A Conspiracy of Paper bw-1

by David Liss

  I could not guess the whore’s connection to this ruffian, and I feared she might be bespoken for the night. But I thought it unlikely that a woman like that would allow a gentleman with a purse to be long disappointed, so with a variety of looks and smiles I made it plain that I had a liking for her, and I hoped that any business she might have with this fellow could be dispatched quickly.

  My wishes were gratified. In less than a quarter of an hour, the ruffian stood up and left the premises, and I began to stare hard at Kate, looking at her in the most uncivilized and lascivious way imaginable. She was not shy of my meaning and lost no time removing herself to my table, where she sat down very close to me. Placing a hand upon my leg she leaned forward and whispered, allowing her breath to caress my ear, that she should like a glass of wine.

  My enthusiasm was genuine, though not the kind she would have anticipated, and affecting a great drunkenness, I called for a bottle of the sour piss the Barrel and Bale was proud to serve.

  Up close I could see that Kate was a woman not without charms for gentlemen who are so inclined, but she had the kind of hard, hollow look of the street about her, and that was always for me enough to tame my more lickerish passions. I had no amorous feelings for women I could not trust with my purse should I doze off. Moreover, Kate was badly in need of a washing, and her dress, while tight about her pleasing shape, was soiled with the leavings of customers gone by. The once-ivory muslin was now yellowish brown, and her plain tan stomacher had grown so filthy as to almost want delousing.

  “You are a very pretty lass,” I told her, slurring my words enough to allow her to believe I had already had more than my fill of spirits. “I could not help but notice you, my dear,”

  “And what didcha notice?” she asked me coyly.

  I confess that I had a bit of the libertine about me in my younger years, and even in this matter of business, I could not resist the temptation to win over this woman. It was a great weakness of mine, I suppose. So many of my friends enjoyed conquering only women they found charming, but I felt some need that women should find me charming.

  “What did I notice about you?” I repeated back to her. “I noticed the redness of your lips, the whiteness of your throat, and the delicate curve of your chin”—I reached out and rested my hand against the side of her face—“and the marvelous line of your cheekbones. You look to me like a glorious and sensual angel in an Italian painting.”

  Kate squinted at me. “Most gen’men say they likes me arse.”

  “You were sitting upon it when I noticed you,” I explained.

  Satisfied, Kate laughed and returned to her drink.

  I joined her, gulping my wine, and allowed Kate to encourage me to drink more. Even when I drank in great quantities I rarely lost my head to spirits, but the cream in my stomach safeguarded me well. To my dismay, it had begun to turn sour, and it took some concentration to keep this unfortunate mixture of liquids in its place. I gritted my teeth together and disregarded my unease, acting the drunken fool, shouting, stumbling upon my words, and once, falling over in my chair.

  “Ya get full of wine easy, don’cha, me big man,” she said with a smile of irregular teeth. “What ya need is a good walk, yer do. Clear your ’ead. And if we ’appen to find ourselves a quiet spot, what’s wrong with that, eh?” She gave my upper arm a good squeeze and then paused briefly to consider the resistance of muscle where she had anticipated a more pliable kind of flesh.

  After fumbling through my purse to pay the reckoning, all the while making sure that Kate could see that there were many more coins to be had, I walked with her into the October night. It had grown cool with nightfall, and pulling her close to me, I let Kate lead me through a winding maze of London back alleys. I understood that she sought to disorient me, and though I was far less cloudy with wine than she believed, she had me all but entirely confused within a few minutes, for she knew well the dark and labyrinthine streets. I could only be certain that we stayed near the river and walked in the direction of Puddle Dock.

  It was late and quite dark, and close to the river as we were it should have been dangerous for us to walk in that way. A strong wind blew the fetid Thames stench into my face. Kate clung to me for warmth as much as to entice me on in a direction she knew no sober gentleman with any valuables about him would willingly venture. Even a man skilled in the art of self-defense avoids any excursion into the dark streets upon the river, for in a time when gangs of violent thieves, a dozen or more strong, freely roamed the city, a man could offer himself or his companion but little protection. A young woman with a staggering gentleman upon her arm must have appeared a delicious target; I could only assume that the scurrying we heard around us bespoke footpads and prigs who knew Kate and understood what she was about, for there were surely others out who crept close enough to inspect us, but they always walked away, and sometimes with a laugh. Once a group of linkboys surrounded us, attempting to aggravate Kate into agreeing to pay one of them to light our way, but she had an acquaintance with these urchins and dismissed them with a few affable quips.

