The Revenge of Captain Paine (56 page)

Finally Conroy could contain himself no longer. He sprang up from his chair and screeched, ‘This is absolutely unacceptable. I will not be dictated to in these terms.’

But Melbourne ordered him to sit down and not interrupt them again. As Conroy did as he was told, dejected and beaten, Melbourne looked at the letter Pyke was holding and asked what it said.

‘Sir Henry wants Gore to know that, fearing my retaliation, he’s gone into hiding, and asks Gore to meet him at the address of a property he owns in Somers Town.’

‘And has the letter, in fact, been penned by Sir Henry Bellows?’ Melbourne asked, confused.

‘It’s the chief magistrate’s handwriting. I helped him with the content.’

The penny finally dropped. ‘You mean you . . .
forced
him to write it?’

In fact, Pyke had hijacked the chief magistrate’s brougham as it left his home in Holland Park earlier that morning and had already taken him to the aforementioned house in Somers Town.

‘And you expect me to sit back and do nothing while you propagate this deception against one of my oldest and dearest friends?’

‘A friend who’s put his advancement and material betterment above any loyalty to you or your party, who’s killed or had people killed on his orders, who’ll stop at nothing to get what he wants.’

Pyke noticed that Peel had gone very quiet, perhaps fearing that he was about to expose his role in the affair: the fact that he, Peel, had first sent Pyke to Huntingdon in the hope he might dig up something which, in turn, could be used against Abraham Gore. That was why Pyke had wanted the Tory leader to be present at the meeting. He hadn’t planned to say anything about Peel’s role in the whole business but he wanted the Tory leader to
know
that he’d held his tongue.

This time he wanted Peel in his debt.

‘I have to say, Prime Minister, I’ve conducted my own investigation into Pyke’s claims and I feel there’s some validity to them,’ Peel said, unexpectedly coming to Pyke’s rescue.

It was unexpected until Pyke remembered that Peel had wanted to drive a wedge between Gore and Melbourne from the outset.

‘You think he’s telling the truth? My God ...’ Melbourne complexion had turned a ghastly white.

‘And what if I refuse to do what this
guttersnipe
is asking me to do?’ Conroy said, unable to hold his silence.

Pyke turned his gaze on the comptroller. ‘Then I’ll pass word to the princess that you sought to weaken her by introducing poison into her food, thereby strengthening your hand in negotiations to become her private secretary. I know you tried to get her to sign a document to this effect only a few weeks ago when she lay on her sickbed with a fever of your making.’

Melbourne slumped back in his armchair, seemingly unable to take on board these further allegations.

To a stunned Conroy, Pyke added, ‘Baroness Lehzen suspects you already. You’ll have noticed how she won’t let you anywhere near the princess’s food.’

The comptroller evidently didn’t know how to respond, especially in front of two such powerful figures. He licked his parched lips but didn’t say anything.

Pyke turned back to Melbourne and said, ‘This arrangement suits everyone’s best interests. Conroy holds on to his job, the equilibrium is maintained, and you escape from being tainted by the whiff of scandal. Above all, Cumberland is kept in the dark about his claims on the throne. That’s what we all want, after all, isn’t it? Princess Victoria as our next queen.’ He put the letter Bellows had written on the table next to the prime minister, adding, ‘Remember, it’s to be delivered on Monday. No earlier than Monday.’ And then, apparently as an afterthought, Pyke said, ‘Oh, and when I take action against the Grand Northern next week, when I do what I plan to do, I want your government and indeed His Majesty’s opposition to do precisely nothing. As Abraham Gore might say, I want you to place your faith in the efficacy of the market.’ He allowed himself a smile. ‘Thank you all for coming and I’ll bid you good day.’

Pyke strode calmly out of the room. A slightly flushed Tilling caught up with him in the entrance hall. ‘I’m so sorry about your wife. I had no idea ...’

‘I know.’

Tilling shifted awkwardly from foot to foot. ‘What are you planning to do?’

‘I can’t tell you.’

‘You do know you can’t hold the government to ransom.’

Pyke collected his greatcoat from the butler and nodded his thanks. ‘I’ve played my hand: what they decide to do is up to them.’ He paused for a moment and added, ‘And Peel knows I could have exposed his own complicity in this whole sorry business in front of Melbourne. If he flies off in a rage at me, remind him of that.’

