A Parade Of Virtue (A Poor Man At The Gate Series Book 9)

by Andrew Wareham

  White watched him out of sight, shaking his head. Dementia was coming close, he feared.

  "Will the family be safe? I worry, Mrs White!"

  "You fear he might do harm to them before perhaps putting an end to his own existence, husband? It has been known, we all have heard of such, but what is to be done?"

  The nearest real peace officers were to be found in Albany. The local villages had only their own little councils and appointed mayors, none of whom had the authority to restrain a madman, or would have known how to.

  Mr Humphrey reappeared soon after harvest, still employed by the feed merchant, he said, and seeking to purchase from the farms. He bought very little and was ready to move on after two days at the saloon.

  White was alerted by shouts and screams in the village, came running out of his forge to see Merton standing in the centre of the road, a scatter gun in his hands and facing Humphrey.

  "You know me, Mr Humphrey! You have found who you have been looking for!"

  "I know you indeed, Oliver, but I was not seeking you out. I have no business with you and no interest in you. I left Mr Smith's employ nearly two years ago, and I can assure you that you were a forgotten man then. There is no hue and cry called for you, sir, nor can I see any reason why there ever should be. Go home, sir, you have nothing to fear!"

  "So I heard you say many a time to your poor victims. You cannot fool me, Humphrey!"

  "I have no wish to fool any man, Oliver. I have put the past behind me."

  Merton raised the gun, cocking the hammer.

  "Better to put you behind me, Satan!"

  "Do not be foolish, Oliver! You were never one to kill with your own hands, sir - do not try to shed blood now, for your own sake."

  Humphrey's own right hand stole under his jacket as he spoke.

  White suspected a concealed pistol, a death in their street. He stepped forward, though keeping well out of the line of either gun.

  "Mr Merton! Neighbour! Do not do this thing! You would jeopardise your immortal soul by the crime of murder. You would hang, sir, and where would your children be then?"

  "It is not murder to kill the evil in the commission of their sins, Mr White. He has come to destroy me and mine and I must forestall him!"

  "Not this way, Mr Merton!"

  "There is no other way, Mr White."

  Merton spoke sadly, regretfully and suddenly snatched the shotgun into his shoulder and pulled the trigger. Humphrey fired his pistol as he fell. Merton crumpled, shot through the throat, dying within seconds.

  Humphrey stayed down, clasping his belly, panting and moaning.

  White took a quick look, sent his boy running for Joby to come with his medicines and bandages, though he feared it to be pointless.

  "He has opened my belly!"

  White could not lie to a dying man.

  "Birdshot, sir, a dozen and more of punctures."

  "Then I cannot live, sir."

  "Our doctor will examine you, Mr Humphrey. Perhaps the wounds are not deep and the gut itself is unharmed."

  Joby came within minutes, bent over his patient, looked and then sniffed, shaking his head at the whiff of opened bowel.

  "I 'ave a bottle of best laudanum, sir, and can feed you doses that will bring you to sleep. I can offer no more. Best would be if you told Mr White of any folks you wanted to 'ave a letter sent to 'em."

  "I have no family, sir. I beg you to write a brief note addressed to Mr Smith, at the offices near to the Opera House. That will find him, the Post Office will be awake to it. Say that I ran across Oliver the Spy, by accident, and he made an end of me, and, I believe, I of him."

  White promised to write the letter.

  "You will find two hundred of gold sovereigns in my saddle bags - they will be accepted here, I doubt not. Five to my good doctor and another five to bury me deep and safe. For the rest? Had Oliver any wife or child? If so, give it to them, tell them it is the last of Judas' pieces of silver."

  Humphrey spoke no more, died soon after, hastened by a massive dose of laudanum that took away all pain.

  White arranged for the bodies to be taken to the burial ground, to be laid next day by the tiny graves of the smallpox victims. He then harnessed up his buckboard and drove the short distance to the Merton's place.

  All was well, the children singing and laughing at play. White was relieved - he had discovered increasingly dark fears as he had come down the road.