  Finally she took me down an alley until we were almost at the dead end and in near-total darkness. We were perhaps ten yards in from the entrance and only a few feet away from the end. The alley was narrow and gave of the cool of the surrounding stones; the ground below us was wet and foul odors drifted up from the puddles of putrid water and the moldering garbage that littered the ground. We discovered a wooden crate set against the wall almost for our convenience, and I could scarce believe that in this part of town an item that might fetch at least a few pence would not be salvaged and sold within minutes of its abandonment. Indeed, I should not have believed it, but more concerned with Kate, I dismissed my curiosity almost at once.

  “No one’ll bother us ’ere,” she said. “We can get some privacy.”

  I followed silently, her willing partner in the lusty adventure. I must say that I little understand those gentlemen who take pleasure in a hurried dalliance in a damp alley or under a musty bridge. Yet, were men to forswear such outdoor delights, I believe that half the whores of London would be forced to turn to the workhouses.

  I sat down upon the crate and let my head fall to the side. Kate stooped down and offered me a kiss just to the side of my lips. She was a clever one, for she wanted to learn if my intoxication overpowered my desire. If I had pulled her closer and directed the kiss, she would know I had at least some of my wits about me yet.

  I did not move.

  “You’re not planning on falling asleep before we get to know one another better, are ya?” she asked, hoping I would do just that. She knew her business, Kate Cole. Some thieving whores would have made their move at that instant, but she stood quietly, watching me for a good five minutes, letting me, as she believed, fall into a deeper, more certain sleep until she was sure my repose would be uninterrupted. She then knelt before me and began unbuttoning my coat, her fingers nimbly reaching for the fob of my watch. Kate had a great talent, I noted with hesitant admiration, for she too had been drinking wine, but the spirits affected her not at all; her fingers dexterously danced about my middle, and I knew that if I did not act with haste I would be forced to demand the return of my watch along with Sir Owen’s pocketbook.

  With a rapid and violent burst that I had calculated to both shock and unbalance Kate, I arose, knocking her down into the filth of the alley. She fell backward, as I had intended, and she only kept herself entirely off the ground by holding herself up with her arms behind her. Her position was to my advantage, for she could make no moves quickly. I, meanwhile, removed an imposing pocket pistol I was certain always to have about me and pointed it directly toward her. “You’ll excuse the ruse, madam,” I said. “I can assure you your charms are not lost on me, but I’ve come on another gentleman’s business.”

  “You bastardly gullion,” she breathed. Even in the dark, I could see her eyes shifting as she calculated. Who was I? What was my business? How might she gain the advan
tage?

  I held the pistol in my steady hand. My face bespoke calm and determination. Whores and thieves tended not to respect authority or law or even danger, but they respected terror, and nothing filled street filth with terror so rapidly as an enemy who displayed a mastery of his passions. “This need not become more than a simple matter,” I said in an even tone. “Let me explain our business. Last night you met a gentleman and had an adventure much like the one you were planning with me. You took a number of his goods, and he wants them back. Give me this man’s property and I shall leave you unharmed. He knows who you are, but he won’t swear out an arrest on you should you cooperate.”

  If Kate felt terror, she did not show it. She sucked on her bottom lip like a pouting child. “An’ what if I say you was a liar and I weren’t near no one like a gentleman last night? Then what?”

  “Then,” I said calmly, “I’ll beat you until you’re bloody and unconscious, search your room until I find what I am looking for, and when you wake up you’ll find yourself in Newgate prison with nothing to look forward to but the next hanging day. You see, you are in a bit of a situation, my dear. Why not be helpful so I may proceed with my business?”

  I hope my reader recognizes that I had no desire to harm this woman, for I never choose to inflict violence upon that sex. I have, however, few scruples about the threat of violence, and with the more delicate sensibilities of the female constitution, threats are generally all that I require.

