The Barrister and the Letter of Marque

by Todd M Johnson

  Blind in the fog, she stopped the mare beneath some low-hanging branches to listen again. Wind passed through the trees, playing a chord of creaking wood and shivering leaves. A pheasant’s wings launched the bird toward a nearby field. Then the sound of hooves rose again, close enough to hear the other horse’s panting through the fog.

  Her chest tightening, Madeleine tugged the reins to force Gypsy off the road and down a shallow ditch, then up the far side into a stand of trees. A few feet into the woods, she reined her in and slid to the ground.

  The following hooves came abreast on the road, invisible only yards away. Their sound was passing.

  Relief seeped in.

  Then the horse and rider slowed.

  Halted.

  Madeleine stroked her mare to silence with trembling fingers. The horse on the road backed up and snorted.

  “Whoa,” a low voice came through the fog.

  Silence.

  The fog and trees shrunk around her like prison walls. The woods behind her were too thick to flee through, and only marshland lay beyond that. The road with the rider offered the sole escape.

  A long minute passed.

  The voice clucked to the horse on the road, and they began to walk away.

  Madeleine let out a long breath. She waited until the road had become deathly quiet, then reached for the cloth sack of coins in her saddlebag. Taking a handful that she slid down into the depths of the saddlebag, she knelt to scrape a hole in the damp earth, where she laid the sack with the remaining coins. Covering the hole with dirt and leaves, she took off her scarf and tied it around the nearest sapling.

  Then she stood and huddled for warmth against the mare.

  She waited what seemed an hour. When her teeth were grinding and her body shaking, she finally pulled herself stiffly into the saddle and walked Gypsy back onto the road.

  The sound of the other horse and rider had disappeared. She tried to clear her mind over her shivering. The wood where she’d hidden had to be the small thicket near the drive to the manor house grounds. Another mile or so and she’d be safely home.

  She kicked the mare into a walk.

  Half an hour passed. A small hedgerow signaling the manor drive emerged from the fog to her right. Madeleine turned her horse onto it.

  Home. A fire. Embracing her father. A bath. Her body began to relax.

  Gypsy whinnied and sidestepped with alarm. Madeleine looked up.

  Another horse and rider had appeared out of the fog ahead.

  Madeleine gasped, yanking Gypsy to a sudden stop. She peered at the figures through the wisps of gray. The man looked huge, seated calmly atop a black stallion. A scarf was drawn across his chin and mouth. A hood covered his head. One hand gripped a pistol.

  “What do you want?” Madeleine forced out.

  The man and horse stood quietly in the mist.

  “If you’ve no business with me, then get out of my way,” she commanded, her voice lifeless in the wet air.

  “Your saddlebag, miss,” the man called in a London accent. “Tie it loose and drop it to the ground.”

  Her mind and body were riven in two.

  “Were you sent by the American?” she asked.

  “American?” The man snorted. “What American? Now drop the bag to the ground as I told you.”

  She had no choice. She couldn’t reach the manor without passing within an arm’s length of a pistol shot. If she rode the other way, the race in the fog would be more dangerous than the pistol.

  Madeleine reached down to obey, untying the saddlebag and letting it slide to the ground.

  The man threw a leg back and dropped from his horse. Ambling to her side, he retrieved the bag. Reached in.

  She heard the tinkle of coins.

  The man looked up with his covered face. “Off the horse and step away, miss.”

  The wall of fog seemed to echo the man’s words.

  “You’re stealing my horse now?”

  “I said off.”

  She did as he commanded. Landing hard on cold, deadened legs, she took a step back.

  Pistol fire split the night from the far side of the horse. Gypsy reared, let out a heaving squeal, and collapsed hard and unmoving at her feet.

  Horror engulfed her. The man walked back through the eddying gray to his own horse to remount. He reined the stallion by her through the fog.

  He slowed to lean down.

  “Don’t be hanging about the Inns of Court looking for any more barristers, miss,” he said through his mask. “And you’d best be leaving that ship in London for your betters to sort out. Or next time that’ll surely be you.”

