The Mercenary Major by Moore Kate

Author:Moore, Kate [Moore, Kate]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Stillpoint Digital Press
Published: 2013-12-03T04:00:00+00:00

Jack drew lines in the condensation on his ale cup, studied a copy of Cobbett’s Register left behind by an earlier patron of the Swan, and waited. He was known at the tavern now, though not yet trusted. Lovett, the proprietor, had welcomed him readily enough as a morning customer, but the cheerful formalities of greeting done, the man had beckoned a boy and sent the lad running. When the boy returned minutes later, breathless, with a message for Lovett, the voice in Jack’s head spoke once, sharply.

The door of the tavern opened and a group of sailors and workingmen entered. They settled noisily at three tables in the center of the room, and then Jack noted beyond them the hunched profile of a man who had not been there earlier, a man with his back to the wall, his hat-shadowed face to Jack.

So the watcher had been alerted by Lovett. Jack ordered coffee and opened the Register to yet another column denouncing the policies of the government.

A man from the sailors’ table rose and headed down the hall. A door opened. Jack kept his eyes on the newspaper but concentrated on the exchange of words at the mystery door. He heard a muffled voice from within say, “Jack?”

He almost turned his head at the sound of that voice, but consciousness of the watcher kept him staring at the paper in front of him.

“Sprat,” replied the man in the corridor.

“Dine on the ninth then,” said the voice from the mystery room. Jack wanted that voice to say just a few more words.

“Eat no fat,” replied the first man. The scrape of boots and closing of the door were the next sounds.

Jack lingered over the bad coffee. He’d had better in the hill camps of the guerrilleros. Bertram, and now, if his suspicions were correct, Hengrave had been seduced by the secret behind that door in the dim hall. His friends were very different men, but both had shed their blood for England. To find them frequenting a tavern where sedition seemed as much as part of the fare as ale made little sense.

The answers lay in the mystery room. Bertram, when questioned, claimed he’d been playing cards there the night Jack first came to the Swan. Hengrave had disappeared. So how did one get in? Jack would figure it out sooner or later, whether the watcher wanted him to or not. In the meantime he’d like to see the watcher’s face, and he’d never get a glimpse of the man in the dark taproom.

He stood and stretched and strolled over to Lovett to pay his shot, taking a few minutes to lament the state of his once fine uniform and to tell the host that he was walking toward the West End to meet a fellow officer who’d promised him a meal.

By Long Acre Street Jack knew the watcher had taken the bait and was following him, and the man was good at it, too. Jack knew well how to

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