Tuesday
When Justy awoke, it was still dark outside. He washed quickly in the basin in the corner of his room, strapped on his money belt and dressed in the clothes he had brought from his uncle’s house. He appraised himself in the mirror as he tied his white cravat. The cream-colored hunting breeches that had been too tight for him when he left now fit perfectly. His black waistcoat was snug—he had let out the belt at the back as far as it would go. But he had only one coat that could fit across his shoulders, a dark green formal affair with a black velvet collar. It was a little tight, but tight clothes were the fashion in Europe, so it would do.
He went by the market and paid a cent to a butcher’s boy to rub tallow into his boots. A barber had set up beside the butcher’s shop. His gray linen shirt was rolled up to his sleeves, showing the tattoos on his forearms, a web of dark lines against his tobacco-colored skin. He already had a line of customers and he pointed Justy to a stool. There was a pamphlet on it, an anti-slavery tract calling for more boycotts and advertising a Manumission conference that coming Saturday.
After the barber had finished running the razor over his face, Justy gave him another coin for a haircut. He knew it was important to give a good impression, if he was to be offered a clerkship by his father’s old friend. He could get away with a too-tight coat, but fashionably long hair would not do for a lawyer in conservative New York.
Jarlath Cantillon had been friends with Francis Flanagan for as long as Justy could remember. He had spoken at Francis’ funeral and had asked Justy to call on him before he sailed to Ireland to start his studies in the law at St. Patrick’s College. The lawyer had told him that if he ever decided to return to New York he should be sure to call on him again.
Justy was sure Cantillon wasn’t expecting to see him so soon.
Or quite so early. Justy didn’t know whether Cantillon worked from home or in an office somewhere. But he reasoned that the lawyer was unlikely to leave his house before half past eight, given the farthest commercial district in New York was no more than a thirty-minute walk away.
William Street was a quiet street, lined by three-story redbrick town houses, built in the same uniform style that Justy had seen in London. Cantillon’s door was shiny with thick black paint and adorned with the number 9 and a knocker made of brass.
The sound of the knocker echoed inside the house. There was a thump, and Justy stepped back to look up at the window. A curtain twitched. He glimpsed a frizz of orange hair, a chalk-white face and a pair of panicked eyes that flicked up and down the street.
A moment later he heard the sound of footsteps through the door. “Who is it?” a voice snapped.
“Mr. Cantillon?”
“Identify yourself!”
“My name is Justice Flanagan, Mr. Cantillon. Forgive me for calling on you so early. You said if I was ever back in New York, I should come and see you.”
There was a long pause, and then the sound of bolts being drawn. The door opened a crack.
The past four years hadn’t changed Jarlath Cantillon much. The lawyer was a little older, a little rounder, but he still had the shock of red hair that earned him the nickname Carrots. He was wearing a scarlet silk dressing gown, wrapped tight around his round body. He looked Justy up and down with narrow eyes.
“Come in, then.” He opened the door just wide enough to let Justy inside, then slammed it shut and threw the bolts back into place.
“This way.” He led Justy into a parlor. The room was cold and smelled of old ash, like the inside of a funerary urn. But it was clean, the grate swept and the surfaces free of dust. The room was dominated by a suite of four overstuffed armchairs, upholstered in a gaudy tapestry. A large painting of a woman hung above the fireplace.
Cantillon waved Justy to a chair, then disappeared. He returned a few moments later with a pewter jug of water. He filled two glasses, then sat down, glancing out of the window and tightening his dressing gown around him.
Justy wondered what the lawyer was scared of. New York had its problems: foul water, bouts of yellow fever, a growing and increasingly restless population of free Negroes and European immigrants, and the occasional fire, but otherwise it was a fairly safe place. Unless things had changed in the four years since he’d been away.
Cantillon tried in vain to soothe his shock of red hair. “Forgive my appearance. I was working late last night.”
“I’m sorry for coming so early without warning, Mr. Cantillon. I can come back later, if you’d prefer.”
“No, no. You’re here now.” The lawyer settled in his chair and tried a smile. “So, Justice Flanagan. Returned from the old country. Tell me what you’ve been about.”
