Airman

Chapter 10:

UNLUCKY FOURTEENTH

1894. Two Years Later

Arthur Billtoe took one last chew on a wad of tobacco, then spat a mouthful of juice towards the hole in the floor. The stringy wad missed its target, landing square on the toe of his own boot.
‘Sorry,’ said the guard, then realizing he apologized only to himself, cast an eye around in the hope that no one had overheard, or they might think him simple and lock him away with the scatterfools.
No one had overheard except Pike, and that hardly mattered as Pike was only half a step removed from idiocy himself. In any case, Billtoe decided to cover up his blurted apology.
‘Sorry,’ he repeated, but louder this time. ‘It’s sorry I am for the poor lunatic Salts inside Flora this night.’
The prison guards stood in the subterranean pantry overlooking the dive hole. Below them, Flora was submerged ten fathoms in dark Saltee waters. The seas outside were rough and the tunnel to open water had become something of a blow-hole, rattling the diving bell with each bellow of bubbles from its spout. With every impact a flurry of peals rose through the chamber.
‘Sorry indeed,’ continued Billtoe. ‘They’d best move sharpish or Flora will remove a limb or two.’
Pike did not believe for a second that Billtoe was actually concerned for a prisoner, any more than he would be concerned for a blade of grass. But it didn’t do to contradict Arthur Billtoe if you were further down the prison ladder than he was, or he would set you working Christmas Eve on the mad wing.
‘Don’t you waste your legendary compassion, Arthur,’ said Pike, rubbing his hairless head.
Billtoe glanced sharply at his comrade. Was that wit? No, surely not from a man who thought that electricity was a gift from the fairies.
‘No, worry not. It’s Finn and Malarkey on the night shift.’
Billtoe nodded. Finn and Malarkey. Those two were the best pair of miners ever to work the bell. Young Finn was the brains of the pair no doubt, but whatever he pointed to, Malarkey would dig up with the strength of a giant.
And to think, two years ago when Conor Finn arrived on Little Saltee, he’d been little more than a scrap of a boy destined for a stitched-up canvas bag and a burial at sea. Now he was a force in the Battering Rams and one of the main sources of income for Billtoe himself.
Billtoe cleared his throat. ‘I’ll be searching Finn and Malarkey myself, Pike.’
Pike winked slyly. ‘As is your habit, Arthur.’
Billtoe ignored the insolence. It wouldn’t do to get into an argument about private diamond stashes, but he silently resolved to mark Pike down for supervision of the sewage works. It was bad enough that Pike’s comments were bordering on insolent, but Billtoe had also heard whispers that Pike was selling information to the Kilmore arm of the Battering Rams without cutting in his old friend Arthur Billtoe.
Billtoe leaned over the edge, peering down into the lamplit abyss. The bell glowed and shimmered in the dark waters, humming with every stroke of the current. Through the filthy porthole he could see vague movements and shadows. Finn and Malarkey mining, he presumed.
Best of luck, Salts. Bring back a goose egg for Uncle Arthur.
Billtoe spat a second wad of chewed tobacco, and this time it sailed into the hole, landing on the bell’s rubber air hose.
‘Hmmm,’ he grunted proudly, winking at Pike. Then he strode to the ladder, trying to project an air of incorruptibility. He wanted to be on the rocks when Finn and Malarkey surfaced.
‘Here, Arthur,’ Pike called after him. ‘You’re walking funny. Was it that herring?’
Billtoe scowled. He would have to do something about Pike. ‘No, you hunchbacked, hairless son of a circus oddity. I am being incorruptible.’
‘That would have been my second guess,’ said Pike, who like many dullards had a streak of sharp wit in him.
Conor Finn and Otto Malarkey fought like demons inside the diving bell. Their makeshift swords sang as they cut the air and sparked along each other’s shafts. Both men perspired freely, breathing so deeply that the water level rose at their feet. They were sucking in air faster than the pump could supply it.
‘Your balestra is clumsy,’ panted Conor. ‘More grace, Otto. You are not a hog in a pen.’