  8

  NEWGATE PRISON

  Heavy drizzle drained the sky as Edmund strode busy streets beneath his umbrella.

  The darkness and close air suited his mood.

  He forced his head up. Come out of it, you sniveling child. Mr. Snopes hasn’t taken the case yet. Even if he did, the woman didn’t seem the worst sort of her class. Why rip into her or fight a battle with his senior that he might not have to? It wasn’t their fault that his head and legs ached; they didn’t put the cards in his hand that lost him every shilling of the pay Mr. Snopes had given him.

  If only he had a different vice. Like gluttony. At least he’d be able to pay the rent on time each month.

  A stone made its way into his shoe. Perfect. Edmund lowered his umbrella and stopped abruptly, kneeling to empty it.

  A man only a stride behind shifted quickly to move past, coming so close that Edmund saw a thin white half-moon scar above the man’s left eyebrow, overseeing an eye that drooped like a low-hanging chestnut onto his cheek. Edmund stood and walked on. Up ahead, the man turned a corner and disappeared.

  Since the lady’s appearance, Edmund had been to every prison except the most obvious. None of the others had record of the arrest of a Captain Tuttle. He’d deliberately left this one, Newgate Prison, for last, hoping a trip here wouldn’t be necessary.

  The building came into view ahead, making Edmund shudder with his reluctance to go there. Dark brick walls with arched windows stood several stories tall. Pestilent and filthy, five hundred inmates crowded a building that might safely hold half that number. A gust of wind brought its smell, and Edmund nearly gagged. Ahead, the coroner’s wagon pulled away from a barred exit. Filled with those who’d earned the “black reprieve,” no doubt.

  No matter his mood, no matter a prisoner’s crime, Edmund couldn’t muster the hardness to wish anyone be locked up here. It echoed of memories of his time with his parents in debtors’ prison yet was far worse. He put a handkerchief to his mouth as he neared the visitors’ door.

  A single clerk sat at an elevated table in the entryway. Bundled against chill and dampness that his small coal brazier couldn’t dispel, the pale young man was inking entries in a journal.

  “Your business?” the clerk demanded. In a deliberate display of insolence, the young man didn’t even look up.

  “I’m here to visit a prisoner.” Edmund leaned his umbrella against the table. “Captain Harold Tuttle.”

  “We’ve no prisoner of that name here.”

  Such a long and fruitless day after a long and fruitless night. The answer gave him the perfect excuse to turn and leave.

  Except he wouldn’t do that to Mr. Snopes. And the clerk’s voice and look riled him.

  “Truly? You know that without consulting your journal?”

  “I know my business.”

  “Well, do me a kindness and look anyway, will you?” Remembering William’s lecture, he tried to sound congenial. “He would have been admitted seven or eight nights ago.”

  The clerk pulled the journal closer to reluctantly comply. “Your name?”

  That tone again.

  “Why would you need my name? You haven’t even confirmed there’s anyone for me to visit.”

  “If you want me to search, I’ll need your name first.”

  Ridiculous. And intentionally provocative. Edmun
d felt his back and arms stiffening.

  “Edmund Shaw. I’m a barrister.”

  The clerk made a show of turning back several pages in the journal.

  “No one of the name Tuttle here.”

  “Do you have any prisoners brought from a ship called the Padget?”

  “No.”

  “Again without looking?”

  “I can’t help you. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

  He’d stand here all day before he’d be dismissed this way. “I want to speak with the warden.”

  “He’s got no appointments available for several weeks.”

  Edmund raised a finger and pointed. “Then you’d better tell him that I’ll be back with a writ of habeas corpus for Captain Tuttle’s release in the morning.”

  The clerk sneered at the naked bluff. “A writ gets a prisoner released if they’re wrongfully imprisoned, Mr. Barrister. I’ve already told you: I’ve no record of your captain even being imprisoned here.”

  The bureaucrat knew his law, and it burned in Edmund’s stomach. Before he used his fists that ached to respond, he was out the door and into the rain in three long strides, fuming as he walked up the street.

