Lord Portman's Troublesome Wife (20 page)

‘Yes. I heard the fellow talking to his mates before Harry arrived. He said something about a boat to Chiswick.’ He paused to watch the effect his words were having on Rosamund. She had gone ghostly white and her hands were shaking. He gave a satisfied smile. ‘If we make haste and ride to Chiswick, we will get there before the boat, taking into account the bends in the river.’

She did not stop to ask him what they would do then. Or why he thought she could rescue her husband, but if Harry had got himself mixed up with criminals, then she would have to do something. Anything. She stood up. ‘I will go and change. Go to the mews and ask to have my horse saddled, will you?’

‘With pleasure.’ He paused; she was already halfway to the door. ‘Don’t dress too grand, will you? You do not want to embarrass Harry, do you?’

Ten minutes later she was mounting up beside him, dressed in one of her old gowns covered with an equally shabby cloak. She should have thrown them away when she married, but had not done so in case Harry decided to annul the marriage and send her away with nothing and she might need them. The thought of that weighed her down, but she pulled herself together and concentrated on riding as fast as was possible given the amount of traffic there was on the road. There were coaches, wagons, carts, hackney carriages and sedans, costers with their barrows, children bowing hoops, dogs running in and out and the occasional cow being driven to Green Park. She had to get to Chiswick before that boat, though what she would do when they got there, she had no idea. It all depended on Harry.

O
nce the rowing boat had passed under Westminster Bridge it left the crowded buildings behind and the houses became grander and more widely spaced with gardens coming down to the water’s edge. Further on there were market gardens and fishermen’s cottages, and the tide was no longer helping them. ‘How far?’ asked Harry, breaking the silence.

‘Ask no questions and yer’ll soon find out,’ O’Keefe told him.

Harry lapsed into silence, wondering if they meant to kill him and take the bag of coins. They could throw his body in the river and it might not surface for days, even weeks, and then it would be one of hundreds of unidentified and unidentifiable corpses pulled from the mud of the Thames every day. No one would know what had happened to him and Rosamund would be relieved of the encumbrance of a husband who could not bring himself to make love to her. She would be a very rich widow. And a beautiful one. Every unmarried
man in the kingdom would court her. And that idiot Frances would inherit the estate.

He shook himself. He was not dead yet and he did not intend to let it happen. He began to think of ways of protecting himself. He was still thinking of and discarding ideas when they rounded the great bend in the river and were approaching the village of Chiswick. They passed the osier beds where men and women were at work harvesting the reeds, than drew in at a landing stage on the north bank. O’Keefe and Harry disembarked and the boat pushed off again.

O’Keefe led the way up through the village to the high road, followed by a still silent Harry. Was the farm close at hand? Or was the whole trip a wild goose chase, meant to get him out of the way? He considered making a run for it; the road was busy with vehicles, one of which would surely stop and take him up, but that could be a dangerous thing for those who had helped him; having come so far, he would not abandon his quest now.

They went round to the back of the Packhorse Inn where an old-fashioned closed carriage stood in the yard ready harnessed to a couple of mismatched horses. As they approached it, Job Smithall and Thomas Quinn came out of the inn with tankards of ale in their hands. ‘You’ve no time for that,’ O’Keefe told them. ‘Put them pots down and, Tom, you get up there.’ He indicated the driver’s seat of the carriage.

Quinn gulped down the last of the ale, set the tankard on the window sill and climbed on the box, leaving O’Keefe, Smithall and Harry to travel inside. Two minutes later they were on their way, moving in a westerly direction. It was a road Harry knew well, having
travelled it any number of times going back and forth from Bishop’s Court to London. He wished he could have let Ash know that was the direction they were to take, but O’Keefe was a cunning operator; he was making it as difficult as possible for them to be followed.

They had not been going very long when O’Keefe opened his money pouch and handed Smithall the change Harry was supposed to have got from passing the clipped guineas. ‘Do y’think that’s a fair return for our work?’ he asked him.

Smithall counted it. Harry was ignoring them, looking out of the window, making a mental note of their route.

‘Fair enough,’ Smithall said, handing them back.

‘Good. He’s sitting on fifty yeller boys. He’s goin’ to give ’em to us when we arrive.’

‘You lettin’ ’im see where the work is done then? Ain’t that a bit risky?’

‘No, for he’ll ’ave no idea where he is.’ He put his head out of the door and called up to the man on the box, ‘Draw up before we get to the crossroads.’

