Instead of being taken aback, Gyssels leaned forward. ‘I have heard of the behaviours you speak,’ whispered he, hungrily drumming his fingers on his thighs. There was a hefty silence during which I listened to Tina sucking candy in the hall.
‘What do you know of it?’ asked I, unable to take more of his muteness.
‘There are rumours. Rumours that I will not repeat, in the name of decency. From where I come, it is described as the monkey’s feast.’
He stared at me expectantly.
‘I’m not familiar with the term,’ admitted I.
‘The galleon in the grotto?’ he asked.
He yelled to Tina in his tongue; it sounded like the bouncing of a ball. She soon entered with beer. ‘And you’ve quit his service completely?’
I nodded and took a cautious sip of the beer, which was thick and warm, just as I like it. ‘I announced yesternight that I would leave and not be returning no matter what the enticement.’
‘Hmmm.’
‘’Tis my belief that you’re better starved on the street than living as a king in debauchery.’
‘You’re a man wiser than his years.’
‘Mr Gyssels, not long ago you said I might count on you and King Philip as allies.’
Gyssels looked at me, and settled back. ‘What is your plan, Mr Wild?’
‘I plan to assist you in fostering the demise of Lord Uxbridge.’
Gyssels grinned. ‘The demise of Uxbridge would mean the demise of Great Britain, and much of Europe with it.’
‘So be it!’
‘Hold your horses, young Wild.’
‘I have stabled my horses long enough! Uxbridge deserves his humbling.’
‘And as I understand it, you have no solid way about it?’
‘Aye, aye.’
‘Tell me it then.’
‘I said, aye, I have no solid way about it.’
‘So you mean to say you have no plan?’
‘Aye, I do.’
‘You do or you don’t?
‘Aye.’
‘Ugh. Wild. If you have a plan, say so.’
‘I have no plan.’
Gyssels took a draught of his beer and stood. ‘Dear me. I will send word to the King that we have your allegiance. Unfortunately, as you are no longer in service … you are of less value, as I’m sure you understand.’
‘I know all of his secret business.’
‘Tell me some.’
‘He is heavily invested in sugar. And he buys children with a Prussian Junker named Von Trunka.’
‘Both ventures my King Philip is privy. Mr Wild, walk with me.’ Gyssels laid a hand upon my shoulder and soon I realised that we were walking towards his door. ‘I will send word to the King. However, speaking plainly – and of course, not wanting to burst your bladder – I believe it will be a tough match against Uxbridge. He is well resourced for a fight. Of any kind.’
‘Was David no match for Goliath?’
‘I admire your zeal, Mr Wild.’
‘When shall you hear back from King Philip?’
‘It shouldn’t be too long. Two or three months, perhaps.’
‘And until then?’
‘I may be able to help you,’ Gyssels said, nodding to himself.
‘If you have some money, that is. There is an investment opportunity that I had intended to give Uxbridge first right.’
‘Tell me of it.’
‘You must swear your absolute secrecy.’
‘You have it,’ replied I, palm upon my breast.
‘There is a man. Reginald Crossley.’
‘Aye.’
‘You know him?’
‘Nay.’
Gyssels pressed his fingers against his eyes and let out a deep sigh of vexation. Then he began explanation of an investment opportunity.
‘Crossley requires funds to produce a miraculous piece of machinery. Fully developed, of course. The prototype of which is currently in Antwerp, hidden in a secret warehouse.’
‘What sort of a machinery?’
‘It is a device that can convey four men.’
‘A coach can convey eight.’
Gyssels grinned. ‘This device requires no horse.’
‘Not possible.’
‘My words exactly.’
I eyed Gyssels, but his expression was unchanged.
‘Explain me then how such a thing is possible.’
‘’Tis called perpetual motion. A series of weights are spun using the limitless supply of the Earth’s gravity. These weights pull levers, which in turn drive the wheels. Crossley has worked on the idea for close on twenty years. He has sold the rights to King Philip for a song, who now intends to raise investment for mass production. I was going to approach Uxbridge, but maybe this is your chance.’
‘How much do you need?’
