Tommo & Hawk (22 page)

Our gaoler spins around, amazing quick for such a stout cove, and sticks his same podgy finger into Hawk's chest. 'And you be the one who murdered the first mate, ain'tcha!'

'Oh,' I says, quick and cheeky. 'All settled then, is it? We be guilty, is that it?'

'Would be if I had me way. Take you out the back, string you up the nearest tree together with the big Maori and call it a damn good day's work! One of each kind of villain, black, white and brindle, couldn't be fairer than that now, could it? Shame you can't just do it, these days.'

'Well, I'm thankful for that,' Hawk sighs softly.

'Now it's down to Auckland, magistrates on the bench growing haemorrhoids, jury sitting on their arses twiddling their thumbs and, when all's said and done, probably the same verdict: hanged by the neck until you dies. Goin' to Auckland be just a waste o' time and taxpayers' money!'

'And Captain O'Hara, what about him, Sergeant Nottingham? Has you thought that he might be the real villain?' I points to Hawk. 'Ask me brother to show you his back!'

Nottingham dismisses this with a toss of his hand. 'Could be, could be. Quite possible. But it ain't, see. 'Cause it wouldn't be right. Wouldn't be the decent thing.'

'What do you mean by that?' Hawk asks.

'It's all about sides, ain't it? Sides and ingredients! Yankee whaling ship skipper, Christian Quaker gentleman. That be one side. Ingredients on that side be a lopped-off hand.' He stops and looks at us hard. 'Four Maori, a nigger and a white man what carries a razor-sharp axe about his person. Ingredients here be the bloody axe what done the deed. That be t'other side.'

'What about British justice in all of this?' Hawk asks.

'Justice don't come into trials. White jury, Christian folk, or professed to be. Yankee whaling ships what come regular into port be good for business and ain't to be discouraged under any circumstances. And like I said, Quaker Christian captain with a ship what's a dry cask afloat, so the crew drink the port dry at top prices when they comes to land. That's more commerce. This be the case for the plaintiff.'

Nottingham sniffs and grabs his nose with his forefinger and thumb, wiggling it vigorously. 'Maori and niggers known to be heathen savages what can't see reason, don't have no discipline, 'less both be brought about by means of a good flogging before the mast. That be the case for the defence. What say you then, gentlemen o' the jury, guilty or not guilty?'

Nottingham says all this in a steady drone. Now he pauses and looks down at his naked big toe poking out of his broken boot. He wriggles it as though he's surprised to find it there. Then he shakes his head slowly and squints up at us. 'I might be a gamblin' man, but I wouldn't venture threepence on your chances. You be pushing wet dung uphill with a broken stick, lads. Best confess and be done with it, eh?'

'You say you're a gamblin' man, sir?' I asks.

'Could be, could be,' he sniffs through his tangerine moustache. 'Depends, don't it now?'

'Play the flats, then?'

'Been known to play a hand or two from time to time. Fancy yerself, does you? Didn't your daddy tell you never to play cards with strangers?'

'With friends? You play with friends?' Hawk asks.

'Poker, is it? Or whist?' I butt in before he can answer Hawk.

'Play the odd game in town now and then,' Nottingham says, without answering my question.

'What, in them one-shilling hells, full o' chumps and whores? I'll wager there's not a decent game to be found in this whole town!' I laughs.

'Look, lads, you be in enough trouble, don't go looking for no more. This town's got a poker school what's too rich for your blood!'

'Aye,' Hawk says, 'most wisely spoken, Sergeant Nottingham. On the other hand, there could be a quid in it for you.'

Nottingham looks at Hawk shrewdly. 'Cost yer five sovs to sit in.'

I whistle. 'Five pounds!' I has no idea if Hawk's got this kind of money. I look at him, showing me surprise, but he signals she'll be right. 'That be a big game,' I says to the Sheriff o' Nottingham.

'Too big for me, and I suggests too big for the likes of you mangy lot.'

'If you can get my brother into the game, we'll go fifty-fifty, what say you?' Hawk challenges.

A greedy look comes into the gaoler's eyes. 'You've got five pounds to wager?'

'Could be, could be! Depends, don't it now?' Hawk mimics him cleverly.

'Fifty-fifty?'

Hawk nods.

'And if you lose?'

'No onus,' Hawk replies.

'If we loses, you gets our confession signed, sealed and delivered. Feather in yer cap and all,' I says.

I can hear Hawk's sharp intake o' breath at this offer.

