That in turn reminded me I didn’t know where Marcus was, only that he was off on an errand for Denis. One more person in the world I worried about.
Our journey took two days, with the horses changed often. By the end of the second day, we crossed the river Medway on a ferry and headed for the Isle of Sheppey, which was cut off from the rest of Kent by a thin piece of water called the Swale.
South and east of Sheppey lay the estate of Lord Mercer, so Egan had said, a prosperous piece of land stretching through rich fields toward the sea. I had promised Sir Montague I would not seek out Mercer, but I gazed southward, wondering if I’d be able to hold myself to my word.
Our first destination, however, was the island and the hulks there.
I paid for the ferry crossing to Sheppey, and the carriage rolled onto the flat barge to be floated across the Swale.
Flat land under large skies flowed around me, sunshine gleaming on the strip of water to either side of us. I was reminded of Norfolk, and the touch of homesickness the thought engendered surprised me. As a lad, I had not been able to rush from Norfolk quickly enough. Now I looked forward to summer and walking with Gabriella along the wide, gentle shore at Cley.
We disembarked from the ferry and continued along the narrow track to Queenborough.
The Royal Navy had been on the northern tip of this island for a century and more, ever since the entertaining Samuel Pepys had recommended shoring up the garrison in the late 1600s, thus guarding the entrance to the Thames. So said the little guidebook Grenville had thrust at me before I’d gone.
A gun tower stood on the very tip of the island, where the Medway and Thames met, in a place the locals called Sheerness. The tower had been built in the late seventeenth century but was in much disrepair now, said my book. As the long war with France was over, and Bonaparte had never managed to finish his plans to invade England, we’d likely not need such a thing for a long time.
Despite the April warmth, the wind coming off the sea and the mud flats was sharp. I huddled into my coat, watching fat clouds race overhead, as we found accommodation in Queenborough.
After a decent enough meal and ale and a sleep in tiny rooms under the slates, we headed the next morning two miles north to the Royal Navy docks and the hulks.
The houses we passed on our way to the point were tiny but neat and painted a uniform grayish blue. Women came out to watch us pass, and small children ran through the streets, shouting after us.
Brewster went silent as we descended the coach and received our permission to go out to the docks—which was given to Pomeroy, who acted as leader of our party. The navy men would reluctantly admit a Runner, we’d decided, but an army captain alone, probably not. Rivalries ran deep, and I’d met naval men who could be utter bastards to their army counterparts.
Brewster hunkered behind me, pretending to be my servant, his hat pulled well down around his ears.
We were given a guide, a young sailor whose cheeks were reddened by the wind, the youth eager to finish with port duty and head off to see the world.
I smelled the hulks before I saw them, two rudderless, mastless ships resting on a mud flat offshore, low tide keeping them out of the water. They were about half a mile apart, but the stench blown toward us made me regret eating such a hearty breakfast.
Human beings packed together, and waste, blood, disease, and death, combined into a miasma that was bad enough this far away. I hated to think of the men trapped there, breathing that air, praying they survived long enough to live on dry land again.
“They wait here about three months,” our young guide, who gave his name as Jones, said. “Then the prisoners are shipped out to Van Diemen’s Land. Long journey.”
Many would die along the way, and those who made it to the far side of the world would be subjected to hard labor, often for the rest of their lives.
“Prisoners from France were kept in the hulks during the wars,” Seaman Jones went on. “But when the Frenchies went home, the ships were needed for our own villains.”
“Any ever escape from them?” Pomeroy asked with professional interest.
“They try. It ain’t easy. They mostly attempt it at night, if they can get out of their shackles, and either they’re shot or they go the wrong way and drown. Water’s beastly cold.”
Frigid. I’d bathed in the North Sea in my boyhood but I’d been hardened to the chill and it hadn’t seemed so harsh then. My years in warmer climates and my injury had made me more sensitive to cold, as I was now, shivering in the brisk wind blowing over the mud and water.