‘How much do you have?’
‘If I sold all I own, three pounds four. Maybe a guinea more if the bracelet … let’s call it four pound sterling.’
‘A moment, please.’ Gyssels took out a paper, conducting calculations in quick scribbles of his quill. ‘He needs a great deal more, but for that sum, I might be able to acquire you a three-and-two-thirds percentage in the concern. A concern, I might add, that should be worth thousands once production is complete.’
‘Thousands?’
‘Your four pounds will be worth …’ He wrote a few sums in a second column, then looked up, eyes twinkling. ‘Six hundred, thirty-eight and six shillings, four pence.’
‘But, it seems too good to –’
‘If you wanted to foster resentment in Uxbridge, I believe this might be your chance.’
‘’Tis true, he would be furious. I shall return at once with the money. It’s a sure thing, you say?’
‘No investment is without risk, Mr Wild. But let me say it this way, Uxbridge would put his money down without batting an eye.’
‘If Uxbridge is in, so am I.’
‘Very well, I shall have a contract ready for you by night.’
I traversed the city once more to the Edgware Road, Winterbottom’s door chime ringing upon my entry.
‘I thought you were a man of your word?’ Winterbottom asked from behind his counter. He buffed the gold owl tip of a walking cane.
‘I am,’ replied I. ‘And I am also a man ready to admit an error when one is made.’
‘You promised to wreak upon me great regret. I have been rattling in my boots. Positively sleepless. Do you mean to say I can finally take rest from my torment?’
‘I come in the spirit of –’
Winterbottom returned the cane to a shelf and reached to the heavens. ‘The midget boy will spare me!’
‘Enough of it, Mr Winterbottom. I admit –’
‘I am saved. The day I’ve been longing for is here.’
‘Mr Winterbottom.’
‘I am free. Free!’
‘You’ve made your point. Now to business. I have with me …’
Winterbottom now stepped from behind the counter into the centre of his floor and placed his hands upon his hips, looking out the large shop window. I began unclasping my valise, taking out the items I intended on selling. But there was a prodigiously loud banging. The many items in the cabinets shook and rattled. I turned to see Mr Winterbottom’s enormous boots banging the floorboards, hands still on hips. He was dancing a jig.
‘Free of regret!’ he shouted, dancing with apparent skill.
‘For the sake of Christ.’
Winterbottom, who evidently had no intention of ceasing these taunts, now opened up his door and called into the street. ‘God is great!’ he shouted to the sky. ‘I am saved!’
Passers-by paid him no mind, except a melon-grower who crossed himself.
‘Still here?’ asked he, once he had returned behind his counter.
‘I intend to conduct business.’
‘Very well.’
He picked up some of my plates, then set them aside and inspected the garnet bracelet
I took from My Lord’s antique display.
‘This is an antique item,’ spoke I. ‘Its worth could run into the hundreds for the seasoned collector.’
‘Hundreds?’
‘Mr Winterbottom,’ said I. ‘May I speak freely?’
‘As you wish.’
‘This once belonged to the richest man in the Kingdom. It lay next to the coronet of none other than Julius Caesar. I believe it was his bracelet.’
‘Julius Caesar, you say?’
‘Aye.’
Winterbottom spat in his hand and rubbed at the gemstone. ‘And what’s this?’ He pinched King Richard between two fingers.
‘That fine piece was a keepsake of the Earl of Russell.’
‘I didn’t know the Earl was enamoured of limp toy pheasants?’
‘Whatever floats your boat, I say.’
He snorted and took up a quill to tabulate the many items, before encircling a number at the bottom. ‘There is my price for you, boy,’ he said, pointing his gargantuan forefinger at a not-gargantuan sum. ‘You can keep the pheasant.’
I will save you details of our negotiations which as you would rightly assume were lengthy and imprecatory, but at long last finalised upon five pound sterling, seven shillings, threepence and one farthing, such that I had sufficient ready money to make my investment in the Perpetual Motion Machine.
