Blood Diamond: A Pirate Devlin Novel Read online

  Blood Diamond: A Pirate Devlin Novel

  Mark Keating

  www.hodder.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain in 2012 by Hodder & Stoughton

  An Hachette UK company

  Copyright © Mark Keating 2012

  The right of Mark Keating to be identified as the Author of the Work

  has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright,

  Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,

  stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any

  means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be

  otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that

  in which it is published and without a similar condition being

  imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious or are historical figures

  whose words and actions are fictitious. Any other resemblance to

  real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

  eBook ISBN 978 1 444 72787 6

  Book ISBN 978 1 444 72784 5

  Hodder & Stoughton Ltd

  338 Euston Road

  London NW1 3BH

  www.hodder.co.uk

  Contents

  Dedication

  Quotation

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  For my parents

  But ships are but boards, sailors but men:

  there be land-rats and water-rats,

  water-thieves and land-thieves;

  I mean pirates . . .

  Shylock

  The Merchant of Venice

  Prologue

  The gentleman in the purple silk banyan and cap looked out over the ornamental gardens – not his gardens, only leased, along with the London mansion that had lately become his home.

  January. An icy January. No wonder one could not enjoy fountains in this miserable city if even the Thames froze solid.

  The gown hoisted itself as he set his hands on his hips, revealing bone-thin ankles and slipper-heels to the dark official sitting quietly several feet behind him.

  The gentleman’s back rose and fell as he took in the futility and desperation that now faced them. Faced the whole country.

  He watched the peacocks on the lawn beyond and promised himself to shoot one after this tiresome meeting was adjourned. At last he spoke again.

  ‘Well, how does one find a “pirate”? If that is our only choice.’

  The official in black serge and Mechlin cravat shifted in his seat. He was senior in years to the gentleman at the window but lacked the capacity for indulgence that made the other seem the older man.

  ‘Not our only choice, but for secrecy and immediate solution it has many avenues through which we may profit.’

  The purple gown rustled downwards again as the gentleman turned to face the official. ‘How so, profit?’ Still a trace of accent remained in his vowels that years of cavorting in London had failed to erase.

  A fidgeting emanated from the chair. ‘If we engage a pirate for the task I believe we will more likely minimise future intrusions on our goodwill than if we choose a native party. Awarding a pirate a Mart will enable him to legalise his trade and grant him freedom from persecution by our navy, naturally. Then he will be gone. Back to the seas. A pirate will come with his own ship, his own men. We will leave no paper trail beyond these walls and the principals involved.’ The official shifted again, leaning his chin into his hand. ‘And, should he refuse our proposal, it would not seem untoward that such a fiend be destroyed, for that is our duty; and if he fails . . . what mystery is there in a pirate attempting such an action?’

  The gentleman nodded agreement. ‘And of course he would want to be unknown? His life is discretion, no?’ He pointed sharply. ‘But he must be good. Perfect in fact. Already a success so he should not want to betray us. He should have no objective other than reward and pardon for his crimes to continue under sanction. Less than a base man would want.’

  ‘Precisely.’

  The gentleman picked up a burnished carapace paperweight from his escritoire and made it swim to and fro. ‘But again, how does one find a such a man?’

  ‘I have already taken the liberty of drafting a letter to accompany every packet that sails for the Americas and New Spain. I am sending a political advisor with the letter on every South Sea Company vessel. Any ship that is due to sail the pirate round will deliver such a letter until the appropriate party is found.’

  ‘The “pirate round”? How so this?’

  ‘The Caribbean, the Carolinas, the slave coast, New Spain, Newfoundland, the Verdes. It will not be perfect. That is why I have given plenty of time for the task. We need only panic if September comes too soon.’

  The gentleman put back the tortoiseshell. ‘But who is to receive the letter? Who have you in mind that is neither too loathsome nor incapable?’

  The other drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair and thought on the fact that the chosen man had been his decision alone, and his blame alone should all go wrong. But no matter; come September half the world would be ruined if he did not act.

  ‘I have thought on a rogue known as Devlin. An Irishman, but no matter for all that. He has excelled beyond the curse of his birth.’

  ‘How so? I have never heard of him?’

  ‘It is pertinent that one only hears of “unsuccessful” pirates. Those of us in the polite world only know of them when they are . . . no more. This pirate Devlin has shown himself to be most able.’

  ‘How so?’

  The repetition of this question with its faint German inflection still caused subtle amusement in the official, although he had known the gentleman for years now and was sufficiently familiar to call him, in certain circles, a friend.

  He cleared his throat, recalling the notes studied on the carriage journey to Leicester House.

