“You walked into it?”
“You sound remarkably like your father. We’d just turned the tables on this Mr. Fish when things, well, got away from us, you might say. Tell me more about this William Jones.”
“It wouldn’t have been him,” Bartholomew said.
“All the same.”
“No good comes came of idle talk.”
After dinner Balty took Bartholomew aside.
“This afternoon my friend asked me for a razor to cut his own throat. Now, maybe it wasn’t this prominent citizen who crippled him. But maybe it was. Either way, it’s not idle talk, is it? So please—tell me about this William Jones.”
* * *
“Did you bring it?”
“No. But I’ve had a think on it. And I’ll fetch you a razor, if it’s what you truly want.”
“It is.”
“Very well. I see Thankful brought you more whisky. Give us a taste.”
Huncks handed Balty the jug.
“She stayed an hour. Kneading my legs. Sweet girl.”
“She is, yes. By the way, Bartholomew was at the market in town today. People are talking about the two Englishmen who fell to their deaths trying to rob Indian graves.”
“Nice to be talked about.”
“Yes, I thought you’d be pleased. I learned something else. Who our Mr. Fish is. One William Jones.”
Huncks considered. “William Jones who married Eaton’s daughter?”
“The same.”
“John Jones served under Cromwell. Colonel of Cavalry. Distinguished himself. Married Cromwell’s sister. A widow. Jones was one of the commissioners of the High Court in ’49. He was one of the judges. With Whalley and Goffe.”
“Ah.”
“He was among the first to be arrested and executed. Conducted himself well at the end, by all accounts. His son William arrived in Boston in ’60, aboard Prudent Mary. In the company of Whalley and Goffe.”
“So he’s that William Jones?”
“It would provide a motive.”
“Is everyone in New England related to a regicide?”
“Who told about you about Jones?”
“Micah. I was describing our Mr. Fish. The eyebrows and rummy cheeks. He piped up and said, ‘Oh, that’s Mr. Jones.’ His mum and dad weren’t pleased.”
“No, I shouldn’t think. We’ve caused them enough trouble as it is. Jones is Deputy Governor here.”
“That would qualify him as a prominent citizen.”
Huncks stared at his legs. “Shame these sticks don’t work. What I’d give to pay a call on Deputy Governor Jones.”
“There are a number of people here I should like to call on. Including Davenport and his murderer godson.”
Balty related what Mrs. Cobb had told him. “That’s why she was there in the church that day.”
“Sweet Jesus,” Huncks said. “Poor girl.”
“That’s what she said about you when I told her you wanted a razor. She said, ‘Poor man.’ Then came in and rubbed your legs to cheer you up. She who’s not said a word to either of us about what she’s been through. If you’re still feeling sorry for yourself, I’ll get your razor.”
“No. Not just yet.”
– CHAPTER 22 –
Integendeel
Pepys’s legs ached. He’d stood on the wheel of a cart for over an hour, waiting to watch Turner the highwayman hang, for stealing £4,500 in jewels. He’d paid the owner of the cart a shilling for the privilege.
It was a popular hanging. Crowds poured into St. Mary Axe. Later it was said fourteen thousand had watched the handsome robber flung off the ladder. Pepys hoped it was Turner who’d robbed him on the Chelsey road that day.
After the execution, Pepys visited with a pretty young merchant, a seller of ribands and gloves. Things got so exceeding merry he forgot the pain in his legs.
Then to the Sun Tavern, to meet with Mr. Warren, timber merchant of Wapping and Rotherhithe. Warren presented Pepys with a fine pair of gloves. Sam wondered if Warren had purchased them from the same pretty merchant.
Warren said the gloves were a gift for Pepys’s wife. They were neatly wrapped in paper, and weighed very heavy, being stuffed with forty pieces of gold. A gesture of gratitude, for his continuing good relationship with the Navy’s chief purchaser of timber.
And so home to Seething Lane.
Pepys waited anxiously for Elizabeth to go see about supper so he could admire his gold in privacy. He dumped the coins onto the table, purring at the sight of them, all lambent in candlelight. He congratulated himself on his good fortune and gave thanks to God Almighty for his blessings. He felt surpassingly happy, which always made him want to take wine and play his lute.
