by Avi
“Yes, sir.”
“You’re not about to take anything from ’is office, are you?”
“Oh, no, sir.”
“Then, seeing you’re ’ere—not yer father—and learning of yer errand, I need not be ’ere no more.” With that, he touched a finger to his hat again and said, “Go on in, then.”
He was surely agreeable. Yet, I kept feeling that something in all this was very odd. I wanted to ask him who had requested this guard duty—or what he thought I could possibly take from the office—but feared to. Instead, I went up to the door, turned the handle, and since it was very heavy, had to push my way in with two hands.
I entered upon a long hallway with shiny marble floors and bright white walls on which hung many paintings of great ships in full sail. Some were in furious battle, with blazing cannons blasting away at close quarters. I could almost smell the smoke.
In the middle of the hallway was a high desk, which faced the door. Perched behind this desk sat a naval clerk dressed in the dark blue uniform of a junior officer. Junior in rank perhaps, but senior in age, with white hair and many a ratlinelike wrinkle on his face. He had a black patch over one eye and, moreover, a scar across his left cheek, as if he’d been cut by a sword. It was easy for me to imagine him in one of the pitched battles depicted in the paintings.
He must have been sitting on a high stool, for he was able to look down at me from what felt like a lofty height, as if from a yardarm.
“Yes, mate, what can I do for you?” he asked.
“I wish to report for my father, Wesley Huffam. He’s a clerk here.”
“What’s his ranking?” he said, opening a large ledger book.
“I’m not sure.”
“Huffam, you say.” He turned the pages. “Hayman. Hochman. Huffam! Here it is! Wesley Huffam. Copy Department.” He looked down at me. “For your information, he copies ordinance specifications for the cannon manufacturers.”
“I didn’t know that, sir.”
He considered me with his one good and severe eye. “Lad, the more a sailor knows about his captain,” he said, “the more he’ll know how he’ll weather the gales. You’d best remember that,” he said, wagging a bent finger at me as if wielding a curved saber.
“Yes, sir.”
He studied his ledger book momentarily before returning to me. “Are you aware that your father has missed a fair number of workdays?”
I felt my cheeks grow hot. “No, sir, I am not.”
“If I were you, I might inform him that there are those in the First Lord of the Admiralty’s quarters, so to speak, who might take exception to his shirking his watch. They just might.”
“Yes, sir.”
“All right, then, end of fo’castle preaching. Now, what about him?” He picked up a steel-pointed pen, dipped the nib into an ornate bottle of ink, and readied himself to make a note in his book while awaiting my answer.
I said, “He bid me to say he would not be coming to work today. He … he’s not well.”
“What’s his ailment, then?”
This not being a question I had expected, I could feel my face grow hotter. Fortunately, I remembered a word from Lady Euphemia’s list. “Dyspepsia,” I blurted out.
The old sailor looked down at me, rather sternly, as if he doubted my word, but then he wrote, I presume, what I had said. “All right, then, mate. Dyspepsia. I’ve marked it in the log.” He aimed his finger at me. “Now then, some advice: Sail back to your home port. Convey the message to your captain that the Lord High Admiral trusts that every man will do his duty at his appointed watch on the morrow.”
I didn’t have the heart—or stomach—to say such an event would be unlikely. I said only, “I’ll tell him, sir.”
As I turned to go, the clerk’s words—The more a sailor knows about his captain, the more he’ll know how he’ll weather the gales—made me think what I’d not thought of before: To wit: I knew my father well enough at home. But of his life outside home, other than his theatrical interests, I knew very little. It had never troubled me before. It made me uneasy now. For surely we were sailing in a fierce storm.
Regardless, I was relieved to have accomplished all Father had told me to do. So it was with a somewhat lighter heart that I pushed open the door and stepped out into Black Swan Court. There, standing before me, was a man I had never seen before. Nonetheless, he was staring at me in such a direct, aggressive way that I could have but little doubt he was waiting for me.