Justy told Cantillon about his time in Ireland, leaving out his extracurricular activities with the Defenders. The lawyer seemed pleased that he’d chosen a career in jurisprudence, although he appeared less impressed by St. Patrick’s College in Maynooth. Justy remembered his father telling him Cantillon was a Yale man, although he had been forced to pretend he was an Ulster Protestant to get into the prestigious college. Not an easy thing to do when you’re christened with an Irish saint’s name. But he managed it somehow.
As Cantillon refilled their glasses, Justy examined the painting that hung above the fireplace. It depicted a plump, cheery woman of about twenty years, dressed in a pink dress that flattered her figure and clashed appallingly with the long locks of red hair that fell over her bare shoulders.
Cantillon was staring out of the window. His glass was slack in his hand.
“Is everything all right, Mr. Cantillon?” Justy asked.
“Oh yes, quite.” Cantillon’s voice was brittle. He cleared his throat. “So, now you are back in our fine city, how can I be of service?”
“My father always talked about you with great affection, Mr. Cantillon. He said you were a man he could trust.”
Cantillon gave a glassy smile. “Thank you.”
“I’ve come back to New York to make my start as a lawyer, but I know so few people here.” Justy paused. “In this part of town, anyway.”
Cantillon winced, and Justy cursed himself for his clumsiness. He had no wish to make a point of his relationship to the Bull. Cantillon may have distanced himself from the waterfront, but he would almost certainly be well informed about what went on there. Every Irishman in New York knew Ignatius Flanagan had clubbed and stabbed and intimidated his way to the top of the city’s Irish gang hierarchy. He owned or protected most of the waterfront, and it was common knowledge that every hellion who worked the wharves between Dover Street and Maiden Lane paid the Bull a tax or risked a cracked head followed by a dip in the East River.
Justy decided to deal with the issue head-on. He looked Cantillon in the eye. “I have nothing to do with my uncle. Nor do I want to in the future. I want to make my own way.”
“Very admirable.” Cantillon folded his hands in his lap.
Justy felt a sting of frustration. Budding attorneys apprenticed themselves to older lawyers. It was how the system worked. And it was part of a lawyer’s portfolio of responsibilities to act as a mentor to those who needed it. Given Cantillon’s connection to Justy’s father, it was entirely reasonable for Justy to expect the lawyer to take him on as a clerk, or at the very least to help find him a position. But for some reason Cantillon was reluctant to volunteer his help.
Justy looked up at the painting of the plump woman. “A relative?”
“My mother. She passed away a few years ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
Cantillon gazed at the painting. “I know people say this about their mothers, but she really was a remarkable woman. She came here from Ireland in 1750. Pregnant with me. And alone. My father was washed overboard on the crossing. Fortunately, she had some money, which she used to buy this place. She rented it out and used the money to send me to school.” He paused, looking wistfully at the portrait. “This was painted just after I was born. She hated it. I found it in the attic after she died.”
“She has a lovely smile.”
Cantillon beamed. “Doesn’t she? It is the one redeeming feature of this otherwise appalling daub.”
“You could find someone to paint her dress a different color. A shade of green, perhaps.”
Cantillon cocked his head on one side. “Good Lord. What an excellent idea. That would improve things.”
Justy felt the thaw. “What kind of lawyering do you do these days, Mr. Cantillon?”
“Why do you ask?”
“I wondered if there was any way that I might be of assistance to you.”
Cantillon gave him a hawkish look. “What do you know about securities law?”
“I know what my father told me about stocks and bonds and the like. But as for the law? I didn’t know there were any laws.”
Cantillon smirked. “Well said. There aren’t. Which is why we’re writing some.”
“We?”
Cantillon placed a hand on his chest. “I am part of a small group of reformers. We base ourselves at the Tontine. The new coffee house on Wall Street. I am the secretary. I arrange the meetings, help set the agendas, keep the minutes and draft the bill that we shall soon send to Congress.”
“It sounds exciting.”
“It is a great deal of work.”
“What I mean is, you are at the beginning of something.”
Cantillon bobbed his head. “Yes. We are. We are not popular, however. Most brokers and auctioneers would have no rules governing the trading of stocks and bonds, but we have seen the results of that kind of anarchy. Last year land speculators caused a panic that ruined a great many people. Although that was nothing compared to ’92, of course.”
