Hudson's Kill Read online

  “Did everyone get out?” Justy’s throat closed around the words.

  “I wish I could say so.” The Bull’s face was grim. “There were three girls in the top room. No one’s seen them. If they didn’t burn or choke, they’re buried under that lot now.”

  Justy stared at the heap of wet, smoldering ash that spilled across the narrow street. He remembered the terror he had felt as the smoke burned its way into his mouth, his throat, his lungs. Better than burning? He couldn’t say. He turned away.

  “You saved many more, Justice,” Hays said. “If you hadn’t tackled those men, hundreds might have died.”

  “How did you know they’d be back there, anyhow?” his uncle asked.

  Justy rubbed his throat. “I don’t know. It just felt like a diversion. And given they kicked off in Tickler’s Alley, I figured the fire would be set in the opposite place. Well, Hardluck figured.”

  “I should have seen it,” Hays said. “My blood was up, I suppose.”

  “Aye, well. Mine too,” the Bull said. He nodded to Hardluck, who was still standing a few feet away in his blackened clothes. “Good thing for all of us your man has his head screwed on.”

  Hays watched his men tear down the last of the burned building. One of them wrenched at a stubborn bundle of thatch, jerking it loose so that it flew across the road and landed at Hays’ feet. He prodded it with his toe. “Old reeds. The thatch went up like a candle, did you see? Not many buildings like that on this street, which suggests this took some planning.”

  A man pushed through the crowd. Cooper Corrigan’s wide face was pale, his Adam’s apple jumping in his throat.

  The Bull stepped in front of him, put a meaty hand on his chest and shoved him back. “What are you doing here? You’re supposed to be minding Dover Street.”

  Corrigan pulled his hat off. His hair stood up, wet and slick. “I put Daisy in charge, gaffer.”

  “Look me in the eye, you bastard!” The Bull’s voice was like a whip. “If I’d wanted that lump Daisy in charge, I’d have told him myself. It’s your job to look after the libben when I’m not there. So why the dumb glutton are you here instead?”

  The big Irishman gaped. “Liam…”

  “Stop stammering like that’s a pudding on your shoulders and not your head. Liam who?”

  “My boy, gaffer. I gave him a punishment for stepping out without my say. I sent him here to clean the jakes.”

  He was still staring at the smoking ruin of the building. The Bull followed his gaze. “Well, you won’t need to worry. The jakes is out the back. The fire didn’t touch ’em.”

  Corrigan’s face crumpled. “I told him he had to work in the house an’ all. Empty the girls’ slop buckets an’ that.”

  The Bull swore.

  “How old was the lad?” They turned at the sound of Hardluck’s voice.

  Corrigan turned on him. “Mind your own, snowball. If it hadn’t been for one of your lot sniffing at him, I wouldn’t have had to trounce him.”

  “I carried a lad out,” Hardluck said. “A tall streak, all arms and legs. Thirteen or fourteen years, maybe. I laid him down by the pump there.”

  “Was he alive?” the Bull asked.

  “He was senseless, but he was breathing. His legs and arms were burned, I think. I laid him down and washed his face off.”

  The frantic filling of buckets had stopped, but a watchman still stood by the pump. Hays walked over and spoke with him for a moment, and then returned. “The lad was taken up to the Almshouse with the rest of them. He was awake and breathing. Likely burned, but alive.”

  “Oh, thank Christ!” Corrigan’s voice wobbled. He put his hands over his face.

  The Bull cuffed them down. “It’s not Christ you’ve to thank. It’s that man there.”

  Corrigan scowled. He glanced at Hardluck. “Thankee for the life of my son,” he said.

  Hardluck said nothing.

  “A pretty trick for a snowball, to walk into the fire and come out whole.” The Bull chuckled. “Seeing as you left your post and this man saved your boy, Cooper, I think it should be you buys him a new set of clothes. I’ll take it out of your next wage. Fair enough?”

  Corrigan’s face turned purple. He opened his mouth and snapped it shut. He nodded.

  “It’s about time you got a grip on your boy,” the Bull said. “What was it this time?”

  “I caught him carrying on with some guinea girl. Right where my missus keeps her stall, if you can believe it.”

