enemy, Mr. Weaver. It pains us, you must know, to treat you in this style. But we need you and you would not have us, and here is the result.”
“I have no interest in your protests. Deliver your message, and next time recall that I know well how to read. Further communications would be better sent by note than by mouth.”
“This one could not wait. I am come to repeat Mr. Cobb’s warning not to inquire into his business. It has come to his attention that your uncle and your associate have both been heard to ask inappropriate questions. As you and Mr. Gordon have met with your uncle this evening, and as you have then met with Mr. Franco, I cannot but think that you continue to pursue matters that you’ve been advised to leave alone.”
I said nothing. How could it be that they had known? The answer was most obvious. I was being followed, and not by Westerly, for so large a man could not hope to travel unseen in the streets. There were more who had followed me. Who was Jerome Cobb that so many men served him?
“I met with my uncle and my friend. What of it? We were as like to meet prior to these events as after.”
“Perhaps, but you discussed the matters at hand, did you not?”
“No,” I said.
Westerly shook his head. “I cannot believe that. And you would be wise, given the fragility of your situation, not only to avoid any wrongdoing but to avoid the appearance thereof.”
“I shan’t shun my friends,” I answered.
“No, pray don’t. But you must ask them to make no more inquiries.” Westerly pushed his bulk from my chair and steadied himself with his walking stick. “We know your nature, and know these efforts were inevitable, so you shan’t be punished this time. Now, however, you see that you cannot escape our gaze. Cease looking to wiggle free of the net. Accept your generous employment and do our bidding. The sooner our goals have been met, the sooner you will be free of our demands.”
Mr. Westerly bade me good night and departed my rooms.
TWO DAYS LATER I received a visit from Edgar, who wordlessly handed me a letter and then withdrew. His contusions had healed somewhat, but he nevertheless appeared badly used and was in no disposition to make friendly conversation with me.
In the privacy of my rooms, I opened the note and discovered the instructions Cobb had promised would be forthcoming. I was now to contact Mr. Ambrose Ellershaw of the East India Company, the man whose document I had stolen, and explain that, in the course of some unrelated thieftaking activity, I had happened upon the enclosed report. Recognizing the papers to be of likely importance to their rightful owner, I now wished to return them.
I took no pleasure in jumping to do Cobb’s bidding, but I did believe that moving forward in this matter was superior to not moving at all. Perhaps I would soon have a clearer sense of what I was to do and why Cobb was so anxious that I should be the one to do it.
I situated myself in a coffeehouse where I was known and sent the note as Cobb desired, instructing Ellershaw to send any answer to that location. I would pass the afternoon, I decided, reading the newspaper and sorting through my thoughts, but I had hardly an hour to myself. The same boy I sent out returned with an answer.
I finished my dish of coffee, headed immediately to Leadenhall Street, and once more made my way to Craven House and the East India yards, though this time my approach was more direct and less dangerous. A guardian at the door—a handsome young fellow who, by his accent, had recently arrived from the country and could count his good fortune at finding such easy employment—allowed me to enter without molestation.
In the light of day the East India house appeared to be nothing so much as an old and unlovely building. It was, as we now know, outgrowing these old quarters, and the structure would be rebuilt in not many years’ time. For the nonce, however, it was spacious and indicated little of its purpose other than the paintings upon its edifice —a great ship bordered by two smaller ones—and the outer gate, which suggested that none but those with purpose might enter.
Inside, I found the house to be full of activity. Clerks rushed from here to there with bundles of papers pressed to their chests. Runners moved from the house to the warehouses, checking on quantities or delivering information. Servants scurried this way and that, delivering food to the hungry directors who labored tirelessly in the offices above.
Though I knew well where to find Ellershaw’s office, I inquired for the sake of appearances and then climbed the stairs. I found the door closed, so I knocked, and my actions were met with a gruff call to enter.
Here was the same room I had explored under cover of darkness. Now, in bright daylight, I saw that Ellershaw’s desk and bookshelves were of the most ornately carved oak. His window offered him an expansive view not only of the warehouses below but of the river in the distance and the ships upon it that brought him riches from so far away. And while in the darkness I had seen only that his walls were covered with framed pictures, now, in the afternoon glare, I could see the images.
At last I began to gather some understanding of why Cobb had so desired that I, and I alone, should deliver to Ellershaw his missing documents. I still had no idea what Cobb wanted of me and where his manipulations might lead me, but at least I understood why he required that it should be I, and no other, who engaged with Ellershaw.
Not all his pictures, mind you—for many depicted scenes of the East Indies—but many of them had a single focus. There were some dozen woodcuts and prints upon one wall that celebrated the life and exploits of Benjamin Weaver.
They spanned the course of my career. Ellershaw had a print of my early days as a pugilist, when I first made a name for myself. He had a print of my final match against the Italian, Gabrianelli. He even had a rather absurd rendering of me escaping without benefit of clothing from Newgate Prison, a consequence of my unfortunate involvement with parliamentary elections from earlier that year.
Mr. Ellershaw was, in short, an aficionado of the life of Benjamin Weaver. I had met men in the course of my work who recalled me from my days in the ring, and I flatter myself by observing that more than one of these recalled my fights with reverence and regarded me with special notice. I had never before met a man who seemed to collect images of me the way some odd fellows will collect bones or mummies or other curiosities from afar.
Ellershaw looked up from his work and an expression of pleased surprise came over his face. “Ah, you’re Benjamin Weaver. Ambrose Ellershaw at your service. Do sit down.” He spoke with a curious amalgam of gruffness and amicable cheer. Observing that my eyes went to his prints, he colored not a little. “You can see I’m no stranger to your doings, your comings and goings. I know full well about Benjamin Weaver.”
I sat across from him and offered a weak smile. I felt both awkward to be engaged in this charade of returning what I had stolen and embarrassed by his enthusiasm as well. “I am gratified and surprised by your attentions.”
“Oh, I have seen you fight many times,” he told me. “I even witnessed your final match against Gabrianelli— that was the night you broke your leg, you may recollect.”
“Yes,” I said stupidly, for I wondered how he thought I might somehow forget breaking my leg in the boxing ring.
“Yes, quite a sight, the breaking of your leg. I am glad you are here. May I see it?”
I own I showed the greatest surprise. “My leg?”
“No, you blockhead,” he barked, “the report. Give it me!”
I hid my surprise at the insult and handed the documents to him.
He opened the packet and examined the contents with evident approbation, leafing through the pages as though to make sure all was in order and nothing missing. He then took from a ceramic bowl, painted in red and black in the oriental design, a hard brownish thing that he placed in his mouth and began to chew methodically, working at it as though it tasted both horrible and unspeakably delicious. “Very good,” he mumbled, through his chewing. “Not a thing out of order, which is rather fortunate. Should have been a bit of work to replace. When I