This pleasant idyll was interrupted by knocking on the door. His servant entered with a message. Pepys recognized Downing’s seal. A summons to Whitehall, a matter of “some urgency.” The wine and the lute would have to wait.
On his way out, Pepys’s nostrils filled with the aroma of roasting marrowbones. It was a particular favorite dish of his. He hoped Downing’s matter wouldn’t keep him long.
He reflected anew on the happiness he felt here. How blessed he was! Sated as his exertions with the riband merchant had left him, he felt a surge of concupiscence in his loins. He thought of the wenches he’d recently seen at Ludgate Hill. It wouldn’t be too much of a detour on his way back from Whitehall.
But no, he told himself sternly. One dalliance a day was enough. He would return straight home. He’d go by water, so as to avoid temptation. There were no sirens on the Thames! Then he and his wife would drink wine and suck on marrowbones and he would play his lute for her. His “Gaze Not on Swans” was coming along nicely. The lute often put Elizabeth in the mood for bed—and not for sleep. Pepys’s heart was burstingly full.
* * *
“My lord.”
“Ah. You arrive. I trust this is not too great an inconvenience?”
“Being of service to my lord is never an inconvenience.”
Downing rang a small silver bell on his desk. His scrivener, Fell, entered. Pepys nodded a greeting. They knew each other. Fell sat, dipped a quill in ink, and looked on with the expectant but patient face of one awaiting dictation. Odd, Pepys thought. Downing rarely made a record of their meetings.
“Perhaps you can illuminate a matter for me.”
The scratch of Fell’s quill filled the silence.
“Yes?”
“When did you last see the Earl of Sandwich?”
Pepys’s buttock cheeks clenched. “Sandwich?”
“Your cousin. And patron.”
“Distant cousin. Well . . . let’s see. My Lord Sandwich has not of late been much at Court.”
“No,” Downing said, not looking up from the papers on his desk. “He has been much occupied in Chelsey. What can be keeping him there? I wonder. Perhaps he prefers the tranquility of village life to the cut and thrust of Court.”
Pepys squirmed. “He does, yes, have an affinity for the rustic.”
“Get out there much yourself, do you?”
“Chelsey holds nothing to attract me. The road is a horror. Highwaymen and cutpurses at every turn.”
“Then you have not visited with the Earl of Sandwich in Chelsey?”
The scratch of Fell’s quill sounded like the fire-etched writing on the wall at Belshazzar’s Feast: Mene, mene, tekel: You have been weighed on the scales and found wanting.
Pepys spurred his brain. Better to offer Downing something.
“As a matter of fact, I have.”
Downing leaned back in his chair and cocked his head to the side, resting temple on a finger.
“A most unhappy undertaking,” Pepys said. “But I deemed it my duty.”
“Yes?”
“I had arrived at the melancholy conclusion that my lord’s comportment there was doing him no good at Court. Or with his majesty.”
“Yes. Family relations can be such a burden.”
“I
have a great affection for my Lord Sandwich.”
“As you should. After all, look how high his patronage has lifted you.”
“I am indeed fortunate.”
“No wonder, then, you should risk the horrors of the Chelsey road to entreat with him to give up the pastoral life and return to Court. How gallant you are, Pepys.”
“My lord exaggerates my heroism. It was no more than my duty.”
“ ‘Non nobis solum nati sumus.’ Eh?”
“ ‘Not for ourselves alone are we born.’ ” Pepys cleared his throat. “How well the imperishable Cicero puts it.”
“And when did you visit with Lord Sandwich in Chelsey?”
“Well . . . Let’s see. Was it . . . ?”
“Tuesday, perchance?”
“Tuesday? Well, I would have to consult my calendar . . .”
“In the absence of your calendar, let us, arguendo, say it was Tuesday.” Downing’s tempo quickened to a trot. “In which case, your mission to Chelsey must be adjudged a success. You are to be congratulated, Pepys.”
“I am?”