'A feather in me cap, eh? A written confession?' Nottingham removes his cap to show a bald, shiny red pate, spotted with bright brown freckles like stars in the night sky. Then he punches the inside of the dirty, misshapen cap with his fist. The crown flaps loose and three dirty fingers wiggle through the gap. 'Even with a feather it ain't never going to be much of a cap.' He grins, showing gappy yellow teeth. 'There's no more promotion for Sergeant Nottingham, this be my final patch, my last station o' duty!'

'You mean, you'd rather have the money?' asks Hawk, coming straight out.

'What do you think?' Nottingham grins.

'Well,' says Hawk, 'what I think is that you think my brother and I will be condemned whether we are guilty or not, would that be correct?'

Nottingham smiles a secret little smile and shrugs. 'That's about it, lads. Ain't no jury in this land what's gunna condemn your Captain O'Hara for a bit o' Maori and nigger flogging.'

I am impressed at how quick Hawk's grasped the situation. Nottingham be a man what's condemned by his own habits, a drinker and a gambler, and a failure at both. Shit! I thinks suddenly, that's what Hawk sees for me! He sees Nottingham. He sees his desperation, his despair, in me future.

That's the difference 'tween Hawk and me. I sees a mongrel clear as daylight. Not a very important mongrel, mind, but one what can cause us harm and what's got power over us. Hawk sees a man what's on the bones of his arse, what's closer to prisoner than to policeman, trapped by what he is and where he be. A man what's dying same as the town around him, sinking into nothin'.

Hawk is a fair man, fair in his heart and mind. He don't understand that fair be not understood by such as Nottingham or even, matter of fact, by such as me. Fair don't come into the reckoning of poor folk. Hawk sees someone to be pitied and yours truly sees danger. Hawk be about to mess things up proper by trying to get Nottingham to let us escape for five pounds. Hawk don't understand how a gambler's mind works.

'This game o' poker, we're in, then?' I takes up the question again.

'Fifty-fifty?'

'Fifty-fifty, solemn oath,' I shoots back.

'Remind me what happens if you lose?'

I shrug. 'You ain't no worse off and we still be Auckland-bound. But if we wins, what then?' I asks.

This is the moment o' truth. I sense that even Hawk knows this. I try to keep the smile on me gob, hoping that I haven't struck too early, that me smile means it don't seem too important to know the answer if I've read him wrong.

Nottingham don't know for sure if we've got the five sovs, but he's got to figure we must have, or there's no point. Thank Gawd Hawk ain't shown it to him. Then I thinks, Christ Jesus! What if Hawk don't have it and he is bluffing? Nah, Hawk don't have the gall, he's got the money all right. Nottingham has to figure he has, too. So what's his options? He can take it by force - there be three constables as well as himself and we be in chains and manacles. Five pounds be a lot of money. Or, he can gamble there's more to come if I can win at poker. It's time for all Ikey's lessons to pay off.

'Sergeant Nottingham, sir, if you'd be so good as t' remove me manacles for five minutes, perhaps you'd care to witness the skill what's being brought to our side.'

Nottingham looks me up and down and I guess he figures there ain't all that much to me and that even he might make a show of capturing me should I try to scarper. Besides, the cell is locked behind him. We waits and he don't say nothing. If he says no, we're done like a dinner.

'Righto!' he says and, taking the keys from his belt, opens me manacles.

Well, it's all sporting stuff. Ace where no ace should be. Ace, King, Queen, Jack dealt straight off after Nottingham has himself shuffled the pack. 'Take a card please, Sergeant? Any card.' I offers the pack wrong-side up and he selects a card blind. 'Turn it over and put it down,' I points to the four picture cards already spread face up. He turns his card and puts down the Joker, amazement writ all over his rough gob. Then he smiles and I know we has won. Greed be the most dependable of all human characteristics.

'Righto, you can count me in,' he growls.

'Just a moment, Sergeant, what about our winnings?' Hawk asks.

'Fifty-fifty!' he says, indignant.

'Ah! Not what you win, what we win?'

Nottingham looks puzzled.

'If we are Auckland-bound,' Hawk continues, 'and if, as you say, the verdict is already decided?'

There is a long silence as Nottingham stands thinking, looking down at his broken boots. Then he slowly raises his head and looks squint-eyed at Hawk. 'You means, what price freedom?'

Hawk stays stum.

The gaoler seems to be thinking again, and then he says quietly, 'Fifty pounds.'

