Home From The Sea (31 page)

“Oh, yes.” Jim stepped back into the tavern, where the water was down to just below ankle deep and so
filthy,
he could barely see his shoes through it. “Call the dogs downstairs while I go back up and get the fire going.”

Like the rest of the house, the kitchen was still inches underwater. The swirl there was filthy with the cinders and ash from the gutted hearth, and Jim noticed a definite reek of mildew this morning. He muttered the kind of language that would have earned him a boxing for his ears when he was a boy. Local laborers would be scrubbing with salt and vinegar for days, in every crevice, to get the mildew out – and much of the stink was coming up from the cellar. A bucket-line would be working there through an entire day to bail it out, before braziers would burn for days more, to get it dry enough to even start the salt and vinegar scrub –

And there Jim stopped himself, wondering why he was fretting about the day to day business of a sailors’ alehouse.

Even if he and Toby took only a small handful of the prize – so little, the likes of Burke might never guess it was gone – they were rich men, and the largesse would last long if it was wisely spent. They could hand the job of cleaning up to a foreman and spend a month in France. They could sell the place and buy a whole new tavern, somewhere less prone to the constant risk of high water from a beck that never stayed inside its own banks after three days of rain. They could outfit a ship, chase the horizon to places Jim had always dreamed about but never actually thought to see with his own eyes.

Such thoughts consumed him as he reset the fire. He was in the kitchen, hunting for kippers, eggs, bread that was not too green around the edges, when he heard a voice he recognized in the yard right outside the backdoor.

“Ho there, Master Fairley, are you well? I knew you’d be flooded again, Jim – is there anything you need?”

It was John Hardesty – and Jim kicked himself. He should have known the doctor would come over as soon as the rain stopped. Hardesty was much more than a good doctor; he was a decent man, with the welfare of patients in mind. Jim’s heart was in his mouth as he splashed to the door, but before he could drag it open he heard Edith Clitheroe calling down from a casement above.

“
G’mornin
’, Doctor,” she shouted. “
We’s
all alive, if that’s what ’as thee
wonderin
’!
We’s
upstairs, well outta yon flood.”

Jim threw his weight against the door to force it through the water, and pasted a smile onto his face. “John! It’s good to see you, and it was kind of you to come by. I’d offer you coffee if I had it, but the fires are out … will you take a jar of ale instead?”

A small rowing boat was bobbing in just enough water to float it off, a few yards from the three-foot pad on which the tavern had been rebuilt when the old ruins were flattened. A brawny young man sat at the oars and Hardesty was in the front, the big brown leather medical bags around his knees. He was not in oilskins this morning, and his shirt was open in the heavy, humid air. His oarsman was slick with sweat, eyes narrowed against the first bright light they had seen in days.

“Another time, Jim,” Hardesty called. “I’d love to be sociable, but
there’s
a dozen more houses to visit before I turn this cockleshell for home … damn these rains. Are you managing?”

“More or less,” Jim told him cautiously. “The bloody cellar’s flooded again. It’ll be a shite of a job to get it dry, as usual, and it’s already stinking.” He paused, slapping his left leg. “I worked too hard, getting us battened down, and I’m afraid I used a lot of the laudanum, John. Too much, actually … I slept like the dead! Any chance you can let me have another bottle?”

“Will tomorrow do?” Hardesty frowned at his bags. “Promise me you’ll be cautious with the stuff – it can be death of you, faster than the leg, if you’re foolish with it.”

“As well I know,” Jim said grimly, at that moment thinking of Burke and Pledge. “You can trust me, John. These last days have been the worst I’ve known since I was a lad, and … here I am, to tell you about it.”

“Well said,” Hardesty approved. “I’ll come back in the morning, then. Christ alone knows what I’m going to find in the cottages up yonder. I’ve seen broken bones and gashes that’ve already gone green as pond scum, just between here and home! Idiots have been wading in thigh-deep water, stepping on poisonous old lumber. I’ll be sawing legs
off,
if me best poultices don’t work.”

