Wild

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by Nathan Besser


  Dear Master Gyssels,

  Excuse my brevity, for I am forced to compose this en route to a meeting with an attaché to a certain minister, who is not the prime one himself, but very cosy with him and the Exchequer, I assure you.

  Due to an unexpected invitation to invest in some civet cats, I seek to liquidate the majority of my holdings in the Perpetual Motion Machine. You had mentioned my portion worth over 600, however owing to the suddenness of my request, I will endure a 50 per cent reduction in exchange for 80 per cent of my shares, which I will gladly forward upon the receipt of funds.

  I, of course, am still a great believer in the mechanism, and were it not for this other ‘opening’ as one might name it – for indeed, it is a doorway – I should tie up my funds wholly with you and the ingenious Perpetual Motion Machine.

  Moreover, I have found our business together wholly satisfying, and seek to continue this most prosperous friendship with yourself and King Philip V, Count of Flanders, and willingly remain,

  Your humble associate,

  Jonathan Wild

  Monday, 14th December, 1705

  P.S. Please warn your young maid Tina, if you depart her as messenger to me, that my return address is not what it seems, but rather a way to dissemble the worth of my investments.

  P.P.S. During my ambulations through the West End of our city, I saw in the window of a reputable pawner two pepperpots very similar to those that I admired on your mantelpiece. I thought it only decent of me to acquire these on your behalf, considering them either stolen or previously part of the collection. The pawner wanted to charge me almost five guineas for them, but I was able to bargain him down to three, two shillings and tuppence. If you’d be so kind to remit these monies to me, I’ll gladly have the precious pepperpots sent your way. I have an idea who the scoundrel is – he goes by the name ‘Blueskin’ Blake.

  My Lord Mayor of London the Honourable Thomas Rawlinson,

  Forgive my inability to pay cordial and humble visitation in person, but I have been travelling the last weeks with a variety of your associates: Lord Uxbridge, a few of the Medicis, Count Philip of Flanders et al.

  My name is Jonathan Wild, and I write to you as a concerned citizen of our Great City of London. As no doubt you are aware, our streets are being increasingly overrun with heinous crime and abominable sluttery. Some blame The Poor, who care only for drink and theatre. Others blame The Jews, who enfeeble our businesses with interest too high to afford. And some will blame the management of the City, for not providing wide enough roads to accommodate our heavy traffic, and clean enough air to pause our suffocation.

  I, however, do not write to Your Eminence to blame The Poor or The Jews or The Pollution. I write to propose a Solution. For I am no writer, no philosopher, no rector, no minister. I am a man of action. For whilst there are many willing to give their ideas, there are few willing to execute them.

  I would like to propose a plan dubbed ‘Law Enforcement’. It will be a program that rewards those willing to catch the city’s malefactors. For, while there exist deterrents viz. the gallows at Tyburn and many laws to send the wayward thither, few are brave enough to bring these malefactors to their reckoning.

  I have already commenced the program and done as follows:

  Returned stolen oyster forks for the Lord Uxbridge.

  Returned stolen pepperpots to Master Gyssels of Flanders.

  Subdued fearsome criminals, who go by the names ‘Nicky Lips’ and ‘Blueskin Blake’.

  I should be happy to continue my efforts catching thieves and returning stolen goods. However, I believe it only reasonable that a fee be paid accordingly for this Perilous Work.

  I humbly await your reply and remain,

  Your ready servant,

  Jonathan Wild

  Monday, 14th December, 1705

  P.S. You will note my return address lies in the heart of the filth of which I speak, and it is no coincidence. I have driven a Trojan Horse into our city, and intend to unleash its belly upon your say-so.

  To The Queen,

  Pray don’t consider it impertinence to call upon you in absentia, Dear Almighty Queen Anne, but I’m currently indisposed in many travels of business throughout your Great Kingdom. I trust you received timely dispatch from my Lord Mayor Thomas Rawlinson regarding the impending appointment of yours truly as Law Enforcer to our Great City of London.