He stopped.
An image flashed in Justy’s mind. His father, hanging. The gold signet ring on his right hand. Justy remembered touching it. How cold and stiff his father’s fingers were.
Cantillon’s face sagged. “Forgive me.”
Justy looked him in the eye. “I’d like to be a part of what you are doing.”
Cantillon said nothing.
Justy leaned forward. “I am a quick study and hard worker, Mr. Cantillon.” He glanced towards the window. “And perhaps I can be of service to you in other ways. Beyond the usual clerk’s duties.”
Cantillon’s face was blank. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“I’m merely saying, I have a full portfolio of skills that I’d be willing to place at your disposal.” He filled Cantillon’s glass.
The lawyer drank half the water in a single swallow. He paused to catch his breath. “Perhaps I could use an assistant. It is not intellectual work, by any means, but it requires considerable discretion.”
“I can keep a secret.”
“It may also require long hours.”
“I’m not afraid of hard work.”
“It’s an unusual arrangement. I have no office, to speak of. I work in the Committee Room at the Tontine, and keep my records here.”
“I’m comfortable working wherever I’m needed. Just tell me what to do, and I’ll get it done.”
Cantillon gave him a sharp look. “Yes. I do believe you would.”
There was a long silence.
“I must warn you that people will ask about your relationship with your uncle,” the lawyer said.
“And I will respond by saying there is no relationship. He paid for my tuition, but I shall not be beholden to him for that. He will be paid back.”
“With what? You’re a clerk.”
Justy reached for his glass. “I have some money. Not enough to pay him back yet, but enough to sustain me for a while.”
“Indeed?”
Justy smiled. “I developed some facility with games of chance while I was in Ireland.”
“Cards?”
Justy shrugged. “Anything that required a stomach for high stakes.”
Cantillon raised his eyebrows. “Very well. But remember, at some point you are going to have to ask people for favors. They may want your help dealing with the Bull in return. God knows how that might end.”
Justy shook his head. “I can’t live like that. I can’t be compromised.”
Cantillon shifted in his seat. “We’re lawyers. Compromise is our business.”
He looked away, but not before Justy saw something in his eyes. Not fear, this time. Something else.
Guilt?
Almost before the thought was in his head, the words were in his mouth. “What can you tell me about the partnership William Duer created with my father?”
Cantillon’s eyes were wide. “What are you talking about? What partnership? Why are you asking me this?”
“I’m just curious. I met a man named William Constable in London. He told me a few things, but he said you might know more.”
“You met Constable? What did he say?”
“Just that my father worked with William Duer, and a fellow named Isaac Whippo. Some things about their business.”
Cantillon’s face was pale, except for two red spots burning high on his cheekbones. He pulled the lapels of his dressing gown closed at his throat. “What did he say about me?”
“Just that you were one of my father’s closest friends. And that you might know more. About the nature of the partnership. I want to get a better understanding of what happened.”
The lawyer jumped to his feet. He paced to the window, then back again. “At the risk of upsetting you, Justice, I must tell you that your father was not a good speculator. He went into business with William Duer against the advice of several of his associates, including William Constable and me. I am a lawyer, not a financier, but it was clear to everyone at the time that Duer was taking tremendous risks with borrowed money. But your father would not listen, even when the market kept moving against him. He was besotted with Duer.”
Cantillon smoothed his hands down the front of his dressing gown. The touch of the silk on his palms seemed to soothe him. He glanced apologetically at Justy and sat down again. “Forgive me. Your father was very dear to me. I feel his loss acutely, even now.”
“I understand.”
Justy was telling the truth. He understood perfectly. Cantillon felt some kind of guilt about his father’s death. And he was lying. Or at the very least, not telling the whole truth. Justy felt a tingle of hope. Duer might be dead, but there was still a way to find out what had happened to his father, and why. But he knew he was in danger of pushing Cantillon too far.
He stood. “Forgive me for coming unannounced, Mr. Cantillon. I’m grateful to you for receiving me. And I’m indebted to you for offering to include me in your work.”
Cantillon stared at him.
Justy hid his smile. “When would you like me to start?”