Malarkey smiled tightly. ‘Hogs are dangerous animals, Conor. If you are not careful, they can run you through.’
And with that, he abandoned the rules of fencing, dropping his blade and charging his opponent, arms spread.
Conor reacted quickly, dropping to his stomach and rolling underwater, knocking Malarkey’s legs from under him. The big man went down heavily, clanging his temple against the bell curve on his way down. By the time he recovered his bearings, Conor had his trident jammed under his chins.
‘Your hair looks well,’ said Conor. ‘A healthy shine.’
Malarkey preened. ‘You’re not the only one to notice. I’ve been eating the oily fish, as you suggested. It’s costing me a fortune in bribes and I hate the stuff, but with results like this I will suffer the taste.’
Conor helped Malarkey to his feet. ‘You need to practise the balestra. It is a dancer’s leap, not a drunken stumble. But, apart from that, your progress is good.’
Malarkey rubbed his head. ‘Yours too. That was a neat little roll just then. The king of the tinkers couldn’t have done it sweeter. I have never seen a fighter like you, Conor. There’s the sword which is mostly Spanish, but with some French. Then the proper pugilism that I would class as English. But there’s the chopping and kicking too, which I have a notion is Oriental. I saw a fellow once in the West End, gave a demonstration of that chopping and kicking. Broke a plank with his foot. At the time I thought it was trickery, but now I am glad I didn’t call him on it.’
An image of Victor flashed behind Conor’s eyes. He snuffed it out brutally.
‘I have picked up a few things in my travels,’ he said.
Malarkey huffed. ‘Typical Conor Finn. Most people in here are desperate for someone to listen to their story. Telling it to the walls they are. Not Conor Finn. Two years you’ve been instructing me, and I have learned no more than a dozen useless facts about you in that time. The most obvious being that your beard is multicoloured.’
Conor bent at the knees, examining his burgeoning beard in the water. As far as he could tell, there were strands of blond, red and even a few greys in the sparse growth. Surely grey was unusual in the beard of a sixteen-year-old boy. No matter. It gave him the appearance of someone perhaps five years older.
He had changed utterly in the past two years. Gone was the gangly skinny youth who sobbed his way through his first night of imprisonment, and in his place was a tall, muscled, flinty young man who commanded respect from inmates and guards alike. People may not like him, or seek his company, but neither would they toss insults his way or interfere with his business.
‘You should shave that beard,’ commented Malarkey. ‘All your lovely hair, then that ratty beard. People only notice the beard, you know.’
Conor straightened. His blond hair was pulled back with a thong, so that it did not interfere with his work. It had darkened a few shades since he last walked in the sunlight.
‘I am not as concerned with grooming as you, Otto. I am concerned with business. Tell me, how is our hoard?’
‘It grows,’ said Malarkey. ‘Seven bags buried we have now. All in the salsa beds.’
Conor smiled, satisfied. Billtoe had ordered the Suaeda salsa beds planted on Conor’s own advice. The plants grew like weeds, were saline resistant and provided cheap meals for the convicts. This meant a few pounds a month for Billtoe to steal from the food funds. Of course, prisoners had to be allowed to tend the beds, which was when Malarkey and his Rams buried their stolen diamonds.
‘Not that they do us much good in the earth,’ continued Malarkey. ‘Unless a diamond bush sprouts, and even then Billtoe would strip it bare.’
‘Trust me, Otto,’ said Conor. ‘I don’t intend being here forever. Somehow I will get our stones and send your share to your brother, Zeb. I promise you that, my friend.’
Otto clasped his shoulders. ‘The Rams have certain funds, but with riches on that scale my brother could bribe my way out of here. I could be a free man. I could stroll through Hyde Park with my magnificent hair.’
‘I will succeed, my friend. Or die in the attempt. If you are not free in a year, it is because I am dead.’
Malarkey did not waste his breath asking Conor for details of his plan. Conor Finn laid out his cards sparingly. Another subject then: ‘Badger Byrne has not paid his due yet,’ he said. ‘How’s about I issue a few taps?’