  “Not one of Lew Owens’ motts, I hope. I don’t want that bastard getting any more custom.”

  Corrigan shook his head. “She didn’t look like a doxy. I only got a glimpse before she ran off, but she was a wee slip of a thing, dressed fancy, with her hair tied up in ribbons and little red shoes on her feet.”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Wednesday

  It was impossible to sleep. Every time Justy swallowed, he felt as though someone was pouring boiling pitch down his gullet. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw the girl, her abdomen split open, the whites of her eyes. Eventually he gave up, dressed in his spare clothes, and walked through the dark streets to the Federal Hall.

  He had plenty of paperwork to do after the events of the previous day. A report to file on Chase Beaulieu; a second on his interview of Beaulieu’s father; a third on the riot and fire.

  And a fourth on Liam Corrigan, who was barely alive, according to the nuns. Justy and Hays had rushed to the Almshouse the moment Cooper Corrigan mentioned the girl with the red shoes, but the duty sister had turned them away, and not even Hays’ bluster could gain them entrance.

  Gorton had processed all the men arrested in the riot, and written a detailed report. No one had been killed in the fighting, but nine men were sent to the Almshouse with serious injuries. Gorton had identified all the white men involved as members of the Bull’s crew except one, a man named Shard who had received a blow to the head in the melee, and had complained loudly about his treatment before passing out in a faint. He was carried up to the Almshouse and left in the care of the sisters. “Well-drest. Well shod. Well school’d,” Gorton had noted in his careful script. The Negroes, he reported, all said they had been plied with drink and handed weapons, but none could say for certain who had led them down to George Street and encouraged them to riot. Attached to the report was another note from Gorton, saying he needed to rest after the night’s events, and would report to Justy in the evening, to see if he wanted to continue working on his investigation.

  “A waste of five dollars,” Justy muttered. As the Wall Street traffic built up below his window, he sat and thought about Jake Hays’ refusal to let Justy interview Piers Riker. Why was he so opposed? Tobias Riker was an influential man, it was true, but Justy and Hays had investigated powerful men in the past. Riker was on the Common Council, but he did not have complete control of the purse strings governing Hays’ budget. Nor did he have a casting vote in the decision to expand the Watch and create a police force for the city. Was there something else? He turned the thought over and over in his head, but it was like a puzzle box, and he had no idea how to open it up.

  When the Trinity bell sounded seven, he walked down the hallway to Hays’ office. The High Constable was already there.

  “How’s the hero of the day?”

  “A little scorched.” Justy placed his report on the desk.

  Hays flicked through it. “Lew Owens up to his tricks, I presume.”

  “I don’t think so. I think something else is going on. I think there’s a connection to a man named Umar, who’s been trying to stir things up between the gangs.”

  “Umar?”

  “He’s the top man in the Mohammedan community I told you about. That compound his people have built up by the meadows is quite a place. He calls it Mimo. The word means sanctuary, and the place is a damned fortress.”

  “You’ve been inside?”

  “He invited me in. I was asking about the girl, to see if she was one of
his people.”

  “And?”

  “He said he didn’t know the girl.”

  “And the compound?”

  “Empty. Except for a few women working on the shawls they make.”

  Hays stood up suddenly, his chair grating on the floor. He walked to the window. “And you think this man Umar is trying to stir things up between Lew Owens and your uncle. Why would he do that?”

  “I have no idea. That’s what I want to find out. Which is why I want your permission to take a section of men up to the compound. Have a proper look around.”

  Hays turned to face him. “No.”

  “No?”

  “No. You will not confront this Umar. You will not go near that compound.”

  Justy laughed. “Is he on the police council, too? I can understand you not wanting me to brace Riker, but this hackum? He nearly set the city ablaze last night. What’s his hold on you?”

  Hays’ face was crimson. “His hold on me? How dare you!”

  “How dare I? How dare you! I’m doing my best to solve a murder and rein in a man who’s trying to breach the peace, and you won’t even let me get started. Don’t speak to Riker, don’t speak to Umar. Who can I speak to? God? Neptune?” Justy leaned over Hays’ desk, his fists pushing the papers aside. “There’s been something rank about this from the start, Jake. From the moment that girl got killed. The line you fed me about not knowing anything about these Mussulmen? It’s bawbels. You know this city better than any man, and I’m damn sure you know who Umar is. No doubt you know what he’s up to, as well. And the way you’re carrying on, I half-believe you’re part of it.”

