Death at Rottingdean (13 page)

“And wot ‘bout my 'baccy?” Curly grunted, glowering down at Harry. “I din't git all that wuz comin' t' me i' th' last shipment, ‘cause a bale of it went t' Hove, t' Burke, that scaly rascal. I'm tellin' ye, 'Arry, I need it
now.
I'm as sorry as th' next ‘bout young Radford, God luv 'is soul, but I sez we get on wi' th' game!”

Curly spit out the last words emphatically, and a man in a crushed green felt hat, who drove one of the wagons that was used to haul goods to Brighton and Lewes, picked them up and hammered them home.

“Right, ‘Any. On wi' th' game. I got a wife an' babes waitin' on my haulin' pay. Wot's th' matter? D'ye think Fat Jack is goin' t' blab on us? On wi' th' game, I sez! On wi' th' game!”

There was loud applause, more shouts of “On wi' th' game!” and a round of sarcastic sniggers at the mention of Fat Jack.

“Fat Jack a ten-shillin' man? Not bloody likely,” muttered Curly, and Perry Stiles agreed. “Not if ‘e knows wot's good fer 'im,” he growled in a surly tone. He looked around. “Where's Trunky Thomas? I want t' ‘ear 'ow Trunky feels about suspendin' Wednesday's shipment.”

“Trunky'll land it.” said a short, sallow-faced man with his hair parted in the middle. He was Grantly the grocer, recently elected to the Parish Council and therefore a man whose opinions might be thought to count for something. “Trunky's a brave man, not one to dodge a risk. An' I'm wi' th' rest o' ye—I got a big order comin' wi' th' next lot.” He cast a meaningful look at Harry and added judiciously. “Mayhap we should vote Trunky t' be our lander, since ‘Arry's feelin' gingerly.”

There was a mutter of agreement among the crowd, and Mrs. Higgs the laundress, a close friend of Fat Jack, raised her voice. “Ye've said a true thing there, Gabriel Grantley. Trunky Thomas wud be glad enough t' bring th' ship in Wednesday night, investygashion or no.”

“An' don't forget Cap'n Smith,” Mrs. Higgs's sister, Iris Portney, chimed in. “The cap'n is ‘ere t' take care o' us and 'elp us get the job done.”

“That's right, Iris,” Mrs. Higgs agreed. “Cap'n Smith won't let an investygashion get i' th' way.” She looked around. “Where th' devil is Trunky?” she demanded, “an th' cap‘n, too. Somebody fetch both o' ‘em, an' let's vote.”

Harry himself had been looking forward to the arrival of Foxy Smith, whom he had tried several times that day to contact. Foxy usually made it a point to show his face at these meetings, if only to remind the villagers that they owed their present affluence and their future prosperity to him. Harry was confident that he would agree as to the need for caution and delay. Foxy was in close and frequent contact with the investors and understood the larger situation in a way the villagers could not.

But Harry was not at all pleased to hear the group calling for Trunky Thomas. Trunky was an out-and-out troublemaker, in Harry's opinion, and would not be above exploiting the group's unhappiness to wrest its leadership from him. In fact, Harry had known for some time that Trunky had designs on his position of leadership and would try almost anything to take control of the operation. Not to put too fine a point on it, Harry didn't trust Trunky as far as he could heave a tun of brandy. If he had things his own way, Trunky would have been out of the game altogether.

But the choice hadn't been left to him, for the investors insisted that every important citizen of the village be included—with the exception, of course, of the nobs who lived around the Green and came and went as the whim struck them: the Burne-Joneses, the Ridsdales, and the new residents of The Elms. But while Harry chafed at this stipulation, he certainly saw the wisdom in it. Exclusion led to disaffection, and disaffected men easily become informers. And these days, informers with the right sort of intelligence to sell could earn a great deal more than ten shillings.

Harry jumped up on the bench and raised his voice, striving to regain control of the unruly crew. “Ye've got t' think straight about this,” he cried. “Wot ‘appens if Trunky lights th' ship in on Wednesday night, an' th' chief constable from Brighton is waitin' wi' th' Brighton police? Wot 'appens if there's a pitched battle, an' some o' ye don't return ‘ome?”

