The Queen of Bedlam (16 page)

“Saddlebag,” Matthew said, but only with great reluctance because he knew what else was in there. He thought he could hear the ocean roaring in the pistol’s barrel.

“Open it.” The man took Suvie’s reins and stepped back.

Matthew tried to take his time at undoing the leather straps, but the highwayman said, “I’m going to take what you have, so cease the nonsense.” When Matthew had opened the bag, the man commanded, “Step off the road,” and Matthew backed up into the high grass. Then the raven of the roads strode forward, reached into the bag, brought out Matthew’s brown leather drawstring wallet, and…the indignity of it…the silver watch just presented to him two hours before.

“Shiny,” the highwayman commented. “I like this very much, thank you.” The watch disappeared into his coat with practised grace. Next was the undoing of the wallet, and this time the half-face gave a menacing scowl. “What’s your job? Professional beggar? How is it you carry a silver watch of wealth and a wallet of poverty?”

“My station in life,” Matthew answered. “The watch belongs to someone else.”

The highwayman stared at him impassively for a moment, looked into the empty saddlebag once more, and then gave Suvie a flathand whack on the rump that caused her to squall like an infant and shoot forward, her eyes wide with terror and her ears back against her head. She galloped wildly away along the road, heading in the direction of the DeKonty estate, and Matthew thought he heard the chestnut horse give a whicker that for all the world sounded like an evil little laugh.

Matthew slowly let go of the breath that had lodged in his lungs. He knew full well he was up to his ears in what his face had been pushed into two nights ago.

“Open your coat,” came the next directive.

Instinctively, Matthew’s fingers went to his coat just over the envelope. He winced and dropped his hand down as if seared by unearthly fire.

“Open it.” The highwayman came forward until he was an arm’s length from Matthew. The tarpit eyes glittered and the pistol rose up to rest against his own shoulder.

“I have no more-”

In the next instant Matthew’s coat was wrenched open, a button flew from within, and a hand pulled the envelope out before the button could fall into the grass. The robber checked the other side of Matthew’s coat for another pocket but, finding nothing, turned his attention to the waistcoat. Its small pocket was empty and so too was the pocket of his breeches; therefore the highwayman took two steps back and looked down at the envelope, starting to turn it over to the sealed side.

Matthew stepped forward, damp sweat prickling his face. At once he had the highwayman’s full concentration and the pistol barrel at one nostril.

“Listen,” Matthew said in a voice that was near breaking, “that doesn’t concern you. It’s an official document. Amendments to a deed, but worthless to you. Please give it back to me and let me go on my-”

Still staring callously at him, the highwayman broke the seal. Bits of red wax fell down into the grass. He backed away six paces, the pistol yet aimed at Matthew, and then he drew the document out, unfolded it, and spent a moment examining it. There was nothing written on the back of the parchment, but something on the front must have appealed to the brigand because Matthew could tell he was grinning wolfishly even under the kerchief.

“Well,” he said, “this bears some very nice signatures. I expect my friends in Boston who have a talent for handwriting might wish to see this, do you think?”

Matthew put a hand to his eyes. Slowly, his hand moved down to cover his mouth and his eyes went cold.

The highwayman crumpled the envelope and threw it down upon the road. He refolded the document and slid it into his own coat. “I thank you, young man. You’ve made the day of a lowly wanderer that much brighter.” He shoved his pistol into a belt holster and then, taking the reins, swung himself up into the chestnut’s saddle with smooth and powerful economy of motion. Thunder spoke from the west again, and the robber cocked an ear toward it. “I shouldn’t waste too much time around here,” he advised. “It might not be safe.”

He turned his horse along the Post Road and galloped off in the direction of Boston, and the last view Matthew saw of him was a horse’s ass carrying a horse’s ass.

Matthew listened to the birds singing. The air was warm, the trees beautiful, the summer at its full height of glorious bounty.

It was a damned hell of a day.

After a time he wiped the sweat off his face with his cravat, and then he stood staring down at the crumpled envelope in the road. He looked southwest, toward New York, then back at the envelope.

Interesting, he thought.

He made no attempt to pick the envelope up. It was a dead thing.

Then he turned to the northeast and began walking, first at a moderate pace and then faster still. He had a way to go, of course, and he didn’t wish to wear himself out before he got there but some speed was essential. Possibly he might find Suvie up ahead, eating grass in a meadow. He hoped.