‘Pyke ...’ Tilling shouted after him as he stepped out on to Berkeley Square.

Pyke turned around, squinting in the sunlight.

‘Just remember, nothing you do will bring your wife back.’

 
Much later Pyke would find out from one of the committee members still loyal to Morris and his vision for the railway that on the same day he had met with Peel and the prime minister, a heavily guarded meeting of the committee and proprietors of the Grand Northern Railway at their head offices in the Square Mile had also met. By all accounts it was a fractious, heated meeting with frank opinions exchanged by all parties. In the first motion, Chauncey Bledisloe was narrowly elected as chairman of the company and in the second it was agreed, by just three votes, that the construction work would terminate at Cambridge. It was also agreed that every effort would be made to ensure that the railway line to Cambridge was completed as quickly as possible. The three votes cast by William Blackwood, representing the interests of Blackwood’s bank, proved to be decisive. Gore, who was not present at the meeting and who, according to close friends, had been taken ill, had retreated to his suite of rooms at the Richmond Hotel. Apparently Gore was said to be ‘delighted’ at the outcome of the Grand Northern’s meeting. It meant that he’d finally achieved his long-held objective: a monopoly for
his
railway on all passenger and freight traffic between the capital and points north. Pyke was also told that Gore had employed as many as fifty men to guard the hotel and, for a while at least, he became a self-imposed prisoner there. But his triumph had also come at a hidden cost. As the new majority shareholder in Blackwood’s bank, which had invested heavily in the Grand Northern, Gore now needed this venture to be moderately successful. Not perhaps as successful as the Birmingham railway,
his
railway, was and would be, but certainly Gore didn’t want the Grand Northern to fail.

If it failed, Blackwood’s would suffer and, in turn, he would suffer, too.

It was this Pyke was counting on, and this he would exploit to his own advantage.

 
The following morning, Pyke rode northwards from Hambledon Hall on a young grey horse and reached Huntingdon by nightfall. It took him all the next day and most of the following one to find what, or rather who, he had been looking for. Red, Billygoat and the other navvies he’d encountered in Huntingdon were drinking in an inn on the road between Peterborough and Ely. As Red explained later that night, after the violent clashes in the town they had been expelled from the parish and told never to return, otherwise they would be charged with conspiracy to riot, criminal damage and disturbing the peace. Red also said they had not managed to find any work in the last month and were down to their last few pennies.

‘Perhaps I can help you there,’ Pyke said, when he had stood them all a round of drinks. They were sitting around an oak table at the back of the room.

‘You mean to say you’re offering us work?’ Red said, removing his white felt hat and scratching his matted ginger hair.

‘Of a sort.’

Red leaned forward, his elbows resting on the table. ‘I’m listening.’

Quickly Pyke whispered to Red what he wanted them to do. When he’d finished, the navvy whistled and shook his head. ‘That’s a serious business. What makes you think we’re the men to help you?’

‘The same man who orchestrated the rape and murder of Mary and planned for the townsmen in Huntingdon to drive your men into that river, and to their deaths, has greatly profited from the situation.’

Red eyed him carefully. ‘So what you’re proposing to do would hit him hard?’

‘If it was done right, it could ruin him. And many others like him.’ He didn’t want to go into the details and Red didn’t look as if he wanted to hear them.

‘You’re asking us to break the law.’

‘And I’m prepared to pay you handsomely for doing so.’

‘What do you mean by handsome?’ Red said, his gappy teeth showing behind his lips.

‘Fifty guineas a man.’ With the money he’d made from the deal with Gore, Pyke could easily afford it. Not that Red knew it, but he’d be willing to pay up to ten times that figure.

‘Fifty guineas?’ Red hardly seemed to know what to do. It would take them two or three years to earn that kind of sum.

‘I’d need more than the nine of you, though,’ Pyke said, matter-of-factly. ‘At short notice, how many others do you think you could get?’

Red scratched the stubble on his chin and shrugged. ‘I reckon we could gather up, say, twenty more bodies by the end of tomorrow.’

‘As many as you can get.’

Red seemed surprised. ‘And you’ll pay ’em all fifty guineas? A man like you must have mighty deep pockets, if you don’t mind me sayin’ so.’

‘How I spend my money is my business,’ Pyke said, brusquely. ‘I’ll need you all down at my home near Enfield by Sunday night. I’ll arrange transportation. Two wagons ought to do it. The drivers will know where to go. Just have your men ready and waiting at the Stag in Peterborough by two on Sunday afternoon. Weather permitting, the journey shouldn’t take longer than five hours.’