“What, more ‘weeds’ from your garden?” In fact, Jim knew the good of herbs and was joking, not mocking.

“Weeds, indeed,” Hardesty scoffed, but he was chuckling. “I’ll get back to you as soon as I can, Jim. If you find yourself in strife, send a lad to run and get me.”

“Tomorrow or the next day will be fine,” Jim judged. “The
water’ll
be dropping today. I could come over to your place tomorrow night, if you’ll be there.”

Hardesty waved. “I’ll be there. No one in the house needs a doctor, then?” He craned his neck back to look up at the casement. “And you, Edith – you’re well?”

“Oh, aye,” she said dismissively. “The worst thing’s them damn’ stairs,
wi
’ these bloody knees o’ mine, but I’m up ’ere now.”

“We got the food and firewood and lamp oil up, before the water got to it,” Jim added. “We’ll manage nicely, John – but I’m grateful for your concern. That’s a
favor
I owe you.”

Hardesty waved off the gratitude. “I’ll see you for dinner tomorrow, if you can make it through.” Then, to the boatman, “Go on, Freddie, let’s see some muscles. We’ve a mile to go yet, before
it’s
cakes and ale!”

The boat turned slightly and pulled out, right through the stableyard and past the coach house, which was as bizarre a sight as Jim could imagine. He waved, lingering on the backdoor step until Hardesty was out of sight, and only then permitted himself the luxury of breathing properly.

“You don’t trust him?” Toby’s voice asked from the other end of the kitchen.

“In fact, I do,” Jim said with wry
humor
, “which is the whole problem. John’s as law abiding a man as Nathaniel Burke
isn’t
. If he knew there’d been death and mayhem in this house, he’d make tracks for the garrison, report the whole business to Captain Dixon, and we’d have dragoons up to the rafters before luncheon. Burke and Pledge would be in the bailey before they woke up – which would suit me just fine. But I’ll give you short odds, the others, this Willie Tuttle and Eli Hobbs, would soon get wind of it. They’d go to ground before Dixon could get the irons on them, wouldn’t they?”

“They’d be gone like rats,” Toby said quietly. “Like the vermin they are.”

“And when the coast was clear, we’d have to go through this whole business again. Give it a week or a month and they’d be here, as nasty as Burke and Pledge, and likely just as hard to deal with.” Jim shook his head, a sharp negative. “I want it done
now
, Toby. I want it over and finished, so we can get on and do … whatever it is we’re going to do with one small handful of those baubles.”

“That’s about the size and shape of it.” Toby rubbed his face hard.
“Time’s wasting, Jim.”

“We eat,
then
we’re on our way,” Jim said with bleak determination.
“Kippers and eggs?”

They sizzled on the skillet in the big bedchamber. The two dogs were hungry, intent on the pan, nostrils flaring, and after Jim served himself and Toby he scraped a pile of the hash onto a spare platter. The tomcat remained on top of the wardrobe but he was sitting up this morning, grooming himself with a skilled pink tongue. The shutters were open, and a fresh sea wind filled the room as the sun climbed swiftly

Any other day Jim would have called it a lovely morning, but he saw none of its beauty today. The food tasted like straw and he forced it down, eyes on Toby, whose face was tight, clenched. Jim lifted a brow in question and he said,

“
Pistols,
powder and shot.”

“I’ve a pistol and a boat gun of my own,” Jim mused, “and Burke and Pledge came in armed with two pistols apiece. Scum like them take care of their weapons before they look to the comfort of their women, so I’d be glad to take theirs, unless these old friends of yours at The
Cattlemarket
would recognize them.”

But Toby made negative noises. “A pistol’s a pistol. Nathaniel was always well armed, but there’s nothing special about the cannons he’s carrying now. Leave the boat gun, Jim. It’s too visible. If Eli and Willie got one glimpse of it, they’d be likely to shoot you down before they bothered to inquire about your business.”

“Time.”
Jim stood and dusted off his hands.

“Time,” Toby agreed. He looked up, saw Mrs. Clitheroe in the doorway and forced a smile. “Edith, will you do me a
favor
? Catch Bess and hold onto her. She’s going to want to come with me, but I’d prefer to have her out of harm’s way.”