That got their attention and the room quieted somewhat. They all remembered the bloody stories of the fierce fights between the smugglers and the Crown's preventative forces, less than a century before. He lowered his voice. “It's a coast guard ‘oo died,” he said, slowly and with emphasis, “not some poor drunken sod 'oo ‘appened t' stumble off th' cliff one dark night.” He looked around the group, challenging one pair of eyes after another. “There's no doubt about it. Somebody did young Radford, an' th' Crown is goin' t' want t' know 'oo. Th' Crown is goin' t' want
satisfaction.”

That reduced the objections to mutterings, at least momentarily, and gave Harry time to consider his strategies. It was a sticky wicket, to be sure. Trunky was threatening on the one hand and the coroner and the chief constable on the other, and there was the inquest into Radford's death to be got through. But equally important, and equally difficult to know how to handle, were the investors—the men who had put up the capital to purchase the merchandise from the French suppliers and pay the villagers of Rottingdean to smuggle it into the country.

The romance of smuggling had died several generations ago, and with it the knowledge of how most smuggling operations worked. But central to all of them, Harry knew, had been the need for money to purchase the imported goods. This meant that somebody—often a consortium of wealthy merchants—would advance the funds. A London draper, for example, might stock his shop with smuggled silks and gloves, or a publican would readily pay good value for a constant supply of duty-free wines and spirits.

Harry did not know the identity of the current investors, but he suspected that they were just such wealthy merchants, concerned that a change in the excise laws might make it difficult for them to obtain their goods and anxious to establish an alternate trade route, as it were—another way to move their merchandise into the country, in the event they were not able to use the accustomed avenues.

In fact, the investors had made it very clear, according to Foxy Smith, that this was not a short-term arrangement. They had investigated several villages along the southeast coast before they determined on Rottingdean, choosing the village because of its superior beach, its established tunnels, and its proximity to the London, Brighton, and South Coast Railway, just a few miles up the Falmer Road. They wanted to establish a regular, reliable organization that they could count on for the long term, and were willing to invest sufficiently so that the whole village would profit. They had paid very well for the improvement of the old system of tunnels, including the addition of three new tunnels to the cliffside and the excavation of a huge underground storage depot far larger than was presently required. Indeed, in Harry's opinion the tunneling project was substantially overbuilt, and he had told Foxy that he couldn't imagine bringing in enough merchandise to fill even half of the new capacity.

But Foxy had just grinned and shrugged his narrow shoulders in his usual sardonic fashion, which led Harry to suspect that the investors had financed the tunneling operations out of a different motive; that they intended to put as much money into as many pockets as possible, thereby purchasing the villagers' cooperation and ensuring Rottingdean's eagerness to continue the business arrangement in good times and bad.

Well, if that was the investors' hidden motive, Harry thought sourly, they had certainly achieved it. The honest folk who for years had been accustomed to live frugally on the weekly shillings brought in by the family breadwinners had immediately begun to savor their new affluence. They were spending every ha'penny of their increased income on new gowns and coats and horses and gigs, repairing their old cottages and building new ones, expanding old businesses and investing in new ones, such as Mrs. Howard's dress shop and Curly Knapton's tobacconist shop, which depended on the very goods they were bringing in. Now, they were willing to risk the enterprise, their investments, and perhaps even their lives to keep the merchandise and money Sowing—which did not seem to Harry like a very sound plan.

Harry frowned. Where was Foxy Smith? He was the only one who could tell him how the investors had reacted to the news that a local coast guard had died in suspicious circumstances. He was the only one who could endorse Harry's plan to postpone Wednesday night's landing. Without Foxy—

There was a thump-thump in the taproom in front. The double doors flew open and Trunky Thomas burst through. His right leg was shorter than his left and stiff, so that he walked with a peculiar rolling motion, like an old salt home from the sea. His jowled face was flushed with exertion, his cap half off, his knit jerkin hanging open.

“Well, it's about time, Trunky,” Mrs. Higgs cried cordially. “We been talkin' ‘bout ye an' wonderin' why ye weren't 'ere. Come in an' 'ave a drink.”

