The Devil’s Acre. Matthew Plampin
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Название: The Devil’s Acre
Автор: Matthew Plampin
Издательство: HarperCollins
Жанр: Историческая литература
isbn: 9780007395248
isbn:
‘Don’t know what they’re looking so deuced pleased about,’ he declared, nodding towards the Americans. ‘The last I heard our engine was barely strong enough to animate a sideshow automaton, let alone a sufficient quantity of machinery to occupy this blasted rabble.’
Edward considered the press agent for a moment, thinking with some distaste that this wretched fellow was actually the closest thing he had to an ally at the Colt Company. ‘I’m sure that the Colonel is not given to displays of undue confidence, Mr Richards.’
Richards showed no sign of having heard him. ‘You see that Yankee over there,’ he murmured archly, angling himself away from the Americans, ‘standing a little apart from the rest?’
It was immediately obvious to whom he was referring. The man was smaller and leaner than the others, and the oldest of the group by a clear decade, his skin scored with scar-like lines that bisected his hollow cheeks and spanned his brow in tight, straight rows. He was dressed in a dark blue cap and tunic, creating a distinctly military effect that was augmented by the high shine of his boots and the precise cut of his greying beard. While his companions laughed with the Colonel he continued to regard the ragged assembly of applicants with the fierce focus of a terrier.
‘Mr Noone,’ Edward replied. ‘The factory’s watchman, I believe.’
‘And a chap with the very blackest of reputations. I’ve heard it said that the Colonel risked losing several of his most trusted people back in Connecticut when he took the villain on – threatened to walk right out, they did, so low is the regard in which our Mr Noone is held among certain of his countrymen. But the Colonel wanted him – said he was right for the post, a fellow who could be counted on to defend one’s interests at all costs.’ Richards paused significantly. ‘At all costs, Mr Lowry.’
Edward fixed the press agent with a probing look. The scoundrel wants me to beg for more information again, he thought, as I did with the Colonel’s axe-murdering brother. Well, I shan’t; I won’t hear any more of his plaguing stories. He stated that he was going to take the pistol case back up to the factory office, walking past Richards towards the tall sliding door that served as the main entrance to the factory block. Before he’d taken more than a couple more steps, however, there was a flurry of rough shouts from inside the building. Three men, Scots from the sound of it, marched out to the centre of the yard, bawling curses against Colonel Colt and his Yankee contraptions. All three were drunk, and from what they were yelling had just been turned away by those enlisting the factory’s personnel. Seconds later Mr Noone, the watchman, was upon them, backed by a couple of other Americans. They collared the malcontents and hurried them over to Ponsonby Street, administering hard kicks to their behinds as they reached the gate.
This spectacle was greeted with laughter from the line; as more people turned to take it in, Edward noticed a lively-looking young woman in the plain yet respectable clothing of a domestic servant away from her place of employment, waiting in the queue with several others in similar dress. She was smiling wickedly at a remark made by one of her companions – a smile that made him smile as well to behold it. In the middle of her left cheek were two small but distinctive marks, side by side and oddly even. As she turned back towards the factory door, her smile fading, their eyes met. For a single clear moment they both stood in place, contemplating each other.
Then Colonel Colt called out his name, clapping his hands together as he headed back to the carriage. Edward smoothed down a twisted lapel and went over to join him.
Sam took the steps of the American embassy three at a time. Ignoring the grand brass knocker, he hammered on the door with his fist. It opened just an inch or two, as if in caution, so he gave it a hearty push, causing it to connect violently with the forehead of the unfortunate footman on the other side and send him staggering back into a floral arrangement.
‘Ice, right now,’ Sam instructed as he strode past, flicking a shilling at his victim. ‘That’ll see you right.’
The servants were coming at him, taking little bows, their eyebrows raised all the way up in that queer English manner, but he would have none of it. Deftly, he weaved around them and loped up the main staircase, arriving in an emerald green hall with the doors to the main reception room directly ahead. It was an apartment designed to make a man not born to splendour feel small and worthless: columns, chandeliers, fancy pictures, gold leaf by the yard. Nonplussed, thinking that the effect was rather aristocratic and decidedly un-American, Sam turned his attention to the other guests. His mood improved immediately. The crowd was a grey one, and sombre-looking. This, he knew well, tended to denote the presence of some serious political authority. He also registered a handful of smart naval coats and crimson jackets, adorned with medals and sashes of various hues. Generals, admirals and politicians, rounded up in one place: prime hunting ground for a sharp gun-maker.
A voice bleated at his shoulder. Irritably, Sam turned to see a persistent flunky asking for his surtout, his hat and his name; he supplied them, not bothering to disguise his impatience. He was announced to the company, and met their attention with a scowl.
‘Take it in, you blasted Bulls,’ he muttered under his breath as he attempted to flatten his curls. ‘I shall have you yet.’
Mr Buchanan, the newly appointed American minister in whose honour the reception was being held, approached to welcome him, looking pretty damn distinguished with his neat white hair and high starched collar. ‘It pleases me greatly,’ he declared, ‘that such a singular personage as Colonel Samuel Colt, perhaps the most famous American presently in London, can find the time to attend this modest gathering.’
Sam knew Jim Buchanan a little from Washington and their handshake was cordial enough. The minister was no businessman, though, and could not disguise his personal feelings. That oblong face with its prominent chin and small, mild eyes was easy to read: he considers me vulgar, Sam thought with some amusement, and is concerned that I might put lordly noses out of joint with my brash manners. They exchanged a few words about Buchanan’s new post.
‘I was on good terms with Mr Lawrence, your predecessor,’ Sam said. ‘He was a man prepared to extend whatever help he could to an honest American trying to achieve something in this damnably slow-paced country.’
‘Indeed,’ Buchanan replied carefully.
Sam saw at once that the fellow didn’t want to give any sense of an understanding between them – to put himself in a position where he might be asked to overstep some invisible barrier of diplomatic protocol. This was a predictable attitude. The new minister was renowned for his aversion to risk, to anything that might attract critical attention; a general habit of life that had been fostered (or so it was rumoured) by his secret preference for male companionship in the bedchamber.
Taking Sam’s arm, Buchanan guided him over to a large group of men and women whose colourful dress and openness of manner marked them as Americans. There was a round of introductions, and not a single name Sam recognised. Binding them all was the false sense of familiarity that one so often encountered among countrymen brought together abroad. Their conversation was concerned entirely with Franklin Pierce, the new president, and the tragic accident which had befallen his family between the election and his inauguration; they were relating the details, Sam couldn’t help but think, with a certain ghoulish pleasure.
‘Crushed to death, the boy was, within the president’s sight!’ one lady pronounced, her eyes open wide. ‘The railway carriage rolled over onto its side, СКАЧАТЬ