“Your new passengers,” said Julian, holding the gold up under the man’s hooked nose. “My friend and I want to go to London today, in this coach. I don’t give a fuck about any lord and lady, they can come along if they want to, but we’re riding in this coach today to London. Got that?” Before the man could answer, Julian called out, “Benson! Come over here!”

The shooter didn’t have to think very long. He said, “Fuck if I care either, I don’t run this damn shop.” He snatched the coin from Julian’s hand, while Matthew stood watching this endeavor with more than a little bemusement.

When Benson—an older gray-bearded and mustached gent who appeared to have quite the number of road miles on his stoop-shouldered shape—took the offered guinea it was explained to him that for both men to receive a second helping of gold coins they would not be stopping overnight at a coach inn, but just long enough to change horses, get something to eat and drink, piss and drop a fig or two if it was necessary, and then hell’s blaze on toward London.

“Got that?” Julian asked, his face right up in the driver’s.

The old man sucked his upper lip down and chewed on his mustache while he regarded the guinea, which seemed to shine even more brightly on this cold, grim and blustery morning. At last he gave a guttural grunt and rasped with dusty lungs, “Can be done.” Then he stuck a black clay pipe in the wrinkle of his mouth, and when he went around to see to the horses he sauntered like the king of Siam.

Matthew and Julian climbed in and took one of the red-leather-covered bench seats that faced the other. The windows were protected from the elements by wooden shutters, and overhead in a rack was a dark blue horse blanket. On both sides of the interior, mounted on the wood in gimbals that kept them steady, were oil lamps with little red shades.

They didn’t have long to wait. Within ten minutes there came the sound of clopping hooves and turning wheels. Julian opened the window shutters on his side and Matthew caught sight of an elaborately decorated carriage with a uniformed driver and being pulled by a team of white horses.

Julian removed his pistol and put it in his lap.

They could hear some inane pleasantries being exchanged between the male new arrival and Benson, who didn’t let on about the present occupants. Then the door on the street side came open and a middle-aged woman in a white coat, a dress like a frosted cake and a high white wig was being helped into the coach by the shooter. Her heavily rouged and eyelined face took on the distortion of distress as she saw the two men within, but she was given a shove that was a little more than rude and she came tumbling in like a sack of the queen’s laundry. Then the man in his white coat and attempt at the beribboned military uniform of some unknown force and country entered much the same way, and his heavily rouged and eyelined face under his high white wig took on the same expression. “What the devil!” he sputtered.