Lord John and the Hand of Devils

Fanshawe sighed.

“That one wasn’t mine. Half the experimental batch was outside, packed in kegs, standing near the shed, where I’d carefully placed it—for Philip. But the explosion went the other way; the kegs didn’t explode. And the overseer was one of the men killed in the explosion; the kegs weren’t marked specially yet—someone simply loaded them onto the barge with the others. It was weeks before I recovered enough to speak, let alone act. By then, the high-grade powder had already gone to market, so to speak.”

“And A

The peaked cap bent toward him in a nod.

“Eloped,” he corrected. “They never had a chance to marry; Philip was called back to his regiment and sent to Prussia. He had just time to send a note to me, asking me to look after A

“Evidently not.” The brick wall was hard; Grey shifted his buttocks a little, seeking a more comfortable position, but none was to be found. “But you didn’t look after her.”

“No.” Fanshawe’s voice had lost its momentary passion, gone back to its colorless normality. “He died. I knew Philip wouldn’t have left her well provided for—couldn’t. And her father…Well, you’ve met him. So I waited.”

Waited, with the cold-blooded patience of one accustomed to handling explosive substances. Waited until A

“She wrote to that fool, Coles, who of course came bleating to me, money in hand. I took it, kept it.” And waited.

A

“I meant, you see, to keep it for her,” he explained. “When she had reached a state of complete desperation—then I should come to her, and she would have no choice but to accept me, even as I am. Something she would never do,” he added bitterly, “save to escape from utter degradation.”

The grenadier was by now wreathed with floating smoke from the burning slow match at his waist, and Grey caught the whiff of brimstone as he moved. Fanshawe drew a length of the slow match from its tube and blew thoughtfully on it; the black silk fluttered, and the end of the slow match brightened like a spark.

“I waited too long, though,” he said. “She gave birth, and I should have come then—but I was afraid that she wasn’t yet so desperate that she’d have me. She’d taken refuge in a brothel, but with her belly big, they hadn’t yet put her to work. I thought after thathad happened once or twice…”

Grey felt incredulous revulsion form a ball in the pit of his stomach.

“That is the most…You—you are—” he said, but speech failed him.

“You ca

“I waited too long,” he repeated, matter-of-factly. “She took a fever and died. So there it is. Bloody Philip’s won again.”

With an air of absolute calm, he held the slow match to the fuse of the grenade.

“What in the name of God do you expect to accomplish with this bit of theatrics?” Grey asked, contemptuous. “And what of the child? Did the child live? If so—where is it?”

Fanshawe’s head was bent, watching the slow creep of fire through the burning fuse. What was the maniac about? It couldn’t be a real grenade.

Could it?

Uneasy, Grey got off the wall. His backside was chilled and his legs stiff.

“The child,” he repeated, more urgently. “Where is the child?”

Fanshawe lifted the grenade, weighing it in his hand, and seemed to consider the burning fuse. How long did it take to burn down? Not more than seconds, surely….

“Catch!” he said suddenly, and tossed the sphere at Grey.

Grey fumbled madly, the slippery thing bouncing off his hands, his chest, his stomach, finally trapped precariously against his thighs. Blood hammering in his ears, he carefully took a double-handed grip of the grenade and straightened up.

Fanshawe was laughing, his shoulders shaking silently.

“God damn you for a frigging buffoon!” Grey said, furious, and turning, flung the thing over the garden wall, toward the river.

The night flared red and yellow, blinding him, and a blast of hot air singed his cheeks. The sound of it was mostly drowned in the racket of music and conversation, but he heard a few voices near him, raised in awe or curiosity.

“Oh, fireworks!” someone exclaimed in rapture. “I didn’t know there were to be fireworks tonight!”

He sat down suddenly, all the strength in his legs gone to water. The place on his breast where the splinter had come out throbbed in time to his heart, and black-and-yellow spots floated before his eyes.

“Me lord! Are you all right?” He blinked, making out Tom Byrd’s anxious face among the spots. Tom had acquired a comic hat somewhere, a huge thing of shoddy red sateen, equipped with a curling feather. This brushed against Grey’s face as Byrd bent over him, and he sneezed.

“Yes,” he said, and swallowed, tasting sulfur. “Where—” But the grenadier was gone, the space beneath the tree dark and empty.

Not quite empty.

“He’s left his sack behind.” Tom bent, reaching for it, before Grey could shout a warning. He flung both hands over his head, curling into a ball in a futile attempt at self-protection.

“Oh,” said Tom, in tones of astonishment. He was holding up the flap of the bag, peering inside. “Oh, my!”

“What?” Uncurling, Grey made his way on hands and knees to the sack. “What is it?”

Tom reached gently into the sack and drew out the contents. A small baby, perhaps a month old, stirred in its wrappings and opened its amiably popping eyes.

“Oh,” said Grey, bereft of words. He held out his arms, and Tom Byrd carefully handed him the child, which was sopping wet but appeared not otherwise the worse for its recent adventures.

Somewhere in the night, there was a sudden, tearing sound above the music, and the air beyond the hedge flashed red and yellow. Grey paid no attention to the screams, the shouts of dismay. His whole being was focused on the bundle in his arms, for he was sure this would be his last vision of the face of Philip Lister.

It was very late, but John Grey was not yet asleep. He sat by the fire in his quarters in the barracks, the distant sounds of the night watch outside his window, writing steadily.

…and so it is ended. You may imagine the difficulties of discovering a wet-nurse in an army barracks in the middle of the night, but Tom Byrd has arranged matters and the child is cared for. I will send to Simon Coles tomorrow, that he may undertake the business of bringing the boy to his family—perhaps such an ambassage will pave the way for him in his courtship of Miss Barbara. I hope so.

I cling to the thought of Simon Coles. His goodness, his idealism—foolish though it may be—is a single bright spot in the dark quagmire of this wretched business.

God knows I am neither ignorant nor i