Dodger (45 page)

‘His Lordship will want to confirm this is indeed the jewel before you're set free, Dawkins,' he said. ‘This could be a likeness and you're trying to pass it off as the real stone. For all I know, you never even went into that house.' He forced me further up the alley and I thought about that deadly pistol he still had in his other pocket. ‘Your aborigine friend has been instructed to meet Lord Evershed at the docks and wait with him until Calista arrives with the carriage. Then they are to travel to the Dancing Mutineer,' said Pin referring to the public house in Wapping where he had taken me on our first meeting. ‘Lord Evershed could be on his
way there now expecting to be presented with this jewel and we can both be thankful that we secured it in time. There would have been a mighty reckoning if we had failed.'

The alley led out on to a busier street and he held his arm up to hail a hackney cab but none came. This was a low part of town and it was all donkey carriages and carts pulled by men or dogs. ‘His Lordship will be very pleased with what you have delivered, Mr Dawkins,' Pin said at last when a small horse-drawn carriage for two drew near. ‘You'll have made an old man very happy.'

It was Fagin what had first told me of the dreadful history of the Dancing Mutineer, the pub what I had learnt years later was owned by Timothy Pin. When I was a small kinchin what had just come to live in Saffron Hill he told all of us boys the story of it before bed and why it was a place where thieves was too scared to go.

It was on one of those nights when we was all too excitable to sleep on account of the great thieving adventures we had got up to during the day and we would have been stamping, scrapping, shouting and making all manner of mischief above the room where he slept. He poked his head up into that attic room and told us that it was far too late for fun and games if we was to be up and out first thing tomorrow.

‘Early birds, my dears,' he would say, pointing towards the jackdaw what I had carved into the wooden beam from where the lantern hung. ‘Early birds.' We boys, what loved it whenever he would come up to say goodnight to us, pleaded with him then to tell us one of his frightening stories and promised we would sleep all the softer for it afterwards. Fagin, who never needed much persuasion to spin another cautionary tale, then climbed the rest of his bony self into our attic and made us get in our beds before he continued.

‘Should I tell you, my dears, more of the terrible Baron Beazle?' Fagin cackled once we had settled ourselves and he had positioned himself under the one lamp for full effect. ‘Or, as he is better known, the drowning judge!' After making us promise that we had steel enough to listen to the story of this hanger of seafaring thieves he continued to tell us about the heroic Magnus Craft what had fallen into the clutches of the navy and been brought home to England to face justice. ‘Captain Craft,' Fagin told us, ‘was a fine pirate and he and his crew had plundered their way across the South China Seas like champions. They had buried so much treasure under the earth of tropical islands that the greedy British Empire decided they wanted it for themselves and would not rest until they had found it. Craft was clever though and spent years dodging his pursuers with his crew of hearty young pirates, many of them boys as young and as fine as yourselves. But, and here is where the story turns sour, he was led into a trap by a man he once trusted, his own midshipman, what had been paid by the navy to betray the good captain. He had been peached upon, my boys, by one of his own. Now what do we all think to that?'

A chorus of disapproving voices rang out as we all clamoured over the others to describe what bloody vengeance we would each carry out on anyone foolish enough to play such games among our little crew. Fagin grinned with pride and continued.

‘Very good, my dears, that's the spirit. Now Captain Craft was taken back to London and found himself up in front of the Admiralty Court, presided over by the cruellest man in the land, the black-hearted Baron Beazle.' Some of the younger boys pulled up their blankets at the mention of this man we had already heard so many bad things about. ‘Beazle wanted to know where the captain had buried all his treasure but Craft, being a brave pirate what only cared about the fortunes of his crew what was all still
free upon the ocean waves, refused to answer him. So Beazle decided that a common hanging was too good for Craft. Instead he had him taken …' there was a long pause before Fagin made a leap towards us in his scariest voice, ‘…
to the drowning chamber!
'

