Page 1 of My One and Only Duke
Chapter One
“You isn’t to be hanged on Monday!” Ned declared. “Old Fletcher’s got the bloody flux. Can’t stir but two feet from the chamber pot. Warden says no hangings on Monday!”
Joy was the first casualty in Newgate prison. When Ned skipped into Quinn Wentworth’s cell, the boy’s rare, angelic smile thus had a greater impact than his words. An uncomfortable emotion stirred, something Quinn might once have called hope but now considered a useless reflex.
“You mean I won’t be hanged this Monday.”
Consternation replaced ebullience on the grimy little face. “Old Fletcher might die, sir, and then who would they find to do the business? Your family will get you out, see if they don’t.”
Quinn had forbidden his siblings to “get him out.” Abetting the escape of a convicted felon was itself a hanging felony, as were 219 other crimes, among them stealing anything valued at more than twelve pence.
“Thank you for bringing me the news,” Quinn said. “Have you eaten today?”
Ned studied ten dirty little toes. “Not so’s I’d notice.”
All manner of strange protocols applied in Newgate. One of the most powerful and feared bankers in London could invite a pickpocket to dine, for example, simply because the banker had learned that company—any company at all—was a distraction from impending death.
Despite the signed warrant dictating Quinn’s fate, his cell might have been a successful solicitor’s quarters. The floor was carpeted, the bed covered with clean linen, the desk stocked with paper, quill pen, two pencils, ink, and even—such was the honor expected of a wealthy felon—a penknife. The window let in fresh air and a precious square of sunlight, which Quinn valued more than all of the room’s other comforts combined.
Even in the relatively commodious state quarters, the foodstuffs had to be kept in a bag tied to the rafters, lest the rodents help themselves uninvited. The pitcher of ale on the windowsill was covered to prevent flies from drowning themselves along with their sorrows.
“Fetch the ale,” Quinn said. “We’ll share some bread and cheese.”
Ned was stronger and faster than he looked, and more than capable of getting the ale without spilling a drop. Quinn, by contrast, usually tried to appear less muscular and fit than he was. The warden had taken one pitying look at him and muttered about the big ones dying quickest on the end of a rope.
That comment—a casual, not intentionally cruel observation—had made real the fact of execution by order of the Crown. Hanged by the neck until dead, as the judge had said. The proper fate in the eyes of the law for most who violated the Sixth Commandment.
Though to be accurate, Quinn’s crime was manslaughter rather than murder, else even all of his coin might have been insufficient to earn him quarters outside the dungeons.
“Shall I get the bread?” Ned asked.
The child was being polite, which ought not to be possible, given his upbringing—or perhaps he was being cautious.
Incarceration had also revealed in Quinn a latent propensity for rumination. What would death by hanging be like? Was the point of the proceeding to end the felon’s life, or to subject him to such awful, public indignity that he welcomed his own demise?
“The bread, sir?” Ned’s gaze had grown wary.
“And the cheese,” Quinn said, taking down the sack suspended from the rafter. Cutting the bread required patient use of the penknife. Davies, Quinn’s self-appointed man-of-all-work, and Penny, the whore-turned-chambermaid, were privileged to carry knives, but Quinn shuddered to contemplate what improprieties those knives had got up to when their owners had been at liberty.
Quinn set the food on the table, cut two thick slices of bread for the boy, situated cheese between them, and poured the child some ale.
Pewter tankards, no less. That would be Althea’s influence, as was the washstand with the porcelain pitcher and basin. Quinn had been born in the poorest of York’s slums, but saw no need to die looking like a ruffian.
“Aren’t you hungry, sir?” Ned had wolfed down half his sandwich and spoken with his mouth full.
Quinn took a sip of fine summer ale. “Not particularly.”
“But you must keep up your strength. My brother Bob told me that before he was sent off. Said when the magistrate binds you over, the most important thing is to keep up your strength. You durst not go before the judge looking hangdog and defeated. You can’t run very far on an empty belly neither.”
The boy had lowered his voice on that last observation.
“I’ll not be escaping, Ned,” Quinn said gently. “I’ve been found guilty and I must pay the price.” Though escape might be possible. Such an undertaking wanted vast sums of money—which Quinn had—and a willingness to live the life of a fugitive, which Quinn lacked.
“Why is the Quality all daft?” Ned muttered, around another mouthful of bread and cheese. “You find a bloke what looks half like you and has the consumption. You pay his family enough to get by, more than the poor sod would have earned in his lifetime, and you pike off on Sunday night leaving the bloke in your place. The poor sod ends his suffering Monday morning knowing the wife and brats is well set, you get to live. It’s been done.”
Everything unspeakable, ingenious, and bold had been done by those enjoying the king’s hospitality. That was another lesson Quinn had gleaned from incarceration. He’d seen schemes and bribes and stupid wagers by the score among London’s monied classes, but sheer effrontery and true derring-do were still the province of the desperate.
He’d also learned, too late, that he wanted to live. He wanted to be a better brother and a lazier banker. He wanted to learn the names of the harp tunes Althea so loved, and to read a book or two simply to have the excuse to sit quietly by a warm fire of a winter night.
