Ratcatcher

“Ah, now there’s a tale, right enough,” Jago said. “You recall how I said he was a gunner on the Inflexible?”

Hawkwood nodded.

“Well, it were the Inflexible’s crew who was last to surrender, all except a dozen or so, Scully included, who wanted to fight on. The rest of the crew, though, had had enough and they locked Scully and his diehards down below. It was while the rest of ’em were waitin’ to surrender that Scully and his men climbed out of a gunport and made off in a couple of longboats.”

Hawkwood listened as Jago told him how the escapees had made it as far as Faversham, where they had stolen a sloop and set sail for Calais, in the hope of joining the French.

“Reckoned they’d be welcomed with open arms,” Jago continued, sitting back in his chair. “Stupid bastards! Soon as they landed, the Frenchies threw them in prison. Probably planned to exchange them for prisoners of war we was holding.”

“Is that what happened?”

“Nah, they were freed after a time. Most of ’em were allowed to sign on with Frog privateers.”

“Including Scully?”

“That’s the way he tells it. Served for eight years before he made a run for it. Jumped ship off Martinique, made his way back ’ome and took up the smuggling game. He’s from my neck of the woods—Sheerness. Knows the coast like the back of his hand, the best places for offloading and lying up to avoid the Revenue. Mind you, you got to admire the bugger’s application. Can’t be too many who’ve gone over the side from two navies!” Jago snorted with contempt.

“He’s a fair way from home,” Hawkwood said.

“Ain’t we all,” Jago murmured. His eyes roamed the cellar, missing nothing. “Fact is, Spiker’s one o’ the best light horsemen on the river.”

There were two kinds of horsemen. Heavy horsemen was the name given to thieves who operated during daylight hours. Light horsemen plied their trade under cover of darkness: professionals who worked in gangs, usually with the aid of copemen, who received and distributed the stolen goods. Their hunting ground was the river and the vessels that sailed upon it. Their knowledge of the moon and tides enabled them to prey on the barges and lighters. Their method was to cut the chosen vessel adrift, allowing it to drift downstream to a chosen spot where they would run it aground and strip it of its cargo. It was a good living for those with nerve and the right connections.

“Why ’Spiker’?” Hawkwood asked.

Jago gave a grim little smile. “We call ’im that on account of he’s got an interestin’ way of dealing with people who cross him. What you might call ’is trademark…”

Hawkwood waited.

“Most men’ll use their fists to settle an argument, or a blade, like as not.” Jago indicated the table over Hawkwood’s shoulder. “Your man Scully uses a marlinespike. Fearsome weapon in the wrong ’ands,” Jago commented reflectively.

Not that the disclosure needed embellishment, certainly not as far as Hawkwood was concerned. He had ceased to be surprised at the variety of means by which the more murderously inclined members of society were prepared to perform grievous bodily harm upon their fellow men—or women and children, come to that. The ex- seaman, Scully, was just another piece of human jetsam to have drifted in with the tide. The capital’s rookeries were full of men like Scully. Rootless, violent types, willing to use any means of intimidation to further their own ends.

“As an abidin’ ’atred of authority, does our Spiker,” Jago went on, warming to his subject. “Wanted to string the Inflexible’s officers from the nearest yardarm, so I ’eard. Funnily enough, it was Parker who stopped him. Though I did ’ear he killed an officer before he went over the side o’ that Frog ship he was on. Stove his ’ead in, poor bugger, an’ speared his ’ands to the deck.”

A cackle of laughter erupted from the table behind and Jago’s face darkened. He drained his mug. “You want toppin’ up?”

Hawkwood shook his head. “Time I was going. My guess is I’ve overstayed my welcome.”

“Then you’ll need someone to guide you back,” Jago advised. “It’s getting dark out. We don’t want you roamin’ the streets and getting into trouble, not with this lot around. You never know who you’re likely to run into. Why, I’d never live with myself if you was robbed on your way home.” The ex-sergeant winked broadly.

Jago beckoned with his finger. A small figure detached itself from the cluster of bodies around the dog pit and scampered up to the table. Hawkwood assumed the girl, Jenny, had been pressed into service once more, but he was mistaken. The small, tousle-haired, stick-thin figure who answered Jago’s summons was male and instantly familiar. It was the boy he had last seen fleeing Mother Gant’s lodging house, the one who had so deftly relieved Major Lawrence of his watch and chain. Somehow, somewhere between the Widow Gant’s and the Bridewell House of Correction, young Tooler the pickpocket had managed to do a runner.

Tooler favoured Hawkwood with a cheeky grin and a mock salute and looked to Jago for orders, while Hawkwood promised himself a serious talk with Constable Rafferty.

Jago placed a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “You’re to see him safely home, Tooler. And that means all the way, mind. I don’t want you runnin’ off and leavin’ him at the mercy of footpads and ne’er-do-wells. You got that?”

Tooler nodded obligingly.

“And I want you to come straight here afterwards. No dilly-dallying along the way. No puttin’ your sticky fingers where they don’t belong, like in other people’s pockets, f’r instance. Understood?”

Hawkwood could see that Jago was enjoying himself, but he had to concede that had he been in Jago’s position he’d probably have milked the situation for all it was worth too.

Jago held out his hand. “Mind how you go, Cap’n.”

“You, too, Nathaniel.”

The pressure in Jago’s grip confirmed to Hawkwood the bond between them. Translated, it meant that if Jago received any information about the coach robbery, he would pass it on.

Jago watched Hawkwood and the boy make their way down the stairs, sensed the relaxation of tension in the cellar as the tall Runner departed.

At the next table two men rose to their feet.

Jago’s voice was a growl of warning. “You hold it right there, Asa Hawkins. You, too, Will Sparrow. I’ve a feeling you gentlemen are bent on mischief. Am I right, Spiker? Your boys weren’t plannin’ an ambush, by any chance?”

“We was only goin’ to take a piss, Jago. That’s all,” the man called Hawkins whined.

“An’ I suppose Sparrow was goin’ to hold it for you and give it a wee shake afterwards, right? Sit down, both of you. You can hang on a while longer. What about you, Spiker? You got any plans to answer the call o’ nature?”

“You think you’re so bleedin’ clever, Jago, don’t you?” Scully fixed Jago with a fierce glare. “That bastard’s a Runner. He’s got no right comin’ in ’ere. Do you know how many of our lot he’s taken down?”

“Can’t say as I do, offhand,” Jago said. “But then, anyone who’s stupid enough to get themselves caught probably deserves it. And is that why you were sending these idiots out after ’im? To teach ’im a lesson? Not prepared to do your own dirty work? You ’ave to employ others to do it for you? Maybe I should have let ’em go. They’d have been taught a pretty lesson.”

“We could have taken him,” Sparrow, the slighter of the two men, said truculently. “No trouble.”

Jago threw Sparrow a pitying look. “Don’t make me laugh. You wouldn’t ’ave stood a chance. Believe me, I did you a favour.”

“He’s only one man,” Scully grated.

Jago stiffened. “That he is, but let me tell you about that one man, Spiker. That man was a soldier, an officer in the 95th Rifles. You’ve heard of them, I take it? Hardest regiment in the bloody army. He’s killed more men than you’ve supped pints of ale, and he’s the best officer I ever served under. You saw that scar below his eye? He got that pullin’ me out of the way of a Frog Hussar. Took a cut from a sabre that was meant for me. That makes him more of a man than you’ll ever be, Spiker. So while he’s under this roof, he’s under my protection. You got that? And anyone here who thinks different’ll ’ave me to answer to.” Jago’s right hand curled around the blackthorn staff.