

He stepped forward. "Listen to me. I have indulged you; now you will tell me what I I want to know. When shall I see my sister?" want to know. When shall I see my sister?"

I must have waited too long to answer, because he slammed his palm down on the table. "I have had enough of this," he said. "If you think I shall simply let you walk out of here in the hopes that you return my sister unharmed, you are sadly mistaken. I thought to beat the information out of you, but I cannot risk anything so bold, so we shall instead take a ride to the magistrate's office. You'll soon find you have little to gain by remaining quiet."

"Perhaps," I said merrily. "But on what charges shall you bring me to the magistrate? You cannot prove that I have done anything with your sister."

"I have these letters," Dogmill said, slamming them down on the table.

I felt that the moment to reveal all was now at hand. "Those letters reveal both less and more than you have realized." I picked them up and held them out to Dogmill. "Examine them once more, if you please. I hope that if you look at all four at once, you will notice something you have not before observed."

Dogmill looked at them and then Hertcomb. Both shook their heads. They saw nothing.

"Perhaps I did a better job than I realized," I said. "Look at the hand."

And then Dogmill's eyes went large. He moved from one sheet to the next, until he had examined all four letters. "They are written in the same hand. It is disguised in each, but it is the same hand."

"In truth," I said, "I wrote those letters. They are a fabrication. The gentlemen you contacted never received your messages."

"You speak nonsense," Dogmill stammered. "Mr. Gregor here can testify to that."

Elias rose and walked over to where I stood-no doubt so that he would stand less of a chance of being pummeled by Dogmill.

"Mr. Gregor," he explained, "is also not what he seems, and is here to bear witness to something far different. So, you see, we have two men now to testify to what has been said. Your case is much harder than you've suspected."

I grinned at Dogmill. "Your lovely sister was kind enough to provide me with the notes you wrote to your Jamaica acquaintances, and my friend Mr. Gordon was good enough to impersonate a Jamaican you have never met in the flesh. Of course, Miss Dogmill is unharmed and was never in any danger. She is not my victim but my confederate. I asked her to remain hidden for a few days, that I might be able better to perpetrate this fraud. You will find her with her cousin on Southampton Row. You may rest a.s.sured that she removed herself there voluntarily and without duress. Her sole aim was to a.s.sist me in my plans."

"And why should she do so?"

"Because she is fond of me," I said.

"She is fond of an impostor, though I have no idea who you be in truth. A Jacobite spy? The one they call Johnson?"

I laughed. "Nothing so remarkable, I a.s.sure you."

"Then say who you are and speak what you want. I grow tired of this masquerade."

I then leaned forward slightly, removed my hat, and plucked off my wig, allowing my natural hair to fall back behind me. "You used your influence to see me wrongly convicted. I will now ask that you use your influence to have that conviction overturned."

It was Greenbill who recognized me. "I thought I knowed you from somewhere," he said. "It's Weaver."

Dogmill's jaw dropped. "Weaver," he repeated. "Under our nose all this time." He now looked at Greenbill and back at me. And he smiled. "Well, you've got yourself a bit of a problem, Weaver. You see, if it's evidence exonerating you that you sought, you are a man short, for you cannot stand witness in charges leveled against you. Your friend's testimony in this matter won't serve you much good if he cannot corroborate it. Your voice will count for nothing, as you are implicated in these matters, so you might as well have remained hidden and far from me. I think I shall resolve this evening by bringing you to a magistrate, collecting a nice bounty, and forgetting about you. My sister might have been beguiled by you, but her sympathy won't save you from the hangman."

It was then that the door opened, and, as per our arrangement, Abraham Mendes walked in. He had no weapons drawn, but there were pistols visible in his pockets. He meant to make an impressive entrance, and with his bulky form and ugly scowl he did just that.

"No," said Mendes, "but my oath will. I heard all that was said, and I'm afraid you've got some difficulties now, Dogmill, for you've two men who will substantiate Weaver's claims, and all the Whiggish courts in the world can't deny justice now."

I could not restrain a simper. "Your position is not so strong as you once thought."