We walked along the strand, turning our left sides to the sea to head toward the shipping docks beyond the naval ones. Commercial vessels put to sea from here, fairly small ones carrying cargo across the Channel to France or Holland, or perhaps south to Portugal and Spain, and larger vessels that trod the world.
The entire strand teemed with ant-like movement, as men worked in the yards, both naval and civilian. Naval ships rocked at the ends of moorings, and one ship was in a huge dry dock, a racket of hammering and sawing filling the spring day. On the commercial side, men ran up and down gangplanks with loads under their arms or guided winches to move nets full of cargo from decks and open holds to land.
Both sets of workers carried on without much cheer. The endless sky, endless water, and flat, flat land might have something to do with that. Such a landscape was hard on those unused to it.
Along a more deserted stretch of shore a line of men dug a trench in a desultory fashion. They were chained together, watched over by several large fellows with pistols on their belts, whips folded in their hands. One of the chained convicts gazed at us, his eyes devoid of expression.
Brewster glanced at them and away. I gave the man who stared at me a polite nod. He looked startled then quickly put his head down and went back to digging.
“Poor buggers,” Brewster said in a whisper.
He might be here with those chained men if I did not clear him of this murder. I quickened my steps to catch up with Pomeroy.
“Which ship belongs to Captain Steadman?” Pomeroy was asking as he strolled, his eye on the line of masts around the corner of the point.
Our sailor gave a visible start, and his face lost some of its pinkness. “He’s out,” he said quickly.
“When’s he returning? I hear he assists fellows who maybe don’t like it so much on the underside of New South Wales.”
“Never heard that,” Jones stammered.
“Ah, well,” Pomeroy said. “Only curious. Did you give this tour to another Runner? Name of Quimby?”
Now our guide looked confused. “Never heard no one of that name. Never saw no Runner either. You’re me first.” He looked proud.
“Funny that. Quimby said he’d be in this area—would have arrived several days ago.”
“I’m not always walking visitors around, sir,” Jones said. “And Sheppey’s a big place. He could have gone to Minster or Leysdon—Leysdon’s on the south end of the island.”
“True. Or he might not have come here at all. Thought I’d ask.”
Pomeroy spoke offhandedly, as though Quimby’s whereabouts didn’t much interest him. I walked silently behind the two, the tip of my cane sinking into mud between the stones. Brewster crunched behind me, head down, his breathing loud.
We continued the tour of the docks, thanked the cheerful Jones and the sour-faced lieutenant who’d lent us Jones in the first place, and returned to our carriage.
Before I ascended, I felt eyes on me, and turned my head to see a large man in the shadow of a brick building, staring hard at me. He said nothing, only looked, and then turned as Brewster came up behind me.
We made our way to our lodgings with no further occurrence except that the wind sharpened. Clouds bunched up, bringing us rain.
We warmed ourselves with a pint of ale in our inn at Queenborough. “We’ve learned nothing,” I said to Pomeroy as we sat in the inglenook by the fire. Brewster had remained in the yar
d with the coachman, keeping a healthy distance between himself and Pomeroy.
“Not necessarily.” Pomeroy leaned back, resting his tankard on his wide chest. “We discovered that talking about Steadman made a young seaman nervous. He’s been told to keep quiet, an order that could only have come from higher up. We also discovered he was truly baffled when I mentioned Quimby, so the man might never have set foot in the Royal Navy’s shipyards. Might not even have made it to Sheppey.”
In that case, where the devil was he? Waylaid on the road? Highwaymen were by no means completely a thing of the past. Captured by Lord Mercer? By this Captain Steadman?
“Guv.” Brewster approached the table, holding a tankard which he’d secured before ducking out with the coachman. “Man what was watching you up by the shipyard is here. Think he has sommut to say.”
Pomeroy began to rise, but Brewster’s hand came up. “No Runners. He’s here for the captain, not you.”
Pomeroy sat back down without losing his bonhomie. “Tell me all about it when you return, Captain. Don’t mind you doing my job for me.”
I set down my pint and followed Brewster through the narrow hall of the inn to the yard. Brewster continued out of that into an alley as narrow as the inn’s hall, a mere dirt path between high stone walls.