We boys all cried out in mock terror and Fagin chuckled at us before going on to explain how this chamber worked. ‘The chamber is the cellar of a pub, my dears, but this is no friendly establishment like the Three Cripples, oh dear me, no. This pub is the Dancing Mutineer, a place feared by everyone in our profession and with good reason too. It still stands to this day on the bank of the Thames near Execution Point, but the way in which the condemned men meet their doom when sent to the Mutineer is not always by way of the noose. It is much slower and more painful. When the tide is low they are taken down into the dark steps of the cellar and chained to the walls, where they are left, but not before their executioners have opened the tiny sluice gates that face the river. As the tide comes in, the water rises, filling the chamber. Poor Craft was left there to scream out his lungs as the water poured in and rose and rose up to his chin. Chained to other walls was the skeletons of other pirates who, like him, had fallen foul of the Baron.' Fagin stood then as tall as he could and snuffed out the lantern light. Light still beamed up from the trap he had climbed up through and he crawled back towards it. ‘Did he survive or did he perish, my dears?' he said as his bottom half descended down it. ‘How would you like to hear that the story ends?'

‘He was rescued,' I said. ‘By a woman what loved him.'

‘By his crew,' said Georgie Bluchers. ‘They blew open the river wall with dynamite and stole him away.'

‘He told them where the treasure was,' said Charley Bates. ‘And the Baron let him go.'

‘He drowned,' said Jem White. ‘Like a rat.'

The only part of Fagin still seen in the attic now was his head, and the light from below illuminated his red hair making him look like something from a bible picture book. His left arm reached over to the trap door ready to shut it after himself. ‘All fine ideas, boys. Anyone of you could be the next George Shatillion with fine ideas like that.'

‘So what happened?' asked Mouse. ‘Did he live or did he die?'

‘The thing is,' said Fagin as if telling us a terrible secret, ‘it don't matter how it ends. How it ends ain't the lesson of the story. The lesson of the story, the lesson of every story, is these three little words.' He raised a finger and tapped the air with each one. ‘
Don't. Get. Caught
.'

And then he pulled the trap door over himself and left us with darkness and dreams.

*

The place in Wapping where the Dancing Mutineer stood was a deserted vicinity made up of ship-building factories. And, while it was true that some among the criminal community avoided the place for superstitious reasons, many law-abiding persons would also steer clear just because it was horrible. Dockers and factory workers would frequent it after a day's labour, but it was less than a week before Christmas and the street was deserted.

‘Lord Evershed is here already,' said Pin in a nervous voice as our small cab reached the pub and we saw Calista waiting outside with her carriage. ‘Dear God, I hope he's in a good humour.'

‘You look more scared of him than I am,' I said as we squeezed out of the box on wheels what we had been travelling in and Pin paid the driver. He did not reply but breathed out as we entered the pub and walked through the bar, where Warrigal sat alone drinking a whisky, and then led me up the staircase. He walked towards that office room where we had spoken less than two weeks
before and where he had admitted to me that he thought Lord Evershed was not of sound mind. Pin placed his hand on the handle, glanced at me for one second and then opened the door to meet his employer.

‘Lord Evershed,' he said in a strong voice as he strode into the room with me, ‘I do so apologise for keeping you waiting. I trust your voyage was not too hellish.'

Evershed was stood in the middle of the room with his back to us. He was dressed in black trousers and waistcoat but there was a long military sword sheathed in a gold-plated scabbard around his waist. On the table was a long-barrelled flintlock pistol, black with a golden butt, what looked old enough for him to have used as a soldier in India. He was looking out of an open window to the river beyond and a small fire in the grate was struggling to stay alight against the draught. When at last he turned to face us he seemed even older than I remembered him being in Australia although his face was still brown from the sun. If he recognised me at all then he made no sign of it.

‘This city,' he said to neither of us in particular, ‘is even more squalid than I remember.'

There was a silence then as Pin seemed unsure of how to respond. ‘I know,' he said at last. ‘It's ghastly. But once our business is done you shall see no more of the dreadful place and return to Longwinter in the country.'

