Ratcatcher

8

Hawkwood lay pressed back against the pillow, his arm around her waist. Her cheek rested on his chest. Her eyes were closed. She was breathing softly. The bed sheets lay in disarray around them. They were both naked.

The carriage had delivered them to a fashionable house on the corner of Portman Square. There were no servants in evidence, other than a maid who had opened the door and curtseyed low before disappearing, at her mistress’s bidding, to her own quarters. Her services, she had been told, would not be required for the rest of the day. The girl had expressed no surprise at Hawkwood’s presence.

Once inside, her first action had been to tend his wound.

She had become aware of his injury when the carriage wheels hit a pothole. The carriage bounced hard on its springs, jolting Hawkwood out of his seat. He had let out an involuntary grunt of pain and pressed his hand to his stomach. Her reaction had been immediate.

“You’re hurt!”

“A scratch. It’s nothing.”

“Let me see.” Before he could stop her, she had pulled his jacket away. “My God! There is blood! You’re wounded!”

“It’s not as bad as it looks.”

“But you need attention! A doctor!”

“The hell I do! I’ll not be prodded and poked by some damned apothecary. Bastards pass on more infections than they cure.”

It occurred to Hawkwood that he should probably have been more mindful of his language, given that he was in the company of a lady and not in some dockside tavern. The amusement playing across her lips, however, hinted that his vocabulary was not her main concern.

“Then you will let me take care of you. No, not another word, Captain,” she cautioned as Hawkwood opened his mouth to protest. “I insist upon it!”

The look in her eyes warned Hawkwood that it would be wiser not to resist.

She had shown him to a couch in the drawing room before removing her cloak and disappearing, returning with a bowl of hot water and bandages.

“Take off your shirt,” she commanded.

Hawkwood hesitated.

“Must I do it for you?” Her eyes flashed. “If you are concerned about my being compromised, there’s no need. My maid is discreet and gone to her room, and there’s no one else to disturb us.” She smiled. “Or is it that you are embarrassed? Surely not? Not my brave captain?”

Hawkwood sighed. “I’m not a captain. I’m not anything. Not any more.”

“But you’re still my hero,” she murmured softly. “Now, take off your shirt.”

She did not look away. Instead her gaze moved frankly over his body, taking in not only the blood-encrusted runnel below his ribs but the older scars that crisscrossed his torso. Her attention was drawn to a crescent of puckered skin etched into the flesh beneath his left arm. Caused by a heavy blade of some kind, she presumed. A circular, discoloured indentation high on his right shoulder suggested a bullet wound, while a thin weal an inch below his left nipple looked as if it might have been made by a knife. It was a body mauled by war and almost twenty years of soldiering.

As with most superficial wounds, the degree of blood was disproportionate to the damage sustained. Nevertheless, despite her gentle ministrations, he was forced to bite his lip more than once as she dabbed away the rind of congealed blood. Once the wound was cleansed, he knew the healing would be quick. As a result, the scarring was likely to be negligible, just another addition to the painful legacies of battle.

By the time she had finished, the water in the bowl had cooled to lukewarm and turned crimson. She reached for the bandages.

“Sit up,” she instructed.

A frisson of pleasure moved through him as he caught the faint scent of her perfume; jasmine, he guessed, with perhaps a hint of wild lemon. He felt her breath, light as a feather on his neck, as she leaned in and wound the bandage around him. For a moment, their eyes met. Her hands stopped moving, her breasts rose and fell invitingly before him.

“I think it’s time,” she whispered.

Hawkwood frowned. “For what?”

Her steady gaze transfixed him. “Your reward.”

She looked down on him through a tangle of lustrous black hair. Her skin was the colour of cinnamon. The dark tips of her breasts brushed his skin. Wordlessly, reaching down between them, her fingers searched for him. Hawkwood felt himself respond. She bent her left knee, straddled him, and gave a small moan of pleasure. All the time her eyes remained open, watching him. Encircling him with her hand, she began to massage him gently.

“I want you,” she breathed.

She released him, lowered her head and kissed his neck, her teeth nipping playfully at his skin. Her tongue flickered along the line of his jugular. Her lips were warm and moist. She moved down his body, nuzzling his chest, kissing his scars. Her hands traced his hips, caressed his thighs. Her head sank lower. Her lips enfolded him and Hawkwood surrendered to the moment.

When she sensed he could hold back no longer, she disengaged her mouth and tongue, raised herself on to her knees and lowered herself carefully. Head thrown back, eyes closed, she began to move urgently against him.