They stopped in the entrance to a farm yard and O’Keefe jumped down and indicated Harry should get out. Harry stood on the road beside O’Keefe and looked about him. He could hardly believe they were at the farm where the clipping was done; it was too close to the main road, which was always busy with traffic, a road he knew like the back of his hand. The crossroads just ahead of them was where the way divided to go to Hounslow on the one hand and Bishop’s Court on the other. He was less than five miles from his home. Had they penetrated his disguise, after all? Were they taking
him to Bishop’s Court? They could cause havoc there by terrorising the servants and stealing whatever took their fancy, and would no doubt think it a great jest. And there was Annabelle with only Miss Gunstock and servants for protection. For the first time he began to feel a real
frisson
of fear.

‘Job, fetch some good stout cord from the basket,’ O’Keefe said.

Smithall rummaged in the basket at the back of the coach for a length of rope with which they proceeded to bind Harry’s hands behind his back. With two of them holding him fast, his struggles were in vain. ‘What you want to go an’ do tha’ for?’ he demanded, aggrieved. ‘I ain’t about to cut and run.’

‘No, but we don’t want you seein’ more’n you oughta, so we’ll blindfold you an’ we don’ want you rippin’ it off.’ And with that, he took a black kerchief from around his neck and bound it over Harry’s eyes. That done, he prodded him in the back. ‘Get back in the coach.’

Harry did as he was told and they set off again. Unable to lean back with his hands tied behind him, he sat uncomfortably in the corner, straining his ears and every other sense to make out the direction they were going in. He would need to find it again if the Runners were to catch the gang red-handed.

The horses slowed to turn off the main road and he sensed that they had taken the Hounslow turn and were making for the Heath. After a while, the coach took another turn and then began to roll and bump over deep ruts. He could hear a ferocious dog barking and could smell farmyard smells. He thought he heard a child
crying and a woman scolding, but they carried on past them and a minute later drew to a stop.

O’Keefe climbed out. ‘Out you get,’ he said, grabbing Harry by the arm.

‘A’right,’ he said, pulling away and getting down awkwardly by himself. ‘Untie me, can’t you? I can’t see where I’m goin’.’

‘Tha’s the way it’s meant to be,’ O’Keefe said, leading him. ‘Duck yer head, the door’s a low one.’ He pushed Harry’s head down and he found himself in a building which was unbearably hot. His hands were untied and his blindfold removed. He was not surprised to find himself in a forge, but it was all he could do to hide his astonishment when he found himself face to face with Alfred Chappell. He was at Feltham Farm!

He realised they would not have brought him here if they had any idea who he really was. He needed all his acting ability now; not by a flicker of an eyelid must he be anything but the acquisitive and inquisitive Gus Housman. He looked about him with the open curiosity that Gus Housman would have shown. The building they were in had been a barn converted into a forge with a brick fireplace, in which a red hot fire glowed. On it a cauldron of shining liquid bubbled. There were several tables used for the separate processes: stamping, milling, polishing. Bert Ironside was setting out the moulds on the one closest to the fire to take the melted gold. Sitting at another table under the only window a man, whom Harry recognised as Alf Chappell’s brother, Bob, was busy clipping coins, catching the clippings in a dish. He was being very meticulous, but looked up as Harry entered.

‘Alf, Bob, this ’ere’s Gus Housman what I told you about,’ O’Keefe told them. ‘He’s prepared to get us yeller boys to work with if we cut him in.’ He turned to Harry. ‘Alf’s the boss o’ the outfit and Bob’s his brother.’

‘’Ow do,’ Harry said.

‘Did anyone follow you?’ Alf asked O’Keefe.

‘Not a chance. I was watchin’ out the whole way. And he’s been blindfolded the last five miles.’

‘You wanted to see the operation,’ Alf Chappell said. ‘It’s not something we’d allow everyone, so are you satisfied?’

Harry gave a non-committal grunt as Thomas Quinn helped Ironside pour the liquid gold into the moulds. Beside them were the dies used to stamp the image on the coins. ‘Where d’yer get them dies from?’ he asked, moving forwards to examine one of them.

O’Keefe tapped his nose. ‘Thomas, ’ere, were once employed at the Mint. They’re the real thing.’

‘Where’s the yeller boys?’ Bob got up from his seat and came over to face Harry. ‘We could do with them, I’ve just about run out. How many have you got?’

‘Fifty.’

‘Let’s be having them, then.’ He held out his hand.

‘I want in, first,’ Harry said.

‘For a paltry fifty guineas! You must be jesting.’

‘Not just fifty guineas. I gave you more’n that when I held up Lord Portman’s coach. There were near a hundred there and some small change. An’ I c’n get more.’

‘Lord Portman!’ O’Keefe laughed. ‘I nearly split me breeches when I saw that. Neat as you like, it was.’

‘Wha’s so special about Lord Portman?’ Harry queried, genuinely mystified. ‘He ain’t no different from any other gentry. More of a coward than most, which is why I picked ’im.’