CHAPTER 14
I Meet a Mysterious Man
The man was rather tall and skinny, with a long and, from what I could see of it, narrow head. Not only was he heavily bearded, his features were further concealed by a large brimmed hat in the American style. He wore a common black frock coat, buttoned high to his neck. In his hand was an umbrella, which he held before him like a rapier.
The more I considered him—and we stood there staring at each other for a goodly time—the more I sensed something false about him. Which is to say, I became uncomfortably convinced he was wearing an ill-fitting disguise, that his beard was not real. I truly had to curb an impulse to leap forward and yank it away. Of course, I dared not. For while he stood there looking most peculiar, there was, notwithstanding, something menacing about him, for his eyes gazed upon me with ill-concealed hostility.
I glanced about, very aware of the fact that the constable I’d previously chatted with was nowhere in sight. Other than this man and myself, no one was in Black Swan Court.
“S-S-Sir …,” I stammered, “were you … were you waiting to speak to me?”
By way of answering, the man tucked his umbrella under an arm, took a little gray book from a pocket, and began to leaf through it rapidly, touching finger to lips to aid him in turning each page.
“What … what do you want?” I demanded.
“Father,” he fairly barked, reading from his book, “Wesley John Louis Huffam. Father’s employment: Naval Ordinance Office. Present circumstance: In debt three hundred pounds. Owed to: Mr. O’Doul. Current residence: Halfmoon Inn, a sponging house. You, John Horatio Huffam, his son, went to Forty-five Great Winchester Street. Why?”
He snapped a page over. “Because you called upon your father’s great-aunt, Lady Euphemia Huffam. For what purpose? To beg money. Next: Came to the Naval Ordinance Office. Next: Met me.” He lowered his little book and stared at me. “Dare you,” he demanded, “deny any item?”
“How do you know all that?” I cried, dumbfounded.
“An informant,” he said, rather smugly, I thought.
On the instant I recalled the ragged girl with the cap, the one who had been stalking me, and made the quick guess that it was she who provided this man with all this information.
Now, I could have escaped with ease. But where would I go? For, even as I contemplated fleeing—wanted to go—I realized that this man had already revealed that he knew where my family was staying. That meant, since I fully intended to return to my family, I would not be able to escape him.
“Who are you?” I asked. “Why should you care about me?”
He made a stiff, jerky bow. “Inspector Copperfield. Scotland Yard.”
Having never heard of such a person or of Scotland Yard, I replied, “What do you inspect?”
“Crime! Misdeeds! Frauds! Which is to say, thieves, burglars, robbers, cheats, housebreakers, embezzlers, blackmailers, pickpockets, swell mobsmen, shoplifters, assassins, muggers, and”—he glanced in the direction of the Tower of London—“traitors.”
“Do you think I have committed a crime?” I gasped, now feeling very alone and quite afraid.
He pointed his umbrella right at me. “You look just like your father, and I have little doubt he is one of those criminals.”
“Please, sir,” I said with all my heart, “I don’t think so. I truly don’t.”
“Think again,” he returned.
“But … when you inspect criminals,” I managed to say, “what do you do to them?”
“Jail them. Set them to the treadmill. Put them in the hulks. Transport them. If necessary, hang them. Now then, explain what you have been doing.”
“I’ve … I’ve been running errands for my father.”
“Errands?”
“It’s the truth, sir! It really is.”
“Your father is,” he repeated, “is Wesley John Louis Huffam?”
“Yes, sir. That’s his name. Does he know you? Do you know him?”
“I know a great deal about him,” he replied. “What do you know?”
“Why, he is … as you just said, my father, sir.” Then I recalled what the clerk at the naval office had told me. So I added, “He copies ordinance specifications for cannon manufacturers. What else, I’m not sure.”
“You need to know more. Consider this a warning.”
“A warning? A warning about what?”
“Your father,” he said. “It’s your business to know more. When and if you do learn more, remember, I am Inspector Copperfield of Scotland Yard.”
“But … how can I find you?”