  Hays was very still. The color had drained from his cheeks. He stood with his hands clasped behind his back, his eyes blank, but unwavering.

  Justy felt the heat come out of his own face. He pushed himself upright. “Did you really expect me to do nothing, Jake? You know I’m not the sort to shy away when some cove barks at me. When something doesn’t smell right, I don’t scowre off, I put my nose to the ground. That’s what makes me good at what I do. That’s why you’ve kept me here.”

  Hays said nothing.

  “Well, Jake.” Justy spread his arms. “Say the word. Tell me I’m finished, and I’ll walk out of here. But I won’t let this go. Warrant or no warrant, I’ll go on poking at this rat’s nest until something breaks. Go ahead.”

  They stared at each other, letting the silence fill in the space between them, until Justy nodded, turned on his heel, and walked out of the door.

  TWENTY-FIVE

  He walked up to the Almshouse. It was still early, but he hoped the nuns would have fed their charges by now, and that Liam Corrigan would have a full belly. It should make him more willing to talk.

  He took the backstreets, staying off the main roads that were a crush of people, carts, and carriages hurrying to work at that time of day. It wasn’t until he had turned into one of the wealthier residential streets that he registered the sound of hooves behind him. When he turned, he saw a carriage, driven by a slim black man with a wide hat and a narrow face. The carriage stopped and a giant climbed out of the cab. He was shaven-headed and dressed like a sailor, in a short coat and long trousers made of dark brown wool. The coat was buttoned to his neck, and because he was almost as dark-skinned as the color of the clothes he wore, he looked like a moving shadow, a man-shaped hole in the light of the day.

  He held the door open and jerked his massive head.

  Lew Owens sat inside. He wore black breeches and a black waistcoat, unbuttoned over a white shirt that was open at the neck and rolled to the elbows. He could have been a waiter taking his break, except that the waistcoat was made of velvet, the breeches of finest whipcord, and the shirt of pristine linen. His oiled, shaven head gleamed like a cannonball on a hot day.

  He gestured to Justy. “Come on up, Marshal.”

  “And why would I do that?”

  “Because I’ve got something that you need to hear.”

  “Spill it then, Owens. For I’m not getting in that cab.”

  Owens plucked at a speck of dust on his trousers. “It’s about Kerry.”

  “What about her?”

  He grimaced. “I fear I may have put her in bad loaf, Justy.”

  Justy felt panic squirm in him. And then his dream came to him. The girl on her side in the alley, her back to him. His hand on her shoulder, rolling her gently on to her back. Her face. Kerry’s face.

  “What did you do?”

  “I sent her into Jericho.”

  “Jericho?”

  “The Mohammedan place.”

  “What do you mean, you sent her in?”

  Owens said nothing. Justy climbed inside. The carriage rocked as the big bodyguard climbed up beside the driver, and then they were moving.

  Justy sat for a moment, fighting to get his feelings under control as his dream played, over and over: Kerry cold. Stabbed. Slashed. Dead.

  “Tell me,” he said.

  Owens folded his arms. “I asked her to go inside. See what that bastard Absalom’s up to.”

  “Absalom?”

  “Umar Salam. Absalom’s his slave name. Or it’s the name he arrived here with. Anyway, he’s up to something, and I want to know what.” He looked at his hands. “So I set her up with one of my girls, to see if she could find out anything.”

  “So it was your idea to tog her up like a whore.”

  Owens winced. “She’d have climbed the walls on her own, if I hadn’t had the idea. It was that girl she found. She was blazing about it. Not just that someone had milled the lass, but that no one would claim her. She reckoned the titter had a bellyful, which made it worse.”

  Justy felt a cold, clear urge to stab Owens in the face, to tear him open. “When did you last see her?”

  “Two days ago. At breakfast. I sent her up to the fort, to see a girl named Tanny.”

  “Short, light skin, red dress?”

  Owens frowned. “You know her?”

  “I saw the both of them, at a gathering on Monday night.”

