Betty appeared with a clean change of clothes and a bowl of hot punch, God bless her. My waistcoat could be cleaned and mended, but my breeches and stockings were torn beyond repair. I stripped by the warmth of the fire, wincing from the bruises along my ribs. I pulled on the fresh stockings and a pair of old, snuff-coloured breeches, then eased myself into a matching waistcoat and jacket. Clean and dressed, I felt more myself again – but when I glanced in the tarnished mirror above the fireplace, I was startled by my reflection. I didn’t look like a man of honour – if I ever had. I looked like a man who would run.
I shivered. So – this was my choice now. Gaol or a life of crime. A life that would most likely end with a rope around my neck. I touched my hand to my throat.
‘Mr Hawkins.’ A soft, low voice behind me. Betty’s reflection joined mine in the mirror, my ruined clothes gathered in her arms. She stole a glance towards the front door, where Moll was slopping out the blood and water into the piazza. ‘There is another way,’ she whispered.
I turned, hope rising in my chest. ‘Tell me.’
She smiled, gently. ‘You could go home, sir. Go home and ask your father for help.’
My shoulders sagged. I poured myself a glass of punch and knocked it back. ‘I’d sooner ask the devil.’
‘What’s this?’ Moll asked sharply as she returned, but Betty had slipped away with my clothes and we were alone.
‘There’s the scoundrel! Arrest him!’
Benjamin Fletcher, my landlord, stood in the doorway, hands on his knees as he caught his breath. He must have run all the way from Greek Street. As he limped forward he was followed by a warrant officer, a huge ox of a man, carrying a large wooden club in his fist. His nose had been squashed about his face a few times and a large white scar ran through one brow. A long loop of chains hung over his shoulder like a sash. Our eyes met and he smiled, quite cheerful, as if he had come to escort me to the theatre, not prison. His gaze dropped to the blood-soaked cloth in Moll’s hand. ‘Run into some trouble, sir?’ he asked, in the slow, steady voice of a man with very quick fists.
‘Seize him, Mr Jakes!’ Fletcher wheezed, tearing the hat from his head and fanning his sweaty face.
‘Mr Fletcher,’ I said, holding my hands out wide in apology. ‘I swear to you I had the money…’
‘No more lies, Mr Hawkins,’ he cried. He pulled a note from his waistcoat and thrust it at me, his hands shaking. ‘You have played me for a fool, sir.’