  The purpose of my dispatch is to humbly inform you of a ‘liability’ within your outer coterie, which may, if exposed, create a ‘tetchy’ problem among public opinion, which would at the least cause distraction from your other righteous duties of war and governance. Your colleague and financier, Lord Uxbridge of Middlesex, has been participating in certain ‘activities’ that some might consider not befitting the status which he has been bestowed.

  I am willing and able to meet you personally to elaborate.

  With thanks and appreciation, I announce my,

  Gracious subservience as,

  Jonathan Wild

  Monday, 14th December, 1705

  P.S. Don’t pay mind my return address, it’s a joke.

  DEFOE

  Trader, writer, bounty hunter

  May 1724

  ‘If you were like any other normal, decent wife,’ Defoe says, ‘you’d ask no questions at all.’

  ‘So you did!’ she shouts, sitting up in bed, pointing her finger.

  ‘That’s not what I’m saying, what I’m saying …’

  Despite his insistence otherwise, Mary presumes he has been whoring in St Giles.

  ‘I allowed you pleasures not one week ago, and you resort to this. To fulfil your depraved –’

  ‘Allowed me!’ shouts Defoe. ‘That’s how it works? You allow me? Like some sort of … rented boat?’

  ‘Rented boat? That’s the best analogy you’ve got? Some writer.’

  ‘Look at my clothes, Mary! If I’d done what you say, I’d have at least cleaned myself to disguise it.’

  This gives her pause.

  ‘I’ve told you the truth, Mary,’ he pleas. ‘Should you wish to believe me, is entirely up to you.’

  Defoe removes his shirt and stockings and throws the muddied, stained attire in a pile by the window. He shivers uncontrollably as he pulls on his nightshirt.

  ‘So you drugged yourself in Spitalfields?’

  ‘Yes. I wanted to be away. From everything.’

  ‘From your wife, too?’

  ‘From all responsibility.’

  ‘That’s what I am to you, a burden?’

  ‘Why do you bother asking for the truth? Regardless of what I tell you – truth or fib – you only hear insults.’ Defoe groans and slides beneath the sheets. The comfort and cleanliness of the bed is astounding. ‘I’m too tired, Mary. I’ve been robbed. My purse is empty, my owl cane is gone. Barbarous.’

  ‘Darling,’ she says, laying a hand upon his shoulder.

  As Defoe now takes the matter to be reconciled, his marital plight is immediately replaced with the much more pressing one. The last horse was already traded a week ago. Aside from furniture and his wife’s dresses, there is nothing left to sell. Soon Mary’s purchases will be refused. How will they fare without these luxuries? These sheets, the feathered pillows, the gauzy softness of his nightshirt. Defoe presses his fingers into his eyes.

  ‘Did you see your father, in the end?’

  ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’

  ‘That captain came again today,’ she says. ‘He said you have until Thursday to bring the papers you promised.’

  ‘The bill of lading,’ Defoe says quickly. ‘Very well.’

  ‘He also asked about your writings, if you’d been busy.’

  ‘And how did you answer?’

  ‘I said that I had no insight into your affairs, and even if I did, I would be no sort of wife to reveal them to a man I’d met but once.’

  ‘You are a fine boat, my dear.’

  She cuddles into him, runs her fingers through
his chest hair.

  ‘Mind my side.’

  ‘Oh, my poor darling.’

  He takes her hand and kisses it. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says.

  ‘Don’t worry yourself,’ she replies, snuffing her bedside candle. ‘’Tis over now.’

  The darkness buzzes. Mary continues to run her fingers along his chest and belly. She knows him to be exhausted, so is free to caress and stroke without fear of nuisance.

  ‘How many chickens do we have?’ he suddenly asks her.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Chickens. In the yard.’

  ‘Why on earth –’

  ‘Curious is all, I’m counting them in my head.’

  ‘Sheep won’t do?’

  ‘We own sheep?’ he asks eagerly, gripping her.

  ‘No! I meant counting the jumping sheep.’

  ‘Chickens then, how many?’

  ‘Four, since we ate one the week last.’

  ‘Four? Very well, very well. I might need them.’

  ‘You what?’

  ‘Nothing, nothing. No matter.’

  He pats her hand, makes shushing sounds. Fool that he is, already calculating. Always calculating.