  Was it plain, if galling, disrespect, or was he hiding something?

  Edmund pulled up his collar to keep out the rain—and recalled: he’d left his umbrella behind with the clerk. He turned back reluctantly.

  A man slammed into him, sending Edmund stumbling backward.

  “Your pardon,” Edmund murmured, catching his balance.

  The other man grunted and pushed quickly past. He soon disappeared from view behind several other walkers.

  Strange. Edmund had caught his face and seen the scar and drooping eye. He was the same man who’d nearly collided with him before his visit to Newgate.

  Edmund shook his head woefully. A losing night at the brag table. Facing the dark prospect of Mr. Snopes taking on a case defending a rich family’s fortune—the kind Edmund had sworn to himself he’d never support. Nearly run over twice by the same man in a matter of minutes.

  All unforeseen outcomes. Coincidence? Fate? Luck? Whatever its name, Edmund wished chance would deliver more favorable winds.

  THE THAMES DOCKS

  EAST END, LONDON

  It would be dark soon. Obadiah stood in the light rain amid warehouses and stacked cargo on the wharf. There it was, the Padget. Resting in the waters of the Thames, a brig, docked and lying low in the water. Two men with constable’s armbands were lounging on its deck amidships.

  Obadiah began a slow walk down the busy waterfront, weaving between stevedores and sailors. He passed the Padget, noting faces looking out of the gunports. Likely the crew, locked belowdecks. He also noted a group lingering ashore in the shadows. More guards, Obadiah concluded.

  He reached the end of the dock. The ship directly behind the Padget was the Boreas. He turned about.

  Passing the men standing about onshore, Obadiah took a breath and approached.

  “Eh, chaps?” He smiled. “Sorry to trouble you. I was supposed to meet a mate here who works the docks. If I was late, I was to meet him at a pub. Can’t recall the name, but my mate said it was the best one hereabouts. Can you guide me?”

  Blank faces greeted him. From the back of the group, a thick man with a walrus mustache emerged.

  “That’d be the Rusty Scupper,” he said in a growling voice. “Cross Corning Road and go east.”

  “Thanks kindly.” Obadiah tipped his hat and moved on.

  Not a man there, except for the big one, knew the local pubs. Those were no local seamen. Likely they were more constables assigned to watch the ship. Guards keeping a low profile.

  It was all consistent with Lady Jameson’s story of her missing cousin.

  The Rusty Scupper was where the gruff one said it would be. Obadiah entered into a wall of sound.

  “Guinness,” he ordered at the bar, looking about. When the pub manager returned with his beer, Obadiah said, “Say, do you know whether any sailors are here from the Boreas?”

  The manager looked down the bar at a young man seated alone. “I heard him and a few mates talkin’ about the Boreas.”

  “Thanks kindly.”

  Obadiah looked to the young sailor. His glass was nearly empty. Taking his foam-capped beer, Obadiah went to a seat beside the boy.

  “Son,” Obadiah began, though he looked only a few years younger than Obadiah, “let me fill that for you.” Before the boy could respond, Obadiah whistled to the bartender, who came to oblige.

  When the bartender was gone again, Obadiah leaned in. “That beer’s for the favor you’ll be doing me in a moment. I’m from the Union newspaper. I was sent to follow up a rumor that the Padget got boarded by some constables when it docked next to the Boreas a week or so ago. Would you know anything about it?”

  The boy blinked blankly several times. The beer Obadiah had replaced wasn’t nearly the boy’s first this night.

  “Well, I’m from the Boreas,” the sailor said unsteadily. “You’re from a newspaper? Anybody in trouble?”

  “Nah. Don’t worry yourself on that account. I’m no constable. I’m just looking for a story.”

  The boy took a long drink of his beer.

  “Sure, that ’appened.”

  Obadiah smiled his interest. “Why, good! What did you see?”

  “Didn’t see it meself. But Steven, he was on deck. He knows just what happened. HEY, STEVEN!”

  Obadiah cringed. A chair at a table nearby scraped the floor.

  “WHADDYA WANT, JESSE?” a voice boomed back over the crowd noise.

