the old tune as he proceeded across the landing stage from the ticket booth to the ferry — 'was what made Yankee Doodle cross and did inflame his dander.' Relaxed by the warm sunshine, he found a spot at the rail and leaned there, thinking of his wife and other pleasant subjects. The ferry, packed with families, shoppers, and workers whose offices closed early on Saturday, left the city stage at a minute past four, bound for the Woodside stage across the Mersey.
Cooper had succumbed to Liverpool as he had long ago succumbed to the charms of Charleston, though the two cities could not have been more unlike. Charleston was a pale lady who napped away the hot afternoon, Liverpool a freckled girl who poured the beer at a public house. But he had come to love the second as much as the first.
He loved the bustle of the port. Into the Mersey poured the commerce of the empire, and out of it went old ships freshly loaded and new ones freshly launched. He loved the banter of the seafaring men who came and went like the tides. Whether they were Liverpudlians or lascars from the East Indies or even would-be shipbuilders from the Carolinas, they spoke a common tongue and belonged to the same restless, frequently lonely brotherhood.
Cooper loved Liverpool's dark, square buildings, as solid as the good-humored people who inhabited them. He loved the comfortable town house he and Judith had found, directly across Abercromby Square from Prioleau's. He had even learned to eat black pudding, a local specialty, though he would assuredly never love that.
He did love the people, a fascinating, cross-grained lot, from the magnates who sent men sailing around the storm capes with a pen stroke to lesser mortals such as Mr. Lumm, his greengrocer, who had abruptly been made a childless widower at thirty-seven and never remarried because he had discovered the world's enormous population of willing women, a population unknown to him when he wed at fifteen.
Now seventy-four, Mr. Lumm continued to operate his shop a full six days each week and boasted to Cooper, man to man, of the enormous resources of his goolies. 'Nuff ter popyoulate an ole country, assa fack.' While still in his fifties, he had discovered that the secret of keeping his nudger in trim was to exercise it often, with any quim but a House of Commons. Cooper loved the roguish old fellow as much as he loved the white-haired vicar of the parish, who bred bull terriors, led wildlife walks in the Wirral, and took pains to visit the Mains at least once a week because he knew strangers in a foreign land lacked friends. The vicar strongly opposed slavery and the South, but on a personal basis that made no difference.
Of an evening, Cooper liked to stroll the Toxteth docks and gaze at the stars above the Mersey and the Wirral hills, and tell himself it was a good time, a good place, even if he was far from home. 'Dirty old town,' Mr. Lumm often said in a tone of great affection. Cooper understood perfectly.
His mind drifting and his eye on the panorama of docks and coaling floats on the Liverpool shore, he suddenly had a tight-drawn feeling. He turned, and saw the man for the first time.
About fifty, Cooper judged. Bulbous nose. A mustache of heroic proportions. Cheap suit, too heavy for the weather. Paper sack in one hand. The man stubbornly occupied one end of a bench overloaded with a thin woman and her five children. From the sack the man drew a leek. He bit the white bulb with great relish.
Chewing and chewing, the man gave Cooper a glance — not unfriendly, merely curious. But Cooper was by now experienced at spotting those who might be Dudley's thugs. He checked the width of the man's shoulders. Very possibly this was a new one.
He felt jittery as Birkenhead's yards and old, soot-black buildings rose ahead. The ferry bumped in, and Cooper was one of the first to get off, moving quickly but not at a pace to suggest panic. He wove through the rank of lounging hackmen and climbed the cobbled street to a lane tucked behind Hamilton Square. He darted in and, halfway down, turned around. He watched the mouth of the lane, but there was no sign of the man who ate leeks.
Relieved, he entered the public house, the Pig and Whistle, where the lane dead-ended.
As usual, only a few sailors and dockworkers were in the place at this hour. Cooper took a seat at a small, round table, and the landlord's gray-haired wife soon brought him a pint of ale without receiving an order. 'Afternoon, Mr. Main. Evensong is delayed two hours.'