  The Blue Boar leans top-heavy into the intersection at Turnagain Lane. Patrons mill directly beneath the overhang, undeterred, mugs in hand. It is rumoured that the Blue Boar offers any condemned man a free dram on his way from Newgate to Tyburn, but Defoe has never witnessed the spectacle. Pipe smoke and steam from evening laughter are illuminated by light from glassed sconces.

  Inside, two fiddlers rub at their strings like at a flint, and then a song catches and the pub is alight. Defoe sidles into the crowd like between thorny shrubs. Once at the bar, wet with sploshed ale, he takes the shilling that he found in his wife’s coat pocket and orders himself an ale.

  ‘I’m looking for Hell-and-Fury,’ Defoe tries at the young, energetic bartender.

  ‘Ya what?’

  ‘A man who goes by –’

  ‘Can’t hear!’ he says, shaking his head and pulling an ear forward.

  ‘Two more berry gin,’ someone shouts from behind.

  ‘Make it three!’

  ‘Three berry,’ the bartender repeats, turning and tossing three mugs into the air. He catches each one in quick succession, lining them along his bench, then throws a bottle into quick revolutions. There is uproar as he spins around and catches the bottle behind his back.

  Defoe steps outside. A crowd of five men converse in the relative quiet of the lane.

  ‘Pardon my intrusion,’ he says. ‘I’m looking for Hell-and-Fury.’

  Laughter. ‘You’ll find it here, friend.’

  ‘It’s a name.’

  ‘Doesn’t sound like one.’

  ‘So you’ve not heard of him?’

  ‘Of who?’

  ‘Hell-and-Fury.’

  Again, they answer with sneering.

  ‘Very well,’ replies Defoe.

  As he turns, there is a single tug at his shirt. One of the men, a banker by the look of his sleeves, nods his head towards the next doorway, where a boy no older than sixteen is standing dressed in a gentleman’s suit. The skin around his eyes is thick with silt and the white rim of his collar stained yellow. Evidently he’s made away with an entire suit of clothes that fits just right.

  ‘Hell-and-Fury?’

  The boy doesn’t reply. The left corner of his mouth turns up, like something doesn’t taste right.

  ‘The Lad is calling in what’s owed from the sponging-house,’ says Defoe, repeating Sheppard’s instructions. ‘It’s a favour he seeks in return,’ he adds. ‘Not vengeance.’

  ‘I owe The Lad a great nothing,’ the boy replies. ‘And since when does he consort with gentry-coves like you?’

  ‘I’d like to see his sentence commuted.’

  ‘You’re a lawyer?’

  ‘A writer. Chronicling his life and escapes. But I consider him more friend than subject.’

  ‘What’s the favour, then?’

  As Defoe reaches inside his breast pocket for Wild’s quote, they both move as though choreographed, the ginger-haired one forward to Defoe’s arm, Hell-and-Fury behind him. A blade glints briefly, then is an unseen cool against Defoe’s neck. His heart thumps as he tries not to move.

  ‘What’s in that pocket?’ says Hell-and-Fury’s friend.

  The finest layer of skin is grated from Defoe’s throat. ‘It’s a piece of paper. Please, release me.’

  ‘Nobody here can read papers.’

  ‘You speak like one able.’

  ‘Speaking and reading are two different things.’

  Hell-and-Fury reaches into Defoe’s coat and pulls out the quote.

  ‘Read it,’ he commands Defoe, handing him the page. Defoe’s hands are shaking.

  ‘’Tis a quote from Jonathan Wild, for the recovery of a certain item. Please, put the knife away.’

  ‘Recovery of what?’ The blade’s pressure eases, but remains against his neck.

  ‘A blue velvet-lined case, containing … it’s a bit hard to describe. Geese. Five wooden geese, sculpted with jade.’

  ‘Jade?’

  ‘It’s a green stone. Oriental. If you recover them, and deliver them to my father, I will pay you. Two guineas.’

  ‘Are you a fool? Trying to undercut Jonathan Wild?’

  ‘I am a fool, yes, but for a different reason.’

  Hell-and-Fury releases him and nods at his friend to follow. Defoe rubs at his neck.

  ‘Two guineas?’ he confirms.

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘Hand ’em over, then.’