“You can’t, but I can find you. Good day.” That said, he again pointed his umbrella at me—as if to mark me—pulled the brim of his hat lower, then spun about and strode from the courtyard, leaving me in a state of astonishment and fright. Indeed, I was shaking.
Trying to steady myself, I left the courtyard and went along Tower Street until I reached Trinity Square, the little oval park overlooking the Tower. There, I found an iron bench, upon which I sat to calm down.
Though I gazed again at the ancient White Tower with its fluttering royal flags, that time I barely saw it. Instead, I tried to make some sense of the things this Inspector Copperfield had told me. Gradually, I realized something: It was one thing for him to have known about what I did that morning—my public movements. They were there for anyone to see, and presumably, that raggedy girl had noted them. But how did he know about Great-Aunt Euphemia? Or that I had requested a loan from her? Even the amount! Yet he spoke nothing of my meeting Mr. Farquatt. In short, he did not know everything I had done that morning.
As to why he wished to know these things, he more than implied a crime was involved. And … my father was in some way implicated.
Did he mean the crime of being in debt?
I almost hoped so. That is to say, I hoped there was nothing more. Among the other crimes he had mentioned—perhaps because we were adjacent to the Tower—treason loomed large. But then, I didn’t even know what made one a “swell mobsman.”
Quite agitated, I decided to return home as quickly as possible, report on what I had done, and then beg my father to explain more than he had previously. I suspected that if he wished to do so, he could.
My head filled with the questions I was determined to put to him. The primary ones were: What was Scotland Yard? Secondly, why was the inspector from that place interested in my father?
Deeply troubled but resolved, I headed toward the Halfmoon Inn. I walked as fast as I could—occasionally, for such was my anxiety, even breaking into a run. But no sooner did I turn, quite breathlessly, onto Halfmoon Alley, than someone leaped up before me, bringing me to a sudden halt.
I gasped: It was none other than the ragged girl with the large cap, the one who had been following me, the one, I was sure, who had provided Inspector Copperfield with all that information about me. And this time she was not running away. On the contrary: She was blocking my way.
CHAPTER 15
I Am Confronted by the Ragged Girl
Small, slight, and wiry, she had snarled, dirty brown hair that hung below her neck in disarray. While her face was positively filthy, it yet offered up the broadest grin of crooked teeth I’d ever seen, along with eyes positively bright with merriment.
She wore what appeared to be a man’s jacket—much too big for her and thoroughly ragged—so that I had little doubt if I had pulled upon it, it might tear apart in any number of places. As it was, the sleeve cuffs were tied round her wrists with bits of string to keep out the chill. As for the baggy skirt she wore, it, too, was torn and patched in more than a few places. Her overlarge shoes were old and did not match, giving her a clownlike look. As for that hat, I had never seen such on a girl. It positively flopped upon her head like an oversized and cockeyed muffin cap.
Moreover, she stood before me arms akimbo, shockingly brash, with something fierce and determined about her, as if enjoying my discomfort. Indeed, her whole appearance suggested nothing so much as a belligerent and scruffy bug, one capable of quick, darting movements and the ability to give a sharp sting.
“I knows all ’bout you,” she proclaimed loudly, as if daring me to contradict her.
“Because you’ve been following me.”
“I guess I ’ave.”
“And you told Inspector Copperfield where I went.”
“Inspector Copperfield? Can’t say I knew that. But then, in me line of work a surprise is like a bright shillin’. Course, I don’t much like the Peelers, but they are some of me best customers.”
“Customers?”
“Don’t they pays me to sneak ’bout to follow types like you? They do indeed! Who’s goin’ to notice a shabby mite of a girl like me? An’ since they pays me, shouldn’t I do what’s asked? It’s not easy findin’ work—respectable work—for a girl these days. Sellin’ flowers on a curb ain’t me style, no more than sittin’ in a sewin’ shop for fifty, sixty ’ours a week for three shillings or less.”
“Are you suggesting that minding my business is respectable work?” I said.
