Because he’d seen it in the New Times. The paper Edwards had named, the paper Edwards had specifically said to buy—not It’s in the newspaper, but It’s in the New Times! The paper on which they’d based their conspiracy to murder the lawful government of the land, and that conspiracy had been set off by who else but Edwards? Don’t you see? They’ll all be there….We can do every one of them in at once!
There was a term for it: agent provocateur. Frenchy words, because Englishmen weren’t supposed to sink to such things. Aye, right.
Edwards had helped the Spenceans buy their illegal weapons. Helped them keep going until the noose was around their necks. He’d even persuaded Silas to agree to write seditious libel in support of a treasonous plot. Silas was the only writer of the Spenceans and, what with the Six Acts, it would be very useful indeed for Lord Sidmouth if Silas was caught in this net too.
Had George Edwards taken coin to betray his fellows? He was one of those who least needed it, as far as Silas could tell: well-spoken enough, decently dressed. Or maybe that was because the government was paying him.
Anyway, of course they wouldn’t have a wretch as their agent again, after the Spa Fields debacle. It was the turncoat’s notorious bad character that had done for the prosecution then. This time they’d have picked a man with nothing against him. Someone who wasn’t obviously a villain, who could sound plausible and decent as he testified in court to every damned thing he’d heard them say and seen them do.
Silas couldn’t doubt it. Edwards was a traitor, and the plan was a trap, set to snare desperate men. It would prove that radicals were murdering villains and the Six Acts were necessary and just at the right moment for the general election, due to begin in a few weeks. Plenty of time for news to spread. Plenty of time for a trial.
Unless he could stop them, he thought, and heard St. George’s clock chime eight as if in mockery of that hope.
It was a bloody long way to Cato Street. Two miles, he reckoned, maybe twenty, twenty-five minutes at his jog-trot pace. He stuck his hands in his—Dominic’s—pockets, hoping for money for a hackney, and found them empty. Useless bugger, Silas thought, though it would not have felt right taking Dominic’s money for this.
Had Dominic known about the entrapment? Silas could swallow the Tory views, because he knew Dom held them honestly, but something so low as this, where men were lured into crime for the sole purpose of ensuring their deaths by torture? If his lover had had a hand in this filth…
No. He couldn’t believe that. Dominic would not have been part of this. Surely not.
Dom had talked about murder, though. Had it on his mind. If he hadn’t planned it, had he nevertheless known?
Silas cut along Oxford Street, dodging a couple of hackneys. He didn’t much know what he was going to do, only that he had to do something. He couldn’t dine in comfort with his Tory lover while his brothers were led to slaughter. His Tory lover, who might have known of that murderous plan.
As Silas had known of a murderous plan. He’d been aware that men intended to kill ministers of the government that Dominic served, and he’d no more said a thing than Dominic had. And Dominic would know that Silas knew, because he had stolen his coat and run.
Silas had been wondering if he would be able to bear to look Dominic in the face again, if he’d see guilty knowledge. It came upon him absurdly late, like a terrible awareness in a dream, that Dom would feel the same about him, and the thought curdled in his belly like foul meat.
He took Mary-le-bone Lane off Oxford Street, cursing the way every westward road angled south when he needed to go north. Zigzagging through fine rows of fine houses, snarling at a would-be rampsman who approached with a smile and a cudgel. Try it. I’ll rip your arm off, friend. Running at last up Queen Street, almost there, and now he could hear the shouting.
He should have gone then. Turned and walked away, knowing that it was too late, that he’d taken Dominic’s coat and lost his respect for nothing. At least he’d have saved his skin.
But there was yelling, men’s bellows, women’s screams, the pounding of feet, and then the report of a gun. Shooting on the street. He had to know.
He came through the little alley that opened into the end of Cato Street as a man fled past him in the opposite direction, head down. It was a little narrow, obscure road, now alive with people. There was no gaslight here, and the swaying lamps and torches seemed to cast far more shadow than light. He hurried toward the other end, where the crowd gathered, and by about midway could see officers of Bow Street. They were heavily armed, swarming a stable.