  ‘This is the same pirate that stole a considerable sum of gold from out of French pockets, and ours, some years back. Gold we had intended for our own use once we became aware of its existence. A year later he bought his freedom with the secret of the art of porcelain, which we gratefully profit from, as does all Europe, which shows he is a man not unaccustomed to subterfuge and espionage while wishing scant profit for hi
mself other than his ongoing freedom. You will know something of this in that he cost us one of our finest international agents. A man I had thought impossible to destroy and have found impossible to replace.’

  The gentleman nodded at some memory of this, although the name escaped him. ‘He killed him?’

  ‘He killed him. And escaped from imprisonment on New Providence under the very roof of Governor Rogers. He has also collected enemies in our allies, all of whom have orders against him. Another reason why he may be willing to accept the sanctity of the crown. For a time at least. As we see fit.’

  A small silence reigned as the gentleman tapped at his chin and lingered over the idea. ‘Very well, Walpole. To your business, and bother me no further with the matter until the pirate is before me. I wish my father and my wife to hear none of this. Promise two thousand pounds to this pirate and my warrant. His head if he fails.’

  Robert Walpole, Paymaster General, stood and bowed. From the door, already opened as if by some secret signal, a footman appeared holding his hat and cloak. Walpole, head still lowered, backed out of the room.

  ‘Your servant, Your Highness. Our success is already written.’

  Chapter One

  London. August 1720

  Seven months later.

  The gentleman in the black coat was Edwin Tinkerman’s third fare of the Monday morning. He had just dropped off at Morris’s causeway in Limehouse in the hope of having time for a pie, but the brown boots stomped into his wherry before he had time to decline. A shout from a neighbouring wherryman, however, halted his forming objection.

  ‘Ho, governor, don’t be sailing with young Edwin there! He’ll bill you sixpence befores you sits down! I’ll takes you for threepence anywheres you aim to. Step lively now, governor. Over here, now! Threepence to the city!’

  Edwin motioned his passenger to sit as he yelled back. ‘George Temple, you can busy yourself. When you gets your Doggett coat you can charge sixpence. Now, off.’ He flicked a dismissive wave to his competition and hard eyes to the others who had begun to row towards the fare.

  ‘Where to, Cap’n?’ he enquired, for the man had the look of the sea about him, with his tanned skin and salt-bleached boots.

  The gentleman tipped back his hat. ‘How comes you get to charge sixpence, Edwin?’ His voice sounded amused.

  Edwin straightened himself proudly, still holding an oar, and ran his free hand over his fine red wool coat. ‘Ain’t you seen me red Doggett, Cap’n?’ He twisted his left arm to show his large silver badge, ‘Or me silver horse? Hanover horse, no less. I wins the Doggett last month ain’t I? Fastest wherryman on the Thames ain’t I?’ His passenger shook his head. Edwin winked. ‘Ah, you been away ain’t you, Cap’n? A man who don’t know me Doggett, don’t know London.’ Edwin set to his pushing off, nodding that he was listening as the gentlemen replied.

  ‘Aye, Edwin. I’ve been away ten years now,’ he pointed a lazy hand vaguely north. ‘Near the Pelican I used to be.’

  ‘Ah, The Devil’s Tavern, eh, Cap’n? You lived a rough one,’ he said, and gave another wink to indicate that he meant no offence. ‘I don’t do those steps after midnight lest I don’t sees me missus evermore.’ But he had heard enough of his gentleman’s past. ‘Where to then, Cap’n? Mind I don’t go near the bridge this time and tide for less than a shilling.’

  They had moved off shore into the thoroughfare and the gentleman took pause as the magnitude of bodies and ships swamping the river burst onto his senses like a thunderclap.

  From the streets on land one could hear the rhythm of mallets, the haul of chain and rope and the working shouts from the water: the background noise of the city. By looking up at the rooftops one could follow the meander of the Thames by the thicket of masts etching out every inch of her against the sky, but nothing had prepared him for the sight of the city’s lifeblood pulsing along the current.

  Amongst the fleet of ships that lined her wharves for miles toiled nearly five thousand watermen like Edwin, who sculled and rowed their hoys and wherries between the plying stairs of Surrey and the city, like beetles scuttling over pig slurry, whilst the giant barks towered over them; only St Paul’s dwarfing them, dwarfing everything. The river seemed more wood than water and Edwin turned back to look as the thrill of it silenced his passenger – a man clearly used to wider, freer waters. ‘Where to, Cap’n?’

  Edwin’s fare tore his gaze from the walls of oak now blotting out the lesser buildings, so that only the stone medieval city remained proud, hazy through a fog of coal-smoke.

  ‘I’m to Leicester House. I have an appointment there.’

  Edwin nodded and bit his lip. He appraised his fare differently now. A sailor of sorts but one of some note if the house of the Prince of Wales was his destination. Perhaps some great deed in the war was to be rewarded – or taxed, which was more likely.