‘No more violence, remember. Anyway, Badger has been laid up with shingles, I hear. Let him rest a while.’
Otto Malarkey pursed his lips in frustration. ‘Rest, Conor? Rest? Always the same response with you. I haven’t dished out a beating since you took the ink.’
Conor rubbed the Battering Ram tattoo on his upper arm. ‘That’s hardly true, Otto. You near drove MacKenna into open water.’
‘True,’ admitted Malarkey, grinning. ‘But he’s a guard. And English too.’
‘All great strategists know when to use force and when to use reason. Alexander of Macedonia, Napoleon.’
Malarkey laughed outright. ‘Oh aye, little Boney was a great one for the reason. Just ask anyone that was at Waterloo.’
‘The point is that we have seven bags now, where we had none before. Seven bags. A tidy fortune.’
‘It might as well be seven bags of clay,’ scoffed Malarkey. ‘Until your plan succeeds. I don’t know how you’re going to do it. Even the guards have not managed to smuggle diamonds from Little Saltee. A man would need wings.’
Conor glanced sharply at Malarkey. Could he know something? No, he thought. Just a turn of phrase.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘A man would indeed need wings.’
?

Billtoe was waiting for them at the shoreline, up to his ankles in water just in case another guard would beat him to the search.
‘Right you two lemon-sucking scurvy dodgers. Stand away from each other and raise your arms.’
Conor fought the urge to strike this pathetic grafter. To assault Billtoe would surely satisfy him briefly, but it would just as surely lead to a beating that would leave him near dead and incapacitated. He could not afford to be incapacitated now, not when things were going so well with the design. Not with the coronation so close.
Billtoe began his search, making a great show of being thorough.
‘You’ll get nothing past me, Finn. Not so much as a bubble of seaweed. No, sir. Arthur Billtoe knows all your tricks.’
The man was as good as advertising his intentions. Protesting too much.
Presently, he happened across the small stone in the leg of Conor’s much repaired army breeches. Without a word, he flicked the diamond up his own sleeve. This was his payment for a lax search.
‘Any news?’ Conor asked, while Billtoe moved on to Malarkey.
Billtoe laughed. ‘You Salts are devils for news, aren’t you? The most mud-boring happening is like a golden nugget to you.’
‘More like a diamond,’ said Conor.
Billtoe’s hands froze on Malarkey’s shoulders. ‘Is that insolence, soldier boy? Did I hear insolence?’
Conor hung his head. ‘No, sir, Mister Billtoe. I was trying to be humorous. Friendly, like. I misjudged the moment, I think now.’
‘I think that too,’ said Billtoe, frowning, but his expression improved when he came across the stone in Otto’s shirt pocket. ‘Then again, nothing wrong with a bit of humour. We’re all men after all. Wouldn’t want you to think that we guards didn’t have hearts in our chests.’
‘Yes, Mister Billtoe. I will work on my delivery, perhaps.’
‘You do that,’ said Billtoe. ‘Now let me deliver some news.’ He paused. ‘Did you see that? You said delivery then I repeated it in my sentence. Now that’s delivery. Pay attention, Finn, you could learn something.’
Only in prison, thought Conor, could such a bore be tolerated.
‘I shall keep my ears open and my mouth closed, Mister Billtoe.’
‘Good man, Finn. You’re learning, if slowly.’
A year ago, Billtoe would have punctuated this lesson with a dig from his rifle butt, but he hesitated these days before striking Finn. It did not do to unnecessarily antagonize the Battering Rams, and Conor Finn himself was not a young man you wanted snapping on you. He cut a fearsome figure, except for the beard, which could do with some foliage.
‘Anyway. My nugget of news. Queen Victoria of Great Britain has declared a wish to attend Princess Isabella’s coronation. She will not come on the fourteenth, because she believes the number to be unlucky, having lost a grandson on that date. So the coronation has been moved forward two weeks to the first of the month, though Isabella will be still sixteen. We will see your balloons then. Or should I say, my balloon.’
Conor’s practised composure almost slipped away from him, to reveal internal turmoil.
