Skull and Bones (23 page)

    Sir Frederick having business in his study, Flint adjourned to the library, generously allowed to himself and Billy Bones as a day room. He entered just as Billy Bones was going out. Flint was full of himself, laughing and chuckling, casually flinging hat, coat and wig aside for the servant to deal with, before he threw himself into an armchair.

    "Billy-my-chicken!" he cried.

    "What?"

    "What,
sir.
Will you never learn?"

    Billy Bones scowled.

    "Them ways is shipboard ways," he said.

    "Indeed?" said Flint. "Are they indeed?" And he laughed. He was too merry to take offence. "In that case, Mr Bones, would you do me the honour to bring me a bottle and a glass from the sideboard?"

    "Huh!" said Billy Bones, and did as he was bid.

    "So where are you going, Mr Bones? I see you have your hat and coat on, and your walking stick at your side. Are you off on another voyage of exploration?"

    Billy Bones blushed. He actually blushed, unwilling to reveal the nature of his mission.

Oh?
thought Flint, instantly spotting Mr Bones's mood.
What's this?

    So Billy Bones was put to the question: which, with Flint probing, soon drew out the truth. It came out like a nail prised up by a crow-bar: squealing and protesting, but drawn inexorably by the leverage of Flint's intellect.

    "It's a woman, Cap'n. That's to say,
she
is."

    "Is she indeed?"

    "Aye. One as I knew long ago… and which was…
special
to me."

    "God save our precious souls! Mr Bones, are you saying you have a wife?"

    "No, Cap'n. None such as that."

    "A-hah! A mistress, then? A sweetheart?"

    Billy Bones blushed scarlet, and blushed deeper still when - stumbling and halting - the tale of Olivia Rose was dragged out into the open for Flint to mock and taunt.

    "So," said Flint, when the game was done, "you don't know where she lives, you don't know if she's dead or alive, and you don't even know if her father stayed in London! Is that the course you're steering?"

    "Aye, Cap'n. For I went to sea again soon after, and never came home for years."

    "And now you would tramp the streets of London, hoping to meet her by chance?"

    "Aye, Cap'n. That's about the length of it."

    "Billy, my Billy!" Flint shook his head. "Has it not occurred to you that her father is in trade, and that the name
Burstein
is uncommon, and that there are directories published in this city listing alphabetically, by name, all the tradesmen of the town and the addresses of their premises? You have only to go to the nearest bookshop - and there is one on the corner of the Piazza over there -" he pointed through the window "- where you may purchase such a directory. With God's grace and a fair wind, you will have the father's address within ten minutes, and the father will likely lead you to the daughter."

    Flint laughed, for an eloquence of amazement was displayed in the dumbstruck face of Billy Bones.

    "Bugger me!" he said, "Fuck, pluck and draw me!" And he was off through the door and thundering down the stairs with mighty boots, and Flint's laughter behind him.

    The directory cost half-a-crown, a sum that made the eyes water, but Billy Bones had most of his fisticuffs money left, and he paid up and elbowed his way through the wigs, brocades and feathered hats and out into the noisy street with its grinding, iron-tyred traffic and clumping hooves and bellowing hawkers. He opened the book, thumbed through the pages… missed his way a few times… and then… heart thumping, fingers shaking, legs trembling… THERE IT WAS! Under
Mathematical Instrument Makers…
Burstein, Josiah: 14 Cripple Lane, St Paul's Churchyard.

    Billy Bones stood gaping and gasping. Not only had he found the address but he'd be guided to it by the biggest landmark in the entire city! He set off at once, and as with the book, he got lost a few times, but asked the way and was soon gazing up at the soot-blacked pillars, the mighty dome, the arches, pediments and cornices of Christopher Wren's masterwork. Finding Cripple Lane was easy after that… but then… he who'd never flinched in all his life… he who'd stood shot and shell and plunged into the fight slashing left and right… he - Billy Bones, the terror of the lower deck - stood backing and filling, unable to go ahead nor astern, nor larboard nor starboard, nor yet to drop anchor and do nothing.

    Over twenty years had passed since he'd seen her, and then she'd been a child. So what would he do if he
did
find her? What would he say? What could he offer?

    And while he stood dithering, alone in a crowd of busy Londoners, Mr Josiah Burstein himself walked past and into Cripple Lane, and entered a large, double-fronted shop with huge glass windows and a glazed door.

    Billy drew closer. The window display featured a gleaming range of instruments for sale: brass and glass, steel and boxwood, ivory and ebony. There were quadrants, octants, dividers and compasses, and mysterious others that Billy Bones had neither seen nor heard of.

    But that was nothing compared with proof that this was indeed Josiah Burstein - Olivia Rose's father! His hair was grey, his face was lined and he walked with a limp from a damaged knee… but he was beyond a doubt the man Billy remembered from the
Isabelle Bligh.
Clearly he had grown tremendously prosperous during the intervening years: he was excellently dressed, and he went about with his nose in the air, for all that he dragged one foot.

    And thus doubt struck again. Billy Bones didn't dare enter the shop. He hadn't the courage. He didn't know what they'd do or what they'd say. So finally he went away. He went back to Sir Frederick's house. He bowed his head and bore the mockery and cynicism of Flint… And returned next day to Cripple Lane, and paced up and down around St Paul's, orbiting the cathedral and returning to Cripple Lane every few minutes.

    He did that all day, for four consecutive days.

    And on the fifth day
he saw her!
It was a hammer-blow. She was coming out of the shop. Her father was kissing her cheek. She was so lovely. So very, very lovely. The beautiful child was now a voluptuous woman… And all the tender feelings of Billy Bones's youth rose up from the deep of his soul as if no time had passed and he was a lad once more.