As he walked, he remained aware of not only what was ahead but also what might be coming up behind, and he was ready at any moment to jump into the underbrush.

Again Matthew walked alone, but the strength of his purpose was company enough.

Eleven

Late afternoon’s shadows had fallen across Manhattan, painting the wooded hills deep green and gold.

Weary but still determined, Matthew covered what he felt must be the last quarter-mile along the winding wilderness road, and then he recognized the waist-high rock wall of the DeKonty estate through the trees ahead. A pair of closed iron gates guarded the trail leading up to the house, which couldn’t be seen for all the foliage. He guided Suvie off the road and into the forest, thankful that he’d found her chewing apples in an orchard about a half-mile from the point where she’d been rump-slapped, and thankful also that she had graciously accepted him back on after being so rudely treated.

Now there was a score to be settled.

He said quietly, “Whoa, girl,” and reined her in. Then he climbed off and walked her deeper into the woods, where she couldn’t be seen from the road. He tied her securely to a branch, gave her one of the apples he’d put into his saddlebag, and then he was ready to go.

Best not to enter through the gates, he decided. Possibly they were locked anyway, and he wished to find his own route in. He walked along the wall, remembering that the DeKonty house was set well back from the road and was surrounded by tulip gardens that had been Mrs. DeKonty’s pride.

After a few minutes he climbed over the wall, terribly mauling his best suit, but then he was over and into some manicured shrubs and he crouched down thinking that if Mr. Hudson Greathouse kept a mastiff or wolfhound to guard the place his suit would be the least thing mauled today. But there was no bark and roar of one of those beasts rushing to break his bones and so he rose up-carefully, cautiously-and walked through a little grassy paradise where butterflies swam amid the seas of flowers and a path of raked gravel led off beside a fieldstone well. It was a meticulously kept estate, Matthew thought, and then he came upon a hillock where four sheep were grazing and he saw how the grass was so evenly trimmed.

Up past the sheep, the trail that led from the road curved up toward the main house, which stood surrounded by huge oaks and as he recalled overlooked the river on the far side. It was a structure obviously built by a wealthy merchant in the quarry business, for it was two levels made of dark brown and tan stones with a gray slate roof. At the apex stood a brown-painted cupola topped by a brass weathervane in the shape of a rooster. The front door was a big slab of tea-colored wood with a knocker the size of the highwayman’s fist.

He remembered a barn and a carriage-house back behind the main dwelling, and also on the riverfront side there was another garden where the party had been held. Over there as well were glass-paned doors that led into a study where Mr. DeKonty had gone on at length about the various grades of lumber. A place of education then had become of interest now, and as Matthew headed around toward the back of the house to make a circuitous path to his destination he heard the distant clang of metal and knew that someone had just unlocked the gates.

He had to hurry now. He walked quickly past a hitching-post in the shade of a green-mossed oak and made a mental note to buy new boots if he was going to do any more hiking such as this, for his heels were rubbed raw.

On the river side, the water shimmering down at the bottom of a rather high slope and the forest unbroken beyond, Matthew found the double doors he knew to be there. Closed, yes. But locked, no. The brass handles gave as he carefully turned them. A set of dark red drapes was drawn across the entrance. He couldn’t see beyond into the room, but he would have to risk the chance that it was not empty. He opened the doors, parted the drapes, stepped into an empty study, and closed the doors behind him.

Within the walls of dark wood were bookshelves, a writing desk with quills and inkpot, a chair at the desk, and two other chairs. Across the back of one chair he saw hung in a leather scabbard a rapier with a bone-white grip and an undecorated metal handguard and pommel. A workman’s sword, he thought. Made for use instead of threat. A man’s coat hung on a wallhook across the room, next to a closed door.

Then he heard voices approaching from the other side, and he thought it wise to retreat behind the drapes and stay as still and quiet as mind over nerves would allow.

“…unfortunate, really,” said a man’s muffled voice. “He gave it away so…” and here the door opened and the voice became clear “…easily. He practically showed me where it was.”

“And how was that?” A woman’s voice, behind the man.

Matthew had to grin just a bit. It seemed that Mrs. Herrald would not be at the Dock House Inn at seven o’clock.