The first. He was not ready. Everything was not in place.
‘The first?’ he blurted. ‘The first you say, Mister Billtoe.’
Billtoe cackled and spat. ‘Yes, the first, Finn. Did you not receive your invitation? I keep mine with me at all times, tucked into my velvet cummerbund.’
Billtoe’s tasteless chuckles died in his throat as he noticed Conor’s expression. Fearsome was the best word to describe it. And while the prisoner made no aggressive move, Billtoe decided that it was best not to prod him any more. He made a silent decision that Conor Finn would have to spend a few days in his cell alone, to learn some humility, Ram or no Ram.
The guard relieved Conor and Malarkey of their diamond nets, ushering them towards the ladder. He thrust his fingers among the dozen or so wet stones in each net. The rough diamonds were like glazed eyes, slipping and clanking. Billtoe could tell it was mostly dross. The best was in his sleeve.
‘Traps shut now, both of you. Climb on out and thank God that I didn’t decide to shoot you for no good reason. You are alive today because of Billtoe, never forget that.’
Malarkey rolled his eyes. ‘Yes, Mister Billtoe. We thank God for it.’
They climbed from the pit and into the pantry. The entire room was in constant vibration from tidal shock, and scores of water jets spurted and drooped with each pulse of water. Every day for the past two years, it had seemed to Conor as though the subterranean mine must surely collapse. Every day he had longed to work above sea level with the so-called normal inmates, but his requests were refused.
Orders from the palace, Billtoe had told him. If Bonvilain wants you underground, then that’s where you stay.
In all his time on the island, Conor had only been allowed outside once to supervise the planting of the salsa garden. On that day, the salt-blasted surface of Little Saltee had seemed like a paradise.
Conor winked a farewell to Otto Malarkey as Pike took the Battering Ram to his cell. Billtoe led him away from the main building to the mad wing’s main door. As with all the wings, there were no keys to this door, just a heavy vertical bolt which was winched from the next floor up. Billtoe rang the bell, then doffed his hat and showed his face to the guard above.
‘The right place for you, Billtoe,’ called the guard, though the spy hole, then hoisted the bolt.
‘Every day,’ muttered Billtoe, flinging the door wide. ‘Every blooming day, the same comment.’
Conor waited until they were deep into the mad wing’s slowly collapsing corridor, before speaking. His arrangements with Billtoe must be kept secret.
‘Have my sheets arrived?’
This cheered Billtoe immediately. He had forgotten the sheets.
‘Ah, yes. His majesty’s extra sheets. Today or tomorrow, I am not sure. What’s your hurry?’
Conor strove to look shamefaced. ‘I cannot sleep, Mister Billtoe. My mind has convinced my body that if I had sheets, as though I were a boy in my mother’s house, then maybe a day’s rest would be mine.’
Billtoe nodded at one of the chimney flues dotting the wall. ‘Maybe we should stuff you up the chimney. The ghosts could sing you a lullaby.’
The flues ran in complicated routes behind the prison walls, once a network of hot air, now sealed tight by stone and mortar, but still Salts scrambled up, given the chance, only to lose themselves in the twists and turns, one stone corner looking much like another.
‘Anyway, sheets is against regulations,’ Billtoe said, holding out his empty hand, though he had already been paid.
Conor clasped the hand, passing on the rough diamond he had been keeping for himself. ‘I know, Mister Billtoe. You’re a saint. With a few hours’ sleep behind me I will work doubly hard for you.’
Billtoe squinted craftily. ‘More than double. Treble.’
Conor bowed his head. ‘Treble, then.’
‘And I need more ideas,’ pressed Billtoe. ‘Like the salsa and the balloons.’
‘I will set my brain on it. With some sleep, I feel certain the blood will flow more freely. I have a notion for a twelveshot revolver.’
‘I don’t know about that,’ said Billtoe frowning. ‘It’s one thing to allow prisoners to dig in a garden or draw a balloon, but playacting with firearms…’
Conor shrugged. ‘Think on it, Mister Billtoe. There’s a lot of coin in arms. We could be partners upon my release.’
