At this, George looked at Mac; then, smiling, "... and imagination."
Austin took out from his waistcoat pocket a large wad of money and threw it down on top of the bill of exchange. "That ain't imagination."
Seeing the challenge, Mac tossed a second roll of notes onto the impressive pile.
"Nor that." Mac grinned at Austin.
George paused, looked at both of them, took out his own smaller roll of notes and placed it on the pile. He gauged the amount, then slowly settled back into the seat with his brandy.
"No, boys," he said, "it's a start."
George raised his eyebrows and lifted the brandy glass. Austin remembered that toast as the most reluctant he ever made. But they all drank to it.
§
The two children should have been in bed. Why was the nanny pushing a third in a pram, obviously newborn, four hours before midnight? These, Austin always remembered, were the first thoughts that had struck him.
The fact that the pompous, fat, swaggering epitome of Victorian middle-class society was parading with his wife so late, along with the incident he prompted, was part of what created in all three Americans the resolution that was to put them into history. Having strolled down Lombard Street, George, Austin and Mac paused before the Bank of England. Stars glittered from a night sky that framed the building clearly. Torches burned on either side of the entrance. The doors were open still. It was late, Mac thought, for what was about to happen, but they had come in the hope, now proved correct, that they would see it. The man and his small entourage mounted the large center island between the two roads that met in front of the Bank, and they too now waited with the patience that knowledge gives to the well-timed arrival at an event.
The man, leaning on his cane; the wife, a puppet on his arm; and the nanny and children obediently behind these two, turned their heads toward the regular marching noise now discernible to all ears. Around the corner in the distance, lit by the city gaslights, in perfect order, a platoon of Coldstream Guards marching with the precision of discipline came into sight. The traditional night guardians of the Bank of England were about to take up their duties.
The red tunics and gold buttons caught the light as the column ordered ranks and began to pass along the Bank's facade. The officer in charge reached the entrance as his sergeant barked out a command. A final tread, the stamp of boots on cobbled stones, then only the roar of torch flames sounded out against distant noises from the West End of London. In a moment the Ceremony of Keys took place, and in loose order the guards mounted the steps, fur glowing as each busby passed between the torches. The last man in allowed the Bank watchman to close the doors. The deep, resounding note of tons of metal fitting together ended the spectacle.
George, Austin and Mac were impressed. The "toy" soldiers outside Buckingham Palace had looked like pretty statues, but the way these men moved left little doubt in all their minds that the fathers of their fathers' fathers could not have had too easy a time of it against Burgoyne.
The family group was already on the move as a little urchin boy ran up to the fat gentleman. Without even breaking his stride the man lifted his cane and hit the boy such a blow that he staggered and fell. George's anger was instant. Austin and Mac were forced to take hold of him.
With only a cursory glance the gentleman looked at the three Americans, sensing commotion. Recognizing no threat in the distraction that had prompted him to turn his head, he took his wife, nanny and children off into the darkness.
George, watching the small boy rise, whistled across at him. Mac threw a sovereign, which was well caught, bitten, tossed and pocketed. With a grin, the boy ran off, leaving three
Americans, two flickering torches and the entire fortune of an empire before them, behind massive sealed doors.
As Austin remembered later, Mac had said, "How?" He himself had spoken knowingly, looking first at George, as if the plot were fathomed and the ploy fully understood. In fact Austin had known nothing when he said, "Like a ladder at a window, Mac. You know where you're goin', but you concentrates every rung of the way.''
What they all remembered was the way George put out his hands and took Mac's and Austin's warm and firm. The grip communicated a passionate hatred of the bureaucracy and traditions of the country that had bled nations dry, subjugated continents and destroyed cultures.
Looking at the Bank of England that night, George had become quiet and Calm. His American voice spoke softly.
"We'll take her," he said.
1872
Golden Cross
SPRING had settled in England with the quirkiness particular to that country. Equatorial winds and sharp rainstorms shared each day as if competing for dominance of the season.