‘It's all still whores and vagrants, as far as I can see,' Evershed went on as if he had not heard him. ‘Whores and vagrants.' He moved over to the desk then and stood behind it, looking at the two of us. He had not shut the window after himself and the cold December air filled the room. ‘I waited in that dockyard for one hour
all on my own
until your blasted driver arrived. It's a good job she knew me from my portraits.'

‘Oh dear,' said Pin. ‘Was Warrigal not there to keep you company, Your Lordship? I sent him along ahead of us for that purpose.'

‘Warrigal was late,' barked Evershed. ‘He arrived after she did. Said he got lost, the wretch.'

‘He's only been in London a month, Your Lordship,' Pin bowed his head. ‘It was my fault for sending him. But I could not greet you myself as I had an urgent task to attend to with Mr Dawkins here.'

Evershed's head turned towards me for the first time. ‘Was it him after all then?' he said to Pin in disgust. ‘The one who was given the doll? This fellow?'

‘No, Your Lordship,' Pin explained. ‘Mr Dawkins and another boy were both given a similar doll to throw us off the scent. But the jewel was given to a different child entirely.'

Just then there was a sudden bang and I spun around. Warrigal had walked in and the door behind had been slammed by either him or the wind. He stood there, with his hands together, as if awaiting instruction.

‘Then why is he still here?' asked Evershed, his eyes still fixed upon me. ‘And not the correct child?'

‘Because Mr Dawkins here,' said Pin, unbuttoning his coat, ‘was extremely helpful to us in the end, Your Lordship. Without him we never would have discovered the identity of the true recipient.'

Evershed turned away from me then and looked with eagerness to Pin. ‘You have it then?' he asked. ‘It's true?'

In reply Pin reached into his pocket and pulled out the jewel I had given him. ‘It is my great pleasure, Lord Evershed,' he declared with his chin held high, ‘to present you with what was always yours by moral right. I give you, sir, the Jakkapoor stone.'

Evershed said nothing but moved around the desk and close to Pin. He took the jewel from him and inspected it.

‘It is the real jewel then, Your Lordship?' asked Pin after Evershed had stared and sniffed at it for some time.

‘Oh yes,' murmured Evershed. ‘It's the very one I liberated from Seringapatam as a much younger man. It's unmistakable.'

‘I am pleased, Your Lordship.'

‘You've done well, Timothy,' Evershed said, and then turned away from him. ‘I thank you for this.'

And then, with one swift and strong stroke, he threw it out of the open window and straight into the Thames.

‘Fucking thing!' he said, and turned back to us.

I cried out in horror. ‘What did you do that for, you mad bastard?' I had forgotten all about the danger of the moment, so outraged was I by the travesty of this action. I almost wanted to barge past him, jump out of the window and dive in after it. ‘I've spent the best part of a month looking everywhere for that!'

I looked to Timothy Pin to see if he was as shocked as I was.

He gave me a small shrug. ‘Revenge is a wild justice,' he said as if he had expected that.

‘I've never wanted it,' grunted Evershed. ‘I don't believe in silly curses, Dawkins, I'm not a child. So,' he turned to Pin. ‘Tell me his name then. And where the bastard can be found.'

‘
Her
name, Your Lordship. The child was a girl.'

‘Wrong, Timothy!' Evershed shouted in sudden anger. ‘George Shatillion wrote that the jewel was given to his bastard. Bastard means boy!'

‘I assumed so too. But the girl Dawkins led me to walked past us in the street just hours ago. Her name is Ruby Solomon. I got a good look at her face and I'm certain that she is the one.'

‘How can you be?'

‘Because her likeness to your late wife is startling,' replied Pin.

I stood listening to all this dumbstruck. I was still confounded
by the tossing away of a priceless jewel and could not begin to make sense of this talk of bastards and Ruby.

‘The hair is the colour of Shatillion's, Your Lordship, but the rest –' Pin stopped and then looked to me – ‘belongs only to your late wife. I even remarked to Mr Dawkins that she had the face of a heartbreaker.'

‘Hold up a second,' I said after I had at last roused myself out of confusion. ‘What we on about?'