Greed shone in Billtoe’s eyes like yellow fever. Partners? Not likely. If Finn’s twelve-shot revolver worked, then it would be Arthur Billtoe’s notion. Bed sheets were a small price to pay.
‘Partners it is. I’ll get those sheets down to you next shift.’
‘Silk,’ Conor reminded him. ‘They must be silk. I had silk as a child.’
Billtoe balked, then checked himself. A twelve-shot revolver. His name would go down in history with Colt and Remington.
‘Very well, Finn. But I warn you, these balloons of yours better work on the day. If they do not, you will suffer.’
If my balloons don’t work, I will do more than suffer, thought Conor. I will die.
During his internment on Little Saltee, Conor had managed to barter for a few basic comforts. A bucket of mortar sat on a stone and was used to patch the weeping walls. A sewing kit to repair his worn uniform was wrapped in leather and hung from a peg. He had even managed to secure a straw mattress for his bed. Linus Wynter’s cot had been converted to a table where he could study the few texts that Billtoe had deemed harmless, and work on the plans for his approved schemes, such as the salsa garden and the coronation balloons.
In fact the salsa garden had not been Conor’s idea. Victor had talked of it during one of their horticultural lessons. The Parisian had even written to King Nicholas about introducing the vegetable to the Saltees. The advantages of such a plot were threefold he explained. It would allow the prisoners outdoors for some exercise, it would teach them a valuable skill and the salsa itself would add a much needed vegetable to prison meals.
It was a harmless idea, presented by Conor to gain Billtoe’s trust. There were no disadvantages and no possibility of escape or injury. No one had ever died from vegetable assault. Coronation balloons were Conor’s next suggestion. Billtoe had seized eagerly on the idea, puffed with the success of the salsa garden. In Billtoe’s mind, the coronation balloons were his ticket to promotion, in fact they were Conor Finn’s ticket to freedom.
There were several major obstacles standing between Conor and escape to the mainland. There were locks, of course, and the doors around them, and the walls in which the doors were embedded, and the guards on duty outside these walls. But the main difficulty was the island itself. Even if an inmate could pass through the prison walls like a spectre, there were still over two miles of ocean between him and the Irish village of Kilmore Quay.
This particular stretch of ocean was notoriously unsafe, with riptides and currents that lurked beneath the surface like malignant agents of Poseidon. So many vessels had been lost in this patch of Saint George’s Channel that the British Navy painted it red on their charts. And even if the seas did not do for an escapee, the famous Saltee Sharpshooters would put a few air holes in the back of his head. So swimming for the shore was not a realistic option. No, the only way to escape Little Saltee was to fly, and that was where Conor’s coronation balloons came in.
It would be a spectacular addition to the coronation celebrations, he had told Billtoe one night on their walk to the pipe, if the Saltee Sharpshooters could pick hot-air balloons from the night sky. What a display of marksmanship.
Billtoe was not convinced.
Shooting balloons. He sniffed. A child’s trick.
Conor was expecting this response.
But what if the balloons were loaded with Chinese fireworks, he said. And, when struck, would light up the night sky with a string of spectacular explosions.
Billtoe stopped sniffing. Spectacular explosions, eh?
This is a brand-new invention, Conor continued. This has never been seen before. Marshall Bonvilain would be extremely impressed.
Impressing the marshall is a good thing, mused Billtoe.
Billtoe’s Balloons, people will call them. By next year they will be launching them in London, Paris, the next World Fair.
The guard’s eyes glazed over, lost in dreams of his own fame and fortune. Then he snapped back.
It would never be allowed. Prisoners working with gunpowder. Impossible.
I don’t need to work with gunpowder, said Conor soothingly. All I need is paper and ink to design the balloons. Have them made up on Great Saltee if you like, but make sure they are tied to our walls for an impressive shot.
Billtoe nodded slowly. All you need is paper and ink?
And perhaps a day above ground as a reward. One day a week, that’s all I ask.
Now Billtoe felt as though the upper hand was his.
