The Devil’s Acre. Matthew Plampin
for every major scientific advance in British naval cannonry since. Sam didn’t know too much about any of this. It was enough for him that the aged Commodore had influence, a passion for all things gun-related and a demonstrable predisposition for Colt.
‘My dear Colonel, what is this I hear about you and Clarence Paget?’ Hastings whispered discreetly, moving away from his companions to greet Sam. ‘You pointed a pistol at him, in his own rooms? Can this be true?’
They shook hands. Hastings was plainly delighted to think of Paget being threatened with a gun; the two men were fierce rivals of long standing.
‘Not exactly, Tom,’ he replied. ‘We disagreed, is all.’
Hastings grinned. ‘A subject best saved for another time, perhaps.’ He directed Sam towards the ministers. ‘Here, come and meet these fine gentlemen.’
Clarendon and Newcastle were somewhat reserved, as might have been expected, but they proved open enough to Sam’s conversation and soon became curious to learn more of the revolver factory at Bessborough Place and its many innovations. Sam invited both to take a tour, thinking that he would send them each a pair of the finest engraved Navys that same night. It was looking good, in short, very good indeed; then an English lady, clad in black silk and lace, appeared between the ministers.
‘Excuse me, Lord Clarendon – Lord Newcastle – Commodore Hastings,’ she said with an incline of her head, her voice surprisingly deep and full of confidence.
Sam was immediately vexed. Could she not see that business was underway? Was such a thing beyond her cosseted mind to perceive? He almost ordered her to leave them alone, to get back to her gossiping, but managed to restrain himself and turn towards her with terse civility. This lady was perhaps fifty and more heavy-featured than he usually cared for, but not without allure. There was an appealing energy there; was she a widow, he wondered, who had devoted herself to charitable works? She was looking back at him coldly. Although she had not yet said his name, it was plainly him that she had come over to speak with.
‘Lady Wardell,’ said Newcastle with a bow.
‘Cecilia,’ murmured Clarendon. ‘How very nice to see you.’
There was definite apprehension in the Foreign Secretary’s tone. At once, Sam knew that this Lady Wardell was the campaigning sort. She was there to confront him.
‘And you, sir,’ she announced sternly, ‘must be the American gentleman who plans to flood the streets of London with repeating pistols.’
The skin around Sam’s right eye tightened with irritation. These people were always so goddamn self-important; every one of them seemed to believe that he’d never heard their particular line of garbage before. ‘I am Colonel Colt, ma’am, certainly,’ he said. ‘What is it that you have to say to me?’
The woman lifted her nose in the air; as with so many of these rich Bulls, haughtiness came to her as naturally as drawing breath. ‘Only, sir, that you are quite unquestionably a merchant of death!’
This remark was made bluntly and bitterly, less as an accusation than a statement of fact, and it killed all other conversation within a wide radius. Newcastle and Clarendon glanced about in furtive embarrassment, as if they’d been caught smoking cigars without their host’s permission and were looking for somewhere quietly to dispose of their butts.
Sam, however, was a picture of unconcern. ‘Only that, ma’am?’
Her lips formed a resolute line. This was a veteran, a sturdy old cruiser with a long record of skirmishes behind her, and she would not be easily vanquished. ‘Your dastardly wares are designed to kill, and to kill in greater numbers than ever before. This cannot be denied. How can you possibly reconcile this with your Christian conscience, sir? How can you bear to profit from such copious bloodshed?’
‘Ma’am,’ said Sam with a sigh, readying his standard defence, ‘I think we can agree that the people of this world are very far from being satisfied with one another. I call my guns peacemakers: yes, peacemakers. They are tools expressly designed for preserving the peace. If every man had a revolver on his belt, who on earth would dare draw one?’
Hastings, God save him, made a low sound indicating concurrence; the ministers, however, were drifting off like untethered barges on a canal, slowly distancing themselves from the gun-maker and the attention he was attracting.
The fractious noblewoman was unconvinced by Sam’s solid reasoning. ‘You cannot honestly believe that, Colonel. Surely you must understand that firearms generate violence in the exact way that liquor generates drunkenness. Put a revolver in a man’s grasp and he will long to use it at the very first opportunity!’
There was no curtailing her now. On and on she went, enlarging on her theories about Sam and his business with furious vigour. Growing more angry, he considered mentioning the Kaffir War, and how much easier it might have been on the British Army if they’d had his revolvers; or perhaps the efficacy of the Colt six-shooter in the ongoing American struggle against the barbarian red men. He thought better of this, though. It was pretty certain that the self-righteous drab before him would not be won over by talk of proficient savage-killing.
‘You must agree, somewhere within you,’ she was saying now, almost imploringly, ‘that it is the religious duty of men of ingenuity and engineering skill – men such as yourself, Colonel Colt – to aid the peoples of the world, not provide the means for them to destroy one another.’
The ministers were gone now, swallowed up by the company; Sam’s speedy path to the higher levels of government, such an unlikely stroke of goddamn luck, had closed. Hastings had stuck loyally by the gun-maker’s side, but was entirely cowed by this lady and therefore useless. Colt’s tolerance for his aristocratic adversary, this creature of England’s grandest houses and rolling private parks, suddenly left him.
‘Unfortunately, precious few of the world’s troubles will find a solution in these fine sentiments alone,’ he declared with an air of curt finality. ‘As I’ve said, ma’am, my revolvers are tools, that’s all, designed and manufactured to the best of my ability, and intended to help disputing parties reach a condition of peace as quickly as possible.’
The woman stared back at him in horror; Sam thought for a second that she was about to strike him with her fan. ‘The only peace to be attained by revolvers will be due to one of the parties being dead!’ she spluttered. ‘How on earth can you stand here and –’
‘It’s all very well and good for you to take issue with me,’ Sam interrupted again, sticking his thumbs in his waistcoat pockets, ‘but I’ll wager that you ain’t never had to really struggle for anything. You’ve never reached your end through sheer perseverance, have you, ma’am, or earned your due through honest goddamn effort? I am a businessman, and guns are my business. And that’s all there is to be said.’
The lady had nothing with which to counter this thumping rebuttal, her pale, wide-set eyes registering her defeat. She was clearly not used to being addressed with such simple honesty. Sam felt a certain shortness of breath, and hotness around his ears. He noticed the bank of staring faces behind her, every one slack-jawed with shock, and realised that he might have been shouting. That milksop Buchanan was drawing near, no doubt to rush in and mollify the blasted woman – to apologise for the unspeakable rudeness of Colonel Colt. Sam decided that he wouldn’t stay to witness this. He wouldn’t be made to feel shame for defending himself.
Hastings was standing very quietly at his elbow.
‘Enough of this, Tom,’ he said, turning away. ‘I’m leaving.’
The gun-maker’s exit from the reception room and descent down to the entrance hall passed in a wrathful blur. Only the form of a short, blond, neat-looking Englishman, inserted directly in his path at the base of the stairs, prevented him from storming straight out into the night. Sam drew up, taking in the fellow irascibly. He was no servant, but no lord either. Was he a lackey of one of the ministers, come to upbraid him – or an embassy man,