Traversing the city once more to send funds to Gyssels then to find lodgings, I soon found myself unable to take a step more for the pain in my feet, and what a relief it was, upon this conclusion, to find myself in Dirty Lane, St Giles, at the rooms of none other than Miss Elizabeth Lyon. I stepped slowly up the dimly lit stairway, the cadenced clanking of my pumps not nearly as deafening as my own heart, which seemed dislodged from my chest and thumping in my ears.
DEFOE
To Newgate once more
May 1724
He is immediately shocked at Sheppard’s deterioration in only two weeks. The boy’s cheeks sag and his eyes are sunken.
‘Do you feed him nothing?’
‘’Tis not us,’ the guard answers, pointing to a basket of untouched fruit, bread and cheese. ‘He refuses to eat.’
Sheppard smiles broadly, his sallow face stretching. ‘Th-th-the wr-wr-writ-t-t-t-ter!’
Defoe takes one of his bony, chained hands and shakes it, the iron clinking. The cell is frostier than Defoe remembers.
‘Why won’t you eat?’
Sheppard smiles. ‘You loo-oo-ook-k-k-k lik-k-k-ke …’
‘I know, I know. You may leave us,’ Defoe directs to the guard. ‘I’ll call when I’m done.’ He turns to Sheppard. ‘Tell me,’ he says. ‘What have they done to you?
Sheppard turns to coddle the wall. ‘Looking at you I’ve thoroughly lost my appetite.’
‘Be serious.’
‘I am very serious. You smell like a baby borne by a man. A brown baby.’
‘I’ve had a rough night.’
‘What’s rough night euphemism for, I wonder?’
Defoe takes an apple from the basket and hands it to him. ‘Please, eat something.’
‘I’ve eaten what I need. Water sustains me.’
‘Why do you starve yourself? At least live your last days with a full stomach.’
‘It’s not just the odour. You look like a burst haemorrhoid.’
Defoe eyes the apple, salivates, then with a little more hesitation returns it to the basket. ‘Who has sent you all this?’
‘Women hear my story, think me a modern day Robin Hood. I’ve fed half the prison with what I’ve only been sent.’
Defoe’s stomach lets out a gnawing groan.
‘Help yourself,’ Sheppard says, without turning around. ‘I can hear your insides calling.’
‘Well … if you insist.’ He takes a bread roll and stuffs a gnarled lump of cheese into its centre. The dryness in his mouth is problematic. With increasing shame, he now helps himself to Sheppard’s bucket, taking a mouthful of water.
‘Would you believe,’ Sheppard begins, in his usual merry voice, ‘last night there was a whole troupe of singers beneath my window. Word has spread of my fasting.’ Sheppard begins to sing:
‘The King and his ministers we will defeat
But Jack the Lad, we implore you eat.
Then, once released
And all of Newgate unleashed
The King will bow at St Giles’s feet.’
Defoe grunts through his mouthful, to show he’s listening.
‘Let them have their hopes, I say. Don’t let them down too hard, will you, Mr Defoe? Surely you can twist reality a little? But before we continue my narration, I have a request.’
‘I’ll provide whatsoever I can.’
‘I hear you’re heir to the Foe Fire empire.’
‘My father won’t give me a bloody penny,’ explodes Defoe, a breadcrumb flying and lodging on the back of Sheppard’s shirt. ‘Let alone …’
Sheppard laughs. ‘Sounds like you and the old man don’t dance much. I mention it because I need tallow.’
‘You want mutton fat?’
‘About yea much.’ From his place against the wall, he holds up both hands to indicate the size of a cricket ball.
‘Whatever for?’
‘They won’t let me keep a coat. If I layer it inside my shirt, I’ll be warm as a whale.’
‘Let me speak with Henry and arrange a coat for you. Surely you would prefer that to a ball of tallow?’
‘Must I be interrogated? I’m asking for tallow. This much.’
‘If it’s your wish, I’ll bring it,’ Defoe says, shrugging. ‘But now it is you I need ask a favour of.’
Sheppard makes a disapproving click that echoes off the wall. ‘You mean you want more than the narration of my story?’
‘I thought you might help me find something.’