Ah, so that’s it. You would have me defy Marshall Bonvilain himself.
One day. A night-time stroll even. I need to breathe the air, Mister Billtoe. These balloons could make you rich. You will be famous.
Billtoe tucked a chew of tobacco under his lip, taking several moments to mull it over.
I will give you the paper and ink, and I will have a single balloon manufactured on Great Saltee, at my expense. If a test is successful, then you shall have your day outside after the coronation. If not, then I will strip your cell of anything resembling a comfort and the next time sunlight falls on your eyes you will be too dead to appreciate it.
The test had been successful, spectacularly so, and Bonvilain immediately approved the manufacture of several fireworks balloons in a small workshop on Great Saltee. The marshall was always eager to demonstrate the island’s sophistication to visiting dignitaries, and fireworks balloons would serve both as a delightful show of innovation and a chilling reminder of the Sharpshooters’ prowess.
The marshall jovially assured Guard Billtoe that the balloons would indeed bear his name, if they exploded successfully on the night. Not only that but he would receive a commendation and a generous pension for his efforts. In truth, Billtoe had never seen the marshall so happy. He even hinted that Billtoe could well be sent to various foreign capitals for balloon demonstrations. Billtoe came away from this audience glowing, and well disposed towards Conor Finn.
The exploding balloons were clever contraptions, and Bonvilain did not believe for a second that the idea was Billtoe’s, but the test was such a dazzling success that he did not care who his guard had cut the notion from. It worked and neither the British nor the French had it.
Each pyrotechnical balloon was a simple sealed hydrogen balloon coated with phosphorous paint. Inside the balloon there was a pack of fireworks and a short fuse. All the marksman had to do was nail the centre of the glowing balloon with a nitroglycerine bullet, and the hydrogen would ignite, setting off the fuse to the fireworks’ pack.
For Queen Victoria’s entertainment, Bonvilain’s sharpshooters would pop these balloons from a distance of almost a mile. It would be a spectacular finale to the coronation celebrations.
Conor had not shared this idea with Billtoe out of a patriotic desire to excite the coronation audience. If everything proceeded according to his plan, then one of the balloons would bear an extra cargo. A human cargo.
But now, because of Queen Victoria’s superstition, the coronation was being moved forward and he was not ready. The vital silk sheets were still in a linen closet on Great Saltee. His plans were incomplete. To be thwarted now, having plotted for months, would be a cruel blow.
Conor crawled to the niche behind what he still thought of as Wynter’s bed, popping out the false brick. Crimson sun rays flooded the space, sinking into the coral, which drank the light in and converted it to green energy. He had long ago traded his day job for the night shift to allow him more daylight with his plans.
In less than a minute, the entire cell glowed with a thousand calculations, schematics and blueprints. A treasure trove of science brought to life by nature. The walls bore dozens of sketches of balloons, gliders and heavier-than-air flying machines. These scratched pictures represented two years of obsessive study. All previous diaries had been written over, except the final four bars of Linus Wynter’s opera, and the word Fin.
For the first few months, dreams of the machines themselves had been enough to fuel Conor through the long lonely hours, but a man cannot stay in the air forever, even in his dreams. And so a purpose for his flying machines was needed. A place to land.
Conor Broekhart would have flown to his parents, to Isabella, but in two years they hadn’t once questioned Bonvilain’s version of events. If they had, surely he would have received a visit or a message. Isabella could have saved him. She could have waved a royal finger and had him pardoned or banished if their young love had meant a thing to her. Obviously it had not. He was deserted and despised. Young Conor felt these things as certainly as he felt the cold rock under his feet. And so his heart hardened and selflessness was suborned by selfishness.
Conor Finn took over and Conor Broekhart was displaced. And where Broekhart had nobility, Finn had self-interest. He would make himself rich by stealing from the people who had stolen his life. The Saltee Islands would pay for the past two years. A diamond per day. And once he had money enough, he would buy Otto’s freedom, then book passage to America and begin his life anew. This was his plan, and it kept him alive just as surely as his heartbeat.