  Mrs Merton wept, widowed a second time and left to run a stock farm and bring up five children on her own

  "Your oldest is no more than ten, is she, ma'am?"

  "Just that, Mr White, and mortal terrified of they old bees."

  "Do you know how to keep them, ma'am?"

  "The man did show I, Mr White, and we shall 'ave need of every cent they can earn us."

  "What of the horses?"

  "Too strong for I, Mr White. I can't 'andle they."

  "Then I must, ma'am. I do not have the money to pay you for them all, so best will be that I put a man in to work them, paying you a share of the price when any are sold each year."

  A cash income, in addition to the honey and the produce of her garden land and such fields as she could plough and sow, would give her a living. She gave her thanks.

  "The man who shot him had money on him, English gold to the value of a little short of a thousand dollars. Most of that comes to you, ma'am."

  Children safe, and the prospect of a living secured, she wanted to know how Merton had come to die, saying that he had become increasingly strange over the previous year and she had feared sometimes that he might bring them to a bad end.

  She listened and wept a little more.

  "He was mortal feared that 'is past was to catch up wi' 'im, so 'e did say. Poor man!"

  'Oliver the Spy' meant nothing to her and White, who had heard the name, chose to not to explain. He would let that book remain closed.

  "He was a man who had been accused, suspected rather, of wicked deeds, Mrs White. Oliver the Spy seduced unwise men into unlawful plots against the government of the land, and then made a profit from betraying them to the authorities, or so it was widely said. Even Parliament raised his name, and then discovered him to have disappeared. We know now where he fled to, yet he could not leave his conscience behind, it would seem. The mills of God, ma'am!"

  "They grind slowly but thoroughly indeed, it would seem, husband. A pity! I never could find any liking for the man, sir, but he leaves behind too many for comfort."

  "The eldest girl may find a husband in five or six years, and he will, no doubt, move into the farm and take its burdens upon himself for a few years, until her whole brother is of an age to inherit. They can then move out, having put together a stake that will settle them further to the west. The younger ones will move out in their turn, as would have been the ordinary way of things. We must look to their comfort for the next few years, but Mrs Merton is a sensible lady, one who knows how to work."

  Mrs White agreed, chiding herself in her own mind for being not displeased that her husband would be again the leading man of their small town. It was only right that a man of his parts should be recognised, she felt, but it was, of course, a great pity that the fellow Merton had died in such a way.

  White sent a letter to John Quillerson, begging his advice on the legal processes that must be followed. Murder and, probably, a killing in self-defence must surely be noted somewhere, somehow, by officialdom.

  Quillerson took advice in Albany, where he was now well-known as a figure in the business community of the state, and replied that he believed Mr White to be the local magistrate and that his ruling on the matter would be sufficient. Where neither party could be brought before a court, being dead, and there was no other involvement, then there was little point to any expensive legal fuss and bother. An entry in the parish register of births and deaths would be enough to satisfy the law, and to provide evidence if an heir should ever appear demanding proof of the demise of eit
her party.

  The Town Council met and sought a candidate to take Mr Merton's place in the chair, turned to Mr White as still the most respectable of them and living conveniently in the village itself. This time he accepted their plea that he should name himself Mayor.

  Word came to Lord St Helens from Mr Michael that Oliver the Spy, whom he might recall, had come to the end that so often repaid men of his quality for their services. He might wish to pass the news to Lord Star, who would, no doubt, be interested to spread it amongst certain members of his family.

  Robert read the letter before going down to breakfast at Freemans.

  "You will remember that silly business with your brother, Mr Justice Star, some few years ago, Thomas?"

  Thomas did, only too well - he still kept a weather eye on his brother's circle of acquaintance.

  "The agent provocateur who brought the affair to a closure, known rather flamboyantly as 'Oliver the Spy', has been shot dead in the dirt of the street of an American backwoods town. A not inappropriate ending, I believe!"