She only grinned. “Matter o’ fact, I do call it just that, when you consider mindin’ other people’s business is me business. So I guess that’s all right, ain’t it?”
“How did you know my great-great-aunt’s name was Euphemia?”
“Don’t know that I did,” she said. “But since you’ve just tossed me ’er name—Eup’emia, great-great-aunt—I’ll keep it up ’ere.” She lifted her ridiculous cap. “See, what I am is a sneak, a street sweeper o’ bits o’ information. Got more bits in me ’ead than most dogs ’ave fleas. I don’t forgets nothin’. See, there’s money to be ’ad for bits o’ information. Good as the Queen’s coins. Sooner or later, I’ll sell that bit—Great-Great-Aunt Eup’emia—see if I don’t.”
“You can do what you like with it,” I said, quite sure she was mocking me. “I have to get on.”
“I’ve no wantin’ to stop you, mate, though I’d guess you’re goin’ back to the ’Alfmoon Inn to be with yer family.”
“Are you going to tell him that, too?”
“I’ve done me work for the day, thank you. Been paid for what’s been sneaked, an’ no more sneakin’ till more coins cover the palm.”
“Then what do you want of me?”
“Well now, as it ’appens, Master John ’Uffam—see, I knows yer name, don’t I?—sometimes when I finishes a job followin’ a fella, like I done this mornin’ o’ you, then, when I’m done, the fella I’ve been followin’ pays me to follow the one who ’ad ’im followed, if you can follow that.”
“And a girl, too,” I said with indignation. “You should be ashamed of yourself!”
The smile vanished. “What’s wrong with a girl doin’ what I do? I’ve never ’ad a look inside me insides, except I’m guessin’ a girl ’as a stomach like a boy, don’t she? And it needs food too, don’t it?”
“At any rate, I have no need for you,” I said, not wishing to answer her question.
“Not now maybe. But maybe. I’m just offerin’. Keeps everythin’ even’anded. I may be a sneak, thank you, it suits me, but I’m proud to say I’m an even’anded sneak.”
“I’ll get on very well without you, thank you,” I said, and walked past her.
“Mind,” she called after me, “if ever you change yer notion, just come ’long to the Rookery of St. Giles. Ask for Sary the Sneak. Full name Sarah, but Sary works fine. People there know where to find me. Get that, Sary the Sneak!”<
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I shook my head in annoyance. I had never met a girl like her and sincerely desired I’d never meet her again.
CHAPTER 16
I Wonder About Father
Putting the girl out of mind, I made my way to the Halfmoon Inn. When I got there, Mr. Tuckum was sitting on one of the benches, intently reading a light blue pamphlet covered with many illustrations. I recognized it as the same as I’d seen in Lady Euphemia’s hallway.
“Ah, good morning to you, Master John,” he said, glancing my way as he pushed his eyeglasses up onto his forehead. “You’ve been out and abroad early like the good old-fashioned boy you are.”
“I had some errands to do for my father.”
“Did you now? Then let me be so bold as to hope that they were fruitful. He’s a fine gentleman, your father is, and I hate to see him mired in these … hmm … troubles. I do enjoy his company. And he plays a fair game of all fours,” he added.
I recalled seeing the cards on the table when I’d come down that morning.
“Unfortunately,” continued the bailiff, “the cards were not falling his way. Still, he took his losses like the old-fashioned gentleman he is. ‘Put it on the bill,’ says he, laughing. ‘I can do that,’ says I.”
“Has he come down?” I asked, for as I looked around, I saw no one.
“Not him nor any of your excellent family. But your servant girl—Brigit, is that her name?—was about asking for you and brought up some tea. Have you had any yourself?”
“I had some of the leavings from last night, thank you.”
He lay down his pamphlet, sat back against the bench, and considered me in a speculative fashion. “Well then, my lad, might I ask—in a purely professional, old-fashioned way—have you had any success?”
I stood there, but my feelings of shame and embarrassment kept me from answering his question.
