A Conspiracy of Paper

THIRTY-FIVE

THE NEXT DAY Elias affected an unwillingness to talk to me, blaming me for the failure of his play, which the management of the Drury Lane Theatre indicated would not continue for a second night. Elias was not to have even one benefit performance. His play had not earned him a single penny.

After some grueling hours of explanation, supplication, and promise of silver, Elias agreed that I had probably not shown up at the theatre with the intent of throwing anyone upon the stage, but he demanded the right to retain his foul disposition. He also demanded an immediate loan of five guineas. I had been prepared for a request of this sort, knowing the extent to which Elias had been depending on the proceeds of the benefit night. And as I, too, blamed myself in some small measure for the failure of The Unsuspecting Lover, and I wished to make amends as best I could, I handed an envelope to my friend.

He opened it and stared at the contents.

“You suffered no small amount at the hands of this inquiry,” I said. “I thought it only fair that you share in the rewards. Adelman has bribed me with a thousand pounds’ worth of stock, so now you will have half of it and together we shall share in the fortunes or misfortunes of the South Sea Company.”

“I think I hate you considerably less than I did this morning,” Elias said, as he examined the issues. “I should never have made half so much had my play lasted to a benefit night. You won’t forget that we need to transfer this to my name?”

“I think I have sufficiently familiarized myself with the procedures.” I took the stock away from him for a moment that I might get his attention. “However, I do still require your opinion on some unresolved matters. I have been hardly used, I fear, and I know not by whom.”

“I would have thought your adventures to be at a finish,” Elias said absently, pretending he felt perfectly comfortable while I held his shares. “The villain is dead. What more could you wish?”

“I cannot but have doubts,” I told him. I proceeded to explain how I had been visited by a woman claiming to be Sarah Decker, and how she had exposed Sir Owen in a series of lies. “It was at that moment I concluded Sir Owen to be the villain behind all of these crimes.”

“And now you are uncertain.”

“Uncertain—yes, that is the very word,” I said.

“Is it not the best word to describe this age?” Elias asked pointedly.

“I should like if it were not the best word to describe this month, however. That woman told me she was Sarah Decker so that I might become convinced that Sir Owen was Martin Rochester. But if she lied about her identity and her motives, how do I know Sir Owen truly was Rochester?”

“Why would he have been murdered if he had not been guilty? You must surely have concluded that either the South Sea Company or someone else, equally implicit in these crimes, removed him in order to prevent him from speaking of what he knows.”

“It is true,” I agreed, “but perhaps this murderer made the same mistake I did. Perhaps Sir Owen’s assassin was tricked as I was. For if the South Sea Company had known Sir Owen to be Martin Rochester, why would they not have dealt with him long before?”

The puzzle had his attention. He squinted and dug his shoes into the dirt. “If someone wished you to believe that Sir Owen was Martin Rochester, why not simply write you a note telling you so instead of sending you hints from pretty heiresses? Why engage in an elaborate performance in the hope that you will reach the conclusion the schemer wishes?”

I had thought about this question as well. “Had I just received word that Sir Owen was Martin Rochester, I would have certainly looked into the matter, but as things have been set up, I did not hear that Sir Owen was the villain, I discovered it. You see, it was the discovery that fired my actions. Had I simply looked into an accusation, I should have done so quietly and discreetly. I believe that someone wished to see me turn to violence. The schemer knew Rochester’s true name all along but needed for someone else to remove Sir Owen. I just wish I knew who the schemer is.”

“You may never know who the schemer is,” Elias said as he took his stock back from my hand. “But I would bet that you can guess—in all probability, that is.”

He was right. I could.

