A look at the man’s unconcerned face as he disappeared into the forward cabin told Hart that his rescuer had no idea who he was—a wealthy man, that was all. Hart would need to make certain he never did find out.
Hart watched the child a little longer, then he reached down and picked up part of the net. He extracted a copper coin from the thin rope and tossed it to the boy’s growing heap. “You missed this.”
The boy snatched up the penny, peered at it, nodded, and let it drop. He’d collected coins, links of chains, a tin box, a necklace of shells, and a tin soldier. Hart picked up the soldier.
“Highland regiment,” he said, tossing it back down. He continued looking through the net, and the lad didn’t object.
“You’re a Scot?” the boy asked.
“Obviously, lad.” Hart played up his accent. “Who else would be lost in the sewers in a tartan?”
“Dad says they shouldn’t come down here if they don’t understand the streets of London.”
“I agree w’ ye.”
By the time Dad returned with a mug of coffee, a handkerchief over it to keep the rain out, Hart had added another shell, a ha’penny piece, and a broken earring to the boy’s pile.
The wife came out with him, a sturdy woman in a bulky sweater with black hair under a fisherman’s cap. She sat down with a bowl of water and a cloth and started dabbing Hart’s head.
It hurt, but his skull throbbed less now than it had underground. Hart gritted his teeth and got through it.
“Now, then,” the man said. “Who are you?”
Hart had decided what to tell them—exactly nothing. At least for now.
He exaggerated a flinch as the wife probed the wound at the base of his skull. “That’s th’ trouble,” he said in a careful voice. “I don’t remember.”
The man’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t remember nothing?”
Hart shrugged. “It’s a blank. Perhaps I was robbed, hit on the head, and shoved down a shaft. You said I didn’t have money with me.”
“That be true.”
“Then that’s likely what happened.” Hart fixed his gaze on the man, telling him without words that it would be to his benefit not to question the story.
The man looked back at him for a long time, his hand on the hilt of his knife. Finally he nodded. “Aye,” the man said. “That’s what happened.”
The wife stopped dabbing. “But if he don’t remember who he is, how is he going to pay us?”
“He’ll remember, sooner or later.” The man took a pipe from his coat and shoved it into his mouth, showing missing teeth. “And the longer it takes, the more he pays.”
“But we ain’t got room,” the wife said in worry.
“We’ll manage.” The man took his pipe from his mouth and pointed the stem at Hart. “You stay, but you earn your keep. Don’t care if you’re a lord. Or a laird, I guess the Scottish call them.”
“Not the same thing,” Hart said. “A lord has been given a title by a monarch. A laird is a landholder. A caretaker of his people.”
“That so?” The man brought out a pouch of tobacco and stepped under the cabin’s eave to fill his pipe without rain dropping in it. “How do you remember that but not your name?”
Hart shrugged again. “It came to me. Maybe my name will too.”
The man slowly filled the pipe, then put the pipe into his mouth. He took out a box of matches, struck a match against the cabin wall, and touched the spurting flame to the bowl. He sucked and puffed, sucked and puffed until smoke rolled from the pipe, pungent against the smell of the river.
“Got another pipe somewhere,” the man said, seeing Hart’s gaze.
“Coffee is fine for now.” Hart took a sip of it. Very bitter, but thick enough to cut the haze in his head.
The man pulled out a dented flask, put a drop of brandy in his cup of coffee, and added some to Hart’s. “The name’s Reeve. The lad there is Lewis.”
Hart took another sip of coffee, fortified now with the brandy.
“I got something he can do,” Mrs. Reeve said to Hart. She pointed at the cabin. “Two buckets of night soil need emptying.”
Hart laid down the net. “Night soil.”
“Aye.” Mrs. Reeve’s dark blue eyes met his, daring him. Lewis didn’t register an expression. Reeve said nothing but looked on in amusement.
Earning his keep.
Hart let out his breath and got to his feet. He ducked into the cabin, removed the indicated buckets from the rear, and came back out with them. While Reeve watched with obvious enjoyment, the Duke of Kilmorgan, one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in the empire, trudged down the deck of the boat to empty buckets full of English shit.