She cried out as she came, the shudders moving through her. Hawkwood held her tightly as she fell across him, trembling like a bird.

He had been unprepared for the aggressive way in which she had taken the initiative, undressing with tantalizing slowness until, clad only in silk stockings, she had opened her legs and spread herself before him. His skin still smarted where her nails had raked his shoulders as he had taken her.

A bright sheen of sweat covered their bodies. A light breeze rippled coolly through the open window, ruffling the drapes. Hawkwood pulled the sheet over them both.

Hawkwood stroked the smooth cleft of her buttocks. She sighed, pressed herself to him, rotated her hips, and kissed the underside of his jaw. “You realize,” she murmured, “I don’t even know what they call you.”

He frowned. “Who?”

“Why, your friends, of course. Or do you expect me to address you as Captain Hawkwood all the time?” She looked up at him and smiled. Her fingers traced small circles on his chest.

A moment passed.

It occurred to Hawkwood that the number of people he might have regarded as friends was depressingly small. Over the years there had been acquaintances, men he had fought alongside; some brave, some foolish, a few cowardly. But true friends? Individuals he would willingly have given his life for away from the fever of battle? Precious few, when it came down to it. Probably no more than could be counted on the fingers of one hand, and most of them already dead. There was Jago, of course. All things considered, he supposed the ex-sergeant was as close to him as anyone, or at least had been before their return to England. These days, he wasn’t so sure, given that Jago now ran with the hares while his own allegiance lay with the hounds. And in any case, in all the years they had been together, Jago would never have had cause nor, for that matter, the inclination to address him by his first name. In the army, even where friendship was concerned, rank would always prevail. As for the present, there was a wellworn saying among his fellow officers: a Bow Street Runner never made friends, only informers.

“Matthew,” Hawkwood said. “My name’s Matthew.”

“So, my Matthew,” she said softly. “Tell me about the scars on your throat.”

Not so much scars as an uneven necklace of faded bruising running from the hollow below his right jaw-line to the area of skin below his right ear. Hidden beneath his collar, the discoloration might have gone unnoticed, but in removing his shirt the marks had become visible.

Hawkwood reached up and covered her exploring hand. Sensing the change in him, she frowned. “You’re afraid to tell me?” Then she gave a small intuitive gasp. “Wait, I understand. C’est une…” her brow furrowed as she searched for the words “…a mark of birth, yes?”

Hawkwood stroked her flank, marvelling at the satin texture. It was not the first time he had been asked about the marks on his throat, nor was it the first time he had avoided an explanation of their origin. They were not a birthmark, nor were they a souvenir of his soldiering or his career as a Runner. They belonged to a more distant past; a dark time of his life he had no desire to revisit, and a reminder of how, in the blink of an eye, a man’s destiny could be changed for ever.

“Oh, my poor Matthew,” she said, sensing his disquiet. Resting her arms across his chest, fingers entwined, she looked up at him. “Tell me everything. I want to know it all.” She eyed him speculatively. “Is it usual for an officer of the law to fight a duel? Over a woman?” Her kittenish expression mocked him.

“It would probably depend on the woman,” Hawkwood said.

She feigned annoyance and gave his arm a playful slap then lowered her head and kissed the spot tenderly. She regarded him levelly and her expression grew serious. “So, tell me, my Captain, when you were a soldier, did you kill many men?”

“I never kept a tally.”

She elevated herself on to one elbow, ran a fingertip along the muscle in his forearm. “But you did fight and kill?”

“Yes.”

“Frenchmen? Bonaparte’s soldiers?”

“Mostly.” Hawkwood wondered where this was leading.

She sensed his hesitation. “You do not like to talk about it?”

“Not particularly.”

She frowned. “It disturbed you? The killing?”

“Not at the time.”

She stretched languorously. “So, you enjoyed it?” It sounded almost like a challenge. Once again Hawkwood was reminded of a cat sated after a saucer of cream.

“It was war. I was a soldier. They were the enemy. I didn’t have a choice.”

“Is that why you let Lord Rutherford live? You had the choice?”

“Let’s just say I’ve grown tired of seeing men die needlessly.”

She sat up quickly. “Had I been you, I would not have been so forgiving. I would have killed him!”

Her sudden vehemence startled him.

“You doubt me?” she asked. Her look dared him to contradict.

“Not for a moment,” Hawkwood said truthfully. He went to sit up. As he did so, his hand brushed the underside of the pillow.

“Christ!”

The pain was so sudden and so intense he thought at first that he’d been stung by something. He jerked his hand away quickly and stared at the tiny dark red bubble of blood that had appeared as if by magic on the end of his finger. Certainly no wasp or bee sting.