The morning Austin Bidwell stood opposite the entrance to the Bank of England, heavy rain fell from a dark, lowering April sky for several hours. Then, as the clouds parted, sun burst through, drying up quagmire streets and pavements awash from the blocked gutters; this created, from the dampness and heat, noxious odors so intense that Austin decided to lunch and return at two o-clock to wait and watch again.
That was how he met Mr. Green. Not in the small restaurant behind the Scots Bank, but as he sauntered back to his vantage point and saw the fussing figure, patting his pockets and peering at his deposit book through rimless glasses. The smile, as Mr. Green found the new total, beamed its way across the road. Austin immediately sensed that he had found his man.
What had happened for several days was this: Austin had waited at the same vantage point until he saw someone he felt might be the one he wanted. Four out of fjve depositors, he discovered, when they took money to the Bank, came out examining their passbooks. He had followed several, using the same cab each time. The cabbie established Austin's identity early on, and thereafter he gave Austin the respect he felt due to his fare. Austin had not argued and now just continued to smile knowingly.
The previous morning the cabbie had looked inquisitive as Austin rejected a third possibility on instinct and walked out of the East India importing house leaving a costly white shawl, bought but not paid for, resting on the counter within, awaiting a customer who would never return. Austin had been curt to the cabbie, disgruntled by another false lead. The man inside the import house had been totally unimpressed by the hundred-pound note. For the scheme in Austin's mind, money was the key.
"Nothin' you wanted, sir?" the cabbie had asked.
Austin had shaken his head at the driver's question and climbed into the open vehicle.
"Where now, sir?" the cabbie had asked, concealing badly that he had already guessed the answer.
"The Bank," Austin said, knowing his driver knew.
"Again, sir?"
It became for a moment a game between them. "Yep."
Austin drew deeply on his long cigar and took off the large Stetson, donned every time he entered an establishment to which a "possibility" led him. He had brought the hat with him, from across the Atlantic. In the United States, Stetsons were commonplace but admired. In Europe they represented the wealth of a new world and, in consequence, were impressive.
The English at that time still had absurd ideas concerning Americans. The stage version of the American Silver King they took for the genuine article and devoutly believed that the pavements in America were crowded with "millionaires in silver" marching around with rolls of thousand-dollar bills in their pockets ready for whimsical distribution to bootblacks and bartenders. In England it was cobbled streets of gold and Dick Whittington's London. Every country has a similar myth, and Austin was playing on his.
The cabbie said the obvious. "That's three times, sir." Austin grinned. "Superstitious!" he stated, as if it were a confidence.
The cabbie and he were now eye to eye. Austin gave away nothing, preferring speculation to fact. Instantly the cabbie's suspicions were confirmed. He winked knowingly.
"Are you a detective, sir?"
The thought had not occurred to Austin, but as a cover it
was not bad, and it would be a good enough reason to keep the man on until he was successful in his quest. Austin puffed the long cigar, winked back at the cabbie and replied, "I ain't sayin'."
The cabbie straightened up, proud of his intuition. "I knew it, sir, the minute I saw you, sir—I ain't never wrong."
"You don't say." Austin swallowed alternative responses. "Mum's the word, sir." "What?" Austin didn't understand. "I'll not say anything, sir."
Again the cabbie winked, touched his cap and, Austin remembered, had been distinctly cocky in the way he made the reins flip their message to the two horses. Austin had bought his man with better than currency. Silence creates enigma, and assumption was always international exchange. Austin made a mental note not to forget this discovery about the English. It might well prove valuable.
The cab had driven Austin back to the Bank, where he waited once more. He followed two further possibilities, buying an expensive opera glass from an optician and promising financial involvement in a producer's play. Austin rejected both men, as instinct dictated, but time was passing and he had made no progress.
So it was with acute anxiety that Austin waited for and then, thankfully, saw the cabbie returning from watering his horses on the afternoon Mr. Green turned the corner of Threadneedle Street to begin his brisk constitutional back to the West End.