“Yes. It shows you dispose of great powers of persuasion. I must keep you in mind for some embassy in the future. Clearly, the Crown has not availed itself of your full talents.”
“My lord is too kind. Yet I do not know quite why I deserve such . . . garlands.”
“Then I shall explain. Only two days after your . . . let us call it your Chelsey remonstrance, your prodigal cousin sought an audience with his majesty.”
“Ah? Oh.”
“And not merely just to show his face. Far from it! Indeed, from the specificity of his business with the King, one would think Lord Sandwich had spent the previous months immersed in military matters. Instead of Mrs. Becke’s crinkum-crankum.”
“I . . .” —Pepys’s mouth had gone dry—“rejoice to hear that my Lord Sandwich has stayed . . . on top of things.”
“His majesty was most impressed. Not only that the Earl was so well-informed. But that a matter of such great confidentiality had somehow”—Downing walked two fingers across the surface of his desk—“found its way to Chelsey.”
Pepys swallowed. “Did my Lord Sandwich vouchsafe to his majesty how he had come by this intelligence? Whatever it was.”
He braced to hear Downing utter that most dismal of sentences: “Take him to the Tower!”
But Downing said, “No. His majesty did not think it polite to ask.”
Pepys stifled a sigh of relief. “How very gracious is his majesty.”
“Yes,” Downing said. “And how fortunate for whoever provided the information to Sandwich. But no matter. Secrecy is a chrysalis inevitably shed in the fullness of time. The matter will reveal itself soon enough. Out of the shadows, into the sunlight. Nothing like sunlight, eh, Pepys?”
“Quite, my lord.” Pepys was sweating.
“You look pale, Sam. I think you must get some sunlight.”
Downing returned to his papers. Pepys rose and walked to the door.
“Pepys.”
“My lord?”
“Did I ever thank you for delivering those dispatches to Colonel Nicholls in Portsmouth?”
“I . . .”
“I don’t believe I did. Thank you.”
“It was nothing, my lord.”
“Integendeel.”
“My lord?”
“Good night, Sam.”
Pepys went directly home, with no thought of the lusty wenches of Ludgate Hill. Nor was he in the mood for wine or marrowbones or strumming bars of “Gaze Not on Swans” nor for making merry in bed with his wife.
He tossed and turned until three, when, giving up on sleep or breakfast, he dressed and went down Seething Lane to the Navy Office. He found what he sought in the library, in an English-Dutch dictionary and phrase book.
Integendeel meant “on the contrary.” But what did that mean?
– CHAPTER 23 –
Promise?
Balty woke to the sound of shouting. He bolted from bed. Thankful and the Cobbs were standing outside Huncks’s door.
“What on earth?” Mrs. Cobb said.
“Another of his nightmares,” Balty said.
“Doesn’t sound like a nightmare.”
A yelp came from the other side—a demented whoop.
“Told you he was drinking too much whisky,” Mrs. Cobb said.
“I’ll deal with it.” Balty opened the door. Huncks was standing, propped against the wall. He was looking down at his feet, lifting one, then the other in turn. He looked up at Balty, grinning, and resumed his foot raising, as if in awe of a newly invented mechanical marvel.
“Look, Balty! Look!”
Mrs. Cobb and Thankful came in.
“My legs!”
“It’s your knees you should be on,” Mrs. Cobb said. “Giving thanks.”
Huncks continued his foot lifting.
“I was dreaming I had to piss. Reached for the pot. Couldn’t find it. Next thing, I’m standing. Standing!”
Over the next few days, Huncks regained full use of his legs. Mrs. Cobb and Thankful competed with each other for the credit. Mrs. Cobb asserted it was her clam chowders. Thankful said it was her prayers and rubbing his legs. Balty offered his own opinion that the credit must go to God for a miracle, not a miracle of healing, but mercy—liberating the Cobbs from further burden of hospitality. Micah took to calling Huncks “Mr. Lazarus.”
Thankful, who throughout had been attentive and gay, now grew distant and withdrawn. Balty noticed it more than the others. As Bartholemew urged Balty and Huncks to remain inside out of sight, it was difficult finding a chance to speak with her alone. Finally he did, the day before their departure.