  "An evil man, I understood. I cannot comprehend why government soils its hands with his sort, Robert."

  "Revolution is a crude business, it would seem, Thomas. The kid glove is ineffective to deal with bomb-throwers and assassins. On the other hand, it does seem that the agencies have been indiscriminate in their activities, as willing to hang the fool as the felon and creating ill-feeling in the process. The consideration of Utility makes it abundantly clear that one does not solve the problem of revolutionary ire by adding further injustice to the existing grievance."

  Thomas finished buttering a slice of toast while he considered that last remark.

  "Profound indeed, Robert. Expressed more simply, I find it preferable to ameliorate hunger rather than to hang the starving."

  "It is not impossible that I am growing pompous in my old age, Thomas! That is in essence what I meant. We must get rid of these damned Corn Laws before our own greed causes the masses to rise against us."

  "There must be a debate in the Lords this year, Robert."

  "Then I will attend, Thomas, and will at least vote in the right way, even if I do not speak."

  "I will join you."

  Henry had sat in silence during the discussion, having no direct knowledge of the incident referred to and little interest in the Corn Laws.

  "Brother Luke is to join us today, is he not? Judge Star is on circuit, one gathers."

  "Busy in the north of the county. Another unlawful combination of workers, the great bulk of whom will soon be enjoying the sunshine of Botany Bay, I suspect. Mark has a short way with those who break the law."

  Henry really cared very little; trades unions were of small concern to a slaveholder.

  Henry marvelled as he shook hands with Luke - the man stood two inches taller, straight-backed, swaggering almost, keen-eyed. Where was the simpering priest of yesteryear?

  "You look well, Henry. America must be good for you."

  The schoolboy memories Luke had were of a grovelling weakling, a nasty little boy. Henry had indeed changed, though he much suspected that he might have grown into a nasty big man.

  "What is this of a guerrillero in Greece, Luke?"

  "There was a job to be done, Henry, and, if truth be told, I enjoyed the life!"

  "And now you are to go to the East, I am told. Have you not thought of the West instead? There are wild lands in America, and a need for men to subdue them, and earn a fortune as well, possibly. There must be gold in some of the creeks. There are thousands of miles of cattle land, and great forests to fell, fur beasts to trap, buffalo to shoot, and savage Indians to fight!"

  Luke was tempted, as Henry could see.

  "There is a need for men to open up the land for the settlers who are flooding into the country, Luke. There are towns to build, river-ships to navigate, wagon-trails to prove. A bold man may make a fine life in the West, I believe."

  Grace lent her voice to Henry's, assuring him that there was a continent to open up to the white man, and if the British did not take the opportunity then the Germans certainly would.

  "The French are also much present, Mr Star. A patriotic Englishman might well wish to ensure that they did not obtain colonies in the New World."

  "The family could benefit greatly as well, Luke," Thomas added. "A presence in the young lands of the West could be much to our advantage - and a gold mine or two would be very welcome as well!"

  They talked over the next few days and Luke agreed in the end that the open plains of the West might be preferable to the sweaty jungles of the Orient, and little less profitable. He would go to the States in Henry's company.

  "What of slavery, brother?"

  Luke disliked the very concept, but had no intention of himself remaining in the Slave States and was now sufficiently a pragmatist to expect to ignore what he could not see.

  "I do not think I approve of the emancipation of the slaves, Henry. They should rise up against their masters and free themselves. Freedom cannot be given, it must be taken or it is just another possession of the masters. I learned in Greece that the only free man is one who has fought for his liberty. A man who takes what he is given is no more than a pensioner, he is beholden to another and so can never be truly free. Charity destroys the recipient, and gives power to the donor. The slaves must stand on their own feet, or live forever on their knees."

  Thomas cried out against so uncompromising a doctrine, but Henry was much inclined to agree. The slaves that he had seen were humiliated and spiritless, acquiesced in their own bondage as if they believed they were lesser beings. They were commonly called 'boy', and could never become men except they chose to grow up.

  Grace did not approve.

