from downstairs came the incongruous sounds of continued merriment and the rasping groan of a badly tuned fiddle.
The warning had carried a distinct Irish brogue. As his partner covered the room, the gunman who’d spoken stepped forward.
The grey-haired man looked quickly towards the table at the top of the taproom stairs. The lone customer was still seated, but this time his hands were palm down on the table beside his book and his jaw was clenched. The business end of a third Barbar nuzzled the back of his head. The weapon-holder stood behind him. He was dressed in similar fashion to his companions, in a long coat and a hat which cast his face in shadow. Above his clamped lips, the seated man’s eyes expressed silent apology. The grey-haired man’s gaze returned to the threat in hand.
“Told you I’d be back,” the first rain-coated man announced.
“So you did,” Nathaniel Jago said calmly.
“And that there’d be a reckoning.”
“As I recall.”
The gunman frowned. Tall, with a cadaverous face, a faint bruise was visible below his left eye.
“God save us, Shaughnessy,” Jago said softly. “I might have grey hairs but they ain’t affected my memory. Talking o’which, you remember what I said to you last time?”
A thin smile formed on the Irishman’s face. “Said you’d kill me if I showed my face.”
“Offer still stands.”
The gunman’s eyes flickered. The grin faded. “Think you’re king of the castle, don’t you?”
“An’ you got plans to the contrary, I take it?”
“Do it, Patrick,” the second gunman urged; the brogue as strong as his companion’s. “Bloody do it now.”
“What’s up, Declan?” Jago’s gaze flickered to the speaker. “Arms gettin’ tired?” He moved his gaze back. In the second it had taken to divert the first gunman’s attention, he’d already braced himself. His hands cupped the edge of the table.
“Going to enjoy this,” Shaughnessy gloated.
Made for close-quarter combat, the blunderbuss was a fearsome weapon and capable of inflicting appalling damage. From where Jago was standing, the muzzle looked as big as a howitzer. He wondered if the table top would absorb any of the gun’s load and if he’d be able to move in time. Unlikely, but it was worth a try. At this stage, anything was worth a try, to avoid the murderous hail that was about to be unleashed in his direction.
But it wasn’t Shaughnessy who opened the bidding.
As the Irishman’s trigger finger tightened, a sharp grunt and a clatter from the direction of the taproom stairs drew everyone’s attention. Shaughnessy pivoted, in time to see his companion sinking to the ground, hands clasped about his throat, blood spurting from between his fingers. As the body toppled, another figure moved into view. The Barbar, Shaughnessy saw, had changed hands.
With a curse, he turned back and fired.
The roar from the gun was deafening. A woman screamed. Downstairs, the music trailed off and the fiddler’s dog let out a shrill bark of alarm.
But by then Jago was already hurling himself aside.
Having anticipated the move, Del and Ned were also flinging themselves backwards. As the table went over, dominoes, coins of the realm, alcohol and broken glass flew in all directions. The table top did absorb a lot of the charge but it wasn’t enough. Jago, still travelling, felt the impact as shot scored across his right shoulder. The window took the rest. He heard the panes shatter as he hit the floor. And then he was rolling, or trying to.
Around him, panicking customers, undeterred by the second gunman’s threatening stance, were throwing themselves behind tables or towards the back stairs and sanctuary.
Jago’s legs were caught up in Ned’s abandoned chair. He kicked it away. His shoulder felt as if it was on fire. He looked up. Shaughnessy stood over him. The Irishman had drawn the back-up pistol from his belt. He levelled it, eyes black with rage.
Christ, Jago thought wildly.
The second gunshot was as loud as a whip crack.
Jago flinched and then watched in disbelief as Patrick Shaughnessy’s head snapped back, the air misting red as the body fell away.
Declan, who’d already turned to face the new threat, bellowed an obscenity at seeing his comrade cut down and brought his own gun to bear.
Which was when Jasper, who was still half-prone, rammed the edge of his boot heel into Declan’s left knee. It was enough to send Declan’s aim wide. Shot slammed into the rafters and then there was another ferocious roar and Declan went over backwards, the discharged weapon falling from his grip. Something warm and viscous landed across Jago’s left cheek. Wiping it off hurriedly, he stared down at his hand and the ragged piece of flesh adhering to it. His sleeves, he saw, were flecked with blood. Flicking the offending gobbet on to the floor, he raised his head cautiously as the echo from the guns died away.
It was hard to make out details. The room was filled with dissipating powder smoke and the sulphurous stench of rotten eggs, while the scene was more reminiscent of an abattoir than a public house. Around the room, people were slowly regaining their feet, transfixed by the carnage. Astonishingly, from below there came the screech of a fiddle starting up, indicating that, to the downstairs clientele, who’d only heard the gunshots and not witnessed the effects, it had sounded like just another drunken night in the Hanged Man.
Jago stood groggily, ears ringing. He stared down at the bodies and then at the two men who’d come to a halt beside him.
One was the former occupant of the far table who now held a discharged pistol. The second man, whose hands gripped the still-smoking Barbar, was taller and might have been mistaken for an associate of the dead men, for he, too, was dressed in a long military greatcoat. The difference was that he wore no hat, which, now that he had drawn closer, rendered his features visible, in particular the powder burn below his right eye and the two ragged scars that ran across his left cheek.
Jago stared at him. The other man gazed back, a grim smile on his face.
“Can’t leave you alone for a minute, can I?” he said.
Several seconds passed before Jago found his voice.
“Nice to see you, too, Officer Hawkwood. It’s been a while.”
“So who were they?”
Hawkwood looked down at the body being hauled unceremoniously towards the back stairs by the boot heels, Del and Ned having taken a leg each. A trail of blood, black in the candlelight, marked their passage across the uneven floorboards.
Jago followed his gaze. “That one’s Patrick Shaughnessy. The one missin’ half ’is brains – good shot, by the way; those things have quite a kick – is his younger brother, Declan, who didn’t have that much reasonin’ power to begin with. The one who had the drop on Micah, I don’t know; never seen him before. Ne’er-do-well cousin, I expect. They tend to hunt in packs. Christ, go easy, Padre!”
The former physician’s name was Roper. His manner and the way in which Jago had summoned him to tend to his wounds indicated to Hawkwood that this probably wasn’t the first time his services had been called upon. There had been a faint tremor in the man’s hands as he’d helped Jago remove his bloodied shirt, which either suggested he was fearful of his patient or else he had an over-fondness for the Genever, which might have gone some way to explain why he was reduced to performing crudely lit examinations on the floor of the Hanged Man rather than by chandelier in a set of well-appointed consulting rooms in Berkley Square.
Jago winced as