‘You’re assuming we’ve already agreed to help you.’

Pyke held his gaze. ‘Are you saying you won’t?’

Red looked at the others. ‘There’ll be repercussions. We’ll be hunted down, won’t we?’

‘What if I could guarantee that no one will ever hold you responsible?’

‘An act like you’re planning? They’ll chase you and anyone involved to the ends of the earth.’

‘But as I just said, what if I could guarantee that this wouldn’t happen?’

Red stared at him. ‘And how could you do that?’

‘I’m a resourceful man.’ Pyke shrugged. ‘But I’m also a man of my word and as a man of my word, if I say there will be no repercussions, I’d expect you to believe me.’

Red put the white felt cap back on his head. ‘Reckon you’ve got all the answers, don’t you?’

‘In this instance, yes.’ Pyke saw something in his eyes and added, ‘But you’re still not convinced?’

‘You’re right. I’m torn.’

‘Between?’

‘I’d like to see this gen’leman get what’s coming to him, that’s for certain.’

‘But?’

Red took a slurp of his beer. ‘We like to
build
things,’ he said, simply. ‘It’s what we do.’

Pyke nodded. ‘Someone I knew who died recently also liked to build things. You’ve never seen anyone with more energy, more passion. He had a vision. He wanted to build a railway that ran from London all the way to York, a cheap, quick form of transportation that would change people’s lives for ever and would last for a hundred years.’ He waited for a few moments and looked into Red’s piercing green eyes. ‘His dream died with him. That railway isn’t going to be built. Greed and self-interest on the part of shareholders and committee members have won the day. You might think what I propose to do is nihilistic . . .’

Red was frowning. ‘Nihilistic?’

‘Pointless, barbaric even.’

‘And you don’t?’

Pyke thought about Emily and felt his anger return. ‘Sometimes all we’ve got left is the impulse to destroy.’

Red thought about this. ‘You talk about greed and self-interest like they’re wrong but you’re offering to pay us an enormous amount of money.’

‘So?’

‘So maybe there’s a virtue in greed, after all.’

Pyke looked at him and smiled. ‘You could be a philosopher yet.’

‘Does the job pay well?’ Red asked, playfully.

Pyke shrugged. ‘Fifty guineas for a morning’s work isn’t a bad start.’

THIRTY-TWO

At dawn on the following Monday morning, the first of a multitude of explosions could be heard in the vicinity of the town of Bishop’s Stortford in Hertfordshire. It was a loud blast that woke up many of the town’s residents and was quickly followed by further explosions detonated at intervals of approximately five hundred yards along the railway line. Similar blasts were heard in the vicinity of Hertford, Ware, Hoddesdon, Broxbourne, Waltham Cross, Edmonton, Ponders End, Angel Road, Tottenham Hale, Lea Bridge and Stratford. Initially, once the acrid plumes of black smoke had cleared, those who chose to investigate the blasts reached the same conclusion: that some kind of terrible accident had befallen the fledgling railway and that stores of black powder used by the navvies to blast their way through rocky impediments had spontaneously combusted. But it was only later, when the subcontractors responsible for overseeing the work at different points along the line inspected the terrible damage, that it dawned on people that the railway had been victim to a series of co-ordinated attacks: carefully planned explosions that had decimated much or all of the track already laid and created blast craters as deep as six feet along every part of the line.

At first light that same morning, thirty-six men, each one responsible for a mile of the thirty-six miles of track already completed or under construction, had moved along the railway line from Bishop’s Stortford in the north to Stratford in the south, lighting and setting off pre-prepared, carefully positioned charges along the way. In order to prepare for this, Pyke had broken into a storage warehouse belonging to a contractor working for the Birmingham railway - hoping Gore would later appreciate the irony - and loaded up his carriage with more than a ton of black powder. Having transported this material back to Hambledon, he had then set about assembling a hundred or so explosive devices. To do this, he had poured equal measures of the powder into already prepared parchment tubes and, employing a design associated with a Cornish-man, William Bickford, had made a safety fuse for each tube by carefully wrapping strands of jute around a core of powder and coating it with varnish. To detonate the powder all the navvies had to do was light the end of the fuse and move on to the next device.