A Spectacle Of Corruption

CHAPTER 9

JONATHAN WILD’S secret message indicated that he wished me to call on him come Monday, but I found his note on a Thursday, and I had no intention of waiting so long for my answers. I continued to believe that the pretty girl with the yellow hair and the deftly hidden tools of escape had been his creature, but I could not know that with any certainty. I only had a hunch and the knowledge that Wild was inclined to send off pretty girls in disguise to do his bidding. But even if he had helped to orchestrate my freedom, I did not for an instant believe that he would be immune to the lure of a hundred-and-fifty-pound bounty. He could not truly expect that I would walk into his offices in the Blue Boar- a tavern located across from the Little Old Bailey, just a few paces from where my death had been mandated by law- and present myself to be disposed of as he saw fit. Wild had used me ill in the past, and even his kind words at my trial could not entice me to trust him now.

Instead, I thought to learn more of his interest in me through quite different means. I visited a butcher in a part of town where I was unknown and there took for myself some choice cuts of beef, which I noticed were wrapped in newspapers featuring a story about the notorious villain Benjamin Weaver. From there, I sat in a tavern until dark and then made my way to Dukes Place, my own neighborhood, where I had not been now in more than two weeks. It was an odd thing, being back in such familiar surroundings, hearing the chatter in Portuguese and accented English and occasionally the tongue of the Tudescos from eastern Europe. The streets smelled of food now being prepared for the Sabbath, to begin at nightfall the next day, and the air was ripe with cinnamon and ginger and, less appealingly, cabbage. Ragmen and trinket peddlers and fruit sellers cried out their wares. It was all too familiar, for I was only a few streets from my own rooms, rooms that had surely been picked clean by the state in compensation for my having been convicted of a felony. I felt a strange urge to go there, to see what had been done, but I knew better than to indulge such a feeling.

Instead, I found the house I sought, which was none the best guarded, and it was no difficult thing to slip inside a window that faced an alley and climb the stairs to my desired chamber. The locked door proved no great obstacle, for, as my reader already knows, I have in the past proved myself handy with a lockpick.

The barking and growling on the other side of the door, however, would present more of a challenge. Nevertheless, I had always heard that the man I sought made a habit of coddling his dogs, feeding them sweetmeats and fondling them like children. Here, surely, were beasts who had never tasted human flesh. That, at any rate, was the wager I had made.

I opened the door, and the creatures lunged at me- two enormous mastiffs the color of day-old chocolate- but I was ready and held out my package from the butcher. Whatever urge to protect their territory that drove them they now set aside, as they tore at the little package, devouring flesh and paper all. I, in turn, closed the door and took a place in a chair I found convenient, acting all the while as though there were nothing more natural than for me to be in this room with them. It is the trick with dogs, I had long since discovered. They are strangely canny at discovering your mood and responding to it. Act with fear, and they will lunge at you. But toward a calm and relaxed man they will show indifference.

By the time I took my seat, the meat I had purchased was gone, and now I faced no greater challenge than managing the affection of the creatures. One showed me its belly and demanded that it be rubbed. The other set its head in my lap and stared at me until I agreed to scratch its ears.

I had a trying two hours to wait in this unlikely state, breathing in the pungent scent of pampered beast, and then I heard the turn of the door handle. I could not tell if he detected that the door had been meddled with or no, but he entered the room, a candle held before him, calling out warm greetings to the dogs, who had now abandoned me that they might leap up upon their master.

The instant he shut the door behind him, I had a pistol to the back of his neck. “Don’t move.”

I heard a heavy exhalation, perhaps a laugh. “If that pistol misfires, you’ll have to face both me and the dogs.”

I shoved a second pistol into his ribs. “I am willing to gamble they’ll not both misfire. Are you?”

“Shoot me if you like. You’ll still have the dogs at your throat, and you’ll never get out of here alive,” said Abraham Mendes, Wild’s most trusted lieutenant. He, like me, was a Jew of Dukes Place and we had grown up together. While this accident of geography hardly made us friends, there was something of a begrudging understanding between us, and I was far more inclined to treat with him than his master.