  “THIS MAN HERE WANTS TO KNOW ABOUT SOMEBODY BOARDIN’ THE SHIP NEXT TO OUR’N LAST WEEK!”

  Oh, sweet Mary. Obadiah looked about. The bar went quiet to make way for the shouted exchange.

  “WHAT IN BLAZES DOES HE WANNA KNOW?”

  “Whaddya wanna know?” Jesse asked Obadiah.

  Obadiah glanced over his shoulder, preparing to move to Steven’s table, but he was unable to pick out Steven with his booming voice.

  But then he did see the big man from the group at the dock—the mustached one who’d told Obadiah about the Rusty Scupper. The man had appeared in the door and was scanning the room earnestly.

  “It’s all right,” Obadiah said to the young sailor, hearing the crowd noise rising again. He took a gulp of his own Guinness. “I’ve got to go. I’ll look you and Steven up next time I’m back.”

  Lowering his head, he made his way through the crowd toward a side door.

  Once outside, he ran as fast as he could away from the port.

  9

  PARK STREET

  MAYFAIR DISTRICT

  LONDON

  William stood on the street corner, his umbrella thumping with the tempo of the falling rain. With his toes he tapped the rhythm of a waltz he’d heard performed at Vauxhall Gardens the previous summer. Hearing the name Mandy Bristol again had reminded him of his younger days when he’d been considered a good dancer, especially the cotillion. He wondered how he’d fare with the more modern waltz, a step he’d never actually tried at a ball. Dancing was one of the few things he sorely missed from his days of youth before leaving Oxford, predating his move to London to experience the solitude of a modest professional income.

  He glanced up and down Park Street. When he’d first settled in London, the city had seemed a delicious cauldron of people and commerce and energy. Despite his limited means, he’d tried to explore every inch of it—naïvely and sometimes at great risk. Park Street in those days was home to orderly shops, teahouses, and bakeries, though in the past twenty years it had grown into an even more settled haven of affluence, with handsome town homes and estate houses bordering streets where professionals could buy or sell their goods and services in safety. Only a few miles, but a world away, from the narrow roads and alleys where the honest poor fought to survive gangs, pickpockets, and purveyors of illicit pleasures. London was excitement and grinder all at once, the years
had taught William. But oh, how he loved its people with all their imperfections.

  “Lookin’ for a shop, are ya, mister?” a voice called.

  A young boy had appeared at his feet. Ten or eleven likely.

  “Easy to get lost here, sir,” the boy went on. “But me, I know this street like a compass. Just half a quid, sir, and I’ll see you to where you’re going.”

  William’s colleague at the Inns of Court had sworn that Mandy Bristol’s present office was near this intersection. Maybe it was, but half an hour’s search had revealed no solicitor’s sign in any window.

  William put on a look of serious consideration of the boy’s offer. “Half a quid? You look too young to be a highwayman. A shilling. That or I’ll ask at the millinery shop over there.”

  The boy’s eyes flashed displeasure. “The shilling first, sir.”

  William reached into his pocket and handed over the coin. “I need to know the way to the office of Solicitor Mandy Bristol.”

  A glint of surprise came into the boy’s wide eyes. “That door right behind ya. Second floor.”

  The boy was out with it and running away before William could thank him, as though he suspected William might try to retrieve his coin.

  The slap of his wet shoes was soon accompanying William up the building’s wooden stairs to the second floor.

  Mandy Bristol, Solicitor, a hand-painted sign on the door announced. The sight of it raised a note of old anger in William. He raised a hand to knock, then thought better of the courtesy and simply marched in.

  The front foyer had been decorated to convey success. Two doors led away to back offices. In the middle of the foyer stood a double-sized solicitor’s cabinet, open on one wall. A barrister’s desk and chair occupied its center, the desk surface and chair back lavished with riveted dark leather. Twin padded client chairs faced the desk. Hunting landscapes graced every wall.

  “I beg your pardon!” a voice called through the door leading to an inner office. “Isn’t it still customary to knock? We’re open only by appointment. That door should have been locked.”