Part 20 (2/2)
The Irishman shook his head. ”Well, he won't be able to share the evidence, that much is certain. I would not have him believe that we mean to do him any harm, however.”
”Oh, no,” said the third man, in a patrician voice. He emphasized each syllable he spoke. ”No, I am too much of an admirer of Mr. Weaver to even think of acting against his interests.”
And then I knew his face, for I had seen it a hundred times-on posters, on broadsheets, on pamphlets. Standing in the room with me, not fifteen feet away, was the Pretender himself, the son of the deposed James II, the man who would be James III. I knew little about the planning of revolutions and usurpations, but I could not but believe, if he dared to step foot in England, that the situation for His (present) Majesty King George was dire indeed.
I was in a private house with the Pretender himself and what had to be two very highly placed Jacobites. No one knew I was there. My throat might easily be slit, my body hauled away in a crate. And yet my foremost concern was not for my safety but for decorum: That is to say, I did not know the correct protocol for addressing the Pretender. On the other hand, I decided that I might be far safer if I acted as though I did not recognize him.
Ufford, however, would not let me take that route. ”Are you mad? He's seen His Majesty. We can't let him leave.”
The Irishman closed his eyes for a moment as though considering some great mystery. ”Mr. Ufford, I must ask you to wait outside and leave us alone here for now.”
”I should remind you whose house this is,” he answered.
”Please step outside, Christopher,” the Pretender said.
Ufford bowed and retreated.
Once he closed the door, the Irishman offered me an amused smile.
”I have come to believe,” I said, ”that you are the man they call Johnson.”
”It is a name I use,” he said. He poured three gla.s.ses of Mr. Ufford's Madeira and, after delivering the Pretender his gla.s.s, he placed one in my hand and then stood across from me. ”I am certain you have already surmised that with us is His Majesty, King James the Third.”
Without any training in this sort of thing, I bowed to the Pretender. ”It is an honor, Your Grace.”
He nodded slightly, as though approving of my performance. ”I have heard many good things about you, sir. Mr. Johnson has kept me informed of your actions. He tells me that you have fallen victim to the government of a fat German pig of a usurper.”
”I am a victim of something, that much is certain.” I thought it best not to say that I had come to believe I might well be the victim of his own machinations. It is the sort of thing that does not win friends.
He shook his head. ”I detect some suspicions on your part. Let me a.s.sure you, they are unfounded.”
”I had thought better of you, Mr. Weaver,” Johnson said. ”The Whigs want you to believe that we plot against you, and you are so foolish as to believe it. Surely you recall that the witnesses hired against you at your trial tried to link you with a mysterious stranger called Johnson. Johnson. Do you need more evidence that the Whigs were trying to turn you into a Jacobite agent to scapegoat before the world? Only your clever escape prevented it.” Do you need more evidence that the Whigs were trying to turn you into a Jacobite agent to scapegoat before the world? Only your clever escape prevented it.”
There could be no denying what he suggested. Someone certainly had wished to paint me the Jacobite.
”I have followed your trials with some interest,” Johnson continued, ”as I always follow with interest when a useful and productive-dare I say heroic?-member of our society is trampled to paste by a corrupt ministry and its servants. I can a.s.sure you that it has never been the aim of His Majesty or his agents to see you come to any harm. What you have witnessed is a Whig conspiracy, meant to remove its enemies, cast blame on its rivals, and sway an election by distracting the voters from a financial scandal engineered at the highest levels of Whiggery.”
I looked at the Pretender. ”I do not know that I have the liberty to speak freely,” I said.
He laughed a condescending kingly laugh. ”You may speak as you like. I have been at this end or the other of plots my entire life. Hearing of one more will not harm me.”
I nodded. ”Then I must say that it seemed to me most likely that it had been Jacobite agents who had a hand in the death of that fellow Groston and the false witnesses he hired for my trial.”
He laughed softly. ”What sort of men do you take us for? Why should we wish those men ill-or you, for that matter? The notes left upon the scene were a carefully constructed farce. They claim that you committed these unspeakable acts in the name of the true King but are written so as to give the lie to that claim, thus making it appear appear that it is a Jacobite plot meant to expose the Whigs. In reality it is a Whig plot. The world suspects us of this sort of deception, but the world is wrong. What have you ever done, Mr. Weaver, that we should know of you or care enough to murder three-no, four!-men for the purpose of seeing you suffer?” that it is a Jacobite plot meant to expose the Whigs. In reality it is a Whig plot. The world suspects us of this sort of deception, but the world is wrong. What have you ever done, Mr. Weaver, that we should know of you or care enough to murder three-no, four!-men for the purpose of seeing you suffer?”
”I cannot answer that question, but neither can I say why the Whigs would pursue the same course.”
”Then shall I tell you?” Johnson asked.
I took a hearty drink of my goblet and leaned forward. ”If you can, I beg you do so.”