  “Aye, well. No one’s seen either of them since. Tanny’s not been back to the fort, and Kerry’s not been back to her libben. I figured she got inside, like we planned. But I’ve had neither word nor no sign from her.”

  “What sign?”

  Owens made a face. “She was to signal she was safe by chalking the wheel of a cart or a carriage. I’ve got a crew up there, watching. But there’s been rotans driving in and out all the time, and not a mark on any of them.”

  “That doesn’t mean anything. She just might not have got close enough.”

  “Maybe. Maybe not.”

  Justy pressed himself back against the cushions of the cab. His nostrils were full of the cloying smell of coconut oil. He felt sick. His mind unspooled, like a reel of fishing line with a whale on the hook. Too fast to stop. Too fast to think.

  “Why are you so concerned about Umar?”

  “He’s up to something. He’s trying to set me and your uncle at odds. Poaching his doxies and passing word it’s me that’s been doing it. Sending blackfellas to start fights in his gin shops and bowsing kens. That tilt in Laycock Lane? That was his crew, not mine. But the Bull doesn’t believe me.”

  “I believe you.”

  Surprise, for an instant. “You do?”

  “I saw a man at the riot last night. He was with Umar on Monday, too. He looked like a ringleader. But why set you two against each other?”

  Owens shrugged. “I don’t know. Could be he wants us to kill each other, so he can step in and take over. Or maybe he just wants us weak, for when he’s ready to fight and carve out a piece for himself. Either way, he’s getting ready for something behind them walls of his.”

  “Jericho.”

  “Aye. But it’ll take more than a few trumpets to get in there.”

  Justy nodded. He felt calm now. The dread was inside him, like a worm working its way into his guts. But he could ignore it while he decided what to do.<
br />
  He said, “What do you have in mind?”

  “I’ll go to your uncle. If we band together, we can take the bastard. He won’t expect that.”

  “What makes you think the Bull will help?”

  “He’s close to Kerry, isn’t he?”

  “Not really. And even if he was, why would he believe she’s in danger? You don’t know for sure yourself.”

  Owens shook his head. “You’re a cold one.”

  “I’m calling it how he’ll see it. Apart from anything else, the Bull won’t believe you care enough about Kerry to get into a fight for her. Truth is, I can hardly believe it myself.”

  Owens’ eyes were steady. “She’s the only blood relative I have left.”

  “One you tried to put on the street when she was barely a titter.”

  “That was a long time ago. Before we got close. Before Daniel.”

  Daniel. Justy remembered the last time he had seen the boy, laughing in his mother’s arms, the spring before the fever had struck, before they had hurried him out of the city. There had been no funeral service that he knew of, and he had no idea where the child was buried. Kerry had refused to talk to him about it. And then they had drifted apart.

  “Again, I believe you. But the rest of New York thinks that Lew Owens doesn’t give a dog’s cock for anyone but himself. That’s what the Bull thinks. It’s what he knows. So he won’t help you. He’ll think you’re trying to lure him into a scrap with Umar. To bleed him. Or worse.”

  “So what do we do?”

  Justy looked into the street. People hurrying in the thin sunlight, to work or home or lunch or church. While Kerry was locked up, perhaps bloodied, or broken, or dead. He felt like ice.

  “An eye for an eye, Owens.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning if you’ve killed her, then I’ll kill you.”

  “She’s not dead, boyo.” Owens’ voice was quiet. “If she was, I would know. I would feel it. And so would you.”

  Traffic was heavy and the carriage was moving slowly. They were in the new build, to the north of the city, and Justy stared out of the window at the half-made houses as they inched along. The view opened up at a junction in the road, and he was suddenly looking down a sweep of freshly laid cobbles that ended abruptly at the edge of the ramshackle chaos of Canvas Town. In the sunshine, the slum looked like a colorful regatta of small boats, jumbled up in a crook of the river. But then the wind gusted, carrying the stink of the cesspits and middens up the hill; the sun disappeared and Justy saw the place for what it was: a tip of broken masts, torn sails, ragged sheets and blankets, ingeniously piled up and stitched together, the most concentrated mass of people in New York, a rookery to rival London’s Cheapside.