“My reputation is secure,” I answered, “and if I use it to level accusations upon you and your company, you will be the sorrier for it.”

“I will be the sorrier,” he informed me, “if I betray the confidence of those I serve by revealing what I have no obligation to reveal.”

Our exchange continued in this manner for another several minutes until I noticed that the door to Ingram’s office was once more opening. Here was the signal that Elias and I had agreed upon; it marked the time I must remove myself from the premises. I did so, with threats that they would not remain unpunished for these outrages.

Then I departed to the selfsame tavern where Elias and I had met earlier. I ordered another pot and awaited his arrival, which came far sooner than I had anticipated.

“I used the chaos of your visit as a reason to excuse myself,” he told me, “but I cannot but suspect that Ingram or one of the clerks will realize my visit was in conjunction with yours and will understand our deceit.”

“Let them understand it,” I said. “So much the better. They cannot act upon it, for they shan’t desire the world to learn their books can be so easily violated. Now, did you obtain the list of names?”

“I did,” he said. “I know not what it means, but it cannot be good.” He removed from his pocket a scrap of paper, upon which was written three names I had never before beheld.

Jean-David Morel

Pierre Simon

Jacques LaFont

“Perhaps you notice something about them,” he said.

“These are all French names.”

“Just so,” he agreed.

“The French, I have been made to understand, are beginning to assert themselves within India, and it is not unlikely that, in order to achieve their ends, they must act against the East India Company. That much I comprehend. What I do not comprehend is why they should believe their success depends upon mine-to such a degree that they must insure my life.”

“That is but one interpretation. There is another, and I believe it may be far more likely, I am grieved to say.”

“They know I will soon be dead, they see no reason not to profit from it,” I said.

Elias nodded solemnly. “You had enemies enough before this, but I suspect, Weaver, that your situation has now been revealed to be even more dire than we had supposed.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

WHILE DISSEMBLING WITH ELLERSHAW, CONCEALING FACTS FROM Cobb, plotting with Carmichael, and perfecting my schemes with Elias, it had never occurred to me that French knaves might be so confident in my impending doom that they should make wagers upon it. The thought was disconcerting to the least, but as I had discovered at Kingsley’s Coffeehouse not long ago, even the most secure of wagers is never secure, and I had every confidence these foreign dandies would lose for their efforts.

I should have liked to have more time with Elias, for even though much of what we could puzzle out happened within the first five minutes of our conversation, there are, nevertheless, revelations that take time to sit and settle, like a good bottle of wine, before we are ready to consume them fully. This luxury of slow fermentation was not afforded to me, however, for I had an appointment to keep, and despite my uneasiness I would not be late.

It was the thing that had been in my thoughts all day, and it was now time to take myself to St. Giles in the Field. My reader certainly knows that this is not the most pleasant part of the metropolis, and while I am no stranger to the less delightful neighborhoods, this one offered particular difficulties, its winding streets and labyrinthine alleys designed to confound the most accomplished navigator. Yet I managed to find my way with reasonable alacrity, and a few coins in the palm of a garrulous whore helped direct me to the Duck and Wagon.

This was a tavern of reasonable architectural soundness, at least in light of its location. My entrance produced no considerable attention except among the gamers and whores and mendicants, all of whom sought fresh and unsuspecting purses. I have long plied my trade in these sorts of establishments, however, and I knew well how to wear a mask of menace. The unfortunates who prowled these waters in search of weak prey knew the scent of a fellow shark and accordingly kept their distance.

It took me little time to recognize that the Duck and Wagon fell into that category of tavern called a dive. Proximate to the kitchens, a massive pot, nearly large enough for a man to bathe therein, had been set forth, and surrounding it were half a score of men who had paid their three pennies for the opportunity to take two or three dives-dependent upon the rules of the house. In the hands of each was a long knife, which they plunged into this gustatory lottery, the winner to lance a piece of meat, and the drawers of blanks to find themselves impaling nothing of greater consequence than a carrot or turnip.

I took a table in a dark corner, far away from the excited and despondent shouts of the divers, and pulled my hat down, better to shade my face while sipping at a watery ale. It took two more watery ales before Miss Glade arrived, and I confess I did not know her at once. It was neither the darkness nor my slightly dulled senses that postponed my recognition, but her manner of dress. It would seem that the serving girl and the lady of business were not the only two disguises known to this intriguing creature. She came in looking like an aged and slovenly whore, so unappealing in her ersatz person that she might well have been invisible. There could be no better disguise, I realized, than to dress as a creature upon which no one wishes to gaze. These aging unfortunates, whose withered bodies are unfit for their trade, haunt the streets by the hundreds in hopes of finding a man too drunk or too desperate to care about the taint of his goods. Here was Miss Glade in tattered clothes and disheveled hair. Paint upon her face gave the illusion of age, and she had blackened some teeth and browned others, to create a sufficiently unsavory effect. But more than any of this, it was the way she carried herself. I had never before observed that old whores have a particular way of walking, but I now saw that it was so. Only her dark eyes, bright and alive and full of ravenous curiosity, betrayed her true nature.

At her request, no doubt to maintain the integrity of her disguise, she asked that I order a gin for her, and while a few of the patrons laughed at my taste in women, none thought any more of this arrangement than was natural. I was no longer fit in my senses, and this woman was lucky enough to find me.

“Very well, then,” I said, feeling unspeakably awkward. “Your masquerade has quite astonished me, but it is no matter, for we have much to discuss.”

“And yet it shall be hard to do so, for neither trusts the other.” A smile, her true smile, emerged like the sun from beneath the clouded layers of paint.

“That, madam, is a sad truth. Perhaps you would care to tell me of your business at Craven House. And perhaps, while you are on that business, you might tell me how the silk workers’ riots disturbed your plans the other night.”

Something shifted in her gaze, and I knew I had struck home. “My plans?”

“When you saw me, you said, ‘There you are,’ or some such thing, and expressed a surprise that the uprising at the gates had not hindered me. It is clear you thought I was someone else, which was why you used your true voice with me rather than the one you deploy within Craven House. Had it not been for that understanding, I presume I would never have known you were anything but the creature you pretend to be when serving the East India Company.”

“You presume a great deal,” she said.