Bob Chappell joined in the laughter. ‘His lordship has been supplying us with gold coins at the rate of five guineas a month for years. I reckon he’d wet hisself if he knew that.’

‘How so?’ Harry asked, though he fancied he knew the answer.

‘To keep his brat. Fancy thinking it took five guineas to keep a scrawny little thing like her for a month!’

Alf Chappell grunted. ‘Well, she’s gone now, took away by his lordship’s new wife.’

‘Do he know what he’s married, I wonder?’ O’Keefe said, musing aloud. ‘I reckon she’d pay good money for him not to know.’

‘Know what?’ Harry demanded, almost forgetting his role as Gus Housman, but quickly added in Gus Housman’s vernacular, ‘You got summat on ’er?’

‘Never you mind.’

He did mind, of course, but had to pretend indifference. O’Keefe intended to blackmail Rosamund. He hoped sincerely that when that happened she would confide in him and not meekly pay up. Did that depend on how guilty she was? Guilty of what? Coining, along with her brother? He had no answer to that, but had to admit it was one of the reasons he had come on this escapade alone when he would have done better to involve the rest of the Piccadilly Gentlemen to bring the gang to justice. In doing so he had as good as incriminated himself.

He watched as O’Keefe emptied his pockets of the loose change he had given him and spoke to Alf. ‘Here’s the change from Gus’s shopping trip. It’s a fair return.’

‘Give it to Tilly,’ Alf told him.

‘How many more you got in this gang?’ Harry demanded. Tilly was a new name to him.

‘Oh, Tilly ain’t part of our gang,’ O’Keefe said. ‘But she’s come in with us since her pa and ma and her old man got took two or three months back for the silver lay. Bordes and half-bordes she specialises in, though she ain’t half as good as her old man was.’

Borde, Harry knew, was their slang for a shilling, but that was not what had grabbed his attention, it was the fact that her parents and husband had been sentenced to hang, a sentence which should have been carried out a month before but all hangings had been postponed on account of the royal wedding and the coronation. It was felt that those happy celebrations should not be marred by the public spectacle of a hanging. Or perhaps those arranging them thought the hanging might prove the better entertainment. Could Tilly be Matilda Watson?

She had sworn revenge on whoever had informed on them and that had been Harry in the guise of Gus Housman. He had never spoken to her, simply watched her and her husband doing business in the Nag’s Head and followed them to their lodgings. The Bow Street Runners had done the rest. But she might remember seeing him sitting alone in the corner of the tavern and put two and two together. He must be doubly careful.

While he was musing on how to deal with the situation, they heard the dog set up a frenzied barking and
something being knocked over and Mrs Chappell shouting. Alf went out to investigate, leaving the door open. Harry could see the path leading to the farmyard and the side of the farmhouse itself. Rosamund was standing in the yard, facing Mrs Chappell who held the dog by its rope, ready to let it go if Rosamund so much as blinked. It snarled and showed its teeth. Harry’s heart jumped into his throat as he watched the scene. Why was his wife here? Did she know his secret? Had she followed him? But that was impossible; he had left her asleep in bed in Berkeley Square. Did that mean she was in league with the coiners and her arrival was purely coincidence? He dare not go to her.

Alf grabbed her arm and pulled her away from the dog, giving the animal a vicious kick as he did so. It yelped and subsided. ‘You should know better that try to pass that animal, my lady,’ Alf said, still holding her arm. ‘What are you doing here?’

Rosamund had caught a glimpse of Harry in the doorway of the barn, along with several others. If she had not seen him at home dressed in that filthy garb, she would not have known him for her husband. Now she did not know what to say to explain her presence.

She and Francis had ridden to Chiswick as fast as they could, though she had little hope of catching up with her husband. Francis had entertained her on the way with stories of Harry’s exploits as a boy and his unnatural affinity with the lower orders. ‘There was nothing he liked better than climbing trees with the village boys for chestnuts to roast on a camp fire and fishing for roach and eels in the river,’ he told her. ‘He would invite them on to the estate and they would swim naked in the lake.’

‘Did you join them?’

‘Me? I was still in leading strings. Saw them once when I was out with my nurse. She was disgusted and hurried me away.’

‘No doubt they were only enjoying themselves.’

He had sniffed his contempt of that remark and reined in because they had reached the crossroads at Chiswick. They had been about to turn down the lane that led to the river, when a coach rumbled out of the yard of the Packhorse and Francis had a glimpse of O’Keefe inside it. ‘They they are!’ he had cried in triumph, as the vehicle disappeared up the road. They had followed at a discreet distance. Rosamund had begun to wonder if Harry was taking his companions home to Bishop’s Court when they turned off. Following as closely as they dared, they had watched the coach turn down the lane to Feltham Farm. She had been no less surprised than Harry had been.