Thus it was I procured the service of a handsome woman from a local bawdy house. When Mr. Hunt left his home at eight in the morning, he was approached by the lady I had hired. She stopped him on the street and made some polite inquiries of direction, and then, once the conversation had begun, asked if he were not Thomas Hunt, the well-known speculator, who had been pointed out to her so often. She spoke those words as though she regarded stock trading as only slightly less remarkable and heroic than minotaur slaying. She had, she said, a large sum to invest and she knew not what to do with it, and perhaps so great and successful a man as he could advise her on how best to order these troublesome dollars. He told her he would be happy to advise her on the matter and would call upon her tomorrow, or perhaps even later today, but that this moment was for him bespoken. Alas, she answered, she was but in town for the day before she returned to Boston, and required an agent in New York immediately. If he could spare just half an hour she would be eternally grateful. He removed his watch and studied it with great anxiety but, once he had taken the time to calculate his duties and responsibilities, found he did have half an hour to give her, though no more.
I watched from a safe distance as the lady led him to an empty house, one for sale, the use of which she had acquired for the day. Left to his own devices, Mr. Hunt would be occupied well past half an hour, I had no doubt. A man means to dally for but a short time, but when he is with a willing lady the hands of the clock move at a most unreliable pace. A quarter hour becomes two or three. One’s morning appointment is forgotten as noon comes and goes. Should these events come paired with a bottle or two of good claret, then so much the better. Mr. Thomas Hunt would not be available for Duer’s service, and he could blame no one but himself.
Thus it was no great matter to procure a bucket of beer and a tankard and find a comfortable place to sit while watching the door to the house I had rented, to make certain that Mr. Thomas Hunt, hunter of whores and dollars, remained where I intended. Yes, it was cold, and yes, flurries of snow fell upon me and into my beer, but I did not mind. I was a man hardened by the trials of revolution, and a chill in the air meant nothing.
So it was that at fifteen or twenty minutes to nine, still enough time for him to arrive at his destination without much difficulty, the door to the house flew open, and Mr. Thomas Hunt emerged, hurriedly putting his arm through the sleeve of his greatcoat. My good whore, not so much dressed as her man, with her shift falling off her shoulder, tried to hold him back, but Mr. Thomas Hunt brushed her off, and rudely too, more roughly than I like to see women treated. Mr. Thomas Hunt, it was now quite clear to me, was a bad man, and though I had better than half my beer remaining, and leaving it upon the street meant I could forget ever again seeing my deposit, I nevertheless heeded the call of duty and sprang forward.
“Great God, sir!” I called out. “Mr. Hunt, Mr. Thomas Hunt, I say, you are in danger, sir. Go no further, take not another step, Mr. Thomas Hunt, for your life is in the balance!”
He looked up and saw me running toward him, running with concern plastered upon my face, and he must have recognized in me the countenance of a revolutionary hero, for he paused in his tracks long enough for me to catch him.
“Thank Jesus, you’re safe,” I breathed, holding on to his arm. “They are coming, and you must hide.” I began to lead him back up the steps to my rented house.
Now he resisted. “Who are you, sir? Who is after me? Of what do you speak?”
I faced the not inconsiderable problem of having no idea of what I spoke. I struggled within myself for an answer. I don’t know that I took more than a few seconds, if that long, and then I gestured toward the street with my head. “Men you have cheated,” I said.
He was a speculator, and it seemed to me likely that he’d cheated someone. Indeed, he blanched, and without further explanation he moved toward the entrance of the house. Inside, the foyer was stripped of paintings and decorative objects, but the wallpaper and the floor covering, painted like Dutch tiles, were still there, and the house seemed a bit sterile if not precisely empty. Our footsteps echoed, however, as we pushed farther inside.
At the end of the hallway stood the whore, waiting to see what happened next. “I tried to hold him,” she said, sounding bored by her own words, “but he wouldn’t be held.”
I’d no time to signal her to keep her silence, and she’d not read the commands upon my face or even the irritation that came after. As for Mr. Thomas Hunt, he looked between us and in an instant understood that the danger he faced came from me and from no other quarter. He attempted to push past me, shoving hard into me with his shoulder, but I held my ground and held Mr. Thomas Hunt fast, taking his arm in my grip.
“Just keep your peace and be still, and nothing will happen to you,” I said.
“Whoreson,” he answered, only not in a calm and quiet voice, as it might appear on the page. No, it was loud and shrill and full of fight and fire, more like “ Whoreson!” I suppose, and he-the true whoreson if one of us must be so nominated-made to stick his fingers in my eyes. It was unexpected, vicious, and resourceful. He came at me, his fingers extended like an eagle’s talons. If I had not thrust a knee into his testicles, I would be a blind man today.
Like his companion before him, Mr. Thomas Hunt found himself tied quite handily, his arms behind him. I had no need of his silence, we having the house to ourselves, so I concentrated only upon his hands and feet, and with him so detained, I dragged him into the front sitting room and put him upon a settee, the house being sold with some furnishings intact.
“Keep him here until two P.M.,” I said to the woman. “Then you may let him go.” To the man I said, “When she unties you, lay not a finger upon her in vengeance, or she will come to me and I will make you pay for it.”
“If I am to be kept prisoner,” he said, “may I have the woman’s services at least?”
He was a practical man, and I could not fault him for it. “If he’s still interested at two this afternoon, let him enjoy himself. And then,” I added, for it never hurts to let a man know that his enemy understands how things lie, “he may return to his wife.”
R umors of the impending success of the Million Bank had been spreading throughout the city for some weeks, so I cannot say with any certainty that if I had not hindered Duer he might still have stumbled. As it happened, he arrived at Corre’s Hotel nearly an hour late, at almost eleven o’clock. I never heard what happened at his home, but I imagined the scene. First, perhaps, Duer would be tapping his foot, waiting impatiently for at least one of his agents to show himself, yet not a one appeared. Then a servant would come running inside with the most horrific announcement. It would seem that every carriage in the house had suffered a breaking of the wheels, and, the doors to their stables having been thrown open, the horses had all wandered away. Oh, such carelessness, and on so important a day too! It was almost as though some malevolent spirit had visited Greenwich in the middle of the night to effect the chaos. With no other option, Duer and his man Whippo would be forced to find what horses they could and ride to the city. I suppose they had been in hopeful expectation of discovering their agents in place, handily purchasing every bit of stock available, their own lateness costing nothing more than the pleasure of observing a successful operation. Their arrival proved to them an unhappy truth.
Corre’s Hotel was packed full of the angry and the agitated, a mob to be contained by a table at which sat three cashiers, far too few for the demands put upon them. The Million Bank had hoped to launch successfully, but not so frantically, not with the verve and enthusiasm that had marked the launch of the Bank of the United States the previous summer. Yet here was a throng of angry, pushing men, each hoping to buy riches cheap.