A man skulked in the shadows of the house at the end of this. Brewster, having divested himself of his tankard in the yard, moved quickly and had our fellow hemmed in.
The man’s face was covered with bristly beard, the corners of his eyes lined from sun and wind. He stood bareheaded in the rain, not seeming to mind that his hair was dripping.
“I know where your beak is,” he said before I could ask who he was.
“Do ye?” Brewster didn’t touch the man or even ball his fists, but the threat he exuded was clear. “Where is he then? And don’t be touching the captain for coin.”
“Don’t want your coin.” The man’s accent was flat, a native of the coastal fens. “Ye want to know or not?”
“Please,” I interceded. “Anything will be helpful.”
“He’s on the hulk, ain’t he?” the man said. “They knocked the poor bugger about then dragged him there. Ten to one he’s already dead.”
Chapter 21
The rain took on a fiercer chill. “Hulk?” I asked the man, my lips stiff. “Which one?”
He pointed off to his right. His finger indicated the wall, but I understood what he meant. The easternmost one, the Atonement.
“How do you know?” I asked.
The man shrugged, but Brewster took a step to him, and he shrank back.
I assessed him. Our informer had the build of a laborer, but unlike the locals inside the tavern, who were loud, whether snarling or singing, this man barely parted his lips to talk.
His spirit had been broken. I’d seen such a thing in soldiers in the army, who had gone into battle once too often. They folded up into themselves, some continuing their duty as expected, but without any fear or hope—they felt nothing at all. Others slid off into the night and either deserted or ended their misery with knife or pistol.
“You’ve been there,” I said. “On the Atonement, I mean. As a prisoner.”
He gave me a nod. “Aye. Months. I think. Labored by day, chained at night. Pardon came through just before I was to be transported. My innocence proved. Don’t matter now, do it?”
Brewster stared at him. “What you still doing here? Me, I’d be galloping home were I free and clear.”
Another shrug. “Nowhere to go. No money to get there. I work for my keep. Sleep in a stable. No irons.”
His lack of inflection chilled me. He was going through the motions of life, not knowing what else to do. He might have no family or perhaps one that wanted nothing to do with him.
“You’re certain you saw a Runner from London?” I asked. “On this hulk?”
The man’s eyes flared with irritation. “I recognize a Runner when I see one. Like that big lout ye came here with. ’Sides, he told me. Was looking for old Jack Finch, what was transported years ago. Don’t know what he thought he’d find. He said was chatting to a few sailors on a dock when suddenly they jump on him, beat him down and strip him, and row him out here. He were here, half insensible, when the rest of us came back.”
“Good Lord,” I breathed. I thought of Quimby, small and thoughtful, a smart man but not gifted with bulk. “Was he still there when you were let off?”
“Aye,” the man said. “Thought he wouldn’t last—a thief-taker in with hundreds of convicts? They went at him at first, those who could reach him, but he talked us round. Said it was only his due, and when we got to Van Diemen’s Land, we’d save our pennies and buy us a fine house and have dances all night. He were a kind bloke, ye could see.”
“What day did you see him last? How long ago were you released?”
The man shrugged. “Don’t know. Three, maybe four days. Saw you and knew the yellow-haired one was another Runner. But you, sir, seem more amiable, like, so I decided to talk to you. You’d best get the other one out of there.”
“So we shall.” I dipped my hand into my pocket and pulled out a few shillings. “You might want to find another town to rest in, in case someone takes umbrage that you spoke to us. If you can get yourself to Norfolk, on the far north end of it, go to a village called Parson’s Point. Look up a man named Terrance Quinn, and tell him I said you can be hired to work on my house there.”
The man blinked as though coming awake. He switched his gaze to Brewster. “Is he a madman?”
“Aye,” Brewster answered readily. “But don’t let that worry ye. He’ll not steer ye wrong. Take his money, and his advice.”
The man at last accepted the coins, clutching them in his fist as though fearing they’d disappear.