  ‘I’ll take you to Execution stairs, Cap’n. Safe for a gentleman to get off at Execution.’

  Edwin stalled expertly as a train of five passed before his bow and doffed their caps to his red coat. ‘You can get a chair there or walk it. Only four mile from there, Cap’n.’ He resumed the pace that had won him his jacket and rowed his way effortlessly upstream.

  ‘It’s all coal now, Cap’n.’ Edwin nodded to the black ships lining the north shore, but still the cages of geese and other animals seemed to dominate. Or perhaps that was more from their vocalisation than their majority.

  ‘Coal and paper. Tons of paper. We’ve daily sheets now, Cap’n. You can even buy daily prints of the Bailey’s trials. I can find out what me father’s been up to without asking me mam,’ he winked yet again.

  Silence now, just the plash of oar as rounding Rotherhithe the spectacle widened and demanded quiet respect. The whole of St Paul’s lay before them, presiding over the jumble of smoking buildings below her still gleaming dome and columns built new from The Fire. In the distance, mired in a dark auburn cloud of yet more smoke, a small village seemed to float above the Thames.

  The bridge.

  Piled four-stories high with shops and dwellings and the doll’s-house prettiness of Nonsuch House that stood over the Surrey entrance to the bridge, its four onion domes as tall as St Paul’s.

  The bridge. For six hundred years it had been the only walkway in and out south of the city, and the thousands of men like Edwin Tinkerman had enough sway to keep it so.

  A quiet twenty minutes later, his fare not much one for talking, Edwin had reached the Execution stairs with its green walls and wet stone walk; sounds of revelry came wafting down from the casement windows of the Bell inn above.

  Just visible, topping the water, stood the iron stake where at low tide the corpses of those tried and condemned for their wickedness at sea would sit on the shoal and wait for the solemn waters to wash over them three times before being pitched and gibbeted to hang as a warning, at Graves Point, to all those young men who might suppose that a life of piracy had more lure than honest sweat and sinew.

  Edwin’s fare alighted with easy balance, perfectly upright, well used to stepping from wood to shore, and slapped a shilling into his calloused palm in the same step.

  Edwin protested honestly. ‘I can’ts change a shilling, Governor. Not this early.’

  The sailor turned back with a deep sniff of the rancidness of Wapping. ‘I don’t need change Edwin, but remember my face. If I need across in a hurry look out for me and I’ll look out for your red coat. Could that be a deal?’

  Edwin agreed and studied the sailor. Tall. Black hair, no wig, no bow. Thirty, maybe, but the sea had made his eyes older. Good black twill coat and hat. Those ancient brown bucket-top boots.

  ‘Aye, Cap’n, I’ll remember you.’ He tipped his hat. ‘Good luck to you, Cap’n.’ And he pushed off again into the rushing lanes.

  Walking up the wet green steps still bubbling from the morning tide the sailor dodged past the shrunken corpse of a dead horse. Its tongue was missing, chewed out by rats, and two dogs ignored
him as they growled at each other over the ownership of the animal’s pizzle. He shook his head at the surprised look of the horse in its ignominy. London had changed very little.

  A narrow alleyway ran straight off the steps. Tall stone walls blocked the light and funnelled the stench of Wapping straight into his face as the passage cambered upwards to the throng of people in the bright street ahead.

  To his right he eyed a figure slumped against the black wall with lowered head and hat, drunk or pretending to be so, a smouldering clay pipe hanging from his lips. Early in the morning to be the worse for it, he thought, even for London.

  The sailor raised himself as the traveller went by. The six foot and more of him would not be an easy mark. On his left, a few strides further, another wretch slumbered against a barrel, with bare chest and naked feet. To this one the sailor drew aside his coat to show the hilt of his sword, even though its presence was obvious by the rise of his left coat-tail. Still, a glimpse of steel would not hurt.

  It was more his custom to wear his unfashionable cross-belt over his coat: all the swifter to draw. He had deferred to custom to seem more like a gentleman for the company that would follow at the end of his journey.

  Twenty feet more to the street – moments away – but his shoulders sank as he heard the call behind him. He was sorry that they had not let him walk on.

  ‘Ho, Governor!’ came a friendly chirrup. ‘I thinks you’ve dropped something. Wait up, Governor.’

  He could carry on. Hurry to the breech of the alley with his back to them. But he knew them. Had known them all his life. They could run like rats and he would only be presenting them his kidneys. He could run though. He would make the street most definitely if he ran.

  The chirrup continued, a scuffle of feet hurrying behind him. ‘Dropped your purse, Governor: I has it here for you.’

  But he never ran from. Towards, yes. Not from. Not any more.