IT TOOK ME some days to work up the will to do so, but I knew I had to understand the events that transpired in these pages, and I knew that there was but one man who could clarify much of what I had seen. I had no desire to seek him out, to engage with him more than I had to, but I would know the truth, and no one else could tell me. I therefore mustered my resolve and paid a visit to Jonathan Wild’s home. He had me wait almost not at all, and when he entered his drawing room he greeted me with a smile that might have suggested amusement or anxiety. In truth, he was as uncertain about me as I was about him, and his uncertainty made me feel far more at ease.

“How kind of you to call.” He poured me a glass of port and then limped across the room to sit across from me upon his princely throne, utterly confident in his powers. As always, Abraham Mendes stood silent sentry over his master. “I trust you are here on a matter of business.” A smile spread across Wild’s wide, square face.

I smiled falsely in return. “Of a sort. I wish for you to help make things clear for me, for much that has happened still confuses me. I know that you were to some degree involved with the late baronet, and that you attempted to control my actions from behind the scenes. But I do not entirely understand the scope or the motivation of your involvement.”

He took a long drink of his port. “And why should I tell you, sir?”

I thought on this for a moment. “Because I asked,” I said, “and because I was treated rudely by your hands, and I feel you owe me. After all, had things gone your way, I would be in Newgate this moment. But despite your efforts to keep me from contacting anyone while inside the Compter, you see I have emerged victorious.”

“I know not what you mean,” he told me unconvincingly. He did not wish to convince me.

“It could only have been you who prevented me from sending messages during my night of confinement. Had the Bank of England involved itself so early, surely Duncombe would have ruled against me. You would not have so extended yourself as the Bank would, but it would have been no large thing for you to convince the turnkeys at that jail to perform such a small service for you. So, as I say, Mr. Wild—I believe you owe me.”

“Perhaps I shall be open with you,” he said after a long pause, “because at this point I have nothing to lose by being so. After all, anything I say to you can never be used against me at the law, for you are the only witness of what I shall say.” He glanced at Mendes, I suspected for my benefit. He wished to make clear that any friendly exchanges between Jews should serve me not at all. “In any rate,” he continued, “as you are so clever, perhaps you might tell me what you suspect.”

“I shall tell you what I know, sir. I know that you had a personal investment in my inquiry continuing, and I can only presume it is because you wished to see the demise of Sir Owen, whom you knew to be the same as Martin Rochester. Your reason for doing so was that you, at some earlier point, were Mr. Rochester’s partner.”

The corners of Wild’s mouth twitched slightly. “Why do you believe that?”

“Because I can think of no other involvement you might have with Sir Owen, and because if Sir Owen had wished to sell and distribute this counterfeit stock, he must have needed your help. After all, anyone who engages in a certain kind of trade must sooner or later do business with Mr. Wild. Is that not true?”

I looked at Mendes, and I took some satisfaction in his very slight nod.

“It is still conjecture,” Wild told me.

“Ah, but it is all so probable. You sent the much-beleaguered Quilt Arnold to watch me when I put my notice in the Daily Advertiser. He told me that he had once been more trusted of you, and that you wished for him to see if he recognized anyone who came to meet with me, and if not, to describe them. Is it not probable, then, as Mr. Arnold had been more trusted of you in the past, that he had been more privy to your dealings with this counterfeit stock? Thus he might recognize a purchaser, and even if he did not, you might from Arnold’s description. None of these details on their own are condemnatory, but combined I believe there is no other way to interpret them.”

Wild nodded. “You are perhaps more impressive than I have given you credit for, Mr. Weaver. And yes, you are quite correct. More than a year ago, Sir Owen approached me because he wished to engage in a scheme to produce false South Sea stock. He had been, in the past, involved with the South Sea’s parent organization, the Sword Blade Company, and as a result he had great insight into their inner workings. But he wished to recruit those who knew their way about the underworld, and he needed connections to make his plan work, and so he wisely approached me. He offered me a percentage I thought generous, and soon we reached an agreement. It was a complex operation, you understand. He wished earnestly that no one should know who he was, because he rightly feared the power of the Company. And so he established the identity of Martin Rochester. With the aid of my men upon the street, and an inside operator at the company itself.”