Hawkwood lifted the pillow cautiously. The knife lay on the sheet. The blade was some six inches long, very thin, and needle sharp. The handle was of a similar length to the blade, black in colour and inlaid with an intricate gold filigree design. The workmanship, Hawkwood could see, was exquisite. It was a weapon as finely wrought as it was deadly.

Humour danced in her eyes. Her hand moved to her mouth as if to stifle laughter. She reached over him. The tips of her breasts dimpled his arm as she lifted the stiletto from its hiding place. “Oh, my love, forgive me! I’d quite forgotten it was there!” She laid the knife aside and took his hand in her own. “Here, let me see.”

She bent her head, as if to examine the wound. Before he could stop her, she had closed her mouth around his fingertip. He felt the warm curl of her tongue. Slowly, she slid her lips down the length of his finger. Hollowing her cheeks, she closed her eyes as she sucked the still warm blood from his flesh.

Releasing his finger from her mouth, she raised her head and smiled again. “Am I forgiven?”

Hawkwood stared down at the knife.

She followed his gaze. “We live in dangerous times, my love. A lady needs protection.”

“From whom?”

“Why, Bonaparte’s agents, of course. It is not unknown for the Emperor to send his people against us.”

“Us?” Hawkwood said.

“Those of us who wish to see Bonaparte deposed.”

“Royalists?”

“King Louis is the rightful heir. Did you know that this year alone the Emperor has twice sent agents to murder the Comte d’Artois? That means anyone who supports the Bourbon cause is at risk. We must be able to defend ourselves. Would you deny me that right?”

Hawkwood was about to suggest that her honour would probably be better protected by a brace of pistols, but he was silenced when she leaned over and plucked the weapon from the bed sheet. He watched, fascinated, as she raised the stiletto to her lips and kissed the blade. It was a mime as erotic as her scent and the feel of her lips sliding over his knuckle. Looking down, he thought he saw her nipples harden. For a fleeting second, it was as if she and the knife were one, bonded together like lovers and, despite the incongruity of the moment, Hawkwood felt the stirrings of arousal.

Her dark eyes flashed. “Had you not come to my rescue, I’d have used it on that pig Rutherford without a moment’s regret.”

She stood, placed the knife on the armoire, turned to him, and grinned.

“But enough of this! What must you think of me, speaking of such things?” She leaned over him, breasts swaying invitingly, and chuckled seductively. “When I can think of much more pleasurable ways of passing the time!”

It was mid morning by the time Hawkwood arrived at the Blackbird. The tavern occupied the corner of a quiet mews at the lower end of Water Lane, one of the many winding arteries leading from the south side of Fleet Street down towards the river. Hidden deep within a maze of secluded courtyards and passageways, less than a stone’s throw from Kings Bench walk and the Inner Temple, it was inevitable that the majority of the tavern’s patrons should be members of the legal profession. The tavern’s proximity to Temple Church and St Dunstan’s also ensured regular custom from those of an ecclesiastical persuasion. Writers, actors and politicians—callings that often went hand in hand—had also been known to duck through its low portals in search of a late supper and a soothing dram.

To Hawkwood, however, the Blackbird was more than a convenient watering hole. It was home. The two rooms he inhabited beneath the tavern’s sloping roof were a quiet haven to which he could retreat from the bustling streets that were such an integral part of his life.

Several booths were occupied. One or two of the regulars glanced up and nodded in silent recognition as he entered. Not everyone was eating. Some groups conversed over drinks. A few customers had paired off and were engaged in games of chess. Others played whist, while a number of individuals, at ease with their own company, were content merely to sip coffee, enjoy a quiet pipe, and peruse the morning papers.

“Well, now, if it isn’t Officer Hawkwood! And I suppose you’ll be wanting breakfast?”

The voice came from behind. Hawkwood turned and smiled.

“Morning, Maddie.”

Maddie Teague was a woman who carried her beauty without a trace of vanity. Tall and slender, her most arresting features—a pair of emerald eyes framed by a halo of dark auburn hair—had been known to strike men dumb at over fifty paces. It was safe to say that those striking good looks were as responsible for attracting the many and varied customers into the comfortable dining room as the tavern’s Epicurean delights. Maddie Teague ruled the place with an effective combination of grace and efficiency. Under her guiding hand, the Blackbird had become one of the area’s most respected establishments.

Watching Maddie and her girls distribute an assortment of steaming platters among the diners reminded Hawkwood that it had been a while since he had last eaten. The aroma of the food wasn’t helping matters either. A late breakfast, Hawkwood decided, wouldn’t go amiss. He placed an order for eggs, ham and cheese.