“I’ve already faced down the ferocity of your beasts.”

“Look, Weaver, you may have lost all fear of my dogs, but though they do not tear you apart at this moment, rest assured that they will not hesitate to do so if I give the command or if you hurt me. Nevertheless, this show of strength is hardly necessary. One word out my mouth would have you dead and ripped to pieces. That I haven’t spoken this word should tell you I want you alive and healthy. Surely you must know after Wild’s performance at your trial that we will not go after you. You’ve nothing to fear from him or from me.”

“There wasn’t a hundred and fifty pounds to be had at my trial.”

“He has no interest in pursuing that bounty and neither do I,” he said. “I give you my word.”

I was reluctant to take the word of a man who made a good deal of his income through perjury, but I felt I had little choice, so I set aside my weapons. “Apologies,” I muttered. “But I’m sure you understand the need.”

“Of course. I’d have done the same.” Mendes lit two lamps and called over his dogs. If they felt any guilt at having betrayed their master, they showed none of it. Neither did Mendes show any resentment to the animals for their gullibility. He pulled from his pocket some dried beef, which surely paled in comparison to their earlier fare, but they made no complaint.

It was odd for me to see this man, large and ugly, with hands that appeared strong enough to crush these dogs’ skulls if he chose, engaged in such a warm display toward mere beasts. But I had long since learned that people are not the uniform creatures the novelists would have us believe but, rather, a series of contradictory impulses. Mendes might love these beasts with all his heart and still coolly unload a pistol into the skull of a man whose only crime was to be disliked by Jonathan Wild. And Mendes alone would see the consistency in such behavior.

“Some port?” he asked.

“Thank you.” I only briefly considered the possibility that he might poison the drink. But poison did not seem Mendes’s way. Seeing me ripped to pieces by his dogs was more in his line, and as he had not done this I could assume the drink to be safe.

He moved to hand me my pewter cup, but it slipped from his hand. As it landed on the wooden floor with a light tap, I understood that it was empty- and I understood that it had been a distraction.

Mendes now stood over me with a blade to my throat- a long knife of remarkable sharpness. He pushed with the sharp blade, and I backed up, feeling it cut into my skin. He pressed forward, however, and soon I was against the wall.

“Guard,” he said quietly. I did not understand his meaning until I realized it was a command to his dogs. They approached and stood at my feet, legs wide apart. They looked at me and growled but did nothing more, awaiting Mendes’s command.

The blade moved just a quarter inch, and I felt the skin on my neck slide. Not deeply, but enough that there should be blood. “I thought to let the insult go,” Mendes said. I felt his breath on my face, hot and pungent. “I understood that you believed you needed to put a gun to me, that you could take no chances until you were certain. I am not unaware of all of that, and so I thought to forget the matter. But I cannot forget it, Weaver. You put a gun to me and you threatened me, and now there must be retribution.”

“What sort of retribution do you envision?” I asked. I spoke slowly to keep the skin from moving too much against the blade.

“An apology,” he said.

“I apologized before,” I observed.

“Before you apologized to be courteous. Now you must apologize out of fear.” He stared hard into my eyes, refusing to turn away. “Are you afraid?”

Of course I was afraid. I knew Mendes to be unpredictable and violent, two qualities I did not desire from a man holding a knife to my throat. On the other hand, there was such challenge in his voice that I could not capitulate- not like he wished me to.

“I’m uneasy,” I said.

“Uneasy is not enough. I want to hear that you are afraid.”

“I’m concerned.”

He blinked. “How concerned?”

“Quite.”

He let out a breath. “And sorry?”

“Certainly,” I said. “Very sorry to have had to hold a pistol to you.”

He took away the blade and backed off. “I suppose that will have to do. You with your irrational pride- we’d have been here all day.” He turned away- to show his confidence, I suppose- and found a rag, which he tossed to me, presumably for the purpose of dabbing up the blood on my neck.