  ‘Upon delivery of the goods to my father in Bury Street. Until then, here is a down payment. My father, James Foe, will pay you the remainder.’

  Defoe places Sheppard’s sterling coin into the grimy palm of the ginger-haired boy.

  ‘I do this for The Lad,’ Hell-and-Fury says. ‘And The Lad only.’

  ‘One last matter. I promised to deliver this personally, but the keeper, Harrison Henry, is growing suspicious of me. Will you deliver this package to him? It is his wish.’

  Hell-and-Fury takes the lump of fat that is wrapped in wax paper and tied with twine. The truth is, Harrison Henry refused Defoe entry to Newgate for not paying his last due. Who would have thought – too poor to enter a prison.

  ‘What’s in it, then?’

  ‘Something to keep him warm.’

  ‘You deliver this to The Lad at Newgate,’ Hell-and-Fury says to his friend. ‘Now.’

  The child nods, takes the package, runs off. Defoe watches his body subsumed into night, like he is sinking into oil.

  ‘You realise,’ says Hell-and-Fury, ‘that if this goes wrong, Wild will turn us both blue.’

  ‘Then let us ensure it doesn’t happen so.’

  Defoe shakes his hand and sets off.

  He detours via Wren’s cathedral, gravel crunching underfoot. The enormity of the building echoes against his body, cool and defiant. The full moon is unusually distant, yet simultaneously lucid, as though examined through the wrong end of a telescope. A single cloud, its edges refracted into multicolour, slowly drifts behind the dome. Defoe is brought to a halt. The chill against his face, the sidling cloud, the cathedral, the moon; all deaf to his woes. He sighs and steps on. Back to chickens, he tells himself. How much can I get for three or four decent chickens?

  It is a cool, overcast afternoon. He eyes each of them, as they move spryly around the yard. He marks a speckled brown one pecking at the root of a post. Cornered. He opens the bag and takes slow menacing steps.

  ‘Come, my sweet,’ Defoe whispers. ‘The bag beckons.’

  The hen is indifferent to his approach, continues her business and clucks in pesky disapproval. When he is within two or three yards, she raises her tiny head to observe him. With a further step from Defoe, she replies with a step of her own. At the distance now between them, with the hen cornered, it will be easy enough to grab her.

  ‘I know the fe
eling,’ says Defoe, as they watch each other.

  With the sack in his left hand, Defoe lunges. The hen takes three or four quick steps and easily evades his swooping hand. His shoe sinks deep into the mud. His stockings are now splattered too, but this, of course, is fuel for revenge.

  ‘No more children’s play,’ says Defoe, dropping the bag and approaching the other three, his fingers spread wide and open.

  An hour later, Defoe stands naked in his bedroom, another set of muddied clothes upon the pile. He presses a bunched, wet cloth against the bleeding wound on his forehead. From his bedroom he looks from the window, watching all four hens move about their pen.

  ‘Bumdick chickens,’ he says, applying pressure to the growing bump above his brow. ‘We’ll see who decapitates who.’

  Mary has thankfully left for the afternoon. Off to Shepley again, Defoe presumes, judging by the time she’d spent making her face. He hopes there is some kind of indiscretion. Maybe then Shepley will clear their debts.

  ‘Master Defoe,’ he hears. It is their one remaining staff. The door is being knocked rapidly. ‘Master Defoe!’

  ‘I’m dressing,’ he says.

  ‘Master, there are men here and –’

  ‘What nonsense do you mean, “men”?’

  ‘Three men, sir. They say it’s urgent, sir.’

  He stands in his nudity, face inches from the door, listening to his maid’s breath, still heavy from her quick ascent of the stairs.

  ‘Pray tell them wait for my dress.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘One thing more, Harriet.’

  ‘It’s Melissa, sir.’

  ‘Melissa. Sorry. One thing more. Which of my children are home?’

  ‘Only Tracey, Anne and the little one, sir.’

  ‘You keep them in their rooms, do you hear me?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  There is the urgent patter of feet, the receding squeak of a sweaty hand down the banister, then a dreadful silence. Defoe’s heart is galloping. He thinks quickly of which objects he might conceal about him.

 

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