'That late?' He couldn't suppress anxiety. 'Why?'
'I know nothing about the reason, sir.'
'All right, Maggie, thank you.'
Damn. Two hours to kill. The man on the ferry and now this — was there trouble? Had Charles Francis Adams somehow convinced the crown to seize the 290? A flock of alarming fantasies flew around in his head and robbed the ale of its savor. He jumped when the bell over the door jangled. A bulky figure filled the rectangle of light.
The man with the sack of leeks came straight to his table. 'Mr. Cooper Main, I believe?' A smarmy smile; a pudgy hand extended. 'Marcellus Dorking. Private inquiry agent.' He withdrew his hand. 'Mind if I sit and have a word?'
What the devil was the game? Matt Maguire, Broderick — none of Dudley's other detectives operated this boldly. Heart hammering, Cooper said, 'I don't know you.'
Dorking slid onto the long seat beneath the window of dirty bottle glass. He laid the much-handled sack on the table, called for a gin, took a leek from the sack, and began to toy with it, his huge smile unwavering.
'But we know you, sir. Bulloch's chap — right, eh? No problem there. We admire a man of conscience.'
'Who is we?'
'Why, the parties who requested me to approach you, sir.' He bit the leek in half, masticating noisily. From the bar, a small man with coal-dusted hand complained about the stink. Dorking glared, then shone his smile on Cooper again. He ate as he spoke. 'Parties discomforted by Captain Bulloch's interpretation of the Foreign Enlistment Act.'
Cooper sensed he was in trouble, perhaps caught. Would he be searched? The message in his hat discovered? Unwise to put that sort of thing on paper, he realized belatedly, but no one in Bulloch's office was a professional spy.
Would he be arrested? Jailed? How would he notify Judith?
Dorking reached for another leek. 'You're on the wrong side, sir. This nigger slavery stuff — m' wife's very strong against it. So 'm I.'
'Does your conviction spring from your conscience or your pocketbook, Dorking?'
The man scowled. 'I wouldn't joke, sir. You are a foreign national, involved in serious violations of the Enlistment Act. Oh, I know the dodge, sir — shipyards cannot arm and equip vessels of war for belligerents with whom Great Britain is at peace. But nothing in the act says it's illegal to build a ship
Cooper stayed silent. Dorking leaned in again, intimidating. 'Very Jesuitical indeed. In your case, however, it could be overlooked — even a small stipend paid — if my clients received one or two brief reports as to the purpose and status of a certain vessel sometimes identified as the 290 and sometimes as
Pale with rage despite his fright, Cooper said, 'You are offering me a bribe, is that it, Mr. Dorking?'
'No, no! Merely a little more financial security, sir. Just for a few helpful facts — such as an explanation of the odd behavior of some sailor boys lately seen on Canning Street. They were marching along with fife and drum, playing a tune called 'Dixie's Land.' The same sailor boys had been spotted at John Laird's not long before. Spotted inside the gate. Do I make myself clear? Now what does that say to you, Mr. Main?'
'It says they like the tune of 'Dixie's Land,' Mr. Dorking. What does it say to you?'
'That Laird's might be hiring a crew, sir. For the proving run of a new Confederate States war vessel, could it be?' The inquiry agent flung his half-eaten leek on the table, roaring at Maggie. 'Where's my damn gin, woman?' He then gave Cooper time to observe his narrowed eyes and clenched teeth before he said, 'I shall be candid with you, sir. There's more than a fee if you help us. There's assured safety for your wife and little ones.'
Maggie had reached the table. Cooper snatched the glass from her hand and dashed the gin in Dorking's face. The man cursed, dripping and wiping. Cooper grabbed his throat with his left hand.
'If you touch my wife or my children, I'll find you and personally kill you.'
'I'll fetch Percy,' Maggie said, starting away. 'Me husband. He weighs seventeen stone.'