“Now,” he said, as he picked up the fallen pewter cup, “shall we take that port?”

Soon we sat in chairs across from each other, faces red from the fire, chatting as though we were old friends.

“I told Wild you would never come to meet him,” Mendes said, his scarred face erupting into a satisfied grin, “but he insisted the advertisement, assuming you saw it, would have the desired effect. And now it seems he was correct, for in truth he only wanted to pass some information along to you, and in your current state you are a difficult man to seek out.”

I could not regret that it was so. In the past, Wild’s efforts to seek me out had involved sending his men to attack me and drag me to his house against my will. “And what information would that be?”

Mendes leaned back in his chair, as satisfied as a country squire who had just finished his evening fowl. “The name of the man who has brought all this trouble down on your head.”

“Dennis Dogmill,” I said flatly, in hopes of seeing him perhaps a bit less puffed up.

He leaned forward, unable to hide his disappointment. “You are cleverer than Wild would have believed.”

“Wild thinks no one clever but himself, so I cannot bristle at his underestimating me. Nevertheless, I wish you would tell me what you know.”

He shrugged. “Not very much, I’m afraid. We learned that you had been meddling around with the porters at Wapping. Dogmill has been wrestling with the labor combinations for months, even while he sets them against one another. This fellow Yate was causing him no small amount of grief, and it’s easier to kill a porter than it is a rat.”

“That much I know. Why would he choose to blame me for the crime?”

“Wild had hoped,” Mendes said, “that you would tell us that.”

I felt the sad tug of disappointment. Nevertheless, that Wild had known to blame Dennis Dogmill for my woes suggested to me that he might have more information as well. “I wish I could. I believe that is the very key to all of this.”

Mendes gazed at me skeptically. “Come, Weaver. The truth.”

“Why should I not speak the truth?”

“There have been some suggestions in the paper that your loyalties are not to His present Majesty.”

I laughed aloud. “The Whigs are merely trying to turn an embarrassment into political capital. It was one of their judges who so blatantly condemned me against the evidence. You are not so foolish as to believe what you read in the political papers, I hope.”

“I don’t believe it, but I wonder about it. You have not involved yourself in some Jacobite plot, have you, Weaver?”

“Of course not. Do you really think me mad enough to indulge in treason? Why should I want to see any James the Third on the throne?”

“I admit it seemed to me unlikely, but these are strange times and there are plots everywhere.”

“I cannot speak for that. Until recently, I could have hardly told you the difference between a Tory and a Whig- or a Tory and a Jacobite, for that matter. I am far more interested in saving my skin than restoring a dethroned monarch- and I should be loath to see a change in a government that has treated our race so kindly.”

“I should think you would look favorably on the Whigs when the man who married your cousin’s pretty widow runs as a Tory. You once took it into your head to marry her, did you not?”

I glared at him. “Don’t think to take liberties with me, Mendes.”

He held up a massive hand. “Stay your temper, friend. I meant nothing by it.”

“No, you did mean something. You meant to prod me to see how I should react. Prod me again on this matter, and you’ll know- dogs or not- I am not to be made sport of.”

He nodded solemnly, a look- almost of remorse, I must say, settling onto his misshapen face. “Then let us go back to the matter at hand. Why have you been singled out to hang for Yate’s death?”

“I cannot even speculate. It seems there would be countless other men who would have made more convenient victims, so I can only conclude that Dogmill chose me for some purpose relating to my inquiry.” Here I told him of my service to Mr. Ufford.

“Ufford has been making trouble with the porters,” Mendes said, “and he is a known Jacobite, but that hardly seems reason enough for Dogmill to wish you to hang. You say you learned nothing about these notes, but it would be reasonable to suspect that Dogmill thinks you’ve learned something- and he would rather see you dead than reveal it.”