“Aye, I will.” She faltered. “But,
thee’s
comin
’ back ’ere after, isn’t thee?”

“We
are
,” Jim said loudly, emphatically. “We’ll be back before dusk at the very latest, and probably a lot sooner … and we won’t be alone. I’ll leave the laudanum on the bar, and you keep dosing Burke and Pledge every three or four hours till mid-afternoon. Keep an eye open for the boat. When you see it, get back upstairs, quick as you can, and stay well out of the way. Don’t even let them see you.”

“I can do that,” she said darkly.
“Bess?
Come on ’ere,
Bessielove
, come
wi
’ me and I’ll feed thee some cheese.
Thee
likes cheese. Come on, Boxer – cheese
fer
thee
an’all
.”

Both dogs took the lure, and the door to the small room clicked shut behind them. With a grim glance, Jim and Toby headed downstairs, and Jim came to rest in the middle of the taproom. Burke and Pledge were still snoring, still trussed. Toby frowned over them as he collected his coat from the rack by the open door.

“These bastards are going to have heads like merry hell itself when they wake,” Jim said, amused. “I did this once, myself – only once, mind you. Took the medicine, and again, and yet again, to stay away from the pain, the time I took a fall off a horse. Two whole days, I was away with the pixies.
Didn’t know a thing about the world.
When I woke, all I wanted was for somebody to find the common mercy to put a pistol ball in my skull, put me out of my misery!” He fetched the bottle from his pocket, pulled the stopper and pinched Burke’s nose. The man’s mouth fell open and several drops dribbled onto his tongue. Jim performed the same service for Pledge, and left the bottle on the bar as he had promised.

Not quite on a whim, he reached under the bar for a bottle of rum. Toby was shrugging into his coat, and watched without comment as Jim liberally doused both Burke and Pledge, even filled their mouths with the spirit. Now, they would never convince even their oldest friend that they had not drunk themselves legless on purloined grog and passed out. The pain of overindulgence in laudanum would be scorned as a hard-earned hangover.

“They’re well out of it,” Jim judged. “You have your knife there?”

Toby drew the skinning knife from the inside pocket of his coat, stooped over the prisoners and cut the intricate knots out of the ropes. As they fell loose, Jim gathered up the oddments of line and stowed them under the bar. He fetched back three empty rum bottles and a fourth half-full, and set them on the table, right beside the sprawled bodies.

“Wicked,” Toby observed. “When Eli and Willie clap eyes on these two, they’ll be too full of scorn to be spare Nathaniel a civil word.”

“
Which,” Jim said grimly, “is the plan.
Pistols and shot, now.”

Burke’s and Pledge’s weapons still lay on the bar and Jim watched, impressed, as Toby checked all four over from lock to barrel. He had handled weapons often enough to have more familiarity with them than Jim had ever possessed – and since Toby had run with Burke’s crew, the aplomb was hardly surprising. Jim’s eyes remained on the men as he fetched his coat, thrust his arms into it, but Burke and Pledge were too deeply unconscious to even twitch.

One pistol went into each coat pocket; powder poke in the left pocket, spare shot in the right. Satisfied, he took his hat from the rack and stepped out into the bright light of an April morning which would have been lovely, if not for the murky brown lake lapping right under the tavern walls.

The longboat was old, patched, but with the weight of two men in it, it was not taking water. Jim was satisfied, and slid in at the right-side oar as Toby took the left. His hands curved around the wood and he thanked his father’s saints that he had done this work often. Almost every day, he would row out into Sandy Bay to put a line in the water for dinner and pull up his crab pots. He had the muscles for the job and, more importantly, the calluses.

It might have been much longer since Toby had rowed a boat any great distance, but he had worked hard for years. His hands were as tough as Jim’s, and his body was far stronger. Jim always
favored
the leg, nursed it, thought of what he was about to do, before he began. Toby was still young enough to have no care about his limbs, and did not hesitate to throw his full weight against the oars.