Andrew Pepper - The Revenge of Captain Paine

‘Are you planning to leave the body down there until it rots?’

‘The body belongs to a local lad. Word spreads slowly in the country. I’m waiting to see if someone decides to claim it.’

‘You know it’s a local lad for certain?’

Yellowplush shrugged.

Pyke nodded. ‘So tell me something. How does an ex-soldier suddenly become a magistrate?’

The question seemed to take Yellowplush by surprise. ‘I don’t take kindly to your insinuation, sir. Remember, you’re here as my guest and, as my guest, your invitation can easily be revoked.’

‘Is that what happened to the dead man?’ Pyke held the magistrate’s stare. ‘Was his invitation revoked, too?’

‘You’d do as well to hold your tongue. The countryside isn’t always the peaceful idyll city folk imagine it is.’

‘I can see that well enough with my own eyes.’ In the yard men were still queuing for weapons.

Yellowplush rearranged his wig and stared out into the darkness. ‘Navvies can be a barbarous lot but we’ll not tolerate their violence. If they try something, we’ll be ready for them.’

‘Why would they try something?’ Pyke didn’t bother to hide his scorn. ‘What is it you’re not telling me?’

‘Despite that letter, I’m not obliged to tell you a thing.’ Yellowplush waited for a few moments, his stare intensifying. ‘And in answer to your question, do heathens need a reason to embrace violence?’

‘I don’t know,’ Pyke said, staring directly into his dry eyes. ‘Do they?’

‘I think you’ve officially outstayed your welcome.’ Yellowplush ran the tip of his pink tongue across his pale, flaky lips. ‘I’ll bid you goodnight, sir.’

‘Goodnight and good riddance?’

‘Country people don’t much care for city types with their fancy clothes and slick ways.’

‘I’m sure the feeling’s mutual.’

‘If you know what’s good for you you’ll go back to London and leave us to sort out our own troubles.’

‘What if I don’t want to go? What if I’ve taken an inexplicable liking to this dour town of yours?’

Yellowplush took out his pistol once again and thrust it into Pyke’s face. ‘Do you really want me to answer that question?’

Pyke stared down the barrel and said, ‘Hasn’t anyone ever told you that the wig makes you look like an overgrown spaniel?’

The very considerable wealth that Sir Horsley Rockingham had plundered from his sugar plantation and the exploitation of African slaves was on display from the moment Pyke entered the wrought-iron gates of his country estate and approached the huge Queen Anne mansion from the carefully manicured gardens. Beyond the mature oak trees, Pyke could see stables and a paddock where a young woman with blonde hair was riding a chestnut-coloured gelding. Straight ahead, the house, constructed from Portland stone and glistening in the midday sunlight, was four storeys high and twelve windows long. Pyke dismounted from his horse and tied it to a handrail. At the top of the steps, he passed through a pair of Ionic columns and swept uninvited into the entrance hall, where a flustered servant tried to enquire about his business. In the hall, oil paintings by Titian, Van Dyck, Rubens and Gainsborough hung on the walls alongside oriental tapestries.

Pyke found Rockingham eating lunch alone in the dining room. It was an opulent room with high ceilings, rich cornices and ornate gilding. The old man had a white napkin tucked into his collar and was slurping claret from a crystal glass. He greeted the intrusion by spluttering red wine on to his beefsteak.

One wouldn’t have known from looking at him that Rockingham had spent much of his life in the West Indies. Wrinkled with age, his skin had developed a translucent hue that recalled a cadaver rather than a sun-kissed expatriate. Hunched over his food at one end of a long polished table, he cut a frail figure, eaten away from the inside by his own bile, and his eyes, as hard as acorns, darted nervously between Pyke and the servant who had followed him into the room.

‘What’s the meaning of this interruption?’ He addressed the servant rather than Pyke. ‘Can’t you see I’m eating my lunch, boy?’

‘I’m sorry, sir, but this gentleman wouldn’t permit me to ask him his business…’

‘Stop bleating, man! Tell this blackguard to leave me in peace and learn some damned manners.’

Pyke wandered across to the polished table and spied the condiments. ‘Perhaps I could pass you the pepper, Sir Horsley. I hear you enjoy smearing it into bloodied flesh.’ Taking the ceramic shaker, he shoved it along the polished surface of the table in the old man’s direction. He made no effort to stop it and the vessel flew off the end of the table, smashing on the wooden floor.

‘Go and fetch the magistrate and his men,’ Rockingham barked at the servant. ‘Damnation, man, didn’t you hear me?’

‘Are you quite certain you want to be left alone in this man’s company, m’lord?’ The servant seemed puzzled, doubtless trying to work out whether Pyke’s smart clothes indicated benevolent intentions.

‘Do you imagine I’m intimidated by this specimen?’ Rockingham shuffled across to where Pyke was standing. ‘I lived for fifteen years among three-hundred-odd niggers, all of whom fantasised about killing me.’ He rubbed his finger against Pyke’s cheeks and peered down at it. ‘I reckon you might have some nigger blood in you.’

Hesitating, the servant looked again at Pyke and turned to depart the room, afraid to disobey his master.

‘Before the magistrate’s men arrive and toss you out on your ear like a whipped dog, perhaps you might enlighten me as to the purpose of your unsolicited visit.’

Pyke wandered around to the other side of the table and filled a glass with claret from the decanter. Sitting down on one of the horsehair chairs, he took a sip of the wine and proffered an approving nod. ‘I’m afraid we might be here for quite a while. It would appear that Yellowplush’s ruffians are tied up in Huntingdon. Haven’t you heard? There’s going to be some trouble there involving the navvies.’

Rockingham gave him a peculiar smile. ‘What do you expect if you permit hordes of barbarians to roam around the land on a whim?’

‘I thought they were here to work.’

‘More like piss their wages against the wall and infect our women with the French disease.’

‘In my experience venereal diseases are the gift of the aristocracy.’ Pyke stood up and walked over to the large Venetian window that looked out on to the lawn at the rear of the building. ‘It explains why most of your lot are effete twits who can’t tie their own shoelaces.’

That even drew a chuckle from the old man. ‘I like you, boy. You’re spirited. But a spirited horse won’t always become a champion. That takes discipline and courage. I’d enjoy breaking you in, of course, but I don’t think you possess those qualities. In the end, you’d end up in the slaughterhouse like the rest of the also-rans.’

‘Since you seem to appreciate blunt talking, I’ll try and make this as clear as I can. The Grand Northern Railway will be built across your land whether you like it or not.’

‘You’ll see to it personally?’ Rockingham’s voice was light, even mocking.

‘Flatterers tried to convince Canute he could command the waves to go back but he only attempted to do so in order to ridicule them. You could learn a thing or two from him.’

‘Is that so, boy? Perhaps you don’t know as much as you seem to think.’

Rockingham shuffled over to the fireplace and stood there for a moment, his back to Pyke, while he fumbled at his breeches. Pyke heard the splashes and saw some steam rising from the fire before he realised what was happening. When he’d finished, the older man buttoned up his breeches and turned to face him.