“Right you are, sir,” he said, and then turned around and walked into the mist and rain, as though ready to trudge to Norfolk on the spot.
“Whew,” Brewster said. “I don’t like Runners, but I wouldn’t wish that on one of them. Mr. Quimby is a good sort, for all he’s a thief-taker. Are we off to rescue him?”
“Yes,” I said. “Let us hope they don’t chain us up and throw us into the hold as well.”
Pomeroy, when we broke the news of Quimby’s capture, was ready to continue drinking and have a night’s sleep, saying we’d investigate the former prisoner’s claim in the morning.
“On your feet, Sergeant,” I told him sternly. “One more night might kill him. If you were festering out there, you’d be grateful we didn’t wait for the convenience of daylight.”
Pomeroy refused to grow angry, though he did rise. “Ye keep forgetting I ain’t your sergeant anymore, Captain. And on this little jaunt, it’s me what’s in command. Have ye thought this man from the hulk might be playing you for a fool, luring us out so we’ll be cornered ourselves?”
“It occurred to me, yes,” I said. “But you did not see his eyes when he spoke to us. The hulks nearly broke him. He had no reason to tell us about Quimby except concern for the man.”
“Ye mean except maybe being paid to tell you.” Pomeroy lifted his tankard and drained it. “You’re right that if Quimby is there, he needs to be hauled out. But you let me talk to the turnkeys. Obviously the Governess didn’t know how to put the fear of God into ’em.”
I agreed that Pomeroy could bully the way for us, and we departed the inn.
Our hired coachman did not want to leave his warm billet and plenty of ale, but after I put a crown into his hand, he grunted and went to ready the horses.
The naval yard, when we reached it, was far from silent. Though carpentry work had finished for the night, plenty of sailors were on duty guarding the valuable ships and guns. Sentries remained on the lookout for warships, should the Austrian or Russian Empires take the whim to invade tonight.
“Good sir,” Pomeroy called out to the guard with musket who halted us. “Fetch Lieutenant Ostman. I have a favor to ask him. A casket of best brandy to him if
he does it, and have a cup yourself. The captain here will stand it.”
I tried not to flinch, but at least the guard nodded and fetched another guard to lead us to Ostman’s lodgings.
The lieutenant, who had reluctantly welcomed us earlier and assigned Seaman Jones to be our guide, was not happy to be pulled away from his dinner, his wine, and his mistress. He met us in the cold and dark foyer of his house, light and warmth waiting in the rooms behind him.
He was even less happy when Pomeroy asked for a boat to row us out to a hulk.
“Nothing to do with me,” the lieutenant barked.
“It might, sir, begging your pardon.” Pomeroy’s eyes twinkled and his voice boomed like a cannonade. “Runners abducted and taken to the hulks, criminals escaping from the colonies, all under the Royal Navy’s nose. Quite a scandal, sir.”
Which everyone on Sheppey and beyond would know about, thanks to Pomeroy’s hearty bellow.
The lieutenant flushed. “I will arrange it,” he said stiffly. “But I have never seen this Mr. Quimby. You’ve a bee in your bonnet, man.”
“It’s buzzing quite hard,” Pomeroy said. “Pass us off to your flunky and get back to your beefsteak and pudding.” He gave the lieutenant a wink.
The lieutenant’s countenance became more sour than ever. “I will arrange it,” he repeated, and swung away, calling orders to his servants.
Seaman Jones arrived quickly at the lieutenant’s door. The lad must have been pulled away from his supper as well, but he greeted us cheerfully.
“Got a boat for ye and good strong rowers. But I don’t know why ye want to go out to the Atonement, sirs. Terrible place.”
“Exactly why we’re going, lad,” Pomeroy said. “Lead on.”
Jones took us from the officers’ quarters and down through narrow alleyways to the water. We trudged behind him across the wet and slick shingle to a waiting longboat.
The boat was already in the water, straining at its tether tied to a ring in the rocks. We waded out to it, the brackish water freezing me through my boots. My knee throbbed.