“Virgil Cowper,” I speculated.

“The same,” Wild acknowledged. “And thus, with all these pieces in place, we had business upon our hands.”

“But you later wished to be out of that business,” I said. “You told Quilt Arnold to keep a watchful eye for South Sea men. You knew enough of their determination to fear them, yes?”

He nodded. “It took some time, but I came to realize the dangers this operation presented to me, for it left me at another man’s mercy, a state I was unused to. When I finally understood what the South Sea Company was, I realized it was a dangerous thing to have such an enemy. When I had first entered into the venture, I presumed the directors to be but a bloated collection of lazy gentlemen, but I soon saw that I should be much better off with the Company caring nothing for me, for if they chose to destroy me I had little confidence that I could equal their power. And so I had to find a way to release myself of the connection.”

“Yet,” I surmised, “Sir Owen knew at this point too much of your operations, and should you turn on him, you need fear his vengeance.”

“Precisely.” Wild fairly glowed with the pleasure of his own cleverness. “I needed to find a way to remove him without his suspecting my involvement. It was about the time that Sir Owen and I went our separate ways that he learned that your father and Mr. Balfour had discovered the truth about the false stocks. As near as I can determine, Mr. Balfour discovered the false stocks in his possession, and he approached your father for assistance. When Sir Owen learned that your father wished to make this information public, he lashed out venomously—far too venomously for my taste, for in my business, sir, discretion is all. I knew him to have organized the murder of your father, Balfour, and the bookseller. I knew also that Sir Owen kept about his person a document written by your father detailing evidence of this forgery. I cannot say why he kept these letters—perhaps he thought they would give him leverage with the Company should he ever need it. At any rate, I directed Kate Cole to steal this document from him, knowing it would be easy, for his taste in whores was legendary. And then I planted some rumors that would make him believe that I might be behind the theft—might be, you understand. I simultaneously planted rumors that I was in no way involved. I could not have him know me to be his enemy. I merely circulated information to make him not quite comfortable trusting me—but not so uncomfortable that he should risk acting against me. Now, Mr. Weaver, should a man have something lost he wished recovered in this city, and he be unable to trust Jonathan Wild to recover it for him, to whom would he turn? It seemed he would have but one choice.”

“Good Lord,” I sputtered, “the letters he had me recover of Kate Cole were my father’s papers?”

“Indeed. He also carried about with him some sentimental letters of his dead wife, but they were far less important to me. Now, with his incriminating document stolen, I forced him into a position where he would need to hire his victim’s son to recover the very proof of the crime. I had no reason to believe he knew that you were Samuel Lienzo’s son, so he could have no cause for alarm there, and I could not but suspect that in order to obtain your goods you would read what you recovered—but that was not to be the case.”

I still did not understand why Wild had made it so difficult for me to learn of Sir Owen’s true identity and his responsibility for my father’s death. “Why did you not have your people unseal the packet?” I asked. “Why did you make the recovery so devilish complicated?”

“It was necessary that they did not know they acted a part in this matter, for I could hardly bring those villains into my confidence. I could never trust my own prigs not to ’peach me out to Sir Owen should they find themselves in a difficult position. Thus you had some problems retrieving the document. The death of Jemmy was an unfortunate detail, but what can one do? In any event, because I had to confront the possibility you would be so damnably scrupled in your service to Sir Owen, I took a second precaution—I asked that fool Balfour, in exchange for a ridiculously large consideration of fifty pounds, to involve you in this matter. You perhaps wondered why he lost all interest in finding his father’s slayer, but it was only because he cared not a fig for his father or his death to begin with. And so, fired by Balfour’s insistence that your father’s death involved some hideous plan, you at last took the bait. I tried to lead you in the right direction, which was hard indeed, but now you see why I was forced to treat you roughly in so public a forum, for I had to make Sir Owen believe that I sought to dissuade you, not encourage you, and I had to indemnify myself against the possibility that you would someday be forced to recount your steps. I knew you could not but have discovered the connection with the South Sea Company, so there was no danger in my mentioning it to you.”