‘Some perfume, perhaps, to mask the odours of other men’s urine on your wig?’
Defoe pulls out the quotation from his torn pocket, hands it to Sheppard.
‘I’ll never be rid of him,’ sighs Sheppard. ‘From all bloody angles.’
‘I must recover these items,’ Defoe says, too desperately. ‘And I can’t afford to pay the absurd sum Wild quotes here.’
‘Surely a man of your stature can afford –’
‘May I be candid with you?’ says Defoe.
‘This keeps getting better.’
Defoe rubs his face. ‘In a week, maybe less, I’ll be thrown into the compter.’
Sheppard turns and faces Defoe, frowning, then returns to the wall. ‘But you’re a famous writer.’
‘I’m wanted for debts near two hundred pound. My father, my rich bastard father, who has enough money to pay it ten times over, has promised to relieve me if I can recover these items.’
‘Where were they stolen?’
‘On the road between Bath and Bristol.’
Sheppard shakes his head. ‘Long way from here, Defoe. Long way.’
‘Would even Wild be able to hunt them down?’
‘Something like this – fuck me, jade geese – will always end up in London. And if it comes to London, it will cross paths with Wild. There isn’t a pawner in the city who isn’t in his pocket. If it’s not already in one of his warehouses.’
‘He has warehouses?’
‘He has more valuables than the Duke of York. Rooms piled high with gold, silver and every possible trinket you could imagine. If he can’t sell the loot back to its owner, he sends it to Paris and Vienna to be sold on the secondary market.’
‘Can’t be conceived.’
‘That’s not the worst of it neither.’
Defoe rubs his eyes, feels his stomach turn. ‘It’s late. I’ll return tomorrow with your fat. When exactly are you to Tyburn?’
‘You ask like it’s taking coffee.’
Defoe holds up his hands. ‘Oh God, I’m sorry. I hadn’t meant it flippantly. Forgive me. I was only enquiring if you knew the date is all.’
Sheppard�
��s shoulders drop as he sighs.
‘I don’t want to die, Mr Defoe,’ the boy says, after a long pause. ‘I want to live.’
The two statements are discrete, almost unrelated yearnings.
‘I have interviewed many criminals,’ Defoe says. ‘And never offered it. But I will call on the most powerful of my contacts to seek clemency. We will find a way.’
‘About those geese,’ Sheppard replies in a fresh tone. ‘There’s a man who goes by the name of “Hell-and-Fury”. James Sykes to the gentry-sort. But ask by his flash-name, to avoid suspicion. If anyone can find them, it’s Hell-and-Fury.’
‘Where do I find this Hell-and-Fury?’
‘You’ll find him at the Blue Boar most nights.’
‘And how do I … broach …’
‘You tell him The Lad’s calling in what he owes from the sponging-house.’
‘Am I supposed to know what that means?’
‘You just ask him what you need, show him the quote. And offer him a few quid if you can.’
‘I can’t thank you enough.’
‘Now, sounds like you need some money. Here.’
From his jacket, the boy pulls a sovereign and flicks it through the air; it glitters momentarily then chases itself in circles on the floor. The sound of its gyrations grow in speed, like an accelerating heart. Defoe stares at the coin.
‘Take it,’ Sheppard urges. ‘I’ll have no use for it when I’m hanging. Just bring me that tallow.’
‘I thought I’d hit the bottom of the barrel,’ Defoe replies. He picks up the coin, turning it over again and again, before sliding it into his pocket. ‘But who is to say how low I can go.’
WILD
Blueskin Blake; my lodging in a cupboard
1705
Through a slim opening of the door, I saw her agitated face and the many fine strings of her blouse knotted across her bosom.
‘I’m engaged at present,’ said she. ‘You can’t arrive unannounced.’
A white cat slithered an exit and made a loop around my legs.
‘I announce it now.’
‘In my business,’ whispered she, looking back over her shoulder, ‘interruptions are not much appreciated.’
I heard the slats of her bed grind and a dagger rattle in its hilt.
‘Cast him out,’ said I. ‘I have just invested in a Perpetual Motion Machine.’
Wild Page 15