  Book Nine: A Poor Man

  at the Gate Series

  Chapter Six

  "It's a 'orrible clamity, Mr Michael, sir. Blood everywhere!"

  Michael started to his feet, stared out of his window at a perfectly quiet street.

  "What? Where, Horatio?"

  The adenoidal office boy stared at the piece of paper in his hand, his mouth forming the unfamiliar words.

  "Safampton Water, sir. Off Calshot Spit, sir."

  "What is it? Give me the message boy! Where did you get it?"

  "Messenger, sir. One of them Marines what works at the Admiralty, sir. Said it was off some semmy-for what they got."

  The Admiralty had semaphore towers connecting to every major naval station in the country and could send messages to and from Portsmouth, for example, in less than two hours.

  Michael read the brief despatch and demanded action.

  "Town carriage and driver to the door, immediately. Mr Jenkins!"

  His junior came running, Mr Michael never shouted.

  "Express to Sir Matthew Star - use the City service, the fast horse-post - informing him of a shipwreck off Southampton, a Roberts-built paddle steamer. There have been deaths, how many as yet unknown. Report of 'clouds of steam', so perhaps a boiler explosion. Immediately, if you please, sir. Take the packet to the messenger yourself and demand the utmost haste - and pay a bonus for it."

  "Horatio!" Michael turned back to the office boy. "You will take this note that I am about to write and give it into the hands of Sir William Rumpage, in person. If he should not be there then you may pass it to Mr McGregor and none other. If the news reaches any other person today then you will be out of a job tomorrow! Take this!"

  Michael put a half-sovereign in the boy's palm.

  "A fast cab, you understand? The rest in your pocket. If I find you walked to save the extra shillings for yourself, I will have you transported."

  The boy ran, believing every word he had been told.

  Michael scurried outdoors, jumped into his carriage.

  "Mount Street, Lord St Helens' residence. As fast as may be!"

  "Marine disaster, my lord. A Roberts paddle steamer, one presumes it to be a ferry-boat from Southampton to Cowes. Passenger or cargo carrier is u
nknown. Report sent from the Admiralty, my lord. I do not know how many copies have been released, or to whom."

  "That it would happen one day was inevitable. A pity that it did not happen to one of our competitors, but the Good Lord disposes as he will."

  Michael was a pious man, and knew that my lord was not; he was inclined to suspect a degree of satire.

  "Sir William Rumpage has been informed, my lord."

  "Good. He will be in a post-chaise by now, I doubt not. What is the moon?"

  "Full, sir, and a dry night I would expect, though cold."

  "Good driving weather - a bright, frosty night. I expect he will reach the coast by dawn, or soon after. I will call my chaise for first light. Can you remain here while I ask Mr James to join me?"

  Michael was wholly at my lord's disposal, naturally.

  "Why, Mr Michael?"

  "Why, my lord?"

  "Why did the message come directly to you, so that I am one of the first to be informed?"

  "Oh, that why, my lord. Mr Smith, my lord, has sight of all messages that are other than routine information of ships sailing or arriving or of the weather. He sent the information to me by way of a favour, no doubt. We are very close in many matters, my lord."

  "He must be reaching the end of his working days, one would imagine. My father must have known of him thirty years ago."

  "I believe him to be nearer seventy than sixty, my lord, but men in his trade tend not to retire whilst they are still alert. Sleeping easily at night can be a difficulty, my lord, after a day of idleness with time to remember and think. Besides that, he has neither wife nor lover to accompany his old age - one tends to be solitary in the profession, my lord. He will work until he is taken by an apoplexy, if he is lucky."

  "And if he is not fortunate?"

  "Then he will discover his memory to be failing. There will be tasks left undone, decisions incorrectly made... If he realises then it will be a pistol to his head one dark evening; if he does not then he will be visited by a pair of doctors who will 'invite' him to accompany them to a place of sanctuary where he can rot in comfort. They will generally be kind gentlemen who will ensure he has access to a very large bottle of laudanum."