The stratagems that had so long eluded me were now made clear. “It is for the same reason, then,” I speculated, “that Sir Owen conducted his business with me in St. James’s Park—in order to make a public showing of our dealings. He wished for word to reach you that he had formed some kind of agreement with your principal rival—in the hopes, I suppose, of making you see that he was not to be trifled with.”

Wild nodded. “Both Sir Owen and I were compelled to draw you in for more or less the same reasons. Naturally, he made more mistakes than I did, and as you grew too close, he was forced to attempt to remove you from his path.”

“And when you learned from Mr. Mendes that I grew despondent, you sent a false Sarah Decker to put me on Sir Owen’s trail.”

“And how do you know I did such a thing?”

“Who but Jonathan Wild has at the ready a stable of actress whores?”

“Who indeed?” He laughed.

I was silent for some time after this narrative. “It is astonishing,” I said at last. “But you have certainly emerged victorious.”

“Of course,” he added, “there was another possibility, and that was that in your inquiry you would be destroyed by Sir Owen, and while I would not have lost my current enemy, I should have eliminated a future one.”

“I wonder if it was you who had Sir Owen killed,” I said. “Perhaps you set him up to appear the mastermind behind the forgeries and then had him killed so he could not deny it.”

“Surely you have seen too much to believe that I alone could orchestrate that particular villainy. Sir Owen’s death looks to me like the style of these companies, who strike boldly yet secretively. Hardly my way at all. I prefer quietly and secretly.”

“As you have tried to deal with me,” I noted.

“Precisely. You see, Mr. Weaver, to my mind I owe you nothing. And when I said that I believed we could coexist, I was saying that only to lay down your guard. I do not believe we can coexist, and we must come to blows sooner or later. I should like to add one thing, however, because I sense you are overly nice in your notions of justice. The three men of Sir Owen’s employ—the ones who killed Michael Balfour—are even as we speak awaiting trial at Newgate. Not for murder, but for other hanging offenses such as I could muster. These men are a danger to our city, I think you’ll agree, and while I profit from their destruction, all of London profits as well.”

He paused to chuckle lightly. “In the end, I suppose, the South Sea Company and I did work together—if not intentionally so. But we shared the same goals, and each, in our own way, strove for the same ends. I arranged for the exposure of Sir Owen, with you as my instrument. They, in turn, arranged for his destruction. Indeed, I to some degree depended upon their desire to remove him, for neither I nor the Company could risk his revealing the things he knew.”

Wild stroked his chin thoughtfully. “Yet I may give the Company too much credit when I say we worked toward the same goal, for I believe I did lead them along rather effectively. Indeed, I manipulated the Company no less skillfully than I manipulated you.”

I knew what he said to be true, but I realized that I had, against all evidence, wanted to believe that Wild had done it—to believe that I had misunderstood Adelman’s winks and nods. Wild was powerful, but he was only one man, and he could be destroyed in a moment. The South Sea Company was an abstraction—it could kill, but it could not be killed. In its rapacious desire to circulate paper wealth, it was all that Elias had said: merciless, murderous, invisible, and as ubiquitous as banknotes themselves.

I found I did not like to think on this abstract villain, and I had need to concentrate on the flesh-and-blood villain before me. “I think,” I said after a moment’s reflection, “I shall rejoice upon your hanging day.”

I could see that I had shocked Wild. Perhaps he had grown to believe he could predict my every act, my every word. “You are bold, sir. I should think you would have learned not to think so lightly of me. You believe you can somehow outmatch me, Weaver? You are but one man,” he said, “and my forces are legion.”

“It is true,” I said as I left the room, “but they hate you, and they will be your undoing.”