'Fifty pounds!' Fuck! I'm took completely by surprise. Fifty quid, I'll wager, be near six months' salary for a police sergeant! But Hawk don't even flick an eyelid.

'How big is the game?' he asks cool as you like.

'Five, six with him,' Nottingham points t' me.

'Can't do it,' Hawk says firmly. 'Five-pound stake for each player, that's only thirty-five pounds. If each isn't prepared to lose more than his buy-in, we can't make the fifty. Even if Tommo cleans them all out, which isn't likely. Let's say twenty pounds, which will be hard enough?'

Shit, Hawk's got twenty pounds on him, I thinks. If Nottingham accepts, he'll offer him the money right off so that we can scarper, never mind the poker game.

'There's some what will be willing to lose more than their stake,' the gaoler says. 'They don't muck around.' He pauses. 'You scared, is it? Sorry, lads, but I ain't sticking me neck out for less than half a hundred.'

Hawk shakes his head. 'Sergeant Nottingham, it isn't reasonable.'

Nottingham laughs, his fat stomach wobbling like a jelly. 'It ain't a reasonable world, son. It ain't reasonable that the jury should hang you in Auckland, but take my word they will. Fifty pounds, that be my first and last offer.'

'You're on!' I says suddenly. With twenty pounds I can build a proper scam. But Hawk's right, to take fifty pounds from a single five-pounds-in game is damned nigh impossible if they's good players. Even if I does a whole heap o' relocation I'll need two games to set it up.

'But it's got to be two nights, two games. Over two games we've maybe got a chance,' I says to the gaoler.

Nottingham looks doubtful. 'Two games? I don't know if these gentlemen will like that.'

'Tell you what they won't like? They won't like playing with a stranger for one game only!'

Nottingham accepts this. He's said himself he don't play cards with a stranger.

'Fifty-fifty if you should not make the fifty pounds for your freedom?' Nottingham says again.

We both nod. It is sheer bastardry, but what can we do? 'Fifty pounds in your hand and you let us scarper, right?' I want it from his lips once more.

He clears his throat like he's even nervous to think of it. 'Yes, but I'll have to come after you, mind. Do me duty.'

Hawk smiles. 'By going in the wrong direction, I sincerely hope?'

'Aye, I'll do that by and by,' Nottingham says, still shifty.

'Two games, right?' I persist, bringing them two back to the business at hand. 'Five pounds on the table to buy into each game. The second five held at the end of the first night as surety for the next - right?' I points to Hawk, 'Me brother to hold the second game buy-in, in trust overnight. Oh,' I adds, 'and two new packs o' cards, DeLarue & Sons, no other, one blue, one red, we breaks the seals at the table.'

Hawk looks at me and I shrugs. In for a penny, in for a pound. Worst what can happen is we are transported to Auckland and strung up. I'm making a book on Nottingham's greed. He's a gambler himself, he'll be itching to sit in on the second game and I hopes to make it possible. Nottingham's a mongrel, and mongrels has to pay.

'Right, two games,' the gaoler agrees. 'I think I can arrange that all right. But,' he points at Hawk, 'I don't think they're gunna let a known murderer hold the stakes overnight.'

I see Hawk scowl and his eyes grow hard at Nottingham's accusation that he can't be trusted.

'Safer than a bank,' I pipes up quickly. 'We ain't goin' nowhere, is we now?'

Nottingham laughs, relieving the tension. 'Righto, the nigger holds the buy-in and the wee lad gets new cards, DeLarue & Sons. By the by, what's the ante?'

'Let's say five shillings.'

'Five shillings?' Nottingham thinks for a moment then nods, 'Fair enough, lad.'

'With the right to raise it before each hand?'

The gaoler hesitates then says, 'We'll let the others decide, though I can't see they'll object.'

We leave it at that and Nottingham returns the Queen's bracelets to me wrists. As soon as he's gone, Hawk asks me in strong lingo what exactly I think I'm doing.

'How much money has we got?' I ducks the question.

He hesitates. 'Twenty-five pounds,' he says.

I acts shocked. 'Shit, why didn't you say before? I thought I were gunna have to work with five! That I'd have to work a scam where we comes out square the first game so's we've got the deposit for the second. Twenty-five quid, eh? That's a king's bloody ransom! Now we can have a proper strategy.' I grin. 'With that much, the very best o' Ikey Solomon be possible.' I pretend to think for a moment.

'We'll lose fifteen right off! "Thicken the plot and sweeten the pot," as Ikey would say.'