    But he dared not go near her, so he ran away and hid. And then he followed at a distance. He followed her the brief, five-minute walk to a smart, respectable street where he saw her go into her smart, respectable house.

    It wasn't far, and all the way he struggled to find something to say to her - but couldn't; or something to do - but couldn't. As before, in the end he gave up and returned to Sir Frederick's. This time, not even the utmost persuasion from Flint could draw the truth from Billy Bones, who growled at his master like a mad old dog that will stand the whip no more.

    He went back the next day, and watched her house. He saw a man emerge, whom she embraced, and who must be her husband. He looked a decent fellow. And he saw the children that stood beside her and held up their hands to Daddy.

    Billy Bones found that he wasn't jealous, and wondered why. He was much puzzled until, finally, it dawned on him that there was nothing here for him: only ghosts and dreams. And so he very nearly escaped unscathed.

    But he waited too long, for he was still watching the house as she came out into the street a few minutes later with two of her youngest children. Billy Bones tried to step into a doorway, but it was no good. At a range of twenty yards she saw him… their eyes met… and Billy's heart stopped to see how she would receive him: the love of
his
childhood and
hers
… a faith kept and a promise cherished for over twenty years…

    A brief second followed… then she shuddered in disgust, gathered her little ones in her arms, and walked past Billy Bones on the other side of the street.

    She didn't know him. He was just a huge, rough man with a seaman's walk, a tarred pigtail and a mahogany face. If he wasn't exactly a monster, he was something precious close.

    It pierced him to the heart and extinguished all hope of escape from Flint.

    So he wept many tears.

    He found a tavern and got drunk.

    He thought of hanging himself.

    And the only thing that stopped him was the sure and certain fear of Hell.

    But others too faced agonies…

Chapter 20

1a.m., 24th June 1753

Lavery's Wharf, Bermondsey

London

    Even this late it wasn't quite dark. Not in late June. There was a glow in the sky, and
Walrus's
launch was clearly visible as she came quietly to rest among the rows of dark boats moored alongside the wooden pier. But nobody noticed her, and even if they had, they'd have not seen the two men carried as prisoners, blindfolded and bound and under orders to keep quiet else they'd be heaved over the side.

    With Allardyce recovering but still unable to stand or speak, for the moment, the Jacobite interest aboard ship had lost its leader, and much of its passion. Spotting this change in the wind, like the good seaman he was, Silver had called a council of all hands, and persuaded them that it would be best to take McLonarch and Norton ashore to set them free - so he told them - and he made sure that he chose the right men for the job: men loyal to himself.

    Thus the launch's crew shipped oars, and made all neat and tidy, and one man stayed aboard, while the rest got their awkward cargo up the stairs to the planking twenty feet above. The only sound was the steady, bump, bump, bump that a one-legged man must make as he climbs a set of wooden stairs with the aid of a wooden crutch.

    "Long John!" said a figure looming out of the half-light from the little watchman's hut at the end of the pier.

    "King Jimmy?" said Silver.

    "Aye!" Jimmy looked at the bound, blind figures. "You brung 'em then."

    "I did," said Silver.

    "Good. Follow me."

    King Jimmy led the way along the pier, past bollards, cranes and old casks, above the slopping, greasy water below, and the stinking squalor of old bottles, rotting food, dead cats, bog-paper and worse that lapped into quiet corners of the river. For the Thames was not only London's highway and water supply but its sewer and rubbish tip.

    "In here," said King Jimmy, and light showed as a big warehouse door swung open and lanterns burned within.

    "At the double!" said Silver, and eight men dashed forward, four to each prisoner, and brought them inside. The door swung shut, the newcomers blinked in the light, and Silver saw that he and his men were once again outnumbered by King Jimmy's. There were at least thirty mudlarks in the high- packed warehouse, and they were standing in groups, giving Silver the hard eye and looking to King Jimmy. They were all armed, though not so heavily as gentlemen o' fortune: cudgels and cutlasses aplenty, but few firelocks.

    "Huh!" said Silver, wondering who'd win if it came down to it.

    "Hmmm," said his men, and felt for their pistols.

    "John! John!" said King Jimmy. "We're all pals together, here."

    "Aye," said Silver.

    "Come along o' me," said King Jimmy. Then, turning to his men: "See these kiddies?" He pointed to Silver's crew. "Give 'em a drop o' drink and some shrimps, and see if you can manage not to murder one another 'til I get back - and Gawd help the bugger what starts anything!"

    "Yeah," said his men.

    "Same goes for you!" said Silver, to his men.

    "Aye-aye!" they said.

    "Come on, John," said King Jimmy, and he took a lantern and led the way into a big office that ran down the side of the warehouse. "Here we are, old chum!" he said, lighting some candles and dragging two chairs to a table. Then he fished out some mugs and a couple of pots of shrimps. "Here you are, John," he said, and smiled.

    But Silver was busy heaving a heavy load out from under his coat, where it had been slung on a strap across his shoulder. It was a canvas bag that clinked and clunked as it landed on the table.

    "That's another lot on account - as agreed," he said, and King Jimmy's eyes gleamed. "And five times that, if you find her," said Silver.

    King Jimmy laughed and felt the bag, and filled the mugs from the tap of a barrel. Then he shook his head.

    "Which ain't yet," he said. "Sorry, John."

    Silver sighed. He waved a hand as if he could brush pain away. He paused, gathered strength, and moved on.

    "What about McLonarch?" he said.