“Yes, Trunky,” Gabriel Grantly said, pouring a mug of ale for the new arrival. “Where's Foxy?”

Trunky rocked to a halt. “Where's Foxy?” he repeated in a gruff, grim voice. He ignored the mug Gabriel Grantly was holding out to him and waited until the whole room was quiet and all eyes were on him. “Where's Foxy? I'll tell ye where ‘e is. 'E's i' th' old mill. An' ‘e's
dead,
that's 'ow 'e is. Dead as a door knocker.”

“Dead!” Mrs. Higgs cried, open-mouthed.

“Dead?” Gabriel Grantly gasped, staring at Trunky. The mug of ale dropped from his grasp and splashed over his new black trousers. He didn't notice.

“Dead?” Harry whispered. His heart was pounding, his breath coming fast. Without Foxy, he could not contact the investors. Without Foxy, he was like a ship adrift in a fog, unsure of its heading, unclear of its destination. Without Foxy—

“Aye, dead,” Trunky said. “Shot through th' chest, ‘e were.” He turned to glare at Harry. “An' I've got a pretty fair idee 'oo dun it.”

The smugglers used her dusty lofts
And dozed there through the day,
Or waited signals from the sea
To bring ‘moonshine' away.
Now owlets roost in her cupola,
And pigeons peck her stones;
But the corn she ground, the corn she ground
Has passed into our hones.

—R. THURSTON HOPKINS “Rottingdean Mill”

 

 

 

K
ate slept fitfully and wakened the minute Charles stumbled into their room and began taking off his clothes. The hands of the clock stood at five minutes to one.

“The boy found you?” she asked, getting up to light the gas lamp on the wall beside the bed. “You've seen the poor man in the mill?”

“Yes,” Charles said wearily, stepping out of his trousers. “Patrick found us at Arthur Sassoon's. And yes, I've seen the body—at the insistence of royalty.”

“Of royalty? You can't mean—”

“Yes.” Charles was grim. “I'm afraid I do mean. His Royal Highness has taken it as a personal affront that two of the Queen's coast guard have been murdered, under the royal nose, as it were. I have been assigned to investigate the matter, and Sir Robert Pinckney, the Brighton chief constable, is to assist.” He took off his collar and unbuttoned his shirt. “I'm so sorry, Kate. I hope this matter won't take too long, and we can get back to our holiday.”

“It can't be helped,” Kate said philosophically. “What did you discover at the mill?”

“It was too dark to discover anything, and I couldn't risk disturbing the scene by poking around without sufficient light. Anyway, I was much too tired to do more than glance around the place. We had a great deal of trouble on the return from Hove. We're lucky to have gotten back safely.”

She looked at him, concerned. “Trouble?”

He drew back the blankets and climbed into bed. “I'll tell you about it in the morning,” he said, in a muffled voice. “Let's go to sleep, shall we? There's much to do tomorrow, and I'm going to need your help at the mill. I will also want you to keep an eye on the boy.”

“The boy.” She put out the light and lay down beside him. “Do you think he's in danger?”

“Patrick knows far more than he has told us so far. In fact, he may hold the key to both these murders. If you can keep him with you and befriend him, you may be able to gain his confidence.” He lifted his hand to her cheek and touched it tenderly. “I hope it's not too ... difficult for you, my dear.”

He was thinking, she knew, that it might be trying for her to be with the boy. She thought for a long moment before she answered, wanting to tell him that she mourned the loss of their infant for
his
sake and not for her own. That she could go through life in great contentment as long as they were together, never mind having children. And that if the deepest, most secret, most wretched truth be told, it was that she was sure she would
not
have been a good mother, by the standards he held. She did not believe in the English way of raising children: confining them with their nanny to the nursery until they were old enough to have a governess or be sent off to school. She would have felt it necessary to have her children always with her, which meant that she could not so easily travel with Charles and do the other things she hoped to do, and that she might have come to resent the child.

But while she chose the careful words she needed to tell Charles what was in her heart, his breathing slowed and became more regular, and he began to snore a little. After a moment, she put out her hand and let it rest on his shoulder, feeling the warmth of his body under the cambric fabric of his nightshirt. Somehow, soon, the words would have to be said, or they would always hang in the air between them.