“Is all well?” Balty said. “You seem a bit sad.”
“Perhaps.” She went on with her housework as she spoke. “Where will thou go?”
“I’m not supposed to say. New Amsterdam. Don’t let on to Huncks I told you.”
“Thou’ll not linger in New Haven?”
“Not sure what Huncks has in mind. He’s pretty hot about Mr. Fish. Huncks isn’t one to let bygones be bygones. Not that I wouldn’t mind dangling him from the cliff. Or that damned Quiripi—”
Balty paused. “Amity told me. About Gideon. And . . .”
“Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord. I shall repay.”
“That from the Book of Quaker?”
“There is no Book of Quaker, Mr. Balty. Paul’s letter to the Romans.”
Balty harrumphed. “From the sound of it, Paul never made it to New Haven.”
“God has spared thee and Mr. Huncks. Thou might repay him.”
“I’ll propose it to Huncks. But I don’t think he and Paul are of the same mind.”
“Then for me?”
“You are a puzzle, all right. After what these saints have done to you?”
“Leave justice to God, Balty. Promise?”
“I will if you’ll promise not to go parading in their worship house without clothing.” Balty pressed. “Forgive me for saying, but I wonder if your mind’s jiggled loose from all that quaking. You know what they’ll do to you. Do you want to die like that?”
Thankful smiled. Their lips came together. Larks sang hymns at Heaven’s Gate. Then the door banged open and Mrs. Cobb came in swinging a beheaded chicken in each hand.
“Well,” she said. “Didn’t mean to interrupt.”
* * *
Balty and Huncks left the next morning. Thankful accompanied them as far as her cabin. Huncks said his goodbye and waited at a distance.
Balty said, “I didn’t know Gideon, but I can’t think he’d want you to throw away your life like that. I’m sure of it. I do know he was lucky to have you.”
She put her hand to his cheek. “I thank thee, Mr. Balty, for all thou did for me. Whatever lies ahead, I pray I shall be worthy of your good heart.”
She kissed him on the forehead, then turned and went into the little cabin by the pond and closed the door.
A Fish for Mr. Fish
“But I promised.”
“I didn’t.”
“Well, it was rather a promise from both of us.”
Huncks sighed. “Quiet, man. You natter like geese.”
It was going on sunset. Balty and Huncks, posing as fishmongers selling from a cart, had positioned themselves up the street from William Jones’s house.
“I don’t believe you were thrown out of Harvard for drinking on the Sabbath.”
“What are you talking about?”
“It’s obvious you didn’t pay the least attention to your Bible studies. Certainly not to Paul’s letter to the Romans.”
“Do you want to find the regicides? It’s why you’re here, isn’t it?”
“I thought so. Until you told me my brother-in-law’s only trying to be rid of me.”
“I’d like to be rid of you.”
“I thought our mission was to assist Colonel Nicholls with his visit.”
“It is. It’s all of a piece. But if the New Haveners are protecting the regicides, they may also be conspiring with the Dutch. We’ll find that out from Jones too. If you cease nattering.”
The front door opened. Out stepped the familiar stout figure.
“Look lively,” Huncks said.
Huncks led the horse down the street toward the approaching Jones.
“Oysters! Mussels! Lobsters and cod!” His neckerchief was pulled up around his face.
“You there!” Jones said. “What are you about? I’ll see your license!”
“Got it right here, yer worship,” Huncks said. He drew a truncheon and clubbed Jones on the back of the head, dropping him like a slab.
“Quick—into the cart.”
Balty tried to lift his end of Jones. “Weighs more than a bloody horse.”
“Come on, man.”
Balty dropped his portion of Jones onto the street with a fleshy thud.
“Can’t we tie him to the cart and drag him?”
“D’you want the whole town after us? Get his legs. One, two, three.”
With Herculean grunting they got the carcass onto the cart and shoved Jones in among the ice, slime, and rotting fish. Outside the town, Huncks bound Jones’s hands and feet and stuffed a gag in his mouth.
The Judge Hunter Page 13
