T.F. Banks - The Emperor's assassin

Morton thought it would be hard to find a better description of Eustache d'Auvraye, Rolles, and Jean Boulot. “To whom did they speak?” he asked the man.

“Myself. Mr. Tooley, the manager.”

Morton tipped the man, and they went into the big old inn.

Mr. Tooley was, not surprisingly, an Irishman-a gentleman of some fifty years and enormous energies. He did everything at a pace that would leave a younger man breathless, and never did one thing when he could be doing two. He was curly haired and handsome and not, it seemed, particularly fond of the law.

“I only spoke to one gentleman,” he said, his soft Irish accent almost worn away by what Morton suspected was most of a lifetime in England. “Don't know about any others.”

“And what speech passed between you?”

The man glanced up from the sums he was doing rapidly on long sheets of paper. He glared at Morton with undisguised hostility. “Disputed some charges on his bill a little.” His gaze went back to his paperwork, spread out over a large standing desk that took up the greater part of the narrow, low-ceilinged room.

“Mr. Tooley,” Morton said, his own anger rising, “we believe these men travelled to Plymouth to commit a murder. If you do not help us, I shall have you on trial for aiding and abetting them.”

The man looked up. “These gentlemen? Murderers?”

“By day's end, sir. Now, what passed between you and these Frenchmen?”

The man set down his pen and thought a moment. “They asked to leave their carriage here for two days,” he said, “and then wanted to know if it was far to the quayside.” He paused. “And they enquired after a men's clothier. I directed them to Lawley and Sons. I can think of nothing else.”

Lawley and Sons was but a few short blocks away. It was not, as Morton expected, a gentlemen's shop, at least not such as you'd find in London. No, Lawley's catered to the less well-to-do. Law clerks and other such functionaries. Working men with clean nails, as his mother put it. Not the kind of shop where you'd expect Eustache d'Auvraye to find his wardrobe-though Boulot's dress would have been improved by a visit.

Mr. Lawley himself was not present, but one of his sons was.

“Yes, three French gentlemen, just as we opened for business,” the younger Lawley said. He was an overly serious young man and would have made a perfect priest, Morton thought. “Two of them made purchases. Very tasteful.”

“One had a raspberry mark on his head?”

“That's right.” Lawley the younger gestured. “He sat on the stair there the whole time. Never said a word. I thought he might be ill.”

“And what did they purchase, these French gentlemen?”

“A complete suit of clothes for the young nobleman. He was dressed for the French court, it seemed-you've never seen such embroidery! When I enquired, he said that he did not wish to stand out so but to travel quietly among the English people.”

“Did they say anything more?”

“Very little. They seemed in a hurry. They asked about Bonaparte, but of course all visitors do, these days.”

“What did they ask, specifically? Do you remember?”

“Only if Bonaparte was still here, and how you'd recognise the ship he's on. I told them there'd be no trouble-there must be a thousand small boats surrounding the Bellerophon .” The young man considered a moment. “I can't think of anything else.”

“Do you know where they went from here?”

The young man shrugged. “They went down the hill. Likely to find a boat to take them out into the sound, as everyone does. I hope you've rooms arranged. You might have trouble finding lodgings otherwise.”

Morton and Presley went out onto the street, where tendrils of fog wafted gently up from the harbour below. The sun tried to break through, silvering the foggy sky.

“Where do we go now?” Presley said. “Down to the quay to look for three Frenchies trying to pass quietly among the English?”

“I think we can do a little better than that,” Morton said, and Jimmy looked at him, raising an eyebrow. “We'll go down to the quay and ask for Berman.”

Presley stopped. “You mean Berman wasn't a London waterman after all?”

“If he was, the River Police could never find him. All along we've thought the assassination was of d'Auvraye and that Boulot said botiment -ship-when he meant to say bachot , or wherry, for it was a wherry that took the count's murderers away. But what if he did mean ship? Now I wonder if the assassination will not instead be Bonaparte, and if Berman might be found on the Plymouth quay.”

They were soon down the hill, searching along the stone quay where the fishermen and costermongers jostled among the throngs of holidayers there hoping to catch a glimpse of the fallen Emperor of the French. The scene itself was strange, dreamlike. Upon the narrow quay people swam through the thick fog, men and women in their bright holiday clothes, the dark-faced fishermen working among them, big-knuckled hands mending nets, flinging fish to the costermongers by their carts. Morton had a sense that there were not many engaged in the fishing trade that day-fishermen had gone over to the more lucrative trade of ferrying people out to view Bonaparte.

Of the ships beyond, nothing could be seen, for the fog was dense, impenetrable. Boats appeared, presaged by the knuckle knock of oars working against thole pins. The people aboard were oddly silent, perhaps disappointed, though Morton had a sense that it was the uncanny and impenetrable fog that had stolen people's words away, or had them whispering. At least there was no cry upon the quay that aught was amiss, that Bonaparte had been cut down as he strolled the deck.

Morton and Presley began asking among the fishermen and people who found their employment along the waterfront. After half an hour Jimmy came hurrying out of the fog.

“A net mender says we should find our man down the way,” the young Runner said.

“Then we're not wrong,” Morton said, both relieved and suddenly more uneasy. He checked his pocket watch, mindful of the hour.

“Have we time before we meet Westcott?” Presley asked.

“A little. Let us go see what we can learn of Berman.”

They strode along the damp stone, the reek of fish strong in their nostrils. Morton hunted among the passing faces, searching for the raspberry-stained pate, the secretive little Rolles, the dark-eyed young count. An unlikely trio of assassins-and one of them had left London in their company only reluctantly. Had Boulot changed his allegiance on the journey? Had the young count offered him what his father had not-a return to his beloved France? Morton thought that Boulot would be disappointed by his return. His old life was gone, swept away by two decades of revolution and Bona-parte's failed empire. There would be no crowds waiting now to hear him sing, no one, perhaps, who even remembered his name. Boulot's France was gone, as was the young man Boulot had been, however promising. He was an ivrogne now, a drunkard and a near derelict, a man who would sell his friends for a bottle, or for a thirty-mile passage across the Channel.

Across from the anchorage they found a little knot of older fishermen, sitting around on barrels and nets.

Morton put a hand on his young companion's shoulder, slowing him, then said quietly, “It would seem almost certain that good Mr. Berman is a smuggler or involved with the smugglers in some way. I don't think he will feel too kindly toward constables from Bow Street. We might try to keep our real profession to ourselves for a while.”

Presley nodded.

Morton approached the lounging fishermen respectfully. “Is Mr. Berman about?”

The half-dozen faces turned toward him. Morton had an immediate sense that these men were guarded, though they did much to hide it.