“He touched his coat pocket,” said the highwayman, whose voice had become much less that of the raven of the road and much more the English gentleman. “The outside of it, here.” He was displaying the motion for Mrs. Herrald. “Furthermore, as I took the envelope he told me what it contained. He altogether lost his nerve.”

Matthew decided to say Better than losing my knee, but he wished to make a grand entrance. He pushed aside the drapes, stepped forward…and two things happened in a blur.

Mrs. Herrald, who had removed her riding-hat since arriving at the house, gave a startled cry. In the next instant the supposed highwayman, still a huge man no matter his masquerade, moved faster than Matthew had ever seen a human being react in his life. There was a hissing sound of leather spitting steel, a bright spark of sunlight leaped in an arc across the walls, and very suddenly Matthew had the sharp tip at the end of thirty inches of rapier up under his throat where all the life flowed.

Matthew froze. The swordsman also became a statue, as did Mrs. Herrald, but the weapon did not waver a nose-hair.

“I surrender,” Matthew said, and slowly lifted his hands palm-out. “By God!” the man thundered, shaking the glass in the door panes. “Are you insane? I almost ran your neck through!”

“I thank you for your hesitation in that regard.” Matthew tried to swallow and found his Adam’s-apple in jeopardy. “I have a delivery for a Mr. Hudson Greathouse.”

“A delivery? What are you-”

“Mr. Greathouse,” said Mrs. Herrald quietly, “please lower your sword from our courier’s throat.” Her face was still blanched but some humor had returned to her eyes, and Matthew thought that even by what the man Greathouse had told her, she knew his trick.

The sword dropped, but Greathouse kept it at his side unsheathed. Matthew felt it was a compliment, in a way. The man’s rugged, hawk-nosed face bore the rather dazed and confused expression Matthew had seen on six-month-long sea voyage passengers as they staggered onto the dock encountering long-forgotten stability.

“May I deliver the envelope?” Matthew asked.

“I already took it,” growled Greathouse.

“Yes sir, but…no, sir. You did take an envelope, yes. But the right one, no.” Matthew shrugged off his coat, reached back underneath his waistcoat, and retrieved the envelope where it was lodged between shirt and breeches-band. “I apologize,” he said as he handed it over. “It’s a little sweat-damp.”

Greathouse turned the envelope to look at the red wax seal with its embossed H. “This can’t be! I broke the seal on the envelope I took from his pocket!”

“That envelope did have a wax seal, yes sir. The color of red used on the real envelope is probably a shade or two lighter than that used in Magistrate Powers’ office, where I did the work before I left. But I didn’t believe it would be a problem. I think, Mrs. Herrald, that you’ve bought your envelopes from the same source as does City Hall, namely Mr. Ellery’s Stationer’s Shop on Queen Street. If not, the envelopes are nearly the same in size.” He looked back and forth between Mrs. Herrald and Hudson Greathouse. “I couldn’t duplicate the correct seal, of course,” he said, enjoying their silence, “so I had to divert the highwayman’s…um…Mr. Greathouse’s attention from examining it too closely before it was broken. Then again, if he’d seen it was not embossed with an H and he’d shown any reaction, he would’ve given himself away even before he pretended to read official signatures on a blank piece of paper.”

“Really?” Mrs. Herrald’s eyes sparkled, as she was obviously relishing the display.

“Yes, madam. His six paces stepped backward might have been far enough to keep me from seeing there was nothing written on the paper, but I already knew there wasn’t.” That part had been comical to Matthew, and he’d had to put his hand over his mouth to hide a wicked smile as the “highwayman” had read the “signatures” and boasted of his forger “friends in Boston.” They had to be quite some forgers, to forge names out of nothing.

“And how did you know I wasn’t a real highwayman?” Greathouse asked. “How did you know that when I saw a blank piece of paper I wouldn’t just cave your head in?”

Matthew shrugged. “I didn’t. But you had my wallet and the watch. Why should you get so upset over nothing?”

Mrs. Herrald nodded. “Prior preparation, using the envelope and wax. Very clever. Misdirection, with your hand over your pocket. Again, clever, but Mr. Greathouse should have been aware of that old trick. Anything else?”

“Yes madam, the fact that you were arriving was very clear. Mr. Greathouse threw the torn envelope down onto the road as a signal to let you know the game had been played out, in case I walked so far to find my horse that you missed me on my supposed trip back to town.”