“Coffee, too, Maddie, if it’s no trouble.”

Maddie wiped her hands on her apron, all efficient. “No trouble at all, Officer Hawkwood. You just sit yourself down and I’ll be with you in two shakes.” She looked Hawkwood up and down and arched an eyebrow. “You look as though you could do with a decent meal inside you. Hard night was it?”

Hawkwood forced a grin. “You know what they say, Maddie. No rest for the wicked.”

“Do they indeed?” Maddie responded wryly. “And that’s why you’ll be wanting me to send your shirt to the seamstress, I suppose?” She paused before aiming the killer punch. “That’ll be after the blood’s been washed out, no doubt?” Having delivered her parting salvo, Maddie straightened her shoulders, turned on her heel and headed back towards the kitchen.

God’s teeth! Hawkwood thought. The woman was as sharp as a tack. Speechless, he could only stare in admiration at the landlady’s shapely form as she made her departure.

An hour later, his meal over, Hawkwood sipped the dregs from his second mug of coffee and sat quietly. A copy of the Chronicle had been abandoned at the next table. He picked it up and skimmed the latest news. The war had been relegated to a couple of columns on the second page. There were two prominent articles on the front page. One was a description of a failed insurrection by French prisoners on a prison hulk anchored off the Woolwich shore. The other concerned an upcoming prizefight at Five Courts, the calibre of which was destined to be far higher than the brawl in the yard of the Blind Fiddler. One of the fighters belonged to the stable of Bill Richmond, the ex-slave turned pugilist who, the previous December, had taken on Tom Cribb. Cribb had won the fight, but rumour had it that Richmond had a new fighter under training who had the potential to beat Cribb and the Five Courts contest was to be the first taster of his protégé’s abilities. Hawkwood read the articles with only half an eye. He was unable to concentrate. Oblivious to the murmured discourse going on around him, his thoughts returned to the morning’s events.

By anyone’s reckoning, it had been an extraordinary day. He doubted he could remember a stranger one. Not only had he participated in and survived a duel, he had just spent the last three hours with one of the most beautiful and enticing women he had ever met. Had it not been for the nagging pain from the wound on his stomach and the scratches on his back, he could well have thought he’d imagined the entire episode. Only the throbbing hurt along his ribcage and the dull yet not unpleasant ache that was permeating another, more intimate, part of his anatomy swiftly dispelled that notion.

And in the quiet aftermath of their lovemaking, he had learned more of Catherine de Varesne.

Seated cross-legged on the bed, a silk robe over her shoulders, she had relived her childhood.

“I was twelve years old when they sent my father to the guillotine.”

Prior to his arrest, the Marquis de Varesne, aware of the fate that awaited him, had arranged for his wife and daughter’s escape from France. The Marquis had remained behind in order to allay suspicion, fully intending to make his own way out of the country at a later date. The Committee for Public Safety, however, in carrying out its own sinister agenda, had apprehended the Marquis before he could put the final stage of his plan into operation.

“We were taken across the mountains into Spain and then on to Portugal and my mother’s family estate.” Fists clenched, she had blinked back the tears. “My mother never recovered from my father’s death. She died less than a year later. They told me she died of a broken heart. Perhaps it’s true. I know she adored my father. He was a sweet and gentle man who loved his country. I was brought up by my aunt. That was how I learned to speak English. I had cousins my own age. The family employed an English governess. I was very happy there.”

Hawkwood had watched as a shadow stole over her face.

“But even then we were not safe.”

Bonaparte’s invasion of the peninsula had forced the family to break apart once more. At the first rattle of French musketry, Hawkwood recalled, the Portuguese king and queen had taken flight to Brazil, along with a good number of Portuguese aristocrats. It had been the beginning of a chain of events that had led, eventually, to Britain’s involvement with the war in Spain.

And yet she had remained behind. At risk. Why?

She had given a wistful sigh. “Here, in England, I am close to France, among friends who feel as I do, who will never rest until Bonaparte is defeated and we can all return home.”

Her eyes had flickered to the stiletto on the nightstand. It had been her father’s, she told him, pressed upon her when he had engineered his family’s escape from the guillotine. She had kept it with her at all times, during her flight across the mountains into Portugal, concealed within the folds of her dress by day and beneath her pillow at night. Because, she told him, those who opposed Bonaparte were never safe and the English Channel was no protection against determined agents whose sole agenda was to eradicate the Bourbon dynasty and all those who supported it.