A doorbell rang as Mr. Green entered the shop. His assistants had already seen the familiar figure through the window and had ample time to engage in their various tasks with heightened fervor, to create for the old gentleman the correct impression and conceal the real. For nearly a century, Green's of Savile Row, fathers and sons, had followed tradition almost to the minute and, apart from holidays, the Crimea emergency, news of Waterloo and the Trafalgar victory, had returned from the Bank on a Friday afternoon, entered the shop to survey and absorb the level of activity, check the same pocket watch, snap it closed, then walk through without another glance to the rear office.
Austin Bidwell, arriving outside in the open cab with white Stetson and long cigar, momentarily disturbed the habit of almost a century.
"Mr. Green, sir!"
The assistant was already pointing out the window, where the family name in reverse obscured a clear view for Mr. Green.
"What is it?" asked Mr. Green.
He was irritated. He liked to sit in his office and think of his accruing account, alone and in silence, before engaging further in the afternoon's problem of running a high-class tailor's establishment.
"Money!" replied his assistant.
The one word stopped the entire shop. Mr. Green's reflexes to it were faster than those of his staff. Although his reaction was a mere flicker of the eyes, he saw, as did the others, the white Stetson, large cigar and ebony cane climbing down from the cab now pulled up onto the pavement of Savile Row.
"Go about your work," he commanded.
The staff immediately scurried as Mr. Green began to retrace his steps to the door.
The bell rang again as the door opened inward. Mr. Green stopped in mid-step to avoid the heavy oak and glass as it swung past him to reveal Austin Bidwell, poised at the threshold, radiating a confidence born of wealth. Sounds of the street invaded the large room. Smoke from a long Havana cigar curled past Mr. Green. The American stood where he was and said nothing.
Cloth talks—to a tailor. Although the cut of Austin's clothes left much to be desired in Mr. Green's English eyes, the material he wore was of undoubted quality. Austin had chosen it, fine gray worsted wool, mindful of the impression it would make in the practiced eye of tradesmen. Here it found its mark more truly than he had ever hoped.
Silence held sway in the shop as each assistant calculated the potential customer's spending power. But even Mr. Green was far off the mark, though years in business had taught him to estimate the worth of a client at a glance. But then, Austin was not playing by the rules. Given the opportunity, Austin veered almost always toward the ostentatious—a word discovered by George to lightly remind his brother of a natural flamboyance that must not be allowed out of control. The rhyme with Austin's name George used with merciless humor, much to Austin's irritation. But in the English tailor's shop this aspect of Austin's personality gave a fillip to his imposing character. The tailor was already convinced of Austin's importance and the American had yet to speak.
He stepped down into the shop and the door was closed by a respectful assistant, who took the Stetson from Austin almost with reverence and immediately (as an excuse for a professional examination) began to brush it down.
"Can I be of assistance, sir?" asked Mr. Green. The tentative question ended in a cough.
Austin raised his eyebrows. He was obviously going to ask to whom he was addressing himself, Mr. Green realized, so he spoke quickly and smoothly.
"Green, sir. Mr. Green, tailors hereabouts for almost one hundred years."
"Indeed," Austin replied languidly, but he speedily calculated the wealth that must be amassed in the vaults of "the Old Lady" from these fathers and sons whose charge was probably more for reputation than for the fit of their garments.
"A suit, sir?"
The suggestion was made by Mr. Green with the winning smile of one who believes he has guessed correctly, wants the answer corroborated and is then immediately able to continue with proposals already formed.
Austin savored the moment and continued a slow march between the arrays of cloth. Not so much scuttling, but decidedly at Austin's heels, Mr. Green had time to prepare the idea of a topcoat as well, and his hands came together in an automatic family gesture almost a century old. The words from Austin, who had now stopped and turned to Green, drove palm against palm with some force.
"Ten suits, Mr. Green—or thereabouts." Austin wafted a hand airily. "Three from that," he pointed. "Two of that—cut hacking and long."