And so, how to escape? By land, sea or air? There was no land, the sea was treacherous, so that left the air. He must fly out of here, or if not fly then at least fall slowly. An idea was born, but one that was to take more than a year of planning and manipulation.
Suddenly the coronation was shifted and his schemes shattered like broken mirrors, and there were only days to put the pieces together.
Conor lay on the uneven ground, salt water darkening his clothes, studying his plans. He must memorize the designs now, and then destroy them. These plans would be valuable to any army in the world, but especially to Bonvilain. And the greatest torment that Conor could ever endure was the notion that he had somehow aided Marshall Hugo Bonvilain.
He traced each line with his forefinger. Every plane, every twist of propeller, each line and rudder, the arrows that denoted airflow, even the fanciful clouds that his artistic side had almost unconsciously etched. As soon as a glider, balloon or aeroplane was committed to memory, he smeared mud across the design, patting it into every groove.
By sunset, these amazing plans existed only inside the head of Conor Finn.
Billtoe arrived thirty minutes late that evening, swathed from head to toe in silken sheets.
‘Catch a goo at me,’ he warbled. ‘I’m the emperor of Rome, I am. Arthur Billtoe Caesar.’
Conor was waiting by the door, and was dismayed to see Billtoe’s boot heel catching on the hem of one sheet. He had enough stitching to do without repairing rips too.
‘My sheets,’ he said, in strangled tones.
Billtoe stopped his tomfoolery. Inmate Finn had that look on his face again. The fearsome one.
‘Here you are,’ he said, suddenly eager to be out of this tiny room. ‘And while you’re sleeping on ’em, dream about that twelve-shot revolver, partner.’
Partner, thought Conor doubtfully. As if Arthur Billtoe would ever accept a prisoner as partner.
Conor caught the thrown sheets, laying them carefully on his bed.
‘Thank you, Mister Billtoe. These mean the world to me. These and my walks on the outside.’
Billtoe wagged a finger. ‘After the coronation, soldier boy. After.’
‘Of course,’ said Conor contritely. ‘After.’ He took a timid step forward. ‘I was hoping to have the revolver designs ready for the coronation. Perhaps if I didn’t have to work for the next few nights…’
Billtoe backed out of the cell. ‘Don’t even ask, soldier boy. This is starting to sound like a relationship. As though we do things for each other. Favours and such. Well, it ain’t a relationship. Not of the friendly type at any rate. You do whatever you can to stop me slitting your throat in the night. That’s all there is to it.’
Conor knew better than to wheedle. Once Billtoe was set in his path, trying to change his course would only send him trundling along it faster.
‘I am sorry, Mister Billtoe. Of course you are absolutely correct. There’s work that needs doing.’
Conor thrust out his hands for the handcuffs, as he had every day for the past two years. And just as he had been doing for the past two years, Arthur Billtoe ratcheted them on tight enough to pinch. Other guards stopped cuffing their charges after the first while, but not Billtoe. Care only took seconds, but it could keep a person alive for years. Billtoe had no intention of ending his days with his head stove in by some fisheye-sucking inmate who had lost the will to live and replaced it with the desire to commit murder.
‘That’s right, Salt. Those diamonds aren’t going to just pop out of the ground and jump into the royal treasury themselves, now are they?’
Conor winced as the steel bit into his flesh.
Two more days, he thought to himself, doing his utmost to hide his hatred of Billtoe behind a mask of compliance. Two more days, then I can begin to collect my diamonds.
Billtoe was thinking too.
This one is not broke. He stands broke, but his eyes are burning. I will have to keep an eye on Mister Conor Finn.
Conor Finn was important to Billtoe, and it was not just for the clever notions, and the calm he seemed to have generated in the ranks of the Battering Rams. He was important because every so often Marshall Bonvilain enquired after the young man’s health. There was a story somewhere in soldier boy’s past but Billtoe had no desire to find out the specifics. It wasn’t healthy to have the marshall wondering how good a man was at keeping his mouth shut. He might decide that the man in question would hold his silence better on the bottom of the ocean with only the crabs to know the contents of his brain.