  Not so in this instance. “I should help so you can proceed with your business, I should?” she repeated with a wicked smile. “Your business is getting yourself dead, and I’ll help with that’n plenty.”

  It was at that moment I realized that I had underestimated Kate Cole’s operation, for the sound behind me was that of a pair of heavy boots moving forward from the shadows. In an instant I knew that Kate did not work alone, and that at least some of the footsteps I had heard belonged to her partner. This operation was one they used to call the buttock and twang: a whore would lure a drunken victim to a secluded place, and if the wine failed to do the business, the twang completed the task. I, though armed, found myself at a severe disadvantage, for I did not dare turn my back on Kate, but I had to turn, and turn quickly, to face my as-yet-unseen adversary.

  Taking one step onto the wooden crate, and grabbing a crevice in the wall, I leapt over the still supine Kate, and pivoted quickly, pistol pointed forward. What I saw was the ruffian from the Barrel and Bale, rushing for me with a sword thrust outward. My back was against the wall, and I had no room to maneuver. Had I nothing in my hand, my first choice would have been to draw my hangar and take the man in fair competition, for I flattered myself that I was a skilled swordsman and that I would be able to disarm the fellow without loss of life. But there was no time to drop my firearm and draw my blade, and regretting that I had to take these extreme measures, I pulled back the hammer of my pistol and fired into the oncoming shape. There was the loud crack, a momentary flash, and a burning sensation upon my hand, blackened now by the powder. For an instant I thought the gun had misfired, but then I saw the ruffian stop, as a steady dark stain spread across his threadbare shirt. He fell to his knees, his hands covering the wound, and in a matter of seconds he fell backward, and his head hit the dirt hard.

  Dropping the warm piece into my pocket, I squatted down and grabbed Kate, who had already begun to flex her face muscles to let out a shriek. I clasped my hand over her mouth to prevent this outburst and held her as still as I could, for she struggled violently against my grasp.

  I felt nothing but rage at that moment. Black, violent, seething rage that nearly incapacitated me. I had no love for killing my fellow-men, and I despised Kate for having forced me to fire the pistol. I had taken life only twice before—both times when I had sailed on a smuggling ship and we had been attacked by French pirates—and both times had left me with a kind of intangible anger for the man I had killed, for forcing me, as he did, to kill him.

  With my hand squeezed tight upon her face, feeling her writhe, feeling her hot breath upon my palm, I was nearly overwhelmed with the seductive urge to twist hard, to break her neck, to make the difficulties she had caused me disappear in the dark of this alleyway. Perhaps my reader will be shocked that I write these words. If so, the shock is that I write the words, not that I felt the impulse, for we are all driven by our passions, and our task is to know when to submit to them and when to resist. At that moment I knew that I wanted to hurt this whore, but I also knew that I had just killed a man and that I was in great danger. No danger, however, excused me from carrying out the task Sir Owen had hired me to perform. I had to calm Kate, to make her cooperate that I might finish my business and escape this misadventure without finding myself before the magistrate’s court.

  “Now,” I said, trying hard to keep my voice as calm as it had been before, “if you promise me you won’t call out, I’ll take my hand from your mouth. I won’t hurt you; you have the word of a gentleman. Will you listen to what I have to say?”

  She stopped squirming and feebly nodded her head. I slowly took away my hand and looked at her face, ashen with terror, streaked now with gunpowder I had smeared upon her.

  “You killed Jemmy,” she whispered, through lips grown stiff with terror.

  I let my eyes flash to the lifeless mass beside me. “I didn’t have much choice.”

  “What do you want of me?” she whispered. A tear began to roll down her cheek.

  My passions dissipated somewhat at this unexpected display of tenderness. “You know what I want. I want that gentleman’s goods. Have you got them?”

  She bobbed her head incoherently. “I tell you, I don’t know who you mean,” she whimpered. “I got some things in me room—just take ’em if that’s what you want.” After a few more questions I learned that what goods she had were in her room above the Barrel and Bale. I was concerned to hear that, for with a dead man on my hands, I had no wish to return there, but I saw that I had little choice if I were to retrieve Sir Owen’s pocketbook.