“True. All true. But for one small hitch-knot, young man. Mr. Greathouse, would you open your delivery?”

Greathouse broke the seal and opened the envelope. A smile flickered at the edges of his mouth. “Oh,” he said. “I see the amendments to the deed came.” He held up an official parchment written in an expansive, flowing hand and bearing half-a-dozen fat-fingered signatures.

“It arrived by ship’s post, two hours before my meeting with Mr. Corbett,” Mrs. Herrald said, still speaking to Greathouse. “I was unfortunately unable to tell you in time that our courier would be protecting a real, and very valuable, document.”

Matthew looked down at the floor’s oak boards and tasted a little sour remnant of his Gold Compass codfish.

“I should sign it now, while it’s in front of me.” Mrs. Herrald took the parchment, sat down at the desk, dabbed quill into ink, and wrote her name in stately script below the other names.

“This is your house?” Matthew asked.

“Yes. Oh, there’s a matter of some landholdings, but this settles it once it’s back in London.” She smiled up at him. “I’ll take it to the post myself.”

“You smacked me, boy!” hollered Greathouse, who slapped Matthew on the back so hard Matthew thought he might wind up head-over-heels in the garden. The man grinned with square white teeth that looked cut from DeKonty’s quarry. “Well done!”

When Matthew had gotten all the wind back in his lungs and could speak again, he said, “Pardon, Mrs. Herrald, but…if your plan was for me to be waylaid on the road and the envelope taken, then what was the point of all this?”

She spent a moment refolding the parchment. Then she looked up at him and in her eyes Matthew thought he saw a new appreciation. Or respect, as the case might be. She said, “I know your history from Nathaniel Powers. I know your motivations concerning that situation in Fount Royal, and I know your desire for success. What I didn’t know was how you would deal with failure.”

She stood up, now regarding him face-to-face. “As a member of the Herrald Agency, you will do your best to succeed, but in spite of that, many times you will fail. That is the nature of the world, and the truth of life. But when you find your horse again, will you go back, or will you go forward? That was what I had to know.

“Welcome,” she said, and she offered her hand.

Matthew realized he stood at an important crossroads, and one that should not be lightly negotiated. If dealing with a false highwayman was the worst of it, fine; yet Matthew thought today’s incident was likely a frivolity, considering the danger of this line of work. Yet, for the chance to use his mind and his instincts, to further the career that Magistrate Woodward had begun by removing him from the orphanage, to make something of himself in this rowdy and riotous world, wasn’t it worth at least a try?

It was, he decided, though he knew he’d decided this when he’d left town by the Post Road.

It was.

He took Mrs. Herrald’s hand, and right away received another slap on the back from Hudson Greathouse that made him think he couldn’t survive many more congratulations.

“You’ll stay for dinner,” Mrs. Herrald announced. “Mr. Greathouse will make his famous Irish beef and ale stew. I presume your horse is somewhere nearby, so I’d suggest you go ride it properly up here, get it watered and settled in the barn. The key to the gate is hanging on a peg next to the front door.” She motioned him off. “Go!”

As twilight gathered, the stormclouds grew and thickened and at last the devilishly playful showers of the day became a driving rain. In the dining-room of Mrs. Herrald’s house, candles burned as rain beat against the windows and Matthew sat at the polished walnut table realizing that Mr. Greathouse’s stew was not so famous for its beef as for its ale, which had been poured in by the brewer’s jug. Matthew ate lightly and Mrs. Herrald more lightly still, yet Greathouse drank a mug of ale to go along with his ale and showed no effect other than a proclivity to fill up the room with his voice.

Matthew had not been told directly, but he surmised as they talked about various things-the state of the town, the new governor, the high constable and such chit-chat-that they were employer and employee, yes, but also something more. Not so personally involved as sharing a professional…what would be the word? Matthew thought. Elan, possibly? A bond of purpose? That they greatly respected each other was obvious and paramount, in their patterns of speech and their responses to the other’s comments, but again there was something more than respect present here. Matthew had the impression that Greathouse was Mrs. Herrald’s “right-hand man,” so to speak, and might even be second-in-command of the agency. In any case, she listened intently when he spoke and he did the same for her, and Matthew thought this was not simply a professional courtesy but rather a deep alliance of kindred minds.