”Mr. Ufford hired you to discover the men who sought to disturb his quiet and the exercise of his traditional liberties as a priest of the Church of England. He did not intend you to find yourself caught in such a nest of vipers, but that is inconsequential, for caught you are. But those who wished to silence Mr. Ufford are the very ones who want you destroyed-namely, one Dennis Dogmill and his lapdog, Albert Hertcomb.”
”But why? I have found myself returning again and again to this man, but I have not yet discovered a reason why Dogmill should go to such trouble.”
”Is not the answer obvious? You were attempting to learn who sent the notes to Mr. Ufford. If you were to discover that they originated with Dogmill, he would have been ruined, Hertcomb discredited, and the Westminster election lost for the Whigs. Instead, he cleverly arranged that he could remove an obstacle, this poor Yate, and blame the crime on an enemy. I own that the matter has taken on political dimensions it might not have had otherwise because of my efforts to keep you in the public eye, but that is the extent of our involvement in your affairs. And if I have encouraged sympathetic newspapers to praise your efforts-which are indeed praiseworthy-and to point to the dangers you face from the Whigs-which are quite real-I can hardly be blamed.”
”If the Jacobites are my friends, why did Ufford attempt to have me destroyed tonight?”
The Pretender shook his head. ”That was a regrettable mistake. He feared you grew too close to learning what he would not have you know, so he took action himself. When I received word, telling me what he had done, I instructed Mr. Johnson to make certain you did not fall into Whiggish hands.”
”And I did as much as could be asked,” Johnson said.
I nodded, for I had to admit to the justice of what he claimed.
”Then you must trust me enough to believe my interpretation of the facts before us,” Johnson continued.
Johnson's theory withstood the a.s.sault of logical inquiry, but it still failed to convince. Could Dogmill have been foolish enough to believe I would go blindly to the gallows? All I knew of the man suggested that, though he might be violent and impulsive, he was also a calculating planner, and he would have known better than to hope I should cooperate with my own destruction.
”I feel there must be more to it than that,” I said.
Johnson shook his head. ”Perhaps you are not familiar with the principle called Occam's razor, which tells us that the simplest theory is almost always the correct one. You may spend the rest of your life searching for the truth, if you like, but I have set it out before you.”
”It may well be as you say-you cannot but know that I have come back to those same conclusions many times-but I must be able to prove it in order to accept the truth of it and to sway others.”
”It is pitiable, but you may never be able to do so. Dogmill is a treacherous beast, and he will not surrender d.a.m.ning evidence easily. You have already made your case to the law, and the law has been proved to care nothing for justice. In light of that, I fear you have set yourself upon a course, no matter how honorable, that will ultimately end with your destruction.” He paused to sip his wine. ”But there is another way available to you.”
”Oh?”
”I should like to offer you a post in my service,” the Pretender said to me. ”I will have you spirited out of the country before nightfall tomorrow. There is much to be done on the continent, and you will be able to act without fear of the law. What say you? Is it not time that you ceased your n.o.ble efforts to make a corrupt system acknowledge justice? Would it not be better to help usher in a new order of fairness and honesty?”
”Please do not take this as an insult, Your Grace, but I cannot act against the current government,” I said, very coolly.
”I have heard this sentiment before,” he said, ”and I am ever astonished that even a man like you, who suffers at the whim of evil men, can be so reluctant to turn away from those same men.”
”You fear being called a traitor,” Johnson said. ”How can it be treachery to serve the man who is your true sovereign? I am sure you know the history of this kingdom too well to require a lecture, but I shall only point out that our right monarch was driven from his throne by a pack of bloodthirsty Whigs who would have served him with the same sauce they served his father when they beheaded that great king. Now, out of a bigoted hatred of the way the king chooses to wors.h.i.+p-a bigotry that must be particularly odious to you Jews-they have conferred the crown on a German princeling with no connection to these islands, no knowledge of the English language, and nothing more to recommend him than that he is not of the Roman religion. Are not the supporters of the Whigs the true traitors?”
I took a deep breath. I cannot say I was not tempted. This kingdom had gone through so many changes and upheavals in the past century that surely another one was possible. If the Pretender was successful in his bid for the throne, and I threw my lot in with him, would I not gain, and gain greatly, by my efforts? But that could not be incentive enough.
”Mr. Johnson, I do not style myself a political thinker. I can only say that my race has received an uncommon warm welcome in this country, and it would be ingrat.i.tude of the highest order to rebel against its government, even if some of its members seek to do me harm. I understand your cause, sir, and I sympathize with the depth of your beliefs, but I cannot do as you so kindly request.”
The Pretender shook his head. ”I say this not to be critical, Mr. Weaver, for it is the condition of all men. But you would rather live in servitude to a master you know than risk freedom with a new master. It is a sad thing that a person of your stripe cannot quit the clogs of subjugation. You may depend on no ill will on my part. When I am returned to my rightful place, I will beg you call upon me. There will be a place for you yet.”
I bowed in return, and the Pretender left the room.
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