  “Now listen to me,” I said. “We are going to your room and we are going to get what I am looking for. If you act as though anything is wrong, if I even suspect you are considering playing me ill, I shall not hesitate to bring you to the magistrate’s office and tell him precisely what happened. Your friend was shot while you tried to rob me, and you’ll hang for it. I do not wish to pursue that course, but I shall have that pocketbook and I shall have it whether you live or you die, whether you are free or in prison. I know you understand me.”

  Kate nodded suddenly and sharply, as though the act of agreement was a torture best completed quickly. That we might not attract attention, I removed my handkerchief, which I now moistened with Kate’s tears and used to wipe the gunpowder from her face. My own gentle impulse disturbed me, so I pulled her to her feet, and, with my hand clasped hard about her arm, she led me back to the Barrel and Bale. I had been concerned that we would encounter Kate’s friends as we returned to the alehouse, but the prigs must have heard the report of my pistol and fled into their dark holes and kennel gutters for the nonce. No one chose to be upon the streets when the constables came looking for a blackguard upon whom to blame the murder.

  It was a long walk—silent, jerky, and tense. Upon our return, the Barrel and Bale was now sufficiently filled with merrymakers that our entrance and ascent up the stairs appeared, as nearly as I could ascertain, to go by unnoticed. I entered her room cautiously, not wanting to be duped again, I saw nothing but a rough, straw-stuffed mattress, some broken furniture, and a hoard of stolen goods.

  I struck a pair of cheap tapers and then barred the door. Kate let out a whimper, and only half aware that I spoke, I muttered to her again that she had nothing to fear as, in the flickering light of the candles, I cast my eyes about the room for anything that might be Sir Owen’s.

  With a quivering hand she pointed to a pile of items in the corner. “Take what you’re looking for,” she said quietly.
“Take it and be damned.”

  Kate had been a busy girl. Here were wigs and coats and the buckles of belts and shoes. There were purses—I presumed already emptied of their gold and silver—and handkerchiefs and swords and rolls of linen. There were even three volumes of the writings of the Earl of Shaftesbury, which I suspected Kate had not looked into. She had enough here that, could she but sell it, she might acquire a neat little fortune. I presumed that though she might work for Wild, she was not quite willing to hand over all her stolen loot, but fearful of placing these goods in the hands of Wild’s fences, she had no safe place to unload her booty. Such was Wild’s power—those who did not work for him had no way to sell their merchandise and thus gained little for their pains. Kate was certainly stuck with a collection of goods that, while valuable, were all but useless to her.

  I searched through the booty carefully, for I had to keep my eye upon Kate as I proceeded, but I finally saw a handsomely bound leather pocketbook protruding from under an ostentatious periwig. I took a step back and instructed Kate to hand it to me. A quick inspection revealed that this was indeed Sir Owen’s book. With a sigh of relief I pocketed this prize and told her I was satisfied and that she might keep the rest.

  Now I found myself facing the very troubling dilemma of what to do about Kate. I knew it a risk to leave her where she was, for I could not doubt that her taskmaster, Mr. Jonathan Wild, would force her to tell him what had happened, and I did not want her to reveal anything that could be traced, no matter with how much difficulty, back to Sir Owen. He had requested privacy, and I aimed to give it to him. It occurred to me that I could report what had happened to a magistrate—Kate would be taken for theft, I would in all likelihood be acquitted of any blame, and I should receive a reward for her conviction as well. The difficulty with this maneuver lay in that I had promised Kate I should do no such thing. Besides, Kate knew too much of my purpose for me to believe that any inquiry into this incident would not lead back to Sir Owen. Furthermore, had I been a Christian gentleman in a similar situation, I could have approached a judicial bench with the certainty that a judge would look with approbation upon my necessary killing of a felon. I could by no means be certain that a judge would think more highly of a thief-taker of the tribe of Hebrews than he would of a robber. What I required was that Kate depart on her own, without speaking to anyone—particularly Jonathan Wild. I could not suppose that Jemmy was well loved nor that he would be missed. Should Kate disappear for even a few weeks it would be sufficient to generate a protective coat of apathy should the matter ever thereafter be discussed.