“They took my father,” she had told Hawkwood. “They will not take me!”

The chiming of the tavern clock brought Hawkwood back to the present with a reminder that a day and a half had passed since his meeting with Jago. He had hoped that the ex-sergeant might have come up with something by now, a clue that would lead to the identities of the two highwaymen. But he had heard nothing. Experience had taught Hawkwood that Chief Magistrate Read, a man not widely known for his patience, would be expecting, if not demanding, a progress report. And the Chief Magistrate was not a man who accepted disappointment lightly.

To be fair, Hawkwood, due to circumstances not entirely unpleasurable, had not made it easy for Jago to track him down. Which meant it was now his responsibility to search out his old comrade and see if the former sergeant had come up with anything. He did not relish making another pilgrimage into the Holy Land, but he had no choice. An unannounced journey into the rookery was asking for trouble, however. It looked as if he’d have to have another discreet word with Blind Billy Mipps.

As he set his empty coffee mug aside, Hawkwood wondered if and when he would see Catherine de Varesne again. He would need to gather his strength beforehand, he reflected wryly. He thought about those bewitching eyes, that smooth skin and the way her body had arched above his and, as the serving girl took away his empty plate, he couldn’t help but smile to himself at the memory of it.

His attention was drawn again to the clock on the wall. The hours had sped by all too quickly. The day was nearly half over. It was time to pay that call on Blind Billy. Tossing payment for the meal on to the table, Hawkwood left the booth and exited the tavern.

His first thought as he felt the brush of the boy’s hand against his sleeve was that of all the marks available, it was the young pickpocket’s supreme ill luck to have chosen a Bow Street Runner as his target.

Hawkwood’s arm shot out with the speed of a striking cobra. His fingers encircled a thin wrist.

“Not so fast, lad.”

But instead of the expected cry of protest and whine of innocence, there was only the breathless, “Ease up, Hawkey! It’s me, Davey!”

Hawkwood looked down. The face peering up at him was streaked with mud and set on a rail-thin body that would not have looked out of place on a sick sparrow. A fringe of ginger hair sprouted from beneath a filthy woollen cap.

Hawkwood released the wrist. “Christ, Davey! You should know better, sneaking up on a body like that…And don’t call me Hawkey. I’ve told you before.”

The boy pouted. “I weren’t sneakin’! An’ if I ’ad’ve been, you’d never ’ave spotted me! Never in a million bloody years!” The pout disappeared to be replaced by a disarming gap-toothed grin. “Mr ’Awkwood.”

Hawkwood couldn’t help but grin back. For indeed, had he been a legitimate mark, he knew that young Davey would have made the snatch and been off and running without him being any the wiser.

Not that picking pockets was young Davey’s sole source of income.

Davey was a mudlark, one of the many homeless children who prowled the Thames at low tide, wading through the stinking black mud and silt on the lookout for items that might have been washed ashore or had fallen or been tossed from a ship, boat or barge. Anything that could turn a profit. They operated alone and in packs, living by their wits, like rats in the darkness.

Young Davey had other talents, too. They lay in the use of his eyes and ears, for the boy was one of Hawkwood’s most reliable informers. Despite the best efforts of watchmen patrols and the Wapping-based River Police, crime along the river was rife and the authorities relied on any help they could get.

Davey and his cohorts were certainly no angels, it had to be admitted, but in the general scheme of things, they were small fry. Hawkwood and his fellow law officers were prepared to overlook instances of petty pilfering in order to land the bigger fish, the organized gangs of thieves and traffickers who stole to order from ships and warehouses the length and breadth of the water front.

“So, what’s up, Davey? What have you got?”

The boy glanced around. He looked apprehensive, as if afraid of being overheard. The cockiness of the previous few moments had evaporated. When he spoke his voice was low. “We’ve found a dead ’un, Mr ’Awkwood.”

The first uncharitable thought that entered Hawkwood’s mind was that if the boy had only seen one dead body so far that morning he obviously hadn’t been trying hard enough.

Not that the streets of the capital were strewn with corpses, but they were not that uncommon, providing one knew where to look. Old age, disease and foul play all took their toll, particularly among the poor and destitute. Venture down any dark alley in one of the rookeries and you could guarantee a cadaver most days of the week. Which, given the sort of company that young Davey ran with, made it all the more curious that the lad should have thought the matter worthy of Hawkwood’s attention. Hawkwood started to say as much when something in the boy’s eyes stopped him cold.

“But, Mr ’Awkwood, this ain’t no ordinary stiff. This ’un’s different. ’E’s one o’ yours. ’E’s a Runner!”