Billtoe shuddered. Sometimes his mind conjured the most gruesome images. Perhaps they were memories seeping from Little Saltee’s walls.
‘Look lively, Salt. There’s more’n you to be seen to, and only Billtoe to see to ’em.’
With a last regretful glance at the precious sheets on his bed, Conor followed Billtoe through the doorway and into the flooded corridor. There was a spring tide that day and salt water ran along grooves eroded into the mortar. Conor swore he saw an eel wriggling through the tiny torrent. This entire wing was a death trap, and had been for centuries. When he had first arrived, there were signs of King Nicholas’s planned renovations: scaffolds, ladders and such. But these had all disappeared within days of the king’s death.
No. Not simply death, thought Conor. Murder. His life was stolen, as mine was stolen from me.
But soon he would steal it back.
The following days were a blur of feverish toil. By night, Conor mined the pipe, sucking down the bell’s greasy air almost as fast as the pump team could send it through the vent. By day he worked on his sheets, stitching with lengths of thread he had bartered for, and cutting with a sharp stone whetted on the cell walls. There were twelve panels to be cut, hemmed and stitched. The silk was not as tightly woven as he would have liked, but there was nothing to be done about that now. It would have to do. The work was flawed, Conor knew that, but how could he be exact with poor light, improvised materials and no experience? He was most likely stitching a shroud for himself, but even the idea of a quick death held more comfort than a lifetime in this cell.
On the evening before the coronation, Conor almost gave himself away. Run ragged by stitching and mining, he began to behave like the lunatic he was supposed to be. When Billtoe collected him for his shift, Conor’s face hung from his skull like a wet cloth and his lips flapped in a dull mumble.
He is breaking, thought Billtoe satisfied. It was the sheets that did it. Sometimes reminders of home are too potent to bear. The work will go quickly now; he will be desperate to please me.
The guard clapped on the handcuffs and led the way down the flooded corridor. He enquired on Conor’s progress regarding the revolver, but all he heard in reply was a burble of counting.
Billtoe stopped suddenly, wavelets scurrying from his boot heels.
‘What’s that you’re saying? Numbers is it? A count of some sort?’
Conor barely managed to avoid shunting his keeper. He had been making a count. A vital and secret one. He realized that one slip of the lip could be disastrous to his plan.
‘A nursery rhyme, Mister Billtoe,’ he mumbled, flushed. ‘Nothing more.’
Billtoe looked him square in the face.
‘You’re red as a boiled lobster, soldier boy. Are you up to some scheming? Some numbers’ plan?’
Conor hung his head. ‘Just embarrassed. Those sheets set me thinking of my mother. Of the rhymes she used to recite for me.’
Billtoe laughed. Perhaps Conor Finn was not as fearsome as supposed. Then again, he had seen bigger men than him with Mummy’s handkerchief clutched in one hand and a bloody dagger in the other.
‘Come to your senses,’ he advised the prisoner. ‘A diving bell is no place for daydreamers. You’re away with the birds.’
Nearly, thought Conor. Very nearly.
The final day whirled past. For months, time had mocked him, prolonging itself elastically. Each second a yawning chasm. But now there was not time enough to squeeze in the day’s work. To Conor, it seemed to take an age simply to thread a needle. His fine mind was fuzzy with fear. Twice he sewed sections of his contraption upside down, and was forced to pick out the stitches. Sweat dripped constantly from his brow, speckling the silk sheets.
This is ridiculous. I am a scientist. Look upon this as an experiment.
It was no use. He could not calm himself. The spectre of failure tapped his shoulder in time with the water dripping from the ceiling. There would be other plans certainly, he already had the bones of half a dozen. Some more convoluted, some less so. He had designed a diving helmet, like a miniature bell, which should contain enough air to get him to open water, after that he could manually inflate a pig’s bladder and swim to shore by night. To amass the materials for that plan would take five years, at the very least.
Five more years. Unbearable.
Conor redoubled his efforts, blinking the fog from his eyes, pressing his fingertips together until the shake subsided. The coronation was tonight, he must be ready.