I shook my head. “Then why not slip a blade into my back when I am not looking? Why not have my food in prison poisoned as I awaited trial or have a guard smother me in my sleep? There are a hundred ways to kill a man, Mendes. You know that. A thousand, if he is in Newgate. Arranging for a trial and bribing a judge to misdirect a jury hardly seem the most effective. I am not convinced that what has happened to me is a mere effort to keep me silent.”

He gazed into his glass thoughtfully. “You may be right, but it is nevertheless true that Dogmill wished that these things should befall you. Wild believes you must be dangerous to Dogmill in some way, and he is willing to offer you protection in exchange for learning the truth. But now you tell me you don’t know. That’s bad news, Weaver, because if you cannot hold something over Dogmill, you will be on the run for the rest of your life, and with a hundred and fifty pounds on your head, the rest of your life may prove to be a sadly short period of time.”

“Why would Wild offer me protection? What is Dogmill to him?” I asked.

“Well, that is another matter. Wild supports the Whigs in general, but not this one. Dogmill has had the quays under his thumb for some time now. A lot of business can be conducted on the quays, but it is impossible to move in with Dogmill there. He has too many Parliamentarians working for him, and he has the Customs in his pocket.”

“Yes, I’ve already had to dodge a pair of Riding Officers who were on my trail. Is it not a bit of a contradiction for customs men to be working for an importer?”

“A rather convenient one. Half the men employed by the customs office receive bribes from him. When his ships arrive in port, these fellows remove a significant measure from his hold before the true inspector comes to assess the value. This is a fine practice they call hickory pucker. Dogmill then pays duties based on only a fraction of his cargo.”

“A little bribery is one thing, but to use the armed constabulary of the Customs is quite another. How can I hope to act undetected?”

Mendes shrugged. “It’s brazen, but unsurprising. Dogmill has the wealth to bribe whom he likes, including many open-handed fellows in the Commons. His slaves in Parliament recently pushed through legislation that allows significantly lower duties for tobacco men who pay all their assessments within six months, meaning that, because he is wealthy in the first place, he pays far fewer taxes than merchants who have to borrow their wealth and then sell their goods before paying their duties. So he cheats the government at both ends.”

“Is it not a little sanctimonious for Wild to look down upon such cheating?”

“I don’t know that he looks down on it. I suppose he admires it. I merely meant to inform you of the sort of enemy you face. Dogmill is a bad man, Weaver, you may be sure of that; it is not every scoundrel that Wild hesitates to cross. It is not merely his power that Wild fears, it’s his rage. The man was cast from his school at Cambridge for torturing his tutor. One day Dogmill could no longer accept the tutor’s demands of a Latin memorization or some such nonsense, so he horsewhipped him as though he were a servant. I have heard of three instances in which he’s beaten men to death with his fists. Each time, the magistrate dismissed the matter as self-defense, for Dogmill insisted that he had been attacked. But I know from a reliable witness that, in one of these attacks, Dogmill was accosted by a beggar looking for a bit of copper for bread. Dogmill spun around and beat the fellow in the skull until his head was quite broken.”

“I believe myself equal to a man who beats down beggars.”

“I have no doubt you are. I only warn you that he is vicious and unpredictable. All the more reason why Wild should like to see him gone.”

“I suppose, with Wild’s own smuggling vessels, he wants Dogmill out of the way to gain a better grasp on the quays.”

“That is it exactly. A few years ago, I made some inquiries on Wild’s behalf with a few of the more powerful men on the parish boards. It soon became clear that no one dared to cross Dogmill in this regard. And he let us know that if we tried to interfere with his business, things would go hard for us.”

“So Wild testified in my favor because he could do so while pretending to know nothing of Dogmill’s involvement in Yate’s death.”

“Precisely.”

“And that is why he sent the woman with the lockpick.”

Mendes leaned in. “Wild told me about the woman. He said you must have set it up. Her technique, he reported, was rough but adequate.”

“Come, Mendes. Am I to believe that you and your master were not behind this woman?”

“Wild is a man who loves to boast, and I am one of the few people to whom he can boast freely. If he did not commend himself for that action, I can promise you he was not behind it.”

