David Liss - The Devil's Company

“I am only a servant,” he said, “with little more power in all this than you. I have been manipulated just as you have been. Oh, have mercy on me, sir, I never meant to harm anyone.”

“Who are you?” I demanded once more.

Elias spoke. “Oh, enough.” It was the first time he’d spoken since we entered the carriage. “Who is he, Celia?”

I observed his informal use of her name but worked hard to keep my face from registering the disappointment.

“He is an agent of the French Crown,” she said. “He’s a spy, working against King George and the East India Company.”

“A French spy?” Elias blurted. “But that’s what we thought you were.”

Something like amusement flashed across her face. “I shall very much like to know how you reached that conclusion, but that is for later, and Cobb is for now. Go on, tell them,” she said to him. “And tell them anything else they wish to know.”

“It is only partially true, Mr. Weaver. I do work for the French, though it is not out of any loyalty to them. You see, they bought me in much the way we did you. Through my debts. Only in my case, it was not my family that was threatened, but my own person, and while I have little doubt you would have regarded such dangers to yourself with contempt, I have never been the man you are.”

“Perhaps,” Elias suggested, “because he chooses to flatter you, you will refrain from breaking his fingers.”

“He would be wise not to depend upon it,” I said. “Tell me why the French Crown would wish to employ me against Ellershaw.”

“I don’t know,” Cobb told me. “They do not inform me of their reasons, just their desires.”

“It’s rather obvious, I think,” Elias said. “You recall my mentioning that the French are starting to develop their own designs upon the East Indies. To no small degree, our East India Company is viewed as an adjunct to the British Crown, for its wealth increases the wealth of the kingdom, and it is involved in a sort of mercantile conquest. Anything the French can do to harm the East India Company harms the wealth of the British nation.”

“Just so,” Miss Glade agreed. “And though I doubt our friend here has Mr. Gordon’s keen mind, I suspect he knows at least that much. Which suggests that he is not being forthcoming, and that perhaps this finger-breaking you discussed might not be out of order. I have promised to deliver this wretch, but I have made no promises as to his condition.”

“Deliver him to whom?” I asked.

“Why, the Tower, of course. He is to be a prisoner of the kingdom.”

“Not before he releases Franco from his minions,” I said.

“I assure you,” Cobb stammered, “he is in no danger. It is not in my power to release him, but you need not fear that any harm will come to him.”

“Not in your power?” I asked. “Is he not being held in your house?”

“He is there, yes, but Mr. Hammond has him.”

“Your nephew?”

“He is not truly my nephew,” Cobb said.

And, at last, I understood. “And neither is he your subordinate either. Mr. Hammond is a high-ranking French agent, one who has worked his way into the highest levels of the British customs, and you are but his plaything. You present yourself as being the man who gives the orders only because it provides a further level of protection for Hammond, is that not so?”

Cobb said nothing, and his silence confirmed my suspicions.

“Does Mr. Cobb have another name, one he uses among the French?” I asked.

Miss Glade nodded. “He is called by them Pierre Simon.”

It was as I suspected, and it cleared up one remaining question. “So,” I said to Cobb, “you sought not only to serve your masters but yourself? You and Hammond and Edgar, using your French noms de guerre, purchased insurance policies upon my life. Clearly you intended, once you were done with me, to kill me and to profit from doing so.”

“It was but business,” Cobb said, his voice hardly more than a whisper.

“What shall become of Mr. Franco once Hammond learns that Cobb has been arrested?” Elias asked.

“He won’t learn,” Miss Glade told us. “We discovered Cobb about to leave the country, sailing for Calais on what appears to be official business for his masters. He shan’t be missed for a week or more. Hammond has no idea what’s happened to his toadeater.”

The equipage then came to a stop. I looked out the window and observed we were hard by the Tower. In a moment a quartet of dour-faced soldiers appeared.

“One moment,” Miss Glade said to them. And to me, “Have you further questions for Mr. Cobb? I suspect he shan’t be made available again.”

“How do I get Mr. Franco out of Hammond ’s home?”

“You can’t,” he said. “And I would not try if I were you. Leave it alone, Weaver. You are dealing with men who are far more powerful than you can imagine, and Mr. Franco shan’t be harmed if you just leave it alone.”

“What does Hammond want with him? Does he hope to keep me in line by holding my friend in his clutches?”

“ Hammond only discusses his plans with me when he cannot avoid doing so. If you must have answers, I fear you will have to pose those questions to him directly.”

“I assure you,” I said, “I shall do just that.”

“SO,” I BEGAN, “WHO ARE YOU?”

We rode now in her equipage, one fewer with Cobb having been led to his doom at the Tower, safely in the hands of soldiers. Surely there would be pain and torture ahead for him, but Miss Glade showed no sign of distress. She appeared, as always, calm and composed.

“Have you not guessed?”

“Not an agent for the French Crown, as I once supposed, but for the British?” I proposed.

“Just so,” she agreed. “We have been aware for some time of the danger to the East India Company on two fronts. First, the French wished to infiltrate that they might steal secrets and, if possible, do damage. As you have no doubt supposed, we could not permit such a thing to happen. To that end, we have been cooperating with the Indian Mogul, who may be uneasy about British presence but is wise enough to want to keep his country from becoming a battleground of European powers. Thus I was working in at least some degree of concert with Aadil Baghat. I don’t pretend to believe he was entirely forthcoming with me any more than I was with him, but I knew him to be a good man, and I am genuinely grieved to learn of his death. These French are devils who will stop at nothing.” Something like grief passed across her face, but it was gone in an instant.

“You said there were two goals the French wished to accomplish.”

“Yes,” she said. “The second is Mr. Pepper’s engine. If the plans for this device should fall into the wrong hands, it could do great harm to the East India Company. Tea and spices may provide revenue, but it is the textile trade that makes it great. Without that trade, it is but a commercial concern.”

“And what is it now?” Elias asked.

“The new face of empire, of course,” she answered. “Imagine the possibilities. The British Crown may place its stamp, wield its power, see its will done in nations all about the earth, and never have to deploy its military or naval might, never have to convince its own citizens to leave their homes and move to a foreign and inhospitable land. The East India Company has shown us the way with its mercantile conquest. They fund their own expansions, pay for their own armies, establish their own governors. And all the while, British markets expand, British influence grows, and British power swells. Can you truly wonder why we would wish to protect the Company at nearly any cost?”

“So you wish to crush the fruit of British ingenuity in order to promote British empire?” Elias asked.