An assistant began to scribble even before Mr. Green's gesture showed that he had absorbed the fact that here was money indeed. Austin continued:
"A topcoat from that, another suit from the check tweed, another from that."
He pointed swiftly to each roll of cloth, number and mark taken immediately by the efficient assistant.
"Another from that, from that; that." He spun on his heel. "And that, with gold buttons and braid for ceremonial occasions." He smiled. "Not a uniform, Mr. Green, but a dress reminder of my military past in the Americas, of course."
Mr. Green answered warmly, "Of course, sir."
"Now show me some dressing gowns," Austin continued.
Mr. Green was already moving.
"Oh, and tell the cabbie I shall be a short while." Austin turned and walked toward a young man who had bowed the moment the word "gowns" had left his lips.
"Williams!" Mr. Green called to his other assistant and indicated to him that a message was to be conveyed outside. Reluctantly, the young tailor's assistant put down the white Stetson beside his brush on the shining mahogany work top.
Williams had a mind of his own. He was, he thought, no errand boy, but the look in Green's eye was formidable enough to remind him who paid the meager salary he took home, so he made do with a youthful scowl, and—deciding to slam the door, outgoing and incoming—he went.
§
Lounging in imitation of his fare and smoking a long cigar (a gift from Austin), the cabbie replied to Williams, "Thankee, me man. Tell me fare I 'as the message and will conduct meself accordin'."
His toothless Cockney grin stretched ear to ear. The cabbie had observed the scene within through the window and now had a question to ask this haughty youth before him.
§
"Frederick Albert Warren," said Austin, enunciating his invented name slowly, allowing Mr. Green ample time to spell it out for himself. If it was good enough for a countess, it would do well enough for a tailor.
"Address, sir?"
For a moment Austin's face went blank. The address! of course. Hell, he thought—he was so pleased at the alias he'd forgotten a damn address.
He put down his cane, took off a glove quite unhurriedly and reached into his pocket to find the newly acquired English diary. He used a pencil from the spine of the small book to flip the pages.
"I've not been here long, Mr. Green, and always seem to forget your English names."
"Of course, sir."
Mr. Green waited patiently. Austin ran out of pages and imagination. Where the devil could he say?—he couldn't make up a name or mention a place he wasn't able to find. At that moment Williams entered and slammed the door. Distracted, Mr. Green turned to the approaching figure to chide him, but Williams spoke first. He addressed Austin, who was grateful for the delay.
He said, " 'Ave you found your man, sir?"
Deeper and deeper, thought Austin. The last thing he had expected was conversation between the damn cabbie and this obviously inquisitive assistant. What was his name?
"Indeed, Williams," said Mr. Green.
"It seems that Mr. Warren has indeed 'found his man,' as the cabbie puts it; a suitable tailor would be more like." He turned to Austin.
"You will find, sir, that we shall do our utmost to please."
Austin nodded his thanks and found on the last page of his diary an advertisement for a small hotel—family, intimate, aiming, as it stated, like Mr. Green, to do its utmost to please.
"The Golden Cross, Mr. Green, at; ah—Charing Cross? Would that be it?"
"No doubt, sir." Mr. Green took it down.
From Austin's wallet came two one-hundred-pound notes. Williams swallowed. Green accepted them, respectfully. He paused only to glare at Williams.
"Hundreds? Why, thank you, sir. Now if we could have your basic measurements?"
Austin raised his arms to allow the tape measure around his chest and felt, in that moment, not the exuberance of a quest accomplished, but the depression of a man surrendering to the machinery of a plot he had now activated and whose momentum might well prove difficult to control.
Fear or premonition? He could not decide. A moment later, as the two, Green and Williams, bustled about him, his dismal thoughts were replaced with the high excitement he had anticipated. He had to wait until he was in the street to actually laugh, and then he covered his emotion with a cheery wave back to the faces at the window of the shop. He climbed into the cab knowing all eyes were on him still.
The Four Hundred Page 6