“I don’t believe you,” I said.

He shrugged. “Believe what you will. I cannot make you see the truth of it, but surely you must admit that if Wild had done you this favor, there would be nothing gained by refusing to acknowledge it.”

I could not but see his logic. “Then who?”

“I don’t know. I would suggest that finding this woman, or finding who sent her, may help you discover what it is that Dogmill thinks you know.”

I took a moment to consider his words. “What do you know of a man called Johnson? One of the false witnesses at my trial said that I announced myself to be in his service.”

Mendes shook his head. “It means nothing to me.”

“And what of Dogmill’s roughs? I find it hard to believe that the foremost tobacco merchant in the city goes about murdering porters on his own. He must have fellows he deploys for his dirty work.”

Mendes shook his head again. “I would think so myself, but I have never heard of any such men. Surprising though it may be, I have concluded that he does indeed go about murdering porters himself. Dogmill has no fear of violence. He relishes it, and if he was of a disposition not to entrust his crimes to the silence of some ruffian or other, he might well have killed Yate with his own hands.”

“And he might not have,” I observed.

He grinned wickedly. “True enough. I suppose I don’t know very much at all.”

A moment of silence passed between us, for it seemed as though there was little more to say.

“Very well.” I drained my glass and stood. “Thank you for your time.”

“Thank you for feeding my beasts,” he said.

“Just one more thing.” I turned to him. “The metropolis is crawling with men who want that bounty on my head. Is there some way Wild could call off his men?”

“No,” he said. “Wild won’t appear to support you publicly. He might have hazarded it if you supplied information to help destroy Dogmill, but he will not risk the notice of the law on the one hand and Dogmill on the other. It will have to be enough that he is not actively seeking you out. You should be more than a match for the brutish fellows who might attempt to outwit you.”

“One would think that if I remove this great enemy of Wild’s, he would be in my debt.”

“You are already in his debt.”

“And why is that?”

“Because he has decided not to capture you for the bounty.”

“Do you really think he could?”

“I could,” Mendes said, without a hint of good-natured teasing. “But you need not fear. And I might add that I am willing to go where Wild is not. This must remain between us, but if you do find yourself in need, you may safely call on me.”

I studied his deep-set eyes. “And why is that?”

He took a breath. “I told you that when we first began to inquire into Dogmill’s doings, I was the one who went forth to learn the lay of the land. It would seem that, because I engaged in the reconnoiter, I became the target of Dogmill’s anger. I had a dog back then, a wondrous beast called Blackie. These two are very fine dogs, make no mistake of it.” He paused to pet them, that they might not feel neglected. “Yes, these are good animals, but Blackie was a great friend. I was used to taking him to the tavern with me and on my way. Though he had the heart of a lamb, the sight of him drove fear into the hearts of all who opposed us. And then one day he was gone.”

“You think taken by Dogmill.”

“I know it. I received a note not a week later in which the anonymous writer detailed how poorly Blackie had acquitted himself in the dogfighting pits of Smithfield. Dogmill was not mentioned, but he is known to have a taste for blood sport, and there was no misunderstanding the message. Dogmill meant for us to keep away from him and his business. He made a point of discovering what he could about us and so learned of my fondness for my dog. It took all of Wild’s protestations and a dozen men to hold me down, to convince me not to murder the blackguard. But Wild promised me Dogmill’s time would come, so I will do what I can for you, Weaver, to make that time come the sooner.”

“How did he get the dog out from under your nose?”

“Do you remember a fellow that used to travel with Wild, a funny-looking Irishman called Onionhead O’Neil?”

“Yes, a peculiar fellow with orange whiskers. What ever became of him?” I asked, but then I knew the answer at once. “I suppose nothing good.”

“Onionhead thought it worth a few shillings to side with Dogmill against a helpless beast. I had no mercy on such a one as he. And I can have no mercy on Dogmill. If you want my help, Weaver, you need but let me know.”